writing, reading, art, and randomness
work
bike rides
work
walks
work
reading
work
revising
work
work
work
sleep
Meanwhile, here’s something the cat drew during a meeting::
-me♥w
So as much as I l♥ve you and l♥ve blogging, this week I’m calling it off.
I have to get some serious WRITING and READING done, and it’s not happening, so I’m changing my schedule up.
Feel free to leave me some funny jokes in the comments, I will probably need a good laugh.
Hope you’re all doing awesome.
-M♥lly
Like I found a faithful, trustworthy friend who knows about magic and romance and laughs and charm and delight and green slime and weed killer and PLOT TWISTS.
And you know I like all those things.
sigh.
Allow me to introduce you (I think many of you have already met):
THANK YOU SO MUCH to Sandy Shin and Kari, who were genius enough to recommend this amazing book that I can’t believe I never read before.
So clever, so witty, so unexpected…I could go on and on.
I hope you add it to your TBR list.
Also, look at this cover that doesn’t do the book any justice:
Seriously, just stick with the cover at the top of the post. That one’s more like the story. (But the story’s even better.)
Have a great weekend!
-M♥lly
hmmm…
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*yawns* *stretches*
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*hums “O What a Beautiful Morning…”*
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Oops
It’s Monday, isn’t it?
Huh.
Well, it doesn’t feel like one. Maybe that’s why I forgot to blog.
But I remembered!!! yay!
let me know if you’ve come up with anything better–
and I allllllmost feel ready to start re-revising. Which I will tomorrow.
I highly recommend the above activities or similar ones to anyone recuperating from reviseitis (inflammation of the revision).
-M♥lly
Yay! I made it to Friday!! Congrats to all of you who did as well!!
Okay, anyways,
the other day I was riding in the car
(Kissyface was driving me to Chipotle)
and I look over and this guy is waiting at the same light we are.
He’s a couple years younger than me, but he’s pretty handsome.
And he has this great smile.
And he’s dancing.
Yes. He was dancing in his car. At a stoplight.
So then he looks over at me, keeps dancing, raises his eyebrows and widens his grin, like, “care to join me??”
And I can’t help it, I’m cracking up.
And he just smiles bigger when he sees me laughing.
Still dancing.
So Kris is trying to figure out the reason for my random outburst of giggles (not exactly an unusual event) and he’s like, “What??”
And I’m laughing so hard, but I say, “That guy’s dancing! He’s dancing.”
But by this time, the light has changed and we’re driving again and
I’ve lost sight of my dancing buddy.
But then, right before we turn into Chipotle I see him.
Still dancing.
And he smiles at me again, like, “I’m cool, and I’m perfectly confident enough to dance in my car and not care who sees me.”
And yeah, maybe it was kinda weird. But it was more…I don’t know. Fun. Free. Random.
So I think I want to be like that.
And I’m pretty sure that guy needs to wind up in one of my stories.
Have a beautiful weekend. I dare you to dance in your car at a stoplight.
Love,
M♥lly
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So the other day, Kari posted on larger than life characters via her reading in WRITING THE BREAKOUT NOVEL.
Yesterday, I finished a book portraying a larger than life character. So I thought I’d piggyback off of Kari’s thoughts and add my own, review-style.
I decided I had to read THE GRAVEYARD BOOK after pouring through Kate’s analysis of it (look around her site, she pulls out awesome aspects of the book over multiple posts).
Actually, I “read” this one by audiobook. I have to tell you, the experience was especially delightful because Neil Gaiman was the narrator.
Plus, I must add that Gaiman has this magical storyteller’s voice. He was created to tell tales.
Of course, the book gets to break all the rules. Hopping character perspective mid-narration. Following a character from infancy to adolescence. Noticeable (but wonderful) use of adverbs. The thing is, Gaiman does it masterfully, and I didn’t mind A BIT. (And, as Mary Kole says–geniuses can get away with this kind of behavior much easier than an aspiring writer can.)
The main character, Bod, is exactly the kind of person you want to root for, you want to follow around, you want to be. Even when he’s making a stupid decision, you know it will work out, because you know deep down that he has a good heart. He does things I’m not brave enough to do. He has talents I only wish I had. But he’s humble and kind, and I’m pretty sure we’re BFFs now.
I didn’t want the book to end. As I felt the narrative wrapping up, I caught myself pausing the story and finding all sorts of reasons to do something else.
Not because I was bored with the story.
The biggest revelation this book offered me was its simplicity. The plot was straightforward. You could see every brick that built the tale. You knew where it was going. I enjoyed every delicious word of it. Each character was delightful and unique. For goodness sakes, I was sad to stop living in a graveyard!
And because I didn’t want it to end, even after it was over, I kept thinking about the story. How could something so beautiful and simple apply to my life? How can I hold on to the delight I felt in the narrative?
And then all of my graveyard memories came flooding back to me.
I learned to drive in a graveyard.
My friends and I would walk through it before youth group and talk about life.
We drove around it in the back of a truck on Halloween to scare ourselves, and my dad hid behind a tombstone and TERRIFIED us.
I used to (need to again) visit my aunt’s and my grandma’s graves and remember who they were.
We played football in the field that wasn’t yet full of graves.
It was one of those places where I learned that there are real people and there are fake people. And there are real people who act like fake people because they’re too afraid to be real.
All of which proves that this is truly a great book. Any book that can pull me through the above thought process gets a 20 out of 5 hearts from me.
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
Peace ♥
PS.
So my mom sent me some pictures. Maybe you’ve seen them, but I hadn’t. I was shocked.
as my co-worker said,
IT ACTUALLY MADE ME A LITTLE SAD. But that’s beside the point. WOW, our mindset as a culture has changed so much in so many ways over one single century. The meanings of words have changed, what’s considered acceptable has changed. The way people look has changed. Cars have changed (Actually they were invented and then they changed). Advertising has changed.
These ads are so dated. Please see below. Feel free to laugh (or cry).
Beer is nourishing for baby, right?
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Oooo I'm so weak. I can't even open up ketchup bottles. I hate being female.
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If you put cheesy cliches and buzzwords in your narrative and dialogue…
Mommy, why don't you smoke to take the edge off being a mom??
Papa says it won't hurt us. REALLY?????
Right.
Sugar's got what it takes. make it stop.
mmm...just swallow tape worms and you will be skinny!!
I'm a man, I wear ties, get me my breakfast, little woman. You don't know it, but there is arsenic in his coffee.
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your readers are going to think it sounds really lame ten years from now.
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You might even make them want to cry or punch you.
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Think of original phrases. Like a spirited writer who yearns to be tamed.
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If you eat lots of sugar, you will have the energy to come up with creative phrasings.
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So don’t be too groovy man or your book will become a #datedfail.
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Twitter hashtags will probably be #datedfails in a couple years.
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Have a beautiful Friday!!!!
Peace♥
As Nathan Bransford says, revision in semi-important. I am going through like my 5th terrible, yucky, draining, life-killing revision, and I thought, Shouldn’t this be easier?”
So I looked up all these easy ways, and I thought that today I would share tips for a super fast, super excellent revision process. Seriously, these will sike you out of your mind:
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If you follow these tips, you’re sure to have your revision done in one easy sweep and be snatched up by top agents in no time. Good luck!
Told you it was a sike.
But this isn’t a sike: Wednesday we have a very special interview with none other than the Honorable Queen of Funny and Sarcasm herself, T.H. Mafi. Yay!
Peace♥
***Oh wait. I almost forgot to tell you about this contest. Super cool from a super cool 16 yr old author!
UNOFFICIAL CONFERENCE TIP: When there is a table full of yummy scones, muffins, brownies, etc. along with nice long tongs to pick up said yummies, please don’t use your fingers and then proceed to munch on your brownie over the rest of the yummies.
Conference tip #2: No matter how shy you feel, don’t keep to yourself. I can be super shy around large groups of unfamiliar people, heck even around small groups, but I chatted it up with everyone I met— in elevators, in the bathroom, in the lunch line, before class.
YES, THIS WAS HARD AND INTIMIDATING, but it got easier because pretty soon I started seeing familiar faces, even in the big crowd.
I’ve heard the horror stories of agents getting pinned in elevators and bathrooms and forced to listen to some crazy writer. You never know if the stranger in the stall next to you is a savvy agent or a seasoned author.
That’s why I wasn’t pitching.
Instead, I asked the best question for any writer: Continue reading ‘DFW Conference Tip #2′
I am reading like a fiend. Working on a peer’s MS and trying to stay caught up on my fiction reading list.
I had to go to the nonfiction section of the library last week…it was so weird. All those numbers on the spines (involuntary shudder).
No it’s not that bad. I went to the nonfiction section because I’m supposed to be working on a grammar critique, and while I was an ace at grammar in college, things can get a little fuzzy with time. Also, there are so many different opinions when it comes to grammar.
So, to my husband’s disbelief, I brought home The Comma Sutra. COMMA! It’s not the book you’re thinking of. Also, I brought home Eats, Shoots, and Leaves. My head is spinning from the forcing myself to read a book with no plot line, but I feel much more confident that I’m not making my punctuation preferences up.
Here are a couple online references I found helpful for a quick overview:
Junket Studies’ 11 Rules of Writing
Daily Writing Tips’ English Grammar 101
And the always helpful Nathan Bransford has a great post on a general
(non grammar) revision checklist.
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