Justine's Writing Journal

I know, I know ... I don't post forever and then BAM! A gazillion in a row. Click the link for the full article. Snippets below.

From INTERN - "it's not you, it's me": INTERN's guide to breaking up.

"It was with the godawful novel she’d been working on for over a year. In many respects, INTERN’s relationship with this novel was more tumultuous than any of her other relationships have been, and the parting of ways was definitely messier. INTERN just didn’t know how to leave."

She makes some really good points. The part that most resonates with me:

"Your novel wants commitment and you want to play the field.

You’ve been though one draft together. It was fun and all, but now you’re thinking you want to write a thriller, or maybe some poetry, or that screenplay you’ve been thinking about. Your novel, on the other hand, wants to settle down and make beautiful revisions together. [...] You’re not ready to commit to untold months of revising, querying, and revising some more. You like your novel, sure, but that doesn’t mean you want to spend your whole life together."

Here's an article that might make you feel a bit better about the seemingly endless number of rules and guidelines for writing (you know, the ones that so many of the bestsellers break).

Writing Rules are Just Tools from Rachelle Gardner.

From Nathan Bransford - How to Write a Novel

If you try and hold the entire novel in your head all at once and attempt to imagine it in its entirety and all of its various ins and outs, your brain will suddenly become so heavy that you will topple over backwards and pass out.

I love that he walks you through the process, linking to posts he's done in the past on specific topics. Oh, and a random link to a Bachelorette article. This one's definitely something to bookmark, even if you don't agree with everything he says.

Last week I posted about villains. This week I link to a more general article with some interesting tips, including a couple of suggestions regarding protagonists.

From Janet Fitch, Ten Writing Tips That Can Help Almost Anyone:

7. Smarten up your protagonist

Your protagonist is your reader’s portal into the story. The more observant he or she can be, the more vivid will be the world you’re creating. They don’t have to be super-educated, they just have to be mentally active. Keep them looking, thinking, wondering, remembering..

So ... any words of wisdom you have or that you've read? If you could come up with one to five tips on writing, what would they be? What works best for you? On the flip side, have you read/heard tips that you think are a load of crap, or that just don't work for you?

Personally, I found that two books in particular are excellent.

The First Five Pages: A Writer's Guide To Staying Out of the Rejection Pile by Noah Lukeman.

Manuscript Makeover by Elizabeth Lyon.

Both of these get into the nitpicky details as well as the big-picture issues. I own both books and have referenced them a lot. No, not alot, but a lot. ;D

From the Guide to Literary Agents blog, here's a link to a recent article on Urban Fantasy you may find interesting:

Urban fantasy has become a catchall phrase for contemporary-set fantasy and magical realism. It draws on many traditions of fantasy, horror, hardboiled crime fiction and even romance, blending them together in differing degrees to give us new stories with old tropes. It first really broke out with Laurel K. Hamilton’s Anita Blake series in the 90s and has been growing by leaps and bounds ever since, cross-pollinating additional genres as it goes, including of course young adult. By this point, it’s a mature subgenre and very crowded. So can a new author still hope to break out? Of course!

Here are a few things to keep in mind as you go about breaking out ...

People write in such varied ways, and I know that outlines are an integral part of some writers' process, while they stifle the creativity of other writers. Out of curiosity, I thought I'd post a poll. (I swear I don't plan to spam your friends page like this all the time, but I seem to be on a roll today). Humour me, would ya? Thanks. :)

( Click to complete the poll ... only 5 questions )

Until recently, I did not do a lot of pre-planning, but rather started out with an idea, jotted some scenes down, then expanded upon it based on what I had written and where I was going. Now I plan more, but there's a bit of play involved. I have a basic outline when I start, then as the story evolves, I can fill in more details and revise as I go. And - big surprise! - there are spreadsheets involved. I look for things typical in my own writing as well as overall issues with plot, character and word usage.

How about you?