Happy Birthday Dear Blog

It’s a year since I joined Twitter and started my tree house website. My friend still loves to remind me of our conversation – one of many in the same vein – shortly before this event, “Trish, you need broadband, it’s much faster.” “Nonsense, I don’t need that internet stuff, hardly ever use the thing.”

The worm not only turned, it spun on its tail.

Blogging has gone hand in hand with Tweeting, so I’ll begin there. Starting with two followers, and following nine, Twitter seemed a sedate place. I remember, after much agonising thought, bravely putting up my first tweet – fortunately I can’t remember what it was – and the fearful excitement of seeing it on the screen for ‘everyone’ to see (failing to realise it would be seen only by my two followers). I went off to make a celebratory cup of tea to calm my nerves. When I returned, my tweet was gone – betrayed! It was found later, of course, by scrolling down, but I’d learnt the ephemeral nature of Twitter. Now, it is more a torrent than a stream.

It’s been a wonderful year: I’ve made real friends, useful connections, learnt a huge amount from links and tweets, have nearly 2,000 Tweeps – real ones, no bots – and follow about the same number.

Those first two followers have had a successful year, too, and I celebrate them here as a ‘thank you’ for their support and encouragement of a rooky.

The first is Lorraine Mace, (@lomace), author, writing tutor and ‘critiquer extraordinaire’.Her critique service and Flash 500 competitions have ballooned in the last twelve months, becoming a truly international affair, and she added a new humorous verse competition which is proving equally popular.

But the biggest drum roll is for the publication of Lorraine’s first crime novel, Bad Moon Rising, published by Crooked {Cat} Publishing under the pseudonym Frances di Plino (@FrancesdiPlino). This is a gripping psychological thriller, written with all the literary flare and technique that Lorraine has at her fingertips and shares so readily in her wonderful critiques. I can tell you, she is an excellent editor, too.

My second follower was The Writers College, (@Writerscollege), tweeted by the principal Nichola Meyer. The college operates in South Africa, New Zealand and the UK, with published and award-winning course tutors.

In the last twelve months, student enrolment in New Zealnad has doubled, and judging from the college newsletter, their students are getting published and winning prizes. One of the reasons might be Nichola’s innovative approach to keeping up with new markets: new courses in the last year included ‘Scriptwriting for Games and Online Video’. During the year, Nichola invited me to write a series of posts for the college blog; one of them, ‘Flash Writing’ was later included in the study notes for their new flash writing course.

(Links for both Flash 500 and The Writers College are on my blog roll, on the right.)

So, if you are followed on Twitter by someone with only two followers, and they look halfway human, please give them a leg up and follow them back; it could lead to a mutually productive relationship.

I want to celebrate new Tweeps, too, but how to do that without making a huge list, or leaving out lovely people?

My solution is to mention just one, who will represent all the wonderful Tweeps I chat to and exchange links with each day. That iconic Tweep is George Allen, (@thewhitespike), a delightful Scotsman. He is a good representative: kind and generous, responsive, endlessly encouraging, interested in everything and everyone, he follows a wide range of fascinating Tweeps, and he has a blog that shares his personal journey – learning about Shakespeare. It worries him that he struggles so hard to write his posts; he has yet to realise how much all writers struggle – keep at it George.

It was from following Twitter links that I learnt about blogging.

I read everything I could find, and the more I read, the more formidable the task looked: it was going to be a full-time job. That could not be. So I asked myself four questions:

Q. What is my focus?

A. I am a writer. OK. Be a writer who shares her thoughts, experiences and work on her blog, not a full-blown blogger with all the networking and frenetic posting that involves.

Q. What commitment can I make, consistently, regularly?

A. With a little more discipline, weekly: often enough to generate interest and to give me rhythm.

Q. Received wisdom says I should become known for one subject, so what will I post about?

A. That’s not me: my interests are wide; my mind is a rag-bag of things I like to relate. OK. Make it like a magazine, articles, short stories, pictures.

Q. What is my goal for identifying topics, and writing posts?

A. I want to entertain and inform, while promoting my writing and my books. Then the posts must be good quality: imagine writing for the grittiest, grumpiest editor, like [Deleted! Ed.]

Here I am, 56 posts later and only you can judge whether I have done a good enough job, but I am enjoying it and that is important, too.

 Finally, my own big achievement during the past twelve months.

Through Twitter and blogging I met my ideal publisher, Mike Hyman from Collca, (@collca). My proposal for an ebook about spectacular Easter rituals – the Moryonan – in the small town of Mogpog in the Philippines, became the first title in a new series of BiteSize Travel books: Masks of the Moryons: Easter Week in Mogpog. More information at http://collca.com/motm

On 20 April, Collca published my second ebook for the series: Journey in Bhutan: Himalayan trek in the Kingdom of the Thunder Dragon, a much longer book but an absolute joy to write, re-living the amazing experience of being in Bhutan. More information at http://collca.com/jib

In preparation for the next title, I am now ploughing through 500+ pages of single spaced, badly typed journal entries made during five years living in Papua New Guinea.

 Whoever their publishers are, all writers have to promote their work these days.

It can feel awkward, embarrassing, but I’ve learnt three important lessons in the process that I will share with you:

 * be creative in blogging and tweeting about our books,

* give something of value to those who read our posts and tweets, and

* build relationships and promote the work of others in the spirit of reciprocity.

Guest blogging is hard work but it achieves all three. A big thank you to the author friends listed here, who invited me to appear on their blogs:

Terre Britton (@terrebritton) on her blog Creative Flux – an article: How I Survived Inside a Crocodile http://ow.ly/atFY5

Morgen Bailey (@morgenwriteruk), an “author spotlight” on Morgen Bailey’s Writing Blog – http://wp.me/p18Ztn-2AF

Jane Isaac (@JaneIsaacAuthor) on her blog Caffeine’s Not a crime – “author interview”, Author Interview: Meet Trish Nicholson

Gabrielle Kimm (@gabrielle_kimm) on her sumptious Renaissance website – “author interview” http://gabriellekimm.co.uk/2012/05/13/interview-with-trish-nicholson/

Lorraine Mace (@lomace) on her blog  http://thewritersabcchecklist.blogspot.com/2012/05/writing-life-experiences.html?spref=tw   – an article: Writing Personal Experience

And thank you to the on-line travel community GotSaga Travel (@GotSaga) for inviting me to post an article on their website: 10 Wonderful Things to do and see in Bhutan http://ow.ly/at021

I had to celebrate my blog birthday this week, but next week I’ll post more Bhutan pictures and chat – promise.