Tag Archives: Jack Remiel Cottrell

Interview with Jack Remiel Cottrell — Runner-up, Novella-in-Flash Award, 2018

Jack Remiel Cottrell is one of two runners-up chosen in the 2018 Bath Flash Fiction Novella-in-Flash award judged by Meg Pokrass Here he describes how his novella ‘Latter Day Saints’, published in our trio of winning novellas-in-flash In the Debris Field emerged from one single line which sparked his imagination and how he gets inspired from authors in many different genres and forms, including writers of ‘Twitter’ stories. We very much like his advice not to worry about what you are writing, or get hung up about different genres and making your novella fit under a ‘Literary’ label. Jack often writes in one of the most mesmerising locations we’ve heard about yet  the laundromat. We haven’t a picture of Jack in the laundromat, but we’ve included his note book and beer picture, his comment being “Are you really a writer if you don’t have a large stack of half-filled notebooks on your kitchen table? (Beer added for scale. Also for drinking.” In the second photograph taken by his writing teacher Kathryn Burnett, Jack can be seen “hunched over second from the left at the back, trying not to be distracted by the outside world.”

  • Will you give us a brief synopsis of your wonderful novella-in-flash, ‘Latter Day Saints’ for those who haven’t read it yet?
    A young man is attempting to find his patron saint, and in doing so meets a number of patron saints as they live in the 21st century.

  • At Bath Flash Fiction, we think ‘Latter Day Saints’ is a very inventive quest story. Can you tell us more about what sparked the idea to write it?
    I was 20 tabs deep in the mire of TVtropes.com when I came across something which prompted me to think of the line “It’s dark at the end of the universe.” If there’s one thing I love, it’s a good line. So I needed to find someone to say that line. I gave it to St Dominic, who is the patron saint of astronomers, who didn’t end up making the cut for the novella. From there, I wanted to explore the idea of patron saints in a modern setting. My narrator was initially supposed to be a reader proxy rather than a character. I wrote about three chapters before my writing group told me the narrator was actually the most interesting character, and they were right.

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In the Debris Field
Three Novellas-In-Flash

A collection of three flash fiction novellas from the second Bath Flash Fiction Award which demonstrate the range and scope of this exciting and innovative genre.

In the Debris Field by Luke Whisnant… chronicles the unconventional experiences of a male protagonist from childhood through middle-age. It is a breathtakingly imaginative study of the strangest ways family members will accidentally scar one another. Readers will relax and enjoy the ride, because they’re in the hands of a flash fiction master.
A Slow Boat To Finland by Victoria Melekian… in which we are not sure how a bereaved mother will recover after losing her toddler daughter in a car accident. Especially when the little girl’s heart saves another child. The strong and convincing writing will pull you right into this story and make you want to know what happens next.
Latter Day Saints by Jack Remiel Cottrell… is a highly inventive quest story. A young man tries to find answers about life and whether it is worth living, from his visits to ‘saints’. Flawed characters, the saints include a labourer, a celebrity, a taxi driver, a city business woman, a second-hand dealer, and an old and frail man. They sometimes help him, and often make him question more.”

—Meg Pokrass, writer, poet, editor, tutor. Author of Bird Envy, Damn Sure Right, The Dog Looks Happy Upside Down and Here, Where We Live and Alligators at Night.

196mm x 134mm, 112pp
Paperback ISBN 978-1-912095-61-2

£9.99 GBP Buy Now

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Novella-in-Flash 2018
About the Winners

Luke Whisnant
Winner

In the Debris Field

Luke Whisnant’s fiction, poetry, and nonfiction have been published in over 50 different journals and anthologies in the USA, the UK, France, and Portugal. He is the author of four books: two poetry chapbooks, Street and Above Floodstage; the story collection Down in the Flood; and a novel, Watching TV with the Red Chinese, made into an independent film in 2012. Whisnant is Professor of English at East Carolina University, and is a two-time winner of his department’s Excellence in Teaching Award. Since 2006 he has edited Tar River Poetry, a nationally ranked magazine of verse. His website is lukewhisnant.com
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