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Detox | Writing News

A highly detailed, sharp-focused image featuring a remote lighthouse.

It’s always nice to be able to share a piece of good news…

I attended the Scottish Association of Writers 2026 Conference last weekend, and was delighted to receive second place in the Constable Silver Stag competition for the general novel, judged by the fantastic Anne Hamilton.

‘Detox’, a novel I’ve been working on for some time, is pencilled in for being complete in early 2027, and it was fantastic to get some positive feedback on the draft and to know what I need to go and work on. The elevator pitch is as follows:

Abandoned and starving at a remote therapeutic lighthouse retreat, Becca must uncover the awful truth of her captivity before fear and betrayal tear her fellow survivors apart.

I shall keep working away at the drafts, but it was nice to hear that I might be on the right track in the meantime.

Thanks for reading folks. Recent short stories include ‘Shift‘ and ‘The End of the Day‘.

Matthew Richardson is a writer of short stories. His work has featured in Gold Dust magazine, Literally Stories, Close to the Bone, McStorytellers, Penny Shorts, Soft Cartel, Whatever Keeps the Lights On, Flashback Fiction, Cafelit, Best MicroFiction 2021, Writer’s Egg, Idle Ink, The Wild Word, Down in the Dirt, and Shooter magazine. He has a Professional Doctorate in Education. Matthew blogs at www.matthewjrichardson.com.

Sense of Community | Short Story

These flats were quite the thing when they were first built – waiting lists as long as your arm, polite enquiries with people whose cousins’ brothers worked at the council and might be able to put a word in. These flats were the place to be back ten – kids running up and down the hallways and in and out of each other’s houses. Everyone looking out for one another.

Of course, nothing stays the same for ever. People move on and people move out; at least, people moved out around Irene. The folks next door had a family, and once Tommy started working on the rigs, Sheila wanted something to show for looking after the kids herself. Out they went to Clarkston or Eaglesham or some other swanky place on the south side. Raymie and Mags left for the Costa del sol when his retirement money came through. There was talk of letters and twice-yearly visits, but apart from a postcard twice a year nothing came of it. Plenty had dies, of course. Irene had lost count of the funerals she had attended at the church down the road; she was on nodding terms with the minister despite not being a great believer herself, and knew what sandwiches to avoid at the funeral dos afterwards.

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