Sarah Barnard's Blog, page 10

A personal appearance.

I seem to have booked myself a table at an Arts and Crafts Fair locally. I have books on order and it’s just a little bit scary.

It’s not a full on author appearance as such, it’s a toe in the water to see how it goes on a more personal basis. I’ll be trying to sell a few books, willing to sign them if requested, and having fun at the same time.

If anyone is local enough and wants to come along then it’s here:

Post by The Coach House Glyn Clydach.

Sunday, March 16th, from 2pm til 5pm.
See you there!

Let’s get back to writing.

Today is a day of mixed feelings, memories and sunshine. It’s a weird one.

It would have been my brother’s 41st birthday. So I’m having a thoughtful kinda day. The sun is shining, and it’s windy, perfect laundry and drying weather. So the line is full of bedding, there’s a load in the machine, and another load at least lined up for after that. It’s going to smell fab when it’s all dry. I love the smell of line dried washing, and getting into a bed freshly made, and still smelling of sun? The best!

Amongst all that I could crack on with housework, it needs it.

But I’m going to sit here and write more on Elois. That still needs a title, and an idea for the cover, and will need an editor at some stage. Any volunteers?

“No daughter of mine will work in the forge, I have a son for that,” he said finally, turning away from her to scoop stew into a bowl. Elois stared at her dad’s broad back, tears welling up. Osk’s face was flat and calm, as usual. Briony glared at Kyt, furious, but she said nothing.

Today’s planned words involve crossing the ravine and finding out what’s on the other side. They’re sitting at the edge of the map, it’s all uncharted from here.

This is me, being all disciplined and going to write, not check facebook.

Sample Sunday – Broken Promises.

Broken Promises.

Sam went with him willingly, but once he had her he wouldn’t let her go. Abused for years, Sam has to find a way to escape his clutches.

My name was Sam Brewer and I was thirty-one when I discovered I had never been who I thought I was. Now I have no idea who I am supposed to be.

I left my kids. I walked away from my life. I left it all behind for him. Why? Honestly? I have no idea. Maybe this will help you, and me, to understand.

It doesn’t matter any more. An end is coming. I can’t stop it, the damage was too great, the pain too large. You asked me what happened, but I couldn’t tell you. Then when I was ready to speak it was too late.

The Portals are sealed now and there’s no way I can find of getting back to you. I broke it all, again, and I’m sorry.

I sit here at my desk and I write longhand by the flickering light of an oil lamp. I have freshly-cut quills and reed pens and ink made especially for me. But it wasn’t made for this. It was made to indulge me. I like to write things down where the ink makers like to recall their history aurally. There is no electricity here and no computers. My life is simple in its complexity and I can’t trust that this peace will last. It’s all gone so horribly wrong. I don’t know how to make it right.

Shall we start at the beginning then? It does really depend on where you decide it started I suppose. Does it start with my birth? I suppose it could, but then it would be a very long and very boring tale to tell and to listen to, or read. It could start the day Kate walked into my class at school, maybe the day I had sex for the first time, the day I gave birth. It could start at any point in my life. But it is really a culmination of all those and other times and places which made me who I am today. They all focused, all came together one dark autumn night a couple of years ago.

I’d told you I was going to see my parents. Of course I meant my adoptive parents. It was late October. The leaves were golden, red and orange as they tumbled from the trees into drifts on the pavements and blew all over the town centre. It was a day or two before Hallowe’en, Samhain, that night of changes. It was cold, wet and dark.

I had planned to spend a day or two with my parents. I had wanted to ask them so much. I’d only just found out about being abandoned as a baby. In thirty-one years they had never mentioned anything about my being adopted.

Buy Broken Promises, Now.

Click the links below for the Osier Publishing Direct Edition of Broken Promises (including short story, The Heir) in the format you need.

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Sarah Barnard

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Thank you for respecting my hard work, and the hard work of any artists involved in the creation of these items.
Sarah Barnard

By clicking the button below, I agree with the Terms & Conditions.




















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All downloads are licensed for your personal enjoyment only. These downloads may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share your download with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader, or in the case of free content please ask that person to download their own copy. If you’re reading this book, or using this item and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to www.sarahbarnard.co.uk and purchase your own copy.
Thank you for respecting my hard work, and the hard work of any artists involved in the creation of these items.
Sarah Barnard

By clicking the button below, I agree with the Terms & Conditions.




















US Readers

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Kindle


All downloads are licensed for your personal enjoyment only. These downloads may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share your download with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader, or in the case of free content please ask that person to download their own copy. If you’re reading this book, or using this item and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to www.sarahbarnard.co.uk and purchase your own copy.
Thank you for respecting my hard work, and the hard work of any artists involved in the creation of these items.
Sarah Barnard

By clicking the button below, I agree with the Terms & Conditions.




















ePub


All downloads are licensed for your personal enjoyment only. These downloads may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share your download with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader, or in the case of free content please ask that person to download their own copy. If you’re reading this book, or using this item and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to www.sarahbarnard.co.uk and purchase your own copy.
Thank you for respecting my hard work, and the hard work of any artists involved in the creation of these items.
Sarah Barnard

By clicking the button below, I agree with the Terms & Conditions.




















PDF

All downloads are licensed for your personal enjoyment only. These downloads may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share your download with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader, or in the case of free content please ask that person to download their own copy. If you’re reading this book, or using this item and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to www.sarahbarnard.co.uk and purchase your own copy.
Thank you for respecting my hard work, and the hard work of any artists involved in the creation of these items.
Sarah Barnard

By clicking the button below, I agree with the Terms & Conditions.

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Life keeps getting in the way

Parent’s evening at school, dentist and orthodontist appointments. Spring coming and the need to sort out the garden. Housework, children demanding time and attention. Cats, shopping, furniture delivery and collection. Cooking, cleaning, spending time with friends. Sleep? What’s that?

It all adds up and now and then it all lands together and derails any writing time I have. It feels like a regular occurrence that this happens over a few days at the moment, and I get out of the writing groove.Once that habit has broken, it takes time to get back into it again. I feel like I’m starting again every week, and my targeted word count is slipping further and further behind.

Discipline is needed. I can excuse each day, I can write off a day as lost for writing, or I can just sit down and write. So, I’m going to do exactly that. Turning off facebook, opening Elois and pondering exploring new places.

How many ponies would I need to carry gear for a month long expedition of four people, into uncharted territory?

Balancing act

Life is a balancing act. We all have to balance one thing against another, and the balance we find is fluid, subject to change at a moment’s notice. Sometimes the balance is hard to find, we’re pulled in so many directions, there are so many demands on our time. There are children, parents, other family, friends, work, the house, pets… and so many more. When do we get time to just relax, time for us?

Over the last couple of years, my balance has slipped further and further. I’m a self-employed author, no-one is cracking a whip and making me work, so I find excuses to not write. The words aren’t flowing. I’m not inspired. I’ll do more tomorrow, next week, when the sun comes out, on rainy days. I’ll go for a long walk first, make a cuppa, do a level on Candy Crush, pop out to see a friend, look at the garden which is being neglected and then spend time thinking about what I’d like to do out there. Then my kids need something, some time, taking somewhere, picking up from somewhere. Other family, friends demand a bit of my time, and can I please help out with this, that, or the other, and I make time for them too. Housework needs to get done, laundry needs doing, bits of DIY and workmen in refurbishing the kitchen and bathroom. I can’t write with a houseful of people banging and crashing about, can I? That’s reasonable, isn’t it?

And breathe.

This is the curse of the self-employed, of the creative, the artist, the writer. I’ll work from home and life will be perfect. I can balance family and work and all will be rosy. Not exactly, it doesn’t work like that. I’ve let myself slip. I’m not writing every day, but equally I’m not diverting that time to my kids, friends, or family. I’m not spending all day doing housework, and there’s no big garden project underway. The balance is so far off that everything is suffering.

Our time is our own, but it’s also our livelihood and we need to remember that. For me, if I am to work as a writer, and make a living at it, then I need to treat it like I have a boss setting targets, and I need to write every, single, day – not just when I feel like it. And I need to stop giving myself days off, letting life get in the way.

So do you.

Sure, there are important things that need doing too. Kids, family, friends, shopping, hoovering, cooking and plenty more. But just think. How would you fit those in if you were going to work in an office every day? You’d make it work, wouldn’t you?

Working from home, you have total control over how you spend your time. You can plan your writing time for when you’re home alone, or after the kids are in bed. But make that writing space in every day.

Mine is straight after the kids leave for school, before I do anything else. I have a target for that time – 500 words. If I get that done in 20 minutes, then I have the rest of the day for shopping, gardening, going for a walk, or housework. Some days it takes forever to get those 500 new words added to whatever I’m writing. Some days I have to move that chunk of writing time. But I write, 500 words, every day. That’s my job.

Hot question of the day is….

If you need to take a pelt somewhere and you can’t freeze it, no time to tan it, and it’s going to take weeks to get there – how do you stop it going stinky before you get home?

New horizons

Exploring a new world takes time, especially if you’re using basic equipment, or are lacking technology. A group of colonists who have chosen a beautiful, green world to make their home, who have little technology to use, are exploring on foot, on horseback, and mapping with paper and pen.

Three years after landing, the land beyond the ravine hasn’t been mapped. Kyt, Osk, Briony and Elois are approaching the edge of the maps. No human has yet set foot on the land on the other side.

“That’s it!” Osk shouted, his face shining with excitement. “No-one’s been beyond the ravine yet, the map stops just there.” He turned, scooped up Elois and spun her in a tight hug. “Isn’t it incredible? This is what I signed up for, to see places for the first time, to be the first to set foot on new grass, to be the first hands in new dirt. It’s amazing.” He placed her carefully back on the ground so they could carry on walking. The day was drawing to an end, the sun was close to the treetops and shadows lay long and thin on the ground. The first moon could be seen clear and full, high in the sky and the first stars were just beginning to shine in a darkening sky. Kyt wanted to find the place he and Osk had camped the previous year. It was an excellent site, with a partly hollowed rock that formed a shallow cave for shelter. He was aiming to be there before full dark so they could make a fire while it was still light.

“Who gets to be first?” Elois asked as they forced through a patch of grabgrass, hoping they might allow her to set her foot off the map before anyone else.

I love this. Osk is ex-fleet. He’s spent most of his adult life on space craft, barely making planetfall for more than a couple of days and then not really able to venture far from the ports. I can feel his exhilaration, the thrill of the freedom he’s claimed for himself.

I love writing fantasy and sci-fi

I love reading, and writing, fantasy and sci fi stories. When you dive into a story and find a whole new world to explore, that’s just magical – for the reader and for the writer too.

Imagine for a moment you are on that ship, the world looming closer is the one where you’ll be living, and you might have an idea of what to expect but you’re not really sure. The sun might be yellow gold, and the sky might be blue, but what will the air smell like? There may be large bodies of tidal water, you may even know if they’re sweet or salt, but what will the new sand feel like under your feet? How will that salt taste in the air?

If it feels special to visit a new place for the first time, imagine how much more intense that might be if you knew you were the first human to set foot in a place? Then magnify that into an entire planet. If the initial survey work were done by drone and robot from orbit, you could be the first human to ever set foot on that planet.

Wow.

As a writer, I get to do that with every book I write. I get to create the alien sky and then lay down and stare at the stars. I imagine and then listen to alien birds, insects and other creatures. I design and watch alien animals. I invent alien flowers and then decide if they’re poisonous, sweet smelling, or foul. How cool is that?

Today’s random writing question – What colour is the sand?

Random research.

If you choose to plan your novel with any level of detail, you’ll find you need to do some research before you start. Some stories need less research and some need more. Certain genres need more research otherwise the narrative doesn’t make sense. Imagine a crime novel set in Elizabethan England where the street urchin picks a pocket and reads the gentleman’s address from his wallet…

Genres such as fantasy and sci-fi require a certain amount of world building and mapping before you start, otherwise the world you create won’t make sense.

If you’ve ever played Dungeons and Dragons then you’ll understand. You’re stranded in the desert and night is falling, it’s getting cold, what do you do? Light a fire! What with? There’s no wood and you didn’t bring any matches. Your character is becoming dehydrated, what do you do? Have a drink! But the goblins punctured your only remaining waterskin… Research and planning mean you know where the water is, how to make matches, or make fire in your chosen environment, and how your created world world at a basic level. If you don’t know how it works then you can’t explore it.

Research also throws up more research as you write.

Last night I wrote a scene where Elois tears her coat, and it’s late Autumn so Winter is coming and she needs her coat. She lives on a low tech, agricultural world, and her colony has only been there a few years – they’re still discovering resources and can’t just pop to the shop for a new one. Her mother mends the tear, but the coat will no longer be waterproof…

Last night’s research was “How do I re-wax a coat?” followed by “How do I make the wax to re-wax a coat?”

The results were interesting!

Writing for a different audience.

I normally write for myself, for an adult audience. Not anything really “Adult” but there are hints and darkness in the stories I tell, and the concepts are maybe more adult in theme. I wouldn’t be overly happy with my own children, or their friends, reading most of my work, certainly not my youngest who is 10.

The first book I wrote with my own children in mind, was well received. The Map and the Stone is part of my Portal series and my kids loved it. Since then I’ve found my writing has changed and I am more aware o who I would want to be able to read each piece. I still tend towards the complex and more adult themes.

My self imposed challenge for the first part of 2014 is to write another book for that audience, for my youngest child and her contemporaries.

The house was warm and cosy. The bed was far too comfy and the curtains closed against the dark. Sunlight would filter softly through the fabric in a couple of hours and it was Elois Young’s twelfth birthday. She rolled onto her back, gazing at the fabric draped across the room, hiding the stained metal ceiling. She didn’t remember much about the crossing, only the bright lights that hurt her eyes when she woke from her long sleep, and it being chaos getting everyone into the right places for landing.

This one has no titles, no cover and is still very much in development at this stage, but I thought you might appreciate a snippet.

I’ll be writing every day from now until it’s finished, which should be around the end of March. Then it’ll be edits, and I hope to have this one released in time for Christmas 2014.

Planning

When I first started writing I was what is known as a “Pantser”. I’d have an idea, run with it and see where it went. I’d get to know characters as I went along, like making new friends. There’d be no plot, no story arc and the path through the narrative would be like fighting through jungle.

But it was fun!

The downside to that as a writing method, is when writer’s block hits then there’s no way forward. You just run into a brick wall and stop. Sometimes you can break through, or find a way round, but there is the risk that you’ve lost your way, that you’ve lost the thread of your story. You may have gone so far off track that you’ll never find it again.

Maybe you’re happy with that, and that’s perfectly OK. In many ways I am still more than happy writing like that, and I definitely feel that my writing flows better when left to roam, when not constrained by planning and plotting.

But sometimes I wonder if I can work to a plan. Sometimes I let life get in the way and writing gets pushed to the back of my mind and I get out of the habit. Or my ideas feel flat, small, or stalled. I need a kick start.

I’ve dug out a spreadsheet that I found a few years ago on a NaNoWriMo forum. I used it to plan Broken Promises, and I’ve used it a couple of times since. The spreadsheet guides you through a very loose plan for your novel. You can add as much or as little detail as you like, and when you get stuck you can refer back to your notes and, hopefully, get back into that writing groove! I’ve filled mine with notes for the YA/Scifi novel I’m working on. Working through the spreadsheet has made me pull out old notes, flesh out characters, think long and hard about where the novel is going, what I want to happen, and also the tone and pace of the finished piece. I’m finding it really helps.

I can’t find the original link to download the spreadsheet, if anyone knows where it came from, or who deserves the credit then please let me know and I’ll happily link to you and credit you for a marvellous resource. There’s a copy to download for free here.

Download Novel Outline Helper

Help yourself, it’s self explanatory and might just help steer you along with your next project.

Me? I’m off to tinker with what I have in there already and then start thinking about where to start writing. My self imposed schedule is to plan until the kids go back to school the day after tomorrow and then crack on with the writing. I have a day left for planning and plotting, then it’s 500 words a day, every day, until it’s done.