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Needed Some Exercise
So I Dug Into the Bookstore Back Room Again… The back room at the bookstore is where we hope to expand into a new public area to get more room for books. But when we bought it, the place was buried in boxes and trash. Basically it looked like a hoarding place like my friend Bill’s home and apartment that I cleaned out. I have been slowly, when I needed some exercise like today, been working through it. And even more fun is the back room has almost as many treasures per square foot as Bill’s places. Today I found an entire box of rare and antique perfume bottles, some…
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Finishing Up Short Story Challenge Reading
And Writing Up Comments… I also did a bunch of work on Pulphouse Fiction Magazine #1 besides reading and typing up my comments back to the writers in the short story challenge. I also allowed myself to take a long nap, meaning almost two hours tonight. Guess I needed it. I had a meeting up at WMG with the the crew there to get approval for my crazy idea I will announce on Monday. I had to get their approval and feedback on some things before I could even do this, since they have to do a bunch of the work on the idea. This will add into the 67…
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Setting Up Challenges for 2018
Been Working on Planning… I ended up driving to Salem this afternoon to get a couple standees from a theater there, but the place was so busy, the manager and I decided to do it next week instead since tearing them apart makes a mess in part of their lobby. Wow, what a zoo that theater was. But I ended up doing a bunch of picking and got some pretty cool stuff. And the drive allowed me to do a lot of thinking about how I want to handle the 2018 goals and challenges. So all good. My main challenges are the two 67 Challenges. I will be doing some…
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Getting Ready for 2018
Sort of a Look Forward… A Really Long Post Part of this is new, part of this is an older post from 2012 that I thought still made sense today. So once again, the way back machine strikes again. Every time I do this post, or talk with writers at the end of the year, I hear goals being set that are seemingly impossible when you do the math. I’ve set a few of them myself, to be honest, over the decades. I honestly have no problem at all with impossible goals. None, as long as the person setting the goal understands that the likely failure can also be deemed…
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Want to Be Challenged Into the New Year?
I Am That Crazy… I am going to do it again. I am offering to be a first reader for some of you. I am still just finishing up the reading for the short story challenge that ended at the end of November and the writers are still working on novels until January 15th, but that means I will have time to read again starting January 1st. What a great way to be motivated starting the new year. The first two times I did this, the challenges turned out to be fun for me. And the writers who participated said it challenged them to get writing done they might not…
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Promotional Package Opened For Five More Days
JUST FIVE MORE DAYS… I got a few letters about this from people who had missed it because of the holidays and Kris mentioned that she thought a number of people had missed it because we closed it off before the holiday. So we talked with Allyson and she and the staff at WMG Publishing agreed to open it for five more writers or the 1st of the year, whichever comes first. Then they want to get planning. So those of you signed up already, expect the first questionnaire tomorrow night from me. Anyone who might want to sign up, details are below. Questions, write me. Five writers or five…
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New Classic Workshop Now Available
There Are Now Ten of Them… That’s right, over the holiday I finally managed to get Writing Thrillers Classic Workshop up and on Teachable. Classic Workshops are workshops that used to be Regular Workshops at one point or another. The information is still good, but we moved them to classic to get them out of the monthly rotation. They cost $150 and there are six weeks of videos. And there are assignments, but you only do them for yourself. You do not turn them into me. Another difference from Regular Workshops is that you can go through the Classic Workshops at any point, all six weeks as fast or as…
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A Fun Christmas Eve
And I Thought My Blogging Steak Was Going to End… 45 minutes on the phone with Bluehost this evening got the problem solved. Seemed like a security certificate had gotten shut off. Shut down pretty much everything until we got it fixed. But the fine folks on Christmas Eve at Bluehost got it solved and I am doing yet another blog in the streak. This afternoon a bunch of writers showed up for Sunday lunch at WMG and the discussion was fun for almost three hours. And then besides my time on the phone with my internet provider, Kris and I spent the rest of the evening together. I cooked…
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A Christmas Prince
Yup, A Romance Movie… Got stuck right at the “meet cute” of the move called A Christmas Prince staring a bunch of actors I didn’t really know. Stayed with it because I knew every detail that was going to happen and I wanted to see if I would miss. I didn’t. Still a movie nice enough to watch as well. If you want to study either the romance plotting structure or romance team structure, this is a perfect movie to study. No theme deep enough to get in the way, standard romance troupe of hidden prince, standard heroine, everything. And they hit every detail in the plot structure as they…
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You Are More Than Welcome
I Just Wanted a Way to Say Thanks… You all keep me on my toes and learning with great questions, both in comments and in letters both here and through the workshops. I feel like I am very lucky to have the ability to keep active, keep learning, and keep having fun with my writing. So for all of the thank you comments and letters, I want to say from myself, Kris, Allyson and the gang at WMG… “You are more than welcome.” I just hope a comment or two in the lecture will help you get focused in the coming year. Now, it’s Saturday before Christmas. Go enjoy the…