How simple storytelling techniques can make you a better writer
October 26, 2020I’m running a new online course, starting in January. This guest blog post for Journalism.co.uk explains some of the techniques and insider tips I will share from some 20 years of freelancing. Here’s a sample from the text: People love to read about people. Keep that idea in mind as you… Read more
Journalists and content writers: sign up for my new masterclass this autumn
August 9, 2020Journalism is complex but the secret to good storytelling is simple: people love to read about people. This new course, hosted via Journalism.co.uk [see image above], is a hands-on class exploring techniques for writers, such as case studies, sourcing expert views and playing up the human interest to build empathy… Read more
How to get into travel writing — via Zoom
April 13, 2020The landscape looks pretty different since my last post. Global events have overtaken normal life and we’re all now staying home to protest out precious NHS. It’s easy to hide under the duvet at times like these but, as a long-standing freelancer, I know it means I need to change,… Read more
How to get into travel writing at the Chester Literature Festival
November 17, 2019The Chester Literature Festival was in full swing this week. I was there on Friday to run a travel-writing workshop [pictured above] for future freelancers and career changers seeking to branch out. Some planned to pitch ideas to magazines, others were looking to develop their voice online as a blogger.… Read more
Two essential events at this year’s Chester Lit Fest
November 25, 2018A busy day at Chester’s Storyhouse, then. It was the final full week of the Chester Literature Festival and I was running two events last week — a morning discussion [first two slides] and a lunchtime workshop [latter two slides]. The former was based around my book, Inside Fatherhood, and… Read more
The Amazing Story Of How My Music Fanzine Made History
March 9, 2018It was 1994. I was a student on a postgraduate magazine journalism course in London with a project deadline. Step forward Heaven Up Here, a music fanzine I put together with two fellow students. We dreamed of jobs on Select magazine and loved getting on the guestlist for gigs at… Read more
Writing workshops: how to read magazines — and write for them
September 22, 2017If it’s Friday, then it’s a magazine masterclass in Chester. I ran the first in a series of new-style workshops today, hosted by Meltdown, in which we got to grips with some of the thorny issues of making it as a magazine journalist. Such as, you ask? Well, try signposting,… Read more
Tortoise Magazine writing workshop at the Good Life Experience
September 21, 2017A phone call out the blue. It was the nice people from Tortoise, Chester’s independent magazine. They had a stand at the Good Life Experience, the annual festival of, well, good life, taking over Hawarden for a weekend each September. And they were thinking of running some writing workshops to… Read more
A travel-writing masterclass at HiOA university, Oslo
September 15, 2017To Oslo then — thanks to an Erasmus exchange with a British university. After a week in the Norwegian capital, I learnt that photojournalism is alive and well in Scandinavia, you can buy a pint for less than £10 and knitting is actively encouraged in the front row of Nordic… Read more