Acceptances | Jonathan Pinnock

Category: Acceptances (page 1 of 12)

The Caterpillar and the Beeb

September 17, 2014 / admin / 0 Comments

Lots of excitement here at Pinnock Towers. First of all, I had a sudden urge yesterday to see if I could get a few more of my strange animal poems for kids published. So I dug out a selection, read them through and fixed some of the scansion (amazing what you find when you go back to something with a more critical eye). Given that (a) the only place I know of that publishes that kind of thing is The Caterpillar and (b) they’ve published a couple of mine there before, I decided to send them to The Caterpillar. Classic marketing skills on display there.

Anyway, I had a very positive response the same day and some of them will indeed be appearing in either the next edition or the one after that. I’ll let you know either way. Seriously, if you do have kids who enjoy reading (or indeed kids who don’t and bloody well ought to), it’s a terrific magazine. Oh, and did I mention that it’s published people such as Michael Morpurgo, Frank Cottrell Boyce and John Hegley. That last name may make readers of TAKE IT COOL prick up their ears, as they may recall that I once almost formed a band with him.

The other even more exciting thing is that I’ve just been invited to be Steve Yabsley‘s main guest on his lunchtime show at BBC Radio Bristol / Somerset on Wednesday October 1st. Make a note in your diaries now. I will too, with a special addendum telling me to get there several hours in advance, unlike my Ujima Radio cock-up.

Tweet This Post

TAKE IT COOL Hits the Broadsheets!

August 5, 2014 / admin / 0 Comments

One of the essential activities for a writer who has just had a book published is to Google their own name at regular intervals in combination with the name of their book to see if any new reviews have turned up. For a writer lurking in the lower levels of the food chain, this can be a depressingly futile thing to do, but occasionally things can turn up, such as this lovely piece from Scotland’s The Herald.

Apart from a minor inaccuracy in the very first clause (I was actually in my early 20s when I came across the single), it manages to convey the essence of the book far better than I ever could myself. And that is more than you could ever ask from a reviewer.

Last Friday I was interviewed about the book by the lovely Freya Morris. You can read what I said here. And the very wonderful Itz Caribbean website are running a competition where you can win a copy. Get in, I say.

What else has been going on? Oh yes, my entry for Thresholds Short Story Forum‘s recent feature writing competition, which failed to make the shortlist and was thus mentally consigned to the dustbin of oblivion, is going to be published in September there after all. Not only will this make me very happy, but it will also come as a massive surprise to the subject of the piece.

Finally, I had an acceptance the other day from the very classy-looking Ariadne’s Thread magazine for my poem “Parable”, which will appear in issue 13, later this year.

Tweet This Post

Paradise Found Wanting

June 12, 2014 / admin / 0 Comments

Didn’t have time to post about this before I went off on my hols (and very nice they were to, thanks for asking). Anyway, here’s my poem “Paradise Found Wanting” up at the ever-excellent Ink, Sweat and Tears. Don’t think it really needs much by way of explanation…

Not much else to report, apart from the fact that my frankly rather puerile flash “The Sixth Generation” is going to be included in the forthcoming National Flash Fiction Day anthology “Eating My Words”. There will be more details on how and where to purchase in due course. Having been one of the judges for the 100-word competition, I can say with hand on my heart that there will be some seriously good stuff in there. As well as my piece.

Tweet This Post

Take It Cool Full Cover and First Review!

May 27, 2014 / admin / 0 Comments

Take It Cool is now feeling a lot less exposed, because it now has a back cover as well as a front one. And apart from that picture of yours truly, it’s rather spiffy, is it not? All we need now is the book to come out and for loads of people to read it.

What? Someone has already? You’re kidding…

Many thanks to Pete Sutton for some very nice comments there.

Meanwhile, back in short story land, I had an acceptance yesterday from the people at the very excellent Unthology for a rather odd story of mine called “Hay. Pee. Ah. Wrist.” Not sure if it’s going to be Unthology 6 or Unthology 7, but either way it’s going to be extremely cool to join that list.

Tweet This Post

The Stinging Fly and Other Stuff

March 4, 2014 / admin / 0 Comments

The Spring edition of the Irish literary magazine The Stinging Fly has just been published, and what a lovely thing it is. It’s always nice to appear in print, and I’m especially chuffed that my odd little magical realist flash “The Meaning of the Rabbit” has been included in Nuala Ní Chonchúir’s flash fiction showcase, along with loads of other cool people’s work.

I do hope that last Monday’s BristolCon fringe audience appreciate that magical realism reference, by the way.

The excellent Short Review have also put up an interview I did with them about DOT DASH and other stuff. I quote George Saunders in it, which just goes to show how hip I am.

If you’re near Bath this Friday, do come along to Story Fridays at 7:30PM in Burdall’s Yard, where I will be reading “Nature’s Banquet” as part of their “Feral” evening. More – ahem – magical realism.

Finally, I had an urge the other day to start submitting some TwitFic again, and I’ve just had a couple of acceptances, from Confettifall and Twiction Addiction. They’ll both be appearing in April, and I’ll give you a nudge when they do.

Tweet This Post

Two Ravens Press to Publish TAKE IT COOL!

January 20, 2014 / admin / 6 Comments

Excuse me for being a little excited.

However.

I am quite unbelievably pleased to announce that my odd little musical/biographical/historical/genealogical not-quite-a-memoir thing, TAKE IT COOL, has found a publisher, in the form of the excellent Two Ravens Press.

As you may be aware, this has not been an easy process. Large numbers of agents and publishers – sixty-odd in all – have had this manuscript sitting in their slushpile. Most of them, I suspect, took one look at the synopsis and ran a mile. I can’t really blame them, because it’s one of those things that doesn’t fit any standard template. However, there were a select few who said they liked the writing and that someone would eventually love it enough to take it on. Even if it wouldn’t be them.

But still no-one said yes, and I was beginning to get a bit despondent. So I decided to take the initiative and run the book as a blog, just to see if there was an audience. I wanted to know if I was kidding myself. I did this with my first book, MRS DARCY VERSUS THE ALIENS (although there was a further motive in that case, which was to motivate myself to actually finish the bloody thing), and it did in fact get a publisher just a few weeks before it finished. I’m not even sure if the fact that it was out there for everyone to read had any direct impact on the publishing decision. What I do know is that I wouldn’t have had the confidence to continue touting MRS DARCY around if I hadn’t known that I did indeed have an audience who were avidly following my blog.

In some ways I was less confident about finding an audience for TAKE IT COOL. There weren’t any big cliffhangers (apart from the will-I-won’t-I-finally-find-Dennis-Pinnock thing) and there were several disparate threads to the story that made it less compatible with blogging. However, I was extremely gratified to find that I did indeed gather an audience. Not only that, but a handful of the celebs that I pestered to look at it on Twitter gave me encouraging responses. I wasn’t deluding myself, after all.

So when brilliant short story writer and Facebook chum David Rose posted that Two Ravens Press were open to submissions, I went in with renewed enthusiasm. Samantha Hawkins, who has recently taken over TRP, responded very quickly and positively and suddenly everything seemed possible again.

This means a hell of a lot to me. TAKE IT COOL is a highly personal project, and one that I’ve been trying to write, on and off, since 2005. I’d like to think it’s one of those things that might develop a bit of word of mouth and spread out a bit further than its original market (whatever that is). And if it helps Dennis sell a few more records, well so much the better.

Oh yes. He’s recording again. Didn’t you know?

Tweet This Post

The Story Player

November 1, 2013 / admin / 0 Comments

One of the things I’m coming to realise is that the most exciting thing that can happen as a writer is when someone with a different skill set collaborates with you. I am by nature a solitary creature when it comes to the actual business of putting the words together, but I love seeing what happens when you let go of the words and let someone else play with them.

So far I’ve been lucky enough to have a few of my stories illustrated by some very talented artists (although I’m still awaiting a full-blown graphic novelisation – my life would probably be complete if that ever happened). I’ve also had some excellent live readings by some wonderful actors and a couple of excellent studio productions (one by the BBC and another by Short Story Radio).

And we can now make that three excellent studio productions, because a new site has just gone up called The Story Player, and my story “The Birdman of Farringdon Road” is one of the first to appear there. It’s expertly read by David Wayman and superbly produced by the man behind Short Story Radio, The Story Player and National Short Story Week, Ian Skillicorn. Do have a listen – it’s only 12 minutes long. Whilst you’re there, take a listen to some of the other stories from great writers like Susie Maguire and – coming soon – Tania Hershman and Jon McGregor.

I also heard today that my story “The Alternative Electrician”, which I read at Story Friday in Bath nearly a year ago, has been accepted for publication by Every Day Fiction. It’ll be nice to see that one getting a second audience.

And don’t forget that “Take It Cool” is still running, having just hit its thirtieth episode. If you haven’t been following it, don’t worry, there’ll be another “Previously…” post along soon. Or just start wherever you like and pick it up from there. I’m not fussy. Just as long as you read it, right?

Tweet This Post

The Caterpillar

September 8, 2013 / admin / 0 Comments

This is pretty exciting. I’ve got a couple of poems in the second edition of The Caterpillar, an Irish print magazine for kids. As its name might suggest, The Caterpillar is the junior arm of the highly respected literary magazine The Moth, so I was decidedly chuffed at being part of it already. However, my chuffedness knew no bounds when I looked at the list of the other contributors and saw people like Frank Cottrell Boyce, John Siddique, Smarties Prize winner Hilda Offen and Bina Shah. If you’ve got kids or grandkids (or indeed if you are a person between the ages of 7 and 11 yourself), I’d thoroughly recommend investing in a copy.

In other news, TAKE IT COOL continues, the latest episode describing how I came to forge an alliance with the Mormons in order to penetrate the more distant branches of my family tree. I’ve also updated the discography page, so you can now hear for yourself the record that may or may not have influenced Massive Attack.

Tweet This Post

The Stinging Fly

September 2, 2013 / admin / 2 Comments

This is cool. I’ve just had an acceptance for the forthcoming Flash Fiction Showcase in Ireland’s splendid literary magazine, The Stinging Fly, to be edited by the excellent Nuala Ní Chonchúir. (Just take a look at some of their former contributors here. Impressive, huh?) My curious little piece of sort-of magical realist metafiction “The Meaning of the Rabbit” will be appearing in Spring 2014.

Meanwhile, there is a fascinating revelation in TAKE IT COOL today: did Dennis influence Massive Attack? Take a look at my lexical analysis and see if you agree with me…

Tweet This Post

Cease, Cows and other stuff

July 16, 2013 / admin / 2 Comments

I’m always on the lookout for new and unusual places to submit stuff to, so when I noticed that Tania Hershman had had this typically strange and wonderful piece published by the delightfully-titled Cease, Cows magazine, I knew I had to send something their way myself. (Any magazine that titles itself after a quote from “One Hundred years of Solitude” is OK by me.) So I was very pleased when I received an acceptance for “Wood”, a story that clocks in at just over 200 words. I’ll let you know when they put it up. Here’s the submissions page, by the way. You get a cow-themed response, too.

The reviews for “Dot Dash” continue to trickle in, and here’s a nice one on Goodreads from Tracy Fells – many thanks for that, Tracy!

Finally, here’s a quick plug for my new beekeeping blog, Hiveminding. It’s basically what it says in the subtitle: “The Adventures of a Novice Beekeeper”. Join me in my journey into the strange and unusual world of bees and the equally strange and unusual people who keep them! (I really did say “journey” there, didn’t I? Oh dear.)

Tweet This Post