Flushed with excitement Ebony McKenna descended the stage stairs at the Melbourne Emerging Writers Festival in 2010. Dark curls bounced around her shoulders, her cheerful countenance and rosy cheeks a testament to her successful interview. In looks she reminds me of Snow White and also in temperament. Her honest enthusiasm for sharing her love of her first book Ondine is infectious. In this heady moment I asked my fellow Melbourne Romance Writers Guild Member if she would grant me an interview for an assignment in my professional writing course. How could she refuse?

Sitting in her warm and welcoming home Ebony and I drink coffee and talk about our favourite topic, writing. In particular I’m interested in the path which took her from unpublished author to emerging writer. With writing roots in journalism and the later shift to writing novels she focused on writing for a market. The difference with ‘Ondine’, her young adult novel published by Egmont, was that she wrote to please herself.

Of course she had knowledge of the market however this wasn’t her priority while writing ‘Ondine’. She said ‘I had no idea where it would fit.’ ‘I didn’t even think about the market’ during the revision process her publisher suggested changes to accommodate the target market of young teenage girls. It is interesting to note that reader reviews show the mothers of these girls also enjoyed the book so much they recommended it to their friends, showing that McKenna has tapped into the accessibility of Young Adult fiction to appeal to a broad market.

Ebony explained that she also wrote about what she knows. Her experience of being raised in small rural town where everyone knows you informed her knowledge of what life would be like for Ondine. Ebony helped out in her parent’s restaurant, this life experience enabled her to bring authenticity to Ondine’s character who is growing up in her parents hotel. She recalls what it was like to be a teenager, saying, ‘I enjoy writing about this age because the feelings are still there, the peaks and troughs. As a teenager these are the first hurdles you come against and so they feel like the worst thing possible.’ In creating the characters for Ondine she said she got to know them so well that she fell in love with them and in return they loved her back. ‘Love your characters and they will love you,’ she said and then laughed because it had just that minute occurred to her to coin the phrase. We both picked up our pens to write it down.

 I asked how becoming published had impacted on her writing. She said, ‘It doesn’t feel like a hobby anymore and I don’t feel I have to justify my writing time. When I got an agent I didn’t feel like I was pretending anymore’ and ‘I have always had a good writing routine.’ ‘It just solidified it for me that I have to get that done first before I do anything else.’

McKenna’s passion for her book is compelling. No wonder she had success with getting it published.

It has been a couple of years since I interviewed Ebony. Since then book two of the series ‘The Autumn Palace’ has been published and book three is completed and ready for publication.

By Cara Gabriel

I’m assuming you’ve heard of the seven deadly sins? Wrath, sloth, gluttony, pride and the rest. Lesser known are the seven holy virtues, which include chastity, temperance and charity (and are far less fun than the sins, but that’s a whole other story).

Even less well know are the seven enemies of creativity. These little mental viruses can infect you at any moment, paralysing your ability to write and sending your word count into a tail spin.

The good news is, once you know about them you can beat them, so read on to learn more and protect your creativity.

The Procrastinator

You’re going to start writing today, right? Well. Maybe next week would be better. But wait – there’s that big meeting at work on Tuesday, then Wednesday is parent-teacher night, then Thursday is footy practice, and Friday you’ve got that appointment with the dentist...

But the week after? No problem!

To ward off The Procrastinator, try this exercise:

Remember when you missed school and your mum had to write a note? Next time you want to skip writing, take out a sheet of writing paper, and in your best ‘Mum’ handwriting, write yourself an excuse note:

Dear Muse,

Cara won’t be writing on Friday because she has to go to the dentist.

Sincerely,

The Procrastinator

Now think about it – is this really a good excuse to do no writing ALL DAY? Or do you just have to reshuffle your schedule a little?

The Victim

All of us play this role at some point in our lives. It’s an easy way to avoid the challenge of creativity because The Victim points her finger at other people and says ‘I’m not creative because...

·       my family doesn’t understand me

·       my boss is a jerk

·       my housemates are noisy

·       my children are demanding’

The key to fighting The Victim is to stop complaining and realise that the only reason you don’t lead a creative life is because of YOU.

To fight off an attack of The Victim, try this exercise:

List the most common and frequent reasons you give for not spending more time being creative. Next to each entry on the list, write who is in control of that situation (hint: the answer is ‘me’. Every time). Now write your plan of action: for example, if your excuse is noisy housemates (or kids), your plan could be to fill your iPod with great tunes and plug yourself in when you write.

The Talker

The Talker is the enemy who just won’t shut up. You’ve got a great idea for a novel, and The Talker tells everyone. Your mum. Your writing group. Everyone at work. And by talking and talking and talking, she squanders your creative nest egg. When you finally sit down to put the idea into action, its dead, or at least not as exciting as it seemed a few days ago.

To silence The Talker, try this exercise:

When you feel The Talker wanting to take over, tell her she can talk about it when you’ve written the next scene. The urge to talk will abate as you immerse yourself in your writing again.

The Critic

The first thing to understand is that The Critic never goes away. It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve been published, The Critic still sits there and is never truly silenced.

The best thing you can do with The Critic is to learn to be friends with him. Yes, seriously. As your writing career progresses, he is the one Enemy who can turn into a Friend, as he will help you to identify strong writing from weak writing.

To become friends with The Critic, try this exercise:

Sit down and commit to writing for a set period of time, maybe half an hour. Just write – it doesn’t matter how good it is. You can guarantee that The Critic will stick his head in at some point and offer some advice. When that happens, promise him that he can look at your work at the end of your scheduled writing time.

At the end of half an hour, stop writing and let The Critic go for it. Let him pull it apart if need be. This exercise starts to build a trust between your Muse and your Critic – both learn that when they are working, the other one isn’t going to butt in and interrupt.

The Judge

The Judge is your conscience, and he appears when we feel guilty about spending time writing. We start to feel selfish for spending time tapping away. Isn’t there a better way to spend our time, to make money, rather than indulging in fantasies of publication and bestseller lists?

To make The Judge chill out, try this exercise:

Write about why you need to write. Call your essay ‘Why I Write’, and be brutally honest. Really dig down into the urge you have to write, and talk about how your life would be if you didn’t write (here’s a clue: The Victim would get even louder if you didn’t write). When The Judge starts picking on you, get your essay out and re-read it. 

The Author

The Author is that part of ourselves that sees every moment of writing as important and valid ONLY IF it leads to publication. The Author is the one that urges us to follow the market rather than our hearts. The Author is the one who tuts away in the background if we spend a morning writing a short story when we ‘should’ be working on our novel. Or working on a character sketch that has nothing to do with our current manuscript.

To give The Author a sense of perspective, try this exercise:

Remember this – ALL WRITING IS GOOD. Every moment that we spend putting words on a page increases our creativity. And that character you’ve just sketched out could be your next heroine.

Allow yourself a set period of time every day where you’re allowed to work on something else. Set up a separate notebook or folder for random writings, and use this to record ideas that don’t relate to your main project.

The Muse

Yes, she can be an enemy of creativity if you don’t learn to work with her properly. Sitting around waiting for her to show up is not how books get written. The Muse works best with a regular schedule – book time with her, and she will show up brimming with ideas. Meet her irregularly and she’s likely to forget you even exist.

To catch up with The Muse, try this exercise:

Woody Allen once said that 80 per cent of being successful in life is just showing up. For one week, schedule a specific period of time each day where you sit at your desk (or wherever you write). You don’t have to write, but you can’t do anything else either – no internet surfing, no emails, no texts, no phone calls. Having this quiet, regular time will encourage The Muse to visit with ideas.

By Angela Castle

Goal setting is vital for any endeavour, as without a goal, it is difficult to hit a mark. It holds for writing too. However, simply setting goals is not enough. They need to be achievable and realistic. Your goal should be SMART - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Result-oriented and Time -bound

First, set a long-term goal as a writer. If you intend to become a professional novel writer, set your goal as a novelist with a library of books to your credit.

Next, you have to set achievable annual and monthly goals. In order to achieve your monthly goals you need short-term goals that are immediate, things that you can perform right now. This will bring you closer to your long-term goal.  It should be easily achievable like finishing one page of your novel every evening.

In order to make your goal achievable, it should be quantifiable. For example, write everyday is not a quantifiable goal. Instead, as an example, set your goal as 2 pages, or even a few hundred words per day. Your goal should be measurable Only then can you achieve it.

Making a schedule is a great way to achieve your goal. Get specific What time will you start and end? Write it down. It should be treated as an important appointment. At the end of the week, evaluate your actions. If you achieve your short-term goal, well and good. Compliment yourself. If not, don’t get disappointed, don’t get glum and think you’re failing. It means your initial goal is too high. Reset your goal, it is amazing what you can achieve, when you set your mind to it.

Try setting a new writing goal today. You will be surprised and pleased with the results.


Please visit Angela on the web at http://www.angelacastle.net/

A pilgrimage to the battlefields of France and Belgium

Australia was a small country in 1914, with a population of less than 4 million, yet we sent over 300,000 men to the front, Gallipoli in Turkey, Egypt, France and Belgium.  More than 60,000 of our soldiers lie on Gallipoli or in the beautiful cemeteries of France and Belgium, 12,000 miles from home.

Our pilgrimage commenced in Amiens where we were met by our guide Colin Gillard who runs Battlefield Tours with his wife Lisa. Colin has a wealth of knowledge regarding the battlefields. Using war time maps, he was able to point to within a hundred yards, where my grandfather’s cousin was seriously wounded near the village of Hermes in 1917. Chills ran down my spine, I felt as if a hand was gripping me from the grave. Unfortunately, this relative died of his wounds, leaving a wife and 2 small children behind.  He is buried in the war cemetery at Rouen, and we were elated but sad when we found his grave.

We visited large cemeteries where hundreds of white headstones stood amongst green lawns with pretty flowers nodding their heads between the graves. It was so poignant one could have cried a million tears and it still wouldn’t have been enough.

At Thiepval we saw a monument with thousands of names engraved on it, for English soldiers who fell in the area but have no known grave. One of the most memorable monument wasn’t very big.  It was at Fromelles, a bronze statue of an Aussie soldier carrying his wounded mate.  

Cobbers statue at Fromelles.

The battle for Fromelles was fought on the 19th and 20th July 1916, Australia had 5,500 casualties the British 1,500.  For over 90 years no-one knew the fate of nearly 300 of these soldiers, but there had been rumours for many years of mass graves in the area, and it was only after a tenacious campaign waged for years by an Australian school teacher that the authorities finally acted, and four mass graves were discovered about three years after our visit. 250 soldiers have now been laid to rest in separate graves in a new Commonwealth war cemetery.  Of the 250 bodies, over 100 have so far been identified by name using DNA volunteered by relatives, but the authorities are still hoping that more soldiers will eventually be identified.

At the Menin Gate in Belgium, there is a huge monument with thousands of names inscribed on it for soldiers without a grave.  Even after all these years, they still play the last post every evening as a mark of respect for the fallen. We visited large war cemeteries here and beautiful and sad as they were, the most touching was a small cemetery near Passchendale with only a handful of white headstones. Night was falling as we passed through this cemetery, and as we stopped to read the inscription on an eighteen year old soldier’s grave, we whispered that someone from home had come to visit him. When we turned and walked away through the misty rain, all we could leave behind for him was our tears and a red poppy.

The wearing of a red poppy on Armistice Day/Remembrance Day, 11th November, honours those who fell in the 1st World War and all subsequent wars. In Australia and New Zealand, we also pause to remember our war dead on ANZAC day, the 25th April. ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) day, commemorates the landing of the ANZACS on the Gallipoli peninsula on the 25th April, 1915

I would like to close with the opening words of the poignant poem, penned on the battlefields by Lieut-Col. John McCrae of the Canadian army.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow, between the crosses row on row, that mark our place.

 

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I write historical romance, and my favourite era is the 1st World War.

My novel, Wild Oats, published by The Wild Rose Press, is set against the background of the 1st World War, and for my research I delved into my family history, trawled through dusty old tomes in the library, and combined this with my visit to the Australian battlefields.

http://www.margarettanner.com/