My 8 Step, Plan to Writing a Novel. 07/20/2010
 
 My handwritten notes that I am converting to printed text using Dragon Naturally Speaking software, see headphones above. Below is my pile of finished with notes, scrunched up ready for the rubbish and my words are all safely stored and backed up, as printed text.  Like my art fridge magnets? Find a typo in my post and let me know, and I'll post one of these to you. :-). This one is of snow in Venice. The title of my novel will remain a secret until I am ready to publish so I will simply call my first novel, “Secret”, to give it a name, to talk about it here.. Tonight I have spent 4.5 hours in preparation time on my novel, “Secret”.. I have not written a word of my novel, I do not intend to write the novel until November, Tonight I completed the time management planning to write the novel and allocated other aspects of my life into a secondary position in my life to give the novel, a primary focus The division of Time I have allocated to each stage. I have generously allowed myself 21 hours a week to work on the novel. 1/ Preparation and research - 3 months, Begun. 2/ 1 month to write, the novel, in November. 3/ 5 months to get it properly, edited and re written to a finished stage. Total of 9 months, lol, ‘that would be right, that is how long it takes to produce a child’. · What have I achieved tonight, doing the past midnight oil fat burner? Time Management Plan to Gain a 21 Hour Novel writing working week. 1/I have allocated 3 hours x 7 days a week to my novel writing project, giving me a 21 hour novel writing week. This should be more than adequate to do a good job. 2/ I will continue to blog and I will do EBooks and art prints for sale from my blogs also free form link work and advertising as I will need to save my money in case I self publish a book 3/ I will discontinue my gym and focus on ¾ of an hour of cardio exercise and ¾ of an hour of strength training exercises on alternate days, from ‘home’ as this will save me time. I will not be active in the 12wbt forums as I need to find additional time I have to cut back on some actions. Similarly, I may move entirely into my Kathy Shell page on facebook to chat, my site I publish my blogs to, purely due to needing to find this extra 3 hours a day. 4/ As my time for exercising will be reduced I will need to be more focused on eating clean. 5/ I will be packing my paints away, for some time. A novel will be my major work of art for the year, I have achieved painting I am ready for new achievements. 6/I may learn how to download audio books to an IPod or get a portable CD player to listen to audio books while exercising fulfilling some additional exercise benefit and learning more about the craft of novel writing by listening to the work of good authors. 7/ After an initial stop start attept to begin the novel preparation work, earlier in the night I realized that this work will have to happen after reg retires for the night. 8/I discovered as I researched my novel, I found great ideas for blogs so I actually deviated and did some blog topics while they were flowing off my fingers into print easily, that 'works for me', in the same way as sharing how I write this novel, can be a useful blog topic for those interested. Happy with the time management plan above and placing it into action immediately, I am ready to write the Plot Chart I am ready to begin to write the rough plot chart for the novel, plan where it will start and how it will end and prepare my character descriptions.  Giveaway of the Day. Brachina Gorge, Flinders Ranges, South Australia, A Fridge Magnet from the Art of Kathy Shell. My Giveaway to be drawn this time tomorrow is as a thank you, for any input you would like to give, as advice to me, as a reader or writer of historical novels. I want your opinion of the best order in which to write a series. Here are my thoughts I feel writing from 1950 forward, given I can remember this time well would be the easiest place to begin a series, for me. Then I thought I would write a novel that went from 1910, until 1950, a time described to me by my mum who intended to write a novel from this time, but never did. After that, I have a lot of early Australia, and Scottish oral history I would love to research for accuracy and write. All the main characters to be, inter-connected to make a series, written forward initially then a jump back into time with each book that followed. I would love reader and writers opinions before I choose my time and make the official start and am offering this fridge magnet of Brachina Gorge in the Flinders ranges as my thank you for the best advice I am given J, or if there is equally useful advice I will draw a thank you prize winner. J I also plan to write an EBook, About :- Getting Fit, Past Sixty. I am taking about 5 years, to make a transformation, from morbidly obese to slim and fit journey, I am just over the three-year mark, into my progress and I have used my creativity to write my journey in what has become a successful and award winning blog, artslim. Soon I will write and launch an Ebook from this and my gray-nomad.com, seniors and travel interest, blog. I do not diet, think diet, nor take apidexin, I just strive to eat healthy and portion control my meals to 300 to 350-calorie size x 3 times a day. I allow 100 to 150 calorie healthy snacks if I feel I need them, any drinks I have, like tea or coffee with skim milk and no sugar, or a small glass or red wine, occasionally, are counted, as these snacks. I work out, quite hard; at least one hour of every day alternating strength and cardio exercises and I do other exercise, incidental exercise to my day. I do a program of three strength training days, alternating with 2 cardio and 1 flexibility training day both of those having some core strength training involved. Comments VERY WELCOME. A friend, Oanh Nguyen has already replied to this question on facebook with her comment “sounds good. I'm not a writer but many series are written that way...” So Oanh is in the draw J Thank you.  Today I began more advance planning and preparation to make extensive notes for the novel I want to write in November. Tonight I am striving to work out how I can fit this in with the bread and butter writing I do each day. I have decided the time frame for the novel, this is a big step considering the huge time frame of ideas in my mind, Simplifying to a 10 year time frame and a child as my main character, out of a potential 100 year several generations of stories I want to tell, gives me a realistic starting point. I have so many great stories that were told, to me by my mum as well as those stories I accumulate through my Australian travels that I could use in novels. Too wide a time frame for just one, so learning to simplify and focus on a period of time, is a step forward in my novel planning. My mum’s mother, (I never met her, so tis is what I always called her), ran a mixed business, a combination milk bar and smoke shop and apparently, there were laws that the milk bar section could stay open any hours but the smokes were not allowed, to be sold, after 10pm at night. They would send inspectors around late at night trying to catch milk bars selling smokes after hours and they would fine them. My mum was born in 1910 this was during the mid 1920’s. Late at night cigarette sales was apparently the main business for milk bars in the mid 1920's. Late one night a stranger called at my grandmother’s shop and asked to be served smokes. He was asked, to wait awhile; grandma said she was busy with the children. She popped back and forth from the back room to the shop, chatting to this man each time she reappeared in the shop, kept him there, talking for a good 20 minutes. Then she went and got his smokes, and served him. He pulled out his badge and showed he was a afterhours smoke sales, inspector. Grand mum, pointed to the clock on the wall. It was 2 minutes after midnight and there were no laws about how early in the day smokes could be sold.  "Love what you do and you'll never have to work a day in your life." I love that quote. That is a fantastic way to live your life. In many ways I do live my life that way. I am not conventional; I do not try to do what is, expected, of me. I am comfortable in a mess as long as I can find the things I need and things are clean and hygienic. After all nature has litter around the place and I love the landscape with its fallen leaves and fern fronds with insect chew marks, the landscape and my home does not need to be perfectly manicured for me to be happy. Too much tidyness would cut into my creative time, my 'work', that I love too much to call work. My idea of beautiful hands would be hands reaching out to aid someone or up to their wrists in wet clay or other creative medium. My vision of beauty is different to the conventional. I see beauty in eroded mountains and scars on trees and wonder that people view these things as flaws in people when they give such character. I am certain artists see life differently. You do not need to be a trained artist to feel this deep satisfaction from creativity, there are web programs like slideshow that can help you turn your regular photo collecting into art forms to share. The writer in me has overtaken the painter, and just like when I was a painter I am now turning away work I don’t have the time to do and choosing, only the best assignments or the best businesses to do work for and enjoying planning the novel I hope to write in November. Creative people, never retire, we just reinvent ourselves. Yes, I am a carer, but I retained my creativity, by adapting my talents to those compatible with my new lifestyle. Where I once was, the painter who wrote, I am now the writer who paints. By adapting to my changing needs, demands and environment, I have retained the love for my work. My work is my play, my passion. My sister was a writer, by profession, she also painted, (the reverse of my early career choice), so we mentored each other. She then adapted to becoming a painter, then as her life needs changed, she returned to our early life upbringing, that of working with fabrics. We were born into 'the rag trade', my mother being a fashion designer. My sister now makes beautiful art quilts for galleries in San Francisco, loves her work and is highly respected for it. My family, past and present, have all gravitated towards doing what they love and turning it into a profession. This is a great way to live if you can do it. "What do you love enough to make your life's work and then never work a day in your life?"  Establishing A New Routine. A Balanced Life. 06/22/2010
 Fitting exercise into a busy creative life. o find time for illness" Quote by Earl of Derby. I felt this quote suited my ‘A Creative Life’, blog as I know how hard it can be when we are creative people, striving to make time for our own physical needs. For a long time I treated my body as if it was just a vehicle to get me from here to there, and as long as I was fit enough to hang a painting and load a pottery kiln, I gave it little thought. More recently, I have realized how important staying in shape is, if I wish to continue my creative life, for a lot longer and as a result, I began writing my healthy lifestyle, fitness and natural slimming blog, artslim a little over a year ago. Last weekend I won a ‘best body transformation blog’, first prize award I am working my way through all the emails , there have been so many congratulation emails coming in, plus general advice questions, from people, one asking me about apidexin. Thank you for the congratulations :-) With accolades’ for my writing and I believe a prize or prize money, it is making it even easier saying good-bye, emotionally, to my grand scale artworks and my art gallery days. It becomes more natural for me daily, to state that ‘I am now a retired painter, turned writer.’ I now paint small-scale art works. This is my latest one of the Johnson River from the Esplanade at Innisfail. POA, original 5” x 10” acrylic painting on stretched canvas. My writing has become the primary focus of my creative work. Staying fit and happy has become a primary focus of my life.  A Satisfyingly Creative Week. 05/03/2010
         What a fantastic holiday, we have had here at Ballina Beach Tourist Park, with great meals and performance art by, Byron Circus Arts giving lessons on the Flying Trapeze and the great entertainment of live music and stunning fire dance performed by Utopianfire. I am working on the painting of the Warby Hut J. I have done an ink block in plan of the subject on to 300-gram 100% rag content watercolour paper. Other creative activities I have been up to, have involved quite a large amount of creative writing and web design work Oh and lol, does clipping the poodle, count as creative art? If so that is one more art experience I got my hands into this week and I was the receiver of a great style cut and foils, myself. This has been one of my most satisfying creative weeks for this tour. I have enjoyed a very creative week, here at Ballina Beach Holiday ParkJ. Tomorrow we head towards Maleny and the beautiful Glass House Mountains of QLD.  The Warby Hut. Photo subject for my current painting.  Strange how the creative mind, works, wasting time is often the best way to spend our time and where the best creative, results will stem from. I have a very busy day planned today, more than enough to do, including creative pursuits of painting and writing and I was not sure how I was going to fit them all in. With this in mind, I began to wonder how I was ever going to fulfil my commitment to myself to write a novel in November. That is rightJ, I have promised to make November my novel writing month. This morning I was feeling if I did not have time to fit all of today’s activities into today, I would risk failing at my November goal and I know some serious time management work needed to be done again. So I began my morning in bed with coffee and opening up my own diary, news and forums I read, saying good morning to friends and composing the blogs I write as I ‘get into’, my day. Morning over and I have written hardly any words, spent a lot of time chatting with friends on face book, wandering sideways into blogs and newspaper articles published on line about Australia, and especially central Queensland’s settlement history. That is the era and location where my novel may take place. I came out of this, ‘wondering trance’, initially with the feeling that I had time wasted a entire morning, then I realized I had been on a valuable job search and had in fact gained a valuable referenced history that backed up the oral history I need to work into my novel. So I have switched from this feeling of ‘a morning wasted’ to ‘knowing I have done a morning of fantastic reference for a historical novel’. I am seriously troubled in some ways about how to write this novel. It will be no pretty romance. It will involve a story of atrocities, committed on all sides, against innocent people and yet somehow I want the work to be ‘uplifting’, to have some final message of understanding of the worst of human nature.. A glimpse into why people can do some hideous things to each other and yet we all are the same, longing for the same things and wanting to be good people. HOW do I express ‘that’, in WORDS? Am I right to think ‘this is beyond me? Do I give in to self-doubt that it would need a greater mind than mine to express such profound feelings? Do I try to lighten a serious subject with humour? Could this straight laced wowser, lol J, I do that? I think I postponed writing this novel for so long because I doubted I would have the skill required to do it well. This is all new territory for me. I WELCOME ADVICE. This novel, if written, (self-doubt), could become one of several novels, along similar, oral history story lines. This morning my head is beginning to flood with material, my characters becoming visible to me and having personality, I need to write for it, (so much for my already packed with activity, day) and I know I am ready to start developing these stories NOW; maybe November will just be my month to relocate the scrabbled dyslectic, loose rambling, of notes in my brain into a draft on the computer and hope its intelligible enough, to allow someone else to try to proof read it. As I have never written a novel length or a fiction article in my life, this is going to be a challenge for me, the material is to sensitive to write in its factual form I will need to totally rewrite it into fiction.  I was up late last night writing about a serious subject, plagiarism and recommending that people view the website Bloggers against Plagiarism, so we can learn to do more to protect our own and others, intellectual and creative copyright material. I had a very special occasion today, meeting a friend, I have known for more than a year, via a self-help forum, and I had never met her in person until today. I met her and her sister, also my friend now J and other family members. We picnicked at the Kiama Blowhole and returned along the coast road to the beautiful strip of coastline where we are staying at the Seven Mile Beach, Tourist Park. I was running on about 5 hours sleep today due to blogging about the serious subject of plagiarism last night and probably looked like I needed the best eye cream for dark circles and so I popped on my peaked sun hat, to hide the late night blogger’s eyes. If you are interested in reading more, this is the blog I wrote, on the subject of The crime of plagiarism . On a lighter note, I'll finish with some lovely photos I took today. It was a beautiful day, shared with great friends.       It has been a night of amazing finds. It was almost as if Reg was trying to keep me from meeting, with a secret lover he was jealous about. A novel I had structured out with part written chapters and a full plot block in, mysteriously disappeared three years ago and I have made lots of requests for Reg to ‘keep his eyes out for it’, as I need it. Today I asked him to search up some black folders as I wanted them for art work and after a couple of hours I asked him again and he said I would not want the black folders. I asked him why. He said, you just would not want them. Not understanding, I said I did want them. He still insisted I did not want them and I asked where they were, and we went on with this, seemingly silly conversation. He finally said they contained heaps of papers and so I would not want them. I said, “Let me have a look”. He did not seem to want to show me where they were and I had to insist on seeing them. There it was. My missing, part written, novel! OMG! What do I do with this NOW? I have so much to do already. IS there any point in writing a novel, when you, are known, for your nonfiction work? Who would publish it, it is not like at 64, I would be a young upcoming writer. Where will I crib the time from to write a novel now? Do I pack t to go away with me on tour for 6 months? OMG decisions at this stage of the planning, I already have more work with me than I can possibly do. No, I’m not panicking. Lol J. In this last year, with my blogging taking off and my part written novel, having been hidden away, I had come to deciding I would never write that novel. I had resigned myself that it was no longer something I wanted, life was complete as it was and obviously my man must feel slightly threatened that I might become too totally absorbed in it, if I began this work.....and he is probably right. Foot note. Another find, A 'Biggy', like a lost passion, reappearing, at an inconveniently time. What do I do with my lost love? Reignite the passion? Kill it off? Just leave it to smolder and see what happens? lol. I will never be bored. I've more to do in my lifetime than I'll ever have time to do. I AM pleased this is found, even if I don't know what to do with it now. | Kathy Shell on Facebook What is RSS
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