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Short Non-Fiction - Fictional Worlds

Changes

August 12th 2010 12:14


As I'm sure you can tell, Fictional Worlds has undergone a major facelift over the last couple of days. It all began with me creating a banner-I've made two, including the one you see above-and then I changed the blog's theme to match the banner more.

They say a change is as good as a rest and while I'm not quite sure I believe them-or ever did believe them-I am quite happy with the physical changes to Fictional Worlds. I am trying to make other changes-changes in my schedule, my commitments, and my life overall-and this is just the beginning. Over the next few months I will be sharing writing related changes here and more personal changes on my other blog.

I am incredibly grateful to all those who have stayed with me throughout the last two months during which I've posted less than half as much as I should. It's time to think about my commitment both to my passion of writing and to my love of blogging.

While this summer has been almost dull for me-without any of the trips out of town I wanted or very much writing completed-it's also been full of change. My change is largely inspired by a very dear friend of mine, Sam, who spent the first month of this summer in the Bahamas. The lucky girl who is one of the most talented artists I've ever met was artist in residence at a summer camp.

She's back now and with her came the beautiful shell that you see in this post. Seeing her again and seeing just how much she's grown as a person and an artist over this last month is incredibly inspiring. Although it makes me ache for a place that isn't here and desparately wish I could escape the city, it also brings me great joy. The shell sits on my writing desk now and it's an inspiration.

Sam has big dreams and I have dreams that are just as big, and together we'll accomplish them. We have to make some changes to ourselves and to our lifestyles but someday we'll travel the world, and someday the two of us will change the world around us.

It all starts now in those precious last few months between being dependant and almost being a kid and being an adult, independant and ready to face anything the world has to throw at me. This is the summer of change and there are crazy times ahead.

Come with me on my journey?
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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Short Non-Fiction, Articles/Info
   


Interview with Lea Schizas, Creator of the Muse Online Writer's Conference

July 12th 2010 12:55
Lea Schizas has been in the writing world for over twelve years. She's edited for several publishing houses, founded The Muse Online Writer's Conference and the MuseItUp Publishing epublisher. She also founded Apollo's Lyre. Best thing about her in my opinion? She's Canadian too, and she agreed to let me interview her for Fictional Worlds.

Thanks for agreeing to do this interview.

~When and why did you decide to become a writer?

I really didn’t decide. I remember being in mom’s womb and writing with this cool implement on organs that were soft and mushy. Okay...not really...but I’ve always loved to write as far back as I can possibly remember. Entertaining readers with words, giving them an opportunity to laugh, cry, connect with my characters is a thrill that nothing – other than having my five children – compares to. I love to give readers a chance to escape their everyday life’s troubles and woes.

~How did you go from being just a writer to running the Muse Online Writers' Conference?

I’m still a writer, regardless if I’m crazy enough to organize the conference and now publishing houses. These are all the same thing to me – giving writers an area to learn and expose their amazing writing voices.

~What can you tell us about the Muse Online Writers' Conference in 2010?

Well, we’re proud to offer again this year pitch sessions with various houses and agents. We have another long list of weeklong forum workshops and chat workshops.

There’s a long list of workshops and presenters so the easiest thing would be to offer our 2010 workshop line up so far, and I say so far because this year I’m a bit behind in posting everyone so far:
Really Long Link

~Can you tell us a bit about the MuseItUp Publishing house you opened earlier this year?

Yes, I’d love to because I am so proud of the staff and authors we have so far.

First off, the publishing house didn’t just materialize. It’s been a goal of mine since I made my very first list of goals to achieve in my career. Over the years I’ve been blessed to have worked with fantastic editors and publishers who mentored and were there when a question was asked. Kim Richards (Eternal Press/Damnation Publishing) is one publisher who continues to help me with any question I may have along with Vivian Zabel (4RV Publishing).

The whole goal behind our house – and I’ll explain the ‘our’ shortly – is our motto: building the team to achieve the dream. We want to go back to the roots of the publishing world when authors, staff, and publisher were one unit, a family so to speak, who helped each other achieve their goals with a respect and honesty so many nowadays seem to have forgotten. We’re author-friendly, there every step of the way in the author and staff groups answering questions, and basically having fun.

The ‘our’: every decision or website implementation is passed through our writers and staff to get their input and thoughts because we feel that any decisions made by us (this includes my co-partner Litsa) affects everyone so it’s very important that the authors and staff have a say before a major decision is made. It’s not that we can’t make a decision but in order to make everyone feel welcomed, we need to have an open book policy and it’s been accepted and appreciated so far by all.

~What are three things you're looking for in potential books for MuseItUp Publishing?

That’s easy:
1 - Thoroughly fleshed out stories
2 - Memorable characters
3 - Out of the box twists to surprise us and tie in the whole storyline at the end.

~What do you think are the three most important steps for writers to take when improving their craft?

We hear ‘read, read, and then read some more’ and there’s truth to that. The more you read the more you begin to understand what goes into a genre to make it an interesting read. Study famous authors, their characters, what hooks you into the storyline, how they end each chapter or begin them, how they lure you to continue the read, etc.

Next would be to join a critique group to have several pair of eyes looking over your work. As a writer you know your story and might miss areas that still need further fleshing out, or plot holes that need to be plugged. Be objective and open to suggestions. That’s the only way your manuscript can be honed to the best it can be.

And the last step is to put that manuscript away for a short spell before you submit it. Sounds odd, I know, but at times the yearn to be published forces writers to submit work that they believe is fully developed but it’s really not. So by putting it away and coming back to it with a fresh pair of eyes you will notice things you missed the first time. So before you submit your work, put it away and then go back to it and really go through it with a fine tooth comb.

~What would you recommend writers do to get the most out of your Muse Online Writers' Conference?

Simple enough, participate in the forums, and meet the publishers and presenters in the weeklong forums that have given their time to answer questions from writers and offer workshops. If you don’t participate you won’t get the full benefit.

~What projects are you currently working on that you're excited for?

Besides my own work I have to say working on the Muse authors’ projects, editing, preparing the galleys, sending out for reviews, and getting their blog book tours set up has to be the most exciting thing I’m doing so far. Helping writers in any way possible to get their names out there is not only beneficial to the publishing house but to the writer as well. And by helping the
writers, it’s not only promoting the Muse books, but mainly to promote the authors as writers that is more important because in all honesty, readers follow authors more than they follow publishing houses, so our goals is to promote our authors and all of their books.

Thank you for the opportunity to talk about the Muse Conference and the publishing houses. I really appreciate it.

Registration for The Muse Online Writer's Conference ends August first. Register here.
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My Personal Blog

May 11th 2010 12:39
Those of you hoping to get to know me better might be happy to hear that I've decided on a very basic posting schedule on my personal blog.

You can expect posts there three times a week, on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, full of everything from my school essays to political rants to (maybe) pictures of my cat.

Check it out by clicking here.
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The Softest Bunny in the World

April 7th 2010 21:53
Another holiday has just passed, a long weekend for most of us, and for many of us an emotional time. People go to services at churches or dinners with family or friends. We see people we might not see all the time, cousins or aunts and uncles we've never been very close to.

But some of us were alone this Easter, or have been, or will be. Last year around Easter my life fell apart. This year it seems to be doing much the same thing, what with school and writing being all tangled up in a mess. But this year I think I'm still in a much better place


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Quick Survey-Website Building

April 6th 2010 12:11
Hi guys. I hope everyone had a great Easter Weekend. I've been working on building a website in relation to Fictional Worlds, and I've created a very short survey to find out what you would like to see on my website. It's just a couple of questions to help me decide what to put into my website while I'm working on it.

Click here to take the survey
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5 Great Blog Posts

February 26th 2010 12:34
Nanoedmo is almost upon us, and come Monday I will be posting the beginning of my March editing workshop. In the meantime, here are five great blog posts for you to read:

~The Definitive Guide To Choosing A Topic For Your New Blog is a post over at Skelliewag talking about what to do before you create a new blog. It's the first in a series and I suggest you read them all if you're looking into creating a new blog, or your first blog. I hope this helps you


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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Short Fiction, Short Non-Fiction
   


Phoebe: A Cat

February 22nd 2010 12:33
Seven or eight years ago, it's hard to say now, my grandmother took in my aunt&uncle's cat who didn't like other cats. Phoebe was only supposed to stay with her temporarily, but it turns out that my grandmother never found a place to send her-or maybe she just never had the heart to let go of the kitty.

For the last eight months or so, I've been living with my grandmother, which, of course, means living with Phoebe. Phoebe was a beautiful cat, black and brown with a little bit of white. She was old, she was overweight and when she was left alone too long she would get angry and poop in the doorway, we loved her just the same


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What I've Been Doing For the Last Year and a Half

February 12th 2010 23:45
I have two names.

One of them is the one you know, Dianna


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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Short Non-Fiction
   


Difficulty Focusing

February 5th 2010 02:30
For the last couple of months, I've had issues focusing on my writing for any consistent period of time. There's been a lot of stuff going on in my social life and I had a lot of catching up to do for end of semester.

I haven't been as committed to this blog or to my other writing as I should have. I've let other things that aren't, in the long run, as important influence what I do with my time. In the last two months I haven't gotten much of anything done. There will be a later post to explain some of it, but it really boils down to me worrying too much about certain friends of mine, and trying to spend as much time as I could on something before I lost it


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Blogging Commitments and Terry Pratchett

February 2nd 2010 12:35
I've decided that I'm going to cut back my goal blogging frequency to 5 posts a week, Monday-Friday. This is in an attempt to reduce the pain in my wrist so that I can work on other things more.

I love writing. I love this blog. I love a lot of the things that I've written here, a lot of the things that I've said. I love reaching out to other writers. But in the end, the writing I love the most is my fiction writing, and if I have to cut back on my blogging to be able to do so comfortably, so be it


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Ouch!

January 29th 2010 17:29
As most of you know, I've got really bad carpal tunnel. Sometime over the winter break, I lost my wrist brace. Because of that and doing a lot of work very quickly for school, I'm in quite a lot of pain.

I'm going to be taking a long weekend away from the blog in the hopes that my wrist will feel better by Monday, if only a little bit


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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Short Non-Fiction
   


Link Love: Blog Posts and Websites

January 25th 2010 13:11
I've been doing a lot of writing related web wandering lately, and I've stumbled across some great reading material. So here goes...

Blog Posts
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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Short Non-Fiction
   


Reaching Your Goals in 2010: Tips For A Newbie

January 13th 2010 12:45
On the WriYe forums I found a thread from a newbie writer asking for advice. This person has never written a novel before this year. So I got to thinking: what kinds of advice would I give to a newbie writer? I may not be a well known author with dozens of publications under my belt, but I've been writing for about half my lifetime and I like to think that I've learned a fair bit about it throughout the last few years.

So I've come up with a few tips for reaching your writing goals in 2010. These are tips aimed to help the beginner, but they're also good to keep in mind no matter how many years of experience you have. So here goes


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Quick Survey

January 12th 2010 23:57
I'm just putting this out there a second time because the first time I didn't get very many responses. I've built a quick survey to find out why you read Fictional Worlds and what you want to get out of it. You can do the survey by clicking here. It shouldn't take more than two or three minutes.

Thanks for reading and thanks in advance for your response. Without your help I can't know how to make Fictional Worlds a better reading experience.
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Death

January 12th 2010 12:21
This is what happened when I did a free write... it's one of my creative writing exercises for school.
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Free Write-Death


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Sad Farewells

January 11th 2010 12:54
I want to talk briefly about something that's going on in my personal life today.

In Toronto, we have quite a lively club scene. For a year and a half, I've been partying at a club called the Big Bop, at all the all ages events I could make it to. It's a pretty grimey, really old building, but it has character and I've come to love it and many of the people that I've met in it over the last year


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Top Fifteen And Quick Thoughts

January 8th 2010 13:19
I got an email yesterday saying that my poem Unchained has been listed as one of the top 15 writing pieces published at Uhuru. You can find the list of submissions here (clicky). This is a selection of the most popular pieces, those with the highest ratings and those the editor likes the most. I'm really proud to be on that list.

My posts have been short of late but I've been working on workshops for this blog. Over the next few days I'm going to be doing prompt/free writes for my English class and I will be posting the prompts and my responses here


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Kittens!

January 5th 2010 13:15
I don't have much to say at the moment... I'm very tired as I'm writing this post. Later on today I will be doing a fantasy rant. Expect it around eight or nine PM EST.

In the meanwhile, look at an incredibly cute cat


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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Short Non-Fiction
   


What Would You Like to See Here in 2010?

December 30th 2009 12:49
2009 is coming to its end, and overall, it's been a shaky year for me and for Fictional Worlds, but overall I think it's been a good year for my blog-I can't necessarily say the same thing for my case. There are going to be changes in the coming year, there are going to be new things, new thoughts, new journeys.

Take a few minutes to complete this survey and help shape the future of Fictional Worlds


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Interview with Robert J. Sawyer

December 22nd 2009 12:31
The interview with Sawyer last night went very well. He seemed to be very real and nice. I asked him if I could post the interview, and he said yes, so here it is. It's somewhat paraphrased but the most important sentiments are intact.

Me: When did you know you wanted to be a writer?
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