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An Evening of Learning
A Night of Learning Once again tonight it has been proven to me that I am one of the luckiest people on the planet. I got to sit in a room tonight with eighteen other professional fiction writers and spend three hours doing nothing but talking about publishing and writing. The beginning writer still tucked inside of me sort of still just claps with joy. The writers came from all over western Oregon for the evening. No structure. Only rules are only writing and publishing talk from 8 p.m. until 10:30 or 11 p.m. Sharing information and asking questions. Tonight I ended up asking a bunch of questions actually. Terms…
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Point of View
Point of View As I said yesterday, Kris and I took a day off and drove into the valley, an hour to two hour drive, depending where you go from the coast. And along the way we were talking and brainstorming about the new online workshop Point of View. I was telling her what I saw from beginning writers since she doesn’t see beginning writers much with what she teaches and edits these days. I was telling her about the character having “thoughts” like … I wished I was there, he thought… A huge viewpoint problem if not done right in a story. And I was telling her that I…
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Took a Day Off
Took a Day Off Nice dinner in the valley, fun movie, a bunch of television when I got home. I did manage to get some e-mail answered, but past that, a day doing real world things. Who knew Kris and I could do that at times? (grin) ——————— October Online Workshops Start In One Week Click the workshop tab above for description and sign-up or go to www.wmgpublishingworkshops.com. Questions about any of the workshops, feel free to write me. All are limited to 5 writers. All still have room at the moment. Class #31… Oct 4th … The Business of Writing Class #32… Oct 4th … Character Voice/Setting Class #33… Oct 4th … Writing Mysteries Class #34……
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Regaining Focus
Topic of the Night: Regaining Focus Last night I talked about focus, how times and outside events sometimes cause us to lose focus in our writing. How do you get the focus back on writing besides the simple answer “Slowly?” That answer helps no one, really. So let me give a few ideas on how to regain focus, or at least how I have done it at times. How I have brought back up writing on my priority list over the years when the world is tossing in far too many things. Look at Overall Goals Sometimes losing focus can be not only caused by other things in life taking…
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Focus
Focus It has been sort of a very strange period for me with my writing over the last few weeks or so. And I got a hunch this sort of things happens to everyone at times. Not the first for me, but one of the first times since I started this blog streak three plus years ago. Let me see if I can describe this. It takes, at least for most of us, a level of focus at fiction writing. I am not talking about planning ahead or outlining or anything silly like that. And I am not talking about all the problems that stop us from getting to the…
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Workshop Finished Here On The Coast
Workshop Finished Here Today was the last day of the Historical, Time Travel, and Alternate History workshop here at the coast, taught by Kris. What a fantastic group of writers who attended from all over the world. Kris was the instructor on this one, so I played behind-the-scenes support, but last night I got to read a group of stories from them because Kris wanted me to be reader feedback. I was impressed and got to give them my feedback today. Some of the most innovative ideas came out of there and I got a hunch I’m going to be seeing a lot of those stories as parts of new…
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Running Breakthrough
Running Breakthrough As I have talked about since the first of this month, I am in training to try to finish a marathon in November. I started this over twenty pounds heavier on July 1st and have been slowly and carefully working my way toward that goal of starting that race. Very, very carefully since I was overweight and have bad knees. My goal is to run/walk the marathon. I want to say that right from the start. Actually my goal is starting. Finishing is sort of a distant dream. I respect that distance. But after today it feels a little closer. I had planned on upping my daily milage…
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A Workshop Day
Workshop Day I spent most of today, in one fashion or another, on workshops. For those of you who missed it, the workshops now have a curriculum, or at least a suggested order to take them. That is under the Workshop Curriculum tab at the top of the page. The entire things is broken down into core workshops, business workshops, craft workshops, and genre workshops to make them easier to find. I also in two areas suggest order and what you should take first. And for those of you who signed up for workshops through our Kickstarter drive, the first week of October I’ll send out a survey through Kickstarter…
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Got Sidetracked
Got Sidetracked I had all sorts of things I was going to do tonight, including writing, and didn’t get many of them done. Got a few, but got sidetracked on setting up some forms to help with both writing organization and running organization and workshop stuff. And hours just went away. Amazing how that happens, isn’t it? ——————— What Was I Thinking Update #2 I have a video update on my race progress as part of the series What Was I Thinking. It’s only a couple minutes. ———————- I want to push these two bundles again!!! I am in two great bundles at the moment and so is Kris. You…
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Back To Regular Fun
Back to Regular Fun We hit the final hours of the Kickstarter this afternoon and it finished strong. Wow, just wow. Thank you, everyone. And through Kickstarter, when everything is done on their side, I will send out to everyone a survey for the information we need to fulfill the rewards, including the workshop and lecture stuff. That will happen in the first week of October. So now I want to get my focus back on three things. First, I am doing my best to ramp up my running. Second, I want to talk about the two fantastic bundles I have books in. And third, back to the novel and some…