Mother's Day Special!

Read the first in the Blountmere Street trilogy, "He Called Me Son," FREE on Amazon from 9 - 10 May

 

For more information on these titles, please visit My Amazon Author Page

WRITING CLASSES

When I was in my thirties, together with my husband and two sons, I emigrated to New Zealand. After I had settled into my new country, I began asking myself what it was I really wanted to do. They had told us at New Zealand House that this was a country of opportunity, after all. The answer was, 'I want to write', so I enrolled to do a three month 'Writing for the Media' course, followed by one on Creative Writing at what was then The Christchurch Polytechnic.

The first thing I wrote was a humorous article on office work (you write best what you know best, my teacher had told me), which I mailed to a rather dull magazine. To my surprise, they accepted it, asked me if I'd write a series and, at the same time, paid me, I followed this startling success with a couple of 'Thought for the Day' type pieces which I read on National Radio. What was this thing called 'rejection'? All one had to do was to write something half decent and it was published! Thereafter I wrote prodigiously for three years without any success and could probably have decorated our house with the rejection slips I received.

It took many years before I felt ready to write the novel I'd promised myself I'd write years earlier. As it was the first two or three were destined for the bin and 'He Called Me Son' and 'The Best in Blountmere Street' took me thirteen years to write!

LEARNING TO READ

I was twenty-one and I worked with Doreen in a solicitors office just off Oxford Street. She was clever, fun and well-read. It wasn't long before she was bringing books to work for me to read. I was like a baby bird with its beak open ready to receive anything she deemed would nourish me. Neville Shute was swallowed whole, along with Hemingway and Thomas Hardy. I couldn't get enough of books by A.J. Cronin (of Doctor Finlay's Casebook fame) and Winston Graham. One day Doreen brought in "My Son, My Son" by Howard Spring and I discovered what it was like to be so captivated by a book I actually read it walking along the road.

And that was that! I was a reader and I've never stopped reading since. Through books I've met thousands of interesting people, eaten hundreds of exotic meals in far away countries and been privy to all sorts of intrigue and mystery.

So, if you're still around, Doreen, bless you. The little bird you nourished has become a veracious book-eating eagle! Thank you, my friend.

Barbara

NOT A PROMISING START 

Because I promised I'd blog on some aspect of writing on a monthly basis, today seems as good a time as any to begin.

One of my most frequently asked question is, "Can anyone be taught to write? My answer is, "If you have a sensitivity to words you can be helped to write better and to avoid some of the obstacles witrh which those of us who have gone before have had to struggle.

I would love to say that I was a literary child prodigy who read and wrote veraciously, but I wasn't. I have hazy recollections of picture and pop up-books being read to me by my mother. I loved Enid Blyton and adored boarding school books about girls with posh names and with titles such as "Felicity of the Fifth', even though I would have died if I'd been sent to one. My mother's reading matter was limited to the popular classics such as Little Women etc; What Katie did etc; Anne of Greengables and the like, which she read over and over. She never got round to Pride and Prejudice or Jane Eyre, so neither did I. My father's reading was even more limited. On the small table by the side of his armchair was a book entitled "Rommel, The Desert Fox", which I can never recall him touching. On the other hand, he did pretty well devour the Evening Star every evening and the News of the World (which I wasn't allowed to read) and the Pictorial every Sunday.

What I did possess was the ability to scatter adjectives throughout my stories. which, in those days earned me good marks at school. For example, "The fat, ugly, hairy, friendly  dog .... merited four ticks for the number of adjectives and a 'Well done' in the margin. Nowadays I'm sure the adjectives would be circled and there would be a note somewhere suggesting that instead of adjectives, I use a strong, or stronger verbs and nouns. For example, The dog, froth slathering from its jowels, waddled ...

As I approached my mid teens my reading diminished and I only read the books set for my Royal Society of Arts exams, one of which I remember being called 'Cycle of the North - A Story of the Tundra", which put me off reading for a good few years. Thus by the age of twenty-one I had stopped reading anything other than things I had to such as instructions and bus timetables. As for writing, the occasional letter had to suffice.

NOW YOU CAN GET SOME OF MY BOOKS FROM THE LIBRARY

Today has been an exciting one because I've received an order for a few copies of  "He Called Me Son" and  "The Best in Blountmere Street from the local library suppliers which means you might see them on the shelves soon. You never know, they might even make their way to "Staff Picks".

The Createspace copies of "There is a Time" are still not available because of a few hiccups, but I'm hoping to have them (the hiccups) sorted out within the next few weeks.

Roger has volunteered to be my despatch clerk, so that I can get on with my next book, which I hope to start sometime in February. I have some ideas for the book swimming around in my head, although when I attempt to catch them they dart away..

I've taken advantage of the holiday season and the beautiful weather we've been having to do some reading and have just finished "The Unknown Pilgrimage of Harold Fry" by Rachel Joyce. It's very well written and I loved the character of Harold Fry. Has anyone out there read this book? If so, what did you think of it?

I'm taking this opportunity to wish you a Happy New Year and to tell you I hope to blog a lot more regularly than I did last year. I hope to do a regular blog on 'creative writing', so keep tuned.

Barbara