Books I Have Read - The Trouble with Wenlocks

I have just finished reading a little book titled 'The Trouble with Wenlocks a Stanley Wells Mystery" written by Joel Stewart.

It is strange little book with a strange story that turns out not to be so small but big, huge even. It is about a small boy named Stanley Wells who imagines everything and anything to the point were reality and imagination get lost.

He meets Dr E. B. Moon who is an unraveller of ravelled things. An untangler of the tangled. With his faithfully dog (I suppose you'd call him and by the way Dr Moon is NOT a person) the three of them try to solve the problem of the Wenlocks that keep eating the Sorrows (little furry creatures) that are hanging over everybodies heads.

Upon meeting Albert Lee, a man who lives on a river boat Stanley finds that his daughter Umiko is missing. She has been kidnapped by the Wenlocks.

The search begins to find Umiko and on the way people are found sitting, standing, laying down like zombies. Wenlocks are everywhere eating up the Sorrows that float over peoples heads and as the Sorrow is taken away the human becomes a zombie.

As the puzzle unfolds Umiko is found creating lots of little Sorrow creatures from her bad memories of her mother dieing of cancer when she was younger. She also created the Wenlocks to eat up the Sorrows to make people feel better. It is not until Stanley points out that we all need our sorrows to make us human that she makes them all go away except for one Sorrow, which she keeps for herself as she is not ready to give it up yet.

I found this story an amazing way of discussing the problem of sorrow, heartache and how people will try to get rid of it in anyway they can so they can feel better but in the end it doesn't work. People need their hate, their sorrow, their sadness to know what love, kindness, happiness is. We are all made up of the experiences we have had in the past and no matter how much we would like to get rid of the pain it is with us until the day we die. We just have to come to terms with it and change it into something positive or else it will eat us up like the Wenlocks.

Creative People - Pip and Pop Display

Well I visited the diplay 'We Miss You Magic Land' being displayed at the Queensland Gallery/ Gallery of Modern Art and I must say that for a person like me it was AMAZING!

What I did find interesting beside the obvious creativity and detail to the colour schemes and the overal design of the whole display was the way people interacted with it. Most people wanted to get down on their knees and lean on the edging (which was NOT allowed) so they could look straight at it.
The range of ages of the people were amazing. It was NOT just for children.
I've taken over 80 photos and I'm soo pleased I have.

I loved the twinkling lights. It gave the static display movement and it is something to think about with my own model. The use of space was very good. There were areas of absolute clutter and colour and then of others of just empty space. It made the whole thing better. The more you looked the more you saw. Which is what I am doing with my model. It was also amazing to 'see' what the artist's used to create this amazing display.

I for one LOVED it and strongly recommend that if you can visit the display do so.
If this doesn't inspire people I don't know what would.





This extrodinary piece of artwork is being displayed (free entry) at GOMA - Queensland Art Gallery/ Gallery of Modern Art from 26th November to the 4th March 2012 located at South Brisbane. (See map below)

'Perth-based artist duo Pip & Pop (Nicole Andrijevic and Tanya Schultz) will create an immersive and vibrant environment for children and families to explore in this major Children’s Art Centre installation as part of GOMA’s fifth anniversary celebrations.
Drawing on children’s stories, creation myths, Buddhist cosmologies, video games and folktales, Pip & Pop create large-scale fantasy worlds coloured with a bright, often fluorescent palette, using cake-decorating tools, intricate layers of sugar, glitter, modelling clay and mirrors.
Pathways and peepholes will lead visitors to different worlds: a magical forest filled with strange flowers, vines, mushrooms and animals; a cosmic universe condensed into a darkened room with twinkly stars; and a volcanic lake with crystals, mist and liquid pools are just some of the creations waiting to be discovered.'
Information above supplied by the Qld Art gallery website.

Books I Have Read - Pond Magic

I have just finished reading for the second time Pond Magic by Angela Sunde.
Now I have known Angela for three years and I find her nothing but inspirational.
When I first read Pond Magic in its infansay as a manuscript I was amazed at the magic, the cleverness and wonder of the story. Now that it is finished, tidied up and squished down into the number of words that are required to be an Aussie Chomps author it is just great!

As you know everything is beholdent to the viewer (or reader as in this case) and I am a person (if you couldn't tell that likes MAGIC! WONDER! and CLEVERNESS! and that is what I see and read when I read this book.)

By the way the story behind Angela being picked up by Penguin Publishers deserves a story all of its own but I am not here to talk about that.

Here Angela has written a mesmerising tale about the trials and tribulations of a girl - Lily Pond- of 12 living nextdoor to a witch! When Lily starts burping and her feet become webbed and her skin turns green she realises that she is turning into a frog! Something has to be done! I mean to say she nearly eats a fly for crying out loud!

As Lily struggles with this dissaster and the kids at school teasing her another one comes to live with her in the form of an exchange student from France - Rainier le Dauphin. She finds this person who she refers to as Rain Gauge or Rainy (just pick one) irratating beyond dispare. Lily's mother on the other hand is delighted as she is with all things French but wouldn't you know it in the end Lily needs Rainier to save her from ending her days living the back yard pond.

I have found this a delightful story and as I know there is a second story about the adventures of Lily Pond in the winds I, for one, just can't wait.

Below is a list of places that you are able to purchase a copy of Pond Magic. Also if any one would like to have a signed copy then please contact Angela through her web site. Angela Sunde's web site.

A local Gold Coast bookstore;
Network Educational 4/498 Scottsdale Dr, Varsity Lakes, Gold Coast. Network Educational
and
Love That Book bookstore, Southport Park Shopping Centre, Southport Park, Gold Coast. Love That Book Store

Pond Magic can be ordered from any bookstore in Australia and New Zealand.

It can also be ordered from any online store such as: these are all facebook sites. Just click on the continue button there is no need to log in if you are just looking.

Fishpond: Fishpond
Borders online: Borders Online
Mighty Ape online: Mighty Ape
Seek Books online: Seek Books
Booktopia: Booktopia

The book retails for approx $12.99.

Prana Writers Win

We won and we have the awards to prove it!

As mentioned in my previous post Prana Writers won the Write A Book In A Day Competition. We are the National Winner as well as the Eastern States Winner!

This award or should I say awards were given out by the Royal Children's Hospital.
Visit Prana Writers blog for more information. Click Here.

On the 24th November 2011 the group (less two members who were unable to attend) was prented with the awards at the Gold Coast City Creative Juices Networking Event. The members of the team that participated in the project were presented with a certificate and a T-shirt.

Prana members Angela Sunde presentated a power point presentation on the creating of the winning entry (The Coral Sea Monster). She went through the many processes that the group needed to complete in the one day. It was not until the beginning of the day did the members even know what it was they were to write about.

Tom Betts gave a presentation on how the Prana Writers came into being. He explained how a group of sixteen came together three years ago when the Gold Coast Council ran a Write A Kids Book workshop with Louise Cusack. The next year eleven of us decided to apply for a grant and employ Louise again. This year those eleven became known as Prana Writers.

It was a wonderful night and I am soo proud of our group.
Below is an exert from the judges report on The Coral Sea Monster by Prana Writers.

'The Winner of the Open Section this year is the most beautifully illustrated as well as the best written story of the bunch: ‘The Coral Sea Monster’ by Prana Writers. The team was given the challenge to include a podiatrist, a sheep shearer and a sea animal in their work, as well as to employ the setting of a motorway and the theme of love. The result is an amusing and engaging story of a 13 year-old sheep-whisperer, Jack, whose hopes of competing in the shearing event at the Ekka showgrounds are shot through when a truck overturns on the motorway into Brisbane, blocking the traffic in both directions. The truck in question is carrying a sea monster, of course, and Jack and his new found friend, a teen podiatrist (yes, there is such a girl!), set out on a fun-packed adventure to save the sea monster from the clutches of Lionel Measly, the greedy Ocean-World curator who hopes to make a million out of the endangered species. A competition like Book-in-a -Day challenges all of its competitors to take an imaginative leap, to work together against the ticking clock, to produce something extraordinary and new. ‘The Coral Sea Monster’ is a delightful example of the best kind of new work this competition is capable of producing. Congratulations to team members Tom Betts, Rob Brown, Margaret Choinski, Rebecca Fraser, Janis Hanley, Kerry McGuicken, Helen Stubbs, Angela Sunde and Amanda Worlley, as well as to the children at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane, to whom this team’s sponsors directed their funds. You are all very worthy winners!'

Congratulations of a job well done and may we all go from strength to strength in the coming years.

Creative People - Inga Moore

I have come across a blog called Surface Fragments. Within in it are some amazing pictures and information. One of those is about Inga Moore. She is an english illustrator who is now living in Austrlia and I thought I would show you just a couple of her beautiful pictures here. These are from The Wind in The Willows and The Secret Garden. I highly recommend that you vist this blog and see more of her work. I had hoped to find an offical website of her work but as of yet nothing!




Wouldn't it be wonderful to paint like this!

Creative People - Lisa Lichtenfels

Many many many years ago when I was at the workshop fo Robert McKinnley in Brisbane so was Lisa Lichtenfels. I have collected images of her work for many years and have just stummbled across her site.

Isn't she amazing (below) and to think she is made out of fabric and nylon!
If you would like to know 'how' Lisa creates her art work make sure you go to the 'Techniques' title of her site.

Creative People - Lorell Leham

I love to troll through the web and see what other people are creating. To me the web is like a huge library and I LOVE library's.

Today I have found Lorell Leham I found her because I was looking in Google Images for original fantasy dolls. I came across the art work of Koldo Barroso and therefore came across Lorell.


This is one of her amazing dolls and it is called The Pobble. Isn't it brilliant!
P.S. I have found a lot of her work on her older posts in her blog. As of the time of this post her website was not up and running again.

My theory is that a person needs to see and learn from people who are better than they are. In my case I'm looking for people who are much better in creative dolls and models. I love to see what they have created (I collect their images for reference) I love to learn how they create these creatures and why they have created them. Enjoy.

I have Finished! Well Almost.

I have finished my story, well almost. When one is writing a story, big or small for that mater, there are so many many things that have to done. I am the type of person, I have learnt, who writes one chapter and when I am happy with it then I write another. When I have finished what I thought I wanted to say I sit down and read the whole story from beginning to end. For myself I have found writing to be like any other craft I do. In this instance I shut my eyes and touch type. When I open my eyes what I wanted to say is there on the page, mostly.
        Anyway I found that the story was pretty well what I expected but then thought 'Well hang on a minute. How are my characters going to get across a field when they are only the size of a person's thumb! How are they going to send and receive messages and more importantly I can not just have them go from A to B with nothing exciting happening. Umm ... I wonder what I could do to them?'
        Another thing I found invaluable was a 'time schedual'. Not for my writing but because I have two groups of characters that only meet up at the end of the story. I needed to know where everyone was in relation to everyone else. This was soo important. Upon creating one of these I found I needed another day with one group of my characters and so I had to create a disaster to delay them. Once this was put in place I ended up with a dilemma. I now had delayed them so much that now they had no time to catch up and be in the right place at the right time! Strewth! I'd done it now!
       I then devised a way to solve this problem and, as my story is being read at this very moment by some trusted friends, I'm sure they will tell me if the solution is plausible or not.
       Now that my story is written it is being read by, as I said before, some trusted friends who are authors themselves. I shall also be delivering my story up to a dear friend of mine who is the smartest man I've every known and he will sort out my grammar. Once all of this info comes back I intend to take myself off for a week and go through my story from top to toe and THEN it shall be finished! That is until an editor gets his/her hands on it. It just never ends!
      Now I am turning my attention to a cover letter and the synopsis.
      I can't wait to start my other story. That I am really looking forward to.

WE WON!

                             WE WON!
or should I say the Prana Writers won the National Awards for the Write a Book in a Day competition.
Unfortunately I and two other members were away at the time the other members of the Prana Writers were competing in the competition.

It is amazing, on the one hand, that our group has pulled off something so brilliant and distressing on the other that I was unable to be there to be part of it. I was on a two week trip up to the Gulf of Carpentaria. I enjoyed myself immensely and I was able to complete an awful lot of writting on my story but still ...

http://f1.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/wJW1Tgd1N2rlVWNln-mh_Yj8iNrauNayehWz1aUXEht-aZYejvnvZf5nISdr5wDV_i5InDahMzfiJw4WBNFsXwFUYuJgqFmt6w/Write%20a%20Book%20in%20a%20Day%202011/Prana%20Media%20Release.5.pdf

I have included the link for the press release of our groups success. Before the group knew of their success they had decided to re-edit the story The Coral Sea Monster with a view of self publishing it and donating some of the profits to the Royal Children's Hospital as a matter of course. Now that the group has won, that will definitely be happening.
The three of us that were unable to be involved in creating this fine story have been asked to review the story once it has been polished up by the eight members who came up with the story in the first place.

It is an amazing accomplishment by the members of the group and I congratulated them all on their achievement.

Write A Book In A Day Competiton

I thought I would share with you something rather special. I am involved with a writting group called Prana Writers. The group entered a competion called 'Write A Book In A Day'. The idea of the national competiton was to raise money for a hospital. We chose the Royal Children's Hospital. We raised $940.00. Our book is called The Coral Sea Monster.

Anyway the good news is that Prana Writers has been shortlisted to win. If we win (which we will find out today - the 3rd November) the book will be printed and half the profits will go to the hospital. I think that goes for two years (but don't quote me on that.)

I will keep you posted.