Fortune telling kit
You may have read some six-word short stories, often in the form of an advert. One of the most famous by Hemingway is “For sale. baby shoes, never worn”. Can you come up with a six-word advert that hints at an unknown story?
You can see my effort here:
Book now. Fortunes told. Future sold.
Now it’s your turn. Why not use the comment area below my post on my website to share your thoughts.
The post Fortune telling kit appeared first on Linda Parkinson-Hardman. (Source: The Hysterectomy Association)
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - January 20, 2022 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Creative Writing advert hemingway Source Type: news
Painter and canvas
I love the idea of generating writing ideas from a set of pre-prepared words. In this one, simply choose one word from each column and create an introductory sentence for a short story, flash fiction or a novel using each of the words.
My effort is below.
“I watched the painter as she worked the rain-soaked canvas, yellow running into red into green using her finger as yardstick measuring the proportions of our local station.”
Now your turn. Why not use the comment area below to share your thoughts.
The post Painter and canvas appeared first on Linda Parkinson-Hardman. (Source: The Hysterectomy Association)
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - January 14, 2022 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Creative Writing wordsquare writing prompt Source Type: news
The day of glorious silliness by Jill Waters, Hysteria 2021 category winner
Jill Waters is the winner of the Short Story category in the 2021 Hysteria Writing Competition. You can find her story, along with the other finalists from each category in the Hysteria 8 anthology.
Listen to the recording
Read by Caroline Brewer during the Hysteria 8 launch party.
https://lindaph.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/jill-waters-the-day-of-glorious-silliness.mp3
Read the story
Georgie lay in bed, psyching herself up to open her eyes. January 6th. Twelfth Night. Christmas 2020 had come and gone with not so much as a whimper. Restrictions and guidelines meant plans had fallen apart, and celebrations were cancel...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - January 13, 2022 Category: OBGYN Authors: Jill Waters Tags: Hysteria hysteria 2021 hysteria 8 short story Source Type: news
Following Fido
Wherever Fido went my little sister went too. Faithfully holding on as he bumped and rolled his way around the garden, the house, the pavement.
Not once did he look back to check she was ok. And she never questioned his direction, simply following along like a puppy on a lead.
The day she followed him off the pavement and onto the road was the day my mother decided Fido had to go.
Year’s later here he is, forlornly sitting in the junk shop window waiting for his playmate to come back and rescue him.
I walk in, pick him up and take him home to my child who follows his bumpy, rolling trek around a new territory called ...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - January 6, 2022 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Fiction Source Type: news
In conversation with Jenny Rossiter, author of The Freedom Bus
Jenny Rossiter first joined me on this blog back in 2012 with her book The Masks that Men Wear. Since then much has changed in her life and business. In her latest book, a memoir called The Freedom Bus from adoptee to true self Jenny combines her heart-warming story with her professional expertise, calling on her experience as a psychiatric nurse and lessons from corporate life, while drawing parallels as a single mother and successful business owner.
As an adoptee, she unveils her story from rejection to acceptance and how her midlife questioning empowered her to be her true self and how she found a version of herself sh...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - January 4, 2022 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Podcast author interview memoir Source Type: news
In conversation with Jenny Rossiter, author of The Freedom Bus
Jenny Rossiter first joined me on this blog back in 2012 with her book The Masks that Men Wear. Since then much has changed in her life and business. In her latest book, a memoir called The Freedom Bus from adoptee to true self Jenny combines her heart-warming story with her professional expertise, calling on her experience as a psychiatric nurse and lessons from corporate life, while drawing parallels as a single mother and successful business owner.
As an adoptee, she unveils her story from rejection to acceptance and how her midlife questioning empowered her to be her true self and how she found a version of herself sh...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - January 4, 2022 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Podcast author interview memoir Source Type: news
Baking biscuits
Susan was reflective cutting the perfect snowflake biscuits. Sometimes all it took was a sprinkle of magic and sugar dusting to wash away the cares of the day.
Slotting the trays into the oven she leaned back against the marble coffee in hand, watching as they turned from cream to golden. She wondered how Paul would react when she told him. Hopefully, hearing the news over a plate of his favourite biscuits would make it easier.
The timer pinged, ten minutes and all done! Her inner creative sprang into action. Mixing icing sugar and colours in glorious, Christmassy shades reflecting the snow outside.
The doorbell rang, Paul...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - December 31, 2021 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Fiction friday fiction Source Type: news
The art of being human in the 21st century
If you search ‘digital intelligence’ in a search engine you will find that, broadly, it is either a “new type of intelligence that combines knowledge, ways of knowing, and the ability to interact effectively in a cultural or community setting” 1 or something to do with big data, marketing, and strategy.
These definitions ignore our essential humanity moving the playground of our digital lives firmly into the school room of skills, abilities, and knowledge.
They also assume something fundamental has changed about the human experience when really nothing has changed, we are simply looking at our world through a diffe...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - December 21, 2021 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Life digital transformation Source Type: news
How to save the planet
Let’s be honest, when we talk about saving the planet we don’t really mean the planet. After all the planet will look after itself, it has for the billions of years it’s already been around. We don’t even really mean how to save the amazing, glorious, generous ecosystem that is nature. What we really mean is how do we save ourselves!
Somehow we’ve divorced ourselves from both the planet and nature. It’s as if we see our planet as a pyramid with us at the top, lording it over everything else below us as if we aren’t part of nature at all, seeing ourselves as separate. What we seem t...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - December 15, 2021 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Life ecology Source Type: news
Living in the dream
‘Dermot, Dermot’. I tug at his shirt urgently, trying to get his attention.
‘Yes?’ He glances at me and smiles.
‘Dermot, what if I told you all this,’ I wave my arms around expansively to indicate the enormity of what I’m about to say, ‘is not real, that it’s all just a dream.’
I finish breathless and cock my head on one side waiting for his astonished reaction.
‘Piffle’, he says, and I realise he’s referring to the book he was reading.
A beat later he looks up and smiles.
‘Go on then spud, tell me what you mean?’.
He says it kindly a...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - December 10, 2021 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Fiction dreams friday fiction short story Source Type: news
Hysterectomy Before 50 Can Bring Health Risks
Title: Hysterectomy Before 50 Can Bring Health RisksCategory: Health NewsCreated: 12/9/2021 12:00:00 AMLast Editorial Review: 12/9/2021 12:00:00 AM (Source: MedicineNet Womens Health General)
Source: MedicineNet Womens Health General - December 9, 2021 Category: OBGYN Source Type: news
Hysteria 8 launch event and winners announcements
Well, what an evening. It was the first time I’ve ever held a launch event for a book, let alone an anthology for the Hysteria Writing Competition. And it was the most fun. With my special guests and friends helping out, together with a few technical (no make that human glitches) we got through it and the feedback from attendees was that they enjoyed it too.
The point of the launch was to announce all the winners of the categories and the Guess the Cover competition. And the winners also had their entries read by my good friends and Distinguished Toastmasters (check them out on LinkedIn and you’ll see they all ...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - December 3, 2021 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Hysteria hysteria 2021 hysteria 8 Source Type: news
Hysteria 8 online launch party
7 pm on 2nd December 2021 saw a bigger group than I’d imagined coming together on Teams to celebrate the launch of the Hysteria 8 anthology containing all 30 long-listed entries over three categories in the Hysteria Writing Competition 2021.
I and the audience were joined online by a cast of almost thousands, well seven anyway; three of my closest friends (including my husband) who are all Distinguished Toastmasters, and three of the amazing reading team who read and judged all the entries.
Each of the overall categories winners entries was read aloud, and the readers and I had a good natter about what it takes to wi...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - December 3, 2021 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Podcast hysteria 2021 hysteria 8 Source Type: news
Hysteria 8 online launch party
7 pm on 2nd December 2021 saw a bigger group than I’d imagined coming together on Teams to celebrate the launch of the Hysteria 8 anthology containing all 30 long-listed entries over three categories in the Hysteria Writing Competition 2021.
I and the audience were joined online by a cast of almost thousands, well seven anyway; three of my closest friends (including my husband) who are all Distinguished Toastmasters, and three of the amazing reading team who read and judged all the entries.
Each of the overall categories winners entries was read aloud, and the readers and I had a good natter about what it takes to wi...
Source: The Hysterectomy Association - December 3, 2021 Category: OBGYN Authors: Linda Parkinson-Hardman Tags: Podcast hysteria 2021 hysteria 8 Source Type: news
