Hi! I’m Patsy Collins, aka ‘The Travelling Writer’ as I often work from a campervan wherever my stories are set. I’m a romantic novelist and short story writer. My short stories regularly appear in UK magazines as well as those in Ireland, Sweden and South Africa.
My debut novel Escape to the Country was first published after I won a writing competition. I’ve since published three more romances, A Year and a Day, Firestarter and Leave Nothing But Footprints. There’s also the slightly darker contemporary novel, Paint Me a Picture which is set in and around Portsmouth. For my most recent novel, Acting Like A Killer, I’ve turned to crime!
Twenty–one themed collections of my short stories are available, including a small free one. The themes include romance, family stories, those involving plants and gardens, ghost stories, crime, and tales about food, work and time.
I’ve had some success with writing competitions, resulting in prizes such as tea with the local mayor, a silver trophy, T-shirt, dinner in the House of Commons where my poem was performed, an e-reader, books, cheques, book tokens and pens and other appropriate goodies.
As well as fiction I sometimes write articles and books about writing. A Year Of Ideas: 365 sets of writing prompts and exercises is self descriptive. From Story Idea to Reader (co-written with Rosemary J. Kind) is an accessible guide to writing and publishing fiction.
Sometimes I present creative writing workshops, and give talks about and readings of my work in libraries and for groups. If you’d like to attend one of these, or book me for your group, please see the events page.
If you’d like to sign up to my occasional newsletter, and receive a free short story, you can do that here.
Patsy Collins 