Eight months ago, I started writing a book. Over the next 3 months I wrote about 12,000 words that make up the beginning and some of the middle of the story. Then I got a bit stuck, the inspiration left me as I spent my evenings talking to fellow travellers, rather than just siting on a bunk with my computer writing.
Month: October 2014
Weekly Photo Challenge: Art of Covers
I know you aren’t meant to judge a book by it’s cover, but we do, of course we do. If I see a book with a plain black cover, stern white font and one item lit up with one colour tone then I’m going to avoid it because it’s either 50 Shades of Grey or one of it’s many knock-offs. I’m never going to read any of them. If it’s all ink with slightly curled font in a pastel tone, perhaps with cupcakes or stars around it, then that’s probably not a book for me either.
I love collections of anything grouped together as a subject for a picture, but particularly book or album covers. I like the differences and similarities in the layout, font, colour choices, images, sizing and all that sort of thing. And so I take pictures of these groupings and some of these can be seen below:
Weekly Photo Challenge: Cover Art
The brief for this weekly photo challenge is to think about an image that could be used as a cover for something – a magazine, an album, a book perhaps.
I’d like to make an album at some point. I know what the cover is going to be like, I’ve got it in my head, but I don’t want to reveal that yet. I’ve started writing a book and I’ve got an idea of what the cover of that might be, even if I’ve got no title and no definite conclusion to the story. So I’m not going to reveal that yet.
At some stage I’m going to put together my photo journal of Felt Sherlock‘s travels and I think this should be the cover:
More than words
Aren’t words brilliant? You can use them for everything. You can take them and combine them and shape them into whatever you want, however you want. They can give you power, they can give you humility, they can give you insight, explanation, beauty.
I was reading over a book that I want to read to my class – The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett – and early on, Tiffany, our 9 year old heroine is thinking about the word sussuration and how much she likes it. It’s the sound of wind through leaves or grass and it alerts Tiffany to something odd that’s about to happen. I love that sussuration is included in a children’s book. Would you get a word like that in the rainbow fairy series of books? Would you get a word like that in one of Katie Price’s children’s books? In Beast Quest? Or even in Harry Potter?
Gimme a head with hair…
I was ill last week with a horrible bug. I’ll not go into details but it wasn’t pleasant. And whenever I’m ill something horrendous happens to my face and my hair. All nutrients and good stuff that get whizzed around by the little red and white blood cells get re-deployed to fight whatever is battering me. I picture it like this:
If you want to understand how it works, then this instructional video will definitely help. Despite watching days, weeks, probably months of House, ER, Grey’s Anatomy and all that jazz, this is still how I picture the inside of my body. I love those red blood cells. I’m far too susceptible to TV programmes.
Anyway, by Saturday I was almost feeling normal and the only way I could make myself fell almost human again was to get my hair cut. I’ve been growing it since last January, only having a small trim and getting my fringe cut in, so that’s what I planned to have done again. Or get it cut really short, one or the other.
It started reasonably well, with the bleach going on to boost my red and blue streaks, the brown going on to sort out all the grey roots. I chatted to the lady, she seemed quite busy. I said that I was going to try and keep it long and to get some long layers in.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Dreamy
Who knows where the time goes?
So the letters came…
“…So they went down and they sat on the pier
He said I bet you got a boyfriend but I don’t care
I got no one to send a letter to
Would you mind if I sent one back here to you?”
“So the letters came from an army camp
In California then Vietnam
And he told her of his heart
It might be love and all of the things he was so scared of
He said when it’s getting kinda rough over here
I think of that day sittin’ down at the pier
And I close my eyes and see your pretty smile
Don’t worry but I won’t be able to write for awhile…”
Travellin’ Soldier by The Dixie Chicks
When I was younger, one of my favourite things about school was being able to write in ink with a fountain pen. It was brilliant. Making the first mark on the paper, knowing that it would stay forever, blemishing the crisp white sheet in the best possible way. The scratch of the nib across the paper; the occasional blot if a hair got caught in the fine metal, dragging an extra bit of ink with it as it moved across the page. I had at least three fountain pens at any one point – one for blue or black ink as the school required and the other two with purple, pink, turquoise, red green, whatever I could get my hands on from WHSmith. I know I wasn’t the only 13 yr old to do this, but I wonder if it happens much any more.
I hated writing thank you letters, especially after Christmas, on Boxing Day, being sat down with a list of what I got to diligently copy out a seemingly endless number of letters to aunts and uncles and grandparents to thank them for their gifts. There were probably less than ten to write, but it felt like forever was being taken up, precious time that I could have been using my ‘My Little Pony’ fashion catwalk, or chemistry set or Duck piano…
Writing letters is not fashionable any more, sending things in the post often gets forgotten – my niece’s birthday card was in my bag for three days before I posted it this afternoon and her birthday is today (sorry!) – people don’t like the cost of stamps, the lack of instantaneous acknowledgement of their input into the world, the delay in response. We live in an instant world now. Who has time to wait for ink to dry? We have twitter, facebook, snapchat, instagram, wordpress and many more to get our instant fix. But what is there to leave behind with those?
Over hills and far away... 