Travel Inspiration: Aruba

The bright morning sun must be inspiring me this morning, after the recent very cold weather - even yesterday, it was zero degrees when I drove from the house. As we wander gently into spring, many people's thoughts are probably turning to holidays now, whether at home or abroad, and it gave me a new idea for blog posts.

Since my husband has been a travel professional all his working life, we've been lucky enough to visit many countries around the world, even more from cruise ships. I love taking photographs and have amassed a huge number now that digital makes it so easy to keep snapping. So, I'm going to start a new occasional blog series, using photos to inspire creativity. Some will be scenic shots, some might be more quirky, but I hope they might spark an idea for a story, or poem, or just some dreams of far of lands, or even remind us of the beauty in our own country.

I'm beginning with the Caribbean island of Aruba, in the Lesser Antilles, partly because this notice I snapped at the entrance of a little garden came to my attention this morning and I love the sentiments. Hope you can read it as it was rather old and faded.

Aruba is a small island, only 33 kilometres long and is surrounded by beaches, but the most interesting sight for me was this stunning natural bridge down by the sea.

If anyone is ever looking for professional, personal travel advice or arrangements, by the way, you can find details of my husband's independent business and the company he works with on his website here. Many of my photos are on his site!

Rosemary

Mslexia Short Story Competition and Exercises

The Mslexia writing magazine short story competition has become an annual event and is well worth entering if you write more literary stories, as opposed to commercial women's magazine fiction. It's a hugely popular magazine, but you must be a woman to contribute to its pages or enter the competitions.

The current short story competition closes on 18th March and should be a story on any theme of up to 2,200 words. The judge is Janice Galloway, a writer I greatly admire - I wrote a review of her wonderful novel, Clara, on this blog some time ago. It's quite a steep entry fee at £10, but the prizes reflect the quality of the competition, with a first prize of £2,000 plus two optional extras of a week's writing retreat at Chawton House Library, and a day with a Virago Editor. Second prize is £500 and third prize is £250, plus three other prizes of £100.

To inspire and help entrants, Mslexia are running short story workshops and exercises on their website and you can read the first excellent advice and exercise here. The next workshop will be live on their site tomorrow, 26th February. These are useful to all short story writers, whether or not you intend entering the competition. Mslexia magazine also features a New Writing section in many of their issues which is free to enter and is usually a mixture of fiction and poetry.

Good luck if you enter!

Meanwhile, the first post in my new series of features about children's, tween, and YA books is over on my Flights of Imagination blog, where Bil and Bon Franks are talking about the inspiration behind their new YA book Running Over Rainbows, and their Twilight of Magic series.

Rosemary

Log Lines and Print

I'm really pleased that my Victorian novella, Mischief at Mulberry Manor, is featured on the Log Line blog today. This is a great idea for promoting books, as it forces us to condense our story into one sentence of 25 words or less. You might have heard of the term Elevator Pitch - that's when you get the chance to pitch your book to an agent or publisher until the lift (or elevator) stops - well, a log line is the equivalent. It certainly makes us focus on the relevant parts of the story!

Although I love my kindle and read as many ebooks as print now (or maybe more), sometimes we still want to hold a paper copy of our book in our hands. And not all of my friends and family have e-readers yet. So, by way of an experiment, I published my novella through FeedARead which is supported by the English Arts Council and several large publishers. It's ideal, as I can now order several copies to sell to anyone who might prefer a print copy, and readers can buy it straight from the FeedARead store. Authors can pay to have their print book available on every other site too, such as Amazon and Waterstones, but I've decided against that option for now.

It's great that we have so many more publishing options than before, so it's good to try a variety of methods and see what works best. I'm aiming to stay with publishers wherever possible but experiment with other options for some work. It's a whole new world!

Rosemary

Edits and Revisions

I love when a book gets to the editing stage, as it means I've actually finished and submitteded the whole novel! As a panster, I'm never quite sure how a story will end until I get there, and I'm still trying to decide if I should plan a little more. Like many other writers, the characters are the most important element of a novel for me and I prefer to set them up then let them play. But my plot sometimes get a little lost on the way, and occasionally I have to rework an ending.

This week, I was delighted to receive the first edits for my new tween book, The Jigsaw Puzzle, which will be coming soon from MuseItUp Publishing. Fortunately, my editor really likes the story and there are no issues with the plot, nor too many corrections as far as I can see from my quick glance. I'm really looking forward to going through it all in the next day or two, with the benefit of her professional experience and advice.

I also submitted another children's story, shorter and for younger children, to an online publisher who bought one of my previous children's stories. Although they really like the story overall, this one needs a slightly stronger ending. I was very pleased to get the opportunity to revise the ending and submit again - which I did right away this morning! I'll let you know if it's successful.

I'm also redrafting and revising an adult historical that had some very good feedback from the first publisher I tried, but some elements of the plot let it down. Now that I'm going through it all again, I completely agree and I've already ditched almost 5,000 words of it (I'm about 3/4 of way through revisions). I've learned two lesons from this: I submitted in far too much of a hurry, and some novels need a little more plotting than others. This novel will hopefully be all the stronger for its revisions and will soon be ready to wing its way to another publisher.

Fortunately, I love all the stages of writing and submitting, and don't even mind occasional rejections, as long as I'm still getting acceptances. It's even better when I learn valuable lessons that hopefully strenthen the writing along the way!

In case anyone is interested in writing for children, I'll be starting a new series over on my children's blog, Flights of Imagination, from Monday. Each week, I'm going to feature a children's, tween, or YA author and book. If you write for these age groups and would like your book featured, please let me know.

Rosemary

Writing Market: CafeLit

If you write short stories that perhaps don't fit the women's magazine market, you might like to try submitting to CafeLit. Stories up to 3000 words are welcome, including flash fiction length, and a collection of the best stories is published each year. It's worth having a look around their website as they sometimes have other projects on the go.

I was delighted that my daughter, Vikki, had a short story published in the Irish literary online journal, The Bohemyth the other day. Her story, 'Pop Goes the Gun', is the second one down. This might be a good market if you're more concerned with getting your name out there in literary publications, rather than trying to earn an income from writing.

Rosemary

Romantic Interlude

I can't let St Valentine's Day pass by without a mention, since some of my writing is romantic intrigue. Venice is one of my favourite destinations and I still think it's the most romantic - without having to pay a fortune in a gondola ride. The year we stayed there for almost a week, our hotel was near the top of the narrow canal under the Bridge of Sighs.

One evening, I was standing at the open window admiring the view when a gondola whispered past. The gondolier, in his distinctive striped top and beribboned hat, was serenading the occupants. I found it much more romantic being the onlooker to such a scene. With its bridges, canals and labyrinth of narrow streets, Venice was made for intrigue!

A couple of people are offering free downloads today, so it might be an ideal time to stock up on more books, many with a romantic theme. Sally Quilford has a great list of stories on offer so there's bound to be something for everyone. Over on the Minxes of Romance, they're giving away an ebook of eight sexy stories about firemen, appropriately titled Blaze. Enjoy!

I've also posted a short piece about red roses over on the Romancing History blog.

Have a loving day, whether or not it's romantic.

Rosemary

Write this Moment

I know of a few people who are seeking more writing opportunities this year, and I'm sure many more are trying to increase their income as freelance writers.

WriteThisMoment is an online subscription based site which provides details of writing jobs and opportunities in the UK and USA, as well as some from other parts of the world. Although annual membership is £24 (for twelve months), you can try it over three months for £8 which seems ideal for testing its worth for your particular needs. I'm about to do exactly that!

Let me know if you've used them before, or how you get on if you decide to sign up.

Rosemary

Gwen's Next Installment

I've had a busy but very enjoyable week so I'm running a little behind. Just want to mention that this is the final day for a free download of the fouth part of Gwen's Laird of Lochandee series, A Maxwell Loss - in case you've been following the absorbing story!

Available free today on amazon.

Rosemary

New Look and Updates

Nearby woods on a wintry walk

As you can see, I've finally taken time to update the blog with a new look. I'm sure there are still a few links to check or add but at least the bulk of it's done. I'd planned to change it for the beginning of January but other work and pleasure intervened. Do you ever have to stop everything else and get a job finished? Fortunately, I completed a little writing first but I'm in catch-up and organising mode today! Since it's very wet and windy here, it's a perfect day for staying in and working.

I've recently started writing web-based non-fiction for the UK division of American online company, Demand Studios. I used to contribute articles a couple of years ago and was delighted to receive an invitation to write for them again. Although I still love writing fiction, I get paid for these fairly quickly and can choose a couple or more titles a week - if the subjects suit me! I also had an article accepted by Scottish Home & Country Magazine - I've contributed there before over the years.

So I guess I've been in more of a non-fiction mood for a week or so, although I'm trying to finish a contemporary novel, and I'm in the middle of judging short stories for a local schools competition sponsored by our writing group. I also managed to write and submit a new children's story, so I don't feel too guilty about taking time out to do some organising. Anyone else in clear-up and update mood?

Rosemary