Friday Links - Volume Five

It's Friday again (thank goodness), so time for more links.  The first link is a special one.  Melissa Maygrove is hosting a blogfest dedicated to increasing writers' awareness of social media. It runs all next week, and I've signed up for Monday. The link takes you to a post that not only explains how to join the blogfest, but also has lots of information on how to add social media buttons (and other widgets) to your website.  So by Monday morning, you should find my website much more media savvy.

Enjoy the weekend!

Suspense Versus Action

Why Do Libraries Have That Smell? a very short article in Popular Science

Pricing for Launch: Book 1 in a New Series, Go High or Low?

Formatting: The Easy Ways 

It's Time for Platform Building Again

I've just joined Rachael Harrie's Fourth Writers' Platform building Campaign. I participated in the campaign last year and it was fantastic. I met so many other writers it was unbelievable. So if you have a blog and are a writer, I suggest you drop on by and sign yourself up.

Right now! You only have until Feb. 15th to sign up!

The Insecure Writer - Part III

Today is January's contribution to Alex Cavanaugh's Insecure Writers Support Group.




The fact that I find it so easy to come up with reasons why I’m insecure as a writer makes me feel insecure as a writer.

That’s my happy thought for the New Year.
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I spent much of Christmas vacation working on my book. I’m pleased to say I accomplished quite a lot – tightening up early chapters, fleshing out some of the middle ones, and outlining the last third of the book. In fact, it’s gotten to the point where I can now visualize the book as a finished product sometime in the (distant?) future.

Then why am I insecure? Because I’m gaining a better understanding of everything that is necessary to finish a book. Despite my recent progress, I’m a bit worried that I may be even farther away from finishing than I first thought. It seems the more I learn about writing, the more I realize how much more needs to be done before I can consider the book finished. I’ve spent two and a half years on this story so far and I despair that it might take another two and a half before it’s done. I just don’t know right now.

Nevertheless, my New Year’s resolution is to have it completely finished by next Christmas. Is this a realistic goal? I’ll let you know in June.

The Insecure Writer - Part II

Today is my December's contribution to Alex Cavanaugh's Insecure Writers Support Group.






What makes me an insecure writer this month?

Reading.

Yes. Reading.

We’re all told that to be good writers, we need to be good readers. Read as many books as you can, they say. It’s good for you. See how published writers write. It will make you a better writer.

Perhaps. But it also makes me a depressed writer.

I read books on story structure and discover how poorly my story is structured.

I read books on the do’s and don’ts of fiction writing and find my story is chock full of don’ts.

I read fiction and discover how much more fluid everyone else’s writing is compared to mine.

The first two problems I can handle. It may take lots of practice, and oodles of time revising, but for the most part, everything I’ve read on how fiction works makes sense to me. I believe I can put together an interesting plot. I believe I can arrange my story so that I hit all the proper beats at the appropriate times. I’m confident I have an active enough imagination so that I’ll never run out of ideas about which to write.

It’s the last problem that keeps me up at night. Almost every time I read fiction, I’m reminded of how much better everyone else is at wielding words. Even in books that I find flawed (poor structure, too many dialogue tags, large wads of backstory, etc.), the authors still have a way with words that makes me envious. And I have no reason to assume that I’ll ever be able to do anything about it – no matter how much I practice.

So please forgive me if I don’t read any other fiction this month. I'll be much happier for it in 2012.

P.S. But I'll still keeping reading the writing how-to books.

Torturing Your Main Character

I almost didn’t respond to this week’s Warm Fuzzies assignment – to describe the worst thing or things you’ve ever done to your MC. As I’m still working on my very first book, and as my MC’s journey is still ongoing, I didn’t think I had much to talk about. But after thinking back over what my MC has been going through so far, I think I can describe his torture in one word.

Insecurity.

Insecurity over whether anyone is ever going to accept him in his new job.

Insecurity about his age and whether he’s too young for the task that gets dropped into his lap.

Insecurity that someone will discover his dark secret.

Yep. That’s the theme all right. Although perhaps a better word would be fear. Fear of doing the wrong thing. Fear of failure. Fear of discovery.

Hmmm... Sounds familiar, somehow. Makes me wonder if the MC is really just me in wizard’s robes.

Can You Guess My WIP?

This is week #2 in the Warm Fuzzies Blogfest.

Our assignment was to post a photo that we use for inspiration when writing our stories. Here's mine.



I like to wander around this building whenever I need an additional kick in the pants to keep working on my story. It's the only building like it in my area. Too bad I don't live in Britain. Sigh.

There's no point in asking if any of you can guess the type of story I'm writing, since you've probably already seen the blog's title, but I'm sure my next story will use the same photograph.

An Insecure Writer

This post is my first entry for Alex Cavanaugh's Insecure Writers Support Group.


Question: Why am I an insecure as a writer?

Answer: Why shouldn't I be?


After all, I'm a chemist. I've never written a book or short story before (except a one page story about a silly rabbit back in fifth grade). I didn't grow up wanting to be a writer. I've never taken a single course on writing and I've only recently learned that the term "fiction novel" is redundant. Up until a few years ago, I thought the ability to string together enough words to create a story was reserved only for certain god-like beings granted "THE GIFT".

Oh, and one other thing. I've always hated writing.

Seriously.

With the fire of a thousand suns kind of hate.

It's not as though I've had no experience with writing. I've written technical reports at work and submitted a few papers to scientific journals, but only when my boss or advisor made me do it. My big problem is that translating my thoughts into words on a sheet of paper (or computer screen) ranks as one of the most difficult things I can ever imagine doing. It's like swimming in molasses. It's like climbing a mountain while wearing lead weights. It's like passing a kidney stone.

I'm just guessing on the last one, but it sounds about right.

Writing just doesn't come naturally to me. I've often likened my writing process to that of trying to sculpt a statue from a metal block by repeatedly pounding it with a hammer. Eventually it kind of resembles what's in my head, but that's about it. And my revision process consists of repeating the process over and over again with successively smaller hammers. I don't create sentences -- I beat them into submission. My manuscripts resemble battlefields, not something anyone would want to read. Slow and painful.

And yet, two years ago, I decided to become a fiction writer.

This paradigm shift had nothing to do with any surgical procedures or dalliances with drugs. It occurred two and a half years ago when I began contemplating how a certain well-known author (hint: see blog title) might go about beginning another storyline, and I discovered just how much fun it was to create fiction. Developing new worlds and unusual characters and intricate plots is simply a hell of a lot of fun. I'm hooked. Forever. I think about my story every free moment. How should I introduce such and such a character? What is their motivation? What's the most horrible thing I can do to them and still keep readers interested?

So no matter how painful the process of getting all those thoughts down onto paper can be, I just can't stop.


So why am I insecure about writing?

Because no matter how great my plots might be or how well I've crafted my characters, I don't know if I will ever be able to conquer my seeming inability to convert thoughts into words -- at least well enough to be published.

Warm Fuzzies BlogFest entry

Juliana Brandt has invited everyone to share the best response we've ever received after having told someone that we are writers. I don't have any good stories myself; simply because after two and a half years of working on my story, I haven't told more than ten people about it yet. I didn't even tell my wife until after the first year! After all, I already have a job as a research chemist, there are plenty of projects to be done around the house, and my story can't even be published (as it's mostly fan fiction). I'm not sure I could have even explained what I was doing to myself, much less others.

Since then, I've told my sister-in-law, her husband, and several moms in our school district. Not the dads, though. The only guys I've mentioned it to so far are close personal friends. Don't know if I ever told my brother. Why the reluctance with guys? I guess I just feel women will view "writing" more favorably.

Perhaps once I finish my story and move on to my own story worlds, I'll be more willing to admit to my passion for writing fiction.

Then again, maybe I'll wait until I actually publish something first.

Darn insecurities!