The Next Chapter

pencil drawing of a type writer with partial paper visible with words 'it was a bright and sunny'

‘ “It was a dark and stormy night…” The cliché line was written in font reminiscent of a typewriter’s singular offering, with a deliberate smudge of the printed words for added authenticity. The otherwise blank sheet of paper was wrapped around the platen of the typewriter cake* from the iconic Australian Women’s Weekly Children’s Birthday Cake Book, with pastel icing of sage green and peachy creme, mint slice platen knobs, liquorice typebars, a musk stick space bar and keys of multi-coloured smarties. The aspiring author blew the candles and made her usual wish of publication before slicing through the cake as party guests whooped and cheered. That was me, Mek, 80s tragic, birthday cake baker, engineer, and increasingly, adopter of the label ‘writer’ as one of the many facets of my identity…’

That was a snippet of my 500-word statement that formed part of my application for a university course that has been on my radar for quite a while. Continue reading →

V/Line Vignette 1

Golden 1.4.19

Pauline’s husband died on the eve of their 50th wedding anniversary. A heart attack. It was no surprise as he had been one of a dying breed. A smoker who over the years had to trade the convenience of smoking anywhere he chose for surreptitious drags in the shadows wedged between the looming office tower where he worked and the adjacent apartment block where he kept four walls for late nights at the office, doubling as a faux bachelor pad for the high class hookers he was dependent on. He’d work late into the night, billing clients for time that would never be his again. Pauline had been busy with arrangements for their anniversary party that coming weekend. It was just another of a long list of projects that kept her occupied through the course of their marriage. Their secret for longevity, they’d only half joke to anyone who cared to ask, was that they were both too busy to have any marital discord. This was of course not entirely true. There was discord, but it was spoken of in the hushed tones of their body language, separate beds, and dreams on divergent paths. Continue reading →

2017 Blog Navel Gaze

Grab your celebratory beverage of choice and join me as I reminisce on most viewed posts; a hilarious search term that landed a confused internet user on my blog; my wild card entry of a post that had a great impact on my creative output for the year; and finally, resolutions for 2018! Continue reading →

Storyteller Series

I was lucky enough to be featured on Nadine Tomlinson’s Storyteller Series. Nadine, a friend, fellow blogger and speculative fiction writer asked great questions on creativity and life — are there any other topics worth discussing? If you want to read my thoughts on those topics, head over to Nadine’s blog where you’ll also find posts in which Nadine shares insights on the creative process and writing inspiration. Thanks Nadine, it was a real pleasure!

Welcome to Storyteller Series, where I highlight writers, authors, and those who tell, publish, and promote stories. This month, I’m featuring Mek. She was born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and emigrated to Sydney, Australia at the age of six. After taking the safe route of a chemical engineering degree rather than exploring her love of art,+…

via Mek: An Artistic Storyteller — Nadine Tomlinson • Speculative Fiction Writer

Debrief: Session One

Photo of an eerie house with a bunny clutching a carrot seen in the windowsill. Used to illustrate the idea of an enticing opening of a novel. — Photo by Ksenia Makagonova on Unsplash

This is the first of what will be seven updates on the seven month 3^rd draft novel writing course I am currently undertaking. The course is divided into seven sessions, each requiring a submission to my tutor. Once I have digested the session feedback, I’ll be posting on course content, my novel progress and what I have garnered from my tutor’s feedback. Continue reading →

Positive Political Action

I came across this via methodtwomadness’ reblog and had to share- check it out for a treasure trove of inspiration – changing the world never looked so practical and doable!

Myfanwy Tristram

As you may remember, back in October, I went for a run and came back with a glimmer of an idea.

Remind me not to go running again: that little seed grew into a project that has taken up every spare moment since then. But today, most of the hard work is over. Today we launch Draw The Line.

It’s been astonishing to watch, as what I’d conceived as a modest small press project blossomed, and more and more comic artists came on board (139 of them at the final count). Every single one of them is a superstar in my books, but it’s perhaps worth mentioning the bigger names, just to underline how the project grew so much bigger than I’d imagined. So, look out for work by Rachael Ball, Hannah Berry, Kate Charlesworth, Hunt Emerson, Kate Evans, Karrie Fransman, James Harvey, Lucy Knisley, Dave McKean, Fumio Obata…

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NaNoWriMo Week 2

NaNoWriMo participant statistics; 10000hoursleft; migratory patterns' magical realism — Source: screen grab from 10000hoursleft’s NaNoWriMo account

The world is a different place since my last update which was written on the eve of the US election. Although I had three days free from work in the past week, my numbers didn’t climb as high as I had wished, for a number of reasons: Continue reading →

Optimal Daily Word Count

photo of a stack of magnetic poetry words to illustrate story on optimal daily word quota for a writer — Photo by Steve Johnson

The habits of famous writers are a source of fascination and perhaps inspiration for book lovers and aspiring writers: aesthetics of their writing retreat; curios in their space; rituals performed before sitting down to work; writing tools; and, perhaps ‘easiest’ for the aspiring writer to replicate: their daily word quota.

Should we follow Michael Crichton’s gruelling 10,000 words per day, or keep it easy breezy at Ernest Hemingway’s 500?

To answer this question, I looked at available data on 39 famous writers and drew inferences on:

– Relationship between daily word quota and rewards

– Gender influence on daily word quota and rewards

– Perceived value of effort and output, and its influence on the writer’s psyche

– Optimal daily word count

Continue reading →

Writers Write, Right?

Image courtesy of National Novel Writing Month.

I have a goal! The title and accompanying image might give a hint as to what it is. I am working towards finishing my second draft novel writing course by the end of October (it has been on hold since April). At the end of the course I’ll have a solid synopsis, which will allow me to get real value out of NaNoWriMo 2016: tackling the feat of completing a novel (or at least 50,000 words of it) over the course of November.

To borrow from a tagline on Camp NaNoWriMo’s site, the event is:

An idyllic [writer’s] retreat smack dab in the middle of your crazy life.

Yes, if I can’t have a beautiful mountain top cabin with a view of a cascading waterfall, the accompaniment of bird song and fragrance of spring blossoms and a perfect coffee, I’ll take the virtual version. Continue reading →

The Unhappy Wife

A Conversation with Dr. K E Garland

Dr. Katherin E Garland (writer/ academic / blogger / my friend) has just published The Unhappy Wife, a book of short stories based on the real lives of 12 women in marital discontent.

The closest I’ve come to marriage is having a partner who is a wedding photographer. With or without the ring, however, relationships have their ups and downs: sometimes they work; sometimes we invest in the work to make them work; sometimes we walk away; and sometimes, we remain – unhappily.

Over the weekend, Kathy and I chatted about her book, the writing process, and insights on love and relationships.