I have had a couple of nice surprises recently.

Firstly, I was involved in a local project called Mythmakers earlier this summer, where local writers were asked to create new myths on the Isle of Wight – and each tale had to be a maximum of 500 words. It was part of the year-long Sandown Rocks project co-ordinated by Boojum & Snark.

I duly wrote a story about a shape-shifting selkie who comes to the rescue in St Lawrence – and I was hoping to perform it as part of the We Are The Myth Makers event at this year’s Isle of Wight Literary Festival in October.

Unfortunately, Mum’s medical emergency meant I missed the rehearsals and so I did not take part in the live performance – BUT my myth has been included in a lovely booklet, which features 11 tales from Island writers. The book was also on display at the project’s recent exhibition at Quay Arts in Newport.

Then, I received the news that my work had been highly commended in not one, but two categories in the annual Paul Cave Awards for Literature. I was highly commended in both the flash fiction category (300 words maximum) and the microfiction section (100 words maximum).

For my microfiction entry, Silent Witness, the judge said: “Kate is a strong writer and this is a good story.”

Here is Silent Witness:

They were both happily married to someone else, but from the moment Declan and Georgia met, they had an uncontrollable desire for one another.

They met by chance at a bar in midsummer, and the rest – as they say – was history.

The secret assignations went on for months. Then one frosty night, Declan’s wife followed him to Georgia’s modest house and – having worked out exactly what was going on – she turned their cosy December date into a chilling blood-strewn murder scene with only the Christmas tree by the window as a silent witness.

The competition anthology is now available on Amazon – my pieces are in the 2025 Novelettes, Short Stories, Poems, Flash Fiction and Microfiction collection.

It’s actually the second time I have been highly commended in the Paul Cave Awards – I was also recognised in the Novella section (10,000 word maximum) in the 2023 competition.