charles barrow's writing

"Trashy Tales of Terror : cheesy horror fiction featuring creepy kids, killer animals, mutants and monsters, etc." The above caught my eye when I was perusing the submission guidelines for an anthology called Trash Tales, to be published next summer, but with a submission deadline of midnight on December 31st. Happy New Year. There is also a 5,000  word limit for entries. There were any number of other suggested categories to submit stories in, from Sci-Fi to romance to cosy crime, in fact, as the guidelines state on the website (see link at the end), "Your story can be in any category or genre you like, as long as it's what we might all consider of a trashy nature!" I learned of this opportunity whilst watching a #booktube channel, on Youtube. Alex Unabridged was the channel - you can link to their site here  youtube.com/@alex_unabridged  Alex will be producing/editing the anthology along with Olly from CriminOlly - you can find his #booktube channel here  yout...

I watch a lot of Youtube videos, or more accurately, BookTube videos - BT being the corner of YT where people discuss books (naturally); what they own, what they've read, what they intend to read. It's full of reviews, recommendations, warnings (sometimes), encouragement, and interesting, fun people that I enjoy spending time with. It also has a broad timetable of monthly events that viewers can choose to join. I've spoken previously about the short story theme in September, and the Victorian literature in October or, so called, Victober, both of which I chose to take part in this year. The upcoming event for December is Remember December, during which viewers/readers are encouraged to re-read a book they once read and can't recall anything about. I have a long list of those. I'm not sure I'll take part in this event, other than incidentally, firstly because I want to get festive and read some Christmas stories in December, as I also like to get festive by watch...

As mentioned in early September, October is all about Victorian literature. In a theme tagged #VicTober on Youtube, where I first learned of it, readers are encouraged to read books written during the Victorian period - 1819-1901 if you wanna get pedantic. Furthermore it has to be by an English writer. BookTubers are reading Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge as a group read, but I decided to skip over that as I read a Hardy recently (Under The Greenwood Tree), and had my heart set on reading Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte instead. I thought I must have read this book before, at school maybe, but no. I didn't recognise large swathes of the story. I definitely knew that I'd seen a film or TV adaptation because I remembered a crucial, very cinematic, plot point that comes right near the end. Anyways, I enjoyed it. It was slow going at times, as classic novels can be. Some of the language is overly flowery - why use one word when you can use ten. Some of the religious and...

It's Short Story September- at least it is in my house. I'm getting into the idea of themed reading weeks/months. I'm already geared up for VicTober (Victorian October) next month - I came across the idea on Youtube, where several Booktubers are already talking about it. But more about VicTober in October. This month I'll be diving into these collections. I also have further collections on my Kindle, Murakami's Men Without Women, and Bolu Babalola's Love in Colour particularly peak my interest. I always love the idea of a short story, but don't very often find myself reading one. And since I'm increasingly drawn to writing some more short fiction, I figure I ought to read a whole variety from different genres and time periods, genders, ethnicities and sexualities. These below, skew white and male, though the ebooks balance things out a little, and I intend to visit the library to find a more diverse range of authors that I don't currently have any wo...