the writer is a lonely hunter

As with many of the authors I’ve interviewed on The Writer is a Lonely Hunter, Alice and I first met on social media. We both commented on Tweets from the Women Writers Network account, and as I became more aware of Alice through her online presence, it was a delight to realise we had things in common including projects coming to fruition in July. While you don’t need to know anything more about The Secret Life of Carolyn Russell, I’m pleased to introduce Alice and her outstanding short story collection, The Truth Has Arms and Legs which will be released by Fly On The Wall Press on Friday 14 July 2023.

About Alice

Alice Fowler is an award-winning writer of short stories and longer fiction. She won the Historical Writers’ Association short story competition in 2020 and the Wells Festival of Literature short story competition in 2021. Other stories have been short- and long-listed in prizes and printed in anthologies. Her historical novel was longlisted for the 2021 Stylist Feminist Fiction Prize.

Alice has a degree in Human Sciences from Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford and worked as a national print journalist until 2006.

She lives in Surrey with her husband and teenage sons, and loves theatre, tennis and walking in the Surrey Hills.

About The Truth Has Arms And Legs

Delve into a world of change and reinvention. Where relationships are as delicate as turtle eggs, and just as easily smashed.

This poignant short story collection explores pivotal moments that transform our lives. Jenny, whose life is defined by small disasters, discovers a more generous version of herself. A traveller girl might just win her race and alter her life’s course. A widow, cut off in a riverside backwater, opens her heart to a stranger.

In this captivating collection, readers will be moved by the raw vulnerability of human connection, and the resilience that enables us to grow and thrive. In change, Alice Fowler’s characters find the ability to be truly free.

Q&A

The About Alice page on your website says you write short stories and longer fiction including work on a historical novel. What are the benefits of writing both short form and long pieces? Is your process for writing short fiction and longer fiction different? 

Thanks so much for having me on your blog Gail! I particularly like this question as it really makes me think about my writing process. When I begin a short story, I often don’t know where it will end up. Or, if I do have an idea of the ending, I certainly don’t know how I’ll get there. I really enjoy that feeling of discovery. When it’s going well, writing can feel like painting: you add a dab of this colour, and a dab of that one, and then stand back to judge the overall effect.

For me, this approach works very well for short stories precisely because they’re short. You can throw all the plates up in the air and then (hopefully) catch them again. I write my stories from a place of pleasure, and I hope that readers sense that as they read.

With novel writing, this ‘pantser’ approach is riskier. I still like to write this way when I can, but it sometimes sends me off into blind alleys. Ideally when I begin a chapter in my novel I have more of plan – and stick to it! – while leaving enough unknown to make the writing process fun and interesting.