Past Writer Tips:
How to Beat Writer's Block (11-13-07)
This is a topic that has come up lately in workshops I've attended. One answer that comes over and over is a long hot shower or bath. And I have to admit to running to the computer with only a towel after soaking myself in the lovely warm water myself. Sometimes I have so many ideas popping in my mind I don't take time to dress, but dash to the computer to record them all.
I like to think of the writing muse as something that needs replenishing. Let's pretend its like a gas tank of a car. Let's say you've written and written (or driven and driven) until the tank is on empty. So the question is how to replenish your fuel.
Some of my ways of refueling are:
Reading.
Walking.
A long shower.
What are your favorite refueling methods?
Ideas? Please share. Write me at beckieweinheimer58@yahoo.com.
Also, check out some of these writing resources for teens:
Teen Ink: Writing by teens from around the country. Be published here
Young Adult Books Central: A wonderful site where teens can review books and win free books.
Cyberlight Comics: Your one stop location for web based comics and stories
Spooky Writing (10-30-07)
Did you know that you don't always have to fill it with blood and dead bodies. Sometimes it is scarier not to mention it all. But just worry the reader.
Example.
Jane closed the front door of her house behind her after she had walked home from work in the dark. She heard a noise upstairs. She climbed the stairs. It was a creaking noise and then it sounded like the wind was blowing. Only all the doors and windows were shut. She went to open the bedroom at the top of the stairs. The light was on and it smelled like fire or a match or a candle was burning. She hadn't left the light on and she didn't even own a candle. The house was completely dark when she'd looked at it from the street five minutes ago! The wind noise got louder and louder. It was coming from the closet. She could see smoke coming from under the closet door. She crept over to the closet door. Her heart was racing now. She put her hand on the door nob. It was hot. So hot it burned her. She took her sweater off and used it to turn the nob. Inch by inch she opened the door. "Oh no. Please no." She screamed. . . .
Okay that is lame. Because I'm not really good at writing spooky stuff. And that was a first draft. But maybe you get the idea. Noises, smells, the feel of wind, add sensory detail and worry the reader. Don't tell them. Let them be scared. Sometimes the unknown is scarier than the blood and guts you read about!
Have a Spooky Halloween!
10-12-07:
Follow your heart. That's where the voice is. Did you know when I wrote converting kate a very dear friend/mentor of mine told me it probably will never sell. Religion doesn't sell to teens. (And it didn't six years ago). But follow your heart and write your story.
And guess what? Converting Kate sold to the first editor who saw it, on the spot. Trust your heart, not the critics who say, but this isn't going to be widely read. If you have a story and are passionate about that story, then write it. My gut feeling is it will be just as easy to sell as the latest, "hot" topic. Because when you write from your heart, when you let your unique voice do the talking, well it's magic. That's what I believe.
Happy Writing. And remember To thine own self be true, NO MATTER WHAT!!!
10-3-07:
Make sure to always take time out from writing to do something else you love. Then when you return to writing you will be refreshed and full of new ideas and energy. That is what Beckie is doing this week - soaking up the sun in California during long walks on the beach!
9-25-07:
Having Trouble Getting that Muse of Yours Going?
Reading is always wonderful, nutritious food for the writing muse. The number one secret to becoming a writer, is to read, read, read! And then of course do some writing. And speaking of reading, what have you read lately that you really liked?
Here are two books I have recently read:
Forbidden by Judy Waite. Oh my. I wrote the author, Judy Waite, wondering if she she had come from a cult like life, because what she wrote about was so scary and familiar to me (as in my past). But she had just done her research well. Really good read.
Also Quaking by Kathy Erskine. If you are mad at the war in Iraq you will like this book. If you wonder how it feels to be a foster kid tossed from house to house, you will love this book. If you've had a really crazy fanatical teacher like the main character Matt does, you will totally relate. Really great read.
What have you been reading lately?
Write me at Beckieweinheimer58@yahoo.com and we'll post your favorite reads!
Happy Writing.
Maddy from PA shares one of her favorite books:
Fruits Basket. It's by a Japanese artist named Natsuki Takaya. She's really amazing! The book is filled with character profiles, from their family history, down to their favorite foods and what shoe brand they love! It has all of these story lines, stickers, interviews, etc. Frits Basket is a ‘Fan Book’ which was set out after about the nineteenth book (Heh)! It is a Japanese comic book known as Manga (otherwise known as Anime). It’s about a girl named Tohru who’s mother dies and she then (Excluding a TON of details) ends up living with a classmate. She finds out that there is a ‘curse’ (once again excluding a CRAZY amount of details) on the family. It’s got a little fantasy in it and a little romance and it has a ton of family drama.
9-18-07:
Music is it helpful to the writing process or not?
Send in your opinion
I know an author who I admire a lot and if I mentioned her/his name you would recognize it. It is their opinion that you should not listen to music while you write as it will falsely elevate the level of your writing.
I am of the belief that listening to great music inspires me and helps me write deeper and closer from the heart.
When I was in high school in my first creative writing class I had a little record of a single song, "Fly Away" sung by Olivia Newton John and John Denver. I would play that song and sit by the record player and write, it lasted about three minutes, and then I'd have to get up, move the needle back to the start position and play it again. I did that over and over until I had written my exercise for class. I had tears streaming down my face by the time I was done and my teacher and class really liked what I wrote, but most important I loved what I wrote and I think "Fly Away" helped me reach that deep inner level of writing.
Now I have a favorite music CD I listen to for every book I write. When I wrote Converting Kate I listened to the soundtrack from the movie "Cider House Rules" because I liked the music, it had no words, and the movie was set in the same part of Maine that I was writing about, so somehow the music helped me travel back to Maine.
So to listen to music or not? What do you think? Write me at beckieweinheimer58@yahoo.com and tell me, and we'll post your comment on the writer's tip page.
And while you're on the website, you can listen to a really good piece of music a friend of mine, Marc Peterson wrote, what's the title -- Converting Kate!
Personally I love music. It's a passion for me. Yep. I especially like listening to Vienna Teng to calm myself down - she's simply och amazing! Maddy from PA
9-10-07:
Bored with school? Hate taking notes. Here's a crazy idea. Sketch instead.
I sketched my way through graduate school. I do have written notes but I have more sketches, and I can still look at them and tell you what the lecture I was listening was about. And I'm no artist--think stick figures with color. I bought myself some colored pencils to make it more fun. I know I'm more right brained than left brained and taking notes for me was and is certainly a left brain tedious, dreaded, activity. But for me sketching, making a figure of Shakespeare instead of writing his name made an otherwise mundane task fun.
And it had benefits! I discovered I actually listened better with my hand doing something creative, retained more of what was being said and gave that right brain, that creative side I use to write some exercise during an otherwise left brain type of day.
8-24-07:
Due to Beckie returning from vacation in Alaska and her Web master moving and then going on vacation, there will be no writer's tips posted until the 2nd or 3rd week of September. But don't give up, they will return like school in the fall!
8-13-07:
Do not try this at home!
Hello From Alaska. A couple of days ago, my daughter, husband and I were hiking around the ocean edge in a nature trail outside Juneau. The sky was so deep blue which of course made the glass calm ocean that color too. And the pine covered mountains were gigantic and appeared so pristine like no one had ever touched them or seen them before us. It was like a National Geographic special. And I am haunted by waters. I love to swim. We saw an island that I guessed would take ten minute to swim out to. My 21 year old daughter guessed it was a half hour. The water was frigid, well, okay, below sixty. My very wise daughter decided to sit and watch while my husband and I swam out to the island and back. My husband didn't get past his ankles before he wisely decided the water was freezing and he too decided to watch me swim. I however was up to proving my daughter wrong. I knew I could swim to that island in a mere ten minutes.
Sadly, she was right. It was a good half hour swim and by the time I got to the island my toes were aching and red. I sat in the sun for a few minutes but knew my husband and daughter were waiting for me. After all we were still on the middle of our hike, this swim of mine hadn't been part of the plan. So I started to swim back before my body had the time to warm up. My chest was so cold after five minutes it hurt every time it slapped the water with my arm stroke. My toes went from aching to no feeling at all. I could freeze out here my dizzy head slowly informed me. People died of hypothermia in cold water. It was a half hour back if I swam as fast as I swam going out. Could I make it? My mind raced with horrid thoughts. I remember people who drowned within feet of the shore. We'd read about a high school athlete who had died that way just last week in a cold mountain lake. My heart pounded with fear which made my aching chest hurt worse. And then in the midst of all the panic my fright of not knowing if I had enough energy to keep on swimming, the worry of questioning if my body could last, I thought, emember how this feels. Remember the panic, the coldness of the water, the ache in your chest, the fear of dying over a stupid bet that it was only a ten minute swim and use it in your writing.
So I kept at it with every struggling stroke of my arms, I kept describing the cold, the pounding aching chest, over and over. And I made it. The best part, the part I will remember like it was two minutes ago and will be able to write was the euphoria I felt when I got on dry land. To look back at the island and the water and not be a part of it any more. To have tomorrow and next week and the rest of my life to look forward to. I will use it. The driving back to our hotel with the heat on full blast until my husband and daughter were sweltering and my teeth still chattered. The hour long soak in the tub and then wearing four layers of clothes to dinner while everyone else dressed in shorts. And the warmth of the soup going down my throat and soothing my aching chest. It's too good not to use.
Don't get me wrong. I don't recommend jumping into a dangerous situation just to make your writing more accurate, but if ever you do find yourself in some scary situation--well, it might calm you and it will certainly make for good writing later!
8-4-07:
Writing is not a race its a journey. So while you're on the journey make sure to take time to smell the roses. And while you're at it, tell us how the roses smell, what color they are, where you saw them and why you were there smelling roses in the first place.