A short trip away--Tricia McGill

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My next book is due out in December, and I await its publication date with trepidation—as always. Because I lost my little dog not long ago, I decided it was time to go on a short road trip before I considered whether to get a new companion or not. The original idea was to take the ferry to Tasmania for the umpteenth time as my next work in progress will be set there and I figured it would be worth another visit to Port Arthur, site of the penitentiary where my book will begin. Unfortunately, as the ferry terminal has changed locations the trip to Tassie had to be abandoned, for the available dates did not fit into my travelling companions’ time-table or mine.

So off we went instead along Victoria’s Great Ocean Road. The last time I made this trip was quite some years ago, in fact 22 years, and I was amazed at how our southern coastline has changed through the years. The coastline is slowly but surely eroding and falling into the sea. Where once we could leave the car in the carpark and walk a few paces to take in the view, now the road has been relocated so far back from the coast that it involves a long trek. This is the same wherever you go along Australia’s southern coastline.

Some visitors to our country may have taken this road trap, perhaps to view what was once the Twelve Apostles and is now drastically reduced in numbers—or perhaps lovers of surfing would hone in on Torquay. It still remains one of Victoria’s most scenic drives in parts. 

On the way back inland, we had a surprise when we spotted a koala sitting in the road. The poor chappie looked slightly dazed, and we wondered if perhaps he had escaped the floods that are currently sweeping through our country. Of course, we stopped with the hope of encouraging him/her back into the trees, and soon two other carloads of travellers had stopped with the same idea. To our complete surprise the creature decided to climb up one man’s trouser leg and cling to his shirt. Eventually the man was able to place the koala on the trunk of a nearby tree. We can only hope that it returns to its favoured habitat safely. The numbers of these little creatures are in such decline every one saved is a blessing.

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Remembrance Day

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Remembrance Day

 Earlier this month, Remembrance Day was observed in the UK and in many Commonwealth countries. It commemorates the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month – 11am on November 11th 1918 – when the guns fell silent along the Western and Eastern fronts in Europe. An armistice had been signed, and the Great War had ended, after over four years of the bloodiest warfare ever.

There is an almost cruel irony in the fact that the first and also some of the last shots of the war were fired within fifty metres of each other in a small village called Casteau near the Belgian town of Mons which I visited several years ago.

On August 22nd 1914, a British cavalry troop, the 4th Dragoon Guards, were involved in the first skirmish with the Germans at Casteau. During this short battle, Captain E Thomas fired at the enemy, and killed a German cavalry officer.

Over 4 years of conflict later, on the morning of November 11th, 1918, a Canadian Infantry Battalion were on the trail of retreating German soldiers, and after firing their final shots, they stopped firing at 11 o’clock at the village of Casteau.

In between those first and last shots in this small Belgian village, hundreds of thousands lives had been lost in the trenches and battlefields on the Western and Eastern fronts.

                                                                         1914 Dragoon Guards Memorial           1918 Canadian Memorial

In 1915 Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, a Canadian medical officer, wrote a poem after presiding over the funeral of a friend who died in the Second Battle of Ypres:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row, 

That mark our place; and in the sky 

The larks, still bravely singing, fly 

Scarce heard amid the guns below. 

The reference to the red poppies that grew over the graves of fallen soldiers in France and Belgium led to the poppy becoming one of the world's most recognized memorial symbols for soldiers who have died in conflicts.

In Britain, a Festival of Remembrance is held at the Royal Albert Hall in London on the Saturday nearest to November 11th. It commemorates all who have lost their lives in conflicts. Part concert, part memorial service, it concludes with a parade of representatives of all the armed forces as well as the uniformed volunteer organisations. Once they are all in place in the large arena, there is a two minute silence, and thousands of poppy petals are released from the roof. It is said there is one poppy petal for each person who has died in conflicts during and since the First World War.

The following morning, a memorial service is held at the Cenotaph in London’s Whitehall, and at the same time, similar services are held at hundreds of war memorials in every part of the country, and also wherever British troops are serving overseas.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

(Lawrence Binyon)

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Be Kind to Yourself by Joan Donaldson-Yarmey

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.bookswelove.com/donaldson-yarmey-joan/
 

Writers are sometimes hard on themselves when it comes to their writing. As a writer I can be my own worst critic. One moment I think I am writing something great and the next it will seem like the most boring stuff. Sometimes I look at other writer’s books and wish I could write like them.

Over the years I’ve tried to keep to the following rules. These might help any new or experienced writer.

No. One: Remember every writer, whether a best seller or a working-hard-at-becoming-a-best-seller, started their very first book with a blank page.

No. Two: Don’t try to write your novel in one sitting, or one month, or even one year. Give yourself time to enjoy the experience, to change the story line, if need be, as you progress, and to get to know your characters. I attended a romance writing course and the speaker, who wrote for Harlequin, said you should know everything about your main character, even what type of toothpaste she uses.

No. Three: Sometimes, now is not the time to write the book you’re sure will be the next great best seller. Sometimes you need to put in more time learning the craft, like how to write good dialogue, how to flesh out your characters, and how to decide which is the best location to set your story.

No. Four: It is nice to have a set schedule for writing, whether it’s from 5-7am before work, 8-10pm after the children are in bed, but sometimes that won’t always work. Some authors write twenty minutes here and there throughout the day. Some try for two hours Saturday morning and an hour Wednesday evening. Find what works best for you and try to stick to it as best you can.

No. Five: Whatever language you write in, make sure your language skills are up to par. I write in English and all my life I knew that when a person nodded their head, they agreed and when they shook their head they disagreed. In some books I’ve seen where the character shook their head yes and nodded their head for no.

No Six: Try to have a separate space for your writing even if it is a corner in your dining room or bedroom. That way when you are there you know you have replaced you mom or dad hat, or your friend hat, or your working hat with your writing hat.

No. Seven: Back-up your work whether it be on a thumb drive, or the cloud, or even an email to yourself. I’ve read of many writers who have lost whole chapters or multiple chapters due to their computer crashing. Don’t let that happen to you.

No. Eight: Most of all be kind to yourself. Not every word you write is going perfect, not every story your write is going to be a masterpiece. But each time you finish a project you can tell yourself: “You Did it!!Good Job!!”

On Writing Historical Fiction by Victoria Chatham

 

AVAILABLE HERE

I was recently asked why I  chose to write historical novels, and I needed to think about the answer. The truth is, I was not too fond of history when I was in school. Other than the Norman invasion of England in 1066 and Columbus sailing the ocean blue in 1492, dates meant nothing to me. I don’t think I once correctly listed the succession of kings starting with Edward 1. Nor could I tell you the dates of the Wars of the Roses or the Great Fire of London. As for the English Civil War, without resorting to Google, I can only tell you that the combatants were the Parliamentarians, or Roundheads, led by Oliver Cromwell, on one side and the Royalists, or Cavaliers, who supported Charles 1, on the other.

The first historical novel I remember reading was The Sun in Splendour by Jean Plaidy, and, for

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once, history came alive. After that, I started looking more closely at historical fiction and found that history was not just about dates. It was about people who had lived in different eras, whether they were rich, privileged people at the top of the tree, or the lowly commoner. Catherine Cookson set most of her novels in Northeast England. Georgette Heyer’s characters populated London and wherever their country seats might be, while several had adventures in France or Spain. I enjoyed C.S. Forester’s Horatio Hornblower, who served in His Majesty’s Royal Navy and then the adventures of Bernard Cornwall’s British soldier, Sharpe.  

In writing my historical novels, I have envied colleagues who still have family papers, whether letters or diaries. In my family, very little of our history survives. Thanks to dedicated cousins on my mother’s and father’s sides of my family, I know something of it now. As much as I enjoy research, building family trees was never something I wanted to get into, possibly because of all those dates of births, marriages, and deaths, or hatches, matches and despatches, as my maternal grandmother used to say.

History may seem like a thing of the past, but the truth is we live in history all the time, and what we know today may make dusty reading for some teenagers in the future. While we hark back to the Regency or Victorian eras, more recent histories set during WWII are still popular. I won’t apologize for referencing English history because that is what I know best, but history happens everywhere. Ancient Egypt was the setting for several novels by Pauline Gedge and Wilbur Smith, the latter giving a vivid depiction of South Africa in many more of his novels.

History can be fascinating whether you enjoy it in fiction or non-fiction, movies or television series. Wherever you find it, I hope you enjoy it too.

Victoria Chatham

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Art and Mayhem

 

For those of you unfamiliar with my Two Harbors cozy mysteries, they feature the residents of Whistling Pines Senior residence. The protagonist is the facility recreation director, Peter Rogers. A talented musician, Peter is tasked with providing recreation opportunities for the aging residents. An unwritten portion of his job description is squelching unfounded rumors before they become contentious.

In Whistling Artist, newly released by BWL Publishing, the facility is in an uproar over the removal of a painting by a local artist. The northwoods scene has hung on the wall in Whistling Pines for decades. The artist, a local woman with a remote studio, had specified that the painting couldn't be displayed with a companion piece showing a cabin overlooking Lake Superior, until after her death.

As is the case in many of the small towns featured in my writing, the local residents are distrustful of outsiders and reclusive people. As soon as the painting is removed, rumors start to swirl about the artist's private life. Because the artist never married, rumors swirl about her elderly male patron, her live-in female mentor (who doesn't return from a sabbatical), and the numerous art students she used as models for her paintings.

That's the serious part of the book.

Being a cozy, we don't want to dwell on a serious aspect of the story for too long. As the main plot unwinds, a group of Whistling Pines art students are taking classes from a woman who owns a local art studio. We're unsure if the interest in the class is due to the art classes, the inebriated instructor's tales of her life in France during the '60s, or the liberal amounts of wine dispensed to the art students during the class. When a nude model is recruited, an uproar ensues, led by a group of right-wing religious fanatics. The art studio is picketed, and a news crew arrives to document the protest. There are mixed feelings about the publicity, with the Chamber of Commerce viewing it as an opportunity to advertise an upcoming festival. The police chief defers an interview to the quirky fire chief who'd been called to hose down the protesters.

As usual, things get crazy, in a good way, and the two plots get woven together in a surprise ending that puts many rumors to rest and confirms others.

Check out Whistling Artist at:

Hovey, Dean - BWL Publishing Inc. (bookswelove.net)