The Girl from the Workhouse - Lynn Johnson explains how her grandmother (and Stromness Writing Group) set her on the road to being an author
First of all, thank you Babs for inviting me on to your blog to speak about writing. I never set out to be a writer. In my youth – a long time ago now, I wrote stories of The Faraway Tree that Enid Blyton didn’t know about, and even illustrated them. I thought it was brilliant! At work I progressed to writing policy documents and stodgy reports for council meetings and was so busy, writing for pleasure was never in my mind. When I took early retirement and made the move to Orkney, one of the first things I did was go to Stromness Library and ask if there was a writing group somewhere in Orkney. That was in 2005. Joining Stromness Writing Group provided the key to unlocking my creativity. I started writing short pieces, stories mainly. I was never any good at poetry. It was during the first year with the Group that I wrote a short story, based loosely on my Grandma, that became the basis for The Girl from the Workhouse published earlier this year, as part of a two-book deal, by Her