Where Have I Been?

I haven’t been around for a while. I was super busy getting straight A’s at school! Whoohoo! I’ve become very anal about my schooling in the past two years, and when push comes to shove, school trumps everything else in the world when it comes to importance (short of breathing, ’cause, y’know, that’s important in its own right).

But school is out for the summer. I packed up and moved back into my house with my family, and I stocked up on books that I didn’t get to read all semester, and I cleaned my room, and I have been hardcore reading, writing, and celebrating for the past couple of days.

My sister will be graduating in ten days, which will be fabulous and fun because there are always parties involved in graduations, and there’ll be lots of family coming into town.

I’ve been reading FRAGMENTS, which is the sequel to Dan Wells’ PARTIALS, an amazing book all about biosynthetic human beings and postapocalyptic America. Plus, the books are really fat and thick and they last forever.

I’ve been writing THE HEART KEEPER, a quasi superhero book chock full of conspiracies and power struggles. I started writing it in April of 2012, but I let it languish for months because I had no idea what the heck was supposed to happen. But I’ve figured it out for the most part and have reached the 61k mark, which puts me at roughly two-thirds of the way through. I want to finish it this month.

In other news, I got a creative writing scholarship at school and I might be attending the Clarksville Writers Conference next month. It will be my first conference ever, so I’m hyper excited!

That about sums up what’s happened. I’ll have both more and less time for blogging this summer, because there’s a ton of things going on, but hopefully my posts will interesting enough to tide you through the dry spells.

How To Make Write

Reblogged from Mariella Hunt:

Being Workshopped

I like to talk about editing and critiquing a lot. I want to be an editor, so it’s a topic that’s constantly on my mind. Some of you probably remember my rant on critique partner etiquette. But between my four English classes this semester, I’m currently in the midst of two writing workshops, and these are just some of the things I’ve been noticing.

1) Some people want validation and some want critique. This is a given. A certain someone in one of my classes, whom I will call Po (I’ve got Kung Fu Panda on my mind, okay?), usually has one or two rants in their work. When my fellow classmates and/or the professor call them on it, they become defensive and insinuate we just don’t get it.

This infuriates me, so I choose this point to shut my mouth and not say a word, because a classroom is not the setting to word vomit years of frustration with thankless writers.

Then there are people who keep their mouths shut, calmly listen, take notes, and – calmly and rationally – ask questions at the end of the session. I love these people. They genuinely want help, and I’m a hundred percent happy to do what I can.

2) It’s difficult to just listen. It’s in a writer’s nature to want to explain and defend their work. But the best thing you can do is take notes and try your best to understand what your audience is telling you. There might be stuff you immediately throw into your mental trash can, and that’s a hundred percent okay. But be an active listener and, most importantly, don’t become defensive.

3) There’s going to be stuff you throw away. Sometimes there’s one person who didn’t “get” something and they write that on your paper. But if it makes perfect sense to you and nobody else pointed it out, you can probably throw that observation away (unless you value this person’s opinion extremely and they’re way more intelligent than everyone else).

And of course there may just be differences of opinion. You might want to hold onto something that’s dear to you and doesn’t do anything for the workshoppers. As long as you’re not being pigheaded for no reason, that’s fine, too.

I’ve always had extremely good experiences being workshopped, and I know a lot of that comes from a good attitude and an open mind.

When it comes to workshopping, what are some things you’ve noticed? Do you get to do workshops/critiques very often?

Meltdown Having

I’m having a meltdown, m’kay?

Not a real meltdown, but I’m really busy, and even with packed days I still go to bed with stuff needing to be done. So basically I’m saying I shall try my best to post for the next three weeks until school lets out, but it ain’t gonna be easy.

I’m up to chapter four posting California Girl. I wish I was at chapter eleven (I think) already. Y’all are going to get a kick out of that one.

Like Free Stories?

In a way that feels ostentatious (I always feel that way when talking about myself or my stories), I announce that CALIFORNIA GIRL’s chapter one has been posted on Wattpad and Figment.

After a very long wait.

After much laziness on my part.

Normally, I don’t like to brag. But today’s Writer’s Market class was about marketing your book and standing behind your work. So, here’s what I’m gonna say:

DADGUMIT I WROTE A FUNNY STORY AND YOU SHOULD READ IT.

Summer Rush. (the first Lincoln novel)

California Girl on Figment. California Girl on Wattpad. (the second Lincoln novel).

I’ll be posting a fresh chapter of CG at regular intervals, although I haven’t decided what interval, yet. It depends on how fast I finish the last couple of chapters.

I keep looking back at the word dadgumit. I like it. I’ll probably use it a lot more often. Before my mind wanders any farther, I shall take my leave. I have to finish my homework before eleven so I can get Subway on my way home. I love their turkey sandwiches.

Point of this post being… go read! I promise you, if you like contemporary, humorous stories and characters who like chocolate and good jokes, you’ll enjoy these books.

(If you like bloody sacrifice and cool weapons, I’ll have a story you can enjoy very soon!).

Two Days

You know when you run your mouth and think you can do something and then the deadline starts looming and, surprise!, you might not be able to do what you said you were going to? *nervous laugh* That’s kind of what I did. Kind of. Because I think I might still be able to make it happen if I turn off the internet and duct tape myself to my computer. 

But, y’know, it’s the weekend and I’m home with my family and all I really want to do is chase my nephew around humming the Jaws theme song and driving his mother crazy. 

In case you don’t have the slightest clue what I’m talking about, I promised myself and many other people that Summer Rush’s sequel, California Girl, would be all pretty and polished by April 1st and that I’d be posting it on all my usual sites. 

Well…. 

Just know that a lot of blood, sweat, and tears are going into this effort. A LOT. 

I Wrote a Blog Post!

Just not here…

I wrote about What Editors Look For on the REUTS blog, so scamper on over and don’t despair about poor Of a Writerly Sort

Audio Posts

Lately, I’ve been pretty busy. With school. With writing. With critiquing. With life. And while it may seem like I toss this poor blog and its loyal readers to the wind without a second thought, I feel really bad that I can’t post regularly.

But I think I have a solution!

Using the handy dandy microphone thing on my iPhone, I can record my posts when I’m out and about and then upload them as mp3 files. Which, turns out, I can’t actually do on this blog without getting an upgrade. Said upgrade might be somewhere in my future, but in the meantime, I’ll upload them to my tumblr and link to them on this one.

I’m not copping out entirely from writing written posts, but hopefully this medium will keep me from disappearing for big chunks of time.

If A Publisher Offers You a Contract for Your Self-Published Book, Will You Be Forced (By Amazon) To Refund Past Customers Who Bought It?

Reblogged from Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors:

The answer just might be yes because this is exactly what is happening to Jamie McGuire.  Jamie originally self-published her book Beautiful Disaster and the sales were so good that a publisher wanted the book.  So now the book is with a publisher.  Cool, right?  You'd think so except for this thorn that cropped up.  Amazon is sending out mass emails to people who bought…

Read more… 434 more words

Just to Catch You Up

Today’s post is just nuts and bolts to catch you up with all the fabulous happenings in my glamorous writer life

Numero uno! NEXT FULL MOON has been posted on Wattpad in its entirety. So if you like paranormal stories with feuds and smackdowns with a hint of Buffy, go read it. I hope you enjoy.

If you’ve heard me talk about SUMMER RUSH but have never had a chance to read it, go check it out on Figment. Its sequel, California Girl, will be coming to Figment and Wattpad on April 1st (if all goes according to plan).

I’m on Facebook! If you enjoy reading about my being lazy and scrambling to meet writer’s deadlines, and an occasional bit of whining or pictures of yummy donuts, you can like me on there and I’ll BECOME PART OF YOUR DAILY LIFE AND IT’LL BE WONDERFUL.

I’ve been meaning to write a whole post about REUTS, but, y’know, life, laziness, and the pursuit of that perfect moment to do things (it resides in the place where unicorns and pots of gold hide). So I’m just gonna’ say it! As of a few months ago, I’m an editor with Reuts Publications. Click on the link to find out all about who we are, what we do, and what kind of submissions we’re looking for. Reuts is also on Facebook and currently running a contest for a full manuscript critique from a Reuts editor or a print-ready cover made by our creative director!

It’s almost Spring Break! I’ve decided that this year I’m not going to entertain any wild ideas about how much I’m going to sleep in, eat, etc. This year, I’m just going to get ahead on school work and writing. Keep it simple. That’ll mean less stress for when I go back to school, and that definitely trumps a week of sleeping in.

Finally, I’m writing this post on my father’s fifty-inch television with the help of an HDMI cord and it’s awesome! PEACE!