More than Writers

                                                                                              Picture Credit: Google  Last month I was in ‘curious mode’, this month I’m in ‘travel planning mode’. I’m not always good at initiating trips, but when Mrs Smart prods me firmly in the right place, I am good at taking the hint and then we enjoy arranging it. At the Holiday and Travel Show, we learned Albania is an up-and-coming destination and you can have a week there for the price of two frothy coffees at the Olympia Exhibition Centre. Our next trip, though, is not to Albania. We are off to Portugal. Three nights in Lisbon, a train ride, then three nights in Porto. Do you have any tips for us when we’re there? ...

   Jennie Allen, an American author, and speaker around the world, had a vision to gather the Global Church together. The vision left her with the question: “If Jesus were coming back soon, what would we do?” She realised that there are so many people who still don’t know Jesus. Her vision was to have a large church meeting, the worldwide church, and every follower of Jesus gathering together, and call it Gather25. It was shared with many leaders across the globe; A 25-hour Global Christian Conference, live-streaming the churches together from all over the world, with prayer, praise and worship and testimonies of what God is doing in each country worldwide.  The mission was to commission the 2.5 billion Christians who love Jesus to reach the 5.5 billion who don’t yet know him.   Imagine being part of history in this way. Matthew 28: 19-20 (NIV) Jesus said “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and...

Redwing, sitting on a branch All around us, the first signs of Spring are beginning to emerge.  Snowdrops, Primroses and Crocuses are already in full bloom and the daffodils are now beginning to make an appearance.  Oh the sweet joy of spring!  Those first rays of sun can bring such a cheer to one's countenance. Recently, I discovered the very addictive Merlin App, which can be used to record and help identify birds by their song.  Whenever I'm out walking the dog in our local park now, I've been stopping for a few moments to play a game of Avian Guess Who! Along with all the typical garden birds one would expect to find in a South London park, such as the Robin, the Blue Tit, the Magpie, the Blackbird and the Crow, I have been delighted to discover a whole host of other regular visitors too. I've learned to distinguish the Coal Tit from the Great Tit.  The Dunnock from the Sparrow.  I've discovered there are Gold Finches and even Great Spotted Woodpeckers ...

  I remember the first time I attended a gathering of writers. As I looked at the table of books people had brought to sell, it was overwhelming. It seemed as if everyone else there was a published author, whereas I was “just a blogger.”  Fortunately, my feelings of inadequacy were quickly dispelled as everyone was friendly and welcoming. I learned a lot, but I was also surprised to be able to help others who had questions about blogging.  Several years later, I have shared pieces in various anthologies, but mostly I am still “just a blogger.” However, it is now a title I own with pride as I have experienced so many of the benefits of blogging.  Here are just a few:  Blogging helps to establish a habit of writing and posting. However frequently you decide to post on your blog, the key is consistency. I always find deadlines helpful, even if they are self-imposed. Without a deadline, the danger is either that I will never get started or that my quest for ...

    How do you find information online that you need for your writing? Why do Google, Safari and Edge find different content, and why do some pages get to the top of the page and others are further down? How can you improve the visibility of your writing online?  As a quick overview, browsers, such as Edge, Chrome, Firefox, Duck Duck Go, Opera and Safari, use a ‘search engine’, like Google, Yahoo and Bing to retrieve searches. Some set their own default, but you can select your preferred one in the settings. A search engine (SE) ‘crawls’ through published web pages and classify content to index them for retrieval later. When you enter search words or a phrase, algorithms (computer decision processing) are used to match your search words with their pre-indexed stash. They present the best matching pages, using a ranking determined by the algorithms, in a process better known as Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). Each s...

HAVE YOU EVER TRIED TO … What is the other part of the question? I will let you have it in a minute. This is not a game I often see on Twitter, where one is told to end the question with something silly, impossible, or just with any word. However, it is about a vocabulary issue. I will explain below. I began writing a crime novel in May last year, my first attempt at this genre. The flow and pace were good, and I was pleased with the story plot and characters. Along the way, I paused to edit it. Then the problem started. I abandoned it—not because of ‘writer's block.’ I attended an imaginary ‘writer’s clinic’ and realised I had developed a desire for ‘scriptocide’. This was explained as an offshoot of ‘impostor syndrome’. During editing, I had asked myself, ‘Am I following the traditional pattern of the crime genre? Who will enjoy this?’ Then I murdered my manuscript! And 'scriptocide was born! On February 21 st , Lesley Hargreaves shared ‘ Writing with the best intentions’ on...

 I always prefer to follow a path, than to strike out across an open space.  I like my walk to be easy so I can enjoy seeing the dog run and play without fear of falling.  I love to follow where others have walked and to be secure in knowing that I am not trespassing.   As I put one foot in front of the other, I can gaze at the sunlight dappling through the trees and the green of the fields rolling away to my side.   It's a strange thing that our lives are so full of paths, those that are visible like the life choices we make, and those that are invisible. Unlike the paths on a country walk, God's paths are often hard to discern and Jesus told us specifically that it is a narrow path that leads to eternal life.  Walking God's paths is very different from following a Sat Nav telling you step by step what direction to take.  How much we long for that at times!  I am in a season at present of great uncertainty.  I am not even totally s...

When I left the charity I co-founded and developed for 24 years, people told me I had left a wonderful legacy. Ever since, I have been considering what we all leave behind as a legacy. The charity helped thousands of young people and their families. Are they also part of my legacy and what legacy will they leave behind? What impact did my influence have on them? As I think about this question, I naturally think about the many who influenced me. Am I, their legacy? My dad was a builder and as a young man he laid sewer pipes and built manholes (now called inspection chambers). There is a particular area that I know he worked and whenever I walk those streets, every manhole reminds me of him. What a legacy he left and he influenced me into the building trade. Are the houses that I built part of my legacy? My mum wasn’t a great achiever as far as work, but in her 50’s she decided to study for her English Language GCSE and she passed. Some 20 years later, when she died, we found the s...

 Great, she thought. My very first contribution to More than Writers and I've got flu. My head is blurry and I maybe should have done this ages ago. It's hard being human, isn't it? And fallible, frail and prone to... well, all the stuff this world throws at us. Today, my To-do list has two important things on it (or to write it in what my friend Julie calls LOUD LETTERS, IMPORTANT THINGS). Makes it worse, doesn't it? Having IMPORTANT THINGS to do when you really don't feel up to it, or something's happened to get in the way. What doesn't help:  1. Beating yourself up. I'm good at this. But it will just add feeling miserable on top of feeling unwell, or overwhelmed or whatever. 2. Forcing yourself to knuckle down and just do it. You'll feel worse afterwards and will not do any kind of a good job. Maybe even have to go back later and unpick the mess you've made... What does help? 1. Acceptance. Yes. Join the human race. Fallible, frail and prone t...

When your meal arrives in a restaurant, do you admire the look of it? Inhale the smell before you pick up your cutlery? My teenagers don’t do that with a meal I’ve cooked for them at home! I wouldn’t expect them to. But restaurants want diners to admire the food; they put time and effort into the presentation (I definitely don't do that at home!). They want to build anticipation and maybe prompt a photo or two.  The title, cover and blurb of a book work in a similar way, tempting the reader with what's on offer.  Yet however good food looks and smells, I think the main test is that first mouthful. From that you can tell the taste, the temperature, the texture. If they're not right, it's going to be hard to keep eating.  The opening of the piece of writing needs to have a similar effect to that first mouthful of a delicious-looking meal. It needs to please, to pique the reader’s interest with characters or events or questions that make it almost impossible not...