Yesterday was a great day. I ended up getting a contract in the mail from the Queensland Writer's Centre for my article, The Unutterable Phrase which will appear in their September edition. I also got an acceptance email from Copeland Publishing for my article, Earning My Stripes. They want to keep it on file to be used in a future edition of their Brisbane's Child magazine, which also has a Sydney, Melbourne and Perth version - I think they are pretty much the same just with local advertising. I guess in reality this one may never be published, but at least they want to hang on to it for a while.
I also was approached to write for CQ (Collegiate Quarterly) which is the Sabbath School lesson produced by the Adventist church for young adults. I jumped at the chance - it's a nice change to write to someone else's specs rather than just where my whim and fancy takes me. I decided to get stuck into it last night, as I'm very aware each evening could be my last before the twins arrive, and became quite inspired by it all. The end result was really pleasing. That one will be published in the fourth quarter, 2009 (Oct-Dec).
It appears that I may have found my calling. This whole process is sitting so well with me - probably because it is me. Hopefully the motivation will continue! It's just so much fun! And even my rejection letters aren't actually bothering me. I guess I've had a balance of yesses and nos, so that helps.
And I've also decided that there's a good reason why I like Christian author, Max Lucado's books. I love the way he writes and I can pick his work just about anywhere. I've decided it's because I actually write in a similar way. Now I'm not suggesting I have his ability, talent or anything else for that matter - it just suddenly hit me why his writing resonates with me so much. Who knows, maybe one day our names will appear in the same sentence!!! It doesn't hurt to dream does it??
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Monday, April 28, 2008
Thursday, April 24, 2008
The Writing Bug Has Bitten Me...and Hard!
Well it's been an interesting week at my house. I am now over 35 weeks pregnant and am half expecting my boys to arrive at any given moment in time. Each night I go to bed and wonder, "Is tonight the night?" For some reason I can only imagine myself in labour at night...I may fall apart at the seams if it happens in daylight!!
But the insomnia that goes with being this heavily pregnant ("heavily" is actually a really good adjective for the situation I might add) - and that is that I am having time to write.
I have started a novel - yes, another one - but this one is going to be different; not because I'm a better writer (which I think I am compared to 5 years ago), or because it's more interesting (once again, I think it is!), but purely because this time I am going to finish it! It's hard to believe, I know. But armed with me NEO I actually think it's possible.
In my previous attempts at novel writing I have jumped ship when the waves hit. If I felt the storyline was slowing down or my characters were too one-dimensional, I would throw my hands up in despair and abandon the keyboard forever. This time around, I have experienced both of those sensations, yet I'm proud to say I have kept on writing. I have - honest! Because I can't critique what I'm doing on the NEO, I have written through the writer's block barrier (which I personally find more painful that the so-called pain barrier).
So, I am now six chapters into my little creative endeavour and am over 22,000 words on my way to the end. Where the end will be, I'm not exactly sure. But gee I'm having fun getting there!
"What is this novel about?" you may ask. Well, I was inspired to write about something that doesn't require a lot of research, something I know fairly well...so I am writing about the experiences of 5 women who become first-time mums. Of course they have wildly varying personalities and backgrounds, but they are thrown together by a maternal health nurse who links them to form a playgroup. Through their experiences you will get to see varying perspectives on issues such as circumcision, breastfeeding versus bottle, going back to work versus staying at home - none of which I am actually making a statement on. I am simply exploring the perspectives and attempting to show how good mothering means different things to different people. An one of the underlying themes if the devastating impact of post-natal depression...
So far, I like my characters a lot, and they are starting to become real. I don't like chapter 5 at all, but I will wait until I reach THE END to do anything about it. There may be something worth saving. In the meantime I'm writing a chapter a day (which involves me writing from each of the five character's perspectives around a similar theme or timeframe - or dialogue as the case may be). I'm finding the dialogue the hardest part - it's tricky getting the voice of each character right, but I think I'm getting there. I am hoping my boys will wait until I get finished or close to finished before they arrive. I'm writing on average 5,500 words a day so will have to wait and see how far I get!
But the insomnia that goes with being this heavily pregnant ("heavily" is actually a really good adjective for the situation I might add) - and that is that I am having time to write.
I have started a novel - yes, another one - but this one is going to be different; not because I'm a better writer (which I think I am compared to 5 years ago), or because it's more interesting (once again, I think it is!), but purely because this time I am going to finish it! It's hard to believe, I know. But armed with me NEO I actually think it's possible.
In my previous attempts at novel writing I have jumped ship when the waves hit. If I felt the storyline was slowing down or my characters were too one-dimensional, I would throw my hands up in despair and abandon the keyboard forever. This time around, I have experienced both of those sensations, yet I'm proud to say I have kept on writing. I have - honest! Because I can't critique what I'm doing on the NEO, I have written through the writer's block barrier (which I personally find more painful that the so-called pain barrier).
So, I am now six chapters into my little creative endeavour and am over 22,000 words on my way to the end. Where the end will be, I'm not exactly sure. But gee I'm having fun getting there!
"What is this novel about?" you may ask. Well, I was inspired to write about something that doesn't require a lot of research, something I know fairly well...so I am writing about the experiences of 5 women who become first-time mums. Of course they have wildly varying personalities and backgrounds, but they are thrown together by a maternal health nurse who links them to form a playgroup. Through their experiences you will get to see varying perspectives on issues such as circumcision, breastfeeding versus bottle, going back to work versus staying at home - none of which I am actually making a statement on. I am simply exploring the perspectives and attempting to show how good mothering means different things to different people. An one of the underlying themes if the devastating impact of post-natal depression...
So far, I like my characters a lot, and they are starting to become real. I don't like chapter 5 at all, but I will wait until I reach THE END to do anything about it. There may be something worth saving. In the meantime I'm writing a chapter a day (which involves me writing from each of the five character's perspectives around a similar theme or timeframe - or dialogue as the case may be). I'm finding the dialogue the hardest part - it's tricky getting the voice of each character right, but I think I'm getting there. I am hoping my boys will wait until I get finished or close to finished before they arrive. I'm writing on average 5,500 words a day so will have to wait and see how far I get!
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Finding NEO
I have a new best friend. I apologise to my old writing buddies, but you’ve been usurped. I am a NEOphyte in the truest sense of the word. Allow me to explain.
I was first introduced the wonderful world of the NEO at a writing workshop with Canadian author, Trudy J Morgan-Cole (you can check out her blog at http://trudymorgancole.wordpress.com/). Whilst being inspired, encouraged and extended throughout the workshop, I was curious about a nifty little gadget Trudy had on her desk. Black, slim-line, sleek.
At the question and answer session, I couldn’t help myself, I had to ask. “What exactly is that keyboard computer looking thingo on your desk?” (My spoken eloquence was hopefully not an indication of my written expression.) Trudy picked up the item, clutched it to her breast and sighed. She literally sighed. Forcing herself back to the non-transcendental world, Trudy told us all about it. It was her NEO by Alphasmart.
Essentially, it was a stripped back computer that enabled her to do one thing and one thing only. To write. More valuable than her American Express card, she never left home without it. Trudy reeled off a list of the NEO’s highlights – light-weight, tough, portable, instant on/off, automatic save. But that wasn’t the bit that impressed me most. I was interested, but I wasn’t about to rush out and buy one…until she mentioned the power of the NEO to keep her focused on her single most-important task as a writer; that is, to write. With no internet capabilities, no web-surfing distractions, no games or instant messaging, the temptation to procrastinate, to meandre through cyberspace was gone.
Trudy talked of the common experience of being part way through a paragraph on her laptop, only to discover that she really needed to research what people ate for breakfast in 5th Century BC Persia. And so she would Google…and while she was waiting for the search engine she would check her email…and update her Flickr photo album, respond to Facebook comments and check out the most recent Target catalogue. Two hours later she hadn’t written another word. The opportunity was lost. The scenario resonated with me and so my NEO fact-finding mission began.
The NEO is originally designed for use in the classroom. It is a teaching tool for those who don’t want their students to be diverted from the primary task of writing. There are a few built-in features that are custom-designed for the classroom – a keyboarding tutor, the ability for quizzes to be downloaded and the potential for NEO’s to connect to one another. As a teacher, I was impressed. As a writer, it didn’t really matter.
What did matter was the single phrase Trudy used in the climax of her sales pitch (I think she may be a secret agent for Alphasmart and part of their grand plan to overtake the world…). The NEO overcame her inner critic. Now that was a big call. Was it really possible that a less-than-one-kilo word-processor could overcome that hideous, loud and insistent voice in my head that keeps telling me my stuff is rubbish, I need to rewrite the first paragraph – again – and I may as well give up because it’s never going to be good enough? The simple answer is yes.
So I decided to commit. There are two suppliers of NEO’s in Australia: Spectronics (www.spectronicsinoz.com), a Brisbane-based supplier of learning technologies and Battery Powered Computers (www.batterpoweredcomputers.com) out of Sydney. Being parochial, I chose the QLD based supplier (plus they were $14 cheaper) and promptly ordered my NEO for $385 including postage and GST. It arrived within three days. My techno-head husband was somewhat bewildered as to why I would want something so, well, primitive. But sometimes less is indeed more.
Typing on the NEO is easy – the standard QWERTY keyboard applies, although it is a little smaller than the average laptop and may take just a bit of getting used to. The instant on/off feature is an absolute delight. No more waiting for my laptop to boot up. Come to think of it, my laptop is arrogant really, not allowing me to even type until it finishes thinking. In contrast, the NEO is ready to go literally within three seconds. The other night I had a visit from the middle-of-the-night writing fairy who gifted me with a poem. Rather than lying in bed, tossing the words about in the ocean of my brainwaves, I decided to get up and write them down. Then maybe I could get some sleep. I switched on my NEO and my laptop at the same time. Without a word of a lie I had finished typing my poem (about 40 lines) before my computer had finished booting up. I was back off to bed while my arrogant Sony Vaio was still contemplating its navel.
The NEO is also amazingly conservative when it comes to power usage. The unit runs for approximately 700 hours on three AA batteries. No, that’s not a typo. 700 hours.
There are eight files in which to store your work. That means I can be working on multiple topics at one time. Each file has approximately a 50 page capacity. I can switch effortlessly between the eight files simply by the push of a button.
Another great feature is the automatic save. You seriously cannot lose your data. I’ve even tried on purpose. Nope. Can’t be done. I turned the NEO off a nanosecond after I’d typed a letter…but when I turned it back on, the letter was there. There is no need to press SAVE or CRTL+S – it all happens as the words appear on the screen.
Speaking of which, the screen is tiny. It can be formatted to display between 2-6 lines, depending on what font you select. I have mine set to four. It doesn’t sound like much and at first I was a little nervous. But by keeping my screen to four lines I am forced to write in the moment. I can’t easily re-read the entire paragraph or page – that will have to wait till I dump the file onto my computer. In the meantime, I continue to write until I am finished. The NEO single-handedly silences my Inner Critic. She has no choice but to submit. When there are only four lines to see at a time, she hasn’t got much to say. Put to bed like a naughty child, she is told not to come out of her room until I say so.
So how do you transfer your unedited, raw first draft to your computer? It’s really simple. The NEO has two options – a USB cable which comes with the unit or via infrared – whichever you prefer. I just have to start my word processor (in my case Microsoft Word, but it works on Macs too), wait until the blank page is ready, and then connect my NEO via the USB cable. The NEO leads me through the rest, asking me which file I would like to transfer. I press SEND and the words begin to appear as if by magic. It’s not an instant dump of text into my Word document. Instead, it happens at the rate of an exceptionally fast typist, which I actually kind of like. It allows me time to re-read what it was I wrote at the start of the document twenty minutes ago and get a feel for the text as a whole. If you prefer, you could always go and make yourself a cup of coffee in celebration of getting to the end of your first draft and come back to find the text transfer complete. If you have multiple files to transfer into one document, you just transfer them one at a time – the text will be dumped to wherever you place your cursor on the page. It really is that easy.
I’m nearly to the end of my article, which of course I am writing on my NEO. I am about to dump the text across into Word and shamelessly edit. The Inner Critic can come out of her room and correct typos, check my tense, add and delete words and shuffle paragraphs to her heart’s content. But I have finished the article without a single interruption. That in itself is a miracle! I’ve done more writing in the weeks since I got my NEO than I have in the previous twelve months. It really has changed my life. And maybe, just maybe, it will enable me to get to the end of a novel one day instead of being stuck in the endless loop of trying to write the perfect first chapter.
And just so you know, there really will be a neophyte - or should I say, neofight – shortly…a writer friend is coming to visit and one NEO between two authors is simply not enough.
I was first introduced the wonderful world of the NEO at a writing workshop with Canadian author, Trudy J Morgan-Cole (you can check out her blog at http://trudymorgancole.wordpress.com/). Whilst being inspired, encouraged and extended throughout the workshop, I was curious about a nifty little gadget Trudy had on her desk. Black, slim-line, sleek.
At the question and answer session, I couldn’t help myself, I had to ask. “What exactly is that keyboard computer looking thingo on your desk?” (My spoken eloquence was hopefully not an indication of my written expression.) Trudy picked up the item, clutched it to her breast and sighed. She literally sighed. Forcing herself back to the non-transcendental world, Trudy told us all about it. It was her NEO by Alphasmart.
Essentially, it was a stripped back computer that enabled her to do one thing and one thing only. To write. More valuable than her American Express card, she never left home without it. Trudy reeled off a list of the NEO’s highlights – light-weight, tough, portable, instant on/off, automatic save. But that wasn’t the bit that impressed me most. I was interested, but I wasn’t about to rush out and buy one…until she mentioned the power of the NEO to keep her focused on her single most-important task as a writer; that is, to write. With no internet capabilities, no web-surfing distractions, no games or instant messaging, the temptation to procrastinate, to meandre through cyberspace was gone.
Trudy talked of the common experience of being part way through a paragraph on her laptop, only to discover that she really needed to research what people ate for breakfast in 5th Century BC Persia. And so she would Google…and while she was waiting for the search engine she would check her email…and update her Flickr photo album, respond to Facebook comments and check out the most recent Target catalogue. Two hours later she hadn’t written another word. The opportunity was lost. The scenario resonated with me and so my NEO fact-finding mission began.
The NEO is originally designed for use in the classroom. It is a teaching tool for those who don’t want their students to be diverted from the primary task of writing. There are a few built-in features that are custom-designed for the classroom – a keyboarding tutor, the ability for quizzes to be downloaded and the potential for NEO’s to connect to one another. As a teacher, I was impressed. As a writer, it didn’t really matter.
What did matter was the single phrase Trudy used in the climax of her sales pitch (I think she may be a secret agent for Alphasmart and part of their grand plan to overtake the world…). The NEO overcame her inner critic. Now that was a big call. Was it really possible that a less-than-one-kilo word-processor could overcome that hideous, loud and insistent voice in my head that keeps telling me my stuff is rubbish, I need to rewrite the first paragraph – again – and I may as well give up because it’s never going to be good enough? The simple answer is yes.
So I decided to commit. There are two suppliers of NEO’s in Australia: Spectronics (www.spectronicsinoz.com), a Brisbane-based supplier of learning technologies and Battery Powered Computers (www.batterpoweredcomputers.com) out of Sydney. Being parochial, I chose the QLD based supplier (plus they were $14 cheaper) and promptly ordered my NEO for $385 including postage and GST. It arrived within three days. My techno-head husband was somewhat bewildered as to why I would want something so, well, primitive. But sometimes less is indeed more.
Typing on the NEO is easy – the standard QWERTY keyboard applies, although it is a little smaller than the average laptop and may take just a bit of getting used to. The instant on/off feature is an absolute delight. No more waiting for my laptop to boot up. Come to think of it, my laptop is arrogant really, not allowing me to even type until it finishes thinking. In contrast, the NEO is ready to go literally within three seconds. The other night I had a visit from the middle-of-the-night writing fairy who gifted me with a poem. Rather than lying in bed, tossing the words about in the ocean of my brainwaves, I decided to get up and write them down. Then maybe I could get some sleep. I switched on my NEO and my laptop at the same time. Without a word of a lie I had finished typing my poem (about 40 lines) before my computer had finished booting up. I was back off to bed while my arrogant Sony Vaio was still contemplating its navel.
The NEO is also amazingly conservative when it comes to power usage. The unit runs for approximately 700 hours on three AA batteries. No, that’s not a typo. 700 hours.
There are eight files in which to store your work. That means I can be working on multiple topics at one time. Each file has approximately a 50 page capacity. I can switch effortlessly between the eight files simply by the push of a button.
Another great feature is the automatic save. You seriously cannot lose your data. I’ve even tried on purpose. Nope. Can’t be done. I turned the NEO off a nanosecond after I’d typed a letter…but when I turned it back on, the letter was there. There is no need to press SAVE or CRTL+S – it all happens as the words appear on the screen.
Speaking of which, the screen is tiny. It can be formatted to display between 2-6 lines, depending on what font you select. I have mine set to four. It doesn’t sound like much and at first I was a little nervous. But by keeping my screen to four lines I am forced to write in the moment. I can’t easily re-read the entire paragraph or page – that will have to wait till I dump the file onto my computer. In the meantime, I continue to write until I am finished. The NEO single-handedly silences my Inner Critic. She has no choice but to submit. When there are only four lines to see at a time, she hasn’t got much to say. Put to bed like a naughty child, she is told not to come out of her room until I say so.
So how do you transfer your unedited, raw first draft to your computer? It’s really simple. The NEO has two options – a USB cable which comes with the unit or via infrared – whichever you prefer. I just have to start my word processor (in my case Microsoft Word, but it works on Macs too), wait until the blank page is ready, and then connect my NEO via the USB cable. The NEO leads me through the rest, asking me which file I would like to transfer. I press SEND and the words begin to appear as if by magic. It’s not an instant dump of text into my Word document. Instead, it happens at the rate of an exceptionally fast typist, which I actually kind of like. It allows me time to re-read what it was I wrote at the start of the document twenty minutes ago and get a feel for the text as a whole. If you prefer, you could always go and make yourself a cup of coffee in celebration of getting to the end of your first draft and come back to find the text transfer complete. If you have multiple files to transfer into one document, you just transfer them one at a time – the text will be dumped to wherever you place your cursor on the page. It really is that easy.
I’m nearly to the end of my article, which of course I am writing on my NEO. I am about to dump the text across into Word and shamelessly edit. The Inner Critic can come out of her room and correct typos, check my tense, add and delete words and shuffle paragraphs to her heart’s content. But I have finished the article without a single interruption. That in itself is a miracle! I’ve done more writing in the weeks since I got my NEO than I have in the previous twelve months. It really has changed my life. And maybe, just maybe, it will enable me to get to the end of a novel one day instead of being stuck in the endless loop of trying to write the perfect first chapter.
And just so you know, there really will be a neophyte - or should I say, neofight – shortly…a writer friend is coming to visit and one NEO between two authors is simply not enough.
Saturday, April 12, 2008
Look Out World, I'm Having a Book Published!!
I'm a sucker for sharing news - good and bad. As soon as something significant happens in my life I'm on the phone. It usually goes in this order...Mum, Ally, Sarina, Karly, Belinda...and whoever else happens to be home. Of course Mike gets first dibs if it's something that would interest him...I think he's secretly glad I have girlfriends I can talk to - otherwise I'd drive him crazy.
Anyway, my good news is....drum roll please....one of my picture book manuscripts has been accepted for publication by a small publisher, Innovative Resources (http://www.innovativeresources.org/).
The picture book is called There's an Elephant in My Loungeroom and deals with the harsh reality that many of our kids are growing up in homes where there are addictions or compulsive behaviours influencing their lives in profoundly negative ways. The book is a therapeutic picture book that will hopefully allow children the opportunity to explore what elephant lives in their loungeroom and open up a dialogue with counsellors and therapists about how it impacts them. It could also be used in the classroom but would need a really sensitive teacher to guide the discussion.
So, I'm very excited. I won't see a contract until about July as they need to source an illustrator first and it won't be off the press until the second half of 2009. And I'm certainly not going to be rich! I will get 2.5% of the retail price at the most...which will be somewhere between about 50c and $1 per copy. So I hope you all buy 10!!!
This rates as one of my top 10 achievements in my life. I have always wanted to be a published author and it's going to happen - with a lot of divine intervention!! God's timing was perfect - I sent off the manuscript just when Innovative Resources were discussing the exact metaphor I used. I just feel really led in this direction. I would love to be able to make a living from home as an author...it's what I feel is my true calling and it appears God is confirming that desire He placed within my heart.
So, look out world, I'm having a book published!
Anyway, my good news is....drum roll please....one of my picture book manuscripts has been accepted for publication by a small publisher, Innovative Resources (http://www.innovativeresources.org/).
The picture book is called There's an Elephant in My Loungeroom and deals with the harsh reality that many of our kids are growing up in homes where there are addictions or compulsive behaviours influencing their lives in profoundly negative ways. The book is a therapeutic picture book that will hopefully allow children the opportunity to explore what elephant lives in their loungeroom and open up a dialogue with counsellors and therapists about how it impacts them. It could also be used in the classroom but would need a really sensitive teacher to guide the discussion.
So, I'm very excited. I won't see a contract until about July as they need to source an illustrator first and it won't be off the press until the second half of 2009. And I'm certainly not going to be rich! I will get 2.5% of the retail price at the most...which will be somewhere between about 50c and $1 per copy. So I hope you all buy 10!!!
This rates as one of my top 10 achievements in my life. I have always wanted to be a published author and it's going to happen - with a lot of divine intervention!! God's timing was perfect - I sent off the manuscript just when Innovative Resources were discussing the exact metaphor I used. I just feel really led in this direction. I would love to be able to make a living from home as an author...it's what I feel is my true calling and it appears God is confirming that desire He placed within my heart.
So, look out world, I'm having a book published!
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