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Jo’s Journal

January Recap

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I haven’t blogged regularly for some time, in fact I’ve not done much of anything for some time now, but things are changing this year. Every month I shall be sharing my wins and losses, hopefully more of the first and I promise to learn from the second.

Books Read This Month

Like many, I’ve struggled with my reading this past year. However, I’m realising that it provides great escapism, so I’m spending less time on reading news and more on books. I’ve signed up to read 50 books on the Goodreads Reading Challenge. Here are the titles I’ve read this month, a good mix of fiction and non-fiction. Any recommendations are welcome!

  • Black Narcissus – Rumer Godden (watched both TV versions over Christmas)
  • Quite – Claudia Winkleman
  • How To Write Dynamic Scenes – Randy Ingermanson
  • Throne of Glass – Sarah J Maas
  • River Magic – M.A.Phillips (my Indie Author Recommendation of the Month)
  • Peaky Blinders The Real Story – Carl Chinn ( I got half way and abandoned it)
  • Blood Rose Angel – Lisa Perrat (could have been written about this last year!!)

Stories Published

As well as regular Social Media posts I try to publish a short story or flash fiction once a week. I decided that I’d rather publish them than submit them to competitions which is time consuming and often unrewarded. Also, this month, I’ve been responding the #vss365 challenge on Twitter which are stories under 100 words, mine average around 40 words. You can find all these stories over at My Writer Within.

  • Mistaken Identity
  • The Decision – a story from The Good(Expat)Life series
  • A Room of My Own – first published in Woman’s Own some years back
  • A Slip of the Tongue
  • Forever Reunited

Goals Update

I started a Quarterly planning system after taking the HB90 course last September. I can honestly say it’s been the best investment I’ve made. I haven’t been so productive in a long time and it’s really given me a boost.

Goal 1 Writing and Editing

  • First Draft of The Fire Walker book 2 in the series Luna Legends – 30,000 words written long hand, in ink over 14 days…
  • 10, 000 words written or edited for flash, shorts and blog
  • Redesigned series aesthetic for inspiration which I may share at some time

Goal 2 Publishing and Promotion

  • Enrolled in Publish and Thrive course (delivered by Sarra Cannon from the HB90 method)
  • Cover art research for the series and book 2
  • Review of Social Media schedule

Goal 3 Healthy Writing Habits

  • Monitored my writing session moods – which are generally good! I just use a simple smiley system in my journal
  • Participated most days in the #vss365 challenge as part of my daily ‘warm up’
  • Daily Morning Pages – before I do anything else, animals willing that is!

I’m really pleased with my focus and sticking to my plans this month, despite it being gloomy in so many ways. One of the main points for my success was to get my writing done first thing, before I do anything else and making a concentrated effort to stay off social media until my words were down on paper.

Hope you’ve had some successes this month, would love to hear about them. And any reading suggestions you may have!

Ciao

 

New Anthology Published Today

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Some of you will know that over ten years ago, I began looking for expat writers like myself, looking for support and advice which they couldn’t get from a more traditional group. Writers Abroad soon emerged and over the decade grew into a thriving online community. Members have come and gone, and most I would like to think, taking something with them to strengthen their writing life.

Today, Writers Abroad launched it’s sixth anthology. All proceeds from the publication have been donated to charities relating to writing or reading in some form or another. This year, the proceeds from Far Flung: Celebrating a Decade of Writers Abroad will be donated to the World Literacy Fund.

The foreword to the anthology has been written by international best-selling author, Peter May who also took part in an interview in one of our magazines some time ago. He has captured the essence of the group with his words and as an expat himself is more than familiar with the nuances of living and writing in a different country.

The publication has stories, poems and articles written by members, both past and present and offers a rich picking from which you can dip into at your leisure.

For a short time the digital version of Far Flung  is available for 99p/99c and the paperback will be available from the 14th November. Enjoy the read!

 

Behind The Mask

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So I took the month off, removed my mask and allowed myself to put me first. Felt very hedonistic, I don’t know why, but I’m feeling a lot happier, or perhaps at least, at ease.

  • I did have my month off from Writers Abroad although I had work to do on the anthology we’re pulling together to celebrate our 10 year anniversary. It was good to step back for a while, though incredibly difficult when I feel so responsible for it. I need to think about my role going forward, this month has given me time to reflect.
  • I did muse every day, apart from a couple of Sundays which have always been a ‘day off’ from everything. I’ve always got my head in a book, or a journal or at a screen and I think one day a week should just be to chill and relax. I’ve got some great potential stories, my battle now will be with making sure I develop something out of them. I shall resurrect my posts on My Writer Within as an incentive. I’ve realised that writing and publishing for myself is good enough. If you read and like it, that’s an added bonus.
  • I completed the Journalling Compendium–in a fashion. I read The Artist’s Way some years back and have been doing the Morning Pages, more on than off, since 2015. Doing the exercises made me realise that really I don’t have any baggage or reason holding me back. Maybe I’m getting too long in the tooth for all this reflection. It was confirmation. I am a writer, and I love my job. The only thing holding me back is me.
  • The final task I set myself was revisiting one of my projects, The Moon Series. And oh boy, did I do some world building. The thing is, as usual, I went down so many rabbit holes and ended up with bits and pieces of different systems. So I now have the job to pull it all together into something coherent. I love this part of the writing process . . .  and that’s okay by me.

The thing I’ve learnt – again – is that it’s all about choices. We all have the same hours in the day, but the difference is how we choose to use it. I’m going to choose to put my writing first despite my desire to ‘just get this done or that done first’ which always frustrates me.

And I shall continue to wear a mask, but only for Covid reasons. 😎

This Is Me.

“Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.” – Oscar Wilde

 

 

Bootcamp Bubble July 2020

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It’s been some time since I’ve posted. I have no excuses, not real ones. I could blame the virus, but then it’s here to stay for some time and we’ve been on lockdown since March so I can’t use that.

So instead I’m going to become one of my female characters who needs to get herself into training to slaughter the monster of procrastination and prioritisation. It’s not a matter of time, I’ve always hated the excuse of ‘I’m so busy’. It’s such a lame lament. We all have the same number of hours in the day, it’s how we choose to use them and what we consider as important.

For far too long, I’ve put my writing at the bottom of the list. Well this month things are going to change and I’m going to fight and destroy the creature that has pinned me down, eaten my muse and trampled over my confidence. If I don’t. It’s time to hand in the towel. And I have fight left within me, so fight I will.

This month in my little Boot-camp Bubble I shall be committing to the following:

  • Time out from my online group, Writers Abroad. We are currently in the midst of celebrating our 10 year anniversary and there is a lot going on but it takes a lot of my energy. They will all be there when I return, as lovely and as supportive as ever, but this is a fight I have to do on my own.

 

  • Musing every day, for 31 days. Every. Single. Day. I will write to a creative writing prompt. I generally do this every week day morning but I also plan to turn at least one of these musings a week into a short story or a scene.

 

  • Journaling I’ve been doing ‘Morning Pages’ almost every day since 2015. It had purpose way back then when I was struggling with so many things. But it’s not challenging me any more, it’s a daily diary, of my daily, rather mundane life. So I’ve purchased the Journaling Compendium by Amie McNee and shall be using her daily prompts to explore myself as a writer, if she’s willing to stick around.

 

  • World Building My writing project priority is the Moon series. I published the first novella back in early March just when we went into lockdown and I’ve not done a thing. So I shall be pulling the publication and exploring and revisiting the world I created to define the next in the series and perhaps a third. Who knows?

So, I hope to be sharing my progress on a short weekly post and I hope to pop out of my bubble at the end of the month. That’s if the monster doesn’t eat me first.

“The soul always knows what to do to heal itself, the challenge is to silence the mind.”

– Caroline Myss

 

Ciao for Now . . .