As I put my Pictish manuscript in a box to wait for someone to want to buy it, I head off on a new adventure.
Book Two, Raven Sword (working title) in “The Stone of Destiny” trilogy, sees my reluctant time traveller smack bang in the midst of Viking Scotland. I’m busy collecting pretty pictures to inspire; reading novels, text books, blogs and dedicated websites. Awesome fun. You may remember reader, how much I love researching.
Beyond that, I am working on the plot, sorting inciting incidents from character development to narrative arcs. Exciting times.
There is something about starting a new story, it’s like heading on a journey. I work out a destination, plan the route, pack supplies and become breathless with excitement. Because, I know, beyond a doubt that my journey will deviate from my intended path, and possibly even find a new destination. It will be fun, frustrating, exhilarating and exhausting.
A year from now, if I’m disciplined, I will have a wonderful addition to my writing portfolio. Who knows, I may even find a home for my writing and you will be able to pick up a paperback with my name emblazoned along the spine.
My year is going to full of adventure, some writing related and some other stuff. We’re off to Vanuatu in May and then I’m heading to the Historical Novel Society Conference in Oxford this September. I also plan to write Raven Sword, and finishing my Australian Historical, but that’s another story.
So, that’s my 2016 sorted. What plans do you have for the coming year? Are you too going to be writing, or do you have some other adventure in mind?
One thing that I love about having a crazy topsy turvy life is that everything that happens is grist for the mill!
I’ve lived on a sheep station, I’ve travelled and lived out west. I’ve been through bush fires, and floods. Each and every experience has given me an insight into how my characters might handle various situations.
After all, historical fiction or not, people are people and mostly people react emotionally to situations.
Recently we’ve had an unusual weather system hit and much of the area was crippled due to category 2 cyclone conditions, flash flooding and heavy rain. It hit close to home when my sister’s property was flooded.
Used with permission.
I have no idea how many horses, cattle, dogs, cats and other pets were lost in the flood waters. There were several deaths and many dangerous situations. These floods aren’t unusual in themselves, its just that the folk who live in town are less effected by the weather. This storm that lasted days, has impacted tens of thousands of homes and properties. Many of the effected were town dwellers, where water and power supplies were disrupted for days. Phone service was limited and staying in contact was difficult. This really hits home when you can’t contact people who may or may not be in danger.
In my current WIP (work in progress) I have my MC (main character) battling the elements as she takes on the responsibility of running her father’s property on the newly colonised Hunter River. There are fires, bushrangers, natives, and of course floods.
I’ve made use of 1830’s diaries and journals to get a sense of place and time, and have already written of a flood that decimated crops and livestock. Now, having been through this natural disaster, and experienced the devastation first hand I have more scope for my writing. The above is a picture of my husband (standing in the water) and my sister’s brother in law going by boat to “rescue” my brother in law and nephew from their stranded and water logged house; and taking hay to cattle on tiny islands of high ground and seeing floating dead cows, I have so much more to add to my story. A part of me feels that using this experience is a little off. Like ambulance chasing, but on the other hand, I hope this last week or so can add a depth of reality to my writing.
Sometimes a writer must delve into the darker side of life. We examine the hard stuff. Sometimes we write about the things that make us cry, and sometimes if feels like we can hardly express it.
I like to read the hard stuff, to delve into the real thing. When you read or write, do you like to go into the dark places? Do you like a story with the hardships laid out, or do you prefer a more romantic view of life?
Here we are reader, almost half way through January 2015 and I have to say my life has been hectic since I finished NaNoWriMo in November. Most of December was taken up with preparing for an audit for our business. With new laws and expectations, I ended up needing to rewrite our entire business policies and procedures as well as implementing a lot of new strategies. The audit was the week before Christmas and we passed with flying colours. So then it was time to get ready for Christmas. Shopping, cooking, present wrapping and cleaning.
We made it through the week between Christmas and New year with little to do and prepared to enjoy the break. I started back into my daily work schedule, decided to paint the interior of our house, started painting, it was all looking good.
Before
After
And then the MOTT had a heart attack.
After the angiogram
As you can imagine, this has taken it’s toll on Miss Muse, she took off and hid in the archive box and wouldn’t come out. So I spent a good majority of the last 2 weeks at hospitals, doctors offices and trying not to freak out. MOTT is fine, out of hospital and preparing to annoy me for the next 8 weeks until he is cleared to resume driving a commercial vehicle.
But, I am taking the opportunity to write while he is running the phones and chasing loads. I need to write a minimum of 30K in the remainder of January, so I can get my ms to Felicity Pulman for her perusal. After being fortunate enough to win a mentorship with the awesome author of “A Ring Through Time”, “The Shalott” Trilogy not to mention the “Janna Mysteries” and her latest release “I, Morgana”, I certainly did not want to blow the opportunity. So from now on reader, I will be writing like a wild thing.
If all goes well, I’ll share a snippet with you soon. So enough about me, what have you been up to? Have you ever read any of Felicity’s books? What did you think? I loved the “Shalott” series, and have “I, Morgana” on the top of the pile beside my bed.
Reader, NaNoWriMo has been a really hard slog for me this year.
After returning from our wonderful trip to the UK, a month away from the pressures of my day job, where my focus was almost totally on my writing, I came back to a back log of work plus a few horrid surprises.
I won’t belabour the pity party I indulged in, suffice to say I got stuck in and caught up during October and did a fair amount of research and preparation to begin the umpteenth rewrite of my first YA novel, “Castle Quest” book 1. I was hanging to start, could not wait for the freedom of November. I had managed to get myself sorted to be able to nano without too much in the way of distractions.
Or so I thought.
Our business has an accreditation that requires an audit every 2 years, but it isn’t due until February, so it wasn’t likely to interfere with nano. Right? Wrong. The auditor paid us a nice little introductory visit to say hi and have a quick look at where we are at. And proceeded to tear my little complacent world down around my ears. Suddenly I had a work load that I couldn’t jump over and the audit was booked for the 18th of December not in February as I’d expected. So instead of having a month cleared for writing, I now had a six week to write policies and procedures and implement a million additional processes to our accreditation model. To say I wasn’t happy was a bit of an understatement.
Stubborn thing that I am, I thought I could still write. After all, I write early in the morning, so I’d write creatively in the early morning, and write business policies after that.
Now this is where things started going awry. I have a bit of trouble jumping from one to the other. So when I had time to write, I found myself thinking about the “verification of on board air scales for individual axle groupings”. When I was supposed to be writing the procedure for fault reporting and subsequent closing out of the fault, I was imagining walking along the Scottish coast, high on the sloping cliff tops, with the water oozing from the earth with each step.
It has been an enlightening time. I’ve learned a great deal about myself. One of these is that I can write rather good business documents, the second and most important is that I struggle to stay in the “stream of consciousness” that I need to be in to write. When I am constantly pulled out of my story I find it really hard to remember what was happening prior to the interruption. That’s ok, I can reread the previous scene and get back up to speed. Well most of the time I can. But as I became more stressed I found it progressively harder to find my characters motivation for their actions. So I’d read back over something and feel as if it was written in a foreign language and that it had little to nothing to do with me.
It is a hard thing to explain, but to lose that fragile gossamer thread can be soul destroying for me. I need to keep momentum up when I write a first draft, that’s why I nano. Not for a 50K word count, but for the motivation and momentum. To keep myself heading down the same path as my characters and to keep everyone heading in the same direction. That’s why, when I am pulled away and distracted, I come back wondering who is who and why they are doing what they are doing.
And so NaNoWriMo is finished. It’s the first day of December, I have made the 50K, some of which needs a major fix up, but I made it. The story is not done, the first draft isn’t even finished, but thank heavens Nano is.
So did you attempt NaNoWriMo? Do you like or loathe the 50K in 30 days concept? Did you win? Is it worth it? I know for me, the time set to get the first draft done is as important as a motivator as it is a generator of the actual words, but when life has it’s way, NaNoWriMo, can be totally ugly. Will I do it again? Yep, I think I probably will.
In my story, The Kelpie King, my protagonist Jack Perry follows a strangely dressed girl into a castle ruin and emerged to find himself in a Pictish village around the time of the introduction of Christianity.
Aberlemno, Angus.
Wow, what an undertaking reader. Sometimes, often, I wonder what on earth was I thinking when I decided to do this. But, I love the story, and love researching the Picts. There is so much to learn, but I find it absolutely fascinating. The trouble is knowing when enough is enough.
So I’ve started with iron age Scotland and the end of the Picts. We know the Picts used and re-used old fortresses.
I’ve been to Sydney to collect and read a book called “The problem of the Picts” edited by TF Wainwright. Photocopied “Picts” by Anna Ritchie.
My research into the Picts and their lives had to begin with where and how they lived, hence the brochs.
Interior of Dun Troddan
Imagine sailing into a wide bay and seeing a huge dark stone round tower on a cliff top. The structure stands about ten metre high and almost as wide. What would this say to those approaching the land.
To me it would say they were strong, intelligent and protected. Powerful and astute.
Dun Troddan
Drystone buildings of this size are something to behold, the precision of the stones, the smooth sloping circular walls that were built side by side to form a double skinned structure with stairways spiralling up between the two walls are a sight to behold. I stood inside those walls and imagined. I climbed to the top. This reader, is something worthy of note as I am very very afraid of heights. I am known to not even stand on a chair! Dave took photos of me on the top of Dun Beag on Skye because he could not believe I would ignore my fears and climb to examine every angle and detail I could on these magnificent structures.
Entrance
The broch has a small entrance with quite a long low tunnel to duck through, one one side there is usually a small chamber, known as a guard chamber. The tunnel opens up into a wide open floor that usually had a hearth in the centre and often a well of some kind too. The inhabitants could stay safely inside for extended periods in both times of bad weather or attack. An opening on the far side would lead to another chamber built into the wall and a stone staircase curving up inside the wall. The stone steps had the dual role of tying the inner and outer walls together.
Guards chamber
Cross section of the inner and outer walls
Steps and upper floor of the chamber between the walls
Examining just a few of the brochs at close quarters was something I’m not likely to ever forget, and I can’t wait to begin writing about Jack and his take on prehistoric life.
Are you interested in history? Have you ever, like me, found yourself caught up in imagining what it would be like to have lived in a different era? Please share, I like to know I’m not alone.
Reader, I’ve been researching prehistory and early history in Scotland in an attempt to make sure my story is as historically accurate as possible when one is writing a story set in the Dark Ages. Dark as in there is little known, so therefore the era is shrouded in mystery and made up stuff.
The journey that began almost ten years ago when I wanted to write a story set in a castle because I loved the TV series “Monarch of the Glen”. This interest set me on a path that has been exciting and frustrating in equal parts.
Ardverikie Estate was used as the setting for Glenbogle in Monarch of the Glen
As you know, I recently attended a writing retreat/course in the Cotswolds with Kate Forsyth and as we shared our current WIP with the group I was distinctly uncomfortable when I had to admit that my story was set in a parallel world because I wanted to mash three historic periods together. My bad! And it wasn’t overlooked by our esteemed tutor. Kate pulled me up short and reminded me that most people don’t learn their history via non-fiction, but rather through fiction, and so we, as authors were obligated to “get it right”. Sigh.
I knew she was right, and if I’m honest with myself, I’d known it all along, hence my inability to get the story finished.
So now, I am on mission to write not one, but three linked stories that will cover the three separate time periods that I was attempting to combine. And you know what reader? It’s ok, because I’ve researched all three periods anyway. So now I am in the process of pulling all the relevant bits out of the first draft and rewriting the first book in the way it should have been done in the first place. Because we all know that there are no short cuts or free lunches.
Which leads me to tell you about brochs.
Brochs. What is a broch I hear you say? Well it’s a very early Scottish version of a castle. Wikipedia says this:
“A broch is an Iron Age drystone hollow-walled structure of a type found only in Scotland. Brochs include some of the most sophisticated examples of drystone architecture ever created.”
A broch was a status symbol, a defensive structure and a home. And in my story it is all three.
While we were in Scotland, Dave and I went broch hunting and had heaps of fun scrambling all over every one we located. I’ve climbed over the ruins of one in Carn Liath Broch near Golspie; walked for miles through fields to find one at Dunbeath; drove all over Skye to find one of the many there; drove through the twilight to find the two at Glenelg. Visiting Dun Telve and Dun Troddan just on dark was beautiful, atmospheric and more than a little bit special.
Carn Liath, Golspie. Outside the remains of a my first broch.
Dun Beag Broch, Isle of Skye.
Dun Telve Broch, Glenelg Dave standing inside for scale
Dun Troddan Broch, Glenelg
We visited more, but I can’t find the photos 😦 I find these wonderful examples of prehistoric architecture fascinating and have lots more to share, but I’ll have to save something for next time. So, stay tuned.
Does prehistory fascinate you? Do you ever wonder what it would have been like to live in a place like these? Have you visited any of these or like these? Or even would like to one day? Please share, as I’d love to know. I might even have to pick your brain for details, it’s all research after all.
Reader, I keep promising myself to get back to blogging regularly, and yet here we are again and it’s been ages. I’m not going to check how long as it will just send me off on a tangent that, in turn, won’t get a blog written.
So to bring you up to speed, I’ve been a bit busy.
Packing
August saw the big count down to the long, long, long awaited trip to the UK. Since 2005 I’ve been trying to write “Castle Quest” and could never really get it finished as it was set in Scotland. So what you say? Well, I’d never been to Scotland, so how could I write about it realistically? In short, I couldn’t. I had several attempts at saving, and each time was unsuccessful for a variety of reasons, but this year was different.
You may remember reader that I attended a weekend writing course with Kate Forsyth last year in Sydney? Well here’s the link to Kate and the Australian Writer’s Centre. At the course, called History, Mystery and Magic, we had a wonderful time, but Kate told us of a course she was going to be running in the following September in the Cotswolds, England. How lovely, I thought.
The Lygon Arms, Broadway, The Cotswolds
Well somehow, Kate convinced my darling husband that I should go, so I booked in and paid a deposit and then I panicked! I had a lot of money to save and I’d committed to going to the other side of the globe on my own! ON MY OWN.
Lygon Arms
Thankfully, Dave decided to meet me for the second half of my trip and so we went to Scotland together. It was the honeymoon we’d never had, well sort of. For me it was a research trip with my own personal chauffeur and sounding board.
The highlight of my trip was . . . well the whole thing actually, but as far as my writing was concerned it was visiting the setting of my story, Castle Sinclair Girnigoe, near Wick in Caithness Scotland.
Hello again reader, I’m trying to get back into the groove of a routine and it’s only taken me almost 4 months. No sense in rushing these things.
Today I’d like to chat about editing and where that can take you; the things it can lead you to do.
For instance, trying to describe the way someone’s face looks and expression changes when they are surprised. Yes reader, I do pretend and then scribble down the results.
Sometimes, ok – most of the time, I find myself so busy examining facial & body movement and reactions on the telly or while I’m out for coffee that I forget to follow the show’s plot or respond to the MOTT’s (Man Of The Truck) question. Not to mention eaves dropping. MOTT reckons I’m am embarrassingly obvious in my attempts to observe fellow diners. So I guess I won’t be getting a job as an undercover private investigator. Never mind, I’ll just have to continue with this writing gig.
The other clanger I battle with is repetitive words. As you can imagine, reading over a paragraph and realising you have written the MC looked, was looking and saw, seventeen times in the same sentence isn’t what you want to see. See! See what I mean? It’s hardly what one would call good writing, but it is fairly normal for a first draft. The problem is when you want to convey the situation and lose all the repetitive words. This is where we drag out the Thesaurus and start dredging for the exact word. And let’s face it, sometimes the exact word is “Look”.
I can spend far too much time flicking through good books I’ve read to find a passage that describes a scene well. To get a feel for the perfect description, how it’s done and why it works. So much time that I end up not doing much on the actual edit.
I’ve recently read a post on a writing forum regarding how long it takes to revise or edit for different people. I must admit there is a lot of weeping and gnashing of teeth when I read that someone takes about a week, less if there’s a deadline. HOW? I demand of the screen. This question quickly rolls over into WHAT AM I DOING WRONG? I mean for goodness sake, it can take me all day to edit one chapter and then I go over it again the next day and I have to start over. It took me 30 days to write Something In the Water and it’s taken me over 12 months and 70 gazillion edits to realise I need to do it again. I honestly wonder sometimes if I’m beating a dead horse. But, and I really appreciate every single bit of advice or encouragement I get, friends, writing buddies and just about everyone who’s read it, urges me on, to not give up and to keep at it. So I do. So the advice I clutch to my heart is this comment from one well known author of romance, she said “How long is a piece of string”. Yes, those seven simple words have pulled poor Kiki and Jared from the fire once again and I will battle on. On with the edit I say . . . ok, I might be getting a bit delirious here.
As a reader do you notice things like repeated word, or even worse, if a writer has written a scene that seems an obvious attempt to say someone looked at the ant on the corner of the table without using the word “look”? Writers, do you struggle with this darker side of writing too? How long does it take you to edit a story to publishing standard? How many sweeps are required? I find if I’m in a good story I don’t notice the writing, but that may be because the writing is so good that I don’t notice the writing at all. Now there’s a thought.
We often hear people talk about their muse. But, what the heck is a muse anyway? So I looked it up, and then I remembered I actually did know this. Hey, it’s a sunday afternoon and I’m a bit tired after a big weekend.
I like to make a playlist of music for when I’m thinking about, planning and writing a story. I’ll put it on my iPod and play it frequently during the long and winding process of writing, editing and polishing a manuscript that will one day be a published novel.
Sometimes I’ll put one song on repeat while writing a particular scene that the music resonates with. Often I’ll put the 20 – 30 song playlist on a loop and within a few bars of the first song I’ve zoned out and don’t hear the songs at all. I don’t know why, but I find writing easier with the music, whether I actually listen to it or not.
This conundrum piqued my interest, so I headed off to Google, as one does. Apparently music moves the brain to pay attention. But I believe it also encourages us to get into a rhythm. I’m sure some of you go to the gym. I don’t, preferring walking the dogs and playing tennis. But when I use my elliptical machine I play up beat music and find that, intentional or not, my body tries to keep in time with the beat. So when I played something like Flo Rida’s “Good Feeling” I nearly killed myself trying to keep up. (one of my goals is to lose weight, you can read my goals here).
I did a little experiment, and did a few typing sessions with different songs to see how it effected my writing. I found that the more regular and up beat the rhythm the faster I typed. I was also more accurate. Interesting.
A few years ago I had a very bad bout of Trigeminal Neuralgia and could’t stand music at all. It would make me feel sick and oftentimes would set off an attack. This aversion to music lasted about 5 years. The only music I listened to in this period was classical, and the only time I listened willingly was when I was doing bookkeeping. Again, once I started working, I would barely hear the actual music. I’m happy to say that I can once again listen to everything from pop tunes to classical. I must admit I still don’t like Death Metal, but that’s probably just because I have a degree of good taste. Just kidding – actually, no, I’m not, but I don’t mean to offend anyone. You can listen to it as much as you like.
In November 2012 I wrote Something in the Water, originally the story was called Sweet Solomon but when I came across Brooke Fraser’s “Something in the Water” it fit my story so well that I changed the name and added the song to the playlist.
From my afternoon of researching and terribly clinical testing, I’ve found that Music and the Muse work hand in hand. Music is good for our brain processing. So if you’re having trouble with a wayward muse, perhaps you should give her/him something to listen to.
Do you listen to music while working, working out or writing? Or do you find the exact opposite and can’t stand the distraction? If you do use music, what kind do you listen to while writing or working. Do you use different genres for different tasks. I love to hear from you, so please share your thoughts.
Dear reader, I can only apologise for my long absence. I have no excuse except perhaps rebelliousness.
I have been busy, trying to continue to write, edit, keep our business going and assist in a major back yard blitz.
Pre Backyard Blitz
Until Dave came home with a mini excavator
And it started to look a bit messy
Then came the dingo, that was a bit wild, with the thing almost tipping over, that may have been the operator though 🙂
Then we had rain . . .
retaining wall under construction
Now let’s have a go with the bobcat
back filling, more wild moments
now for the topsoil
and turf- Sir Walter soft leaf buffalo- lovely
Beautiful new back yard
As you can see, it’s been pretty busy and I admit that visiting here and keeping in touch have been pushed so far to the back of the stove that it was in danger of falling off.But to bring you up to speed, I was so sick during NaNoWriMo and I kept writing to make sure I made my 50K. And I suffered for it. I should have given up and gone to bed, instead I persisted and burned out in a big way. December was full of trying to finish, restart, restructure and sort out the mess I’d made of the story. I’d done so much research for it and planned everything out meticulously only to have it come to a lot of incomprehensible waffle. Now I don’t even want to look at it all. It’s dreadful and garbage. But perhaps one day it will come to light and I’ll see if it’s redeemable. Just not yet.
On a good note, I received wonderful feedback for Something on the Water from Charlotte Ledger of Harper Impulse (remember I won a manuscript development in August with RWA’s Clayton’s Conference?), and have been slogging away at rewriting SITW for about the gazillionth time. At times I’ve felt like tossing the whole thing, thinking if it takes me this many goes to get the darn thing right I should just toss it. But then I realised it’s all good practice, and who knows, it may even finish up publishable. Wouldn’t that be nice?
And so that’s me, for the last two and a half months, I’ve been hiding, editing, trying my hand a little poetry and renovating our back yard.
I apologise for my slack friendship, and hope you’ll forgive me and we can remain friends.
Enough about me, what have you been up to? How was your Christmas and holiday season? Did you work through most of it like I did or were you laying back enjoying the sun, or the snow? I’d love to hear so please, share.