Sally Murphy's Blog, page 58

The Reviews are In (Well, one of them, anyway)

There is nothing more nerve racking than waiting for the first review of a new book. Okay, apart from waiting to see if a publisher likes it enough to publish it. Or if you can actually get the text right in the first place. Or if the .. .Well, you get the idea. But I digress. I get pretty nervous waiting to see if reviewers will like my book. After all, reviewers are more likely to be honest

March New Reads

I had lots of reading fun in March. I’m currently immersing myself in
collections of children’s poetry, which has given me a chance to
rediscover some old favourites and discover some new (to me) gems. Of
course, I’ve read lots of prose, too, but it may be the first month ever
that the amount of poetry I’ve read outweighs the prose – and I like
it. Hopefully it will reflect in my own poetry

A Magnet Poem

Last year at the Perth Writers Festival family Day  I got a free magnet board and enough letter magnets to spell my name. This year  got a sheet of magnet words. Today I finally opened both - and wrote a poem.








Not a great photo - actually very hard to photograph because of white background and tiny size of words. But lots of fun.

Seventeen Years to Write

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February Reads

Another month has passed, and so it’s time to have a look at what I
read for February. Pleasing to see my balance being restored towards my
chief love – books for children. This month I indulged my six year old
self and tracked down old copies of AA Milne’s poetry from Ebay. I loved
rediscovering them and have moved from there to lots of other verse and
poetry, so look out for them in my

January Reads

Well, where did that go? And by that I mean January. Seems only
seconds ago we were ushering in the new year and now here it is February
already!

After last year's challenge to try to read a book a day
(at which I failed miserably) this year I've decided not to put a number
on t, but I am keeping track of my reading and am going to try to post
my list each month.

So, without any further

Moments

There are many exciting moments in the months ( or years) between writing a book and finally seeing it in print.

There's the moment when you write (literally or otherwise) the words 'The End' (And, of course, it should be said that this may happen multiple times for the one book, as each new draft and set of edits is completed)

There's the moment when you are offered a contract, the moment you

A Morning Poem

Tough choice Should I walk 'Round lake? Through bush? Along beach? I have a hard life. (Today I chose the beach)

Beached

At about 4 o'clock this afternoon I had to choose: write something, read something, or take a stroll along the beach. I chose the latter, and it was a wise choice.




My beloved came with me and we strolled, hand in hand, on a beach that had that beautiful stillness that comes before a storm. The odd drop of rain, and we could see more falling over near Dunsburough,
There were fewer people on

366 Books: The Outcome

It's the last day of 2012 which means the last day of the wonderful
National Year of Reading.  It also means that it's the last day of my
year-long challenge. Back on January1 I set myself a challenge: to see
if it was possible to read 366 books in 366 Days - ie a book a day.

At
the time I knew it was a big task but I believed it was doable, even
though I also knew there was a good chance I