When to Retool
I’ve been having difficulty getting back to my Motes novel since I finished up moderating the MidSummer Madness II novel outlining workshop. I sat down and wrote a few thousand words and stopped at a point where I encountered negative enthusiasm.
Now rewriting is something I don’t enjoy. In fact, it’s a real grind, but if [...]
Midsummer Madness II comes to an end.
The novel writing workshop I moderated at Liberty Hall Writers Group is coming to an end this weekend. It was a forty-two day marathon. We started with about eight participants and ended with four, counting me. The workshop is really centered around planning a novel.
The other three participants are discovery writers, known in the group [...]
Surgery setback delays writing
Life is wonderful. My recuperation was moving smoothly until Superbowl Sunday. I put out a flash for LH’s challenge and was about ready to sit for more than a few minutes and do some real writing.
I came home from church and laid down. My temperature rose throughout the day. When it hit 103.7 just after [...]
NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month
Here is it November 12th. It’s twelve days into NaNoWriMo and I didn’t write a single post. My, my.
NaNoWriMo is a contest for fun. Thousands of writers sign up to write 50,000 words in a month. The NaNo organizers don’t care what kind of tripe is written. Their word counter jumbles up all the words [...]
The Chapter Exchange
Panix is up to 86,000 words. I needed another set of eyes on the manuscript, so I started a chapter exchange with another writer. I’ve read her story, she’s in the process of reading mine.
It has proven to be of real value. Since my spouse abhors speculative fiction, I don’t use her as a reader. [...]
Stop Being an Old Man!
Did a flash on Liberty Hall this weekend. It was mercilessly beaten, kicked, and spat upon. It seems my story was much less PC than was good for it. Problem is, I couldn’t recognize the un-PC.
Sure a bodice gets ripped, but all I say about it is the goofy hero looked. No descriptions. I get [...]
A Plot
Today I learned to do two things. 1) Write a story from one word. I was thinking of writing, so I used the word ‘plot.’ I put my fingers on the keyboard waiting for something to happen. So I wrote, instead of a plot, I wrote about The Plot… a piece of ground. 2) The [...]
New Story: 8,000 Words in one go.
What a night. I decided that I would forego a big background section in a new novel I have sketched out. I decided that it had enough action to stand alone as a story rather than a distraction in the novel. So I wrote an intro (first 13 lines or so) and fully intended to [...]
Quick Ideas can lead to some Hard Work
Yesterday’s idea just wasn’t working out right. I had that little book jacket blurb to guide me. It was coming OK, but I hit a soft spot in the flow. I decided to expand my blurb and wrote a two page plotline summary taking me to the end of the story. Then, last night I [...]
Premise vs. Plot
Look up at the title bar… it says NEW writer. So I make these little discoveries and yell within my head, Eureka! Yet to the long-time writer, these are rather blatant self-evident truths.
I had a Eureka moment this morning. I had an idea pop into my head and it said book idea. Well, it wasn’t [...]
