Dear readers, contributors, submitters and other friends,

Our 2020 newsletter ended with the line: ‘We wish safety and good health to all our readers and writers.’ When we wrote it, Covid-19 was a relatively new arrival, there were lockdowns worldwide and times were scary. Now we know so much more, not only about the disease, but also about the toll it has taken.

Our own lives have not been untouched by the virus, and this has led to delays in some of our projects, such as expansion of our site and the production of our first e-book, an anthology of stories that have appeared on the website and which we have recently completed editing. The proceeds from the e-book will be donated to a UK-based breast cancer charity and we hope to announce the book’s appearance on a well-known publishing platform in a matter of weeks. We are extremely grateful to all the writers who are taking part in this project, many of whom have had great success in the past year which saw a number of our contributors publish novels and many others doing well in writing competitions.

It’s a joy to see our old friends realise their dreams, just as it is a joy to see new names in our inbox all the time. Our monthly submissions have tripled over the last year and we are delighted that so many women write funny pieces and are happy to share them with the Funny Pearls readership. The latter is growing too, but we still have a long way to go and so we hope you will all continue to share the site with friends and family.

To health, fun and happiness!

Philippa and Mette
7th July 2021