You Tube: Bradbury, King & Keillor

I've been writing my latest WIP (so close to the end!) and writing business plans, bylaws and what not, trying to get SWS in order :( But I took a minute to seek inspiration on youtube. Here's a few videos I found... Bradbury's work I love, King I admire, and Keillor's radio show is something i grew up with :) ...

Sylvanopolis Writers' Society.

I wanted to take a minute to discuss the organization I am building and why. My grandpa (apparently) knew I'd be a writer when I was 8. I knew at 11. I have sought to write and hone my craft for the past 16 years. But there were times in high school and college, especially, where the resources to get where I wanted to go took as much time to research as any school work. Naturally, this meant less...

Remembering What I Once Understood

When I was 13, I decided to spend a whole year world building. Well, all right, I didn't "decide" I just sorta ended up coming up with everything...I have always believed in Cause and Affect. I have always been inquisitive. So the combination resulted in Don-Yin. Through high school, I tried to write a rough draft. But I was torn in too many directions! The world(s) I had built were too complicated...

Derailed...Kinda Sorta

I love outlines. I think...I set everything up, I know the characters, and then...voila! I'll know how it goes. But, it never happens that way. I just reached chapter 5 for my NaNoWriMo project. The characters started subverting my carefully set plans two chapters ago. I think they're laughing at me... somewhere... thinking "Su-cker!" I certainly feel like it. The story will still reach the...

NaNoWriMo

I did it. I signed up. I have been shifting back and forth between my epic fantasy and urban fantasy...with little progress on either. But because the latter has a simpler plot, I'm choosing it for my NaNoWriMo project. No More False Starts I've seriously had plenty of these in the last year. but over the course of the past week, I've begun gearing up. After all, in order to make a novel-in-a-month...

Fantasy Societies and Our Modern World View

Now that I can see again, and read without eye-strain headaches I'm plunging back into reading. A month ago I had a post about my guy reading a series that I read about 13/14 years ago. And I've currently been reading Masques by Patricia Briggs. Which is awesome, because I have followed Briggs...

Writing Life

I'm not sure where I picked up the phrase "writing life," but it fit so well, I thought it was self-explanitory :( And it just slid into my vocabulary. I recently released a survey, in order to see what SWS could do better. I have been doing my best to devise the best way to create a writing...

Time, It's On my Side--Not!

If I were to personify life, it would be as a greedy old man trying to devise new ways to hinder and distract. I can hear evil chuckling right now. T.V. shows, friends and family, responsibilities that stack one atop the other. Squeezing in time for myself to read and write can be a struggle....

What Should Fantasy Characters Eat?

A friend asked after reading my Blogfeast entry, "How do you decide what your characters should eat?" This friend mentioned that she thought the food was particularly detailed, so how did I come up with it? At the risk of lapsing into an anthropological rant... Food is important to all societies....

What a Weekend

Sorry all! I know I failed to come through with a few blogfests. I was super excited that I would have internet at the Nevada County Fairgrounds that I planned to blog from the festival (or, more precisely, the tent) instead, after the concerts closed on the last tap of shoe and stroke of the bow...well,...

New Glasses!

I know cheap isn't always better...but I just received my new glasses courtesy firmoo.com and they were $36 all in all. For prescription lenses. And they're comfortable, good-looking... And best of yet!!! --I can see. Meaning: I can read. Which is especially wonderful as my list of "books to be read" has stacked up while the eye-strain headaches worsened. So I'm looking forward to some quality...

Blogfeast!

Hey! Sorry for posting late in the day...I know for some people it's probably already the 24th :( But here is my blogfeast Entry for Angela McCalister's feast fest hosted on the Jaded Love Junkie! So head on over and read about food 'till it makes you ready for the holidays :D I will try to offer a little context this time :P The main character of this piece is Tati. She and her best friend...

Shhh! It's a Secret Blogfest...

So tired today! I just could not sleep last night...I was planning on writing an original scene for today's Blogfest...but am pulling an excerpt from more sitting & rough material :( Thanks a ton to Summer Ross for hosting! (and all her generous cpomments she leave me here :D ) There are lot's of wonderful entries listed on Summer's site "My Inner Fairy." Go check 'em out Let me know what...

A Little Segway...

I'm going to talk about another blogger and good real-life friend of mine today. since she seems to be avoiding using her "real name" in the virtual sphere I'll call her LTB. LTB and I have known each other for 12 years. She got me into Livejournal when she left our community college for Cal. She cured my boredom when I was working as Student Assistant in a State Agency's Library by sending me...

Back-to School Daze Blogfest

I really love the blogfests :D I've been using/writing/re-writing scenes from my WIP Silver Mask and its world for the past several blogfests...so for Roh Morgon's Back to School Daze I'm including a tidbit from Lara's still-developing world :P Our host has a really cool blog and bio. On her bio she states that she "...found that periodic immersion into other worlds is the key to my coping with...

So September Begins

My Birthday was last Thursday. I turned 27. Yes, still young :P But I'm having the "OMG, I'm almost 30! And 3 years is sooo short!" minor crises. Looking for work daily for the past year with few interviews only worsens this feeling. So this week, I'm focusing on things to make my life feel more under control. Which is kind of funny to me, because I used to have it all down. But I guess...

Fight, Fight, Fight Blogfest!

So I got carried away with the fairy tale :P This one is shorter. I promise. And It's a rewrite of a scene from Silver Mask! Still rough though >.< So whatever commentary you have is more than welcome. I want to thank JC Martin the Fighter Writer for hosting this one :D I love reading action scenes, but I always feel mine are forced :( So I posted on facebook "Help Me!" And Ariane Broome,...

Fairy Tale Blogfest!

Thank you Emily White for hosting the Fairy Tale blogfest! I got a bit carried away :( But! No fantasy elements...which I thought would be difficult. The Fairy Tale I found is The Bronze Ring, an Arabic Fairy Tale. While I set the story in a contemporary (American) setting (cuz that's what I know)I chose Arabic names in order to refer to the original tale. Tell me what you think? Sorry 'bout the...

Word Paint Blogfest!

Thank you Dawn Embers for hosting the Word Paint Blogfest! Not only does this fellow blogger have an awesome name, it's Dawn! My middle name :P (My mother called me Andrea (on-dree--uh) Dawn half the time growing up, but when I was 13 and started going by Drea (Dray-uh)the pattern fell away. Besides, Drea Dawn just doesn't sound right...I think it could do as a dinosaur name, though :P Thankfully,...

Rainy Day Blogfest

I am back to the blogfest rounds! Whoohoo! I want to thank Christine H. blogging at The Writer's Hole for hosting this. In my early drafts I usually have an issue with time. I tend not to give enough weather cues to help recognize the passage of months, years, whatnot. It's something I'm working on :P So this exercise was particularly valuable in stretching those writer-ly muscles :D Hope you enjoy! #...

Old Books

About a week ago, my guy finished Sanderson's Warbreaker and comes to me asking "What should I read next?" Naturally, I have a lot of books. At one point I had read all that I have on my shelves, but a few years ago my collection surpassed my ability to keep up. and I have become very picky about new books. I find myself going to the bookstore and browsing, just browsing. I'm completely indecisive!...

Slow Progress

I've a lot of things on my plate right now :( 1) Job hunt continues! I've had some recent success with careerbuilder. Meaning, I'm actually getting calls! Yay! 2) Event planning and promotion of Leafkin Anthology release. Via mediabistro e-newsletters, I've certainly been piecing together some plans...which I'll start implementing next week... 3) Non-profit forms for SWS. Something else I'm...

What I Learned from Leafkin 2010

Editing the anthology was intense. Why? Because I had to be picky about craft. I like concentrating on structure--evaluating what works for the characters, plot, how a story is built. That includes having an intuitive knowledge of 1) the storytelling process and 2) an eye for what the author "intends." 3) discussing with the author about the effectiveness of the prose. What craft is important...

I didn't die, I promise :(

This month, Leafkin chaos descended. I edited short stories at a furious pace, assisted in planning and manning some of our fund raisers...and dropped off the internet. But now I get to work on promoting while others format and arrange the publication of the anthology. Whoohoo! And I am returning to my own writing. This makes me happy. Reading so many other peoples' writing always teaches...

Thursday's the Day

This Thursday is the deadline for the anthology my writers' group is going to (hopefully) release in October. I'm not writing anything for it, but I am editing. The looming preparations, fundraisers and the like have kept me out of the house and/or focused on critiquing, planning, etc. I'm looking at character and structure (the substantive edits) Erica is looking at line-by-line and Mellisa (who...

Crazy Monday

Today is not going as planned. I am trying to get two chapters done by the end of week (not shooting for words, but arcing over scenes, just to get things down). I will be posting Wednesday to another blog...which I wanted to be "a part of" but hope the friends for whom I wanted it, really take the project and use it to its potential. I interviewed a local artisan for my Wednesday post today. Then,...

Fun Saturday

So today is a writers' group meeting :D In this one, we usually attempt an exercise, or even write to a prompt. This week's was kinda fun, so I thought I'd share. Exercise: write about a child's monster. This is rough and just written :( But have a look! :D ### Taysha pushed herself against the wall and hoped the shadow fully obscured her. She heard the creature...

Breaking the Rules Blogfest!

Thank you Elizabeth Mueller for hosting the Breaking the Rules blogfest! Go Check out Elizabeth's Blog to find all the other awesome entries. As I am working on commenting ...enjoying the blogfests but still getting into the swing of incorporating them into my daily routines...I read and commented first on several of the blogs. There are some really excellent posts! So yeah, people, go check...