K.S. Nikakis's Blog, page 13
September 23, 2012
Writing about death
We lost our dog this weekend. It is very odd when you write about death so often but have been lucky enough to avoid it in real life.
The dog was 14 but very perky. We went to work leaving a happy, yappy little dog and came home to one that could scarcely move. Multiple vet visits followed and 2 stints in doggy hospital. Her pain would be quenched and she would be rehydrated and then we would bring her home, and she would cease eating and drinking which meant there was no way of getting pain killers into her. There was no diagnosis either - just something causing awful pain in her head.
It is agony watching something you love die by inches and you wonder if your wish to end it all is really the wish to end your own suffering. Yesterday we went to the doggy hospital and she didn't recognise me or my voice. She could scarcely stand. She cried in pain and fear as the vet approached and I held her and spoke to her as she had her last injection.
It took less than 10 seconds for her heart to stop. The Tibetan Book of the Dead describes how you should speak to the dying as hearing is the last sense to go.I hope she knew I tried. We laid her to rest just below the verandah where she would survey her territory and bark to the wind.
What did I learn as a writer? Nothing more than we all learn as humans. Love is the most wonderful of all things human, but it has a cost. All things end.
The dog was 14 but very perky. We went to work leaving a happy, yappy little dog and came home to one that could scarcely move. Multiple vet visits followed and 2 stints in doggy hospital. Her pain would be quenched and she would be rehydrated and then we would bring her home, and she would cease eating and drinking which meant there was no way of getting pain killers into her. There was no diagnosis either - just something causing awful pain in her head.
It is agony watching something you love die by inches and you wonder if your wish to end it all is really the wish to end your own suffering. Yesterday we went to the doggy hospital and she didn't recognise me or my voice. She could scarcely stand. She cried in pain and fear as the vet approached and I held her and spoke to her as she had her last injection.
It took less than 10 seconds for her heart to stop. The Tibetan Book of the Dead describes how you should speak to the dying as hearing is the last sense to go.I hope she knew I tried. We laid her to rest just below the verandah where she would survey her territory and bark to the wind.
What did I learn as a writer? Nothing more than we all learn as humans. Love is the most wonderful of all things human, but it has a cost. All things end.
September 8, 2012
Kyneton Writers' Festival
A chilly Kyneton day for their Writers' Festival part of their 40th Daffodil Festival. Writers gathered to talk about bush poetry, blogging, how to get published (me)and generally the joys of writing. It was great to sell 4 sets of The Kira Chronicles because it means more people will get to learn about the forest world of Allogrenia, the stone city of Sarnia and the mountain hamlet of Kessom (my favorite). Still gives me a real buzz when the my worlds and characters are carried away in peoples' hands.
August 18, 2012
Book 2 Elddim
Now up to Book 2 in my Angel trilogy. Book 1 Ezam is with the publisher of the Kira Chronicles but I have no idea whether they will take it on. Publishing is very difficult at the moment. Still, most writers will say they write to tell the story in their heart; getting a major publisher to take it on is a bonus. Lucky for us writers we now have e-publishing!
July 15, 2012
Mountains and Mist
Just found the remedy for feeling a bit tired and jaded with my writing. We took a trip down the coast - Lorne in Victoria, to be precise. Looked at fume being whipped off waves by a stiff wind, then turned inland as the rain closed in. Water gloved trees; mist plumes in valleys; dark, gleaming trunks. Could feel myself come alive again; hear dialogue; feel the joy of characters' loves and lives.
July 8, 2012
what I'm writing now
well, Hunter is still languishing in some slush pile somewhere, so this lovely tale of a female hunter whose quest appears to be impossible, will probably be my first online publication. Meanwhile, Book 1 of my angel trilogy, called Ezam, is finished and I am on Book 2. In Book 1, Viv is standing at the graveside of the man she thinks is her father, when a stranger turns up and offers to reunite her with the mother she thinks is dead. When she agrees, she is seized and transported to a new world, or fold, only to discover that she is daimon,that is, half angel.
April 21, 2012
Ezam
Ezam is book 1 of my angel trilogy and I have just hit the 99,000 word mark, not bad considering the whole thing began with a graveyard scene where one of the characters says: So this is the man you called your father. Stories are amazing things and I wonder sometimes whether writers build them on discover them floating around in the ether.
