Marathon Madness?

What have I gotten myself into? I must be mad. This weekend I’m participating in the Muskoka Novel Marathon. A whole 72 hours to do nothing but write. A novel. And I’ve never written one before. (I don’t think that fantasy adventure I started writing in high school should count, do you? Besides, I quit after about 2,000 words.)

I’ve always had some excuse to myself for not writing a novel even though I have plenty of half baked ideas. So the fact that I’ve committed myself to devoting three days to writing a crappy novel first draft scares me. Okay, I will have to sleep in there and I have to minus the time to attend my niece’s wedding. But that still leaves me a decent two and a half days. And I’ll be in a room full of other writers all doing the same thing! Will it be intimidating or motivating to see everyone around me writing away? I guess I’ll find out.

But here’s the other great component to this event: we’re all raising money for the Simcoe-Muskoka YMCA’s literacy programs. All participants are asked to collect donations for the YMCA. Here is my Canada Helps donation page where online donations are accepted (if you take that as a hint or invitation I won’t object) and you get an instant tax receipt.

Between my paper pledges and my online donation form it looks like I’ve reached my minimum fundraising goal. That makes me happy. Now here’s hoping at a minimum I can get some ideas flowing this weekend, and keep them flowing for the whole event and beyond. That would make me very happy. And maybe, at a minimum, I would prove to myself that I’m not mad.

© Lizann Flatt, www.lizannflatt.com
No part of this blog may be used without written permission from the author.

Me, the Museum and Medieval Times

Before school was out, one late June afternoon I wrote this as my Facebook status:

Am in a school bus with 39 grade 4/5s in Toronto rush hour traffic and it’s 30 some degrees and two plus hours home. Oh did I mention most of the boys bought swords at Medieval Times? My writing friends will understand I’m just callin it research. 🙂

I wasn’t kidding. Getting home from the trip was no picnic. It took just over three hours–an hour longer than it should have. Here’s a shot of the traffic through the front of the bus:

 But it was all worth it because

  • I got to spend time with my youngest daughter and her friends 
  • I love museums, so seeing a couple exhibits at the ROM was fascinating and made me realize I need to bring my kids back for a more in-depth visit
  • I was quite serious about putting the trip down as research. I listened and observed and just absorbed the experience of being in grade four 
  • and Medieval Times was just a lot of fun and made the kids feel like they really were at a king’s tournament. Plus it was air conditioned.

As if that wouldn’t make the day rewarding enough, I had an unexpected bonus.

At the ROM we took part in a special program. We donned cotton gloves so we could carefully handle actual objects from medieval times. ROM staff had grouped objects by theme at each table. My daughter’s table was full so I couldn’t sit with her, but there was a space at a table with a few boys. Turns out this table had a piece of chain mail, a knight’s spur, a rounded ceramic vessel that would have held Greek fire, and an odd tiny square piece of metal with intricate characters on it. Very cool.

I picked up the tiny square and looked at it closely– it looked like it had Arabic lettering on it. The facilitator confirmed that yes, that’s exactly what it was. I was holding an early Arabic coin. Wow! Here is a photo of the square coin. It was wrapped in a protective case.

The coin in its protective case.

This was my unexpected bonus because I’d just received the finished copy of an educational title I worked on for Crabtree Publishing called Arts and Culture in the Early Islamic World. I’d done lots of research but never actually handled something from that era or that part of the world. This makes book number twelve for me.

I was a bit flippant describing the journey on Facebook, but the whole day’s experience is one I count as excellent. More importantly, I think my daughter would count it that way too.

Bonus photos:

The hall at Medieval Times

The stadium at Medieval Times 
Two of the knights–boo! (We were to cheer for the Green Knight)

© Lizann Flatt, www.lizannflatt.com
No part of this blog may be used without written permission from the author.

Scene Stealing Seagulls and SCBWI

Wow, what an experience at the SCBWI Canada East Niagara Falls retreat! Tons of talent, talk, and inspiration. Here’s a bit of what it was like:

Keynote Quotes

“Story matters most.” Emma D. Dryden, drydenbks, talking about all the many technological devices and platforms there are.

“Bring your props out before you need them.” Kathleen Duey, talking about introducing physical elements or setting details to your reader when they’re just insignificant details so you can bring them up again later when they become pivotal plot points.

“Think of voice as personality; the thing that stays with you.” Nancy Conescu, executive editor, Dial Books for Young Readers, telling us she needs to see this in manuscript submissions she would consider acquiring or working on further.

“No more missing sock stories!” Tracey Adams, agent, Adams Literary, when asked what she does not want to see…but she did go on to say that anything can work if it works.

Most Memorable Moments

* Walking to dinner and coming across a bride and groom’s photo shoot backdropped by the falls. But the wind was whipping the bride’s hair and dress all up and around. Immediately, Kathleen Duey stepped up and suggested the bridal party, a group of mostly men standing idly by, form a windbreak by positioning themselves in front of the bridge and groom but out of the photo. They did and it effectively blocked the worst of the wind. Situation saved!

* Waiting to deliver Lesley Livingston to the group tour and snapping this photo as a seagull soared right towards me. Check it out:

* And downloading my photos to find some seagull snuck into my snapshot of Janis and Lesley. Scene stealer! Look at it there between their heads, bold as all get out!

Seagulls aside, in summary Jackie Garlick-Pynaert did an outstanding job of gathering the talent (which also included Patti Ann Harris, art director of Little Brown; author Kristin Clark Venuti; editor and author Lorin Oberweger; director and writer Roman White) and coordinating the conference.

I look forward to enjoying the new connections made at this conference for a long time.

© Lizann Flatt, www.lizannflatt.com
No part of this blog may be used without written permission from the author.

Sky Circle

I was driving home yesterday when I noticed a peculiar contrail in the sky. Check this out:

It seemed weird to me that it was circular because they’re usually straight. At least around here they are.

Then I came across this article thanks to Twitter about an air show happening further north and that planes performing in it would be flying over: http://www.cottagecountrynow.ca/community/southmuskoka/article/1369946

Ah-hah, mystery likely solved.

What did we ever do before the internet??

© Lizann Flatt, www.lizannflatt.com
No part of this blog may be used without written permission from the author.