CSFF Blog Tour Day 1: Outcasts vs The Hunger Games

It was about two years ago that I discovered The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. I devoured the books and have reread them many times since.

I had a similar feeling when I discovered Captives, the first book in Jill Williamson's The Safe Lands series. The book was temporarily free on Kindle and I snapped it up, just because I wanted something new to read.

I was very pleasantly surprised by the book. I loved it in pretty much the same way that I loved The Hunger Games. And I was very impatient for the release of Outcasts, and the day I downloaded the book to my Kindle I got absolutely nothing done around the house until the book was finished.

Now, I'm not saying that The Safe Lands series is 'just like' The Hunger Games. There are major differences. And for all I know author Jill Williamson hasn't even read The Hunger Games--- The Safe Lands series is by no means a 'copycat' effort.

But there are some similarities that I think will make the books popular with those who enjoyed The Hunger Games. They are:

1. Both books are set in the future, after apocalyptic events. In The Safe Lands, the apocalypse is caused by a plague.

2. Both books contrast an evil and decadent power against less-powerful and more down-to-earth people. In The Hunger Games it's the Capitol vs. the Districts, in The Safe Lands the decadent power is the Safe Lands, while the people living outside the Safe Lands are the more down-to-earth people.

3. In both books, young people must struggle to survive the outrages perpetrated on them by the decadent power. In The Hunger Games, it's Katniss and Peeta trying to survive the Games, in The Safe Lands it's Omar, Mason, Levi, Shaylinn and others trying to survive their kidnapping by the Safe Lands authorities, who mean to use them to produce healthy children as they are uninfected with the plague.

There are some major differences in the books as well. They are:

1. In The Hunger Games, the very concept of religious faith is not mentioned, even in passing. In The Safe Lands series, the major characters come from a Christian community, and the non-Christian beliefs of the Safe Lands are also mentioned.

2. The Hunger Games is very bloodily, explicitly violent, and much of the violence affects young people. In The Safe Lands series, there is some bloodshed but it doesn't dominate the story.

3. In The Hunger Games, the subject of temptation doesn't seem to exist. We never see Katniss or Peeta expressing a desire to live in the Capitol and enjoy the decadent lifestyle there. In The Safe Lands, we see that some of the young people are very tempted by the lifestyle of the Safe Lands, and a few go out to experience the decadence for themselves.

4. The Hunger Games is centered on Katniss, in The Safe Lands series there are a number of different viewpoint characters the reader can identify with, including some strong male characters (guys need that the way girls need strong female characters.)

I feel that both Outcasts and the first book in the series, Captives, are very powerful fictional works that will appeal to a great many readers--- both fans of The Hunger Games and critics of it. And although it's Christian fiction, I don't think non-Christian readers should rule it out. It's a great series.

Outcasts – http://www.amazon.com/Outcasts-Safe-Lands-Jill-Williamson/dp/0310724244/
Author Website – http://www.jillwilliamson.com/

Red Bissell
Thomas Fletcher Booher
Beckie Burnham
Pauline Creeden
April Erwin
Victor Gentile
Ryan Heart
Timothy Hicks
Jason Joyner
Julie Bihn
Carol Keen
Shannon McDermott
Meagan @ Blooming with Books
Melanie @ Christian Bookshelf Reviews
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Joan Nienhuis
Nissa Annakindt
Jalynn Patterson
Writer Rani
Chawna Schroeder
Jacque Stengl
Jojo Sutis
Steve Trower
Phyllis Wheeler
Deborah Wilson

My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

Indie Life Blog Hop: Lawrence Block's Gone Indie!!!

Written for the Indie Life blog hop. Visit the link if you'd like to participate in this monthly blog event.

Being an indie writer has been making great strides in respectability lately. Especially now that famed mystery author Lawrence Block has gone indie for some of his books.

  He'd done an indie book before, Write for your Life, to go with some seminars he was then conducting. But he also decided to go the indie route for a collection of Matt Scudder short stories. (Link: Anne R. Allen's Blog: Lawrence Block talks self-publishing.)

And now, he's self-published a Bernie Rhodenbarr novel--- the first since 2004. I didn't know it was self-published until my own copy arrived. (Links: Lawrence Block: Look Who's Back, Mystery Fanfare: A dialogue between Bernie and Larry on Self-Publishing.)

Lawrence Block, I would say, is doing indie right. He has his credentials as a writer well-established through years of traditionally publishing his books. He has a reader base for both the Matt Scudder series and the Bernie Rhodenbarr series, both of which have fans looking for more.

Sometimes the new indie author forgets that the first thing he has to do is establish those writing credentials--- to prove to the world that he really can write. There are too many books and ebooks out there written as a get-rich-scheme or by a tag-along NaNoWriMo writer, that show no skill at all as a writer. Readers who pick up such books come away with the conclusion that the indie writer, like the old-style vanity press writer, is someone who just cannot write well enough to do the job.

Traditional publishing--- somewhere, somehow, in a forum with a gatekeeper that doesn't publish dreck, establishes those writing credentials. So would a well-written blog that has sufficient traffic to make it authoritative. Or being invited to post articles on a well-regarded website.

Without these credentials, most indie authors don't sell well. By continuing to write well and publishing many novels and short stories, eventually the good indie writer will pick up fans.  In time, success at the level enjoyed by Hugh Howey may come along.

Lawrence Block's indie books:
The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons (Bernie Rhodenbarr) (Volume 11)

The Night and The Music: The Matthew Scudder Stories

Has your initial opinion about indie (self-published) fiction changed recently? In which direction? What factors led to the change?

My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

IWSG: Writing While Depressed

This post is for the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop.

Recently my therapist told me I'm depressed. Don't know why he thinks THAT--- maybe it's that during that session I was talking about death all the time? But anyway, I've come to agree with him on the depression thing and so lately I've been coping with Writing While Depressed.

Now, my writing life is pretty messed up already--- first, because of my Asperger Syndrome, and second because of my ongoing struggles with writer's block. In observing myself and my writing process, I think clinical depression adds something to the mix.

In non-depressed times, when starting a writing project, I usually have a few really good, upbeat days when I very much believe in my project and don't have any particular doubts about it. When Writing While Depressed, I have ideas for writing projects that I believe are objectively as good as any others I've had, yet on the very day the ideas occur to me I begin to have 'this idea is dreck' self-talk flitting around my head.

I try to tell myself that this is just the depression talking. And my depression really has got to stop swearing in Yiddish. So far this has helped me to hold on to the writing project in question in spite of the doubts.

Because this writing project is my first attempt at the mystery genre, I'm following the exercises in Writing Crime and Suspense Fiction by Lesley Grant Adamson in order to get the outlining/plotting done. I think of it kind of like an experienced writer is taking my hand and leading me through the world of building a mystery story.

Instead of working out this preliminary stuff on my computer, I'm using a composition book and writing with my lucky purple-ink gel pens. This seems to be a good way of doing it, except that Ender the kitten keeps jumping in my lap and wanting to sit on the composition book.

I'm also fighting the depression's effects with by starting the writing day with exercise. Due to the current Wind Chill Apocalypse I can't go outside and walk, but I put on loud music and the house and pace briskly for a half-hour.

I'm also thinking of breaking out my Lawrence Block 'Affirmations for Writers' audio and playing it. It's a bit on the New-Agey side but there is nothing that really goes off the deep end in it, and I think it does make me feel more confident about my writing.

In a number of how-to-write books I've read that when suffering writer's block one must always remember that it ends. Which doesn't feel all that true in my case, but this depression-induced supercharged writer's block will certainly end, as the depression will end (and come back--- did I mention I'm depressed?)

One thing that HAS perked me up is that since I'm writing a novel centered around a crime, it gives me a great excuse to wallow in all the true-crime books and television programs I like--- because it's research, you see. True stories of murder have been one of my Special Interests since I was a kid and sneaked a peek into some old books about Leopold and Loeb, and the Boston Strangler. Reviving this Special Interest helps me to have a more positive attitude toward my writing project, as anything strongly connected to a Special Interest is something I can feel positive about.

A final factor in Writing While Depressed is that I am far more conscious of being an isolated writer. In fact, depression makes me a more isolated writer than usual since I'm less likely to seek out some semblance of contact with other writers on Facebook and such. In me depression generates a lot of self-talk about how other people don't care for me and never will, and if people don't like me in person why would I expect them to like my writing? I also tend to isolate myself from God, avoiding prayer and even thinking about prayer, though I have forced myself to watch the daily Mass on EWTN a few times (a great 'pill' for depression).

Well, this has turned into a depressing post, hasn't it? But the upbeat part of it that I cling to is that depression isn't forever, even when it feels that way. Even in the worst part of a depression you can always be surprised by a fleeting moment of optimism or good cheer. Cherish those moments. And know that things will get better.

Unless there's a zombie apocalypse. I hate it when there's a zombie apocalypse.

Are you undergoing any special writing challenges right now? How do you cope? Or not cope?

My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

CSFF blog tour, Day 3: Merlin's Shadow

The sun had long ago sunk below the granite-boned horizon, and Merlin crept up the mound hoping to catch the stranger asleep. Halfway to the top he drew his sword--- gashing his arm on a blackthorn bush. He bit his tongue and continued to climb through the shadowed grass, once again thankful he could now see, and see clearly.

Unfortunately, the miracle that had restored his sight had not made him the perfect scout. Whoever this man was who had camped so close to them, Merlin and Garth had to find out. Hopefully Garth would quietly scale the other side of the hill and not disturb the man's horse they had heard. If the stranger was alerted to their presence, and if he was one of Vortigern's men, Merlin might need to capture--- or kill him.

And now, we get to the meat of the blog tour--- the book itself. The quote above is the beginning of the first chapter of the book. Here are some of my immediate reactions to it:

1. Before the beginning... Before chapter 1 we have a summary of the first book--- this is book 2 of a trilogy. And also a prologue. According to some of the wise voices out there, prologues are soon to go the way of great-grannie's corsets. In my opinion, all that will mean is that the content of prologues will be shifted to a slightly later place in the book.

2. First sentence. 'Granite-boned horizon'. Memorable. And then we have Merlin creeping around trying to catch some stranger asleep. From that first section we've got interesting stuff starting to happen. The first sentence may not have quite reached the level of Gregor Samsa turning into a bug, but then, what does?

3. First paragraph. We learn that Merlin, until recently, could not see. Next paragraph we see that this is due to a miracle. That catches my interest right there. Miracles aren't much used in fiction precisely because they are hard to handle well. But we quickly see that a mere miracle hasn't solved all of Merlin's problems.

4. First Glimpse of Bad Guy. Vortigern. Just the name tells you he's trouble. I mean, when you read that name 'Vortigern', did you assume maybe he was Merlin's hair stylist or something? No, the name has this bad-guy vibe to it. Kind of like Lord Voldemort, only I'd guess anyone named Vortigern has worse table manners.

My reaction: I think this beginning can do the job story-beginnings have to do--- make the reader curious, and interested enough to want to read on. If YOU feel that way, you can actually read on. Right now, if you have a Kindle or some such. Here's the link: http://www.amazon.com/Merlins-Shadow-Merlin-Spiral-Treskillard/dp/0310735084/

If, like me, your pockets are currently full of empty, you can download a free sample of Merlin's Shadow and at least get a taste of what the book is about.

You can also visit some of the other links on the blog tour, and see some other viewpoints on Merlin's Shadow.

Red Bissell Thomas Clayton Booher Beckie Burnham Jeff Chapman Pauline Creeden April Erwin Victor Gentile Ryan Heart Timothy Hicks Jason Joyner Carol Keen Jennette Mbewe Amber McCallister Shannon McDermott Meagan @ Blooming with Books Rebecca LuElla Miller Joan Nienhuis Nissa Jalynn Patterson Writer Rani Nathan Reimer Chawna Schroeder Jacque Stengl Jojo Sutis Robert Treskillard Steve Trower Shane Werlinger Phyllis Wheeler Deborah Wilson

What do you think of Arthurian fiction?
My first taste of the Arthur thing came in a set of storybooks my mother bought for me when I was just a baby, called My Book House. The twelve volumes kept me entertained with fairy tales, myths and legends, not to mention a glimpse or two of good literature. And in it I read my first stories about King Arthur and his associates. (Gosh, I made them sound like mob guys just there. I wonder, who was the enforcer?)

My next big Arthurian kick was when I read Marion Zimmer Bradley's pagan feminist reimagining of the tale, Mists of Avalon. I loved it at the time, but although I continue to re-read Bradley's Darkover books from time to time, I haven't wanted to touch Mists of Avalon in years.

A Christian-fiction version of the Arthurian legend is certainly as worthy a concept as Bradley's pagan version, though alas it probably won't sell quite as well. Is Merlin's Shadow just what the fiction world needs right now, or is it a story that's been done too many times. I don't know myself. I just know that every time I feel like I want to put the whole Arthurian thing aside as something that's been done to death and beyond, I find something that reminds me how deep-rooted that story is in my culture and in my own experience. Like the Merlin Spiral trilogy.
 
My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

CSFF Blog Tour, Day 2: Making the Most of the Blog Tour

Today I think I will blog a little about the Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy blog tour itself. Even before I started this particular blog, I started participating in the CSFF blog tour. It was how I got the first readers for the blog I had at that time (which was named 'Moreover the Dog went with them',an obscure reference to the even more obscure Biblical book of Tobit), and after I deleted that blog, how I got readers for this one.

For the author--- or would-be writer--- who begins a blog, the CSFF blog tour is a chance to gain a few readers for your blog. I always tend to notice, on the tour, some of the blogs on the tour that don't seem to have blog readers yet, the bloggers who are just beginning to learn how to blog effectively.... I think participating in the tour can really help that.

The Visiting Round
One of the best parts of the blog tour is visiting the blogs on the list of blog participants. You don't have to be an official participant of the blog tour to do this. If you've accidentally found this blog post and never even heard of the CSFF blog tour before, perhaps you've never realized there was such a thing as Christian science fiction and fantasy before, you can still visit the blogs on the participant list.

Commenting is the most important thing about the Visiting Round. After you've read the blog post, it's good to say SOMETHING. It can be really hard to think up a good comment sometimes. But, hey, it's a blog tour. Just saying hello and telling the blogger you are visiting the blogs on the tour list is a good beginning for a comment. Then make a remark that relates to the post. Even if you have a bad case of 'commenters' block' and can't think of anything to say that doesn't resort to the word 'interesting', your comment will be encouraging to the blogger. And most bloggers these days are wise enough to visit their commenters' blogs and comment back.

Meeting the Author is an exciting aspect of the blog tour. The featured author has a blog and also participates in the tour. Not ALL blog tour authors make the rounds of the participating blogs, but most do. This month's author Robert Treskillard started making the rounds of the participants early in the day on day one. It's very exciting to have a real, traditionally-published author commenting on my blog! While visiting Robert's blog, I found out how to connect with him on social media, and so now have another author on my 'authors I kind of know but not really' list.

Robert Treskillard links:
*Merlin’s Shadow -  http://www.amazon.com/Merlins-Shadow-Merlin-Spiral-Treskillard/dp/0310735084/
Author Website - http://www.KingArthur.org.uk
Author Blog - http://www.epictales.org/blog/robertblog.php  

Following blogs is another thing you can do while doing the Visiting Round. I nearly always click on the 'follow' widget if it's the Blogger one. There are also other 'follow' widgets you can find on blogs, NetworkedBlogs being the next most popular after the Blogger one. I find that if I follow ten new blogs, I will get about 3 or 4 blogs to follow me back. Sadly, the Blogger widget only allows you to follow 300 blogs though some blogs have thousands of followers, which is kind of hard on the reciprocal-following concept. But you can follow from a widget when you are above the 300-blog limit, which is one good reason to provide a 'follow' widget if you have a Blogger blog.

The Link List:
This is your Big Opportunity to visit blogs and build more traffic for your own blog. Use it well.

Red Bissell Thomas Clayton Booher Beckie Burnham Jeff Chapman Pauline Creeden April Erwin Victor Gentile Ryan Heart Timothy Hicks Jason Joyner Carol Keen Jennette Mbewe Amber McCallister Shannon McDermott Meagan @ Blooming with Books Rebecca LuElla Miller Joan Nienhuis Nissa Jalynn Patterson Writer Rani Nathan Reimer Chawna Schroeder Jacque Stengl Jojo Sutis Robert Treskillard Steve Trower Shane Werlinger Phyllis Wheeler Deborah Wilson


My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

CSFF Blog Tour, Day 1: Robert Treskillard

The Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy blog tour is here once again and we are featuring Merlin's Blade by Robert Treskillard, the second book in the Merlin Spiral trilogy. Now, normally I hate trilogies with only three books in them, but, hey, we're only on the second book, Treskillard can write lots more if we give him the proper encouragement!


Our first day's post is dedicated to the man behind the book. Robert Treskillard is a software designer, Celtic enthusiast, graphic artist and sometime bladesmith. He has a B.A. in Biblical & Theological Studies from Bethel University, a school sponsored by the Baptist General Conference. So, alas, he's probably not Catholic. :(

He and his wife have three children and live in the country outside Saint Louis, MO. Which makes me wonder: does he raise goats? Chickens? Guinea hens? Does he want to? Does he know I have some guinea hens I'm willing to unload, cheap?

Here are some internet places to meet Robert Treskillard:

His web site: http://www.kingarthur.org.uk
His blog: http://www.epictales.org/blog/robertblog.php

His Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/treskillard
The Merlin Spiral on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EpicTales.org

Merlin's Shadow on Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Merlins-Shadow-Merlin-Spiral-Treskillard/dp/0310735084/

The Fun Part of the blog tour is to visit the blogs of the other participants and comment. See which ones have posted their blog tour posts early and which are waiting for the last minute. See who has something exciting to say and who is afraid their blog tour posts are dull. And, there may be kitten pictures! This is the internet after all. So go and visit the blogs on this list and say hey.

The numbers indicate the blogs I have personally visited and commented on during the tour. 1 is for first-day posts, 2 is for second-day, and so on.

Red Bissell
Thomas Clayton Booher: 1
Beckie Burnham: 1
Jeff Chapman 1
Pauline Creeden: 1
April Erwin
Victor Gentile 1
Ryan Heart
Timothy Hicks: 1
Jason Joyner
Carol Keen
Jennette Mbewe: 1
Amber McCallister 1
Shannon McDermott 1
Meagan @ Blooming with Books
Rebecca LuElla Miller 1
Joan Nienhuis
Nissa Annakindt  YOU ARE HERE.
Jalynn Patterson
Writer Rani
Nathan Reimer
Chawna Schroeder 2
Jacque Stengl
Jojo Sutis 2
Robert Treskillard:(Our Featured Author) 1 2
Steve Trower
Shane Werlinger
Phyllis Wheeler 2
Deborah Wilson

My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

Goals Bloghop: Your Blog and Your Writing Goals

This post is part of the Do You Have Goals? bloghop sponsored by the Five Year Project.

Writers and aspiring writers who have goals also tend to have blogs, these days. Why? Something to do with having a platform, I imagine. A blog is not the same thing as a platform, but it's easier to put together.

How does your blog connect to your writing goals? Perhaps your writing goal involves writing a novel and having it published. Whether you publish with a large publisher or a small press, you will want to sell a few copies of that novel. Your blog can affect those sales.

Your blog is a place where your writing can be seen by potential readers without their having to take a gamble on purchasing your novel. What do your blog posts say about you?

Several times I've visited a blog by a would-be writer whose blog posts contain misspellings, grammar mistakes, and, worst of all, incomprehensible sentences. My presumption is that if these bloggers have books out, they are probably self-published and have the same flaws as their blog posts. Such blogs actually discourage book sales. Just as well, because these bloggers are probably prematurely self-published, which is not good for their writing career.

Other blogs are clever and interesting and, at the least, prove that the blogger is capable of writing in good English. Some blogs go even further and show that the blogger is a thoughtful, intelligent person who probably is able to write fiction that is compelling. One great example of this is the blog deCOMPOSE by author Mike Duran. Since Mike is a Protestant and I'm a Catholic, we don't always agree on the issues he blogs about. But at least his blog posts are intelligent and worth reading, and his blog is one of those that I look to as a role model for my own blog.

Now, not all of us can be a Mike Duran. We can't put together a thoughtful blog that attracts lively debate without cutting into our writing time too much. But we can all do something. And we can improve our 'something'.

For my own blog, my goals are to improve the blog by:
1. Posting more often--- sometimes I neglect the blog for a couple of weeks. I want to post at least twice a week.
2. I want to participate in 4 blog events monthly in order to interact more with other blogs.
3. I want to make my blog more personal by posting excerpts from my writing journal, and sharing about my struggles with writers block, low self-esteem, and my autism spectrum disorder (Asperger Syndrome).
4. More cat pictures. My blog really needs more cat pictures. Because my cats are way cute.

Kitten Therese mourning her dead friend, kitten Myfanwy.

MY goals update:

My goal, which I put down for this blog hop, was the limited one of writing 10 more poems in a series I started. I didn't do much work on this poetry project because of NaNoWriMo. And I didn't finish my NaNo novel, either. But I am continuing with my NaNo novel after the month is done. I've come up with some good ideas for it and the work is continuing.

Another goal which I haven't worked on this November is to work on putting together a ebook version of my poetry book. Also at the same time a revised print version of the book. I'm so indecisive about the whole project, though. I don't know whether to stick with the current version of the book or to totally do a new book with stuff added. Well, I'll think about that tomorrow.


My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

Would the Saints Kill Sick People During a Zombie Apocalypse?

 

Recently on The Walking Dead, Carol killed a couple of people because they were sick, and might spread their illness and/or turn into zombies when nobody was looking. And lots of Walking Dead fans said Carol did the right thing.

That made me thoughtful. As a Christian I'm called to be a saint. What would the saints do during a zombie apocalypse? I just can't picture Saint Paul or Saint Maximilian Kolbe or Saint Therese the Little Flower killing sick people because they might become zombies.

A saint would quarantine the sick people in zombie-proof cells and then most likely volunteer to be the one stationed in the quarantine area to care for the sick.

Honestly, I don't think I'd volunteer for the get-sick-and-die zombie apocalypse duty. I mean, I admire Saint Maximilian Kolbe, how when he was in the Nazi death camp and a man was about to be killed Maximilian Kolbe volunteered to die in his place. But I know I wouldn't have the courage to do that myself.

Moral issues like this need to be thought through logically. If we establish the principle that one may preventatively kill a sick person to stop them from spreading a disease or becoming a zombie, that sets a precedent. Many people in the zombie apocalypse may suffer sicknesses and even if medical doctors are around--- NOT a given--- there are no operating labs to confirm a diagnosis, so one cannot tell which sicknesses may be fatal ones.

And any person, regardless of age or apparent state of health, might die suddenly and become a zombie. So--- if some member of a survivors group kills another, it's fairly easy to make a claim of necessity--- the dead person seemed unwell. He might have endangered us all. How can anyone prove it one way or another? And chaos would reign and groups fall apart.

No, the whole Thou-shalt-not-kill thing is still a good rule. In a zombie apocalypse, you can't go it alone. You will need people with skills you don't possess. You will need people to watch your back. You will need to be able to trust them, and how can you if you knew they would casually kill you if it might conceivably make themselves a bit safer.  

How would YOU handle the issue of people sick with a contagious disease during a zombie apocalypse? Would you kill them? Abandon them? What if you had no handy place in which to quarantine them and no one to care for them that was not needed to care for vulnerable people?

 

This post is my post for the Indie Life blog hop. And the message the above post has for the indie writer is I guess on the importance of thinking things in your story through in a logical fashion.

If you are writing a zombie apocalypse tale, for example, you may have a vague notion as you put your characters through their paces that in a zombie apocalypse everything is different and the old rules don't apply.

Question that. What are the old rules? Why, in each instance, might they not apply? And what will be the extended consequence of their not applying? It actually doesn't matter what your precise answers are to these story questions--- so long as you have thought these things through and it makes sense, not just to you but to the average intelligent reader.

Because a well-thought-out story is a story that people will remember.

My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

IWSG: Humble Writing Projects

 Written for the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop.

 It's National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), and so it's time for my annual re-read of 'No Plot? No Problem' by Chris Baty, founder of NaNo. And what struck me on this read-through is the value of having a humble estimation of your writing project.

While trying to write a first draft at a rapid pace, it can be FATAL to decide you are working on the Great American Novel. You will constantly be tempted to stop/slow down to get every word just right. It will seem like a good idea to skip two or three writing days in order to do research on a few minor things for your story, to make sure everything is just right.

The NaNo approach isn't about sitting down to write great literature and getting everything right. It's about getting things WRITE. It's OK to write second-or-third rate prose for NaNo. It's OK to use Thuggy for a minor thug character's name and plan to give him a real name in the rewrite. It's OK to write INSERT CLEVER PLOT THING HERE and move on.

The NaNo goal--- 50000 words in a month--- seems insane for the inexperienced writer, but it actually works out to the sort of writing pace many of the best professional writers do routinely, at least during their youthful, energetic career phase. A number of writers have written decent novels in the period required or less. In fact, some in their heyday could do a write and rewrite of a 50000 word genre novel in a month after they had a bit of writing experience.

Many writers who did this were working on forms of fiction they thought of as 'potboilers'. Lawrence Block, the mystery writer, famously wrote a lesbian novel as his first published novel, and went on to write soft-core porn novels to pay the rent while also writing mystery short stories.

By giving yourself permission to write imperfect fiction, you are giving yourself the needed permission to WRITE. Even great novels are not perfect, and were even less perfect in the first draft.

Fear of error is a great source of insecurity for writers. For me, at an early age I somehow internalized the idea that making a mistake--- in writing or in other things--- was close to unforgivable. In school I often failed to complete writing assignments to avoid the shame of having my errors exposed--- even though my writing skill was ahead of that of my classmates.

By deciding that my current work in progress is NOT great literature, but more of a potboiler, perhaps closer to a writing exercise in combining incompatible genres (gothic romance, science fiction), I am able to reduce my overwhelming anxiety when sitting down to write. Yeah, I still have this sick feeling that I'm about to have a panic attack when I just think about sitting down to write, but this counters it a bit.

So, that's it about my humble and insignificant writing efforts. How are YOURS coming along?

My page at NaNoWriMo:
http://nanowrimo.org/participants/ilsabein
My Facebook writing page:
http://www.facebook.com/NissaAnnakindt

Goals: You Must Pay the Price

 This post is part of the Five Year Project/Do You Have Goals blog hop.

My Five Year Goals: 
1. Finish the Sons of Jacob poem series.
2. Build up this blog til it's popular like Mike Duran's.
3. Finish 3 novels.

Setting goals. It's kind of like being a kid at Christmas Winter Holiday and making a Christmas Santa Claus list. But it's not enough to set the goals. You must follow through. And the first step to that is being willing to pay the price.

Each goal comes with its own built-in price, and this differs from writer to writer. For example, some writers, unlike me, didn't learn spelling and English grammar in their school, and so part of their price is to go back and study these things so they can write well-crafted or at least correctly spelled and understandable English sentences.

A novel-writing goal always comes with a reading 'price'. You need to be well-read in your genre--- the classics of the genre, older genre works, and today's newest offerings. You don't HAVE to follow the latest trends in a genre, but you DO need to know what these trends are to work within the genre with confidence. (You might find your writing ideas place you in an emerging subgenre. Or maybe you will start a whole new subgenre.) So perhaps we all need to include 'read 3 novels a month in my genre(s).' Not to mention outside-of-genre and nonfiction reading. (Note to mainstream and literary fiction writers: those are 'genres', too. At least as far as the reading requirement goes.)

Sometimes the 'price' means overcoming problems of disorganization, as in the case of a person with AD/HD. I have Asperger Syndrome, which comes with 'executive function deficit'. Which essentially means AD/HD. So you may need to search out organizing tips for AD/HD people to find organizational ways that work for YOU.

You may need to overcome psychological issues. I have a sort of chronic writer's block which when it hits makes it next to impossible to work any further on the current WIP, or even on any writing. I am currently reading a number of books which help writers with these issues.

Self-confidence is a major problem for writers. Your 'price' likely will include working on this. I can recommend 'Write for your Life' by Lawrence Block as a help with that. (It's a bit new-agey, but the affirmations technique is also recommended by Christian pastor Norman Vincent Peale in 'The Power of Positive Thinking'.)

So as you look over your goals, think: are you willing to pay the price? What will that price be? What steps can you take to pay it?

My goals update:
1. Have written 2 of the poems and taken notes on the third.
2. Am working on posting on this blog and commenting on other blogs more regularly.
3. Planning to participate in NaNoWriMo with a cross-genre novel (Jane Eyre inspired Gothic with a sci-fi setting) that doesn't seem as complex as my previous, unfinished NaNo novels. Currently at work writing an outline of a favorite Gothic novel that will serve as a model for my own novel's outline. Writing starts Nov. 1. My NaNo page: http://nanowrimo.org/participants/ilsabein





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Insecure Writer’s Support Group Blog Hop | Renee DeAngelo

Insecure Writer’s Support Group Blog Hop | Renee DeAngelo

Please click on and visit the link above, a new participant in the Insecure Writer's Support Group.
 
One thing that makes me better at being an insecure writer is that should I ever come to realize that I am good at doing a certain thing, that thing becomes trivial and not worth doing.

Take my poetry. I started seriously writing poetry in 1988, and began submitting to poetry zines. In 1989 I was first published. I accumulated quite a volume of poetry written in those first 3 years. But once I realized I was good at it, I decided poetry wasn't what 'real' writers did, and so for the next few years wrote the opening chapters of about two dozen novels instead of poetry.

The advantage of writing  novel beginnings destined never to have endings is that no one can read them and judge them harshly. And I don't like being judged harshly. Somehow I was able to overcome that fear and submit to poetry zines for a while. And I blog poems and self-published a book (which is currently being revised and expanded). I suppose it is 'safe' for me to do that with poems because Poetry Doesn't Count, No One's Buying Poetry.

So I am a poet now. But then there's this.

I have been reading about a kind of Japanese poem called a haibun. The haibun is a haiku combined with a section of prose. The two, poetry and prose, compliment one another and are a unified work. I have just written my first haibun recently.

And in the novel I'm currently just beginning, I started things off with a haiku. And then the chapter continues in prose. Which will make the whole novel, in my mind at least, a haibun. A poem. And poems are something it's safe for me to write, finish and share with others.

Pretty sneaky, huh?



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Do You Have Goals? There's a Blog Hop for That

Visiting some blogs today I found out about the Do You Have Goals blog hop over at Aloha! Mark Koopmans says hi from HI. It takes place the last Friday of every month. Instead of putting your blog name in the linky, you put your goal. 'Write 28 Christian sex novels in Latin by next Tuesday', or 'Kill the wasps in the upstairs bedroom window before they destroy the universe' or 'write 5000 more words in Amish Zombie Apocalypse Book 3.'

The web site for the Do You Have Goals blog hop is here:
The Five Year Project: Do You Have a Goal?

And so, goals. Long term goals, short term goals. I set goals but never believe I can achieve them because I never do, or if I do they must have been so easy they don't count. So I don't think I will set a big or long-term goal this month.

My goal is: 'write 10 more poems in the Sons of Jacob series'.

To explain: I've been taking a few days off from the novel planning process for Starship Destine to work on doing an ebook version of my poetry book Where the Opium Cactus Grows. While working on it the project kind of grew. I am now doing an expanded version of Opium Cactus with the addition of about 20 or so newer poems, which means I will have to do a revised print edition as well.

Which takes 20 or so poems out of the poems I'm saving for the next book, which might be titled 'Sheep's Feet Dancing'. Or not. And it brought my attention to the fact that my poetry output this year has been pretty sparse.

So I've been setting to work, and on impulse I did something new--- I decided to do a series of 12 poems. You see, when I write poetry I grab random books to snatch words from, and the book I happened to grab this time was called Jacob's Dozen by William Varner. It's written by a pastor and is about the 12 sons of the Biblical Jacob, centered on the prophecy made by Jacob concerning his sons and their descendants.

I came up with the idea to do a poem for each of the 12 sons. It's not all Bible-y, though. I DO use the words of the Genesis text (in KJV) but I also use another book as source for other random words in the poems. So we end up with lines like this:

thy father's children bow down
before thee
using the most scientific methods

The thing about my doing the poetry is that it is something I know I can do. I was writing poetry 20 years ago and got quite a few published in 'zines and could do it again if I could spare the money for postage and sample copies of the 'zines. It's just that I've absorbed the idea that it isn't worth doing and that I'd be better off working on a failed attempt at a novel. But I'm beginning to suspect that's not the right way to look at it.

And so my goal is to finish the poem series--- which will be the centerpiece of a future poetry book I'm sure--- and stretch myself as a poet. To allow myself to be a poet. Perhaps I'll do better as a serious poet who writes a novel or two on the side than by trying to force myself into a prosier mode.

So that's my goal. Do you set goals? What has your experience of that been? What is your goal right now?

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Worldbuilding Blogfest: History of the Frederikaners

History of the Frederikaners
from 'Shepherd'

The seed colonists of the planet Niesse are a distinct nationality/ethnicity known as the Frederikaners. The main group of Frederikaners live outside the Terran Empire, and are under the authority of an alien species known as the Gray, and live on a continent on one of the Five Worlds that is owned by the Gray. This is their history.

 The Gray

They are humanoids with bulging foreheads, large eyes, and tiny noses and mouths. Their skin is a greenish-gray color and they are hairless. They are the creatures known to Terran folklore as the Gray aliens, the ones who commit alien abductions. And some of what is said about them is true.\par The Gray are what is called 'true aliens', as opposed to human aliens who are biologically humans but of non-Terran origin who can interbreed with humans. Like other true aliens, the Gray seem mentally alien to humans and it's difficult to understand and judge them.

The colony of humans they started is one example. Humans would regard the notion of collecting human beings and putting them in an isolated habitat on another world as a form of cruelty. The Gray consider that they are preserving interesting living artifacts in a sort of museum. They consider that since they took the original human stock from a world which had not yet developed interstellar travel, the humans were merely a form of clever animal with no more rights than any other animal not to be put into preserves and zoos.

The First Collection

 The first group of humans collected by the Gray to form their human colony was collected at least ten years prior to 1871, when the Second Collection--- the first successful Collection--- was made. The First Collection was composed of a group of random individuals of all racial and linguistic backgrounds, collected both from cities and from agricultural areas. It had about 15% more males than females as human social customs on Terra during that era made it less likely for women other than streetwalkers to be roaming the streets. The First Collection failed to form a viable colony due to strife.

The Second Collection

The Grays somehow got rid of the survivors of the First Collection and began on the Second, which they determined was to be a more homogeneous group. They decided on a preferred type of human--- agricultural workers that were speakers of Germanic languages such as English, German or Danish. and who were of the Nordic physical type. This collection began in 1871. The Second Collection did not pick up individuals, but small groups, mostly groups of sisters and brothers who were young enough to be adaptable. They were collected in North America among groups of mostly-immigrant farmers and ranchers, many from an American town called Fredericksburg. A notable member of this group was a professor of linguistics from a university who had created a simple international language based on Anglo-Saxon and Germanic root words. This language, Aermannske, became the basis of the Frederikaner dialect, and in addition was revived on Terra much later and became used on a number of Terran colonies with significant Germanic-ethnic populations. The Second Collection, perhaps because they were people of a pioneering spirit, made a successful colony.

The Third, Fourth and Fifth Collections

These Collections were made of small groups of the desired type, both from North America and from the European homelands. The Third Collection was to bring in people with craft skills--- blacksmiths and stonemasons, potters, weavers and the like. The Fourth Collection featured people with cultural skills--- musicians and makers of musical instruments, painters, wood-carvers, and tailors and seamstresses who were familiar with the national costume of the various European regions which were the home of those in the Collections. The Fifth Collection included a number of university professors with specialties related to Germanic history, languages, mythology and folklore, as well as Catholic and Lutheran theology professors and pastors.

The Last Collection

The Fifth Collection was complete by 1900, but the Grays continued to travel to Terra and observe humans. During the time of the Holocaust, their observation posts were near to Jewish villages in Poland which were overrun by Nazis. The Gray were sympathetic and spirited many of these rural Polish Jews out of harms way. Many of these were of the desired Nordic physical type, and they all spoke a Germanic language, Yiddish. So it is not too surprising that many of the rescued found their way to the Gray colony of humans, who by then were known as the Frederikaners. The people of the Last Collection, having experienced a few extra decades of the goings-on back on Terra, were considered rather sophisticated and clever.

 Post Collection History

The Frederikaners and their farming enterprises did very well in the years following the collection. They may not have been happy on the restrictions placed on them by the Gray but the learned to live within the restrictions. Because of the trauma of being kidnapped by the Gray at a time when humans didn't even know alien beings existed, the Frederikaners became suspicious of 'outlanders'--- anyone from outside the Frederikaner community, whether Terran or alien.\par From time to time, when troublemakers, misfits, rebels or criminals arose, the individuals involved were removed from the colony by the Gray. The only new Terrans were emissaries of the Pope, to report secretly on the state of the faith among the Frederikaners, so that the Pope would be able to appoint the appropriate Frederikaner-born priest to be the group's bishop. (So the Frederikaners knew nothing of Hiroshima or of the European Union, but knew about John Paul II and Mother Teresa of Calcutta.)

The population growth among the Frederikaners reached a peak just as the Terran Empire began a phase of rapid expansion, and colonists for the new worlds were a highly valuable commodity. The Gray offered a company called Grovanli Iterations a contract for a group of colonists--- all volunteers--- and Grovanli gladly paid the rather exorbitant price to get access to some of the unique Frederikaners as seed colonists for the world Niesse.

Wow, this post is long!!! If you would like to read some of the more concise entries on this blogfest, the list is at Sharon Bayliss' blog.  It's also a day late due to the early arrival yesterday of the septic tank guy who got my indoor plumbing functional again. Functional indoor toilets are cool.

Link Caritas:
TonyBreedenBooks.com: Worldbuilding: A Look at the History and Politics of Øtherworld  First, I must express my admiration for Tony's stamina in using the Ø, it is a lot of work putting in strange letters. The world seems to be a relatively near-future world. With mutants. Mutants are cool. Not as cool as functional indoor toilets, but cool. Note: I could not figure out how to link to the individual post on the blog, so just linked to the blog itself.

Icefall Studio: Worldbuilding Blogfest #2: History & Politics    Layla Lawlor blogged this without having internet at home, so her blog-stamina is greatly to be praised. Karamanda is a city in the mountains in which everyone has wings.

Worldbuilding Blogfest: Geography of Niesse

Geography and Climate of Niesse

Niesse is a world in the Terran Empire, from a WIP with the working title 'Shepherd'.

The planet Niesse is located on the Wieman Expanse, a relatively new slipstream trail with a start-point at the Star Colony Olmayo. Niesse is in the third stage of terraforming and is under control of Grovanli Iterations, an ellessee new to the enterprise of terraforming.

The view on the planet Niesse, regardless of where one chooses to land, is bleak, as is common in a terraformed world at this stage. It looks like a bleak endless sand desert--- rocky in some spots--- with no visible living things.
The presence of human technology is most easily seen in the presence of man-made towers--- the larger ones, called Regulators, regulate the atmosphere and cause the scheduled rains, and the smaller ones, called Shooters, which shoot out spores of multiple varieties of the malarit plant, a genetically engineered terraforming plant used mainly to build up a soil, and also, in time, to provide feed for the earliest life forms to be released on the world.

The sand-like material on the ground has the technical name of 'dust'--- meaning that it lacks the organic material that it would need to qualify for the term 'soil'. As the terraforming process goes on, generations of malarit plants go through their life cycles and die, and contribute that needed organic material. The seed colonists of Niesse--- along with the small number of animals they tend--- also make their contribution to the organic material needs through their excretions.

There are two human settlements on Niesse that qualify for the term 'cities', at least in a relative way. They are Amandus and Bennet, and both are headquarters for bands of terraformers and tower monkeys (the men who set up and maintain the Regulators and Shooters). In addition there are the fixed towns, such as Herford, the one nearest to the home of our main characters, and Bjarka, which is the home of the planet's only educational institute, the seminary in which priests of the various religions are trained. It is also the seat of the planet's Christian bishop.

Most of the seed colonists do not live in fixed towns, but in wandering villages located near a fixed town. The wandering village Horn is home to the main characters of the story. It is near the fixed town of Herford, as is the wandering village of Senda, which also plays a part in the story.

Because the oceans of the planet Niesse have not been fully installed, much less stocked with an ecosystem, all of the cities, villages and towns now in existance are on hilly or mountainous ground. This is to prevent the annoyance of settling valuable seed colonists someplace that will end up under water, drowning them and causing the expense of replacing them.

The seed colonists were all obtained from an old human colony on one of the Five Worlds, a lush agricultural community. They all agreed to be sent to a new world in order to obtain land. But when they arrived from their green and growing world to the harsh reality of Niesse, it was a shock. Depression, misery and apathy were common reactions. But as time goes on some of the seed colonists are recovering their ambition, and are determined to make something of their new world, if they are allowed to.

This was Part 1 of Sharon Bayliss' Worldbuilding Blogfest. In Part 2, which covers the topic 'history', we will learn the history of the seed colonists of Niesse, and a little about the aliens who formerly owned them.

Part of the fun of blogfests is visiting other blogs. Here are two that I have visited and enjoyed so far.

Writing the Other: Worldbuilding Blogfest: Geography and Climate By S. B. Stewart-Laing from Glasgow, Scotland, who writes historic fantasy.  

Rebekah Loper, Writer: Worldbuilding Blogfest Day 1: The World of Catalyst  By Rebekah Loper, a self-described 'cat wrangler and urban farmer', possibly from Oklahoma, and has a husband who re-draws her maps.

Worldbuilding Blogfest starts Monday!!!

Sharon Bayliss is hosting a Worldbuilding Blogfest which starts this Monday. There are post suggestions for each day of the blogfest.

I've found such events are a chance to visit other blogs and to be visited by them, so I am participating. Hope you will consider doing so as well.

Here is the Blogfest list:

Recycled Mondays: A Blog Event and Free Story Ideas

UPDATE: due to the fact that 'Linky' now wants money for what was once free, Recycled Mondays has been cancelled.



 

A poetry blog I read has a weekly event with a Linky in which you can post a link to your own blog post. I've decided to do the same, and do it on Mondays. (I'm starting early this week because this event is new. Here are the rules:

1. Find an older blog post of yours and do a revised/updated version of it as a new post. You may in addition tell a little about how the original post came to be written. Writing related posts are particularly enjoyed, but anything that isn't death threats, bomb making instructions, porn or spam is OK.
2. Include the Nifty Recycled Mondays graphic if you can. 3. Include the Linky code.
3.5. I forgot to say, include these Recycled Monday rules in your post as well.
4. Post your post, then add the link of that post to the Linky.
5. Visit at least three of the other blogs on the Linky list. Comment on at least one. Politely.  

 ~~~~~~~~~~
This is one of the earliest blog posts that I wrote for this blog.

Are you planning to write a short story or novel but don't have any ideas? Here are a few concocted by the boys in my basement. Use as many as you need.

1. Main character is a blind, deaf or wheelchair-bound werewolf (vampire, fairy, elf, gaki). Extra points if your character DOESN'T want to die rather than living ('undying') with a disability.

2. Scientists are involved in a genetic study of sociopathic killers. They find a gene which causes this. A group of blood samples of prison inmates is exchanged for blood samples of preschool children. Three children test positive for the sociopath-killer gene. What happens next?

3. A presidential candidate is about to win the nomination, in large part due to her or his support of a certain issue. The candidate is visited by an actual angel who says that the candidate must switch position on this issue, and shows why this is important. Will the candidate ignore the warning to get elected? Or change her-or-his position on the issue?

4. A family finds a gateway to: a) another dimension b) fairyland or c) hell in their basement. What do they do about it? And will it lower the resale value of their home when it comes time to sell?

5. A being with superhero-type powers fights the criminal element in a large city. The cops must find a way to capture the superhero and put him on trial for vigilante-action.

6. Panini rolls are actually alien life forms plotting to destroy the human race. This idea is actually true. Hero of this story should be a heroic Zorba roll.

7. A vampire is appointed to the Supreme Court and makes his fellow justices into vampires too. (Remember Supreme Court justices are appointed for life, and can rule forever.) I think the hero of this one will have a big stake.

8. A man plants trees, each one named after a friend, family member, or a famous living person. When a person's tree dies, the person dies. Some one finds out and kills the tree of a popular US president. (Does that count as assassination???)

~~~~~~~~~~

Baby Faces Blogfest

Writing Off the Edge blog is participating in the Baby Faces Blogfest, and in case you want to go and do likewise, here are the rules.

1. Between Dec. 2nd and 3rd, post a picture of yourself as a baby, and/or
2. Tell us a story about when you were a baby. (No doubt you can't quite remember it yourself, but you've probably heard some stories from other members of your family.

It's hosted by Trisha at WORD +STUFF blog. Go and sign up if you don't believe me!

Here is my contribution:

When I was a baby, I made my mom miss her sister's wedding. You see, when my mom knew I was on the way, she had her sister delay the wedding until Oct. 4th to ensure I would have already arrived.

She did not expect that I would be a procrastinator right from the start. She had to miss the wedding because she was otherwise engaged in having me. I was born at 5 am on the 5th of October (and haven't got up that early since.)

I have also heard that the original delay to my aunt's wedding caused my cousin to be born early--- less than nine months after his parents' wedding. But that's another story.

In the interests of national security, I'm not posting my baby picture. So here is a gratuitous kitten picture.

Got Green? Blog Hop

Just in time for Saint Patrick's Day..... An Irish-themed 'blog o'hop'.

So hop on over to Mark Koopmans' blog for details and to sign up.

There are prizes, which include:

1. A $30 gift card
2. A query critique
3. All the snakes St. Patrick drove out of Ireland

I may have made that last one up....

Bloggers will be posting on Mar. 17 and visiting one another's blogs.