What a collection!
Many of you follow Patsy Collins's excellent blog Words about writing and writing about words. (This week she is blogging about the word 'flourish'.) As writers, words are our craft. The English language never fails to amaze me and I love to learn new words. 

Do you know what a group of crows is called? This was a question in last night's pub quiz and no one in our team knew the answer, even though many of us were old enough to have learned lists of collective nouns in school! The answer is........... 

a murder of crows

Isn't that a wonderful term and already I'm thinking where can I use that in a story? I was planning a crime story before I went to the quiz last night and now ideas are coming to me about including a murder of crows somewhere in the story. This morning, I've found out a few facts about crows:

- Crows often feature in European legends or mythology as portents or harbingers of doom or death. This is because of their dark shine black feathers and their unnerving calls. They are commonly thought to circle above scenes of death such as battles.

- They scavenge on carrion, dead animals and garbage. 

- In Chinese mythology, they believed that the world at one time had ten suns that were caused by 10 crows. The effect was devastating to the crops and nature, so they sent in their greatest archer Houyi to shoot down 9 crows and spare only one. Also Chinese people believe that crows mean bad luck, probably due to the colour black.

- Crows feature in Hitchcock's film 'The Birds'. They congregate on the playground outside the school in the yard and when the children are evacuated by their teacher, they attack and injure some of the children.

So many collective nouns are embedded into our every day language. We wouldn't talk about a flock of cows or a herd of sheep, would we, so should we be more accurate when writing about groups of other animals or birds? In my story, Monty the Tabby Cat, I did write about him leading a 'clowder' of cats but as it's not in common usage, I don't know if it sounded a bit contrived. I just loved the word!

Have you used any collective nouns to give your writing accuracy? Which ones are your favourites?

Thanks for reading and please comment. You can also follow me on Twitter @JanBayLit.

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Characters in 'Under Milk Wood'

Last night I saw Theatr Clwyd's production of 'Under Milk Wood' at the New Theatre, Cardiff and what a treat it was! Over the years, I have listened to the play on CD and watched a DVD of the film but it's a very long time since I've seen the stage play. Dylan Thomas is probably my favourite poet and writer and as I listened to his wonderful language again, I thought it would be a fitting post-script to yesterday's blog post on creating character to look at some of those from Llareggub [have you read this backwards?! ] - later changed to Llaregyb.

Dylan wrote 'Under Milk Wood' as a play for voices and through his careful use of words evokes some of the best loved characters in literature. Who can forget blind Captain Cat, Polly Garter with her haunting songs, Mrs Organ Morgan and No Good Boyo? The list goes on but the very words he uses, so lyrical and poetic, give such an insight into what the characters are really like. He doesn't have to describe them to us; he shows us through their actions, their mannerisms and what they say. 

For me, the play is bawdy humour at its best but is deeply moving at the same time. The dialogue is vibrant, often comical, with the result that the characters are brought to life.

When it was first published in 1954, the Sunday Times wrote:
'...the characters are romantic, earthy, mad, sane, parochial, universal, and wildly comic; and they are gifted with a revelatory wonder of words.'

I think this is a great example of characterisation:

'Alone until she dies, Bessie Bighead, hired help, born in the workhouse, smelling of the cowshed, snores bass and gruff on a couch of straw in a loft in Salt Lake Farm and picks a posy of daisies to put on the grave of Gomer Owen who kissed her once when she wasn't looking and never kissed her again although she was looking all the time.'

I would find it hard to choose a favourite character- Mr Mog Edwards and Miss Myfanwy Price, school teacher Gossamer Beynon, Mr and Mrs Cherry Owen? 


If you have seen, read or heard the play, which of the seventy four characters do you know best because of Dylan Thomas's clever 'showing' not 'telling'?

Thank you for reading. I'd love you to leave a comment.

Pleased to meet you
I often say this when I meet someone for the first time but what about characters in stories? This week, I have been thinking about how well I know my characters. I often write in the first person so I have been a female hoarder in her early thirties, a high flying executive who stops to give a lift  to a teenage girl who died thirty years before, a twenty-something male stalker for whom 'killing her was not part of the plan', a mum-to-be living in a haunted cottage, a father meeting the son he didn't know existed for the first time and a baby girl taking her first unaided steps! I am none of these people so 'writing what you know' has not been the case. When I met them for the first time, I had to find out more about them to hopefully make them credible. 

In short stories, we don't have time to explore our characters in the same detail that we can in a novel but the characters still need to read as real people, with real emotions and feelings. When I'm reading a short story I need to be able to relate to that person, to like or dislike him or her, to understand the conflict or dilemma that presents itself. When writing from a character's point of view, I like to get inside the character's head and tap into the thought processes.  Sometimes, as with the hoarder and the stalker, I have had to research some real life stories in order to do that. Very often, I've found that the most credible characters have an inner contradiction that doesn't reveal itself until the story unfolds and then I really get to know them.

Teagan Kearney has written an excellent blog post this week on constructing character in WRITING MY NOVEL NO WORKING TITLE YET . She makes the point that her characters are often incomplete when she begins to write and they develop as the novel progresses. She talks about the inner conflict a protagonist has to battle with and how this emerges as she gets to know the character better, thereby creating tension. Here is a direct quote from Teagan:

Having both internal and external conflicts are crucial. Readers become emotionally involved with characters, and how your character perceives the threat is what draws readers in - and keeps them captivated. 

In my own novel, Jack is a very fiery, volatile character on the surface and everyone has to walk on eggshells around him but deep inside he is a very vulnerable, insecure person. I'm hoping that this will reveal itself to the reader as the story progresses.  





I have just read 'Gone Girl' by Gillian Flynn. The complexity of the two main characters and the way I reacted to them at different stages of the story certainly drew me in and kept me turning the pages. What book has had the same effect on you recently?



Thank you for reading and please comment on how you construct your characters. 

**One of my short stories, 'Unfinished Business' was published yesterday on Alfie Dog Fiction If you'd like to download it, please click on the link.**

You'll find my Tweets on @JanBayLit too.

A Right Romance? Write a Romance

Feeling romantic?Just spotted this on Della Galton's Twitter post. @DellaGalton

PULSE, the publisher, is looking for romantic short stories. :) http://fb.me/6C1W8dbuc 

Call for Submissions – Holiday Romance Anthology

Sweet or sensual, Pulse is looking for summer holiday romance short stories for an upcoming anthology. They're open to any setting as long as the weather is warm and the romance is dramatic or interwoven with a dramatic story line. Word length guidelines aren't strict but they're looking for stories from around 2,000 up to 7,500 words. They're offering an advance of £30 per story and a share of the anthology royalties. 
Closing date: 30 April 2014. 

Send your stories to submissions AT myrmidonbooks.com

Call for Submissions – Emergency Romance Anthology

Sweet or sensual, Pulse is looking for romantic stories involving the emergency services! Fire, police, ambulance, it doesn't matter which emergency service as long as there is romance and emergency drama involved. They're looking for pulse racing stories for an anthology themed around the Emergency Services. Word length guidelines aren't strict but they're looking for stories from around 2,000 up to 7,500 words. They're offering an advance of £30 per story and a share of the anthology royalties. 
Closing date: 31 May 2014 

Send your stories to submissions AT myrmidonbooks.com

Thank you, Della, for sharing this. Good luck to all of you who enter. :-)

A Sense of Place

There won't be a post next Thursday because I shall be on a week's break in Gran Canaria. I've got my books and Kindle at the ready and I shall be taking my writer's notebook too. 

Different places can spark ideas for setting stories in a variety of locations. One of mine is called 'Meet Me by the Jacaranda Tree', set on the beautiful island of Madeira and is one of my moving on stories where Lucy has to decide whether to move on with her life after Rob's betrayal.

The beauty of the Jacaranda puts her back in touch with her senses which have been dulled by the acrimonious break up. 

The photograph prompt gave me an excuse to indulge myself and write more figurative and descriptive language than I would normally do in a short story. 



I often use pictures and photographs as settings for stories so I may get some good ones next week, who knows? What is the most exotic or unusual place you've used as a setting for a story? Did it add to the plot or have a bearing on the actions of any of the characters? Please comment and share your ideas.

Thanks for reading and if you'd like to follow me on Twitter, you'll find me on @JanBayLit.

To Blog or Not to Blog....?
.....That was the question for me at the end of last year. Two months on, did I do the right thing?

Some of you will have joined in a 'Chain-Blog-Thingy' back in November/December. It was started by Patsy Collins and involved putting a link to her blog, answering four writing questions, then putting the links to three more bloggers who would answer the questions the following week and pass it on in turn. I enjoyed reading the varied answers to the same questions on the blogs I read but I wasn't able to take part because a didn't have a blog at the time.

Because I was undecided, I asked writer friends what they thought were the benefits of writing a blog. 

Pros
- Writing a blog would help me become part of a community where I'll 'meet' other writers, readers and bloggers.

- A blog would give me an on-line presence and my blog posts would be shared without any geographical restraints.

- When (note the presumptuous 'when' and not the cautious 'if'!) I am to get my writing published, any prospective agent or publisher would expect me to have an on-line presence.

- A blog would educate me about the online world. I would learn more about social media and blog promotion as I learn to effectively promote my posts via social media.

- Writing a regular blog post would increase my writing output especially if I set aside a specific time each week.

Cons
- Writing a blog would take time away from writing short stories and especially my novel.

- It would be difficult to think of new things to write about each week.

- There are so many blogs out there with which to compete  that a new blogger would find it difficult to attract readers.

Well,  as you can see I went with the 'pros'. I've set aside time each Thursday to write my blog and far from keeping me away from writing, I think I've actually done more! It keeps me more focused on all things writing and my contact with other writing bloggers has inspired me to keep writing and submitting stories.  This blog is about my writing journey after all.

On Twitter, I have many more followers than when I started and my interaction with other writers has definitely increased. I can't say that this is down to having a blog but I'm sure having a web link to the blog spot on my profile page has helped. 

In the March edition of 'Writing Magazine', Wendy Clarke has written a very interesting piece entitled '@ Be a good blog host' which I recommend for those of you who haven't read it yet. Once I've been doing this for a while, I'll follow Wendy's advice when I invite one of you to be a guest on my blog perhaps! 

In the mean time, I shall....



What benefits have you had since you started writing a blog? 

Please follow my blog and feel free to comment.

Inspiration or perspiration?
A few times during the past week I sat looking at the computer screen knowing that time was slipping before meeting my writing buddy, Kelly. I had a story to write but there was certainly no inspiration coming my way! At our meetings since January, we've been going back through our notes from the 'Telling Tales' course we took together and last time had set ourselves 5Ws as the basis of a story to write by the time we next met. These were the 'ingredients' she'd chosen for me:
- WHO? a female hoarder
- WHERE? small valleys town
- WHEN? after receiving a wedding invitation 
- WHAT? death bed promise
- WHY? to right a past wrong
They were taken from a list that the whole group had offered to Lynne, our tutor. I knew the idea worked and my story And Then There Were Two....which was published on Alfie Dog last year started off from such a list. 



As preparation, I'd done a little research about people who are compulsive hoarders, I considered myself to be quite good at making links and connections but still nothing! I had to admit defeat and go along to Kelly's house empty handed. She hadn't written her story either so we took the time to talk through each other's ideas. What a difference that made. We then spent fifteen minutes just writing the beginning of our stories and I couldn't believe how the ideas started to flow.....at last! The enthusiasm was back and I can't wait to finish the story now. I've also thought of title too so watch this space.


This got me thinking and looking back over the stories I've written. Just where did they come from? Sometimes, they've been seasonal or as a result of 'given' first lines. On other occasions, I've used a photograph or started with some character interaction. I know I enjoy reading Wendy Clarke's blog when she often tells us what inspired her writing and Patsy Collins amazes me with the variety and range of her short stories. Inspiration can come in so many guises and sometimes when you least expect it, I suppose. What has inspired you to write lately?

Is anyone else staying up half the night to watch the Writing Women's Fiction workshop from Writers' Web TV ? It starts at 11 p.m. GMT tonight and it's free. I watched the Crime Writers' workshop last month and it was very good but that was broadcast at 11 a.m. I'll let you know next week if I managed to watch it all....until 3 a.m.!!