Sabbatical

I've given up working in the book shop and I'm currently on a sabbatical until the spring when I will resume my part time gardening jobs. The idea of this break was to get lots of work done on my novel. But I've quickly realised that spending 12hours or more a day at the computer trying to write is not all that productive. Recently I've become obsessed with writing the novel, it's all I do, all I think about, all I care about, even though I find the process of writing difficult and I feel inadequate. 
Back when I first gave up full time work to write (five years ago!) I didn't put so much pressure on it. It wouldn't matter if I only spent an hour writing, the rest of the day would be spent walking or in the garden. And I enjoyed writing more then, maybe because I didn't realise how bad at it I was. But more likely because it wasn't the only thing I was doing. 
I've decided to get back to the good old days of fresh air and wholesome rural living, so I'll hopefully go on more walks and get into the garden more. 

A big reason I stopped walking so much is that I moved to Mr Kite's cabin, which is in the middle of nowhere, but there are almost no footpaths here, and the countryside is dull: intensely agricultural. The village I lived in before was close to the ancient forest of Selwood; there's coombes, woods, lakes, Stourhead (national trust property), hills, and lots of footpaths everywhere. It was just easier to walk there. It's only a forty minute cycle ride away, so I will hopefully return to my old walking routes. On cold days such as these, I have to make do with the lane walking on offer locally. 

I don't like to bring a camera with me when I walk, though I might do so occasionally. Yesterday I had my Dictaphone and recorded some sounds.



Here's some observations I jotted down at this location:

Small lake reflecting white winter light and browns. A duck makes a V in the water as it swims. 
A line of tall conifers near the lake. 
A large deer or possibly small horse lying down near the hedge.
Rolling interlocking landscape, hazy and cold blue.
Remnants of snow flecked on fields. 
A chinnock flies overhead. 

Other observations
Along the railway bank: a glass beer bottle suspended in a barbedwire fence by the handle of a plastic bag, so neatly done it must have been deliberate. Other scattered litter, also deliberate but less artistic. Badger set. 

The Peters Comic

I forgot to mention that I wrote a short comic. Danny Morison did the illustration, and most of the work. At the moment it's up on this website http://thepeters.thecomicseries.com/ so please read it and let me know what you think. This is the first comic we've finished, and we both used it as a learning tool/ a bit of a playground. 

It's a sci fi story set in a future world but with my own hippy nature-is-awesome slant. 

All the books I read in 2012

Happy New Year! Last year I read 55 books (or more, I think I forgot to note some of them). My resolution for this year is to read at least 45, so I can say I've read 100 in two years. I hope I can read 55 again, but too much more than that and I start to eat into my writing time and that's not something I want to happen. 

Other resolutions include to quit one of my jobs in order to do more writing (already put that one in motion, I leave the book shop on the 20th of January), to finish writing a book, to send it off, to  do more exercise, more gardening, more walking, find more good music to listen to, maybe find time to update this a little more often too. 

Books I read in 2012 plus my own personal award ceremony for the best writers and books I personally read in 2012. 

(those in bold have broken into the 80s. Only the rarest of gems get such high scores. Scoring system based on my old University marking system where getting 90 or more was almost impossible).

1. Twilight Robbery – Francis Hardinge                                       65

2. Apples – Richard Milward                                                       45

3. Love Songs For the Shy and Cynical – Robert Shearman        78

4. The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God – Etgar Keret              77

5. Girl on the Fridge – Etgar Keret                                              72

6. It’s Kind of a Funny Story – Ned Vizzini                                  42

7. No One Belongs Here More Than You – Miranda July              69

8. Tiny Deaths – Robert Shearman                                           80

9. Nimrod’s Flipout – Etgar Keret                                               73

10. Dogs 0 (Manga)                                                                   49

11. Naïve. Super – Erland Loe                                                    73

12. The Tiny Wife – Andrew Kaufman                                          75

13. Legend of a Suicide – David Vann                                        70

14. Warm Bodies – Isaac Marion                                                71

15. St Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves – K.Russell        69

16. The Safety of Objects – A.M Homes                                     76

17. All My Friends are Superheroes – Andrew Kaufman               75

18. Palo Alto – James Franco                                                    67

19. 1Q84 1&2 – Haruki Murakami                                                78

20. McSweeney’s 30 – Various                                                   73

21. Suddenly a Knock on the Door – Etgar Keret                                    60

22. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake – A. Bender              62

23. In Watermelon Sugar – Richard Brautigan                              68

24. The Middle Stories – Heti                                                     52

25. Tell Me No Lies – Malorie Blackman                                      39

26. 1Q84 3 – Haruki Murakami                                                  87

27. On Writing – Stephen King                                                   65

28. The Waterproof Bible – Andrew Kaufman                            83

29. The White Cat – Holly Black                                                  66

30. Pastorlia – George Saunders                                                67

31. Red Glove – Holly Black                                                      64

32. Granta 119 – Various                                                            52

33. What We Talk About When We Talk About Love – Carver    85

34. Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned – Wells Tower      89

35. HBWOSG – Dave Eggers                                                     76

36. Lights Out in Wonderland – DBC Pierre                                 71

37. King Arthur – Robin Lister                                                     36

38. Black Heart – Holly Black                                                     55

39. The Crimson Chalice – Victor Canning                                   68

40. The Circle of the Gods – Victor Canning                                58

41. Writing Fiction, Critical & Creative Approaches – Boulter        72

42. The Crystal Cave – Mary Stewart                                           68

43. McSweeney’s 40 – Various                                                   60

44. Civitas to Kingdom – Ken Dark                                             69

45. A Better Angel – Chris Adrian                                             82

46. Assassins Apprentice – Robin Hobb                                     67

47. The Wild Things – Dave Eggers                                            63

48. The Great Night – Chris Adrian                                              58

49. The Bird Room – Chris Killen                                                62

50. The Little Sister – Raymond Chandler                                    74

51. Granta 120 – Various                                                            70

52. The Night Circus – Erin Morgenstern                                     61

53. Dr Who Apollo 23 – Justin Richards                                      15

54. A Monster Calls – Patrick Ness                                             79

55. AD 500 – Simon Young                                                        45

Best and worst of the books I read in 2012

Best short story collection: Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned – Wells Tower

Best novel: Andrew Kaufman’s Waterproof Bible.

Best children’s/ YA book: A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness.

Best Non fiction: Civitas to Kingdom by Ken Dark.

My favourite all-round author in 2012: Andrew Kaufman.

Top authors: Andrew Kaufman, Wells Tower, Robert Shearman, Chris Adrian, Murakami, Carver, Chandler.  

Worst book: Dr Who Apollo 23 (I’m not sure if I should even count this one.) I also read half of Kraken by China Mieville and couldn’t finish it.

Getting to know your characters. Part 1: writing a historical character

Part 1: writing a historical character

I’m deep in rewrites for my Dark Ages fantasy novel. One of my biggest issues with draft 1 was weak characterisation. I thought I knew my characters pretty well, but their personalities weren’t really coming across in my prose.

Over the past few months I’ve been trying out lots of different exercises and workshops to get to know my characters better. I’ll be posting a few different approaches and ideas over the coming weeks. Part one is writing a historical character. The exercises can be applied to writing a modern character.

My novel is set in the Dark Ages. As a 21st Century girl, I automatically feel detached from my characters, even though I’m writing the novel in a contemporary style.

A modern character’s identity can be constructed around what they consume and what choices they make about their appearance and lifestyles. In the Dark Ages no one could flag their personality by their choice of phone, their chosen brand of bag or a penchant for a particular style of music. They had no TV, most people couldn’t read (and if they could, their choice of books was pretty limited), they had no leisure time to fill with extreme sports or camping holidays and they certainly couldn’t choose to go clubbing in Ayia Napa.

That doesn’t mean I can’t imagine what lifestyle choices my character would make if she were alive in 21st Century Britain. If you’re writing a story set in a bygone era, why not try the following exercise out?

I re-imagined my character as someone alive in the 21st Century, and then filled out this questionnaire about her. It’s important not to think too hard about your answers: quickly jot down the first thing that pops into your head. Some of the answers I had surprised me.

Q1: How does she dress?

A1: Like a beautiful beat poet. Outfit 1: Scuffed/ well-worn boots, Indian skirt-trousers, thin tight t-shirt, lots of necklaces and bracelets, sunglasses, chipped nail varnish, short dyed black hair, lots of ear piercings. Outfit 2: converse shoes with little skulls on, black tights and denim shorts, tight tee, woollen hand-knitted cardigan with chunky wool and chunky buttons, sunglasses, etc.

Q2: What music is she into?

A2: Edgy street stuff, and stuff like Bonobo.

Q3: What car does she drive?

A3: Something classic and mechanical. She’d have a basic understanding of mechanics and would enjoy tinkering.

Q4: What are her bookshop habits?

A4: She’d start in the military and history section, then mind, body and spirit, next onto Natural History/ animals, then true life stories. She doesn’t care for books – she is a spine-breaker, a folder back of paperback covers. She plays with her lips as she reads. Skims, picks up lots of books, flicks, puts back. Distracted. If she finds a book she really likes, she’ll find a chair, sit down with her feet planted on the floor, legs wide, rests her elbows on thighs. She might mumble good passages aloud as she reads them.

Q5: What phone does she have?

A5: An old flip-phone, battered, cracked screen, dangling charm of beads, worn keys. All her messages would be saved but she would constantly run out of memory and have to delete the spam to free space. Pay as you go.

Q6: What’s her favourite TV programmes?

A6: Documentaries, Planet Earth, David Attenborough

Q7: Where does she buy her food?

A7: Health food stores, foreign shops, farm shops, Waitrose.

Q8: ideal holiday destination and style of stay?

A8: camping holiday in Britain. Enamel ware. Bell tent. Cooks on a fire. She knows her nature and will eat a lot of wild food. She’ll spice everything up (she’d take her spices with her).

And that’s it. You can add more questions as you think of them. I found that by knowing 21st C lifestyle choices, I could more easily relate, I gained a clearer picture of her and felt closer to her. I can't put any of this into my novel, but because I feel I can relate to her/ picture her, I can now confidently start some characterisation exercises that will generate material I can use in my novel directly. I'll talk more about this at a later date. 

I also collected pictures of people I found on the internet that looked something like how I imagine my character to be – modern style people or historical. I found a Dead Weather video and thought there’s something about Alison Mosshart that’s similar to my character Tarmigan, so I watched that a few times and then watched a bunch of interviews of Alison Mosshart and took notes about her gestures.

These pictures aren't mine, I found them on deviantart. Something about them made me think of Tarmigan, though neither explicitly looks like her, and both are modern women (Tarmigan has a pet crow, so the first pic is particularly good for me!):

http://novenarik.deviantart.com/

This method worked well for me, especially as a foundation for further character work. Maybe it'll work for others?

Update

It’s been too long. I know. The reason? I’ve been writing, and working, and going places.     

       

Here is a sample of interesting things I’ve been doing or seeing since my last post in September:

Iain M Banks book signing and talk. 70% of the evening was spent on a train or train platform, 5% walking from the train station to Toppings and back again, 25% in Toppings listening to Iain M Banks talk about the Culture, which is something I know little about because I’ve never read any Iain M Banks sci fi, other than State of the Art. The portion of the talk I caught was interesting more for learning his writing processes than anything else. He’s a wing-er. He belongs to the “because it’s cool” category of popular writers.

Shaftesbury Arts Week, map making competition, hanging out, putting on prose and poetry evenings in small places.  http://storyslingers.blogspot.co.uk/

Bridport Story Slam – I co-organised this with Dorset Writers’ Network. http://dorsetwritersnetwork.co.uk/eventsshow.htm for the details. James Broomfield won again. Damn, he’s good.

Me and Sue at the Bridport Slam.

Wimborne Literary Festival, a talk from fantasy author Suzanne McLeod and Sci Fi writer Jaine Fenn. It was pretty poorly attended, but pretty rich in how interesting and entertaining it was. People missed out on a high calibre event there.

I’m getting some informal and occasional mentoring help from Winchester Uni lecturer Amanda Boulter. She’s been helping me hone my skills on my current novel.

I’ve been writing said novel, a fantasy set in Arthurian Britain in 508AD.

And reading a lot of history books and doing countless character profile worksheets and exercises.

DWN’s Nell Leyshon workshop: Finding Your Character’s Voice. This was a well-pitched workshop with plenty of practical exercises that not only got the creative juices going there in-session, but can be re-used out of the workshop. For the first time in a long time I came away from a workshop with new ideas, new techniques and newly inspired.

Listening to Alt J, Marbert Rocel (and remixes), The Dead Weather. 

Story Slam at Bridport Open Book Festival 2012

Check out this event I'm organising with Dorset Writers' Network:

 

Dorset Writers Network 

Story Slam

Dorset Writers Network present writers with an opportunity to demonstrate your writing and reading skills at their first ever Story Slam at the Beach &Barnicott, Bridport,Thursday 11th October 2012, 8pm, Bridport Open BookFestival.

So register in advance via zomzara@googlemail.com (or turn up and register on the night) to take part in a celebration of fresh, local writing talent and showcase your work in front of a live audience and a panel of expert judges, including Bridport Open Book Festival’s Writer in Residence, Rosie Jackson.

You'll have five minutes to read out your story –  roughly 780 words. All genres and styles of original prose fiction welcome. If there are more registered writers than time slots, the names will then be entered into a draw.

All this plus live music from the Wrongo Bongo Band with a £5 ticket from the Beach & Barnicott or Bridport Arts Centre.

Shaftesbury Arts Festival

Shaftesbury Arts Festival Sept 5th-9th.
It's a busy week for Storyslingers. Check out the following exciting things that are happening:

I.

MAP MAKING COMPETITION:

Storyslingers, my writing group, set up an interesting competition for writers (and vagabonds, comedians, artists and the general public). Here's the link: http://storyslingers.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/storyslingers-launches-its-first-open.html

The winner(s) will be announced on Saturday 8th at our book stall/ display of wonder, SAC. (see item III. below)

Check out the facebook page for inspiration/ procrastination opportunity: http://www.facebook.com/events/341655955921155/

(this is a random map I found from the internet. Thanks internet!) 

II.

PROSE, POETRY, MUSIC EVENING AT BEGGAR'S BANQUET: 

Storyslingers have teamed up with Beggar's Banquet Music Cafe in Shaftesbury and will host an evening of good stories, funky tunes and slick poetry. There will be snacks of fine quality, there will delicious drinks, you can bring some wine of whatever quality you prefer (corkage fees apply!) 

Beggar's Banquet is an amazing place; provider of wholesome veggie foods, player of excellent music (check out all the vinyl for sale in there), host to exciting arts events. http://www.beggarsbanquetmusiccafe.co.uk/

Thursday 6th September, 7:30pm, Beggar's Banquet, Muston's Lane, Shaftesbury, Dorset. Free entry. 

(writers take note of this amazing opportunity: we have one or two reading slots still available. If you're a prose writer or poet, please email Jennifer Bell or Jennifer Oliver to declare your interest. Time guideline of 5 mins/ 800 words.)

http://www.facebook.com/events/263686563750118/

III.

STORYSLINGERS CURIOUS STALL OF HANDMADE LITERATURE

Come to Shaftesbury Arts Centre at about 10am-4pm on Saturday the 8th of Sept, we will have a stall of handmade books, zines, comics, bookmarks, cards, origami, chapbooks and also published works and postcards. We're not sure which room we'll be in yet, but the mystery will only add to your experience as you wend your way around the labyrinth of SAC in search of wondrous treasure (ie: us). 

(a recycled image from last years' arts festival.)