Monthly Archives: August 2011

Reconnecting with What’s Really Important

Posted on August 21, 2011 | 1 comment

I am about to embark on a long needed vacation. It’s time to relax, and spend some time with my family.  I can’t wait to see the look on my children’s faces when the plane lifts off the ground, or when they see the sunrise from above the clouds for the first time in their lives.

I can’t wait to bring them somewhere where nature is the attraction, not the technology.  I am looking forward to teaching them about another country, another culture, and how people can be so happy when they have so little from our perspective, yet lead such full lives.

For me, it’s time to dig my toes into the sand, and show my children that there are places in the world where the beaches aren’t polluted, and you don’t have to swim between two poles, and there are no boardwalks or loud arcades to drown out the serenity of nature.

I can’t wait to see the looks on the faces of my children (through snorkel masks) when a school of – fish swim right up to them, or when a crab the size of their arm walks across their path in the middle of the night, or when a peacock knocks on the back door asking for a snack.  I can’t wait for them to taste fruit that has been just picked off a tree, or drink from a coconut that was opened up just for them.

Most of all, I just want to get away from all there is to do in my life.  There is not enough time in our busy lives to enjoy each other, any Mommy working hard on getting published hasn’t helped that.  This next week is about re-bonding with my family.

Ire.  Ya Mon.  No Worries.  Jamaica, bring me back to what’s really important… my family.

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Posted in Motherhood, Senseless Ranting

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Free Professional Writing and Query Help from Real Agents!

Posted on August 16, 2011 | 1 comment

WriteOnCon 2011 starts today and goes through Thursday.  If you haven’t heard about it, it’s a really great place to get gads of information all in one place.  It’s great stuff presented by industry professionals that writers normally would have to know someone or have to jump through hoops to try to get.

Here is a link to this year’s offerings.  http://writeoncon.com/2011/08/gearing-up-for-writeoncon-2011-%E2%80%93-the-full-schedule/

There are question and answer sessions with agents, chances to submit your pitches, queries, and parts of your manuscripts for agents to look at and give feedback on.  (And if you are one of the lucky ones, they might ask you to submit something to them off-line)

There are also general topics of discussion.  I can’t wait to see the one on writing the perfect opening line.  I am so darn tired of writing my first page I can’t stand it!

What’s great about this, is if you are like me, and you can’t get off from work to participate in the live offerings during the day, the posts will still be there when you get home.  So, even if you are not participating, you can still learn from the agents that are on-line.  It’s a really great opportunity.

So, what are you still doing here reading this blog?  Get on over there and learn a few things from some agents and GOOD LUCK with your querying!

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Posted in General Writing Tips, Senseless Ranting

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Rooting out the Show Verses Tell

Posted on August 14, 2011 | 2 comments

Have you ever read a manuscript that was JAM PACKED LOADED with tell sequences?

Was it your own?  Would you admit to it if it was?

Even bigger question:  Do you even know what I am talking about?  (I admit, I didn’t when I started out)

There are actually people out there querying novels that are 80% tell and are wondering why they are getting rejections.

Do you know the mistake they made (other than writing a “telly” story)?  They tried to skip the Beta Read process.

If you are querying now, and the only people who’ve read your story are people who know you, you should really consider trying to find a beta partner… or two… or five.

I admit, I was totally convinced my novel was perfect and ready for publication.  When I went through the beta read process I found out it was full of tell sequences and I didn’t even know it.  You know what?  They were really easy to fix (for the most part).

All I needed, was someone to point out to me that they were there.

Don’t walk… run to find yourself a good beta reader, and get ready to have a thick skin too.

You might be surprised about what they find.

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Revision time! (Using losing a contest to your advantage)

Posted on August 10, 2011 | 3 comments

I mentioned last week that one of the judges in a writing contest I entered liked my pitch, but I didn’t make the finals because my first page was not “exciting enough”.  As any good writer would do, I used this as a learning experience, and I tossed my first page and started over.  Now, I didn’t really CHANGE anything per se.  I just started with a blank page, and re-wrote EXACTLY THE SAME SCENE keeping in mind the comment that the first one didn’t seem exciting.

I resisted the temptation of looking back at my original while I was writing, by doing this at a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT computer, and I’m glad I did.  Several times I stopped, and wished I could look back at my original manuscript. If I did, I probably would have ended up with something very similar to the first opening.

What’s odd, is this is really the same thing.  It’s a fight being witnessed by a child, but  the tone is extremely different.  When I look at my original now, my brain says, “what was I thinking?”

I passed this by my writer’s group this weekend, and they seemed to like it.

I think I love it.  Hopefully, I am finally where I need to be!

Here’s my revision.  Hopefully, it makes you bite your nails a little, and draws you in without getting you lost in the commotion of the argument.

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A piece of spoiled fruit flew across the room and hit his father square across the jaw.  Magellan watched him wipe it away indifferently as the tall man started shouting at his father again.  The room erupted in shouts and jeers.

These people are insane, Magellan thought.

“Execute him, My Lord!” someone in the assembly yelled.

Execute him? Now I know they’re nuts.

His mother cringed, and held tightly to his crying siblings as they cowered around her.   The crowd screamed louder, nearly drowning out the roar of the rain on the huge windows surrounding the room.  She reached for him, and Magellan stepped back.  He had no desire to hide in her skirts.

He grasped onto a small black rock in his pocket, ready to throw it if he needed to as the people in the crowd took to their feet.   All Father did was say the moon orbiting planet Roria should be free.  Freedom is a good thing, isn’t it?What’s wrong with these people?

The tall man took a step toward his father, and leaned menacingly close to his face.  “Give me an example of one person on that moon that has asked for freedom.”

His father dropped his eyes.

“What are you doing, Father?” Magellan whispered to himself.  “Answer him.”  You’ve always taught us about how important freedom is.  Here’s your chance to speak your mind.  We’re at court.  Tell them.  Make them believe.  Explain to them that the High King is a tyrant!

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Posted in General Writing Tips, Writing Contests

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YATopia Micro-Synopsis Writing Contest

Posted on August 9, 2011 | Comments Off on YATopia Micro-Synopsis Writing Contest

There’s a Micro-Synopsis contest going on over at YATopia

Here’s the Scoop From the Yatopia Blog Site:

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A Micro Synopsis competition is no small feat – it’s HUGE! And a real test of a writer’s ability to use economy of words.

So YA agent John Cusick from S©ott Treimel NY (can check out his tweets here and an interview with him here), wants you to woo him with not a one page synopsis, but a THREE SENTENCE synopsis that covers the set-up, story and ending (you don’t have to give away a twist/ending – but a taste of it to spark interest).

Your name
Your email
Promo link (blog post preferred,

Genre
Age Group (open to MG, 8 – 12, & YA, 13 – 18, only)
Word Count

The manuscript must be complete and ready for querying. John is open to nearly any genre, but says High Fantasy (dragons, dwarfs and elves) and Vampires are a hard sell at the moment, so you probably won’t get a request if you enter a MS in one of those areas.

There’s no limit on the number of entries (yes you can enter multiple times if you have more than one MS), but you MUST be a follower of the blog.

The all important prizes! The winner will get a full MS request and two runners up will get a request for the first 30 pages of their MS.

Remember this is NOT a pitch contest, so don’t just condense your query. The contest will be open until midnight 11 August. So start shrinking your synopsis!

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A 35 word pitch for the past one was hard enough.  I’ll see what I can do with a three-sentence synopsis.  Who knows?  Gotta chew on this one a bit.

Get your groove on and Good Luck!

UPDATE:  Okay… Here’s what I am going with…

Overwhelmed by the power given to him by the Great Goddess, Magellan Talbot kills hundreds of people before he erases his memory in hopes of saving the galaxy from suffering a similar fate.  Undaunted, the Goddess surrounds her champion with friends who will unknowingly protect him as she maneuvers him toward the threat he was created to thwart. Without his memory, though, Magellan is vulnerable, and the Goddess must protect him from unknown enemies seeking to smother him.

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Happy Birthday to the World Wide Web!

Posted on August 8, 2011 | Comments Off on Happy Birthday to the World Wide Web!

Did you know that twenty years ago, August 6, 1991, the very first WEB page was published?  Back then, only a few people could view it, so no one really even knew it existed, but WOW has it totally changed the world as we know it!

I remember when I used to have a question in my head.  If it bothered me enough, I would go to the library.  Most of the time, my questions would just be left unanswered.  Now… I just Google it.  Life sure has changed.

Not everything that the WEB has made possible is necessarily good… There are things out there that I wish weren’t there.  Also, the convenience of it all has led to some bad things, like the fall of the record stores, and the dwindling bookstores.  I miss them.  Parts of progress, I guess, are not easy to swallow… although I do admit it is convenient to just buy your music or books on-line.  I do miss, though, walking in a mall and strolling through a little bookstore or a music store.  It’s just the experience of it… especially when I was a kid.

You know what else is interesting…  My kids have no idea what it would be like to live without the WEB.  Think about that.  It’s a little weird.

The WEB is part of our culture, now.  It brings us all together.  It’s why you are here, now, reading this.  It makes so much possible.  There have been a lot of inventions in our time.  This one is pretty cool, despite its shortcomings.

Happy Birthday World Wide Web!

(This is the article I read where I found out about the date)

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2011/08/world-wide-web-20-years/

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Hey! I was a Semi Finalist in that Pitch and First 250 Words Contest!

Posted on August 5, 2011 | Comments Off on Hey! I was a Semi Finalist in that Pitch and First 250 Words Contest!

This was pretty cool!

On July 19th I entered a contest.  Click here to see the blog post.  I didn’t really have high hopes.  It was my fist time out there.

On July 21st, I blogged about how good some of the other writer’s first pages were in Just how good are YOUR first 250 Words?

And YES!  The other entries were really good!  (Better than mine… which was the good learning part of this contest for me)

Anyway, imagine my surprise when one of the judges picked me as a semi-finalist based off my 35 word pitch!  I was so excited!  Here was my pitch…

A common boy unknowingly imprinted with the dangerous powers of the Goddess, must find a way to change his fate, and the fate of the galaxy, before a jealous prince manipulated by Darkness murders him. 

(Thanks, by the way, to my friend Jenny Keller Ford who helped me out with this.)

I tanked in the next round tough.  As I expected, my first page didn’t measure up to some of that great work that is out there.  The judge said “I really liked the pitch on this one. The opening paragraphs didn’t grab my attention though. It just wasn’t exciting enough.”

That’s okay, though.  I was really excited to be up there and have her say something positive about my pitch.

The great news is, before I went into this contest, I was fine with my first page.  As you saw in my earlier post… I realized when I chopped out my first 250 words, I saw that they weren’t as strong as I thought they were.

Guess what?  After this weekend, my fist 250 words are going to KICK BUTT.

I am really glad I decided to jump in head first and give that contest a try!  I cannot believe I almost went to query with an opening that might just have killed my story!

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