Tag Archive | writer

Laura Gets Flash

Last week I blogged about my local writing group and the skills I’ve learned through attending Off The Cuff. It was this group that introduced and explained Flash Fiction to me. Wikipedia defines it as “…a style of fictional literature or fiction of extreme brevity.”

I have written stories as short as 25 words, and entered competitions with tales of 500 words. I’ve tried a 6 word story, but am not yet skilled enough to produce anything of value in this range.

As an over-writer who loves to hack and slash scripts down, flash fiction satisfies my desire for concision. It focuses the mind, and helps develop the ability to identify the relevant points of the story.

The following is a 10 minute, 100 word story, written at Off The Cuff. It’s not been tweaked – this is how it was presented.

From Hero to Zero

Handsome and rich. I had everything; Hollywood ranch, private jet, two Oscars. I had glacial white, virginal girls pleading to be walked on the red carpet.

My days were full of action. My nights too.

My face appeared on billboards, my palm prints on the Walk of Fame. My life was documented in magazines, news clippings, movies. “The greatest action hero of all time”, the tag line to my name.

And then I met her.

She taught me there’s no value to property, fame, or notches on a bedpost.

I’d rather possess nothing, and have her love.

Zero.

Not hero.

It’s not perfect, it possibly breaks all sorts of rules, and it’s not award-winning stuff, but that’s not why I wrote it.

I wrote it because I love to write.

Take care.

Laura x

Always On My Mind

Mar21

Yesterday was the first day of spring. A time of renewal.

Today is the first anniversary of the loss of my mother.

Not much has changed, and yet, everything has.

I’m still vulnerable to attacks of naivety, anxiety, and concerns I might have said or done the wrong thing, but I’m the end of the line. There is no more ‘I’ll hear what Mum has to say about it’. That doesn’t stop me wondering. The advice and guidance she offered throughout our life together is drawn upon every day. ‘This time will pass’, features often.

As a family, we have moved forward, and we’ve taken my mum with us.

As Lilo and Stitch say, ‘Ohana’.

Laura x

Feel The Love

Nov8

The weekend of November 16th sees the start of the 2012 Festival of Romance, in Bedford.

I attended the inaugural Festival last year in Watford and had a thoroughly brilliant time. I met authors, publishers, editors and a group of ladies who, with me, were to become The Romaniacs.

The Festival format is a little different this year with Regency Romance hitting Bedford town centre and workshops and events divided between venues.

Friday night is the Festival of Romance Awards and Ball and I am thrilled to announce my current work in progress, ‘Follow Me’, has been shortlisted for the New Talent Award. Not only that, but five of my fellow Romaniacs are also on that list.

In total, twenty five new writers are in the running, so there’s plenty of great competition out there.

Many friends are up for a variety of awards and it is fantastic their hard work is being highlighted in such a positive way.

I offer my congratulations to everyone whose name has appeared on a shortlist and thank Kate Allan, Chief Organiser, and the committee for all their hard work in producing a weekend of romance.

For those who cannot make the event, I hope you enjoy your own weekend of romance.

Take care.

Laura x

Riotous Kittens & Rampaging Ideas.

Oct17

On Saturday 13th October 2012, I attended an Advance Novel Writing Course, run by Julie Cohen. It tickles me that it was held in Reading. I know it’s pronounced Redding, but still.

I enjoyed the whole experience – the early morning drive, meeting like-minded souls and learning how to improve my writing.

The main thrust of the day for me was finding ways to build up my hero in ‘Truth or Dare?’ I’ve been working on ‘beefing’ him up and increasing his point of view, but felt I’d reached a point where anything I added would be waffle. As writers, we know that everything we put in a story must move it forward. Through Julie’s exercises, I have found depths to my hero that need exploring and sides to him I hadn’t considered. This excites me. I have so many ideas, I’m having to rein them in a little, just until I have them under control.

I type this as my two recently acquired kittens, Rascal and Sheldon, run riot around my house. If I can get them sorted, I’m hoping my ideas will lie down and also submit.

Right, kittens. You first…

Take care.

Laura x

To Submit or not to Submit?

Sep1

To submit or not submit? That is the question I asked myself thirty times.

I am a member of the Romantic Novelists’ Association New Writers’ Scheme. It is a fantastic organisation which offers friendship, advice, the chance to meet other writers, agents and publishers and once a year, have one’s manuscript critiqued. The deadline for the critique is August 31st. Well done to everyone who submitted.

At the beginning of this year I had a plan; By July I was going to have a second story written and submitted to the NWS. It started well as I joined in with a challenge set by author Sally Quilford entitled 100k in a 100 Days. The aim was to write 1000 words each day for 100 days, starting on January 1st and ending on April 9th.

By March, I had 60,000 words written, most of which belonged to the work in progress (WIP). My writing came to an abrupt halt late March, when I lost my mum. Everything that followed knocked writing off the agenda.

I could not get back into the work in progress. The last scene I’d written concentrated on the hero’s grief having lost his family. It was not a place I wished to visit. With that in mind, I decided not to submit to the NWS. I emailed the organiser explaining my situation and received a lovely reply which left the door open for me to send in a partial (a non-completed story) and a synopsis if I felt able.

As time progressed and life settled into a new groove, I turned to writing short stories. They were perfect for fulfilling the desire to write without draining my emotional reserves. With aspects of my life hanging in the balance, I derived satisfaction from starting and completing a project within a short time span, and it appeased the guilt of not tackling the WIP knowing I was keeping my hand in.

There’s the telling word – appeased.

In hindsight I think those who know me well realised I was struggling with the idea of not submitting. I had 60,000 words saved in Drive C. I had neglected them. My poor, desperate hero, like me, had to start dealing with his grief. I could not leave him in his state of disbelief.

I began to think about the story once more. I mentioned one or two ideas to my wonderful Romaniac chums, who as ever, were supportive, funny and pillars of rock and again the suggestion was made that I should consider sending in a partial. I then received the same advice from two established members of the RNA.

Have you ever had that feeling someone is trying to tell you something?

At the beginning of July, struck by a bolt of insanity, I declared to my family and friends I would be submitting to the NWS and I would work for as long and as hard as I could to finish and polish the manuscript. I had six weeks, after all.

This Tuesday I didn’t go to bed. I stayed up reading through a revised and rewritten 52,000 words, replacing over-used phrases, correcting chronology mistakes and fixing typos and cut and paste errors.

I went to bed at 07:00, Wednesday, rose at 09:00, and at 11:00, handed the NEW padded envelope, fattened with my partial, to the post office assistant.

It was the first time I’d been out of the house in days.

Okay. So I didn’t manage to write the whole story, but I reached a point about a week before when I knew it was not going to happen. Perhaps I should have written the entire book before editing, but I wanted to submit more than a first draft. I appreciate it is not a final version, but I have presented my work to the best of my ability.

What have I learned? Support, advice and encouragement from family, friends and writing chums are invaluable assets when faced with the impossible, and I thank you for providing all three in lorry loads.

Scrap that. Make it juggernaut loads.

No. Container loads.

And what of my hero? He is out of his disbelief phase and he’s through with the guilt, but he is sinking lower than the Titanic. I wonder if like the sun, he will rise and see the dawning of happier times?

Laura x

Birthdays and Parties.

Jul22

Today would have been my mother’s birthday. Having lost her earlier this year, I wasn’t sure how I would react. It was strange not to have bought a present and a card, although I still wished her a Happy Birthday.

I stayed up until midnight to do so.

At noon, our family enjoyed a lovely lunch at the place Mum and I used to go, then we strolled on the hot sand, where the children played on the swinging boats and bounced on the trampolines, and finally, to wrap up the day, we visited a local dairy farm where the best ice cream is produced. I had honeycomb. I recall Mum had that when we were last there. Then as now, the weather was beautiful.

I suspect my mother had something to do with that.

Mum was extremely supportive of my writing efforts and was pleased I had found a nuturing and friendly group within which to learn the craft. Something she was happy for me to do was attend the RNA Conference in Penrith.

The Romantic Novelists’ Association Conference 2012 was my first.

I joined six of my fellow Romaniacs, and met writers with whom I’ve previously interacted via the internet or with whom I had become acquainted at one of the RNA parties. The Conference was sociable, friendly and fun, with a great kitchen party on the Friday night. I’m pleased to say singing was involved.

Study was involved too, with trade panels and workshops on all nature of writerly things, and I made two pitches to top editors. Once home, it took three days to absorb everything that had happened. Now I realise I have to get my head down and finish book two. Oh. And find an agent.

That will be down to me.

Laura x

Trying Something New.

Jun24

I have spent the past couple of days trying my hand at developing a synopsis before having written the story. I have not tried this before, but I understand it is common practice amongst many writers.

Currently, I am 60,000 words into the first draft of my work in progress and until last night, I had no clue as to how the story would end. I took my ‘Keep Calm and Eat Chocolate’ notebook, my trusty purple pen and Sarah Duncan’s advice, and started writing a series of ’And then’, uncertain where my scribblings would lead.

In a few hours, spread over two days, I noted down what I considered to be the relevant points of the story. I took the synopsis as far as I could – a fraction over half way, but with a need to finish it, I had to decide on how to end the story. I took the radical move of making it up as I went along, resulting in a few pages of rubbish.

And it was rubbish.

But I was getting words onto the sheet.

Yesterday, I reread my notes. They were wishy-washy, there was very little structure, the chronology, like a time machine, was all over the place, and the final part, like me without a map, had no direction whatsoever, but this made me happy. I had a starting point and I knew what improvements had to be made.

This time, I took a different, larger notebook and settled down to transcribe from the smaller pad. I refined the relevant points, put the events in the correct order, discovered exactly who my characters are and what made them that way and…fanfare please…found my ending. I was so pleased, I announced it to Gajitman, who, bless him, stopped racing in the Alps, put down the controller and listened to me.

I have a real sense of where I’m going with this WIP now.

It seems developing the synopsis before writing the story, works. It totally focuses one’s mind, too.

Which comes first for you? The story of the synopsis?

Laura x

Seasons in the Sun

Jun11

It’s June, it’s raining and it’s summer. And I missed spring.

The beautiful season of renewal and new beginnings bypassed me as I dealt with the loss of my mother – emotionally and physically.

I say dealt, but I’m still shuffling some of those cards. They’ve not all yet made it to the table.

This last fortnight, I have been sorting and clearing my mum’s house and have spent many hours being reminded of times past or discovering little gems of information I never knew. Some of it made me cry, plenty made me smile and one or two things made me exclaim ‘Mum!’. All of it helped me understand more about myself. It turns out, I’m more like my mother than I realised. That’s a good thing.

That’s a wonderful thing.

Life is a little less perfect without Mum in it, but my family and I are focussing on a positive future, whilst learning how to remember the good times with a smile and not a tear.

Here comes the sun.

Laura x