Starting a Writing Group

The story of my writing group:

A little less than a year ago a work colleague found out about my writing and asked the simple question: "Have you tried National Novel Writing Month yet?"
"Well no, not yet," I replied. And he went on to tell me that it was one of the best things he'd ever done was try it out and meet with a local writing group in Monterey, CA. He got SO much done, he said, more than he ever had before, "and it felt really good to have that support and camaraderie you know?" Hm, I thought, and told him I would think about it, he made it sound so great.

Driving the Plot Through Conflict: Three Questions When You're Stuck

You're writing such a great story, or novel, chapter, tale, vignette, allegory and suddenly you think, crap, what comes next?

Well, you don't want to just continue haphazardly and risk it being completely bad, no matter what some artistic-types preach about just getting it out there on the page. Because well, let's face it, either you're drawing a complete blank or you're a perfectionist. At the same time you like the idea you had, and you really don't want to abandon it. What do you do? Where do you go next? How do you get unstuck? These are questions that bother a lot of writers.

Writing With Your Heart

"No thinking - that comes later. You write your first draft with your heart. You rewrite with your head. The first key to writing is... to write, not to think!" -Sean Connery as William Forrester

Two posts ago I quoted Stephen King saying that the most important advice he could give up and coming writers is to simply "Read a lot, and write a lot." Sage advice. Simple, laconic, direct. But it leaves some people wondering how, why, or what the thought process behind that may be. Watching "Finding Forrester" the other day for the first time in a long time and hearing the above quote was like a light bulb flipping on in my head. The perfect way to explain simply...writing, and why it is the first key to writing.

A Conversation with Ray Bradbury

For those of you who do not know, Ray Bradbury is a critically acclaimed writer most famous for his novel Fahrenheit 451.

All I can say is that this guy is amazing, the whole 29 minute video is worth the watch. If nothing else however, watch about the first half, as many bits of helpful advice for writers are revealed and Ray Bradbury does the perfect job of passing on "The Zen of Writing." At 5:45 the actual talk about writing begins. Quite inspirational to writers, Ray Bradbury a hilarious, wise, all-around great man. Enjoy.

How Reading Helps Your Writing

Stephen King’s age-old advice to success as a writer: “read a lot, write a lot,” it’s just that simple. Reading is essential to becoming a GOOD writer, and even a GREAT writer. The “write a lot” portion will be covered in later posts, but for now I will detail a LARGELY overlooked aspect of becoming a writer: reading helps your writing. Here's how:

Helps build a better command of the language: You can not help but get rubbed off on by good writing, it’s infectious. Bad writing can be even more beneficial because it leaves an imprinted emotion with each error you read. The subconscious memory of you reading the messed up passage and saying "Whaaat the eff" to yourself will be with you forever.

Free Productivity Tools For Writers

Everyone loves free tools. But most of all, we love free tools that are actually helpful. If you're looking for a way to stay on task, organized, and push past the roadblocks of the writing occupation, then you will find at least one of these to lend you a hand. Enjoy:

One, Two, and Three Dimensional Characters and How to Use Them

Different characters have different levels of depth to them, dimension if you will. A concept I read about once, categorizes these levels into dimension types and explores those types to better aid in character creation and story telling. This article is my spin on the different levels of character depth as well as my commentary on the ways I've found most helpful in using them effectively.

At first glance it seems like a simple concept, but distinguishing these dimension types and integrating them properly into a story can GREATLY improve reader engagement, scene pacing, and believability. Recognizing both the under-developed and over-developed characters in my stories helped me improve my writing in the aforementioned areas and it can do the same for you. It is important for a writer to know both when a character needs to be developed and when to move on.

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A one-dimensional character constitutes the "walk on" parts of the story. These are your waiters, your cab drivers, bartenders, a mother walking down the street, or the random pikeman your hero stabs through the face (though not always). They are briefly seen and do not speak. One-dimensional characters that spend more than several pages in your story should be made two-dimensional. Beside possible subplots, adding realism to an environment, or even promoting general interest, any interaction with a main character serves to flesh out the personality of both characters and add dimension to a scene or personality. Any walk-on that could successfully be made into two-dimensional character should...unless doing so awkwardly upstages an important character/moment or harmfully dilutes the pacing of a scene.

Good Writing Books to Download or Purchase

Ok, first...getting the books the free and illegal way.
You're going to need to download this to download from piratebay: http://www.utorrent.com/ so get that first. Next since the package of Ebooks you'll be downloading is compressed into a rar you may need a more heavy duty extractor such as 7-zip: http://www.7-zip.org/download.html
Now you're all geared up to pirate, arrgggh! Recommended packages and books:

1. http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/3358919/E-Books_-_Writing_novels_and_screenplays.rar
2. http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4524240/70__English_grammar_and_writing_books.rar
3. http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4489511/Writing_for_Journalists__2nd_ed.
4. http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4648754/English_for_Journalists_(Media_Skills)_3rd_ed.

Most worthwhile and essential books of the first package include: "On Writing Stephen King, "How to Write a Damn Good Novel" volumes 1 and 2, James Frey, and "A guide to writing novels and getting published" Bob Mayer.
The second package has much of the same books as the first, with more variety and focus concerning Grammar.
The third and fourth items on the list are books concerning writing for journalism, and although they focus on the aspects of writing non-fiction they contain valuable information on the mechanics of writing.

If you're looking to purchase (either for a hardcopy, or honor's sake). The Idiots Guide and Elements of style are not in the download packages, but highly recommended. Here are links to good books on writing:

Several Writing Websites

Just a few sites for goodies on writing:
http://writing-journey.com/
http://www.frankswales.com/
http://www.writeexposure.co.uk/
http://www.jakaaz.com/Adsense2/volume4/writng-tips/index.html

More money orientated:
http://www.onlinejobs4all.co.in/
http://www.makemoneyfromwriting.com/

Character Bio's: Why and How

Why
It's important as a fiction writer to know your characters. Giving your characters in-depth backgrounds, goals, and features and keeping all of those things consistent provides believable people for your story.
Not only should you know your characters, you should know them better than your reader. How do you get to know them well? By writing answering questions about them for yourself. Whether you commit them to memory or miniature character biographies is up to you. Benefits?

• Helps writing a character's actions and reactions come faster and more natural
• Well rounded, interesting, and deep characters engage readers and are more believable than two-dimensional, shallow, cardboard cut-outs
• A Bio/dossier gives you a complete picture of who they are so that, with this in mind, you can take them on a journey that hopefully helps them grow

Most writers can create good characters off the cuff but is that character vivid in their minds? Can the writer instantly judge how they would act or react in a given situation or intimately understand where they are and where they're going? Most likely not.

If you really DO have a vivid idea of what your character is like then a character bio is a sure way to keep it consistent as the story progresses, or as a reference to revisit later.

The Benefits of the Spiral Notebook

Writing longhand (much less in a notebook) is not nearly as popular as it used to be, and this is no mystery. Computers have made the job of writing much easier with a faster word rate, spell check, thesauri, ease of editing, etc.

But there are many benefits to writing in longhand that are overlooked, as the method seems out of date. I have recently found a personal preference for the notebook over the notebook computer because of the ease of transportation and because it give me less excuses to avoid writing.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Less Excuses to Avoid Writing (and other benefits)
1)Easier to start, and stop- Just the flip the spiral notebook open and go; no logging in, saving, putting it on standby when you leave. The notebook is ever-ready for you to pick it up, and set it down. Piece of cake.

2)Notes in margins- No need to open new documents or get separate sheets of paper for items such as ideas, outlines, notes for the future, maps, drawings, things to edit, because the margins provide room for all of this. If they do not, then you can always skip a page and use it as space for you miscellaneous needs. Better organization and no breaks in your writing to stop and make a document, or stop and get a piece of paper.