Elizabeth Hawksley: Novel Writing Holiday in Fishguard
Fishguard Bay Hotel is the perfect venue for a novel writing weekend
On February 18th-20th I shall be in Fishguard to take six one hour workshops for the Winter Writers and Artists’ Workshop Weekend run by Anne and Gerry Hobbs. Shortly, first chapters and synopses from my prospective students will be thudding onto my doormat. Some of them will be from beginners, others from more experienced writers.
First, I must read the typescripts and then decide what workshops to do. My aims are to stimulate debate, both in the class and afterwards; to give them various technical pointers – for example, to include a number of hooks in the first chapter to draw the readers in; and to be helpful and encouraging. When the time comes to go home, I want them to feel that they have really learnt something.
I know how scary it can be to expose your writing to others, so I shall be keeping an eye on the group dynamic. Occasionally, one can get a member of the ‘awkward squad’ who needs firm handling if the atmosphere is to be as supportive and friendly as I’d like.
My guess is that the workshops will include Plot, the First Chapter, and Character but there are other possible topics. Writing an effective synopsis, for example, is notoriously difficult and they may need help with that. I shall also be available outside the classes to talk to anyone on a more personal level.
My Novel Workshop is one of five courses offered and they make for an interesting and lively mix of people. The weekend (nice hotel and good food) is as much about meeting other people who share your interests as it is about the workshops themselves, and Anne and Gerry are always very welcoming and helpful.
It’s a lot of hard work for both tutors and students but it’s also a lot of fun. I’m looking forward to it. If you’re interested, you can book in here.
Reasons to be Cheerful – Odette Elliott
I woke up this morning to the statement on the radio that “17th January is officially the gloomiest day of the year”.
It was indeed wet and gloomy outside, but I have a strange affinity with 17th of the month, as my birthday is on 17th November. So, since this is my date for the blog, I am searching for Something Cheerful to say. The 17th of the month needs a champion.
My Something Cheerful will be to celebrate the fact that Public Libraries and Mobile Library Services exist. They enrich our lives. One of our daughters lives on the Isle of Mull and how she values the Mobile Library service, especially during the winter season!
The other day I took our little granddaughter to the Public Library in Willesden. She thoroughly enjoyed browsing, reading and borrowing a few books. I already had so many books to read at home and I didn’t really want to add to the pile. However, my eye was caught by a shining, silver book. On closer inspection, it turned out to be a book about outer space, written by Lucy and Stephen Hawking. (Lucy is Stephen Hawking’s daughter.) It looked like an intriguing mixture between illustrated facts, amazing photos and a gripping adventure. It is called “George’s Secret Key to the Universe”.
Of course I borrowed the book and thoroughly enjoyed it. No. I couldn’t pass an exam on the wealth of information that it offered, but felt that it had opened my eye to some of the amazing aspects of life. It is beyond my comprehension that human beings can have so much knowledge about light years, other planets, the timings of comets etc.
Thanks to the Pubic Library, I have been able to enjoy a good story, as well as to reflect and wonder. This has enriched my life. Another time I might take out a book on a much more mundane subject. Variety is the spice of life. You will find variety in libraries. I refuse to be gloomy today. Long live Public Libraries!
Sand Dancers fight Donald Trump for sand dunes
LYNDA WATERHOUSE
Sand dancers don’t want Donald’s golf course on their turf
A few years ago, a walk in the sand dunes and a strand of marramgrass inspired me to create the magical world of the Sand Dancers for a series of stories published by Piccadilly Press.
As with most works of fiction this world was a creation of my imagination but it was fuelled by research and visits to sand dunes. The more I learned about the precious ecology of the sand dunes the more passionate I have become about them. I believe that the act of writing these stories has made me a more thoughtful person. It also means that on occasion my characters demand the right to prick my conscience. I have given them a voice and they demand to speak. What has been happening lately is that one character, Cassandra Marramgrass, has been nagging me to write this letter on her behalf.
This is how it goes,
Dear Mr Donald Trump,
My name is Cassandra Marramgrass and I am a sand sprite. We are mysterious creatures who live inside sand dunes and follow the rules set down in the Sands of Time. The first rule states that we must ‘Honour and care for the dunes as a mother would for her child.’ I know that you admire the Balmedie sand dunes in Aberdeenshire, Scotland because you said, ‘When I saw this piece of land I was overwhelmed by the imposing dunes.’ They are special. So I am asking you, on behalf of the sand sprites, not to build your golf resort, you holiday apartments, luxury hotel and two golf courses on 1400 acres of these beautiful dunes. They are rare and as well as being home to the sand sprites they are teeming with life. The skylarks, lapwings, redshanks and pink footed geese to name but a few of the birds come to rest and nest here. Indeed the area had been designated of special scientific interest but this decree has been overturned by Alex Salmond. This is a worrying precedent and means that other sand dunes and nature reserves are now also be under threat.
We have a saying,
‘Time passes, sands shift and
Secrets are revealed’
In time your scientists may discover what the sand sprites already know about just how important sand dunes are to the ecology of the planet. I am sure that other ways can be found to create meaningful employment and bring prosperity to the people of Aberdeenshire.
We will continue dancing to maintain the health and harmony of the dunes for as long as we can but we do need help.
Cassandra Marramgrass
Has anyone else been nagged in this way?
A walk in the woods
I’ve just come back from a few days in Fowey, Cornwall with family and friends. We spent some time exploring the river walks and woods near Lerryn. There’s something very inviting and playful about this spot. Even before you leave the car park, you see the stepping stones daring you out across the tidal river.
As we were putting on our boots we saw two walkers who were crossing the stones suddenly stop and burst into a mock swordfight. It ended with one of them, fortunately the one wearing wellies, wading the rest of the way.
Further along the narrow path, we came across another group of adults and kids. We smelt their woodsmoke before we spotted them having a winter campfire on a small beach that had appeared below the riverbank. A scene lifted from Swallows and Amazons. Almost.
Although this was a grey day in winter, the colours were varied and vivid as the blocks in a paint box. Bark covered with yolk-yellow lichen. Beetroot red branches in the distant trees. A carpet of copper oak leaves. Even the river mud exposed at low tide had the patina of old silver.
So much about this place suggested possibilities. The path itself that twists and turns, and opens out into spaces that surprise. We stumbled into the hidden Tivoli Park pleasure garden with its fountain, bandstand and plunge pool – once grand, a venue for picnics and regattas, now deliciously tangled and overgrown.
Later, across the water, we caught glimpses of an old, elegant boathouse. A boathouse! The very idea conjures up secret rendezvous and smuggled brandy. At the very least, isn’t it thrilling and ever so slightly surreal to think of entering a building by water?
We paused to watch a white ibis stalk puppet-like against a back-cloth of gunmetal grey. The youngest amongst us felt compelled to first swing on and then climb into the curling arms of a gnarled tree.
Looking through the walking guide as we linger, I see that this river bank, these very woods are believed to be the setting for ‘The wind in the willows”, written by Kenneth Graham in 1908. We have been walking through ‘the wild woods’ where Ratty and Mole meet up with Badger. I’m intrigued but somehow not surprised. The magic of this place has not changed.
MARION ROSE
Tribune Photo
Graphic novels – New year, new format
NIKKI BIELINSKI
I’ve never been one for graphic novels, ‘cartoons for boys’, and all that, but I was pleasantly surprised to review ‘The Little Prince’ recently. This graphic novel edition was adapted from the classic by Antoine de Saint-Exupery. I thought the illustrations and text changes would detract from the story… instead the graphics added impact and a silent, haunting poignancy. I actually feel tempted to dig deeper into reading more graphic novels, and found an interesting review site called Grovel . Yes, I liked the name too… Apparently they took the words ‘graphic’ and ‘novel’ and played about with them a bit. They thought it sounded better than ‘Hicnov’. Fair comment.
I hadn’t realised I was snobbish about graphic novels… no more ! Library shelves, here I come.
New Year New Notebook
by Miriam Halahmy
Christmas is over and in four days time the New Year will begin. I won’t be in London, we are flying off tomorrow to visit my husband’s family in Israel. So today is a packing day and there is one thing which will be at the top of my list. A new notebook.
My husband has discovered that a brand new notebook is always a thrill to me as a writer and so with great relief, he happily wanders around museum shops, Paperchase and backstreet stationers, choosing me new notebooks on a regular basis. He buys me the sort of notebooks I would probably never indulge in for myself.
He has learnt some basic no-nos along the way. I hate most lined paper, I’m so particular about the width of lines that he almost never ventures into lines anymore. And I can’t stand paper with bits of wood in them, you know, those arty crafty papers which are absolutely no use to man or beast.
But I love good quality cream paper, I like a nice hard cover with a picture on the front and I absolutely love the deep pockets that most modern hard cover notebooks have these days slotted neatly into the inside cover.
So what will I be writing in my new notebook? I always keep a journal when I travel. Its nice to have a quiet place to lose myself in, especially as I will be in the middle of my husband’s very large and entertaining family. They are Iraqi Jews and he and his seven brothers and sisters were born in Baghdad. The family went into exile in Israel in 1950 along with almost the entire community. The Iraqi government turned against its Jewish community after the creation of the State of Israel and almost a million Jews across the Middle East were forced out of their homes, losing everything they owned.
Many of my husband’s family still live in Israel. But a sister is coming from Australia and a brother from New York and so it will be a bit of a reunion. And then there are all the children, grandchildren, cousins, their children…. need I go on?
Israel is always a fascinating and challenging country to visit and so I will be bombarded with a huge range of experiences. How will I cope without my notebook to process everything?
And also, as always, a new idea for a book is brewing and so in the end I might find myself packing two notebooks, to keep my book idea separate from my travel experiences. Its is going to be a busy week and the New Year has not even arrived.
HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE/HAPPY READING/HAPPY WRITING
Elizabeth Hawksley: The Tools of the Trade
I have Susie’s interesting and stimulating blog Am I a Bad Writer? to thank for inspiring this blog. How can you tell if a piece of writing is any good or is all critical judgement merely subjective?
I taught Creative Writing for many years and I came to the conclusion that knowing the Tools of your Trade is a vital first step. There are the basics: understanding grammar and punctuation, both essential if you are to get your meaning across clearly. But there other tools as well. It also helps to understand imagery (alliteration, simile, assonance etc) and metrical stresses (iamb, spondee, dactyl and so on).
One evening, towards the end of the first term, we looked at Keats’ Ode to a Nightingale. In it, the poet calls for a glass of red wine ‘with beaded bubbles winking at the brim’. Originally, Keats had written ‘clustered bubbles’. I asked my students why they thought he’d changed it and did they think the change to ‘beaded bubbles’ was an improvement.
A long discussion followed. They thought the ‘b’ sound itself, which exploded from the mouth, was very bubbly; and they liked the alliteration of the b’s in beaded, bubbles and brim which made you think the wine was continuing to bubble.
They then moved on to ‘winking at the brim.’. Here they noted the assonance, where the vowel sounds are repeated, which adds to the feeling of continuity. Someone pointed out that there was assonance, too, in the discarded phrase ‘clustered bubbles’. So, originally, the line had had twice as much assonance. They decided that Keats had traded in the assonance in ‘clustered bubbles’ for added alliteration. They thought he’d been right to make the change.
At the beginning of the term, my students had had no idea what either of these terms meant and, at first, they were self-conscious about using them. Now, I was pleased to see, they were tossing words like ‘assonance’ about quite unselfconsciously. And, in so doing, they were honing their critical faculties. They now understood why Keats chose the words he did. Of course, you don’t have to know the technical terms to get the point – but it helps.
And, yes, their own writing improved, too.
Knowing the Tools of the Trade won’t automatically turn a bad writer into a good one but it helped my students to work out possible reasons why a piece of writing was or wasn’t working, and it certainly gave them a lot more self-confidence.
Odette Elliott-A couple of thoughts about Libraries for ALL.
I was distressed a while ago, when I heard that the Homework Club in my friend’s local library was being closed. I knew how valuable this had been for the children who attended. There are children with no computers at home and no peace to study.
Clearly the loss of any library will be a major disaster for poorer children, who may not have access to books in their homes. This goes without saying and it is really distressing.
People seem to suggest that in many middle-class homes, people just go ahead and buy books and don’t use the library. But what about the child who is just learning to read, who wants to take out every “Horrid Henry” book? The parents will not want to buy each of those books, as the child will fairly quickly move on to something else. The library provides just what the child needs in his or her early reading days. (The same goes for some series books – for example books about fairies. They serve a purpose for the moment.)
My grandson is surrounded by books in our home, but what he has preferred so far, are books about Diggers, Lorries, Tractors etc. We have been able to borrow all these information books from the library and not only has HE been delighted, but I have learned quite a lot!
And there is the matter of browsing. I know that so many books are available on Amazon. However, how does one know what will catch one’s eye and imagination? Yesterday I saw a fantastic book displayed in my library. It is “Animal Migration – Remarkable journeys by air, land and sea”. It is published by the Natural History Museum, price £14.99. I borrowed it from the library. I can’t wait to sit down and read, enjoy and learn about one of the most mysterious aspects of animal and bird life. I also expect to be able to look at it and share the delight and wonder with my 12 year-old grand-daughter. I only discovered this book while browsing in the library.
Browsing is good. Libraries are excellent – for us ALL!
Buzz about Books 