Please note this blog has now moved to Blogger at: http://tonyriches.blogspot.co.uk/
Guest posts are always welcomed on any topic to do with writing - and I am happy to support other authors with new book launches and reviews
If you would like to discuss please email me tonyriches@live.com
Thanks
Tony
Posted in Uncategorized
This week I have been learning about eBooks – can any writer afford not to? The great thing about twitter is that the writing community are so happy to help. A good example is Sydney based writer, journalist and eBook specialist Steven Lewis who runs Kindle Writers.
Steven has been around eBooks from the start in 1993, when he published his first e-zine. He told me “When I started writing seriously, self-publishing was expensive and still had the smack of vanity about it, then the Kindle floated into my life in the hands of a postman who didn’t know what he was unleashing. In that familiar brown Amazon box was the answer as far as I was concerned. Within a couple of weeks I had my first title in the Kindle store. Now I can write anything I want and, with a growing pool of millions of readers, find enough who share my interests to make it more than worthwhile.”
More eBook resources
A quick twitter search led me to some great eBook resources, including Joel Friedlander’s The Book Designer which is full of practical advice. Joel is a self-published author and blogs about his experience of book design and the indie publishing world, so I have been watching out for his posts – and learning a lot. On his blog this week Joel interviewed eBook ‘guru’ Joshua Tallent who has a site called Kindle Formatting – a really very useful resource for anyone interested in publishing content on the Kindle. As well as loads of background information Joshua gives a clear step by step guide to conversion from Word.
High spot of the week
This has to be Joanna Penn’s relentless launch week of her new eBook Pentecost. As someone who plans to do something like this myself one day, I made a point of looking out for the blogs, tweets, interviews and podcasts. Anyone who thinks eBooks make publishing easy needs to talk to Joanna, who told me “The launch was very hard work to prepare, a rollercoaster to experience but totally worth it in terms of sales, networking and marketing!”
Favourite quote of the week:
“TV was banished from our house and since then I have written four books” ~ Joanna Penn
Just a nice ‘tweet’
When Tanya Ray tweeted “Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark” she said it was on her desk in front of her – but didn’t know who it was. Intrigued, I looked it up and found it is by Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore, winner of the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature. (If anyone is looking for a really amazing true story his has got it all – including turning down a knighthood and bcoming the voice of India’s spiritual heritage.)
Funny tweet:
@TwopTwips via @p_f_c “PRETEND you have an iPad by disabling Flash in your browser and having a less than satisfactory internet experience” (Well it made me smile)
Contact me on tonyriches@live.com or follow me on twitter @tonyriches
Posted in Blog
Roald Dahl
I met Felicity, Road Dahl’s widow at the naming ceremony for Roald Dhal Plass in Cardiff. It was neither the time or place but I would have really liked to ask her about his writing routine. As I don’t have a routine I am intrigued at his discipline.
His writing place was a green shed at the bottom of the garden where he would sit in a green armchair, writing with a specially made wooden board on his knees. He would always write from ten in the morning until noon, then take a break and write again from four to six in the afternoon.
When he was living in America he discovered Ticonderoga pencils and yellow legal paper – and never used anything else from then on. Interestingly, Roald Dahl did not find writing easy and often spent as long as six months on one short story. He would rewrite his work over and over again until he was happy and reading it out loud was an important part of his writing process.
Roald Dahl published 57 books during his writing career. Sixty five years after the publication of his first story, The Gremlins, Dahl’s books continue to sell at a rate of over a million copies a year.
Posted in Writers
There is a German proverb “Von nichts kommt nichts.” I used to translate it as ‘you can’t make something out of nothing.’ The phase takes on a new significance, however, if you see it as an idiomatic expression, meaning something different from what the words literally imply. When an idiom is translated into another language, its meaning is often changed. Perhaps it is better understood as nothing comes from nothing? This is an interesting starting point for anyone pondering on the creative process.
Creativity is a wonderful thing. It is very personal but its consequences are invariably very public. As writers, we have to create conditions where we can tune in to that elusive creative spark and somehow nurture it into a flame. This is an interesting metaphor for how my own creative thinking seems to work. You may have seen documentaries where they show how to light a fire with a flint. There is definitely some preparation. As well as having the right sort of flint to hand, you need some good dry tinder that will light from a tiny spark. You have to hit it in a particular way and be ready to catch the spark before it is gone. Even then, technique is important, as you must blow just hard enough to make a flame.
The spark can come unexpectedly (and often inconveniently) when driving or even in the shower. I have to be vigilant and make sure I write these little ‘spark’ ideas down as soon as I can, then let the tinder of my subconscious do its work. Some show great promise but quickly fade. Others flare up into a fire that I can barely control, consuming my every waking moment.
Posted in Writing
Beatrix Potter at Hill Top Farm
Beatrix Potter bought Hill Top farm in 1905 with royalties from her first children’s books, written at her parent’s home in London and inspired by her visits to the Lake District. She wrote many of her famous children’s stories in this 17th century stone farmhouse and her books are illustrated with pictures based on the house and garden. When she died in 1943, Beatrix Potter left her property to the National Trust. This included over four thousand acres of land, cottages, and fifteen farms.
Time capsule
I visited Hill Top on a sunny day in September last year, just as the tourist season was coming to an end. The National Trust guides are passionate about the details of her life and work. The guide explained that one of the conditions Beatrix insisted on with Hill Top farm was that everything should be left as it was when she lived there.
Her house has become a fascinating ‘time capsule’, as since it was opened to visitors in 1946, the National Trust have carefully kept to the agreement. This even includes exactly matching the colour and material of any furnishings, such as the curtains, when they have to be replaced.
Beatrix Potter’s ‘writing house’
Hill Top Farm today
The first thing that strikes any visitor familiar with the work of Beatrix Potter is that the garden is almost exactly as she illustrated in her books, with a green watering can and one brown rabbit nibbling at the grass. Entering the farmhouse you find yourself in a surprisingly large and fairly dark room, with a big range in the fireplace. The guide explained that Hill Top was Beatrix Potter’s ‘writing house’ and so didn’t really need much of a kitchen. She owned several houses in the area and would rarely stay overnight at the farmhouse.
Up some creaking wooden stairs were several bedrooms, the first of which was set up as her writing room. A small wooden writing desk faced the window with views out over the garden and on it were some letters to her publisher. They were written in Beatrix Potter’s neat handwriting and looked real, not photocopies. I was told that the National Trust go to a lot of trouble to make them look as genuine as possible.
Beatrix Potter’s bedroom
Although Beatrix Potter didn’t often sleep at Hill Top she did have a bedroom, which has been kept as if she had recently been there. I was fascinated by the small details of Beatrix Potter’s life, such as her rings on the dresser that were left as if she had just taken them off – she must have had very small fingers, as they were tiny.
The old stone farmhouse had thick walls and in her bedroom a window seat had been made so that she could sit and look out over her garden. When I visited, a young woman was sat in the window seat with her daughter, reading aloud from The Tale of Peter Rabbit, one of Beatrix’s children’s stories. Beatrix Potter would have approved. Very much indeed.
Postscript: Miss Potter
The surprisingly moving 2006 film ‘Miss Potter’, starring Renée Zellweger in the title role with Ewan McGregor as her publisher, was not actually made at Hill Top but at another property she owned close by. In the script for Miss Potter, her Mother asks ’What I don’t understand, Beatrix, is how you’re going to pay for this farm? Beatrix Potter replies ‘I’m a writer, Mother. People buy my work.’
Posted in Writers
Christina Rossetti
EMEMBER me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you plann’d:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.
From Goblin Market and other Poems. Christina Rossetti. Cambridge: Macmillan, 1862 (found on Amazon for a penny)
Posted in Poetry
Started the week well with a link to Michigan writer Jody Hedlund’s excellent blog sent to me by Brisbane author Joanna Penn. Joanna’s site The Creative Penn is also well worth a visit. Looking at Jody’s blog I was inspired to create this site. (We are at the opposite ends of the spectrum but I have a great coach and mentor in Jody). The other fun thing about the week on twitter was to get to know the ‘Bald Hiker’ Paul Steele - have a look at his great site Baldhiker.com. Paul is in training for an extreme expedition to walk 900 km (560 miles) from the edge of the frozen Antarctic continent to the Geographic South Pole for charity. You can support him from the comfort of your arm chair….
Favourite quote of the week:
As writers, we need to get very clear about who we are, what we want to write and how we want to write it ~ Charlotte R Dixon @Wordstrumpet
Funniest moment:
When Tanya (who dscribes herself as ‘a kind of Bridget Jones meets X – factor’) admited “Can’t believe I walked into a post tonight and apologised to it!” – now that’s what you call really a polite upbringing.
Contact me on tonyriches@live.com or follow me on twitter @tonyriches
Posted in Blog
