Where Normal Need Not Apply
Several people I know are going through revisions right now based on feedback they received from beta readers, agents, or editors. Every one of them is dealing with the “I suck” issue along with that. Yes, sometimes feedback can be a bit too mean or blunt, but that’s not the […]
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Now that the dust has settled from the disappearance of Google Friend Connect (GFC) from all non-Blogger blogs, I thought I’d post a followup examining how much the discontinuation affected people. Those of us who never had the GFC widget on our blogs weren’t affected at all. Same goes for those […]
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We all have weaknesses. Some people want to deny their imperfections, but most of us do what we can to overcome them. Like many writers, one of my weaknesses is my inability to interpret my words the way a reader does. That’s not unusual. We know what we meant to […]
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No, that’s not a rhetorical or trick question. Recent events in the publishing industry have left me asking that as a serious point of confusion and discouragement. I know this is an ongoing complaint about the state of literature. Over a century ago, people complained about penny dreadfuls and dime novels, and […]
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Last time, we discussed Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat craft book and how we can use his writing tools to revise our work. His beat sheet points out when story events (beats) should occur in a screenplay, and most of his advice applies to all forms of fiction writing. Whether we dig into […]
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I didn’t want to write this post. I wanted to be stronger. I wanted to be professional. I wanted to hold this pain inside and not let my vulnerability show. If I can’t handle life’s combination of good and bad events without shattering, how will I survive the huge swings […]
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That’s right. I’m asking you to expose your biggest weakness. *locks the door so no one can escape* *evil grin* We all have weaknesses. I’m one of the biggest perfectionists around, but that doesn’t prevent me from having oodles of imperfections. It’s only by knowing where we need more work […]
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I finished the first draft of another WIP (work in progress) on Monday. Guess how I celebrated? *cringes* Uh, yeah…I did nothing. Yes, it was too late to go out for a celebratory dinner. And yes, I have a lot of editing to do. But shouldn’t I have done something? Sure, […]
Several writers I know have recently tried the “Fast Draft” method. What is the Fast Draft method? Fast drafting entails getting the framework of our stories down as fast as possible—without worrying what that draft looks like. Author Candace Havens says it’s possible to complete a first draft in two weeks. […]
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Last week, we talked about how stories change from the initial story seed to the first draft. Then it dawned on me that I’ve experienced that same evolution between a first draft and a finished draft, where so much changed that I hardly recognized the original story any more. For fun, […]
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