Jo Robinson's Blog, page 36
April 25, 2015
Christoph Fischer – Author Feature
My wonderful guest over on Feed My Reads South Africa is brilliant author Christoph Fischer.
Originally posted on Feed My Reads South Africa:
This week I asked a favourite author of mine a couple of questions, which he kindly answered even while in the middle of moving house. Christoph Fischer was born in Germany, near the Austrian border, as the son of a Sudeten-German father and a Bavarian mother. Not a full local in the eyes and ears of his peers he developed an ambiguous sense of belonging and home in Bavaria. He moved to Hamburg in pursuit of his studies and to lead a life of literary indulgence. After a few years he moved on to the UK where he now lives in a small town in West Wales. He and his partner have three Labradoodles to complete their family.
Christoph worked for the British Film Institute, in Libraries, Museums and for an airline. ���The Luck of The Weissensteiners��� was published in November 2012; ���Sebastian��� in May 2013 and The Black Eagle���
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April 24, 2015
World Earth Day – A tribute to the mountains and a bit of water.
Originally posted on Smorgasbord - Variety is the spice of life:
The world has so many faces, some that we see everyday, those that take some finding and those that are hidden away.
I am so grateful for the gift of sight. I cannot imagine a life where I had not seen a mountain, a lake, river, sea and the amazing creatures that inhabit those environments.
When David and I got married it was in the Snowdonia National Park in Wales and I had spent the previous two years exploring the mountains in my time off from work.�� David was an experienced mountaineer and keen hiker so over the next twenty years or so we spent most of our holidays in various parts of the world at altitude. Including Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Switzerland, Austria, France, New Zealand, United States and of course Spain.
It is not just the mountains and the views that stay in my mind but some of the���
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The Latest Progress Report for The Guardian
I love reading short stories. They’re definitely very popular too – I’ve met a couple of people who hardly ever read anything else.
Originally posted on Have We Had Help?:
If you read the lovely Jo Robinson���s post yesterday on getting bored with your current WIP, https://litworldinterviews.wordpress.com/2015/04/23/do-you-love-your-book/ all is not lost. It might just be that you are nearing the end of the particular WIP, even though you don���t realize it.
What do I mean? Read on���
***
I���ve finally realized after many sleepless nights and endless hours of thought that my current science fiction WIP ��� The Guardian in all likelihood will end up as a long short story. In fact, the more I think about it ��� it���s a given. Each story always dictates its own length. Despite what many may think, the writer often has no say in the matter. Why? Because once we start a story in a specific way, it inevitably guides you towards where it needs to end, regardless of what you want. In other words, the story is in charge, not you.
In���
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Motivation of the Indie Author
Originally posted on Legends of Windemere:
Yahoo Image Search
An interesting question was asked about indie authors and motivation.�� Without a boss of any kind, we make our own deadlines that are about as flexible as an overcooked noodle. It gets even harder when the person is a full-time author.�� So how does one stay on track as a solitary organism operation?�� Cloning?�� Train mice to do your bidding?�� Extra wives/husbands?�� Removing all feasible distractions from TV to ceiling fans to any length of string?�� Let���s see some ideas.
A blog can help by making public goals that are either weekly or monthly.�� This creates a sense of accountability since you, hopefully, have people reading your blog.�� They will know if you slack off or aren���t writing at all.�� I would call this the ���forging of guilt and shame��� path.�� At least you try to avoid those two things.
Make a personal deadline for things.�� This���
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Afternoon video – It has been a busy week and need a nap…..
Originally posted on Smorgasbord - Variety is the spice of life:
This has been circulating this week and I know the feeling.. a nap is called for..but unfortunately not as cute as these guys���
Meet Sally Cronin – The Black Sheep.
Originally posted on Daily Echo:
With great pleasure I welcome Sally Cronin as my guest today. Many will already know Sally through Smorgasbord as one of the most supportive of bloggers, where she generously hosts writers, musicians and artists of all kinds, as well as sharing her own knowledge and humour.
Like many, I imagine, I had done little more than read her blog and glance at her bio before I first clicked the ���follow��� button. It was initially the variety of the content that had attracted my attention, after all. Some few facts registered and stuck, but it was only in reading the blog itself that these facts took on a three dimensional quality and Sally herself became a person rather than just an avatar on a screen.
Even then, it was not until Sally invited me to be a guest on Smorgasbord that I actually took the time to look her up��� and���
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Word Crimes…
Originally posted on 
April 23, 2015
Letter R The April A to Z Blogging Challenge #AtoZChallenge
A massive thank you to the fabulous author Luccia Gray for this spotlight for African Me & Satellite TV. I love every one of your words – thank you Luccia!
Originally posted on Rereading Jane Eyre :
April Author Spotlight 2015
Letter ���R��� is for Jo Robinson, author of African Me��& Satellite TV
��
Why do I recommend African Me��& Satellite TV?
Where to begin telling you why I loved African Me��& Satellite TV? Perhaps because it���s the only novel which has brought a tear to my eye, or perhaps because Jo has summarised the heart-wrenching story of Africa, or even more of Colonisation, in a beautiful and moving novel.
In the true Postcolonial style, like Lessing or Gordimer, Jo gives a voice to the minor character in her novel, because she knows that real history is not made up of the names of Kings and Queens, but of the names of anonymous,��apparently secondary, previously unseen and unheard characters, like Christopher, a seemingly��mentally retarded gardener, who acts as a catalyst for the moral awakening of Suzette, and her whole town.
I suffered as I read���
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Do You Love Your Book?
My first book took the longest time to write because I spent a lot of time angsting over every tiny little detail of it, and backtracking all the time, although angst or not, I loved every step of the process. These days I write much faster. A couple of times though, I���ve started a story and it���s taken days just to get a paragraph down. I���m a stubborn old mule though so I generally used to try and persevere, and force myself on. Not anymore though. Even though I���m one of the write every day tribe whether you feel like it or not, and I do write every day, I don���t see any point in carrying on with writing something I don���t love just because I started it.
It got me wondering how many writers try to force themselves to write something that they really don���t want to write, thinking���
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April 17, 2015
A Bony Fido Human & The Siren Sounds
Have you met Lord David Prosser? No? Well here we go – follow the master love hugger of the world. :)
Originally posted on barsetshirediaries:
Sunday April 5th 2015 Easter Sunday.
This morning���s time is so close to yesterday���s I can ���t help wonder whether there is significance��to them. They are 7 minutes apart and it could easily have taken me that much longer to get to sleep.The one thing I do note is that it���s less than an hour and a half since I turned my light out ergo Naff all sleep again. I know some people would suggest I just stayed in bed. But, I had woken before that time as I had yesterday, and had stayed in bed at that point, still tired. When I woke up his time, I was wide awake and wouldn���t have got back to sleep staying in bed. There���s nothing to say I won���t have to indulge myself in 50 winks later though. That���s allowing for inflation and a cost of living rise.
Obviously there is a���
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