tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-72092610318344036922024-03-05T07:00:46.785+00:00StorySeekerRosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.comBlogger33125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-80213562778429006402018-10-25T15:59:00.003+01:002018-10-25T16:04:46.584+01:00Getting unstuckI have eaten two fairy cakes (one of which I was saving for my husband), a bar of chocolate. I've had numerous cups of tea. I've watched two episodes of West Wing and I've got my knitting tangled up. I'm writing, you see.<br />
Or rather, I'm stuck you see.<br />
I can't get the story to come out right. If it was coming out right I wouldn't be indulging in sugar, caffeine, west wing, knitting or even writing this. I would be writing the story that I have in my head that is trying so desperately to get out but is, well, stuck.<br />
How can I unstick it?<br />
I know where I want to go. I know what is going to happen next and where the character has to go. But how can I get there and why am I stuck?<br />
<br />
<br />
So I'm listening to M G Leonard's podcast 'Getting stuck' to see if she can help and she's telling me to 'embrace the stickiness,' because she assures me that 'getting stuck is part of the process.<br />
<br />
Here's the essence of her podcast in poem form:<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Getting stuck is part of the process.</i><br />
<i>Narrative path stones can't go forward</i><br />
<i>characters wouldn't talk</i><br />
<i>there couldn't be a next thing</i><br />
<br />
<i>plot comes from characters </i><br />
<i>with objectives </i><br />
<i>and desires to achieve </i><br />
<i> no matter what gets in the way.</i><br />
<i>like life.</i><br />
<br />
<i>interrogate scene.</i><br />
<i>what do characters want? how badly.</i><br />
<br />
<i>two choices</i><br />
<i>1 - back track</i><br />
<i>2 -improvise and keep going</i><br />
<br />
<i>2nd way is better </i><br />
<br />
<i>1st draft like a long improvisation. mustn't block another actor. </i><br />
<i>do whatever you need to do to keep action moving forwards. </i><br />
<i>free imagination from shackles of probability. </i><br />
<br />
<i>don't look back</i><br />
<i>fundamental rule: </i><br />
<i>accept the improbable for the sake of moving forward.</i><br />
<br />
<i>identify the motivation to make scene work. </i><br />
<i>the moment you imbue character with motivation you can move forward.</i><br />
<br />
<i>getting stuck is inevitable, embrace it, improvise and keep writing.</i><br />
<br />
I'll let you know how it goes! Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-89148719344817268832016-07-26T14:54:00.000+01:002016-07-26T14:54:09.532+01:00Only TimeSo, I posted a few months ago about how hard it is to find time to write these days and that I was trying to just put aside 5 minutes to write. Ha! How hard 5 minutes can be to come by when you have a toddler. How those child-free years seem so indulgent now. What did I do with all that time? All those endless minutes and hours in a day with nobody to please but myself, no considerations except how much of my life I wanted to spend watching West Wing... if I had really understood maybe I would have treasured them more. Paused the DVD to look around at the toy free living room and the cups of tea I had managed to drink and really think <i>this is the pinnacle of freedom. </i>Still, that is the past and for the forseeable future it is snatched moments between nursings at night that I manage to fire up the lap top. And yes I have tried pen and paper - you try using a pen and paper with a curious toddler around and see how much productive writing you achieve as opposed to delighted toddler scribbles.<br />
And Yes, I know it's my choice to let her continue to nurse to sleep and sleep in my bed or on me, and Yes I know there are many many people out there who roll their eyes and tell me to let her cry it out, that she is never going to be able to get herself to sleep. I would like to blow a raspberry at you, but it might get in the way of valuable writing time. So instead I am just grabbing at moments and doing my best. Because that's parenting in its essence. You Do Your Best. Even at your worst you are trying your best.<br />
So, 5 minutes a day has not been possible to physically write. But I write in my head while she sleeps on my breast. I write in my head while she curls into me, her hand laying gently on my arm. I write in my head as she gives contented sighs and rolls away from me. And if I am very very lucky I write on a scrap of paper or even on the laptop while she sleeps for an hour without my body heat to soothe her, and then she murmurs and the laptop is switched off and the paper is hidden away and I am hers again, except the writing continues, on and on in my head. Beautiful stories opening up, keeping the heart of me blazing until I can let them free once more.<br />
I type this drinking hot chocolate in a cafe. I have never in my life taken a laptop to a cafe before. It is really quite lovely. My husband is with the little one and they will be joining me soon and so at the moment, I hammer this out. It bears no resemblance to a structured witty post. But it is me writing and that is, outside of my family, the best thing I can do. I miss those heady days of writing at home from morning to night. But change is necessary and maybe this new way of working will help me to focus. Maybe my writing will be sharper, maybe it will be tighter and maybe it will be good for me. Time will tell.<br />
Time. How I miss you. Nothing makes time fly more than having children. Time changes from a predictable reassuring tamed beast to something altogether harder to catch, flying past with a cheeky grin and yoghurt in its hair and caring not a jot for moments you want to savour, for cuddles that should last longer, for sleep that used to be abundant but now is like a myth you heard about once. Time. I never knew how cruel you were until I saw you changing every day in my daughter. How I love and loathe you and wish I knew before what I know now. But that is the way time works. It just rolls on and on and leaves you scrabbling to keep up.<br />
Anyway, my alloted 20 minute blogging time is coming to an end. Maybe the next post will have some kind of coherence to it. Maybe it will be one of the posts I planned. Who knows? Only Time,Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-24859295053701937662016-05-15T15:13:00.001+01:002016-05-15T15:13:11.372+01:00This is not a book...it's a blog post challenge idea thing<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><img src="data:image/jpeg;base64,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/></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">I started using Keri Smith's <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/This-Not-Book-Keri-Smith/dp/1846144442/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1463321076&sr=8-1&keywords=this+is+not+a+book" target="_blank">This is Not a Book</a> during early morning and late evening train journeys to work, and, also during long boring moments during work.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
If you're not familiar with it, it's basically a book that encourages you to use it in ways that you don't usually use a book... so, for example. a page may be entitled <i>This is a disguise</i> and on that page will be a moustache and glasses for you to cut out and use to disguise your <i>This is Not a Book</i>. I consider it a set of challenges to behave in ways of varying unusualness or un-ordinariness. I love it. Since leaving the previous job and starting one much more fulfilling, interesting and with no train journey to while away I have not used it as much as I had done. But as a way to try and keep me blogging more regularly I hope to fulfil some of the more outlandish challenges and record these happenings on this virtual page. The previous blog post was a small step into this idea pond. Hopefully others will be following it in the coming weeks and months.</div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-60159679944465645852016-04-04T20:51:00.001+01:002016-04-04T20:51:14.458+01:00This is not a blog post...it's a recorded overheard conversation. I wonder if you can guess the age and gender?!<br />
<br />
- There's an ant in my shoe!<br />
- Uh-oh, be careful it will climb up your leg and into your pants.<br />
- An ant in my pants? Ants in my pants. Hey, that rhymes.<br />
- Ants in your pants, ants in your pants. Ants, Pants, Ants. Ants, Pants, Ants, Ants, Pants, Ants.<br />
Is it in your pants yet?<br />
- Er, No... wait it is now!<br />
- Ants in your pants!<br />
<br />
* * *<br />
<br />
- Here's your invisible picture.<br />
- Thanks.<br />
- Invisible prictures are great because they can do anything.<br />
- Can they turn into a human?<br />
- Yes<br />
- A Rescue-bot?<br />
- Yes<br />
- A Dog?<br />
-Yes. But do you know the best thing about invisible pictures?<br />
- Errr...<br />
- It's that they can play videos.<br />
<br />
* * *<br />
<br />
- Look, a fox!<br />
- I think it's a wolf.<br />
- No, it's a fox.<br />
- Yeah, ok.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>This blog post is part of a series of blog posts linked to challenges in <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/This-Is-Not-A-Book/dp/1846144442#reader_1846144442" target="_blank">This is NOT a book </a>by Keri Smith. A separate explanatory blog post to follow at some point... </i><br />
<br />
<i>(These conversations belonged to two 5 year old boys). </i>Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-13501731008432335202016-03-07T13:21:00.001+00:002016-03-07T13:51:38.544+00:00Just 5 minutesSince having my baby I have found it increasingly hard to find time to write. I had naive expectations that I would write when she napped and in the evenings when she slept. Oh how innocent and unknowing I was. Because my little SJ would only sleep ON me and for most of her 11 and a bit months she has woken hourly for breastfeeds. This isn't a blog about babies or breastfeeding and parenting, there are plenty out there who can do it with more wit and panache than me, so I don't want to get bogged down in the you should have, and you could haves. I chose a style of parenting that felt right to me, I am proud to parent this way, I love it. <i><span style="font-size: large;">But</span></i>. But, it is exhausting and it feels like putting myself on hold. In a life driven by an impulse to write I am suddenly not writing, I am Mummying. The self I am is not the self I was before SJ was in my arms. I am now SJ's mum and during these intense first years that is who I will be. I don't regret it, it just takes getting used to.<br />
<br />
So anyway. I've been desperate to write. Just because I haven't been able to get the words out doesn't mean they're not in there filling me up, pressing at my eyelids and lips and skin trying to get out. I tried dictating into my tablet but that was SOOO hard to get the sentences out as they were in my head. So I sat back and I took a breath and I let it go. My mantra became: patience, patience, patience. This does not last forever, do not miss the little moments because you are straining to see past the now into a WHEN.<br />
<br />
So SJ's habits are settling down a bit. She'll sleep in the stroller now during the day, sometimes she doesn't wake up every hour and I have an hour between putting her to bed and turning in myself (what do people do who stay up past 9pm? For the life of me I can't remember ever being awake enough to find out, though I'm sure I used to...) and I've been finding some time to write.<br />
<br />
But it's baby steps. There's no more sitting in front of the computer for hours and hours merrily typing away or rereading or editing. I don't have the energy for that. It has to be bitesize pieces.<br />
<br />
I've been reading <a href="http://www.nationallibrariesday.org.uk/2012/01/profile-to-publish-the-library-book-in-aid-of-the-reading-agencys-library-programmes/" target="_blank">The Library Book</a>, an anthology about how important libraries are. It's a great read, though I doubt the people who SHOULD read it ever will (yes Tory Government I'm looking at you).<br />
Aside from all the wonderful points it makes about how amazing libraries are and how we should be forever thinking it wonderful that we have them instead of closing them down, I came across a chapter that spoke about writing and it was called <i>The Five Minute Rule </i>written by Julie Myerson.<br />
<br />
This line caught my attention:<br />
<br />
<i>'Tell yourself you're going to set aside five minutes a day. If you can't do more don't worry. But never let a day go by without doing your five minutes.' </i><br />
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Fittingly, the advice was given to her during her own maternity leave. She continues:<br />
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<i>'Of course you almost always end up writing longer, but...it is gloriously undaunting. It somehow helps you scale that initial terrifying cliff-face of 'where will I ever find the time?''</i><br />
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So this is my goal. To write for five minutes every day. I've only started applying this for the last couple of days, but so far so good. I've written some notes for a story I need to research, I've written a letter to a friend (which I'm counting as writing) and I'm writing this blog post. At some point I will reopen the file containing the first chapter of the book I want to write, but I'm building up to that because I know that the second chapter has to be rewritten because I forgot to save it. Still, it feels good to be writing. it feels good to have the goal. Just five minutes. Five minutes of word following word. Five minutes of being me. Five minutes of feeling like a somebody instead of somebody's mummy. And if I do longer than five minutes, great, but if not that's OK because I still did five minutes.Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-31677010014635764172016-02-29T11:53:00.001+00:002016-02-29T12:17:43.688+00:00A Child's Eye ViewWhen I found out I was pregnant in July 2014 my world shifted. And not just because of the hugeness of the tiny little spark starting to grow in me was overwhelming, but my perception of the physical world regressed.<br />
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I suffered from 'morning' sickness constantly in the first few months of pregnancy and in the early weeks I spent a lot of time in the burgeoning summer weather walking in the fresh air to soothe my churning stomach. As I walked my eyes began to look at the world as they once had when I was small. My thoughts were constantly with the tiny being who was slowly taking shape inside me and I imagined future days together walking the same paths my feet trod now. And as my feet and thoughts took me forward I also travelled backwards and memories of walks with my own mother flooded over me.<br />
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The thing is children see differently from us. They are closer to the earth than we are and they see the details that adults often take for granted. I remembered how vivid life had been for me growing up and my perceptions shifted and once again took on that incredible detail and vividness that children are so lucky to enjoy. Children move at a slower pace, you only have to take one for a walk to know that. Everything can be, and is, fascinating. Grass is vibrant and thick and tough and calling out to be stroked and plucked and chewed and blown and screwed up and scattered. Bugs are accessible aliens traversing an otherworldy wilderness of boulderstrewn dirt and warm earth. Mud is dense, or crumbly or slippery or slick. It sticks to fingers or squleches under foot, it is strangely appealing to taste. Children are closer to the earth and so they experience it with a closeness we lose as we get older.<br />
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I can't help but wonder if I remember this enough when I try and write for them. As writers for children we should get down to their height, among the grass and the bugs. We should see just how far away the sky really is and how blue and deep it can be. We should notice the small details, the patterns in twigs, the smell of the pavement in the sun or rain, the weeds and flowers breaking into urban landscapes. We should slow down and loiter and dawdle and forget we have things that need to get done. We should bring back the vividness of our childhood worlds.<br />
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And this doesn't just apply to younger readers but right up to teenage
and young adults. These age groups are fresh, the world is still new and
revealing new ideas to them. They feel deeper, they are passionate,
they are scared and they are still small in a big world. They are more
vivid. <br />
<br />
Roald Dahl does this beautifully in the way he zeroes in on the details of characters - such as lingering on the food in Mr Twits beard or the agonising slowness and detail of the Grand High Witch removing her mask... children relish detail and they love to read and re-read and will devour the words that they love. <br />
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I can't find the exact quote now, but I remember Neil Gaiman saying something like 'children read every word, every detail while adults skim.'.<br />
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Inkproductions.org helped me out with this one from him though:<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>'When I’m writing for kids, I’m always assuming that a story, if it is
loved, is going to be re-read. So I try and be much more conscious of it
than I am with adults, just in terms of word choices. I once said that
while I could not justify every word in American Gods, I can justify
every single word in Coraline'</i>. (http://lnkproductions.org/tag/neil-gaiman/)<br />
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So I set myself some challenges and if you'd like to join in, do let me know.<br />
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1) Go for a walk, just a local walk from your house. Head down the road into town or the bus stop or a river or lake. Have no set destination. Dawdle, look around see if you notice things that you never have before. See if you are compelled to go different ways than usual because something catches your eye. Take your time. Get down to the height of your readership to see what they see in front of them. What is too high? What feels too far? What is different? Can you smell scents clearer from the road or path? Does the wind feel stronger, does the sun beat harder? Is the world stranger, scarier or more wonderful? When you get home, take a few minutes to jot down or sketch moments from your walk which you found inspiring or surprising.<br />
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2) Lay in the grass - backgarden, frontgarden, park... wherever. Use all of your senses to really see where you are and what is going on around you. Stare into the sky, stroke the grass, feel the mud beneath you. Take in everything, slowly, without hurry and with eyes and mind open wide.<br />
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3) Write an short passage from the point of view of a child/teenager going for a walk somewhere they have never been before. Maybe they meet people, maybe they are alone. Try to capture the vividness and details that they come across. Write in first person present tense, and then try past tense and then try third person and explore how to get across the excitement of a world revealing itself.<br />
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4) Write a short, six line poem about one thing you saw on your walk and make sure every word you use is justified and making your poem flow and move and create that thing you are writing about so that it is almost there on the page as you read. <br />
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Now think about your current story or poem and consider if you have used a child's eye view to heighten and bring your story to vivid life, even if it is a dark, bleak story. Remember the details and make them count.<br />
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And now I must go because my tiny orange seed from 2014 is now an almost one year old and has awoken from a short nap and is demanding to be shown the world in all its strange glory once more.<br />
<br />
<br />Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-84594503153704220282014-09-28T16:00:00.002+01:002014-09-28T16:02:03.301+01:00Delicious Dahl<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifKzgCC1Mpcb9-dh_p9lCwVFeqRkJnZ9BL93D8E3dPXJSmRntInOaLshR9LnA_aSxHMSJJSvORBWl2pjlinOdKDE0HTDxhyphenhyphenr1UUZSrUmdAJFxnN4spvVOoW5qJv3z5Ai2QmPhq-aHBjf2s/s1600/charlie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifKzgCC1Mpcb9-dh_p9lCwVFeqRkJnZ9BL93D8E3dPXJSmRntInOaLshR9LnA_aSxHMSJJSvORBWl2pjlinOdKDE0HTDxhyphenhyphenr1UUZSrUmdAJFxnN4spvVOoW5qJv3z5Ai2QmPhq-aHBjf2s/s1600/charlie.jpg" /></a></div>
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So, you may or may not be aware that <strong>Charlie and the Chocolate Factory</strong> celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. It got me thinking, and not just about chocolate. I love Roald Dahl, he was a one-of-a-kind writer, the likes of which we'll never enjoy again (David Walliams you can try, but you can't come close). So it's incredible that his books are so timeless. It's incredible to think that even in this day and age of techno-wonder, Dahl can still captivate children and adult readers from half a century away. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggawl073qQKygc_f_bhyphenhyphenXQiKd1oBJQHPlG3Bl7Mv8OTp6xxCg21UTwecuwo-bk7mUOYaFc8e6JQQcyFp85EdkRdRKMuBoSg_cJ_jS4HJILxYowF9zf21YgpfAayuA3kXZpqZIlcoJtREA0/s1600/GPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggawl073qQKygc_f_bhyphenhyphenXQiKd1oBJQHPlG3Bl7Mv8OTp6xxCg21UTwecuwo-bk7mUOYaFc8e6JQQcyFp85EdkRdRKMuBoSg_cJ_jS4HJILxYowF9zf21YgpfAayuA3kXZpqZIlcoJtREA0/s1600/GPM.jpg" height="200" width="143" /></a>I have a problem choosing my favourite Dahl. My earliest Dahl memory is <strong>The Giraffe, The Pelly and Me</strong>. Oh those sweets! (<em>There were Gumywizzlers and Fizzwinkles from China, Frothblowers and Spitsizzlers from Africa, Tummyticklers and Gobwangles from the Fiji Islands and Liplickers and Plushnuggets from the Land of the Midnight Sun... I can remember quite especially the Giant Wangdoodles from Australia, every one with a huge ripe red strawberry hidden inside its crispy chocolate crust... and the Electric Fizzcocklers that made every hair on your head stand straight up as soon as you popped one into your mouth.. and there were Nishnobblers and Gumglotters and Blue Bubblers and Sherbert Slurpers and Tongue Rakers and as well as all this, there was a whole lot of splendid stuff from the great Wonka factory itself..)</em><br />
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Quentin Blake's illustrations brought the pages to life as much as the words (for me Roald Dahl is synonymous with Quentin Blake. It's not a real Roald Dahl book without Blake's illustrations), and of course the wonderful rhymes, made up words and larger than life characters.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG_3_gjzvVTb759LxskuYhzuXdrmGe93Is-QB55hc-wKR6SYWts4PvsT-pFVFOpW5uzNz38Yx4-vai5Kr78tce3yOKBjxOp8wrB6iBtfjM8bOGS8BRk5rV-FD_RpaILwPv0gOZer1sqJQ0/s1600/matilda.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG_3_gjzvVTb759LxskuYhzuXdrmGe93Is-QB55hc-wKR6SYWts4PvsT-pFVFOpW5uzNz38Yx4-vai5Kr78tce3yOKBjxOp8wrB6iBtfjM8bOGS8BRk5rV-FD_RpaILwPv0gOZer1sqJQ0/s1600/matilda.jpg" height="200" width="111" /></a>I love <strong>Matilda</strong> mainly for the descriptions of Matilda discovering another world inside books: <em>She went on olden-day sailing ships with Joseph Conrad. She went to Africa with Ernest Hemingway and to India with Rudyard Kipling. She travelled all over the world while sitting in her room in an English village.</em><br />
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But also for the myriad of characters. Mrs Trunchball - absolutely unforgettable, Miss Honey and of course Matilda's own parents. I love the supernatural aspect of the telekinesis - I used to sit for ages trying to make my pens move with my eyes.<br />
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I love <strong>The BFG</strong>. For snozzcumbers and frobscottle, for dreams in bottles, for the BFG's enormous ears, for the description of the BFG striding across the world: <br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1e1HMRZ_GLIbEdyqcy0rWnQ9CaKMaB-_jjHnO6lcpY3UtEeNeWMq9o5wRzcVSEkvPkf2jg3duRD4-0cazAKfzqs3m8YuDXXEWADIMK4rpfmN_6dvL1wdu9lRTNN65qZpXLDsuyuO2AOxb/s1600/iur.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1e1HMRZ_GLIbEdyqcy0rWnQ9CaKMaB-_jjHnO6lcpY3UtEeNeWMq9o5wRzcVSEkvPkf2jg3duRD4-0cazAKfzqs3m8YuDXXEWADIMK4rpfmN_6dvL1wdu9lRTNN65qZpXLDsuyuO2AOxb/s1600/iur.jpg" height="200" width="150" /></a><br />
<em>The Giant ran on and on. But now a curious change took place in his way of running. He seemed suddenly to go into a higher gear. Faster and faster he went and soon he was travelling at such a speed that the landscape blurred. The wind stung Sophie's cheeks. It made her eyes water. It whipped her head back and whistled in her ears. She could no longer feel the Giant's feet touching the ground. She had a weird sensation they were flying. It was impossible to tell whether they were over land or sea. This Giant had some sort of magic in his legs...Was it really possible they were crossing oceans?'</em><br />
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And <strong>The Witches</strong> is surely a rite of passage - has there ever been a more graphic and terrifying description of Witches in all of literature? Is there any build up more terrifying than the chapter in which the Grand High Witch asks the 'RSPCCC' ladies to '<em>rrree-moof your gloves...rrree-mmof your shoes...rrree-moof your vigs!' </em>and bit by bit the awful truth becomes apparent that we are trapped in a room full of witches? Has the cigar smoking matter of fact Norwegian grandmother ever been bettered? <br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Ffairyroom.com%2FWP%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F01%2Ftumblr_m9wdcfsSh61qznur9o1_400.jpeg&f=1" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="The Dog in the Dark, Dreams and Shadows, and The Witches" border="0" class="detail__media__img-highres js-detail-img" height="320" src="https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Ffairyroom.com%2FWP%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F01%2Ftumblr_m9wdcfsSh61qznur9o1_400.jpeg&f=1" style="left: 0px; top: 0px;" width="249" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><em>That face of hers was the most frightful and frightening thing I have ever seen...It was so crumpled and wizened, so shrunken and shrivelled...There was something terribly wrong with it, something foul and putrid and decayed. It seemed quite literally to be rotting away at the edges, and in the middle of the face, around the mouth and cheeks, I could see the skin all cankered and worm-eaten, as though maggots were working away in there.</em></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
But I also love Roald Dah's autobiographies, <strong>Boy</strong> and <strong>Going Solo</strong>. <strong>Going Solo</strong> in particular. Dahl brings to life a world disappeared, the age of Empire or British eccentrics. I remember my teacher reading it to the class in the last year of Primary School and being utterly captivated by it. He read <strong>Boy</strong> too and I will never forget the description of the canings:<br />
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<em>I was frightened of that cane. There was no small boy in the world who wouldn't be. it wasn't simply an instrument for beating you. It was a weapon for wounding. It lacerated the skin. It caused severe black and scarlet bruising that took three weeks to disappear, and all the time during those three weeks, you could feel your heart beating along the wounds.</em><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk-p_F61Kt4m_x3QXO_urc9qeXWPCZKUy5WAhuO6MuId1cTgEGGv1mvU4U6mw0epPszwbMYvZLGP8Oysn0Wryp5Mx160kbM3n6Yhm0uwPid0s_QTS4GyUfAnQt8pR9xPgo1J5qOsiKA9-7/s1600/Boy+and.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk-p_F61Kt4m_x3QXO_urc9qeXWPCZKUy5WAhuO6MuId1cTgEGGv1mvU4U6mw0epPszwbMYvZLGP8Oysn0Wryp5Mx160kbM3n6Yhm0uwPid0s_QTS4GyUfAnQt8pR9xPgo1J5qOsiKA9-7/s1600/Boy+and.jpg" height="320" width="209" /></a>But it's<strong> Going Solo</strong> that stuck in my mind. From the Green Mamba in Africa to the plane crash in the Western Desert, it is perfect storytelling.<br />
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<em>The snake-man was standing absolutely still just inside the door of the living room...I couldn't see the snake. I didn't think the snake-man had seen it yet either.</em><br />
<em>A minute went by...two minutes... three... four... five. Nobody moved. There was death in that room. The air was heavy with death and the snake-man stood as motionless as a pillar of stone, with the long rod held out in front of him.</em><br />
<em>And still he waited. Another minute...and another... and another...</em><br />
<em>...A moment later I caught sight of the snake. It was lying full-length along the skirting of the right-hand wall, but hidden from the snake-man's view by the back of the sofa. It lay there like a long, beautiful, deadly shaft of green glass...</em><br />
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I've heard since that Roald Dahl wasn't always truthful in his biographies but I've never wanted to know the true stories or find out the falsehoods. I believe in the world he created and the things he told me and that's enough for me.<br />
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So what makes Dahl so timeless? It's hard to say. Perhaps it is the sheer absence of technology that make them so adaptable. They describe a life and time that are almost fantastical to children now, and they accept it without question because of the surety and confidence of his writing. Who doesn't envy Danny and his dad living in the caravan, even if they are poor and live off toast and hot chocolate? It's a world full of love and so, always appealing. <strong>The Magic Finger</strong>, <strong>The Witches</strong>, <strong>George's Marvellous Medicine</strong> also exist in a separate world, not quite fantasy, not quite here and now but also not the distant past. The bright bubbling characters make the stories relevant and contemporary. Perhaps it is the lack of detail in the settings that allow the stories to continue to thrive. The stories live and breath through the characters and the plot and so it does not matter when or where it is really set.<br />
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And of course, no matter what happens in the story the thread that binds it all together is the enduring and overwhelming love that exists in the worlds Dahl creates. Whether it be between Sophie and the BFG, a boy and his Granny, Matilda and Miss Honey, A fox and his family, a man and his inventions, Charlie Bucket and his poor but loving family, the Giraffe, the Pelly and the Monkey, the burgeoning love between two tortoise owners; Dahl's books are full of characters caring for each other or for their world. In <strong>The Twits, </strong>Mr and Mrs Twit may not have a lot of love to exist on, but it can be found in the delight Dahl describes their bitter relationship with, and of course in the way the birds band together to ensure the Twits get their comeuppance and rescue the poor monkeys. There is always love to be found for lost and lonely children, or safe havens for children to experiment and explore in (<strong>The Magic Finger, Georges Marvellous Medicine</strong>), there is always humour, there is always danger and endless invention, but there is always <em>always</em> a sense of home and of belonging.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Danny, the Champion of the World and his father. This limited edition ..." class="detail__media__img-highres js-detail-img" src="https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.roalddahl.com%2Fblog%2F2014%2Fjune%2F7459_IMAGE_0*480%2C0%2C435x244%2C1%3B0*480%2C0%2C870x488%2C2%3B481*9999%2C0%2C1466x825%2C2%3B481*9999%2C0%2C733x413%2C1_3236_.jpg&f=1" style="height: 388px; left: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; top: 0px; width: 688.62px;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><em>I really loved it in that gipsy caravan. I loved it especially in the evenings when I was tucked up in my bunk and my father was telling me stories. The paraffin lamp was turned low, and I could see lumps of wood glowing red-hot in the old stove and wonderful it was to be lying there snug and warm in my bunk in that little room. Most wonderful of all was the feeling that when I went to sleep, my father would still be there, very close to me, sitting in his chair by the fire, or lying in the bunk above my own.</em><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em><br />
</em></strong></span><div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em><span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>'We have tears in our eyes</em></strong></span></em></strong></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>As we wave our goodbyes,</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>We so loved being with you, we three.</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>So do please now and then</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>Come and see us again</em></strong></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>The Giraffe and the Pelly and me.</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em> </em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>All you do is look</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>At a page in this book</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>Because that's where we always will be.</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>No book ever ends</em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>When its full of your friends</em></strong></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><strong><em>The Giraffe and the Pelly and me.'</em></strong></span></div>
</em> </strong> </span><br /></td></tr>
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Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-65379271206397544112014-06-27T18:30:00.000+01:002014-06-27T18:30:00.940+01:00#FF - There are wolves<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This is the beginning of a longer story and for the first time I'm going to post sections on here each time I write a bit. This is the beginning of something and I am not yet sure where it is going or what will happen, only that it is ready to begin slowly unfolding. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I often get a spark of inspiration from a line in a song, and this scene has its origins in a song by </span><a href="http://www.last.fm/music/The+Accidental" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The Accidental</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> called Wolves. The lyric that caught my attention was the opening one:</span><br />
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><em><strong>There were wolves lying in the dark as she was raining sparks
into the room like that </strong></em></span></div>
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<em><strong>
</strong></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><em><strong>she was dancing in a neon cave with a tilted smile and a
lovers laugh </strong></em></span></div>
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<em><strong>
</strong></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><em><strong>embossed upon her in the darkness like a light at the edge of night beside her</strong></em> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">and later in the song:</span><br />
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</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><em><strong>There
are wolves hiding in the woods and they can smell the blood on the summer air
and they run beneath a million stars</strong></em> </span></div>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I highly recommend checking the song out, it's on YouTube </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttum1g_-5PM" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">here</span></a></span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: x-large;"><strong><u>There are Wolves</u></strong></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://naturepunk.tumblr.com/post/24152070717" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" target="_blank"><img alt="http://naturepunk.tumblr.com/post/24152070717" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4EMULNVr53zFcErRPDygsClQ7SV8wIhM29VS7O5FVUpjQbiH7fKJJv5GtyiNwkOcinSXSO3xYWoMNBpJg_ZLsOmzXZgpzWUdPndeAaz8Uhp6Y-1CsTgSvlKJeh_hyZTKhgRwxzy0ANAic/s1600/tumblr_m3iglal4v31rv70z1o1_500.jpg" height="320" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image from naturepunk - click to follow link</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</span><div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">In the stench
of darkness she lies in wait. Around her the hot wasted bodies press closer.
She can smell the rancid air of their breath and feel the fast ticking of their
hearts. She clings to the earth, feeling the grit and scratch of earth under
her fingernails, tasting the damp moss in every lungful of night.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> Wolf Princess,
Savage Girl, Wild Woman. She’s known by all these and more but she knows
herself simply as Edon. She has a scar across her right shoulder. It runs deep
into her flesh and into her bones. The wolves did not give it to her, though
they have given her others. The scar runs over the bony knob of shoulder and
down across her chest, ending above her heart. It aches in the cold and throbs
in the heat.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"> Edon has hair
that she cuts short with the flint daggers she makes from the loose stone in
the caves. Her eyes are silver like moonlight and when she smiles her lips are
blood red, her teeth too white for comfort. Whatever colour her skin once was,
it has taken on the ashy hue of the ground she keeps close to and she melds
into stone and earth if she chooses to. She wears wolf skin like a coat. The
head sits atop her own, her arms stretch into the front legs, her thin legs
into the back. It fastens at the front with thick knots of leather. She runs on
all fours. She howls at the moon. She eats the warm beating flesh of fresh
kill. But she is not a wolf and she knows it. She can read the words in the
loose leaf sheets that she sleeps on. She can scratch her name in the rocks.
She speaks human when she has a need to. But not tonight. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tonight she lies with her belly pressed close
to the ground, the dirt in her nostrils and her ears reaching out across the
vast wind-swept plains of the territories.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"> The Old Grey female
is close to Edon, she twitches her head, tilts an eye in her direction and Edon
pulls back her bloody lips to bare teeth in agreement. Her heart is heavy and
her scar throbs against it. She pulls back onto her haunches, sits for a moment
and her lightning eyes are turned in the direction of the settlement. She feels
a strange sensation in the pit of her stomach and takes a moment to assess it.
A wolf moment. Calm, calculating. It is fear. She looks back towards the Old
Grey and gives a low rumble. The other wolves ease away from her. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"> Edon takes
another wolf moment and then with the long loping grace of the pack she
straightens herself onto two legs. The wolves move away, small whines and
growls rise and fall. Her legs are stiff and awkward, but it is best to begin
now and practise. With a last keen glance out across the plains she catches the
scent once more. The unmistakeable scent of fresh bood and violence. The sharp
edge of gun powder. She pushes her wolf’s head from her own so that it falls
uselessly against her back and then she turns and begins the slow unsteady walk
back to the humans. Behind her the wolves press in close together. Their
bellies to the ground, their ears pricked forward and the moonlight glancing
off their bared fangs.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"></span> </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
T<span style="font-family: Georgia;">o be continued....</span></div>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;">
</span></h2>
</span><br />
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
</h2>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span><h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">
</span></h2>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; line-height: 200%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;">
</span></h2>
</span><br />
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
</h2>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-36717850034235503032014-05-23T22:15:00.000+01:002014-05-23T23:24:57.682+01:00#FridayFlash - A night for darkness<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrh23Zv_2awzUyKemdiqwH2HQeeIQI6RB60hfbTBp-bFZbss0pFvWS5HXBNlSIfFFcTSDSubXjsK3uu5fP3QTaC7PJoliQ36CFHaVSYqvUrd5-Dxvj5kBMuSL6necqIP8LueYji3hR_WBB/s1600/stairs+piced.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrh23Zv_2awzUyKemdiqwH2HQeeIQI6RB60hfbTBp-bFZbss0pFvWS5HXBNlSIfFFcTSDSubXjsK3uu5fP3QTaC7PJoliQ36CFHaVSYqvUrd5-Dxvj5kBMuSL6necqIP8LueYji3hR_WBB/s1600/stairs+piced.jpg" height="320" width="236" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
The house seems bigger tonight; the dark pushing itself up against the windows. I roll down the
blind, but I have to look away from my reflection as I do. I don’t know why,
it’s just this feeling I have at night – that a face will appear against the
inkiness and it won’t be mine. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>With the
blinds down the kitchen clock ticks louder, and the table and chairs seem to
take up more space than usual. I flick off the light and step into the living
room, shutting the door tight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Everything is as it was five minutes ago – the throw over the chair is
rucked up around the cushions, the tv guide is thrown on the floor and the Sky
box is flashing where it’s recording a program for dad. But everything has
changed too.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>A silence
hangs over the room; it’s a heavy, late night sort of silence that makes you
keep checking behind you to see what’s there. It’s a silence that makes
goose-bumps rise on your arms. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I should
have gone to bed earlier. I promised mum that I would. I do this every week.
It’s the one night they leave me alone. I feel fine when I’m heating up the
pizza, and watching telly. It’s only when everything’s off, when the house is
quietly breathing and I’m standing in the living room trying to find the
courage to open the door to the stairs; it’s only then that I hear the moving
upstairs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> C</span>reaks
at first. The house settling, I think. I put my hand on the doorlatch. All I
have to do is click my thumb down and I’ll open the door on the yawning
darkness. But I don’t.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Then I hear the footsteps. On the
landing above. Knocking noises as things are moved about, dragged across the
floor. My mouth is dry, but my palms are sweaty. I glance over my shoulder
again to check the living room. The sofa looks back at me. I look away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
My heart is beating faster. I put
pressure on my thumb and the latch lifts up. I pause, straining my ears to listen,
hearing the pounding in my head. I suck in my breath and then yank open the
door. Blackness tumbles out and my hand is scrabbling around on the wall for
the light switch. The dim glow of an energy bulb reveals the worn carpet of the
stairs. And nothing else.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I take a
breath again and start climbing up. I leave the living room light on for mum
and dad. And it means I don’t have to run to the other side of the room and
turn it off. I go up with my back to the wall so that I can see the top and
bottom of the stairs. And my wild heartbeat is back. The skin on my arms
prickles. The landing is lit and I can see the gaping doorway to my room. Why
do I never think to leave my light on?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The moving
is coming from downstairs now. The chinking sound of the springs in the chair
as somebody sits down, the clunk of a mug set on the table, of plates clinking
together in the sink. Five more steps to the top. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Footsteps across the room towards
the stairs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Four. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
The latch clacking.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Three.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I run the
last two and throw myself into my room, slamming the door shut and flipping on
my light switch. I wait for the blood to stop racing around my head, for my
breathing to slow down.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I imagine a
weight against the other side of the door, of being flung aside of... of what? Ghosts?
Maniacs? Darkness? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I change
into my pyjamas, my senses heightened to every noise of the house. I climb into
bed and pull my duvet up so it almost covers my head. I lay awake watching the
door. Light from the landing pokes in around the edges. I would be able to tell
if those gaps widened even slightly. I watch the handle. I’ll see straight away
if anyone begins to turn it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The crunch
of gravel outside and light floods into my room with the whirring noise of a car engine. Light and sound are abruptly cut off
as the car engine dies. There are thunks as car doors are closed. My mum laughing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I let out a
long breath, feel my body slowly relax.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I roll over and close my eyes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And of course, that's when it takes me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I am in the room when my parents peek on me and I can hear the first anxious beats of their hearts as their voices call my name. But the weight of me is fading and I am spreading, spreading, stretching my long darkness into the house, consuming the light. Darkness becomes me, and I become darkness as beneath me my parents roll back the duvet, staring at only at the faintest impression of where I lay moments before. I expect my sheets are still warm. Darkness is cold, and darkness is hungry and I drift out into the embrace of it, into the stillness of it. Watching. Waiting. Hunting for the shining silence of lonely houses to fill the greed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-10103413866210029722014-05-16T17:17:00.001+01:002014-05-16T17:17:15.788+01:00#FridayFlash - Poker Face<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzA4BQ7l0xUcE0LJJWFlRlbhLTvcbMHF62Fd433HG56xQxcQSVknW9HT8-X6hPx0rcbK5AC3uJF77myhUVne1P73PEyaXEUKY0CLgfX5feUz_hEjcxJfy0SsS-Rm9RcexTCYC72enmSoH6/s1600/Jack.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzA4BQ7l0xUcE0LJJWFlRlbhLTvcbMHF62Fd433HG56xQxcQSVknW9HT8-X6hPx0rcbK5AC3uJF77myhUVne1P73PEyaXEUKY0CLgfX5feUz_hEjcxJfy0SsS-Rm9RcexTCYC72enmSoH6/s1600/Jack.jpg" /></a></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>There was
no electricity in the shed. Dan said this created 'atmosphere' - just seemed dark and gloomy to me. We couldn’t see each other properly. Ruth
had brought candles and she lit them with my lighter, melting wax onto the
wobbly old table and lodging them upright. Shadow and light flickered across
her face. The candles seemed to make the shed darker, it lit the area where we
all sat balanced on stacks of unwanted books or hunched on old boxes and
crates, but behind us the darkness deepened.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘How’d you
find this place anyway?’ Moggy asked, her rich Scottish accent warming the
shadows. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Dan
shrugged. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘It’s Grandad’s,’
I said, earning a sharp look from Dan for breaking his air of mystery.
‘Or was,’ I added. ‘No-one’s been here since he died. He grew
potatoes in the plot. Couldn’t grow anything else.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Alright
Simon,’ Dan said, smacking my arm a little harder than playful. ‘They don’t
want our life story.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Moggy took
the lighter from Ruth and began playing with it, flicking it on and off. She
smiled at me through the glow. Maybe Dan was right. No electricity was good.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘What now?’
Ruth asked. ‘We’re just going to sit in the dark and stare at each other?’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Dan shook
his head.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Course
not, I came prepared.’ He bent down and rummaged about in the plastic bag at
his feet. ‘Ta da!’ he waved a large bottle of cider in the air.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The girls
rolled their eyes simultaneously and shared a glance.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Classy,’
Ruth muttered.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Dan’s
face hardened and I could tell he was on the brink of losing his good humour.
That’s Dan for you. He’s fine as long as everyone thinks he’s brilliant, but
as soon as he thinks you’re laughing at him, you’d better watch out. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘There
should be some cards somewhere,’ I said, before he could ruin everything. It
had taken ages to persuade the girls to come up here alone with us. What was
the point of all that sweet talking if he was just going to lose his cool and
get moody on them? I don’t think girls like that moody act as much as he thinks
they do. ‘Let’s play poker.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Moggy’s
face lit up instantly. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Strip
poker,’ Dan suggested.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Yeah, Dan, in a
grubby shed, in the middle of November.'<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"></span> Ruth sighed
and shook her head. 'You sure know how to show us a good time.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Moggy
giggled and tucked her chin into the collar of her coat. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Come on
then Si,’ she said to me, kicking me lightly on the shin, ‘get the damn cards.
And Dan, pour the cider, I could do with warming up.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Dan
frowned as he stared at the bottle in his hand.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘I didn’t
bring cups,’ he said at last. ‘We’ll have to swig from the bottle.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Better and
better,’ Ruth muttered, but she reached for the bottle anyway and Dan’s face
cleared as he unscrewed the top and gave it to her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I turned
away, my stomach squirming slightly with excitement. Ok, so this
wasn’t exactly the most romantic place in the world. And maybe letting Dan sort the drink wasn’t the best move. But the girls were still here and they were
laughing and joking and they seemed kind of keyed up too. I could feel Moggy’s
bright eyes on me and my stomach squirmed again. I took a deep breath and
began rummaging around in the boxes where Granddad had stored his supply of cigarettes,
drink and cards. Empty bottles clinked, whispery things brushed my hand, my
fingertips slithered over the layer of dirt and sludge at the bottom. Finally
I felt the wooden edge of the box he kept his poker cards in. Clutching it
tightly I turned back to the group. Moggy was drinking from the bottle, her
mouth twisting at the taste as she passed it back to Dan. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Here.’ I
set the wooden box down on the table. It was a faded, plain box with a rusty
metal latch to keep it closed, but the dancing candle light threw patterns
across the worn surface and I remembered Granddad snatching it out of my hands
when I was younger.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘It’s not
for playing with,’ he’d yelled, his bloodshot eyes bulging slightly while
Dan and I slunk away from him. ‘I told yer to leave it be.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Dan was looking at the box with a strangely sombre expression on
his face. Was he remembering that same moment? Grandad was always an
intimidating figure. Stinking of cigarette smoke and stale whisky. His eyes
were yellow, and his skin seemed yellow too. He said it was jaundice from the
jungles when he’d lived abroad... fought abroad. We were terrified of him, but
he impressed us. He was tall and he kept his army figure right up until he
died.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Moggy
reached for the box. I grabbed her wrist.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘What?’ </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Nothing...
I just-’ How could I say I had a bad feeling about opening
the box? It was just a box.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>She smiled,
her lips soft and kind. She twisted her wrist so that we were palm to palm. My
hand tingled.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Sure,’ she
said, ‘he was your granddad.’ She drew her hand away and gave a small nod. ‘Go
on then, you do the honours.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>There was
no other choice. I reached for the box. My fingers seemed to curl away from it,
but I made them wrap around the solid shape. It felt warm. I drew it in close
to my chest.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Grandad
never let us use them,’ I said. ‘He said, they weren’t for playing with.’ I
felt stupid as I spoke. Like a small child.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Come on,’
Dan snapped. ‘Grandad’s dead and the cider’s running out.’ He took another
swig.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘He wanted
the shed burnt down after he died,’ I said, still staring at the box. ‘He left
a letter to mum, said he wanted everything in it turned to ashes. She wouldn’t
do it though.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Simon.’
Dan leaned in close. ‘You’re kind of
killing the mood here. Grandad was out of his head. He wanted to burn himself
with it as well, if you remember - that’s why they sent him to the home. Now,
either open that damn box and cheer up a bit, or give it to me and bugger off.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The box was
still warm in my hand and for a moment I swear it shuddered in my grip. I
almost dropped it, but as I looked up I saw Moggy’s large eyes watching me. I
must look mad to her. She’d never let me talk her into coming up here without
Ruth at this rate. I swallowed down the anxiety that was starting to bubble
inside me and turned my attention back to the box.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I unlatched
the clasp. Lifted the lid and...</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>A tired
looking pack of cards sat inside. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘These are
well old,’ Dan said, reaching past me and grabbing the pack out of the box.
‘The old git picked them up from Vietnam, or Cambodia or China or somewhere
like that.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Cool,’
Ruth took them from him. She slid the cards out of the
cardboard pack and fanned them out.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I grabbed
the cider and took a long deep drink, barely tasting it as it slid down my
throat and into my stomach. My heart was beating madly and I had no idea why.
My gaze was on the cards in Ruth’s hands, I couldn’t look away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Ruth’s face
twisted slightly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Ugh,’ she
said, ‘these are creepy.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Moggy peered over her shoulder at them, her nose wrinkled.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘What <i>are</i> these?’ she asked.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Ruth turned
them so that they faced us. Dan and I both leaned in. I frowned,
squinting in the light to make them out. There were no usual images of queens,
or jacks, or kings, or aces. Instead there were photos of people. Some were Asian
in green khaki uniform, some were western with big perms and hanging hoop earrings,
some were older with white hair and creased faces. All them wore a look of
terror – their mouths twisted in silent screams, or grimaces of pain, their
eyes stretched with fear.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘I don’t
want to play with them,’ Moggy said, drawing away and pulling her coat tighter
about herself. A shock of wind made the candle flames flicker.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Look,’
Ruth said, pulling a card out of the deck. ‘This one’s normal.’ She held up a
jack. The usual sort of jack you’d find in any pack of cards. My heart seemed
to freeze for a moment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Ruth,’ I
said, and I knew as I spoke that it was too late. ‘I think you should put the
card down.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Ruth turned
to look at me. As she did so the card twisted in her hand. Not like cardboard.
Like a living thing. Ruth let out a small cry of horror and tried to drop it.
We all leapt back. The card wrapped itself around Ruth’s wrist, was slowly
twisting up her arm.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Oh my god!’
Ruth was scrambling away from us, shaking her arm. ‘Get it off, get it off, get
it off.’ Her face was stricken with terror.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Moggy and I
lurched towards her at the same time. Moggy wrapped her arms about her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Simon,’
she yelled, ‘pull that bloody <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">thing</span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </i><i>off</i>
her.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The card
was like a red and white snake, entwining itself about Ruth’s arm. Her skin was
turning an awful grey colour wherever it was touched.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ruth’s eyes were wide, her breath coming in
convulsive gulps, unable to utter any words. The thing wound up higher towards
her neck.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I grabbed
at it. It was thick and muscled beneath my touch. And hot. Burning. I let out a
cry of pain, snatching my hands back. Ruth staggered, her arm flailing wildly,
knocking Moggy aside.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The thing
was up her neck, under her chin, curling up and over her face.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I could
hear Moggy’s terrified sobbing, behind me Dan was cowered against the wall.
The thing now covered Ruth’s entire upper body and was working downwards.
Waist, hips, thighs...</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>One moment
she was there, a heaving mass of white and red. The next there was nothing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I staggered
back, knocking against our table. The candles toppled off. Silence fell with
the darkness. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘R-Ruth?’
Moggy’s voice filled the shed. ‘Ruth?’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I fumbled
for a candle. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Moggy,’ I
whispered, ‘do you have my lighter?’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I heard her
moving over to me, her touch trembled on my arm, she pressed the lighter into
my palm. It took me a couple of tries to get the spark to ignite. Each time
Moggy’s face flared pale and sweaty in the brief illumination. Finally I lit
the candle. The flame wobbled. Daniel was still pressed against the wall, his
face stricken.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moggy stood beside me,
her breathing ragged. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Ruth was gone. I stood up and
moved forward, to where she had stood a moment before. A playing card lay in
the dust at my feet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I bent down
and picked it up. I turned it over.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Ruth’s face
stared up at me, frozen in a look of terror.<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-40066907086844607962014-05-05T21:17:00.002+01:002014-05-05T21:17:25.409+01:00Paper butterflies and silent stories<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghToyVrAjEZkfPdUiMpLL0SpGuWZtf33nJrv3sA6Expq651KAeWnkzU1oJSKIC4VPHXCk9VCqMMWw5bGWA9_QHQyCsCwvIJnBqcdFvNlRPpGi3tfQK_9oO5CB-Nqftq7CU_RYGutPgrfkp/s1600/butterflies+alex+arnell+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a></div>
Well, you can tell the Easter Holidays are over and I'm back at work, because suddenly the desire/time to blog, tweet and write mysteriously disappears! <br />
<br />
This is a blog post that I've been meaning to do for ages but have only just found the time and motivation to sit down and write it.<br />
<br />
At the beginning of April I was part of the Golden Egg Social that travelled to London to meet, drink and be merry (and creative!) It was a lovely day, so nice to spend time with people happy to talk about story plots and characters and who are all so generous at sharing their ideas and suggestions. That day fired me up to start writing after a fairly lengthy hiatus and so a big Thank You to Emma Greenwood who organised it all.<br />
<br />
Emma was fantastic not only for organising the day but also because one of the best bits of that day was a Scrawl Crawl around WC1 with Emma as our muse and guide. Emma led us through the streets of London pointing out the various interesting nooks and crannies and hidden faces that we might not usually see and she set us off on writing tasks to get our creative juices flowing. I thought I would share with you some of the free writing that I did on that day - I've left them exactly as I wrote them then.<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: purple;">The Silent Watchers</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: purple;">The Outer Temple, Lloyds Bank, Law Courts Branch</span></div>
<br />
<span style="color: purple;">Heads bowed, stone bones creaking, muscles groaning and necks aching. Nostrils full of the smog and smoke of life, eyes cloyed, lips rimmed with age. But they Breathe. Their stony abdomens expand millimetre by millimetre, draw back in. Inhaling the sweat and rush and hurry as they remain stoic, poised, heads down, dreaming of the otherworld, of the space they were dreamt from, of the place where they were not real but were only light and air and thought and nothing but ideas.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ52-PfdrWBZtqveTfXX2hqyfRCm2h_zP7eMIxGJPBTHXvX2nVgjoVsC0CbvV5wM84bWuxb2vOiTYvcEbDaG1c_gzlfxyfgako_lN-KraTng3v1Ij9Wh5NzMdfMStUhDpIZO1CZIr_mBVp/s1600/lloyds+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ52-PfdrWBZtqveTfXX2hqyfRCm2h_zP7eMIxGJPBTHXvX2nVgjoVsC0CbvV5wM84bWuxb2vOiTYvcEbDaG1c_gzlfxyfgako_lN-KraTng3v1Ij9Wh5NzMdfMStUhDpIZO1CZIr_mBVp/s1600/lloyds+2.jpg" height="303" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: blue;"><span style="background-color: white;">The Paper Butterflies</span></span></div>
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">Shiver of wind against the paper membrane, shocking to the very core. The rise and fall of human buzz and the thick odour of cloying beer and chips. </span><br />
<span style="color: blue;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: blue;">They rest briefly, their bright light colours like boiled sweets against the grimy stone building. They feel the hum of the city through their crease and folds. A spot of sunlight, a snick of wind and they rise again, dancing and twirling up above the rooftops, away over London's skyline.</span><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghToyVrAjEZkfPdUiMpLL0SpGuWZtf33nJrv3sA6Expq651KAeWnkzU1oJSKIC4VPHXCk9VCqMMWw5bGWA9_QHQyCsCwvIJnBqcdFvNlRPpGi3tfQK_9oO5CB-Nqftq7CU_RYGutPgrfkp/s1600/butterflies+alex+arnell+1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghToyVrAjEZkfPdUiMpLL0SpGuWZtf33nJrv3sA6Expq651KAeWnkzU1oJSKIC4VPHXCk9VCqMMWw5bGWA9_QHQyCsCwvIJnBqcdFvNlRPpGi3tfQK_9oO5CB-Nqftq7CU_RYGutPgrfkp/s1600/butterflies+alex+arnell+1.jpg" height="267" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">These are not the actual butterflies we saw that day, but I think those, like the ones pictured here, were part of <a href="https://www.facebook.com/FreeArtFridayLondon?viewer_id%3D0" target="_blank"> Free Art Friday</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
The final stop of the day was the national portrait gallery where we were tasked with finding a portrait and consider it as a character to inspire some writing. I didn't quite get round to that exercise as I was too absorbed by some of the paintings I came across.<br />
<br />
One was a portrait of <a href="http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw232989/Mary-English-nee-Ballard-later-Greenup" target="_blank">Mary English, Nee Ballard, Greenup</a> who lived from 1789 - 1846. I'm really interested in Victorian explorers, particularly women explorers and have been writing a story about a Victorian girl who gets caught up with a Victorian female explorer. I've started to do some research into this area, and Mary English seems to be a good place to start as she certainly seems to have had a colourful life!<br />
<br />
Finally I was arrested particularly by a portrait o<a href="http://www.npg.org.uk/whatson/diallo/home.php" target="_blank">f Ayuba Suleiman Diallo</a> - the earliest known portrait of a freed slave. Beside the portrait was a poem entitled 'Diallo's Testament' by Ben Okri. It's a moving and beautiful poem and demonstrates how inspiration can be sparked by a face drawn in oils on canvas and that stories hide behind so much around us. My favourite lines of the poem are below and you can hear Ben reading the rest <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0PHE9_V34E" target="_blank">here</a><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
'Behind me are silent stories</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Like a storm. I have worn </div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
History around my neck like chains.'</div>
<br />
<br />
Thank you Emma for a wonderful day!<br />
<br />Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-78034548105739072132014-04-21T17:07:00.000+01:002014-04-21T17:10:32.598+01:00Writers Process Blog Tour<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Thanks to <a href="http://www.elliskerkhoven.com/1/post/2014/04/writers-process-blog-our.html" target="_blank">Ellis Kerkhoven </a>for tagging me into the chain for the writer's process blog tour. It's been fascinating reading writers' processes and seeing how people manage to articulate why they write and how they write. </span></span></div>
<div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">For anyone who hasn't heard of it, the Writers Process Blog Tour is 'simply a weekly insight into and
sharing of people's writing process.' So here goes...</span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><u><b><br /></b></u></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><u><b>What am I working on?</b></u></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I have a lot of different stories at different stages of development, but the one that I'm concentrating on at the moment is called <i>The Burning.</i> </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I've been writing this novel for children aged 10+ for about seven years now. I've written draft after draft and seen my writing evolve and develop with each one. I've restarted about four times and the current reincarnation is vastly different from the others (working titles include <i>Master Juggler, WordWeaver, The Storyseeker)</i>. It's a story about storytelling and the importance of having the freedom to create and to imagine. Culture and society is founded on our ability to communicate ideas through writing, art and song and I am intrigued by what happens when you take this freedom away or try to annihilate culture. </span></span></div>
<div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I travelled to Cambodia around the time I started writing this story and learnt a lot about the Khmer Rouge, about how Pol Pot wanted to take the country back to year zero and start again,obliterating its past and history. When the regime began taking over the people they went after were the intellectuals, the masters of their arts. Now a new generation is growing up with gaps in their history. People are relearning their traditions and its hard work because there are so few people left that remember or have the skills to teach what is lost.</span></span></div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">My three (well, ok, it's actually four) line breakdown is: </span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span></div>
<div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: purple;">Romy is a storymaker in a world where storymaking is forbidden
and the only tales you can hear are Emperor approved propaganda. When Romy’s
identity is discovered her home is burned, her mother taken and she is left
alone with only a raggedy juggler boy to help her. Determined to save her mother
and with the help of Mister and the travellers who can tell Romy more about her
past, Romy does her best to survive and find her mother without being caught.
As she travels through the country towards the City of Lies, her stories begin
to ripple about her, perhaps paving the way for a new way of life for everyone.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><u><b>How does my work differ from others of its genre?</b></u></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1wN_DYq7ApoXLkUePpw9aiLJQ9Fb6iWx6Y7zFPdTsXron4EGUYYJfEpcq2uDT874mc7A32tmtRc3BAjT-TPAzk4KB5GhQTQ6H525rv4qV4qWfQXc50NAQuRvsxDf5kH_FKwLEZijnr9IY/s1600/elves+and+goblin.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1wN_DYq7ApoXLkUePpw9aiLJQ9Fb6iWx6Y7zFPdTsXron4EGUYYJfEpcq2uDT874mc7A32tmtRc3BAjT-TPAzk4KB5GhQTQ6H525rv4qV4qWfQXc50NAQuRvsxDf5kH_FKwLEZijnr9IY/s1600/elves+and+goblin.JPG" height="320" width="224" /></a><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">My genre is usually fantasy or magical realism and I like to try and turn usual expectations inside out. During University I wrote a story about a world that existed behind this world and it was run by fairies and elves and goblins. However, the fairies were huge, like giants, the elves were strange creatures with four legs, they were green all over and grew moss like fur and they were very down to earth and practical, also the goblins were not the bad guys - I like to have a different slant on things if I can.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Aside from that though, I don't know if my work is that vastly different from others, I'm just trying to engage readers in a world that feels real and in the lives of empathetic, believable characters with strong story lines to follow. I think that what makes it different is that it is written by me. My way of seeing things, of writing things down onto the page is my way and that will always make it different from someone else's.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><u><b>Why do I write what I do?</b></u></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Looking over things that I have written, I suppose it would be fair to say that I write what interests me, what captures my imagination, I write to explore ideas and possibilities. But I don't ever sit down and think today I am going to write about such and such. Something triggers a scene, or a line of dialogue in my mind and I go on from there.</span></span></span></span> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span> <span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Sometimes it feels like an addiction. I don't know why I have the compulsion to write, I don't know why certain characters or scenarios or ideas take shape and become stories or poems. They just do. I</span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">t's all part
of the mysterious make-up of the Universe. </span></span>It's a kind of magic. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><u><b>How does my writing process work?</b></u></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I very much admired <a href="http://www.candygourlay.com/2014/03/chain-of-fools-er-authors.html" target="_blank">Candy Gourlay's</a> and <a href="http://vashtihardy.wordpress.com/2014/04/07/my-writing-process-blog-tour/" target="_blank">Vashti Hardy's</a> descriptions of their writing processes and would like to be able to be as eloquent as them. For me writing is a process that happens in fits and starts, that means bouncing off the walls one minute and then slinking off to hibernate the next. I'll try to break it down.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Most story ideas I have tend to be triggered by me being somewhere and seeing something. In my book <i>The Burning my</i> main character, the storymaker, has to be surrounded by people, by experience and by life in order to be able to tell stories. Life seeps into her, ideas recharge her, she learns and thinks and words take shape within her that she releases into stories. I feel writing is much the same - you need to fill yourself with experiences and ideas gleaned from being around people, or walking through a city, or sitting in the sun, or browsing an art gallery, or reading books, or listening to music, or watching films, or travelling to a land you've never been to before and breathing it all in. I collect postcards and objects that have the tingle of story about them and I use them as story starts. See my earlier blog post about this <a href="http://rosiebird.blogspot.co.uk/2010/08/wall-of-wonder.html" target="_blank">here</a> or my feature for Words and Pics <a href="http://www.wordsandpics.org/2013/05/undiscovered-stories.html" target="_blank">here</a>).</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj95NMI7Up_4FGssveWidDFQ_lIiNp9FR2ipDxdB1nAyuHj4xULjPZKKMav74DcnzxCOrcZljdS6Q5LZc_JxlcUBaZWnA8gy0BTuIwWXi0Z-p9wCIe2KRTBRgDUIJxSSZ0ZBUaJr7VacRuA/s1600/juggling.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj95NMI7Up_4FGssveWidDFQ_lIiNp9FR2ipDxdB1nAyuHj4xULjPZKKMav74DcnzxCOrcZljdS6Q5LZc_JxlcUBaZWnA8gy0BTuIwWXi0Z-p9wCIe2KRTBRgDUIJxSSZ0ZBUaJr7VacRuA/s1600/juggling.JPG" height="241" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">The current story that I'm writing was triggered many years ago when I was in Belgium eating waffles in one of the main squares - all of a sudden there was a juggler there. He was wearing stilts and he began juggling and then there were hundreds of people all juggling. Here my memory gets a little hazy because I have written that as a scene in my story so many times that I can no longer remember how much of it is real and how much I have made </span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">up. But in my note book that day I wrote: </span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="background-color: purple;"><span style="color: purple;"><span style="background-color: white;"><i>'Juggling
Master at the Grand Palace dressed in red, girl apprenticed, the
drumming of the clubs, cries and shouts, heat of the sun, sticky
chocolate, stripey socks, red wagon</i></span></span><span style="background-color: white;">.<span style="color: purple;">'</span></span></span></span></span> <span style="background-color: purple;"></span> This somehow combined with a memory of a trip to St Ives in Cornwall and sitting on the beach eating chips in the dark listening to the sound of the waves rolling in and seeing the humps of the fishing boats left stranded on the sand when the tide came out. An image arose in my head of a girl seeking shelter in an upturned boat and meeting an extraordinary boy, a juggler, who tells stories. And the story in its first carnation was born. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwmNh8d4Vgsw-bumFKfjhuDMDtPamXeEL6T6z1-BxR8RrqRkiUdq1SvwMU9AC7uTrTITnHljGkibVl3KqsF2StkAm9J42lLyvEKPu4W2yj1MMsiZxUVWPKbgZqquRH0H8OiCJYJAY_dByP/s1600/fairy.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwmNh8d4Vgsw-bumFKfjhuDMDtPamXeEL6T6z1-BxR8RrqRkiUdq1SvwMU9AC7uTrTITnHljGkibVl3KqsF2StkAm9J42lLyvEKPu4W2yj1MMsiZxUVWPKbgZqquRH0H8OiCJYJAY_dByP/s1600/fairy.JPG" height="200" style="cursor: move;" width="144" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">A couple of scenes I drew out for <i>BackWorld</i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I write feverishly when I have story to write - I can spend hours and hours in front of the keyboard not even noticing when it's time to eat or drink. My waking hours are spent thinking about my characters, about the story. I wake up with lines of dialogue in my head and plot problems solved. I'm not an artist but I try to draw out scenes and characters, I write back stories for the world I'm creating and all the characters. </span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlIzUCUert8UhxIsmBT8idbYHjnrFsQS3qmd9zWF151vNZEehz5fEJgTL0j0s9Gp98xXBYbyjBdjO5u_BM435Wm22xfhCde6O8be0xKI5teKFzbwp5DL55Rj_YR_CJIynfg8YuRLEgALb-/s1600/characters.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlIzUCUert8UhxIsmBT8idbYHjnrFsQS3qmd9zWF151vNZEehz5fEJgTL0j0s9Gp98xXBYbyjBdjO5u_BM435Wm22xfhCde6O8be0xKI5teKFzbwp5DL55Rj_YR_CJIynfg8YuRLEgALb-/s1600/characters.JPG" height="150" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I search out pictures of my characters.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I map out the country, the terrain I'm writing about, I search out pictures of characters or places and I display them all around me.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Then there's a lull. Everything goes quiet and I begin consuming books. I read, read, read. Preferably books that I've never read before, a mix of genres, and age range. Recently I've switched between reading Longbourn by Jo Baker, Alice in Wonderland and Generation Kill by Evan Wright. </span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdRI10rqN9lDjTMQvAo-FwTUgXsM5o7fW3pnD1Sc_hgPuI1VXORvuJ9meJZeA7D_HznXUM-6MYqlH8DFny4QX0OsJLAreBTFjz1324P0X0TvVT2sIEj-9wc6Q1FaPfcViKLxk6OWn3ul7k/s1600/gen+kill.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdRI10rqN9lDjTMQvAo-FwTUgXsM5o7fW3pnD1Sc_hgPuI1VXORvuJ9meJZeA7D_HznXUM-6MYqlH8DFny4QX0OsJLAreBTFjz1324P0X0TvVT2sIEj-9wc6Q1FaPfcViKLxk6OWn3ul7k/s1600/gen+kill.JPG" height="200" width="150" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPhxXE4kFNLYBiHP5eMYNAee4PFwkbE-Q9s5ZoXrkoWmAJpgIlsTvoqgiIeDykdkOB9azA9gHflz6ITjTm8UZ25e5S-zOxGpTSUSxTrqqZTiOJEHWXHWyatVmc-J9Zhrywbw1CpnnEg6vT/s1600/longbourn.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPhxXE4kFNLYBiHP5eMYNAee4PFwkbE-Q9s5ZoXrkoWmAJpgIlsTvoqgiIeDykdkOB9azA9gHflz6ITjTm8UZ25e5S-zOxGpTSUSxTrqqZTiOJEHWXHWyatVmc-J9Zhrywbw1CpnnEg6vT/s1600/longbourn.JPG" height="200" width="150" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnKybWF222yeJN9_WZH1FDtUcbpCvtPD3aCdzDRyRC8iCdEy7OeU9_F4_Gpk89W7Kuf1Ev-WW1F9SXl_AuDFd-gFGocj8Tg9OetzPDTflZgHniZxdJuUNWFY_kB6KiFEMtcX6Fg_ZLQvwo/s1600/alice.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnKybWF222yeJN9_WZH1FDtUcbpCvtPD3aCdzDRyRC8iCdEy7OeU9_F4_Gpk89W7Kuf1Ev-WW1F9SXl_AuDFd-gFGocj8Tg9OetzPDTflZgHniZxdJuUNWFY_kB6KiFEMtcX6Fg_ZLQvwo/s1600/alice.JPG" height="200" width="150" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I watch films and I think and I
don't write a single word. Then I'll make myself write something,
anything. I have a trashy romance story that I keep going as a way to
get me writing again. This story allows me to write anything without
self editing. I write without self-consciousness like I did when I was a
teenager. I write without inhibition or rules. Then that dries up too
and that's generally when I'm ready to continue with the story that went into hibernation.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Once the first draft is done I send it out to those people I trust to give critical, useful feedback and then I start working on something else until I feel ready to start editing. I try not to edit as I write, which is hard because I love editing as much as I love writing. But as Fletcher Moss tweeted recently in his series of 52 things he's learnt since The Poison Boy was published: 'A slightly crappy finished novel is ten-times better than a brilliant first five chapters. Whatever you do - finish it! <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23pb52s&src=hash" target="_blank"><s>#</s><b>pb52s'</b></a></span></span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">So as you can see it's a muddle. I don't have word limits, writing days or any real structure to my writing and sometimes I wish I did but every time I've tried it's just felt forced and difficult. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> I was asked recently what would I do if I never got published, would I still write? For me the answer is that there isn't really a choice. Yes, I would still write. I write because I have the compulsion to do so and I love it. It would be a dream come true to have my stories read and loved, treasured by readers for generations and yes, that's what I hope for. But it's not why I write. I write because the stories form inside me and so I write them out as best that I can. Besides, never is a long time and by the time you get to the end of it... well I don't expect you'll worry about things too much then!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">For the next link in the chain I pass you on, appropriately enough, to a storyteller -<a href="http://aimingforapublishingdeal.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank"> Charlotte Comley.</a> </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAEeCg3iVwOdoxvMAgDQf8kzXp4cKR5BAeBf89rgTdbLzIRBIqK8RcSETooZ8Ols0-eKAD0N_tYxLzqJYngp9TzKy9lbI2GsU9sTZAsoQYeYkdmwye2kOyUBGKb5k84V7KWO6VWwR2VH7Z/s1600/charlottephoto.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAEeCg3iVwOdoxvMAgDQf8kzXp4cKR5BAeBf89rgTdbLzIRBIqK8RcSETooZ8Ols0-eKAD0N_tYxLzqJYngp9TzKy9lbI2GsU9sTZAsoQYeYkdmwye2kOyUBGKb5k84V7KWO6VWwR2VH7Z/s1600/charlottephoto.jpg" /></a></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Charlotte Comley
is a creative writing group organiser and now self-employed writer of educational
resources, blog content and articles. She is currently studying for an MA in
Creative Writing for Children at Winchester University. She is a member of SCWBI
and regularly blogs at <a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" target="_blank"><span class="ecxHyperlink0"><span style="color: #0563c1;">aimingforapublishingdeal.blogspot.co.uk/</span></span></a></span></span></div>
<div>
</div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"> Enjoy!</span></span></div>
<div>
</div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-50240635456555146032014-04-18T18:30:00.000+01:002014-04-18T18:30:02.134+01:00#FridayFlash - I dream of Dehli<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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I dream of Delhi.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNBPMlCwfEeIDGp20fq2MIO3Vs5Xkd6ktTEREwyspCjtGAQRbQiOyTdgW-lpxi_yiYqh35V0AyhNhIHVruuDJwYkQ9cTVvnkoZ7unQqbPkZwCwE1BxFo8KsmxN1QPOHPW9qYBRMn5v_EBW/s1600/friday+falsh.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNBPMlCwfEeIDGp20fq2MIO3Vs5Xkd6ktTEREwyspCjtGAQRbQiOyTdgW-lpxi_yiYqh35V0AyhNhIHVruuDJwYkQ9cTVvnkoZ7unQqbPkZwCwE1BxFo8KsmxN1QPOHPW9qYBRMn5v_EBW/s1600/friday+falsh.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a>Standing in Pharaganj, life flowing
around me. A girl in a ‘Free Tibet’ t-shirt, a guy ‘Same Same, but different’.
Pooris inflating over woks licked with yellow flames, children with thin broken
legs dragging themselves along on trays with wheels; eyes bright, faces gaunt.
Lazy-eyed cows with xylophone ribs making the traffic swerve. Trodden rubbish,
the buzz of flies, vegetables ablaze with colour. The scent of hard work, of
hard living on the people shifting amongst fresh white faces, overwhelmed
expressions: gappers in baggy trousers, strappy tops, eyes like saucers.
Motorbikes, taxis, rickshaws, horns blaring, heat and dust, heat and dust, heat
and dust.<br />
<br />
Overhead
the sun sinks and kites fly on breezes heavy with spice, silhouettes on
rooftops reel in their strings and then let them out to soar. The air like
lotion on my skin, leaving me shining, giddy with jasmine: breathing it in,
every last drop, of terrible, wonderful life.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><br />
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
awake cold.<br />
<br />
Thin grey light
in the room, your breath on my shoulder, the clock ticking and the world
silent.</div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-44362509976144813902014-04-17T11:47:00.002+01:002014-04-17T11:50:25.116+01:00The thing with writing...<!--[if !mso]>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here’s what I find difficult about writing. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sometimes your
mind can be burning with ideas. Your characters chatter away in your head, you
see scenes<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>- image on image like beads
on a rosary*- you can’t concentrate on conversations people are having around
you, you drift off into storyworld while you’re in the middle of shampooing
your hair in the shower and you stand there with the suds dripping off you and your skin
turning wrinkly while plot-holes are fixed, motivation is explained and the way
forward is revealed to you… and then, then you sit down at your computer to
write it all down, feverish with anticipation, your fingers tingling with the
words waiting to pour out of your<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>brain,
down your arm and out through the keys on the keyboard and… and… AND</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg_5h4-T3hUfbGpFep1Sj2IBcWJvb1hcj1g4wYaYJm5xeOSo_EZHUJPdvVTpp2px8rOZ0ghdakV-qbrwSSuxSp_8qVAUTJ3_27K9b1jovH7T7Zvf79CEL_Xuim9wYzRDPnP7ysEIZLL3oL/s1600/blank+screen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg_5h4-T3hUfbGpFep1Sj2IBcWJvb1hcj1g4wYaYJm5xeOSo_EZHUJPdvVTpp2px8rOZ0ghdakV-qbrwSSuxSp_8qVAUTJ3_27K9b1jovH7T7Zvf79CEL_Xuim9wYzRDPnP7ysEIZLL3oL/s1600/blank+screen.jpg" height="471" width="640" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-no-proof: yes;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Nothing. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The words don’t come.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Story lines submerge themselves once more beneath
the fogginess of Other Things. You sit, searching your brain for those bright gems
of insight you just had and… nothing. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You start thinking about the washing up, about the bills you
haven’t paid. You start thinking about how you should be mowing the lawn, how
you need to take the car in to get that engine light checked out, you notice that
the windows need cleaning, remember you haven’t got any milk, that you were
meant to reply to an email from your mum, that you haven’t checked social media
this morning and before you know it you’re on Facebook browsing the lives of
other people.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Is this just me? Why does it happen? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When will a story sucker be invented? You know,
a little gadget that we can plug into our brains and that will simply suck the
story straight out as it’s supposed to be. Neat and tidy, perfect as it exists
inside us before our reality filters and normal life filters get in the way. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Is writing a form of procrastination for life and life a
form of procrastination for writing? All I know is that this morning I knew
exactly how the next chapter of my story should be written. I KNEW. And now
when I sit down to type it out, I find myself typing this instead. That’s what’s
so annoying about writing – it’s so easy in your head but when you come to pin
it down on the blank page it’s like catching dandelion down on a windy day
wearing boxing gloves.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<i>*yes, this is nicked from an elbow song.</i></div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-55249899370074826062014-03-29T20:10:00.000+00:002014-03-31T18:01:42.526+01:00One Picture, Three Stories<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgawyeoL_86Z2GoqLDkvP62APr2BV6duj0qMenbEiUMssshirXgcardBbkQLZ0KmAFHiAfC7G4qfuQyrWLKK9nGYmUMuom5_ZKGy-vEWyouyF8WEDldXXbO_2oRi1N_rhQ86TTzM7rjXpwU/s1600/Lost+ballerina.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgawyeoL_86Z2GoqLDkvP62APr2BV6duj0qMenbEiUMssshirXgcardBbkQLZ0KmAFHiAfC7G4qfuQyrWLKK9nGYmUMuom5_ZKGy-vEWyouyF8WEDldXXbO_2oRi1N_rhQ86TTzM7rjXpwU/s1600/Lost+ballerina.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />
For me this little brooch manges to convey the beauty and elegance that dance can encompass. I took this photo of it to try and capture the magical nature of it in the hope that it would inspire a short story.<br />
<br />
As part of the <a href="http://janeheinrichs.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">one picture, three stories link up with Jane Heinrich</a>s, I'd like to share some of the thoughts, stories and memories that this picture evokes in me. <br />
<br />
1. Oh how I wanted to be a ballerina! To have grace and elegance, to twirl and leap as though I was made of dandelion down... alas for me I am flatfooted, clumsy, have no sense of timing and have all the grace, poise and balance of a lumbering anteater. Any time that I have ever performed anything resembling a dance on stage I have come in at the wrong time, or turned the wrong way, or missed my entrance completely. As you can imagine, a career in dance was never on the cards. But how my heart soars when I watch anyone else more blessed with talent, skill, and the ability to stand right up on tippy-toe without looking like a gangling idiot.<br />
<br />
2. I found this brooch on the pavement lost, abandoned, covered in mud and broken. It makes me wonder who owned it, where they got it from. Was it a gift? A token of love, of faith, of hope? Was it a promise? How did it get lost? Is it missed? Who could not miss such an elegant, pretty treasure? Stories can be found anywhere and attached to anything. I like to think of this little dancer as a talisman, a good luck charm for someone embarking on their life of dancing. I hope though that they are not suffering for having lost it, but rather that they no longer needed it and it has been passed on to inspire someone new (i.e. me!)<br />
<br />
3. The Steadfast Tin Soldier is my favourite Hans Christian Anderson story. Although this dancer is made of plastic and not paper, I imagine her as the dancer in the story and can understand the love she inspired in the Tin Soldier. If you're not familiar with the fairytale, you can read it<a href="http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/TheSteadfastTinSoldier_e.html" target="_blank"> here</a>.<br />
<br />
I haven't written the dancer her own story yet but if I do, I'll share it with you! <br />
<br />
<br />Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-776947521201407572014-03-26T19:21:00.000+00:002014-03-28T16:23:32.295+00:00Weekly Wishes #2<span style="font-size: small;">Ok, so it's been an extended week, but here's how my list of wishes looks now:</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: cyan;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: black;"> 1. <strike>Use my spare time to do something related to writing be it a feature proposal, competition entry, research.</strike></span></span><span style="background-color: #b4a7d6;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #8e7cc3;"> </span></span></span></span><span style="color: #8e7cc3;"><strike> </strike>Sorting out my shelving unit and filing systems I encountered numerous story starts and ideas. One has been growing and growing. I re-read my current book and the next part of the chapter is bubbling away in the back of the mind. So although I haven't actually WRITTEN anything, I have most certainly turned my attention to writing.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: yellow; font-size: small;">2. Write the next chapter of my book (or at least start on it)<span style="background-color: #eeeeee;"> <span style="color: #8e7cc3;">This is rolling over to the coming week.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">3. <strike>Sort out the loose filing on my desk. </strike><span style="color: #8e7cc3;">Done!</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">4.<strike> Send back the pension information form sitting on my desk. </strike>- I<span style="color: #8e7cc3;">t's in the envelope to be posted.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">5.<strike> Write a blog post about my word of the year.<span style="color: #8e7cc3;"> </span></strike><span style="color: #8e7cc3;">Online!</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">So for the next week I'm just making a very focused wish list:</span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #bf9000;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #bf9000;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="background-color: #eeeeee;"><b>WRITE</b></span></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee;"><span style="color: #bf9000;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b></b></span></span></span></div>
Specifically:<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-size: large;">book</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: large;">feature ideas for submission</span></span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-size: small;">That's it, short, simple but very very important! </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;"></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">One of the nice things about this link up is that you visit other people's blogs and offer them encouragement and motivation on their goals. Apart from this being a nice thing to do, it also means that you come across some truly interesting, creative and inspiring people, like <a href="http://theinspiredcafe.com/2014/03/26/weekly-wishes-44/" target="_blank">Dija.</a></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;"></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">If you want to join in with the Weekly Wishes link up just click the button below:</span><br />
<div align="center">
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://thenectarcollective.com/tags/weekly-wishes/" target="_blank" title="The Nectar Collective"><img alt="The Nectar Collective" src="http://cdn.thenectarcollective.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/weekly-wishes-button.jpg" style="border: none;" /></a></div>
Good Luck!<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/6662035/?claim=zbb4sf6zhew">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a> Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-70134587116508426982014-03-26T16:48:00.000+00:002014-03-26T17:03:38.323+00:00Never Give In, Never Give Up: REACH!Every year my friend makes a scrap book page for her <a href="http://jennifergracecreates.com/time-to-cleanse-my-word-for-2014/" target="_blank">word of the year</a> and it's something that I've started to do too. A word of the year is sort of like a mantra for that year. Last year my word was FEARLESS and I think I lived up to it by chucking in my job and branching out on something completely new. That actually didn't work out as well as I had hoped, but the sentiment was there: Try. DO.<br />
<br />
Last year my being fearless did open new doors for me too. It led to my features being published in the SCBWI online magazine <a href="http://www.wordsandpics.org/" target="_blank">Words and Pics</a> (<a href="http://www.wordsandpics.org/2014/03/happy-birthday-words-pictures.html" target="_blank">Happy Birthday by the way Words and Pics</a>), it led to me being part of some fantastic writing workshops with the <a href="http://www.goldeneggacademy.co.uk/" target="_blank">Golden Egg Academy</a> led by the inspirational Imogen Cooper and it led me to start writing again.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span id="goog_1013922932"></span><span id="goog_1013922933"></span></div>
This year I didn't want to stray too far from the idea of being fearless, but I have to admit that the whole job situation not quite working out did leave me quite bruised. I wanted a word that would express a desire to remain positive, to not give up, but that wasn't quite so 'in your face'. I chose:<br />
<h2>
</h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #8e7cc3; font-size: x-large;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">REACH</span></i></span></h2>
<br />
Here's my scrap book page for it. The quality of the picture is not very good because I am camera-less at the moment and having to borrow my husband's i-phone.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgonyJVduALUtfdyVtavfjfMWCidC0-DPG_KUNf3BDoFDxHZrNiI4RXMlwicCK9P1Vh_FYv433jQHWkEjB2in1PNW2cUWf6ndCU24vM262v5xbBlqk8LvYZOpQ1mduBw8xYT1Jqx_zdWduU/s1600/Reach+Page.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgonyJVduALUtfdyVtavfjfMWCidC0-DPG_KUNf3BDoFDxHZrNiI4RXMlwicCK9P1Vh_FYv433jQHWkEjB2in1PNW2cUWf6ndCU24vM262v5xbBlqk8LvYZOpQ1mduBw8xYT1Jqx_zdWduU/s1600/Reach+Page.jpg" height="315" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
The journalling on the page reads:<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>Never give in, never give up. </i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>2014 is the year to keep trying, to keep reaching for my goals. </i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>Flapping your wings is the first sign of life!</i></span></div>
<br />
The last sentence links in with the Snow Bird image on the top right hand corner which is a page out of a book. It says:<br />
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;">'Look!' said Jim, 'he's opening and shutting his wings! He's come alive!'</span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;">For me this is a reminder that although it can seem easier to just pass through life without taking risks and making mistakes, to really live and and make the most of your life you have to take action - you can't fly if you haven't stretched your wings. So that's what this year is all about. Moving forward, making progress, reaching for all the things that are important to me with hope in my heart and the sky as my limit.</span></h4>
<br />Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-70555935600086805532014-03-22T20:30:00.000+00:002014-03-26T17:00:29.595+00:00Spy Game<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Amber felt stones and flint
digging through her jeans and into her knees. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Her hair was slick with sweat; she
could smell the rancid scent of her body beneath her clothes. She trembled; her
head a fog of disjointed memories. Her vision was blurred. Figures loomed
around her. Voices blared through bad static.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Where was she? How had this
happened? She could taste blood in her mouth, her hands were numb from the
plastic bindings that tied them. She tried to remember where this had all begun...
it had started with icecream... and something... something...</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
She had been scared. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
But even that feeling was so
buried beneath weariness and pain that it no longer seemed to matter.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
In the distance she heard a
jumble of click-clack noises. Her heart sped up, and she groped her mind for
clarity.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
A cacophony of shots.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Her shoulder exploded with white
heat. Her body jerked back. Warmth spread through her and she welcomed it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
She felt herself hit the ground
in a distracted way. The solidness beneath her head was comforting. She could
fall no further. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
There was a dizzying brightness
above her. The warmth was leaving. Seeping out onto the gravel. She would have
smiled, but her mouth could no longer do that. So she closed her eyes and drew
in the blackness and was thankful for peace.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It had
started with icecream. Josie sitting on the wall outside the cafe kicking her
heels against the peeling paintwork. She was wearing a dark hoody, combat
trousers, and grey plimsolls. Her bronze hair was pulled back into a high
ponytail, strands straggling down her face like snakes. Her lipstick was
smeared; a plummy streak across her cheek mingled with chocolate sauce.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Why do we
always meet here?’ she grumbled. ‘We’re too old to be seen hanging out outside
the icecream shop.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘You don’t
seem to mind that much,’ Amber muttered. She handed Josie a napkin. ‘You eat
like a baby.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Josie
scowled at her as she took the cloth. ‘I’m trying to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">blend</i> in,’ she said, ‘we’d look even more stupid if we just sat
here not eating icecream.’ </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Amber said
nothing. She dug her hands into her pockets and scanned the street. A few
government officials stalked the pavements, their rifles slung over their
shoulders, but mostly it was empty. Shops were boarded up, old posters and
fliers fluttering in the slight breeze that carried in from the slate coloured
sea. Amber felt the hem of her pleated skirt lifting slightly and she flattened
it back down over the jeans. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The iceceam
shop was the only place still open. Dusk was closing in and there were a few
kids loitering in the neon lit cafe. She glanced back at Josie who was biting
her nails and looking grumpy. The napkin was on the ground beneath her feet,
balled up and scratching along the pavement with the breeze.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘He’s not
coming,’ Amber said, ‘again.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Josie
rolled her eyes and jumped down from the wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Of course
not,’ she said, keeping her voice low, ‘did you really expect him? It’s been
days since he last made contact. He’s been caught.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Amber felt
a lump wedge itself in her throat. She swallowed it down and swiped at her
fringe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘He said
he’d always come,’ she whispered.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Josie took
her arm and began tugging her away, leading her down the high street past the
guards. She was chattering, her voice high and girly. Talking about boys, about
clothes, about make up. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>They turned
off into a smaller alley, alone.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘He can’t,’
Josie said, mid sentence, dropping her voice, ‘not if they’ve got him. You know
he can’t. He’ll hardly have a choice, will he? They won’t be offering him time
out or breaks.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Amber
pulled Josie’s arm tighter to herself. Please, please don’t let him be caught.
Not that. Not that.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘And you
know what?’ Josie halted them at the exit to the alley, ‘if he’s caught they’ll
be after us next. It won’t take them long to get information out of him. Three
days already. Think about it. Three days.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>They stared
at each other for a moment. Josie’s eyes were blanked by the glaring brightness
of the streetlight as it flickered on. A guard paused at the entrance to the
alley and turned to look at them. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Josie
plastered a wide smile onto her face and pulled Amber out into the open.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘So I said,
what’s the point in buying go-go skirts at this time of year, it’s bloody
freezing, but she said, look at Amber, she just wears them over jeans...’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The guard
stepped out of their way as they passed, but his gaze lingered on them. Amber
heard his footsteps echoing up the street behind him. A gust of wind lifted the
hem of her skirt again, she held it down with her free hand.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
The footsteps behind them paused
for a moment, and then they started again. More purposeful, quicker, coming
closer. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Josie kept up her relentless
chatter until Amber’s head swam. She could feel the tension running through
Josie’s arms, heard the strain in her voice as she struggled to keep her voice
light and carefree. Amber risked a glance behind, but Josie pulled her on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Girls,’
the guard’s voice was young. It didn’t have the heaviness of authority behind
it, but it was enough to make them both flinch. Josie swore under her breath.
‘Turn around.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>They
glanced at each other. For a split second the crazy idea of running entered
Amber’s mind, but it disappeared again almost at once. That was suicide. Josie
took a deep breath and turned round.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Yes?’ she
asked pleasantly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The guard
struck her, sending her staggering back, releasing Amber as she did so. Amber
let out a cry of shock and moved towards her but the guard shook his head,
hefting the rifle slightly. Amber stepped back, stared at her scuffed trainers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Recognise
this?’ the guard asked.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Amber
lifted her gaze a little. He held out his hand and uncurled his fingers to
reveal a small golden badge resting on his palm. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Amber felt her blood turn cold.
She stared at the badge. Stared and stared. Her hand strayed down to the hem of
her skirt. She wore it pinned to the inside.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was no longer there. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
No, because it was in the palm of
the guard who stood in front of her. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
She turned wordlessly to Josie
whose face was pale apart from the red smack mark.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The guard
moved closer.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Recognise
it?’ he repeated, his voice lined with fury.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Josie found
her voice.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘We’re for
it now,’ she whispered at Amber. ‘We’re going to have to kill him.’</div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-83407555927444654892014-03-17T20:00:00.000+00:002014-03-26T17:00:52.017+00:00The doll<i>Another story start that I've had in my head for a while but haven't been able to take any further. I'm not entirely sure who these characters are yet or what's about to happen. I hope I'll find out one day.</i><br />
<br />
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The doll sleeps beside me now, I
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promised her you would.</div>
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is beautiful.</div>
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Mum thinks I’ve gone simple,
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seems silly to care about whether people think you’re being babyish. I’ll take
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kids. Or maybe we’ll just grow old together and she’ll be buried beside me.</div>
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This is how you saw me:</div>
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A girl with dirty trainers and
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You stepped up to me. Your hair
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towards me and your fingers had a strange paleness. Your hand slipped over my
arm and I felt my mouth widen to holler at you, felt my anger rise up at you,
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The street was still there. MacDonalds was still there. Sarah was hurrying around the corner, her mobile glued
to her ear, but we were gone. </div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-18224363732040698172014-03-16T22:07:00.000+00:002014-03-26T17:01:18.407+00:00Weekly wishesSo as I was entering Jane Heinrichs <a href="http://janeheinrichs.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/group-giveaway-win-amazon-gift-card.html#.UyYX9M73Dcs" target="_blank">give away</a> and exploring the blogs involved in it I came across a link-up called Weekly Wishes - a community of goal setters: <br />
<br />
<div align="center">
<a href="http://thenectarcollective.com/tags/weekly-wishes/" target="_blank" title="The Nectar Collective"><img alt="The Nectar Collective" src="http://cdn.thenectarcollective.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/weekly-wishes-button.jpg" style="border: none;" /></a></div>
<br />
I followed the button above which took me to this post: <a href="http://thewellnessdoer.com/" target="_blank">thewellnessdoer</a> and then this post <a href="http://kcsaling.com/march-goals/" target="_blank">Challenge Accepted</a>. The idea of the community of goal setters really appealed to me because my friends and I hold 'Positive Planning' sessions (to read more about what this means, visit my friend's excellent post all about them: <a href="http://jennifergracecreates.com/positive-planning-is-the-fun-way-to-organise/" target="_blank">Jennifer Grace Creates</a>. Anyway, the idea of weekly wishes fits perfectly into this idea of positive planning - although we tend to make targets for a month rather than a week. However, as we are in the middle of March, I'm going to do a few weekly wishes and see how that gets me through, ready for April and a load of monthly wishes!<br />
<br />
So, my weekly wishes for this week:<br />
<br />
1. Use my spare time to do something related to writing - be it a feature proposal, competition entry, research...<br />
2. Write the next chapter of my book (or at least start on it)<br />
3. Sort out the loose filing on my desk.<br />
4. Send back the pension information form sitting on my desk.<br />
5. Write a blog post about my word of the year. <br />
<br />
<br />
Just five to get me started, though I know a couple of them will be tricky!<br />
<br />
Want to join in too? Then just click on the button above and get going!<br />
<br />
<br />Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-3741996737514305522014-03-15T20:49:00.000+00:002014-03-26T17:01:40.476+00:00To the Trout Pool<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Light glances off slate-rock walls
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Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-2513193782415791922014-03-11T20:34:00.000+00:002014-03-26T17:02:19.548+00:00Rewriting is my hobby...<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">It is a truth universally acknowledged (by writers, writing groups, writing tutors, anyone who has ever tried to put their thoughts onto the page (or screen)) that Writing is Rewriting.</b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">The first draft</b></div>
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Sitting on the beach in St Ives
eating chips an image of a girl came into my mind. The girl was seeking shelter under an upturned boat on a
cold and starry night. I began writing to find out who she was. Her name was
Louie Albright and her story became a novel called <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Master Juggler.</i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Louie scratched the
bite on her forearm with a dirty fingernail, leaving tracks of thin yellow
against the angry red swelling. She knew she shouldn’t scratch, but on evenings
like this when the cold seemed to be a dog gnawing at her bones, the pain was a
good distraction.</span></i></div>
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">
</i><br />
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Thin and scraggly, she felt like a ripped
thread clinging from the corner of a tapestry. Her hair, slick with grease,
tangled and knotted, was a dull uneasy colour. She could remember a time when
it had been the colour of wild strawberries in the sun. She’d tried combing it
with her fingers and tying it back with string, but after three weeks living on
the coast, sea salt and sand felt ingrained in her scalp; the string had long
since been snatched away by the wind. Her face was pale and freckled, but the
air turned it pink, her eyes were as grey as the waves churning under the heavy
sky.</span></i></div>
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">
</i>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bite
began to bleed and she quickly pulled the sleeve of her jumper back down,
patting it over the wound. She pushed her hair out of her face but kept a few
strands to suck. It tasted of smoke and fish and sea salt. She had been hanging
around the fishermen all day in the hope of a few scraps. They had given her
some stale bread and sips of rum. The rum had kept her warm until now, but as
lamps burned in the windows of the homes around the harbour, the wind crept in
through the holes in her skirt and jumper.</span></i></div>
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>She’d chosen an
upturned boat on the beach for shelter tonight. Beneath her, the sand was cold
but not damp so she hoped the sea would not come up this far. The boat was
propped up with a lump of rotten driftwood and she sat hunched up to watch the
day drift off into night. The moon was high and clear, this was the beginning
of the Lunar Year; days would be long, nights bright. The stars emerged slowly,
filling the velvety dark with studs of light. Finally Louie stretched out her
legs and shuffled down onto her back. She savagely kicked the wood away and the
boat clunked onto the sand covering her in a muffled darkness. The wind whined
but was no longer able to feed on her. Shivers raced through her body and she
hugged her arms around her chest and closed her eyes. Sleep would come
reluctantly in fits and starts. She just had to wait…</span></div>
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<br />
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The first draft of Master Juggler
was completed in 2008. It was about a young girl who meets a juggler and
storyteller and they run aware together to be free of persecution. I submitted
the opening chapters to agents and publishers; the agents and publishers began
requesting to read the whole novel, and it aroused some interest in the Chicken
House/Times Competition in 2010. But it was never quite good enough. Feedback
was always the same: good writing but lack of pace, lack of tension, no
motivation, no momentum to keep reading. </div>
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I rewrote the first chapters
again and again, adding description, cutting out scenes, introducing different
viewpoints<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and completely ignored the
fact that the problem did not lie in the first chapters, the problem was in the
heart of the book itself, or perhaps, the lack of heart - it needed a stronger story.
</div>
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Since completing my Creative
Studies degree in 2004, my friend and I had continued to critique each other’s
writing in the same way we had done at University - by workshopping sections of writing. This was the same method used
on my Masters in Writing for Children at Winchester University and one that
most creative writing groups and classes use. Workshopping tends to encourage
in-depth analysis of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">pieces</i> of
writing – a lone scene, or stand-alone chapter perhaps – which, although
important for refining and honing writing skills, can lead to a disconnect
between writing to write, and writing to tell a story. To structure and sustain
narrative it’s important to step back and consider what the piece is trying to
do, and whether it’s doing it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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A friend recommended that I read <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">First Draft to Finished Novel: a writer’s
guide to cohesive story building</i> by Karen S. Weisner. Although wary at first, I discovered that the worksheets suggested by Karen Weisner enabled me to step away from the
intricacies of writing and look at the story arc. My subplots, back story and
characters were complicating the story in order to justify their existence. I
chose to start rewriting on a blank page with fresh words rather than working
on what was already there and that freed me from the weight of all that had
come before.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Louie</b></div>
Characters need to be shaped by
the experiences that they go through, to do less is to render them flat –
events bounce off them without scratching the surface of their skin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>When I first pictured Louie she
was young, only about nine years old. She was feisty and fiery, spitting out
curses and fiercely independent. However, my writing didn’t reflect this. She
was often passive and too much of an observer. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span><br />
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In the next drafts she grew
up. She was thirteen, that age suiting the story better, offering more tension
between the cusp of childhood and entering into young adulthood. She was stubborn
but had seen more of the world to subdue her and make her sad, and this made
her distant, unconnected from the reader. Despite the third person limited view
point, she was hard to know. In an attempt to create tension and intrigue, I deliberately
withheld information about her by making her evasive and her inner thoughts cryptic.
Those whom I shared the story with now felt that she was hollow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoListBulletCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: none; tab-stops: 36.0pt; text-indent: 18.0pt;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>During a tutorial with one of my students we
discussed creating tension. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She had kept
key bits of information hidden from the reader and in doing so her characters
never asked questions they should have, or answered questions put to them. It
made important moments of the story annoying and frustrating. The student told
she me that she had done it so that the reader would need to keep reading. I
advised her that withholding information does not necessarily generate tension
and suspense; empathy and fear for a character does. As I spoke I realised that
I had been doing exactly the same thing. It’s so easy to preach without
practising. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">The second draft</b></div>
The title <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Master Juggler </i>actually referred to a minor character. I started
the next full rewrite with a new one:<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">
WordWeaver</i> which referred to a more important character. This draft fleshed
out the characters and the world, but there were still many questions
unanswered and now Louie’s character was even more passive, a blurry image on
the edges of a story that was no longer really hers. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To decide if it really was her story I wanted
to tell, I spent some time getting to know her again. I answered questions
about her, tried to draw her, made her feel real to me.
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-69S8RWJ1lw-aaLTgi5ouwwErVA9cHIJsJbvnfoMTUX4D4d7FKKsqXwnVVPPTyZ7LeOVps-yd7jC3Jiwrxjw6aoNte7YQyb1sg7Gp8WNj8VJrFkMEYrWlRWOUIV1w7L0LHBQyBDXcVRFx/s1600/Louie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-69S8RWJ1lw-aaLTgi5ouwwErVA9cHIJsJbvnfoMTUX4D4d7FKKsqXwnVVPPTyZ7LeOVps-yd7jC3Jiwrxjw6aoNte7YQyb1sg7Gp8WNj8VJrFkMEYrWlRWOUIV1w7L0LHBQyBDXcVRFx/s1600/Louie.jpg" height="320" width="186" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">The dissertation
draft</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
Time for another rewrite and
another title. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Story Seeker </i>encapsulated
Louie’s desire for stories, real and imagined and it referred to her, not
another character.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I worked on
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Story Seeker</i> for my dissertation; I feel it's stronger but still not quite right. Louie is more connected, has strong
personality traits, but she is too ready to follow the path she is on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so, it's back to the keyboard...</div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Rewriting
can feel dispiriting at times, but I believe that every rewrite has been
beneficial. I am learning about writing, about myself as a writer, and am I
getting closer every time to the story that I want to tell.</div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-52795781572214425372014-02-17T11:50:00.000+00:002014-03-26T19:39:20.611+00:00One Picture, Three Stories - ChildhoodThanks to Jane Heinrichs (<a href="http://janeheinrichs.blogspot.co.uk/">janeheinrichs.blogspot.co.uk</a>) for inspiring me to think about this and for having the idea for a 'one picture, three stories' link up on her blog (see her blogpost about it<a href="http://janeheinrichs.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/one-picture-three-stories-2-blog-link-up.html#.UwHwaM73Dcs" target="_blank"> here</a> and take a look around the rest of her site, I guarantee you that you'll find something to encourage/dazzle/motivate/inspire you).<br />
<br />
Here is my picture, and the three stories that it sparks off:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVBFj1-CvfFRuKnUq8w-VpnO8vRtIMHWf_-sXv3y4HPaw4n7DLZwBC-tZ9Dv03aOCcOfgKgd-onv6yTDvI_oToa-_cAcIgZEvTGlP00cMdpp52vaFC2kzt1qN2Py1yZX_yoSpOV5YQldIO/s1600/One+picture+three+stories+FEB.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVBFj1-CvfFRuKnUq8w-VpnO8vRtIMHWf_-sXv3y4HPaw4n7DLZwBC-tZ9Dv03aOCcOfgKgd-onv6yTDvI_oToa-_cAcIgZEvTGlP00cMdpp52vaFC2kzt1qN2Py1yZX_yoSpOV5YQldIO/s1600/One+picture+three+stories+FEB.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
1) Childhood - that time of long hot summers, wonder, exploration and adventure, when everything is new and exciting. This is my niece. I don't see her as much as I would like as we live in Dorset and she lives in Oxfordshire so every moment I have with her is magic. This was taken last year when she and her dad (my brother) came to stay for a few days. She is standing on the walls of our town surveying the world below her and engaging in some impromptu ballet! If any child captures the sense of joy and excitement of being a child throwing herself at the world in joyful and trusting abandonment, it is my niece. She fills my heart with joy and also a wistful longing to remember the experiences and feelings of being that young, that small and that sure of yourself.<br />
<br />
2) Hope - The pure joy and hope of being alive is, for me, captured here. The sunny day, the warm breeze, the beauty of life and the promise of a future yet to unfold. A grown up shadow falls across her, every so slightly touching her - the reassurance of security, the suggestion of the life she will lead and the woman she will grow into. <br />
<br />
3)The Circle of Life - my niece looks extraordinarily like I did when I was her age. She brings back vivid memories of when I was her age exploring the countryside around our home. She reminds me what it is to explore as a child - something so necessary for someone who writes for children. Sweet, vulnerable, stubborn, strong, excited and overwhelmed, I can see the influences of my brother, of me, of my mother, of our family shining out of her, even (maybe mostly) when she's sulking, having a tantrum and trying to make sense of this sometimes unfathomable world she's learning to navigate. She seems to be a part of me, and I a part of her.<br />
<br />
I highly recommend that you browse through your pictures and see which ones prompt three stories from you, and then link it back to Jane's blog and explore what other people have posted.<a href="http://www.candygourlay.com/2014/01/one-picture-three-stories-funeral-cesar.html"> Candy Gourlay's post</a> is fascinating!<br />
<br />
happy story making!<br />
<br />
Rosie<br />
<br />Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-49541494201135075372014-02-10T17:54:00.000+00:002014-02-10T17:54:00.094+00:00River Girl<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]-->I wrote this beginning years and years ago and have never taken it any further than what is here. I re-read it every now and then, hoping that the rest of the story will emerge. So far, no luck. But one day, I'm sure. Michael and the River Girl will come back and tell me what happens next...<br />
<br />
River Girl <br />
<br />
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Late. It was too
late. The air was thick with starlight. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
wind, blowing up from the river, carried the scent of silt and sleeping
creatures.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
What was it
doing? A human boy sitting alone on the shore. Chin resting on his knees. Lips
turned downwards. Eyes glazed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
The river girl
shifted position, bending the bulrushes away gently, creeping catlike over the
marshy ground. Her bare feet slurped in the weed-tangled water.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
It was a young
boy too. Younger than those that came out on warm summer evenings drinking from
cans and yelling and throwing darts of smoking red into the river where they
died with a hiss.</div>
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Late. Too late
for a human boy to be sitting on the bank.</div>
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The river girl
hunched down, squatting amongst the long grass and rushes. Night would grow colder, prowlers would come. Dark prowlers.</div>
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The river girl
twisted as she heard a noise on the opposite bank. Her long ears twitched,
swivelling slightly to catch the sound. An otter maybe, night fishing, or a
fish trying to reach the stars. They longed to fly. They jumped for the stars
at night. </div>
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Turning her
attention back to the human boy, the river girl made her decision. Tonight was
not a good night to be on the bank alone. She crept forward softly, she was the
whispering of the wind through the grass, the sound of breezes snagging against
the bristled heads of the bulrushes. The human boy was an arm span away.
Sitting on the bank. His shoes shone in the moonlight. Wind ruffled his hair
and tugged the collar of his shirt. Yes, he would be cold and the prowlers
would find him straight away.</div>
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‘Boy,’ she
hissed.</div>
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The boy’s head
jerked up, his eyes widening with fear. She could see the river dancing in them.
It was a good sign. The river liked him.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Boy,’
she repeated.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Now
he was scrambling up, his shining shoes churning up the mud. He was older than
she had first thought, but still young. Besides, once she had decided something
there was no retracing her thoughts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She
moved out of the tall grasses. A thin shadow in the night. </div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Come,’
she said, she held out her hand, ‘come, boy.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He
turned towards her, she saw his surprise: his mouth dropping open, his eyes
wide. He stumbled back. He slipped on the mud-slicked bank. His cry flew out of
his mouth like a bird as he fell, and was cut off by the splash he made into
the river. The river girl started forward, her hand still held out, and then
she dove, slipping beneath the surface of the water, sliding into it like a
slither of moonlight. She left no footprints on the bank, no ripples on the
water, only the sound of the wind through the reeds.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Michael
didn’t know where he was going as he left the wedding party. He didn’t
particularly care. He just wanted out. He climbed the fence at the back of the
hotel and landed on the springy wild grass of the field with relief. Behind him
he could hear the music pounding from the sweating disco room, but out here it
was cold. The moaning of the night air suited him better. Earlier, he and dad
had walked this way, kicking at the skeleton dandelion heads and watching the
seeds swirling away. He could see the cows huddled together in the far corner.
The sky above was clear, the stars bright. It was a night for things to happen.
</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Michael
stomped across the field, deliberately ignoring the meandering path they’d made
earlier and instead heading towards the sound of water. In the moonlight he
could see the tall shapes of the bulrushes that bowed and shook by the river.
The earth here was dank and damp. It stank of cow dung and slid beneath his
feet. He sat on the bank and stared down at the glassy river. He did not care
if his suit got covered in foul oozing mud. It was a fitting end to the day. A
day when everything had seemed wrong.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He
sat for long moments watching the river. It was hypnotic. It drained his
thoughts and carried them away with its current. Goodbye Amanda, goodbye Ben,
goodbye dad. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Slowly,
as his head emptied of the buzzing angriness that he had been carrying around
all day, he came to hear other things. The rustle of the bulrushes, the light
popping of the mud beneath him as air bubbles let out gasps of surprise,
movement of nightime creatures on the opposite bank plopping into the river. He
felt his heartbeat steadying, the dampness from the ground seeping in through
his thin trousers, the air tickling his neck. </div>
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And then he heard it, a strange
whispery voice, fragmented, like droplets of water:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Boy.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>He
looked up, startled. Someone had followed him. Ben. But no, Ben would never
whisper at him from the shadows he would hurl himself onto Michael shouting ‘I
got you Mikey! Now swing me round! Swing me round!’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Boy.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It
came again, louder, closer. Michael jumped up, slipping on the muddy bank. He
must be hearing things, the wind through the grass. He should be heading back
now, they would miss him. He turned from the river and a shadow caught his eye.
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Come,
boy,’ the shadow extended a hand, dark green eyes glinted at him in the
starlight, enveloped in darkness. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Michael
heard himself cry out as he stumbled backwards. His heart was in his throat,
his feet gave out beneath him, he tried to grab something, but there was
nothing but air, and then there was nothing but water. Icy, mud filled water in
his mouth, up his nose, cloying at his eyes. He thrashed, weeds twisted about
him, held him down, the current caught him and pulled him on. He could see
nothing, could hear only his heart and the roaring of his fear. </div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>And
then, something beneath his arms, holding him, steadying him and slowing
everything down. He relaxed, his limbs drifted around him. The mud cleared from
the water like gravy granules dissolving.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>His lungs were burning, his head dizzy, but the water was letting him
go, he was rising. His head broke the surface and he gasped for air.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Come,
boy’ said the same distorted voice, but whoever it was remained behind him,
hands gripping him firmly beneath his arms. ‘We not stay here. They come. Take
deep breath.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Before
he could argue, before he could really breathe again, he was under once more,
into the world of murky water and shadows.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
river girl pulled him along easily. She was strong when she wanted to be.
Strong as a river current. She rose often to let him grope for air, waiting as
he spluttered and coughed at the moon and then she dove again. He struggled a
little at first, but she had held him fast. He did not understand the danger he
had been in.</div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7209261031834403692.post-52718230145843952152014-02-03T10:00:00.000+00:002014-02-03T10:00:02.625+00:00Here and Gone<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">If I hadn’t seen the tree. If I hadn’t seen
the tree and the plastic-coated wire fence clinging to it, I’d never have
known. I’d never have known that this was where the house had stood. How our memories
lie.</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>My
granny takes my hand while my brother chases dreams a mile in front. The field
is a prairie, the grass waves tall as my head, the sun beats down on my t-shirt
and makes me squirm. I am a hunter, hunting the rare Dominic-beast leaping like
an antelope before me. I squint through the heat. His hair flashes in the sun
as he forages amongst the tall grass. My hunting hat is hot; I take it off and
wipe off sweat with a dust streaked hand. I’ve been hunting all day in this
sticky weather, I’m exhausted and hungry, will this Dominic-beast never tire? I
must make it to the castle where they are expecting the beast’s head on a
silver platter. If only I had a horse to chase him down. I can’t make it…I
swoon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Walk
properly,’ my granny snaps as her arm tugs with my weight. She frowns down at me.
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
I am a princess
stolen by a wicked witch. She is marching me across the wilderness to her
castle where she will lock me in the dungeon leaving her devil boy to taunt me.
The devil boy is turning; he’s running at me, look out!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘Race you to the
drawbridge!’ he cries and turns again the other way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
I am a horse
galloping down the grass, my brother-horse races ahead, we are wild and free on
the mountains… the playground looms ahead. My breath is in my head, my brother
wins.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">If I hadn’t spotted the plastic-coated
chicken wire protruding from the tree trunk, I would have been sure I had stopped
at the wrong layby. The evening had turned damp and cold, the light milky, and
at first I blamed that for not recognising where I was. Then I realised - <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>this </i>wasn’t<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> the place. That place was ten years ago. This place was now.</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
My granny lives
in a Lego-brick. A beige one. There are lots of them scattered around the Ministry
of Defence. I crouch in the earth of the flowerbed and peek through the wire
fence, I know I shouldn’t, I could be arrested - they might think I’m spy. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘Rosie, get out
of the dust, come here.’ My mother calls me over; we are taking photos underneath
the apple tree. We stand in a row next to Zakkie’s grave. (Zakkie was granny’s
grey poodle. There’s a picture of him on top of the telly). Click, click, one
more for luck. Someone approaches us from the other side of the fence.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘That’s enough,
no more please, this is a secure area’. I can’t see his face because a branch
is in my way, but he wears a dark suit and has a walkie-talkie in his hand. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘It’s a family
photo!’ My dad protests, his grip on my hand is tight. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘Please no
more.’ The man stands watching us until the camera is put away. Next time I
visit the apple tree is gone. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘They didn’t
want people climbing it,’ my granny explains as we crumble bread for the birds.
She must mean they didn’t like me and my brother climbing it, we were the only
ones. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I stared at the empty space. How could there
have been houses here once? Jean and Bill with the Siamese cats, Lucy who had
fingernails so long and clean they were like claws, the family with the slide
in the back garden. Now there are only my memories that don’t match what I can
see. How did all those lives fit in?</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
I stand in the
doorway to Grandad’s shed. It’s dark and cobwebs pattern the window. I like to
run my fingers in the dust of the workbench and play with the vice that bites
into the edge. Outside the sun dazzles me; I scuttle into the shade and open
the coal bin. It’s black and glittering and I know it’s an entrance to the Cave of Wonders that leads to the sea. Later it
takes a long time to get the coal dust off my fingers. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
My granny’s
house is a world full of multicoloured carpets and green flowered wall paper.
There’s a glass cabinet at the end of the hall where treasure is locked in with
a grey twirly key. A silk-lined, musty shell purse is the greatest prize. I
handle it softly; Mermaids gave it to my granny when she was younger. I lock it
up, the key gives a satisfying click. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
There’s a case
of records in the freezer room. I flip through them, savouring the slap on slap
of vinyl and cardboard. The record-player is in the living room and it’s the
size of a cupboard. I dance around singing:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘Brown girl in
the ring sha-la-la-la</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
There’s a brown girl
in the ring, sha-la-la-la-la-la’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>My
granny dances with me, her velvet slippers scuffing up the orange rug. I’m fascinated
with her feet. She has extra toes. They grow out the side of her feet by her
big toe. Her slippers bulge with them. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
‘They’re called
bunions,’ she tells me when I dare ask. I stare hard at my own feet. I want bunion-toes.
They must be useful when it comes to climbing trees. After my granny tucks me
in I check my feet. Big toe, little toe…no bunion-toe, not today.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The ministry seemed bigger than ever. I’d
forgotten how close it was. I don’t linger once I’ve found the wire. The
ministry was always touchy. </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Me
and Dominic are in the tree in the front garden, there are no trees left out the
back. You have to climb onto the green wire fence and then into the fork of the
tree, pinging out woodlice and spiders. We watch the sun go down and stay out
until the light makes our eyes feel funny.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘Look,’
Dominic says as he helps me down. His muddy finger is pointing at the fence.
‘It’s eating it.’ </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
I look.<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It’s true, the tree is slowly swallowing the fence
into its greedy bark, we pull at it but it won’t budge. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>‘That’ll
be there forever,’ Dominic decides and he races me to the front door.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">They pulled her house down a few months
after she moved into the home. One by one the houses were all pulled down. What
was once a street of beige bungalows is now just a lay-by and an empty bit of
lawn in front of the ministry. </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In
years to come a passer-by may pause, finger that snatch of fence and wonder how
it came there. Or when they dig the ground up for some new building people will
puzzle over how a poodle got buried outside the MOD.</i></div>
Rosie Bird-Hawkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03802758913022279918noreply@blogger.com0