Dumped, my new radio play, was released last week. In this article I’m going to talk about some of the things I like and don’t like about what I wrote, and some of the techniques I used to make a romantic comedy on an exploding spaceship hold together (all of which you are welcome to steal.) But first, if you haven’t listened to the play, now is a good time – because the article contains spoilers!
Congratulations on winning the Little Wonder Radio Play Competition 2018! How do you feel? What was the biggest thing you learned?
Thank you – it’s been very exciting! The winner was announced on New Year’s Eve, so a positive ending to 2018. A big lesson in this process is the importance of finding the right medium for a story. DRIVERLESS was inspired by an exhibition about future technology at the V&A Museum where I spent a long time (probably too long!) in a driverless car simulator. I knew there was a story to be told and my first thought was to write it as a stage play for a Twilight Zone inspired evening. However cars on stage are usually portrayed with actors just plonked on chairs, which rarely really works. When I heard about the Little Wonder Radio Competition I adapted the draft stage piece for the radio which felt like its natural home.
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Our first radio play competition for 2019 is now live and accepting entries until the end of May. This competition is aimed at helping two groups who often find it difficult to get feedback and support: writers of colour and writers with disabilities or long-term illness. We are looking for:
Full details and the means to enter can be found here:
https://www.aboutwriting.org/little-wonder-breaking-boundaries-radio-play-competition-2019/
And are summarised on the BBC writers room website here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/opportunities/little-wonder
The competition is free to enter and at no point will we ask you for money. We no longer offer recording and publication of your work as a prize for the play, because we don’t want anyone to feel that taking part is a form of unpaid work. However, we will talk to members of the shortlist and a few other pieces we like about potential recording opportunities. You can hear last years winning play, Driveless by Annie Fox, here:
Don’t feel left out if you don’t meet the criteria for this competition – we’ll be running a general access competition later his year. And do please read all the instructions before submitting. We’ll be putting up some details about the judges soon, as well as an interview with Annie Fox about what it was like to take part in a Little Wonder competition.
Good luck, and we look forward to reading your plays! Oh, and don’t forget to subscribe so you can keep up to date with the latest news!
I finished my second novel, Dead Moon, two weeks ago. My wife is reading it. She hasn’t fired me yet. My first novel, Vile, has spent the last four months with an editor. Goodness knows if it will ever emerge again. So, here I am, starting a new novel again. But where will I find the idea? And how do I know it’s the right idea? And what sort of ideas make the best foundations for your novel?
In this article I’m going to talk about putting together those first ideas that will launch your new novels. Ideas so strong, that at times they’ll feel they are writing it for you.
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I read more than 300 play submissions during our 2018 Little Wonder Radio Play competition and there were an astonishing number that fell into one of the three types:
Some has an interview and discovers it isn’t what it seems!
Someone is in a strange place and discovers they are/were actually dead!
And worst of all…
Someone is waiting for something… but nothing happens!
All three of these story formats can (and have) be very successful – but they’re also very dangerous. In this article I’m going to talk about why your play about something waiting to be interviewed to get into somewhere only to discover they are actually dead is BOOOORING, and what you can do to avoid writing it again.[i]
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