Libby

A quick reminder to anyone interested in this month’s competition that we are half way through the month. Here’s a repost of the details:

The other day I discovered that sabulous means sandy or gritty. For this month’s competition please use sand and/or grit as a prompt for a piece of fiction or non-fiction, word range 100 – 500. You can use the…[Read more]

Beta reading other people’s writing has taught me all sorts of things. I wouldn’t want to be without it. It’s satisfying too, that link with someone else’s thought processes and their ambitions for their work.

I can come back with my experiences of being beta read but in the meantime, as Jane says: ‘my experience of the book as a reader.’

Y…[Read more]

My theory, Richard, is that the program looks at content rather than style. I leave you to decide if that idea fits with your novel! Possibly the program throws POV into the mix.

I suppose Joyce and Brown both spent some time in Paris…

PS That should be: I could definitely, not probably, learn a lot from other beta readers 🙂 At the moment I do beta reading in a particular way and that’s probably not the best way possible or at any rate not for all authors. Expanding my ideas would be a good thing.

A discussion on beta reading sounds a good idea. I could probably learn a lot from the way other people approach beta reads.

I don’t think I’d want to offer my beta reading services to a wider public, as it were. I’m happy to do it for members here and for people who pop up on the site asking for a reader from whoever is available. I generally…[Read more]

@Bella I hope the writing mojo comes back. And the reading and sax playing. These big events like Covid can really knock the oomph out of all sorts of things.

I agree with everything said so far, from the time pressures for people with publications etc in the works via Richard’s points about the site layout right through to feeling that posting stuff may not be worth the effort. And yes, idle chat would be lovely.

I don’t use social media but I’m quite active on Jericho Writers and therefore could…[Read more]

I like Kate’s suggestion of a fortnightly writing topic. A clearly marked heading and space might draw in potential new members among people who are Googling for writing advice. But it would need the links problem to be solved.

I agree with Richard about subjects currently being hidden away.

As a member of Kate’s SE 2016 group, this site has…[Read more]

Sound Waves (470 words)

An aeroplane churns the sky but no siren has sounded, and behind the blackout fabric at my attic window there are no searchlights. The aircraft must be one of ours.

In my armchair I pick up today’s paper but find it hard to concentrate. We have all turned into experts in aircraft identification and the noise from this o…[Read more]