2025 was a big year of firsts for me and my writing: from my first short story publication in April, to my first in-person writing workshop in June, to my first public reading at a lit-mag launch in October. Looking back, I’m proud of what I’ve achieved – and I’m excited to see where the new year takes me.

Short Story Publications

All Equal in Utopia

“Claude met Allie in Utopia. He’d been there, and been high, three weeks.”

Read online or purchase the anthology.

Officially my first-ever published short story, “All Equal in Utopia” won New2theScene’s Winter Short Story Competition. It’s a high sci-fi tale of haves and have-nots, in part inspired by my experience of becoming a French citizen, during which I thought a lot about the definition of egalité. I’m extremely grateful to Richard Howitt at New2theScene for not only publishing the piece but also giving me the chance to appear on his podcast and contribute to his “Origins” blog.

Pen Friend from Longnight

“My name is Height-of-Summer, and I’m on the other, brighter side of the world – in Spire, the capital of Everday.”

Read online.

I was over the moon to appear in the Spring/Summer 2025 “Light and Dark” issue of the amazing Paperbound, an online magazine for the young and young at heart. “Pen Friend from Longnight” is a YA sci-fi short story, telling the tale of Everday and Longnight: twin roving cities on opposite sides of a distant planet. It’s a love story of sorts, between teenage pen friends – who just so happen to have fur, fangs and scales. Emily, Lucy and Rayan – the fabulous co-founders of Paperbound – were also kind enough to name the story as their submission competition winner. I’m grateful for the work they do.

The Hug

“I do not know the woman’s name, and we have never spoken. She arrived, our eyes met, and I nodded. Now we are hugging and my eyes are closed.”

Purchase the anthology.

In May, my contemporary literary short story “The Hug” was shortlisted for the 2025 Parracombe Prize and subsequently appeared in their contest anthology. It focuses on a man and woman seeking human connection through physical touch during the Covid-19 pandemic. It’s one of several stories I wrote back in 2024 engaging with the idea of using multiple narrators to explore different sides of the same experience. I’m glad it found a home down in Devon!

Night Kingdom

“That chair is where you and I bonded; performed our private, nightly rituals, sealed with tears, sweat and pain. And in the depths of blue night – when we discovered countries – it became the Night King’s throne.”

Purchase the issue.

I’m particularly proud of this one. Indelible is the literary magazine of the London Arts-Based Research Centre. I submitted to last year’s “Awakening” call and was thrilled to discover my piece was not only accepted but would also be the issue’s opening story. “Night Kingdom” is a dark fairy tale about sleep deprivation with a newborn. It’s the first piece I’ve had published that’s explicitly about fatherhood, a subject on which I write frequently. I was pleased to read an extract at the launch of the issue in October. A huge thank you to Roula-Maria Dib and Arden Waterman for making Indelible happen.

Other Achievements

Flash fiction on fiftywordstories.com – I’ve engaged a lot with flash fiction this year, and I’ve loved grappling with the new challenge of writing a complete piece in exactly fifty words. Fifty Word Stories, run by Tim Sevenhuysen, publishes two of these stories a day. I’ve had five picked up since I started submitting in May. You can read them all here.

Nantes Writers’ Workshop – I absolutely loved meeting and writing with a wonderful group of people in Nantes, France, last June. This week-long workshop – run by Nantes-based writer Anna Polonyi and Paris-based writer Emily Monaco – gave me the opportunity to hone my craft and get valuable feedback from talented writers, many of whom I’m still sharing work with today. The workshop is recruiting for their 2026 cycle now; I highly recommend applying.

Thanks for reading this newsletter update! (Yet another first for me.) I’m still building my audience, so please do forward this on to anyone you think might be interested. If you’ve already been forwarded this email, you can subscribe here.

If, rather, you are looking to unsubscribe, no worries: here’s the link.