Every year, the Ottawa Public Library holds a youth writing contest for which hundreds of local kids write stories, poems, and comics. The winners and honourable mentions are published in the annual anthology, Pot-pourri. But the contest's title -- Awesome Authors -- applies to all of those who enter. The contest deadline for 2019 has… Continue reading Awesome Authors 2019 – Decision Time
I’ll be giving a writing workshop tomorrow at the Carlingwood Library to help kids aged 9-12 prepare their stories for the Ottawa Public Library’s Awesome Authors Contest. We’ll do two story-building exercises: one on Character, and one on Setting. For those who can’t be there, here is my Setting handout, with a short version of… Continue reading Young Writers Workshop: Setting Exercise
I posted a motivational blurb on the SCBWI Canada East website today, about slogging it through the last days of November's novel-writing challenge. I have never actually made the NaNoWriMo journey, meaning I've never done a start-to-finish draft in the month of November. I've started books, and I've finished books, but never both in November.… Continue reading NaNoWriMo on the Slow Track
It's the first day of Inktober. Illustrators know this. The rest of us might not -- but we should, all of us. Because Inktober is awesome. And it's for everyone. Inktober began in 2009, by artist Jake Parker, as a challenge to improve drawing skills and practices. The gist is simple: you make an ink drawing… Continue reading Inktober for those afraid to Draw
My tiny home office was featured in this week's "Writing Spaces," a regular blog post from The New Quarterly. This is a fabulous weekly feature from TNQ that offers a peek into the working spaces of each issue's writers, along with inspiring anecdotes and tips from the authors. Definitely a blog worth following. My writing… Continue reading Writing Spaces
Catherine Austen 