Andrew Chamberlain

Hi All

I have two short stories now available on Amazon. They are

Precious Cargo

and

Scouting for Lucy

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Spent the day with my friends and colleagues Ali Hull and Mark Finnie at the Lakes School of Writing workshop at Eden Chapel in Cambridge. Thanks to all who came, I hope you had a good day.

www.lakesschool.com
Andy

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Hi everyone,

Are you interested in writing and looking for some inspiration, a chance to meet other budding writers and get some training and teaching on the craft ? Can I recommend that you sign up for our writers day here in Cambridge on 14th April. Details can be found here.

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Hi everyone,

Just a quick blog to say that I have ventured in to the realm of self publishing and have gone with a great outfit called ‘Smashwords’. I’ve published a short scifi story which is now available to you to download for consumption on any kind of ereader. You can access it here.

Enjoy!

Andy

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Hi there

You might be coming to the site and to this blog on the back of seeing the article in the Autumn 2011 edition of the Association of Christian Writers (ACW) magazine. If you’d really like to develop your writing skills can I ask you to consider coming on the next Lakes Writing School in November, you can access details here. It’s a great opportunity to get together with other Christians who are seeking to express the gift God has given them in putting pen to paper, and fingers to keyboard. Find out how to write good dialogue, develop characters and polish your prose; find out what publishers are looking for and how you an best present your work to them.

See you there!

Blessings

Andy

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Hi guys

I’m going to be attending and tutoring at the Lakes Writing School next month, which has always been a wonderful occasion for learning the craft and having some fellowship and a laugh with fellow writers in the beautiful setting of teh lake District.

We’ll be covering the essentials with some excellent tutors. If you’re interested check out the details here.

Regards

Andy

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Hi all

To any of you who have been following any thing in my blog - I’m sorry that things have gone a little pear shaped recently, my website was tagged as an ‘attack site’ by google - sounds grim!

Anyway, my super web guy Barry seems to have sorted it out. So welcome back. Incidentally for excellent web development you can find Barry at Motivated Design

God bless you guys this Good Friday

Andy

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If you are searching for vision, Christmas is a great place to go looking for it. Looking back at previous posts I see that in December 2008 I was talking about vision and purpose then, and I am drawn to do the same now.

Why is Christmas such a potent source of vision for us? Here are three reasons. First, the Christmas story is a tale about birth, new life. The birth of a child brings hope and purpose to family, as surely as the death of a loved one can sap vision and leave those left behind to cope with the (quite necessary) task of grieving. Christmas is about birth, new life, in a season where, in the Northern hemisphere certainly, so much of the world is stilled and cold and dead with winter.

The second reason is that the birth of Jesus, the Messiah, Immanuel - God with us, fulfills a number of ancient, and powerful, prophecies. Isaiah talks about the coming of the Messiah hundreds of years before the event, and there is power in the words. Yes there is a child,but there is also the presence of God Himself, and authority - government and peace. These are huge themes and they are acutely relevant to us today as they were two thousand years ago. In just a couple of verses Isaiah captures the vision and potency of the moment when he says:

For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
⁷ Of the greatness of his government and peace
there will be no end.

(Isaiah Ch9 vv 6 and 7a - New International Version)

The third reason comes in the form of the depth of the joy implicit in the birth and promise of Christ. This is the most powerful reason for us to look to this time of year for vision, and also the most difficult to grasp. The best way to appreciate it is, I think, to compare it to our own concerns and worries. These exist at multiple levels, at the surface with day to day cares about work, family, home life, chores and responsibilities; at deeper levels in worrying about relationships, parents, children, and also at global levels - terrorism, climate change, poverty injustice. We are swept along by these things and they form the backdrop to our lives. And yet against each of these concerns, against each burden and disappointment, each temptation to despair, against all of this comes the power and life and hope of the baby in the manger and the promise he holds.

If we will let it, the Christmas vision will confront and overcome every sorrow that we have. The vision defeats the concerns of the day, the year, our lives, and the planet. To allow Immanuel to truly be with us in this way will surely make us a people who have seen a great light.

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Back from the Lakes school of writing in the beautiful if windswept setting of the Lake District. At a previous visit I mentioned to the organiser how much I enjoyed talking about ‘writery’ things with friends on the course, it’s a bad word and I love it, so there you are.

Going on the course last week I was reacquainted with some old friends and made some new ones. Had a great time, learning, teaching and writing. We had some real insight from our main speakers,  children’s author Janni Howker and Christian author Nick Page, lots of wonderful food from our resident chef Joe Story, and lots of material think about and practice with. If you are reading this and you are at all interested in writing then I suggest you consider coming along to the next course. Go to the ‘contact us’ page on the site and get in touch with Mark Finnie or Ali Hull.

A

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Yes it’s been nearly a year! Why don’t I blog more often I ask myself? Sadly there is an abundance of reasons, here they are in no particular order:

1. Laziness

2. I have nothing worth saying (I am not going to blog about what the cat did, or the colour of my socks - there’s enough of that sort of thing out there already)

3. Convinced no one will read my blogs anyway. I know this is a bit defeatist, but if you have managed a blog and had to review the comments you will know that it’s rare to get a lot of traffic and what you do get tends to be people offering you get rich quick schemes and dubious porn site addresses, frankly it’s enough to put anyone off.

4. Too busy - which is the fig leaf that covers reason 1.

5. Work takes priority

6. Kids take priority

7. Pets take priority

I wont go on, I think you get the picture.

So anyway, I am back with a purpose. I have been writing about my experiences of being away from God and moving back to Him,  and I intend to publish what I have written, over a number of parts in blog form here on my website. It will be in a separate category on the blog, gloriously entitled ‘Saying goodbye to the pigs’ - with reference to the young prodigal in Jesus’ parable who realises that life with the pigs is not that cool after all, and decides to head back to dear old dad. I am hoping that the material will be of help to some people, if it is then I’m happy.

Watch this space

Cheers
Andy

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