Storytime

I just spent a glorious few days away with a writerly bunch of folks. My writing group and I headed off to Sorrento for a writing retreat. It was a very typical wintry few days. We had wild winds (branches down and lights flickering), rain, lots of rain, very cold, hail, and more rain. But there were moments when the rain settled to a drizzle or an almost stop and we ventured out. The writing retreat is never a straight forward - go to your corners and write. NOW! There is the settling in period, the which room is yours, what's for dinner, how have you been etc but then there are the discussions. About life in general, but more specifically the writerly life. We discuss our goals and aims for the year, we chat about works in progress. We read and reread our work. We edit, we discuss. Sometimes we do find a corner of the kitchen table or set up on a chair in another room and write. It's amazing the stillness that comes over the house then. It's an ...

A few days ago I ran a writing workshop for children. Once again I was amazed at how creative and funny kids are. They love EVERYTHING  and think that ANYTHING can happen. I gave them a quick exercise to get their brains ticking in the right direction and then we were plotting and planning. We talked about the boring real life compared to the adventures found in stories. How you can escape life for a moment or thirty, how you can pretend to be anyone. We looked at a photo (an elderly gentleman with the most amazing lived in face) and they all got to write about him. His life, his family. They created jobs and homes, created his character. We did another exercise which involved two characters, a setting, two lines of dialogue and an ending. It was a fun game with many giggles as characters such as Chicken Nugget- out to get those that dare turn chickens into such things...were created. Then they began to write their stories. I gave them some things to think about. T...

As writers we should have an abundance of imagination...and more importantly, use it. As children we have so much imagination, often told too much, and we use it constantly. We dream and play and anything is possible. However we grow and are told not to be dreamers, to be realistic, to stop 'playing' and we use our imagination less and less. It's school holidays so it is program after program for us at the library. So far we've had a maker space which consists of putting out a table load of craft items and allowing the children to make what they could/ would. We had tubes of all sizes, aluminium foil, icy pole sticks, long sticks, feathers, patty pan papers, twine, pom poms, cotton balls, pipe cleaners, coloured paper, googly eyes and so much more. The children made puppets and rockets, rabbits and collage pictures, machine guns and kites, kaleidoscopes and binoculars, dolls and mobiles. It was so much fun. They can look at something and see so much more in...

To start the new year - 2019 - I thought I would share my A - Z of Writing. ACCOUNTABILITY Yep, there is no one else to blame. No matter what is happening around you or to you...if you want to write you will. Whether it's a few minutes here, ten minutes there...there is always some precious minutes you can use. It all depends on you. So before you blame anyone else for having NO TIME, look at yourself first. Too much phone, internet, television...put that time into your words. BALANCE Follows on from the above. There has to be a balance between family, friends, work and what life throws at us. But once again, we can moan and groan about it all..or do something about it. At times we will want to write, at other times we won't...accept it without the guilt and move on. CRITIQUE Find that perfect reader (or readers).  Someone you trust to tell you the truth. It's lovely if family/ friends tell you that 'it's the best thing I've ever read'. Great...

A few months ago I led a Memoir Writing workshop. It was during seniors week so the majority of attendees wanted to write their life stories.  Some wanted to share their childhoods, whether it was on an isolated farm or in another country. Some wanted to share snippets of their lives such as a two year work exchange program...just imagine walking into someone else's house and living there as if it were your own. And as we talked about these ideas, and wrote and workshopped I kept bringing up the idea that no matter what you were writing there should be a theme. An underlying idea behind the memoir...or any type of writing really. There should be something that ties the piece together. Gradually people began to understand and were soon offering up some ideas as to what others could use as this 'tie' for their piece of work. On the weekend I attended a beautiful country wedding. (My niece's and she looked stunning!) Just look at that backdrop...OMG.....what...

At the moment I'm running a writing group for kids. It's only for five weeks but boy am I having fun. Best thing, is that the kids are too! So far we've had a look at character, setting and plot. What the kids have produced have been so much fun. We do a lot of interactive work on the whiteboard (yes whiteboard)...with them offering up solutions to a plot problem...character descriptions....settings. (these photos have nothing to do with the writing club but wanted to share the lovely place we went to for Mother's Day lunch.... The Brass Razu bar)  Some of the children's writing has been amazing....there was the story about Miss Vicki and the T-Rex that roamed the library (the ending was quite sad).  The time traveller who had a time machine in her bedroom. The planet with the giant spider that devours souls. Another planet that had craters that took you to different places and even different times in history. Some of their insights so humorous. I showed ...

Last weekend I went away with my writing group for a retreat. And after all the preparation I had done in readiness (see last post), I was more than eager to get there and get thinking. Every time I go away with this group of writers, I am amazed at how little  much I achieve. Usually I do a lot of walking. After all, isn't that meant to help the creative cogs churn? Some may call it procrastination but I call it 'clearing the head'. Most retreats I do a LOT of 'clearing the head.' But as I was so prepared this time, I actually got a lot done. You may notice pad and pen at the ready. And if you zoom in it actually says 'we solve the world's problems, one sip at a time.' Not that there was a lot of drinking done... This was at a lovely restaurant where we went to help celebrate two milestone birthdays. The food divine...and afterwards a nice 'clearing the head' along the pier. It wasn't all sunshine and clear skies....ther...

I have this story, it's a good story and I think it has a chance at publication. A friend of a friend mentions a publication is looking for stories...aha...time for my first submission for the year. First step is to find my story. I had saved it...of course I have saved it. But alas not by title. Ten minutes of searching and mild panic and it is found. Next step...now to the internet to make sure that said publication is still looking for stories. Forty minutes later, and much getting lost down the rabbit hole that is the internet (so many simple clicks can take you to so many places) and I have found that yes they are. So back to story. I check the word limit. Hmmmm...it is over by 85 words. Will they notice? I suppose they will. Time for a bit of tweaking. Subtle moving of words and taking away anything that doesn't work. Seventy five minutes later I have the story just below the word limit. Great. Time to send but wait.... Check that I'm meeting all...

It's that crazy pre-Christmas time when all of our groups call it an end for the year. My writing group, Lazy River Writers   meet at the end of the month so last weekend was our Christmas break up. Celebrating Christmas in November does seem strange, but trying to find another date, that doesn't clash with children / work / social activities is near impossible. You should see us try to plan a writing retreat! It is always a fun day. We lunch..we chat....we celebrate the fact that we are friends as well as writers. Serious business does get done. If I recall correctly, this happened about four and a half hours after we got together...but some things can't be rushed. Being the last meeting for the year, we had to plan the dates for the coming year, 2017. And as I work a lot of weekends, this lovely group of writers, always move things around to accommodate this. We tweak the set dates...find venues if our usual local library is unavailable (we do clash wi...