Last month, Claire and Marjorie shared their tips and advice for running a successful writer in residence programme as part of a blog for the Scottish Book Trust’s digital events training for authors Industry Lab. This came following the success of Open Book’s own digital residency programme, which has been running as part of the Unbound programme since last spring. Our writers-in-residence have been creating brand new stories each month written especially for subscribers to our newsletter and Open Book’s group members. Each story is tailored to the theme that we are focussing on that month.
So far, Open Book’s digital residency programme has hosted Northern Irish author Jan Carson with her wonderfully witty postcard stories, and Brighton-based writer Alice Ash, who has intrigued and haunted readers with uncanny tales. Both authors have also taken part in a celebration event at the end of their residency, where they’ve met some of our readers and answered their questions. At the start of June 2021, we welcomed the fantastic Heather Parry – originally from South Yorkshire but now living in Glasgow – as our third writer in residence. We can’t wait to see what she’ll create for us!
You can read Claire and Marjorie’s tips and reflections on what they’ve learnt here: https://www.scottishbooktrust.com/articles/tips-for-running-a-digital-writer-residency
You can also read Jan Carson’s companion piece to this blog, reflecting on her own residency experiences: https://www.scottishbooktrust.com/articles/jan-carson-a-writers-tips-for-residencies
If you want to read the work of our previous writers-in-residence, you can find it here:
https://openbookreading.com/unbound/
