Liz Williams's Blog, page 30

Self promotion

This idea came from John Scalzi via Upstart Crow, via Ellen Datlow and suricattus :


*Please feel free to post links to anything you've got for sale right now: books you've authored or edited, and any arts or crafts you've made. Then spread the idea around on your own blog*

Our main site is: http://www.witchcraftshop.co.uk/store/index.php

Not everything is in stock at the moment, but we can always let you know.

I'm also promoting manuscript appraisal and writing mentorship services - contact me on: mevennen(at)hotmail.com

E-books: the latest instalment in the DI Chen novels, IRON KHAN, is out now on Amazon, and will shortly be available in e-format. I'm also still selling DIARY OF A WITCHCRAFT SHOP, which is nearly there, and I have a few short story subscriptions still available. Again, email me for details.

My colleague Lynn Bastian and myself are also promoting a new project: Deity, which is an illustrated limited edition pamphlet of divine male erotica.

And - I forgot! - I also do online tarot, which you can find through the main Witchcraft website.

Congratulations!

...to Trevor Jones, BA (Hons).

Holy Thorn update

Not really an update - the tree has been treated and there's an ongoing debate as to what to do with the severed branches, involving the entire span of the community. We still have no idea who was responsible, or why, and unless someone lets something slip and is reported, we probably won't.

Someone on the FB page was at her last Gaelic class when she heard about the tree, and they studied this poem, which you may like to share:


A late 16th century piece. The author is given as Laoiseach Mac an Bhaird (Gaelic for bard or poet).

A fond greeting, hillock there,
though I'm cheerless at your decline:
a source of sorrow your brown thorn,
the smooth stem we knew at your top.

A grief to all, the gathering bush
we knew as our assembly place:
its boughs broken-a dismal day.
The land is meaner now it is gone.

The heart in my side has grown dark,
hillock there, for your great tree.
I have scanned from its stem, the whole country.
Your smooth thorn I will see no more.

It served us all as a sign,
the branch that is taken now.
Far from our northern land
we could see the distant tree.

But a blast has wrecked its root,
that branch so long unbroken.
Many men it has sheltered,
that ruined tree, a sore loss.

Its shapely branches of purple shade,
my grief, are in decay.
It is right to mourn the pangs of Christ
as I brood upon this branch.

Hacked from us in total ruin
our lovely thorn, a barn for birds.
A like tree never grew in ground;
a source of tears until I die.

It will hurt to the brink of death
that it stands no more on high.
No hill of fruitful boughs I see
but a ruined thorn to stir our grief.

The assembly hill-it troubles the schools-
today in strangers' hands.
I am in sorrow for its slopes,
the fair hill that held my love.

December

A very mixed bag at the moment - retail trade is appalling, but there are good things happening elsewhere, of which, more later.

We've now got the heating back, a very kind friend has fixed the leak in the down pipe, and the house is clean and decorated for Christmas/Solstice. Lots of holly, ivy and spruce, and I managed to make a wreath out of a gilded hoop of willow bought at the Frost Fayre last week. Just spent the evening listening to Thomas Tallis* and reading recipe books (Trevor is confined to his sickbed with the flu - which is not, in fact, man flu but a very nasty virus currently doing the rounds in Glastonbury - the dogs, who know that the one thing a sick man needs is to be sat on, and NFL).

*A friend of ours is currently posting his take on the Glastonbury soundtrack on Facebook - not the soundtrack to the various manifestations of the Festival, but the soundtrack to our lives. Tallis and Vaughan Williams at the moment (sometimes it's a bit more contemporary, but at the moment, these seem to fit the bill).

Glastonbury Frost Fayre

The Frost Fayre took place smoothly yesterday, after months of planning. Myself and the rest of the team are pleased and relieved. The only slight hitch was that the folk who supply the sledge and the reindeer forgot to bring their pony's 'unicorn' horn, but a handy fake icicle was superglued onto the harness instead. Reindeer were duly admired, although one of them nearly trod on my foot, Santa ho-ho'd in various locations, several policemen took a pie in the face for charity and the result seems to have been several thousand happy people. Which is good.

The darker news this week has been the damage done to the holy thorn tree on Wearyall Hill. This tree, and its siblings, are said to have been taken from an original tree which sprung from the staff of Joseph of Arimathea. Whatever one thinks of the truth of the legend, it's a lovely story, and whenever I go to the supermarket, I have looked up at the little tree on its hillside, and thought of the legend. On the day that twigs were taken from a sister tree in St John's churchyard, to be sent to the Queen for her Christmas Day dinner table (an annual tradition of long standing), the Wearyall tree was vandalised over night, sawn down to a stump. The town is furious, and upset. The tree may survive, but this is not the point. If it was simple vandalism, it's appalling, and if it was a protest of some kind, it has badly backfired. No-one has claimed responsibility.

Facebook

Just to alert anyone new, I am on Facebook as well as LJ, and have been for about 18 months. Because I do not have a very uncommon name...the link is here: http://www.facebook.com/liz.williams2#!/liz.williams2

Irish bankers....

A trenchant analysis of the recent financial crisis. And Michael Flatley.

Comes with a profanity warning that exceeds the Richter scale.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nk36cMgf028&feature=player_embedded

Mists of Avalon

Woke up to no snow, but a thick mist this morning, with the sun sailing through it like a penny. We've been having the usual working weekend - town was busy y'day but not today, although I did meet a large ginger cat which has been trying to gatecrash the conference at the Assembly Rooms, eating cigarette ends out of the gutter (he is a fat cat in a smart collar, so surely not a starving stray?)

...let it....

...and it did.

Woke up to a white world this morning. Since the Shetland has been confined to quarters in the orchard after his last escape attempt, T put him in the barn with plenty of hay and fresh water. This was treated with contempt and the appropriately named Snowy has now vanished against a backdrop of whiteness in his field, after we'd stopped up any likely gaps.

Having done this, and having a day off, we've had a cookathon: chilli oil, home made bread, colcannon, cauliflower cheese, game stew and a sponge cake. I'm intending to resist the temptation to do any work this afternoon and just read recipe books instead.

The Clarke reading is progressing steadily. We met up in London on Saturday for the first jury meeting, which took place in a restaurant in Chinatown. Because the train is now too expensive, I caught the bus - it's a longer trip, but leaves from the middle of Glastonbury and drops off at Victoria, so couldn't be more central for either. It's a pretty run through Bath and the little villages of the Mendips: I saw a big red dog fox in a snowy field, and someone had written 'Merry Xmas' in huge letters in the snow.

London was packed - when our meeting was over, I walked from Soho through Trafalger Square, stopping off at the National Gallery, and then down through London to Harrods, which was an absolute heaving mass of people. Lovely windows, though, and the food store is always fun even though I never buy anything in there. I love London at this time of year.

Creative writing tutoring - repost

As some of you will know, I have been offering manuscript appraisal services for some time now, but I have recently been joined by historical novelist Maria McCann. I am updating this as Maria has now come on board with the Arvon team, and I'm including details of that below.

Maria McCann's first novel, As Meat Loves Salt, was published to considerable acclaim in 2001 and was an Economist Book of the Year. Described as a 'fat juicy masterpiece', it has never gone out of print. The Wilding (2010) was longlisted for the Orange Prize and was one of eight novels selected for the Richard and Judy Book Club out of a hundred and sixty titles submitted by publishers. She has also published shorter pieces in anthologies and magazines.


I will be dealing with SF, Fantasy and Horror, or any related sub-genres. Maria will be dealing with literary fiction and historical fiction. We will be offering:

- manuscript proposal appraisal (first three chapters and synopsis)
- full manuscript appraisal (novels and short fiction)
- submission package assessment

We can also offer tailor-made packages, depending on your needs and requirements. If you want an assessment of your initial three chapters, to see whether a manuscript is worth continuing, we can look at this. If you have a whole novel, and would like it taken up to the point where you are ready to submit to an agent, we can structure a timetable for you and take you through a chapter-by-chapter assessment. This process is likely to take about a year (unless you're a very quick writer!) and we will suggest that you rewrite if we think it's necessary.

You can start at any point. We are both very thorough – this is aimed at the serious writer who is aiming at a professional career. We start with an appraisal, and if we think your expectations are unrealistic and that you would not benefit at this point from a full appraisal program, we will tell you. However, we are solution-oriented and our criticism will always be constructive!

The aim of this process is to prepare work for publication. Obviously, we cannot guarantee that, although I would note that my last student has just had her first novel published as part of a 3 book-deal. I can put you in touch with former students if you wish. For other genres, including detective fiction, post-colonial fiction or other, let me know if you would like details and I will pass you on to a wider mentoring agency.
If you would like to discuss this with either Maria or myself, please email me at mevennen(at)hotmail(dot)com for further information, including a full breakdown of costs.