Welcome to our third newsletter. We have submission stuffs, audio of our stories, Trash Family happenings, Quick Reads and a challenging writing prompt.
Submission Stuffs
We hope you enjoyed the fifteen incredible short fictions we published in our Spring issue. Our first reprints only issue, we were so impressed with the variety and quality of the final pieces.
Our next submission is a themed Pop-Up during April. The window is 1st – 14th with the issue publishing early May.
We’re looking for flash fictions up to 1000 words on the theme of Collectors and Collections. Any genre.
You’ll find several picture and written prompts HERE.
We want a whole plethora of collections – weird, sad, sprawling, beautiful, vintage, evocative of childhood, deadly.
Here are some more prompts to get you obsessing over collectors and the strange things they have to have.
On 1st March, we opened submissions for our first print anthology – The Bin Collection – which will raise funds for UK charity, The Wildlife Trusts . You’ll find all the details and lots of prompts HERE and even more in this blog post HERE where Trash Cat gives insight into what they want from the submissions.
You’ll need to show us why the place is unexpected and why the treasure is, well treasure. It might be nothing of monetary value, something small and seemingly insignificant, but if your character sells it as treasure – we’ll believe it.
Here are some other submission opportunities in fellow lit mags if you want to whet your submit button before ours open:
- New Flash Fiction Review are looking for flash up to 500 words for their current call – which closes 15th April – they like contemporary literary fiction and all details are HERE
- Another northwest UK mag, The Broken Spine have a call for their Festive Short Story Anthology. Looking for 500-2500 word stories of winter festivals, holidays and global celebrations. Get the full details HERE
- Nature writing magazine, The Dodge have a big old word count limit of 8000 for fiction. They want “eco-writing about animals and also minerals, fungi, forests, insects, fire, etc.” Get the lowdown HERE and maybe charm them with a trash critter!
As with all literary publications, including Trash Cat Lit, you should always read a number of the published works before submitting yourself. Get to know what they like and decide if it’s the right home for your treasured words.
New to Trash Cat Lit
Listen in the Bin
There are already several audio versions of our issue pieces available, and more being added as we record/ receive them. It really does add a different dimension to a story to hear it read aloud – especially by the writer themselves.
Start with these and then drop into individual story pages for more.
Write Along With Trash Cat
We’ve now had two writealongs where attendees received a set of prompts 24hrs before the event. What amazing, imaginative drafts were produced. We have one further date at the end of March and will be looking to arrange more for April & May. All the details and how to sign up are HERE
Trash Family
We love to celebrate our contributors beyond Trash Cat Lit, here are some cool stuffs our Trash Family members have going on:
Beth Sherman (READ and LISTEN TO Good for a Dead Girl)
We have seen Beth popping up in all sorts of publications; she is a phenomenal writer and Trash Cat was thrilled to meet her at one of our writealongs. Here we celebrate Beth getting her work into the legendary Smokelong Quarterly. Click the image below to read Beth’s powerful, moving story, Mud Pies.
“He met my mother on a cruise. They hit golf balls into the ocean and laughed about it. She was a hand model, a good time girl. Marriage was never on either of their agendas, until she got pregnant. “
Fiona McKay (READ and LISTEN TO Mammals & Black and Purple, Red and White)
Another Trash Family member who seems to be shining at the moment, Fiona has written an essay for The Pride Roars, a “collective of women’s voices”. In the essay – Also Counts as Writing – Fiona talks about becoming a full time writer. Click the image below to read and have a good browse on the website.
“During the pandemic, I had a long think about what I wanted to do with my life. I had a lot of interests, a lot of things I could try to make into a full-time job. I had just started teaching crafts when the first lockdown happened – I never went back to it.”
Nina Miller (READ and LISTEN TO Heartwood)
Suburban Witchcraft is a fantastic magazine of mixed genre work and Nina has some stunning photography and “artful impressions” in the latest issue (commencing Pg. 183). Our Trash Family really are multi-creative!
“Among the Roman ruins of Castillo de Sagunto, clover finds a way to thrive and invites another floral companion who feels blessed to reside alongside it.”
A Trash Trio of Quick Reads
Whether you’re on your lunch break, the train, the couch while the kids are out, or in bed with that sublime hour to devote to reading – here are three stories from the Trash Cat bin archive for you to savour.
Click on the images to read Best Small Fictions nominees, Gale Huxley and Jenny Hart (from Issue One and our Out-of-Place-Animals Pop-Up respectively) and Kathy Prokhovnik (from our Prompted Stories Pop-Up)
Grandpa Gave Birth to an Easy Chair
Shopping for Two
Only the Sky is Penitent
Writing Prompt
We’ll end this newsletter with a prompt to help you get writing.
Should you be considering attending one of the writealongs or thinking ahead to our August Prompted Stories Pop-Up, here’s a couple of examples of the sets of prompts that might be chosen.
Give yourself 15mins of word splurging and idea generation before having a go at a first draft.
To make things even tougher – you can opt to use the genres suggested below too and practice switching genres for very different stories.
PROMPT SET ONE
UNDERGROUND
A CHILDHOOD SWEETHEART
AN INFECTIOUS AGENT
Try writing the above into a bio-horror – and then use the same set of prompts in a romance and see which one zings.
PROMPT SET TWO
A BUILDING REMODEL
A GHOST
DANCING
Try the kinda obvious spooky but light horror – and then switch up to a humorous fantasy piece and see which one pops.
Thank you for reading our newsletter.
We hope we have inspired you with the amazing writing and readings.
We’ll see you next month.
Happy writing and reading, and above all…
TRASH CAT LIT 