9th and 10th books of 2010

Bertie, May and Mrs Fish: Country Memories of Wartime by Xandra Bingley.

A memoir book I picked up in one of the charity shops on North End Rd. I got this one because most of it is set during WW2 / post WW2, about a girl growing up in the English countryside, and I'm trying to absorb details about this time period for the story I'm writing. This book has quite a different writing style to it - full of ellipses, no quotation marks, people's dialogue running into the text. I didn't like this book, to be honest, but I finished it. Mostly because I'm doing these blogposts about what I've read so I don't feel like I can drop a half-read book now!

The Art & Craft of Storytelling by Nancy Lamb

One of the books about writing that I selected for inspiration. Sadly, this book didn't quite kick it off for me. It feels super weird to say this, but it was too basic. I knew all the stuff she was writing about. I found myself skimming pages, skipping ahead. Still, it covers a good range of information and I may use chapters for reference when I go back to edit my current story. And I found a couple of quotes I liked. First from Nancy, the writer herself. She said "honour your art" (well, actually she said "honor your art"...) in a piece about making sure you write, if you want to be a writer. And I like that. If you have the call to write, then you need to honour that. It's the perfect concept.

The other was this quote from Eddy Peters about the English language: "Not only does the English Language borrow words from other languages, it sometimes chases them down dark alleys, hits them over the head, and goes through their pockets." It made me laugh.

A big fake foam shark!

This has been a strangely productive Wednesday after a couple of weeks of slackness on the writing front.

Tonight I made some minor edits to Piscky's Ascent, the short story I wrote in January. Then I renewed my membership the OWW (Online Writing Workshop for Sci-Fi) and posted the story for crits. I'm going to submit this story. Somewhere, not sure yet. Here's the thing: I've never submitted anything before. Apart from to writing competitions. But not anything for publication. And it's time to do something about that!

I'm going to get myself re-absorbed into the OWW and post some more crits of my own (only 2 more and I will attain "Veteran Reviewer" status!) I've been a member there, on and off, since 2001. Holy sardines, Batman! (I saw some of the original 1966 Batman movie tonight - I've never seen it before! - and it's just awful! I think it jumped the shark before the Fonze was even born - have you seen the foam-shark attack? It attacks Batman while he's hanging from the ladder of a helicopter. Luckily, Robin passes him a handy can of Shark-Repellent-Bat-Spray to ward off the shark, which falls off Batman's leg and then EXPLODES in the ocean. Yep.) Anyway, the workshop is brilliant and if you are an amateur writer in the sci-fi field I highly recommend it.

After the OWW sojurn, I added a few hundred words to In Finding and broke through the 60,000 word mark. A lot of the last 10 k words on that are crap but I need to write more of the story before I know how to go back and fix them. We.are.getting.there.slowly.

Sometimes the most frustrating thing about writing is just how slow it is. For me, at least. Knowing that I have to finish this first draft before I can even start editing, and that process will be lengthy enough too.

Then I played around with another short story that's been brewing since I dialled up some prompts on the story spinner. It doesn't feel as solid to me as Piscky's Ascent, but all short story experience is good experience.

Now, I'm going to publish this, brush my teeth, and settle down to read more of my latest book (Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse - a collection of short stories by some LEGENDARY writers - review will come when I finish it!)

Happy Saturday!

It's another beautiful weekend day in London. I'm super happy with the weather here lately. It's been so lush. Fingers crossed we finally get a decent summer. I personally think I deserve it after living here for almost 4 years without one... Today it's supposed to hit 21 degrees C. WOAH guys. The TWENTIES. That's big.

Duffster and I are off to a BBQ this afternoon at my friends' place. Typically for a bunch of Antipodeans, as soon as the sun comes out, we wheel out the BBQ. This is the second one of the season already! I have some steak pieces marinating on the bench, and we've been tasked with bringing cheese & crackers. We'll pick up some cider on the way and I hear there's Pimms on the cards too!

I am coming down with a cold though, boo! Why does that always happen on a Friday so you get sick on the weekend?! Hopefully I don't infect everyone else on this gawguss sunny afternoon...

Sunday it's Anzac Day - New Zealand & Australia's Poppy Day. Last year, we all went to the dawn service at the London memorials in Hyde Park. I'd love to go again this year, especially as it's on a weekend day again so you can get up early and observe then go back home and get back into bed! But because I'm not feeling so well I think I'll pass.


I'm glad I went last year though. It's a special and important day to respect. Maybe I'll make some Anzac biscuits on Sunday instead...

/photo from http://evanelam.photo-log.com

7th and 8th books for 2010

These next two books I have read this year are fiction novels that I felt drew a lot on each author's personal life and experiences.

The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

An Xmas gift from my sister-in-law, this is a Pulitzer-Prize winning story of a Dominican family, set in both New Jersey and Dominican Republic. My sister-in-law said I should read it with a Spanish phrasebook handy - wish I had! Colourful and easy-to-read and funny + sad, spanning stories from across the family including the title character Oscar, narrated by a friend of his sister. Oscar is this huge fat guy with a total love of sci-fi and comics and no game with the ladies. His sister is sharp-edged, kind of angry. Their mother - I felt so sorry for her, in a way that made me realise - wow, there's some great characters in this book. The author, Junot Diaz, is a Dominican whose family moved to NJ when he was a child.

Girls in Trucks by Katie Crouch

This book... this book is marketed as a novel but halfway through, I felt like I was actually reading a memoir. It's very memoir-ish, full of scenes from someone's life rather than having an actual storyline. And the author is from Charleston and raised to be a 'Camellia' (women's society member), just like the main character. It was a smooth read, concocting a lovely atmosphere of Southern upbringing and lifestyle and personality, but ended with what felt like a tacked-on ending at a point where the author just ran out of scenes. It read in a very real way, and I think that's what made it feel memoir-ish. All the characters and actions are real people things, making mistakes (again and again) and have real emotions and there's no happy sparkly ending. I got this book from one of the op-shops down North End Rd, and think I'll return it there too...

A random assortment of updates

I owe this sucker an update! Should have posted during Easter. So, the weather is just luscious in London at the moment. Full of light, blooming blue skies. Promise of warmer weather still on the MetOffice website. Love love love. You all know how much I hate the darkness and cold of winter.

The Duffster & I have booked plane tickets -- many, many tickets -- for Christmas and New Years: Nelson for the former, Melbourne for the latter! It's going to be a whirlwind trip of 3 weeks but I'm already hyped up about seeing my family again (it will be 2 years since my last visit), and drinking up some southern hemisphere sun, and all the stuff I raved about last time - fish & chips, L&P, jellytip ice cream, taking the boat out for fresh fish and mussels and oysters and scallops... Plus a trip to Melbourne where I will finally meet Duffy's family!

This week for my writing night, I skimmed back through the short story I wrote in January, Piscky's Ascent. Made a few edits here and there. Now I want to write another one -- short stories are a nice way to work on something different without completely distracting myself from the novel.

I'm going to use this wicked brainstormer wheel to uncover some story prompts RIGHT NOW!


You can click "random" to generate three things, or use your mouse to turn each disc. I just got the following: miracle / rotting / cubicle. Hmm.

I wrote Piscky's Ascent using Notwelshman's prompts of "fish" and "escaping". I love how you can build a story from just a few words, a few ideas. They are the pieces of string you pick up, you pull up, and as you pull they bring more ideas with them, till you have a whole ball of string in your hands, along with other useless metaphors. Stories are everywhere.