A Tribute to Bob Marley- reblog via Sepultura13 blog.
Category: Uncategorized
Monday Funnies…
Some Monday funnies from Chris at The Story Reading Ape blog.
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The Best Dressed Bash 2016 #bloggersbash2016
You have until the 11th of May to order your Blogger’s Bash T Shirts. Just ordered mine…. in a small, hope I don’t eat too much cake in the meantime or I might just need a medium…. Check out this post via Geoff to find out more.
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Ronovan Writes Poetry on Tell Me a Story
Ronovan Writes Poetry will be featuring on Annette Aben’s The Magic Happens Radio Network, Friday 29th of April. Find out more about this blog talk show via this reblog.
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Ronovan’s Poetry-prompt-challenge-93-sunmoon
This week Ronovan’s Weekly Haiku Challenge prompt words are Sun and Moon.
Do pop over to Ron’s blog to take part in the challenge: Ronovan’s Weekly Haiku Challenge
I haven’t taken part in Ronovan’s Poetry prompt challenge for ages as I’ve been really busy editing my manuscript. It’s now a staggering 84,330 words in length!
I have to say that I’ve really missed writing haiku, taking part in quote challenges, writing short stories, etc…..
Listening to Al The Author’s radio talk on Annette’s blog talk radio: Meet Poet Al Lane just made me want to write a haiku or two this week! So I gave in, the craving was just too much!
Annette’s Blog Talk radio show has also recently featured our very own Judy Martin from Edwina Episodes who has recently published a poetry compilation, Rhymes of The Times. Listen to Judy talking about everyday things, naughty poems and chocolate! She reckons that just about anything can be made into humorous, rhyming poems, find out more via this link : Judy Martin on Tell Me A Story.
Do pop over to Annette’s blog too, here’s the link: Annette Rochelle Aben
Chris Graham of the The Story Reading Ape designed Judy’s book cover. Here it is in her favorite sunny colour yellow, and very nice it is too:
My two haiku are inspired by my recent job working in my local primary school.
Kids can be so sweet at times, particularly when they’re happy! Not so much when they fall over and hurt themselves in the playground, then they need oodles of TLC…. One day it was raining in the playground, and the infants were thrilled to be out in the gently falling rain getting their hair just a tiny bit wet. Their enthusiasm and excitement can’t help but make you smile, it’s so fresh and invigorating. If only we could bottle that!
I have to say that I hovered underneath the shelter, out of the rain, keeping an eye on them from there. As we get older we tend to view rain as a nuisance, losing sight of the enthusiasm we once had for tiny drops of invigorating, cleansing rain. Rain can have a beautiful aspect to it, particularly if it is followed by a rainbow! This is especially true when you’re young and raindrops can be almost magical. One young boy held his hands out capturing little drops of rain in his fingertips, I joined in and kept him company, and for a moment I remembered how magical and special rain can be!
So with those raindrops in mind I’d thought I’d be a bit playful and suggest that perhaps adults shouldn’t be so quick to attribute rain with negative thoughts. We tend to see rain as a nuisance, thinking about practicalities such as the washing hanging on the line, our soggy wet clothes, and hair. Instead perhaps we should focus on the positives as seen through a childs’ eyes – and go out and play in the rain!
After all if we do get soaking wet we can hopefully come in and have a nice reward. A hot shower and a cup of tea or even a hot chocolate if the mood takes us! Otherwise perhaps a brolly or a raincoat might be a good idea! Ha ha !!!
Play Out In The Rain
Kids teach us lessons,
As do the sun, and the moon,
And the rainbows too!
The sun is hiding,
Stop mooning around grownups,
Play in the rain too!
Hope you enjoyed my double dose of haiku!
Do you enjoy the elements? Rain, rainbows, and perhaps thunderstorms…. do comment I’d love to hear from you.
Bye for now,
Marje @ Kyrosmagica xx
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My Kyrosmagica Review of The Yearbook Committee
Goodreads Synopsis:
The school captain: Ryan has it all … or at least he did, until an accident snatched his dreams away. How will he rebuild his life and what does the future hold for him now?
The newcomer: Charlie’s just moved interstate and she’s determined not to fit in. She’s just biding her time until Year 12 is over and she can head back to her real life and her real friends …
The loner: At school, nobody really notices Matty. But at home, Matty is everything. He’s been single-handedly holding things together since his mum’s breakdown, and he’s never felt so alone.
The popular girl: Well, the popular girl’s best friend … cool by association. Tammi’s always bowed to peer pressure, but when the expectations become too much to handle, will she finally stand up for herself?
The politician’s daughter: Gillian’s dad is one of the most recognisable people in the state and she’s learning the hard way that life in the spotlight comes at a very heavy price.
Five unlikely teammates thrust together against their will. Can they find a way to make their final year a memorable one or will their differences tear their world apart?
First of all before I begin my review I’d like to say a big thank you to Jade at Scatterbooker for sending me my giveaway prize all the way from Australia! Miraculously it arrived the very morning that I was going to Brighton for a family get together for my mum’s birthday! Quite extraordinary… Anyway it was lovely to bring it along with me for a weekend away. In fact I took a photo of it for Instagram along with a beautifully folded towel and some toiletries.
My Review:
The main characters in Sarah Ayoub’s The Yearbook Committee are Matty, Charlie, Ryan, Tammi, and Gillian. The story revolves around the five teammates who are drawn together to create a Yearbook of their final year at school. All of them are reluctant, (expect Gillian,) to get involved in this activity. In fact the five would most probably never have been friends if it wasn’t for their involvement in the Committee. As the Yearbook develops so do their friendships. In fact these new relationships make the Yearbookers’ question some of their existing friendships, and an unlikely but strong bond is formed.
I must admit that I found The Yearbook Committee a little slow to get into at first, but maybe I’m showing my age! Ha ha!! The chapters are set out in alternating Pov’s of the five characters, so perhaps it takes a while for the reader, (particularly oldies like me!) to engage with each individual character. Nevertheless I enjoyed The Yearbook Committee. I’d say that its strongest characteristic by far is its exceptionally well written and believable dialogue. Though, I didn’t get much of a sense of place. Of course we know the novel is set in Australia but there’s very little descriptive language. So perhaps not a recommendation for readers who enjoy a lot of descriptive language…
The Yearbook Committee will definitely appeal to those who enjoy YA, teen books, character led stories with tons of engaging dialogue, an emphasis on the wide ranging difficulties and peer pressures of growing up. The novel highlights a wide range of diverse issues: cyber bullying, having a sibling with Downs, coping with a parent with severe depression, non-nuclear families, moving to a new school, distracted and disinterested parents, lost dreams, pressure to have sex, to do well, to be popular, to take drugs..
The characters are:
Charlie’s just moved from Melbourne with her mum and stepdad to Sydney. She didn’t want to move and is determined not to fit in. She’s the bright spark and feminist of the group.
Ryan is the clever, athletic, popular but nice guy whose dreams are smashed by an injury.
Matty is the scholarship kid who has a tough time of it working two jobs to try to help and support his depressed mother who can’t even get herself together to go to parent’s meetings.
Tammi is to some degree defined by others. She is best friends with the popular but meanest girl going. Tammi finds it hard to convince her parents that she’d like to be a police officer.
Gillian is the only one of the five who volunteered to be on the Yearbook Committee. She’s a politician’s daughter and the target of cyber bullies, and constantly in the media spotlight.
The key words: Revelations, Relationships, Frustrations, Explorations, Decisions, Unlikely Friendships, Unfortunate, Sad, Tragic, Thoughtful (Ryan’s final chapter,) Teen, YA, Social Media, Current, are the key words I would use to describe The Yearbook Committee.
If these appeal to you then I’d recommend that you pick up a copy!
The ending really smashed it for me, very moving and emotional, making up for the slow start.
My Star rating : 4 stars.
Recommendation: Read
Links: Sarah Ayoub Website
Have you read The Yearbook Committee? Would you recommend it? Or perhaps you might have read Sarah Ayoub’s previous book Hate is Such A Strong Word?
Bye for now,
Marje @ Kyrosmagica xx
My Links:
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5 Mind Boggling Reasons Canva is YOUR Blogging Design Heaven
Canva….What’s that you might ask. I did. Lots of information on this blogging design tool via Sacha Black. Reblogging for my readers and for me too, may come in handy…
A friend recently suggested I take some time to look at Canva. I tried not to raise an eyebrow, time is not a commodity I can spare much of to learn new things. But I trusted their professional suggestion and trotted along to investigate this new fangled site.
Having scrutinised it, I have to say I highly recommend it as a design site. For those of you who don’t have photoshop and illustrator its the perfect substitute. It has a plethora of professional looking templates for everything from book covers, blog photos, infographics, flyers, posters, cover photos… anything you could want it has pre made templates which you can edit to your hearts desire.
If you want to increase your blog traffic next year I am certain this tool will help.
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A new #tool to promote (your posts, tweets, videos) Co-Promote
A new social media tool, called Headliner from Lit World Interviews, a find via Olga Núñez Miret, sounds very people/supportive friendly. Reblogging it for future reference and sharing here so that others can find out more. 🙂
Thanks to Unspalsh for another great image
Hi all:
A quick post just to make you aware of a new tool an author shared in one the Facebook groups I belong to.
It’s called CoPromote and you can find it here.
I haven’t been using it very long, so I’m learning as I go along, but I thought you might find it interesting. You can sign with Twitter, Facebook…. (the usual suspects). Once you’ve signed, the site gives you the opportunity to promote (boost they call it) one of your Tweets, Tumblr posts or one of your videos in You Tube or Vine (or the four of them). You’ll have to connect your accounts in those platforms, if you have them, but then if you choose to boost a Tweet, for instance, the site brings up your Twitter feed and you can choose one of them…
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►History: “The Greek Theatre” / Literature: Aristotle’s “Poetics“: “Theory of Tragedy“⭐️.-
Wonderful post from Amalia Pedemonte – Aquileana, about the history of Greek theatre, and Aristotles theory of Tradegy. Quote challenges, photography and a big thank you to Amalia for nominating me for The One Lovely Blog Award. I’ve recently gone award free but really do appreciate the gesture. Thank you so much. 🙂
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I.♠Introduction:
In my previous post, I made reference to the Muses.
Back to the most common typology, I found interesting that Tragedy and Comedy were represented among the Nine Muses. I am specifically pointing out toMelpomene and Thalia. Melpomene was the muse of Tragedy and her symbol was the tragic mask. On the other hand, Thalia was the muse of Comedy while her symbol was the comic mask.
Furthermore, as I read about them, I couldn´t avoid thinking of the well known symbol of the two masks, depicting Tragedy and Comedy.
→Now, let´s see which were the masks´purposes when it comes to The Ancient Greek drama.
The Ancient Greek term for a mask is Prosopon (literally meaning,”face”).
The classical masks had an important function in plays of tragedies and comedies as they were able to create a sense of dread in the audience creating large…
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#WeekendCoffeeShare: Cambridge Literary Festival
If I were having coffee I’d invite you to my new favourite haunt, a mysterious cafe in an exotic land of my imagination. We’d have the sun shining down on us, warming our backs with gentle breezes, palm trees above us, and the sweet aroma of flowers too. It would be so hot that we’d have a chilled coconut coffee filled to the brim with large scoops of ice. Or perhaps if the mood takes us we might indulge in one of these cheeky delights: Tequila Mockingbird, a Margaret Atwood, The Sunday Librarian, in The Study with The Lead Pipe, or a Watership Down!
http://flavorpill.com/ntl/article/other/5-cocktails-for-hardworking-bookish-babes.
Our iced drink would be decorated with one of those fancy cocktail sticks. The theme of the cafe would be books, and an abundance of titles would be artistically placed everywhere, decorating every nook and cranny, because this week my coffee share post is all about the Cambridge Literary Festival: http://www.cambridgeliteraryfestival.com/
Enjoy.
I’m been looking forward to telling you about my recent experience working as a steward at the Cambridge Literary Festival. But before I begin let me fill you in on the first event at the Festival that I attended with my friend. On Friday evening my friend and I had a lovely Thai meal at Thaikun, from the streets of Bangkok, in our very own Cambridge: http://thaikhun.co.uk/
Followed by some Raving Beauties: Hallelujah for 50 ft Women at the Union library!
More about them here: http://www.bloodaxebooks.com/ecs/product/hallelujah-for-50ft-women-186
It was a blast, these ravers have had a beauty of a sell out run at the Edinburgh Festival. Their cabaret of diverse, passionate poetry listed above explores the themes of love, sex, creativity and work. When I say sex I mean it! Some of the titles are kinda in your face (look away if you are easily offended!): Cunts Cocks and Balls -Sally St. Clair, Cunt Artist Boyfriend – Rebecca Smith, Rutting – Arundhathi Subramaniam and a few very female orientated poems such as Women’s Blood – Vicky Feaver, and to my last period – Lucille Clifton. Oh and one for top heavy ladies: the trials and tribulations of a well-endowed woman – Hira A. There were a few men in the audience and I wonder what they made of the Raving Beauties! I’ve mentioned a few of the poems – I think if my memory serves me right they performed 35 altogether, including my favourite: Recognition – Carol Ann Duffy.
After the event my friend mentioned that she’d intended to do an English Literature degree when she was younger and had been persuaded by her then controlling boyfriend to do Law. She seemed to be touched by regret after listening to the talk! But I cheered her up by saying that Law had enabled her to be financially secure career wise. But, it does make you wonder, doesn’t it? How the pathways that we choose can shape your life in an entirely different way. Who knows what she might have done if she’d ignored her then boyfriend and done English Literature. Perhaps she might have become a poor impoverished poet, or been a featured poet in the Raving Beauties!
One can’t help but wonder! I digress. Back to my stewarding duties. It all began on Saturday. In the afternoon I helped out in the Old Divinity School, a wonderful setting for the 2.30 talk by journalists Robert Verkaik and Andrew Hosken: Reflections on the Middle East. The talk was a riveting sharing of their views on the ‘middle east cauldron.’ Robert Verkaik, is the author of Jihdi John: The Making of a Terrorist, (he is the only journalist to have interviewed the ISIS terrorist, thought to be of Arabic origin.)
Andrew Hosken wrote Empire of Fear: Inside The Isalmic State. The event was chaired by Helen Lewis, Editor of the New Statesman.
After that at 4pm I had the opportunity to steward in the Tracy Chevalier, Helen Dunmore & Linda Grant event: Reader, I Married Him.
This talk celebrated the 200th Anniversary of Charlotte Bronte’s birth. The three speakers, Tracy Chevalier, Helen Dunmore and Linda Grant’s short stories were inspired by Jane Eyre, questioning who, how and why we love. Again, another wonderful talk that I was able to tune into gratis via my stewarding role!
For those of you who might be interesting in volunteering for literary events here’s a brief rundown of what I did while I was stewarding at the Divinity School:
I made sure that everything was in order before the talk began, that the auditorium was clear of rubbish, that the viewers of the previous talk left, (with a little gentle cajoling,) and that the speakers had water and the appropriate number of glasses. Also I had to keep an eye on the heavy door. I had to ensure that it didn’t slam shut with an almighty bang when latecomers came! (The building seemed to echo with the least noise so we were asked to keep disturbance to a minimum!) We helped with organising the queues for the auditorium, and the book signing, and generally tried to get festival goers in the right direction for toilets, etc. Oh, and we smiled a lot!
On Sunday I did it all again! Here’s us stewards posing for this photo opportunity twittered via Kate Kirk, and yours truly!
There’s me second on the right of the photo!
On Sunday morning I was due at the Fitzwilliam museum at 9.30, via a back entrance which was quite hard to find. Luckily I came across another steward who seemed to have a better sense of direction than I had and we found our way into the Goods In! Now that we were tagged, and signed in, we took a large (no I lie, an enormous lift,) into the museum.
I was so lucky! I was stewarding at the Claire Harman: Charlotte Bronte: A life, talk.
I have to say that this talk and the Hallelujah for 50ft. Women were my two favourite events at the Festival this year. Perhaps the Fitzwilliam event was in part due to the venue, my photo doesn’t do it justice, the room was beyond stunning:
But, moreover I was riveted by Claire Harman’s discussion of her acclaimed biography: Charlotte Bronte: A Life. After the talk, audience members were able to enjoy a display of Charlotte Bronte’s personal letters dating from 1845 to her death in 1855. These letters cover the period during which Jane Eyre, Shirley, and Villette were published, as well as her marriage to Arthur Bell Nicholls in 1854. The letters are still available for a short time period (a week, I believe) from today to view. The event was chaired by Tom Gatti, Culture Editor, New Statesman.
In the afternoon it was time for a quick bite to eat and then I was off to the take part in the Children’s programme! Yippee!!!
At 2.30 it was time for some Roman Mysteries and Quests with best selling author Caroline Lawrence in the Union Blue Room. Her novels are mostly set in ancient Rome. To find out more visit Caroline’s website:
http://www.romanmysteries.com/
I was impressed by Caroline’s ability to get her young audience members to join in at every opportunity, making the event a very fun and interactive experience. In fact, when she mentioned the xylospongia, an implement to clean yourself after you’ve been to the toilet,(in Roman times,) that got more than a few laughs. Toilet humour, always does the biz!! Below she’s grinning holding a xylospongia at the ready!
I managed to have a chat with Caroline and the tech guy, before the talk. Caroline was really lovely, so friendly and nice. And the tech guy was too, he trusted me to be responsible for his expensive piece of tech, I was the microphone lady for Q & A. First time doing this….. think it went ok. I didn’t drop it! Thank goodness. I didn’t mention I’m a bit accident prone! Though, I think the head steward might have guessed when I tripped over the queuing rope barriers. Luckily there was no harm done, just a bruised ego.
At 4pm I was in the Blue Room again this time helping out with Monica Vaughan’s talk on her book, Six. This is the American cover:
A thrilling and chilling sci-fi mystery that tackles controversial topics. Like the sound of this…. As before I wielded the microphone, for Q and A, and afterwards I managed to talk briefly to Monica before I left. Again she was very lovely, and thanked me for my help which was very sweet of her.
Here’s a link to Monica’s website to find out more about her:
and a photo of her at the Festival that I pinched from her twitter account!
I hope you enjoyed finding out more about my stewarding role, perhaps it might inspire you to help out at the next Literary Festival near you. It’s a very worthwhile thing to do, particularly if you are a book worm, or a budding author, (you get free attendance at talks that aren’t sold out, have a chance to chat to authors, particularly in the smaller events.) Of course you do have to get in the spirit of the festival by wearing a free lurid tee-shirt, or perhaps shuffling about in a funny costume, ha ha!!! While you’re stewarding you can listen to talks and generally have the opportunity to meet like minded people. Stewarding gives you a marvellous insight into the workings of event management too. So do have a go. My motto at the moment is try everything at least once!
Do pop over to Diana’s blog, Part Time Monster to see all about the weekly Coffee Share post:
All about Weekend Coffee Share :http://parttimemonster.com/weekend-coffee-share/
Link up to the Weekend Coffee share blog by clicking on Diane’s blog, Part Time-Monster, there’s a blue link: https://parttimemonster.com/category/weekly-features/weekend-coffee-share/
Have you ever stewarded before? At a Literary Festival or perhaps another event? Do share your experiences I would love to hear all about them.
Bye for now,
Marje @ Kyrosmagica xx
In case you’re curious to find out more, do visit my links:
Wattpad: https://www.wattpad.com/story/67166165-the-curse-of-time
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/20419289-marje-mallon
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kyrosmagica/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Marjorie_Mallon
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kyrosmagica/
Tumblr: http://kyrosmagica.tumblr.com/
M J Mallon YA Author and Poet 