On Easter Monday I was shaken and very sad to hear that John Brantingham had suddenly died.

John had been involved with Bath Flash Fiction projects since 2018, when he wrote to me to ask if he, along with his friend and colleague Grant Hier, could present a workshop at the Flash Fiction Festival. At that time, he was Professor of Creative Writing at Mt. San Antonio College (Walnut, California).Their credentials were amazing, and I loved the sound of their workshop, called ‘Extraordinary Points of View’. It made a great impact when they ran it at the festival that year.

Writer, Karen Jones, one of our team members at the festival reminded us that John also helped out with festival tasks, like putting books in tote bags. Here’s a picture of him relaxing at the festival bar with Karen and writer Robert Barratt.
 
In subsequent years, John returned to run workshops about nature writing in flash. 
Novelist and flash fiction writer Damhnait Monaghan attended John’s workshops , and writes:

“I was privileged to attend two of John’s workshops at the FFF. He was a lovely, generous man. I left these workshops examining the world and my place within it more closely, more personally, more radically. My workshop notes are full of inspirational quotes. In tribute to John I share a few. 

From 2018, in the workshop he ran with Grant Hier: 

“Try to live in state of radical amazement.”
“Be a keen observer of the world.”
When writing flash, “cut straight to the humanity of your character.”

From 2024

“I am part of a large cosmic experiment.”
“Fight against the middle vision.”
“To write about nature, you don’t have to know how to look, but how to watch.”

We love these statements. They sum up John’s attitude to life. Damhnait reviewed, on this website in 2019 , Californian Continuum, by John and Grant. With his wife Ann, John also created Kitkitdizzi, an exquisite non-linear memoir set in the Sequoia and Kings National Parks. John wrote the prose and Ann illustrated it with her nature drawings.

John’s many other published works are listed on his website. His novella Inland Empire Afternoon was a runner up in our 2019 Bath Novella in Flash Award, selected by judge Michael Loveday and published by Ad Hoc Fiction in early 2020. The novella tells what is happening to over 40 different people on the afternoon when an earthquake struck in an area of California called The Inland Empire. This book, like all John’s writing, shows his great humanity. You can read what Michael says it about it on the Ad Hoc Fiction bookshop page. Though out of stock in paperback from Ad Hoc, you can obtain the ebook from Amazon. 

In 2023 and 2024 John was the judge of the Bath Novella in Flash Award. The photo here shows him in the bookshop with UK writer, Anna Wang, a runner up in 2023 for her novella Prodigal. After awarding first prize to Sarah Freligh’s novella, Hereafter, there was a special moment when John introduced her at its 2024 festival launch.

John sent us many encouraging and insightful comments about the long-listed novellas in the two years he judged the Award. He helped writers from both the short and the longlists get their novellas published with Aroyo Seco Press including Karen Jones, Diane Simmons and Cath Barton. John planned to publish novellas himself, with the Radical Wonder Press he founded earlier in 2026. He only recently re-launched his Journal of Radical Wonder with a first issue at the end of March. 

I had asked John to judge the single Bath Flash Fiction award this year, but postponed it from February to October because of his upcoming heart operation. I interviewed him about his work, and his ideas on what makes a winning flash. This is a must read .

On a personal level, I was honoured to have John publish my work in a previous incarnation of his Journal of Radical Wonder. He also wrote a lovely blurb for my collection,Clearly Defined Clouds. For the past three and a half years he had regular long exchanges online with John Wheway, my husband, about their poetry writing, and was helping him to form a new collection. John Brantingham was generous and kind to a rare degree. It is hard to find ourselves now without him.

At the 2018 workshop, it was Grant Hier who said ,
“‘Every act is your legacy, moment by moment, whether recorded or not.’ 
And what a legacy John Brantingham left.

We offer our deepest condolences to John’s wife Ann, and to their daughter, Shaymaa.

Jude Higgins
April 11th 2026