So Here’s What Happened This Week (May 18, 2012)
May 18th, 2012Former Wannabe Wednesday
May 16th, 2012
“I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.” – Bill Cosby
Tuesday’s Tip for Wannabes
May 15th, 2012
Whatever you do, don’t become a writer or an actor in the hopes that people will tell you how brilliant you are. Praise and good reviews are few and far between. The work will have to be its own reward most of the time.
So Here’s What Happened This Week (May 11, 2012)
May 11th, 2012
What I Did: Worked on rewrite of my middle grade novel, RAIN ON THE WATER.
What I Read : FIELD OF SCREAMS: Haunted Tales from the Baseball Diamond, the Locker Room, and Beyond by Mickey Bradley and Dan Gordon
What I Saw: THE AVENGERS
Cool Links I Found:
Quality Books Take Time
Before Fingers Touch Keyboard: My 6 Pre-Writing Steps
Plotters Vs. Pansters – Get Ready to RUMBLE!!!!
May 10th, 2012There are a lot of heated debates going on in the world today. Democrats vs. Republicans. Ravens vs. Steelers. Yankees vs. Red Sox. And then there’s the fight to the death duel between the plotters and the pansters. Plotters being people who meticulously plot out their stories ahead of time and pansters who fly by the seat of their designer jeans, khakis, or what have you.
Okay, maybe not a duel to the death. More like polite arguments – usually – in writing circles over the age old question: To Outline or Not To Outline? The real answer, no matter what anybody says, is do whatever works for you. It’s that simple. Some say you MUST create a detailed outline before you write or you are doomed to create an aimless story with unmotivated characters who will end up wandering off the page to die in the slush pile of unpublished manuscripts. Others say that outlining ahead of time will STIFLE your creativity! You shall not be bound and tethered to a rigid outline! You should frolic freely through gardens of your God-given creativity where you can pick wildflowers and gather rosebuds while ye may and all those kind of flower-related metaphors that you could never come up with if you were shackled to” The Man” of an outline who’s only trying to keep you down.
People get very attached to their own ways of developing their stories, but sometimes it’s good to shake things up and try things a different way. Or not. I am a plotter all the way. This goes back to my years of training as a screenwriter. When you’ve got 120 pages maximum to tell your story, there’s little time to frolic through the flowers or tiptoe through any type of vegetation.
With a screenplay, you’ve got to tell your story in the shortest, tightest way possible so I learned quickly to develop a very clear outline before typing FADE IN. Now that I’ve switched to novels, I’ve still been taking a long time to develop a very specific outline before I start writing actual pages. With my latest novel, SINGLES VS. BRIDEZILLAS, I began working with a very loose outline. I had the basics down, but didn’t bother going into specifics before writing.
I hated it.
I hated it so much.
I found it such a drag to sit down in front of the computer every morning and have to figure out exactly what comes next. I liked knowing exactly what was going to happen, who was in the scene, and what they were talking about before I started writing. That way I could get right into the heart of the scene and get lost in what the characters were thinking and feeling because I already had thought about it ahead of time. It’s hard for me to imagine just flying blind and making stuff totally up as I go along, but I guess I can understand why some people do.
Not really.
Pansters are as big of a mystery to me as Republicans are.
My philosophy of writing and politics is the same. Do whatever you want as long as you’re not hurting anybody. And if I’m not hurting anybody, stay out of my business and let me do what I want.
That’s all there is to it.
World peace. Right there.
Group hug, guys!
Former Wannabe Wednesday
May 9th, 2012
“I get terrible butterflies. Before I go onstage, I’ll have to freak out for five minutes. I scream. It seems to help!” – Josh Groban
Tuesday’s Tip for Wannabes
May 8th, 2012
Self-discipline takes work. Stop saying “I can’t get motivated”. Nobody said you had to feel motivated. Just shut up and DO IT.
So Here’s What Happened This Week (May 4, 2012)
May 4th, 2012
What I Did:Sent out more queries for my novel QUEEN HENRY. Got 6 more rejections for the same novel. Read through my first novel, RAIN ON THE WATER, to prepare for some revisions.
What I Read: Do-Over by Christine Hurley Deriso
Cool Links I Found:
Advice: The Best and the Worst
Can this Manuscript be Saved
Movie Quotes
May 3rd, 2012I keep a journal of some of favorite movie quotes, so I figured I would put some on the blog from time to time. Enjoy, and feel free to send me some of your favorites!
”Not that I mind a slight case of abduction now and then, but I have tickets for the theatre this evening.” – North by Northwest / 1959
“I’ve got to have money. Doctor’s orders are that I must have a lot of money. Otherwise, I become dull, listless, and have trouble with my complexion.” – Beat of the Devil / 1954
“Now you see that evil will always triumph because good is dumb.” – Spaceballs/ 1987
“You’re dumber than you think I think you are.” – Chinatown / 1974
“The truth is you make your own destiny, understand? You don’t wait for it to come to you.” – Only You/ 1994
“You can’t spend the rest of your life crying. It annoys people at the movies.” – The Odd Couple / 1968
“I think he’s kinda cute. He reminds me of a dog that nobody wants.” – The Goodbye Girl / 1977
“Well, what would you do with a brain if you had one?” – The Wizard of Oz/ 1939
“You’re two wonderful people who happened to fall in love and happen to have a pigmentation problem.” – Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner/ – 1967
“It’s our dreams, doctor, that carry us on. They separate us from the beasts. I wouldn’t want to go on living if I thought it was all just eating and sleeping and taking my clothes off – I mean putting them on.” Harvey / 1950
“It turns out, with due respect, when all is said and done, that there’s no such thing as you!” – Mary Poppins/ 1964
“It’s the same thing your whole life: Clean up your room, stand up straight, pick up your feet, take it like a man, be nice to your sister, don’t mix beer and wine ever. And oh yeah, don’t drive on the railroad tracks!” – Groundhog Day/ 1993
“I am gonna have more fans than Elvis. Yeah! And I won’t even be dead.” – Casual Sex/ 1988
“Well, I always say the law was meant to be interpreted in a lenient manner and that’s why I try to do. Sometimes I lean to one side of it, sometimes I lean to the other.” – Hud/ 1963
“Dead? That’s serious. Can I help?” – Orlando / 1993
“Hello, this is Harris. I’m in right now, so you can talk to me personally. Please start talking at the sound of the beep.” – L.A. Story/ 1991
“Good to be alive. There’s so many things ya can’t do when you’re dead.” – Life Stinks/ 1991
“There’s some places where the road keeps going.” – Pleasantville/ 1998
“You don’t have to pay me, but you can’t fire me.” A Day at the Races/ 1937
“It’s not easy having a good time. Even smiling makes my face ache.” – The Rocky Horror Picture Show / 1975
“We are all interested in this future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friends, future events such as these will affect you in the future.” Plan 9 From Outer Space / 1958
Former Wannabe Wednesday
May 2nd, 2012
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