Harvey: on the occasion of his tenth birthday

Arrrfff! Harvey here. I was ten last Thursday. Any gifts of tennis balls gratefully received. Total destruction guaranteed within twenty minutes.

What with one thing and another, Mrs Boss has had to join the ranks of the 6a.m. dogwalkers, traipsing the darkened streets with a torch. She says she doesn't mind clear mornings when the sky is all black and twinkly, but rain is not so much fun.

Also, while she is not the most social of persons (particularly at 6a.m) she is surprised to find the early morning joggers incapable of as much as a grunt of hello.

So anyway, while she may be too whacked to keep up the blogging right now, she just wants to say that she is still batting about. She was happy to have a poem commended in the Sentinel quarterly poetry competition. It has reminded her that she is supposed to be a writer, and therefore should be writing.

Before that, though, my next walk is due. Oooh look - it's raining!

My favourite bookshop

 

This week I had a little trip to Derbyshire, mainly to visit my favourite bookshop, Scarthin Books at Cromford.

Here is a place where you really can get lost for hours. Three floors of rooms, passageways, and staircases all crammed with books. They have a good stock of new books, but the real fascination is with the old, out of print and obscure. If there is ever a book you are struggling to find, just email them and they will track it down if humanly possible.

I bought two in particular that will really help with my novel research.

There's a small cafe on the middle floor, serving vegetarian and vegan food.

Scarthin's even came in at number six in the Guardian's online list of the world's best bookshops. Note - not just Derbyshire's, or England's, or even the U.K's but the whole world's! 

Researching is thirsty work, you know. So I bought a new tea mug too. Like it?

August news

I was going to let Harvey tell you about his Great Escape this time, but I've elbowed him out of the way so I can share a few bits of writing news.

The most surprising thing of all was winning the monthly poetry contest in Writers' Forum magazine. My entry is printed in the current issue, number 142. Although I don't write much poetry I am enjoying it more and more, especially after my welcome win!

Since my interest in poetry seemed to be growing this year, I began looking for a small press poetry magazine to submit to. I came across The Dawntreader, published by Indigo Dreams and decided to subscribe. It's a quarterly magazine, focusing on poetry that relates to nature, spirituality, myth and legend. Right up my street! And so I also feel honoured that one of my poems is in the current issue of Dawntreader (issue 23)

Thirdly (because you know things always come in three) I was very happy to be shortlisted once again for the Flash 500 flash fiction competition - that's the one for the second quarter of 2013, in case you're looking for the results on the website.

Although I shall probably continue with flash fiction and poetry, I don't see myself writing as many mid-length stories in the next few months. I've been looking through the folder of research that I started with a view to writing a historical novel. I really want to spend some time on that now, and don't think I can cope with more than one narrative at a time.

I've been trying to post a gratuitous picture of Harvey, for anyone who's missing him, but I am having so many problems with Blogger today that I need to go into an empty room and scream!

Southend-on-Sea

It was hot, it was crowded, it was noisy and I loved it! So full of life. See all those little dots on the beach? Each one was a person with a story to tell, and I found that idea kind of exhilarating. It's like when you visit a big city, and for the first half hour it's slightly overwhelming, and then you start to enjoy the buzz. And for me, being by the sea is always wonderful.

                       

Someone, somewhere on the pier, received a very special message. This next picture is a banner being towed behind a plane, which circled round and round above our heads.

If you squint closely you can see it says 'Temilade I love U will U marry me'. I never found out who Temilade was, or whether it was a 'yes'. If you know, please tell me!

Meanwhile, men were fishing...

boats were boating....

and even in the bustle there were quiet and tranquil spots.

When I got home I took about twenty-five photos with the self-timer to get a new profile picture I was happy with. (top right.) Note how I co-ordinated my T shirt with the colours of my blog background. (Well, OK, it was a happy accident really. I'm not that organised!)

It's cooler here today. When I went to the supermarket yesterday, the freezers had been cleaned out of ice cream! Next week, thunderstorms, apparently. And maybe a royal baby! Would you like to suggest a name?

I think we'll have Harvey on the blog next time. He hasn't done a post for a while and he's beginning to feel left out.

Roz Goddard and the coming of summer!

Guest speaker at our local writers' group this week was Roz Goddard. Roz is a former poet laureate for Birmingham, with several volumes of  poetry published. She also writes short fiction. We all enjoyed hearing Roz read some of her own poems, including the powerful and haunting Spaceman. This poem was runner up in Mslexia's poetry competition last year. You can find it, and other work, on Roz's website here.

Roz spoke about her sources of inspiration, such as the visual arts, and how we don't always have to try and write about the big things in life, but just look at small things in new ways. One thing Roz said, which I certainly need to hear every so often, was that we have to decide what is the actual story within the idea that's bubbling away - and whose story it is too.

This may seem obvious, but sometimes when writing longer stories I feel myself throwing more and more elements into the mix, just because I like them. It can take hours of rewriting before I see that these random details add nothing, and out they must go! Maybe this is why I enjoy flash fiction - it gives me no room for meandering down scenic by-roads and forces me into the heart of the story from the outset.

By co-incidence, today I came across an excellent post on editing at Denise Covey's blog from the other side of the world. Here again I found the questions 'what is my story about?' and 'whose story is it?' This is clearly my message from the universe this week. Focus, Jo, focus.

One editing trick I've been trying lately is recording my shorter stories onto my MP3 player. If I find my gaze wandering out of the window during playback, then it's quite likely a reader would lose interest too. I just note down those points where my attention flags, and see how I can give them more oomph. Then of course I delete everything, because it's too horrible hearing a recording of your own voice.

Tomorrow I break up from work for a whole fortnight. Yippee! This time last year I was in Paris. ("We'll always have Paris.") I am taking a little trip next week. Not Paris, but I'm sure it'll be fun in different ways. No, I'm not telling you where yet. You'll have to come back and see my holiday snaps!

Apparently we're going to have a heatwave in July. Are you planning a month of sunbathing and travelling, or will you be a busy bee like the one below? Do drop by and tell me what you're up to this summer.

Feet and flowers

My chiropodist told me that I have the feet of a child and I was not made for work. Bless her! Didn't I always know that was the truth?

So to keep my increasing weight off my tender tootsies I'm giving the gardening a miss for a couple of days. I did go a bit OTT after visiting Gardeners' World Live at the NEC last week. There I saw the glamorous Mary Berry from the baking programme, Carol Klein from Gardeners' World and wildlife film maker Simon King.

But the real star of the show for me was the garden created by Birmingham City Council, called Enlightenment. It celebrates a brand new library opening in Birmingham this September. The garden was divided into four sections, each on a different book related theme. The first represents the library itself. The shape of the building, and its design of interlocking circles can be seen in the garden.

The next three sections were based around the works of Birmingham authors. The first was Benjamin Zephaniah, specifically his poem Nature Trail.

After that came a tribute to Tolkien. Lots of Lord of the Rings fans were posing for photos in front of this one!

The fourth section reflected the work of Annie Murray, the air raid shelter in the garden representing her novel Birmingham Blitz.

As you can see in the pictures, the edges of the gardens were all lined with books. Totally impractical, but very attractive I thought.

With the distractions of gardening, the French Open, and Wimbledon starting next week, I apologise again for not being around much in Blogland. Hope the sun is shining on you, wherever you are.



Stories, stories, stories...

Thank you to everyone who sent me birthday wishes. I can't believe we are already well into May, and still with daffodils in flower here. (This is not my garden, sadly, but photos from Darley Park in Derby, my old hometown, where I went for a visit last week.) 

I spent much of April working on a story that's been floating around in various versions for over a year. Sometimes I thought that one would sink without trace (possibly in the River Derwent), as it was quite an emotional and challenging story to write. Finally I have something I'm happy with, after a long and often draining process of writing. Now it's in the drawer for a week or two, so I can do the last polishing with fresher eyes. In the meantime I have several newer stories at first draft stage that need further work.

Once again I had the luck to see something unusual, practically on my doorstep, and within what seemed like seconds a whole story had formed itself around the incident. At the time I rushed to write the beginning and the end, so now I've been able to fill in the middle. In a different story, I decided to remove a cat and add a husband. (Some of you may prefer to do things the other way round!)

I'm not doing many competitions this year, although I again reached the longlist for the recent Flash 500. I have yet to be placed anywhere in this one, but I continue to enter with optimism. 500 words is a nice length to write, and I always enjoy it.

If any readers of this blog supported the Ifakara Bakery competition, you may be interested to know that the organiser, Sharon Bradshaw, now has her own blog here with details of the winners and forthcoming anthology.

And lastly, a quick mention for Rosemary Kind of Alfie Dog Fiction, who has a lovely piece on Womagwriter's blog today. It's all about the Alfie Dog website, and very informative for anyone who wishes to submit or download stories.

With the sun shining outside, and the blossom trees all pink and pretty, I am today working on a Christmas story. Right - back to the land of snow and tinsel!