Category Archives: Eastlit Live

News December 2016

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Eastlit December 2016 Cover Picture: Lone Coconut Tree by Dave Hopkins. Cover design by Graham Lawrence. Copyright photographer, Eastlit and Graham Lawrence.As we head towards 2017 we have a number of interesting projects covering creative writing going on at Eastlit including one that could give a far larger audience to some writers.

But first, I would just like to say thank you to all of those who have contributed to or read Eastlit throughout 2016. Plus a special thank you to everyone who has worked on the editorial board this year and to those who have donated to help cover our costs.

And in January our ever popular annual list of what were the best read pieces in 2016 and all time will be out!

And having said that, lets move to the news.

Writing Mentoring

Eastlit now offers a full writing mentoring service to Asian focused writers. The service offered is as short or long as wanted and all rates are local Asian rates. So cost is low. We currently have several running and a couple complete, and are currently open to taking on a few more writiers. If you are interested contact Graham for information.

Writing Retreats

Eastlit is currently involved in discussions to set up writing retreats within Asia. These will be for local or distant writers focusing on Asian themes. The plan is that they will follow a typical writing retreat format but also include some of our unique Eastlit ideas. We will also be aiming at running at affordable prices.

This is at early days yet, but we are quite excited and hope to be able to offer something in 2017. Fingers crossed!

A Partnership with an ESL Site

Those of you who know me better know that I work within teaching English to speakers of other language. Within that field in the past I was quite active within the Ed-Tech side and maintain strong contacts with some leaders in the field.

One off-shoot of this is an offer to partner Eastlit with a top ESL websites in the world to supply some audio-story material for learners of English. We will be looking for short short-stories and flash fiction that Eastlit has previously published or will publish. Those selected will be read by actors and then used on the ESL website complete with downloadable material.

This is currently at planning stage but there should be no obstacles. The stories selected will also be guaranteed a far larger audience.

Bangkok Buckaroo by Steve Rosse

A few years back, Steve was a regular columnist on Eastlit with his How not to Write series. Now Steve has released his latest book: Bangkok Buckaroo. 

Steve is an old hand from South East Asia now living in the US, but here he is back writing about Bangkok.

You can also read a review of Bangkok Buckaroo in the Bangkok newspaper The Nation.

Good luck to Steve on the book from all of us at Eastlit.

Supporting Eastlit

And finally a reminder that if you support what Eastlit is doing you can provide support by liking and sharing this post, linking or generally passing the word on.

Or you can make a donation via PayPal (note: the PayPal e-mail is Eastlit1 at gmail dot com). For credit card donation after clicking the link below, scroll down to the credit card pictures and click continue.




 

Cheers

Graham

Eastlit Live Art and News

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Eastlit Live

Recently I haven’t said much about Eastlit Live. However, I have been asked a few times about it. Eastlit Live is still up and running as a concept mixed between Eastlit, the Eastlit Live You Tube channel and our Google+ account. You can access Eastlit Live Channel by clicking the link in the title above. We are always looking for multimedia submissions for Eastlit Live. they can be in any medium: writing, photography, video, audio or any combination. We are happy to consider music, talks, poetry readings or any other art genre of live art. Just send them in through the usual submissions e-mail, or if too big contact us through that e-mail. We can work something out.

A previous post describes the multimedia concept behind Eastlit LIve.

Live Art

Live art! Thomas Donaldson has an art show on in Chonburi, Thailand right now. Why not go along and take a look? I have inserted a flyer below. If you need an idea of his style of artwork, Thomas featured in the January 2014 issue of Eastlit in a piece titled: Thomas Donaldson Art.

Eastlit Live Art News March 2014. Thomas Donaldson Flyer for Where is My Head Art show.

 Other News

Eastlit April 2014 will be out on March 31 or April 1. This issue will include fiction, poetry, non-fiction, artwork, an interview, advice on writing and a book review. I hope you will enjoy the mix we have put together for you. Thanks also to all those who have contributed work for this issue.

We are still taking submissions for the June to December issues of Eastlit. Please go to our Eastlit submissions page to check the guidelines and send your work in. Also please pass this link on to anyone you know who may be interested.

If you have any live art in the form of video, audio or pictures, please also feel free to submit it for consideration for publication on Eastlit or Eastlit Live.

Enough for now.

Cheers.

Graham.

Second Year

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Eastlit Second Year: Cover of Issue One, First Year. Picture and Cover Design by Graham Lawrence. An evening picture of Wonnapha Beach, Chonburi, Thailand by Graham Lawrence.First I would like to apologize for any delays in replying recently. I will be staring a new job in a few days time, and will temporarily be working away from home. That has meant finding some temporary accommodation. So I haven’t been as available as usual. Things should settle down again now though. Anyway enough of that.

It is about the second year of Eastlit and some new initiatives that I want to look at this time.

The cover to the left is of the inaugural issue of Eastlit, many moons ago. Just click on it for a reminder of where we started.

Eastlit First Anniversary: Welcome to the Second Year!

As many of you know we are fast approaching the first birthday of Eastlit. That seems like a good time to introduce some new things. It is also a good time to renew energy in some older projects. So for the second year of Eastlit, we have some plans. We will start to roll these out from the December issue.

Monthly Reviews

We will be introducing book reviews by a regular contributor. The aim is to have one per month. This does not mean we will not take reviews from others.

Author and Artist Interviews

These will be of different types. Obviously we do not have he resources to gallivant around the world interviewing people. But there is modern technology. We have several types of interview:

  • written: we send out our questions and the replies are written.
  • audio: we send out written questions and the replies are spoken.
  • video: we send out written questions and the replies are spoken onto video.
  • full video: we send out written questions and you the author or artist find a friend to ask the questions and then answer them while making a video.

We are now inviting all of our contributors over the past year to be interviewed. Just contact us at Eastlit editors

All previously published authors and artists interviews will be published. We will do this via Eastlit and/or Eastlit Live. Oh unless you are hideously rude or offensive! The timing of these will depend on the popularity of this.

E-Magazine

I have virtually completed the editing of the downloadable E-version of he first issue of Eastlit. I will release at some auspicious time!

Republication

This is just a reminder that as from the December issue we will republish a piece of work from a previous issue of Eastlit. This will be chosen randomly. These will appear on their own special page in Eastlit.

Second Issue - Eastlit. EastlitSplashScreen. The New App

There is still some technical work to be done on our new independent Android app. When it is finished, we will release it. In the meantime the old one is still available from the Google App. Store.

Links

If any of our contributors have a literature or art website or blog and would like us to consider linking to it, let us know. We are going o start building a links list.

Second Year Other Things

Thank you to everyone who reads, contributes to and recommends Eastit. Without you, we are nothing. I hope you continue to do so. And if you have any requests, ideas or comments for the second year, please let me know. I will be doing a separate post on areas we may need or not need to change.

And thanks to those who have donated to help Eastlit cover costs. It does make things a easier. It really is appreciated.

Cheers

Graham

Eastlit Live

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There are a couple of exciting new developments to mention today: The first Eastlit app for tablets and smart phones, and Eastlit Live.

Bracelets not War: Eastlit Live. Photograph by Graham LawrenceEastlit Live

Eastlit Live is an attempt to move beyond just written words. Now we are in the 21st century. That means multimedia and mobility. In an attempt to keep up with the world, we are introducing a new concept. We call this Eastlit Live. At Eastlit we want to introduce a multimedia approach to literature.

This approach though melds the new and traditional. We all know of poetry readings and storytelling. Both have a long history. Or maybe it should be something more modern limited only by the imagination of the creator.

Well now we have set up an Eastlit You Tube channel called Eastlitlive so that you can showcase your poetry reading, readings of your short stories, interviews or other artistic offerings. We want this to be a service for our contributors. And we see it as a way you can promote yourself. We accept anything that is within the normal guidelines. This means connected to or from East and Southeast Asia and not of an adult nature. On Eastlit Live channel we will host anything submitted that meets our guidelines.This is slightly different from the Eastlit Journal where we scrutinize everything. However, what we highlight in the actual journal will still go through this process. And we will be highlighting the best of what we receive every month.

We plan on launching this new initiative as soon as we can. That relies on you, though. So get your videos in now! Oh if you have questions, please feel free to ask through our contact form or by e-mail contact. I will let you know more as this develops. As there is nothing up yet, just subscribe to the channel if interested. We hope it will not be long before we have something for you.

How do you send them? Well just send me a link to a Dropbox file, Google Drive file or any other way you can think of. You can submit these links or files through the normal submission e-mail, or through our g-mail. Submissions will be put up as soon as possible on You Tube. Plus, every monthly issue of Eastlit will feature a page highlighting and embedding what our editors liked most.

Android App

I have been talking about this since the launch of Eastlit. And the app is another aspect of the Eastlit Live concept. Well, now it is in the Google Playstore. You can find it via the link in the heading. You can also go the Play Store and search Eastlit. It would be great if all of you Android users could give it a go and send me some feedback to the normal e-mails etc. The version out is a simple one, but with 3000+ android phones it has to be I guess. At the moment you can access the whole site. I am not sure if that is the way to go on a mobile though. However, I thought it better to await feedback. There are also possibilities of including extra more social aspects. In the end I decided it was better to await feedback rather than decide myself.

This version does have a small mobile adverts panel. It costs to add these developments to Eastlit, so I have little choice but to seek some ways of recouping a little of that cost. If there is interest in iPhone or Windows Phone apps, let me know. These can be created too. Development though for both is more expensive.

Anyway, I would appreciate any feedback on:

  • What you would like to see included.
  • What pages you would like to see removed.
  • Comments on design, aesthetics etc

Other News:

Anna Yin has sent a copy of her recent book Inhaling the Silence to be reviewed. Hopefully, that review will be in the September issue of Eastlit. Information on Anna’s book can be found at the site of Mosaic who published it.

Oh and of course don’t forget the next issue of Eastlit will be out on August 1, 2013.

Cheers.

Graham.