~ How to End Your Story ~

‘If the ending sucks, the book sucks.’ ~ Larry Brooks

As I neared writing the end of my third book in the trilogy, The Chronicles of Aden Weaver, I began to feel distinctly nervous. Yes, it’s great to write a series, and they’re especially popular in my genre, fantasy for young people, however after going on this gargantuan journey, how do you resolve it successfully? How do you bring the ending to a satisfying conclusion?

It’s difficult.

‘While there are plenty of structural criteria available to take us to the sequence of scenes that comprise the ending of a story, there is no paradigm or format for the ending itself’ wrote Larry Brooks.

With every story I’ve written in the last thirty-five plus years, it’s the endings I’ve sweated over the most. There’s a laundry list of things to be ticked off and rounded up and you also have to make the ending count.

In writing a book, you have to answer the questions raised as well as the overall story question, you have to tie up the loose ends and bring everything to a resolution that has soul.

It’s what Larry calls, ‘the golden ring of moments.’

In writing a series, there are more story threads to be pulled together and an overarching plot to be completed. The ending needs to have even more impact when you’re resolving multiple books and rewarding real reader commitment.

There is so much pressure to get the ending perfect. But never fear, help is here.

Here are some of the beats to help you get that all important closure in your ending:

*The hero enters the last act with the aim of vanquishing the bad guy, of overcoming their demons, to win the reward, to return home or in some other way reap the results and conclude their journey.

*The ending is more than just words, it has to deliver a sense of ‘satisfaction,’ that soothes the emotional needs of the reader as well as mental. Having built the readers empathetic bond with your characters, your duty as author is to take care of them to the last word.

*At the climax, in the worst moments, when the hardest choices are made, the hero must use the knowledge they have gained along the way, which has been tested and proved true.

*You also have to deliver that “punch to the gut” – whether good or bad – to the reader’s sense of experience, world view and hope. Some secret comes out, some revelation made, some information released, change, ultimate metamorphosis results.

*The hero is able to win against the force of opposition, and overcome their personal flaws.

*By doing this, they integrate into a new, improved person. They have mastered their own fate. They become complete.

It’s no small feat, in other words. And, I usually approach my books’ conclusions with great trepidation.

Poet and children’s author, Helen Dunmore said, ‘Reread, rewrite, reread, rewrite. If it still doesn’t work, throw it away. It’s a nice feeling, and you don’t want to be cluttered with the corpses of poems and stories which have everything in them except the life they need.’

To inject life and to get the ending right for the third book in my series, I literally walked the halls of my house last weekend. I paced around, reading the last two chapters aloud and editing then reading over and over. I must have rewritten the last paragraph eight times. In the end, I got it written.

To write endings that count, there can be no extra words, no loose ends left flapping, every moment must be part of the story’s resolution.

Of those final paragraphs, Larry Brooks, urges writers to, ‘Deliver a moment when the reader feels as if you are writing about them. A moment when you’ve reached out through the pages and touched their heart and mind, and their soul. A moment that reminds the reader why they love to read.’

No pressure, right?

With my book, The Last Tree, every question had been answered; I wanted to do the series justice, to make the ride through three books worthwhile. I wanted to strike the right note, to really make it feel like our hero, Aden, had transcended who he was before and become a radiant new being. I wanted to give closure and yet, the feeling of hope. Has it worked? Only time and the readers will tell.

How about you? How do you finish your stories and hone your endings? Do you find them hard to write?

Talk to you later.

Keep on Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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‘Finish what you’re writing. Whatever you have to do to finish it, finish it. ~ Neil Gaiman
Repeat.Authors are crazy.

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~ Evolution and Creativity ~

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 the first Wednesday of every month. Every month, the organisers announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG Day post. Remember, the question is optional!!!

OPTIONAL IWSG Day Question: How has your creativity in life evolved since you began writing?

I was seventeen when I began writing. Fresh out of school, I was a teenage mum with a newborn baby to care for. My boyfriend and I had moved out of home, away from our families into the city. In the early eighties, the days before personal cell phones and computers, this meant being totally isolated. It’s hard to imagine, now, isn’t it. But, we were on our own in the big, bad world. I studied for my bursary year by correspondence, while washing forty nappies every day by hand in the bathtub. As my boyfriend was in his first year as an apprentice photolithographer, he only made $96 a week and that was all we had. I bought bulk packs of macaroni and different powdered flavouring and made macaroni cheese with a different flavour added each night. We had one car, and we lived in a dingy apartment building. Our flat was infested with cockroaches, and at the front and back of the building it was nothing but tarmac, there was no view, no garden or green area of our own.

That scenario was the perfect breeding ground for the artist to come forth. I had to escape somehow. The cheapest, simplest way to escape my life circumstances was to pick up a pen and write.

When my son was sleeping, I wrote children’s stories and let my imagination go wild. I didn’t ‘know how to write’ and the stories were pretty bad, looking back. I remember a well-known writer saying once, ‘Every writer has those first manuscripts lying in a bottom drawer that should never see the light of day.’ The writing was crap, and yet, I was trapped in a poor, isolated and uninspiring life, and writing stories gave me the hope I needed. It was like self therapy. Every day, I expressed myself creatively through the written word and by doing so experienced that new, more inspiring reality. This became my outlet, my sunlit garden, and the saving of me.

Every day, whenever I got the chance, I’d pick up the story and write a little more. I’d climb through the green window into the meadow beyond, and there I’d be free.

As my son grew up, our life circumstances began to improve and have their own flowering.

My writing changed too. With each writing workshop, course, conference and lecture I attended, my understanding of the craft developed. My work gained more structure, more form and substance.

My first born son became an adult, and suddenly, I became more independent, I had more freedom. By the nineties, I had a job. I had money, and I was still writing in my spare time. There was the beautiful fruit of my stories developing into purer forms.

Every day, whenever I got the chance, I’d pick up the story and write a little more. I was still drawing and painting my characters in tandem with writing the prose.

I remarried and had two more sons. We had a home with a lovely garden. As my life circumstances and finances settled, I didn’t have a desperate desire to escape my world anymore. In order to continue to work at a steady pace on my stories, I had to learn discipline. Just as I had to attend to the grown-up business of marriage, house maintenance and child-rearing, I also had to learn B.I.C. Butt In Chair is hard to do as it takes immense concentration. I accepted the challenge.

Every day, I’d sit and write a little more. I decided to stop drawing my own illustrations, and I focussed on the words.

I gravitated to writing middle grade fiction twelve years ago, and it felt like I’d found my niche.

Writing has become an integral part of my life. I have come to love every step of the novel writing process. I don’t have an agent or a publisher. I’m my own boss and in the last three years, I’ve self published two books and had two short works included in two others.

My creativity in life has definitely evolved since I started writing? How about you, has yours?

Keep Writing!

Yvette K. Carol

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“Tell me, what is it you plan to do / with your one wild and precious life?” Mary Oliver

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~ A CALIFORNIAN ADVENTURE, Part 2 ~

Today is Halloween in California where the youngest son continues his dream trip, ‘A Californian Adventure’ thanks to Koru Care NZ. The charitable trust is run by volunteers, who raise funds to send a group of seriously ill and disabled children on the trip of a lifetime to Disneyland each year.

When your child suffers so much due to ill health, as the parent, you want good things to happen to them.

Yet, as the parent, you’re also a bit jaded, and you tend to think, will this trip really be the ‘trip of a lifetime’ or will it be a series of disappointments? However, I’m happy to say the Californian Adventure has been all they promised and more.

As was detailed in A California Adventure and Californian Adventure, Part 1, in the first week, the kids had been to meet the California Highway Patrol, to see the Hollywood Walk of Fame, to Universal Studios, and SeaWorld, and in the last blog post, the team were on their way to Disneyland. Imagine being a child at Disneyland for the first time, and you can stay all day through to the evening and go on as many rides as you can handle! Ha ha, I can hardly imagine the joy.

The next day, they went to Knott’s Berry Farm, renamed “Knott’s Scary Farm” for the Day of the Dead. And, then, they visited Disney California Adventure Park.

I love the fact that the kids aren’t being treated like kids. They aren’t expected to be in bed early every night. The team of adult carers have taken the kids out to see the sights in the evenings as well.

They’ve given them a taste of the nightlife. They stayed at Disneyland, Knott’s Scary Farm and Disneyland California Adventure until after dark, so they got to watch the parades and ride the lighted roller coasters at night.

They’ve dined in cool restaurants, seeing the bright lights along the way, and they’ve attended different dinner theatre, things most of these kids would never normally get to do.

In the second week, they had another fun educational visit, this time to the LA Coast Guard and then a day at the San Diego Zoo.

Today was a free day, and they’ve been at the beach all day. Tonight, they’ll have to fasten their seatbelts, because they’re going to a Halloween party! Then, the kids have one more day at Disneyland and California Adventure before they finally depart LAX for home.

I expect the youngest son will come exhausted, satiated, and also, that his life will be forever enriched by this formative experience.

I’ve enjoyed watching on from afar and getting to live every minute vicariously through him, even the scary ones. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves. The trip of a lifetime? It’s proving to be the trip of at least two!

 

I think one of the greatest things Korucare do with this trip is make it ‘device-free.’ The kids aren’t allowed to take phones or ipads or any sort of handheld gaming devices.

They are thrown together for two weeks and without their phones and what-have-you, these kids are forced to communicate. And, it’s a beautiful thing to watch. You can see through the photos how close they’ve grown.

These days, with the research done on the effects of the internet/personal phones/devices on our kids, the research has shown a decrease in the ability of children to hold a conversation.

What a brilliant idea, to make these vacations device-free. It really brings the group of kids together in a way they rarely get to experience, one-on-one, in the moment, and interacting with one another. It’s healthy for them and they need that reminder about how to function in real time with other people.

At an event like this, where the kids are not allowed to bring their phones, you see them instantly revert to sitting in groups on the floor talking, and playing handgames, it’s the most heartwarming sight in the world. I’m so thrilled and pleased and honoured our family was one of those chosen for this special life-changing event.

Thank you, once again, to all those who contribute to KoruCare NZ. We’ll never forget this.

Thank you!

Talk to you later.

Keep on Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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“Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal!” – P. Vaull Starr

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~ A CALIFORNIAN ADVENTURE, Part 1 ~

Last Saturday, the youngest son left New Zealand along with twenty-six other kids, on this year’s ‘Californian Adventure.’ The trip is organized and run each year by Koru Care NZ, a charitable trust based in the South Island of New Zealand, whose mission statement is ‘making dreams come true for seriously ill and disabled children.’

As the last days counted down before departure, the tension began to mount, which escalated into pure adrenalin. We all got swept up in it. The tide of enthusiasm skipped from the kids, who were racing from all parts of the country to meet at Auckland International Airport, to the parents, whether through the Facebook page they’d set up or via those who could be there in person.

The kids were so happy, it was a force to be reckoned with.

The photos started flooding into the Facebook page, which has became my favourite port of call every day since. The organisers have been brilliant, because through the steady stream of pictures, we parents have been able to follow along for the ride.

Part one of their grand adventure has been spectacular.

The first day in California was a free day, to give everyone time to get over the jetlag. There were pictures of kids swimming in the pool and eating ice creams and visiting the local food joints. In these pictures, I can see the youngest son is still finding his feet, still feeling a bit awkward with his new companions. Their second day, they took a bus ride to visit the California Highway Patrol where the kids watched demonstrations by the officers and learned about the work they do. They received souvenirs and were allowed to take photographs sitting on the bikes and cars.

At this stage, the kids and the adults were visibly starting to relax more in the photos, and it seemed they were getting to know one another. I could tell the youngest son had befriended the other heart kid he was sharing a room with. In the pictures, the kids were chatting and getting on.

The whole group dynamic seemed to be becoming more like a family.

The fourth day, they took a bus tour to see the Hollywood Walk of Fame. There was a video taken of the kids screaming when they saw the Hollywood sign. The excitement was infectious. They went to Universal Studios, where they visited Harry Potter’s World and the Staples Centre. In these photos, the youngest son is having fun. There is a hilarious video posted on the KoruCare page of my son and others standing in front of a huge transformer.

The robot knocked off the son’s cap and said, ‘Pick up your hat.’ The son picked it up and the transformer knocked it off again. This was repeated four times to greater and greater laughter from the crowd, and the funny part was the transformer laughed each time too. The group of kids around the youngest son seem tight-knit, and everyone’s in a great mood. The footage absolutely made my day.

It constantly amazes me how much joy my son’s good fortune is bringing me. I’m so happy for him I could burst!

Today, being the fifth day of their Californian Adventure, the Koru Care team visited SeaWorld in San Diego. That would have been the first time my son has ever seen a display like that, and I’m sure he would have been in awe and wonder.

The way the trip has been organized, every morning the kids are told where they are going that day, they have no idea beforehand. The youngest son’s carer had explained the intention behind it being ‘that every morning will be like Christmas morning.’

I wish I could be a fly on the wall for tomorrow morning. Because tomorrow they get to go to … drum roll, please … Disneyland!

The reactions should be priceless. My son will be over the moon. As his cousin was pointing out to me today, ‘This is a big step up from having gone on his first roller coaster ride, this year.’ In January, the boys and I had visited our first ever fun fair. The boys couldn’t get enough of the rides, and the youngest son said it was the most fun he’d ever had. So, for a treat, in May, I paid for him and friends and family to go to Rainbow’s End for his thirteenth birthday. He spent a delirious day going on every ride. That was when he went on his first rollercoaster. And here we are, in October, and he’s about to go to Disneyland! He’ll be in seventh heaven.

I’m so grateful to the good folk who do all the fund raising for these trips and the running of Koru Care Nz What an incredible organization. Support in any way you can. Thank you!

 

Talk to you later.

Keep on Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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“May your dreams be larger than mountains and may you have the courage to scale their summits.” -Harley King

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~ A CALIFORNIA ADVENTURE ~

A few months ago, our family got some great news. The youngest son had been chosen as a “heart kid” (a child who has undergone open heart surgery) to go along on this year’s ‘California Adventure.’ A trip to Disneyland is organized and run each year by Koru Care Charitable Trust NZ, ‘making dreams come true for seriously ill and disabled children.’

I overheard a conversation the youngest son was having yesterday with friends while playing Fortnite. One member of the squad asked, “Why do you get to go to Disneyland?” and another answered, “It’s his reward for surviving heart surgery.” That’s the truth and yet, my youngest felt bad about accepting the gift. He said he felt someone else should be going on the trip in his place because he ‘didn’t deserve it.’

And so, I gently reminded him of the terrifying journey of the first five years of his life. It was an endlessly harrowing ride for me as his chief nurse and caregiver.

The youngest of my three boys was born in 2005, with complex congenital heart disorder (or CHD), although we did not know that at the time. The first clue came when he started coughing at three weeks old, though he had no other symptoms of ill health.

The cough would come and go from then on, however when he did contract the flu, then his health would plummet fast and the cough would become life threatening and continuous. It took me five years to figure out what was wrong, as we went down the road of misdiagnoses and educated guesses, and countless trial treatments.

Finally, after trying everything, I told our doctor the whole story. She listened carefully to his chest. Her diagnosis of a heart murmur then led us on to the hospital tests, which finally confirmed the actual problem was a sizeable hole in his heart or atrial septal defect. The medical part of our journey began there.

In 2010, he underwent double bypass open heart surgery. The operation was later added to the “unusual casebook.” The “hole” in his heart was ‘more than just a hole, there was only a rim between the upper chambers,’ the surgeon, Dr. Elizabeth Rumball, told us later, ‘and his heart had grown a single vein from the liver to the bottom of the heart,’ something she had never seen before. Dr. Rumball had to figure out how create an autologous pericardial patch to fix both issues.

After six hours of surgery, my five-year-old woke up in Pediatric Intensive Care, with a gash down his chest, in a lot of pain. Only three days out from the surgery, he’d been moved to the high dependency unit and was already taking his first steps. Three days later, we were released to go home.

We’ve come a long way since those days. The youngest son starts high school, next year. One of the teachers asked me how having had the surgery affects him now. I said, he’s fine now, yet, he will always be that little bit “fragile,” and he won’t have quite the same stamina and energy levels as other kids. Child heart patients are also susceptible to emotional, developmental and behavioural problems. We haven’t had any issues there, so far.

He has to take daily medications and rest a little more than other kids his own age. But, generally he is healthy, fit and well. He bikes to school each day. And, wonderfully, gone are the days and nights of coughing. He has quality of life and the prospect of a healthy future ahead.

With a bit of gentle prodding on my part, the youngest son had remembered his journey and accepted that maybe it was acceptable for him to go on the California Adventure.

After another month and a half, I started the process of medical clearance for him to take the trip. I started on doing the paperwork, and buying the things he would need to take with him. I borrowed luggage and we went to get some money changed into U.S currency.

As the weeks have gone by, the pressure to have everything in order has increased. And in the last two weeks, I’ve been flat tack. Tonight, the bags are packed. The boy has had his nails trimmed, and he’s had a haircut.

Everything is done, at last.

On Saturday, he leaves on the California Adventure with twenty-four other lucky kids.

The youngest son said, “I don’t feel happy very much, but about this trip, I feel the happiest I’ve ever been.”

The joy! What parent doesn’t want to hear that?

Talk to you later.

Keep on Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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You don’t have favourites among your children but you do have allies. ~ Zadie Smith

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~ Another Family Working Bee ~

Blessed be the ties that bind generations. ~ Unknown

To our eyes looking on, our father appeared to be doing well, living independently in his own home until the last of his days, with a little help from my sisters. However, since his death, we have been discovering the true extent to which he had let things go. At the grand old age of eighty-four, dear dad had still been making his own meals and driving his own car without any problem and lived a full, busy life in the Coromandel Peninsula. Yet, property maintenance was one of the things he’d let slip.

When dad died in February this year, as our last surviving parent, it fell to us to clear our parents’ property. It took a long time just to start to sort out the possessions. Dad’s garage alone took weeks of effort. We always used to joke, when he was alive, that our father was ‘the guy who had it all, and kept it in his garage.’ His double garage was stacked to the gunnels with stuff dating back to the luggage that had come over on the ship with mum and my two sisters in 1962. Our goal became just to see the floor.

It was only when we began to see the floor, and get through that stage of constant sorting and waste elimination that the house itself became a focus. That was when my sister discovered the rotting timbers and non-regulation home handiwork. That was when she found that the sea air had corroded the bolts holding certain key structural things like the upstairs deck. That was when we heard that the damage had gone so far the deck would need replacing within the next few years. The reality hit home.

Dad, for all his integrity and goodness and spirit, had let the reins slip a bit. Our new family co-owners decided to invest in the place, which means we may be lucky enough to holiday there together as family for the foreseeable future, as long as most visits are accompanied by a working bee to get the maintenance done. We might be able to keep our parents’ property but only if we’re prepared to work for it.

The boys and I just came home from the usual “boys’ trip” we do every school holidays. We met my brother and nephew and niece at dad’s home by the seaside, where my sister had been working hard.

We went to the beach. We worked in Grandpa’s garage.

We played basketball. We threw out a skip worth of rubbish.

We went to a 60^th birthday party. We scrubbed and cleaned the conservatory from floor to ceiling.

It’s wonderful to spend time together and there’s nothing wrong with a bit of hard work to earn your cold beer at the end of the day.

The joy is in living for an extended period under the same roof that’s what it’s all about.

The other very nice thing that has started to happen as the jobs get ticked off one-by-one, is that we have started to witness our parents’ dilapidated home gaining a new lease of life. The effort being put in behind the scenes by various family members has been herculean. Each improvement transforms the old place a little more. It has “a million dollar view” as we like to say, so it has great potential.

If the property can become a source of passive income stream for the co-owners then it’s possible we might be able to keep it in the family.

It’s a wonderful feeling. It feels like keeping our connection to our parents, who are buried in the small town. It feels like it would make dear old dad happy, who had once expressed a wish we keep the place ‘if we could.’

It feels like providing that link to family history for our children and grandchildren, the tradition of coming together there in holiday times and at Christmas.

Therefore I am happy and willing to work as much as needed and even contribute money, if necessary, in order to keep the old homestead in the family. In these turbulent times, there’s nothing more important.

To go “home,” it feels immeasurably comforting simply to be there. You feel grounded and settled into neutral again. While at the same time you feel supercharged with energy like you put your finger in a light socket. We came home and I felt rejuvenated.

For me, the little seaside town is my turangawaewae or the place in the world I most feel my roots. What about you, where’s your turangawaewae?

Talk to you later.

Keep Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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Family is the most important thing in the world. ~ Princess Diana

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~ Ever Written Your Way to Transformation? ~

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 the first Wednesday of every month. I encourage everyone to visit st a dozen new blogs and leave a comment. Your words might be the encouragement someone needs.

Every month, the organisers announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG Day post. Remember, the question is optional!!!

This month’s co-hosts:  Dolorah @ Book Lover, Christopher D. Votey, Tanya Miranda, andChemist Ken!

OPTIONAL IWSG Day Question: How do major life events affect your writing? Has writing ever helped you through something?

There was a time, not too long ago, when I wasn’t drawn to the idea of the optional IWSG Day Question. I preferred to write what I wanted to write instead. Then, one day I was stuck for ideas, so I turned to the question offered. And, I’ve been a convert ever since. I’ve only missed one month and that was because I couldn’t come up with an answer! But, apart from that, I’ve come to relish the Question – even looking forward to it – to see what the clever upper-ups at IWSG Headquarters have come up with next.

I love the October Question!

 

Writing has helped me through every hard time and helped me to get through every trial I’ve experienced. There have been times, after the losses of family members, when I’ve stopped writing altogether. Dried up and couldn’t write, at the same time I didn’t want to be near anything about the online world, at all. There have been times when I’ve needed to retreat in silence and stillness and be with the grief.

After hard times, writing was my way back into the world of people, and into the fray via the internet. Sometimes, I would resist for longer than others. But, eventually, every time I suffered a blow and was devastated, I returned to my normal life by sitting and translating what I had been through into words. Writing blog posts, writing for my monthly newsletter, writing fiction.

Writing always provided the catalyst for my positive evolution, through the sadness and out onto the other side, of having grown through the experience.

In that place, I could contribute again and be of service through writing my stories, and other stuff, along the way.

My father died in February of this year. Within about three hours of getting the news he had passed, I was off the grid. I’d sorted out what needed to be done for the household to run and for the world to excuse the boys and I for a week. Then, we were on the road for my parents’ seaside town. I stayed off line and away from my cell phone, feeling  I needed all my energy and attention on the unfolding events as we laid dad to rest.

We returned home, and I was a different person. I could feel it, I knew it. You are so changed when you lose someone important in your life. I’d always suspected losing dad would be the most painful, and so it was. I couldn’t face writing or any sort of social media. I remained in this “other” space for weeks. I’d cried so much over the week of sitting with his body and then burying him that I was completely dry of tears. I had wept until I couldn’t shed anymore. So, I did my daily exercises and tended to the kids, ran the household, and went to Toastmasters, gave speeches, without really being there.

I was on automatic without being fully engaged in my life.

One of my fellow Toastmasters said I had lost weight that she could see it in my face, and she expressed worry about me, which really touched my heart.

One day, I opened my computer and I made myself open my work-in-progress. I sat in front of my laptop, and I started editing and rewriting and the energy started to flow again. I felt myself literally coming to life, through the passion I have for my stories. My writing ushered me up from the void into the land of the living again. I was once again able to engage with my children and others in my life fully and I was working on my book.

I felt such deep gratitude!

Has writing ever helped you?

Keep Writing!

Yvette K. Carol

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I put things down on sheets of paper and stuff them in my pockets. When I have enough, I have a book. ~ John Lennon

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~ How to Make Your Own Bean Sprouts ~

(and save money going organic)

For years, I’d intended to “go organic” but, somehow, I’d never managed to get around to it. Yet, with both my parents dying in the last two years, I felt life was catching up with me. So, I decided this year, I’d make the effort to improve our diet and our health.

After multiple car trips around the neighbourhood, comparing prices and availability of organic produce, I found a good local wholefoods store. And, I’m proud to say, we have now made the move over to eating (nearly) all organic food and it feels wonderful. We also make a few things ourselves. It’s a matter of trial and error as we go along. The wonderful thing about being connected via the internet, as I have been for the last five years, is that you can share your developments and discoveries as you go along, and (hopefully) benefit other people. So, here goes…

I used to buy pre-made dumplings. Now, we make our own. Simply buy a pack of dumpling wrappers, some lean, free-range, ethically raised pork mince, and add a few diced shrimps and herbs and chives from the garden, a dash of sesame oil and soy sauce. Mix and dumplify. Then drop in hot water and freeze in batches. The ultimate dream would be to make my own dumpling wrappers as well, using organic ingredients, but, hey, one has to take one amazing step forward at a time!

The first time we made our own dumplings, they lasted for weeks. It was a saving and they were tastier and better for us.

*Top tip: make your children do all the work. My kids love making dumplings!

I used to buy a bag of mesclun lettuce for the kids at $3.99 and a fancy lettuce for me at $3.99 each week. Now, I buy two packs of multiple organic seedlings for $3.95 each from a wholefoods store and we grow our own salad greens for months.

I used to buy bean sprouts. One pack of organic alfalfa at $3.95 and one organic broccoli sprouts or chickpea sprouts at $3.95 from the wholefood supermarket a week.

Now, I buy 100gm packs of alfalfa and lentil sprouting seeds at $6.90 and $3.95 respectively, from BinnInn, and we make our own bean sprouts. The bags last for more than a month.

I thought I’d share the steps of how to do your own sprouting, to show how simple it is. My son says the homemade sprouts taste better. And they’re obviously fresher which means they’re better for you. It’s a win-win all round!

Here’s how to grow your own bean sprouts:

Start with your pack of seed, a jar and a preserving jar lid with mesh glued around the inside. We made our own sprouting kit, using a 1 kg peanut butter jar and preserving lid, adding mesh we bought at the hardware store. However, you can buy starter kits with the seeds included in most wholefood stores. In New Zealand, you can get them at Binn Inn,  for a reasonable twenty-five dollars.

With the alfalfa, I use a tablespoon and a half of seed. With the lentils, I use two tablespoons. Cover the seeds in separate containers with filtered water by at least an inch. Screw the lid on top of the jar. Leave the seeds to soak overnight.

Drain off excess water the next morning. Roll the jar onto its side and spread the seeds out a bit by shaking so that they all get a bit of space and air can circulate.

Each day, water them night and morning, and drain off water. Repeat until the sprouts are to the size you want them. The alfalfa takes about four days to reach a decent size.  The lentils only take a couple of days, or they get a little ‘tough.’ Then move the sprouts to the lidded container of your choosing and refrigerate.

I like to wash the sprouting jar and lid, and give them a day and a half at least of non-use in between batches. After that, cover the next lot of seeds with water and start again. It makes enough sprouts for our family of three for a week.

You’re welcome. Enjoy! And let me know how you go with your bean sprouting adventures.

I do feel improvement in my health and overall wellbeing, and it feels so good to do this for my kids. I hope these tips are of use to you and your family!

Talk to you later.

Keep Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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“I don’t believe in ageing. I believe in forever altering one’s aspect to the sun. Hence my optimism.” – Virginia Woolf

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~ KILLING ME SLOWLY, or eleven reasons to do a read-aloud edit ~

Beware the dreaded terror that is the read-aloud edit! Everything they say about it being a back-breaking labour is true. These days, you often hear the advice to read your own work aloud. This is primarily because, no matter how obvious it seems, the fact remains that stories were made to be told, to be heard by the reader’s inner ear, and to be shared with others. If a piece of prose can’t pass the read-aloud test, it’s dead in the water. And yet, reading aloud your own story, especially if it’s a full length novel, will crush your soul beneath its heel.

I’m currently three quarters of the way through a read-aloud edit of my next middle grade novel, and I cannot tell you how many times I’ve wanted to give up. Labours of Hercules, on steroids.

You see, three weeks ago, after having edited my work-in-progress, The Last Tree, a gazillion times, I decided it was time to do the dreaded read aloud edit. By the end of the first hour of recording myself, I was drained of all energy and, by the end of the first day, the will to live.

Each weekend, that I’ve gotten to work on it again, I’ve been surprised afresh by how it makes me want to claw my own hair out by the roots. It’s tedious, arduous and gruelling. No part of reading aloud 67,634 words comes easy. In fact, I have discovered a whole new appreciation for voice artists and especially those who do the audio novels. It takes power and endurance and patience. You read page after page until you think you’re going to go mad. And, then you find you’ve only read one chapter and there are still fifty more ahead.

The reason you keep going through this undeniable hard slog, is that there’s such a big payoff. You get this incredible transformation that starts to come over the work that no other editing technique can touch.

The reason you keep going despite the mental and physical anguish is that when you read aloud, you hear your story anew. When you listen to the recording to edit the story, you hear the prose in a new way again. This effectively brings to light every flaw. It is quite special and unique in its singular transparency.

The reason you keep going is because you discover where the story doesn’t flow as well as it should, and you swiftly knock a lot of the bumps out.

The eleven rewards I’ve identified so far in reading aloud your own work:

1. You notice extraneous words, when sentences are too long
2. You hear the repetitions, the favoured ways of saying things, favoured words or ‘tics’
3. You hear where the dialogue is popping and where it falls flat
4. You hear where you need to name who is doing what to prevent the reader getting lost
5. It shows up flaws in rhythm, words that when spoken in sequence trip up the tongue
6. You become aware of leaps in states of consciousness, where you as the writer have made assumptions things are clear, yet you have failed to fill in the gaps. You see the spots where there are not enough words to paint the scene
7. It brings out patterns in actions (like ‘nodded’ and ‘shook their head’ or ‘rolled their eyes’)
8. You see where some parts of the story have heft, they’re meatier, while other parts are weaker and the material too thin
9. You discover where you’ve put the cart before the horse and you have things out of sequence, so you have stated the decision first and the options and problem solving second
10. You’ll hear where too many words have been used in a sentence. You’ll discover sentences so long and convoluted you can’t breathe, and they’ll make you hate your own writing with a passion
11. You can feel the drag where some parts of the story are boring, or could be worded better, and sometimes, you can even hear where punctuation is missing

As you can see, it is well worth the sweat, blood and toil, as well as the inevitable midnight oil. Despite the fact it has been a painful, torturous process, so far, reading my book aloud has also been the most effective editing I’ve done. I might even be tempted to do it again, even though I quail at the thought!

Am I crazy? Yes, possibly.

What about you, have you ever tried the dreaded read aloud edit? Did you live to tell the tale?

Talk to you later.

Keep on Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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“May your dreams be larger than mountains and may you have the courage to scale their summits.” -Harley King

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~ The Never-ending Melody of Childhood ~

One of the things I’ll miss most when the youngest child morphs from child to young adult is the singing. It doesn’t start first thing in the morning, when he’s a zombie and must sit plastered to the couch watching television. The singing starts from the moment of that first voluntary movement towards feeding himself, or finding and turning on his device of choice, he’ll begin to sing random snatches of verse from various songs. Not whole songs, sometimes not even choruses, just a few lines here and there, often repeated before I say, ‘OY,’ and he moves onto the next song that pops into his head. He and his friends have been that way since they were small.

The songs continue throughout the day until he tires in the evening and starts to wind down with snack foods and the cartoon network.

When the youngest son is playing a game on his computer and talking to a friend through his tablet (who is also playing the same game), in between snatches of chatter about what they’re doing, and actually playing the games, one or other of them is bellowing a rendition of a song. They don’t bat an eyelid. It’s part of their banter, part of their way of bouncing ideas off the world. And it’s not just him, it’s all of them.

Kids sing. It comes as naturally as breathing and there’s something wonderful about that. 

They don’t run out of song ideas or steam for it either. It’s simply amazing. I admire their fearless lack of self consciousness greatly. Imagine how great it must be to live that way. To be so young and carefree.

The youngest son’s voice is okay. He’s no Josh Grobin, but he can hold a tune. His natural tone when he’s burbling to himself is sweet. It’s just that he can’t seem to sing at a low volume for long, he and his friends have a habit of turning up the volume until, once again, I have to yell, ‘OY’ to get him to lower the decibel level.

I had expected the childlike tendency for song to have expired by now. However, even at the grand old age of thirteen, he still sings the whole day long. Not constantly. It comes and goes, in between activities and school and time spent playing Fortnite and planning to take the world by storm as the next YouTube gamer video star, the next Dan DTM. He still sings.

I love it. He tapes himself playing online games for his YouTube channel, and in between the banter, he’s singing. I don’t know if he even knows he’s doing it. But, it’s got to be a surefire way to tell the older YouTubers from the younger generation. That’s for sure. Adults are far too self conscious to burst into spontaneous choruses of their favourite tune every other minute.

As a child, I used to sing in all the school productions and sometimes for certain events at church. But, then I grew up, and I stopped. I notice adults, in general, tend to sing, dance and laugh less than children, which strikes me as sad.

At least, for now, I know my youngest son is still a child because he’s still singing. Sure, I get annoyed when he repeats the same line twenty-five times. Sure, I get frustrated when I can’t hear myself think for his warbling. Sure, I get ticked off when he’s still singing and dancing in the living room instead of doing what he’s been told.

Of course, I do, even a tuneful melody can wear your nerves to a frazzle on the hundredth rendition.Here are my Top Tips to survive as the parent:

When going on long trips, take ear plugs.

When it gets too loud, ask for an indoor voice.

When the same line is repeated ad nauseum, ask them to stop.

When jobs don’t get done, set a deadline or there will be loss of a treat or privilege.

When the singing and dancing jars the nerves, escape the room!

Even though I shake my head at times, there is still something endearing about hearing your child sing that wrings the heart strings. And, you can’t stay mad for long. As I said in the introduction, I’m sure this trait is the one I’ll miss the most after he’s grown up and gone. So I’ll withstand and cherish him while I can and he’s young.

How do you handle the never-ending melody of your children?  

Talk to you later.

Keep on Creating!

Yvette K. Carol

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Children will not remember you for the material things you provided but for the feeling that you cherished them. ~ Richard L. Evans

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