andBefore I get on to my main topic let me give you a quick run down as to what I have been doing since my last blog.

Not a lot!!

Well, actually, not quite true. Most of last year was taken up with this strange idea that we should move from our village into the nearby town. My idea. I'm not complaining. It was a good idea. Instead of being stuck in the middle of the countryside, very nice though that was, surrounded by nice people, it meant travelling for everything I needed to do. After several false starts we finally found, bought, and redecorated, a nice little flat right in the middle of town, ten minutes or so walk from everywhere.  But it took all year. Writing took a back seat and I've promised myself I will make a new start.

I would have started last week but had a cold. I don't do colds well, I'm not one of those who fight it and carry on no matter how red and sore my nose is. I roll over and die for a week, hopefully keeping the bugs to myself.

But now I am up and running. That's another reason for moving into town, increased exercise. Walk to the shops, swim and hit the gym at the leisure centre!

This morning I did my first major shop of the year. We were away over Christmas and last week I just got a few essentials to keep us going until I felt better. Today I tackled the Supermarket. I won't say which one as that is free advertising, but it was one of the big ones, only two or three years old and I'm quite happy with it most of the time. Today I spent a fortune, but that was because I bought some extras in the sale, and was topping up in case we have snow over the next couple of weeks. Don't want to trudge down there in the snow!

When I got home I thought I would check my first receipt of the year against things I bought last year since moving in here. I'm not too worried about shopping bills, yet, but I thought it would be interesting to see if and what rises in price there had been, especially with the dreaded Brexit looming. I generally buy pretty much the same things most of the time so it is fairly easy to see if things have gone up. And some had. Cheese, muesli, tea, some frozen favourites and all gone up by 5, 10 or 15 pence. Which set me thinking.

It's annoying but not surprising that things have gone up but looking down the till receipt I noticed that ALL prepacked, frozen or processed food ended in 0 or 5. And this is what I wondered. Why? We have a choice of 1,2,3,4,6,7,8,& 9 pence. Why do supermarkets only deal in 0 and 5? I'm glad that most shops have dropped the 99p thing. This has mainly happened in shops where women shop. You rarely see a clothes shop that sells things at £9.99 these days, although there are still some around. But why are other things ending exactly 0 or 5p?

It could be to save having loads of change in the till, I suppose. But you have to have all the coins in the till anyway. And with more people using contactless for small purchases or paying with chip and pin, the argument for change is rapidly fading.

The thing is, as customers we are paying at least an extra 5p whenever there is a price rise. Over a large shop that might not be that noticeable to some people who don't have to worry about shopping bills. But the shops are getting an extra 5p for every items they sell. I have no idea how costs are worked out for your packet of cheese, but surely in this day and age it is possible to raise the price by 2p or something similar. It's not as if big major stores actually pay their suppliers in cash, everything is paid electronically these days so prices could easily be more precise.  Petrol is constantly going up in pennies and then back down again, so why not food?

Things that are weighed come out in precise pennies. So why can't a packet of biscuits be 87p instead of 90p? Yes, I suppose it will make labelling the shelves more complicated if you have to have different prices for every single item. But in these days of trying to keep costs down maybe this is one way of doing it.

​

So long since I've done something here I couldn't remember how! Got it going now so here goes.

Most people make promises to themselves at the beginning of the year. I don't like the New Year, it happens in Winter when I'm in hibernation mode. 

I've woken up now and have made a few promises to myself to get me to the end of the year.

1. Stop trying to be everything to everyone.
2. Concentrate on what I need.
3. Write for myself and stop thinking about what other people want to write.

Looking at this list strikes me as a very selfish list and I am not a selfish person. That is probably my downfall as far as being a writer is concerned. I want to help other writers be better. Over the last few years I've looked at books for nearly ten other authors. I do not regret it. I have loved doing it. But while I'm doing that I can't write my own books. There are only so many hours in the day, and I can only read so much. The big question is, Do I want to be an author or an editor and author wins. So, sorry guys, I won't be offering to look at anything in future. I wish everyone the best and hope you all do well in whatever you decide to do.

​Watch out for my next book. Coming soon. 

It is exactly the middle of August, give or take an hour or two, and I'm sitting here wondering what has happened to the year. It seems to have flown and all the things I promised myself I would do are still not done. I really must learn how to schedule myself a bit better. Twenty years ago I was complaining there were not enough hours in the day or days in the week, and things don't seem to have improved.

I know I am my own worst enemy. I'm trying to get noticed as a writer and keep being told, follow blogs, interact with people on Facebook and other social media, join forums, keep an eye on what's happening in the literary world, and the big wide wide, and the world of technology and don't forget to do your Spanish lessons. News people, by the time I've done all that I've used up the energy I had to write!

So should I write first thing, before I do all those other things? That would only ever happen if I didn't bother getting out of bed. I could quite happily sit up in bed and spend a few hours hammering away at the keyboard. Maybe I should try that. The trouble is as soon as my feet hit the floor at the side of my bed life takes over.

Sort out the washing that was done over night, well actually just before I went to bed. Have a bath so that I can actually start moving. Check my emails just in case someone has offered me a film deal for one of my books, never happens. Check Facebook to see if the world has ended; eat; walk the dog; think about what to eat for dinner tonight. I would like to say I vacuum and dust every day but I don't. Such things get done when I can't ignore the bits on the carpet or the fingerprints in the dust. Speaking of which, guess what I really must do when I finish typing this.

And suddenly it's time to cook dinner - that is if the star of my life hasn't informed me an hour before I start that he won't be home for dinner because he is on his way to the back of beyond and probably won't be home until midnight. So I'm walking the dog again.

So dinner eaten, it's time for the evening news during which I usually fall into an exhausted power nap because I have been running around all day and still haven't sat down to write a word.

Power naps are great. I often feel better after a nap than after a night in bed, but there are then the evening things to do. Wash up, make tomorrow's packed lunch, see if there is any washing to do tonight. Check if there have been any sales today. It's now pushing nine o'clock and I STILL haven't written anything. 

At some point, I'm not sure where, I do manage to get some editing done for other people. But when it comes to my own writing, I might start at ten pm. But more likely my eyes are too tired and I just sit and watch old TV shows - there hardly ever seems to be any new ones worth watching. Although I did enjoy Humans that was on recently.

Don't suggest going to bed earlier, it doesn't work, never has. My entire life I have gone to bed at a 'reasonable' time and tossed and turned for two hours before I sleep. I am an owl, I go to sleep late and wake up late. That's me, don't expect anything different. But I quite like this idea of maybe writing before I get up. I'll have to take my tablet to bed with me and try it. Could mean I don't emerge from my cocoon until around lunch time!

We will see.

Must go now. The dog is looking accusingly at me to let me know her dinner is late. There are far to many 'so's in this piece, but I couldn't care less at the moment, so they will stay there! 
    

Hi, someone just sent me a message praising my blog and asking for advise. Unfortunately they didn't give me an email address for my reply so I'm posting this in the hope they may look and it may also be useful to others thinking about setting up a blog.

It is very easy to set up a blog, I have one on my website which is provided by Weebly and I have a personal one and one for my publishing business on blogspot which, I believe, is part of Google.

Setting up is easy. Knowing what and when to post is the difficult part. Do you want to blog about something specific, life in general or are you supporting a particular cause?

The next thing is to post regularly to keep people interested. Something I fail miserably at (posting regularly that is, hopefully people are interested!). This takes up time and eats into other things you should be doing. Also, you need to have something to say, otherwise why blog?

Finally, you need to let people know you have posted something, usually through whatever social media you use, be that Facebook, Twitter or any of the other platforms now available.  

Hope this helps.

It has been announced that the word hashtag has been included in the OED as not only a word to describe the # sign, but also as a word that is attached to another word as in ‘hashtag brilliant’.

I’m not a grammar nazi, nor am I opposed to new words or new ways to use them, but I do wonder at this.

The hash sign was, is, used on social media so that people in the vastness of the cyber sphere can quickly share ideas and thoughts. If you want to draw attention to something put a hash sign in front of a word and the computer will link your post to any other similar word. A simple #blog will link all the posts that contain the same tag so that people looking for a blog to read don’t have to read 50 million irrelevant posts before they find one about a blog.

It has developed into campaign tags and almost anything can be made accessible in this way.

It now seems that people are using the word ‘hashtag’ when speaking to express themselves.  This does not make sense to me. Using the word ‘hashtag’ in speech is not the same as putting one in front of something that can be accessed by computer software. It doesn’t link together thousands of other people using the same words. My first thought on hearing this development was it is simply another form of expletive.  No different to ‘bloody’, ‘sodding’ or that ‘f’ word every parent tells their kids off for using even though they probably use it themselves and the kids use it all the time in the school playground.

You don’t believe me? An example. A kid comes out of school, annoyed because a teacher has done something the child thinks is unfair. Moaning to his friends the kid says, “Hashtag teacher, wait till I tell my dad.”

How is that different to him saying “Fucking teacher, wait till I tell my dad.” ?

And how soon will it be before saying ‘hashtag’ becomes offensive? Before the bullies start chanting “Hashtag idiot” at their victims?  

There are many new words added to the dictionary every year. Most are innocuous, many forgotten within a generation or so. Being added to the OED gives them a certain status of acceptability. I have no problem with the word Hashtag being added as a word to describe the hash sign being linked to a word or phrase to attract attention on social media. Being used as an expletive, a sentence filler, I’m not so sure about.   

This information came to me second hand. If it’s not 100% correct all I can say of my informant is a ‘hashtag stupidsod.’ 

I'm pleased to announce I have just launched my first children's book. It was quite a challenge keeping the word count down as I do tend to ramble on a bit! But everyone who has seen it so far approves and thinks I've got the balance right. 

There is a big difference between writing for children and writing for adults, especially when writing for the younger end of the spectrum. Not only is the subject matter different but you tend to forget not all children know the words you take for granted! Mind you, some adults don't always know the words I take for granted. And likewise, when editing I have found words that I did not know and have to check before continuing.

This difference is one of the reasons I have chosen to use my maiden name for my children's books. (I'm assuming, here, that they will be popular enough to warrant more than one! We shall see.) So when you see the name A P Lanstone, it is me! 

The other main difference between adult and children's books is that children like to look at pictures and I can't draw to save my life. I mean that. If I had to draw a diagram to tell someone how to rescue me from kidnappers, I'd be dead! So imagine my joy at finding an illustrator who makes pictures exactly how I imagine them! Ann H Griffiths came to me in a very roundabout way for advice on publishing and now she has done some wonderful pictures for my story. 

At the moment the book is only available as an ebook. We are working on the idea of making a printed version in black and white so that children can colour in the pictures themselves. We will see.

So what is the book called?

It's FantasmaGONE! and the Pirates. It's about a little girl who finds a strange creature in her Aunt's garden. A creature that can change shape, turn invisible and fly. Oh, and can time travel too! 

Available in all these places

KINDLE uk  http://dld.bz/dBVaw  
B&N        http://dld.bz/dBNGf
NOOK     http://dld.bz/dBVap
KOBO     http://dld.bz/dBNGe
ITUNES   http://dld.bz/dBVac 

A question every writer asks. And if any one person knew the answer they could make a fortune. But the truth is there is no magic formula. Success is as much to do with luck and being noticed by the right people at the right time as it is about knowing what to do.

I don't think there is an author who has not been rejected by the big publishing companies. I'm talking now of the days when the only way to get published was to be taken on by a main stream publisher. Nearly all the famous names who are now familiar to readers and scholars alike, were once rejected by one publishing house or another.

Now anyone can publish a book. It's easy. You write your book. You submit it to Kindle Direct Publishing and hey presto! you are a published author. Quite often with typos and bad grammar included.

Writing your tome is the easy part. Getting people to buy it, and maybe leave a comment about it, is the hardest part of being an independent author.

So how do people pick their next book these days? In 'the old days' when books were printed, you would go to a shop and look along the shelves for something that sparked your interest. Readers might scan the best seller lists and go in search of what was trending at the time. They would wait patiently for the next book from their favourite author. They might pick something by someone local to their community. They might wait for the paperback version or trawl through the pallets of books on offer at cheap discount stores. But the truth is few authors sold their books in vast numbers. 

So how do authors get noticed now? There are hundreds of websites that offer to promote and advertise your books. I'm on several but I have not noticed any great response to these. Maybe I don't try hard enough. I'm not a naturally pushy person and to be a success I guess this is a flaw. You name a site and I bet I'm on it somewhere. 

There are sites that boast of having mailing lists of tens of thousands of people which you can join, for a fee. 

Social media - get the word out, but no matter how much you tweet and get re-tweeted, if people don't catch that message there is no sale.

What authors have to remember is that their book is a mere drop in the ocean. ANY sale is a success when there are literally millions of books from which the reader can choose. Well done to the few who make it to the top without the backing of the big guys. You are doing well. You are a success - just don't quit the day job yet!

Ever since I started writing I have wondered this. What makes a writer and in particular a good writer? Is it someone who knows how to dot the 'i's and cross the 't's, puts commas and full stops (periods to anyone in America) in the right place? Who can put words in the correct grammatical order? Or is it someone who can tell a good story with wit and humour, make totally unlikeable characters loveable, or unbelieveable scenes seem real?

Since offering my editing services I have come across all sorts. Most have a reasonable grasp of how things should be done and my main task is to spot the odd typo and flaws in the plot line. I think my special talent is spotting continuity errors, you know the sort of thing, problems solved before they have actually occurred, getting married in May when the proposal didn't happen until July (not that I have ever come across that, but it explains what I mean. Of course, it could happen in a time travel story!)

But what about someone who can tell a really good story, verbally, but has no concept of how to write it down? Can such a person be moulded into a good writer? I do hope so as I've recently come across one such writer. He dictated a story over the phone and it was wonderful. 'But my grammar's rubbish,' he confessed. His grammar sounded fine to me. Grammar in this case being the way the words are presented, in the right order. It doesn't matter whether he knows what the words are called, even I struggle once we get past the basics of noun, verb, adjective and a few others. His grammar was fine. His punctuation, however, is non-existent. 

It is a sad indictment on the schooling in this country, that some people can still go through life without knowing even the basics of how to write something. OK, it was probably a few years ago that this guy went to school, maybe things are better now. Maybe he went to a bad school. Maybe he just wasn't interested back then. But it is such a waste.

I am hoping something will come of this encounter. The stories this guy has to tell are too good to miss.

Has anyone else come across this situation? What did you do?
Suggestions welcome   

All on my own this weekend as my husband is off to Italy to watch the Rugby, Italy v Wales. Seeing as how I spent four weeks in Tenerife in on my own in January I can't really complain. 
So what will I do? All the editing I haven't done this week. Not sure where the days have gone but it's already Thursday night and I feel like I haven't done anything.

I will do some piano practise which is long overdue.

If the sun shines I will do some gardening. Last year's dead stuff hasn't been pulled up yet.

That is what I say I will do. Probably won't get a thing done though!