('Spin Faster' © IamNotUnique, 2013)
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SHORT STORY MASTERCLASS
with Alison MacLeod
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In the third instalment of this series of Short Story Masterclass podcasts, Zoe Gilbert interviews award-winning author Alison MacLeod. In the podcast they discuss fiction and the here and now, ‘what if’ scenarios, the mystery behind reality, the psychology of the fantastic, moving from research to writing, and holding a short story together.
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Alison MacLeod’s third and most recent novel, Unexploded (Hamish Hamilton), was long-listed for The 2013 Man Booker Prize for Fiction and was one of The Observer’s ‘Books of the Year’. The Independent described it as a ‘a novel of staggering elegance and beauty’. She was the recipient of the Olive Cook/Society of Author’s Short Story Award, and she has been nominated for The BBC National Short Story Award and The Sunday Times EFG International Short Story Award. Her stories are also broadcast on the BBC. Her second story collection, all the beloved ghosts (Bloomsbury, March 2017), ‘seamlessly blends memoir, biography, and imagination to create narratives that explore the edges of reality’ (Kirkus Reviews). She is currently writing her next novel. In 2016, MacLeod was joint recipient of The Eccles British Library Writer’s Award. She is Professor of Contemporary Fiction at the University of Chichester and lives in Brighton. www.alison-macleod.com
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Listen to the Short Story Masterclass
with Alison MacLeod:
(39 minutes)
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Zoe Gilbert’s stories have been published in anthologies and journals worldwide, and won prizes including the Costa Short Story Award 2014. Her first book, Folk, is forthcoming with Bloomsbury in early 2018. She lives in London where she teaches and mentors creative writers at London Lit Lab, as well as working on her Creative Writing PhD at the University of Chichester. You can read some of her stories at mindandlanguage.blogspot.co.uk.
