Philippa East

Hi @Libby – I can recommend trying to channel the emotions from current affairs into writing, although I think you have to be in a reasonably strong state to do it. It can be hard to write anything much when life has you beaten down.

Ah, oil in biplanes! I don’t know about linseed oil, but castor oil was a very common lubricant for early…[Read more]

I know that Brexit and politics in general has had an impact on my writing because I found myself getting more and more sucked into arguing on Facebook and Twitter and that, I have come to realise, is the worse kind of political discussion because there is never any nuance. It is all so polarised. But I found it hard to switch off from and it…[Read more]

I agree that the political situation over the last few years has been difficult and distracting. I suspect it has affected both my writing and my mental health.

I can name one effect Brexit has had directly on my writing. On the night of the referendum, I had run out of time to finish the William the Conqueror novel I was co-writing with…[Read more]

You have got the premise right @Libby although I don’t think the two soldiers are despatch drivers. To me it just came across as unlikely that only two low ranking soldiers would be sent to cross miles of dangerous territory with no particular plan and little chance of success but maybe it was supposed to show how useless, confused and uncaring…[Read more]

What a wholly satisfying tale Libby. Thank you.

Oh yeah, oh Lord, I got them ol’ Brexit blues…

My writing has been dead in the water for a while now, and while the main cause of that is the totally negative results of my last submissions Brexit hasn’t helped. Like Alan, I’ve found the whole business, from first to last, intensely dispiriting, for more reasons than I can, or would even want…[Read more]

I take a positive view and think that we will be fine. Like you I don’t want to discuss the pros and cons here. There’s been enough elsewhere.

I have had the Brexit blues while the whole thing has rumbled on, though. The uncertainty has been most unsettling and my writing has also suffered.The deep splits in the country are very unpleasant…[Read more]

Yeah, that doesn’t sound so plausible! Libby, I agree with Jane – that sounds much more interesting.

That sounds wonderful Libby. Can you remember what it was called?

The basic premise is that two very young low ranking soldiers get sent off through miles of no mans land to prevent another section (sorry but I can never remember the correct names for sections of the army but it is around 1600 men) falling into a trap by attacking what they think are a few Germans. I struggled to believe that they would only…[Read more]

Hello, Libby 🙂 It sounding less and less like my sort of film.

Hello, Sandra! That all sounds brilliant! I think I must have missed that last year in amidst the chaos. What are they called? I’ll look them up x

That’s a shame, Jane. What was the basic premise? I’m not that big a fan of war films with a few notable exceptions.

Waving back at you, Janette. It’s lovely to familiar faces here. It’s a shame it’s been quiet but these things sometimes go in phases. It was always going to be hard to build something up from scratch after the Cloud.

I empathise with where you are writing-wise. I got like that in 2012 when my children’s novel just wasn’t getting any interest and…[Read more]

Still here also (and elsewhere!) and glad to say one 2019 resolution was fulfilled by my self-pubbing the first three of my ‘Love triangles with murder’ series, so now I’ve got book 4 to a near-beta read stage and begun book 6.

Hmmm Not sure about 1917. It was certainly visually stunning and showed a lot of the awfulness of life in the trenches but it was curiously unengaging – not sure why – Maybe it was just not my sort of film. Plus I thought the basic premise was unlikely which didn’t help.

*waves frantically* Hello Mandy! Great to see you here. Yes, it’s much quieter here now, and though I guess some ex-cloudies peep in from time to time, there aren’t a lot of partakers atm. Only 4 entries for last month’s comp for instance, and so far the same for the winter short story comp. Such a shame, but hopefully things will improve.

As for…[Read more]

Haha, a dead body will certainly shake things up. I’m sorting out all the obvious problems and then I need to pass it on to fresh eyes so that they can tell me all the problems I can’t see. And hopefully they will tell me the story is strong enough…

You’re tempting me with Little Women… Should I go and see 1917 too?

I thought that about Little Women too. Yet another remake. But the structure is very clever, dotting between the past and present, and it is full of life and magic. It made me want to go back and reread the books for the millionth time. I’d strongly recommend it but take tissues!

I always worry if the story is strong enough but I don’t know how…[Read more]