This post is by Nancy Jardine
An author friend of mine at Crooked Cat Publishing commented that he was having a ‘go’ again at the world wide April A-Z Challenge Blog Hop. He’d done it last year for the first time and recommended it. A number of ‘we’ fellow ‘Cats’ signed up.
image from http://www.123rf.com
Rules are simple. Blog for 26 days of the alphabet on anything of your choice so long as your post is centred around the letter of the day (Sundays off for good behaviour) Try to visit at least 5 other blogs each day – lots more if you can is very welcome.
Main idea – ENJOY reading/viewing everyone else’s posts.
Why did I decide to fit this into my already busy life? Good question and my answer is for lots of different reasons. There are 1942 people signed up on the linky list. I’m sure I will meet some new people during the hop who will hopefully remain cyber friends. I’m also learning something new every single day when I visit other blogs, and most of that has little to do with writing.
This year they’ve put up a category listing, so if you choose to you can sign up for one of these and post about that subject eg. LI posts are about Lifestyle. There are classifications for photographers, artists, gardeners, politics minded people – lots to choose from if your posts are themed. If you don’t want to enter a theme category you can post anything so long as your daily post is centred around the letter for that day.
I’ve chosen to do all my posts about Celtic/Roman Britain AD71-84. What? Loads of you might say – that’s nuts! Why have I restricted myself to historical posts like that for 26 days?
Food fresco from Pompei – Wikimedia Commons
During the last 6 months, when not doing my full time babysitting of said cherub who is my granddaughter, I’ve been writing the sequel to my historical novel, THE BELTANE CHOICE, which is set in Celtic/Roman Britain AD 71-84. Surprise, surprise! I’ve amassed a huge amount of historical data that will never sneak into my novel- though I do that whenever I can!
The A-Z Challenge is a superb way of ‘airing’ that knowledge and finding a practical use for my time researching. Since I love history and am obviously steeped in Celtic/Roman Britain I’m loving the CHALLENGE already.
What I’m sure would be far too difficult would be ‘winging it’. I’m more inclined to be a ‘pantser’ in my writing but I’m sure I’d be spending all day long chopping and changing my mind if I had no theme to work to. So, does that make me more of a ‘plotter’. Oops- I guess I’m that too!
Whatever… the challenge of posting an A-Z entry forces some discipline on me. I intend to complete the challenge… and get my sequel completed this month.
Apples, pear, plum, cherry!
-image acquired from http://www.123rf.com
Oh… did I forget to say I got 5 fruit trees as a birthday gift a few weeks ago from my daughter. (mother of grandchild) They arrived a couple of days ago and since the snow outside has now melted, and we’ve had a couple of nights almost frost free, I guess I’m spending my day planting my trees in patio containers.
Roll out that compost!
I’m delighted to do that since, around AD 84, there were possibly as many as 10,000 Roman soldiers encamped about 400 yards away from my garden. (Yes I really do mean that number as recent evidence has proved the camp to have been very large) My fruit tree garden compost was possibly trampled down by them. (Spurious- I know but the thought makes me smile a lot!)
Any guesses why I love my Celtic/ Roman history posts?
If you’re interested my post today is all about the Roman food my Roman character might be eating in Northern Britannia.
(NB. When I added my HI for ‘history’ as my A-Z Challenge theme it has been posted as AC for ‘Adult Content’. This is because my blog is set to that in case I’m posting a risqué romance cover when a guest blogger comes to visit… or as in today’s case a risque historical image from Pompei! My blog is, otherwise, a safe one.)
The Beltane Choice is available from:
Smashwords http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/221383
View my Youtube trailer http://youtu.be/igJmfBoXRhQ
Nancy can be found at:
Amazon UK author page for all novels http://amzn.to/N6ye0z
Amazon.com author page for all novels http://amzn.to/RJZzZz http://nancyjardine.blogspot.com http://nancyjardineauthor.weebly.com http://on.fb.me/XeQdkG Twitter @nansjar http://about.me/nancyjardine http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/nancy-jardine/3a/9b0/a91/ Google+
Enjoy your day! I’m sure I’m going to enjoy mine.
Keira's Place 
What fun. I never heard of the alphabet blogging. Really enjoyable.
Yes it is, Barb. I’ve only 3 more weeks to go! Will I make it?
There is always so much going on in your posts, I have to pay close attention or I miss the details. Roman soldiers trampling your garden soil–I love the image.
So do I. When I dig up a rusty old nail I look at it and think- is this a Victorian one? (house built in 1820s) Or could it be a REALLY old nail like a ROMAN one. I;ve never sent tehm off for inspection but I have a wee collection.
I know you will make the A-Z with ease and teach so many people so much about a fascinating time in history. Fun!
Aww, thank you!
Sounds like fun Nancy. When I did the 30 day blog challenge in December I thought I was nuts. But I really enjoyed it and missed it when it finished. Good luck – I’m sure readers will be as delighted as we are with your content. Be sure to give us links!
Yep! I have added links to the Wranglers FB page, but not every day. But I will be posting every day!
The ‘Roman Food’ link at the bottom of the post takes you directly through to the blog post. 🙂
Sounds fun, but just too much on my plate. I escaped from writing news stories so I could post a link to your Wrangler post and comment here. But got to get back to writing those news stories — they provide a paycheck. I am trying to get back to working on book 3 of my trilogy … wrote some over the last couple of nights.
Good luck with that writing, Mike and thanks for all reposting!
This makes me thirsty for some Agri-cola… 🙂 Just joking; good luck on the blog challenge, and keep us updated on the sequel to “The Beltane Choice”!
Will do, Erin. Might use that ‘Agri-cola’ thing sometime. Very neat!
Wish I would have signed up when you gave us a chance. sounds like great fun. I love historicals. Thanks. Cher’ley
It’s going to be an interesting month- that’s for sure.
Have fun. Wish I had heard about it earlier, but I don’t think it would work with my schedule right now. Gave me an idea for doing blog posts though.
I loved ancient history when I was in school. Haven’t read much in the era since, though.
It’s not an era that’s covered very much, Kate- mainly because the ‘evidence’ is limited. I hadn’t covered the era as a teenager at school, but had to learn about it when I was teaching it to my primary classes and became hooked!