Hi !
I’m Richard Attree. Welcome to My Journal. I hope you enjoy my musings on the craft of writing, and the stories, experiences, insights and observations of my life here in las Islas Afortunadas (the “Fortunate Islands”, as the Canaries are called).
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An extract from my multi-timeline yet-to-be-published novel, ‘The Rhythm of Time’ received an Honorable Mention in the Writers of the Future Contest. READ MORE
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My bucket list is simple: to enjoy life as it happens, day by day, minute by minute—as Fred, our dog does. I think we can probably learn a lot from our furry Best Friends. READ MORE
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Any kind of writing success is like winning the lottery: rare as the proverbial rocking horse shit, so I’m sharing a few recent contest successes … READ MORE
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Yesterday was my 70th birthday. When I checked my emails I found a nice present: an email from Lorian Hemingway telling me my story, The Last Wave had won third prize in the Lorian Hemingway Short Story Competition. It could not be more serendipitous. The story is about ageing, and I received this good news READ MORE
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Yo Yo Mar is one of my heroes. His passion for music is inspirational. For the past few years I’ve been writing a novel with music as the theme, and this quote sums up what connects my three interlinked stories: “I have always been very curious, wondering, above all, what is it that makes us READ MORE
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I recently spent a week in hospital (hip replacement surgery). With time on my hands, there was plenty of stuff running through my head. I wanted to write some of it down (perhaps for the memoir that is, of course, a never ending work in progress.) But I wasn’t well prepared—no laptop, pad, or even READ MORE
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This is my tabla de inversión. I keep it in my writing room to stretch my back after too many hours sitting at my desk, staring out of the window (the view is temptingly distracting: Mt. Teide, the highest mountain in Spain and the second highest volcano in the world). It also gives me a READ MORE
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Tuesday, 24th March. My first visit to the supermarket since lockdown was imposed. My first time out of the house, except to take our dog, Gizmo, for a walk in the barranco behind us. My first contact with anybody except my wife, Nikki, for the past nine days (“contact” being a smile from a safe, READ MORE
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Monday, 16/03/2020. Here in El Médano, Tenerife, we have the army on the streets to enforce the Spanish government’s ‘Estado de Alarma’, imposed yesterday. Two days ago, I was on the ocean, windsurfing (El Médano is famously one of the best spots in the world). Yesterday, a couple of windsurfers ignored the lockdown. A few READ MORE
Richard Attree 