A couple of days ago, I took an online writing workshop run by American writer, Vanessa Martir. I did a free workshop of hers a while back (and meant to double down with the paid version, but got distracted) and when this one popped up in my feed I signed up, not least because it wasn’t expensive (US$30) and I like the way she structures her classes. Vanessa sends through pre-class readings, which are discussed in the workshop and there are timed writing/thinking sessions to prompts (maximum of five minutes). Given that I’ve pretty much lost my mojo, I figured
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Today I went for a run. No big deal, I hear you say. People run all the time. The thing is: I haven’t gone running for 18 months. Not since I was in Hanoi. This pandemic (or rather, the government’s response to the pandemic) has sucked the productivity right out of me. I’ve had no goals and no direction because there’s so much uncertainty, particularly in Australia. Our leaders are drunk on power and – in their relentless and destructive pursuit of zero COVID – love to “snap” lock Australian borders and cities because of one freaking case, with the
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A while back, I posted an essay to a Facebook group of women writers that I’m in. In a nutshell, this essay is about me — while I was living in Hanoi — dating a much younger Vietnamese man for 10 months, who turned out to be a covert narcissist. He almost killed me. You would think that the comments about my essay would centre around the cycle of narcissistic abuse, or trauma bonds or intermittent reinforcement. Or how a smart, educated woman like myself could be drawn in by manipulation and lies. How I was gaslighted and controlled. Or why leaving emotionally abusive
Continue reading...Writers write about creative writing Regular readers will know that over the last 18 months—yes, it’s been that long since it started!—I’ve been running a series by writers, for writers, on their approach to creative writing, with a special focus on how they fit writing into their busy lives. I am super pleased to announce that The Secret Lives of Writers is now available in the Amazon Kindle store, Kobo, Nook and and iBooks. You can grab your copy from the Delicious Publishing Book Store. So who is this book about writing for? If you are interested in creative writing, or dabble in
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Photo via Visual Hunt. Used with permission. Someone asked me recently, knowing that I was a writer and knowing I wrote mostly non-fiction and knowing that I often wrote about difficult things, whether I wrote for healing. As in, was writing a cathartic way of lancing a few boils? I responded in the negative. And it got me thinking. Why do I write? Hell, why does anyone write? It’s not like I have a huge audience of a gazillion people champing at the bit to digest every word I write. It’s not for money, because I don’t earn a living from
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