I've done NaNo a couple of times. As a writer, I discovered a lot about myself and my story. You discover if you have endurance or not. Yes, endurance, not how long you can run before you succumb to muscle fatigue but how long can you sit in a chair before you become numb from the waist down?
The next thing you discover is whether you prefer M & M's or Reese's pieces and cola or coffee? Remember you are pushing to write as many words as you can each day so stopping for food slows you down.
The hardest thing for me to discover was that the family could actually operate without Mommy. This is both a blessing and a curse. It's great that I've raised the kids to be self-sufficient but it hurts my feelings that they are.
So Jill, here are some other questions to ask the authors of your panel.
- M & M's or Reese's Pieces, cola or coffee?
- Are you prepared for your characters to veer off your storyboard and go their own way?
- Food, do you have your freezer full of quick to cook meals?
Have fun and good luck to all participating in this year's NaNo.
Thursday, 18 August 2011
Friday, 12 August 2011
Don't Lecture Me! It's all about Entertainment
The other day, an American interviewer challenged me about the purpose of fiction; should it always contain a moral message? Specifically, should crime fiction?
My instant answer: No No No! The purpose of crime fiction should be to Entertain, and nothing should come before that.
Why? We have countless other venues that preach morality. Religions seek to teach us how to behave. Every day we are bombarded by newspapers, radio and other nonfiction outlets, that expose us to the ‘evil’ of greedy politicians, nasty world despots and out of control celebrities.
If fiction – and crime fiction in particular – was required to follow a moral code, we would miss so much. If the good guy always won – if the bad guy always got caught – wouldn’t that make crime fiction lamentably predictable?
Does that mean crime fiction can’t teach us something? Of course it can! Put me in the mind of a serial killer for a few hours. Let me know what it feels like to experience the overwhelming greed of a con artist. Dress me up as a torch singer, with a black heart and a gun in her stocking.
Let me discover something about how other people think, if only for a little while. But above all else, entertain me. Don’t preach at me, even from a distance. I don’t want it from my fiction.
Just tell me a damn good story, thank you. Take me out of the real world for a few hours.
That’s the purpose of crime fiction.
Follow Melodie’s comic blog at
thttp://funnygirlmelodie.blogspot.com/2011_06_01_archive.html
View trailer and read opening scene at http://www.melodiecampbell.com/
View trailer and read opening scene at http://www.melodiecampbell.com/
Rowena Through the Wall (Imajin Books) is available at Amazon.ca, Amazon.uk, Amazon.com, Smashwords and Barnes and Noble..
Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/65519
Thursday, 11 August 2011
Wednesday, 10 August 2011
If you were just beginning...
I'm planning an October panel discussion of published authors, as a prelude to "NaNoWriMo" (National Novel Writing Month). The goal is to be as useful as possible to people who are going to begin (many for the first time) writing a novel. The format will be that a moderator will ask the authors 5 or 6 questions, letting each author take a few minutes to reply to each one.
Possible questions:
What is your writing schedule?
Where do you write and what tools, machinery, music do you have there?
How do you begin - story boarding, outlining, character sketches...?
Think back to when you were beginning. What did you need to know? What was interesting, what was inspiring, what helped?
What else should I ask?
Possible questions:
Think back to when you were beginning. What did you need to know? What was interesting, what was inspiring, what helped?
What else should I ask?
Tuesday, 9 August 2011
We Are Not Alone...
The online universe is still expanding. There were many wonderful mystery blogs going strong when Write On Mystery was set up. Indeed, we couldn’t even go with our first three choices for blog name!
Here is just ONE of the mystery blog lists I came across: http://www.invesp.com/blog-rank/Mystery_Novels#google1
My first real experience with a mystery blog was with the Ladykillers, top Mystery Book Blog 2010. http://www.theladykillers.typepad.com/ This is an impressive blog, with author photos, links to websites, appearances, advance promotion of upcoming blog topics, and guest bloggers. Very nice that you don’t have to be a member to comment. They get several responses to most of their entries.
Another attractive blog, http://mysterysuspence.blogspot.com/2011/07/mystery-crime-fiction-blog-carnival_31.html, has been around since 2009. This one focuses on reviews. They have over 400 members, and interviews with the likes of Jan Burke and L. J. Sellers.
A Canadian contribution to the sub-genre is http://mysterymavencdn.blogspot.com/. They use lots of photos, including latest book cover of the blogger.
The Cozy Mystery List blog comes up often when using Google. It’s a simpler format, focused on the cozy sub-genre of mysteries. http://www.cozy-mystery.com/blog/
Using the theory that we are all one big supportive community, I encourage you to check out these blogs, and find more wonderful ones. Post there if you like, and if appropriate plug Write On Mystery.
Here is just ONE of the mystery blog lists I came across: http://www.invesp.com/blog-rank/Mystery_Novels#google1
My first real experience with a mystery blog was with the Ladykillers, top Mystery Book Blog 2010. http://www.theladykillers.typepad.com/ This is an impressive blog, with author photos, links to websites, appearances, advance promotion of upcoming blog topics, and guest bloggers. Very nice that you don’t have to be a member to comment. They get several responses to most of their entries.
Another attractive blog, http://mysterysuspence.blogspot.com/2011/07/mystery-crime-fiction-blog-carnival_31.html, has been around since 2009. This one focuses on reviews. They have over 400 members, and interviews with the likes of Jan Burke and L. J. Sellers.
A Canadian contribution to the sub-genre is http://mysterymavencdn.blogspot.com/. They use lots of photos, including latest book cover of the blogger.
The Cozy Mystery List blog comes up often when using Google. It’s a simpler format, focused on the cozy sub-genre of mysteries. http://www.cozy-mystery.com/blog/
Using the theory that we are all one big supportive community, I encourage you to check out these blogs, and find more wonderful ones. Post there if you like, and if appropriate plug Write On Mystery.
Wednesday, 3 August 2011
Defining Success
How do you define your success?
Success is defined in the dictionary as: degree or measure of succeding; favourable or desired outcome. As writers we define success as a contracted book but there are more ways for us to count our successes.
One of the ways I count my success is writing one hundred words a day. They have to be new words so when I do editing I still have to write my hundred words a day. Now you might say that's not much of a challenge but I usually don't stop at a hundred words. I get two or three pages done each day, more on days I don't go to work but if all I get is two pages every day for seven days, then I have fourteen pages or a chapter every week. At the end of the year, I've written fifty-two chapters. Whoo! Whoo! for me.
Accountability is another way to measure success. Another group has word count Wednesday. Now that means that every Wednesday you post your success. Now many words have you written? Have you entered a contest? Have you submitted to an editor or an agent? In othe words, what have you actually done for your writing career for that week.
In another writing group we have success bracelets. Now what sister doesn't want a lovely bracelet with each step of her writing career symbolized by a charm? I'm typing this article and looking at the way my charm bracelet reflects the light. It's a wonderful measure of success.
I hope I've given you some ideas that you can incorporate into defining your success as a writer.
Success is defined in the dictionary as: degree or measure of succeding; favourable or desired outcome. As writers we define success as a contracted book but there are more ways for us to count our successes.
One of the ways I count my success is writing one hundred words a day. They have to be new words so when I do editing I still have to write my hundred words a day. Now you might say that's not much of a challenge but I usually don't stop at a hundred words. I get two or three pages done each day, more on days I don't go to work but if all I get is two pages every day for seven days, then I have fourteen pages or a chapter every week. At the end of the year, I've written fifty-two chapters. Whoo! Whoo! for me.
Accountability is another way to measure success. Another group has word count Wednesday. Now that means that every Wednesday you post your success. Now many words have you written? Have you entered a contest? Have you submitted to an editor or an agent? In othe words, what have you actually done for your writing career for that week.
In another writing group we have success bracelets. Now what sister doesn't want a lovely bracelet with each step of her writing career symbolized by a charm? I'm typing this article and looking at the way my charm bracelet reflects the light. It's a wonderful measure of success.
I hope I've given you some ideas that you can incorporate into defining your success as a writer.
Series entries
I just finished the new Sookie Stackhouse short story in Home Improvement: Undead Edition (edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner). The short stories in the Sookie Stackhouse series have been interesting. Some have depicted pivotal events (such as Sookie being informed of her cousin's death), others have seemed as if they might lead to whole new and amazing story lines (such as Sookie sleeping with a shape-changing fairy - which seems to have had no consequences, at least so far...does anyone know what gestation period would be likely?), this story may have introduced a new ongoing character, or added another complication for Sookie if anyone searches her land. If we gained new insight into any character, it may have been J.B.!
In Dark and Stormy Knights (edited by P.N. Elrod) the new Harry Dresden story by Jim Butcher is fun, introduces a new character who may be a player in the series future, and shows us a side of Harry that we already know, but that we love. I have to say that my favorite short story of the last few years was "The Warrior" by Jim Butcher published in Mean Streets. Lovely entry in the series, character growth for Harry, and a different view of the series (and the world) for the reader!
The latest Jim Butcher novel, Ghost Story, is an interesting series entry. Some entries in series are game changers, others circle back to the status quo, and some seem like second halves of the story told in the previous book. Ghost Story seemed to me to be the second half of Changes, and the two together are a game changer in the series. Changes raised some disturbing ethical questions about Harry. In Ghost Story some of the questions raised are answered, and the story (the entire series) can move forward in a new direction. Nicely done! This is not the book that one should use as an introduction to the series, but it is essential for those who follow Harry Dresden.
The series entry I'm anxiously awaiting is the "Ivan" book in the Vorkosigan saga. If anyone is interested in a taste of the Lois McMaster Bujold series, there are links to free "samples" from the series in the Baen Free Library:
The Hugo- and Nebula-winning novella "The Mountains of Mourning"
http://www.webscription.net/p-622-the-mountains-of-mourning.aspx
and one of the prime entry-point books for the Vorkosigan series, The Warrior's Apprentice.
http://www.webscription.net/p-1290-warriors-apprentice.aspx
In Dark and Stormy Knights (edited by P.N. Elrod) the new Harry Dresden story by Jim Butcher is fun, introduces a new character who may be a player in the series future, and shows us a side of Harry that we already know, but that we love. I have to say that my favorite short story of the last few years was "The Warrior" by Jim Butcher published in Mean Streets. Lovely entry in the series, character growth for Harry, and a different view of the series (and the world) for the reader!
The latest Jim Butcher novel, Ghost Story, is an interesting series entry. Some entries in series are game changers, others circle back to the status quo, and some seem like second halves of the story told in the previous book. Ghost Story seemed to me to be the second half of Changes, and the two together are a game changer in the series. Changes raised some disturbing ethical questions about Harry. In Ghost Story some of the questions raised are answered, and the story (the entire series) can move forward in a new direction. Nicely done! This is not the book that one should use as an introduction to the series, but it is essential for those who follow Harry Dresden.
The series entry I'm anxiously awaiting is the "Ivan" book in the Vorkosigan saga. If anyone is interested in a taste of the Lois McMaster Bujold series, there are links to free "samples" from the series in the Baen Free Library:
The Hugo- and Nebula-winning novella "The Mountains of Mourning"
http://www.webscription.net/p-622-the-mountains-of-mourning.aspx
and one of the prime entry-point books for the Vorkosigan series, The Warrior's Apprentice.
http://www.webscription.net/p-1290-warriors-apprentice.aspx
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