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About Me
- Satima Flavell
- I am a writer, editor and reviewer based in Perth, Western Australia. I specialise in historical and high or epic fantasy. If you have a manuscript in preparation, don't waste money on editing too early. Instead, let me help with a mini-assessment of your work, based on careful reading of your synopsis and first 20 pages. Then, when you've worked on the manuscript in line with our discussions, I will be happy to do a full edit before you send it off into the big wide world. My fees are very reasonable - for more about my editing work, CLICK HERE
Buy Mythic Resonance
an excellent anthology that includes my short story 'La Belle Dame', together with great stories from Alan Baxter, Donna Maree Hanson, Sue Burstynski, Nike Sulway and nine more fantastic authors! Just $3.99 from Amazon.
Prefer hard copy?
For Readers, Writers & Editors
- A dilemma about characters
- Adelaide Writers Week, 2009
- Adjectives, commas and confusion
- An artist's conflict
- An editor's role
- Authorial voice, passive writing and the passive voice
- Common misuses: common expressions
- Common misuses: confusing words
- Common misuses: pronouns - subject and object
- Conversations with a character
- Critiquing Groups
- Does length matter?
- Dont sweat the small stuff: formatting
- Free help for writers
- How much magic is too much?
- Know your characters via astrology
- Like to be an editor?
- Modern Writing Techniques
- My best reads of 2007
- My best reads of 2008
- My favourite dead authors
- My favourite modern authors
- My influential authors
- Planning and Flimmering
- Planning vs Flimmering again
- Psychological Spec-Fic
- Readers' pet hates
- Reading, 2009
- Reality check: so you want to be a writer?
- Sensory detail is important!
- Speculative Fiction - what is it?
- Spelling reform?
- Substantive or linking verbs
- The creative cycle
- The promiscuous artist
- The revenge of omni rampant
- The value of "how-to" lists for writers
- Write a decent synopsis
- Writers block 1
- Writers block 2
- Writers block 3
- Writers need editors!
- Writers, Depression and Addiction
- Writing in dialect, accent or register
Interviews with authors
My Blog List
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Okay or not OK? - ** I was happily reading the Age the other day, thinking everything was okay with life when I spotted an article titled “You don’t need to spell it out, ...1 hour ago
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Whither Came We? - I apologize for not putting up a post last week. Without getting too deep into the personal space, life intervened. Anyway: Back to Science! At least one o...2 hours ago
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Troll, Scalzi, Mallet, Gamma Rabbit - Man, this sketch from Howard Tayler has it all. Also: that poor troll. I almost feel sorry for it. Almost. Phoenix Comic Con continues to be awesome. That ...3 hours ago
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Smugglers’ Stash and News - YES! That time of the year is here: Book Expo America and Bea Bloggers Con are around the corner and by the time this post goes live I will be in New Yor...4 hours ago
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Sunday Surfing - Congratulations to this year's Nebula Award winners! Donna Hosie interviews Andrew Brown, her trilogy's cover designer 60 Rules for Short SF (and Fantasy) ...4 hours ago
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The Privileging of Visio over Vox in the Mystical Experiences of Hildegard of Bingen and Joan of Arc - Even though medieval women mystics have enjoyed increased attention in recent scholarly discussion, a topic that still has not been tackled is the possible...9 hours ago
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Heirs of the Fallen Promotion! An Author's Shameless Plug... - The end of the world is only the beginning. Experience the entire epic fantasy adventure for $2.99 for the next three days! The God King, book one, is...16 hours ago
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Kit Reed - Kit Reed's books include a new novel, Son of Destruction and The Story Until Now: A Great Big Book of Stories, which features some Reed classics as well as ...18 hours ago
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Something else two writers of epic fantasy have in common... - I have mentioned before that one of my ancestors, Richard Pickersgill, was on board His Majesty's Bark (sic) *Endeavour* when it sailed into Botany Bay und...19 hours ago
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Site slightly bolloxed - Apologies all. This site is going through a theme upgrade and there’s going to be a few glitches along the way. Hopefully it’ll all be fixed up ASAP, but w...20 hours ago
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Piers Gaveston's Daughter And The Earl Of Ulster's Grandson - On 25 May 1317, Edward II arranged the future marriage of his great-niece Joan Gaveston, Piers' daughter, to John Multon, grandson of the earl of Ulster a...20 hours ago
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Missing in action - I'm sorry that blog posts have been down of late. This is because I am doing the final read through and edits of THE OUTLAW KNIGHT (Lords of the White Cas...21 hours ago
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‘Wins’ Without Losses: Agreeable Disagreement - Five Quite Recent Provocations Langdon gasped. If he’d deciphered the symbols correctly, Jesus had married Joan of Arc at Stonehenge! If not, it was a reci...21 hours ago
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Physical Attributes Entry: Back - *Physical description of a character can be difficult to convey—too much will slow the pace or feel 'list-like', while too little will not allow readers to...1 day ago
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Girls Only Award, World Wildlife, CPAP - Viveka at My Guilty Pleasures was kind enough to give me the Sisterhood Award which I am very delighted with. It was Viveka who added the flowery frame to ...1 day ago
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Literature Circles 2013: The Adventure Continues! - Yesterday, we started Literature Circles. This year, I decided the best way to do it was with two classes and made my offer to a Year 7 English teacher wh...1 day ago
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Twenty Years Makes No Difference - Racism In AFL - Twenty years ago St Kilda footballers Nicky Winmar and Gilbert McAdam -- two out and out champions - were subject to some of the most vile abuse from a rabid...1 day ago
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An Honor For Writer Beware Co-Founder and Chair, Ann C. Crispin - *Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware* I'm thrilled and extremely proud to announce that my friend and colleague, Writer Beware co-founder and Cha...1 day ago
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ABADDON’S GATE and our Top Five Scary Spaceships! - [image: Abaddon's Gate]Next month sees the release of ABADDON’S GATE [UK | US | ANZ], the third novel in the Expanse series that began with the criticall...1 day ago
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Flogometer for Elizabeth: would you turn the first page? - Submissions invited: If you’d like a fresh look at your opening chapter or prologue, please email your submission to me re the directions at the bottom of th...1 day ago
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April 2013 Roundup: Diversity - With the backdrop of DisabilityCare and questions about gay marriage circulating in politics and the media recently, it was good to see readers picking up ...1 day ago
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How Real is your Fantasy? - On her own webpage, Joanna Fay explains how she uses intuition and word association to invent meaningful names for people, places and objects in her fantas...1 day ago
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Some Thoughts Ahead of Our Submissions Window… - I know, I know…. it’s been ages and ages and ages since we last opened for submission. Months. Maybe even a couple of years! This has not been a plot or a ...1 day ago
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Brothers in arms - Loss and sacrifice on the Home Front, 1914-1918 Today’s blog post, using the Military Service Tribunal papers from MH 47, will look at the emotional impact...1 day ago
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A Book A Week - The Host - The Host - Stephenie Meyer I've been avoiding this book. It's not that I didn't want to read it, it's just that it's, well, big. One of the nice things...2 days ago
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Laughter is the best medicine - One of the first things I ever got published and paid for was in the Reader’s Digest Laughter is the Best Medicine slot. I’m not going to tell you what I w...2 days ago
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Writing Exposition in First Person Without Sounding Daft - When you’re writing a novel in first person, how do you write exposition without it sounding weird and unnatural? Vicky posted this question on my “Ask A...2 days ago
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How to Create Wealth and Happiness - Spiritual and financial guru to world leaders and celebrities, Angela Hryniuk invited me along to her workshop “Enlightenment & Money” as a guest. Angela...2 days ago
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Why Boston? A Plea For Support - Let me start with this: For those of you who don’t know, I am hosting a fundraiser/giveaway to benefit the victims of the Boston Bombing through the One F...2 days ago
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How to Create a Blog Purpose Statement in 3 Simple Steps - Yesterday, I shared a series of questions to help those bloggers seeking a little clarity when it comes to what their blog could be about. Today, I wanted ...2 days ago
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How to Create A Custom Widget in WordPress - So, you want to make a custom widget for your sidebar or footer, but don’t know HTML? Never fear! There’s a pretty nifty trick you can use to create a cu...2 days ago
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How to Create A Custom Widget in WordPress - So, you want to make a custom widget for your sidebar or footer, but don’t know HTML? Never fear! There’s a pretty nifty trick you can use to create a cu...2 days ago
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Further ruminations about the complex notion of scale in publishing - Our May 29 conference is built around the theme of “scale” in our business, which means something different than it did a very short time ago. Usually “usi...2 days ago
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How real is your fantasy? - I’ve seen a few posts recently about names – especially character names – in fantasy novels, and how they can either draw a reader in or repel them….and ho...2 days ago
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#243 - a. Word Count: 43,000 b. Title: Patrick – The Younger [Children's Historical Fiction] c. Contact Info: (author name) You know not to start with this becaus...3 days ago
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Different voices in your narrative - you're weaving them right now, and you might not know it. - Today I'm working on developing a voice for a character in my new novel (which doesn't have a good title yet). He's a hard guy to work with because he's a ...3 days ago
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Rowena Cory Daniells books brief reviews… - This is a brief review of Rowena’s books The King’s Bastard Totally enthralling, so easy to get involved with the characters, laughing at their happy bante...3 days ago
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Hit - *Joe:* So tell us about HIT, the 40,000 word prequel to the Codename: Chandler series. *Ann: * Hit takes place before Exposed. Chandler is tasked with ass...3 days ago
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Short Story Highlight: “The Ink Readers of Doi Saket” by Thomas Olde Heuvelt - Dutch author Thomas Olde Heuvelt has a new story up at Tor.com: The Ink Readers of Doi Saket: It was during a night in the twelfth lunar month of this year...3 days ago
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Daisy’s wedding - We have a contractor at work who is getting married on Saturday, registry office as her ‘real’ wedding will be in Europe next year wit her family. We are g...3 days ago
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Even Alpha Writers Need Beta Readers - *By Tiffany Reisz, @tiffanyreisz * Let’s talk betas! Not the fishies, the people! First of all, what is a beta? You often hear the term in reference to s...3 days ago
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Giving it all away - Yes, well, I'm giving it all up. I had two separate conversations with children today. One was with one of my nephews. It was about how boring his new s...3 days ago
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Removed almost 10,000 folks from my Writing Tips newsletter - It was not the easiest thing I’ve ever done. There’s something comforting about thinking you’re talking to 21,000+ people at a time. But at the point where...4 days ago
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Random Topic: Best. Recipe book. Ever. - I do some volunteering for Lifeline to help out with the fundraising Bookfairs that run in Canberra three times a year. Something I’ve recently started doi...4 days ago
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The Imperial Palatine Seat Tilleda - Fortifications - I have mentioned Tilleda a few times already since it's one of the rare examples of a Medieaval palatine seat of which more remains than some crumbled ear...5 days ago
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Silly and in need of mental help - If one keeps tracks of the general insults thrown in one's directions, one gets a consensus of what exactly bothers folks about you. So... let me do a min...5 days ago
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Aurealis Awards 2013 - Before they head south to Conflux next year, the Aurealis Awards this year were again hosted in the fabulous Independent Theatre in North Sydney. It was th...6 days ago
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Margo’s Aurealis Night! - It was a great night at the Aurealis Awards – I was on the return trip from two weeks travelling north doing Song of the Slums school visits, but even my d...6 days ago
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Serendipity - For many years I had a pair of heavy, black wellies. They served me well until gradually they developed cracks and crazes. Then they got hard and brittle -...1 week ago
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Writers [on Writing]: Gish Jen - Writers [on Writing]: Gish Jen *One must live in order to have something to write about....Still the bulk of everyday life comes as an interruption. Some p...1 week ago
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I am stunned and grateful. - Tonight at the Aurealis Awards, I received the very great honor of the Kris Hembury Encouragement Award. I didn't know Kris — I think I may have met him br...1 week ago
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Among the Beautiful Living Dead – the movie - If I had to nominate which of my short stories has generated the most questions from fans, it’d have to be “Entre les Beaux Morts en Vie” (“Among the Beaut...1 week ago
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Short Story Competition Win - My short story, “The Silence of Clockwork”, picked up third prize in the Conflux 9 short story competition. I’m especially pleased about this as the story ...1 week ago
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Dakota FitzPercy & the End of the World - Ever wondered why the world didn’t end last December? Now, for the first time, the whole story is made public. Well, more public than Dakota’s facebook pag...1 week ago
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Compare My Manuscript to a Famous Book—A Writer’s Question - A reader's asks whether or not to compare a manuscript with other books in query letters and elevator pitches.1 week ago
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THUMBNAIL THURSDAY GETS HITCHED - Ah, wedding humour. It's quick, it's easy, and it's infinitely variable. This is one of them. *What do you mean, "What are the options?"?*1 week ago
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More Christian than you can poke a stick at - In response to some recent silly and strange claims on the net regarding the history of the Golden Dawn, I recently reposted to Facebook an old post, A Pag...1 week ago
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KSP WRITERS’ CENTRE 2013/14 RESIDENCY PROGRAM - KSP WRITERS’ CENTRE 2013/14 RESIDENCY PROGRAM Applications closing soon 2013 Young Writers-In-Residence Applications for 2013 Young Writer-In-Residence...1 week ago
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A giant TOUR catch up. Also, we wear the same boots. - I need to get back to blogging. Too many things are stacking up, and I'm paying attention over on Twitter and Tumblr and such, but not here, and really, th...1 week ago
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Update from Rio - *The renovated staircase leading up to the Buddha Vihara* Hi Friends, Namo Buddhaya, I have been in Rio De Janeiro staying at the Rio Buddha Vihara for th...1 week ago
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And then there was cake... - We have an announcement. A very important announcement. We have a new cake-maker in the House! Yes, it's true. A new cake-maker. And she has certainly wo...1 week ago
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Spam poetry never sleeps - Cynthia’s offering du jour: Je suis un débutant à ce forum, by Cynthia Mershark I ultimately stumbled upon 2 types of people: well-informed people I don’t ...1 week ago
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MtLawleyshire’s Hyde Park in Autumn - I took a break from my studies and risked it – I went down to Hyde Park yesterday – a sunny day after days of rain & storm. We had more rain in 2 days tha...2 weeks ago
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A blog about stuff - I’m back at work. I’ve uploaded everything I need to this semester in the Masters yesterday. I went to Veronica Parsons’ book launch for Murder in the Moat...2 weeks ago
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Japanese Cover! - *Jyo-ou Heika no Majyutu-shi* *Wizard of Her Majesty* Boy Nightingale is well Bishōnen ain't he?2 weeks ago
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Book Review: Marlo Can Fly, by Robert Vescio - Marlo Can Fly is a new Australian picture book by Robert Vescio, illustrated by Sandra Temple and published by Wombat Books in 2013. Marlo Can Fly is a lo...2 weeks ago
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Editing today - I was asked for advice on becoming a book editor, and of course, as a young friend calls me, I'm the dreamkiller. I go around being "realistic" and/or "neg...2 weeks ago
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Book Promotion Tip of the Week #12: Get Lucky, and Live with the Guilt - To Warn Prospective Buyers or Not To Warn: That Is the Question This week, the outstanding American novelist Claire Messud published her fourth book of fic...3 weeks ago
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Catalina's Choice. - Today I finished the third edit of Catalina's Choice! 114,000 words. I shall leave it for a time, like a cake, baked, now let it settle, and then the feast...3 weeks ago
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Much Ado About Nothing finds Aussie distributor. - Sharmill Films has acquired Joss Whedon’s adaptation of Much Ado. It will be released in Australia later this year. Click here to read the details and watc...3 weeks ago
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The Ursuline Experience of Slavery - A zealous commitment to social justice and human rights has not always been an attribute of the Catholic Church. Although Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote in th...3 weeks ago
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A Series Ian Likes: The Dragonriders Of Pern - They’re fantasy’s most beloved megafauna. Feared for their deadly flame, famed for their miserliness, they have somehow come to be a symbol for the magical...3 weeks ago
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Still life with exotic jug (102) - Sticking with the still life theme, this one of an exotic jug with fruit is my first water colour painting. Again, I painted it at my friend Sue’s house. ...3 weeks ago
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Post-Swancon post - One of the best presentations at Swancon 2013 was Gail Simone's Guest speech, where she asked us what spec fic had given us... So I thought it was worth wr...4 weeks ago
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Edward de Grazia, the lawyer who fought book censorship & wrote Girls Lean Back Everywhere - In a 2008 post about Banned Books Week, I recommended an excellent 1992 book about literary censorship and obscenity prosecutions in the United States, Edw...4 weeks ago
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Proceeding as per usual and nothing to report - Time travel would mess up nearly everything. Without strict controls there could easily arise a situation where the natural progression of things precludes...5 weeks ago
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What day is it??? - A writer’s life can be a strange ephemeral world in which we waft about finding meaning in the sound of the wind or a blade of grass…..or in reality we won...1 month ago
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It's PR, darling! Branding an author, and other interesting pastimes - ** *All-new, value for money, always satisfied...* *Why do I feel like I'm...well, you know - SELLING myself?** * * -----------------------------------...1 month ago
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The Age of Play - Paul Klee, "Love"How to Set the Stage for a Creative and Compassionate LifeLiving happily and successfully requires a rich fantasy life, the ability to ima...1 month ago
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Finalist BBC Wildlife Artist of the year 2013 - I am delighted to be able to report that I have had three of my paintings accepted into the finals of the BBC Wildlife Artist of the year competition 2013....1 month ago
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E-book vs. Traditional Publishing: Pros and Cons - by Annette Lyon With the huge boom of e-book publishing, particularly self-publishing, writers today have more options than ever before. What to do? Are th...1 month ago
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Are you a Freelance Copy Editor? - Are you an experienced freelance copy editor who has an interest in working with self-publishing writers? We (BubbleCow) are currently looking for two co...1 month ago
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One Publisher’s Journey - Guest Post by Benjamin LeRoy I’ve been a steady lurker on the Absolute Write forums since 2005. Every now and again I jump into a thread if I feel like the...2 months ago
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This Blog has moved to www.gailgaymermaritn.com - This blog has been moved to www.gailgaymermartin.com Please visit my Writing Fiction Blog there filled with the same comprehensive information and many mo...2 months ago
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So much happening, so little blogging... - I called my blog The Best Audience Award because, as well as feeling "not good enough" as a maker (writer, photographer, whatever I might otherwise post) I...2 months ago
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Query letter #10: Mitch H - A monastic trained orphan with a talent for Sorcery, Caldan's entire world dissolves when he learns his family was murdered, almost kills his friend's bro...3 months ago
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Can you use my Word book cover design? - Using word to design a book cover Microsoft Word is not appropriate software to use for an actual book cover design, however it is great if you've cre...3 months ago
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Incredible article on Photographer Joel Grimes - I was having a chuckle at the first two minutes of this video and got to thinking how similar it sounded to me growing up. From pulling things apart and no...3 months ago
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Tinye gifte for Valentynes Daye: Amour Ys Lyke a Potel of Wyne - O gentil rederes of my blog, how grete the peynes smerte that come to me whanne Ich thinken upon my lakke of updatinge. Swich grete busynesse hath fallen u...3 months ago
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Just writing & associated thoughts - What sets me writing? I know people ask this of writers & now I'm asking it of myself. I'm pulling out of a long de-motivated block of time and getting s...3 months ago
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Tarnished Crown #1 is done - sort of! - Insofar as it has a beginning, a middle and an end. So now people with less mushy brains than me can rip it to shreds so I can rewrite it and make it bette...4 months ago
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Edward IV's marriage to Elizabeth Woodville - An evil fairy almost made me include 'supposed', 'bigamous' or 'purported' in that title. After all, in a world where at least one author has put Richard I...4 months ago
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Messenger Feast - * Kivgiqsuat, Messenger Feast, Inuit of Alaska* *"After the separation of the summer months the villagers begin socializing with other village groups. Durin...4 months ago
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Defining the Target Audience for Your Fiction - So you’re writing a novel and your critique buddies want to know who your “target audience” is. What do you tell them? Nee posted this question on my “Ask ...6 months ago
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"It is only a Black Dog, I am a wolf" - Hail, I have not been writing much lately, now I will try to write about why I can't write, and why I actually think it is possible I am going a little b...8 months ago
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Rev. Johann Polhemus' deadly scrapes - *© Christy K Robinson* He survived war, bubonic plague, trans-Atlantic travel, 20 years in the equatorial rainforest, two pirate attacks, two years' separa...8 months ago
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LoNoWriMo - LoNoWriMo is local novel writing month, and this is my second in a row. LoNoWriMo is where you sit down at your computer and write a novel in a month, with...9 months ago
Favourite Sites
- Bren McDibble
- Celestine Lyons
- Guy Gavriel Kay
- Hal Spacejock (Simon Haynes)
- Jacqueline Carey
- Jennifer Fallon
- Jessica Vivien
- Joel Fagin
- Juliet Marillier
- KA Bedford
- Karen Miller
- KSP Writers Centre
- Lynn Flewelling
- Marianne de Pierres
- Phill Berrie
- Ryan Flavell
- Satima's Professional Editing Services
- SF Novelists' Blog
- SF Signal
- Shane Jiraiya Cummings
- Society of Editors, WA
- Stephen Thompson
- The Specusphere
- Yellow wallpaper
Places I've lived: Manchester, UK
Places I've lived: Gippsland, Australia
Places I've lived: Geelong, Australia
Places I've lived: Tamworth, NSW
Places I've Lived - Sydney
Sydney Conservatorium - my old school
Places I've lived: Auckland, NZ
Places I've Lived: Mount Gambier
Blue Lake
Places I've lived: Adelaide, SA
Places I've Lived: Perth by Day
From Kings Park
Places I've lived: High View, WV
Places I've lived: Lynton, Devon, UK
Places I've lived: Braemar, Scotland
Places I've lived: Barre, MA, USA
Places I've Lived: Perth by Night
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Saturday, 28 July 2012
Another review
Saturday, July 28, 2012 | 
Posted by
Satima Flavell
Tehani Wessely gives my story, La Belle Dame, a thumbs-up in her review of Mythic Resonance at http://aussiespecficinfocus.wordpress.com/2012/07/24/mythic-resonance/.
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4 comments:
Glad you are getting good reviews.
Most of us have disabled the word verification as its a bloody nuisance to potential commenters.
She liked mine too! :-) thanks for posting this. I'll put a link on my own blog.
Yes, I'm sorry about the word verification, Jo, but even with moderation I still have to sift through the spam. And who is 'most of us'? Nearly all the blogs I visit use it and having tried doing without it I can see why.
I still get the odd bit of spam written by real people, of course, but, as the saying goes, you can't blame a man for trying! :-)
Yes, Sue - a very fair and even-handed review from Tehani, I reckon. Of course, it does boil down to taste - she definitely didn't like a couple of stories that are among my favourites!
But so far, everyone has liked your story and mine, I'm pleased to say - not just reviewers, but readers who've commented as well.