A Cwmbran woman has published a collection of short stories where she brings “inanimate” objects to life.
Katy Wicks, 37, started to write “Inanimate Confessions: The Secret Lives of Silent Things: A Series of Dramatic Short Stories From Unlikely Sources” while travelling the world.
The collection includes “tales of joy, heartbreak, longing, and discovery” about items like her beach towel, the couch at the backpackers’ hostel where she lived, and the front door key she left at home in Croesyceiliog.
At 26 she flew out of the UK and spent four years travelling including two years working in Australia, long stays in Africa and New Zealand and short stays in the Pacific Islands.
Her first instinct was to start a travel book with “little bits about my journey. Somewhere to put that info that I could remember, not a journal, it was more about other people reading it. It was my experience noting things I was doing.
“Then while in New Zealand, I sat still for a long time. I’d come up with little stories that weren’t about people. It was quite a natural thing to come up with the personalities. So not so much about travel, more about imagination.”
This is how she started writing the short stories that became part of her first collection that’s just been published.
The former Croesyceiliog Comprensheive School pupil is a project manager with the Office of National Statistics. She’s currently writing a non-fiction self-help book.
This is how her short story collection is described:
“What if the objects around us could speak?
“From the shadows of forgotten drawers to the heart of bustling homes, everyday items have their own stories to tell – tales of joy, heartbreak, longing, and discovery.
“In this collection of short, dramatic stories, you’ll hear from a weary traveller longing for one last adventure, a hostel counsellor enduring the weight of human lives, and a seductive Frenchman revelling in his fleeting moments of glory.
“Told with wit, emotion, and unexpected twists, these stories blur the line between human experience and the quiet lives of the things we leave behind. Each narrator draws you into their world, their struggles and triumphs resonating with truths that are hauntingly familiar – until their story reveals their true identity. Inanimate Confessions will change the way you look at the objects around you. Because despite their silence, they have so much to say.
Buy Katy’s book
You can check out her book (available in paperback or as an ebook) here https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DNY8BX7C