Just returned from the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School, after a fabulous week of excellent courses and getting to catch up with writer friends, with whom, for the rest of the year, I stay in contact with via social media. Lovely as that is, you can’t beat getting together face to face!
So tonight’s post is all on the theme of coming back to earth and I also look at Books That Should Have Been Written as a lighthearted CFT post. There is nothing anywhere that says you HAVE to come back to earth with a bump or several!
Facebook – General – and Chandler’s Ford Today
My CFT post this week is called Books That Should Have Been Written and, if you like puns, this is definitely for you! I also take a peek at irony.
Back from a wonderful week at #Swanwick70. The highlight of my writing year is the week at the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School. Why?
I meet up with writer friends that for the rest of the year, I keep in contact with by social media. I make new friends. I learn loads from the courses, which is never a bad thing. Oh and I sold a few books in the Book Room too!
Back down to earth then but with perhaps a more gentle bump! My CFT post this week is a lighthearted one called Books That Should Have Been Written. Contributions welcome in the CFT comments box!
Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again
Had a lovely time at #Swanwick70. Really enjoyed reading three of my 100-word stories from From Light to Dark and Back Again at the Prose Open Mic hosted by #JenniferCWilson. Flash fiction works really well at these things (as indeed does poetry – I missed the Poetry Open MIc night as it clashed with the Literary Quiz and I do love a good quiz but I hope all who took part in the Open Mic slots had a fab time).
Images of Swanwick were taken by me at last year’s event. Such a lovely place to be!
Fairytales with Bite – A toZ of Fairytales Part 2
So on to the second part of this series…
D = Determination. The best fairytale characters I know have this trait in buckets (other suitably large utensils are available, as they say…!). They can vary from determination not to be ground down (Cinderella) to determination to survive (Hansel and Gretel). Determination can keep a character going when the world and its dog/unicorn/dragon seem to be out to “get them”. Determination separates the wolf (big, bad or otherwise) from the sheep.
E = Energy. Can be topped up by determination but your characters are going to need plenty of energy to get them through whatever frightful horrors you’re putting them through. Not only are there the obvious physical needs to think about, but bring in how your characters top up their mental strength. They will need plenty of that too.
F = Fairies/Fantastic Creatures. The great irony with fairytales is you can have them without fairies in (Little Red Riding Hood), but when you do use them in your stories, give them plenty to do and ensure not everything is solved with a wave of the magic wand. Your fairy character still has to work for/struggle to get success, even if that is only implied in your story. A wave of the wand may be what they do to remedy a situation or modify it (Sleeping Beauty) but there should still be issues for the characters in your story to overcome. Otherwise there is no conflict and without that, the story vanishes. Fantastic creatures can vary from animals to other magical beings (including your own invented ones) but we still need to have some sense of what they are like and where they fit in to the world you’ve created.
More next time…
This World and Others – Coming Back to Earth
But how do your characters come back to earth? They’ve experienced perhaps great adventures, now there’s a lull in the action as they come to terms with what they’ve just gone through. How do they handle that? I love The Lord of the Rings for many reasons but the portrayal of Frodo becoming more and more tired as the stress of what he has to do becomes more and more of a burden is realistically shown. On the assumption your characters are not super heroes who never get tired or out of sorts, how do your characters handle setbacks, tiredness, illness etc?
How do they pick themselves up from “earth” to get back to their “mission”? Who helps them and how? Plenty to think about there!
Goodreads Blog – Coming Back to Earth
Have just got back from my annual highlight – the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School.
Had a wonderful time discussing and learning about all things connected to the worlds of books and stories. What’s not to like about that?
But, as ever with these things, you come back home again and you feel shattered and a bit flat. (You take in far more than you know you are when you are there and then I think the physical/mental tiredness of that hits you later).
So what can help you perk up again?
Why, nothing but a good book of course!
And the lovely thing about being a writer? You need to read widely, in and out of genre, to help feed your own imagination in any case, but you also get to write the books and with a lot of hard work, and some luck, get them out there.
So happy reading and writing!
Allison Symes: Collected Works 