Classic Stories and Modern Tales

Category: writing (Page 3 of 4)

Guess the novel’s genre based on the music

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Okay, so I am currently working on my fourth novel (and am hoping to publish the second soon), so I thought we’d play a game. Based on my three favorite songs on my writing playlist for this novel, what specific genre do you think my WIP falls under?

  1. Better Place by Rachel Platten – Simple and sweet. It’s enough to put me in a happy mood without being too much for me to focus on while I’m writing.
  2. Not Today by Imagine Dragons – I pick up songs from movies all the time. I’ve always been a fan of Imagine Dragons, and this is a nice, easy song to listen to and write to.
  3. Cheap Thrills by Sia featuring Sean Paul – This song always gets me dancing in my writing chair. Which, oddly enough, doesn’t prevent me from writing. Weird? You bet.

All right folks. What do you think?

Leaving on a jet plane…

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I’ll be MIA for the next week or so while I travel to Los Angeles with my best friend. I’m claiming it’s a research trip (my current WIP is about movie stars), but it’s honestly just going to be a nice time for a little R&R. What should I do and see in LA when I get there?

The Worst Parts of Starting a New Novel

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  1. Carving Out a Plot – Okay so.  Maybe it’s just me.  I get a brilliant idea, and what I think is a great plot and then I sit down to actually plan, to actually write.  And I slam into a brick wall.  “Well, how is that going to work?”  “How am I going to get to that part?”  “Who the heck is going to actually want to read this?”  I get stuck, and I can’t move.
  2. Naming Characters – Yes, I have name generators.  I USE them all the time.  But have you ever struggled to find the PERFECT name?  Name generators are great, but they are limited.  What if they don’t hit the right mood for a character?  Naming a character is like naming a child.  The name is there, in print, forever.  It’s a huge, scary decision!  (Yes, I’m overdramatic.)
  3. The semi-crippling anxiety of making something good – I’m a writer because I love to write.  It’s my favorite thing to do, and I want nothing more than to do that all the time.  But I want to put out a quality product because I want people to enjoy what I put out there.  And so that’s what I worry about.  Will people like this?  Is this a pointless exercise?  Am I any good?

 

Promote yourselves

Here’s a break from your regularly scheduled blogging for you… I don’t check into this site as much as I should, but with summer break on the horizon, I want to turn that around.

So what blogs should I follow?  What blogs should I read?  I love books, teaching, writing, pop culture, movies, Broadway, adulthood struggles… You name it.

Tell me what to check out.  Comment here.  Promote yourselves if you want to.  Why should I check out your blog?  I want to!  Here’s me breaking out of my shell.

Keeping a diary

Did you ever write a diary?

I’ve been thinking about this today.  I’m a history teacher, and my students today were examining diaries and accounts from westward pioneers.  Did those people realize what it was they were leaving behind?  That their words would be studied for hundreds of years?  Or did they just do it as therapy?

I wrote in a diary a few times.  In my youth, about once a year for about three or four years, I started a diary.  I think the most entries I wrote was about five each time.  Then I lost the habit.  And my entries weren’t any good.  No thoughts, no feelings.  They were a simple list of every day.  What did I do at school?  Who did I hang out with?

They hardly leave anything behind.  Except embarrassment.  And they barely give me enough for that.

I wish that I had written more.  I’d have loved that view into my life as a kid.  But at the same time, maybe the mystery is a good thing.

Have I always been a writer?

When I read interviews of authors I admire, they always talk about how they “always knew they wanted to be a writer.”  They talk about the stories they used to write anywhere and everywhere, ever since they were little.  And I love stories like that, I really do.

But I am trying to be a writer, and when I think back on it… It was when I was 13 or 14 that I got the writing bug.  THAT’s when I started planning stories and writing with friends and writing on school bus trips by the light of my iPod.  I always (and this is where my self-doubt comes in) wondered why I didn’t start sooner.  Would I be a better writer if I had started sooner?  Can I be considered a writer if I didn’t start sooner?

There was a period of my life where I didn’t write.  When I was in the 5th grade, I failed some state standardized writing test we had to take (Have I mentioned I hate standardized tests?).  They made my mom do writing workshops with me.  They threatened to put me in remedial writing classes, even though I was in advanced reading classes.  I remember feeling embarrassed and awful that I wasn’t a good writer.  I remember the sick feeling in my stomach that gave me.  It wasn’t until 7th or 8th grade that I was able to pick up writing again.

This week (it’s spring break, weeee!), I was helping my mom clean out my old bedroom when I stumbled upon it.  The evidence that maybe I have always been a writer.  In the top drawer of my old dresser was stowed away autobiographies, reports, silly stories about my friends and made-up characters, and newspapers that I created (about the solar system, about trips to grandma’s house), all written before that terrible 5th grade test.  I had forgotten all about them.

And I wish I had taken pictures to post here.  My silly stories with my terrible handwriting.

I know it’s dumb, to find this kind of thing validating, but it’s nice.  It’s nice to see how far I’ve come and how far I have yet to go.

The most boring blog post ever

I’m finally revising my novel. This is a pretty big deal because the only thing I have EVER revised is a story I have been writing with a friend. And even that is just checking for continuity. This time, though, I am trying my hand at actual revision.

Ugh, it’s hard. I mean, not to sound whiny or anything (my last few entries have been incredibly whiny), but it’s sooooo hard. I thought I could get it done in a month, but with the amount of mental energy it’s taking, it’s going to be so much longer.

I’ve never ever been good at the revising. Editing, sure. But once I have written something, it’s written. I don’t like taking scenes apart and rewriting them again. This story, though, needs some plot fixing. It really does. So I am going to need to do that. I wrote this novel two years ago, so getting back into the headset of these characters is difficult. How do I make it work? How do I make it consistent?

I guess it’s just frustrating. At the heart of everything, I am a perfectionist. I want it to be perfect. I know it never will be, at least not with me. I’ll nitpick and nitpick. I just have to figure out where to stop.

Revisions

I hate revisions.

I mean, I can do a simple edit just fine.  Change a few words, fix some spelling errors.  But once I get something on paper (or computer), that’s it.  I can’t imagine going back and completely changing scenes and plotlines.

For me, once it’s there, it’s there.  I know it’s not perfect, but it’s hard for me to envision it any other way.  Am I supposed to be?  Is there a way to make this easier?

I always dread doing revisions.  I always feel like I am doing them wrong.  Change should come quicker, easier.  Should I be enjoying it?

Am I the only one who feels this way?

Do you write with other people?

Co-authoring has always intrigued me.  There aren’t many novels out there with multiple authors.  In fact, I can only remember reading a few (Peter and the Starcatcher by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson, The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan).  Writing can seem like such a solitary pursuit, but for me, it’s always been the opposite.  Writing with friends is what got me into writing in the first place.

I started writing, really writing, with my friend Megan when we were teenagers.  I don’t know why.  I think I was jealous that she had written something with another friend.  We liked to goof around, insert ourselves into our favorite stories, write about inside jokes.  But as we got older, the stories became a little more serious, a little more realistic.  A few years ago, we even tried rewriting one of those stories we had written as teenagers, hoping to publish it.

We’ve kind of faded off in our writing together (because being adult we have lives now – gross) (actually, she has a life, I read all the time), but that bond is still there.  We still remember those stories and laugh about them.  And we’re still close now, which is the best.

And I write with some other friends too.  Again, those stories are kind of silly and never amount to anything (and more often than not, fade off), but it’s always so fun to plan and create with a friend.  It’s my favorite bonding activity.  Because I’m weird like that.

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