Susan Forest

Thanks to Simone at Brol, I now have our flights booked within Brazil and to Chile and Uruguay. We’ll get to go to many places we’ve researched and look facinating: Foz do Iguacu falls, see a sunken ship at Montevideo, 3 days of motorcycle riding through the Andes, the Pantanal, historical Salvador and hiking in the Champada Diamantia, and a steam locomotive (of course!) in Tiradentes!

I am so glad I went: I attended 4 breakout sessions as well as the 3 keynotes and each one was instructive and engaging. The Grammar Gals were hilarious and had a ton of resources. The session on the roles of the writer/agent/editor/publisher was fascinating, and questions from the floor helped to move the topic into deeper levels–a well-moderated panel! I moderated the one on genre fiction, and was very happy I did not run out of questions–and again, questions from the floor were very perceptive. The panel on YA, like the others, was really good, too. AND–I managed to take a tour of the Alberta Legislative Assembly Building before coming home. As my screenplay deals partially with Alberta politics, it was wonderful to be in the building to get a sense of the setting.

One of my students, Leesa, sent me an email that included the following:

You have an amazing talent to see things clearer than I ever do. I can not even put words to it, but I appreciate it so much, especially when it’s my work your talking about. It’s like you bring a new lens and focus to things I have not yet learned how to see. It was because of you that I re-wrote a turning point chapter. I had Arie removing her gloves because I knew it needed to happen, but until you pointed out that finally her character was being pressed to change, I sincerely did not see it that way. It changed how I proceeded.

Thanks, so much, Leesa, for the kind words!

Into the home stretch: writing the climax! And, today, I presented at the Calgary Young Writers’ Conference. I always enjoy the day because the kids are always so enthusiastic. Also, it is great to touch base with so many writers, many of

I often find the second half of a book goes so much faster than the first half, because of course, I know my characters and what is happening so much better. So now I feel like I am on a real roll. Hope to finish the first draft by the end of the month. On the other hand, I have often found that the last few chapters turn out to be really long and I wind up dividing them up–more, but shorter chapters. So…maybe the end of the month is a bit ambitious. Still–good to have a goal.

I wrote 11,000 words in 3 chapters. Finished to the end of Chapter 19, including 2 naval battles, each very different from the other. Very satisfying.

So nothing new on the writing front to report this week–took a ski holiday, which was loads of fun. However I did get some time to read “The Book Of Negroes” which was fabulous! Usually I read in such short bits, it takes me forever to get through a book, so it was nice to sit down and live in Lawrence Hill’s world for a week!

Just got home from the Calgary Public Library’s writers’ conference (which was, as always, fabulous) and learned that I sold a story to The Urban Green Man anthology coming out this summer from Edge Press! I’m pumped! My first sale for 2013!

Went back and added a few lines of dialogue to plant the info I needed for the next chapter. Very straightforward to start the next chapter–carrying on from a scene 2 chapters back that ended on a high note.

…and Chapter 13 is half way through the book (I have it plotted out to 26 chapters). Yay! And, I always find the second half goes faster than the first half.