Today I offer you a link that offers help if you think you may be battling self-sabotaging behavior in your writing, your business and relationships, or your life. May you find liberation from whatever is blocking you.
A gathering place for wordsmiths of all levels
Am I Writing?
Yes, I am. I can’t blame you if you don’t believe it. It has taken so long from the start of this journey of dreaming about getting published to being close enough I can smell it.
Some people take a very linear route: from idea to outline to manuscript. That has not been my path, partly due to inexperience, partly to distraction.
Even now, it is NOT the novel I am wrapping up. That manuscript is next. It is a novella, about 10,000 words, called Strange. The cover art is done. The final edit is a week from being complete. Formatting the manuscript is next, then off to the publisher, Acorn Book Services.
I am getting close to achieving the dream. Very, very close.
Washington, DC Area Authors Event for All Ages
Today I received an e-mail from my author friend Penny Clover Peterson: “I’ll be at the Cascades Library in Sterling April 11th from 10:30 until 1:00. I will actually have advance copies of ROSES ARE DEAD MY LOVE!!! Hope you can make it.”
The all-genres author event may appeal to you, so I am sharing the details below.
LEESBURG – More than 60 authors from the D.C. metro area will share their work in a Local Authors Fair at the Loudoun County Public Library on Saturday, April 11 from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
Children’s, teen, fiction and non-fiction authors from Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C. and West Virginia will read from their work, sign their books and discuss their writing during the half-day fair at the Cascades Branch of the Loudoun County Public Library.
The event kicks off with children’s authors reading aloud during story time, and includes informal opportunities to meet and talk with writers, book sales and signings. It concludes with a special presentation by Sue Fliess, author of 18 children’s books including many in the Little Golden Books series.
The Local Authors Fair is for all ages and is co-sponsored by the Friends of Cascades Library and the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI).
Participating authors include: Mary Amato, Maya Corrigan, Moira Rose Donohue, Tracee L. Garner, Tracey Kyle, and Penny Clover Petersen
For more information, visit the Cascades Library, 21030 Whitfield Place in Potomac Falls, or visit library.loudoun.gov.
Super Seminars for Those Who Write
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Suspending Reality–Just for a Minute
If I could suspend reality for a minute, here’s what would happen in Fay World.
I would twitch my nose and bob my head as Jeanie did in the old TV show I Dream of Jeanie, and my current novel re-write would be done.
In fact, the other two novels rattling in the deep space of my mind would also magically translate from thought to printed word and be done.
Wouldn’t that be lovely to pull the rabbit out of the hat, just like that?
Shazammm.
Lauren Carr Seminar: Writers in Bathrobes
Want to learn the ropes of the writing/ publishing business? Want to work from home? Then you need this! Top Selling Mystery author Lauren Carr is going to be teaching all this and more in historic Harpers Ferry, outside Washington, D. C., in March 2015.
Here’s an excerpt from her e-mail!
BIG NEWS: I have just scheduled to conduct a SIX HOUR workshop in
March at the church called: AUTHORS IN BATHROBE. I am still working out the details, but this workshop will break book promotion down into an understandable format for writers. Even if your book is not out yet,
then this will include things that you can do now to get the ball
rolling for sales when you book is released.Focused completely on using the internet to promote your book and your
writing career, the workshop will include no less than an hour on
Twitter and an hour Facebook. (My own sales drop 10-20 percent on days I don’t tweet!) It will discuss the importance of a website and how to set
one up without breaking your budget. What is a blog? What goes into a
blog post. Virtual book tours. It will even cover the basics of an
author bio and what makes a good profile pic.It will be 9 to 4 on Saturday, March 21. Lunch will be included. Price
is still being determined.You are the first to hear this, so spread the word.
Write for Yourself–and Only Yourself
That’s right. I am warning you. Otherwise, you could find yourself washed up with the first book. Or, in the case of Herman Melville, the sixth book.
Writer Lucas Reilly tells the story at mentalfloss.com.
Herman Melville had everything a young author could dream of. By the age of 30, he’d traveled the world and written five books, including two bestsellers. He’d married the daughter of a prominent judge, and he owned a beautiful farmhouse. He hobnobbed with the literati. Strangers asked for autographs.
Then he wrote Moby-Dick and ruined everything.
Today, the book is often hailed as the Great American Novel, an epic D. H. Lawrence called “one of the strangest and most wonderful books in the world.” But in Melville’s time, it was a total flop. Readers couldn’t comprehend the difficult narrative. Critics dismissed it as the ravings of a madman. When Melville tried to mend his image with a follow-up, titled Pierre, the reviews were equally brutal, and the work cemented his reputation as a lunatic. At just 33, Melville was finished.
I Finished an 8,500 Word Short Story
When sudden stroke or paralysis knocks a person off the track of life, it takes time and rehabilitation to re-order things. One starts walking again one baby step at a time.
In my recovery from my writing paralysis, it is similar. Time helps. Writing therapy (exercises) does, too. Finally, I reach the point where I decide I am going to finish a story I started two years ago, and I do. It feels good. A friend of mine, an avid reader, looks at it and says it works. That feels good, too. I like the story. That feels best.
Final editing and getting the story formatted for publication comes next. Baby steps. Each step gets me closer to my goal of professional author.
EVEN GREAT AUTHORS GET DECKED
Dave, an acquaintance, shared an article with me that made me giggle. It seems even authors that time and academia have deemed “classic” or “noteworthy” get creamed by critics from time to time. In the universe of literature, no one is exempt from a scathing rebuke.
Feeling glum because someone dissed your work? Read this. You’ll feel better. You may still have to re-write, but you will feel as if you are in good company.
The 30 Harshest Author-on-Author Insults In History
[Editor’s note: While your Flavorwire editors take a much-needed holiday break, we’re revisiting some of our most popular features of the year. This post was originally published June 19, 2011.] Sigh. Authors just don’t insult each other like they used to. Sure, Martin Amis raised some eyebrows when he claimed he would need brain damage to write children’s books, and recent Pulitzer Prize winner Jennifer Egan made waves when she disparaged the work that someone had plagiarized, but those kinds of accidental, lukewarm zingers are nothing when compared to the sick burns of yore. It stands to reason, of course, that writers would be able to come up with some of the best insults around, given their natural affinity for a certain turn of phrase and all. And it also makes sense that the people they would choose to unleash their verbal battle-axes upon would be each other, since watching someone doing the same thing you’re doing — only badly — is one of the most frustrating feelings we know. So we forgive our dear authors for their spite. Plus, their insults are just so fun to read. Click through for our countdown of the thirty harshest author-on-author burns in history, and let us know if we’ve missed any of your favorites in the comments!
For the complete article, go here:
http://flavorwire.com/188138/the-30-harshest-author-on-author-insults-in-history/view-all
Give Your Readers a Warning
Author Lauren Carr just helped me solve a dilemma. I’ll explain.
In a story I am working on, there are bigoted characters–as there are bigoted people in real life. There are bad guys–as in real life. And a few of the scoundrels look and behave differently than me.
Nevertheless, as a new novelist, I wondered what the reading public would think about my story, especially if their own family heritage were the same as the despicable characters in my book. When I wrote the story, I never gave the cultural or sexual orientation or race issues a thought. I simply told a story.
Once the story was essentially complete, it dawned me that several of my friends were going to find ugly characters in my story that resembled them in some way. Would they feel differently about me because I cast a negative character with their ethnicity or sexual persuasion?
Apparently mystery writer Lauren Carr had similar concerns because she included the following disclaimer in the press release for her new book:
Best-selling mystery author Lauren Carr takes fans of past Mac Faraday and Lovers in Crime mysteries down a different path in her latest whodunit. “Don’t worry,” she says. “We have plenty of dead bodies and lots of mystery-as well as intrigue, suspense, and page turning twists.”
However, Lauren does issue a warning for readers. “The key job of a fiction writer is to look at a situation, make observations about how things are and how they work, and then ask, ‘What if …’ This is what I have done with Three Days to Forever.”
Lauren Carr’s latest mystery plunges Mac Faraday, Archie, David, Gnarly, and the gang head first into a case that brings the war on terror right into Deep Creek Lake. “Current political issues will be raised and discussed by the characters involved,” Lauren says. “It is unrealistic for them to investigate a case involving terrorism without these discussions.”
With this in mind, Lauren reminds her readers that “Three Days to Forever is fiction. It is not the author’s commentary on politics, the media, the military, or Islam. While actual current events have inspired this adventure in mystery and suspense, this fictional work is not meant to point an accusatory finger at anyone in our nation’s government.”
Consequently, I am considering a disclaimer, to make the reader aware that I acknowledge there may be sensitivity to character portrayals. The disclaimer also reminds the reader that the work is fiction.
Have some thoughts? Please share them. This is a site for learning.
P.S. In the “draft” version of this post, paragraph spacing is correct. In the “published” form, there are spaces missing between paragraphs in the final section. It is a format error on WordPress’ part. I can’t fix it.
Fay Moore: I Want To Be a Writer 