I have neglected my blog of late and won’t bore you with a long litany of excuses. I can offer you: Plott Dog ate my copy but that would be a lie.  I do however have a bit of an excuse, a.k.a the Great Shiitake Incident in which I managed to  develop a toxic reaction to Shiitake mushrooms.  The results weren’t pretty: imagine chemical peel meets measles and you’ll be about there.  I know, I know, there’s a story in that somewhere and I’m working on it. Anyway, I’m finally feeling like a human again and glad to be back—bearing good news too.

I am still hanging on in this year’s Whittaker Prize. Currently sitting at 4th overall after 6 rounds with another 3 to go, I can’t say the competition this year hasn’t been a bit of a bumpy road but it has certainly produced some interesting and lively discussion about the vagaries of judges’ tastes—more on that in a future post.  The good thing is that it has me writing again and I have a headful of a squabbling characters to prove it. 

My big news today though is twofold. The launch of the latest version of the Ether Books iPhone App and although I am truly a new book smell junkie, for me the Ether App is as exciting as Gutenberg’s press  must have been in its day.

The second part of my news is that those very excellent folks at Ether Books have published two more of my stories, Body Parts & Coal Dust and Valediction.  Available now at a mere snip of 59p each.  Ether have published eight stories on the app and I hope over time to sub more work for consideration.

What I love about the Ether App is that for me as a writer it provides a level of exposure for my work which quite frankly it could never have in print. More importantly is the fact that the Ether App opens up a whole new world of accessibility short stories and goes a long way towards silencing the drone of the naysayers who insist  the short story is dead.

I’m always very tempted to ask this question of the doom and gloom squad: If the short story is deceased, then why are so many people actively involved in writing them?

Just a quick skim through the Ether app and you will find living, breathing big name authors— Hilary Mantel, Alexander McCall Smith, Louis de Bernieres to name but a few. Not only that but you will also find a plethora of emerging writers, notable names, literary heavyweights from yesteryear and, most importantly some excellent stories from a myiad of genres. Non-fiction and columnists too,  there’s definitely something for everybody, no matter how eclectic or off-the-wall your tastes may be.

Anybody who believes the short form has no place in modern literature should go and read A L Kennedy’s  article which appeared last week in the Independent  in which she argues that the form very much alive and well.  I  believe the short story is alive and seriously kicking but the proof of course is always in the eating, so instead of me telling you all about if, go and find out for yourself.

I have to say this was a very pleasing sight in the iPhone App store this morning - Body Parts and Valediction at 2 and 3 in the top ten!

Here’s what Ether have to say:

Download the latest version of the FREE iPhone App from Ether Books!

Ether Books has just brought out the latest version of their popular iPhone App with fantastic new design and functionality!

New features include the option to share details of your favourite reads with friends and followers on social media and email, OTA messages for your favourite writers and genres, and new easy reading features. We have also updated the one tap for ease of navigation when reading in the App and rearranged the order of scrollling by authors surname, tweeks which make this the best Ether App ever!

You can download the latest version from this link to access 100s of contemporary short reads from both new and bestselling writers from across the world –  http://bit.ly/bpvC84 

Ether Books.. making reading mobile!