Transition Girl

Why transition girl?... Best answered by a quote from the Iliad....."The soul was not made to dwell in a thing; and when forced to it, there is no part of that soul but suffers violence."

Saturday, July 01, 2017

the start of July

The winter solstice (shortest day of the year) has been and gone in Australia. The weather reports say the days are colder. I went for a walk yesterday just after dawn and let my breath create fog as the air escaped my mouth. It was bracing. Yet I was fueled by a warm glow that was not just a result of the crispness adding a rosy hue to the cheeks on my face.

Maybe it's the holiday I've just had - fulfilling an (almost) life-long dream to visit the Kimberley region in remote north western Australia, a dry summer experience in the middle of winter. Maybe it's the job offer that came at the tail end of that break - finally an opportunity to move roles after almost 13 years into a new area, which coincidentally is a role I've wanted to try for years (first time advertised in that time). Maybe it's the report back from my Beta readers - those six anonymous avid readers who invested time reading a draft on my latest manuscript and who all trumpeted the originality of the premise. Maybe it's my latest celebrity crush - a (much) younger man who I admire from afar for their writing talent as much as their adorable smile.

The walking in heat. The walking in cold. The opportunity to explore new things in my real world as well as in my writing imagination. These are the things that inspire me. It is not the middle of winter at all as I am sitting at my writing desk with my gas log fire burning, drinking chai-spiced tea to inflame the creative spark running through my veins.

I am about to start working on the third draft of the Peithosian Gift. I have lost track of the plethora of ideas for plot, character, and story structure that came to me yesterday afternoon (after a long walk where I let my mind wander through a tangent world singing songs by Neil Finn). I have a whole new character to create to help balance the moral stance I have taken in drafts one and two - even out the stakes so my readers can decide for themselves which characters are right and wrong rather than trusting my choice. I need to develop more detail about time and place, flesh out the world of the story and the characters that inhabit it. I need to decide whether one of my characters is a real saviour or just a vessel of something much stronger. I need to decide when I reveal one of the key plot twists in the story.

So much to do.

I am so excited.