Writer.
I want to start linking to interesting posts I find about writing. There is a lot of great advice out there. Today I found something that I could really use in my own process.
Michael J. Sullivan talks about names: http://www.riyria.blogspot.ca/2012/05/names.html
That’s all for now folks.
Thanks for reading.
Heidi out.
Reading through the completed manuscripts of my Spell Carriers series has had an unintended side effect: I’m dreaming about them. This is way cool. Even the one where I was stalking a Trook through a house was way cool.
Last night it was Banhaks. He was coming home from being in prison for ten years.
So, basically, the beginning of book III. My gosh.
And I got to hug him, and it was awesome.
Good job brain.
Well, this is silly.
Last year, Short Story Writing Month gave me a kick in the pants to start writing short stories. It was a welcomed change from writing novels. It put some distance between me and them, and, quite fortunately, garnered me a couple of credits for my CV.
And now that’s SSWM is here again, I feel somewhat silly that, suddenly, I’ve stopped writing short stories to tinker with my novels again.
Now that I’ve got a couple of things in print, I feel I have a better position when approaching an agent to represent the Spell Carrier series. I hope this is the case; I’d love to see these books get picked up.
I reread the first book last month, and was delighted/excited/relieved to discover that I really, really enjoyed it. It’s been a few years for that one, and, having distanced myself from ‘the work’, it actually held up to my critical eye.
…Except the opening few pages, which I was never happy with. So I rewrote them from scratch, and now I have my best foot forward. I know where the story gets its hooks into *me*, I hope it snags my other readers the same way. I know if they give it a shot, they’ll be hooked. I know I was.
And that, my friends, is just about the best feeling I’ve ever had as a writer.
Thanks for reading.
Heidi out.
Worderfall: when words fall of your fingers in a torent of writing and you murder the passage you were dreading.
That moment when you wake up from a nightmare you were having and realize you were dreaming about something you wrote- oh gosh.
I was hunting a Trook, the Big Bad from my two-books-completed young adult fantasy series. Holy smokes it was scary. I was Bazzil, hunting it through a house, with people, who may or may not have been Bazzil’s entourage from me second book, backing me up as I stalked through dark hallways.
Around a corner: a Trook! Only it was more like a Ring Wraith. It wielded a sword I recognized- Bilbo’s Sting, and stabbed me quite deeply. I fought back, though my own sword, Rending, was strangely long and bendy. I stabbed a few times to fight off my attacker, but my sword was too bendy and wonky. Sting was hard and exacting as it thrust towards me…
Wow, I don’t read much into dreams, but it’s very rare I dream of weapons and violence. And the collision of Tolkien’s work and my own in the dream world was quite interesting to experience.
I quite enjoyed my read through of my first book. It stood up well to the test of time. Now onto my second, and we’ll see how it flows from one to the next.
But for now, I must finished my “Werewolves be bad, yo” short story. Deadline looms.
Thanks for reading.
Heidi out.
That awkward moment when you realize you really, really need to get your writing career off the ground, before some other career takes over your life so you can make money and live. (BC Film Set Orientation certification completed over the weekend.)
That equally awkward moment when you realize the novel you’ve been trying to get agents interested in all these years is **young adult** fiction. Holy living figs, why is it so hard for me to sell my writing? I feel like a babbling idiot when trying to describe it enough to get an agent to want to actually read the whole thing.
But then, that amazing moment, when, before bed, you pick up your first book, flip to the last few chapters, and can’t put it down until you’ve finished. I did a good job. Even after these years, it still holds up. That was pretty sweet. So I flipped to the middle and kept reading.
I’m going to flip back, earlier and earlier, until I find out why my beginning is ass.
The first few pages need work, I’ve always known that. If I could just get them together, enough so that it draws people in, then they’ll be hooked.
Back to reading. I’m extremely happy to say that I’m enjoying it.
I’ve had a streak of unproductive, uninspired, generally depressing weeks. My writing is in a slump. Putting words down is like a slog through quicksand.
And then I made myself a bunch of coffee… I was drinking decaf for health reasons. …And I had no idea how much I really relied on coffee to get my but in gear and WRITE.
I suppose it’s not the worse vice to rely on for that elusive inspiration. My stupid Prechordial Catch Syndrome will likely make me have to ration my new method of kick-it-into-gear, but hey, now when I want a nice cup of delicious coffee, I’ve got to earn it by writing.
So cram it, heart, we’ve got work to do.
It’s been a month of going to the gym, nearly everyday. And heck, I feel great.
I just wanted to share.
Oh, and my brain has clicked into novel writing mode. The first one took a year. The second one took four months. Let’s see what happens with this one. I’m excited to begin. It’s still in the planning stages- gotta iron out some characters and basic plot before I begin.
I’ll keep you posted.
Also, I’m addicted to Dr. Who (which has led to an addiction to David Tennant in general). And I’ve been playing Skyrim since it came out- what a marvelous game. Really, it is a tremendous, beautiful, stunning game. I really enjoy it.
In the mean time, getting fit! I have made a lazy comic to share. 🙂
Cheers guys.
Thanks for reading.
Heidi out.
So, no updates in a while. I moved! I’m settled in now. Back to writing.
Today I’m venturing into the scary awesome territory of Steam Punk; cogs and steam, goggles and clockwork guns, zepelins and gyrocopters. I’m writing about the Magnificent Floating Hospital, which gets hijacked.
In other news, I’m working out a ton, but am currently eating cheesies with chopsticks.
Today, I just wanted to say that I love the Oxford Comma.
I use it. I dont’ know why I wouldn’t.
In example:
And also, perhaps more usefully:
That is all.
Thanks for reading.
Heidi out.
H.G. Bells 