Holiday Reads

I haven't reviewed any books recently so today I thought I'd review two of the best books I read on my recent holiday.  They are: A Weekend with Mr Darcy – Victoria Connelly From the moment I started to read this book I was hooked.  I loved the two female characters, Dr Katherine Roberts and the younger Robyn, and wanted each of them to find true love.   At times I did find their reactions to the situations they found themselves in a little frustrating but overall, it didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the book. I loved being plunged into the world of Austen mania and have been inspired to re-read her novels, and all things regency.  A perfect holiday read. And: Want to Know A Secret? – Sue Moorcroft I read Starting Over a while ago and thoroughly enjoyed it, so I was looking forward to reading this novel.   What can I say?  I certainly wasn’t disappointed. I loved the main character – Diane – and really felt for her as she gradually finds out how much her husband has betrayed her.  At first she thinks he has been having an affair but the truth is so much worse than that. The characters are drawn brilliantly. Her husband is such a manipulating, controlling and convincing liar – boo, hiss.   Diane, though, is a strong woman and the story charts how she deals with the fallout from her husband’s helicopter crash (pardon the pun) and how she becomes even stronger as a result. I loved every minute of this book and can’t wait to read All That Mullarkey.

And now its back to the "To Be Read" pile.

Linda

It's Beginning To Feel Alot Like Winter

This time last week I was lying on a sun lounger soaking up the rays in Lanzarote. Today I had to defrost the car before I could drive to work.  It’s a bit of a culture shock and the thought of the long winter ahead is just a little depressing.  I’m also suffering with early darkness since the clocks went back and have rediscovered that I hate driving in the dark.  It really makes me want to hibernate until the spring.

I must admit though it was wonderful to get away at half term and it definitely recharged the batteries. As we didn’t get away in the summer, and on our holiday in May it rained most of the time, it felt much deserved.  The boys had three inset days tagged onto the half term so we didn’t even have to take them out of school which was even better.

We went to Playa Blanca to Flamingo Beach, a First Choice holiday village and I must admit the facilities were fabulous (the food was pretty good too which means I have come home with a serious intention to diet).   The entertainments team were brilliant, and whilst I’m not big on group fun, the boys loved it. As they were entertained, I got on with some reading and writing, which for me is the best kind of holiday.

Before I went away I was feeling a bit jaded about my writing and couldn’t seem to get anything finished. Without the usual distractions though I drafted some new stories and came back feeling much more confident.  I’ve also made a list of things I want to write for the rest of the year which appeals to the OCD side of my nature.  You know what they say, “Nothing beats the satisfaction of a ticked off list” and for me it really helps to set myself targets.

Talking of targets, its November and time for NaNoWriMo.  This year, I didn’t want to start on a big new project as I’ve got lots of editing to do. I must admit though that I’m missing it.  So I’ve decided to set myself a mini NaNoWriMo.   My aim is to write 500 words a day.  It’s a really good exercise because it makes me write even when I don’t want to and even if I don’t do anything else, knowing I have achieved that small target makes me feel good about myself.   So far I have written 1½ new stories and whilst they are a very rough first draft, at least they are there.  They are both stories which have been on my ideas list for a very long time so it feels like a small achievement.  The aim for the rest of the year is to get as many short stories out there as possible, and who knows, one or two may even hit the target.  One can only dream!

Hoping that the dark nights and cold mornings aren't getting you down too much!

Linda

A Slow Month

October has been a bit of a slow month writing-wise.  It’s been busy everywhere else with family birthdays and families in general.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that my mum was 70 and we’d planned a bit of a birthday meal with all the rest of the family including her brothers and sister and my own brother who is currently living in Spain.

It was all a bit hush hush and the secret keeping a bit stressful.  It all went OK on the weekend though and she had a lovely time.  We bought her laptop. She’s never owned a computer of her own before so this was a bit of a thrill for her. She’s really gone for it and is now online.  There’ll be no stopping her once she starts!  She’s had a few lessons off me and my other brother, but I’m sure there’ll be a lot more.

My niece was 10 last week too, so we went up again last weekend.  It’s lovely to see all the family so much, but when you’re working all week, it does take a big chunk out of your time.  I seem to spend my life in constant catch up with housework and clothes and making sure the kids are where they are supposed to be at the right times.  There never seems to be much time in the evenings to write and even if I do I’m usually exhausted.

I’ve been trying to concentrate on short stories at the moment and am part of a wonderful on-line writing group called Fiction Addiction.  Their feedback is invaluable in improving my writing but I’m currently trying to re-write a story they critiqued and I’m getting myself in knots over it. I can’t figure out if it’s better or worse.  That’s the thing isn’t it? Your writing can only get better if you do question it but when you do you just end up thinking its rubbish.

I’ve re-read my critique from the RNA for my novel too and now that I have some distance I can see that the criticisms are spot on.  The problem now is how to fix it.  And that’s the hard part and the reason why I’m not making any progress this month.  I just can’t see the wood from the trees.

I’m off now to go and get an axe – I think I need to do a bit of clearance work!

A Very Frustrating Day

Technology is a wonderful thing – but only when it works.  When it doesn’t it can be very, very trying.

Stupidly I transferred a lot of my work from my netbook onto a memory stick when we went on holiday as I had downloaded a load of dvd’s.  When we got back I didn’t bother putting it back on as I work from different computers and it was much easier just to use the memory stick than to continually move stuff back and forth between the computers – I have little memory myself and get easily confused! 

At the back of my mind I kept telling myself to back up all my work in case I lost the stick but never got round to it.   You know what’s coming next don’t you?

I’ve been working on my husband’s accounts recently – only behind by about 6 months so decided to do it in the dining room, so I could watch / listen to the X Factor.   I’ve worked hard this week on that and amazingly am almost up to date.   But when I was at work yesterday I decided to look at something on my usb in my lunch hour.  Put it this way, I didn’t eat much when I found that the memory was completely empty of files. 

I wracked my brains trying to figure out when I’d last done a back up, how much recent stuff I had printed off and what I was going to lose.  I wasn’t a happy bunny at all and constantly kicked myself all afternoon for not backing up properly.  It doesn’t matter how many horror stories I hear, or even the fact the hard drive on our main computer crashed before now, I still don’t seem to have learnt my lesson.  

Lesson now sunk in – BACK UP! BACK UP! BACK UP!

When I got home I decided to do a test and to my immense relief, it worked on my net book and all my files were there.  I was so happy!   I have now copied all files back onto my netbook as well as on to another memory stick just in case. There must be something wrong with the connection though because it memory stick wouldn’t work on the kids’ laptop either.  Think I will throw it in the bin now!

So sometimes technology is a wonderful thing and sometimes… well there’s just too much of it isn’t there?  In our house we just have too many gadgets and now my son has bought an I-pod touch with his birthday money.  Unfortunately I’m the only one in our house who even has a vague idea of technology so it’s up to me to set them up and deal with any problems when it all goes wrong.  Last night I was trying to set up the Ipod, help son with his homework, drop youngest son off at a class and pick him up an hour later, clean the house, cook the tea and put the ironing away.  Needless to say I didn’t get much of anything done. A very frustrating day indeed.

Anyway, whinge over, normal service to be resumed.  I just can’t wait until the boys get older and can deal with the techno stuff!

Recovery!

Well, it’s been a busy few weeks with birthdays aplenty.   Son’s birthday sleepover went without physical mishap so that was good.  On the negative side it was very, very LOUD.  Well, I suppose it’s what you would expect with five 9 / 10 year olds a 7 year old and a 6 year old.  But I’d forgotten just how loud boys can be when they’re en-mass.

Only three slept over other in addition to my two, but I am still struggling to figure out where the “sleep” in sleepover is.   I naively thought that it would be fun for them all to sleep in one room – a downstairs bedroom.  Well, it was fun for them but not for me.   In the end I had to split them up and then stand sentry on the door to prevent one individual from sneaking back downstairs again.   Then at 2.15am three of them woke me up with their noise and I got very cross.  It didn’t make me feel like a very nice person but it had to be done as four of them had football matches the next morning.   I won’t be doing it again in a hurry – or ever if I can help it!   One at a time from now on.

On the Saturday I visited my family and then on Sunday afternoon we took some of son’s friends and his cousin to Crocky Trail.   This is a brilliant place, but as I hadn’t been before I didn’t really know what to expect.   You have to admire farmers in this day and age who do something unusual with their land to bring in some extra income.   The place is full of slides and apparatus for the kids to play on. A particular favourite was Titanic where the slide rose up and then started to vibrate and the kids had to try and stop themselves from falling down.

There is also a trail with swings at various intervals, rope bridges and all sorts of fun obstacles.  As a child my grandfather owned a farm and it really took me back to when we used to sling a rope from a tree to swing on, or roam across the fields.  Kids don’t get enough of that these days.

One of my son’s best friends has his birthday the day following his, and as we are friends with the parents it was nice to be with other adults when supervising kids who are not your own.  We had a really good afternoon and a real giggle too.   The sun shone which was an added bonus.  I’ll post some pics next time if I get a chance to download them.

Last weekend was my mum’s 70^th birthday and we went to visit with some of the family.  More about that next time though.

Birthday!

Not mine I hasten to add.  Today is my first born’s 10^th birthday.  Ten years? Where did that go then?

It’s hard to reconcile the boy with the cheeky smile, dry sense of humour and an endearing sense of thoughtfulness with the tiny scrap of humanity who entered our lives all that time ago. 

As births go it was pretty awful. Three and a half days of labour followed by a caesarean section under general anaesthetic.  Needless to say I wasn’t too with it for those first few vital hours, and my husband was booted out and left to pace the corridors like an old fashioned father.  But he came out perfect in the end which was a blessing.   And he is still a blessing too – more than he’ll know until he has children of his own. 

I remember feeling so scared that this tiny human being was completely dependent on me for his every need. He was only just over six pounds with “legs that look like they should be hanging out of a nest”.  My husband’s words, not mine.    His legs haven’t improved much – they are still long and skinny but he runs like the wind now.  

It’s been a long run up to this birthday and the excitement levels have been fit to bust.  We’ve got three friends coming for a sleepover tonight, family tomorrow and then a trip to an outdoor activity centre on Sunday with more friends followed by pizza and cake.   I only hope that his birthday lives up to his expectations.  That’s the hard thing about kids’ birthdays; it’s up to you to deliver the perfect day / weekend.  No easy task but let’s hope I’m up to the job. Wish me luck!  

Christmas is Coming!

It’s true.  The supermarkets are full of advent calendars and other Christmas goodies.

I nearly fell over when I saw them at the weekend.   I haven’t even fully recovered from the summer holidays yet.   Halloween seems ages away and yet it’s Christmas.

I thought that rows of school uniforms and Back to School signs in June long before the kids had even broken up from school was bad enough but this is a step too far.  I was glad though that they were playing Christmas music in store, that would have finished me off completely.

No wonder time seems to be passing even more quickly with each year.  It’s because we’re having Christmas in September!  Go away, I’m not ready yet!