Featured Writer
Fiona Atchison
My lifelong love of reading ultimately led to a love of writing but didn't 'gel' until I reached my forties. I initially began with poetry, a 5 month period of absence from work was responsible for allowing my mind to roam at will. With no urgency to days of gentle recuperation, I gazed at the sky through the conservatory window and began to 'write' in my head. Insidiously my brain became a prolific schemer of lines; a virtual rhyming dervish! During this period of late 2003 into 2004 I was even brave enough to submit a few poems to various magazines and subsequently amazed to receive acceptances by publications such as: New Cauldron, Connections, and First Time. There is an adrenalin rush, akin to euphoria when a piece is accepted and a further delight in seeing it in print for general consumption.
I eventually began to think of writing in other genres but really didn't know where to start. It was therefore a fortuitous turning point when I became a member of Ayr Writers' Club in the season of 2004/05. Here I found like minded people, some who wrote professionally, others as a pastime but who all shared the same passion for writing stories, plays, poems, or whatever. I have a lot to thank the club for. It gave me confidence in trying new genres for competitions, some of which I have won or been placed over the years. In 2006, one of my short stories was printed in the Ayr Writers' Club Anthology, '800 Words' to mark the town of Ayr's 800th anniversary. The club has also spurred me over the years to enter the Scottish Association of Writers (SAW) competitions where I have been successful in winning the Dorothy Dunbar Memorial Trophy for poetry in 2005 and earlier this year won the inaugural award by /Writers' News/ for a Science Fiction story. I would never have achieved this without the support and knowledge gained from being a member of AWC. I was priviliged to be President of AWC in our previous session 2007/2008 and thoroughly enjoyed such a challenging experience.
My aim now is to write articles or short stories for submission to magazines as, a few weeks ago, I reduced my working week to job share. This gives me much more time to sit and gaze at the sky through my conservatory window...and wait for inspiration to strike!