New Creative Endevours: Baking

During my extensive editing period on Dragon Kin, I discovered that I needed an outlet for my creativity. Although some of this was quelled by writing new pieces for contests and publications, about a year ago I discovered a new creative format that felt productive and satisfying. Baking.

Here are a few recipes that I’ve tried so far this year and loved!

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Key Lime Pie

My key lime pie tasted even better with a dollop of whipped cream!

 

The key lime pie recipe was stunningly easy and cheap to make. Just five ingredients and half an hour, and I had a beautiful pie ready to be eaten. I didn’t even have to bake it!

Although this short-cut recipe is wonderfully simple, it did lack a bit of the depth of flavour of a more traditional key lime pie. If you have time to make a regular pie I recommend it, but if time is tight, this is an easy and delicious alternative!

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Chocolate Raspberry Mousse Cake

A perfect birthday cake for my sister-in-law

 

This one was definitely a weekend project!

The brownie base had to be cooked and completely cooled (I let it sit overnight). Then each mousse layer was made and poured individually, and left to set in the fridge.

The bottom layer mousse is chocolate, then white chocolate raspberry, and white chocolate vanilla. Real raspberries were used, and just a touch of food colouring gave it that more vibrant pink colour. Then the decadent ganache on top.

Three layers of mousse

 

 

A heads up, it was quite expensive to make with all the premium dark/white chocolate,  and a lot of whipped cream. However, it was by far one of the best cakes I ever made! And that was a family consensus!

Tip: If you let the cake sit over night once complete, it will taste much fuller the next day.

 

 

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Savoury Cheesecake

For an experiment, it turned out surprisingly well

 

This savoury cheesecake was one of my more improvised creations. The cheesecake itself is made of cream cheese, sour cream, goat cheese, spinach and mushrooms. The base is a cracker/Panko crumb mixture and it is topped with candied pecans. I may still write the full recipe if I make a Part 2. Considering I already have a white chocolate lavender cake and homemade Oreos to discuss, there is a good chance there will be a second part!

It paired the best with the nacho chips

 

 

I would perhaps avoid using the word cheesecake here, but that might be me struggling with that mental block of cheesecake being a dessert. I think this a little more like a cheese ball- perfect for dipping crackers, chips and vegetables, and a wonderful item to bring to that potluck at work.

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Fresh Strawberry Cupcakes

Perfect summer cupcake

 

I made these for Mother’s day and what a treat! A light and fluffy little snack with that burst of summer berry. Relatively straight forward to make, I used fresh strawberries for the puree and it was such a hit they didn’t even last two days.

Note: I used this recipe for the icing, because it was simpler.

Pottage- Medieval Research

Recently, I’ve been trying to make my fantasy novel realistic as possible (which may seem like quite the oxymoron of a concept!). One of the things I realized though was that I had no firm idea what medieval folk ate. So I decided to take my book’s era to my own kitchen and get a better idea of how food might have been prepared back then.

In my book DRAGON KIN, the characters would often eat bread and stew out on the road, but I didn’t know how this would have been prepared. So I decided to try and replicate this with as much authenticity as I could. And one of the best known stew-type meals back then, I discovered, was pottage.

Pottage is a thickened stew that was popular among the commoners and serfs in the medieval ages. You can find more information on it here. Basically, the peasants would have thrown whatever food they had into a large pot, and just kept adding to it over the course of days, even weeks! Vegetables were considered the poor man’s food back then, so the peasants would put in a lot of ingredients like peas, carrots and onions, rather than a lot of meat the nobility could better afford.

Ingredients

This was all of the information I had going in, and decided to use this philosophy in my own recipe. I only used what I already had at home, but I had the added difficulty of only using vegetables available to English peasants. This was harder than I had anticipated, considering I hadn’t gone shopping all week. But it was a great way to use up some leftover vegetables!

I did some further digging, and discovered corn, tomatoes and potatoes came later to Europe, they wouldn’t have been around in that era, so I had to rethink my menu a little bit. Instead, I included vegetables like carrots, celery, green onion, cauliflower and also chickpeas as well.

To start off, I prepared the chicken. During October, when I originally created the recipe, the harvest would have just come in, which meant the villagers would have just slaughtered the farm animals they used for meat to avoid having to feed them over the winter. So during the fall, their pottage would have been full of fresh vegetables and meats.

Wandering noses!

I cubed a boneless chicken breast. Normally the chicken would have the bone in it, and the bone would have been used for stock, but boneless chicken was what I had in the freezer.

It was also common to thicken things with eggs, and use butter for flavour. In medieval times electric refrigerators didn’t exist, so things like butter were heavily salted to preserve it longer. Of course, not everything kept well. Sometimes the meat or the vegetables became a little off, so the villagers used lots of fresh herbs like rosemary and thyme to mask any odd tastes.

I put the chicken in a pan with 1/4 cup of cubed butter and mixed in 2 tsp of rosemary, 1/4 tsp of salt, 1/2 tsp of garlic powder and 1 egg. I simmered it until the chicken was no longer pink, but rather a pale colour. I made sure not to cook the butter out, which would make the chicken dry.

Raw chicken

Cooked chicken

I peeled and chopped three carrots and two stalks of celery, but I soon realized that this wasn’t enough. I diced more, and ended up with a total of five diced carrots and three celery stalks. I then chopped a head of cauliflower, a green onion stalk and 1/4 cup of fresh parsley.

I boiled four cups of water in the kettle and dissolved in one chicken bouillon cube. Obviously chicken bouillon cubes weren’t around in medieval times, but they would have boiled the chicken bones to make a broth, which as I said I did not have, but lots of salt would have been added to the chicken to preserve it, so I felt this was a fair substitute. I then mixed in herbs to the stock solution. One tsp of each basil, sage and garlic.

Vegetables, stock and chicken

I stirred the vegetables and the stock solution together in a large pot.

I then added the chicken and any butter solution still remaining in the pan.

The common folk had something even more in abundance than vegetables; the very thing that made pottage so distinct. Grains. This is where the thickened part of the stew comes in. They added rye, barley, oats or whatever grains they had on hand, even legumes like chickpeas. Although I’m pretty sure their chick peas didn’t come in a can like mine did!

I added in 3 tbs of both instant oats and chickpeas to the pottage. I simmered the whole pot for about 5 minutes before deciding the stew wasn’t thick enough, so I added in an extra 2 tbs of oats and chickpeas both.

It was at this point I added in 1/2 cup of fresh, chopped spinach. Spinach doesn’t take long to cook, so don’t add this in too early.

I let the whole thing simmer for another 10 minutes, stirring regularly, until the vegetables were tender but not crunchy. The oats disappeared right into the mixture, and it took on a yellowish tint.

The pottage was thick but not paste like, truly more of a stew than a porridge. In the past, they probably added more oats or barley and there would no doubt have been less chicken, but I did consider taste as well as authenticity. I wanted to avoid it taking on a bland paste-like consistency.

 

I served it hot, along with a slice of homemade bread I’d prepared with the bread maker. A bit of a cheat, but bread making would have to come another day!

Pottage and homemade bread!

My two tasters gave it two thumbs up and a score of 4.5/5 stars!

It tasted even better a few days later. During medieval times, they would have kept a pot of pottage going for days, adding a few new things at each meal to stretch the food out. We did find after a few days, although we had the luxury of a fridge, all the seasonings had marinated into the pottage more throughly and actually gave it a fuller and richer taste. Also a note, it freezes well especially since there’s no potato in it.

 

Recipe:

Ingredients

Preparing chicken:

• 1 boneless chicken breast
• 1/4 cup of hard butter
• 2 tsp rosemary
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1 egg (beaten)

Vegetables:

• 5 peeled carrots
• 3 celery stalks
• 1/4 cup fresh parsley
• 1 green onion stalk
• 1 cauliflower head

Stock:

• 4 cups of boiling water
• 1 chicken bouillon cube
• 1 tsp basil
• 1 tsp of sage
• 1 tsp garlic

Extras in Pot:

• 5 tbs instant oats
• 5 tbs canned chick peas
• 1/2 cup fresh, chopped spinach

Directions

1. Cube chicken and butter. Stir in rosemary, salt, garlic powder and beaten egg.
2. Simmer until chicken is pale but not pink. Do not cook out butter entirely.
3. Chop the vegetables and mix in a large pot.
4. Dissolve the bouillon cube in boiling water. Mix in basil, sage and garlic to make stock.
5. Add the stock to the pot of vegetables and stir throughly, coating the vegetables entirely.
6. Stir in the cooked chicken and any butter left in the pan to the vegetable pot.
7. Add instant oats and chick peas. Stir often and bring to a boil.
8. Add the fresh spinach.
9. Simmer for about ten minutes, until the vegetables are tender but not crunchy. The pottage should thicken, like a stew, and will gain a yellow tint.
10. Let sit for a few minutes. Serve hot.

A slice of fresh bread is wonderful addition to this. Can be stored in fridge for later consumption, or put in freezer.

*NOTE: You can also add diced white or yellow onion. Peppers weren’t around in those times though, so that addition will depend on your need for authenticity.

Enjoy! 😀

Tips on writing a character self-reflecting while physically alone

Recently I was struggling with a section of my WIP (Work in progress), that was necessary for the plot, but just seemed to drag on. It was a scene set between action filled chapters where my main character (MC) was by himself and taking emotional inventory. A lot had just happened, and he was suddenly alone and reeling with a barrage of emotions. This was a necessary part of the book, but how could I write a scene when my character had a lot of feelings and thoughts to work out, but no one to talk to?

I was once given some very good advice from a friend.

If you’re bored writing it, your audience will be bored reading it. 

This is very true. I was bored writing this section. Bored rereading and editing it. But it was necessary to move the story along- in fact it was crucial to character development. But what could I do to make it more interesting? I was actually able to come up with a list of ideas, and thought I would share them for anyone else similarly stuck!

 

• Add Action

Sometimes the simpler solutions can work best for your piece. If your emotional section is too long, maybe there’s some action you can add in. Is the character running away/towards someone or something? Is their life in danger? Is there any way to up the stakes of the situation and add more urgency?

It’s usually a good idea to have some downtime between big events. Your character should have a moment to catch their breath and take stock of what’s happened, because generally when you’re running for your life you aren’t doing your best self reflection. Just make sure this downtime isn’t too long, and it leads to something a bit more fast paced.

 

• Use Setting 

You can intersperse setting descriptions with thoughts/emotions to make your writing more dynamic. One of the ways to do this is to have your character go somewhere or find some object with a lot of personal significance.

Be careful with this one, it can be a bit over done.  How many romance plots are furthered with the MC going to think about everything that’s happened at the place they met their true love? Or someone who’s lost a loved picking up their favourite item and reflecting back on some memory tied to it? It can be a beautiful moment if done properly though, so don’t discount it entirely.

It’s also better to make your descriptions active if possible. Having six pages describing minute details of every knick knack, table and chair in a room can be a bit much, so maybe have a couple of sentences to give a general sense of the setting, and then have your character move within that space.

For example, imagine a huge, stone room that’s cold and drafty. The character walks through the doorway, their echoing footfalls leaving dusty prints while they think about some major events that’s just occurred. They have to step around the massive, worn wooden table that could comfortably seat fifty people and stretches nearly the length of the room. The character idly runs their hand along the iron candleholders welded to the wall, shivering as a draft rattles down the chimney and tears through the room, stirring up the smell of must and decay that makes them sneeze.

We’re seeing more details of the setting being revealed as the character moves and interacts with the room. Have the character experience the space while reflecting on something- engage all the senses and your readers will go along for the ride!

Another way to use setting is as a contrast.

It can be tempting to have someone reeling with angst and regret in the pouring rain, but imagine how powerful that same scene could be if it were set on a sunny with a playground full of happy children running and playing just behind them? Or a burnt down husk of a house being the place the MC is happy about something that’s just occurred? The contrast of setting and emotion can draw the reader in, and create more memorable moments.

Of course the location should still make sense to the plot. Don’t make things needlessly more confusing and complicated just to have an interesting setting. For instance, the scene I was working on in my book had to be set in the forest due to the timeline and plot of the book.

Yet you can still add setting contrast in other ways. Maybe it’s your character’s go-to to drink at a dive bar when they’re upset. The bar is a common place to go when someone’s struggling, but that’s your character’s safe place to think and where the next part of the plot occurs. So maybe your MC is wallowing at this dingy bar as per usual, but on that day there’s a big game on and the bar’s unusually busy while everyone cheers and crowds around the TV. This excited and frenzied energy could be a great backdrop to your character’s breakdown.

 

• Talking to themselves

The obvious answer to a character needing to talk things out but being physically alone is to have them talk to themselves.  This could work, depending on the situation and character, or it could seem like lazy writing that pulls your reader out of the story.

If your character has lost someone, or is having a crisis of faith with whatever god they worship, then having them shout at the sky may be perfectly natural.

If they’re the type who often talks to themselves, this may seem normal for your character. Or if they’ve been alone for a long time/delusional with some substance or fatigue/hunger this could also be understandable. Just make sure if you use this one sparingly if it fits the situation in your book.

 

• Dream/Hallucination

Then there’s the next obvious choice; the dream/hallucination. Your character is physically alone, but in their mind someone else is there with them. I would say, again, if this fits with your plot it can be very effective, but if you just use it as a way to shoehorn in some dialogue and it comes out of the blue, it can seem very contrived and forced.

If your character took some substance/is near some object that induces visions, this could be an incredible look into your character’s psyche. The whole dreaming a conversation with someone who’s dead can seem cliche, so if you do use it, explain it in the plot or use it intermittently.  If your character is magic and can connect with others’ in their dreams, this could be a very effective tool. If your character just dreams every time they need to work something out, its may come across as very contrived.

 

• Use Actions to Show Character’s State of Mind

Rather than just outright saying what your character is feeling, show your readers with some well placed telling-actions. The old show not tell writer’s adage is perhaps overused, but the right action can tell us so much more than just saying what someone’s feeling.

This can come down to body language. Some of the classics might be for a character to walk with their arms crossed if they’re feeling very overwhelmed or scared. Maybe the character has a tic when they’re nervous or unsure. Little things like playing with their hair/biting their nails, down to something a little more obvious like a stutter or twitch etc.

Word choice is also key here. Someone running down the street tells us nothing except the character’s moving quickly. But if they’re excited to share some good news and they’re pelting down the street, we can feel that excitement in how fast they’re moving.

 

• Don’t Go For the Obvious Emotions Only

My biggest breakthrough moment was coming to this realization. My main character had just been chased from his home and family, and his mind was whirling because he was feeling lost, scared and mad simultaneously. Now, that probably sounds like perfectly reasonable range of emotions given the situation, but how often when something earth shattering happens do we ever just feel the obvious things? Yes, those are the overwhelming emotions at the forefront in that scenario, but that section of my book was boring because I was barely scratching the surface. Think of all the undercurrents of other emotions could be scattered in to make the readers feel that mind reeling sentiment of suddenly having no home and family.

My character was finally out on his own, so he might be a bit happy/excited. Maybe he feels guilty for feeling anything positive when his family’s in danger. Maybe there’s some hopelessness or hopefulness at how the situation’s progressing, maybe he’s envious of everyone else who doesn’t have to deal with all the insanity of his village. Maybe there’s some bitterness that he now feels obligated to help people that rallied against him his whole life.

You don’t want to put too much in, it will overwhelm the scene, but little hints of varying and clashing feelings can add some emotional depth, plus you may discover some new underlying themes/character traits that you can carry through the rest of the book.

I listed some general emotions below (remember all of these emotions can be aimed towards the situation, towards others or towards the self) :

• Fear
• Anger
• Sadness
• Joy/happiness
• Hatred
• Repulsion
• Surprise
• Faith
• Anticipation
• Pity
• Indignation
• Helplessness
• Hopelessness
• Dejection
• Anxiety
• Determination/stubbornness
• Humble/unassuming
• Love
• Shame/guilt
• Envy/jealousy

Here’s a more comprehensive list for your brainstorming pleasure.

 

• Less is More

Finally, less is often more. Another trite saying that has staying power due to its undeniable truth.

We as writers can sometimes underestimate our readers’ understanding. Having a whole chapter just on how sad a character is will likely come across as overly melodramatic.

A few inner thoughts, mixed with the proper movement and setting will usually be enough to convey your character’s state of mind. Not that they should just move on from some wonderful or crushing event, but having nothing but wallowing/basking in the moment for page after page may have your audience skimming your work instead of actually reading.

Also remember, your character has probably not achieved perfect self-reflection. This means they won’t understand every aspect of their feelings. How often do we have these whirlwinds of emotion and not always entirely understand why we feel a certain way? Sometimes we feel an undercurrent of opposing emotions, maybe feel a bit petty, jealous, happy etc. even though it may not be conducive to our situation. Try not to have some thought or emotion come from too far left-field, but also try not to beat your readers over the head with explanations either. Give them some breadcrumbs and let them find their way.

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These were the ideas that broke me out of my emotional reflection rut for my book- I hope some of them may be useful for your own work. Happy writing!

Character Arcs (Rewrites Part 8)

I have finished my world building and filling in a few gaps my manuscript had. The final page count is 1009 pages- but don’t worry, as I said, I have a whole month set aside for cuts!

I have moved onto tightening character arcs and dialogue. I missed most of yesterday and I will miss Monday as well, but not to worry, I’ve built in a bit of leeway with all of that in mind.

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I have gone back over all the major events for the most important characters, and broken down each plot point into basic character development notes so as I go back and start reworking them, making sure to highlight each one a little more throughly.

I will hopefully be posting my first travel piece next week, and I find out how I place in my contest tonight, so I will keep you updated on that as well!

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Hope everyone out there doing Nanowrimo is doing well. Just keep writing! Remember, whether you hit your goals or not, any writing is progress!

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An Update (Progress!)

Last week I took a few days to compile all the rewrites I’ve been working on for months, and to say my book has grown is an overwhelming understatement. There’s still a few places that need some bulking up, but it’s currently sitting at, drum roll please….

In my defense, that’s 994 pages DOUBLE spaced.

Needless to say, I am quite glad I’ve put a month aside for toning up and trimming down this behemoth (but that might not be enough).

I am working on world building for the next couple of days still- I’ve gone back and identified the places where I introduced a new location, and I’m improving the descriptions, especially now that I am surrounded by pictures of places that look like the settings I’m describing (I printed them out and stuck them all around my office wall). I’m finding this really helpful, because when I’m just focusing on setting, I can see a few places where the descriptions were really just too vague. It’s really starting to feel like progress now that I’ve put it all back together and have a book again instead of just files filled with sections and chapters.

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I will also be posting some slightly different entries here as well over the next few months. I am taking a course on Travel Writing, and I will be taking a course on Magazine Writing in November, so I thought with this being my writing blog, it would be the perfect place to post some of my forays into different types of writing, alongside my regular blog content. I have a piece in mind already about a trip to the local museum to see their brewers’ exhibit, and a visit to the new artisan cheese shop, so keep a keen eye out for that one.

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Also, I am working on a new blog called Far Back Foods. It’s my culinary journey into the past. I will be launching that blog soon, with my first post on my experimental cooking of potage, a medieval thickened stew where anything the people had they threw in. Evidently you could see something as open ended as that, especially for someone as far from a cooking expert as myself, has the potential to go very wrong. Not going to lie, my mantra making that meal was “I have no idea what I’m doing”, but I will be posting that article on my new blog within the next week, so watch out for that thrilling conclusion.

I think that is all for now.

Thank you all for sticking with me, and here’s to growth and progress moving forward! Lots more updates and writing to come!

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Just keep writing (Rewrites Part 7)

I’ve been a little creatively stuck lately. Just feeling very overwhelmed with all the changes that need to be done to my manuscript. Writing started to feel like a bit of a chore at times.

I have an idea of what needs to be done. I’m rewriting a lot of transition scenes, the ones where the characters are travelling, and need to get to know each other between the action filled parts. The scenes need to feel natural for the characters and plot, but obviously it must still be interesting to read. Because some of these events are still a little muddled in my own mind, it’s hard to find the proper angle to take. To find something interesting to write about that helps us get inside the characters minds a little more. I’ve been taking time to plot and outline and tighten character profiles, but the actual writing has seemed daunting.

Then last night, amidst a lot of pacing, I decided I should get back into jogging because I’ve been feeling very lethargic lately. That’s when I came to a realization. Writing is a lot like working out. When you don’t do it for a while, you can get flabby and slow, and it seems harder to get back into the swing of things. You won’t start out as quick or focused after a bit of time away, but that will come back if you persevere. The most important thing is to keep writing, one scene at a time. You do sometimes need to know the rough outline of the book to get an idea of where that character is heading, but sometimes it’s ok to just focus on the section you’re writing. Maybe that scene will end up in the final book, maybe not, but you always learn something from it. You always get a better sense of that character you’re writing. Their voice. Their little ticks and idiosyncrasies. Their thought process.

Sometimes it seems like you’re stuck in the mud, spinning your wheels. And sometimes you are, and it is best to stop and make a plan. But sometimes, like all the writing blogs will tell you, sometimes it really can be as simple as putting your butt in a chair and writing. Even if its not the best. Even if its flawed and all over the place. It’s never a wasted effort, because you are building and maintaining those “writing muscles” and you are learning something about your book.

So now I have decided that nights will be for planning and thinking, but mornings will be for that quick jog, and getting those scenes written and that word count up.

Action scenes (Rewrites part 6)

Sorry for the delay in updating- I got sick right around the second book launch for the Blood is Thicker anthology. Of course I was fine for most of that day, then right when I walked into the symposium my cough started to act up again. I was told by my friend who was in the audience that my increasingly scratchy throat just added to the effect of my reading. But then with the microphone bent oddly and the way I was standing, I had to kind of hunch my shoulders and crane my neck to look up at the audience. I was told by that friend in the crowd that I looked ‘like a water creature surfacing’. But I did not trip or lose my place. So it all evens out I guess.

Anyways, the action scenes went a lot quicker than the character turning point rewrites. I found that the action scenes were already pretty solid, and really only needed a bit of tweaking more than any serious rewrites or overhauls. It was helped in large part by the fact that I had a really good teacher who taught me all about writing action; keep the sentences short, but still varied a bit in length. Don’t bog it down with unnecessary details and choosing the right action word, rather than relying on lot of adjectives and adverbs, is critical. For example, there is a huge difference between someone running/sprinting/pelting down the street. They are placed in order of speed and sense of urgency. Having learned all of these techniques a while ago though meant that the vast majority of those scenes were fairly well constructed. The longest part of the whole process was actually finding and picking those specific parts out of my full-length manuscript. Ctrl-F can be a huge help, unless the word you’re looking for is too common and peppered throughout. Then its a nightmare. Your word has been found… 343 times. 

So I officially finished round 2 of my rewrites today (YAY!!!!), and starting tomorrow will be beginning of phase 3…the Journey Moments. These are the times where there is a lot of travelling/passage of time in one area. These moments are crucial for character interactions with smaller moments for training/talking, that kind of thing. It’s important to put them in, but not to weigh down the story with too much, so I’m thinking this part will be one of the longer sections to rework. Anyways, I already have my list of scenes ready, so I can hit the ground running tomorrow.

And I will keep you updated as that progresses.

Update to Rewrites part 5

Tonight I finished the first round of rewriting!! I am actually a bit ahead of where I thought that  I would be, so I’m feeling very accomplished right now. I already have the action scenes all listed out so I will be starting that next round of rewrites on Monday.

And the Launch at the Canadian Author’s Association writer’s summit is tomorrow! I’ve been asked this week to read part of my short story at the event, so I’ve been practicing that all night and I think I’ve figured out a few good tricks to help me read even smoother. I’ve had experience reading in some of my classes, so I think tomorrow should be a fantastic evening. I’m so excited to get to meet some of my fellow authors and all the new writers, editors and publishers who should be attending as well- I’ve got a whole purse of business cards I plan on handing out! I will keep everyone updated on how this goes, but I am feeling pretty good for tomorrow (it’s now two minutes past midnight, so I guess I’m feeling pretty good for today!)

 

The last of the first (Rewrites part 5)

So today I’m on track to finish my first round of rewrites; the emotional turning points. 200+ pages of new prose, and editing some of the old stuff, although I must admit I have left the two toughest parts for the end so it might be a long night.

Next week I will start round 2 of editing, this time focusing on the action scenes- got some pretty exciting parts I’m eager to delve back into!

I have to say I’ve really enjoyed breaking up the editing into sections like this. For the longest time I had felt so overwhelmed trying to just fix everything at once. This method has been giving me a sense of purpose each day. Even on the days I feel I don’t have as much time or if I ever felt unfocused, I would always just force myself to pick whatever point appealed to me most that day and just go for it. Now that I’m about to go to the anthology launch tomorrow for my short story, I can go in and talk to people about how the editing is actually proceeding, rather than having to turn a stagnant standstill of feeling burnt out into something positive.

I’ve learned having a list that I can check off has been the best way for me to keep making progress. It’s not one giant task of editing the whole book, it’s just 25 key scenes for character arcs and change, and that is something i can work towards and feel accomplished on!

Book Launch

There will be a public book launch and writing symposium on short fiction this Wednesday, June 20 at 7pm at U of Toronto. There will be authors, editors and publishers giving keynote speeches on the writing industry and some of the anthology authors (including me!) giving short readings of their stories.

The link is below for all the details and the registration (Free unless you choose to give a donation to the Creative Writing Bursary or buy raffle tickets).

https://www.universe.com/events/new-directions-in-canadian-short-fiction-tickets-toronto-P6D4GK

Now I have to go practice my reading for this event!