Tag / Writing Forum

by Colette

October Editorial – A Return to Horror during “Scarefest” on Inkblots

Hey Inkblotters!

Returning after our September break, we’re back to bring you lots of fantastic content as part of our Halloween Scarefest. After a short break away to Austria, where I was unfortunate enough to be ill for half of it, it was nice to be back in the UK and ready to start afresh at work once again. Despite my time away from Inkblots, I was still busy and didn’t get much of a chance to recuperate in between different jobs. But, with that said, it’s nice to be back again writing the editorial for October.

Moving swiftly on, then, there are a number of changes currently taking place within the Inkwell forum. In what will be announced officially soon, we’re moving away from the writing forum platform and focusing solely on Inkblots Magazine. As it stands, the magazine is a great way to showcase the talents from many of our contributors and, we feel, it’s the best place to continue our little community. Unfortunately with my time stretched in multiple directions, I can now longer run the forum as I have been doing for the best part of two years. And with no one ready or willing to take that responsibility on, our writing forum must come to an end.

Of course, we aren’t just dropping it entirely. And for those who are members of the forum, they will be able to save all of their work before we archive everything completely. The official closure for The Inkwell forum is December 31, 2015. But until then, we’ll continue as a community on both the magazine and the writing forum.

Getting down to business, October’s content really gets us in the mood for a good old scare. Kicking off with our Scarefest content on the 5th is Dizzy Dazzle’s thrilling short on wolves, while on the 15th we’ve got a particularly interesting psychotic tale from Lockmaker entitled Mulberry Way. The short poetry spotlight is once again returning on the 25th, so don’t miss it, and we’ve also got returning contributor Alex McCarron and her short fictional piece, Morte Mare, penned in for prime time scaring on October 30th.

As our Fiction Frenzy competition ended back in August, I’ve taken the time to read through the entries and have finally crowned a winner. Check back on October 20th to see who won and to read their gruesome entry. Of course, I can’t end the editorial without mentioning our next Half Hour Challenge. Inspire yourself with a horror classic under the theme: The Devil Inside. As a fan of horror, I’m going to revel in reading your entries.

For now, I hope you have a fantastic October and I’ll be back in November for our Winter special issue.

– Colette, Inkblots Editor

Featured Image CC // Kevin Dooley

by Colette

Mag News: The Inkwell’s Big Move And Our New Email Address

belgian_waffles_toppings

My mouth is already in that half-watering saliva state. NOM. Image // Cybjorg

Hey Inkblotters,

We’ve got some pretty interesting news for our Inkblots readers and contributors, as well as some big changes happening over at our sister writing forum. But first, a quick update on content progression for the remainder of this year. As I’m currently acting as the sole editor for the magazine, with Lilith stepping in only occasionally as editor and mainly rummaging around behind the scenes, Inkblots content will be taking a break during September. But don’t worry, the break will only be for one month as I’m hoping to be scoffing my face full of local Belgium waffles for at least one week during the month.

Our next update is a pretty important one – our email address has changed! Yes, instead of contacting us at the long-ish creative writing email you’ve got stored in your inbox, you can now contact us at theinkwellwriting@gmail.com. All of the necessary pages have been updated, including the Submissions page and contact forum. We’ll be emailing all our external Inkblots contributors and forum writers our email address change, so no need to panic if you’ve just sent us an email to our old address.

Given our change in email address, we’ve also had some changes to our sister site, The Inkwell. We decided to purchase a domain name and instead of the long-ish (again) name that came with the forum, it’s now simply theinkwellwriting.com. If you’ve got the old one bookmarked, don’t fret as it does piggyback onto our new domain name. We’re still sorting the kinks out, but it’s all lovely and a PROPER writing forum. Hurrah!

Also, I’ll just quickly mention that the Fiction Frenzy is still happening until the end of August. If you wish to get an entry into us, we accept all external Inkblots contributor FF entries through email. Check out our newly updated submissions page for all the rules / guidelines.

Hope you’re having a scorcher of a Sunday. 🙂

– Silver, ‘Blots Editor

by Colette

The Inkwell

Written by Sparky 

book_igloo_home

A home for book lovers and writers; that’s our Inkwell.
Image Courtesy of thisiscolossal.com

“It seems so long ago now, when we started.” The scratching of the quill was the only sound in the room. I dipped the nib back in my inkwell and carried on. “There was only a few of us back then. A few like-minded people who had known each other for a few years by that point. We had moved from one forum to another. At first we only talked online, brought together by our singular love for one author. Evolving over time as we got to know each other more. We began to explore our own creative depths with each other. We had our own world there, we controlled what happened within it. It was subject almost entirely to our own rules. I say almost, we never had full power there, but it just seemed that way. We created stories with each other, cemented friendships both through the site and out in the real world. Relationships sprung up and faded away, but the friends we made there stayed. Such was the magic of that place; our Old Kingdom.

“Afterwards, we started to pave our own path and make our own world completely. A forum dedicated not just to one author but to our work, our stories. We made more friends during that stage of our journey, more writers brought together by our joint love of the written word. I remember many moments where we all celebrated each other’s achievements. From finishing stories to creating new ones, each new world enjoyed by all.”

I sat back, reading over my words, taking a small break. The history of my writing career was almost laid bare in front of me. Everything I had written had been seen by the people I had met through these places. Those friends were amongst the closest friends I had, the ones I trusted most. I took a sip of the sweet tea cooling next to me and carried on. Continue reading →