With the onset of daylight savings time, we’re springing forward into sunnier days, while also for Tom, as he works on his memoir, circling back and finding brightness in the winter years of his childhood that followed his father’s death.
You can read an excerpt here.
That final trip to Far Horizons, which afterward (for reasons more emotional than financial) slipped forever out of reach, was marked, or maybe marred—if the lack of something can make a mark—by absence. Not just my father’s physical absence but the absence of all the things we’d done with him.
I probably ate banana pancakes at a dimpled glass, metal-rimmed table by the long pool ringed with red pavers, but they didn’t taste the same… [read more]
Last week’s flash fiction workshop was great fun, as our troupe penned passages on what lurks in the hearts of men and explored a character whose love language is fear. One writer ran with a prompt about marriage and divorce, creating a curmudgeon who had just split from his tenth spouse. We still have space for one or two more writers in this lively collective. Come join us. The humor bites, but we don’t.
The view from Christmas Lake Creative
Our work with Julia Cameron’s classic, The Artist’s Way continues, and Tom credits it with helping to unlock the flow of his memoir. After purchasing what he’d intended to be a dream journal, he’s now using the leather-bound book for morning musings that have morphed into (some might say mad) memoir-writing sessions. Julia didn’t need her namesake, Ms. Cameron, to teach her the value of writing when you wake. She’s been doing it for years to prime the pump for her creative day. Of course, not every day here is totally creative. Laundry gets done, meals get made, and errands get run. And some days—for both our clients’ projects and our own—are better than others. There is ebb, but (gratefully) there is also flow.
What we’re working on…
In the last edition, we talked about reading out loud as a way to gauge and improve one’s writing. The past two weeks have been all about oral pleasures (no, not that kind), as we’ve been focused on finishing the audio edition of The Big One, engineered to perfection by Morrison Ellis, to which Julia is now adding co-author Mike Krysiuk's original songs.
The audio version of Greg Lawrence’s techno-thriller, With You, is coming soon, as the files, recorded by narrator Louise Porter, have now been uploaded to Amazon’s ACX service and are awaiting approval for distribution on Audible.
You can listen to a sample here.
What we’re looking for…
Along with memoir and creative self-help, we’re expanding into business books that tell a good story. If you know of any writers looking for a publisher or just some advice, please send them our way.
What we’re reading…
Robert Boswell’s The Half-Known World continues to deliver insights to Tom. The section on omniscience offers a practical and eye-opening guide to the narrator who knows all. Here is an example:
The omniscient narrator’s responsibility is not to present the reader with any universal or undeniable truths, but with statements that will be proved true in the world the story creates.
We could write a world of words about creating worlds, but if you’d like to learn more about this essential foundation of storytelling, join our weekly workshop or contact us for a consultation.
This little globe sat on my father’s desk in his law office and rests here on his (now my) copy of A Conrad Argosy.
Books of poetry, such as Poems from the Book of Hours by Rainer Maria Rilke, always provide Julia with light as well as inspiration for her own work. She is also reading Harlem Shadows by Claude McKay and Old Monarch by Courtney Marie Andrews.
From Old Monarch:
ONCE IN A LIFETIMEThere is a one-in-four-trillion chance that you exist at all. If you have any love letters—send them now.
What we’re listening to…
With about an hour left of Maya Jasanoff’s The Dawn Watch, Tom is still absorbing history lessons on Belgian abuses of the Congo Free State, British imperialism, the Panama Canal, and Joseph Conrad’s unlikely life as a writer. Julia continues to brighten her day with A Light so Lovely: The Spiritual Legacy of Madeleine L'Engle, Author of a Wrinkle in Time.
What we’re cooking up…
We’re putting the finishing touches on our first pop-up Zoom workshop, coming in April. Short duration, short notice, short fiction. Look for an email in your inbox.
As always, we are grateful to our authors, clients, friends, and supporters. Onward and upward in 2022 and beyond!
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