The Writers of Wales Database

WILD, SUSIE

Tel: 07896 304663
Email: susiewild@hotmail.com 
Websites: http://susiewild.blogspot.com/; http://twitter.com/Soozerama; www.goodreads.com/author/show/4607021.Susie_Wild; www.myspace.com/soozerama; www.brightyoungthings.info

Mslexia's 'Literary It Girl', writer, journalist, editor, poet and film-maker. Susie was born in Tooting, London in 1979 before heading further south to spend her childhood on the beaches of Devon and Cornwall. She moved to Wales to study Psychology at Swansea University in 1997. Working as a regular reporter for the student newspaper, Waterfront, as an undergraduate inspired a move to London in 2000 to study for an MA in Journalism at Goldsmith’s College. While studying she also worked on the Education Desk at the Guardian writing news and features for their websites and G2 supplements. Susie then worked as a journalist with youth advice website and charity TheSite.org; working her way up to channel editor over three years. She has freelanced for them ever since.

In 2004 Susie moved back to Wales and began editing Swansea’s glossy art magazine Platform. She ran the magazine for four years interviewing a wide range of writers, musicians and artists from Rachel Trezise, Niall Griffiths and Stevie Davies to Sue Williams, Glenys Cour and Richard Billingham. She has also worked as the film editor for Welsh lad mag Red Handed and long-standing news editor for the much-loved music magazine Kruger. A prolific freelance journalist, Susie now blogs as the Literary It Girl for Mslexia. She also writes and radio comments about music, arty things, wordsmiths, sex, drugs, yoof and homelessness and all sorts of other things for: Mslexia, New Welsh Review, Planet, Venue (Bristol and Bath), The Big Issue Cymru, Metro, Swn Magazine, Big Times (The National Lottery), Buzz, BBC Wales, The Western Mail, TheSite.org, Oculus, UK Parliament, RedHanded, The Spark, Cambria, Clash Magazine and ArtRocker.

Writing poetry and stories since childhood, and later, lyrics for her band Arthouse in London, her return to Wales was an attempt to reclaim some time for creativity. A flair for evening classes in fashion design almost led to a change of direction (setting up her own label) yet in the end it was writing that won out. A chance meeting with the poet and MA tutor Nigel Jenkins convinced her to apply to the MA in Creative Writing at Swansea University. She was awarded a bursary, and gained a distinction for her dissertation in longer fiction in 2008, under the careful eye of Stevie Davies. Parthian printed her story ‘Diving Lessons’ in their Nu: fiction & stuff anthology in 2009. The debut collection of short stories The Art of Contraception was published, also through Parthian, in September 2010. It won 'Fiction Book of the Year' in the Welsh Icons Awards 2010 and was Book of the Month in Buzz Magazine, October 2010. Susie is also on long-list for the 2011 Edge Hill Short Story Prize.

As a poet Susie performs regularly (The Crunch, First Thursday, Poets in the Bookshop, Blast House, Stuff Happens, Poetry on Tap, Floralia, Milgi, Radio 5 Live, Culture Cymru Stand Hay Festival 2010, The Big Read), has won a selection of small performance prizes, and been published in various magazines (Rising, Square etc.). She is a co-organiser of the Hay Poetry Jamboree (Salem Chapel, 3/4/5 June 2010) and the accompanying fundraiser The 24 Hour Poetry Marathon.

Susie is also a member of Swansea Film-makers Collective and has undertaken numerous courses with Undercurrents that mean she makes her own films and can train others to make, edit and screen films too. Susie’s debut short film, featuring her poem ‘Dim Smoking, Girls,’ won The Co-op Award for New Directors at Beyond TV Festival 2007.

In between her journalism endeavours Susie is currently working on a collection of poetry, her debut novel and a new short film. See www.myspace.com/soozerama for updates. She is a Member of The Welsh Academy.

Reviews:
With respect to Nu: fiction & stuff (Parthian, 2009):

"… 'Diving Lessons' by Susie Wild explores multiple points of view on a wet, drunken evening. Frustrated desires surface as a woman threatens to dive into a harbour, and there's a great deal of narrative achieved in a short work…"
New Welsh Review


With respect to The Art of Contraception (Parthian, 2010)

"...The watchword in this collection is variety, Wild approaching her subject from a diverse range of narrative voices, viewpoints and structures. Underpinning this literary ventriloquism, however, is the distinctive and unifying voice of Wild herself: amusingly quirky and darkly humorous, yet always ready to identify and sympathise with the loneliness and sense of loss that pervades the lives of her characters..."
Harri Roberts,Planet

"...Wild’s stories seem to have their core buried in the small things; those hidden behaviours we all try to keep secret – in the same way that Raymond Carver does. Veering from the purely observational into a strangely unnerving other-worldliness, these stories have at times a Lynchian (or even Twilight Zone) quality...The stories in this collection are all interesting and well constructed...the more you read the more you appreciate the tales."
Buzz Magazine

"...A talent for razor-sharp, satirical observation..."
Nigel Jenkins, Poet 

 
Selected Publications:
The Art of Contraception (Parthian, 2010)
Arrivals (Parthian/ Kindle Single, 2011)

Contributed to:
Nu: fiction & stuff (contributor) (Parthian, 2009)
Bugged... Writings from Overhearings (contributor) (CompletelyNovel.com, 2010)
Nu2: Memorable Firsts (contributor) (Parthian, 2011)

The Art of Contraception (Parthian, 2010)

Susie Wild’s debut collection of stories is a quirky mix in which tales of the fantastic and the everyday are told with inimitable style and flair.

The deranged cravings of a mum-to-be lead to the accidental poisoning of her co-worker in ‘Pica’. Rob holidays in his bathroom and dreams about his underage love interest in ‘Aquatic Life’. The poignant and subtle novella ‘Arrivals’ unfolds slowly, revealing a mother and daughter in opposite corners of the planet, both experiencing their own personal revelation.

Transvestites, Tamagotchi, egg cups, ex-landlords, memory blanks, bikinis, blue-haired pixies, pints and pubs all have their place in these unravellings of lust and love; join them under the covers.

Extract from ‘Aquatic Life’:

‘At school Rob hadn’t had any human friends. He’d quite liked the croaky toad in the pond at St Fagin’s Primary, and the biology teacher at sixth form, because she let him eat his lunch in the labs while reading illustrated science books about aquatic life. There he had washed away his loneliness with watery facts: sea lions do not mate for life; young male Steller’s sea lions, known as bachelors, remain isolated until they are large enough to compete with mature adult males for a territory. Unlike Rob’s dad.

Sylvie liked Rob because he let her talk – with her friends she couldn’t get a word in, well, rarely, and her parents would hate to know what she thought about all day long. It was hardly rocket science: boys, rock music, smoking, and escaping from said parents and their crappy town. As soon as she could. On a jet plane.

Sat in his bathtub, Rob was sweating. His heating was turned up to eleven – tropical – while a desk fan perched on the windowsill, pointing its meagre breeze at the quickly cooling bathwater to create gentle waves, but failing to produce his much-desired surf and spray. No relief. His thoughts were turning more feverish with the rising temperatures. He could feel his temper bubbling, a kettle about to boil. A phrase caught like a stuck record in the soundtrack of his torrid mind – I haven’t done anything wrong.’ 
 
To purchase this title from Bright Young Things, please click on the front cover

Eligible Writers on Tour subjects offered:

1. Read and discuss own work
2. Journalism discussion sessions, Q&A and workshops. Topics include: The art of blogging, news writing, feature writing, being a critic, interview skills, getting into journalism, producing your own fanzine or magazine, and freelance journalism
3. Creative writing workshops. Topics include: storytelling, writing the self, an introduction to poetry, love poetry, prose poetry, poetry games, and writing short stories
4. Online skills for writers of the digital age: getting to grips with social networking (Twitter, Facebook etc), the art of blogging, creating and updating a web profile, digital film-making
5. Performance workshops: performance poetry, reading your work to a live audience, and organising spoken word events

AGE RANGE: 10 - 18 years, adults
SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS: Vegetarian, performance space, PA for large audiences, overnight accommodation when necessary