Happy Hogmanay and New Year

Wishing all my lovely friends and followers a Happy Hogmanay and much health, happiness and success in 2013. If anyone would like to read about Scottish Hogmanay Traditions, I've put a little piece over on the Romancing History blog.

Thank you very much for being so supportive and encouraging over the year and I look forward to many more interactions in the coming year.

I'll leave you a verse and chorus of Auld Lang Syne from our famous bard, Robert Burns.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind ?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne?

For auld lang syne, my jo,
for auld lang syne,
we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

Happy New Year,
Rosemary

End of Another Writing Year

How quickly this year has passed. I’m so glad the world didn’t end yet after all, as I have too much still to do! Hope everyone had a great Christmas and as much chocolate as they wanted. I’m still enjoying working my way through the yummy chocs here.

This seems a good time to make a note of how the writing has gone so far before trying to set any goals for next year. One thing I must do is keep better records of everything, although I’ve made a step in the right direction by recording different lists on a spread sheet. So here goes with what I can remember of my achievements this year.

Published

Summer of the Eagles – Tween Novel (MuseItUp Publishing)
Alternative Short Story Markets - article in Freelance Market News
The Invitation – short story in Woman Alive
To be a Family Again - short story published in My Weekly
Jeremy Jones and the Jungle – children’s story on Knowonder
Wander Round my Garden – poem on Breast cancer Awareness Site
The Narrow Path – Meditation in The Upper Room
Romantic Fiction Markets – article in RNA Romance Matters Magazine
Mischief at Mulberry Manor – Victorian Novella on Amazon

Competitions

The Artist’s Wife – Winner of Multi-story short story competition, and published online
The Price of Progress – highly commended in Sunpenny short story competition
Winner of writing group article competition
2nd prize in writing group poetry competition
Samhain – short story considered for US anthology

Accepted (to be published in 2013)

St Teresa of Avila – article for She’s the One collection
The Jigsaw Puzzle – Tween Novel (MuseItUp Publishing)

Submitted (waiting to hear)

Two novels and one part novel
One novella
Nine short stories
Two poems
Two children's stories

Also judged three competitions and delivered a short talk after each.

Not bad but could be better! Managing to finish over 50,000 words during the NaNoWriMo challenge was another first and succeeded in instilling better writing habits in me which I hope to continue after New Year’s Day.

Next year, I should have at least another two novels to be submitted and another couple to finish, as well as others to begin. So I guess I’ll be busy. I’m also judging at least two competitions before summer. And, of course, I still have lots of short stories to send out again. One thing is for sure – writing is a wonderful adventure and we never know where it might take us!

Thank you so much to all the lovely bloggers, writers and readers who join me in this journey.

Rosemary

Happy Christmas!

Wishing all my lovely blogging friends, readers and visitors a very Happy Christmas. May you experience joy and peace and lots of chocolate treats!

Here's an appropriate verse from Sir Walter Scott, considering my Victorian period novella, Mischief at Mulberry Manor, was just published!

On Christmas Eve the bells were rung,
On Christmas Eve the mass was sung;
The damsel donned her kirtle sheen,
The hall was dressed with holly green;
Forth to the wood did merry-men go,
To gather in the mistletoe.

Rosemary x

Mischief at Mulberry Manor Published!

Oh, the excitement - now that my Victorian novella is published on Amazon kindle! Mischief at Mulberry Manor is around 29,000 words and I really enjoyed writing this. It’s part Gothic romance, part ghost story and is set around the forthcoming Twelfth Night Masked Ball in 1859. I’m so delighted with the lovely cover which writer and journalist friend, Sara, designed from my own original photo.

Here’s the short blurb:

When Maryanne Robertson visits her cousins’ old manor house for the Twelfth Night Masked Ball in 1859, she does not expect to find the manor haunted, or to fall in love. But mischief is afoot and one of her cousins is missing, while out of doors snow and frost covers the ground. Is the mischief caused by a ghostly presence or someone more human?

If you’re a visual person, like me, you might enjoy the trailer I made for YouTube – can’t resist having fun with these!

And if anyone wants to read it (hopefully) it’s available from Amazon UK and Amazon US, and all the other Amazon countries.

Rosemary, or that should be Romy for now!

Inspiration

I'm delighted to accept another blogging award, as it means people are actually reading and enjoying the blog! This lovely Very Inspiring Blogger Award is from the most inspiring Patsy and I'm supposed to tell you 7 random things about myself. I expect you've heard nearly everything about me by now, so I'm going to give you seven inspiring quotes to take into 2013:

'The strong are strengthened by defeats.' Antoine de Saint-Exupery

'A poem is the image of life expressed in its eternal truth.' PB Shelley

'Ask me not what I have, but what I am.' Heinrich Heine

'A merry heart doeth good like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones.' Proverbs 17: 22

'Do not fear going forward slowly, fear only to stand still.' Chinese Wisdom

'Inspiration is the art of drawing up a chair to the writing desk.' Anon

'There are two ways of spreading light - to be the candle, or the mirror that reflects it.' Edith Wharton

All the blogs I follow are inspiring in their own ways so I hesitate to choose only a few but I haven't mentioned the following for a while: inspiring daughter Vikki ; prolific author Paula Martin; fabulous Talli; talented Joanna; informative Carol; and interesting Jean.

Rosemary

Advent Fun and a Starry Blog

I’ve been having as much fun as any child during December with my fabulous Jacqui Lawson electronic Advent Calendar. Each morning is filled with anticipation, as I find out what delights await me from the snow globe on my desk top - and the husband wonders why I’m laughing aloud!

One day, I was making snowflakes, or a snowman, or a train, while yet another I watched as different shops came to life. The whole scene is set in an Alpine Village and each day the Christmas tree adds another decorative item to its branches. I can’t recommend this highly enough for another year.

I’m also honoured and delighted to receive a Blog of the Year 2012 award from the lovely Teresa Ashby, and it’s added to my enjoyment of one of my favourite months.

The rules for this are –

1. Select the blog(s) you think deserve the ‘Blog of the Year 2012′ Award

2. Write a blog post and tell us about the blog(s) you have chosen - and ‘present’ them with their award.

3. Please include a link back to this page ‘Blog of the Year 2012′ Award - and include these ‘rules’ in your post (please don’t alter the rules or the badges!)

4. Let the blog(s) you have chosen know that you have given them this award and share the ‘rules’ with them.

5. You can now also join the Facebook group.

6. As a winner of the award — please add a link back to the blog that presented you with the award — and then proudly display the award on your blog and sidebar … and start collecting stars… Unlike other awards which you can only add to your blog once — this award is different!

When you begin you will receive the ’1 star’ award — and every time you are given the award by another blog — you can add another star! There are a total of 6 stars to collect.

I'm passing this on to:

Teresa - her blog is as warm and friendly as her delightful stories in many of the women’s magazines.

Janice - whose blog is full of life and fun, and who is an absolute star at indie publishing.

Frances – for her great sense of humour and down to earth posts.

Anita – whose blogs are always full of interesting posts on a variety of subjects.

Patsy – who provides endless free competition details and quirky posts.

Hope everyone else is enjoying December,
Rosemary

Gwen's Second Free Download

Having Internet problems and trying to finish editing the novella. This is just a quick post to let you know that Part Two of Gwen Kirkwood's great historical romance saga set in the Scottish Borders between the two World Wars, A Maxwell Mourned, is available as a free download until Sunday, 16th December, from Amazon UK and Amazon US.

Enjoy!
Rosemary

Christmas Spirit

We went for a lovely walk in the grounds of my favourite Georgian country house yesterday and imagine my delight when we discovered two of the beautiful Clydesdale horses were decked out to pull a little Christmas trolley along for children and their parents. I'm a sucker for anything like this but restrained myself to taking a few photos!

Inside the house, children were queueing up to visit Mrs Claus in one of the gracious rooms upstairs, which was suitably decorated in Christmas finery. We went instead to the lower floor for a browse through the Christmas gifts on sale. How much more enjoyable than busy shopping malls, when I could buy a few items in the converted old kitchen that still sported an authentic Victorian cooking range.

I came back refreshed and ready to get on with the rest of the novella and the final tweaks of some critiques I'm doing for the writing group tomorrow. It's our Christmas party, so the festive spirit is well and truly under way!

Rosemary

Arrival of Winter

We've had our first fall of snow the last couple of days and today the sun is shining, making it a lovely winter scene here, although I took the above photo last year. The birds are fighting over the hanging containers of food and the clever little robin is waiting beneath one of them for the crumbs dislodged by the longer beaked birds. All very distracting while trying to write!

I'm now forging ahead with the Victorian novella I was hoping to get onto kindle before the end of the year. Mischief at Mulberry Manor is set around twelfth night but I won't talk about it too much in case I don't get it published in time for January. Also managing to keep up the word count on the contemporary novel, and enjoying the new habit of writing a little of it each day before going near the Internet.

Meanwhile I'll leave you with this great quote:

'Let us not look back in anger, nor forward in fear, but around in awareness.'
James Thurber

Rosemary

A Winning Situation

Well, I’ve done it – I completed the NaNoWriMo Challenge for the first time! It was a close thing in the end as I was out most of yesterday at a wonderful lunch in Glasgow with lots of writer friends. But I’ve mentioned before how much I like writing on trains and I managed to write nearly 1000 words between the half hour journey there and back!

Nearly didn’t get to register my total last night, as the Internet connection chose that moment to stop working. After a few minutes panic, I remembered dear husband had a different connection upstairs and it worked. Total word count validated and exhaustion setting in. But I’m glad I persevered as I now have ¾ of a contemporary novel and 80% of the Victorian novella written. I might have finished one of them if I hadn’t (madly) decided to write the first part of another type of novel for our annual SAW competition – and the deadline for that was also yesterday (didn't count that for NaNo total)!

But I must thrive on challenge and deadlines and the whole month has proved to me what I can actually achieve if I knuckle down and write first, before playing on social networks. It has also shown me that I thrive on having two projects at once – if I write them at different times of the day. So NaNo worked on lots of levels for me. Main problem now will be finishing each of these projects. But since the novella is set around Twelfth Night, that’s the priority!

Meanwhile, I was delighted and proud to hear that my daughter Vikki has won third prize in the latest Multi-story competition. This was a Flash Fiction comp and I’ve just read her beautiful story on the Multi-story website - just scroll down their page.

And if you would like an enchanting weekend read, then Jenny Twist’s great little story, Away with the Fairies, is free to download from Amazon UK and Amazon US over the weekend.

I’m away now to enjoy a coffee and walk with husband this morning before tackling the rest of this novella!

Rosemary