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A funny, yet heartbreaking, tale about a teenager and her fascination with writing. A widow and her golden horse. When the names of plants disappear. Broken vases and broken hearts. A slow revelation about a marriage...These six winning stories and the twelve dazzling others in the anthology will keep you gripped.

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Short story

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Publié par	Brown Dog Books
Date de parution	29 octobre 2017
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781785452277
Langue	English

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THE BATH SHORT STORY AWARD ANTHOLOGY 2017
THE BATH SHORT STORY AWARD ANTHOLOGY 2017
Compiled by Jude Higgins, Jane Riekemann and Anna Schlesinger
Copyright © Bath Short Story Award 2017
The right of individual authors to be identified as the authors of their work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the copyright holder.
Published under licence by Brown Dog Books and The Self-Publishing Partnership, 7 Green Park Station, Bath BA1 1JB
www.selfpublishingpartnership.co.uk
ISBN printed book: 978-1-78545-226-0 ISBN e-book: 978-1-78545-227-7
Cover design by Elinor Nash Internal design by Andrew Easton
Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CR0 4YY
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION Jude Higgins, Jane Riekemann and Anna Schlesinger
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
2017 JUDGE Euan Thorneycroft
THIS IS ALL MOSTLY TRUE Kathy Stevens
PERFORMANCE IN THE HILLS Mary Griese
FORGET ME NOT Sarah MacKey
BREAKING THE GLASS-BLOWER’S HEART Chloe Turner
EVERYTHING MUST GO Sandra Marslund
NORTH RIDGE Fiona Rintoul
BIG BONES Harriet Springbett
SPEAK NO EVIL David Butle
INTO THE LOOKING GLASS Shannon Savvas
HUNGER IN THE AIR Judith Wilson
LITTLE COMRADE Joe Eurell
SEEN/UNSEEN Colin Walsh
LAUGHING AND TURNING AWAY Patrick Holloway
THEN I AM GONE Emily Devane
PAID IN FULL Catherine Finch
HOLLOW Bridgitte Cummings
NICO AND MOLIÈRE Alexander Knights
BIONIC GIRL Mara Blazic
INTRODUCTION
The Bath Short Story Award is entering its sixth year and almost 5,700 stories have been submitted since we began in 2012. There’s so much creativity buzzing around the world and by the time this, our fifth anthology, is in print, we’ll have published 90 of the most startling, original and wonderful stories — such a joy and privilege.
We are truly an international competition. In 2017 we received entries from 45 countries: UK, USA, Australia, Ireland, Canada, India, New Zealand, France, Germany, South Africa, Russian Federation, Switzerland, Spain, Hong Kong, Netherlands, Aruba, Belgium, Brazil, Finland, Italy, Japan, Malta, Singapore, Sweden, Angola, Armenia, Austria, China, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Egypt, Indonesia, Israel, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Norway, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey and United Arab Emirates. All the continents are represented, with the exception of Antarctica — perhaps the inspiration for fiction freezes at -50°C?
This has been quite a year. The political turmoil and unrest fanning out across the globe has provided a rich lode for writing and, although there were few stories explicitly on, for example, Brexit or Trump, the underlying themes have emerged in a number of the 1100 stories we received. Racism, discrimination, loss of identity and the displacement of people through war and poverty continue to resonate with writers, the best stories engaging the reader through powerful prose and possibly an unusual perspective. The same is true of stories about death, illness, dementia and growing old where finding a fresh angle can lift the subject.
Ultimately, the truth of the story is in the telling of it and writers explored a range of genres to do just that. Dystopia, magical realism, historical/science fiction and even the Western emerged from under a general umbrella of literary fiction. Although the majority of stories were in either the first or third person, a number of writers moved to the second person, which is notoriously difficult to handle but when done well can create a real connection with the reader. It was exciting to see experimentation with style, layout and contemporary forms of communication incorporated into the narrative. One story was entirely in text speak.
With such a range of styles, genres and subjects, it was not easy to whittle the entries down to a longlist of 48, selected by us and our reading team. From the longlist, emerged the shortlist and we were delighted that literary agent Euan Thorneycroft from AM Heath agreed to choose the winners and his comments on the three winning and two commended stories can be read in the authors’ profiles. The winner of the Acorn Award was chosen by us; as many of the writers who enter are already successful in their careers, this award was established a few years ago to give unpublished writers another chance at a prize.
We hope you enjoy these stories. If they stimulate you to write, the 2018 Bath Short Story Award opens in November with details on our website bathshortstoryaward.org
We also work closely with Bath Flash Fiction Award and you might also check out their website for further inspiration bathflashfictionaward.com

Jude Higgins, Jane Riekemann and Anna Schlesinger
Follow us on Twitter @BathStoryAward
Subscribe on the site to receive news and updates on the competition.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The Bath Short Story Award is a team effort, supported by our keen and committed readers. Each story was read by two people from the team who recommended their favourites for the longlist. For the 2017 award we thank:
Anne Corlett
Paddy Edwards
Fiona Longsdon
Katharina Riekemann
Hannah Riekemann
Pat Robson
Diane Simmons
Dylan Spicer
Simon Toseland
Alison Woodhouse
Yet again, we are grateful to Mr B’s Emporium of Reading Delights, Bath mrbsemporium.com for donating the Local Prize. In the current climate, where the arts have been given a backseat, Bath is still a literary beacon and lucky to have independent bookshops. Mr B’s has won awards for its eclectic range of books and attentive service and is the traditional venue for our anthology launches in the autumn.
Local writer and artist Elinor Nash elenash.com won the 2014 BSSA and has continued to provide our artwork ever since. Each of the four anthology covers is an adaptation of her original stunning collage in a different colour. We thank her for her patience in providing an endless palette of colours for us to choose from and for her continuing support.
2017 JUDGE EUAN THORNEYCROFT

We were honoured that Euan Thorneycroft, one of the senior agents at literary agency AM Heath, accepted our offer to judge this year’s shortlist. He represents a wide range of fiction, from the highly literary to the more commercial and his constant goal is finding new exciting authors; prominent short story writers and teachers Cynan Jones, Vanessa Gebbie and Stevie Davies are among his clients. In addition to his agency work, Euan has been a committee member of the Association of Authors’ Agents as well as the external examiner on one of the country’s leading creative writing courses. He also judges the Bridport First Novel Award.
On receiving our short list, Euan commented, ‘ What a challenge? But an exciting one. The standard of the shortlist was very high and I would like to congratulate all the authors who made that list. Short stories are strange beasts – one day, a particular story might get under your skin. But on rereading, leave you a little cold. A detail that you passed over on a first read might make itself apparent to you on a second. I could only choose five winners but, rest assured, they all left a mark. I was looking for three things – originality, authenticity and confidence – and in the best stories here, all three of these were in ample evidence.’
FIRST PRIZE
KATHY STEVENS
This Is all Mostly True
Mum says lying is wrong; Dad says white lies are okay; Stacie says fiction is lies and fiction is the best thing in the world but your mum’s got a point.
Mum says to be polite and not have seconds unless I’m genuinely hungry.
Dad says to have fun, always plan ahead and wear the sort of shoes that I could run in if I needed to suddenly. Dad and I watch zombie films whenever Mum’s out with the girls (it’s our thing). The girls are all older than Mum; they have a lot of fun but rarely plan ahead, and in the shoes they wear they’ll be the first to get their brains scooped out come the zombie apocalypse.
Mum’s out tonight with the girls – she’s just left. She said she’s going to the bingo and will be back before ten. This means she’ll be going out clubbing and will be back after one. Mum’s rubbish at planning ahead and she tells lies of all colours.
She drinks too bloody much, is what Dad says.
I drink because your father’s a cheating bastard, is what Mum says.
They don’t say these things to each other. They say it to themselves and to me if I happen to be there at the time.
I like to watch Mum getting dressed in the morning. I sit on her uncomfortable, white-silk kidney seat and watch as she stretches and wiggles into her tights. I don’t like to watch her get dressed when she’s been out with the girls the night before because she often puts her foot right through her tights and they rip and she swears and shouts and her jagged big toenail sticks right through the nylon and I get upset and have an episode.
I’ve only kept with him because of you, Mum says, because I love you very much.
Mum feels obliged, because of me, to keep trying to love Dad. I’m an obligation. Stacie taught me that word and what it means. Stacie didn’t say that I am an obligation, because Stacie’s very careful with the truth. I like Stacie. She’s thirty-three and quite poor, and she’s got short blonde hair with pink ends and wears the most sensible shoes I’ve ever seen.
Dad calls Stacie ‘lass’.
Dad’s forty-four.
Thirty-three and forty-four are good numbers.
Mum’s fifty-three which means she can’t have any more babies. She had me fourteen years ago. I’m her first and last. Sometimes Mum sings My first, my last, my everything, to me and hugs me a lot. Sometimes she tells me to stop being weird and go away, especially when I’m watching her get dresse