~ Getting Over Artist’s Block ~

I am working on a new children’s series, which will be seven books in total. I have been writing this middle-fiction fantasy series since 2021. You may notice I never mention the title or concept. It might be six or seven years before publishing the first volume, so it’s best to keep things under wraps for now. However, there are aspects of book creation that can be shared without giving too much away.
Alongside editing the second volume in the series, I am illustrating the first book. I have a whole history with writing and illustrating which I won’t go into in this post. Suffice it to say I had determined to focus on the writing, perhaps working my way back to the sweet spot of writing and illustrating someday in the future.
Then a friend who is an English teacher and had edited the first book in the series suggested illustrations would be ideal for these stories. Long story short, I decided to illustrate the chapters myself. But it’s funny how once you make a challenging decision, it seems as if life conspires to prevent you from doing it. While I wanted to haul the pencils and pens out and get started, life intervened more than once or twice. Things kept coming up. Legitimate things. But at some point, I started inventing excuses. After a couple more weeks of ignoring the artwork, I realized I might be procrastinating. I was having the artist’s equivalent of writer’s block – artist’s block.

The following weekend, I did the same thing I do whenever I have writer’s block. I made myself sit down with tools of the trade in hand and start anyway. As soon as I struck a free day on a weekend I picked up my tray, stepped outside to the picnic table, and finally broke the ice by picking up a pencil. The first step was taken. Whew!
Ever hopeful, I had prepared for that moment. A few weeks ago, I read through book one in the new children’s series and took a note every few pages of moments or characters that would lend to illustration. So, to kick the boat off from the shore, I consulted my notebook. For the first sketch, the quote was, ‘A group of boys slunk out of the shadows, blocking the path, hunched over in hooded sweatshirts.’

Once I started, I had to employ trust to keep going. However, the reward of putting pencil to paper is the excitement of seeing that first image emerge. I felt like, oh yeah, that’s cool, it does add to the story, and then I began to feel even more deeply connected to the story, more moved to want to create more. That’s the essence of what writing/illustrating is for me – it’s an ever-regenerating cycle of inspiration. And so I found the strength to keep going. I kept going with the sketch until I more or less had the grouping of the gang the way I wanted it.

Once I had the outlines in pencil, I picked up a medium-sized tip black ink pen and followed those same pencil lines in pen.

Then, I added lines for shading, contours, and extra details. I always enjoy seeing the image come to life when the light and shade become emphasized and deepened.

I used black watercolor paint and a fine paintbrush to fill in larger areas of shadow. Then I also took a white gouache (watercolour but more potent saturation of colour) to add white highlights in places.
The result was I finished the first illustration for the interior pages of book one. Woohoo! We are out of the gate. What a relief to be underway. One done…many more to go!
Have you done anything creative lately?

Talk to you later.
Keep reading!
Yvette Carol
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There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening, that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique. If you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself and your work. You have to keep yourself open and aware to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open. (There is) no satisfaction whatever at any time. Only a queer divine dissatisfaction. ~ Martha
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~ A Book Review: Hamnet, Maggie O’Farrell ~

I have finished reading my sixth novel for 2024, Hamnet, by Maggie O’Farrell. A riveting read, this novel my eldest sister handed me for Christmas with the words, “This is my favourite ever book.” I had never heard of the author before, though I noticed it had won the Women’s Prize for Fiction, in 2020. I didn’t put it at the bottom of the to-be-read pile of books – oh, no – I started reading Hamnet immediately. From the first page, I was drawn back into the past – into the murky days of medieval England – to the days of Shakespeare (I love it when an author can take us there and make it feel authentic). What a neat idea to have the story concern this intriguing historical character without focusing the spotlight on him. Shakespeare is referred to as “the father” or “the Latin tutor,” he appears mostly as the frustrating love interest or the absent parent.

The story starts from eleven-year-old Hamnet’s point of view. I truly felt gripped by the intense stomach-churning desperation of this poor little boy searching the dark wooden houses for his mother, Agnes – or any other adult – who could come to the aid of his twin sister, Judith, lying abed, feverishly ill, and near death.
The unthinkable happens. A child dies. Although I wouldn’t normally mention a spoiler of this magnitude, in this case, it is part of the historical record and it’s also mentioned in the promotional material therefore permissible.
The book jumps from Hamnet to the head of Agnes (his mother). There is a local story about her mother not being human – so Agnes and her twin brother, Bartholomew, are regarded with uncertainty by their local community. Agnes has become the village herbalist. She grows/gathers herbs, keeps bees, and flies her hawk, and can’t seem to fit in with what society and her family expect of her. As fate would have it, she falls in love with the intelligent, restless, foppish “Latin tutor,” which upsets the families on both sides. Bad juju ensues.

I lapped up this fictional account of a little-known part of Shakespeare’s life, which explains so much about him. It is a believable retelling as if we were seated around the fireside, listening to Agnes tell us the tale of her unsupported love affair with the young tortured artist, William. The Latin Tutor is suffering under the thumb of his authoritarian father. He is a frustrated artist trying to follow his father’s footsteps into a career and life he doesn’t want.
In short, it’s heavy. The characters are tortured, to begin with, which is why our insides fill with dread, primed for worse to come. And come it does. In the saddest way possible for young parents.
The story deals in a visceral, heartrending way with loss – a family tragedy – then goes back in time to the beginning to where it all began, where it all went wrong. It’s an evocative, involving tale. We’re so curious and keen to see more of Shakespeare from this unusual point of view, that of his wife, that we can’t stop reading.

Life was tough and taut in those days. Everyday medieval life is rendered credibly. The tragedy unfolds and there is the unbelievable pathos of the heartbreak driving his loving parents apart; sending Shakespeare running away to London where he finds the stage and starts writing his plays, while forgotten in the background, still keeping his home, family, and community together is his neglected wife, Agnes, despite nearly losing her mind with grief.

Hamnet is a sensitive, immersive story about pain – the relentless nightmare for parents who lose a child – and what happens when that child is the progeny of William Shakespeare. Granted such a kick-ass premise, it has to be delivered perfectly to work and it is and does. Sometimes, there is an almost dreamlike quality to O’Farrell’s storytelling, and you feel transported. Even though the material is sombre, it is the human experience written in a way that makes it feel revelatory.
It’s an emotional rollercoaster that I did not want to get off so exquisitely were the characters and scenes drawn by the indomitable Maggie O’Farrell. However, I imagine it would not have been an easy book to write. It’s an excellent sign when I finish a novel and immediately buy the next title I see written by the same author – I have The Vanishing Act of Annie Lennox lined up to read soon!

Maggie O’Farrell, born in 1972, is an Irish novelist who hit the ground running, winning the Betty Trask Award with her first novel, After You’d Gone. Then, her novel, The Hand That First Held Mine won the 2010 Costa Novel Award. She has been shortlisted twice more for the Costa Novel Award for Instructions for A Heatwave in 2014, and This Must Be The Place in 2017. Her novel Hamnet earned her the Women’s Prize for Fiction in 2020 and the Fiction Prize at the 2020 National Book Critics Circle Awards. No two ways about it, this girl can write!
My rating is four stars

Talk to you later.
Keep reading!
Yvette Carol
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A portrait of unspeakable grief wreathed in great beauty. ~ New York Times

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~ HOW TO MAKE My Most Popular Dessert CHOCOLATE MOUSSE ~

My two younger boys have always been interested in cooking and learning how to bake. I think it runs in the family. It’s a well-told story that my father’s mother would spend time with my two elder sisters (when they were little) in her kitchen, teaching them how to bake. Gran was an excellent cook! Her cheese and onion pie was her own recipe and legendary. Her husband, Granddad was famous for never taking Gran out to dinner, “Why should I pay to eat out when I can eat better at home?” Gran taught my sisters to bake in her kitchen in Sussex, England – all three garbed in aprons – with the girls working at a smaller table in the middle of the room. Epic cuteness, no less.

Echoes of that legacy have continued in our kitchen for the last fifteen years, as my two youngest sons have shown interest in all things culinary. I’ve therefore learned to include them every time I am baking. We have tackled the baking of the giant Christmas Cake together each year – the three of us in the kitchen – and it has become our little tradition that rings in the festive season.
The sweet treat the boys prefer, however, is chocolate mousse. Lately, I’ve been giving the youngest son lessons on how to make himself simple dinners (in preparation for him going overseas soon), and he asked if we could make the mousse. This was followed soon after by a request from my sister for the same mousse recipe. I thought, well, the heat is on – might as well share it online with everyone else. Prepare to melt hearts with this one…

Ingredients List:
300 ml cream
2 Tbs Demerara sugar
Extra cream, usually ‘thickened’ is the easiest
4 eggs, separated
150 g dark chocolate, roughly chopped
grated chocolate/ cocoa powder
fresh strawberries (or other soft fruit)

Here’s how to make your mousse:
I always prepare the other ingredients before the chocolate. I beat the 300 ml cream until thick. Then, I also prepare the egg mixture. Beat four egg whites until firm and slowly add the sugar until the mixture looks glossy.

Break the chocolate into the top of a double boiler and heat, stirring constantly until melted.

Take it off the heat and allow it to cool for at least five minutes – but take care – if you cool it too much the chocolate congeals and becomes hard to mix. Cool it too little and the chocolate cooks/curdles the eggs. Once your melted chocolate has cooled with dignity intact, add the egg yolks and whisk together.

Then quickly fold this mixture into the whipped cream. Fold half the egg whites into the chocolate batter and blend the rest of the egg whites. I always marvel over the marbling effect and never fail to find it pretty.

Combine and serve in individual dessert bowls—dust with sifted cocoa. Chill until set. Decorate to your heart’s content with dollops of thickened cream, sliced strawberries (or any soft fruit you have available), and grated chocolate.

My son put it best, when he said, “I can’t get over it. Mousse is the easiest dessert we ever made, and it tastes the best of everything we’ve ever made!” LOL. I couldn’t agree more.
Enjoy!
If you try it, let me know what you think…

Talk to you later.
Keep creating!
Yvette Carol
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“There is nothing better than a friend unless it’s a friend with chocolate.” —Linda Grayson

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~ IWSG: Blogging or No? ~

It’s time for another group posting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group! Time to release our fears to the world or offer encouragement to those who are feeling neurotic. If you’d like to join us, click on the tab above and sign up. We post on the first Wednesday of every month. Every month, the organizers announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG Day post. Remember, the question is optional!!! Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!
Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and the hashtag is #IWSG.

April 3 question – How long have you been blogging? (Or on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram?) What do you like about it and how has it changed?
It was 2014. At that stage, blogging was new on my radar, although it had been around as a medium for a while and had been taking off in the public eye for a few years. Enter the incredible Kristen Lamb, author and social media expert. I read one of her books, We Are Not Alone, about social media for authors (*I think this book is out of print, but contact the author). In her book, Kristen advocated authors should have blogs. She said that it is another form of writing and a discipline and that it helps us as authors to have to write an 800-word article a week. It flexes our writing muscles differently from writing fiction, and it’s good for us. At the same time, it’s building our brand and a fan base who, one day, might hopefully buy our books.

The idea of flexing a different writing muscle made sense to me. But there was a big problem; I was too scared to start. There was always a reason why not. Every time I considered the idea of blogging, I would put the brakes on by asking myself, what would I say each week? Who would care? Would it end up being another commitment I didn’t need? There were so many ways I could fall flat on my face. It was stepping further out of my comfort zone than I was used to.
For several years, I watched other writer friends start blogs without feeling any closer to starting my own.
Then, in 2014, for some reason, I leaped off the side of the pool and started posting, and I have posted every week ever since. I loved it instantly. I remember there was one week when I didn’t and that was when my computer system got hijacked by scammers. My poor sick computer went away to be cleaned of viruses and rebooted. I could not put out a blog post, and I felt bereft of my way of communicating with the world. What had started as a writing exercise had become a fully integrated, enjoyable, relaxing, satisfying, and creative part of my week.
By 2015, the blog was just one of seven social media sites I juggled, including Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, and Slideshare. I felt I had to be everywhere, building my digital footprint.

Apart from my website, Facebook Author Page, YouTube channel, and LinkedIn, I was also building my email list and putting out a monthly newsletter to subscribers. It was a lot.

But in the last few years, I have changed as has the entire landscape of my involvement with social media. I think COVID-19 was a big part of that. Building a brand and selling books has taken a back seat in my mind – it’s no longer what’s most important. Life these days is about connecting with flesh and blood friends and family, writing stories, and living a creative life. I have closed nearly all my social media sites, including the Facebook Author Page – which I deleted last week.

I have retained my personal Facebook page for friends and family, my weekly blog, and my monthly newsletter for public content. The rest of my time is free for creative fiction and family life. There’s a greater sense of calm as if I’ve stopped chasing something.

There is a lot to like about social media. It is a necessary marketing tool for artists and entrepreneurs, more today than it ever has been, but by the same token, I believe it’s more vital than ever that we keep a healthy balance between our virtual and actual lives. We need to be the master of social media and not let it become the master of us.
What do you think? How do you feel about blogging/Instagram/Facebook?

Talk to you later.
Keep Writing!
Yvette Carol
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“It’s a new season – a perfect opportunity to turn a new leaf and begin something wonderful! ” – Siabhan

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~ Wicked Little Letters, not a film review ~

I’m not qualified to write film reviews which is why I don’t write them – this is the first – but Wicked Little Letters is a film that, once seen, you feel compelled to talk about. A water cooler talk for days, kind of film. It was honestly so good. It is the sort of British movie that kicks your front door down, headbutts you, and says, Yeah, this is how it is and whatcha gonna do about it?
Last week I went out with friends on a girl’s night to see a movie. I learned the name of the film as we climbed the stairs – Wicked Little Letters. The 2023 British black comedy written by Jonny Sweet, surprised us by turning into a mystery film. Directed by Thea Sharrock, the film stars Olivia Colman, Jessie Buckley, Anjana Vasan, Joanna Scanlan, Gemma Jones, Malachi Kirby, Lolly Adefope, Eileen Atkins, and Timothy Spall.

The first message on the screen told us the movie was based on a true story. The film opens – your classic British period piece – set in the seaside village of Littlehampton. In the 1920s, life was simple and tough, man. The stage is set for a typical, conservative small village, with working-class folks living cheek-by-jowl under strict rules of conduct, toiling daily to make ends meet.

We are saturated in cozy English old-timey-ness.

Then in the middle of the pastoral feeling, an obscene letter arrives at Edith Swan’s house, like a filthy bomb going off in a clean chicken house. The explosive ripples continue outward. Edith’s parents are exquisitely drawn, Victoria her mother is frail, freaking out over the letters, and her uptight father, Edward, explosive. The devoutly religious family appears respectable on the outside, but indoors, they live on a razor’s edge – Father Edward is an abuser ruling his home with an iron fist. The worst example of an out-of-control narcissist, Edward, is backed up in his tyrannical control of his family by the social mores of the time. The way Olivia Coleman portrays the mental debilitation of a daughter being severely disciplined psychologically, and emotionally abused by her overbearing father is sometimes hard to watch and yet ultimately uproarously hilarious and uplifting.

Into the chaos of the letters and the police being brought on board, Edith’s neighbour Rose blasts onto the screen dropping the f-bomb every five minutes and rips us out of our comfy seats propelling us at speed into the unknown. I was most discomfited by her character. I’ve never heard so much swearing in a movie as this one and most of it comes from Rose. The daughter of travelers tells us that she grew up stealing things for a living with her father. She is unashamedly who she is – something very much frowned upon at this time in history.
It turns out an unlikely friendship had developed between the two neighbours, the subservient, pious Edith Swan, and the foul-mouthed, alcohol-swilling Rose Gooding. But after the saccharine, holier-than-thou Edith starts receiving obscene letters, the finger of blame gets pointed at her chainsmoking neighbour, Rose. Some crazy court scenes ensue. I loved all the facial close-ups in this movie.
Rose is a rough-as-guts, rowdy, young solo mother who is hard to like, however, her honesty, bravery, and fierce love for her equally foul-mouthed daughter, Nancy – the scene-stealing Alisha Weir – win us over by attrition. Toward the end of the movie, we are on Rose’s side, completely.

The characters were engaging. The emotion felt real. Coleman as Edith was luminous even when she was being obnoxious. Jessie Buckley as Rose was an honest arsehole – a woman who doesn’t give a sh.t about the rules or the establishment (a free thinker), which makes her the target of a lot of judgment and therefore punishment. Set against the backdrop of the burgeoning suffragette movements, it is at heart a mystery movie – while also managing to be about equal rights – and a darned funny one at that.
Some critics felt the plot wasn’t strong enough, however I disagree. There was a full story arc that came back around and answered all the questions. We were taken on a lovely ride of not knowing and fascination, where we started to ask quite early on, huh? What was going on? Something didn’t seem quite right. Our senses tingled. We were intrigued.

The story unfolds with a curious crew of women pulling together to solve the case and free an innocent woman, in the process uncovering the surprise revelation of the actual culprit. The true story that stunned 1920s England is still astonishing today, though it got mixed reviews including this from reporter Robbie Collin, “this British chocolate-box period comedy thinks that excessive swearing works as a substitute for a good plot – but it really doesn’t.”

Okay. At first, I was affronted by the foul language too, but then it began to fit the tone of the story and become an integral part of the characters, including defining the radical change in Edith’s character as the movie goes on. Then it is foul language that caps off the ending in the funniest way possible that kept us laughing after the credits rolled.
The entire theatre of women filed out of the cinema, cackling with laughter and chattering in animated groups. Talk about a lively atmosphere. The film transported us into other people’s shoes and then delivered us home, slightly altered, looking at the world in a slightly different way. And that is the function of art. So, mission accomplished, Wicked Little Letters. A small-budget movie – afflicted with wall-to-wall cursing – about the insidious results of familial abuse, and yet I was left feeling transformed. It was so funny we came out with our cheeks sore from laughing. Quite the feat.
I highly recommend this quirky film. Have you seen any great movies worth talking about, lately?

Talk to you later.
Keep reading!
Yvette Carol
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Thanks largely to a strong cast that leans into the story’s humorous side, Wicked Little Letters is a diverting comedy even if the mystery at its core isn’t particularly clever. ~ Rotten Tomatoes

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~ A Book Review: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Betty Smith ~

I have finished reading my fifth novel for 2024, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith. What a book! The first time I read it, I was 12 years old. Many aspects went over my head then, but I remember bonding with the main character, Francie, because we were alike in many ways. It was one of those novels that stays with you after you read it for the rest of your life. When I saw a secondhand copy in a charity shop recently I grabbed it. Curious, I started reading, wondering if it would enchant me again as it had as a child. I was not disappointed.

The debut novel by Betty Smith tells the life story of Francis Nolan, born in Brooklyn in 1901, to desperately poor parents, Kate and Johnnie. Francie and her little brother, Neely, suffer heartbreaking hardship yet it is lovingly rendered through Francie’s innocent eyes. She tells each part of her life through the child’s lens nonjudgmentally, depicting their family’s struggles, the unpredictability of life with her handsome, charismatic, drunken father, and the earnest striving of her harried, hard-working mother who wears gloves to hide her ruined hands. Kate can find five different ways of rehashing stale bread to make five different meals. But some nights when there is no food, Francie tells how they play a game that they are on an expedition to the North Pole, stranded without supplies, keeping a record, “Expected rescue did not come” and so on. By using their imaginations they learn to survive without food.
Fierce, determined Kate, wants her kids to have an education. She makes the rule they must read a page of the Bible and a page of Shakespeare each night before they go to bed, and she arranges to do extra work as a janitor for piano lessons from two old women living downstairs. She and the kids save a few coins each week in a tin can bank nailed to the floor in the closet, in the hope that one day they might buy a plot of land – the dream of all immigrants. Their spirit is indefatigable.

The book moves through decades as Francie and Neely grow up, describing oftentimes incredible minutiae of life in Brooklyn in the early 1900s. As a child – and still today – I find that sort of historical info fascinating. This book is a real vehicle to another era, a literary time machine. Smith does an impeccable job with her historical detail.
Francie starts work at a factory to earn much-needed money to help out at home, and Kate works harder than ever to feed and house them. The story is about the evolution of a family from the point of view of the daughter. It follows the family fortunes and nearly all the scenes involve scenes we can all relate to, the competitive goodnatured sibling fighting between Francie and Neely, the sisterly chats between Katie and her sisters Sissy and Evy, and then as Francie grows older, the female talks about life with her mother and aunts. It’s about the bitter, remorseless, soul-destroying realities of life and simultaneously how to face obstacles and overcome them with the right attitude, and an imaginative positive approach. A sometimes startling, heartwarming, sometimes uplifting, haunting family saga. I loved it and still do. You know a book is great when you fill it with post-it flags while you are reading it.

Betty Smith was born in Brooklyn, New York, on December 15, 1896, to German immigrant parents. She grew up poor in Williamsburg, the same era as the main character of her first novel, and she used her life as material. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn was published in 1943 to great acclaim and has become an American Classic. It proved so popular upon release that it went into a second printing before the official publication date. Throughout her life, Smith worked as a dramatist. During her career, she earned many awards including the Rockefeller Fellowship and the Dramatists Guild Fellowship for her work in drama. Her other novels include Tomorrow Will Be Better (1947), Maggie-Now (1958), and Joy in the Morning (1963).
My rating is four and a half stars

Talk to you later.
Keep reading!
Yvette Carol
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The last time of anything has the poignancy of death itself. Oh, the last time how you see everything; as though a magnifying light had been turned on it. And you grieve because you hadn’t held it tighter when you had it every day. ~ Francie ~ A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
“I can’t explain the emotional reaction that took place in this dead heart of mine… A surge of confidence has swept through me, and I feel that maybe a fellow has a fighting chance in this world after all.” ~ One Marine wrote to Smith, after the release of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn as an Armed Services Edition, in paperback.

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~ LSV Graduation ~

The youngest son has been “a bit fragile” his entire life. Born with Congenital Heart Disorder, asthma, and multiple allergies, he underwent double bypass open heart surgery at the age of five and fought his way back to health. He has always been fascinated by the military but to be honest, I suspected he would never be strong enough.

Toward the end of last year, he surprised me by saying he wanted to attend LSV or Limited Service Volunteers. The LSV program started in 1993 as a New Zealand Government initiative to help young people develop life skills, confidence, and independence, guiding them toward employment or further education. The course is based on military methodology with the Youth Development Unit staff drawn from the army, navy, and airforce.
The LSV intensive 6-week course was due to start at the end of Jan. My son made phone calls, wrote emails, filled in application forms, organized doctor’s certificates, and six weeks ago, he flew to Christchurch, all without my lifting a finger.

The first weekend, forty bright-eyed, eager beavers of 2 Platoon were settling into their barracks, getting to know one another and the rules. The second weekend, realities were setting in. Ten trainees had given up, unable to hack the training. By the fifth weekend, only twenty-eight trainees stood in 2 Platoon. However, the son had learned he was capable of far more than he’d ever imagined. “I thought LSV would be a tough physical challenge, but the mental challenge was the hardest part.” Through sticking with it despite the difficulties, he learned he was capable of doing anything he put his mind to and that there were no obstacles he could not overcome.

I flew down to Christchurch on Saturday for the Graduation ceremony. When the trainees marched onto the parade ground, I gasped. They looked smart and strong. The first time I caught sight of my son, I didn’t recognize him. He had filled out and toughened up, the shaggy hair was gone, and he was standing tall. I didn’t think someone could change so much in six weeks. It was astonishing.

Both platoons demonstrated fitness drills before marching onto the parade ground in full uniform. The trainees stood at attention for the speeches and the whole awards ceremony – out in the sun for over forty minutes – not moving a muscle. It was impressive self-control and self-discipline. To see all those bright young people shining, brimming with newfound confidence and potential was uplifting. The ceremony finished with the platoons parading and marching to cheers and applause.

I would never have imagined my boy could have withstood the rigours of military methodology training. But he did. Seeing him step up to the LSV challenge, conquer his fears, physical weaknesses, and mental hurdles, and walk through that fire, coming out the other end a powerful young man was inspiring. I couldn’t have been more proud. He can join the military (if he decides to do so – he’s interested in the Navy) and tackle whatever else his heart desires. He has learned that his potential is limitless that it is exciting to try new things and learn new skills, and he’s learned the value of teamwork. What a gift for a young man at the start of adult life.
Have your children ever truly surprised you or have situations with parenting surprised you?

Talk to you later.
Keep reading!
Yvette Carol
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“One of the most effective means for transcending the ordinary is saying YES! more frequently and eliminating NO almost completely” – W. Dyer

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~ IWSG: AI for Authors? ~

It’s time for another group posting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group! Time to release our fears to the world or offer encouragement to those who are feeling neurotic. If you’d like to join us, click on the tab above and sign up. We post on the first Wednesday of every month. Every month, the organizers announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG Day post. Remember, the question is optional!!! Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!
Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and the hashtag is #IWSG.

March 6th question: Have you “played” with AI to write those nasty synopses, or do you refuse to go that route? How do you feel about AI’s impact on creative writing?
At this stage with AI, I don’t know how I feel. There are so many unknowns – and to some extent unknowable factors – that it feels futile to try and establish a position.
There are so many pros and cons to consider with AI. The pros are staggering. Yawningly drab writerly tasks like writing synopses can be done for you, at the touch of a few keys, for free. How great is that? And yet, what is the hidden, unforeseen, dragon of repercussion that will claw us to our bloody untimely deaths if we stop tackling our creative tasks ourselves? The scary answer is we don’t know. And, I want to protect the relationship I have with my muse at all costs.
I feel there will need to be careful thought given to how to protect human authors from AI. Publishers are not currently required to say whether a publication is written by AI. There will need to be some well-thought-out guidelines set in place soon. Some folks have advocated adopting a label system similar to the Non-GMO labelling system. Time will tell.

Just recently, I finished the writing and editing of book one in my next children’s series. I am putting the manuscript aside for a year or two to percolate. I’m busy completing the book one file by writing the accompanying material: the back cover blurb, a longer description of the book and the series, and the synopsis. My first reaction to the thought of writing the synopsis was to groan, no, anything but that! All writers balk. You have to present the whole book in a few paragraphs – of course, it’s a challenge and hard to do. But, guess what? That’s what makes it kind of cool. It’s a real authorly task to master. You sit and wrestle with your story until you fit the whole of it inside the cupped hand of your mind, and then – using as few words as possible – you transfer that understanding/image into words. You finish the synopsis and go hey, that is the essence of the book. I did it. And you feel stupid good about yourself. Forever afterward, you feel proud of that material. You faced up to one of the serious tasks, the steep climbs, of the author biz, and you nailed it. Remember, your creative intelligence is your creative intelligence. After all, it’s your name on the cover for the rest of your life.
There’s a core strength to owning our creative work. At this stage in the AI proceedings, I have abstained.

When it happens naturally, creative writing works best for me, straight from the muse within to the page. But I can’t speak for anyone else. There are as many ways of writing as there are human beings, and all ways are equal. For a lot of folks, AI is going to provide gratefully accepted shortcuts and much-needed assistance. It can “hold the hands” of authors who couldn’t do it otherwise. Who knows what great works of literature are going to result?
I write stories with pen and paper. It will take me a few years to decide where I stand on the AI for the author’s issue. I can only speak from where I am now at the start of 2024. No, I haven’t “played” with AI to write my synopses or speeches. I feel uncertain about whether adding ease and AI shortcuts will somehow undermine the basic integrity of my creativity, so I feel afraid to start. Maybe it will have no adverse effect whatsoever. That’s the reality I want to believe in. At the moment, I am happy sitting on the sidelines, paying attention to what is being written and said about AI for authors, and biding my time, preferring to write my copy the old-fashioned way.
How do you feel about AI’s impact on creative writing?

Talk to you later.
Keep Writing!
Yvette Carol
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“Now is a great time to submit your book ideas to us,” she wrote. “We’re looking for stories written by real people.” ~ A children’s book publisher’s recent comment on social media

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~ Picturing Future History ~

Some things you don’t talk about. And, practicing visualization was one of those things we didn’t talk about 35 years ago. It is a technique my sister and I first read about in a book by Shakti Gawain called Creative Visualization. Back in those days such ideas as the mind-body connection were considered airy-fairy. Even so, this “little” book went on to sell more than six million copies. Essentially, it is about the practice of making mental images and confirming statements toward attaining a goal. Luckily, there’s a lot of research proving that mental practices like visualization are incredibly powerful aids to achieving life goals, especially those to do with health, business, the creative arts, and sports. For many years, elite athletes like professional athletes and Olympians have used visualization to enhance sports performance.

In Dr Gemma Newman’s new book, Get Well, Stay Well, Gemma talks about using this technique. She mentions research that was done using a group of volunteers. One group had to sit and visualize themselves doing bicep curls with a dumbbell for 15 minutes five days a week. One group did the same but they saw themselves doing the exercise in the distance. The control group did no visualization and no exercise. In the end, the group who saw themselves doing bicep exercises up close, in real time, in their mind’s eye had increased their bicep size and strength – purely by imagining themselves doing the workout.
Therefore, in everyday life, if there is some hurdle coming up, I could use this technique to see myself doing whatever it is, in real-time, up close, feeling the good feelings associated with things going well, telling myself positive statements, and that would help me to achieve that positive goal. Gemma advocates using visualization regularly to be more effective and affirmative.

When she was interviewed on Dr Rangan Chatterjee’s podcast, Feel Better, Live More, Gemma told us a story about Mohammed Ali. Apparently, Ali used visualization as part of his preparation for a fight. He would see every move he was going to make, every punch, right down to the knock-out punch. In fact, he started telling people in press conferences exactly when he’d deliver the knockout blow. He was requested by management to stop doing so, as it was adversely affecting the betting!
Ali instead wrote on a piece of paper when he’d deliver the knock-out blow, and slip the paper inside his glove. After the fight, he’d strip off the glove and throw it into the audience then ask whoever caught it to take out the piece of paper and read it out – revealing that he’d written out beforehand when he would deliver the knockout blow – and how did he know? Because he practiced visualization beforehand. But he didn’t call it that, he called it Future History – which I love. It demonstrates that it is possible to craft our own future or at least influence it. For my purposes, I have re-coined it, “Picturing Future History”. It’s simple, free, and you don’t have to move from the spot.

Since being reminded of the technique, I have been using it daily. What do I visualize? Myself getting younger stronger and healthier every decade. Why not? At the moment my sister is sick and some days stays in bed. I reminded her of our old days of practicing Creative Visualization and suggested that on her bad days, she imagine herself walking and doing a workout. My sister also has to undergo painful medical procedures. I suggested she imagine herself painless and tell herself she is pain-free.

The new studies are showing that visualization reduces the perception of pain – therefore, the experience of pain. Scientists are doing research into this at the moment to help relieve chronic pain sufferers. I’ll be watching the developments with interest. Techniques like this can support us in so many ways. It’s an exciting new technology of another kind. Picturing Future History is simple, free, and organic (LOL), you don’t have to move a muscle, and all it costs is a few moments of your time.
For all the world’s faults, I sometimes think this is an exciting time to be alive.
What new research and scientific studies have lit you up lately?

Talk to you later.
Keep reading!
Yvette Carol
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Our bodies communicate to us clearly and specifically, if we are willing to listen. ~ Shakti Gawain

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~ A Book Review: Starcross, Philip Reeve ~

I have finished reading my fourth novel for 2024, Starcross, by Philip Reeve. Starcross, or The Coming of the Moobs! or Our Adventures in the Fourth Dimension! is a middle grade novel released by Reeve in October 2007. When I picked it up in a secondhand bookstore, I did not realize it was book number two of the Larklight trilogy. If I had realized it sat squarely between Larklight and Mothstorm, I might not have bought Starcross, but I’m glad I didn’t find out. I might have missed out on a fun read.
I was immediately drawn by the size, the sturdy hardback cover, the fonts – the whole steampunk look – the heft and weight of the sturdy little doorstopper. The binding and presentation of this series is to die for. I thought if only I could put my books together this well. The hardcover feels velvety. The inside covers are Victorian newspaper advertisements. It’s all in the details. Chapters start with individual posters, and the chapters are filled with glorious illustrations or “illuminations” by the talented David Wyatt. The book is so well-groomed, a thing of beauty.

Despite the awesome size of the hardback, Starcross is a relatively short read. I inhaled it in three breathless sittings. From the opening page, I warmed to the content because of the humour. The subtitle on the front page tells us that Starcross is ‘A Stirring Tale of British Vim upon the Seas of Space and Time!’ I thought, okay, let’s go! I’ve always had a fondness for tongue-in-cheek children’s writing when done in a certain way, as in the books by Anthony Horowitz, or when it is used subtly and mischievously in the way of the Moomin books by Tove Jansson. I seldom achieve that sort of gentle humour in my stories – because it’s hard to write. It is something I aspire to use confidently one day when I’m a grownup. But in Starcross, Reeve does it beautifully. We had only read his Mortal Engines quartet previously, and I didn’t know he was capable of producing lighthearted younger fiction like this. It’s a joy. What a revelation. He should do more of these.
The Larklight series is a bit of a tricky genre to get your head around at first – combining the 1850s-era British Empire with space travel to the planets – it took me a moment to get in stride with reading steam-punk. Or at least, Reeve’s version of it. But, it was well worth the effort because it’s a new world in there.

In Starcross, the second book in the series, Arthur (Art) Mumby, and his sister Myrtle are invited to the Starcross hotel on an asteroid. While staying at Starcross, the beach appears and disappears overnight. Art, Emily, and Arthur’s mother suspect the hotel was constructed on top of a piece of Mars, which moves back and forth through a hole in the fabric of time. Jack Havock, turned British secret agent, appears on the scene as an Indian prince. Then, they meet the ruthless French Delphine, a secret agent searching for her grandfather’s shipwreck, with manic aspirations to style an American republic.
Then, people start disappearing. Strange dark beings haunt the grounds of the hotel. Art and the others are attacked by the Moobs, an alien race able to shapeshift into inanimate objects. Disguised as black top hats, the Moobs are busy taking control. It sometimes gets scary amid asteroid-strewn seas, until they get help from one of the Moobs!
Starcross is a cracking good read and funny. Any kid would love it.

As a fantasy writer, I understand the difficulties of world-building. The world created in Larklight is undeniable. To all you writers out there, the Larklight series is world-building 101, a master class. Reeve renders the solar system in a whole new light, giving each planet new fantastical histories, detailing the lives of the alien races. I was stunned and amazed, to be honest.
Born in Brighton, Philip Reeve is a popular British kids’ author. His Mortal Engines quartet has made him a household name. He’s also well known for illustrating the Horrible Histories, Murderous Maths, and Dead Famous series. Reeve started working in a bookstore, then began illustrating, and has since provided cartoons for around forty children’s books. He published Larklight in 2006 and Starcross came out in 2007.
My rating is three stars

Talk to you later.
Keep reading!
Yvette Carol
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The Grand Hotel at Starcross sleeps peacefully tonight beneath a sky dusty with stars. ~ opening line of Starcross, Philip Reeve

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