Ruth E. Walker's Blog

What if you knew the clock was clicking so loudly that you could actually hear it. My writer-colleague Annette McLeod must make a decision no parent would choose to be burdened with. Honest, clear and undeniable, she faces that decision in a most human way.

Inkstroke's Blog

Cancer is like a black hole. It devours friends and family and leaves broken survivors in its wake. Survivors who bear the scars of surgery, Chemo burns, and the invisible scars that no one sees. Loved ones who carry the scars of watching their friends, family, spouses, children, suffer.

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Originally published August 2016 on Writescape‘s Top Drawer blog.

Years ago, I was a committed aquafit attendee. Underwater lunges, leg lifts by the jets, jogging through chlorinated pools—it all turned my crank. I went twice a week with my best friend, Linda. We had a blast, challenging each other to push harder, harder. We churned up big waves with our enthusiasm and built up some wonderful stamina and energy. Aquafit helped keep me healthier and decidedly thinner.

But life got in the way. I lost interest. And, you know, aquafit just moved to the backburner of “I’ll sign up next year.”

Several years and pounds later, I find myself back in aquafit. A new year’s resolution I opted to actually keep. But man oh man, what happened to make water churning so much harder? Linda and I were iron-women back in the day. Now, I’m feeling far more like rubber-woman. Sometimes even like sopping wet cardboard-woman. I swear they added molecules to the pool.

In this Top Drawer post, Ruth commits publicly to diving back into the writing pool. She’s determined to finish her novel. Read the rest.

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A remarkable, bold, unnerving, sad and, ultimately triumphant story of survival in the one place we should feel safest: our home; children tucked into bed; a shared glass of wine after an ordinary day. Extraordinary post. Difficult to read and impossible not to finish.

23thorns

This morning I woke up to find that I had been invaded. Violated. I turned on my tablet to be greeted by a cheerful message informing me that my blog was doing rather nicely. This seemed a little strange, since I haven’t been a particularly diligent blogger of late. I logged on to see what was up. This. This was up.

I had apparently posted it yesterday. Twice. Which would have been a curious thing to do. If you had to ask someone who knows me to sum me up as quickly and efficiently as possible, they would show you that image and say “Do you see this? He is the exact opposite of every single thing you can see right here.”

So what was it doing there? Twice? Well, thereby hangs a tale. Let’s start with lions, shall we…

If you spend any time out in the…

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My goodness. So great to read this (pun intended.) Making time in your life for reading for pleasure enriches all other aspects of your life. As someone who teaches writing workshops to bureaucrats and office staff, I can generally tell who reads and who doesn’t. Well done Alice Soon.

Alice Soon

My co-worker made a joke last week about adding new letters to my title – C.E.O. – Chief Editing Officer. It turns about our actual CEO had written something that he wanted me to look over and fix. Why? I have no idea. Apparently being a fiction writer also makes me qualified to edit EVERYTHING.

And that’s when I realized – Every day, I read stuff in the corporate world by people who are highly educated & intelligent, but that makes me want to poke my eyes out. These emails, letters and articles are filled with run-on sentences (not the stream-of-consciousness kind you would find in Faulkner’s work*), commas in the wrong places, terrible slogans & marketing euphemisms.

They cannot write. They think that writing should be the way you speak. WRONG. Writing is about communication. It’s about crafting words specific to your audience (remember, overwriting is just as bad…

View original post 315 more words

My goodness. So great to read this (pun intended.) Making time in your life for reading for pleasure enriches all other aspects of your life. As someone who teaches writing workshops to bureaucrats and office staff, I can generally tell who reads and who doesn’t. Well done Alice Soon.

Alice Soon

My co-worker made a joke last week about adding new letters to my title – C.E.O. – Chief Editing Officer. It turns about our actual CEO had written something that he wanted me to look over and fix. Why? I have no idea. Apparently being a fiction writer also makes me qualified to edit EVERYTHING.

And that’s when I realized – Every day, I read stuff in the corporate world by people who are highly educated & intelligent, but that makes me want to poke my eyes out. These emails, letters and articles are filled with run-on sentences (not the stream-of-consciousness kind you would find in Faulkner’s work*), commas in the wrong places, terrible slogans & marketing euphemisms.

They cannot write. They think that writing should be the way you speak. WRONG. Writing is about communication. It’s about crafting words specific to your audience (remember, overwriting is just as bad…

View original post 315 more words

Canadian Flag

Warning: I am about to get political. I don’t get political on my website but frankly, I want my Canada back. No, scratch that. I demand my Canada back.

I’ve not been happy about many of the actions of our federal government since 2006. But our government’s treatment of a Canadian citizen in Egypt became the last straw. Mohamed Fahmy needs a passport so he can get married. So he has papers to allow him to travel more than two blocks in a country under military rule. So he can have basic mobility as a human being. And our government shrugs its shoulders and says “nope.”

And so on April 2, I wrote a letter to Minister of Foreign Affairs Rob Nicholson and Minister of Citizenship and Immigration Chris Alexander, as follows:

“Canadian citizens who have legal issues while travelling abroad remain Canadian citizens. At least that is my understanding. But over the last few years, my understanding of “being Canadian” and what my country means to us, its taxpaying citizens and residents (temporary or otherwise) is on shifting sand. Fairness is being replaced with suspicion. Problem-solving and negotiating skills are being eroded and an “us versus them” mentality is filling the empty, echoing space. Compassion has been kicked to the curb.

Minister Nicholson, as you already know, Mohamed Fahmy is a Canadian citizen and on-the-job news reporter who lost his Canadian passport unfairly and in a broken, likely corrupt, political and judicial system in Egypt. Even the presiding judge of the current review — no soft-hearted liberal by reputation — is unimpressed by the lack of credible evidence against him. Which is why he was granted bail after being jailed from the first flawed conviction.

He needs a passport to replace the one confiscated when he was first arrested. He’s asked for a passport. I can’t help thinking that if his name happened to be Rob or Chris or Steve, a way would have been found to help him.

When asked yesterday at the House of Commons foreign affairs committee why you wouldn’t issue him a new passport, his travel-ban status was cited as the stumbling block. You suggested responsibility belonged to Minister Alexander to deliver. “Not my responsibility” is often a convenient refrain from this government.

And about that “travel-ban” status? A “travel ban” didn’t stop us in 1980. To save our American cousins hiding out in Iran during the revolution, Ambassador Ken Taylor could get fake Canadian passports for the U.S. diplomatic staff. He was hailed as a hero. And we can’t even get a real passport to a real Canadian? Shameful doesn’t even begin to describe this. And fury doesn’t begin to capture how I am feeling right now.

I expect much better of my government than a blanket refusal by federal ministers to even respond to questions in committee. And Minister Alexander, where are you in all of this? Mohamed Fahmy needs his government’s help. And we need to see that he gets it.”

I sent my letter to the two ministers and posted it on Facebook. Then I headed for our Haliburton cottage. Three days later, I arrived back home and online again. Given the responses posted to my Facebook page, it appears I’m not alone in my distaste for the Conservative government’s machinations. I am gratified by the wide range of Facebook Friends, from a diverse personal and political spectrum, who agree with me. There is something very wrong with where our nation sits these days. And in a time of increasingly complex and evolving global tensions and uncertainties, how good it would have been to see Canada take a leadership role in problem-solving and innovation.

We used to be able to see into the distance. To imagine how to broker peace. To hold to our values while being open to difference.

And no, we were never perfect — certainly not even at home did we always remember to treat Canada’s First Nation peoples with fairness and respect.

But since 2006, we’ve gone places and accepted changes that, in hindsight, have altered the bones of who we are as a nation. Time for some corrective surgery. On October 19, 2015, I will vote to get my Canada back.

The Colonial Hotel by Jonathan Bennett

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Ah Mr. Bennett. You’ve done it again. Crafted a novel that took me in unexpected directions, imagined characters that will stick — Paris & Oenone — in a place that will likewise remain indelible.

I really like ancient mythology and how echoes appear so often in contemporary work. But it is not always successful and can be downright clumsy. Happily, Jonathan Bennett has managed it quite well.

This is a brave book — a kind of retelling of Helen and Paris and Oenone, one that Bennett twists and shapes into a series of first-person narratives to explore…well, what does he explore here? “The Colonial Hotel” takes an intriguing look at colonialism, at good intentions, at privilege in a world it doesn’t properly understand. Corruption. Power. Deception. Love. Longing. Betrayal. Sacrifice. And he explores the resiliency of women. And recovery — socially and personally. Very cool.

There is a lot of “rescue” in this book but motivation is not left out of that equation. Nor is consequence. And that’s what I think I enjoyed the most (though given the circumstances of those consequences, enjoyed may not be quite the right word here.)

“The Colonial Hotel” is such a slim volume — 227 pages hard cover in paperback dimensions. But man, it packs a heck of a lot into such a small space. Yes, it is a love story — all kinds of love and devotion set against…well, you’ll just have to read it. And then you’ll know.

I loved the book so much that I meted out the last few chapters like a ration. I finished it last night, reluctantly. It was a satisfying ending and I suspect I’ll come back to “The Colonial Hotel” sometime in the future. This one’s a keeper on my bookshelf.

View all my reviews

Reading About Where I Lived. “Living Underground” by Ruth Walker: A Book Review.

Pen to paper

Every two weeks, I head to my local branch of the Whitby Public Library to meet with 9 other writers. We have the same goal for our meeting: to give/receive in-depth critiques.

We call our group Critical Ms (CMs)– the Ms stands for Manuscripts. It’s not for the faint of heart – if you need to only hear lovely things about your writing, CMs (or any similarly intense group) is not for you.

Manuscript excerpts are submitted by email at least one week in advance. A large submission gets the whole two hour meeting.  Smaller submissions split the meeting time (we keep our critique focus to two pieces maximum each session.) One person maintains the list of who is “up” for the next two or three meetings and members are responsible to make sure submissions are sent on time, ready or not.

Each submission gets remarkable written comments from all the members – edits and comments to take home to review. But the true gold of CMs is the lively and diverse group discussion about the submission that happens during the meeting.

Frankly, my CMs colleagues have saved my writerly ass many times.

Braveheart “greeting” to British troops

I can’t thank them enough.

Discoveries are made. Plot holes and thematic possibilities debated. Character arcs are dissected, along with murky or confusing settings. POV shifts. Tense shifts. Time shifts. Smoking guns that need resolution…  CMs members have a range of professional expertise and resources, and they bring all that to the table. We generally don’t do “fixes” but suggestions can be mused upon – and the writer takes notes and speaks only occasionally (if clarification is needed.) It is gruelling and exhilarating because it validates you as a writer.

There’s an added bonus for me. Analyzing another writer’s work lets me add to my own understanding of the writing process, of the craft, of the basic nitty-gritty of getting words on the page that will matter to readers.

I’ve belonged to other writing groups/circles before CMs and it was wonderful to give and receive feedback and comments – often carefully broached to avoid bruised egos. And I learned from them and became a better writer because of them. But the time came for great intensity.

Ruth at Muskoka Novel Writing Marathon, July 2014

When you are ready, like I was, to receive critiques on the level of a publisher or professional editor, you need to seek out the next level of your feedback process. It is not easy. And you need to commit to offer careful and thoughtful critiques to your colleagues. But it is an important step to let go of the ego and move deeper into the craft of writing.

So. Where are you on the feedback continuum? Is it time to dip your toe in as a new writer or are you ready to ramp up the level of critique you receive? If you don’t know the answer, maybe it’s time to give the question greater attention.

ruthewalker:

Some very good advice for writers of all types. Especially for those who don’t think they should call themselves a writer: see #10.

Originally posted on Chris Bohjalian's Idyll Banter:

I’m asked on occasion what advice I might offer aspiring writers. Here are ten random suggesstions — the last a reference to the fact I was told by a creative writing professor when I was in college that I should become a banker.

1) Don’t merely write what you know. Write what you don’t know. It might be more difficult at first, but – unless you’ve just scaled Mount Everest or found a cure for all cancers – it will also be more interesting.
2) Do some research. Read the letters John Winthrop wrote to his wife, or the letters a Civil War private sent home to his family from Antietam, or the stories the metalworkers told of their experiences on the girders high in the air when they were building the Empire State Building. Good fiction is rich with minutiae – what people wore, how they cooked, how they…

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