Climate Fiction Facebook group
This last post caused a flutter on Twitter which resulted in several climate fiction authors deciding to get together. There's safety in numbers.The best platform we could find was to set up a Facebook group. Not ideal since not everyone is on Facebook: apologies to Nick Green!
Nevertheless anyone who either considers themselves be writing fiction connected with climate change, or who even touches upon it in some of their work, is welcome to join.
The aim of the group is to share experience, marketing, information, etc. the members so far include, besides yours truly:
One of our first achievements has been to be offered an event at next May's Hay Festival debating Cli-Fi. The discussion will be chaired by Jane Davidson, former Welsh Environment Minister, and will include two other panellists besides myself:
- Saci Lloyd author of The Carbon Diaries
- George Marshall, author of Don't Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change.
This is very exciting because I have always wanted to be on a panel at the Hay Festival! The discussion will take place on May 22 at 5.30 p.m. We hope to see you there.
Welsh Branch of SCBWI
The second exciting development is a new incarnation of the Welsh branch of the Society for Children's Book Writers and Illustrators.
As many of you will know this fantastic organisation has been going for about a decade in the UK and has some very dynamic regional groups. I was a member of about 6 to 8 years ago at which time I tried to start a Welsh branch, but it fell apart because members were too far apart.
(As an aside, it gave rise to the Dragontongue blog, which eventually merged with this one).
With the advent of some new Welsh writers joining SCBWI there has recently been a new impetus to start a group. At the moment it is only seeming to reach a saturation point (this is the point of geographical density at which writers will deign to venture out of their studios and coalesce together in a mutually agreed venue) in the south of Wales. Writers and illustrators up north in gog-land will have to wait.
Those joining up so far and signed up to the Facebook page include:
Our first South Wales meeting will be this Saturday at 11 AM in Calon Cafe and Interiors, 2 Mansel Street, SA31 1QX Carmarthen. Anyone is welcome to attend. I'm looking forward to it.
We will also be meeting at 2pm on Sunday 29 March at the Cardiff Children's Literature Festival, which any of you might also like to attend, and where we will be joining up with Malachy Doyle who has a session at 5 PM.
As they say here, Croeso i Bawb!
David Thorpe is the author of clifi YA fantasy Stormteller and the SF dystopia Hybrids.