Category Archives: Books

Nurturing Creativity

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I found some new inspiration for my book on my friend Amanda Fink’s blog. Thanks Fink!

I absolutely loved the book that this woman Elizabeth Gilbert wrote, and sometimes when I’m sitting down to write I feel like this.  I feel so much pressure to make sure it’s good.  What if we could relieve ourselves of some of our egos, and relax?

Since I have watched this film, I feel so much less burdened.  What if I didn’t have to take complete responsibility for how it turns out?  It’s allowed me to just let things flow.

I am now up to page 46 in my book.  I’m just starting to figure out how I work.  I’ve tried writing at all different times of day, before taking a shower, after taking a shower, before working out, after working out, right before bed, as soon as I get up…and I find I work best by starting first thing in the morning.  My mind is fresh, my spirits are high, and although I may smell a bit, my words fly.  I still have no idea if it will be any good, but I do picture myself on Oprah. Fair enough?

The Beginning of the Beginning

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I started writing last night.  I got a bug at about 2AM and I couldn’t go to sleep because I had a sudden realization of how the book will begin.

I’ve been doing all this research on authors writing the same sort of stories I plan on writing, and just am reading as much as I can to figure out what I feel works and doesn’t.  Although I know the subject I’m going to write about, I had no idea where to begin, and I felt research would help guide me in the right direction.  It’s amazing how many young female authors there are that are really popular right now.

I think the biggest piece of advice was found on Cecelia Ahern’s website.  I ordered a book of hers online called Thanks for the Memories, and when I received it, I realized she was the author of P.S. I Love You, which happens to be one of my favorite moves of all time.  I didn’t even know that was a book, let alone a young female author had written it!  Not only did she write that, but she is also the creator of Samantha Who? starring Christina Applegate.  It’s so nice to see women who are multi-talented, and bringing strong female leads to the cinema and television.  Right, so this is the advice she writes to aspiring writers about how to start a book:

“Find the environment that suits you to write. Silence is an inspiration to me. Space is so important. Left alone for an hour, my mind starts to create. Scenes begin to fill the empty spaces and the sounds of those scenes and characters voices fill the silences. My belief is that if you wake up in the morning, or in the middle of the night, and all you want to do is write, then you’re a writer. There is no magic formula to being a writer and there is no magic formula to writing a book. It’s something that comes from deep inside that cannot be taught in any writing class….

You have to introduce your characters, you have to set up the story, you have to embark on the story, travel through the story, allow your characters to often lead the way, then you reach your destination that should feel right without having taken any short cuts or U-turns or circles and then end it when the journey’s complete.
I think that aspiring writers should find their own voice, don’t try to repeat what is already done because it seems to be successful, do your own thing. Don’t be afraid to do something different.”

I am so excited to have my own space and my own silence to find that time.  It seems to me that writing is a lot like acting, only you get to find more than one character at a time.  I can not wait to really get into the journey.  Just as in acting there are no shortcuts, it seems that writing will teach me again to go through the journey one step at a time.  We are so often probed to get a result, get a product…when will I learn that it’s the process that counts?

Theatre, Deal or No Deal and Books

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Here we are three weeks before we move to Bristol. I have started doing research on Theatre in Bristol and have found this great website with detailed descriptions of the current events of Theatre in Bristol.  I found that the writer of Mamma Mia is from there and has just produced a play that opens this month! My major goal is to write of course, but I can’t help but keep up to date on the theatre in town.

Plus, I know there are tons of tv shows that are filmed there (not to mention tons of BBC shows and Deal or No Deal!).

Speaking of Deal or No Deal, I’m trying to get Jock to go on the show.  Ok, I have just been on their website FAQ, and have found out that they are no longer accepting submissions, but at least now I know the process.  See below:

Q13. How can I become a contestant on the show?
Firstly you need to fill in an application form online.
If you are successful at this stage, you will be invited to an audition and awarded a bronze ticket.
The audition is in two stages. If you are selected to go through to the second stage you will be given a silver ticket and be interviewed on camera by a member of the team.
These tapes will then be viewed in a casting session where the producers will choose the final contestants. If you have a place on the show you will be given a golden ticket.

Applications for Deal or No Deal is now CLOSED.

At the very least, we know he has the personality!  Man, I just took the Banker’s Respect Challenge and apparently I’m average!  This is what the quiz had to say about me:

Have the words “must try harder” ever appeared on your school reports? Your profile suggests you may have some aptitude but you have still to learn the subtleties of risk, reward and timing that could make you a winner…. -Blah, blah, blah – How rude is that??  Albeit, yes, things have tended to come easy to me, so I did get the assessment of “trying harder” in my school reports at times, but the grades never showed it.

The average amount that a contestant wins is in the 30,000GPB range, so how great would that be just for opening some boxes.

You can see how exciting our life is at the moment, with me doing research on Deal or No Deal.

Regarding my book, watched a show last night on BBC2 (see the whole show) about how book publishing, writing and selling has been changed in the past decade.  It wasn’t the most optimistic show I’ve seen lately, but I’m focusing more on getting the research done before I start writing, and way before I even think about getting it published.  I think my best bet is to do as much reading as I can in the next three weeks in the genre I’m writing so that when April 6th comes, I can buckle down and have fresh ideas in my mind!  Also, every night I’m going over the storyline in my head before I go to bed…not the best idea to get a good night’s sleep, but certainly helps me cement good ideas in my mind.

Just ordered two books from Amazon.co.uk to start off with: Thanks for the Memories, by Cecelia Ahern and Can You Keep a Secret? by Sophia Kinsella (who wrote Confessions of a Shopaholic).  They seemed to be in the right arena I was looking for, and will be writing in.  Will let you know my thoughts!

At the moment, I found this book called Inconceivable by Ben Elton in Jocko’s closet that is hysterical.  I’m on page 63 so far out of 367 pages, but I reckon it will be a quick read.  Apparently it was made into a film called Maybe Baby that I have never heard of.  Doesn’t surprise me in the slightest considering how few British films actually make it out in America.  I tried watching a classic British film the other night with Jocko called L4yer Cake with Daniel Craig and, his favorite, Sienna Miller, but I understand why they don’t come out in the US…I couldn’t understand ANYTHING they said and fell asleep.  I wanted to understand, I wanted to follow the plot…but there was SOO much going on, I simply couldn’t and got defeated.

I will keep trying…