Ch-Ch-Changes

6.26.2011

In order to make this site more user-friendly and more me-friendly, all the writing posts have been integrated into the main blog.  This part of the blog, being more specialized, has (for reasons I don’t get) never been as popular as the main ink diva blog (apparently, some people like it when I’m all random and unfocused).  Which, honestly, works better for me.  Being random and unfocused, I mean.

I’ll narrow it down and commit to a more regular schedule now that I’m not scrambling to handle two blogs in one.  If you are subscribed to this feed and want to continue reading me, please subscribe to the ink diva feed.  If you’re only interested in my writing posts, the same Ink Diva Writing feed still works to provide just those posts.  Thanks so much for your patience!

If you’ve bookmarked this site or linked back to one of the posts in the Writing directory, please click the home button above and find your way back to the blog.  If you need assistance in changing or linking to a post you found here, please email me (lorisizemore @ gmail(dot)com).

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CJ Redwine, whose query workshop I’ve mentioned before, got a great new book deal. Unfortunately for the rest of us, she’s only going to be doing one more query workshop and then she’s calling it quits.  She says she still has room and the last one starts Monday!

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We suck. Seriously. I mean, there’s lots of reasons we’re awesome. I wouldn’t not be a writer for anything, but still.

We always know what’s going to happen next. Well, in fiction. Not like we can predict the future or anything.

  • We yell at the television for bad writing. E.g. “You can’t just ignore the rules in the world you created, writers! Why? Why are you doing that? You’re lazy. That’s why.”
  • We throw books. We even have a name for books that deserve to be thrown. “Wallbangers.” I know this makes sense to us, but how weird is this? We roll our eyes, grumble, and then BAM. Book meets wall.

We’re more interested in the imaginary people in our heads.

  • Holding conversations become difficult because there’s too much noise. Except we’re only talking to one other person. Well, one other live person.
  • We stand in the kitchen, peeling carrots, and the knife clatters to the counter. “I know what happens next!”, we squeal and run for our notebooks because if it’s not written down we’ll forget and then want to gouge our eyes out with the carrot knife.

We’re always reading. Fiction for fun, fiction in our genre, writing books, blogs on writing, agent blogs, publishing news. If it’s in print, we probably read it.

  • This totally should not be annoying. How can such a solitary activity annoy other people? After we’ve been asked the same question three times and we look up and say, “Huh?”, apparently, it’s annoying.
  • We get snippy. “I only have twenty pages left. Could you just try to stop the bleeding and wait for me in the car?”

What do you do, as a writer that annoy the non-writerly types in your life?

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Why Index Cards Don’t Work (For Me)

04.20.2011

I bought another pack of index cards.  I’m at this point in my story where I’m chucking what doesn’t work (after 11k words, trust me when I say: it could be worse).  I’ve got to keep what works (mostly the characters) and dig deep and find the goals and the antagonist(s) and the conflict. (Why [...]

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Watching TV Makes You a Better Writer

04.15.2011

I learned a few years ago, when I lost an entire weekend to the time-suck that was Seasons 1 and 2 of Grey’s Anatomy, if you watch a television series in order, for at least a season, you can actually learn a lot.  A season of television (good television, anyway) has story structure, character arc, [...]

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What is Love in Romance?

04.09.2011

In my not-writing day job, I do therapy.  I spend my day encouraging people to accept and care for themselves, helping them search for balance, and examining what, in their lives, isn’t working.  As day jobs go, it definitely doesn’t suck.  But I have learned that bad things happen to people who don’t deserve it and [...]

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Brainstorming 100 Ideas Resurrected My Story

04.07.2011

I read a post a few days ago.  It’s not the one linked below, because I had Kindle Klipped it to myself and read it there.  In fact, I can’t track it down at all, because a Google of “brainstorming 100″ comes up with lots of posts from different sites.  It didn’t even hit me that much [...]

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How to Get a Website of Your Very Own

04.02.2011

This is by no means a comprehensive post on the many possibilities.  This will get you a website set up quickly and with minimal effort on your part. Decide who you want for a host You need to make a decision (already).  You have the choice of going with a traditional host.  I make no [...]

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How to Grow a Character

03.30.2011

There are approximately a billion ways to create a character. A lot of people use character worksheets or questionnaires.  I do not use these.  I will be brave enough to admit that one of those reasons is because I never spell questionnaire correctly on the first go.  That alone puts me off them.  But, really, [...]

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A Time to Write

03.25.2011

In my experience, which ordinarily involves a great deal of slapping myself on the forehead and muttering, “Why’d I do that?”, a writer who is serious about writing has to write everyday.  Did you see how  many times I use the word write or a variation thereof?  Yeah.  That’s because this is some serious writing [...]

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You Could Win a Free Professional Book Edit

03.19.2011

The ever entertaining @CA_Marshall (Twitter) is giving away her professional services to one lucky winner!  Having followed her tweets for quite some time and checked out her site, I’d already been mulling over paying up for an edit from her.  Especially after already doing what she suggests, checking out the big names and finding their rates [...]

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