I'm now on Youtube!

Check this out.... I did some cutting and pasting and a lot of polishing to make my slideshow shine. I hope you all like it.

J

Whitby Goth Weekend October 2009

Back from an amazing weekend! My much beloved and I had the most amazing weekend. I’ve never been photographed so much in my life. As we walked down the street, people kept stopping us and asking if they could take our pictures. Now I know how celebrities feel.... It was wonderful!

Wow... I've an award.

I've been give this lovely award by Deb so I would love to pass it on to :

With ink from the Pink Pen

Akasha

Alan

Kat

Anton

K.C

And I would also like to say a big welcome to all my new followers and hope you will all drop in for a chat soon and introduce yourself to us all.

The Best Blog Award rules are: 1) To accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award and his/her blog link. 2) Pass the award to other bloggers that you have recently discovered and think are great! Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

Best wishes,

J

Making sure you know, who’s who...

As usual at work in my lunch break, I have been busy scribbling down notes and ideas for my second novel, which is coming together much better than my first idea.

In a book I’ve been reading called ‘How to write a mi££ion’ , the writer Orson Scott Card gives some interesting points on creating characters. As he puts it, not all characters are created equal. It’s hard to measure the exact importance of a character— but there are three general levels of importance, and distinctions that can be useful.
1)Walk ons and Placeholders: Just background people meant to lend realism or perform a simple function and then disappear.
2) Minor Characters: these make a difference, but your reader shouldn’t become involved with them emotionally—either negatively or positively. The reader doesn’t expect them to keep showing up even though their desires and actions may add to the plotline, but play no role in shaping the ongoing flow to the story.
3) Major Players: These characters that the readers must care about—Love them, hate them, or fear them; your readers need to know what makes them tick. These characters are the driving force behind your story, so you, the writer must get to know all you can about them before your reader can fully understand them.

This is why it’s important to make sure you have a full rounded character before you even begin writing your novel as it is the only way to make sure they come alive on the page for your reader.

This weekend, my much beloved and I are off to Whitby for the Goth Festival. I shall post all my pictures when I get back.

Have a great weekend and get plenty of writing done too.

J

If you want to know what it's like to be a new writer with a publishing deal then read Collette blog and learn about what reality brings.

Cally Taylor explains to Collette, how far from the dreams of being a new writer life is like in reality.

May I add my best wishes to Cally too and thank Collette for an interesting posting.

J

Guess who a Saint Now?

Yesterday, my much beloved and I said goodbye to our Cousin. While sitting waiting for the hearse to arrive we got into conversation with a dear friend of our cousin.

The lovely lady helps out at Saint Mary’s Church in Whitby, North Yorkshire. She smiled soft while recounting her tale. “You won’t believe this, but we had a couple who came in, and asked me where they could find the grave of Saint Dracula.”

Yes, you read that right!

Saint Dracula! I wonder just what miracle Dracula would have perform to have won his sainthood, but there again it makes you wonder just which book or film they had been watching to see him as saintly.

I do know the church has a sign up to say that Dracula isn’t buried in the grounds, but it does makes you wonder just who else these people would give a sainthood to, scary, don't you think so?

Inspiration came knock!

I can tell you all now that inspiration was kind enough to make a home visit and I'm busy putting together a new idea. My dear husband was busy on Ebay when he made a throw-a-way comment which sent me into a spin with notebook and pencil, and hopeful this may lead to a great book.

J