McCaw Media

Tag: BBC Local Radio Writing Club

  • Short Fiction: The Melville

    My Nana had two mysterious things in her house – a locked cupboard and a ship in a bottle. I was never allowed to know what was in the cupboard, but I was allowed to look at the ship in a bottle, as long as I didn’t touch it. I spent hours staring at that…

  • Short Fiction: The Portrait

    So I says to Frankie, ‘How do I look Frankie?’ and he says, ‘Bellissima, doll, Bellissima!’ which me giggle, and I’m already like a cat with two tails because Frankie’s spent a cartload of money hiring that Leonardo da Vinci to do me portrait. He’s so generous, my Frankie. Anyway, it’d taken me a couple…

  • Memoir: Bikes

    Sometimes parents have to disappoint their children. And the younger you are when you are disappointed, the longer you have to brood about it and chew it over at family reunions. Take bikes. Dad would not let my brother and me have two-wheelers. Our terraced street which was a favourite haunt of driving instructors and…

  • Short Fiction: The Dealer

    Before he’s even opened his mouth I know what he wants. ‘Vinnie,’ I says to him. ‘I’ve told you before – it’s no good keep coming back, I ain’t got any and I can’t get me hands on any.’ ‘Have you tried—’ he starts. ‘I’ve tried everybody I knows and they’ve tried everybody they knows.…

  • Memoir poem: The Silence Of Saturday Teatime

    Every week my dad would write His Xs in the column: A ritual time-honoured, Almost sacred, always solemn. He diligently worked out – well, I say ‘worked out’, he guessed Which teams would win or lose or draw, Whose score would be the best. On Friday evening at the door The coupon man would be;…

  • Memoir: Windows

    The window I looked up to the sky through had a cracked pane, the result of my dad flailing a cardigan at an irritating bluebottle. The cardigan had a penny in the pocket – one of those big old heavy pre-decimalisation pennies, blackened and worn smooth through countless transactions in tills and endless jostling against…

  • Poem: Something Amiss in My Engine

    There was something amiss in my engine: a new water pump needed, I thought; I booked my car into the garage – for a service, a see-to and sort. The message came back from the garage: your water pump’s fine – working well – And your motor now waits on our forecourt, it’s running as…

  • Short Fiction: Digging The Allotment

    ‘COPS HUNT MISSING ARISTO’ read one of the more down-market headlines. Ella didn’t need a newspaper to let her know what the police were doing. They were on her allotment, trashing a year’s worth of growing and tending as they searched for a body. She watched, raging but helpless, as they ripped up sweetcorn, climbing…

  • Poem: Not An Inch Of Space

    My daughter’s bedroom’s full of toys – There’s not an inch of space. And so I thought I’d clear some out And give them to a place Of charity, where others might Then take them home for play And raise a bit of money for A good cause on the way.

  • Poem: Have A Look In The Chemist’s

    We don’t just do prescriptions – we’ve many other things – We’ve pick-me-ups and calm-me-downs, we’ve bandages and slings. There’s ointment for your skin, hay fever tablets by the score; Warming creams and cooling gels for muscles feeling sore. We’ve syrups and we’ve powders to help with ’flu and cough; Body-building pills if you can…