Welcome to another Weekend Coffee Share.
If we were having coffee today, I’d be asking for a hammock for my head. The Blogging A-Z Challenge has been incredibly intense and my brain is simultaneously firing on overdrive and completely exhausted, even though that makes little sense. When you’ve been writing Letters to Dead Poets for a month and even receiving replies, nothing makes much sense.
I’ll be putting out an Alphabet Soup every Sunday, which will be listed my challenge posts to date and I encourage you to do the same. It can be difficult navigate your way through missed posts. Here’s the link: Alphabet Soup

Pictured with Thomas & Meg Keneally at an author lunch, Pearl Beach.
Yesterday involved another brain blow out when I attended a literary lunch with Australian authors Thomas Keneally and daughter, Meg. While you might not recognise Keneally by name, he wrote Schindler’s Ark, which became Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster movie, Schindler’s List.
Not unsurprisingly, Keneally is an incredibly intelligent man with a deep social conscience and is also a flag-waving Republican. What did surprise me, however, was his incredible wit and humour and his passion for Rugby League. I felt so incredibly blown away meeting this inspiring man, who has well and truly stuck to the road less travelled and turned it into the yellow brick road. Actually, on second thoughts, he would’ve made an excellent Wizard of Oz hiding behind the curtain fiddling with the controls…no doubt with a huge grin and his gutsy laugh.
However, as much as I was thrilled to meet and listen to Thomas Keneally, I was riveted listening to his daughter, Meg, who is co-authoring this series of novels with her Dad. As a writer beavering away to get my first book out the door, I really appreciated her insights into her own journey. Just because her father is a famously successful novelist, there were no guarantees that she’d follow magically in his footsteps. As with any kid with a successful parent, it’s very hit and miss. Moreover, as she said, writing is a very solitary process, so it’s not like she’s been looking over his shoulder all her life!
Meg Keneally is an experienced, successful journalist and a Mum. Some years ago, she apparently wrote a few novels which she said wouldn’t see the light of day. That didn’t surprise me as a lot of writers have a few of those stashed in the bottom drawer. She went on, however, to explain that she was “half-baked” when she wrote them. Her choice of words immediately captured my attention. These are words I’ve used to describe my writing process, although I leave my stuff “to stew”. However, I’d never thought that I needed to cook or bake as a writer and it was only once I was fully baked, that I could finally pull off “my book”. Yet, this made a lot of sense!
After having a number of serious efforts at my “Book Project”, I’ve finally found my voice writing these Letters to Dead Poets. Indeed, I can feel that sense of galloping hooves in my head. There’s incredible momentum. Indeed, it feels like I’m on the homeward strait, even though I’m only just through the gate. I’ve only made it through H.
Why does this writing game have to be so hard? Why couldn’t that book just fall out of the sky and into my lap?
I know! I know! If it were that simple, it wouldn’t be worth reading. Or, would it?!! Am I making it all too hard?
As you can see, I’m well and truly immersed in my writing and making great leaps ahead… just in time for the kids be on school holidays. Now, I’m having to switch hats and go into the entertainment business. Not that I can or want to drop the writing project altogether. That’s the beauty of the A-Z Challenge. It keeps you in the flow so you can actually produce a body of work.
When it comes to what’s going on beyond these four walls, I have absolutely no idea. I’ll be rising to the surface 1st May and until then, the world can wait. At least, I hope it can!
If you are doing the A-Z Challenge, how are you going? Do you have a theme? Please share your links!
Hope you’ve had a great week and an even better one awaits!
The Weekend Coffee Share is hosted by Part Time Monster. You can join this week’s Coffee Share on her blog or by clicking on the “Linkup Linky“. It’s a fabulous blogging community!
Best wishes,
Rowena