Deborah Shepard Books
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Writers' Stories

A collection of life stories by writers who have attended Deborah's classes

Who To Listen To - Juliet Jackson

19/1/2017

 
After becoming blind in her twenties, Juliet started listening to a lot of talking books.  This sparked an interest in creative writing.  The piece below, “Who To Listen To,” was written in Deborah Shepard’s “Life Writing” summer course.
  
We were living in a car at the time.  Dad hadn’t been able to get many gigs, and was drinking too much.  Mum was still working in clubs, as a stripper, but wasn’t getting good tips.  They were talking of driving to another town, where they wouldn’t be known.  It can help in show business.  I was twelve.  I wanted to stay in the same class, with my lovely Intermediate schoolteacher, but secondary school was looming.  Mrs Simmonds encouraged me to apply for St Cuths.  She said it was possible to get a full scholarship. 

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Riding The Teenage Years - Don Cowan

19/1/2017

 
Don has been much encouraged by family and friends to write his story. Allegedly retired some three and a half years ago, he has now made more time to try doing it. So he’s participating in Deborah’s 2017 Life Writing course and this is his first formal effort.
 
I never cared that I was a teenager. Teenagers hadn’t been ‘invented’ in my day. I was simply who I was, and stuff happened. However, having just turned thirteen and being about a year younger than everyone else in my class, I was the only boy in our group who didn’t have a girlfriend. So a girlfriend was arranged.

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Writing To Grandmother  by Mary Henderson

19/1/2017

 
Mary has inherited the gift of several folders of letters written by her parents, and sometimes her siblings and herself from 1948 – 1980, to family in the Netherlands. She is working on bringing these family stories alive for her family, and to honour her parents who made the challenging and rewarding journey of living in their new country New Zealand.
 
My mother made this request regularly, ‘Please write a letter to your grandparents.’  This time it was to acknowledge my grandmother’s seventieth birthday. We were given one transparent sheet of crinkly airmail writing paper and encouraged to write a draft.

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A Childhood Memory - Robyn White

19/1/2017

 
Robyn worked for Greenpeace from 1989 – 1995. Last year she was selected by the NZ Society of Authors for a mentorship programme where she worked with Deborah on her account of a 1992 sea voyage on the Greenpeace yacht Vega, from Auckland to Greece. She is stirred by the questions Who are we?  What are we doing here? How do we make meaning of our lives?

 I remember the thrill of going to the Easter Show with my family.  We always went at night and would walk through the trees in Cornwall Park.  It seemed we were entering a thick mist of soft watery light and boarding a large ship.  There were the sounds of engines, generators behind stalls.  I was so young, and remember looking up into a sea of legs and above that huge flying machines with stunned open-mouthed people whirling high.

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The Teenage Years: Uninformed Decision by Mary Betz

19/1/2017

 
Originally from Canada and USA, Mary has lived in New Zealand for nearly thirty years.  She is an ecologist, theologian and writer, has two grown daughters, and lives with her husband Peter in the Titirangi bush.
 
In 1966, our family moved from Battle Creek, Michigan to Cleveland, Ohio, and my mother decided I was old enough to choose my new high school.  There was only one problem: all she knew was that St Joseph’s Academy was half an hour from home, and Magnificat High School was an extra fifteen minutes.

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A Childhood Memory - by Alison Quesnel

19/1/2017

 
Alison is excited by the wealth of stories that have been uncovered in her memory whilst attending Deborah’s most recent summer life writing course.  She hopes to make creative writing in memoir or observer style part of her semi-retirement – if she can stop working.
 
The picture itself is so faded now that only I know what it really holds within its narrow pale pink frame.

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Riding The Teenage Years by Pauline Sheddan

19/1/2017

 
Pauline has often thought of recording the timeline of her life for her grandchildren. A history of the family told in short stories and memories.  Two daughters and a grandchild are already prolific writers so she has strong encouragement to start the journey.
 
My father had an absolute horror of ‘getting your name in the paper’ so we were generally well behaved.  I don’t know why he had this fear but it was the time of the Truth newspaper and any infraction including court cases and even divorce details were listed.  This was also the time of conscription into the Army. Boy’s names were drawn from a ballot for three months military service.  My brother was doing an apprenticeship so his boss applied for his conscription to be delayed. Even that was recorded in the ‘Court News’ in the Bay of Plenty Times. Dad was furious. You would have thought my brother had committed a crime.

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Sunday Morning - by Adele Ellis

19/1/2017

 
Adele Ellis, teacher of thirty years, is interested in writing and loves words and reading. In my work with children teaching reading and writing is my joy.
 

Auckland. Sunday morning. Mid-sixties.
 
I am in bed. Headachy. Bedspread turned down. Distant sounds of kitchen domesticity drift in and out. The music drones on. Leave me alone. I doze. Am I hearing this again? On the musical menu today Glenn Miller, big bands, heavy piano concertos. Is that Tchaikovsky or Grieg? Mozart where are you hiding?

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    Your Stories

    Please submit your story via the Contact page and it will receive a gentle edit from Deborah.
    WRITING GUIDELINES
    Tips on writing and posting a story
    writing on a theme
    COVID-19 STORIES

    Authors

    All
    Adele Ellis
    Alan Knox
    Alison Mayson
    Alison Quesnel
    Amanda Aitken
    Angela Eastwood
    Anissa Ljanta
    Anna Caselberg
    Anna Groenestein
    Anne Cavanagh
    Anne Morris
    Barbara Myers
    Bernice Raos
    Beth Jewell
    Betty Chamberlain
    Beverley Morris
    Bren Lawrey
    Bronwyn Lewis
    Carmel Byrne
    Carmel Ni Bhroin
    Carol Clayton
    Carol Jack
    Catherine Groenestein
    Catherine Moorhead
    Cathie Hutchinson
    Cathy Gray
    Cherie Buchanan
    Cheryl McCrow-Young
    Cheryl Nicol
    Cheryl Price
    Colin Radford
    Colleen Paisley
    David Arrowsmith
    David Phuah
    Dawn Webster
    Debbie Corder
    Diane Taylor
    Dianne Moffatt
    Dianne Speed
    Don Cowan
    Doris Riegel
    Elisabeth Sutorius
    Elizabeth Buchanan
    Elizabeth Goldsworthy
    Erica Munro
    Evan Mayson
    Evita Fromter
    Fern Paulussen
    Francie Craig
    Gabrielle Reekie
    Gillian Mayo
    Gill Sanson
    Glenys McGee
    Gloria Neale
    Graham McGregor
    Graham Woolford
    Gretel Jack
    Helen Gillespie
    Inge Rudolph
    Isabella Mcdermott
    Jackie Halliday
    Jackie Hawkeswood
    Jane Bissell
    Jane Ouseley
    Janet Bovett
    Janet De Witt
    Janet Pates
    Jane Wilkins
    Janine Peters
    Jeanette Baalbergen
    Jeanette De Heer
    Jean Rockel
    Jennifer McGarry
    Jenny Healey
    Jenny Riviere
    Jessie Jellick
    Jicca Smith
    Jim Barnett
    Jim Cooke
    Jim O'Donovan
    Jim Peters
    Joan Hugo Burley
    Jocelyn Goodman
    Jo Frew
    John Goodman
    Judy Hardie
    Judy Johannessen
    Judy O'Brien
    Julia Blick
    Julie Star
    Juliet Jackson
    Justine Sachs
    Kacie Stetson
    Kate Lewis
    Katherine Kelly
    Kathryn Kearns
    Katrina Cole
    Leona Fay
    Lexie Candy
    Liz Lees
    Liz March
    Liz Marks
    Liz Thomas
    Liz Wilson
    Lorene Verheijden
    Lydia Smith
    Lynley Stone
    Maire Vieth
    Mandy Robinson
    Margaret Farrell
    Margaret Merton
    Margaret Russell
    Margo Knightbridge
    Marg Slater
    Maria Kazmierow
    Maria Zivkovich
    Marie Cameron
    Marie Coyle
    Marie Lynne Mitchell
    Marijke Batenburg
    Marilyn Eales
    Maris O'Rourke
    Maryan Dawson
    Mary Barker
    Mary Betz
    Mary Bogan
    Mary Borok
    Mary Elsmore-Neilson
    Mary Nicholas
    Mary Weal
    Mattie Wall
    Maureen Sudlow
    Max Adams
    Meg Johnson
    Meret Berger
    Michelanne Forster
    Mike Kilpatrick
    Miriam Frank
    Moyra Cooke
    Myrtle Easton
    Nanci Campion
    Natalie Mullender
    Ngawini Hall
    Nicky Won
    Nicola Brewer Fanefjord
    Nitin Sahare
    Patricia Gross
    Pat Scriven
    Pauline Lumsden
    Pauline Sneddon
    Penny Slack
    Philomena Pinto
    Rachael Breckon
    Rae Abraham
    Raewynne Lory
    Rob Creagh
    Robyn Turner
    Robyn White
    Rosemary Auld
    Rosemary Barrett
    Roslind O'Neill
    Roz Nicol
    Ruth Bonita
    Ruth Busch
    Sally Monks
    Samantha Scott
    Sandra Plummer
    Sandy Plummer
    Sarah Ashmore
    Sarah Gumbley
    Sarah Hardman
    Sara Kimsey
    Sharyn Elliffe
    Shirley Glendinning
    Shona Barker
    Sofia Mella
    Steve Charters
    Sue
    Sue Alexander
    Sue Mercer
    Sue Radford
    Susan Grimsdell
    Susan Mcleod
    Susan Schuler
    Susie Johnston
    Sylvia Dean
    Sylvia Nagl
    Terry Levenberg
    Tim Chamberlain
    Tim Paul
    Trevor Bayly
    Val Cotty
    Verna Cook-Jackson
    Vonne Learmonth
    Wyn Hoadley

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Deborah thanks Rangimarie Kelly and Pikau Digtal for website design and artist Karen Jarvis for her image ‘Writers at the Devonport Library,’ (2023)
Writing Memoir
Defining Memoir
The Participatory Model
Tips on Writing and Posting a Story
​From Writing Course to Book Publication
Your Writing Space
​Writing on a Theme
Reviews of Memoir
Writers Stories
​
Events
​About
Testimonials
What People Say

Media
​Contact
Copyright © 2023 Deborah Shepard
  • Home
  • Books
    • The Writing Life >
      • Reviews & Interviews
    • Giving Yourself to Life
    • Her Life's Work
    • Translucence
    • Between The Lives
    • Reframing Women
    • Tributes
    • Personal Writings >
      • Conference Paper
      • Lockdown Journal
      • Travel Journal
      • Elegy for a friend
      • Christchurch - Post Quakes
      • On a residency
      • Deborah’s Love Letter to the Women’s Bookshop
      • Deborah's Q & A With Unity Books
  • Writing Memoir
    • Defining Memoir
    • The Participatory Model
    • Tips on Writing and Posting a Story
    • The Value of a Writing Class
    • From writing course to book publication
    • Your Writing Space
    • Writing on a Theme >
      • Window
      • Surviving a Crisis
    • Reviews of Memoir
  • Writers' stories
    • Writer's Stories
    • Covid-19 Stories
    • Writing Guidelines
    • From Being Mentored to Book Publication
  • Events
  • About
    • Testimonials
    • Media
  • What People Say
  • Contact