What's Up Wednesday! - 7th Aug edition

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What's Up Wednesday is a weekly meme, hosted by Erin L Funk and Jaime Morrow . It's a brilliant way to tell the bloggy world what you're up to, in both reading and writing and anything else that's going on for you.

It's broken down into four headings:

                    1. What I'm reading
                    2. What I'm writing
                    3. What else I've been up to
                    4. What inspires me right now
 

What are you waiting for? Head on over to join in!
                                              

                  

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First of all, I send my apologies for my absence last week in the What's Up Wednesday hop. Those of you who follow me regularly will know that I've been experiencing some internet issue, but now it's all sorted I'm back with a vengeance! Well, sort of ...

What I'm reading:

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce. (Ha! and I bet you all thought it was going to be A Game of Thrones!)

Some buds at work and I have started another mini book club and have all put two books into a pot. The next read is pulled out of the hat by an independent adjudicator. I have a suspicion that one girl has put the new J K Rowling/Robert Galbraith book in, to which one of the others has strong opinion. When that's pulled out it could be interesting!

I'm enjoying Harold Fry at the moment, it's going along at a nice pace. It's a nice departure from A Game of Thrones.

Oh yeah, and I'm still reading that too ;-)  On page 251 now!

What I'm writing:

Ready, Set, Write! goals, week 6 and 7:

 

1. Do first draft of short story for August competition.

My first draft is complete, and I have even gone old-school and written it all by hand in my notebook. There are some benefits to having no internet!

 
     2.  Keep going with Camp NaNo.

 

Overall I managed 10,500 of my 25,000 word count. I'm not getting too upset about it, it's more words than I usually produce in a month so I'm taking away that positive. It's helped me establish ways that I prefer to do my writing, which means I'm wiser than when I started. I probably won't take on such a challenge again for a while, I know now just how much I can get done alongside everything else in my life.

 

     3.  Write and post something for the Writer Wednesday Blog Hop.

 

I have managed one out of the two blog hop prompts, which you can view here. I haven't been able to access he details of the other one in time for the link up, but I'll still be posting my contribution to it this week.

 
      4.  Try and write one page of free writing in my notebook every day.

 

This is the goal I have struggled the most with. If I'm honest (and this is going to sound ridiculous) but I'm just not sure about free writing. I know there is no set way to do it, but I just can't get my head around it. This is probably one of the daftest things to admit to, but I just can't focus on it. It's definitely on my list of things to improve.

 

 

 

 

 

Goals for week 6:

1. Edit and submit short story for August competition.
2. Keep going with planning the novel idea that has forced itself upon me this week.
3. Write and post something for the Writer Wednesday Blog Hop.

 

What else I've been up to:

I have written what was supposed to be a scene for a wonderful blog hop being run by Christine Rains and Ceclia Robert, which is entitled More Than Just a Kiss Blogfest. The idea is to write a kissing scene in no more than 250 words and post it in the designated time period.

Well, my first go at this came in at nearly 500 words, but I was so caught up in the scene and the characters that they are all I can think about at the moment. I have a story forming in my head and I was up until nearly midnight the other night writing down ideas for the story. I'm quite excited by this so I'm making it my new WIP to keep me going. Hopefully I'll have an update on my progress next week.
 

What inspires me right now:

Strangely, work is inspiring me right now. It's pretty safe to say that I don't really enjoy my day job very much, and the last couple of weeks have been particularly difficult. I'm on holiday for two weeks now which means it'll be hard to go back. It really gives me the impetus to get on with my writing, and to try my best to do it well. If only I could do it well enough to give up the day job, then I'd be the happiest person in the world!

Happy Wednesday everyone! 

 

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