Happy New Year 2018

Happy New Year 2018 Fireworks in London (from BBC)

Happy New Year 2018 and thanks for dropping by.

A new year means new beginnings, resolutions and good intentions. 2017 was a very tough year for me in my personal life so I am very pleased to leave it behind and look forward to fresh horizons. As with anyone who takes a hit on the personal front, my work life has suffered over the last twelve months and I start the new year looking forward to getting back to the focus of being an author.

As I have said in other posts, being an author is not all about writing. There are a lot of other aspects to the job – including writing blog posts! So my current Open Projects List looks like this :

  • Series fiction proposals – this is my creative focus for the beginning of the year. I’d love to write and sell one of my zany series fiction ideas to a major publisher.

Move over Famous Five and Beast Quest!

  • Devise sessions for an after school club – I’m delighted to have been asked to run a creative writing club at a school in Forest Hill. I hope to be able to share some of their work later in the year.
  • Write a day course for adults. I teach creative writing part-time at The City Lit in London and I am running a course in early February so I need to put the materials together.
  • CWISL – I belong to a group of authors called CWISL – Children’s Writers and Illustrators for Stories and Literacy – we work together to deliver literary events for children. I’m joint webmaster for CWISL and I’m also jointly responsible for creating the annual literary quiz
  • Review my website (this one) and build a new one to promote my services as a literary mentor to aspiring children’s authors. So if you know anyone who would like some help then ask them to drop me a line.
  • Papers Pens Poets. Like many authors I am a stationery addict. Eighteen months ago,  I set up a website with my dear friend Anita Loughrey, exploring the way authors use stationery in their work. Papers Pens Poets includes interviews with authors and stationery reviews.

Anita at the London Stationery Show

Anita and Me – a business lunch overlooking the Thames

Sadly, Papers Pens Poets has been another victim of my difficult year so I’m determined to put that right in 2018.

So it’s a busy start to 2018. Bring it on!

Jo Franklin

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