Betty
Betty Benjamin (w/a B Rutherford Benjamin) is a writer and public speaker, living in the North Island of New Zealand. An Australian by birth, she married a New Zealander and has lived in New Zealand for more than fifty years. Public Addresses and articles, children's stories, self-published Books of Prayers (3), and poetry have all been part of her writing life. |
Celia
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Chris
Chris has had articles and short stories published; a novel has been written and "longlisted" in a publisher's New Novels competition. Health problems mean that writing activities are now mostly online ventures, but have also highlighted the attractions of shorter literary forms : haiku and "flash-" or micro-fiction.
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Christine
Christine has been living in rural Normandy for sixteen years. She channelled her lifelong passion for literature and language into a teaching career and gradually developed a sideline as a writer of both short stories and articles on wide variety of subjects.
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Clare
Clare is a writer and holistic therapist, living and working in Kent. Her home is a medieval farmhouse, which she shares with her family and large menagerie. Her hobbies which include horse riding and spinning, happily leave little time for housework.
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David (group co-ordinator)
Following a period in France, he’s back in the UK – the mug-shot shows how life was in south-west France!
Retired after forty years of writing lesson plans, worksheets and reports dotted with benign euphemisms. Has had articles published in the Guardian and the Times Educational Supplement; and there are novels under the bed waiting to be discovered!
Hopes to return to stewarding the group when health permits it.
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| Dianne
Dianne lives with her husband near Whangarei in the North Island of NZ. She trained as a journalist (concentrating on feature writing) after raising four children and running a dairy farm with her husband. Dianne finds writing is easier on the back than lifting bales of hay and bobby calves, but suggests that the brain works equally as hard when it comes to writing!
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Geoff
Trained in physical theatre, Geoff toured Europe with various companies in the eighties. Having written countless sketches for expat community shows in Saudi Arabia, he’s now taking scriptwriting more seriously.
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| John
John has been writing for more than 20 years, mostly for his own amusement, but he has had some published articles. He also wrote a technical manual - long forgotten!
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Julie
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| Margaret
After working as a newspaper journalist for 20 years, Margaret became a freelance writer/editor. She now writes mostly fiction. Her short stories have been published in magazines in the UK and Australia.
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Margie
Margie lives in South Africa, having previously spent many years in the Turks & Caicos Islands, UK and USA. She has also travelled in China, New Zealand and Canada. She is a freelance writer/photographer and has had many articles and photographs published on wildlife, plants, gardening and nature conservation. |
| Olaf (acting group co-ordinator)
Olaf Chedzoy started his career at the hard logical edge of science, but has softened to qualitative rather than quantitative assessments. Led a writers' circle for 15 years, written over 60 short stories and articles, and has occasional publications, including one in the Daily Telegraph.
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Rosemary
Rosemary is a full time writer living in Belgium. In addition to writing for business publications, she writes short stories, poetry and is starting to write a novel.
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| Sally
After 15 years as a journalist at the BBC, Sally went freelance at the beginning of 2006 as a garden writer. She now writes on gardens and gardening for several national magazines and websites, and also enjoys writing fiction - though for fun rather than publication! |
Sue
I have been living in Shavington now for 12 years. This writing business sparked in to life about 6 years ago - the same time I joined Alpha! I am ashamed to say that I have not really done much though I have entered a couple of compettions. Currently doing the Writer's Bureau Comprehensive Writing Course which is taking longer than I thought. It is amazing that Alpha has been going for 6 years now.
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| Tara |
Zena |
