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Wednesday 24 October 2018

A double waste of time

I've come to the conclusion I mishandle time, due to faulty logic and a weird brain. When I don't want to do anything, I check my to-do list. I have a rule whereby I must do AT LEAST TWO things off the list daily. On idle days I'll choose something like: "Tell Rick about the work Christmas meal" and "Water house-plants"
And meet my criteria in under a minute.
Then I can think about painting... but I can't paint when I should be writing. I'm not writing because my sciatica is worse when I sit, (so I mostly write in bed.) I therefore take my to-do list into the summerhouse to decide what I should do next.
I sit in the sun and read the list (short and long-term) and stare out of the window, wanting to lie down and read my book or paint a brand new cow; but I can't do these things because they're weekend things, and not on the fucking list.
It's only Wednesday. Yawn.
I have no energy for gardening or other physically demanding tasks today. So I sit and drink my coffee, stare at the sheep in the field that I'd also like to paint, feel guilty about what I'm not doing and just do nothing at all.
Just me?














Monday 8 October 2018

Penguin Random House #WriteNowLive event in Nottingham 2018


The third anniversary of my stroke is probably a good time to celebrate the fact that I might be getting closer to being published :)


This is a snapshot of the third and final Penguin WriteNow event for under-represented writers 2018. And I was one of the 150 writers/illustrators, shortlisted from 1780, to attend WriteNow events in London, Liverpool and up here in Nottingham.


This pictorial snifter gives a flavour of WriteNow's brilliance. We learnt about publishing and contracts; heard from authors and agents; received in depth guidance on querying and synopses. We all had a twenty-minute one-to-one with a Penguin editor - with the chance of being shortlisted, further, as a Penguin mentee.


(I didn't jump this last fence, btw, but received excellent feedback, made invaluable contacts, and was amongst the top 10% of WriteNow Talent, as calculated by my husband :) 


#WriteNowLive






Okay, I have no picture of Roo Hocking but she's one of last year's WriteNow mentees. She told us about her year-long experience and showered us with inspiration.



"What you're making is good"



"There is something quite magical about being taken seriously"



"Today is for you and you deserve it"



And, actually, we were constantly being reminded that simply being here was a huge achievement in itself - proven by the quality of our writing/artwork. 


We were assured that this WriteNow accolade was a reputable badge that would be taken seriously by the publishing community. 


And, in fact, I spoke to someone who'd been getting full manuscript requests since she'd added WriteNow 2018 to her writing CV :)


So we'll see what happens next...








I jotted down some nutshell writing tips from author Rowan Coleman...



"Main thing is to write the best book you can"




"Ensure you're paid for what you do. Remember your work is valuable"




Rowan told us that her process of writing was, "mostly based on panic and despair" :)



"I write because I'm not qualified to do anything else. Believe in the importance of telling stories







This is the wonderful Molly Crawford - Penguin Random House editor, with whom I had my massively positive one-to-one :) 







Illustrator Dapo Adeola entertainingly spoke about his (familiar-sounding) approach to work:



"A long stressful process of trial and error"






I learnt stuff  while I was there too. But, here's another amusing snippet instead... 


The warm and hilarious Journalist Tom Rasmussen said:



"Sometimes I write naked in bed. If someone is in the house I write in cafes"



"I write because I could never afford therapy"










Picture book author Abie Longstaff had loads of advice, like:


"Don't get it right, get it written


(This was about getting bogged down with editing your first draft, if I remember rightly.)


Abie said, on writing, "A story that itches, I have to write or I start dreaming about it"


I really related to what writer Mahsuda Snaith said:


"I couldn't not write. I need to write, it's how I express myself"






The promise of goody bags stacked up in the foyer :)






Tasty lunch :) 





Laura Mahadevan (one of my table-mates) was chuffed to inadvertently end up with two cups of tea :)





And a sneaky Selfie in the pub afterwards, ensuring that the Penguin bag is IN ;)





Doggy bags were stuffed with BOOKS, would you believe?


On a final and more serious note, I've learned that there are deeper holes in publishing, where writers/artists from under-represented communities should be, than first I thought. And this has been the case for far too long.


I heard from Lgbtq+ groups who grew up not finding relatable material to read.


I learnt that these communities are under-represented, not just as published writers, but as employees within publishing too, which explains why less Lgbtq+ books are taken on in the first place.


So it's a snarly vicious circle. 


But I've learned it's slowly getting better.


And publishers like Penguin - with their #WriteNowLive scheme - are one of the best examples, striving to redress this imbalance.



(They didn't tell me to say that, btw, I read it in an article beforehand, lol)



But thank you, WriteNow.














Disclaimer: lots of talented people said lots of clever things at this event. What I scribbled down in notes were mostly funny bits - I'm drawn to humour like a bat to a cave. So please know that this is an incomplete and undoubtedly unbalanced sketch, for entertainment purposes first and foremost. 

Monday 27 August 2018

Juggling arts : /







I haven't posted for a while because I'm trying to juggle my arts



Not to be confused with juggling my arse, which I almost wrote in error


Like most writers, I struggle to keep my mind on the task. I procrastinate, get distracted. I don't like working for nothing. Life gets in the way. You know what I mean.

It took a long time for me to realise 'the arts' was the way for me, the pointlessness of me trying to understand statistical analysis

Being creative is hard because you have to motivate yourself, be creative in your 'spare' time. Creatives have a reputation for being self-destructive, self-absorbed, depressive hermits, who sometimes drink too much. (My interpretation)

All of this can interfere with the task in hand


I've failed to write my novel this year because I started painting again


Writing is hard. Writing and painting is harder. Writing is a time-gobbling, protracted habit that sucks at ones life like a leech 




Painting is different. It's not so intense. Your physicality is looser. I'm less crumpled-up and stiff when painting; I feel light and energetic, airy and free...





Even if I don't look it 😼



Painting is immediate compared to writing. Yielding tangible, visual results in seconds; which is highly seductive, especially after a lifetime of being holed-up in a chair, bleeding through the eyes to produce vaguely useful prose for nothing


  Don't get me wrong, I have a love-hate relationship with writing. We don't see eye-to-eye at times :)



So, to force myself to juggle arts, I started entering more literary things... 


Competitions, magazines, odd enterprises like De Montford Literature. I got a couple of snippets in Mslexia recently. I then applied to WriteNow - part of Penguin Random House 


And managed to jump their first hurdle





So I'll be attending a workshop in Nottingham in a month's time. I'm pretty chuffed :) :)


This made me write, as I had to polish 6,000 words from my novel-not-currently-in-progress


And this little success boosted my confidence because, apparently, I'm one of 150 writers to get through from over 1700 applicants :)






So maybe I'm doing something right?



Maybe I am juggling my arse after all...



Please keep in touch :)








:)