Blog 112 – Seeing the Bigger Picture www.thebiggerpicturefilm.com

I was waiting for my online grocery delivery last week. It was late. So, when at a loose end what do you do? You Google yourself. Well, I did. Therein can lie a story. I wondered why my name was listed under British Film Institute/Oscar nomination/BAFTA award winner 2015 with 26 film awards. It was certainly one of those scams associating one’s name with something which was being sold. I looked a little further and discovered I was the voice of Olive on an animated film entitled: ‘The Bigger Picture’.
Actually a bell rang in my brain. I had been reading about a short animated film in The Sunday Times a few months ago. A short film that had won a number of awards. It was about an elderly mother being cared for by her son. I thought I should Google it. Then a friend told me she had seen an animated film about a family being torn apart by the need to care for a parent in the home. I said, “I think I was in that.” My friend laughed. I thought I should Google it. I forgot.
It’s a dream. Googling your name and finding you have been in an Oscar nominated film and a current BAFTA award winner. I then remembered one sunny May lunch time a couple of years ago when I went into the British Film and TV School and did an hour’s voice over work. A group of MA students had phoned me the day before and asked if I could pop in for an hour. I sandwiched it between my classes. I remember being asked to say a few lines and drown. I spent a lot of time drowning, I recall I drowned very well.
I saw the seven minute film. I have four lines. I counted them. It hardly compares with the hours and weeks and months and years and moments I have spent on my own theatrical, filmic and literary projects. But I smile wryly. That’s life. It’s about the moments you spend loving those people and projects. Not the flashy few moments of glory. It’s what Daisy Jacobs’s ‘The Bigger Picture’ is about. Get to see it if you can.
They cut my drowning.

Creative Ink classes. Tuesdays: Get Inspired – 15th September for 5 weeks – 10. 00am until midday. 1 place left.
Thursdays: Get that Book Out of You – 17th September for 5 weeks – 10.00 am until midday.
A few places left. Email me.

You can catch my Marlow FM radio interview with Dermot Fitzpatrick and reading from my poetry collection ‘God and Lipstick’– bottom left hand corner of the Home Page on my website.

Blog 111 – Summer is Trying to Squeeze Through
Creative Ink for Writers’ summer classes will be ending next week. (Summer keeps trying to squeeze through, doesn’t it?)
The autumn term – ‘Get Inspired’/Tuesdays and ‘Get that Book Out of You’/Thursdays at the Fitzwilliams Centre, Beaconsfield – 10. 00 am until midday begins Tuesday 15th September and Thursday 17th September for five weeks. Email me if you would like to enrol. £160 covers five sessions, 3000 word assessment and proof read, hand out sheets, a seat on an alternative Tuesday or Thursday and updates if you are absent, company, heating and free coffee and chocolate biscuits. The biscuits sometimes have caramel in them and the heating was on in our penultimate session today.

Happy Birthday, Mister Justin Case.

Blog 110 – Lunar Poetry
You can buy edition 6 which features my poem ‘Smoke Screen’ on www.lunarpoetry.co.uk
Lovely group at Missenden Abbey yesterday for ‘Unlocking Your Creative Unconscious’.
My readings from my poetry collection ‘God and Lipstick’ still available online Marlow FM 97.5/Listen Again/Mid-Morning Matters/Friday 17th April 10.00 am until 11.00 am until Friday 8th May.
Happy Birthday, Mister Double Cream from Uxbridge: one of my three readers.

‘God and Lipstick’ – Blog 109
I’m reading from my Creative Writing Masters’ Poetry Dissertation: ‘God and Lipstick’ on Marlow FM 97.5. The readings and interview by the inimitable former Creative Inker and radio presenter Dermot Fitzpatrick is available until Friday 8th May. Google Marlow FM. Hit on ‘Listen Again’ and then ‘Mid-Morning Matters’: Friday 17th April – 10.00 am – 11.00 am. Available for three weeks.
Creative Ink classes are full for the summer term but if you would like to try a free taster then email me.
Unlocking Your Creative Unconscious next Saturday 25th April at Missenden Abbey. Contact the Abbey directly on www.missendenabbey.co.uk
The Unreliable Narrator and Deception – Sunday 14th June with literary agent is now full. New London Writers and Creative Ink will be doing more of these workshops so do contact Alice on publish@newlondonwriters.com

Blog 108 – Literary Representation Opportunity and Deception …

Creative Ink for Writers’ summer term for Tuesdays: Get Inspired and Thursdays: Get that Book out of You at the Fitzwilliams Centre, Beaconsfield is now fully subscribed.

However you may be interested in a Day Workshop I am teaching in London on Sunday 14th June entitled Deception: the Power of the Unreliable Narrator. This is a special event and hosted by New London Writers. Long-established literary agent Jeffrey Simmons will meet with you to discuss your work. The event offers an opportunity to develop your writing in line with a professional appraisal. You will need to send the opening chapters of your novel (plus synopsis) to New London Writers at least two weeks prior to the event. Please note, the novel does not have to be finished but you should have completed three chapters.

Jeffrey and his assistant Nick Purves (editor of The Guardian’s favourite blog,(thelondonword.com) will spend fifteen minutes chatting with you about your material. They will assess your novel’s suitability for agency representation. In the case of uncompleted work, they will offer literary advice going forward.

Summary
• A short presentation by Jeffrey Simmons followed by discussion. You will have the opportunity to talk to Jeffrey about the publishing process.
• A private reading of your work (synopsis and opening chapters) and a critique from Jeffrey Simmons and Nick Purves. (The critique is prepared in advance of your face-to-face meeting.)
• Face-to-face meeting with Jeffrey Simmons and Nick Purves. Jeffrey and Nick will appraise your novel’s market potential and offer critical advice for improvement if need be. (If changes to the work are recommended, you may be able to re-submit your manuscript.)

In addition, there will be a two-and-a-half hour writers’ workshop hosted by Jan Moran Neil who runs Creative Ink for Writers.

The event will be held at the exquisite All Saints in Fitzrovia, a short walking distance from Oxford Circus Tube. Date: Sunday 14th June – 2.00pm – 5.00pm.

Complimentary refreshments will be provided on arrival.
How to Book:
Critique/Agency Meeting/Workshop = £105
You can pay a 50% deposit with the rest payable by May 1st. For more details and to make your booking please RSVP below and drop an email to publish@newlondonwriters.com, with BOOKING in the subject line.
Please specify if you wish to pay the full amount or a non-refundable deposit. We will then send you an invoice with a link to payment and registration.
PLACES ARE LIMITED TO TEN AND THREE HAVE ALREADY BEEN TAKEN. If you have any questions please feel free to call us on 07804900195.

Thinking of You, Hayley – Blog 107 – by Ms Paige Turner

Bread Pudding Days

On soggy days
when the rain spits
my mother’s house is filled
with the warmth of cinnamon sticks,
rich dried fruit
and softly sifted sugar.
She folds and wraps our words:
– the bargain cost of my orange gloves
– the price we paid for our lost loves
– our woeful tales of wicked hate
– our splendid plans to be great.
All are measured, sieved, considered
for their mixed worth
baked into something sturdy,
crusty, spongy and deeply palatable.
And in that cooking fragrance
– the weight and varied textures
touching half remembered edges –
my mother’s syllables and smiles stretch on:
a balm against the greying bits,
a refuge against the rain which spits.

For Muriel – 10.6.22. – 14.2.01.

No places left on Creative Ink for Writers’ summer courses.
News coming soon of day workshops.
No blog last bi-month due to mountain fires.
Happy Mother’s Day, Hayley. You’re one of the best I know.

Blog 106 – Happy Valentine, Husband …

Bored Husband

‘Your husband has just called
to say you can buy anything in this shop,’
the plaque reads.

But my husband stares out to sea;
examines the mainsails of catamarans
whilst I examine the ‘Just Cruisin’’
swimwear.

We know everything in life
carries a price tag.

Amongst the bric-a-brac
there is another plaque which reads,
‘Bored Husband’.

I turn to check the price tag.
On the flip side reads …
‘Not for Sale’.

From ‘Serving Bluebird Pie’ – available on Amazon Kindle.
For a chapter from my second novel read on New London Writers.

Creative Ink for Writers/5 classes starting April 21st and April 23rd: Tuesdays/Get Inspired/Full
Thursdays/Get that Book/ – 1 place left. Email me for a syllabus.

were suspended for the last three weeks due to – was it the router, or was it the laptop battery or was it the land line or was it a cable being stolen in High Wycombe? Well, it was hell but back to normal communications now.

Summer Term – Creative Ink – Tuesdays/Get Inspired/ 2 places left.
Thursdays – Get that Book Out of You – a few more but the class is running. Email me for a syllabus for either course.

Watch out for my poems published in this month’s edition of Lunar Poetry (‘Smoke Screen’) and online with New London Writers. (‘Intruders’)

Blog 104 – White Rhino in Winter by Ms Paige Turner

The wonderful moments I have experienced on safari come to mind and so did this poem which I wrote in 1998 and was first published in The World Wide Writers anthology 1998 and then in Gill Hartley’s excellent ‘Aspects of Loss’ – A Companion for Bereaved Parents and their families in aid of the Compassionate Friends, written whilst at Creative Ink and dedicated to her shining son, Will who would have been 31.

White Rhino in Winter

And suddenly … clamped on road side,
zooless – but ours for the viewing,
prehistoric pedestrian – pavement slab for hide,
blank blinkers stare seemingly – at nothing.

Handicapped horn bent towards winter earth,
the haunting whisper of captivated guide,
“She carried two calves for fourteen months,
– she lost them last week to a pride.”

Mother’s eyes on sun drenched winter evening.
Weighted monument in mourning.

My poem ‘Smoke Screen’ is to be published by Lunar Poets in this month’s edition.
Creative Ink Spring Term/Tuesdays – Get Inspired – Full. There is one place left on Thursdays – Get that Book Out of You. Email me if interested.

Lennon’s Corsets – Blog 103 – by Ms Paige Turner

Just as the new 2015 approaches I had two lovely emails. The first was from Dinah Latham who has just published her autobiography about her experiences as a district nurse and midwife in ‘Walking Forward, Looking Back’ with Troubador. Just before Christmas she did a book signing at Waterstones selling three times more than their average. She is into re-print. Dinah started writing her book a number of years ago at Creative Ink. Writing as one given to self-promotion (I run a one woman business) I was touched to read when I Googled my name – and yes – any modern woman is apt to do this, let’s fess up – Dinah’s acknowledgment of my contribution to her writing journey.
And then Jo Neville emailed me last night. She came to ‘Get that Book out of You’ classes in 2009-10. The book is still bubbling inside of her but she’s started a career in freelance journalism. This week’s ‘You’ magazine/ Mail on Sunday has her beautifully written feature entitled ‘Cache in the Attic’.
This bi-month’s point is this. When John Lennon asks you what you have done this year, if it doesn’t seem to amount to much then think of corsets. They are such a strong foundation and the work you put in now can shape up beautifully in future years, just as it has done for Dinah and Jo. I am also reminded by Lennon’s words, ‘Life is something which happens whilst you’re planning something else’. Actually I think someone else said that first (a poem critique for the first in with the right answer). I was touched that Jo emailed me to thank me for some great teaching. I’ve spent my life performing and writing and forget that I’ve done a considerable amount of teaching.
Novel writing is not the only fruit. Creative Ink Tuesday classes are full this term. There are three places left on the Thursday ‘Get that Book out of You’ course starting Thursday 15th January for five weeks. You can write a novel, but re-creative non-fiction, plays, poetry and journalism count too.
Happy New 2015.