Making their way through Macy's, Mary once again turned around to see if anyone had followed them. And when they reached a far corner of the children's department, she pulled on Jonathan's arm, forcing him to turn around and look at her. The instant he did, she gave him a quick kiss on his cheek.
In astonishment, Jonathan's body jumped backwards, his eyes opening in amazement, as did his mouth.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Sunday, February 26, 2012
JUST CHECKING IN
As of this morning I have finished re-reading and double checking the changes made by my editor. Along the way I've tweeted a few places to enhance the continuity of my story. Should be finsihed reviewing the last 3 chapters later today, and then it's off to writing anew. Would like to have my next 2 chapters completed by Wednesday.
Saturday, February 25, 2012
SELECTING CHARACTER NAMES [PART 2]
Unfortunately, I couldn't post the two listings for my book in one blog,
This is the listing for the popularity of names for people born in 1897.
As can see this site can be extremely in the selection process for the names of our characters.
This is the listing for the popularity of names for people born in 1897.
| Rank | Male name | Female name |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | John | Mary |
| 2 | William | Anna |
| 3 | James | Helen |
| 4 | George | Margaret |
| 5 | Charles | Ruth |
| 6 | Joseph | Elizabeth |
| 7 | Frank | Florence |
| 8 | Robert | Ethel |
| 9 | Edward | Marie |
| 10 | Henry | Emma |
| 11 | Thomas | Lillian |
| 12 | Walter | Edna |
| 13 | Harry | Bertha |
| 14 | Arthur | Grace |
| 15 | Albert | Clara |
| 16 | Fred | Alice |
| 17 | Clarence | Bessie |
| 18 | Willie | Hazel |
| 19 | Roy | Rose |
| 20 | Paul | Annie |
| Note: Rank 1 is the most popular, rank 2 is the next most popular, and so forth. | ||
SELECTING CHARACTER NAMES
Every author in writing their book(s) has to face the dilemma of what to name our characters, luckily for us if our story takes place in the United States, we have a superb tool to help remedy the situation. When we name our characters, we want their names to be appropriate for the time period the story is taking place, and of course it would be wonderful if we can know what the most popular names were for our characters when they were born.
In my YA story I want my characters to be around 13 years old which would mean they were born in 1997. And since my story has a time travel element to it, I would also need to know the most popular names in 1897.
There's a lot more fun stuff there...you can find out how popular your name has been since you were born. Here's the link to the site.
http://www.ssa.gov/babynames
Here's the listing I got for 1997.
In my YA story I want my characters to be around 13 years old which would mean they were born in 1997. And since my story has a time travel element to it, I would also need to know the most popular names in 1897.
There's a lot more fun stuff there...you can find out how popular your name has been since you were born. Here's the link to the site.
http://www.ssa.gov/babynames
Here's the listing I got for 1997.
| Rank | Male name | Female name |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Michael | Emily |
| 2 | Jacob | Jessica |
| 3 | Matthew | Ashley |
| 4 | Christopher | Sarah |
| 5 | Joshua | Hannah |
| 6 | Nicholas | Samantha |
| 7 | Brandon | Taylor |
| 8 | Andrew | Alexis |
| 9 | Austin | Elizabeth |
| 10 | Tyler | Madison |
| 11 | Daniel | Megan |
| 12 | Joseph | Kayla |
| 13 | Zachary | Rachel |
| 14 | David | Lauren |
| 15 | John | Alyssa |
| 16 | Ryan | Amanda |
| 17 | James | Brianna |
| 18 | Anthony | Jennifer |
| 19 | William | Victoria |
| 20 | Justin | Brittany |
| Note: Rank 1 is the most popular, rank 2 is the next most popular, and so forth. | ||
Thursday, February 23, 2012
A-BLOGGING I WILL GO
Each one of us, especially those of us, I feel, who are pursuing a writing career, in the hopes of one day becoming an author need to make ourselves known before making our debut as an author. It is EXTREMELY to sell your book, if no one knows who you are. You not only have to market/promote your book, you must now market/promote yourselves.
One way to accomplish the task of marketing/promoting yourselves is through the use of blogs. Each blog community will tract a different population of followers. Why? The answer is varied. The answer could be as simple as the functionality of the site, some followers simply like one site over another simply because of the way you work with.
The more blogs you have, the better chances you have in creating a base of followers who might/should be quite interest in buy what you have to offer in terms of your book. So far, I have four.
The blogs I have are =
TWITTER - http://www.twitter.com/mypennameonly
WEBSITE/BLOG - http://www.mypennameonly.webs.com
BLOG - http://www.mypennameonly.blogspot.com
BLOG - http://www.mypennameonly.wordpress.com
Might you, handling more than two, is not really for those who are faint of heart, it takes time, and when you consider your emails, and monitoring of a possible group, and of course writing your manuscript it can become a full time job without any real benefits except for your end product.
It addition to the above, I am the creator of a group on Linked In, which is an excellent place to be to learn and hopefully create a following from your interactions with the group in terms of your responses to posts and the posting of your own discussions. My group is called
"Authors/Writers Helping Authors/Writers" To get there, click on this link
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=4173121&trk=myg_ugrp_ovr
Until my next post
Caio
One way to accomplish the task of marketing/promoting yourselves is through the use of blogs. Each blog community will tract a different population of followers. Why? The answer is varied. The answer could be as simple as the functionality of the site, some followers simply like one site over another simply because of the way you work with.
The more blogs you have, the better chances you have in creating a base of followers who might/should be quite interest in buy what you have to offer in terms of your book. So far, I have four.
The blogs I have are =
TWITTER - http://www.twitter.com/mypennameonly
WEBSITE/BLOG - http://www.mypennameonly.webs.com
BLOG - http://www.mypennameonly.blogspot.com
BLOG - http://www.mypennameonly.wordpress.com
Might you, handling more than two, is not really for those who are faint of heart, it takes time, and when you consider your emails, and monitoring of a possible group, and of course writing your manuscript it can become a full time job without any real benefits except for your end product.
It addition to the above, I am the creator of a group on Linked In, which is an excellent place to be to learn and hopefully create a following from your interactions with the group in terms of your responses to posts and the posting of your own discussions. My group is called
"Authors/Writers Helping Authors/Writers" To get there, click on this link
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=4173121&trk=myg_ugrp_ovr
Until my next post
Caio
ABOUT MY FIRST YA PARANORMAL/TIME TRAVEL/FIRST KISS ROMANCE NOVEL
Mary is rather plain looking, and smart as a whip. When Jonathan moves to her neighborhood and joins her class, she's volunteers to help him with his studies so he'll be able to join the school's baseball team.
The relationship begins to grow, despite his becoming popular with the other boys in the school and most of the girls. They both like each other for being themselves. But their relationship comes to an aburpt end. Mary has to move away because her father has gotten a promotion on his job. She decides to do something special, and devises a plan to give him a kiss, the first kiss she had ever given to a boy.
Once in her new house, she quickly discovers that she has a specter living there as well. Their friendly relationship starts to grow. When summer is over, she's finally able to start making friends, everyone had been away at camp. The only problem is they continually tease her about being haunted, and continually to go inside her house because of it. Little do they realize the house does have a real ghost living there.
George helps Mary with her homework, and starts to take her in his past, the past in which he was still alive. Eventually Mary begins to love going into past. The problem with her friends never wanting to come into her house is there until Mary decides to have a Halloween party, a Halloween party for which no one could refuse to go to. In the days after the party is over, her friends finally decide it would be okay go inside to play,
What does George do to help Mary with her homework? What happens when George takes Mary into the past? How does their relationship develop? What happens at the Halloween party to make them change their minds to play with Mary inside her house? Is there another kiss involved, and what happens if and when it does occur? These questions and others will be answered when my book is finally published.
Plase follow me on TWITTER http://www.twitter.com/mypennameonly
The relationship begins to grow, despite his becoming popular with the other boys in the school and most of the girls. They both like each other for being themselves. But their relationship comes to an aburpt end. Mary has to move away because her father has gotten a promotion on his job. She decides to do something special, and devises a plan to give him a kiss, the first kiss she had ever given to a boy.
Once in her new house, she quickly discovers that she has a specter living there as well. Their friendly relationship starts to grow. When summer is over, she's finally able to start making friends, everyone had been away at camp. The only problem is they continually tease her about being haunted, and continually to go inside her house because of it. Little do they realize the house does have a real ghost living there.
George helps Mary with her homework, and starts to take her in his past, the past in which he was still alive. Eventually Mary begins to love going into past. The problem with her friends never wanting to come into her house is there until Mary decides to have a Halloween party, a Halloween party for which no one could refuse to go to. In the days after the party is over, her friends finally decide it would be okay go inside to play,
What does George do to help Mary with her homework? What happens when George takes Mary into the past? How does their relationship develop? What happens at the Halloween party to make them change their minds to play with Mary inside her house? Is there another kiss involved, and what happens if and when it does occur? These questions and others will be answered when my book is finally published.
Plase follow me on TWITTER http://www.twitter.com/mypennameonly
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
THOSE TINY DETAILS
To restate what I said in my previous blog, as I'm reviewing the edits I've entered into my manuscript in WORD [I've kept her red notations] I'm finding a few tiny errors in the continuity of my manuscript. It might seem somewhat trivial, but there some astute readers out there you will call you out for taking the error. So I'm intensifying my review.
It doesn't matter because I'm planning to do more as I write and 2 right before I'll pursue self-publishing my manuscript.
I don't want my ant hill of an error to become a hill or worse become a mountain. Hoping to resume my writing of this manuscript by Saturday.
It doesn't matter because I'm planning to do more as I write and 2 right before I'll pursue self-publishing my manuscript.
I don't want my ant hill of an error to become a hill or worse become a mountain. Hoping to resume my writing of this manuscript by Saturday.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
FULL STOP
What happens when your BEST LAID PLANS deteriorate even futher? And this is what has happened to me, things come to a FULL STOP. When this happens an author has succumed to the most dreaded of all maladies, that of a "MENTAL/WRITER'S BLOCK." This occurs when for one reason or other he/she can no longer think of anything else to write; the mind has become a complete blank.
What can an author do in an attempt to remedy the situation, he/she can:
A. Just take a break from writing a few days to allow the brain to rejuvenate itself.
B. Read a book / watch a movie / take a day trip to get away from the regular environment you write in.
C. Or just re-read what you've written so far slowly, this way you can pick up any errors in continuity.
D. Re-read what you've already written aloud. By doing this you can pick up additional errors because you're now listening to what you've written instead of merely reading it. [Familiarity breeds contempt] Even better is to get someone else to read for you, because your mind now only needs to pay attention to what it's hearing instead of having to read and listen to it.
What works for someone, does not mean it will work for everyone else. As for yourself right now I'm taking a break, then it's back to a re-read to tighten up everything I've already written.
WHAT'S YOUR REMEDY FOR WRITER'S/MENTAL BLOCK?
Post it here or email me at rlmorgan@gmail.com Enter "WRITER'S BLOCK" in the subject line
What can an author do in an attempt to remedy the situation, he/she can:
A. Just take a break from writing a few days to allow the brain to rejuvenate itself.
B. Read a book / watch a movie / take a day trip to get away from the regular environment you write in.
C. Or just re-read what you've written so far slowly, this way you can pick up any errors in continuity.
D. Re-read what you've already written aloud. By doing this you can pick up additional errors because you're now listening to what you've written instead of merely reading it. [Familiarity breeds contempt] Even better is to get someone else to read for you, because your mind now only needs to pay attention to what it's hearing instead of having to read and listen to it.
What works for someone, does not mean it will work for everyone else. As for yourself right now I'm taking a break, then it's back to a re-read to tighten up everything I've already written.
WHAT'S YOUR REMEDY FOR WRITER'S/MENTAL BLOCK?
Post it here or email me at rlmorgan@gmail.com Enter "WRITER'S BLOCK" in the subject line
THE BEST LAID PLANS
Even though I have sent my editor 80% of my planned manuscript, a problem developed, a problem in which the amount I had planned to write vanished. The only thing that comes to my about this is that the best laid plans of mice and men oft times go astray. And it appears the same can be said of authors. Here I am, moving going with my writing and interacting with my editor without a real care in the world, when all of sudden a barrier pops up, hindering the flow of work.The barrier. Yes, the barrier is what some author on this planey has to face each day. The barrier is one of continunity, where what you have just written conflicts with something you've written in a previous chapter, and it could a pair of keen eyes of an editor to point out. And sometimes the author finds this issue in something the editor has suggested for you to change.
Now it's my turn to search out the source of my continunity problems
Now it's my turn to search out the source of my continunity problems
IN THE BEGINNING
Several years ago I began to write a contemporary/paranormal romance manuscript. Notice I said manuscript and not a book. A book is something that is published, whether it be traditional or self-published like CreateSpace [CreateSpace is owned by Amazon, and it's the place I'm going to use once I'm ready to publish.
But why paranormal? Perhaps it is simply because I found the words flowed easier for me to get them into WORD than any other genre. The contemporary I mentioned in the above was intended to be for adults, and for some reason my mind had difficulty in writing for this age group. So I decided to write for a much younger audience, which I found easier to write for.
With 80% of my manuscript done I found an editor, who I feel has done a GREAT JOB in editing my writing. She somehow knows what I had in mind to say as she edits everything, And the strange thing is: it sounds like me as well.
But why paranormal? Perhaps it is simply because I found the words flowed easier for me to get them into WORD than any other genre. The contemporary I mentioned in the above was intended to be for adults, and for some reason my mind had difficulty in writing for this age group. So I decided to write for a much younger audience, which I found easier to write for.
With 80% of my manuscript done I found an editor, who I feel has done a GREAT JOB in editing my writing. She somehow knows what I had in mind to say as she edits everything, And the strange thing is: it sounds like me as well.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)