Alison Wells Author

Head Above Water – Writing, Headspace, Creativity, Verve

Head Above Water Blog – Writing, Headspace, Creativity, Verve

  • Head Above Water Blog: My Debut short story collection Random Acts of Optimism released September 2023!

    Fantastic news: September publication of my debut short story collection! Readers of the Head above Water blog will have followed my story since 2009 of writing endeavours, resilience and persistence, shortlists and near misses. I have written alongside raising a family, challenging circumstances, a new job in public libraries and a Masters by night in…

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  • 42 The Meaning of Life…Flash Fiction Writing Competition!

    To celebrate the e-book launch of Housewife with a Half-Life on May 8th (paperback to follow) and my love of flash fiction I’m running a flash fiction writing competition. Since my space comedy book is a sort of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy in Suburbia and because by amazing coincidence(!) my current age is the…

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  • Housewife with a Half-Life: E-book Launch & Blog Splash May 8th!

    I’m delighted to announce that I’m going to launch the e-book of my first novel (as A.B.Wells) Housewife with a Half-Life on May 8th! HOUSEWIFE WITH A HALF-LIFE Susan Strong is a suburban housewife who is literally disintegrating. When, Fairly Dave, a kilt sporting spaceman arrives through the shower head to warn her, she knows things…

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  • The Alliance of Independent Authors: Inaugural Dublin Meeting 24th April

    The publishing world is changing with increasing challenges for publishers and authors alike. The traditional model faces the many challenges of sustainability, digital rights management, and in the case of smaller publishers survival itself. Some would argue that publishers, particularly among the Big 6 are risk averse, giving rise to homogeneity within the industry and…

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  • 5 things I did to make my self-published book brilliant

    The first thing I want to do is write. It’s essential, it’s non-negotiable. The next thing I want to do is share my writing with others. And that’s what I’ve been doing on this blog and through my submissions to anthologies and zines. Like many I’m still in the process of figuring out what’s the…

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  • Book of Hope Competition Win!

    I’m delighted to say that I’ve been chosen as the winner in the Fiction category of the Big Book of Hope Ebook  with my story Flashes of Entropy and Hope. This story was created out of a series of interrelated flashes I have written for a project in progress Flashes of Sadness and Light. My…

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  • Random Acts of Posting: April 15

    Here are some of my writing.ie posts that you may have missed in the last while. Enjoy! Historical Fiction: Hazel Gaynor’s Titanic Novel The Girl Who Came Home Hazel Gaynor explains the intricacies of writing historical fiction for her Titanic novel. Love: Writer & Journalist Lucille Redmond on her short story collection Writer and journalist…

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  • Lucky Seven: Seven lines from Housewife with a Half-Life

    I’ve been tagged by Jane Rusbridge and by Martha Williams as one of her authors in the Lucky Seven meme. It gives established and new writers a chance to showcase what they are working on. The instructions for Lucky 7 are: · Go to page 7 or 77 in your current manuscript · Go to…

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  • Self-Publishing pen name:Introducing A.B.Wells & Housewife with a Half-Life

    I’m becoming two people…         I’ve been writing consistently since my first son was born 11 years ago but even more seriously in the last number of years since the real baby days of my youngest child, now 4. From my early endeavours I have 1.75 novels in a drawer. In the…

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  • Writers: ditch your angst

    Writers, we’re special, we’re creative, artistic, we tap into the hum of the world that ordinary folk don’t. Hmm? We are struck by ideas, by the muse. We struggle and strain to manifest our gorgeous ideas into words that will astound, entertain, move. We’re reaching for something and sometimes we get there and we send…

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  • Flash fiction thoughts and A.J. Ashworth’s short stories

    Howdy. I’ve been putting myself about elsewhere today. On writing.ie I interview A.J. Ashworth whose wonderful short story collection Somewhere Else, Or Even Here won the Scott Prize and is now released by Salt Publishing. The collection is fabulous. Read more about it and A.J. Ashworths views on short stories here. I’ve also been pontificating…

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Welcome to my Head above Water blog! I’m Alison, writer, mother and public librarian with a background in Communication Studies and Psychology. I have a particular interest in creative resilience, motivation and how nature and wonder can restore us. In my day job I run book clubs and creative events for children and adults.

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