My new writing space, and recommendations
I’ve been meaning to post a couple recommendations here for weeks, and now that I’ve got a nifty new writing station, I’ve decided it is time to do it!
First, the recommendations, and then the story of how my new writing space came to be.
My first recommendation is my friend Ashley Isaacson’s first book, Kingdom Horizon. The book is Christian/historical fiction with some elements of fantasy. I worked on the first part of this book as an editor and I am looking forward to reading parts two and three as well — it’s next in line on my e-reader. Ashley is a talented writer and designer whose name you may recognize from her credit in my website’s footer.- The second is Can Science Fiction Save the World?, a great podcast about the power of science fiction literature. As a long-time reader/writer of speculative fiction, this podcast articulates well what I love about the genre. (For the record, all of the SMNTY podcasts are quite good — but most of them do not relate to this blog.)
Now, despite the resounding silence on this blog over the last several weeks, I have still been writing. Most of my blogging energy, which used to come here to play, is currently going into my Year in Disney Movies project, which has been a bigger undertaking than I initially imagined, although still lots of fun. I’m also STILL writing that Rapunzel retelling (the end is in sight, I swear it!), and I’m also nearly finished with the writing exercises in Julia Cameron’s The Right to Write.
Last week’s exercise is the one that led to my new writing station. The “assignment” was to create a new writing space for yourself. I almost gave myself a free pass on it. My husband and I are building an outdoor office, so surely that must count, right? Plus, we have a small house, I’m already writing in every available corner, etc. etc.
And then I remembered the mailing desk my great grandfather made.
The mailing desk whose surface had not been cleaned since … 2012?
When I first moved in with my husband, the basement wasn’t finished and so I didn’t “move office” from my old house. Instead, I set up shop temporarily at this mailing desk, the only desk in the house at the time. After we finished the basement and I properly moved my office from my old house to this one, this desk became forgotten — and just another horizontal space upon which to accumulate clutter — checkbooks, labels, old mail, and mostly, my writing notes and manuscript carcasses.
That’s no life for a desk.
So I made reclaiming that surface my weekend goal, and, voilà, I am writing upon it now! As an added bonus, the desk portion folds up, so I will keep it closed when it is not in use. Clutter, you are no longer welcome here!