Archive for April, 2008
Starting a novel can be tricky; my problem is continuing it
I’ve been enthusiastically re-watching the Australian series Seachange since I unpacked a box containing my old videos - if you don’t know it, it ran in Australia from 1998-2000 on the ABC, starring Sigrid Thornton as big-city-lawyer turned small-town-magistrate Laura Gibson.
In any case, towards the end of Series 2 there’s an episode called Not [...]
Short story progress and the Writers Weekly contest
Incredibly, three months has come and gone since I entered my first Writers Weekly 24-Hour Short Story Contest, which makes it time for another one. Today, I wrote a short story for the Spring 2008 contest, and I’m happier with it than the story I produced the last time round.
I love the idea of this [...]
Saving money buying books online, or splurging at a favourite book store?
It’s a common trait down here that if a New Zealander moves to Australia to become famous, we Australians take them over and tend to forget their Kiwi origins. Russell Crowe, for example, or the Finn brothers and their band Crowded House; we Aussies like to claim all the popular exports as our own. And [...]
Fiction writer’s over-inspiration … a good problem to have
A recent post about why writers should read on FWJ wasn’t news to me - I’ve always presumed that all good writers must also be good readers. But I had an unusual experience last week, which put me off my regular evening reading session for a couple of days.
I’m an avid reader. I read on [...]
7 reasons why I have to finish writing my novel
Ah, life. So many distractions, so many reasons not to finish writing my novel. From the lows of that quiz which told me it would take years for me to finish a novel to the highs of November when I actually completed a (really very terrible) draft of it for NaNoWriMo, there are some days [...]
Australia-Asia Literary Award sounds like a step in the right direction
What’s happening to my country? Are we actually supporting literature? This week in my state, a new award was announced: the Western Australian Premier’s Australia-Asia Literary Award. It’s for books published by Australian or Asian writers, or largely set in these regions, published in the preceding year, and the especially nice part is it’s worth [...]
Fishpond sends me books, but can’t beat American prices
Remember how Australia’s attempt to compete with Amazon, Fishpond, cleverly convinced me to order my first books from them? The first book just arrived, in under a week, which is obviously not as fast as Amazon.de used to deliver to me in Germany, but I can accept that the distance across Australia to my isolated [...]
Organising my writing week (and not just my fiction)
One of the biggest problems I face with making progress on my fiction writing career (I say confidently, because I hope it one day becomes a career too) is organising all the writing I need to do each week - the stuff that pays the bills - as well as squeezing in time to work [...]
First chapters and the Writing Show
Remember the Writing Show’s first chapter makeover contest I wanted to enter? The contest is a great idea: the winners will get “professional help” to improve their first chapter, all done through podcasts and stuff online so that listeners and readers can follow and learn something out of it themselves.
You might recall I got my [...]
Contest entry goals: Need … public … pressure …
Everyone knows (or if they don’t, they should) that one of the best ways to achieve goals is to tell the whole world what you’re trying to achieve. Shame is a great motivator. It got me through NaNoWriMo and I’m going to try to use it again.
I’ve already mentioned that my goal for the year [...]