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Power Naps for Creative Writing
by Caroline LawrenceRecent studies have shown that taking a short nap is a great way of improving productivity in a day.You admired Google's sleep pods in the 2013 movie, The Internship. Ben and...
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Murder weapons - Michelle Lovric
Lucy Coats and I teach a regular Guardian Masterclass about Writing for Children. Now I also write for adults. And I consider that I write for both sexes, regardless of age. So, being bi-genred?...
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The Gadzooks Question, by Laurie Graham
Any writer of historical fiction has a decision to make before they commit a single word to paper: how will their characters speak? The more distant the era of their story, the tougher the task before...
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My hero by Tanya Landman
Why do I like this letter so much?It was written by my hero, EB.White, to a man teetering on the brink of despair.Dear Mr. Nadeau:As long as there is one upright man, as long as there is one...
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SAY CHEESE: Turkish Women Laugh Back and the History of the Female Smile –...
According to Turkish deputy prime minister Bülent Arniç women should not laugh in public because 'a woman should be chaste. She should know the difference between public and private,' and 'chastity is...
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YALC, a view from the Green Room by Catherine Johnson
I know this happened a month ago now but it was pretty big and very new and if - fingers crossed - Malorie Blackman's exciting new initiative takes off here's hoping it was the first of many. If...
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Posting Inns
by Marie-Louise JensenWith the rise of travel and tourism in the 18th Century, coaching inns or posting inns began to spring up all over the country. The heyday of coaching, stagecoaches and the mail...
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The day I went to Buckingham Palace... by Sue Purkiss
Well, I don't know about you, but I find it's not all that often that I get an invitation to Buckingham Palace. So when, a few months ago, I was invited to a preview of a new exhibition called 'Royal...
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HISTORY ALMOST DAILY by Penny Dolan.
As this is now the second half of August – the downward slope? - my History Girl post is very much a “staycation” kind of piece. Besides, I have work I need to get on with come tomorrow.An interest in...
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Guns and Knives - Celia Rees
Until very recently, I'd never shot a gun. I was rubbish, predictably, but I felt that I ought to have done so, at least once, having written about them so many times in so many books. Guns, knives,...
View ArticleWriting historical fiction by Christina Koning
‘I don’t like historical fiction,’ a friend said recently and, until a few years ago, I might well have agreed with him. I mean – what’s the point of setting your story in the past, when there’s so...
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'Last Look - The Truth about Crimea' by A L Berridge
Admit it, you’re sick to death of Crimea. Writing a series set in one war has made me rather single-minded, and looking back over my time at the History Girls I seem to have written about little else....
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Josselin by Imogen Robertson
I’ve been away on my holidays. This gives me the chance to put up a picture of the town I went to, Josselin in Brittany. Among other things, it has this magnificent castle.You can read about it in...
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Art Lovers
It ought to be illegal for an artist to marry.... If the artist must marry let him find someone more interested in art, or his art, or the artist part of him, than in him. After which let them take tea...
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History and Bigotry, by Leslie Wilson
Paul von Hindenburg, one of the two generalscommanding German troops on 23rd August1914 at AllensteinA hundred years ago today was the start of the battle of Tannenberg. It was fought at...
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FINDING 'ALIENOR': The Journey so far by Elizabeth Chadwick.
It doesn't seem a minute since I was sitting over lunch with my agent and editor discussing my next project, which we decided would be three novels on Eleanor of Aquitaine. Her life story had been on...
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TESTAMENTS OF VERA by Eleanor Updale
This month I was given the highly enjoyable task of talking about Vera Brittain’s great book Testament of Youth at the Edinburgh Book Festival. Don’t worry, I’m not going to reprise my entire talk...
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Scarlet Beauties as ancient as Olive Drupes by Carol Drinkwater
Flowering Pomegranate tree in our garden in the South of FranceVarious parts of a PomegranateTangerines remind me of childhood Christmases. Can you recall that tangy aroma once you’d pierced the skin...
View ArticleBooks are a problem, by Louisa Young (note the importance of a comma . . . )
Todays blog is short; forgive me.Also, it is a question, and a request.I am due to deliver a novel in October.For perhaps four years I have been reading books about the time (1930s), setting (Italy),...
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Hide & Seek, by Clare Mulley
This month The Folio Society republished one of the great memoirs of the Second World War; Xan Fielding’s Hide & Seek. Described by Antony Beevor as, ‘one of the great modern books not just of the...
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