Creative Spaces — Guest Post by Rosanna Silverlight

02/12 By 4 Comments

Creative Spaces

When I write, I enter my own mental space where nothing exists except the page and the will to write – or the struggle to break into the writing state of mind. I fight hard for that precious concentration; once I have it I’m reluctant to give it up when a distraction comes. In one sense, my writing space is wherever I am when that tug of war between mind and page begins. 

It probably evolved that way because I never had one dedicated place for writing until almost two years ago – but since moving in with my boyfriend, first to a flat and then, last April, to our first house, I’ve discovered what it really means to create a physical space where I let myself loose not just on the page, but on the surroundings themselves. 

I’ve had a lot of fun putting my office together. I feel relaxed and happy when I spend time here, and the people we’ve shown around our new house have all pointed out how it reflects my personality. I never know how to respond to this. It’s a toss-up between “Yay, mission accomplished!” and “Oh, but it’s so messy in here right now!”

My office occupies the smallest bedroom – small enough to be cosy but still big enough for everything I need to fit inside. I painted it two different shades of green – a warm, inspiring colour – and put up shelves to house my books. It’s one of the most cluttered rooms in the house and never stays immaculate for long. At the moment my desk is covered in stuff – my laptop, myriad Post-Its, a hole punch, Roget’s Thesaurus, several Lego mini-figures, a copy of Erin Morgenstern’s The Night Circus, a framed photo of my sister, a pot full of pens, index cards … you get the idea!

I set up my desk so I could look out of the window while mulling over ideas. I love to watch the cat that sometimes appears in the window of the house opposite, and the changing weather patterns – we recently had snow in the UK, and this morning the room was full of glorious sunlight, which turned the green walls golden. It was amazing.

I write as often as I can, fitting it in around my part-time job and dabbling in web design. When I’m at home alone, writing is never very far from my mind – I’ve learned to listen when my muse calls, and to try and wake it up when it’s silent. 

Creative Spaces -- Guest Post by Rosanna Silverlight

Rosanna Silverlight immersing herself in her dream of writing

I always need a good drink before I begin – I never feel entirely happy sitting down without a cup of tea (a writer cliché, I know, but it’s true!) or coffee. And while I can sometimes just open up the laptop and start from a blank page, I often fall prey to the charms of the internet before productivity gets under way. A certain amount of determination can cure this, but so can total immersion in a project – which is what I’m going through right now with my novel-in-progress, an epic fantasy I’m calling Swordslave. 

It’s about people – the Swordslaves of the title – who are half human, half other. They’re powerful, but most of them don’t get to use that power – they’re enslaved and forced to take a drug, which suppresses the ‘taint’ of otherness in their blood. A young Swordslave gets caught up in a power struggle between two kings with different ideas on how to handle her kind, and she has to decide what freedom means to her and how far she’s willing to go to fight for it. 

Ultimately, Swordslave is about liberty, and the many guises oppression can take. I’ve finished the first draft and have begun revisions, but I’d also like to write more short stories in 2013, submit them to competitions, anthologies and literary journals, and maybe even e-publish an anthology.

I believe in looking for opportunities to write whenever and wherever I can – especially as I’m a long way off writing full time – but it’s a powerful thing to know that there is a place where I can immerse myself in my dream and allow it room to breathe. 

My number one tip for creating your own writing space? Train yourself so you can write anywhere. Then, when you get the opportunity to make a space your own, treat it as another tool to hone your craft.

Create an environment that sharpens you. And don’t stop writing.

 

Bio: Rosanna Silverlight spent her childhood daydreaming, reading stories about magic and ponies and later on, writing stories about magic and ponies. 

She still adores reading and still writes – though not so much about ponies these days. She graduated from Lancaster University in 2007 with a joint honours degree in English Literature and Creative Writing, and set about learning the hard way that being a daydreamer is fine, as long as you don’t expect too much. If you do, you’d best pay attention and do something about making those dreams come true. No one else will do it for you!

After a year spent in Spain and Portugal teaching English, she moved back to the UK and settled with her wonderful, imaginative boyfriend in Somerset, a beautiful part of the UK well known for its cider and Glastonbury Tor. 

Rosanna currently divides her time between working a part-time job and writing at home. She writes short stories – some of which you can read on her website [www.rosannasilverlight.com] – and is working on her first novel, Swordslave. 

 

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Creative Spaces — Guest Post by Barbara Froman

02/06 By 7 Comments

Creative Spaces

Necessities

Assorted family photos and a poster-sized framed print of Georgia O’Keeffe’s Music, Pink and Blue #2, painted in 1918.

Classical music from all periods. Today’s selection: Prokofiev’s 3nd Piano Concerto, 1st movement.

I’ve learned to rely on the smiles of those I love for encouragement, and the sights and sounds of other artists as inspiration.  I’ve grown used to the comfort of my soft brown chair, its throw pillows at the small of my back, its hand-tatted antimacassars—elegant lessons on the value of diligence and patience—behind my neck and under my forearms. And I’ve become spoiled by how rapidly and simply lightweight technology saves and edits and puts a wealth of sources at my disposal.  I’m always amazed by how helpless I feel when the electricity goes down—which it does far too often—and all that remains is the glare of night on glass, and the sound of my own breath, At those times, I think wistfully back to my early childhood, when the only encouragement I needed was an idea and the only inspiration, a chunk of free time, As long as I had pencils and paper, and a private space in which to work, I was set.

Because we lived in a small two-bedroom apartment in New York, that space was the bathroom. I didn’t care that its furnishings were cold, its decor spartan, its scent antiseptic; it had what I wanted most: privacy. And so, I would take the tools of my trade inside, and lock the door behind me.

The first time I did this, my mother, who deemed any trip to the bathroom longer than three minutes a sign of trouble, started knocking on the door and yelling, “Are you all right? What are you doing?”

Of course, I told her.  But I might not have, had I known she would share my choice of workspace so proudly:  “And this is my daughter, who writes in the bathroom. Read the nice people a poem, honey.”

Eventually we moved into a bigger apartment where I had a room to myself, without porcelain fixtures. I furnished it with a desk—although I quickly discovered that I preferred the comfort of my bed for creative work, a floor-to-ceiling bookcase (which my brother and I built and painted), a record player, and prints I picked up at the Metropolitan and Guggenheim museum stores.  And I wrote.

Creative Spaces guest post by Barbara Froman

Barbara Froman inspired by music

These days, I feel very lucky to have a room of my own, where I can put tchotchkes, photographs, prints, and animation cels on every surface and wall. I wrote class lectures and screenplays here, and started my blog, Beyond Willow Bend.

This is where I finished my novel, Shadows and Ghosts, and composed a set of pieces for piano duet entitled, Six Variations in Search of a Theme.  And now, I’m digging into an historical novel about two pianists. I have a feeling it’s going to be a difficult book to write, much more so than my last, because of the research involved. But, as long as I can sit in my soft chair, look into the eyes of those I love, see O’Keeffe’s swirl of feminine possibilities, and feel my pulse and spirit quicken to Prokofiev, or Brahms, or Ravel, or Bach, I know the words will be there.

Creative Spaces Guest Post by Barbara FromanBio: Barbara Froman received early training in music at the Juilliard School’s preparatory division before going on to earn degrees in Music Composition at Ithaca College and Northwestern University. She was the Director of Mundelein College’s Creative Writing Program, taught Literature and Creative Writing at National-Louis University, and acted as a consultant to National’s graduate program in Written Communication. She is the author of published essays and poetry, is the recipient of the Serving House Books/Fairleigh Dickinson University First Book Award in Prose, for Shadows and Ghosts, has placed in screenwriting competitions, and was nominated for a Fringe First at the Edinburgh Fringe. She continues to compose music as well as work on a number of new writing projects. Visit her website at: http://www.barbarafroman.com 

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Creative Spaces — Guest Post by Flick Merauld

01/31 By 3 Comments

Creative Spaces

I suppose, in many ways, my workspace is like an extension of myself – though I’m not the only person who uses it: my granddaughter claims the computer whenever she comes here, and my partner collects his email from it from time to time. It’s in the hub of the house as well, in the dining room, not in some cosy office or den tucked away from noise and disturbance. Consequently I have people stopping to chat when I’m trying to work (why is it nobody thinks a request not to talk to you can possibly include them!) But somehow this arrangement seems to make it easier for me to get on and write. There are no barriers to break; there’s no countdown to when I have to be there and knuckle down. I can wander off to the kitchen for coffee or a snack or out to the garden. I have dogs coming to lie at my feet and cats wandering across the keyboard. And, of course, the Internet is slumbering under my fingertips, waiting to surge into life whenever I get stuck and need a brief (or not so brief) distraction. Not only that, but the huge mirror behind the computer space reflects the garden, so that I can watch the changing weather and the wheeling seasons, comfortable and sheltered but still feeling connected to Nature and all her inspiring beauty – as I write this, I can see the frosty trees, while later in the year there’ll be daffodils, the unfurling of apple blossom and lilac, then roses, and the flurried activity of birds and squirrels.

Beginning work is easy. I kind of drift in and out, potter and do other things, slip into my space and get absorbed in whatever the current project is, drift off again to the shops or to read for a bit, make some food. I don’t write to music, though, as I find it incredibly distracting. While all this seems very casual and undisciplined, I actually do get a huge amount done when I’m in full creative flow. As I’m a photographer as well as a writer, and process images in Photoshop, my space isn’t for one activity only, and I think that makes my approach more fluid than it might have been otherwise.

Creative Spaces Guest Post by Flick Merauld

Flick Merauld in her creative sanctuary

Thirteen years ago, when I first began writing for publication, I was quite superstitious about my workspace and wouldn’t move or change anything while a book was in progress. Between 1999 and 2004, I wrote a series of books on Paganism for the American Mind/Body/Spirit publisher, Llewellyn, using the pen name Elen Hawke; from the time each of these books was started till it was sent off to the publisher, I wouldn’t move so much as a pen from it’s place on my worktop. When my partner first came to live with me, he decided to tidy up around the computer and I went ballistic – I actually felt invaded. Nowadays I’m less pernickety. Since I began publishing onto Amazon KDP/Kindle, I find I’m quite happy if things get removed or displaced. Maybe it’s the nature of my novels, the Aunt Sally series (The Aunt Sally Team and Aunt Sally & More) and The Sacred Marriage, but I find the whole process of writing much more enjoyable now. Maybe it’s also because I can set my own deadlines, rather than writing to a publishing schedule as I did for Llewellyn. I’m even writing two books at once at the moment, a third Aunt Sally and a sequel to The Sacred Marriage.

I think kind of catching myself unawares — sitting down and looking at what I’ve written, making corrections etc. then deciding to write a bit more, rather than giving myself a strict schedule — works best for me. I love writing, whether it’s answering questions in email discussion lists, chatting on Facebook or Twitter or getting stuck into a new novel. I think I’m privileged to spend my life in activities that I enjoy so much: reading, writing, photography and illustration. So my workspace, where I do all this, is a happy place for me to be.

Bio: Flick Merauld is a writer artist and photographer and plonks around on harp and guitar. As well as training in photography and graphic design at art school, she’s travelled all over the world and done many different jobs including barmaid, farmhand and factory worker. She’s now very happily settled in the beautiful but eccentric city of Oxford (United Kingdom) with her partner and family.

Having had several well known non-fiction books published by the American publisher Llewellyn, under the pen name Elen Hawke, she turned her hand to writing fiction, resulting in novels that include the best selling The Aunt Sally Team (UK visit http://amzn.to/MgZRmW) based on a riotous summer spent playing the old fashioned English pub game of the same name, and its sequel, Aunt Sally & More ( UK visit http://amzn.to/12fQSIy) Both these books combine love, sex, relationships and humour with depth and insight. Her novel The Sacred Marriage (UK visit http://amzn.to/LhdwVm), set in Brittany and Oxford, is written in a more serious vein.

You can visit Flick Merauld‘s blog, cats dogs & eBooks: life love & having a novel published, and visit her Facebook page

Creatives Spaces by Flick MerauldCreatives Spaces by Flick MerauldCreatives Spaces by Flick Merauld

Creative Spaces is a new guest blog series that invites you to take a peek into writer’s special workspaces. Come back often to read the intriguing guest posts.

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Creative Spaces — Guest Post by Ksenia Anske

01/25 By 4 Comments

Creative Spaces

My writing space is more than just a physical place. It’s my pattern, my routine, my specific mood to settle into when writing. You know how when you put on your exercise attire, you’re more likely to actually exercise? Yeah, same with me and my writing space. When I’m in it, with the door closed, I’m more likely to do actual writing. It’s nothing special, really. A typical desk with a lamp and a stack of books in the corner. And an exercise ball instead of a chair because I like to bend back, crack my back and hang with my head upside down when thinking. I imagine because of all the blood rushing to my head, when stuck, within a few minutes of inverting myself I usually get an idea or two on how to proceed.

And I like my space clean, orderly and spartan. When it’s organized, I feel like my mind is organized. I tend to outline my novel before diving in, and I like tracking my character’s journeys on a map, so I have maps on both walls facing the desk and small square sticky notes with scene reminders and character traits. I also pin index cards corresponding to each Chapter next to the map and like to rearrange them when early in the Draft. It felt so awesome to get rid of them on Draft 3!

Another thing I like doing is gazing out the window at the woods that are usually pretty foggy and creepy looking in the winter, but also very green and full of squirrels in the summer. Plus, our house sits really high on a hill, so the whole neighborhood is sort of below us. I love it. It’s quiet and serene and very much ME at the same time. By that I mean, the stranger a forest looks, the more I would want to go in and attempt to get lost in it. So I constantly take pictures of the trees and bushes around my house and post them online as inspiration, be it sunny or rainy or foggy or, you guessed it, creepy.

Creatives Spaces by Ksenia Anske

Ksenia Anske in her creative space

I usually go in my space and close the door at about 8am and do about 2 hours of social media, then at 10am turn everything off except my Sigur Ros or Bjork or Radiohead radio station on Pandora, play my 6 or 7 Words with Friends games, and then start by reading out loud what I wrote the day before, typically 1/2 of a Chapter, correct minor details as I go, and then seamlessly drift into new writing, next 1/2 of a Chapter. I don’t let myself out unless I either wrote for 4 hours or wrote at least 2,000 words. Oh, and I have a large cup of black coffee with me!

I’m currently working on my 1st novel, SIREN SUICIDES, Draft 5, which should be done by April of this year. It’s a story about a teenage girl, Ailen Bright, who lost her mother to suicide by drowning, hates her controlling father and decides to escape reality in the same way. On her 16th birthday she attempts to drown herself, but instead of dying turns into a siren and discovers that her father is a siren hunter. She also discovers that she wants to eat the soul of her best friend Hunter Crossby, because it sounds irresistibly delicious. To figure all of this out, she dives into an adventure akin to Alice in Wonderland, except it’s all things water, rain, songs, and magic that’s both sinister and dreamy.

Despite my beautifully set up creative space, many mornings I go through crying bouts of anxiety before starting, usually lasting 30 minutes (it’s getting better now that I’m gaining confidence), typically being afraid that what I write is complete shit and nonsense and horrible absurdity and nobody will ever be interested in reading it. I have to drag myself through these either by breathing or by bugging my boyfriend over Skype (while he’s at work), sending him messages like “I CAN’T DO THIS, I SUCK!” and him calmly responding, “YES, YOU CAN. YOU DON’T SUCK.”

And in I go, into my daily pattern. Write. Read. Repeat.

BIO:

Ksenia Anske was born in Moscow, Russia, and came to US in 1998 not knowing English, having studied architecture and not dreaming that one day she’d be writing. She lives in Seattle with her boyfriend and their combined 4 kids in a house on top of the hill that they like to call The Loony Bin. Visit Ksenia’s website or her facebook page.

 This post marks the launch of the Creative Spaces 11 part series.  Come back to hear about other writers and their creative journeys.

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Creative Spaces For Writers

01/24 By 2 Comments

Creative Spaces

Do you have a special place to write?  Do you have a special routine to prepare yourself for writing?  How does your space affect your writing?  These and more questions have been buzzing around in my head.  I know the answers for myself but I wondered about other writers.  Were they doing something I’m not?  Could I learn from what others do?  Absolutely!  I decided to invite writers to share about how their office space was linked to their creativity or creative process.  Their responses were surprising and informative.  It turns out there’s much more to our workspaces than just office furniture.  As a result, I’ve started a new guest blog series, Creative Spaces, which launches on Friday. 

writing woman

Do you have a special place to write?

Eleven authors have accepted the invitation to guest blog and if visitors (you) show that they enjoy the series, it may last longer than eleven weeks.  You’ll gain inspiration and maybe some tips.  You’ll certainly get to know some of your favorite authors a little bit more.  Be sure to come back each week to hear about other writers and their creative journeys but especially to take a peek inside their private creative spaces.  

 

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Quotes I Like… Anton Chekhov

12/30 By Leave a Comment

“The role of the artist is to ask questions, not answer them.”
 –Anton Chekhov

Thought provoking and so true. I’m adding Anton Chekhov to quotes I like.

Quotes I Like

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Stepping From 2012 Into 2013

12/29 By Leave a Comment

I’m looking forward to 2013 and I hope you are, too.  I’m eager to take those steps into a fresh year, starting out with a clean slate.  While I usually have a list ready by the first of the year—call it resolutions, goals, or a To-Do list—this year I’m doing something different. My goal is to have a leaner list of things to be done.  I’m resolving to be less stressed, less over-committed, and more living in the moment. 

artsy stairsteps

I must admit I don’t know how long this lifestyle will last.  I’ve always been an overachiever.  But the time has come for me to decompress.  How about you?  Are you feeling like you’ll never be caught up or are you feeling frustrated by too much to do?  Allow yourself some time to unwind.  Free your mind of clutter.  Focus on the important things in your life.  That’s what I’m resolving to do. 

I found this great article, Live In The Moment, which gives useful tips for living in the moment and the benefits of living in the moment.  Believe it or not, I think these practices will help us be more productive.  Wishing you and yours a meaningful New Year.  Start the year out right, step from 2012 into 2013 with less stress.

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Shopping For Writers (Or Anyone Else)

11/27 By Leave a Comment

Wondering what to ask Santa for this year?  Or uncertain what to buy for your dearest writer friends?  I started compiling a visual shopping list on Pinterest to help friends who asked what they should buy for other writers and to assist those who were stumped when their spouses asked what they wanted for Christmas, Valentine’s Day, or their birthday.  101 Gift Ideas for Writers and Book Lovers is my compilation of awesome literary gift ideas for anyone who wants suggestions to give to their loved ones, or find something unique for a writer or anyone who loves books, or to buy something special for yourself.  Are you the kind of writer who rewards herself for making a deadline, or for completing a first draft, or for kicking butt during NaNoWriMo?  If so, look to this list for that amazing reward.

I included practical items for those writers who are like me and are buried under mounds of paper.  We long to free ourselves of paper clutter.  I know others must also want to be more productive so I added a few gifts to aid a writer’s productivity such as Dragon dictation software.  What writer doesn’t want to be more creative?  I recommend fun items to stir the creative juices like a Shakespeare love pillow, a banned books bracelet, and typewriter tote bags.  Then there are health and well being suggestions such as a gift certificate for a soothing massage.  Count me in!   Any woman, whether a writer or not, wants to look and feel good, so I included a couple of  jewelry and beauty ideas, too.  But, most of the items work for men as well.

Writing Prompts and Story Cubes

Now, I do mention gift cards like iTunes, but it’s not a cop out.  Some friends love to buy apps or ebooks.  And if you include a printout of a specific app like the Note Taker HD as a suggestion, then that makes the purchase more personal.

I’ll continue adding to the list on http://pinterest.com/byvictoriaj/gift-ideas/ as I do my shopping and providing the links so you can easily locate each item.   If you have any suggestions for a great gift, let me know and I’ll add them to my growing ‘Shopping for Writers’ list.  What are you asking Santa for?  Let me know in the comments.  I hope this post and board will make Santa’s job easier this year.  Happy shopping!

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