#IWSG – Reading Rave

March 3, 2021 by Roland Clarke

Opening my overflowing Inbox is enough to remind me of a horrific backlog – and what lies ahead…especially as typing is getting harder as is reading.

Gaming is manageable if I only need a mouse and simple keyboard commands.

Editing my novel, Fevered Fuse is toughest. I wish I had the money for an editor who could finish the novel for me. My Unfinished Opus? A pity about the drafted sequels in the Snowdon Shadows series.

Urge/remorse/punishment – list current/final (?) status…the fruitless/failed mission ahead: Fates Maelstrom (v5 so near yet…); Seeking A Knife (v1 to rewrite); Ruined Retreat (v1) + the blogged novellas: Azure Spark, Custody Chain. So much promise undelivered.

Plus, other drafted but unfinished projects, unrelated to my Welsh creations.

An abandoned legacy, which my family shows no interest in. Why bother?

No longer Insecure but Immobile.

Is this farewell?

My final monthly Insecure Writer’s Support Group post? Perhaps.

Answers are not needed, although the Ninja Captain might post a comment. Thanks Alex J. Cavanaugh for all you do – and thanks for creating the Insecure Writer’s Support Group without whom my writing would be non-existent…not even a legacy of any sort. I just wish I’d helped you guys.

So, don’t forget to visit real writers via the IWSG site, and for better answers to this month’s challenging question.

Insecure Writer’s Support Group

Although the question is optional, I’m tempted to answer.

March 3 question – Everyone has a favourite genre or genres to write. But what about your reading preferences? Do you read widely or only within the genre(s) you create stories for? What motivates your reading choice?

A few months ago, I thought my reading was over – for various reasons, from losing my prime reading situation to problems turning pages of any sort.

I was almost at the end of a book which would have been my read of 2020. Instead, Madeline Miller’s Circe remains unfinished on my desk.

Then I remembered the pleasure of listening to good readers and favourite stories.

Sadly, my UK Audible account is no longer accessible – even all the books I’d paid for. With finances strained, I can’t afford to start a US Audible account.

But there’s You Tube and great sites to visit. No Circe though.

Anyway preferences. Although I’m selective in the genres I read, my choice is varied – Mysteries, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Historical and points in between. My current writing is a Police Detective series or was. I have written drafts in the other read genres – although my historical attempt is Eagle Crossing, an Alternative History that all began by asking, “What would have happened if Leif Eriksson had settled Vinland permanently in 1000 AD?”

My recent audiobooks included: classics like Frankenstein and Dracula – though I rarely read modern Horror – Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology, various Dick Francis thrillers/mysteries, the Chronicles of Narnia, the Hitchhikers Guide ‘trilogy’, the Assassins Creed novelizations, and finally a wonderful discovery, which was on my vast Want To Read list:-

Leigh Bardugo’s Shadow and Bone Trilogy and from there the Grishaverse…coming to Netflix in April. And her final book in the third series, Rule of Wolves is launched on March 30th.

I could write more…if I weren’t about to miss the IWSG deadline, or my fingers weren’t as uncooperative as my brain, or my keyboard/mouse wasn’t glitching ever since our kitten ran across it.

Maybe I need to revert to Dragon…if my speech wasn’t garbled, or animals played with cables.

Audiobooks – Adventures – Alternatives – Animals – Acceptance

The awesome co-hosts for the March 3 posting of the IWSG are Sarah – The Faux Fountain Pen Jacqui Murray, Chemist Ken, Victoria Marie Lees, Natalie Aguirre, and JQ Rose!

How can I be repetitive asking you to agree these guys are the best? Especially as they all have concerns, fears, and insecurities. But they struggle on, so ticker-tape applause for all of them – plus toasts with the best brew available.

Purpose of IWSG: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

Every month, we announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG post. These questions may prompt you to share advice, insight, a personal experience or story. Include your answer to the question in your IWSG post or let it inspire your post if you are struggling with something to say.

Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer – aim for a dozen new people each time – and return comments. This group is all about connecting!

Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

Every month, we announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG post. These questions may prompt you to share advice, insight, a personal experience, or story. Include your answer to the question in your IWSG post or let it inspire your post if you are struggling with something.

For more on the IWSG monthly post and links to other participants visit:

https://www.insecurewriterssupportgroup.com/p/iwsg-sign-up.html

#IWSG – Amistad

February 3, 2021 by Roland Clarke

Conscience preys on me, and my reluctance to lose my IWSG contacts keeps me making brief appearances – even this late entry.

Is this monthly Insecure Writer’s Support Group post an attempt to stay connected? Should I accept this as a vain attempt to salve my conscience? Could it be an exercise for my brain – or a diversion from urgent work?

Answers are not needed, although the Ninja Captain might post a comment. Thanks Alex J. Cavanaugh in advance – and thanks for creating the Insecure Writer’s Support Group without whom my writing would be non-existent.

Don’t forget to visit via the IWSG site for better answers to this month’s challenging question.

Insecure Writer’s Support Group

As usual, I need to remind myself the question is optional, but why not attempt an answer.

February 3 question – Blogging is often more than just sharing stories. It’s often the start of special friendships and relationships. Have you made any friends through the blogosphere?

The Cambridge Dictionary defines a friend as:

a person who you know well and who you like a lot, but who is usually not a member of your family

In this digital/internet age, I suspect physical contact is not a requirement – Covid-19 exacerbating such contact now. So, level of contact is a key factor.

I often call my writer/blogging colleagues ‘friends’ and I hope you see yourselves as such – well, those I interact with regularly–

Like some of my fellow Voyager anthology colleagues.

Like those of you who encourage my WEP/IWSG entries – the Sparkle Anwyl fans.

Like my beta readers, whom I fear I’m letting down at present.

Like those readers and writers who supported my Spiral of Hooves launch.

Apologies for not listing you – omissions are too easy to make – so, I hope you know who you are.

Although these raise a crucial question: when do such friendships end?

Contact with those latter Spiral of Hooves friends has tailed off as my debut fades – in some cases to a memory.

And that reminds me of a real concern: where are my real-life friends? Even before lockdown, I had none. They were lost back in the UK, even if trawling through my list of Facebook friends, I still have plenty I interacted with in my equestrian days.

However, genuine contact fell away when I retired…when the MonSter took its toll.

But isn’t that ‘fall’ a real test of friendship?

Look to those who stand with you in the darkest hour. That’s reality regardless of physical contact. And my blogging friends are the ones who keep me going now.

Advice – Association – Affinity – Allies – Amigas – Amistad

The awesome co-hosts for the February 3 posting of the IWSG are Louise – Fundy Blue , Jennifer Lane, Mary Aalgaard, Patsy Collins at Womagwriter, and Nancy Gideon!

Louise – Fundy Blue

Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

For more on the IWSG monthly post and links to other participants visit:

https://www.insecurewriterssupportgroup.com/p/iwsg-sign-up.html

#IWSG – Book Interrupt

January 6, 2021 by Roland Clarke

My minimal presence in the writing community continues, but IWSG keeps me in touch. So, this is an attempt at my monthly Insecure Writer’s Support Group post – with the usual raft of flimsy excuses.

As I keep saying, the encouragement of the Ninja Captain avoids me missing a month as he’s such a stalwart follower. Without IWSG, my writing would be post-it notes. Thanks Alex J. Cavanaugh for creating the Insecure Writer’s Support Group where you can find better answers to this month’s challenging question.

I need to remind myself the question is optional, but why not attempt an answer.

January 6 question – Being a writer, when you’re reading someone else’s work, what stops you from finishing a book/throws you out of the story/frustrates you the most about other people’s books?

However, my health problems have seen me struggle to read as I once did. A physical book or a Kindle has become hard to access in my normal haunts – yes, including a guy’s retreat.

I keep trying audio, although the dogs barking makes that hard – even with the headphones my wife bought me. But I’m rereading a classic SF novel at the moment, and the dogs are quieter. Why? Maybe as it’s an amazing read – profound and engrossing.

Anyway, the question.

The most recent book I struggled with – and stopped before reading Book 2 of the trilogy -was due to repetition. Although the plot was good as was the writing, the author kept using battle scenes with structure and phrases from earlier scenes. Too copy and paste.

Poor or weird grammar will lead to me abandoning a book. Bad editing tends to be noticeable in samples meant to encourage me to buy, so I don’t – and this kind of abandonment is rare. However, if a story hooks me and I then start finding errors, these mount up and make me struggle – usually through to the end. Sometimes, an author attempts to write with inventive grammar or language, which can work but sometimes fails. Maybe I missed the point.

More often the fault is mine as I read something and want to know more. My mind creates a rabbit-hole, which can become a warren if I get tempted online to explore. A place, a person, a quote – anything can trigger me to stop reading and wonder to know more. That’s my probing mind, and not the author’s failure to provide footnotes, appendices, or obscure bits of backstory. Of course, I loved Tolkien’s Middle Earth sagas for just that.

The real question is: where are the roadblocks in my writing?

Repetition – Ragbag – Rabbit-holes – Roadblocks

The awesome co-hosts for the January 6 posting of the IWSG are Ronel Janse van Vuuren , J Lenni Dorner, Gwen Gardner Sandra Cox, and Louise – Fundy Blue!

Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

For more on the IWSG monthly post and links to other participants visit:

https://www.insecurewriterssupportgroup.com/p/iwsg-sign-up.html

#IWSG – Productivity

December 2, 2020 by Roland Clarke

Apologies for my minimal presence in the writing community recently. This is an attempt at my monthly Insecure Writer’s Support Group post – with the usual raft of flimsy excuses.

The encouragement of the Ninja Captain avoids me missing a month as he’s such a stalwart follower. Without IWSG, my writing would be post-it notes. Thanks Alex J. Cavanaugh for creating the Insecure Writer’s Support Group where you can find better answers to this month’s challenging question.

I need to remind myself the question is optional, but why not attempt an answer.

December 2 question – Are there months or times of the year that you are more productive with your writing than other months, and why?

In a normal year, November has led my output as NaNoWriMo has motivated me. Otherwise, the WEP/IWSG bi-monthly Challenges have kept me writing throughout the year. And I should thank all the fans of my Welsh police detectives, Sparkle Anwyl and Kama Pillai, for keeping me ploughing on with my Snowdon Shadows tales. Book 1, Fevered Fuse, will appear one day.

However, this year has seen me struggle to be the writer I was.

NaNoWriMo: although I outlined a rough plot, I was unable to write more than a thousand words of my 2020 NaNoWriMo entry called ‘Lost Sheep’ – even with a premise linked to Sparkle Anwyl. But the plot is there as a Scrivener project, so perhaps that will be my 2021 NaNoWriMo entry.

WEP/IWSG: I started a novella with the February challenge, and ‘Custody Chain’ nears the conclusion after five chapters. Although this month’s challenge is now no longer a formal challenge, I’ve started writing the conclusion – despite my state of mind/health etc….

Distractions – Dungeons and Dogs and Depression.

How can I write when everything is falling apart? From the world to this country to my body.

In fact, I failed to read the other WEP/IWSG posts last month or finish answering comments. Well, I did hit ‘Like’ – and wrote one reply/apology for each recent post.

Okay, excuses over as I’m climbing out of the slough of despond, and writing again – well, a bit. However, January 31^st looms and I must do my dreaded UK tax return – not writing in that month…except ‘writing it off’ as I do every year.

Somewhere, I must fit in getting ‘Fevered Fuse’ ready for professional editing….and I owe a beta read that’s overdue.

The awesome co-hosts for the December 2 posting of the IWSG are Pat Garcia,Sylvia Ney,Liesbet @ Roaming About Cathrina Constantine, and Natalie Aguirre!

Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

For more on the IWSG monthly post and links to other participants visit:

https://www.insecurewriterssupportgroup.com/p/iwsg-sign-up.html

#IWSG – Distracted Writer?

October 7, 2020 by Roland Clarke

September has been another of those catch-up month – sporadic fail – after I was ill in August. In short, backlog has multiplied.

Therefore, this month’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group post crept up before I’d found the time/energy/motivation/space/whatever to visit last month’s visitors. Apologies to you all – or is that excuse getting stale?

Anyway, I can’t disappoint the Ninja Captain himself by missing a month – especially as he’s such a stalwart follower. Thanks Alex J. Cavanaugh for creating the Insecure Writer’s Support Group where you can find better answers to this month’s challenging question.

October 7 question – When you think of the term working writer, what does that look like to you? What do you think it is supposed to look like? Do you see yourself as a working writer or aspiring or hobbyist, and if latter two, what does that look like?

My image of a successful working writer is possibly Ernest Hemingway, at the end of his life an Idaho resident – like me, but I avoid the drink and guns, or the suicide ending.

7th October 1939: American writer Ernest Hemingway (1899 – 1961) works at his typewriter while sitting outdoors, Idaho.
(Photo by Lloyd Arnold/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

When I started down my writing path, I took the journalist calling – like Hemingway sin estimulantes. In fact, I was interested in warcos, such as Hemingway’s 3^rd wife Martha Gellhorn. But I wandered along sylvan paths following country pursuits, and my image of a writer scribbling in notepads evolved into a writer at a typewriter with a wastebin of discarded pages.

Even now I have the image of a serious working writer in their dedicated space transforming the notepad scribbles into a manuscript – albeit on a laptop. Whatever the means, that still means dedicated time -a space of regular time set aside each day to go to that space and work. Yet, J K Rowling was forced to use coffee shops and why do I see Mary Wesley writing in her garden?

There’s as many different types of writers as genre variations multiplied by sheets in a ream.

Time to answer the hardest question: what sort of writer am I?

First, a retired equestrian journalist with a notepad/recorder and a desktop PC.

Second, a writer who aspires to release another book into the world, probably set in Snowdonia.

Third, a distracted writer who too easily finds other things to do whether that’s wading through and deleting endless emails, sleeping, or attempting to beat a game.

Are role-playing games my version of Hemingway’s addictions?

Or fourth, at this time of year, I transform into a NaNoWriMo writer. Come November and I usually manage 50,000 words plus in the month. Most of my draft novels were written or revised in November – although one was written at the same breakneck speed one April.

Does that make me a hobbyist? Or a spasmodic writer? That fits the spasms in my limbs/nerves as well as the tingling tattoos of my MC, Sparkle Anwyl.

For the record, I’m prepping my 2020 NaNoWriMo entry called ‘Lost Sheep’ with a premise linked to Sparkle:

A retired Welsh farmer faces challenges to his faith when his legacy is threatened.

Clue: Grandfather.

My thanks to Debs Carey for triggering my NaNo brain with this insightful post:

https://fictioncanbefun.wordpress.com/2020/09/27/secondthoughts-older-people-in-books/

Also thanks to Fundy Blue who encouraged me to contribute a post the IWSG Anthologies blog today:

https://iwsganthologies.blogspot.com/

And a footnote: Hemingway disapproved of the 1939 Idaho photograph, saying, “I don’t work like this.”

Hemingway on Writing

The awesome co-hosts for the October 7 posting of the IWSG are Jemima Pett, Beth Camp,Beverly Stowe McClure, and Gwen Gardner!

Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

#IWSG – Beta Author-Author?

September 2, 2020 by Roland Clarke

August has been a low month as I fell ill a few weeks ago – MS related. The multiple sclerosis MonSter ensured all work was scrapped – except I did post my WEP/IWSG flash entry:

https://rolandclarke.com/2020/08/22/wep-iwsg-august-challenge-long-shadow/

I’ve been steadily working on this month’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group post in advance of the due date. Can’t disappoint the Ninja Captain himself by calling in absent – even if I’ve been sick. Anyway, thanks Alex J. Cavanaugh for creating the Insecure Writer’s Support Group.

Visit their site for exciting posts. Insecure Writer’s Support Group.

And, before I forget, here are the details if you want to enter the 2020 IWSG Anthology Contest. It’s a challenging theme again – Dark Matter –but I’m sure you’ll be inspired. For the contest visit:

https://www.insecurewriterssupportgroup.com/p/the-2019-annual-iwsg-anthology-contest.html

Anyway, on to the monthly question which is another challenge – and possibly a chance to digress – as usual.

September 2 question – If you could choose one author, living or dead, to be your beta partner, who would it be and why?

The idea of one of my ‘idol writers’ as a beta partner is intriguing – and daunting.

The Inklings – https://www.fictorians.com/2017/03/20/the-inklings-one-friendship-to-bind-them/

Would Ray Bradbury have felt my convoluted tales worth wasting feedback time over?

Would J R R Tolkien have related to my crime stories and minimal world-building?

What would Mary Shelley have made of my 21^st century morals?

However, I realise their input would be as professionals and rise above our genre/era/style differences. But I’m looking elsewhere – well, to the living.

I have recently had my WIP, Fevered Fuse read by three fellow authors/writers. One was fellow IWSG Anthology author Rebecca Douglass, one fellow WEP/IWSG writer Toi Thomas – winner of the last Challenge, and the third and ‘diversity reader’ was screenwriter/producer/director Dawn Ostlund. And the feedback was first class.

So, if I was raising my expectations and seeking names?

Well, my debut novel was endorsed by Kristina Stanley, best-Selling Author of the Stone Mountain Mystery Series – https://kristinastanley.com/. I also use Fictionary the creative editing software she has developed for fiction writers and editors – https://fictionary.co/. So, Kristina would be a choice, although maybe as my Story Editor.

If I had to choose a living successful author, who would relate to my current Welsh series, it would have to be Harry Bingham, best known for his Fiona Griffiths crime series set in South Wales – https://harrybingham.com/. Fiona Griffiths is a quirky detective who might have some interesting interactions with Sparkle Anwyl. And Harry Bingham runs Jericho Writers, which offers writers expert editorial assistance – https://jerichowriters.com/. So, Harry it is.