Ad of the Week

Grab bag

Suggested by Michael, 50 Strategies for Making Yourself Work and getting the damnwriting done.

Nathan Norton, a Third Coast Magazine intern, posted a great article on the Third Coast blog about why your story's title is important and ways to think of making it better. He had me laughing several times along the way.

The principles of physics meet real life in Unpopular Science, a comic from NYTimes. I find most of them amusing, but you'll probably get a real kick out of them if you have kids.

Here's some practical magic for writers: a blog post from Writer Unboxed which inspired me to get a copy of this book. The book hasn't arrived yet (no bookstores still stock it), so I'll let you know in a week (or month) how it is.

Speaking of magic and the fact that it's almost Halloween, how annoying is it that you can't get your hands on a Halloween movie from Netflix for the past ten days? You must have to plan all your Halloween orders ahead, submit them at the beginning of them month and then hang on to them all Smog-like until the actual holiday. Bummer. Guess I won't be listening to Thackery Binx tell me how to defeat a trio of witches this weekend.

When I was a teenager I thought Thackery Binx--though human only for 20 minutes of the entire movie--was oh-so-cute.  But it wasn't until I saw a Thackery Binx photo today that I realized that actor is the same one who is now McGee on NCIS.  Ha. Crazy.

Do you NaNo?

It's that time of year again. October's ending, around here the leaves that were so pretty are now in big piles on the lawn, Halloween is practically upon us, Thanksgiving and Christmas just around the corner. That's right: it's NaNoWriMo season.

National Novel Writing Month kicks off it's 12th year in just under four days.

theNathanBransford has been running a NaNo Boot Camp over on his blog all this week. The idea of a NaNo Bootcamp amuses me because NaNo is a bit like bootcamp itself.

You up for it this year?

I'm gonna do it. Not "try," there is only "do" or "do not." I'm crazy busy which, supposedly, is the best way to make it work. No mooning over your novel, your indecision, bemoaning your character's lack of fully developed backstory appropriate goals. Just buy that character some insta-goals and get a move on, you've got words to write.

Evolution of the Geek

From Flowtown via theBransford

Tone in Writing

My students often stumble when I ask them to describe the "tone" of a piece we've read. For some reason, they always say the tone of text book articles and news paper articles is "informational." Far too many students in different classes have said this to me for it to be some sort of fluke. Someone out there has to be teaching that "informational" is a tone. It's not.

When trying to describe tone, use words that would also describe someone's emotions. Don't think what was the text's tone? think how did Jane sound when you talked to her today? If Jane sounded like a newspaper article, then chances are she sounded serious or unemotional. If Jane sounded like a humor column then she probably sounded funny, amused, humorous. If she was announcing the death of a much liked person, then she probably sounded grave, serious, or perhaps a bit shocked.

Tone in writing is much like tone of voice: it comes from word choice and sentence structure. Speaking in short bursts or writing in short sentences is often used to convey that a speaker/writer is angry or excited. Choosing long, sonnorous words and sentences conveys a sense of tiredness or sadness.

So back to work for me -- tomorrow's another day of teaching America's college students that "informational" is not an emotion.

Earned

Better than an Ad of the Week

The Grover Parody of the Week



Muppet Love!

Odyssey Workshop Online

Each summer Odyssey offers an intense, six week writing workshop on the campus of St. Anselm College for speculative writers whose work is of publishable quality or approaching publishable quality. The online workshops don't have nearly the depth or breadth of information as the summer course, but they provide a much more focused discussion for those who would like to brush up on an area or who would like to investigate without making the big commitment of time and money that going to the summer workshop involves. I've been to the summer workshop and highly recommend it. I haven't participated in an online workshop, but I heard good things about last winter's online workshop from people who participated in it. The following comes from the Odyssey Workshop press release:

ODYSSEY WRITING WORKSHOP ANNOUNCES WINTER 2011 ONLINE CLASSES

The Odyssey Writing Workshop, one of the most respected programs for writers of fantasy, science fiction, and horror, is offering three online writing classes this winter. Each class is focused on a particular element of fiction writing and is designed for writers at a particular skill level, from beginners to professional writers.

For sixteen years, Odyssey has pursued its mission to help developing writers of fantasy, science fiction, and horror improve their work by holding its annual six-week, in-person workshop in Manchester, New Hampshire. But last year, using the latest technology, Odyssey expanded its mission, taking the teaching techniques that are so effective at the workshop and adapting them to create online classes. Odyssey Director Jeanne Cavelos explains, "We have worked very hard to ensure that our online classes are of the same quality and caliber as our in-person workshop and that they deserve to carry the name of Odyssey." Courses provide a supportive yet challenging, energizing atmosphere, with a class size limited to fourteen students. While courses are designed for adult writers of fantasy, science fiction, and horror, interested writers of other genres are welcome to apply.

Last winter, Odyssey offered its first online course, Showing versus Telling in Fantastic Fiction. "The class was a huge success," Jeanne Cavelos says. "Using Web conferencing software, we held live class sessions with fourteen students from the US, Japan, and Australia. We had some great discussions, and the students proved that they could commit significant amounts of time and energy to a rigorous, demanding course despite the long distances. They worked intensely on recognizing and manipulating showing and telling in their fiction and made exciting improvements."

This year, in response to demand, Odyssey is offering three different online courses covering some of the most critical issues for developing writers:

Three-Act Structure in Fantastic Fiction
Course Meets: January 5 - February 2, 2011
Instructor: Jeanne Cavelos
Level: Intermediate/Advanced
Application Deadline: December 9, 2010
One of the greatest weaknesses of developing writers is plot. One of the best tools for strengthening plot is the act. Plotting in acts creates a more suspenseful, unpredictable, and emotionally satisfying experience for the reader. The strongest plots often have three acts. In this course, students will study plots of a variety of works, and they'll learn how to create their own strong three-act plots.

Worldbuilding in Fantastic Fiction
Course Meets: January 12 - January 26, 2011
Instructor: Melissa Scott
Level: Beginner/Intermediate
Application Deadline: December 16, 2010
The most prominent element that separates science fiction, fantasy, and much horror from other genres is the setting. A unique, fully realized, believable world provides much of the appeal of fantastic fiction. Creating a vivid, consistent world is not a simple task. Incorporating that world gracefully into a story is another challenge. Award-winning author Melissa Scott is the absolute expert on the subject, and in this mini-course, she will guide students through the process step by step.

Writing in Scenes
Course Meets: February 9 - 23, 2011
Instructor: Nancy Kress
Level: Beginner/Intermediate
Application Deadline: January 10, 2011
For award-winning author Nancy Kress, one principle made all the difference in her writing, transforming it from promising but unsalable to compelling and published. That one principle was writing in scenes. In this unique mini-course, Nancy will explain how to determine the purpose and shape of a scene. She'll discuss the five modes of expression used in a scene, how to find the optimal balance between these five modes for a particular scene, and the importance of dialogue as the heart of almost all scenes. Nancy, an acclaimed writing teacher, provides great insights into the process of creating a scene.

More information about Odyssey's Online Classes is available at http://www.sff.net/odyssey/online.html or by emailing jcavelos@sff.net.

Odyssey's Online Classes pack valuable content into each session and provide assignments that challenge students to take their writing to the next level. The classes provide the tools and techniques students need to improve their writing, along with feedback on their work that reveals whether they are successfully using those tools and techniques.

Cavelos says, "If you're ready to hear about the weaknesses in your writing and ready to work to overcome them, you'd be welcome to apply to one of our online classes."

In addition, the Odyssey Web site, www.odysseyworkshop.org, offers many resources for writers, including free podcasts, writing and publishing tips, a weekly writing blog, and a critique service.

Blow your mind

For your Thursday entertainment. This video does amazing things with images that play great ticks on the eye. It's all projected against a clock tower in Prague and plays both the the artist's imagination and with the existing architecture.

The 600 Years from the macula on Vimeo.

Realms of Fantasy Closes

The fiction fantasy magazine Realms of Fantasy announced that they are closing for a second, and probably final time. A few years ago, the struggling magazine announced it was shutting down only to be bought by another publisher who hoped to turn the magazine around. They only missed one issue -- which says a lot about the character and dedication of their editorial staff. But Realms, a full-sized glossy magazine with interior illustrations as well as cover artwork, needed to change drastically if it was to keep going in a recession, and sadly, Realms changed only slightly.

You can read the publisher's farewell, the editor's farewell, and the farewell from the founder and fiction editor, all online at rofmag.com

Grab-bag

Writing by hand makes us smarter  ... and Margret Atwood can't touch type. Who knew?

National Coffee Day was on September 29. Totally missed it. The good people of America were handing out free coffee around the country, but I was too mired in my 10 Day Slog Through Hell to notice. But I did belated find this article from CBS on the day. Apparently "heavy caffeine consumption" is six or more cups of coffee a day and can lead to health problems. Guess that means my 3-4 cups a day makes me an addict but not a junkie ... or something.

They think they've found the honeybee hive killer -- and since the NYTimes only ran this article on October 6 of this year, all those idiots who previously told me that "oh no, they've figured it out," can stuff it. People are so full of shit. More accurately, they love speaking authoritatively about things they know nothing about.

Speaking of which, it's just a few weeks until elections and the advertisements abound, in my area they're almost all of them for the State Senate race. Except there's going to be a sharp decrease in them. Not because the Republican candidate agreed to stop her smear campaign and step up and take the Democratic candidate's positive campaigning pledge, but because the Democratic candidate passed away suddenly on Monday causing the Republican party to yank all of their negative print and TV ads. Apparently, it takes a death to get through to them this campaign season. (Update: in my mail today there were 3 smear campaign mailers)

This guest blog at Nathan Bransford's blog is wonderful. Covers a lot of ground and several different ways of thinking about the first pages of a novel.

And a little bit of love and one sad orphaned comma from Reasoning with Vampires:

Think about this

I've been having allergy problems lately. I don't know if it's dust or cat dander or my apartment trying to slowly suffocate me or what. So I've been changing the sheets on my bed more often. I've been vacuuming more often. Vacuuming stresses out the cat. When she's stressed out she sheds like mad. Meaning there's more fur lying around my apartment. Which I then need to vacuum up, which stresses out the cat, which causes her to shed...

So I went and bought an air filter.

Apropos

As something of a follow up to last Monday's post, State of the MFA: Year 2.5 and figuring out what matters to you:

There's a lovely post from the blog Invincible Summer where Hanna Moskowitz writes about coming to terms with the stigma of being a children's writer studying writing in academia. Her story is both horrifying and heartening ... and considering she's going through all this as an undergrad she's putting my whole it takes time to find yourself theory to shame.

Ad of the Week

I, for one, did not see that coming. And therefore, this is Ad of the Week.

I love boots, really I do

It's come down to it: the past week has been shitty for me, and there was barely any break between the crazy slog through hell and the beginning of the shitty-annoying-two-faced week, so: I bought some boots.

Retail therapy is not a myth.

Lately I've gone into the store knowing exactly what shoe I'm looking for.  Which, of course, they never have because the shoe in my mind is way to specific.  So I let myself be swayed by necessity and cuteness and walk out with something a little like this:

They're adorable.  Kind of like a sexy pirate.  The heel is just low enough that I can wear it for several hours without wanting to saw it off.  And look! versatile: the top can be folded down for more of a mid calf look or pulled up for a knee high look.

Knowing that no matter how cute these black boots might be with their low slung buckles, I couldn't walk in them all day all winter.  I went in to buy a second pair of boots.  These I knew had to be flat soled, but the good news is that flat sole is in, so I figured there'd be no problem.  Well, there's be no problem if I was willing to buy another super high (higher) pair of boots.  Something vaguely riding-ish and more expensive than the first pair.

I did not think so.

After wandering around and starting to feel dispirited, I decided to try on the gray boots below simply because I couldn't possibly know who stupid a trend looked on me until I tried it.  And I took them home.


I hate Ug boots. I have for years. I think they're ugly and do no one any favors, but hey, if you know that and you're comfortable with it then roll with it. However this season, the idea of the ug boot -- fleecey lining, flat sole, comfortable boot -- has finally gotten a style makeover. These gray shoes are actually cute ... and fuzzy like a bunny inside.

So now I feel better.  Or at least my feet do.

Blog love: Reasoning with Vampires

I am in love with the blog Reasoning with Vampires.

At Reasoning, they take passages from the Twilightnovels and parse what's absolutely atrocious or just plain grammatically wrong with the language.

And they're using fun graphic presentations.

And they've been at it for months now with no apparent let up in the quantity of their posts.

Conclusions: I love Reasoning with Vampires, and Stephanie Meyers throws commas at clauses like darts at a dartboard--unfortunately, aiming for the center only works in one of those endeavors.

And I'm beginning to think this blog might function as a good grammar teaching tool for my classes ... hmm ...

State of the MFA: Year 2.5

After writing the State of the MFA: Year One, Year Two and Year Three, I realized that I'd left out a great deal. I'd left out all the revelatory information that came between the end of one and the beginning of another.

It was in this nebulous 2.5 time frame that I started asking the question (and answering it) Who am I as a writer and what is it that I care about?

For years, I tried quite desperately to write to please other people. As an undergrad I wrote stories like the ones I was assigned to read (all realism). And when someone in workshop said, hey, this sorta reminds me of that Pam Houston story we were assigned I knew I had struck gold. Yes, my writing was quirky and snarky, but it was as much that way because that's how my brain functioned as it was because that's how I knew I could get a laugh from people. Next I wrote to get into the MFA program. They needed to like me and my work to accept me, right? I arrived and the first night of workshop my instructor swiped a hand across the desk and said none of that genre stuff. I wasn't surprised, but I complied. He talked about his great interest in slice of life stories so I, like much of the class, tried to write plotless slice of life stories.

Things kept on like this for a while. I wrote what I wanted in my own free time and wrote what they wanted when I had to show it to them. I was happy (or so I thought) in my knowledge that
what I wrote on my own was important to me and considered worthwhile by other people even if those people were not the ones sitting in class or issuing grades. I thought I would just play the man's game long enough to learn what I needed to. At an AWP panel this past spring I heard a panelist say My goal was always to smuggle out the pretty sentences and take them to Tolkien.

Then it came to a head. I no longer cared to write for other people. I had my This matters TO ME moment.

Someone recently described when she had that same moment some fifteen years ago. Her instructor told her that the story was well written but in the end it was still a story about [dismissive fluff]. She had to work around to it, but she eventually put metaphorical fists on her hips and said, hey, this particular breed of dismissive fluff matters to me.

In my mind, this is the great thing about Year 2.5 of the MFA: you learn to separate out content from style and you realize that you no longer give a damn whether your content is on the approved list of sufficiently weighty topics we can write about.

And once you've had that moment it's hard to go back. Right now I'm working on a story and I'm really sad that it's not as ME as others because it'll be better received if it's less ME and that pisses me off.

Year 2.5 was when I came out of the genre-writer closet, so to speak. In my short profile on the side-bar, you'll see that I love paranormal and urban fantasy novels and I no longer care who knows it. I do love them and I don't care. I used to think that I had to engage only in discussion of aforementioned sufficiently weighty subject matter. Now I honestly admit that I've never given a rat's ass about the boring stuff.

I'm not saying that all MFA students will become genre writers or that we all think the same things are boring. But I do think that it takes a couple of years trying and failing before you realize what's important enough to you that you want to keep trying. To find what it is you'll fight for. If you wouldn't fight whole heartedly in defense of what it is you're doing right now, then why are you doing it? Reasons of learning or pleasing people will only last you so long, and when those reasons expire, you have nothing left except to be yourself.

On Theme

Recently, the Odyssey blog had a discussion about theme and writing in which I'm quoted. Read more.

Ad of the Week

I like the whimsy of this one ... or maybe I just like boots. I went in to DSW over Labor Day weekend to get boots. I was going to be sensible. I was going to get low heeled booties. Walkable boots. Wear when cold boots. Where in snow boots. And I was overwhelmed by the cuteness and got knee high gorgeous girl pirate boots.

State of the Me: Prospectus

No, that's not a typo: This isn't a State of the MFA post, it's a State of the Me post. One is greatly intertwined with the other, but as I have nothing profound or reflective to say about the degree program, I'll focus on the Me side of things.

I regained a bit of my sanity earlier this week. I finished a scary array of projects and then discovered through repeated inquiry precisely how many more credit hours I need to graduate.

Good news: it's fewer than I had even hoped. I had feared a credit-need that would cause me to kill myself this semester, kill myself next semester and into the summer. Now, blissfully, I just go crazy during the current semester.

But then I let go of my fall job hunt notions (as in applying this fall) and decided to just focus on course work. I'll start applying next spring.

And just like that, I'm feeling much less nutty.

Absolutely disgusted

So, after making it through an unbelievable Ten Day Slog Through Hell -- during which every class I took had a project due and every student I taught was schedule to meet with me and every organization I'm a part of had a mandatory meeting -- I went to the mailbox to see what I'd missed over the weekend.

I have now received between 12 and 20 pieces of political print advertisements. All of them, I believe, paid for by the Republican party.

Six have been full color, double-sided cardstock ads for the state senate/rep candidate -- and all six are the exact same ad! Bravo to responsible use of campaign finances.

What's a little bit sickening about this chick is that when she's on TV they dress her up like Sarah Palin. When you see her old headshots she's just a pretty blond (no glasses). When you see her on TV she's got that shoulder length hair pulled half back with a clip and she's wearing rimless square glasses. Creepy.

But I digress.

Yesterday I received a piece of mail which disgusted me.

I opened an envelope with no return sender marked and opened a "handwritten" letter addressed "Dear Friend." Of course this "handwritten" letter was mass produced. By "handwritten" I mean the whole damn thing was in cursive and therefore difficult to read. This is supposedly a letter written to me by a grieving vengeful mother who blames the inability to send many people to jail for her son's murder (instead of just one guy who did go to prison for 12 years) on a politician.

She writes this supposedly moving letter (I did not find it moving, my composition students would not get an A on this thing) about how politician X took her son's case to a plea deal instead of a jury trial.

Letter writing lady: It was an open and shut case of first-degree murder. A jury would have convicted these killers in 10 minutes.

Me: um ... haven't you ever seen an episode of Law & Order? Open and shut murder trials don't exist.

Letter writing lady: My son was a victim twice at the hands of politician X.

Me: First, your parallelism is faulty. It's not "twice at the hands of X" (that would mean that X hurt your son twice); it's "once at the hands of [murderer] and twice at the hands of X." Second, get a clue about the legal system. In this system, most criminal cases do not go before a jury; they are plead out. Your beef is with the legal system not this one dude. Third, you fail your paper assignment because you never stated what politician X's job was when he was trying your son's case. TEARFUL LETTER FAIL.

OH: it gets better.

There's something else in the envelope. I pull out a 3x5 reproduction of the dead kid with more of the "mother's handwriting" on the back. Except this handwriting does not match the handwriting of the letter. It's still cursive, but the letters don't connect the same way. MORE LETTER FAIL.

But what really disgusts me is that this is a political advertisement. You want me to vote based on my heart and not my head? You want me to do that? I simply can't condone or endorse that.

Congratulations paid for byt the Michigan Republican Party, you've just convinced me to vote straight party ticket, straight Democratic Party ticket that is.

The future of publishing

The world is changing, yes. But are you capable of changing how you see it?

Ad of the Week

From ElJohno