Monthly Archives: January 2013

One second of your life

Could one second a day change your life? Here’s how!
via Time to Write by j4london@aol.com (Jurgen Wolff) on 12/10/12

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Or, the idea I like best:

* At the end of each day, write one or two sentences about the most interesting thing you did that day, or the most interesting thought you had, or the most interesting thing you heard or read.

For writers, this could become a great source of ideas as well, and it means you’ll write at least a line or two even on days that you don’t have time for a proper writing session.

I suggest you get a nice notebook or datebook or even a calendar to use.

 

I did this last year, and found it to be not just a great way of keeping a diary, but also a place to put ideas and quick notations on the day.  I found that a full page-a-day was too large, and instead got a weekly/monthly calendar, and that was perfect.

All it takes if a few seconds a day to sum up your day, or something that you saw, or the germ of a story idea, and write it down.  You can also put it in your smartphone’s calendar.

Review: Writer’s Workbook

Publisher: Writer’s Digest Yearbook.  Yearbook, Fall, 2012.  $9.99

This, I think, is better and a lot more up-to-date than most of the writing books out there.  It discusses not only fiction but also non-fiction.

Writer’s Digest is well-known for such things as “25 Ways to Improve your Writing in 30 Minutes.”  There’s an article of that here, written by different writers.  It’s also one of the best articles here.

The first part of the magazine is about “Essentials of the Craft” including grammar, starting stories,  and using gender  when writing.  The second section is about “Elements of Fiction” and includes and interview with Harlan Coben and RL. Stine.  It starts from the outline all the way to the conclusionof the story, and includes pacing, showing feelings, and dialogue.  The third part of the book is about “Non-Fiction Techniques”, including how to write up an interview, travel pieces, restaurant reviews, op-eds, and memoirs.

Unfortunately, this being a magazine, it’s only out for a limited time.  Pick it up when you get a chance, as this will help anyone who does any kind of writing, or who wants to try their hand at a different genre.

Another day, more butt in chair.

There’s lots of quotes on how to be a writer, and most of them are variations of “do the work”. Put the butt in the chair. Arrive at the page every day. Even if what you write is garbage and has nothing to do with the project you’re on, you should write, every day.

During the months of November (NaNo!) and December, I hardly found time to write because of, you guessed it, my day job. Now that things have finally let up so that I can stick my head out of the proverbial piles of papers that is my Outlook inbox and look around to see what happened over the last two months.

My kid grew a couple of inches, is in the middle of another growth spurt, and is eating like a Hobbit (Second Dinner, anyone?).

My computer sounds like an airplane. A new one is due.

I have six gig of RAM in my computer instead of eight all of a sudden.

Champions Online is eating up my CPU. Wait, I have only one CPU? I thought I had two.

The Patriots are aiming for another Division East championship. I think? I don’t know, I know that they are winning.

And why did they make a Hobbit movie? Don’t they have like three of them already?

I am going to make April (Script Frenzy) be my NaNo this year. I had a great idea for NaNo, but it sounded too “Twilighty” for my tastes. I may post my garbage-writing here, or on 800 words (marked down to 500 words) or even on Protagonize (I’m under warwriter). I think maybe the polished stuff on Protagonize to get the maximum amount of exposure, and the first drafts on 800 words.

That’s my new years’ resolution this year – to get feedback and criticism. I’m going to try to not write in a vacuum.