To Kill A Mockingbird... Essay to Come Soon

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I thought that To Kill a Mockingbird was a very interesting and fascinating book. I loved how accurate the time period was in the book and the characters who were created. I had to write an essay on this book and I chose to write about the similarities between Harper Lee's real life and her book including characters, setting, and events. This opened up a whole new world for me and made the book even more interesting for me.

View all my reviews

I WON!

I guess that's it for November. It's been a whirl wind and I can't wait to suffer through next year! Hopefully by then I will have a plot and a novel I can stick to. 

See you on the flip side!

~Snowie

NEVER GIVE UP! Stats 3

LOOK AT THAT!

This goes to show that you can come back and win even if you are behind, doesn't it?


If you're winning, stay ahead. If you are losing, stay ahead of the other losers so you aren't dead last. =) Also, do not give up. Never give up. Giving up is just another way to say you are quitting and quitting will never get you ahead in anything. It takes hard work to get somewhere you really want to be, but once you are there it is completely worth the effort, isn't it? Life has it's own way of working out. It just takes a little time.

Never give up, DFTBA,

~Snowie

Stats Dos

Another Update!
If you're like me and six thousand words behind, you can still do it!!

And congratulations to Crossing for already finishing her NaNo novel and crossing the finish line once again!

~Snowie

“Stubborness is also determination. It's simply a matter of shifting from "won't power" to "will power.” 
― Peter McWilliams

21968 Words In Seven Days

It's been almost a month since I posted a blog. Sorry, I've been busy writing for NaNoWriMo! Here's my current stats...

As you can probably tell, I'm a little behind. 21968 words in fact. And there are seven days left, not counting today. And to finish on time I need to write ALMOST 2746 WORDS A DAY!!! To finish on time. Ugh. My family is going to hate me when I don't talk at all on Thanksgiving because I am trying to finish a stupid novel. Oh, well. That is what Christmas is for.

No where to go but up, right?

Five beginnings of novels, a chapter for a Sherlock fanfic, and this blog post have all contributed to the making of this word count. Comments are appreciated.


Happy Giving of Thanks! Go eat some turkey and pie, it's good for you.

-Snowie

This post has contributed 156 words to my National Novel Writing Month Novel.

Are You Ready?

Around the world people are getting ready to start writing their NaNo Novels. Are you ready? Can you beat the odds? Will 50,000 words be on that paper by the end of this month? There better be. Because this is NaNoWriMo and we are hard-core, ink-sucking, plot thickening, chapter writing, 1,666 words a day noveling machines and we can do this!

nanowrimo.org

Accept the Challenge.


Hope all of you are ready because there's only hours left before October turns into November and you have to sit down in your Halloween costume at midnight. And if someone, somewhere is reading this and suddenly decides to try NaNoWriMo, but it's already November 2nd, you can still sign up and start. It's not whether you hit 50,000 words, it's whether you wrote a novel or not.

Good Writings and Good Luck! See you in November...

Snowie

Happy Halloween!

12 Days Til NaNoWriMo 2011...

12 days until NaNoWriMo! Can you believe it? That's only a week and five days or four sets of three days or three sets of four days or eleven days plus one day. It's not a lot. If you still have no idea what you'll write, don't worry, you are not alone. Hundreds of people sit down in their halloween costumes at thirty til midnight on the thirty-first with no clue about what they will write. And, in the end they still get to fifty thousand. It just goes to prove that anything is possible even if you just wing it. It might not be the greatest, your novel might not make even the slightest bit of sense, but you won. Or at least got close and had fun doing it. It's not about winning. It's about trying. If you win, great. You get a bunch of amazing goodies when you are done. Just try and have fun. Go to a write in at a cafe. Meet new people and hang out. Those will be the things you remember, not whether you won or lost.

Have fun and enjoy your October while it lasts!  What are you dressing up as for Halloween?

DFTBA

-Snowie

15 Days Til National Novel Writing Month 2011

Yes, it's that time of year again! Time to dig deep, find a story and get prepared for a noveling frenzy. Stock up on the coffee and frozen pizza, say good-bye to loved ones, and plan out your write in's. Next make sure you have the 250$ you borrowed from your friend to go to the Night of Writing Dangerously. Plus the 10 dollars to donate and get your halo.

Some of you may not know what I'm talking about. National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) is an event that takes place during the month of November.  Your goal is to write a 50,000 word novel in thirty days. Impossible? No. Not at all. All you have to do is open a word document or crack open a notebook and start writing.

NaNoWriMo starts on November 1st 12:00:01 and ends on November 30th at 11:59:59. To sign up you go to nanowrimo.org. The site is free, but donations are greatly appreciated as they help to bring back NaNoWriMo next year. The site has it's own word counter and it's very easy to add friends and keep in touch. Every week they have well known writers write pep talks to keep you up and running throughout NaNoWriMo.

What do you get out of it? The first rough draft of your novel. The pride of knowing that you did it. A shiny certificate. And if you won, you can treat yourself to a Winner's shirt.


This year I am writing a novel called Reality. It's about a girl who figures out that the world she is living in isn't actually real. And to get to the real world she jumps off a bridge and.. ummm... well kills herself. She wakes up in a world called Reality, the real world. She finds herself stuck in the middle of a civil war that started over the EARTH (Experimental Area with Reconstructing Technology Household) Project also known as the Utopia Project.

This project was originally created to hold people with fatal diseases in a slowed state and give them a chance to live out their lives. The user would be immersed in what seemed like a very real world to live out the rest of their lives. The inventor of this project, Max Gage, was to be executed by his own daughter who wanted the power of his machine for herself. Max escaped and started forming an army called the Reformation.


It's all very interesting, and I am just now starting to figure out most of it.

What are you doing for NaNoWriMo? Leave a comment and tell me what you think of reality.


Keep calm and DFTBA

-Snowfire

Random fact of the day- to google is now in the dictionary ex. I used the internet to google frogs today.


Links to Other Posts About NaNoWriMo
http://snowfireswritingthoughts.blogspot.com/2010/10/nanowrimo-and-night-stalker.html
http://snowfireswritingthoughts.blogspot.com/2010/10/night-stalker-and-nano-and-how-they-are.html
https://twitter.com/#!/NANOWRIMO
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Novel_Writing_Month
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2010/11/12-reasons-to-ignore-the-naysayers-do-nanowrimo.html
http://www.facebook.com/nanowrimo
http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2010/11/01/nanowhonow-nanowrimo-dos-and-donts/
http://www.spacejock.com.au/NaNoWriMo.html
http://www.3daynovel.com/ (Not Really NaNo But A Whole Lot Tougher)
http://www.lettersandlight.org/     (NaNo's People)
http://ywp.nanowrimo.org/        (Young Writer's Program, for 13 year olds and under, same as NaNo run by the same people)

A Little Post

Just a little post today. I might get something up Sunday about NaNoWriMo. Now for your enjoyment, a nerdy video, or, for some, just a nice piano piece.

Troubleshooting

From HermioneJeanWeasley

You wrote a novel. Congratulations! That's a bit more then some people can say. Now you're happily diving in to revising and editing, ready to give you novel the oomph and triumph it deserves. You are already in love with your characters and can't wait to dig deeper into their souls. You think to yourself that maybe this time around you will find something to make them explode with life. As you read through, you realize that maybe it's easier said then done. You start to prepare for the hard months maybe years ahead wondering if your darling will ever be truly brought to life.

Creating characters is hard enough. Now at the end of your first draft you should know at least a hand full of facts about them including their name, physical characteristics, and the other everyday things. Right now for most of us and for most of our readers our characters are average. When we are revising, we have the chance to create unforgettable, one-of-a-kind fictional people. The best way to do this is to describe. Describe, describe, describe. Describe their room, their family, their house. It will help you give your character a whole other level of life. Plus, it will help your readers visualize their room and learn more about the character's personality and life style.

You have your own writing voice. Every writer does. Now try turning your voice in to your character's voice. The next time you are in a meeting or dinner instead of talking, listen. If you have pen and paper, you might want to jot down some notes. Listen to peoples voices, note their body language and appearance. After a couple times of doing this, you'll probably start to get a feel for how certain people talk or act a certain way. From there you can figure out what you want your characters to sound like on the page.

Daily Writing Tips

- Almost everyday a new writing tip, trick, or just interesting article is posted on this website. They focus on grammar, writing voice, writing, words, and over all English usage.

Divergent, Delirium, and Once Upon an Idyll

Divergent Cover From Goodreads

Divergent By Veronica Roth

Setting: Future Dystopian Chicago

Main Characters:
Beatrice- Also know as Tris later in the book, she was raised in the Fraction Abnegation, the selfless.
Four- Known as Four because he only has four fears

Protagonist: Beatrice

A Little Need To Know: Dystopian Chicago is divided into five fractions each devoted to a certain virtue: Candor (Honesty), Abnegation (Selflessness), Dauntless (Bravery), Amity (Peacefulness), Erudite (Intelligence). When the children of the fractions turn sixteen, they choose a fraction to spend the rest of their lives with. Those who are rejected from the fractions (Fractionless) are put out on the streets and given the jobs no one wants.

Plot: Beatrice is sixteen. Her test results were inconclusive and she can choose from three fractions: Candor, Abnegation, and Dauntless. Candor is out of the question, she can lie to easily, but the other two aren't so easy. Will she stay with her beloved family, and be selfless for the rest of her life? Or will she become a brave Dauntless Soldier like the ones she's envied all her life? She makes a decision, one that will change her life forever.
During the deadly initiation that follows, Beatrice becomes Tris and tries to conform to the new life she's chosen. In a game where everyone will kill to win, Tris must watch her back. Not everyone is a friend when it comes to the Dauntless. Everyone has secrets, even Tris.

Writing and Final Words: Read this book. I mean it. It will capture your imagination and pull you in. I guarantee that you will not be able to put this book down until you finish it. Roth has a away with words that will put you in the same place as Tris. In a way you become Tris. I believe that is what makes a good book, a good book. Think about it. The best books pull you in and put you into the characters mind. You feel what they feel, you cry when they cry. The only thing I wish was different would be the final climax. It felt way to short and I would have love it if I was another 5-15 pages longer. Read it!

Goodreads Reviews

Picture From Goodreads

Veronica Roth's Blogspot

Delirium By Lauren Oliver

Setting: Future Dystopian Portland, Maine

"I believe that a life with out love is probably a life without pain, but I also believe that a life without pain is a life without happiness.  Therefore... life without love is a life without happiness."
-Lauren Oliver

Main Character:

Lena- A young girl who lives above and works in a Grocery

Plot: Lena is ninety-five days away from her operation. Ninety-five days and she will be safe from the disease forever. Ninety-five days and she will be safe from love. A lot can happen three months. 

Like everyone else she always believed that love was a disease. She always knew that she would be infected someday, somehow just like her mother and sister. Maybe she would jump off a building when they tried to operate on her, kill herself like her mother did, or escape to the wilds with the man she loved. Ninety-five days. She was counting down praying it would come faster. Until she met him. The boy with all the answers. She was infected. She didn't care.

On Writing: Despite my plot description that ended up sounding like some dramatized teenage girl wrote it, this is a really good book. Nice plot, amazing ending, great characters although at times Lena really should take some toughness pills and suck it up. I mean come on your secret boyfriend (Named Alex) who could potentially get you killed is not going to leave you. I mean seriously, come on! Alex will not leave you unless he is shot down and killed. It's a good book over all. Read it! =)

Lauren Oliver's Website
Goodreads Reviews

Picture from Goodreads

Once Upon an Idyll By Muse Lee

Setting: Present Day and Wagner's Ring, "...a world of dwarves, Valkyries, water spirits, and angry tribes."

Main Characters:
Mary- A young, nine year old girl who lives with her mother and sister in an apartment; has a love of Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen.*
Danny- A new friend of Mary's, also age nine, who lives in a large house with his wealthy parents.
Wotan- King of the Gods, calls Mary and Danny into Wagner's Ring, is Mary's father.

Plot: Every Friday after school, Mary and her family visit the park. And every Friday she goes to the same tree to the same spot to listen to recording of songs from Der Ring des Nibelugen and look at pictures from a book about the opera. It is here that she meets Danny and tells him about Wagner and the opera. They are called in to Wagner's Ring by Wotan and meet Meme the dwarf. Meme, who apparently thinks he has been taking care of the children for a while, tells Danny he must slay the dragon, Fafner, who guards a magic ring. While sitting by a brook in the forest outside on Meme's cave, they meet Wotan. He tells Mary he is her father and she is a Valkyrie, the warrior daughters of Wotan. Wotan gives them a mission. Danny must kill Fafner the dragon and take the ring. He must travel with Mary to the river to return the ring to the water spirits from which it was stollen from. If they do not complete their quest it could spell disaster not only for them, but for the entire world.

Writing: This piece was well written, very original, and overall a great book. Raise you hand if you have ever read a story inspired and connecting with an opera? I know that I haven't until now. This book was a quick read. I probably finished it in a total of four hours or so. It was entertaining although I wish the characters would have been expanded a little more. You could tell by the use of language that Mary and Danny are eight years old. When I was reading it, I knew that Muse Lee had not just self-published it without major editing just to say "I have a book published". Lee put an awful amount of time and effort to make this book the best it could possibly be.

Amazon
Goodreads


 *Sorry if I get any facts wrong in this. The closest thing to an opera that I've seen is Les Miserables 25th Anniversary Concert on DVD.



Good Writings!

Snowie

Writing Challenge One

00900 by brujo

Tomorrow (or everyday if you would like) pick a character from any of your stories. As you go through your day, keep them in mind. Every time you have a situation or problem to react to or solve, try and imagine what your character would do. Not only will this help understand and build your character more, but it will also help to write out your story in your own writing voice. This challenge is also helpful in editing and revising when a scene doesn't feel write or a character is out of character. Try this exercise if you have writer's block or if you can't figure out how your character would react.


DFTBA!

Snowie 

Celebrating Entering Pottermore with Fireworks

I did it! I got into Pottermore at 12:08 PM today after refreshing the page for almost five hours, not counting the two after midnight this morning. Sorry to those who haven't gotten in yet. Don't give up! You still have two more days!  And to celebrate, I posted some fireworks on YouTube, but you can view them here!

Real Life Characters: Obsessions

Every single person has hobby or obsession. In fact, most people have more then a few. All to many times we see characters that are kind of dull and lifeless. Most of the time it is because they have no or very few hobbies. They can be flat and one sided, not very interesting.

Let's compare who sounds more interesting.

Matthew lives in Kansas City. He works for an agency that sells copyright licenses and in his free time likes to watch T.V. He doesn't do much else or like much else for that matter.

V.S.

Kaycee lives in San Francisco. She works at a local coffee shop and is currently attending a college of art and design. In her free time she plays volleyball at the beach and hangs out with her friends. She is obsessed with Van Gogh and Pretty Little Liars on ABC Family even though she's not much of a T.V. person. Kaycee has written a little poetry, but doesn't think it is very good. Before she goes to work in the morning, she likes to practice yoga in her living room.


See what I mean? Who would you rather hang out with- Matthew or Kaycee. Giving your characters personalities, obsessions, hobbies, the little tidbits that make their lives different from everyone else's can make a person's writing so much more interesting. You never know. You may find something out about your character that you never knew before. Or, your story may come to life in ways you never imagined.

I wrote this because I am needing to pass the time. One of my obsessions is Harry Potter and I still haven't gotten into Pottermore yet. Wish me luck!!

~Snowie

P.S. While I'm waiting, I'll get some book reviews up on my book review page... =)

An Amazing Person Destined For Amazing Things

In April I went on and watched one of Charlie McDonnell's new videos: Cooking With Charlie, and of course recognized Charlie and Michael Aranda. There was one other person that I didn't know though so, of course, I checked out her youtube channel. After watching two or three of her vlogs, I was hooked and the rest as they say is history. Today I still watch her blogs just for a laugh and a sprinkle of inspiration and happiness. The person I am talking about is the wonderful Cassandra Croft aka NerdzRL aka Nerdz4L! Welcome to the blog Cassandra! ...Sorry. I've never actually really talked to her... Maybe I'll send her a letter! In the mean time, no interview from my second childhood hero, the first being J.K. Rowling.

Moving on to the reason for telling you all of this. There is a game of sorts called King of the Web. According to kingoftheweb.com this is what it is:

King of the Web is a free-to-play online game of skill and persuasion in which players create campaigns and solicit votes in a competition for cash, prizes, and recognition.
King of the Web is also a place where you vote for who and what is awesome on the web.

What Cassandra and her 12,000+ subscribers on youtube would love is if you would vote for her to become this months King Of The Web!!!!!! Please?  Vote Here!  Watch some of her vlogs. You never know, you may like them. They may become the daily things that make your day. 


Where ever you are, I hope you have a goodnight. 


Soon to be FTB-Snowfire... but not really. 
=)

Harry Potter and Torchwood

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two

Harry Potter Wallpaper
Warner Bros 

As most people know, the last Harry Potter movie finally came out on the fifteenth! Excited face! I doubt it will be the last though. Give it fifty years and a remake will come out. Sadly I did not get to see it the night it premiered as I was staying with friends in Indiana and no one wanted to see a movie at midnight. Sigh. I finally saw it Tuesday and I have to say that no one lied. It was, is, one of the best movies I have seen in a long time and I watch a lot of movies.

Was the acting good?
Good? It was great. Emma Watson is the best!

Did it stay true to the book?
For a movie, I'd have to say yes, yes it did.

How about the special effects?
There is something about special effects for magic that you can tell that it is a special effect, but if the graphics designers do their job well then it is done so beautifully that you don't care. In my opinion, the special effects were very nice. What can I say? I like seeing sparks and clouds of light shooting out of wands.

Anything else?
I do wish Tom Felton was in the movie a bit more. He had maybe a total of 20-25 minutes of screen time in the movie. Draco Malfoy is one of my favorite characters in the books because of how many layers of personality he has and how much he has changed. In the first books, he was out to ruin Harry's world. Now, he wouldn't even tell Bellatrix that it was really Harry in the Malfoy Mansion.
As I watched the eighth movie, I did realize that truthfully the only real evil soul in the entire book was Voldemort. When I first heard J.K. Rowling say that I thought 'You're kidding me. What about Bellatrix? She seems pretty evil to me.' I am halfway sure that was what the rest of the world was thinking too.

Overall?
Five stars for five. Easily.



Torchwood: Border Princes By Dan Abnett

Torchwood: Border Princes
By Dan Abnett
From TARDIS Index File

I believe I started this book early July/ late June and I am just now finishing it. For me that is sad. This was one of those books that you did not really like nor did you love it. It was in between, a tweenie. Yes, that is a new word. A book that wasn't really good or really bad is now dubbed a tweenie.
With this book, just when you thought it was over and finished, the plot just kept going and going and going. A new character named James was added to the mix and I thought he was okay for the newbie one time character. As for the other characters, they needed some work done. I can't pinpoint exactly how, but they seemed different from the T.V. show as if Abnett was maybe trying to make them better or fit them into his style of writing. To me it didn't seem like the same Jack and Gwen I knew. Also, there wasn't a lot of Ianto action and he's one of the coolest characters there!

Rating: Three out of Five Stars

Up Next: Either Torchwood: Slow Decay By Andy Lane or The Nine Lives of Chloe King By Liz Braswell (Books 1-3)

I'm not giving up, I'm just going to lose

Picture By Linzee777
Link To Picture

I love winning. Who doesn't? The feeling of satisfaction that that you did something and did it well and accomplished a goal is truly a great feeling. What if you couldn't finish something that you love and really wanted to finish but it came at the wrong time? An example would be me and Camp NaNoWriMo. Currently I am at 23,044 words and not rising. According to my little lovely Camp NaNoWriMo calendars I am supposedly suppose to be nearing 29034 words today. If I write 2,025 words per day I can finish on time, but seeing how my novel is going makes me think that I won't try very hard. After seeing this and watching a movie and being inspired by the movie and then editing the first Night Stalker for the first time in a week or two, I realized that I didn't need to write Light right now. No, I could never write Light ("Sequel" To Night Stalker). First of all I don't even know how the first book will even end up when I am done editing and second of all I might not even need a second book. I thought about it for a while and it occurred to me. Why would Gail have a child if she knew that Hamilton would be after him for his DNA? She's smarter then that. So yes. Odds are that The Night Stalker will be a single novel and the outcome at the end will be very different from what I first imagined and in turn so will the middle. From now on my main focus will be revising the Night Stalker.

Next thing...

This morning I woke up and got on my laptop to check my mail. Lo and behold I had a message from JustFiction! Edition (justfictionedition.com) saying this:

Dear Ms snowfire,

I am writing on behalf of a new international publishing house, JustFiction! Edition.

In the course of a web-research I came across a reference of your manuscript The Thirteenth Games and it has caught my attention.

We are a publisher recognized worldwide, whose aim it is to help talented but international yet unknown authors to publish their manuscripts supported by our experience of publishing and to make their writing available to a wider audience.

JustFiction! Edition would be especially interested in publishing your manuscript as an e-book and in the form of a printed book and all this at no cost to you, of course.

If you are interested in a co-operation I would be glad to send you an e-mail with further information in an attachment.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards{...}

I did a some research and asked around. Turns out almost no one has heard of JustFiction! Edition and many other users on Inkpop.com received the same email pertaining to themselves and their novels. Read here. I would like to warn you to be cautious if you have received this email as most people have decided that it is a scam.

And last but not least...

If you ever get the chance, watch Magic Beyond Words: The JK Rowling Story. I just watched it and found it to be very inspiring. IMDB says that it does not release until 2012 but it premiered at 8 Eastern time today. It was very good and I recommend it to all Harry Potter and JK Rowling fans.
A Review...


Goodnight, Professor.
Goodnight, Harry. 

~Snowie

  

Wordle!

Blog Wordle

Thirteenth Games Wordle

Camp NaNoWriMo... A Short Post Because it is 11 PM and I am Tired

NaNoWriMo is a 30 day long writing frenzy that takes place in November every year. The goal is to write 50,000 words in 30 days or less. I have participated twice and won twice and am going for my third win this year!!!

Snowfire. It's June. Why are you talking about this now?

I will tell you why!

CAMP NANOWRIMO!!!!

Camp NaNo just opened this year. Now, you can write a 50,000 word novel in July, August, AND November!!! How awesome is that????????

Problem. July starts in two days. Problem. I have no idea what to write. Problem. How will I break it to my family that I am not going to speak to them for three months a year? Problem. You all think I am insane now. Problem. I am insane, mad actually. I'm as mad as a hatter.

Any ideas, supporters, and people who would join me on this literary suicide would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Yes. I am talking to you.

Book Reviews, Movie Reviews

I just saw Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, finished Torchwood: Another Life, and am now listening to Jason Aldean's Don't You Wanna Stay with rain in the background. From anyone's point of view it was a good day.

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides 

Captain Jack Sparrow
Pirates of the Caribbean
Disney

I really liked this Pirates. Story line was great! Good plot, funny lines, great characters, amazing sets and locations. There were some parts that I would have kept out and I would have definitely changed the end. I do hope that there will be another because this movie didn't go out with a bang. It ends with Captain Jack saying,"A Pirate's Life for me." I am told that there is a clip on Angelica holding the Jack Sparrow Voodoo doll and smiling, but I never got to see it.

Main Characters:
Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp)
Angelica Malon (Penelope Cruz)

Rated
PG-13

Links
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1298650/
http://disney.go.com/pirates/#/characters/


Torchwood: Another Life
Peter Anghelides

  Can't get enough of Torchwood! It's so good! How good? So good! Let's face it. Anyone named Captain Jack Something is the best person ever. When I first started reading this, I went into it thinking no way will the book be better than the T.V. show. I was really wrong. The characters were strong and stayed true to the episode characters. They were witty, like usual which caused a good laugh every now and then.

Main Characters
Jack Harkness- A man who can never die
Gwen Cooper- The New Girl
Toshiko- The Techno Geek
Owen- The Doctor
Ianto- Coffee Boy (Save Ianto!)

These five people make up the Torchwood team. They hunt aliens and alien artifacts that fall through the rift, a crack in space and time running right through Cardiff.

Setting
Cardiff, present day

The book lived up to my expectations. It didn't ruin the T.V. show for me, the characters behaved the same as they did in the show, the plot had a nice grueling climax ending with a couple of nice deaths and a slightly shocked Gwen. The characters were realistic. I could really connect with Gwen and what she was feeling. I do wish that Captain Jack was included a bit more. The book was mostly written in third person, so it did jump from character to character, but rarely was it with Jack at all. There was a nice twist when I discovered that some chapters where written in second person using "you" instead of "I" or "John". It was a nice and neat change that most books don't contain. At first I thought I'd be bothered by it, but then I actually read it. When things are written in second person, I feel like it drags me deeper into the story. I feel as if I am actually there.

Rated
PG-14

Click Here! For more on this book.

Next Book: Torchwood: Border Princes by Dan Abnett


Well, I guess that is all for now! Have a wonderful and amazing day....

~Snowie

"Did everybody see that because I will not be doing it again." -Captain Jack Sparrow

Flair... Cute Little Bits of Inspiration

Torchwood
BBC 

Welcome and hello! Today is your lucky day because today is Inspiration Friday. There are times when I get stuck or bored or tired or lazy and I need a little something to get me back up and running. I had been putting off posting anything because frankly I was just to tired to sit and write anything. My writing schedule is way off, too since I haven't been putting in two hours a night every night (Silly Netflix Instant View). As for the Night Stalker, I am working on revising. I am also thinking about what to do for NaNoWriMo. I know that its still a long ways off, but I am really excited for it. They are also coming out with a year round Camp NaNoWriMo which I will tell you more about later. I think that in the coming weeks I will work on some more book reviews. I recently fell in love with the British Sci-fi TV Show Torchwood and I ended up buying the first three Torchwood Novels.


Snowie =)

Trying to Upload Once Every Week (Is a hassle)

I'm not complaining, uploading once a week is hard especially when the week goes by so fast that you've barely made sense out of it and have nothing to blog about. Now I know what the "famous pro's" feel like and why Charlie McDonnell hasn't uploaded anything in a while (Come on, Charlie!). Let's see, the last post was about that little rat called procrastination. I admit, I do procrastinate sometimes (okay, a lot). Usually homework and writing are the procrastinatees and I am, of course, the procrastinator. I did in fact procrastinate on the Night Stalker. I waited a good two and a half weeks before I started revising when I only planned to wait one. My excuse is that I had two and a half weeks of school left and I wanted to go out strong and without any stress. So, to de-stress and go out with a big summer-y bang, I arrived home at 6 o'clock most nights, ate, showered, did an hour of homework, and was asleep by nine-thirty. Lucky me, because I had no homework for the last week, unlike some of my poor stressed out friends. It's a believable excuse, I know.

That brings us to our topic of the day: Revision or Rewriting.

On the 21st of May, I sat down in a three hour car ride, pulled out my new grey notebook and started writing the first chapter of the Night Stalker.... Again. I can hear those British, "WHOTS!" From the invisible people in the back. Yes, I started writing it again. Almost nearly never is a first draft the perfect draft. The first draft is all about getting your ideas on the paper, forming characters, and a very, very experimental, rough plot. With me, the farther I get into a book, the better my writing gets. I fall into the actions, my characters grow, I start thinking that this is the best book ever! Then a couple of months later, I'll read through it again and think,"Wow. That's really terrible." I think the first great writers were just like that. And enter Shakespeare with a sign that reads "Revision". Yes, this is where the great thing that is called revision comes in.

Hundreds of years ago, there was no such thing as revision. Writer's wrote one draft and called it good. Well, this one little writer, Freddy, was terribly smart. One day he was sifting through his animal skins looking at and reading his earlier works and he realized that all of these writings were really, really bad. So he said to himself," Hmmm... All of these things that I have written could be extremely amazing if I rewrote somethings here and took out this part here then maybe added some detail here. And hey! I'm going to call this process revision!"

You get my point.

I often think that this is the one thing that most teachers leave out of their teachings. They have you do all these silly things like making up three plots then picking one out. If you like doing that it's fine, but I can't stand it. After you pick out one, they usually make you write out the events, characters, plot, setting and then you can write your draft. Once you have a draft they say,"Read through and edit and proofread, dearies!" Though it's probably not that creepily said.


AND STOP!!

Key words: Edit and Proofread.

The teacher should have said," Read through then revise. Revision is an important step that shouldn't be missed. Every draft needs revision at sometime or another. Take the Night Stalker for example. The first chapter is very poorly written with a lot of info filler, LONG paragraphs of information having to do with the story, and poor plotting. I couldn't fix those things with editing!

Believe it or not, revision and editing and proofreading are completely different things. According to dictionary.com revision is: to alter something already written or printed, in order to make corrections, improve, or update: to revise a manuscript. Whereas editing is: to prepare (text) for publication by checking and improving its accuracy, clarity, etc. 


Revision has nothing to do with spelling or grammar correction. It pertains to removing unwanted words, paragraphs, chapters, and characters. It involves reworking the plot, characters, and settings to make the story flow smoothly and to make it more believable. That is why revision is also called rewriting. Usually you are changing so much in your story that you have to basically rewrite it. Also, you may rewrite a story hundreds of times (That was a hyperbole, an extreme exaggeration) before you ever start editing. 


When and Where?

When and where do you edit? When is simple and the answer is right before editing. Always revise before editing is more appropriate. Think about it. Why would you take the time to proofread and fix all of the grammar first only to delete it entirely from the story later? Where is in you manuscript where ever it needs rearranging, retelling, strengthening, and structuring.   

P.S. Editing is a term I sometimes use loosely. Usually when I say edit I am referring to revision, editing, and proofreading. In this post when I say edit I mean the process of correcting grammar. Also, editing and proofreading are very, very closely related. They are so close that they could be, and sometimes are, counted, together, as a single step.




I hope that this post was helpful to you and if you have any questions about writing, just comment or message me. 

Happy Writings, 
Snowie  




    

Stuck... Or just Procrastination.

Today's topic of discussion for the 4+ people who read this blog (no, I am not counting myself) is..... Procrastination!

Real Time Example: I really should be doing math right now, but instead I am working on a blog about procrastination.


Oh, the irony.

The dictionary defines procrastination as:

to defer action; delay: to procrastinate until an opportunity is lost. -Dictionary.com

So, what happens when you procrastinate? Well, usually you pull an all nighter to get it done if it's a project for school or work or something. Other times it slowly gets done over the next 1 day - 75+ years. It's like me and 90% of my writing. 90% of it usually never gets finished while the other 10% (Night Stalker, Arya Poisonhold, The 13th Games, school assignments, ect.) does get done.

So after you pulled off that all nighter to get what ever it is that you are doing done what does it look like? Sloppy. Terrible. Poor. Severely lacking anything excellent. And often forgetting key elements. When you hand in that project, you fail or get fired. And if it's bad enough, the teachers will hate you forever and kick you out of school because there is no way you will ever get your dream job at Mickey D's.

Do you see what I am saying? Procrastination is bad. BAD!

And, it is very much like Writer's Block.

See! I did that all by myself in about 20 minutes... Now, I will stop procrastinating and get my math lesson done.

A Few Updates...

I am starting revision on the Night Stalker and continuing revision on The Thirteenth Games.

I am working on a 51 Things do Learn and Do in One Summer.

And, I am looking for tips or good websites on revision, editing, proofreading, and publication. Revision is a mouthful. With track and school it's hard to even get my head around the whole revising book plot, characters.... It's just so much to take in. I'll post my plan on Wednesday. You guys will help with it won't you?


Bonsoir ou bonjour où que vous soyez. Quoi qu'il en soit, je suis parti. Au revoir!

Snowie

Change the World! Do something! Don't Procrastinate! 

FINISHED!!!

I finished the Night Stalker!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHHHHHH! Can you believe it? I barely can! Seven months ago, it was a alien concept and now I'm done!!!! 458 pages. I finished at 9:46 PM!!!!!!!!

Now I get to edit! Yay!!!


Thats all for now!


Snowfire

Inspiration

I love nature, always have, always will. This video is amazing and I'd love to see these things before I die...
And the music is amazing.

Beautiful Link!

So, what inspires you?

Make a list or start an inspiration notebook to writing down your ideas or musings.

You never know when they will pull you out of writer's block.....

Feeling Amazing(ly tired)

With track, softball, Script Frenzy, and the Night Stalker taking up all of my free time..... That sentence was going somewhere..... I just can't remember where.

Anyways... I feel like I should do more write-y stuff and tips....

But first a few updates....

Script Frenzy-

Status: Very Suckish

Data: I am on page 23 and have been for the past week. I am supposed to be on page 43, I think.... Maybe, just maybe I'll have time over the weekend. =D

The Night Stalker-

Status: Amazing!!!!

Data: I can't believe how well it's going. So far I am right where I want to be. I just filled my third notebook and I am on page 446. The final battle is just barely 11 hours away and so far in the last "hour" Gail has had a melt down and two people have been stabbed by Justin.  I can't wait!!! Then over the summer I am editing and typing it up. I have no idea when I will start Night Stalker 2.0. It depends on how much free time I have in the summer.

Track-

Status: Tiring but fun

Data: Our first meet was Monday and our team won second place.

Now- Write-y stuff.......

I think that this week I will share the tips that I try to follow while writing. You do not have to use them, but you can modify them to fit you're needs....

1. Forget everything- don't think.
2. Include as much detail as you want, it can always be edited out later.
3. Don't worry about overusing words in the rough draft
4. Stay to say, said, asked most of the time
5. Don't know how to spell it? Just keep writing.
1. When I don't know how to spell something or a piece of information may not be correct, I put a question mark in the margin to remind myself to check it while editing.
6. Try writing junk during writers block. 
1. When you write junk, you're basically getting a new sheet of paper and writing what ever is on your mind on it. Usually mine look something like this- My foot hurts. My pillow smells funny. Gail should jump off a cliff and nearly die.... Sometimes new ideas can spring forward or something you write down will make you start to think again.
7. Try to stay in the mood that you started writing in. 
1. If you're like me, then you're mood will change often. When I write, I like to try to stay in the same mood. Why? Because my writing style depends on my mood. If I'm angry, my writing voice will sound angry. Or if I am happy, good things will happen to my story and my characters will sound a bit happier. 
8. Write down ideas while you still remember them. 
1. I have terrible trouble with this one. An idea will pop into my mind and either I won't have paper near by or I'll get sidetracked. By the time I finally have time to write it down, I won't remember it anymore. The best solution that I've come up with is to carry an "Inspiring Notebook" around. I can write down beginnings to stories and story ideas or anything else that inspires me in it. 
9. Keep going even if it doesn't make sense.
10. Put blanks if you don't have names yet.
11. Wing it with whatever information you have.
12. So what is its a bit cliche? You can always go back and edit.
13. Try writing a poem if you're stuck.
14. Write it even if it's not grammatically correct
15. In one way or another, get it on paper.
16. Weird conversations can make a book interesting
17. Laugh at your own jokes
18. Doodles are pretty and often inspirational
19. If it's not really real make it fantasy
20. Quotes are fine, but not all the time
21. When in doubt kill a character, then nearly kill the main one.
22. Show, don't tell
1. I know, I know. You've heard this so many times... But what does it really mean? It means instead of telling, show it.
1.  Here's an example of telling: A long time ago in a far away place there lived a Queen and King who had a beautiful daughter named Rose. One day as a child Rose was kidnapped and never seen again for ten years.
2. An example of showing: Rose picked up the sea shell and ran her tiny fingers over the rough edges. She turned it over, smiling at the pretty pink glimmer on the inside. A sea gull squawked loudly and she looked over at it as it flew off. Not ten feet form her was a crippled woman. The old woman smiled and beckoned Rose with a long, knobby finger.
2. See the difference? No? When you tell, the reader is just getting the basics. They don't know what exactly the character did, how they did it, or what they looked like. In my example, you know that Rose has been kidnapped, but you're being told straight to your face. Can't see Rose or the kidnapper. In my second example, the showing example, you can see Rose looking at the shell and rubbing the edges. You can imagine the old woman beckoning her over. You can guess what will happen next but you are never actually told "Rose was kidnapped." You can see it happening, unfolding right before your eyes. 

Well, I hope that helped a bit. If you still have questions, just comment below and I'll try to answer the best I can.

I have an idea for next week's blog. I think I might try to email some well known writers and ask them- What inspires you? What are some writing tips that you have?

http://inkpop.com/projects/101095/epic-nerd-war-/

Peace, Love, And Writing!

Snowie

Please subscribe because you're cool like that! =)