Since my WIP, Illuminate, is also the thesis project for my graduate program, I don’t have as much time as I’m used to for fiddling around and rewriting stuff. The logical response? Go absolutely crazy. Step 1: Make Character Arcs for Everyone. The Interwebs contain lots of great information about character arcs, so in brief: In the course of a story, characters will respond to conflict on an external and internal level, and by the conclusion characters will undergo some sort of change. This creates story arcs. Every book has at least one major arc. I personally like Doug Tennapel’s...
I’ve completed my reading goal for the year! I set my goal on Goodreads back on January 1, 2013. This year I’d lowered it to 50 books, hoping to use my extra time and tackle more classics. I’m not sure how well I accomplished that, but I did pass my goal with a final count of 63/50. Not all of these books were published in 2013, but below is a list of my favorites from my reading list this year. 1. The Knife of Never Letting Go – Patrick Ness Young Adult fiction. Huckleberry Finn meets Firefly. Fantastically written. Though the...
For those who don’t know, Ultimate Spider-Man is an (admittedly pretty terrible) cartoon on Disney XD. The first season was on Netflix, so during my superhero cartoon phase last spring I watched it all, and I’ve occasionally dipped back in throughout the second season. Even though this is the show everyone loves to hate, there are some writing tips you can glean from what it does well and what it does… not so well. 1. Peter Parker is what makes Spiderman interesting. Peter Parker is a geeky, every-day guy who also happens to have spidery superpowers. That’s the heart of his conflict—how...
Last fall, I wrote an essay that eventually won third place in the Elie Wiesel Foundation’s Prize in Ethics. Over a year after the first draft, I found myself in New York City to attend seminars with the other winners and an award ceremony. It was a crazy, crazy experience, guys. October 2nd: I arrived from Heathrow and met my parents on Wednesday. We got to the Wellington Hotel (where the foundation had reserved a room for me) without too much hassle—though Dad driving in NYC during rush hour traffic was a terrifying experience in and of itself. I got...
I recently entered Marissa Meyer’s Pinterest competition and tied for first place! [Insert fangirling here] If you look at my winning board, you might notice it’s organized and has dividers. The credit for the idea goes to my sister, Laura, who’s an art major and recommended I build a board like someone would build an art portfolio. So in case you ever want to create a stellar, beautifully organized board, below are the steps I took to make this one! 1. Collect all the images on a secret board I made a board that only I could see (called: CRESS...
When I was preparing my manuscript for my magical beta readers, I decided to give it a complete read-through in the most merciless way possible. If I expected them to read a 90,000 word novel for me, I wanted to at least make sure they weren’t tripping over typos! There are three ways you can listen to your text: By reading it out loud to yourself (or, even better, with an audience), by asking someone else to read it to you, or by employing a robot. I’ve done the first two before and they work well. However, people sometimes read...
As a child who read over 500 books before she was thirteen (my school curriculum was very reading intensive), there are only a handful of books that stand out in full color among the wash of other stories. Of these books, I still remember very specific moments—and sometimes, even a quote. The following three moments still spring to my mind frequently. They fascinated me as a child, and they still fascinate me as a person, a reader, and a writer today. (more…)
After seeing the trailer for Saving Mr. Banks, I suddenly found myself far more interested in Mary Poppins than I have ever been before. So I picked up the book and gave it a read. Not only that—I decided to put my English major to good use and take notes, and I found some universally good writing tips in this (frankly, very strange) children’s book. (more…)
I’m deep into my revisions for my WIP, Blessings, and if there’s one thing everyone needs when it comes to revision, it’s this: Ways to (productively) procrastinate. “What do I mean?” you ask, tossing your golden/raven/auburn/brown (sorry, brown haired people) locks. “Procrastination cannot be productive, one must simply push on! Also, have you been reading Mary Poppins today? Because I sound unaccountably British.” Yes, yes, I read the whole book in under twenty-four hours. Anyway. When I talk about productive procrastination, I mean forms of procrastination that will keep your creative juices flowing whilst requiring minimum brain cells. Bonus: All...
So some people asked me to share my symposium presentation about building myth in creative writing. Your wish is my command! Here’s my abstract: The world is not constructed simply of fact, but also of myth. The interplay between mythology, geography, culture and history is a relationship which fiction provides a perfect platform for exploring. This presentation will focus specifically on Welsh and Celtic mythology, a relatively unknown genre of myth, before exploring the ways studying the influences of myth can help create worlds in fiction. Welsh mythology is closely tied to its geographic roots, with many tales informing the...
