Writing Beneath the Surface

At the glorious Finca El Cerrillo in March and June 2025, our theme was ‘writing beneath the surface’. We considered what this means to us, and how we can use the concept to make our writing deeper, more multi-layered, and richer perhaps.

Through visualisations and thought-showers, we explored how we could get beneath the surface of an idea – to dig deep and develop that idea into a story, a poem, or another piece of writing.

We thought about place and how we can connect characters to their environment; how we can get the most out of place and use it as an important element in our writing. And then we looked at characters themselves and considered ways in which we could get to know them better.

After a day off mid-week… some of us ventured into nearby Competa to look around the village and have lunch, some went to the seaside, and some stayed at the finca to relax, chill, maybe write some more…

We then discussed ways of getting our deeper writing on to the page, by using internal thought, for example, and self-image.

In our final morning session of the week, we considered symbolism and re-thought some well-worn clichés, as well as constructing a poem from associations connected with a certain emotion.

During the week. groups also created a collaborative piece, which were shared on our final day. There were some brilliant variations – including stories, flash fiction, a play, a song, a poem and more.

Both weeks were great fun. They included Spanish conversation with Keeley around the pool (in June) early morning pilates with Anju on the yoga deck, Elaine’s team quiz, Sheila’s lateral thinking, Rosemary and Catherine’s singing evening, and Keeley’s salsa dancing lesson. All optional of course, but all a fabulous addition to our weeks. Thank you all.

We enjoyed delicious meals at the finca and we also went out to some lovely restaurants in Canillas and Competa.

 

 

In March my new hardback of ‘The Italian Flame’ was published and Sue and Gordon and members of the writing group organised a celebration including a cake beautifully decorated by Gordon. What an amazing thing to do. It blew me away… 🙂

In June, we sadly said goodbye to Sue and Gordon Kind who have run the finca so magnificently for so many years and also given us ‘Gordon’s Desert Island Discs’ which we have so enjoyed.

But we are looking forward to meeting Donna and Jaime who will be taking on the business and we will be continuing our writing holiday with them. (And Sue and Gordon have promised to come back as day students…)

Roll on 2026….