Harrogate Writers Circle

Our meeting of 23rd July 2025 was the adjudication of the article competition.

Denise announced that she was on the shortlist for the Writing Magazine flash fiction competition.

Simon started his adjudication by saying that it was a difficult choice to pick a winning entry as all had high merit. He then went through the entries in detail, indicating where each one excelled and where there was some room for improvement.

First was "Hidden Figures," which gave information about Hedy Lamarr. She was known to most people as one of the glamorous leading ladies in Hollywood. He was picky about the first paragraph as it was the only occurrence of the first-person reference, which jarred slightly. He suggested that at the start, the author should add the reference to her other life as an inventor. The piece then goes through her life in chronological order, which best suits this kind of piece. Simon then explained that it is useful to mention specific dates. For this piece, any submission could be linked to these dates. The article then goes on to mention her life as an inventor. Simon commented that some of this paragraph would benefit from more explanation of the technologies mentioned.Simon then talked about the article "A Trencadis of facts about Gaudi." An intriguing title but one that would benefit from a little explanation. The article then goes on to chronicle the life of the architect Gaudi. There were lots of snippets of information given, with Simon's favourite being a quote from Gaudi's professor at the school of architecture: "We have given a degree to either a madman or a genius." A picky point was that the narrator changed into second person, which should be corrected. A good topical hook is where the article refers to 2026 when the cathedral is due to be completed.

Simon then talked about the article "All Creatures Great and Small." This told the story of James Herriot's life. Simon liked the start of the article, which says James Herriot was born in Sunderland within the sound of the Roker Roar. This locates his birth and refers to the Sunderland Football Club. The article then covers Herriot's life in chronological order. In particular, the author mentions his birth date in 1916 means there is a hook into his 110th celebration which a magazine editor could latch on to. The author states that Herriot always thought about writing a book about his experiences, but it was not until he was fifty years old that his wife nudged him into starting the book, otherwise he would never have done it.

Simon then announced that the winner was Denise, and everyone agreed that it had been a very interesting and helpful adjudication.

Our next meeting on 7th August is a manuscript evening. Please note the meeting is on a Thursday - a one-off. Meetings return to a Wednesday for the subsequent meetings. Details of our programme can be found online at: harrogatewriterscircle.weebly.com

If you want to improve your writing, then why don't you pop into the next meeting?