Inspiration from other arts ...

My fiction writing has been a bit stalled in the last couple of weeks while other parts of life took over, but I'm finally starting to get those fingers back to the keyboard.

A trick I've used in the past, but had forgotten, is getting inspiration - and more importantly, motivation - from other art forms, not just by reading great literature or heading writers speak. This morning we visited the Year 12 Perspectives exhibition at the Art Gallery of Western Australia, an annual affair where the best artworks from art students graduating from high school is displayed.

When my painter-husband is impressed by paintings, I know they're good. And of course, not everything at this exhibit was fantastic, but there were a surprising number of incredibly good paintings in particular, and to think that they were created by 16 and 17-year-old students - that puts me back in my place again.

I've got just a week or so to polish up my novel's first chapter for the Writing Show contest I want to enter. If a 16-year-old can create so well - and my birthday on Tuesday makes me double so old - then surely I can too. Hopefully. Here goes, anyway.