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Memories – Friday Fiction
I set myself the task of writing a descriptive piece of fiction this week using all the senses. I'm more comfortable writing active scenes with lots of dialogue, so this area of my writing needs more practice. I used Sara's prompt word 'laughter' and drew on a memory,...
Summer Term Madness
Why is it that schools feel as though they must pack everything in to the last term? Between all three children, my calendar is full of events: ones that we need to attend, others where we need to remember to take in certain things or do something special for. As a...
A Few Victories for the Shy Ones
I watched my daughter read a piece of her work in her class assembly this week and it struck me that it is the first time in her junior school career that she has done something like that. She's in year six and just about to leave to go to secondary school. Being one...
A Poem for Father’s Day
I love the way my middle daughter's mind works. She is creative, just like her older sister, but she has an understanding and level of empathy that goes beyond her eight years. This means that she always takes great care to come up with deep and meaningful words to...
‘The End’ – When Do You Really Stop Drafting?
'The End' Those two words can mean so much, especially to me this week. I finished the draft of my manuscript re-write. I wrote the end of my story. Except I never actually wrote those two words because I know that it's far from at that point. It felt good though....
Friday Fiction
Welcome to Friday Fiction. Just for fun this week, I have a story that my eldest daughter wrote when she was eight. The prompt from Sara at mumturnedmom is 'Stars' and I wasn't sure if I would be able to join in with it, until I remembered that I had this story filed...
How do you keep up your writing mojo?
If there’s one thing that throws me off with my writing, it’s a break in the routine. A week off for the school holidays is fine, but if I leave it any longer than that, it's much harder to get back in to. That’s what happened this week. Half term came and went, then...
Friday Fiction – How Do You Measure Author Success?
Friday Fiction is here and as it's the first Friday of the month it's link up time! Join me by linking up and sharing your own fiction works and book reviews. Have a read of what others are sharing and don't forget to leave a comment to let them know. All you need to...
Friday Fiction – Fear
Welcome to Friday Fiction. Can I just remind you that NEXT WEEK (5th June) is link up week. That means that if you have any fiction pieces or book review posts that you want to share with others, pop along and feel free to link up. It would be great to see you there....
50 Things That Make Me Happy
I finally got around to doing a post that the lovely Renee from Mummy Tries tagged me in. It's called '50 things that make me happy' and I thought it was such a lovely positive thing to do that I didn't want to pass up the chance to join in. As it happens, Renee is...
Friday Fiction
My Friday Fiction extract this week comes from a manuscript that waits patiently in the background for me to edit it. In the meantime, I often find myself delving in to it looking for interesting passages to share for this weekly post. I chose this piece as it fits...
Developing Your Writing – From Story Ideas to Full Blown Novels
I regularly blog about how to find writing inspiration: from music, images and paintings, stories, inanimate objects and even Literary Agent’s wish lists, inspiration is everywhere. Sit in a café or on a park bench for half an hour and you’re likely to spot an...
Friday Fiction – Dark Days
This is a scene from the story I'm working on at the moment. It is an exchange between the main protagonist (Jake) and his brother (Mattie). I hope you enjoy it. ‘You don’t remember anything from back then do you?’ he says, shaking his head in disbelief. I feel hot...
Children’s Picture Books and Moving On
We met children's book illustrator and author, Katherine McEwan at my writing group last week. What a lovely lady she is and such beautiful work too. People might think it's easy to write picture books when in fact the opposite is true. The word count is limited and...
Friday Fiction – The Departing
Anna sat, consciously unmoving in the leather chair of the Headmaster’s office, aware that any sudden movement might make the old leather groan and squeak to penetrate the already tense and embarrassing silence. Though a fully grown adult with three young children,...
Reading for Research Purposes
Do you read for the purpose of research when you are writing? Or do you save reading purely for pleasure? I don't ever finding reading a chore, but sometimes my choice of books is dependent on what I am wriitng. Some people don't read at all when they're in the...
Friday Fiction Is Changing
I've been writing weekly fiction posts for some time now and I created the Friday Fiction link so that others could join me. It's difficult to come up with new material week after week though, so I'm widening the remit of this slot to include book reviews. I already...
Is It Ever Too Late To Save A Story?
When I came across the ten to one story, I knew I had to try it for myself. That set me off looking for similar writing exercises and I found and completed another three. Lots of you joined in too and it was great to see the variations in interpretation and ideas. The...
Friday Fiction – NaNoWriMo re-visit
Welcome to Friday Fiction. Thanks to those who came along last week and linked up. It was nice to be back and I enjoyed reading your stories. This week I've chosen an extract from the novel I wrote for NanoWrimo. I haven't had much time to work on it, as I've been...
Post Holiday Blues
Having just returned from a fantastic family holiday, today seems somewhat flat. The first day back of school for the little ones, the big girl going off for a few days on her year six residential trip and my mum going back up home. Everyone’s gone and I’m here in the...