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A Prompt To Distract Yourself

March 2nd 2010 12:39
Your goal for this month might be all about editing, but it's always good to keep the writing juices flowing. To help you keep writing, each week there will be a writing prompt. These are designed to be 500-1, 500 word writing exercises. They don't have to be full stories, as long as they sort of make sense.

This week, take a character from a different project than the one you're currently editing, someone who you are somewhat familiar with but who isn't quite a close friend yet. You will be writing from their point of view.

Your goal is to write 500-1, 000 words about this character traveling through an unfamiliar forest. Have them describe the forest as best they can, trying to figure out types of trees, types of flowers, any animals that they find.

I'd love to read your responses to these prompts. If you think one of them is particularly great, email it to me with Prompt Response in the subject line at diannalgunn@gmail.com.
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5 Great Websites/Blog Posts

February 5th 2010 12:22
I've decided that every Friday I'm going to blog a list of great blog posts, websites, and/or markets. This is part of an attempt to try to regulate my writing and my blogging.

Today's list consists of three interesting blog posts and two interesting websites, in no particular order as usual.

~Archetype Writing randomly generates strange characteristics and phobias. These look like some fun things to work with and would be great to add to round out any cardboard characters.

~Truth In My Fiction is a guest post written by Megan Crewe, author of Give up the Ghost. It talks about how her life influenced her writing of this book. I interviewed Megan Crewe around the time her book came out, and you can read the interview here.

~Writer's Block Archive is a livejournal community. Each day they post a new question. You're supposed to answer these as your character-you might learn something new. You can also read through the answers of people who have answered before you.

~What I Saw at Revolution is an interesting post talking about changes in the publishing industry. It also addresses the recent removal of MacMillan books from the Amazon stores.

~A Rose By Any Other Name is a post on Magical Words that talks about naming your characters, and thinking about what a certain name means to you or to other people that you know.

I hope you enjoy these posts. I'll return to posting come Monday.
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Making A Workshop List

February 3rd 2010 12:06
As some of you already know, this year I want to do a workshop that lasts at least one week on my blog. These are meant to be intense, short workshops. In January I did a workshop on Organizing Your Novel, and this month I'll be doing a workshop on characterization. These workshops are designed to help writers with a first draft figure out what they want their story to look like in the next draft, and to help them figure their characters out as well.

I've come up with a theoretical list of workshops for the next year. I'm hoping for some input on what you think would be most useful. Take a look at my list and let me know what you think. Suggestions are welcome.

January-Organizing your novel
February-Characterization
March-Editing
April-Developing a Religion
May-Dear Diary Workshop
June-Developing Mythology
July-Developing a History
August-Increasing Your Productivity (Scheduling workshop w/prompts)
September-Short Story workshop (writing a short story)
October-Character and Plot Building month long workshop
November-Nanowrimo related workshop
December-Short Story Editing

What do you think of this list? Which workshops are you most interested in? What do you think could be better replaced by something else?
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A Story Idea For You

January 14th 2010 12:28
I'm just writing up a quick post for now because I'm rather tired. We had a computer scare here yesterday, but luckily my computer programming uncle fixed the computer for us really quickly. It made me think though.

My life depends on this computer. Not only do I need it to write my books, to work on my blog, and to network with other writers, but I need it for school. The idea that it could have been dead had me in tears, had me panicking. We can't afford a new computer. What would I do without it


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On Nanowrimo

November 1st 2009 12:12
Sorry I didn't post anything yesterday. It was hectic; a friend of mine ran into some trouble and I had to help her out.

I just want to say thank you to everyone for reading and thanks to all those who participated in the workshop. I would love to see your feedback, so if you have any comments-things you thought worked well, things you thought didn't, things you think it would be interesting if I tackled next year-let me know. My email is diannalgunn@gmail.com


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Role-Playing And Writing

October 5th 2009 01:18
This is just a short post inspired by a post on another blog, Holly Lisle's. You can find the post below:

Writers Who Roll-Play
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10 Things To Look Forward To On Fictional Worlds

August 14th 2009 00:11
This is a list of ten things you can look forward to here on this blog over the coming year. I've been planning quite a few workshops and things to do around here to make life more interesting. I've also been debating making a forum for these workshops. Anyone who would be willing to help me run it should contact me at diannalgunn@gmail.com about it.

Here are some things you can expect to see


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Dear Diary 21

July 21st 2009 17:33
Dear Diary,

Today we rose before the sun and ate our breakfast early. We packed up our tents and our bags and put them in our storage wagons-my group has two. I talked briefly with the other generals, who told us to travel along the Appollinian border towards Drakor territory, stopping to help if help was needed anywhere


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Developing Your Voice

July 8th 2009 23:20
I often see writers on various forums asking the same questions. Usually they're questions about things like chapter length, pacing, character building-all those important things. One of the most frequent questions asked isn't specifically about your story though-it's about developing your voice.

Writers ask 'How does one develop their voice


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Jihad-A Seven Book Series

June 30th 2009 21:03
Those of you who have been with me as readers or as writing friends for a while will know that Jihad has been with me for quite a long time. It started as one book in which the main character is thrown out of our world and into a completely alien one on the brink of war. In essence Jihad is about her mission to end the war.

The Jihad was based off of many Gods very real to the world and the mistakes they had made in the past. There was one war seven hundred years before our main character gets transported. The enemies were 'defeated' but now they are returning


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For Young Writers

June 30th 2009 04:48
A long time ago (something like a year and a bit, I believe) I signed up for the Fundsforwriters newsletters. (Fundsforwriters, Fundsforwriters Small Markets, and WritingKid respectively) WritingKid is a newsletter which focuses on displaying markets for young people. (From the age of 'I can write' to college age.)

My publication in Teen Ink was largely thanks to this newsletter, and now I've discovered a small press which publishes books by teens. Because of their restrictions on violence, none of my proper novel-length projects are suitable for this publisher


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Struggling

January 29th 2009 04:07
So far in 2009 I've managed to blog consistently, but it hasn't been easy. There's been a lot going on in my life outside my writing, and my writing is suffering for it; it's just hard for me to write when I'm going through hard times-at least, anything other than poetry.

Things have sort of settled down now, and I'm hoping the writing will become easier for me, but I can't know for sure. We all have times when we struggle, even to do the things we love-especially for those of us who suffer depression


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Working

January 25th 2009 08:03
Writing isn't always easy. The words sometimes come only with force. Sometimes we get bogged down trying to create our worlds. We get fed up when we find out that somebody's already had the same idea. We get depressed, bored, fed up, angry with all the world and with our muses.

We get angry because everything we're writing sounds like crap. We get angry because we feel we aren't getting anywhere


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Learning

January 17th 2009 03:52
Writing is in large part a learning process. A writer needs to be open to new things; this is why we have classes and workshops and books about writing. Not all things will work for you, this is true. We're all different. You probably won't find a class that's absolutely perfect for you. A method won't always work.

But if you don't try new things, how can you possibly know? Everything changes; our writing should too. Let's take the example of a well known author, JK Rowling of the Harry Potter series


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Some Highlights

December 25th 2008 05:26
Today I'm going to highlight some of my favourite things to read. The first few are going to be actual books that I've loved and read more than once; the last few are going to be blog entries geared specifically towards writers. Reading for the cold winter months: curl up with a good book under your favourite blanket-don't we all just love it?

For those of you who have gotten Christmas money, some books to consider


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What makes a writer?

December 12th 2008 06:31
I've gone over this before, but I was reading a thread on Forward Motion earlier and it's been a while, so I felt like writing about this topic.

What makes a writer in my mind is someone who loves to write. Someone who can't help themselves; they just need to do it like most people need to breath. Writing is a passion, writing is a love; when the going gets tough we still keep going. Writers love to do what they do, and are willing to work at it


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Only Writers Can Understand Writers...

October 25th 2008 16:57
I have many, many different circles in which I travel. About seven different groups in which I hang out on a regular basis, and even more who I talk to online. And I have to say, my favourites are my writer friends.

Why? Because if I tell them I can't make it to something because I'm too busy writing, they understand. When I talk about my binder full of notes on different stories and worlds, they understand. When I talk about my love for words, they get it


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When Everything Is Just Too Much

October 4th 2008 23:28
So let me tell you something. School is stressing me out; I'm trying to force myself to go but it isn't working very well. Things at home aren't pleasant either. I'm stressed; so stressed that I've been sick on and off for two weeks now. Nanowrimo is on the horizon.

It's times like these when anybody-writer or otherwise-starts to wonder about all their obligations and if they're worth it. It's times like these when normally I would abandon the blog for weeks at a time; I'm trying not to. It's sort of working. It's times like these when we just want to throw in the towel


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Website Review: Holly Lisle

September 15th 2008 00:48
I'm sick, my internet access is severely restrained because I stayed out REALLY late watching the Batman movie (which I loved), and I'm just feeling generically exhausted from school and life at the moment.

However, I am posting something. I just got the last lesson in Holly Lisle's newsletter course on creating your own royalties. Although it isn't for me at quite this point, I believe that someday I will be prepared to take better advantage of the course, which is saved in my Gmail. (I'm just going to say this: I love Gmail, there is so much space, you can keep most of your emails. I have dozens that are kept because there is just that much space


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The Magical Moments

September 10th 2008 08:46
Why do we live life?

For those moments of magic, those moments of beauty and joy and love.
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