Tag Archives: writing

8:00 pm - November 25, 2014 - sjcarlson

Non-writers just don’t understand: Editing is…um…hard…

Hey, writer friends, what’s up? I was recently tweeting a fellow writer and she mentioned her latest editorial struggle (as depicted in above meme). This is totally me. I am a verbose person. Good for reaching the target word count, bad for keeping it under…. I try to set a goal of keeping my YA contemporary around 80,000 words. Which is almost impossible for me. So I start slashing words. A lot of words.

I go through my MS line-by-line, word-by-word, slashing whatever is not absolutely necessary. …and while cutting things, I’ll realize I need to have more internal monologue or emotional reaction or non-verbals to really convey the impact of a particular scene or the character’s progress on an internal or external story arc. And–tada!–not only have I failed in my goal of cutting X number of words, I’ve actually added 2000. …which leads to another edit.

But I trust the process. In the end, my story will be better for it!

Writer friends, what is your focus when you edit? Too many words? Too few? Those pesky adverbs? Telling instead of showing? Commas and semi-colons?

9:00 pm - November 23, 2014 - sjcarlson

Writing that novel: Typing the first word versus the last….

(Yes, both pictures are me, taken in Banff, Canada)

Let’s just leave that whole pesky “writing” part that happens in between up to the imagination 😛 Oh… and then there’s the multiple, multiple rounds of editing, re-writing, editing, re-writing….

Oh, the joys of writing that novel!

Writer friends, how might you pictorially represent the writing process for yourself?

Category: Writing Tags: creativity, writing

9:30 am - November 22, 2014 - sjcarlson

Non-writers just don’t understand: the joy of making someone cry

My title sounds a bit psychopathic, doesn’t it? I’m not a sadist or anything, I swear! It’s just, there are few jobs in the world where it’s a good thing to make a working partner cry. Not only is it a good thing, it might be like the best compliment you can get! (If you are writing something with sad things in it that is)

So the inspiration for my slightly creepy Sponge Bob meme… I was told this week by an awesome, amazing new critique partner that the end of one of my manuscripts made her cry. This was totally me:

That means I was able to create characters that were real and rounded enough that at least one reader cared deeply enough to be emotionally moved by imaginary events happening to fictitious people. All that hard work on characterization and pacing and plot construction (and redoing all of it several times) paid off!

Writer friends, what do you think is the best kind of compliment you can get on your manuscript?

Category: Non-writers just don't understand Tags: creativity, writing

9:27 am - November 19, 2014 - sjcarlson

Non-writers just don’t understand: The joys of constructing a twitter pitch

Writer friends, have you ever participated in a twitter pitch contest? I’ve done a few now. I have to say, coming up with a pitch in 140 characters or less took longer than writing a query or a synopsis. How do you capture the essence of your entire novel in a tweet, especially if you’re a bit crazy like me and like writing dual POV with subplots? Thankfully, I met some awesome writers who helped me craft mine. On the plus side, I now have an arsenal of pitches, and creating them did help me focus my query letter.

Here are a few of my favorites for Hooligans in Shining Armour:

Seventeen-year-old Fiona’s dad may be a Northern Ireland terrorist; Danny heads into the Protestant paramilitary military. In this dual POV YA, they fall in love.

Star-crossed lovers Fiona and Danny inspire one another to fight for their futures; divided Belfast threatens to rip them apart.

Fiona’s on the track to being valedictorian. But when she is whisked away to Northern Ireland she gets more. She gets Danny.

17yrold Fiona’s dad may be a Northern Ireland terrorist; Danny heads into the Protestant military. In this dual POV YA, they fall in love.

Wherefore art my Romeo? In divided Belfast, protestant Danny has to climb the ‘Peace Wall’ to Catholic Fiona’s balcony.

Oh, and the best, best thing about participating in twitter pitch/other online writing contests? Making all kinds of writer friends. Since doing my first one in September, I’ve added at least 500 twitter followers, found a new online crit group, numerous CPs for chapters and query letters, etc. Awesome. Writers are awesome. Twitter has proved to be an excellent platform to connect, and contests are a venue to “meet.”

Have you ever done twitter pitching? What’s your favorite tweet about your MS?

Category: Non-writers just don't understand Tags: writing

9:28 am - November 18, 2014 - sjcarlson

Finally done gallivanting around America and Australia. Now back to life. Um… I can’t even….

Yeah, I said gallivanting again. I’m bringing it BACK!

So I live in Singapore… About a month ago I had to take an emergency trip back home to Madison, Wisconsin for a funeral. It was an expected passing, no need for apologies. Anyway, the funeral was in Maryland, so old school family road trip ensued, full of fall colors and misadventure. Oh, and that impromptu trip to my high school hometown for me and my friend’s WIP Rafa & Rose!

There for two weeks, back to Singapore for five days, then off to Oz, the land down under! It was like an Australian safari, so many cool animals. Oh, and amazing coastline and mountain climbing. More pics to come. I promise I did NOT ride a motorbike or otherwise injure myself. I came to the realization that I really should journal on on these trips…could be fodder for writing. But then I didn’t. Good story, right?

I actually got quite a lot of writing done. I plotted out Rafa & Rose chapters out through probably the end, wrote a new first chapter, about 5-6 completely new ones, and got started with some earlier revisions. My brain is scattered and crazy, don’t mind me… 😛

My body has no idea what time it is anymore lol.

Anyway, full steam ahead with my full-time, unpaid profession: writing my YA novels.

Here’s what’s on my writing docket:

1) Re-read and comment on four 3000-word writing samples for my new crit group.

New writing friend group hug! So excited to work with them. All of their writing is amazing.

2) Finish going through feedback from my writing partner on Rafa & Rose.

Cuz we cool like that.

3) Finish chapter 1 re-write on Rafa & Rose. Oh, and work on three other points in the MS I’m working on simultaneously cuz my brain is….

4) Fix up Hooligans query letter again based on professional feedback then send back for more feedback.

This is pretty much what I want to do. I’ve re-worked it so many times, but it must be perfect.

5) Go through feedback from crit partner on first 5 chapters of Hooligans.

God, again??? But must be perfect.

6) Continue building my social media empire. I may be stalking through the WordPress reader and twitter feeds, so watch out!

Haha, I’m a friend, not a stalker, right? Promise I’ll just be liking and commenting, not showing up to your house or place of employment :P.

Oh and I should probably do some real-life grown-up stuff like laundry and shopping and cleaning and various other errands to get life back in order.

UPDATE: Oh, and revise my Hooligans synopsis based on professional feedback, so make that seven things… LOL

My fellow writer friends, what are your writing goals for the week?