JAMBARK 2025 is an online summit of writers presenting topics to help writers. It is organized by the fine folks at What’s Your Story Author Services.
We will be presenting about things like worldbuilding, how to write a book if you have no time to write a book, social media for authors, and much much more!
My topic is: “Turning Personal Experiences into Fiction”. I’ll be presenting on Sunday the 26th of January 2025.
Our participants:
The Eventbrite link to sign up:
So now the Write Now Club is starting another challenge! This time, it’s Sixty Thousand Words* in Sixty Days!
But I put an asterisk beside the word “word”… because it’s not just words this time. There are many tasks involved in creating a book beyond just putting words down. What about doing research? Marketing? Illustration? One of our members is an incredibly-talented cartoonist. His stuff just doesn’t have many words. Should he be penalized even though he is doing as much work?
So another member came up with a list of tasks and word equivalents. You can get points for how much time you spend on a task, instead of for how many words you create during that time. Of course, if you’re mostly creating words, that is fine too.
This is great, because I’m doing a lot of illustration and drawing research in support of my story. It helps me figure things out.
Continue readingAnd now I’m trying something new: working backwards from the desired ending of Volume 3 to cross that vast zone of ??? to get to the end of Volume 1!
This was inspired by a Threads post on writing by Charlène A Bagcal:
A couple of years ago, I drew a short story called “The Ornament”, to be included in a wintry holiday compilation. That compilation did not appear then, but it has just been published now!
The compilation is called “Snowflakes, Secrets, and Other Winter Reflections”.
It is available now from Kipekee Press as an ebook. Print books coming soon.
But that’s not all! There’s an advent calendar: https://hi.switchy.io/WinterTales2024
…and a contest!
https://kingsumo.com/g/1ggoez1/winter-tale-advent-calendar-and-book-launch
“The Deathworlders” is a shared fiction based on the premise that Earth is an unusually dangerous place, and anything that can survive there is also unusually dangerous.
I first heard of the idea through Reddit and Tumblr comment threads posted via the aggregator site MediaChomp. But I was able to track it down to its original archive.
The Deathworlders is now a major story with at least 90 chapters. I am currently somewhere near Chapter 67. Here’s the beginning, which was originally posted as a stand-alone story:
The Kevin Jenkins Experience.
More info:
https://www.facebook.com/HamboneHFY
https://deathworlders.com/books/deathworlders/
Karen Hallion has a clear, lucid drawing style that I quite like. I am just discovering her works. She has published a series of inspirational drawings, the “She Series“, which has become a book.
Find out more!
https://www.karenhallion.com
https://www.facebook.com/KarenHallion
Linda of Funny Face Fiction has featured a segment from The Rabbit Trap on her blog!
The story is about a family who escapes a totalitarian nightmare — and what happens when one of them wants to go back.
This segment provides a view of the Great Revolt, where enslaved humans desperately try to escape captivity. It is draft text that may or may not make it into the final book.
Funny Face Fiction is the publisher of Hollow Edge by Frankie Cameron.
My former co-worker Rebecca Thompson has illustrated two charming children’s books. Both books were written by Kirstin Dias.
The first book, published in 2021, is called “C is for Camp”. It’s an alphabet book that describes the journey of a family of bears to their cottage, or “camp”, in the woods. It is utterly charming and makes me intensely miss going to the cottage. Running off the end of the dock into the lake… the way the waves sorted the beautiful multicoloured sand of the beach… the smell of the woods… I miss it intensely.
But I was thinking… we always called it ‘the cottage’, not ‘camp’. To me, a ‘camp’ is an organized thing for public-school students. However, my sister lives in Sault Ste. Marie and calls it ‘camp’. Imagine my joy when I saw that Kirsten Dias, the author of “C is for Camp”, is from Sault Ste. Marie!
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