I’ve just been lucky enough to spend six days in Bordeaux in La Tuilerie at a writers’ retreat run by N Quentin Woolf. I booked this retreat on impulse several months ago. I’d attended one of the writers groups he runs briefly so I knew they usually had a relaxed atmosphere, and I decided what I needed was a short period away from everything in order to focus on writing a larger-scale project than I’ve attempted so far – ie a novel.
Our little group of writers (there is no collective noun – why not? Perhaps it should be a wrangle of writers? ) included a crime novelist, two short story writers and a non fiction writer as well as myself. We all had different life experiences, ages and day jobs but were united by a common sense of purpose, as well as (we discovered) a taste for country walks, lazing around the pool, drinking Bordeaux and playing very competitive games of Star Wars Monopoly.
Alison, who runs La Tuilerie, is a fantastic host. We ate some spectacular meals around the huge round table made from a giant wine barrel, including
cucumber soup and a lasagne I shall dream about. There are some very friendly dogs living in la Tuilerie and we saw deer, horses and rabbits in the area as well as a wild Dratini which I caught in my very first Pokemon Go excursion.
We had a workshop on story structure, some detailed group critique sessions, which were very helpful and informative for me and detailed individual critiques from Nick on whatever we were working on, which gave me some strong steers on how to improve the quality of my work. I think most new writers are afraid of exposing their work to criticism, but the scalpel was handled very delicately and I hardly felt a thing 🙂
We also enjoyed some interesting debates, ranging from who should be the next Bond to whether violence is an inescapable part of human nature, or not. At such a sad time for the world, when we seem to read more and more distressing stories in the news, one little bit of hope I took away (as well as my two completed first draft chapters) is that trying to create art, whatever it may be, is something that unites people rather than divides them.