Step by Step Guide to Outlining a Novel

Being as how NaNoWriMo is sneaking upon us, I thought I would write about my personal way of outlining a novel. In the writing world there are two kinds of people, the Pantsers and the Planners. Pantser is short for “Seat of the Pantser.” Basically that means one writes by the “seat of their pants” and does not plan a thing. Planners is a rather obvious term. They are those organized people who actually sit down and plan out their characters and story line. You must know something, I have always been a Pantser. I have a general idea of…

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National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)

In the month of November, over 100k people do one crazy task: Write a 50k novel in 30 days. This is called National Novel Writing Month, or, as usually referred to, NaNoWriMo. NaNoWriMo started out 13 years ago by a small group of people who wanted to try their hand at novel writing. This formed into the official site NaNoWriMo.org where anyone can join in on the insanity of writing 50k words in only 30 days. It quickly grew into a sensation and now has thousands and thousands of participants, not only national but international, every year. 50,000 words in…

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Writer’s Block

Things are going so well with your story. You are writing and writing. Inspiration is literally shooting out rainbows from you head to your fingers, sparkling on the way down. You have such fun. What a great story. What an enjoyable thing to write. What fantastic characters and plot. All is going so well. …And then it comes. Writer’s Block. The bane of my existence. It comes out of nowhere. A giant blockade full of barbed wire, duct tape, and sometimes even fire, rising up like a ten foot thick, steel wall blocking that rainbow midsentence. All that inspiration is…

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Dear Slightly,

You are a fine word. There are many uses for one such as yourself. Adjectives have a high ranking in our English vocabulary and you have proved yourself as one of the best. But I think it is time we part from one another. Yes, dear Slightly, it is true. As I edit my book, I find you scattered all across the pages. Paragraph after paragraph, sentence after sentence, there you are, often multiple times. I do not know if it is you or I. Is it my own lack of ability to use other words to describe my sentences,…

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This is Going to Take a While…

I must admit to something. I have not started editing until just last night. But, on the other, more optimistic, hand: I started editing last night! ^_^ In my defense, I have been sick and feeling quite dead for the past few days. I could barely pay attention to the screen in front of me, which is no state to edit in. I would probably have made my book worse if I tried to edit like that. <--Valid excuse!! *cough* Anyways, I did begin editing last night. And you know what? I edited for 45 whole minutes! You know how…

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That Evil Practice Known as Editing

We write and write and write, working so hard, long hours, days on end, sleepless nights, much coffee consumption, and then it is finally over… Or is it? After working on a long book, there is no better feeling than finishing it. Something I rarely do but get so much pleasure out of it once it is done. I feel like celebrating, telling everyone I know, jumping up and down and squealing a little…then a realization comes to me that brings me back to my feet, painfully. Editing. Oh editing, I hate it. Writing is so much fun, but then…

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My Grand Adventure of Writing

You have probably already figured this out, but I love to write! This blog will probably be a lot about my writing. I might sometimes post something about my characters, perhaps a sentence from my stories here and there, update on what I am writing or editing, give excerpts or a synopsis occasionally. Who knows? So I thought I’d post about the beginnings of my writing to now and what I like to write about. I figured it would be good to post about my writing first before delving into all that. Also, I thought if I update my blog…

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