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Failing and the Intimidation of the Great Big Writing World
I got my results back from the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge in the early hours of this morning (only the score, as feedback will come later this week), and it would be a mild understatement to say I’m a bit disappointed. I thought that maybe there was some possibility that I would knock this one out of the park and make it into the top 5 to head to Round 3. I got zero. I wasn’t expecting that. I also didn’t know I was going to be as disappointed as I am (I wonder if it’s just a case of bad timing with a number of other things that…
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NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge #2 – The Evacuees’ Circus
This is my second entry for the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge, where my prompts were historical fiction, a circus tent and a doll’s head (creepy, right?). When Operation Pied Piper sends forty little girls from their school in Manchester to Lyme Park in Cheshire, Lord and Lady Newton find themselves having to make some adjustments for their new wards. “Clara!” Lord Newton exclaimed as he walked into the room, two favourite dogs in tow. “What on Earth is this?” Lady Newton spun around. “Oh, dear,” she laughed, a long-fingered hand flying to her chest. “You startled me.” She turned to survey her handiwork. “Wonderful, isn’t it?” Lord Newton looked around…
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Aussie Expats Update – Uni Break Fridays!!
Helllloooooo beautiful people! I know, I know… I didn’t put up a blog post last Friday. Oops. I’m sorry, but it’s a complex iss—ok, to be honest, it’s not that complex. Having (officially) finished Trimester 2 of uni on Thursday with my political ideologies exam done and dusted, I wasn’t overly keen to do very much. Plus, I made the mistake (or brilliant decision) to pick up a new book after my exam and I powered through it… Then the sequel over the weekend. If you haven’t read Erika Johansen’s The Queen of the Tearling, I highly recommend it: it was an awesome read that (obviously!) I struggled to put…
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An Introduction to my Novel
Happy Hump Day everyone! The middle of the week is always a time for partying and celebration… Okay, that’s not true. But it does mean you can all get a little bit excited because it’s that much closer to the weekend (and sleep-ins! Also maybe waffles – James?). Before we get to the promised post though, I wanted to remind you about the Flooded Anthology! The Kickstarter went live yesterday and we’re trying to drum up support for this project: please, spare a few minutes and go over to have a look at this. Perhaps you know someone with a brain injury, perhaps you have suffered one; maybe you’d like to know…
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Figuring Out Your Setting
Hellloooooooo everyone! For those of you who don’t know, I’m currently writing a YA fantasy novel (it took me a really long time to accept that it was YA, so we can all celebrate my publicly announcing it as a lovely little mid-week accomplishment), which is what got me thinking about this particular blog post. But first, a seemingly unrelated paragraph (it ties back in, promise). If you know anything at all about me, you know that I think brains are pretty cool things. For instance, for a woman who is occasionally bad at map reading [Disclaimer: I firmly believe that repeatedly missing turn-offs while James is driving isn’t really…
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Inspiration
Happy Monday everyone! I’m prepping for my politics exam at the moment, which consumed a relatively large portion of the weekend (it also meant getting this up and ready was a challenge). It’s fascinating stuff, if pretty complex; I can foresee this area of my study spawning some politically-oriented posts in the future (hopefully I can keep it theoretical and avoid having to actually understand contemporary Western politics), but for now, I’ve generously decided to keep this post apolitical. You’re all welcome. So, inspiration. I can’t help but feel that, in terms of creative endeavour, inspiration is often held up to be this wondrous, mythical beast we’re all in wild…
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Aussie Expats Update – Be Alert for Aliens
Happy Friday everyone! So, yet again, I’ve left the house every day this week: tonight we’re going out with James’ class to the Fort Sill Oktoberfest. In light of this recent troubling turn of events, I really think we need to implement an emergency protocol. If I get up a running tally of continually leaving the house every day, someone please step up to the plate, shoulder the mantle of responsibility and call the FBI: aliens have definitely taken over my body. James has a secret way of making toast (I can’t tell you what it is, in case the aliens are reading this), but I have no such defence…
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A Wednesday Full of Thoughts
I’m so full of thoughts at the moment that I’m writing three different blog posts about it all simultaneously. One document I’ve got open has four separate ideas going on within it, each trying to wriggle their way out of my head, onto the page and into full realisation while I’m just trying to keep my eyes from crossing. It’s kind of confusing. Mind you, that’s still no comparison to the three-ring circus that’s going on inside my head. So the easiest way is to just start. I really feel right now that there are so many things going on in our world that deserve our time and attention, yet…
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Aussie Expats Update – Lesson of the Week
It’s Friday everyone. FRIDAY. No, I don’t feel like I’m exaggerating when I say I’ve been waiting all week for this. Yeah, yeah, I know – I don’t have a job and I need to study over the weekend for my psychology exam next Tuesday. But don’t bring me down. I have left the house every damn day this week and I’m exhausted. Don’t get me wrong: most of it was good. I mean had an awesome brunch out at Jimmy’s Egg on Thursday (the farmer’s skillet is the business people: go and try it if you don’t believe me) even though I didn’t have room for a cinnamon roll. Anyway,…
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Liebster Award!
Hey people, welcome to the middle of the week! We’re halfway there to a pjs all-day kinda day (it constantly impresses me that I don’t just wear pyjamas all day when I don’t need to leave the house. I am an adult.) But, in other news, on Monday I was nominated for the Leibster Award on Monday by the beautiful, hilarious and talented Nicole Evans over at Thoughts Stained With Ink (I’m really hoping that this will, in part, make up for the fact that I’m a non-video-game-playing loser, but it’s also all completely true). Because she’s a superlative human, she nominated me for something called the Liebster Award after she…
