tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5673419201558176692024-03-13T18:29:03.267+00:00Life, yoga and other adventuresA writer's life for meJulia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.comBlogger646125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-28926097853847441292023-12-09T10:18:00.002+00:002023-12-09T10:18:54.918+00:00What I said to the Planning Inspectorate I was one of the nearly 40 people who spoke up in defence of Weekley Hall Wood and Meadow this week. This is what I said.<!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-17803186799429002102023-08-18T11:54:00.000+00:002023-08-18T11:54:33.434+00:00Betty and Pauline: what happened nextIf you were one of those lovely people who bought a copy of my second short story collection, Tasting Strangers, perhaps you agreed with the reviewer who said that some of the stories could have been longer. Well, if you remember 'A Merry Dance', which related the tale of sisters Betty and Pauline and their adventures at sea on the Marianna Grande, I hope you enjoy Part Two of the story, Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-28138508782816146812023-02-17T14:08:00.000+00:002023-02-17T14:08:20.146+00:00Last week I gave a talk to a local WI group about how to be
a rebel. Here in Kettering, we have an ongoing
battle to prevent half a dozen warehouses being built on an area of woodland
and a wildflower meadow, and that was the starting point for my presentation.
If you want to know more about the Newton Rebellion and the fight to Save
Weekley Hall Wood, click here.
Then I segued into an Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-30376032173526752492023-02-10T11:07:00.002+00:002023-02-10T11:07:46.072+00:00Back in the saddleFailed already, then. I was planning to post a blog every Friday (or as near as I could manage), but have slipped after only three weeks. There are mitigating circumstances, though.January went by in a blur of campaigning for the local by-election. I was lucky enough to go to the count, and it was fascinating to see the democratic process at work, as bundles of voting papers were opened, unfoldedJulia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-91885301669882581732023-01-14T09:41:00.000+00:002023-01-14T09:41:44.706+00:00Out on the mean streetsAnyone else signed up to Country Walking magazine's regular challenge to walk 1000 miles in a year? It's not as daunting as it sounds: 2.75 miles a day and you've got it in the bag. Easy, if you say it quickly enough.I've made a good start. I've already walked 60 miles since New Year's Day, because I've been out canvassing. There's a local by-election coming up at the start of February, so I've Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-73213142546108711752023-01-06T17:12:00.000+00:002023-01-06T17:12:33.352+00:00What you will Just before Christmas, I was out delivering community newsletters. People were beginning to put up lights outside their houses, and inside I could see trees being decorated and people wrapping presents. Now we're at Twelfth Night, and those same houses are looking bare, with just the occasional deflated Santa clinging to a chimney pot. As usual, I haven't made any New Year Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-77300660446083532982022-12-30T13:16:00.001+00:002022-12-30T14:43:39.368+00:00Board but not bored I'm surprised and delighted by the resurgence of the humble board game. I was brought up playing Snakes & Ladders and Ludo, Dizzy Bugs, Mousetrap and Scrabble. My children were initiated into the ways of the Draughts board long before they could ride a bike, and even now on family occasions we will gather around the dining table for competitive games and a little gentle bickering over Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-88474505463830390962020-07-17T15:19:00.000+00:002020-07-17T15:19:29.686+00:00Is the blogging party over? Take two.Well, I guess I've had that question answered.
If you want me, you can find me:
On Facebook - @JuliaThorleyAuthor
On Twitter - @JThorleyAuthor
On my website - www.juliathorley.com
In the 3P Publishing bookshop
On Amazon
Before I go, though, let me just say that while
I didn't win the Dickens Fellowship competition to create a modern-day
character in the style of the great man, my entry - 'Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-82816096129525723172020-07-06T10:12:00.002+00:002020-07-06T10:12:53.512+00:00Is the blogging party over?
From my first blog post
My fellow blogger Susan Jones has here posed the question: has blogging gone out of fashion? I've been wondering the same thing. I've been at it since 2011, with varying degrees of enthusiasm, and while my words have never set the world on fire I know from the stats that people have been reading them and occasionally been moved to comment.
I blog for three Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-50877861774560656812020-06-26T13:05:00.000+00:002020-06-26T13:05:51.981+00:00String theory
Apparently it was National Writing Day on Wednesday. Oops. I must have missed that memo.
Weighed down by heat and apathy, I haven't written much at all this week, other than to put the finishing touches to a couple of stories I wanted to send to two competitions. Instead, I've been having a bit of a clearout, during the course of which at the back of a drawer I discovered a folder labelled: Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-81390241310401508612020-06-15T15:51:00.000+00:002020-06-15T15:51:49.057+00:00We're all mad here!
The Mad Hatter*
Madness, people, that's what's on my mind, as it were. Not that I think I'm mad, you understand - would I know? - it's just that the world has gone a bit crazy. You don't need me to tell you why.
Have you been watching the National Theatre At Home? What a treat these YouTube presentations have been, although I did baulk at Coriolanus. The current production, availableJulia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-12518924532703844432020-06-10T11:57:00.001+00:002020-06-10T13:26:40.229+00:00'Tasting Strangers'
A friend in real life has just asked me if I'm keeping healthy and sane, to which I answered, 'Healthy? Yes. Sane? Most days!'
With all the doom and gloom that's going on in the public world and with the quiet, personal troubles that many of us are enduring, I feel rather awkward about announcing the publication of my new book: but here goes.
Tasting Strangers is a collection of Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-19018029420597424342020-06-02T15:02:00.000+00:002020-06-02T15:02:13.312+00:00Digging inOur allotment has received so much attention in the last three months that it looks as though it has been Hoovered. All but one of the beds are full, the ridings have been mown: even the shed has been tidied. It's an ill wind, as they say. There are quite a few relatively new folks up there whom we old hands have been watching from a respectful distance as they get to grips with the enormity of Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-7047280555207664062020-05-26T13:00:00.000+00:002020-05-26T13:00:51.838+00:00In praise of short stories
I do love short stories, whether published in a magazine, an anthology or a collection. I enjoy them if they're written by people I know and by authors new to me. I know (because I write them) that it takes just as much skill to write short stories as long ones, and certainly a different set of skills.
The books pictured are just a few of the short-story books I have. Amongst the others are Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-45790833098891009762020-05-19T16:36:00.000+00:002020-05-19T16:36:09.870+00:00You've let me down, you've let yourself down
I rarely struggle for something to write on this blog, but since my last post I've not felt inclined. I've been in a bit of a grump, and I'm sure - well, I know from what people have said - that I'm not alone.
For the last few weeks, I've almost enjoyed the lockdown: not the effects on health and the appalling statistics and the incompetence of the government, but the cleaner air, the increaseJulia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-11245055935423225252020-05-04T11:16:00.000+00:002020-05-04T11:16:16.887+00:00One thing leads to another
A favourite film in the Thorley household is Field of Dreams. Even if you've never watched it, you might have heard people quoting the line 'If you build it, he will come.' It's a lovely film and if you have time (!), I recommend you take a look. The film is great, but the book on which it is based is even better: Shoeless Joe by W P Kinsella. On the edition that I have there is a quote on the Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-28415866684619358942020-04-30T13:36:00.002+00:002020-04-30T13:36:29.104+00:00What time is it?
Time is a funny
old thing. One of the reasons we have station clocks is because in 1840 the Great Western Railway introduced so-called railway time to overcome
the problems caused by each town in the expanding railway network having its own
local mean time. The clocks showed passengers what this unified time was.
I don't know
about you, but time has lost all meaning in our house. It is Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-74196138835460290272020-04-21T14:57:00.000+00:002020-04-21T15:15:04.472+00:00Wanted: short stories for broadcast
You know how I've read out a couple of my short stories for my publisher's podcast? Well, now 3P Publishing would like to offer this opportunity to other writers and is looking for tales that take somewhere between five and ten minutes to read aloud.
There is no payment, I'm afraid, but it might be a good way to showcase to a wider audience a story that you've had published already. You will Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-12220435399891607362020-04-18T11:12:00.000+00:002020-04-18T11:12:07.104+00:00'Father, whom our founder worshipped...'
I don't know who drew the picture
I should have been at a school reunion this weekend, but obviously it's not happening. I've been thinking about my old school, though, and its motto 'Nisi Dominus Frustra', which we all translated as 'My God, I'm so frustrated!' I can still remember all the words to the school hymn - I'll spare you - and have just located my teenage face on a grainy Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-10018739403018034982020-04-15T10:25:00.000+00:002020-04-15T10:25:27.861+00:00It's been a while
Eleven days since my last post: good grief! But I've been busy sharpening pencils, hoovering the kitchen floor, walking around the garden making plans - you know how it is.
Actually, there have been things going on. By some miracle I've picked up a couple of new editing jobs, for which much thanks. I see from the latest Martin Lewis newsletter that in a quick survey for his MSE website 25% of Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-77060549726479746332020-04-04T11:11:00.000+00:002020-04-04T11:11:14.537+00:00Don't let the trees obscure the wood
Did my UK friends watch Have I Got News For You last night? (Overseas pals: this is a satirical news-based panel show on the BBC.) In case you're saving it to watch later I won't give anything away, other than to say that it was good to be reminded that there is other stuff going on in the world besides You Know What.
One thing that's cropped up on Facebook and Twitter over the last few days Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-57587745702144108292020-04-02T12:10:00.000+00:002020-04-02T12:10:05.855+00:00Bedtime stories
Photo: morguefile.com
A few weeks ago, I went along to 3P Publishing to record a podcast about my writing life. It hasn't been broadcast yet - I'll let you know when it is, of course - but in the meantime, the 3P team have started another stream of podcasts, namely a bedtime story every night at 9pm. On Tuesday, one of my stories was broadcast, Scoring An Own Goal in Tennis, which I recorded Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-8758337597489183662020-03-26T12:32:00.000+00:002020-03-26T12:32:32.926+00:00You've got to laugh
Out on my permitted walk yesterday, I saw a woman dusting her garage door. I fear for her sanity.
The trouble is, if she's already bored enough to being doing that, how will she cope in, say, a month's time?
I look forward to passing her again in due course and catching her cutting the lawn with nail scissors.
Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-27018353718717938662020-03-18T15:40:00.000+00:002020-03-18T15:40:47.291+00:00How long would four slices of ham last you?
It occurred to me this morning as I was spreading butter on my toast that I might be a bit greedy when it comes to dairy goodies. You should see me with a block of Cheddar: not pretty.
For reasons that I don't remember, I have an old food coupon book in a folder labelled 'Important Odds & Sods' - see pic - so I dug it out and looked up Second World War rations online. Good lord - how did Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-567341920155817669.post-26238472484086964102020-03-08T10:54:00.000+00:002020-03-08T10:54:56.690+00:00Chilling memories
One of the tasks I undertake for the monthly journal of a professional institute is to sub a list of people who have been members of the organisation for 20, 30, 40 and 50 years or more. Those who have been a member for 20 years joined in 2000. This can't be right, because surely the Seventies are only 30 years away.
The Seventies are on my mind at the moment because I've been invited to a Julia Thorleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00485301135194085398noreply@blogger.com2