I spent a few hours last week reading Self-Editing for Fiction Writers. I kept seeing it at the bookstore, kept debating buying it. I picked it up and thumbed through it a few times, thinking it looked pretty good. For whatever reason, though, I just couldn’t make myself pick it up.
Then I read somebody else’s review of it. The very next day, I tried to pick it up, but there wasn’t a copy available. It took a couple of trips to two different bookstores to finally find it, but I’m so glad I did. My copy, roughly a week old, has postit flags sitcking out of it and writign in the margins. I’m already using it, and I’ve recommended it to a couple of people.
Yes, it’s that good. It’s an engaging look at the various components of producing good fiction: voice, characters, narrative, dialogue and monologue, action. I’ve already started applying it to both my own writing and to chapters I’m editing for others, with positive results!
I’d highly recommend picking up a copy and marking it up for yourself. It’s well worth the time and effort!
Posted by Ceara as Resources at 7:33 AM EDT
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I’m still debating whether or not to actually try for independent freelance work, or to apply for freelance positions with educational publishing houses. I realize there probably isn’t much difference between the two, but I’m fairly certain I want to make a go at it.
I’ve been trying to figure out how it will work with my current schedule. I’ve been putting in eleven-hour days four days a week at my current (part-time) job, plus another day that’s anywhere from two to four hours. It doesn’t leave much time for putting together queries and proposals.
It’s slowly occurring to me that I might not have the time right now to build up a freelance writing career, but I’m thinking once I do, I should be fine. Freelancing requires a lot of the same skills that help me in all of my roles in my current work, and are all strengths I’ve exhibited in other jobs.
This should be fun!
Posted by Rebecca as Uncategorized at 7:53 AM EDT
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I have found the best blog ever! Even better, the blogger offers this great article on how to build a strong female character, complete with great, relevant examples.
Comic books, much like the action cartoons I’ve always favored, have almost always had the token girl. As a fiercely independent girl, I always noticed these characters, and nearly always noticed they weren’t characters I wanted to be like when I grew up. It was nice to see girls playing with the boys, going where the boys went, but more often than not they were window dressing. It was annoying.
Even now as an adult, I’m horrified at what passes for girl characters in action cartoons. My favorite eample of this is Anzu Mazaki/Tea Gardner on Yu-Gi-Oh. Here’s this girl who runs with the guys, is set up to be assertive and compassionate at the same time; she seems like she might actually break out and be a good character. As Anzu, she really managed to mostly be this person. Tea, unfortunately, fell apart around a repeated friendship speech that was tired the first time she delivered it and then managed to be nothing but part of the backdrop for ninety percent of the series.
Granted, I’m not quite a feminist (beyond having that crazy notion that women are people, too), but this is a fabulous blog, and this article is a great wake-up call. One can only hope I’ll take it to heart while working on my own pieces!
Posted by Ceara as Uncategorized at 7:39 AM EDT
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I’ve been spending a lot of time recently over my second NaNovel and my graphic novel script, and one thought keeps sticking out in my mind: I can’t develop reasonable characters!
Granted, I am my own worst critic (aren’t we all?), but thanks to someone who graciously reviewed my first NaNovel, I know this isn’t just me. For whatever reason, I can’t seem to create characters who have a sensible purpose for being in the story. I just spent last week bringing life to the three characters who serve as the chorus of the novel I’m currently working on. Somehow, these three very important characters were left to a stilted introduction, and then are downplayed throughout the novel. I’ve fixed part of the problem with their introduction, but I’ll certainly be keeping my eyes open as I edit!
I’ve spent the past two chapters of the manga script developing the character who was the reason for creating the script to begin with. It took ten chapters to start laying anything out about this young man. He seriously could have been described in a single sentence consisting of a simple predicate for the first nine chapters of a story he was supposed to be one of the main characters in.
Oops!
I’m trying to figure out if this is just a problem I’ve been wrestling with for a long time, or if this is a phase that turns up from time to time. I’ve been working on a collaborative story with a friend, and she has never expressed a concern with my work with the characters. Then again, the story is short enough time-wise that there just hasn’t been much room for character development. I also do a lot of fan fiction work, and I’m almost known at this point for character sketches and analysis.
Maybe it’s time to just sit down and get back in touch with character development!
Posted by Rebecca as Uncategorized at 8:10 AM EDT
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I’m trying to drum up my courage and break into freelance writing. It’s a bit scary when you’ve never done it before, and all you hear are the bad sides. Freelancing is evil. Publishers just want to take advantage of you. A trusted potential source for freelance this week is the bane of all writers’ existence the next.
This doesn’t even begin to cover trying to determine rates for your work that both you and a potential employer will find fair..
I wonder why so many people give freelance writing a go (and how they’re successful at it) when I hear all of these horror stories.
I read a number of blogs written by published writers, many of whom are freelance or run some sort of publishing company, looking for any useful advice. The other day, Writers’ Weekly shared an article full of tips for the beginning freelancer. There is some very good advice here. Some of it is just common sense, some of it would help a starting freelancer to not reinvent the wheel.
I love that writers seem to be such a welcoming community, willing to share what they’ve learned with other writers. It makes getting into the freelance writing scene a bit less scary!
Posted by Ceara as Uncategorized at 8:00 AM EDT
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When you write for five to ten blogs, as I do, it’s not terribly unusual to sit down at the computer and realize you have nothing to say. I have this problem quite frequently over at DesignNiche and JewelryNiche, probably because a lot of my current activities are really drawing on my education and writing background instead.
When the doldrums hit and I find myself drumming on my keyboard, it’s not terrbily unusual for me to start working on a tutorial or a story post or an exploration of a specific stone or technique. It turns out that these are perfectly normal ways to beat the blogging blahs.
It also occurs to me that recent posts over at EducationNiche could be misinterpreted as working through a case of the blogging blahs when they’re really just reflecting on some things that have recently come up. In all fairness, many of the story pieces and stone explorations are pre-meditated, too, but there have been some that were written simply because I felt I needed to write something.
Relying on fallback plans in blogging (especially when you’ve been blogging for a couple of years) isn’t shameful,and in fact can help rejuvenate your blogging by reminding you of why you started blogging or by reminding you of interests you’d been meaning to explore. It can actually be helpful on many levels.
Posted by Rebecca as Writing Prompts at 8:22 AM EDT
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I’ve been doing some freelance editing in my spare time. I’ve pretty much had to impose my own brand of electronic mark-up on the people I’ve worked for, and they’ve generally been receptive to it. I’ve often wondered, though, if there’s a better way to go about marking up documents, particularly ones sent to me in the body of emails, to keep them manageable and prevent me from having to create a file when the client doesn’t want one created, and I’m thinking these mark-up tips are exactly what I’ve been looking for!
Last week, I read this great article on marking up a plain text article with a series of brackets. Naturally, I’ve completely misplaced the link. It’s as simple as using the brackets to show where you are suggesting a change, be it grammar, spelling, or content. Once both sides understand the code, it could make editing much simpler.
Then, I found a great article on email tags that I’m thinking I’d love to introduce some of my clients to. I think it would help so much in guiding email conversations by managing expectations.
I’m always looking for great tips to help out my freelancing life!
Posted by Ceara as Resources at 7:49 AM EDT
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I have a very bad habit of slapping together a blog entry and posting it without giving the post a second thought. It’s not the healthiest way to go, I know, but I have made a promise to myself to work on combating that tendency.
Lately, my reading on writing has really focused on improving blogging skills. Oddly enough, right as I started thinking about improving my blogging, the feeds I read all seemed to think about becoming better bloggers, too. It was a little creepy, actually.
One of the posts making the rounds was this post from A List Apart on tips for writing for the living web. It’s an older article, but still very relevant. It suggests writing to a specific topic (nearly all of my blogs have this one covered), writing often (most of my blogs have a very specific posting schedule right now designed to accommodate my odd schedule so I’m not meeting this one at the moment), and interact with people (this is an area I definitely need to step up!). There is a lot of good information here, and I may sit down and analyze each of my blogs against this advice.
The other posts that really caught my attention should both help me with assessing my current level of blogging. Blogging isn’t just about randomly talking on various topics. It’s about generating conversation and moving ideas around. Weblogg-ed really brings that home in this post on assessing blog entries. Copyblogger, however, suggests assessing your blog against the internet itself, suggesting that you write for a human audience instead of the search engines. The prescriptions for each of the problems are pretty good advice, too.
With more reading and more practice, I’m confident I’ll be able to step up my blogging game and bring it to a level I can be proud of.
Posted by Rebecca as Resources at 7:53 AM EDT
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If I wanted to write something when I was younger, I would simply sit down and write it. No real thought process would be involved, I’d jut write. As I mostly wrote short stories, this approach worked well.
Then, I discovered National Novel Writing Month. I learned about NaNoWriMo roughly ten days before it started in 2002, and figured it was no big deal. On November 1 that year, I sat down and started writing a (very bad) novel manuscript. I won that year, too. The next year, I decided to try my hand at plotting out my novel ahead of time. So many fellow WriMos swore by it, so I figured it couldn’t hurt. I randomly worked on an outline for my novel, tweaking it several times before November rolled around. I’m still working on that novel, actually.
These days, I keep a section of EverNote for writing notes. I don’t plan so much as I keep track of ideas I get. I do actually have outlines for a couple of pieces, but most pieces are generated out of nothing but a handful of notes. I’ve also now started using Writer’s Cafe, which doesn’t seem to offer the same ability to organize as EverNote dows (understandable since they’re designed for different uses).
I feel a bit like I combine all sorts of techniques to develop plots (or attempts at plot, as the case often is).
Over the weekend, I was catching up on my Bloglines reading, and read two articles on developing plot that I found rather interesting. Both talk about character development as plot. This isn’t to say that you can build a story on trying to show what kind of person a character is. This is more about creating a conflict in developing the character that can then be used to draw a story around them. I actually used this technique last summer to create a short story that i’m still working on editing. In fact, this idea of personal conflict within the character actually drove the development of the outline for the novel I’m still working on.
One woulkd think this might be an indication that this type of story development isn’t right for me, but I could definitely see how it might work for others. I think that might be because the approach feels more organic, more like how natural life progresses. It’s definitely worth a thought!
Posted by Ceara as Uncategorized at 7:34 AM EDT
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