STRETCHING YOUR MUSCLES

Here we are in August 2021, and New South Wales, Australia is in lockdown. Covid keeps drifting back like a bad smell.

Sick of looking at the same faces you say, just try living on your own. I’m so totally sick of the sight of my face.

All that aside I assume everyone has been taking their daily walks to get their hours of outdoor exercise as allowed. 

Nothing open, nowhere to go, unless you want to shop for food, and if you’re like me, grocery shopping’s hardly stimulating. 

With all this extra time on our hands (excusing those who are home schooling of course), this is the perfect time to stretch those soft flabby muscles.

Don’t get all indignant about that comment, my muscles are just as flabby as the next person’s. 

What I’m talking about is our writing muscles. Especially the ‘little grey cells,’ as Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot often quoted. 

There must be millions of Covid stories out there, and this would be a good way to actually record a historic event in our own time. 

Dystopian civilisations come to mind stretch that imagination muscle with a fictional community or society that is undesirable or frightening.

The recent Sydney and Melbourne riots come to mind. A future where unreasonable anarchists are the order of the day. 

There’s a lot of plots out there just waiting to be brought to life, by guess who, that’s right little old YOU. 

As I’ve said before, the best way to know what you want to write is by reading other authors that interest you. Take note of their genre, their characters, the structure of their plots.

Ecclesiastes said, ‘… there’s nothing new under the sun,’ and I’m not advocating plagiarism, but
looking at the structure/process, and there are different structures for each genre as a rule.  

Reading other authors will give you an idea of how to develop your own voice, and writing style. 

I have a few things on the boil myself at present. 

One of those goals is to develop a ‘Creative Writing’ Course, leading up to ‘Writing Your Novel.’ 

Exciting times. Watch this space.

Murder She Wrote

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been busy adding a few 100 words to my own murder mystery. 

It started as a short story about missing children, because what reader would not show empathy for a lost child, and contempt for the perpetrator. 

The Orphanage

Standing alone on the outskirts of Campbelltown, I understand why the rents’ so low. I can just make out the back of an industrial estate in the distance. 

I turn towards the house, and in that moment curtains sway, as if just falling back in to place, for a second I think the agent must already be inside, until a red Ford Festiva pulls into the curb. 

Growing Memories

I know I've talked about my garden before, but after being away for Christmas, and the fact it constantly rained while I was away, there's a lot of weeding work to be done.

Creative Non Fiction Competition

 Competition Time 

Creative Nonfiction Magazine

Creative Nonfiction 

Deadline: February 22nd  at 11:59 pm

Word Count: 4,000 words including 1st page essay

Entry Fee: $3.00

To submit, click the appropriate link

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The Plot Thickens

As I discussed previously in ‘Digging Your Plot’ I brushed across thinking of Plot in terms of conflict.

Steampunk Watson

Victoria Sterling flinched at the knock on the door, but kept on typing. She wanted to get this article finished before the steam ran out of her typing machine.