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Jan 05 2014

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My 2014 reading list

Hello Readers!

Here is a list of books that I plan to read in 2014.

There is a mix of Inspirational, educational, non-fiction and fiction books in the list, as I like to mix it up!

What do you plan to read this year?

The Power of Now – A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment – by Eckhart Tolle

The God Species – How the planet can survive the age of humans – by Mark Lynas

The Marshall Plan for Getting Your Novel Published – by Evan Marshall

The Writer’s Digest Handbook of Novel Writing – by Tom Clark

Beautiful – by Katie Piper

Trafficked – by Sophie Hayes

The Wild Life – by John Lewis-Stempel

Innocence – by Dean Koontz

The Tiger in the Smoke – by Margery Allingham

Die for You – by Lisa Unger

Black Out – by Lisa Unger

Man and Boy – by Tony Parsons

Death on the Nile – by Agatha Christie

The People Next Door – by Christopher Ransom

Everything’s Eventual – by Stephen King

Never Knowing – by Chevy Stevens

The Double Bind – by Chris Bohjalian

Revolutionary Road – by Richard Yates

Never Tell – by Claire Seeber

Blueeyedboy – by Joanne Harris

The Scold’s Bride – by Minette Walters

The Fifth Victim – by Beverly Barton

The Book of Tomorrow – by Cecelia Ahern

Songbird – by Josephine Cox

A Streetcar Named Desire – by Tennessee Williams

The Cloning of Joanna May – by Fay Weldon

The Year of Magical Thinking – by Joan Didion

Utterly Monkey – by Nick Laird

A Kind of Intimacy – by Jenn Ashworth

All Fur Coat – by Andrew Homes

The Host – by Stephanie Meyer

West End Girls – by Barbara Tate

Call The Midwife – by Jennifer Worth

Northanger Abbey – by Jane Austen

Northanger Abbey Study Notes and Exercises on the novel – Rare Pamphlet published 1968

Jo Nesbo The Harry Hole Collection;

The Bat (The First Harry Hole Case)

Cockroaches 1998 (An Early Harry Hole Case)

The Redbreast (Oslo Sequence 1)

Nemesis (Oslo Sequence 2)

The Devil’s Star (Oslo Sequence 3)

The Redeemer (Oslo Sequence 4)

The Snowman (Oslo Sequence 5)

The Leopard (Oslo Sequence 6)

Phantom (Oslo Sequence 7)

Police (Oslo Sequence 8)

Headhunters – Other

Vintage Collection of stories by Robert Louis Stevenson, including;

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

The Body Snatcher

A Lodging for the Night

Markheim

Thrawn Janet

The Misadventures of John Nicholson

Tagged 2014, Authors, Books, Challenge, Educational, Fiction, Inspirational, Learning, Leisure, List, Non-Fiction, Novels, Reading, To-read

Oct 06 2013

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Today I have given my ‘Alittlebirdtweets’ Facebook page some much needed love and attention! Up until now, it only received updates via ‘automatic links from posts’ that I made on my blog. But, now I intend to visit this page once a week, with something new to sit alongside these links; whether it be a rambling of my days events, or a newly-discovered inspiration.

I have created a new photo album on my Facebook page titled ‘Photo Flashes’; which will serve as an inspirational gallery for my writings, and also provide readers with a visual insight into the type of things that I ‘see’ when I write. I will likely add a comment of reference to each photo to help explain the reason for its inspiration.

If you would like to follow my ‘Photo Flashes’ album, or any other updates made on my page then please use the following link to ‘like’ my page.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Alittlebirdtweets/119259031513618?id=119259031513618&sk=photos_stream

I am always on the lookout for new visual material to spark-off a new story in me. If you have any images that you think I’d like, then please get in touch. Or, if you’d like me to attempt a flash fiction based on a photo then let me know and I’ll see what I can come up with!

Wishing you all a wonderful and inspirational weekend!

Donna x

Tagged Alittlebirdtweets, Facebook, Fiction, Images, Inspirations, Photo, Photo Flashes, Photograph, Prompts, Psychological-horror, Psychological-thriller, Writing, Writing prompts

Jun 01 2013

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‘a little bird tweets’ First Birthday!

Well it is a year today since my flash fiction blog ‘a little bird tweets’ began! Where has the time gone?! It seems like only yesterday I was busy experimenting with template designs, customizing; and trying to get that final website design that I thought would visualize and sum up the genre and theme of my future flash-fictions.

The last year has been a wonderfully inspiring journey. I have met some truly gifted people here in the WordPress community; gifted writers, poets and bloggers with so many different styles and ‘ways with words’. It really is a pleasure to be surrounded by a community that not only enlightens me with their reads, but also inspires me to push forward with my own writing. Without WordPress and its community, my writing would feel very empty. So I truly thank you all for having taken the time to visit, read and provide feedback on my work.

This week I have been reading the latest issue of ‘Writers Forum’; and inside was an article on ‘how to publish your own e-book’. My eyes lit up like candles when I first glimpsed the header, as I had never even given this a thought before. Thoughts such as ‘produce a collection of flash-fiction, a short story, a cover design’ started whirling around my head; and they have now found a comfortable dwelling in my mind; and I doubt they are going to be re-possessed anytime soon! So now I am pondering over the idea of creating a collection of flashes; or may be even developing one of my already published WordPress flashes and turning it into a longer ‘short story’. What do you think?

Shall I create an e-book collection of flash fiction. or one short story?
If I were to develop one of my flash fictions into a short story, then which one would you like to know more about? Are there any characters that grabbed or intrigued you that you’d like to see ‘come back to life’?
Shall I create an entirely new story?

I look forward to being inspired by you. With Thanks!

A link to 23 flash fictions that I have created in the past year.

https://alittlebirdtweets.com/flash-fiction-4/

Tagged e-book, First Birthday, Flash fiction, Short Story, Thanks

Mar 16 2013

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Half a World Away

He staggers up the path to the front door and bellows an incoherent song into the dark silent streets; and she listens to him from their bed. Her body is tense and her mouth is dry from the dread of him bringing home the fighting spirit of the pub. Her mind races with memories of drunken insults, of stings of pain inflicted upon her from the fury of his hand, of bruised skin, of being knocked into unconsciousness.

Shall I pretend I am sleeping? Shall I confront him with the little strength I have left? She thinks.

He ascends the stairs to the top landing where he stops, sways and hiccups; and she observes him through the gap in the door.

I will confront him. I will no longer be afraid of him. I will tell him that I don’t fear him, that I no longer love him. I will tell him I am leaving tomorrow, that it’s over.

He enters the bedroom and switches on the light. She observes his face, his hollow cheeks, his enflamed eyes, and her thoughts and intentions dissipate, and her mouth fails to communicate the words she longs to speak.

He approaches the bed and raises his hand, as he finishes off the violence he began eight hours earlier. She closes her eyes, blanks out the pain and pushes her thoughts away from her sunken life into one that is half a world away.

Tagged Bed, Bedroom, Domestic Violence, Drunk, fear, Half a World Away, Insult, Landing, Pain, Psychological-horror, Psychological-thriller, Pub, Up to 250 Words, Violence

Jun 01 2012

Hello and Welcome!

Today (well yesterday now, as its 00:16am!) is a rather special day for two reasons;

1) 100 RPM – an ebook is published and available to buy on Amazon.

2) A Little Bird Tweets blog is launched to the world!

Over the last week, I have been glued to this blog; working on the website design and the static pages content; about me, contact me, published fiction and shop. The numerous design themes that WordPress offer is amazing and I spent a good couple of days playing around with themes, images, headers and backgrounds – it was so much fun! I have to say, I am pleasantly surprised with the overall result, what do you think?

Now that the initial design and page set-up is complete, the next step is to get writing. As you can see, I am yet to post Flash Fiction and Creative Writing posts…BUT I have a few ideas in mind and tomorrow you shall see the first couple of pieces. I am so excited about meeting the WordPress community and sharing thoughts and ideas with like-minded people.

For now, I bid you goodnight!