Anne Perry - Keynote Address

 

Oh my gosh, what a great writers conference!International bestseller Anne Perry inspired attendees with a powerful keynote address Friday at the LDStorymakers Conference in Provo, Utah. She began with a connection to the past through words and storytelling. Greek mythology and Bible stories were mentioned. The importance of words was further emphasized when Perry turned  her remarks into a personal pep-talk to each listener. "Books give companionship, knowledge, beauty," she listed. "Maybe your words could give this to someone else." Sharing emotion, from laughter to grief, were encouraged. "Put it down with your heart . . . You can do it." So good to have a cheerleader of such renown. So glad I was there. I hope passing along these thoughts has helped to make your Monday more meaningful (or any day you read this.)
I will share thoughts and snippets of what I learned from the conference in the next few posts. Please check back and I hope you have a great week!

Book Review - Inevitable

Tamara Hart Heiner penned this intriguing YA book where the main character possesses a gift she hates--she Sees the deaths of those around her who have a violent end. Here's the blurb:

Visions of death plague Jayne, who thinks watching her boyfriend and sister die is the worst that could happen to her. But when she witnesses a murder, Jayne finds herself caught up in a dangerous world of intrigue and suspense.

As it turns out, she is not the only one doing the stalking. The killer is on to her, and all of her visions of the dying don't reveal how her life will end. Somehow, she must stop the murderer before he arranges Jayne's own inevitable death.

In this contemporary setting, Jayne is conflicted with the things she Sees and maintaining a normal teenage life. She must choose what to do about her annoying gift. I liked the use of lemon scent and capitalizing verbs about her visions as a way of cluing readers in. I liked the romantic and suspense elements. Much of the writing had me right in the moment, visualizing everything from setting to character actions. The pacing was good. There was only one short spot when I wished for a turn of new events before Heiner gave it to me. I wanted to keep reading throughout. I didn't love the paranormal ending, yet it could satisfy most readers. A fun, clean read.

Critiquing Feedback TMI

Ever wish you could call out, "Do-over" and it would happen? My niece asked me to critique her first chapter of a novel draft she completed. She had never taken a class or other helps; she just did it. For that I applaud her. She had the drive to complete the task, believed in herself, and went down the learn-as-you-go road. The girl has some talent, too, and I'm proud of her.

I find critiques and revisions stimulating. No, really. Deciding to give my niece the benefit of my "experience", I critiqued everything that popped into my head--both good and not-so-good. My gently-worded comments included tips and teaching treasures that might be nice to know--one bite at a time. I think I stuffed her with information overload! We learn better line upon line, don't we? Ack! I hope I didn't give her a stomach ache.

What kind of feedback do you give? Do you dish it all out (with no mean intent), praise only what's good, or something in between? I'm learning that all critique audiences are not created equal. Maybe I shouldn't always be zealous to "rip it apart" when someone asks me to do that.

Your thoughts and/or critique-related horror stories are welcome.

Revisions Are Like a Fresh Coat of Paint

We bought a house recently and I'm working on some improvements. Purple may be a pretty color but the rest of the exterior paint is gray. I figured the side gate would look nice in pale gray, especially since I had some on hand. What do you think? Nice, huh? Looked like an easy enough project to tackle. Ha! Everything takes longer than we think.

  

First I noticed the lower left board wasn't nailed on. Second, the whole thing needed a wipe down--dusty. Then there's the regular prep work of taping edges and so forth. One coat wouldn't cut it when going from dark to light paint. It was a job alright, but I like the results.

Writing is like that. It takes longer than we think, we find things that need fixing or polishing, there's prep work like research, and one draft won't cut it. But any story worth telling is worth telling well and the effort put into it makes us like the results much better. Spruce up that manuscript with all that it needs to become fresh and clean! The results are worth it.

Have a great week!

Writing - It's Tough Stuff

Some days are just hard. That's life and we work through it. 
My critique group fizzled out, I had an expensive dental issue, and I'm on crutches for a knee problem. Without a crit group deadline, I didn't write anything new this week. But I did critique somebody else's project and I count that as writing time. The physical problems are fixable and temporary. I'm choosing to look on the bright side and keep things in perspective because the alternative gets me nowhere but grumpy. Grumpy people are unproductive. How do you deal with it when life hands you a harder time than usual? Writers have to be tough. Are you tough?
Writers spend months or years on their first manuscript only to have it ripped to shreds. Then they spend another chunk of time revising once they see what the alpha readers agreed needed to be fixed. I've heard this gets easier and faster with experience but to get that experience, one has to tough it out. Are you up for it? Did I hear a, "Bring it on!" out there? Good for you!
The thing we need to remember is that not only do we feel a sense of accomplishment when we work toward those goals, we get this shiny, finished package in the end that we created. It's kind of like having a baby. (Feel free to skip that analogy if it doesn't work for you.)
So, what I'm saying here is that there will be days, perhaps weeks, that are hard and you may not accomplish much, but there will always be another chance for a good day around the corner. If you have the passion and drive, keep going! I'm rooting for you.