Sarah's writing journal

The one advantage of the tension I feel between writing and teaching is that when the teaching is temporarily over - for holidays - I feel a burst of creativity and manage to get into the flow of writing. This Christmas holidays I've been hard at work finishing my phd thesis, which, I'm SO proud to say, I've just printed off for final reading. I've also been searching on the internet, and found other writing blogs, which have led to more websites, and more, and more. It's so inspiring to see how creative people are, but more than that, their generosity in sharing. I've followed leads to some fantastic stories, beautiful pictures, and fun. After this, I wasn't surprised to see a report in the paper that women are using the internet more than men. When I tracked back on what sites had impressed me, I was amazed to see most were created by women. I wonder why this is?

So here are some of the sites I've been loving ...

Ros Barber is a brilliant poet, author of the collection How Things Are on Thursday. She's currently writing a novel and keeps progress on http://shallowlands.blogspot.com

Clare Dudman is a funny and clever novelist, author of 99 Reasons and Wegener's Jigsaw. Her blog contains her writing progress and also interviews with other writers. http://keeperofthesnails.blogspot.com

I'm a bit worried I'm stalking Myfanwy, but I came across her work from the website Smokelong after I received a rejection email for one of my stories from the editor and forwarded it to a friend with the mature comment: 'Bum'. Yes, you've guessed, I in fact pressed reply and swore at the editor instead! She was surprised but gracious, and when I searched shamefaced through archives, I came across Myfanwy's work and looked at her website. It's brilliant and interesting, and I've spent far too long there following up Myfanwy's links. http://myfanwy.blogspot.com

Kay has been my friend since we were 11 and we've seen eachother through good times and bad. Less recently though, as she moved to Germany some time ago with her family. She'd be the last person to admit it, but she's one of the bravest and most accomplished people I know and I admire her so much for starting again in a new country, learning the language and becoming such a valuable part of the community. Her blogspot is on www.diaryofahousefrau.blogspot.com

And my writing prompt for yesterday was secrets. Today is the title of Paul Durcan's poetry collection: The Art of Life.