writing – Page 5

June 22, 2015

Pep Talk Week 4: Do you ever get stuck?

Stacy Claflin, author of four book series, shares with us her advice on what to do when you get stuck in the midst of your novel–just the Pep Talk we need for the middle of JuNoWriMo!

Do you ever get stuck at some point when writing a novel? Sometimes that middle-ish point can be the most challenging. The beginning is fun because you come in with all these ideas, and it’s exciting. The end is full action, and the writing sometimes seems to happen by itself.

Really, though, any point of the story can give the writer problems.

Feeling stuck

When you’re in the thick of it and things slow down, a lot of different variables can leave you feeling stumped. Maybe the story has gone in a different direction than you planned. You’re not sure if you need to map out a different ending or maybe look for a new path to the end you have in mind.

Or it could be that the story is right where it should be, but doubt has crept in. You know what I mean. Do I have enough material to get to the end and have it long enough? Is this as good as it could be? What if it sucks and I just can’t see it? Or maybe you feel like it is horrible, and you don’t know whether to go on or not.

That valley between the exciting peaks can feel like a wasteland.

The good news is that it doesn’t need to stay that way. There are a lot of things you can do to turn everything around and get excited about writing again. Continue reading “Pep Talk Week 4: Do you ever get stuck?”

June 19, 2015

#JuNoWriMo Featured Author: Eden Mabee

Meet some of your fellow JuNo WriMos in our Featured Author series each Wednesday and Friday through June.

A ‘Jane of All Trades’ in a long line that has included farmers, slack-rope walkers, mechanics, forgers, teachers, horse-thieves, and writers, featured author Eden Mabee shares stories of a universe filled with magic, tech and political intrigue. She’s a self-proclaimed WriMo addict and photography dabbler.

Hi! Nice to meet you all. Welcome to JuNoWriMo, my fourth year of this challenge. It’s a great bunch of people to write with. Come join us for Twitter sprints and chatting about craft via our Facebook page.

For this year’s JuNoWriMo, I’m continuing to work on my Swan Song Series, a set of five planned novels, and will be placing the majority of my emphasis on the first book, Courting the Swan Song. The series crosses genre boundaries somewhat, but the first two books hold to the “Coming of Age” fantasy form. Here’s a quick overview of Courting:

Only child and heir, Alanii Vestimiir has decided that his father’s plans for him are shortsighted and suffocating. He’s off to become a soldier and serve the crown in the way he sees fit. In his attempt, he runs afoul not of only his father, but two powerful noble houses who stand poised to tear down his family and possibly involve their country in a war that might destroy them all.

Along the way, Alanii has to deal with all sorts of normal teenage problems: squabbles with friends, pretty girls, perfectionist teachers, etc.–who said growing up was easy?

Many elements went into CTSS. In writing my space opera, Release, secondary characters such as Alanii founded stories of their own, demanding to show how the brutal universe of the story come about through more than their actions. Before that, my best friend and I wrote fanfiction together, where I learned elements of story writing and developed the seeds of the Swan Song Series. Another MC, Atyr (book 2, Singer of the Swan Song), came out of those stories grew to be her own person as my vision of their universe became clearer.

Since CTSS comes out of writing I’ve been doing since high school, one would have thought I should be further along in the story. I am, and I’m not. A ‘finished’ version, that is very much a First Novel, has been duly been appointed a drawer where it can spend its days peacefully, while I scavenge its corpse for useful tidbits. Integrating elements from this very rough work has meant that I work on the first three books of the series concurrently (books 1 & 2 happen during the same in-world time, and book 3 follows soon after, starting where the original book began). However, this June, finishing a complete draft of CTSS is the plan.

Come visit me on my writing blog Many Worlds From Many Minds, or follow me on Facebook and Twitter.

June 17, 2015

#JuNoWriMo Featured Author: Heena Rathore

Meet some of your fellow JuNo WriMos in our Featured Author series each Wednesday and Friday through June.

Background

I’m a 24 year old freelance content writer and an aspiring author.

I’m a voracious reader and a book reviewer. I also love baking and I have 3 blogs (1 book-blog, 1 personal author-blog, and 1 food-blog.)

I’m married to the love of my life and as a result of my husband’s undying trust in me, I left my engineering degree course in the 3rd year to pursue 3D Animation Film Making (as I have an infinite love for drawing.)

I love watching psycho thrillers and slasher movies. I’ve been a fan of the genre since childhood. From Texas’ Chainsaw Massacre series to The Strangers, Touristas to Nightmare On The Elm Street and Vacancy (1 and 2, though I like the first one!)… I love watching them all and I often wonder what goes on in a psycho killer’s mind or how will it feel to find myself in a similar situation. I watch Zombie movies with my husband and we plan out ways to survive such an apocalypse.

After finishing up with the film diploma, I started with my book-blog and content-writing. And after a year of writing, reading and reviewing, I’m here talking about my debut novel that will be written during JuNoWriMo.

Heena’s JuNoWriMo Plans

The working title (and hopefully the final title) of my novel is Deceived. It’s about a couple who’ve recently moved to an isolated setting to begin a happy new life, but soon they’ll discover the horror that awaits them. The psycho neighbors have been waiting for a nice new neighbor for a long time! The story completely turns in the last few pages and ends with a possibility of a sequel.

It’s a psycho thriller book that’ll mainly focus on the female lead. I’m still working on which point of view I should write the book in (It is first-person for now.) This book will show different phases in my lead’s life and her growth as she realizes how deceiving near and dear ones can be. The later part of the book will focus on her survival and an ultimate plot twist in the last line.

My JuNoWriMo goal is to get the first draft done by the end of June, as I have plans to get this book published by December. Before June started, I wrote out chapter summaries and built character profiles to help my writing. So hopefully, I’ll nail WriMo’s much dreaded 50,000 word count, though i’m hoping to write even more.

Connect with Heena:

Facebook | Twitter | Author Blog | Book Blog | Instagram

June 15, 2015

Pep Talk Week 3: Breeze Through the Middle of Your Novel

Ruth Long addresses how to work through the middle of your book and how to tackle the rest of this challenge.

My first attempts at novel length stories were exhilarating and demoralizing.

Exhilarating because I could so clearly envision the beginning and end of the story.

Demoralizing because I could never quite manage to bridge the gap between the two.

Why is it that middles so often become baffling, exhausting, and tedious to get through?

I’ve been actively seeking the answer to that question and here’s what I’ve come up with so far.

There are no hard and fast rules for writing a novel.

There are, however, a handful of techniques that make the process easier.

The first technique we’re going to reference is the Three Act Plot.

The general breakdown of the Three Act Plot looks like this:

Setup = 25% of story

Middle = 50% of story

Resolution = 25% of story

Whoa! No wonder the middle seems like a monkey on our backs. It’s half the story.

We need to cut that sucker down to size but where do we start?

By employing a middle-of-the-novel-tedium-busting technique I like to call “Lemony Snickett’s ‘A Series of Unfortunate Events.’”

This is the technique we’re going to focus on. Continue reading “Pep Talk Week 3: Breeze Through the Middle of Your Novel”

June 12, 2015

#JuNoWriMo Featured Author: Alathia Paris Morgan

Meet some of your fellow JuNo WriMos in our Featured Author series each Wednesday and Friday in June.

I am an author who writes mysteries. I started really writing last April for the CampNaNo and was able to get my first book started with 25k words. Then, in July, I was ready to start camp again and picked up the manuscript where I had left it in April. I continued into August to finish my first book, Ding Dong is She Dead? It was self-published in September. I have finished my second novel, Death By Poison, and it came out on June 1, 2015. It has been amazing year, and I find myself writing more when I have a group that cheers me on and writes with me.

I’m an Avon Lady which is what my first two novels are based on. I am also a mom to three daughters, a wife, and advocate for Domestic Violence Awareness. I am an avid reader and own over 6000 paper/hardbacks, and several hundred kindle books. My Goodreads goal is 200 books for the year, but now that I am writing, I don’t read as much.

For JuNoWriMo this year, I’ll be working on a story I started back in high school and left it in the notebook until now. I have 100 handwritten pages that I plan to rewrite and update (cassette tapes are so dated) and publish this novel as the first in a new series called The Agent Series.

I love a good mystery with a twist that no one expects.

Book # 1 in The Agent Series

Mac is kidnapped and taken to Scotland to marry the person who bought her on the black market. Nathan works for Interpol and is home on vacation for his brother’s wedding. Sensing something is not right with the bride, he uses his contacts within Interpol discover Mac is being held against her will. The castle she is held in holds ways to aid in their escape, but can she trust Nathan even though his brother kidnapped her?

Find Alathia Morgan online:

Twitter | Facebook | Blog | Goodreads | Amazon

Enjoying JuNoWriMo? Help us make it bigger and better for next year! Donate, and you’ll receive personal fanfare from our Facebook page.

June 10, 2015

#JuNoWriMo Featured Author: Ann Shannon

Meet some of your fellow JuNo WriMos in our Featured Author series each Monday and Wednesday in June.

I am the Manic Writer. I’m a voracious reader and author. I read an average of 23 books a week and write roughly 3000 words a day. I’ve written 4 novels which are all in various stages of revision and editing, not bad since I started writing fiction in February. I also blog about PTSD, working to educate others and help to end the stigma that comes with it by teaching people what it is, how they can heal from it, and live again. And I have a not so secret love for Anime, which I watch obsessively whenever I can.

My writing journey began when I was in college, and I fell in love with romantic fiction the moment I started writing it. My destiny as a romance writer became clear to me with my first fanfiction, but I quickly figured out that I should be writing my own original work.

I discovered CampWriMo by accident through a friend of mine. She “sort of” bullied me into joining her cabin this past April, and now I’m addicted!

My JuNoWriMo project, however, is a departure from my usual work. I am planning an anthology of short stories that will give my readers a glimpse into my writing style. My goals for it will be 50K words, of course, and to finish the anthology. I’ve already been hard at work outlining it and developing characters. To do this, I will have to write a little more than one story a week, but I think I’m up to the challenge, and I know I will get lots of support from my fellow JunoWriMos when I need to catch my breath.

My inspiration for this project came from a few different directions. I had the idea for a short story called, The Table of Misfit Donors. Chelsea Price is a successful graphic artist who owns her own business, so why is she stuck overseeing a table of misfits at the annual fundraiser for the Winston Pemberton Burn Center? Between Louise the gossip, who is doing everything she can to distract the rest of the table from the fundraiser; Samuel the retired Marine, who wears glasses that might double as telescope lenses and is so deaf you have to tell him everything twice; and the distracting young pilot, Randy, sitting next to her, Chelsea has her hands full trying to keep her table on track and focused on the fundraiser.

This is just one of the short stories I will be crafting next month for my anthology, which will cover a wide range of human emotions including humor, love, and despair. I’ve been hard at work crafting plots and creating characters for my readers that they will love, hate, applaud, and wish they could drown.

Find Ann Shannon online:

Twitter | Facebook | Blog

Enjoying JuNoWriMo? Help us make it bigger and better for next year! Donate, and you’ll receive personal fanfare from our Facebook page.

June 8, 2015

Pep Talk Week 2: Seven Things to Do When Your WIP is a Hot Mess

This week, Katharine Grubb offers advice on how to rescue your work in progress (WIP). Katharine’s blog is about the “Confessions of a Busy Mom Who Became an Independent Novelist.”

So it’s JuNoWriMo and you’ve hit the second week!

You’re like um, I have how many words to go?

You thought you could do this. You had ideas! You had characters! You had a plot! I mean you kind of have a plot but now it kind of feels like a plod. You had a vision for the perfect story in this genre! But then you realize that maybe this contemporary romance might do better on Mars? Maybe your heroine needs fangs? Maybe you could kill everyone off, call it a dystopian and be done with it?

What do you do?

1. Take a deep breath. Deep breathing can calm you down. They don’t tell you this in writing classes but breathing when you write is as important as the kind of mug you use for your hot beverage. Take another deep breath. No one ever died from JuNoWriMo. Continue reading “Pep Talk Week 2: Seven Things to Do When Your WIP is a Hot Mess”

June 3, 2015

#JuNoWriMo Featured Author: Elizabeth Conrad

Meet some of your fellow JuNoWriMos in our Featured Author series each Wednesday and Friday in June.

I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was a little girl. By age six, I was typing little stories on my mother’s typewriter and illustrating them. This fascination with storytelling grew with me and has culminated in two novels which I am preparing for self publication over the next couple of years. I don’t have one specific genre, but my first two novel length works are sci-fi and romance.

My still-untitled novel for June, however, will be a more of a mystery about two sisters who deepen their relationship while solving a cold case murder on an island in south Texas.

Mia is twenty-five years old and is an accomplished writer who has chosen to live on a rather remote island in the Gulf of Mexico. When her sister, Isabel joins her to attend the local university far from their home state of Iowa, the differences between them are highlighted even more. Yet the unique 0pportunities of living together as adults draw them closer together. They begin collaborating on the death of a jazz singer from the 1950s and uncover secrets that will astound everyone on the island.

I have loved south Texas since vacationing there when I was twelve. The setting seemed a natural fit, because I loved the idea of someone living there year round and discovering what might happen when the summer is over. I am a singer myself and have been a jazz fan since I was eighteen and love writing about singers from that wonderful era.

I’ve not started on my novel yet, but I am outlining and getting my ideas together! I hope to reach around halfway during JuNoWriMo. It’s such a wonderful opportunity and I very much look forward to it!

I’m active on social media with several accounts

Find Elizabeth Conrad online at:

Twitter | Facebook | Blog

Enjoying JuNoWriMo? Help us make it bigger and better for next year! Donate, and you’ll receive personal fanfare from our Facebook page.

June 1, 2015

Pep Talk Week 1: The Dancer and the Nag

Mat Morris comes to us as a veteran of the 30-day novel challenge–and not only a veteran, but a wizard, having completed 50,000 words in 24 hours. Enjoy his Pep Talk; we know it’ll fire you up for the challenge ahead!

Greetings, fellow Dream Warriors. Welcome to the beginning of the end.

Most of you don’t know me, and that’s fine. This isn’t about me. It’s about you.

You see, you’re about to embark on a journey that will change your life. You’re about to do something that most only fantasize about. You’re going to take that little voice whispering in your ear, and you’re going to set it free. And I’m going to share with you a dirty little secret that will let you do it.

Everyone has a story to tell.

Now, you might be wondering why I called you a Dream Warrior. And we’ll come back to that. Promise.

More importantly, you might be wondering why someone you’ve never heard of was asked to impress upon you some words of inspiration. Honestly, as I sit here on the night of my deadline, writing what amounts to my third attempt at arranging my thoughts into something coherent, I’m wondering the very same thing.

So, a short bit about me—the current voice in your head.

You see, I was asked to write this because of my past successes in completing these little word challenges. Technically, I’ve completed the challenge of writing 50,000 words in a single month on more occasions than I’ve actually counted. But what seems to impress (read: stupefy) people the most is that, on four occasions, I’ve completed it within a 24 hour period.

Yes. You read that correctly. Continue reading “Pep Talk Week 1: The Dancer and the Nag”

May 14, 2015

Another #JuNoWriMo Giveaway! #amwriting

It’s the middle of May. THE MIDDLE OF MAY! That gives us just over two weeks to finish our pre-writing (if we are the pre-writing sort), stock up on our favorite snacks, and enjoy a lazy evening or two before all our spare moments are full of words. To make the preparations even better we are having another giveaway!

Before you go check out the awesome prizes I want to remind you that there is still time to join the blog hop. It’s a great way to spread the word about JuNoWriMo and earn more entries for the giveaway.

Joining is easy.

1. Write a post.

You can copy and paste what you need to from this post, create your own unique post, or do a combo of the two. If you choose to write your own, have fun with it! Share a little bit about what you will be working on this June, talk about your favorite part of JuNoWriMo, share your favorite recipe for a late night snack on those nights when you need to stay up and write all the words, the sky is the limit. The only must is please include a link to the JuNoWriMo website.

2. Join the linky list.
Once your post is live, join the linky list. That way everyone else participating can visit and help promote your post.

3. Hop!
Visit a few of the other participant’s blogs. It’s a great way to meet some of the other writers before the event.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with JuNoWriMo, it’s a month long writing adventure in the style of NaNoWriMo, complete with word sprints and plenty of other writers to cheer you on. The goal is to write 50,000 in one month (1,667 words a day). You can write whatever you want. Fiction, non-fiction, the final 50k to something you started five years ago. Anything. We’d love to have you write with us!

You can learn more and sign up here.

Our Facebook group is here.

Now for the prizes!!!

First prize – writer care package including chocolate, coffee, assorted teas, and a JuNoWriMo mug.

Robot mug — Cute, right? Perfect for long writing sessions!

Second prize – JuNoWriMo swag pack including a JuNoWriMo button, JuNoWriMo sticker, and a hand-painted JuNoWriMo bookmark.

junowrimo rocket button — These buttons are a great way to show what you’re doing this June.

Robot sticker — What’s more fun than a sticker? Especially an adorable, writing robot sticker?

JuNo bookmarks — Now you can show your JuNoWriMo spirit even while relaxing with a book!

What are you waiting for? Enter the giveaway now:
a Rafflecopter giveaway

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