Things that inspire me to write #75: The Velveteen Rabbit

Frustration. It can be painful and annoying and when it comes to the craft of writing, exceedingly persistent  But it can also create wonders. Reading The Velveteen Rabbit to my son this afternoon, I discovered that this wonderful, magical classic in children’s literature was born out of the author’s, Margery Williams, frustration with her previous publications. According to the […]

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Things that inspire me to write #76: East End Culture Crawl

  What does Margaret Atwood’s office look like? Does she have a parking lot view or forest panorama? I have always been interested in artist’s spaces and how they set them up to support and stimulate their work. However as Mrs Atwood does not appear to be on the verge of inviting snoopy strangers into […]

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Things that inspire me to write #77: Remembrance Day

  Normally I write about things that give me creative inspiration, hope, or otherwise motivate me to get writing. However, today being Remembrance Day (in Canada and the other Commanwealth countries anyway) I thought I should so something I rarely do, and that’s remember–remember all the men and women and children who lost their lives […]

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Things that inspire me to write #78: Carrie Mac

At a writer’s event I attended last summer, a celebration of Christianne’s Lyceum of Literature of Art, I had the good fortune of meeting Carrie Mac–author of numerous award winning YA novels including The Gryphon Project. While we exchanged only a few words what really stuck with my afterwards was the fact that Carrie arrived at the […]

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Things that inspire me to write #79: Tree Island Yogurt

  I received an invitation to buy yogurt today and it made me smile–and not because I have a hankering for dairy. Several years ago one of my best friends moved from Vancouver to pursue her and her husband’s dream of  starting their own yogurt brand–Tree Island Yogurt. It’s been a long and difficult haul for them both–but Scott and […]

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Things that inspire me to write #80: Craft fairs

  With Thanksgiving and Halloween finally out of the way (in Canada anyway) the pre-Christmas shopping bonanza has officially started–which means it’s time to get your craft on. Circle Craft, Vancouver’s biggest craft fair, is fast approaching and already I’m looking forward to spending hours upon hours feasting on every kind of artistic creation from […]

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Things that inspire me to write #81: Americans

Four more years of a US president who is intelligent, open minded and seems to really care about people. In a news world filled with pipeline disasters, melting polar ice caps, and federal bank failures, Obama’s re-election brings me a little bit of hope for the future—in both your country and hopefully my own as […]

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Things that inspire me to write #82: The Breakfast Club

Melodramatic, sex-centred brain candy with protagonists that spend way too much time on their hair. Whether in movies or novels, teen pop culture can get a bad rap. And sure, while there may be several dozen (or more) Clueless rip offs out there that doesn’t mean they are the definer of all that it means to be a […]

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Things that inspire me to write #83: JK Rowling

I have a son. He’s two, and at least once a day I feel like locking myself in the bathroom so that I can write for more than five seconds without him thrusting small plastic animals on my keyboard and demanding we play zookeeper again. With the many demands of being a mom, the task […]

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Things that inspire me to write #84: Kate Moss

In a recent Vanity Fair interview Kate Moss recently confessed to all the emotional turmoil and anxiety she suffered during her early modeling career. For someone who has for so long been presented as the epitome of physical perfection, it took a lot courage to admit that in truth, she felt far from that. So […]

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