I've always found short stories to be slippery little things. I rarely feel satisfied when I read them, and this feeling only intensifies when I write them. But I suspect that's the point; a shorter word count, and a more economical usage of language, and there is usually more leg-work on the part of the reader (and writer). A short story constitutes the ingredients for a meal, and the reader has to work out the recipe. Or something like that.
So when Comma Press got in touch, inviting me to contribute a short story about an aspect of my adopted home city for the forthcoming Book of Manchester, I said yes. Despite all my fears about the short story, this was an opportunity-and-a-half. I'd read the Book of Birmingham and the Book of Sheffield, and now Comma were turning their eyes onto their own city. I had to say yes.
But it weighed heavily: I had so much to say about Manchester, but did I have the right to say it? I might have lived here longer than anywhere else, including my hometown, but I still speak like a southerner, even though 'ginnel' has become part of my everyday tongue. And what the hell would I write about?
Well, a weekend at Gladstone's Library with one of my oldest, bestest friends sorted that out, and I returned home with a very rough draft of a story that later became 'Shock City'. It's out in the Book of Manchester next week and I'm also one of the speakers, alongside Okechukwu Nzelu and Tom Benn, at the launch event at Contact Theatre, Saturday 12 October, as part of Manchester Literature Festival.
If you want to read a little more about the origins of the story, you can read my blog on the Comma site here. Let me know what you think.
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