Anthology Selection

Neither of us realised how difficult a task this would be. So many good pieces, so many talented writers, and we wish we could have published every single response as a celebration of everyone’s generosity and commitment. But as that would have resulted in a volume twice the size of War and Peace we had to be practical!

As the original Messages were written as stand alone pieces, despite the links between them, we looked for an element of self containment; writing that did not necessarily depend on the posted message. We also focussed on closure, often one of the most difficult things to achieve in short fiction and poetry, and looked for endings that offered some kind of fulfilment, though not necessarily any firm resolution, and certainly not necessarily happy endings. And finally, we had to consider variety, and how the pieces worked all together.

Again, thank you to everyone who took part in ‘Your Messages’; all your names will appear in the book, regardless of whether your work has been chosen or not. And please be assured that every piece has been read by both of us very carefully indeed. Thank you for that.

We hope to ‘meet’ all of you again.

Sarah & Lynne