This week, in the interest of writing more, and being around other passionate creative types I made a real-life leap of faith and joined a writing group. It was a night of words and wine and women, all being supportive of each other’s words and pursuits. It was sincerely one of the best nights I’ve had in a long time, allowed me to meet other writers IRL, because whilst I adore my internet friends there’s always something to be said for sitting face to face with the people you’re trying to connect with. The group, Write Young Things (follow them everywhere), have their own website/publishing platform which I intended to utilise this week with one of the pieces I started in our meeting, but life has dragged me away. Once I do get some work posted there, I’ll link to it here on the blog so you can enjoy the fruits of my labour.

Also in the world of writing, I’ve been submitting work to a lot of journals this week from my old archives to make the most of my lunch breaks at work, so hopefully that’s something that will pay off. Writing has been hard to carve the time out for, so recycling maximises my productivity in a manageable way.

I’m always looking for inspiration, for writing, for self-betterment, and to just feel good about the world I inhabit. Lately, I’ve been listening to a lot of TED talks as I potter about. I’ve only jut made an account, so I don’t have any likes I can share just yet, but next week I will link you to some of my favourites so far. Happy listening!

I’ve already covered a lot of ground when it comes to summarising Real Life last week – namely, writing group and working hard. I picked up an extra day at work, had a hospital visit that I completely forgot about until the night before, and have just generally felt a little… Overstretched. I’ve been fighting stress dreams, and I let the tiredness overwhelm and overrule my routine, which actually made sleep harder to come by. Maybe it’s the weather, or because my chronic illness has been getting worse again, or just because the week was busy. Hopefully, all I need is a bit of time to rest, and re-set, and everything will settle again.

Oh, by the way, the featured image is from the poetry cafe, doesn’t the lemon cake look divine? I always appreciate how that place knows it’s way around a cake. 

Last week I mentioned I was reading Damned by Chuck Palahniuk, and this week I finally finished it. The book was… different, though that’s a vague and apt descriptor of any Chuck novel, and I have rather mixed feelings about it. I should start by pointing out that this is a favourite author of mine, and Fight Club and Invisible Monsters are two of the most formative and inspiring pieces of fiction that I come back to over and over. Damned was both everything and nothing like what I expected it to be, and it took me longer than is usual for a book by this author for me to get really into the action, I just could not lose myself in the story for the longest time. But once I finally did, and once the narration – which is as clear-voiced as any of Palahniuk’s creations – stopped feeling grating and started to win me over to the protagonist’s typically anti-heroic at best side I was sold. Listen, it’s about a thirteen-year-old girl going to literal hell, the landscape was as putrid as the age tends to make people and sometimes I had trouble getting past that wall, but once the twists and turns began I was well entrenched in the story. I’m not looking to spoil it, so I will simply say: try the novel; it will fight you the whole way, but once it has its claws sunk deep you will let it drag you down to its level.

The aforementioned writing group really did bring out the happy in me this week more than anything else, and I’m chomping the bit for the next meeting.