Blog Posts to Check Out

I've been a bit busy this week planning revisions and working on my costumes for Dragon Con, so I haven't gotten around to planning any blogs. I have, however, collected a couple of great ones from earlier this month that I think are definitely worth a read.

Posts to Check Out!

Deep Characters for Plot-First Writers a guest-post by Suzanne Johnson on Roni Loren's blog. Definitely worth a read!

The Nine-Grid Plan on freelance editor CA Marshall's blog. This is a really fascinating method for hammering out the important parts of your story. I'm definitely going to do this with Beggar's Twin before I get started.

Turning Ideas into Plots by Zoe Marriott, of Zoe-Trope. This is a really interesting method, with fun little graphics included. I can definitely see how it would be useful, though I haven't

Love Scenes in Fantasy by Paul Anthony Scott Also from Roni Loren's blog. This isn't really a "how-to" as much as a comment on both how the fantasy genre tends to display sex and what we should keep in mind to prevent our characters from falling into the demeaning stereotypes prevalent in some fantasy fiction.

Improving Creativity: The Connect Brainset by Livia Blackburne. If you haven't checked out her blog, you should. Livia Blackburne is a "brain scientist" and a writer, who studies the neural effect of writing, reading, and many other things. This post is sort of her version of "filling the well". Worth a read!

Think of the Parents by Scott Westerfeld. As well as writing really great YA, Scott Westerfeld often blogs about issues associated with the YA genre, and his post addressing the "Dark YA" issue that's been circulating these past two or three months is well worth a look. I love that he's not only writing to other authors, but for the Young Adult audience itself, and addressing their questions and comments in a way that doesn't treat them like they're not intelligent and not involved. After all...it's their fiction.

And if you REALLY have a lot of time, or if you're supposed to be driving or doing chores rather than reading blogs, check out Pendragon Variety's Villain Workshop! It was a ton of fun to participate in, and it was really helpful to take part in.

Blog Bus! Great Blogs from This Week

Okay, so I had planned on doing this blog round-up thing once a week, but it turns out my WIP wasn't the only thing in need of revision. It's now been eleven days. I suck, and I'm sorry.

But rather than jumping onto the Fail!Bus, let's take a short-cut and hop straight onto the vastly more scenic route of the Blog!Bus.

On our Route today: Stop 1 - Craft; Stop 2 - Industry/Self-Pub

To start out, how about a little sing-a-long?

John Anealio's Sci-Fi Songs Blog! rocked this week with "New Releases"

And just as a little food for thought, check out Livia Blackburne's post about Psychology as Inspiration for Writers. It seems Adryn is not alone in studying psychology to make people worse...accurately. In fiction.

STOP 1: CRAFT

Three Integral Parts of a Story's Beginning : Author KM Weiland guest posts on the StoryFix.com blog, and talks about how character, action, and setting drive the first scene of a story. Hitler Invades Poland, indeed!

The next three posts illustrate why Magical Words Bloggers are Awesome!

Descriptive Passages Part II: Setting : Magical Words Blogger David B Coe continues his series on descriptive passages, this time focusing on using descriptive passages of setting to help further plot, character, or background. Will be applying this to my own work, most definitely!

Descriptive Passages Part III: Action: Because I suck, David B Coe had time to publish the third in the description series while I was filing my teeth against my manuscript.

Setting, POV, Backstory & Characterizatin (Part II): Another Magical Words blogger, Edmund Schubert, gives some good advice about characters interacting with setting to provide backstory and characterization.

The Trouble With With : I just recently found this blog, Flogging the Quill, and I already love it. In this post, novelist Ray Rhamy talks about techniques for avoiding using "with" in dialog tags, thereby creating stronger writing. No more saying "I did it," with satisfaction.

The Successful Solo Novelist: Possible or Not? Very interesting article from Writer Unboxed, which highlights the importance of editors. He uses Anne Rice as an example, showing how her early work was great, and later, when she fought never to have her prose "mutilated" by editorial hands again, how it spun out of control. Well, we all knew Anne Rice had issues.

I NEED A PIT-STOP!

Howtobescene's 10 Minute Twitter Challenge Song!

STOP 2 : Publishing Industry, E-Publishing, and Self-Publishing
From Draft to Hardback : YA Author Scott Westerfield takes us on the journey of what he, as a writer, does in the process of transforming a draft into a hardback book.
The next three posts focus on the future of the publishing industry when it comes to e-publishing.

Speakin' My Language / The Order of Go : From the Confessions From Suite 500 blog, assistant at the Fine Print Literary Agency, Meredith Barnes, gives her take on why ebooks are NOT going to ruin the publishing industry.
The Future of Story: This post over at Editorrent talks about how we can try to harness the idea of hard and soft trends to help predict the future of story, and figure out it's place in an expanding internet world.
The next two posts from StoryFix.com discuss Self-Publishing, why you might want to do it, and when you probably shouldn't.
Should You Self Publish? One Writer's Take / A Self Publishing Reality Check


And Just Because I'm Shamelessly Self-Promotional:
Go listen to the newest episode of Pendragon Variety, the audio lit mag and round table discussion podcast for genre fiction writers. This week's topic is "Research for Fantasy"

This Week's Blog Roundup

I've been podcasting all morning, and before I dash off to hack at my weekend word-count (+3,000 words by midnight, or my manuscript will turn into a pumpkin), I wanted to share some of the blog posts from this week that I found interesting, timely, informative, and/or helpful. So, without any more babbling:

Industry News!

BitchFest - YA Author Scott Westerfield gives a summation of the Bitch Magazine editing faux pas, which has been a hot topic in the writing (especially YA) industry this week. If you don't know what I'm talking about, read this. If you like Scott, Maureen Johnson, Holly Black, etc., read this.

On the Craft

Finding the Question - Over on the Magical Words blog, AJ Hartley discusses the importance of finding "the question" that your genre-fiction book poses as a means of focusing your story. I found this VERY helpful.

'I do think that the novel as a form lends itself to thoughts and feelings which push beyond genre formula, and that where they grow organically out of story and character, they give an extra level of interest to the work. I would also say that most books have these questions in them already, even if the author has focused simply on plot, but that the book can be made better if the author can become more aware of the question or questions shimmering just under the surface.'

You Can Write Without Inspiration - Loved this post on Writer on Fire by David Arthur Smith. There comes a time in every story I've written when the "magic" left, and finishing was a matter of discipline. I think it's crucial for aspiring writers to learn the three M-words "Momentum, Methodology, and Motivation" that he cites as the backbone to writing when "the inspiration runs out".

Depth of Character - (Writer Unboxed blog) Can I just say how much I love Donald Maas? If you haven't read his book on writing, I suggest you do. He's a literary agent who gives writers the straight facts about craft from the perspective of an agent. The questions and tips in this post got me to thinking about my characters.

How to Avoid the Endless Revise - (at Jill Kemerer's blog) Technically, not this week (Jan 26th), but I was late to the party, so I included it anyway. Jill discusses the pitfalls of revisiting old projects, or continually revising them, and gives a really simple way to decide if it's worth it, followed by a four-step revision method and a revision sheet. *ahem* I needed this post. I printed out the revision sheet. I will flagellate myself with it daily.

The Good News? Writing Never Gets Easier - (on Word Play by KM Weiland) You know you want to read this post.

'A writing life without any challenges would hardly be worth the effort, now would it? Recognizing, and even appreciating, the fact that writing willalways be difficult, frees us from the doubt, and even guilt, of feeling we’ll never be good enough—because the truth is we won’t. We’ll never be perfect, but we can always be better. '

Part II of an interview with bestselling ghostwriter Roz Morris - on Victoria Mixon's blog. This is really interesting! Read the comments.

And that's it for this week! Now, to hack at those 3,000 words...