Estrella Azul

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News Flash – Vol.3 #50

Community News, News Flash 2 Responses »
May 152012

Lily Mulholland has some exciting news about the short story anthology, New Sun Rising: Stories for Japan, in which her story ‘The Brewer’s Son’ was selected for inclusion.

For National Flash Fiction Day on May 16th, Marc Nash will be publishing his second anthology of flash on Kindle, 16 stories called “16FF”.

Justin N. Davies has won the latest Flash 500 competition with his story “Dandelion Breeze”. It is up on the Flash 500 website and will be printed in the next issue of Words With Jam magazine.

Recently,  Rachel Carter has put together a flash-fiction anthology, ”Kissing Frankenstein and Other Stories”. It is a not-for-profit publication available at Lulu containing 53 different flash-fiction written by 40 different writers from all over the South West of England. Some of the writers are well-known (such as Tania Hershman) and other were new writers. Read all about it here.

Writer’s Digest has named Alex Carrick’s personal blog as its web site of the week. If you go to Writer’s Digest website and scroll down the right side of the screen, you’ll notice the description saying: “Alex Carrick’s blog is clean, crisp and entertaining. His stories range from humorous to thought-provoking, making it a fun read.”

Eric J. Krause has been interviewed about ”Ghost Betweens” and writing over at Different Outcomes. Go here to read his answers.

Over at Write Anything, Tony Noland is bemoaning the failing health of the apostrophe key on my old laptop. This has graver consequences than you might realize. Go read his article.

Jon Strother has a wonderful guest post, “The Challenge of Writing Flash Fiction”, up over at Amwriting.Org.

Congrats to all!

 

This is a great turnout for the NewsFlash this week as well, isn’t it so much more fun when you all send in your news items and the post is this long and wonderful? Thank you!

~ Estrella Azul

 

Keep the good news coming! You can send in your news items concerning the Friday Flash community to Estrella at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting her on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page.

 

 


Posted by Estrella Azul at 8:22 pm

News Flash – Vol.3 #49

Community News, News Flash 3 Responses »
May 082012

An Indian film maker is hoping to turn one of Tom Gillespie’s #fridayflash short stories “My Beloved Edith“, into a short film. Check out the original and then imagine the Bollywood version!

Dan Powell’s submission to 1000 Words has been accepted and will apear sometime this month. 1000 words is celebrating National Flash Fiction Day by, over the course of May and early June,  posting the best of stories written in response to the images on their Pinterest board. At the time of writing, two of Dan’s stories have already been accepted. Dan also received his copy of “The Best British Short Stories 2012″, in which his short story, “Half-mown Lawn” appears.

“Red Riding Hood Revised”, Cahterine Russell’s #fridayflash, was published in the most recent Beyond Centauri. This was the first time she has received a contributor’s copy (as all her other sales were online or no contributor copy).

As A.B. Wells, Alison Wells is launching her debut novel, space comedy “Housewife with a Half-Life” today, on Tuesday May 8th. It’s available on Amazon.com, on Amazon.co.uk and on Smashwords.

Eric J Krause’s “Ghost Betweens” is now available for purchase in paperback at CreateSpace for $9.99. If you don’t have a Kindle or free Kindle Reader App, now is your chance to read his Young Adult Paranormal Romance/Adventure. (And do not let the YA tag throw you; it is a great read for adults, as well!) Click here to find it in the CreateSpace shop. Amazon will also be selling the paperback for the same price. That will be ready in 5 to 7 days. Enjoy reading, folks, and do not forget to leave a review at Amazon if you enjoy it!

101 Fiction, John Xero’s website, where he has been posting his own 101 word stories for over a year, is now open for submissions from anyone! The #fridayflash community has brought him plenty of visitors and great comments, now he hopes some #fridayflash folk might like to contribute stories too. 1 word title, 100 word story. Science fiction, fantasy, horror, surreal. For guidelines and submissions go here.

 

This is a great turnout for the NewsFlash this week, isn’t it so much more fun when you all send in your news items and the post is this long and wonderful?

Congrats to all!

~~~

As you might have noticed last week, we have a brand new FAQ page here on FFDO. Go check it out if you are new to #fridayflash, a new community member or an existing member wanting to spark your memory of all things #fridayflash.

~ Estrella Azul

Keep the good news coming! You can send in your news items concerning the Friday Flash community to Estrella at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting her on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page.

Posted by Estrella Azul at 11:04 am

Life and writing are messy - but you’ve got to love the challenge!

Guest post, Writers 8 Responses »
May 032012

Ever since Christmas 2010, I’ve been consciously taking refuge in reading. It’s the only thing that actually helps in forcing my mind to stop all the chattering and relax for a bit.

I’m feeling very lucky, though, because I absolutely love reading! I can read a book in a heartbeat. I’m a firm believer that reading affects our writing, especially enriching our vocabulary. So, I copy passages that especially touch my heart, acquire knowledge and discover new things, analyze, interpret and appreciate those written words.

And, when I’m really lucky, I find answers to questions I never even knew I had.

Bird by bird is my favorite book for 2011, and this is one of the passages which caught my attention and keeps popping up in my mind.

What people somehow forgot to mention when we were children was that we need to make messes in order to find out who we are and why we are here – and, by extension, what we’re supposed to be writing.

~ Anne Lamott

I love how honest and true it rings.

Because, let’s face it, most of us grew up learning how to do everything right – how not to color outside the lines, not to leave food on the plate, not to think of ourselves first, not to break the rules, not to step off the beaten path, not to make messes and mistakes, not to write about that particular embarrassing family holiday for our English composition homework because it’s private, and so on.

When, in fact, doing (well, trying to, at least) everything right only wears us down; perfectionism is tiring.

Coloring outside the lines makes us unique with a different vision than others’.

Leaving food on our plates means we’re done for right now, but we’ll eat again when we’re hungry.

Thinking of ourselves first isn’t selfish, but necessary, and makes us happier so we can make the people around us happier.

Breaking the right set of rules which don’t work for us sets us free to do something we love.

Stepping off the beaten path will lead us to find, and especially to make, our own way to where we need to go and not somewhere other people envision us to go.

Making messes and mistakes may set us one step back, or even more steps back . . . but we need to make mistakes in order to find out who we aren’t.

And finding out who we aren’t helps us find out who we are and why we’re here. There is no better way to learn and to grow.

And, by extension – with a little imagination and a lot of courage we can write about that particular embarrassing family holiday even if it feels like it’s private; because we’re writers and that’s what we do.

We’ll change names, setting and character descriptions, we’ll enhance specific traits and leave out others, we can even call it fiction; no one has to know it was a true story.

Maybe it won’t work, maybe it will be boring. Maybe we’ll rewrite it and it still won’t work. We’ll write something else.

Maybe we’ll write and rewrite a lot of stories which won’t work. They’ll challenge us!

But after writing them, we’ll know. We’ll get there.

We’ll know what we’re supposed to be writing.

When I’m not afraid to fail, I won’t. When I’m not afraid to fall down, falling down won’t feel like failure. I have fallen down enough to get more comfortable with it, to know how productive it can be, how necessary it is to growth. Still, when I sense the ground beneath me giving way, I have to remind myself that it’s OK if I falter.

I have to remind myself that it’s more than OK!

~ Jan Denise

 

Happy writing everyone!

~ Estrella Azul

 

Originally posted as a guest post by Estrella Azul on Fear of Writing.

Posted by Estrella Azul at 6:01 pm Tagged with: , , ,

News Flash – Vol.3 #48

Community News, News Flash 1 Response »
May 012012

Dan Powell’s story, “Strutting and Fretting“, went live at The National Flash Fiction Day flashes site which is up and running in advance of the May 16th celebrations.

“Golden Opportunity”, PJ Kaiser’s story which appeared in “Literary Mix Tapes:  Nothing But Flowers”, has been selected for inclusion in the “Movie Project”.

You can now purchase the e-book version of Eric J Krause’s “Ghost Betweens” for Kindle, on Amazon.

***

Alan Baxter woke up to a Ditmar Award nomination. Read all about it in his blog post.

The No Sleep Podcast is adapting Al Bruno III’s story “The Man That Ate Newborns” into an audio play.

Over at Write Anything, Tony Noland answers the perennial question: “How’s that novel coming along?”

Have you signed up for some dark and quirky urban fantasy from Emma Newman, as part of her Split Worlds project? You are missing out if you have not. This past week, she was over at Jon Strother’s place with her flash fiction, “The Necessary Witness – part two”.

We really do have such a talented group of writers here. Congrats to all!

~ Estrella Azul

Keep the good news coming! You can send in your news items concerning the Friday Flash community to Estrella at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting her on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page.

Posted by Estrella Azul at 6:17 pm

News Flash – Vol.3 #47

Community News, News Flash 2 Responses »
Apr 242012

One of Linda Simoni-Wastila’s wee fictions has found a nest. “Mama Loves Birds” up at Blue Five Notebook.

The Best British Short Stories 2012, in which Dan Powell has a story included, was published at the beginning of this week. Dan’s local library will be buying in a copy and are asking their reading group about his doing a reading and/or some kind of writing workshop for them. Also, Dan’s story, “Peekaboo”, has been accepted for the imminent National Flash Fiction Day anthology Jawbreaker. Dan has been quite busy. He was interviewed by Nuala Ní Chonchúir regarding his writing over on Nuala’s blog Women Rule Writer.

After a six month break Mari Juniper is back to writing. Here is the article she wrote for #Amwriting.org, the important lessons she learned from her time away.

Tom Gillespie has signed a publishing deal with Crooked Cat Books and his new novel, “Painting by Numbers”, will be out later this year.

Eric J. Krause is having a release party for his young adult paranormal novel, “Ghost Betweens”. You can join in while it runs from April 24th until the 27th.

Congratulations to all!

~ Estrella Azul

 

Keep the good news coming! You can send in your news items concerning the Friday Flash community to Estrella at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting her on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page.

Posted by Estrella Azul at 10:17 am

News Flash – Vol.3 #46

Community News, News Flash No Responses »
Apr 172012

Jodi MacArthur interviewed script writer, film producer, and actress Yelena Sabel over at Pulp Metal Magazine.

Janel Gradowski has a flash fiction piece included in “Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Presents Flush Fiction”, which contains 88 short-short stories you can read in a single sitting. Janel seems to have been quite busy, as her flash fiction piece, “Soldier of Fortune”, has been the winner of December Mysterious Photo contest and is now included in the June issue of Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine.

Helen Howell’s story, “I AM”, has been accepted for the Blood Vengeance Vampyre contest on The Were Traveler.

Congrats to all!

~ Estrella Azul

 

Keep the good news coming! You can send in your news items concerning the Friday Flash community to Estrella at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting her on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page.

Posted by Estrella Azul at 9:25 am

5 Quick Ways to Minimize Distractions and Get Writing

Guest post 3 Responses »
Apr 122012

Today we have a guest post from Alexis MacDonald for your reading pleasure. Alexis is not a member of the #fridayflash community, but her excitement to write a guest post for us and the wonderful content she provided have quickly sealed the deal. I am pleased to present to you her article detailing 5 Quick Ways to Minimize Distractions and Get Writing. We are all writers here and let’s face it – we all need to read this advice, maybe even more than once.

~ Estrella Azul

 

5 Quick Ways to Minimize Distractions and Get Writing

There are times in our lives that no matter how diligent we are about setting aside private time to write, life insists on getting in the way. Here are a few tips to help writers roll with the metaphorical punches and get some words down!

1. Self-discipline

Make writing a habit. Write at the same time every day. Write throughout the day. Read a page about writing and then write a paragraph.

2. Disengagement

As writers, we do not need to be connected to others every minute of the day. We know that in order to focus, we need to disengage ourselves from our social life.

• Install a door. There are limits to what a door can do. In spite of their best intentions, family members tend to neglect to respect this impediment and will knock and open it anyway. But the door will diminish the recent movie rental or stereo playing in the family room.

• Telephones. Ring tones and vibrations are extremely distracting. If you have a mobile phone, arrange it so that it does not ring, a light merely flashes. Set it off to one side and in either case, merely glance at the caller ID and unless it is an emergency, ignore it. As long as someone else is at home who can answer it, do not answer the phone at your writing desk.

• The Social Internet. It should not have to be said that in order to better focus, a writer should be self-disciplined enough to have turned off all their social applications that would vie for attention. There are programs to download that help writer’s monitor their time and block out social sites but why would a disciplined writer resort to using these programs? On the other hand, having the Internet up is important for research.

3. Nutrition and hydration

It is important to be energetic yet be calm enough to focus. Did you know that the lack of calcium causes mental depression or that iodine is a mental energizer? Besides salt, iodine is found in peppers, kelp, and raw goat milk. Although coffee and alcohol are commonly connected to writers, water, green tea, and organic fruit juices help maintain hydration and energize the mind. There are also over-the-counter eye drops that help moisturize dry, weary eyeballs.

4. Music

Because writers are creative people, many are also musicians and artists. Some writers cannot work while listening to music with lyrics because they tend to concentrate on the lyrics while others who play instruments cannot listen to music at all. Some need white noise in the background in order to write. Be aware of this and use whatever helps you get the job done. Ear plugs can help but, some people strain to listen to the outside world even more when they use them.

 

If the above tips failed to help, this next one – while seemingly a detractor, might actually remedy the situation.

5. Be in a noisy, busy environment

Going to a place like a mall or a coffee shop where there are people and noise all around you can be freeing. There are times when an overly busy environment actually helps one block out individual distractions and concentrate better. Along those lines, being around other writers who are engaged in their writing can really get you cracking on your own project.

 

———————————————————————————————————

About the author:

Alexis MacDonald is a stay at home mom, midnight scribbler and a freelance pregnancy writer. She answers questions such as “how do you get pregnant” (hint, it’s more complex than you think – for instance: there’s a fertility calendar…) :)

 

Posted by Estrella Azul at 12:21 pm

News Flash – Vol.3 #45

Community News, News Flash 2 Responses »
Apr 102012

Kevin J. Mackey’s fantasy story, “A Song of Danard”, was featured over at Short-Story.me last week.

Jodi Cleghorn has a story, “Intersected”, in the newly available second issue of Vine Leaves Literary Journal (on page 17).

Adam Byatt and Jodi Cleghorn are launching a collaborative project on 10 April called Post Marked: Piper’s Reach. They visited a few #FridayFlash participants on their pre-release Blog Tour. You can catch up on the tour and learn more about the project at their website, Post Marked: Piper’s Reach.

Rebecca Emin has the Facebook event up for the official launch of “When Dreams Come True”, her second novel, on 28 May.

Susan Helene Gottfried invites us all along for the release of “King Trevor”, the much-anticipated follow-up to “Trevor’s Song”, on April 12. Here are the Amazon and Smashwords links.

~~~

“Literary Mix Tapes” flashes turned into short films? You read that correctly. Here is the scoop on things, over at Write Anything.

Congratulations to all!

~ Estrella Azul

 

Keep the good news coming! You can send in your news items concerning the Friday Flash community to Estrella at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting her on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page.

Posted by Estrella Azul at 8:49 am

News Flash – Vol.3 #44

Community News, News Flash 2 Responses »
Apr 032012

Nadine Maritz was interviewed at Real Vampire News, and offer us further insights into the literary figure that the “new” vampires have become. Congrats, Nadine!

John Wiswell’s newest podcast, “Consumed: Spoiled – Just don’t (Mass Effect) 3″ is available for listening and free download. This episode is all about BioWare’s controversial release of Mass Effect 3. Well done, John!

If you are looking for writing prompts, check out Maria Kelly’s here or Eric J. Krause’s here from their blogs. Thanks, Maria and Eric!

~~~

In case you missed it last week, here is some information Tim VanSant offered regarding our I write Friday Flash Badge page here on FFDO. We are pleased with the responses!

E.D. Johnson managed to write a wonderful, highly believable, article this past Sunday, which just so happened to be April 1st. For a laugh, go read BOFF 3 Submissions.

~~~

Now it is time for a quick reminder: I occasionally beg ask you guys on Twitter, FB and G+ to send in your own news items. That is because I am prone to miss some of your news items as life tends to happen (while holding down all three of my current jobs), and can get crazy busy sometimes. Please keep the good news coming in order for the NewsFlash to be filled with all of your wonderful achievements! It would help me out so much if you did so. You can send in your own, or even another #fridayflash member’s, news items concerning the Friday Flash community to me, Estrella, at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting me on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting it on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page. 

Looking forward to hearing from you. Thanks!

~ Estrella Azul

Posted by Estrella Azul at 10:16 am

News Flash – Vol.3 #43

Community News, News Flash Comments Off
Mar 272012

Jodi Macarthur’s flash, “Tap”, has a place in the 9 Days of Madness over at The Leaky Pencil.

Featured at Bibliophilic Blather was  “Precious Sleep”, Janel Gradowski’s #fridayflash for last week.

Virginia Moffatt’s flash fiction piece, “Following the Real Miss Piggy”, is being published in a pamphlet to accompany the Manchester based Blank Media Collective’s “Inside” art exhibition.

On the Bookbag website, Marc Nash was interviewed about his writing.

Congratulations to all!

~~~

Tim Van Sant has some news regarding the “I write#FridayFlash” badge page here on FFDO. Expect that in a full post on Thursday.

~ Estrella Azul

 

Keep the good news coming! You can send in your news items concerning the Friday Flash community to Estrella at estrella.azul@fridayflash.org or by contacting her on Facebook or Twitter. Or feel free to share your news by posting on the#fridayflash Facebook Group Page.

Posted by Estrella Azul at 9:41 am
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