The Girdle of Melian

am experimenting with a new drop cap today, from a gorgeous alphabet by a Swiss designer! I've got three recommendations to share, of a book, a film, and a blog post on how to kill your darlings (a phrase from Stephen King). The book is Handywoman by Kate Davies "Paralysed by a stroke at the age of 36, Kate Davies' world turned upside-down. Forced to change direction, Kate took a radical new creative path. Handywoman tells this story. This is not a book about Kate's triumph over adversity. Rather, it is her account of the ordinary activities and everyday objects that stroke and disability made her see differently. From braiding hair for the first time to learning how to knit again; from the lessons of a working-class creative childhood to the support of the contemporary knitting community; from the transformative effects of good design to developing a new identity as a disabled walker; in this engaging series of essays, Kate describes how th...

uick post! And quick ROW80 update, too. Mainly because I've dropped most everything else and am forging ahead on the short story/novella I started a couple of weeks ago (original 900+ word version is in my previous post below). Here are a few of the inspirational images I've collated on Pinterest: And here's a brief snip, added to the story since my last post: A hand reached down to take the snorkel, leaving me free to swing onto the ladder and climb up. It was Justin. He stood off to the side as I clambered onto the deck. I wrapped a towel around myself, debating. But there was nothing for it; I wanted to show off my photos and he was the only one not dozing in the sun or splashing around in the water on the other side of the boat. I could smell sizzling grilled meat and peppers, and one of the crew was laying a table for lunch. “I saw a seal,” I said casually. “Are you sure?” His question caught me off guard, and I paused in the act of swinging the camera...

ummertime! I haven't been quite working on my ROW80 goals, as it's very hot around here at the moment, but I have been writing, so not entirely prostrate and lazy with the heat. I've just written a short story that evolved from the August Writer's Exercise on the Forum , and it happens to fit the parameters of this month's Write...Edit...Publish challenge! Here are the details of both: Forum exercise: This month "we will write a travel-account, either based on a diary, an essay, a travel journal or a letter or a series of postcards. This is meant to be a fun exercise, so there are two options to choose from. A fictional type of travel-writing. Here I will give those who choose this option the name of a character. You'll take this character, imagine who he/she is and what they are like, and then you will send them on holiday. You can pick any style of travel writing you like: letters, essay, postcards, a literary account of the travel. It ca...

n vacation. I'm not, really. But work is very busy and it's very hot out. I'm not quite meeting my ROW80 goals, but I've just written a new short story! I'm busy editing it, and hope to share a form of it next week, as part of the August Write...Edit...Publish challenge! Here's a wee teaser: When Amelie asked if I wanted to join her and a bunch of her friends on holiday in Turkey, I was all for it. The starting year of uni was tough. I was proud to be the first in my family to go to university, and really proud that I'd got into Oxford. But the work was hard, my English wasn't always good enough, and the Portuguese-speaking community was small. And there was no one else from Brazil in my year. Then I met Amelie at a salsa class, and things got better. She was friends with everyone! And the Turkey trip was going to be excellent. Then I found out that her boyfriend was coming along. What do you think will happen next?

wiss National Day today! There's a long festival going on in Geneva, and lots of fireworks, so for today I've compiled nearly all of my Geneva posts into one: Our arrival ! The Geneva International Book Fair with Irvine Welsh and Joel Dicker Thanksgiving Springtime ! Wintertime ! Lord Byron, Mary Shelley, and Villa Diodati United Nations and Ariana Park Jet d'Eau Where the Rhone meets the Arve Museums and an unidentified object St Pierre Cathedral Escalade Botanical gardens Plane trees Lakefront and zombies ... everything else ! Today is also Insecure Writer's Support Group Day! If anyone needs a break from writing, editing, research, etc., or needs a space to daydream about a story, here's a coffee break in Geneva post I once wrote, back in our first winter in Geneva!: f we were having coffee... This is a blog idea from Conny at Study Read Write . I'm going to borrow it for today! If we were having coffee t...