An Interview, A Sale & A Competition

‘Didn't you blog just yesterday?’ 

‘Mmm, I did, but I’ve  got a couple of things to tell you.’

Firstly, I’ve been interviewed! YES! ME! Cor Blimey, does this mean I’ve finally arrived? OK, maybe I'm getting a bit (a lot) ahead of myself, but I’m still rather chuffed that I was asked by the lovely Charlotte Harrison, who has a great blog called A Place on the Bookshelf  to answer a few questions about my writing.  The interview is HERE.  Do please pop over and say hello so it doesn’t look like I’m talking to myself.

The second piece of news is I've SOLD a story, which is fab in itself, but even more exciting as it's my 49^th sale.  This means I’m nearly 50!  Oh yes! And when I reach 50 there will be much cyber-celebrating, and even a wee bit of real-life celebrating.  Mind you, I'd better not break open the bubbly and box of party-poppers just yet, as it can often be months between one sale and another ... and there are 'no' guarantees I'll ever sell again. 

Ooh, and I saw over on Blog about Writing a link to an exciting novel competition.  It’s for a romantic ‘Christmas Novel’ and the prize is a three-book deal with Harper Impulse and afternoon tea at Fortnum and Mason in London, and the link is HERE.   I’ll certainly be considering it!

The People's Friend Annual 2014

Okay, I have a plan.  A blogging plan. I'm going to blog more, and, when I do, I'm going to waffle less...

So, starting as I mean to go on...here we go...

I'm chuffed to tiny bits to be in The People's Friend 2014 Annual.  It arrived from Amazon yesterday and is absolutely gorgeous.  The picture with my story is just beautiful, and just how I imagined when I wrote the story. And even better than that, I'm sharing the pages with so many fabulous writers, including Suzanne Jones, Pat Posner and Samantha Tonge.  *Does a wee happy dance.*

And talking of the lovely The People's Friend, why not pop over to Samantha Tonge's Blog and enjoy her great interview with Shirley Blair, The Commissioning Fiction Editor of The People's Friend?

So what do you think?  Not too much waffle? Too much waffle?  Answers on a postcard please, to arrive before July 31st 2012. ;-)

Have a lovely day all!

Woman's Weekly Writing Workshop

I won't attempt to go into too much detail about this wonderful workshop, as Wendy Clarke and Tracy Fells,  have written excellent in-depth posts, which are definitely worth reading.  But I just couldn't resist mentioning what a fabulous day it was.  

Gaynor Davis is lovely and made everyone feel instantly relaxed, to the point I even read out the beginning of a story.  And guess what, my voice only wobbled a teeny tiny bit.  Gaynor smiled, nodded and said, ‘lovely’ - which I was thrilled about. I’ll gloss over the fact she said encouraging words to everyone.  (Justifiably I might add, there were some amazing writers there!) 

It was an absolute treat to finally meet writers I’ve been chatting to on blogs, forums and over on Facebook over the past five years.  They were all even lovelier than I thought they would be.

The talks by Suzanne Ahern and Laura Longrigg were excellent, and the building itself, The Blue Fin Building in London, was incredible.  Apparently lots of films and TV programmes have used the location.  In fact, I watched I'll give it a year at the weekend and felt sure parts of that were filmed there - although don't quote me on that one.   I know The Worlds End was definitely filmed there.  Very exciting! 

       There were lots of photographs taken, so keep your eye on the Woman's Weekly Website and on their Facebook page   I hope they caught my good side.  By that I mean the back of my head!

Woman’s Weekly is the *only magazine I haven’t managed to sell to – but I’m going to keep on keeping on, and who knows, following this wonderful workshop I might just produce the perfect story for them. Wish me luck!

Mini-update...
*By this I mean UK women's mags that carry fiction, obviously.  

Also I've just spotted lovely Patsy Collins's post on this great day - go see! :-)

Coincidentally this is a little Contrived

I am having a bit of a panic. Nothing new there then! It’s my novel AGAIN! I have far too many coincidences throughout, which make it all seem a little contrived. It’s so hard though, I want the subplots to link in some way to the main plot - but there’s got to be a valid reason, rather than a coincidence - YES?! So my job over this week is to go through it in the hope of making my coincidences less coincidental – so to speak.

I’ve been so busy on my novel! I’m nearly at 70,000 words on the re-write. Last week I followed Calistro’s fab idea of chapter index cards – and that worked brilliantly! Do go have a look if you haven’t already - it’s such a great idea!

Ooh, and finally, I have a story in My Weekly this week – YAY! I received my complimentary copy yesterday and they’ve done such a lovely job. The artwork is super, as always! It’s out this Thursday, I think! So exciting !

That's Life Australia

Today has started well. I received an email from That’s Life Australia saying they are about to pay me for the story I sold to them a short while ago – YAY! And it’s all thanks to Karen for pointing me in their general direction and Womag for printing all their guidelines – without them I would never have thought to send it to the other side of the world.

And I’d like to give 'That’s Life Australia' a big thumbs up. They responded to my story within a day telling me it had been shortlisted. They then got back to me within three months, informing me they would like to buy it. Oh, and they pay pretty well too!

And to add to the day starting well, during the night I had a short story idea that wouldn’t leave my head – I so love it when that happens, as it's not often. So I got up at 6 a.m. and outlined the story and will spend today editing it. Here's hoping the day keeps getting better-er and better-er!

Finally, a huge thank you to all those who commented on my last blog post. Thankfully, my malady has past and, as you can see, my typing fingers are working overtime again! YAY!

I Love Australia

Australia is one of my favourite places ever, ever, ever! I love it! And over the past two weeks I’ve been lucky enough to be in the company of two of the country’s best imports – my Auntie and Uncle. They emigrated to Brisbane from the UK back in 1968, and have been visiting England, staying with us. We’ve had the best of times, lots of family dos, and visits to super places. Weather could have been better, I guess, but then you can’t have it all. Anyway, I’ve just seen them off. And although it was emotional, I’m determined to see them again!

Oh, and just to add to my love of the Aussies – I received an email from 'That’s Life Australia' this morning saying they want to buy one of my stories – Yay!

Fairy Wishes

When I SOLD my first EVER story, I bought this...



Yes, it's Tinkerbell! A Fairy!

I wished on my fairy, asking that I would sell another story...

....and hey presto, I SOLD my second EVER story!

So when I get my payment for my second EVER story, I'm going to buy meself another fairy ... perhaps one for the garden. And then I'm going to make another wish...so watch this space!

Does anyone else buy a keepsake to remember their successes by? Or am I quite mad? Don't answer that?

With the GOOD comes the BAD!

Oh my word it’s been a week and half. Now they say you have to take the good with the bad.

Well the bad came today in the form of a rejection from Take a Break, saying, in standard letter form, that my story was not quite what they were looking for. But I refuse to be deflated; nothing can take the shine from my sale of earlier this week. Well perhaps it can a widgy bit – rejections are so horrid, aren’t they?! But I’m going to read through my story, have a bit of an edit, and get it straight back out there – somewhere - anywhere. They can’t keep me down for long!

On a happy note, look at the lovely card I’ve received from Helen.

She sent it because she didn’t want me to miss out on Pay it Forward. I’d previously made a right mess of the whole thing, by shouting, ‘me, me, me’ and then ‘no, no, no.’ I went all to pot, worrying I wouldn’t have enough people who read my blog to Pay it Forward to. What am I like? Anyhow, Helen still sent me this lovely card. How kind of her. Thank you, Helen.

Waiting for Short Story Rejection

The hardest part of writing, as every writer knows, is REJECTION.

When I first started submitting short stories to magazines almost a year ago, I waited, longingly, for the postman, hoping he would bring GOOD news.

I have since learnt; the postman, however chirpy, will rarely bring BAD news. Yes, the inevitable A4 envelope, with a letter saying,  ‘Thank you, but no thank you!’ is much more likely.

So, frankly, I now dread the postman’s visit. Just in case he has an envelope that I lovingly addressed to myself in my very best handwriting.