My JOURNALS for CREATIVE WRITERS are becoming more and more popular. The book, with a custom cover, has 275 blank, lined pages for your writing. Tucked into the margins of each page are famous quotes from authors, writers, playwrights, poets and actors, to inspire you to WRITE!
The unique feature of these Journals/Handbooks is that I have included a ‘how to’ section (6) to get you started whether it’s for story telling, fiction, play writing, or poetry.
And don’t forget there are four custom covers to choose from; two for women, one for men, and this one for the student,teacher, writer. The quotes were customized and hand picked by me. They are available on Amazon. Keywords: journals,sugarek
I just put a load of laundry in to my 21st century machine that wants to know my every wish for the perfect wash. What temperature do I want? hot? cold? energy saver? Or perhaps cool? One rinse or two? How long do I want to wash my semi-dirty clothes? Do I want to wash them gently or harshly?
As I loaded my machine, one sweater would not sink into the energy-saving, cool, one rinse, water and for a second I looked around my (oh so very pleasant), laundry room for my ‘stick’. Do you remember the stick your mother used to push down the clothes into the wringer washing machine? Made of wood and squeaky clean the stick was used onlyfor that purpose; pushing down clothes into the water and Tide detergent. I think ours was the old handle from a toilet plunger. And, in the case of my mother, hell would rain down if you borrowed that stick for any other purpose. Continue reading “Nostalgia…through the wringer”
This author is one of my current favorites. Rich stories with believable characters, it’s a pleasure for me to be able to interview Jodi Thomas.
Q. Where do you write? Do you have a special room, shed, barn, special space for your writing? Or tell us about your ‘dream’ work space.
A. I write all over the place. I have a great office at West Texas A&M University with all my covers on the wall. I have an office upstairs in my home with one wall of bookshelves and three walls of windows and I have a tiny office out back off the garden where I’m putting together the plot for a new series.
Q. Do you have any special rituals when you sit down to write? (a neat work space, sharpened #2 pencils, legal pad, cup of tea, glass of brandy, favorite pajamas, etc.)
A. No. I tend to work in two to three hour time periods. I get up to refill my drink every hour—diet coke if it’s warm, hot tea if it’s cold. I always open with what I worked on the day before. If I have to be away from my work more than four or five days, I start from the beginning. Usually spend at least half my time rewriting before I start writing.
Q. Could you tell us something about yourself that we might not already know?
A. I named my youngest son Cole after the hero in ASHES IN THE WIND. Don’t tell him.
Q. Do you have a set time each day to write or do you write only when you are feeling creative?
A. Hey, I could zone out of reality at any moment and write. Don’t believe in ‘feeling creative’. I think of creativity as more like a muscle than a talent. The more you use it
Another favorite!
the more creative you become.
Q. What’s your best advice to other writers for overcoming procrastination?
A. Hardest part of writing is getting your butt in the chair. It’s not easy. I sometimes tell myself, “just 15 minutes tonight, I’m tired’ Three hours later I look up. Once I’m in the story, I’m in the story and don’t want to leave.
Set goals—-5 pages a day 5 days a week.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ DON’T MISS UPCOMING BLOGS featuring INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! April’s author is Jodi Thomas. Coming Soon! Authors Barbara Taylor Bradford and Dorothea Benton Frank. To receive a free audio book and my sign up! On the home page, enter your email address. I love comments! Take the time to write one at the bottom of the post. Thanks!
Five out of 5 quills (ranking) A Review ** ‘Death in a Dacron Sail’
It was a real pleasure to discover a new author….well, actually she found me..and we’ve become friends. But our friendship doesn’t stand in the way of an honest review and telling my readers how much I enjoyed this story. N.A. Granger is a crisp and clean writer. In her second book she takes her readers to the coast of Maine where little girls are turning up missing and then found dead; the latest wrapped in a Dacron sail and washed ashore.
A. Someone who makes you forget you’re reading a book, whose writing makes you care about the characters and what happens to them, sometimes so much so that you ignore plot holes and stay up half the night to finish it and then feel sad because there’s not any more book left.
Q. and the all important: What does the process of going from “no book” to “finished book” look like?
A. For me, writing a book (and I’m referring to series now, so I already have a cast of characters and a place) starts with an “aha” idea. I see or hear or read something, somewhere, and it just clicks. It can be as little as a single word, but it’s the core idea that drives all the rest. That doesn’t mean I jump on it immediately and start writing. Usually I’ve got a couple of books at different stages (draft, revisions, edits, proofing), so I’m busy.
But then there’s the moment when the characters for the new book start speaking their lines, and you know the book is coming alive. Sometimes that comes at an inconvenient moment (like when I have a deadline for something else), but I’m a strong believer in the subconscious, which is busy churning away even when I don’t know it.
Of course, it’s still a long slog to get all the words on paper. I may have a fuzzy idea of the story arc, but like many people, I often have a panic moment in the middle when I think that I don’t have enough story to fill up all those empty pages before the end. So far I’ve muddled through.
Then I ship it off to my editor and forget all about it until he or she tells me that I have to change any number of things and I can’t remember why I said them in the first place. Editing is not my favorite part of the process, even though I know it’s necessary.
Q. How has your life experiences influenced your writing/stories?
A. I’ve had a career no one would describe as linear. I have an undergrad degree plus a Ph.D in Art History, and an MBA in Finance, and you’ll notice I’m not working in either field. But almost everything I’ve done, from providing advisory services to a major city, to working as a fundraiser for a library/museum, to being a free-lance genealogist, has found its way into one book or another. I think it makes a difference to a reader’s experience with a book if you can insert authentic details. Anybody can do research, but it’s the little things that make a story feel real.
Q. Where/when do you first discover your characters?
Sheila Connolly
A. Sometimes I borrow from real people (some but not all of whom know it). For example, the main characters in the Orchard series are based on a woman I worked with for several years, and who is still a friend, and the guy we bought a house from in Pennsylvania, who continued to be a neighbor for years. That may sound a little odd, but the first possesses a wonderful sense of calmness even in the fact of difficulties, and the second was one of the nicest guys I’ve met—he’d do anything for you, and he was sincere about it. In the Museum Mysteries I had to use another amazing woman I worked with, because her history and her knowledge of Philadelphia are essential. She’s in on the secret now and is one of my biggest promoters. On the other, the hunky FBI agent in the Museum Mysteries is my own invention—and my ideal man (as I may have mentioned to my husband a time or two). Sometimes for the protagonist I use myself—a smarter, younger, better version of me.
Q. What inspired your story/stories ?
A. Places, mainly. The Orchard Mysteries are set in a house that one of my ancestors built, in a small New England town where I have multiple generations of those ancestors—I stumbled on it when I was looking for a bed and breakfast in the area. I worked in Center City Philadelphia in a major institution, and I thought people would enjoy seeing what goes on behind the scenes (the Museum series) while my sleuth goes about solving murders. I also wanted to try setting a traditional mystery in an urban setting. And for
Pub in the village
Ireland…it’s a challenge to portray it without making it too cute, but there is a strong sense of community and connection there that works very well in solving mysteries.
Q. Have you? Or do you want to write in another genre`?
A. I started out trying to write romance, because I knew it was the largest market, but I wasn’t very good at it. A few years ago I tried my hand at a rather tongue-in-cheek romantic suspense, Once She Knew, that I self-published. That was fun to write, with a lot of snarky dialogue and a plot that involved saving the First Lady’s life. Then in 2013 I pulled a book off from one of those dusty shelves that most writers have—something I’d written years ago, a romance with ghosts, set in an area I know well and featuring a heck of a lot of my dead relatives. I self-published it as Relatively Dead. It sold well, so my agent said, why not do another? Which became Seeing the Dead, last year. Now I’m working on a third one in that series, which looks at the Salem witch trials from a different perspective (and yes, I have a number of ancestors who were accused of witchcraft in Salem).
Q. Is there anything else you’d like our readers to know?
A. I love what I do. It’s like I’ve been preparing for this all my life, but it took a long time before I thought I had something to say. I can’t believe I get to do this for a living, because it sure doesn’t seem like work.
Click here to read Part I of this interview
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I was sorting through my library of over 500 books and came across, of all things, my ‘baby book’. Inside I found more photos of my mother, Violet, (Wild Violets, a novel) during her flapper days in San Francisco. Most exciting was to find this newspaper clipping featuring her on the team of a semi-pro, female basketball team. Sadly, I did not find the article. She saved enough of her earnings with the winning team to buy a bar and grill on Fulton Street in SF.
This photo is from a costume party she held at her bar.
And this in her camping/hunting garb. No surprise, it resembles what the heroines of the day in Hollywood wore.
Here she is sitting on the porch of the cabin. She used to laugh and quip: ‘I had to sit all prim and proper because the zipper in my pants had broken’. Check out her boots.
Last but not least, here is a studio photo of Violet (on the right) with her sister, Gladys. She was a stunner and never wanted for men…always buzzing around and not always a good thing.
If you want to read more please check out my novel based on her life as a flapper during the hot jazz, cold gin, dance all night road houses, speakeasy days in San Francisco. Available in e-books and audio.
Synopsis:
After documenting my mother’s colorful childhood in the primordial forests of Washington State, I wrote a story of Violet as a grown woman with children of her own. She has left her small home town in the Pacific Northwest to pursue a successful basketball career and with her earnings, she buys a bar and grill. She is a ‘flapper’ in every sense of the word; working all day and playing all night. While her teenage daughter raises her seven year old son, Violet is out on the town with her latest man de’jour. Dressed in her signature red dress, she is the toast of the town and owner of a speakeasy where she hosts the cream of San Francisco’s society, city politicians, bishops, and Hollywood celebrities.
But there is an underbelly of corruption, grifters, the mob, excess, and neglect in Violet’s life. Her two children are an afterthought and she chooses her men over their well being time and time again. Their childhood needs are always trumped by her self-indulgent desires. The two children are possessions that she can put down or pick up again on a whim, showing them off to her current beau or friends and then forgotten. And when they get in her way, she gets rid of them.
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This is my favorite to date from this prolific author. She writes an Orchard mystery series as well as a museum series but the ones I wait for are the County Cork (Ireland) mysteries.
Without the juicy murder, this book would stand just for the history of the musicians, young and old, that keep the music alive. Back in the day, when Old Mick Sullivan was still alive, Sullivan’s pub was known as a magnet for impromptu ‘jam sessions’ attracting famous and obscure musicians alike. In Connolly’s latest story fate brings the musicians back to the new owner, Maura’s, pub but murder is lurking in the back room.
This story has a tight plot with fully developed, rich characters that you will continue to love from the first two books. There’s Maura, the American, who has inherited the ancient pub from a life long friend of her grandmother’s. She’s not certain how she landed in the backwaters of Ireland and isn’t even certain she should stay. Old timer Billie, a fixture in the pub, who sits in ‘his chair’ by the fire and sips his pint while telling stories of the old days to whoever will listen. (Young) Mick, Rose, and Jimmy who work for Maura. All lovable characters that the reader will quickly care about. A must read!
I recommend that you read these in order, (#1-‘Buried in a Bog’) as there is a strong story thread.
Don’t miss my interview with Sheila coming soon!
http://sheilaconnolly.com/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ DON’T MISS UPCOMING BLOGS featuring INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! E. Van Johnson is our March author!
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I have used several artists, depending upon the project. I have had wonderful response from my illustrators (free-lance) and as a team we get the job done!
David White has done several covers for me, most prominent and recent the newest in the World of Murder series.
The illustrator for my children’s books is brilliant in a different way. He reads the story as I write it with clear instructions (from me) on where I want the illustrations placed in my story book. Then he creates all these different perspectives that I would never have dreamed about. They are truly wonderful.
So I thought I would share these tips, with you, about working with another artist. Hopefully they are helpful as you work with your ‘image-maker’.
Tip #1: Be patient.
Tip #2: They are artists, much like you, so they are sensitive about their art.
Tip #3: Don’t push them; they have a time-table that might not be yours. I do state my time-table in the beginning of a project and get some assurance that they will try to meet it.
Tip #4: Be patient.
Tip #5: Be certain that you give them at least two credits in your publication, book or script. I routinely credit them on the back (exterior) cover and on one of the first pages in the book.
Tip #6: Pay them the most that you can budget. Remember the old adage: ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’.
Tip #7: Because I am on a budget; I state my rates (per size of image) right up front. Be honest.
Tip #8: Be patient.
Tip #9: Don’t be afraid to use students at an art school. I have used them (or graduates) from the Savannah College of Art and Design. They are fresh, have the newest technology, and are the most excited by the project. Do I occasionally meet a ‘prima dona’? Who, without any work history, without any credits of any kind, without any life experience, behaves as if they work for a big city design firm, expecting top dollar and……. are confused when you don’t see it that way. (sigh) Yes, I have!
Tip #10: Try to be as clear as you can on what you want in the image. Don’t be afraid to tweak the work as you and your illustrator work together. My illustrators appreciate the second set of eyes.
Tip #11: Pay the illustrator promptly. As I have my illustrator working as I write; when I receive final images I pay him as we go along. I don’t make them wait until the project is finished to be paid.
Tip #12: Be patient.
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DON’T MISS UPCOMING BLOGS featuring INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! E. Van Johnson will be our January author!
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One day I stumbled across the true story of a young entrepreneur who didn’t let his age, or nay-sayers, or haters stand in his way. I was so inspired by this young man and his courage to be different, a play script was born. Since I was writing my series of short plays/small casts, it was a perfect fit (pun intended) to write a one act play about this subject.
Knitting socks for a school business fair, he sold out and found himself with a fist-full of sock orders. The media caught hold of the story and the young man was offered a deal with a chain of department stores. Here is his story.
Synopsis: Favorite thing to wear? Orange socks. Ever since Henry was old enough to wear socks, rain or shine, he would take them off at the first opportunity…..unless they were orange. So his mother dyed all of his socks orange. Now at age fourteen, Henry has a school project in social studies. Create and market a product for the school’s business Fair. The obvious choice? Orange Socks. So he asks his mother, who is a knitter, to teach him how to knit socks. Little does Henry and his mother know but this is just the beginning of Henry’s business career. 1f. 1m.
DON’T MISS UPCOMING BLOGS featuring INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! E. Van Johnson will be my January author.
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I was going through some old photos to update my gallery here on my site and I came across this wonderful production shot of Latrelle Bright, as Billie Holiday. The Renaissance Guild in San Antonio, Texas featured “Scent of Magnolia” in their OneAct Series back in…..gosh, I want to say 2003. Originally I was the playwright, Latrelle was directing it and we had an actress who could sing. We lost our actress so Latrelle (an accomplished actor) stepped in as Billie Holiday and I stepped up as director. Happy Accident time! She was fabulous! Sang all of Billie’s songs acappella. Who knew she had such a lovely voice? Standing “O’s” every performance with lots of tears from the audience. (A writer’s dream)
Latrelle is now a happy resident of Chicago (where it all started for me with this script; funny how that worked out) and is pursuing her teaching career in the performing arts.
My JOURNALS for CREATIVE WRITERS are becoming more and more popular. The book, with a custom cover, has 275 blank, lined pages for your writing. Tucked into the margins of each page are famous quotes from authors, writers, playwrights, poets and actors, to inspire you to WRITE!
One day I stumbled across the true story of a young entrepreneur who didn’t let his age, or nay-sayers, or haters stand in his way. I was so inspired by this young man and his courage to be different, a 