Category: writing (Page 21 of 24)

What happens next?

26/03/2010 / Ellie

Someone asked me the other day why I write. Easy. I write because I don’t know how not to.

I’ve been a storyteller all my life. Since I could hold a pen, and make marks on paper that weren’t just copying something off the blackboard. It’s as natural to me as breathing.

As time went on, the stories got longer, more complex. I’d get an idea and just run with it, to see where it took me. When I was 14, one of those ideas took me on a wild, 260-page adventure cranked out on an old Adler portable typewriter (forever remembered as the Tripewriter) in one-and-a-half linespacing. I can still smell the carbon paper. Continue reading

Socks discrimination

16/03/2010 / Ellie

… or “Whose book is it anyway?” Part Two.

I was inspired to compose this post by a friend of mine, MM Bennetts, who feels not at all confident about writing female characters and was therefore somewhat stunned to find one had leapt, fully formed, like Athene from the brow of Zeus, onto the pages of her latest book.

This got me thinking. I’ve never actually considered that I had any difficulty writing female characters. I mean, I’m a girl. It should be easy, n’est-ce pas? I’ve got the inside track on how a woman thinks and feels, her motivations, her desires. Surely it should be the Sons of Adam, rather than the Daughters of Eve, that I struggle with? Continue reading