Sandra Harris Writes

WE’RE HAVING A HEATWAVE… BY SANDRA HARRIS. © I know I’m going to come across as grumpy and ungrateful now but I’m really not enjoying this heatwave. Ah, don’t be such an auld buzzkill, you might say. Surely be to God you’re happy for the first daycent (Oirish pronunciation) bit of sunshine we’ve had all year, you might say. Surely you don’t begrudge people a bit of relief from the unrelenting misery that’s been 2026 so far, with constant wars, spiralling grocery and electricity prices and the general breakdown of society that seemed to start with bloody COVID and will surely end with an apocalyptic style flood/earthquake/tsunami that sets us back about a bazillion years and forces us all into a hard reset for mankind, you might say. Well, of course I don’t begrudge people a bit of relief from the unrelenting misery that’s been 2026 so far, etc., etc. I know kids have been having a ball with their paddling pools, ice-creams and spontaneous, unscheduled trips to the beach instead...

  HOT GIRLS WANTED: TURNED ON. (2017) A NETFLIX DOCUMENTARY SERIES. PRODUCED BY JILL BAUER, RONNA GRADUS AND RASHIDA JONES. REVIEW BY SANDRA HARRIS. I literally couldn't wait to sit down and write this review, even though I'm nearly a decade late to the party and the show has been on Netflix for several years. This documentary series is a follow-up to the 2015 documentary film, Hot Girls Wanted, in which several young girls/women are interviewed about their lives as amateur porn actresses. They all live in a grotty bungalow with twenty-three-year-old Riley Reynolds, a porn agent, in North Miami Beach. Yes, they go to casting calls and shoot amateur porn movies, but there's an awful lot of sitting around bored on their phones in Riley's house and overall the life isn't as glamorous as it sounds. Riley, though not abusive, reminds me of nothing so much as a douche-baggy pimp, and his words (paraphrased by me as I remember them) live rent-free in my head: '...

EUROVISION 2026: AND THE WINNER IS... BY SANDRA HARRIS. Well, it's all over now for another year. And what's another year, lol. This year's Eurovision, held in Vienna, Austria, was probably one of the most controversial ever, due to the continued presence of Israel in the singing contest, but it seems to all have passed off without incident, thank God. Ireland was one of five countries who boycotted the competition this year because of Israel's participation- the others were Spain, Iceland, Slovenia and the Netherlands. RTE, Ireland's state broadcaster, didn't even show the competition on television last Saturday night, so I had to get my yearly fix of Eurosong from the BBC. Graham Norton was the Beeb's presenter for the night. He's Irish himself, but, like, he's owned by England now, lol. I wasn't particularly disappointed that Ireland wasn't in it, as we haven't had good entries for a few years now, not like the g...

  A BITTER WOMAN’S GUIDE TO WRITING. BY SANDRA HARRIS. 1.         Don’t bother with goals- you’ll never keep them anyway and you’ll only get depressed. 2.       Always wait for inspiration to strike before you write anything- there’s no point sitting staring at a blank screen twiddling your thumbs. Go on social media instead, see if inspiration strikes there. 3.       Don’t waste your time looking for writing ideas in nature or in observing other people. The ideas are already all in your own head- no outside input needed. 4.       Why bother reading anyone else’s books or writings? They’ll only confuse you and your own style will end up as an irritating hodge-podge of other people’s. Best to develop your own distinctive voice by staying away from other people’s. If you really must read something, try a celebrity magazine or, again, social media. 5.       Don’t waste your precious words on wh...

  HAVE A VERY IRISH CHRISTMAS. BY SANDRA HARRIS. © Ah, it’s that time of year again. Christmas is just around the corner and, to celebrate, I thought I’d share with you all a list of my favourite festive traditions. Bear in mind, they might be traditions I remember from my own long-distant childhood or ones I’ve created with my own kids over the years, but, either way, there’ll be a lot in here you’ll probably recognise. That’s because there’s something very special and particular about an Irish Christmas that every Irish person understands. We have our own way of ‘doing’ Christmas that mightn’t be all that materially different to the way other countries do it, but which, with a few tweaks, will be instantly recognisable to native Irish people as being intrinsically Irish. If for some reason an Irish person can’t get back to Ireland in time for ‘the Christmas,’ his or her relatives will go to great lengths to make sure they get a little bit of Ireland in the post well in ad...

ARE YOU GOING THROUGH A WRITING SLUMP? BY SANDRA HARRIS. © I’ve found myself writing a lot less lately and that’s unusual, as anyone who knows me well, even just from online, can confirm. I used to write nearly every day, opinion pieces, film reviews, works-in-progress, like novels and novellas, etcetera. I haven’t stopped writing altogether; I don’t think I could ever do that. But this year I’ve been writing a lot less, and I thought it might be helpful, not just to me but also to other writers, to explore some of the reasons why. It’s not so much a writer’s block, in which you have no idea what to write about next, it’s more of a writing slump in which I just don’t feel like writing much at the moment. Or, rather, I want to write, but the flesh is unwilling and the mind is weak too, lol. I’ve been writing consistently since 2009. I reached a milestone birthday and decided that, if I was going to be a writer as I’d always intended to be, I’d damn well better get a move on. I...