Cottage of Dreams

For the first time in far too long my friend Sue and I managed to escape our everyday lives and retreat to a small seaside crib (batch) for some much needed rest and relaxation.

For approximately three years we have made it a habit to go on a weekend writing retreat every six months or so, but due to bad health, family stresses, work and moving house we haven't managed to get away for over a year.

We had no plans to write this time around. Both of us were just hanging out for the chance to have some down time. We excaped to the Karitane, a little place just 30 minutes drive from Dunedin. There we watched the entire first season of Downton Abbey, went for walks, had coffee with a friend and visited the village of Palmerston. We talked about out books but didn't write a word. It was fabulous!

We could see the sea, and hear its muted roar from our porch. The rain pattered on the tin roof as we curled up in the gloom, sung and warm with our hot cups of tea and chocolate biscuits.

I came away longing for the simple quiet life, free of the rush and bustle, with time to day dream and write and read to my heart's content. I've fallen madly in love with the idea of living in a small tin cottage remincent of a bygone era - with a few of the modern conviences, of course.

It would have lead light windows, tongue and grove walls, a coal range, shelves of glass jars full of all manner of foods on display, cozy quilts, a sand-scrubbed table and worn wooden chairs, a kerosene lamp on the mantle piece and a deep claw-foot bath in the bathroom. Up a narrow stair there'd be a loft bedroom with a steep pitched ceiling and pasley feather quilts on the beds, like Granny used to have.

The sun would spill cross the floor boards, honey gold, and I'd watch the dust motes dance like fairies on beams of light. I'd stand at the door, feel the breeze kiss my lips, taste the changing seasons and perfume of growing things. Sitting before the fire, flame heat warming my toes, my fingers would play over the keyboard turning inspiration into words. Ah, sigh. Dreams are free aren't they?

Fantasy: Thinking outside the Square.

As secretary for the Dunedin writer's workshop, it was my turn to take the short lesson at last week's meeting. Our next competition in October will be judged by the fabulous Tania Roxborogh and the theme is Speculative Fiction. Many of our members have never written fantasy or Science fiction and were feeling a little out of their depth with the subject. So our lesson for Wednesday was: "Speculative Fiction - what is it?"

I wrote up a basic definition;

"Speculative fiction is the umbrella term for all of the fiction genres that embrace the “other”, by this I mean stories and novels that are a bit outside the square in terms of the “real world”."

And listed a few genres that come under this wonderful umbrella term including elements or themes that are often an important part of each genre. I have restricted myself to Science fiction, Fantasy, Gothic fiction, Paranormal and Fairy tales.

Note, my lists are very simplistic. If we wanted to be really technical each other these genres can be split up into scores of sub-genres - but we won't go there. The whole point behind this was to introduce Speculative fiction novices to the genres of the fantastical genres, to help them understand what makes each one different to it's fellows and to make them feel that writing something so outside their comfort zone is possible and can be FUN!

Science Fiction

• other worlds; other civilisations; other universes.

• often futuristic; often involves space or space travel.

• may involve magic, but usually uses futuristic technologies

Fantasy

• often “other” lands, sometimes other worlds

• often (but not always) in a historical setting

• sometimes a futuristic or alternative twist on a historical culture (ie: steampunk)

• usually has quests and heroes who save the world, the land, the princess, etc

• magic is an important element, but the form of the magic varies

• sometimes magic and technology are mixed

• often magical items are involved (ie: the ring in Lord of the Rings)

• sometimes old fashioned technologies with a futuristic twist (ie: steampunk)

• often characters are connected to royalty … or from among the lower classes

• often mythical creatures are used; giants, ogres, dragons, flying horses, unicorns, genies and talking creatures, etc.

Paranormal

• usual set in the real world, cities and towns as we know them

• may involve the faerie, werewolves, vampires, ghosts, angels, demons, zombies, shape shifters or other creatures of myth who are semi-human.

• often involves a journey of self-discovery; a love story which must overcome extreme “paranormal” obstacles; a mystery to be solved.

Gothic

• elements of horror / terror

• elements of romance

• elements of mystery and suspense

• historical setting

• prominent features are: supernatural, ghosts, haunted houses, gothic architecture, darkness, death, madness and transgressions, persecuted females, secrets and hereditary curses.

• may also involve vampires, werewolves, monster, demons, fallen angels, skeletons and ghosts, maniacs, bandits and villains.

Fairy tales and Folktales

• often (but not always) in a historical setting

• often teaches the reader something about human character, mostly folktales do this

• may involve magic or magical items, sometimes quests or tasks must be undertaken

• evil vs good is a common theme (ie: Rapunzel and Snow White)

• often mythical creatures are used; giants, ogres, dragons, flying horses, genies, talking creatures, etc. (ie: George and Dragon)

• sometimes uses bewitched creatures/people (ie: Rose Red and Rose White)

Of course not every story in these genres will have every one of these things is them, but most stories will have one or more of these elements. So for those of you who are new to the fantasy genres I hope this helps you gain an insight into the crazy worlds we write. Perhaps it may even inspire you to try your hand at writing something "other." I hope so.

Enjoy dabbing. Mix things up. Play around with different ideas. Most importantly have FUN with it.

If you're in Dunedin and you're interested in dropping by the Dunedin Writer's Workshop we meet every Second Wednesday of the month at 7.30pm. If you'd like to learn more feel free to email me (you can find my details on the "Who am I?" page at this blog).

In other news: I'm proud to say I've finally finished editing my latest fairytale, Bittersweet. It's nice to have it done and dusted, and looking pretty on my flash drive.
I guess that means it's time to get writing something else.

When Writing is damn Hard: Unclogging the Creative Plughole

In my last post I talked about how life had, once again, conspired to distract me from my writing. After a few days of great productivity, I hit a brick wall as circumstances drained all my time and energy and pumped me full of stress and angst. This left me with nothing to put into my writing. It's fair to say I ground to a screeching halt.

Now that all those stresses are gradually fading into horrors of the past I'm wanting to get back into the writing. However, like a sink where the plughole has become clogged with all kinds of unmentionable gunk, my ability to funnel my ideas on to the paper - or to even access them in the first place - is being hampered by stress. At times like this, getting back into the swing of writing and getting the creative juices flowing again can be really hard.

I feel constipated! There's an uncomfortable blockage in my creativity.

The ideas are building up behind a locked door. I don't have the key. I can't access them.

The frustration builds and can become quite debilitating if it takes me too long to get the ideas flowing again. I become a bit like a caffine addict who has been without their morning hit for five days in a row! It's not pretty. In fact, it can be down right frightening, let me tell you.

So how do I go about unclogging the drain, or finding that magical key?

Editing. Yes, editing.

Editing is methodical. It is deliberate. It requires creativity from me, but not too much.

Picking up a piece of writing that needs to be edited and dealing with it helps me to slowly work me way back into a creative mind set. It picks away at the scum, allowing a trickle of ideas to quickly become a torrent. Ta-da! the blockage is gone, destroyed by the editing process.

When I edit I'm able to push back the worries and the issues of daily life aside and to re-train myself to focus of my writing. Once I'm back in that world - the "other" world of my writing - it becomes easier to slip back into putting words on the page and before I know it I'm writing again.

This is one key in my arsenal that I use to get though those hard patches. It works for me, maybe it'll work for you too.

Distracted?

Are you suffering from distraction?

After two very productive days I've had two unproductive ones. Actually they have been VERY busy but no writing has been done. None what so ever (aside from the blog, but I'm not counting this). Life - as it is want to do - has interfered once more.

On one hand I'm desperate to get back to the writing, on the other hand I'm so exhausted I'm having trouble remembering my name and where I put ...

We are changing our children's schools and so I've been running about visiting various schools talking to teachers, touring schools, listening to philosophies and briefs of what the schools are about; how they can best grow my kids and meet their educational needs. Signing papers and finding old reports and birth certs, buying uniform, and helping my teenage son choose his subjects. So all in all, my head has been rather full of other stuff.

I'd been feeling a bit guilty about my inability to write, in the small moments I've had to think about anything un-school related. Just when I was feeling very glum about it all I read Nathan Bransford blog on Distractions. It was exactly what I needed to hear.

Life will settle back to normal soon. Hubby comes back from his trip away on Saturday and the kids will head off the their new schools next week. Hopefully then I can curl up with my laptop and get the creative juices flowing again.

The Inspiration of Two

First off, I would like to say a big thanks to those readers who have emailed me recently saying how much you liked the blog (though it has been quiet here lately). It has been really encouraging and, as you can see, has succeeded in getting me back in the bloggers seat. So THANKS!

My health has been up and down over the last few months which has markedly slowed the progress of Mercy Me. I am making progress though. I have now mapped the last half of the novel giving me a definite direction or plotted path to follow which should help things move ahead fairly quickly once I get back into it.

I'm so loving writing Mercy Me and I can't wait to get back into it, but assignments and health issues are seriously cramping my style. It's hugely frustrating.

So far feed back on the Steampunk novel is really encouraging. While I haven't actually been writing the novel my Muse has been busy at work, shaping the plot and build scenes in my head. I've mapped out the final half of the novel and I'm excited to announce that I just have to write the thing now. But of course, that's the hard part!

My Muse has also been dabbling with issues in my YA fantasy novel. I'm seriously contemplating breaking down the planned plots of the first two books and putting them together in one brilliant stand alone novel. It looks wonderful in my head, hopefully it'll be just as great on paper.

I'm making notes of my ideas and the strongest short scenes I have so I can free up some creative room in my head. After my initial attack on the Tremorgan's story (the YA fantasy I wrote last year), I'm determined not to touch until I've finished Mercy's (steampunk novel), but at the way things are going resisting the temptation to dabble may take more self control than I possess!

So that is where I'm at. My head is buzzing with ideas and story lines. Now I just need to find the time to write!! Anyone have a gadget to slow time???

Considering an E-venture

It's been ages since I have blogged here, or at least it feels like ages ago.

As I have slowly recovered from my surgery I've been picking up the pace with my writing related activities. I won't just say writing, because I don't know if I have done all that much actual writing.

My friend Sue (aka JT Webster) and I lead our first meeting as the new President and Secretary of the Dunedin Writer's Workshop this month. We've both been attending there for close to three years and it was interesting to sit on the other side of the bench. The feedback we had was positive at any rate.

It took me this long, but I think I've finally cottoned on to the fact that when people tell you to write what you love it's a big, fat LIE!

I mean, sure go ahead and write what you like if what you love and write are exactly what publishers are looking for, otherwise you're more or less just writing for yourself and your friends (if they like it too). However, if what you REALLY want is to be published you'd better love and write the kind of novel a publisher wants to publish.

I spent almost 15 months working on my YA fantasy only to finally figure out that it is too much like the old school fantasy which is 'so last year'. I wrote it because I love this sort of story. The feed back I got on it was good, people loved it, but that isn't enough. In it's present form it's not what publishers are publishing right now.

So I figured I'd got two choices.

1) Stuff it in a drawer and wait until high fantasy is cool again
or
2) re-write it

My choice? I decided to re-write.

I started working on it two days ago. I've tweaked the first two chapters, re-written the fourth and totally scrapped about eight. More will join the heap I'm sure. The middle will be tweaked, but it will more or less remain as is (that's the plan at this stage), while the end will be expanded and added on to.

The result? A different sort of fantasy novel, one I'm hoping will be more 'the thing' and one publishers will want to publish.

I've also decided to focus on making the book a lot more self contained rather than it having to be a trilogy.

In addition to working on this, I'm still writing my Steampunk story. I'm enjoying writing it, even if it's progressing in fits and starts.

I'm also working on an anthology of short stories set in the 1930-50's and I've had good feed back on those compiled so far. (Isn't the photo above just charming? Hat tip to Michele Dyson)

I'm also seriously considering an E-venture - an adventure in e-publishing!

This is not something I ever thought I'd do, but recently the opportunity has come up. It's a children's story in the tone of a medieval fairytale. A wonderful graphic designer who worked at Weta will create the cover art and illustrations. I'm really excited about this publishing adventure and the possibility that it might lead to other similar - or bigger - publishing opportunities.

So there's lots going on in my little writing corner of the world. How are about you? What adventures of the literary kind are you embarking on?