The power of reviews

There I was, actively avoiding writing more of the sequel to Loyalty; wandering around the internet, reading tweets I would normally skim over. You know the drill! Then I came across a review of Loyalty on the US Amazon site. "Could not put it down" they wrote. Wow! It is so wonderful to know someone enjoyed my work. I'm still smiling. Better still, I have several paragraphs of Legacy completed.
From now on I'm going to make sure I review the books I read, hopefully I'll make a struggling Author smile 😀

Quotations

Ocassionaly I find a quote that resonates with me. I was staying in Bloomsbury recently and the following came to mind:

Virginia Woolf

Women have burnt like beacons in all the works of all the poets from the beginning of time. Indeed if woman had no existence save in the fiction written by men, one would imagine her a person of the utmost importance; very various; heroic and mean; splendid and sordid; beautiful and hideous in the extreme; as great as a man, some would say greater. But this is woman in fiction. In fact, as Professor Trevelyan points out, she was locked up, beaten and flung about the room. A very queer, composite being thus emerges. Imaginatively she is of the highest importance; practically she is completely insignificant. She pervades poetry from cover to cover; she is all but absent from history. She dominates the lives of kings and conquerors in fiction; in fact she was the slave of any boy whose parents forced a ring upon her finger. Some of the most inspired words and profound thoughts in literature fall from her lips; in real life she could hardly read; scarcely spell; and was the property of her husband.

She also wrote:

A woman needs money and a room if her own if she is to write fiction

I try to write about the 'real' women. I'm still working on the money and the room!

Making progress?

Two hectic weeks on and I've edited out almost as much as I've written. Legacy is beginning to shape up but I'm still struggling to get the 'feel' of it right. In my head it's there but when I read it out loud, I'm not convinced. The woes of being a writer eh?
I tried putting it aside and focussing on two other projects. First my novel about women transported to the American colonies in 1730s - Maryland. I asked for comments from my writers group. Best thing I could have done. I got a whole new perspective and I think I know how to get this going again. So, thanks to Ron, Eden and Karen.
My sci-fi story also got a dusting off. A big decision has been made. It's going to be two short stories, unless if course, I change my mind. Again!
Today I'm finalising the torture scenes in Legacy. Just got to go practice on the Sunday chicken before it goes in the oven.....

The Muse descended

After struggling for several weeks to find both the time and the inspiration to continue with my two main works in progress, this past few days I haven't stopped! Every spare minute I've been typing or scribbling notes.
Why did this happen? I was welcomed into a writer's circle and my new friends offered honest and thoughtful critiques of my work. A whole new perspective and a revelation on how to improve my work. It's reinvigorated my desire to write.
So, what did I write this week?
I have added to my sci-fi novel, Mergers and Acquisitions, and more importantly I've added 5000 words to Legacy.
This week I'm concentrating on a torture scene. Put myself off my tea!
Can't wait to finish today's chores so I can get writing. And I've booked tomorrow off work.....

*Distractions abound*

Having got back into writing more of Legacy, book 2 in my trilogy following the life and times of the Tregarthin, Wadham and Wyndham families, I was distracted again!
This time there were two culprits: an on-line learning course and a trip to Cornwall.
First the on-line course. This is a FutureLearn course run by the University of Basle on Reading in the digital age. Fascinating academic analysis of modern reading theories. Very engaging, but it's like having a new baby: you find a whole afternoon has gone by with you just looking (in this case looking at words on a page and on a screen and attempting to determine a difference in meaning/understanding).
Second, the trip. A much needed trip to Cornwall. It's cold and windy, ideal for blowing away the cobwebs. But, and there always seems to be a but, I went to Little Dennis in Falmouth, an outpost of Pendennis castle. It's a fantastic little spot but very evocative. I've now got the outline of at least two new stories in my head - getting the notebook out once I finish this - and I've sketched out a few chapters for book 3. Great. But I haven't finished book 2 yet!!!!
Fingers crossed for writing time tonight...

Finally, back to writing

Today I finally managed to find an hour to revisit my draft of Legacy, the sequel to Loyalty. I was pleased with the changes I've made to the first seven chapters, but I did have to sacrifice a few paragraphs that I had been very proud of before. I strongly suspect I will reuse the phrasing elsewhere!
Life gets so busy these days that finding time to write becomes difficult. With the lighter evenings I'm hoping that I can find time to push on with Legacy, as I won't be so tempted to wrap up in thick blankets and snuggle down as I did on those  dark winter evenings!

Inspiration in unexpected quarters

Went out as planned but unexpectedly came across a tiny fourteenth century manor house. Only a few rooms remain including an upper chamber with a beautiful wall painting. They uncovered the Angel Gabriel making his famous announcement, but sadly we don't have Mary. Just standing in that room was like travelling back in time. I have my notebook out and a whole scene for my novel is unfolding.
An inspirational setting. If you're in UK, and Dorset in particular I recommend a visit to Fiddleford Manor.

Legacy - barriers to writing

Well, I set aside a few hours to write some more of this story. I had so many details and plot lines in my head to get down. The computer behaved, but sadly I didn't! I allowed myself to get distracted by a tiny bit of double checking research! I simply had to check the dates of an outbreak of the infamous sweating sickness and the lure of internet links swallowed up a whole hour!
But, that aside, I managed to add quite a bit. I also rewrote one chapter and feel much happier about it.
It's much harder to write about ordinary lives in an exciting and page turning style, but I hope I'm making progress. Focus on the things that resonate with today's reader is my mantra. Hopefully it's working.
Then I went out to the supermarket and had an idea for a short story based on ancient Roman figures - not sure how that happened!
So today I'll go out for a walk and to get some more inspiration for Legacy, but I won't count on it!!

Jane Grenfell strugglingauthor Blog: Legacy - progress report

Jane Grenfell strugglingauthor Blog: Legacy - progress report: Well, as planned, I sat down to write a few more chapters for Legacy. Writing a sequel is hard! Ensuring consistency with volume 1 of the tr...

Legacy - progress report

Well, as planned, I sat down to write a few more chapters for Legacy. Writing a sequel is hard! Ensuring consistency with volume 1 of the trilogy takes longer than I thought it would. By the way a huge thank you from me to all of you who have downloaded Loyalty from Amazon. I appreciate your support and interest.
As I say I did sit down and typed up several thousand words only for my computer to crash. I lost the whole morning's work. #sadface does not do justice to how I felt.
But rather than rail against fate I decided it was the editing fairy or Calliope herself taking a hand. So I started again and actually feel that although I wrote less, it was better.
As I approach this weekend I have two data sticks, a virus checked hard drive and a cloud storage area all ready to receive the fruits of my labours.

Jane Grenfell strugglingauthor Blog: Get writing!

Jane Grenfell strugglingauthor Blog: Get writing!: Promised myself that this Mother's Day weekend I will concentrate on getting Legacy closer to being finished. Need to get about 50,000 w...

Get writing!

Promised myself that this Mother's Day weekend I will concentrate on getting Legacy closer to being finished. Need to get about 50,000 words so I thought let's go for 10,000 over two days. I'll report back!

I want to publish in April, a year after book 1, Loyalty came out.


But, as for many fellow struggling authors I get easily distracted. Usually by a series of other ideas for stories.

Even that triggers ideas for a story about an ambitious author who can't ever complete a project.....

New competitions

Although I'd promised myself I would concentrate on my works-in-progress, I saw this:
http://www.aerogrammestudio.com/2016/02/16/opportunities-for-writers-march-and-april-2016/?utm_content=buffer3bff5&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer.

Could be interesting......

Loyalty - latest edition released

For those of you who already have a copy of Loyalty - thanks for your support and I hope you enjoyed it. A new edition has just been released (available from Monday) with a couple of typos corrected. You can get this revised edition, free of charge, by going to your Amazon account and selecting 'manage my kindle'. Then just click on the book title to update it.
For those of you who have yet to get a copy, wait until Monday to get the latest version.
Don't forget, reviews are always welcome.

Insomnia put to use

Well, once again can't sleep. Too tired to tackle my complicated historical texts. So, I found a competition to enter. A short story by a British writer for the Irish Post. It's part of Listowel writers week. 1000 word limit on an Irish theme.
That was a challenge. What is an Irish theme?
Anyway I produced a short piece I was very happy with and with a click if the mouse it was gone!
So, let's see what they think.
After the deadline I'll publish it here, so you can comment..

Putting my time to good use?

Just decided to enter the Reader's Digest 100 word story competition, as suggested by my wonderful Dad. His blog.
100 words is not a lot, and it had to be precisely 100, not 99 and not 101. Submitted a piece called Retribution. Successful entries for public voting (how scary is that!) go on their website 6 March.

Another sleepless night

Oh well, if I cant sleep I might as well think about my writing. I was trying not to use the computer, trying to let the brain chill and hopefully fall asleep, but I couldn't resist!

I've been working on my sci-fi novella, and finally found a name for my alien protagonist. Imagination defeated I turned to the internet. I looked up some ancient names and found one that fitted the pronunciation patterns I had decided upon for my alien language. When I looked to see what the name had been associated with I found that it was the goddess of a moon of Venus and/or Venus - and my story references that planet. Co-incidence? Did I already know that? I don't care - its a great name and I'm really happy!

I have also been trying to progress Maryland - my novel about the transportation of female convicts to the American colonies in the 1730s.
I have pivotal violent scene in the early part of the book and  keep going back to it. It's the first time I've written such a sexually violent  section and I am almost literally sweating blood over it. Am I over-sensitive? I don't want it to be trite or hackneyed. I want it to be respectful of the victim - after all the writer does not know their reader, they may be a victim. I want it to be accurate but not overly-disturbing. Its probably the hardest thing I've ever written. I'll let you know how I get on.

Work in progress

Well, I've been working on several pieces at once! Not to be recommended as it's easy to get confused!
Last night I finished off two short pieces - both less than 2000 words - and took the plunge by sending them in for a competition. Although the judges don't give feedback it will be interesting to see if they get placed in the commended group.

So that leaves me with books two and three of my King,God and Country trilogy (Loyalty being book 1) partially written; a historical novel set in the 1730s; a science fiction novella of 17000 or so words, a short speculative fiction story and a bubbling idea about my home town of Bridgwater.

2016 seems to be my year of inspiration. Hope it keeps up!

I think I might also get Loyalty out in paper copy. I won't get any royalties for it given the pricing but I'd like those people who don't do ebooks to be able to get a copy.

If you have read Loyalty, please give it a review on Amazon, or tweet about it #strugglingauthor #commuteread

Insomnia strikes

Well, its 2.50 am. I cant sleep. It's a pain because I have to go to work in a few hours. Thought through a few more angles on the sci-fi story - got two titles to choose from. Progeny or Mergers and Acquisitions. I'm favouring the latter.
Also going to work up a short children's fantasy piece and a short i started as part of an on-line fiction writing course.