IWSG: Wednesday, November 1, 2017 ~ A Flight and a Fight

It's the first Wednesday of the month:
the day when members of the
Insecure Writer's Support Group
share their writing struggles
and writing successes
and offer their encouragement
and support to fellow writers.





To visit the IWSG website, click here.

To become a member of the IWSG, click here.

Our wonderful co-hosts who are volunteering today,
along with IWSG founder Alex Cavanaugh are:
Tonja Drecker,  Diane Burton,  F. J. Fifield, and Rebecca Douglass.

I hope you have a chance to visit today's hosts and thank them for co-hosting.
I'm sure they would appreciate a visit and an encouraging comment.

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Every month the IWSG poses a question
that members can answer with advice, insight,
a personal experience, or a story in their IWSG posts.

Or, the question can inspire members
if they aren't sure what to write about on IWSG Day.

Remember the question is optional.
This month's featured question is:

Win or not, do you usually finish your NaNo project?
Have any of them gone on to be published?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, this is an easy question!  
I have never participated in NaNo,
and I am not going to do so this year.

I've heard about it from many IWSG members, 
and I've watched them tackling the challenge each year.

I thought maybe this year; but no,
November is already jam-packed for me,
and I'll have to look forward to next year.

I'll visit as many IWSG members as I can today,
but early tomorrow morning I'm flying to Calgary.
I'm off to a big party to celebrate my sister Barb's retirement;
and typically, I just found out about the party late last week.

First Photograph of All Five MacBeath Siblings

Donnie, Barb (the Retiree), Louise (Me), Bertie, Gretchen (Our Dog), and Roy

Margaretsville, Nova Scotia, Canada
Early April, 1959

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

In January I set a goal of reading five books
written by IWSG authors in 2017.

When I recently traveled to Victoria, British Columbia,
book number five hitched a ride in my suitcase:
Delivered by Patrick Hatt.

Pat's latest novel had me reading late into the night

curled up on the sofa in our tiny hotel suite.

For several nights I raced through its 300+ pages

until my eyes blurred and I was forced to go to bed.

This is my favorite of the four Pat Hatt novels I have read.

I was anticipating a wild, phantasmagorical novel,

but I was in for a big surprise.

Pat Hatt wrote a realistic, contemporary novel with no hint

of the supernatural, beings popping in and out from other dimensions,

or mythical characters wreaking havoc ~

Just a heartwarming story of a small abused boy

who is rescued and welcomed into a close family

which fights to protect him and itself from growing danger.

Of course, given that Pat wrote the book,

it is not your average family!

Martin and Emma Hirtle are a young couple

with four children and a fifth on the way.

They deliberately forego a life of financial security

to devote as much time as possible to raising their children.

When Martin finds a frightened boy abandoned in a snowstorm,

he rescues him and takes him to the Hirtle home.

Martin and Emma soon discover bits of the child's past

and must figure out a sordid secret that haunts him

before the people hunting the boy find him and kill him.

Martin and Emma are quickly pulled into unexpected dangers

that threaten them, their children, and the abandoned child.

Can they solve the mystery of the boy's past in time,

or will they pay with their lives and the lives of their children?

These questions kept me flying through the book into the wee hours.

Pat writes with a distinctive Nova Scotian voice,

filled with the words and idioms of a native Bluenoser.

His characters in Delivered are as compelling as they are unique.

The Hirtles are unconventional, but they are a tight-knit family

with a distinct vision of who they are and why.

I quickly fell in love with them and their idiosyncrasies. 

As in his other novels, good and evil are clearly defined.

With each book he writes, Pat grows as a novelist.

Stephen King, in his excellent book On Writing,

says to become a writer "... you must do two things

above all others, read a lot and write a lot."

Pat lives both, which is why

his list of published books keeps expanding.

Happy writing in November,

and good luck to anyone participating in NaNo.

A Young Barbie,

Long Before Her Distinguished Career in Calgary's Oil Patch

Smith's Cove, Nova Scotia, Canada
Circa 1960

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

Notes:

1.  Quote:

     King, Stephen.  On Writing:  A Memoir of the Craft.  New York:  Scribner, 2000.

     Print.  pp. 145.

2.  Personal Note:  I'm traveling and dealing with multiple appointments before cataract

      surgery in the near future.  My Northern Posts will have to resume on November 10th.

  

Barb and I

Westport, Brier Island, Nova Scotia, Canada
Summer 2015

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved