EMAILS
Enquiries: info@thamesvalleywriterscircle.org
© Thames Valley Writers’ Circle
Created with Xara Designer Pro+
This year’s competition attracted nine entries
covering a wide range from deeply thoughtful to
the light-hearted. The winner is…
David Baldock with his warm reflections entitled
A Bunch of Daffodils
Mark Holman-Lisney’s poem,
Collateral Damage, aired concerns
over the effect of broken
relationships on the children of
those relationships, came second.
In third place was Les Williams’
entry One Summer Day; a chilling
tale of a day at the beach, or was
it - you decide.
12 Mar 2024: Chris Mundy Memorial Poetry Competition Results
A Tribute to Colin
from Les Williams
It was with great sadness that we heard of the recent death of Colin Ferguson following a fall. Colin was a stalwart of the Circle and rarely missed a meeting, from his first joining almost thirty years ago until his death. He was a kind and thoughtful person who had a successful life despite a difficult start. His National Service, where he trained to be a navigator, was followed by a career with the Bank of England and then as a probation officer in South London. We learned much of all this from his fascinating memoir, and a collection of short stories based on his probation officer years. He was often in and out of Holloway Prison! He enjoyed many competition successes with his short stories and poetry and recently published two of his books. Colin will be sorely missed by all his friends at the Circle.
Jill, Colin's daughter, has contacted
us to say that sadly he has died. She
said that he went downhill quickly
after a fall caused by other underlying
health issues, including pneumonia,
heart failure and finally a stroke.
Colin was a regular at the Circle
almost from it's inception, and his
contributions over the years have
always been much appreciated. He will be a sad loss to our
meetings, and to all the friends he made over the years.
22 Mar 2024: Colin Ferguson
17 Apr 2024: Barbara Olive Smith Memorial Trophy
This year’s competition is now open. The competition will be judged by Lynne Hackles who will also provide a critique of each entry. Entry requirements are as follows; • The theme is: Temptation. • The word limit is 1500. • Entries are to be typed in 12 point Times New Roman and double spaced. • Do not include your name on the entry. • Send your entry to nick.swyft@gmail.com to reach him by 15 May 2024. Nick will forward entries to Lynne. Results will be returned to Nick by 17 June 2024. There are tips for this competition from Iain Pattison, who has judged this event for us in the past. You can read Iain’s tips here and here.
18 Jun 2024: Barbara Olive Smith Memorial Trophy
Result
Results of the competition judged by Lynne Hackles were announced and winning entries were read at this week’s meeting. Congratulations to Nick who topped the ratings by Lynne and the members votes with his story Alternatives. All the stories and critiques by the judge are available in the Library on the 2024 page.
17 Sep 2024: Richard Visits UK
Instead of getting up at four o’clock in the morning to join our meetings on Zoom, Richard has made the journey all the way from Australia to attend a couple of meetings in Tilehurst! He read us his account of how he became the owner of Black Horse when he first arrived in Australia. Pictured right is the young Richard astride his newly acquired mount and wearing his also newly acquired ‘cowboy’ outfit, ready for his first cattledrive.
(Left) Richard paused his whirlwind tour of friends and
relatives in the UK long enough for this picture (he is
second from right in the back row) with some of us in
the St Josephs meeting room.
EMAILS
Enquiries: info@thamesvalleywriterscircle.org
© Thames Valley Writers’ Circle
Created with Xara Designer Pro+
This year’s competition attracted nine entries
covering a wide range from deeply thoughtful
to the light-hearted. The winner is…
David Baldock with his warm reflections
entitled
A Bunch of Daffodils
Mark Holman-Lisney’s poem,
Collateral Damage, aired concerns
over the effect of broken
relationships on the children of
those relationships, came second.
In third place was Les Williams’
entry One Summer Day; a chilling
tale of a day at the beach, or was
it - you decide.
12 Mar 2024: Chris Mundy Memorial
Poetry Competition Results
A Tribute to Colin
from Les Williams
It was with great sadness that we heard of the recent death of Colin Ferguson following a fall. Colin was a stalwart of the Circle and rarely missed a meeting, from his first joining almost thirty years ago until his death. He was a kind and thoughtful person who had a successful life despite a difficult start. His National Service, where he trained to be a navigator, was followed by a career with the Bank of England and then as a probation officer in South London. We learned much of all this from his fascinating memoir, and a collection of short stories based on his probation officer years. He was often in and out of Holloway Prison! He enjoyed many competition successes with his short stories and poetry and recently published two of his books. Colin will be sorely missed by all his friends at the Circle.
Jill, Colin's daughter, has contacted
us to say that sadly he has died.
She said that he went downhill
quickly after a fall caused by other
underlying health issues, including
pneumonia, heart failure and finally
a stroke.
Colin was a regular at the Circle
almost from it's inception, and his contributions over the
years have always been much appreciated. He will be a
sad loss to our meetings, and to all the friends he made
over the years.
22 Mar 2024: Colin Ferguson
17 Apr 2024: Barbara Olive Smith
Memorial Trophy
This year’s competition is now open. The competition will be judged by Lynne Hackles who will also provide a critique of each entry. Entry requirements are as follows; • The theme is: Temptation. • The word limit is 1500. • Entries are to be typed in 12 point Times New Roman and double spaced. • Do not include your name on the entry. • Send your entry to nick.swyft@gmail.com to reach him by 15 May 2024. Nick will forward entries to Lynne. Lynne will send her results to Nick by 17 June 2024. There are tips for this competition from Iain Pattison, who has judged this event for us in the past. You can read Iain’s tips here and here.
18 Jun 2024: Barbara
Olive Smith Memorial
Trophy
Result
Results of the competition judged by Lynne Hackles were announced and winning entries were read at this week’s meeting. Congratulations to Nick who topped the ratings by Lynne and the members votes with his story Alternatives. All the stories and critiques by the judge are available in the Library on the 2024 page.
17 Sep 2024: Richard Visits UK
Instead of getting up at four o’clock in the morning to join our meetings on Zoom, Richard has made the journey all the way from Australia to attend a couple of meetings in Tilehurst! He read us his account of how he became the owner of Black Horse when he first arrived in Australia. Pictured below is the young Richard astride his newly acquired mount and wearing his also newly acquired ‘cowboy’ outfit, ready for his first cattledrive.
(Below) Richard paused his whirlwind tour of friends
and relatives in the UK long enough for this picture (he
is second from right in the back row) with some of us in
the St Josephs meeting room.
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