Genre Favorites Blogfest, September 17, 2012 - Alex J Cavanaugh

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Alex J Cavanaugh has the simplest of blogfests, so very easy to enter, and he even reminds you so you don't forget. It sounds easy to pick your favourite genre of anything, but when it comes down to it, it's jolly hard. I still think of favourite songs I didn't think of for his Favourite Music Blogfest. Anyway, they are always heaps of fun and informative at the same time helping us to get to know more about each other in this great blogging community. Here's the guff:

Genre Favorites Blogfest, September 17, 2012

One blogfest, four favorites!

List your favorite genre of:

Movie

Music

Books

And a guilty pleasure genre from any of the three categories!

My favourite genre - Movie

Drama with a historical and romantic element - a la Gone With the Wind - in case you don't know this one (yeah, highly unlikely) - it is a sizzling love story set against the backdrop of the American Civil War based on one of the biggest selling books of all time by Margaret Mitchell, American author and journalist. So many timeless themes...

**

My favourite genre - Music

Industrial Rock a la U2 - I love their lyrics, their music and their overall political, at times 'save the world' style. What other high school garage band is still going strong after all these years? I've visited their hometown on the outskirts of Dublin, Ireland, and I can see some of where their inspiration came from. Seeing some of their album cover settings was pretty awesome for this die hard fan.

**

My favourite genre - Book

Realistic Fiction a la Jodi Picoult - I love so many book genres, there' s very few I don't read and enjoy, but my favourite will always remain big, fat, print books of realistic contemporary fiction exploring the issues humans are grappling with. Jodi seems to keep one step ahead of the NEXT BIG THING and researches and writes a powerful story every year. I also love how she travels to Australia, so far away for a 'mom', on a regular basis, to visit her large fan base Down Under (and sell the odd book or two).

Jodi and me at Noosa when Change of Heart was released

Guilty Pleasure for any category -  Movie - BLACK SWAN

2010 American psychological thriller and horror film

**

I love thrillers in both Movies and Books, but not usually horror. This was the most amazing movie I'll never forget! The horror was handled lightly until the very end...

** I have no right to use the  images ((slaps hand)) marked with ** so I will be deleting them as soon as this blogfest is over! Do be careful of any stolen images you may have used for this blogfest. Hard to source free images for genres.

• What is your favourite genre of Movie, Music or Book?

Click on the badge at the top to go to more entries...Thanks Captain for the opportunity to wax lyrical about my favourites.

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For any writer - prose or poetry - who'd like to write 400 words or less for the next RomanticFridayChallenge, here is the prompt and this Friday is the day! Hope to see you there...

for more details of this and projected prompts, go to the Challenges Page...

TODAY on RomanticFridayWriters we have an Author Guest Post from much-awarded author Linda Gillard. Pay us a visit to learn more about where characters come from...

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Stylish Blogger Award - what is style? Who has it? Do you?

Thanks to Writers Bloc NZ for the Stylish Blogger Award. This is the first time I've come across this award and think it's pretty cool! For this award you have to tell 7 things about yourself, so here goes...

No, no, no, I don't want to do the 7 things about me. I don't think I'm boring but boring people don't know they're boring do they, so just in case, I thought I'd look at the concept of style and what it means to me.


1. Some people are born with style.

The person who comes to mind to me is someone you don't know - my father. He always oozed style. I'm sure he was the original Horse Whisperer - he could work magic with horses. This was in spite of the fact that when he was 21 he was nearly killed by a bolting stallion, and next day his hair started to go grey overnight. True story. So for the rest of his life he had a shock of thick grey hair which set off the Akubra hat he always wore. In America he would have been called a cowboy, but in Oz men and women in Akubra hats, riding boots, R.M.Williams trousers, big horse buckles, spurs and western shirts are just called horsemen/stockmen/Rodeo men. L R Gilroy certainly had style. We buried his beloved Akubra with him.

2. Some people acquire style.

Think of a gauche teenager turned into one of the most stylish celebs in the world and you have Lady Di, Princess Di, Princess of Wales. 

Think of an ordinary, fresh-faced Aussie girl from Tassie, who, through (it is rumoured) yoghurt and yoga, turned herself into a pencil-slim Princess of Style. Hats off to Princess Mary of Denmark and congrats on the twins! 

3. Music is full of style/s.

Rock n Roll, Rhythm n Blues, Blues, Jazz, Country, C and W, Hip Hop, Rap, Grind, Pop, Motown, Anthem Rock, Industrial Rock, Classical, Big Band, World, Gospel, Soul...on and on, so many different styles. I'll bet you can think of a ton more. I don't love them all, but I'm rather wild over Anthem Rock, Bono style. Don't forget Alex J Cavanaugh's Music Countdown (Top 10 Songs of all time) blogfest on Jan 24.

4. Times of crises bring out peoples' style.

Aussies are stereotypically laid back, apathetic, friendly, good-time Charlies, mind-your-own-business sorts of people. Bring on a disaster, then Aussies en masse have style - they look at what needs doing, whether it's grabbing a drowning person, looking for survivors, or rebuilding. They don't whinge, they just roll up their sleeves, grab a bucket, a mop, a shovel, and apply elbow grease where it's needed. I'm proud to be a stylish Aussie. One story about the floods you won't hear as it's not well known - during the horrendous Toowoomba inland tsunami a lady in a small car was being swept away. A guy in a huge semi tugged on his steering wheel with all his might and drove into the flood in front of her. She stopped in the side of his truck, unhurt. That driver had heaps of style.


5.Writers have style (or they'd better!)

If you weren't born with your writer's style it can be acquired. Plenty of style tomes out there, grab a few and study them. You also need to study the style guidelines before you send your work off, as this varies from editor to editor. Writer's style can take years to acquire, but you won't be successful until you find your own style and let your unique voice come through. Some of us are still working on it.

6. Bloggers have style.


Don't we all love to discover a blogger who oozes style - someone who writes from their heart, spreads joy arounds the 'sphere, and even emails if you've been 'off the air' for awhile.It was a happy day for me when I discovered blogging. Now I think my life would be so much poorer without it. Sure, I'd have more time to clean house, shop, work on my WIP etc but what is more important? Let's all be sylish bloggers.

7. Whoever thought up the idea of the 100 Stories for Queensland has style in spades.

All donated stories which are accepted go into an anthology to raise funds for Queensland flood victims. Show your style by submitting a story (click on the Proud to be Aussie link in my sidebar, top right, for guidelines.) Thank you to those who are spreading the word.

So thank you Writers Block NZ for this award. Instead of passing it on to 10 Stylish bloggers, I'd like you to accept this award if you enter a story in the above anthology. That will fulfill the criteria for me.

See, I hope you thought this was more interesting than a list of facts about moi. You still learnt some things about me and the people I admire.

BTW, if you haven't attended the inaugural Publication Party (post 2 below) hurry! Draw for the first week's prizes closes Monday 8pm NY time. Clarissa Draper is the guest of honour at the second session, Wednesday. Don't miss it!

Denise :)

Who am I? If I were a season I'd be Spring. How about you?

This is how I'm feeling today on a lovely Spring Sunday. It's NaNo month, so here is a blog entry I've had in the editing suite for sometime. An easy, yet fun post for those of us who must post!

I saw this on a Writer's Ramblings some time ago, and I've filled it out myself. I'd love to hear yours...I've added a few to the original...

- If I were a season, I’d be Spring.

- If I were a month, I’d be June.

- If I were a day of the week, I’d be Sunday.

- If I were a time of day, I’d be 9pm.

- If I were a planet, I’d be Venus.

- If I were a direction, I’d be South.

- If I were a tree, I’d be a eucalyptus.

- If I were a flower, I’d be a lavender sprig.

- If I were a fruit, I’d be a mango.

- If I were a land animal, I’d be a horse.

- If I were a sea animal, I’d be a dolphin.

- If I were a bird, I’d be an eagle.

- If I were a piece of furniture, I’d be an art deco lamp.

- If I were a liquid, I’d be tea.

- If I were a stone, I’d be turquoise.

- If I were a tool, I’d be a plane.

- If I were a kind of weather, I’d be sunshine.

- If I were a musical instrument, I’d be a guitar.
- If I were a colour, I’d be white (uh, hum, it is a colour!)
- If I were a facial expression, I’d be a smile.

- If I were an emotion, I’d be happiness.

- If I were a sound, I’d be water running over smooth stones.

- If I were an element, I’d be water.

- If I were a car, I’d be a classic.

- If I were a food, I’d be cheesecake.

- If I were a place, I’d be France.

- If I were a flavour, I’d be chocolate.

- If I were a scent, I’d be lavender.

- If I were an object, I’d be a Mont Blanc pen.

- If I were a body part, I’d be a hand.

- If I were a song, I’d be "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" - U2.

- If I were a pair of shoes, I’d be ballet flats.

- If I were transportation, I’d be a plane.

- If I were a fairy tale, I’d be Cinderella.
- If I were a holiday, I’d be Christmas.
- If I were a novel, I'd be Beach Music by Pat Conroy. 
- If I were a movie, I'd be Moonlight and Valentino.


All right - your turn!

BTW - fans of my vampire mini-serial, I've just posted the final episode on my flash writing blog here. Do Ciassia and Sibon die? What is going on here?