And the winner is...
the literary bit of Frome festival kicked off on Friday with Band Night at the Masonic. Alex Whittington took the prize for the lyric writing composition, as judged by Jakarta, local band who wrote the music and will be inspiring more swarming & squealing at Battle of the Bands on July 19th. Here's drummer Miles in post-judging mode.


Saturday, the big street party day, began benignly weather-wise: sun like the Soap Box poets shone (Rosie, you're such a star for this fesival innovation!) and Writers In Residence toiled with their tales in Cheap Street, but by evening the World Food Feast was a drizzle-fest. Frome, of course, being random & resilient, the street stalls and bands were well-supported but a bit of Greek shimmering dusk and mellow warm breeze would have enhanced the night...

Sunday... and the dreary dizzle of Saturday night became a distant memory, as temestuous rain, floods, and thunder, rocked the town. What is going on?

Luckily all my events today are indoors, and I scurry from Frome FM Radio Station - you can hear my Playlist choices here - to Frome Library for the Travel Writing talk. Main theme from both (excellent) speakers is that travel writing can and should be "rewarding - but not necessarily financially." Editor David Kernek gave a helpful & humorous guide to being a favourite contributor, while Laurence Shelley inspired potential self-publishers with his advice on editing and marketing.
Informative, affirming and fun... but still the rain fell. I abandoned plans for a late-night evening in favour of drying out at home. And they wonder why English people talk about the weather! I wonder why we don't have 57 words for rain, as Eskimos allegedly do for snow.
Meanwhile for the dryer side of festival writing, there's Mike's radio programmes - his One-on-one session with me on Friday is archived here. (And still indoors, my latest story "Quiet Women" found a home in Penumbra lit. mag.)