May Inspiration

With NaPiBoWriWee and Short Story Month currently happening, I’m sure there are quite a few of you looking for inspiration this month. Since these events are happening, and since I didn’t do an inspiration post in March or April, I’ve added some extra inspiration in this month, including TWO picture prompts!

PICTURE PROMPTS

Picture Prompt 1

Where does the road lead? What’s beyond the fog? Who is travelling this road? What does the fog mean?

Picture Prompt 2

Who does this belong to? What does it contain? How did it come to be here?

SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE

• Leaves
• Autumn
• Sign language
• Music
• Butterfly
• Revolution
• Red

NORTHERN HEMISPHERE

• Flowers
• Sunshine
• Sneeze
• Children
• Maypole
• Horse
• Cinco de Mayo

GENERAL

• Mother
• The number five
• Fertility
• Elders
• Soldier
• Nurse
• Dance

ANZAC

I wrote the original version of this piece many years ago for ANZAC day and read it to a crowd of a thousand at an ANZAC day service. I think I was about fifteen at the time. In honour of ANZAC day, I’ve revised and rewritten it to post in its current form. Because I only unearthed it today, it is not perfect and it has not been through beta readers, but I wanted to show my respect to those who fought (including my own great great grandfather who fought in WW2). So forgive its roughness and any grammatical errors or typos I may have overlooked, and please spare a moment to remember those who fought, suffered and lost their lives for their country.

The clock ticks on the mantle, the only sound in an otherwise silent room. The old man shifts in his bed, trying to get to sleep. His aching bones scream at him and when he closes his eyes haunting memories flood his mind.

The sound of the ticking clock morphs into planes zooming overhead and gunfire blasting all around. The old man opens his eyes, no longer in his bed, stiff and old, but a young man in the trenches, fighting for his country. On either side of him stand his mates, yelling over the gunfire.

A metal cylinder drops from one of the planes and hurtles towards the ground, exploding only metres away. He takes cover in the trench as shrapnel flies over their heads.  His ears are ringing, he can’t hear what Eddie is yelling at him. Eddie points. The young soldier turns to see the devastation in the trench to his left. Peterson, Lewis and Neal are all gone. If the bomb had been dropped a few more metres to the right it could easily have been him shredded by the shrapnel.

Still, he fights on. They all fight on.

The odour of death fills his nostrils. The smell is a constant in the trenches, unable to be eradicated, even when they have a chance to move the bodies. Flies are everywhere: in the food; buzzing around their wounds; around the dead—mostly around the dead. The dead bodies surround them—a constant reminder of what could happen to any of them. The price of war is all too real. Too scary. He pushes the fear aside. There’s no room for fear.

Another bomb hits, closer this time. Blinding light, more ringing in his ears, and pain. Pain! He can’t feel his legs. Is this death? His sight returns slowly, blurry at first. He can still see the trenches, the soldiers, the chaos. He is not dead.

He closes his eyes against the consuming pain. He does not cry. Soldiers don’t cry.

He opens his eyes again, not as a young soldier, but as an old man in his bed. The sound of guns and bombs fade. The clock ticks.

He looks down to where his legs used to be and lets a tear roll down his cheek—a tear that should have been shed a long time ago.

The war gave him many things: pain, sorrow, loss. Thankfulness. Thankful the war is over. Thankful he survived (though broken). And thankful that his children and their children and their children’s children don’t have to experience the nightmare that he did. For him, the horrors will never fade. He will always remember.

“They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old;

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun, and in the morning,

We shall remember them.

Lest we forget.”

 

 

February Inspiration

Looking for some inspiration for your picture book, short story or poetry this month? Hopefully there will be something here to spark your muse.

PICTURE PROMPT

PICTURE PROMPT

What sort of bird left this feather behind? Where is it? What is the bird’s story? Or what is the story of the person who finds the feather? What does the feather signify?

SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE

• Fire
• Flood
• New Zealand
• Sun
• School

NORTHERN HEMISPHERE

• Family
• Pearls of ice
• Football
• Groundhog
• Flag

GENERAL

• Pancakes
• Valentine
• Water
• Wedding
• Red

January Inspiration

Although this post is primarily written with those partaking in 12 x 12 in mind, it can serve as inspiration for anyone in need of a writing muse.

It’s the first month of 12 x 12, so hopefully you’ve come into the challenge full of fresh ideas, ready to write and, for some, maybe a notepad full of ideas from PiBoIdMo. But maybe you’re already lost. Maybe you did 12 x 12 last year and you’ve exhausted your well of ideas. Maybe you thought your ideas were great, but now when you try to write a PB, they’re not sparking like you expected. But not to worry, if you need a bit of inspiration, here is a list of prompts (including a picture prompt). Maybe a single prompt word will prompt a story. Maybe a combination of prompt words will. Hopefully there will be something there to inspire you. Good luck!

PICTURE PROMPT

PICTURE PROMPT

Who is she? Where is she? What is she doing? Why?

SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE

• Summer
• Holiday
• Swimming pool
• Barbeque
• Australia/New Zealand

 

NORTHERN HEMISPHERE

• Snowman
• Frosty window
• Winter
• Martin Luther King
• Fire

 

GENERAL

• Snake
• Fireworks
• Doorway
• Wolf

Chester Lewis Author Chat

Today I’ll be chatting in the Chester Lewis Fanfiction group on Facebook. For those who haven’t heard of it, the Chester Lewis Fanfiction contest is open until August 2013 and has a $2000 first prize. The idea is to write a fanfiction piece based on The Life and Times of Chester Lewis. Entry into the contest is $10 and this entry fee also gives you access to the Facebook group where you can chat with fellow writers, authors and the editor. Throughout the year (until the contest closes) there will also be author drop-ins which so far have revolved around the story of Chester Lewis, writing in general and the publishing industry (I picked up a couple of great tips during yesterday’s drop-in). It’s well worth the entry fee just for the Facebook group. Plus, who knows what other opportunities could emerge from this competition.

I’ll be dropping into the Facebook group in 6 hours to chat. That’s Sunday 3pm AEDT, Sunday 4am GMT, Saturday 11pm EST or Saturday 8pm PST. Don’t forget you need to have paid your entry fee before you can join.

Writing a Novel – Character Profiles

Welcome to the first post in my Writing a Novel series. Today we will be looking at character profiles.

Usually when I am embarking on a new novel, I plot first, then do character profiles. This time around, my characters, specifically my main character, have been clamouring to be heard. My plot, at this point, is still not completely clear in my head, but the characters already have very strong voices. So this time around I am starting off with character profiles (and hoping once I know them and their motivations a bit better, the plot will become more clear).

Simple Bios

A few years ago I discovered ywriter and one of the great features is that you can include character bios (which can be as detailed as you want), including their goals. There is even a tab for including a picture!

I spent far too much time searching Google images for pictures that fit my character descriptions, but it really made me think about how my characters look and even helped me develop their personalities (of course Nyssa has to be smiling in her picture, because she is such a positive, happy character). The Mac equivalent to ywriter is Scrivener, though I’ve never used it, so I’m not sure if it has a similar feature.

For the bio, I kept it simple at this stage. I included age, physical features, family, personality traits (both positive and negative) and goals. You can see an example of a character bio on the post NaNoWriMo — Character Outline.

Character Interview

With the character’s basic personality now in mind, it’s time to delve deeper. I like to do character interviews with the main characters to really bring the characters to life. In my post, Creating 3D Characters: The Character Interview, I talk about this more in-depth and provide some examples of questions to ask that really get to the heart of your character. And in my post, NaNoWriMo — Character Outline I show how these questions might be answered (using Harry Potter as an example).

Visualising Your Character

There are so many fun, creative ways to do this. Here are a few of my favourites:

- A character collage. Write your character’s name at the top of a piece of blank paper and grab a heap of old magazines, some scissors and some glue. Cut out things that would suit your character and stick them on the paper. Does your character have brown hair? Cut out a actress with brown hair. Does your character love music? Cut out a picture of an ipod. Does you character wear jeans? Does your character love animals? Is your character a doctor?

- Sketch. Blank paper + pencil. It doesn’t matter if you’re not very good at drawing, you’re the only one who will see it. Add labels, eg: ‘blue eyes’, ‘sword’, ‘permanent smirk’. Make it more than just a picture to show what they look like, let their personality and the setting of the novel shine through, too.

- Powerpoint. This is especially good if you have several main characters. On each slide find a picture to represent how you imagine your character to look, then accompany with dot points that describe your character’s personality.

So is it really necessary to make such an in-depth profile of your character before you begin writing your novel? It’s really up to the author. For me, I find having looked at my characters in such an in-depth way before I begin I am able to really immerse myself in my character’s head as I write and their voices come across more naturally. Also, I don’t have to flick back to page seven to remember what eye colour my MC has or to page fifty to remember if my MC’s best friend has two sisters or three, because I know them so well (or if I really have forgotten, it’s much easier to just refer back to my character profile, than find where I mentioned it).

What do you do to develop your characters before you begin writing? Or do you just jump right in and let them develop as you write?

New Writing Resolutions

Happy New Year!

My resolution last year was to submit more, but unfortunately, like many resolutions made on New Year’s Eve, this didn’t come to pass. For the most part it wasn’t my usual submission anxiety holding me back, but an insanely busy roller coaster ride of year that stole a lot of focus from my writing world. Regular followers might have noticed my blog has been more quiet than usual this past year and my Facebook author page and Twitter have also noticeably been much quieter, too.

My new resolution for 2013 is to get back into my writing groove. I’ve joined a group called Sub Six with the goal of submitting at least six manuscripts this year (I’ll be polishing some of my 12 x 12 manuscripts from 2012 as well as a few from 2011 that I’ve been polishing over the year). I’ve dusted off my Publisher Checklist, I know which manuscript I want to submit first and which publishers I think will be the best fit. I’m working on a cover letter at the moment.

I’ve also been hit with inspiration for a novel. Since it is a brand new novel, I’ve decided to share my novel writing process as I write, from plotting through to editing, with helpful hints I’ve learned along the way. My first post in the series will be on writing character profiles and should be up within the next few days.

What are your writing resolutions for 2013?