Tuesday, November 11, 2014

when you read a really good book...


Read my Afterglow review!

There are some books that you just can't put down. Some books that inspire you so much you feel like brilliance will just shoot out of your fingertips the next time you start to write.

...If only that really happened...

But regardless, Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson was one of those books for me. It took me by surprise - the blurbs I've found online for it do not do the story justice.

The story isn't anything like my own - I'm writing an epic fantasy, and Steelheart is in the realm of a dystopian - but I was still incredibly inspired as I read it. It sparked my imagination, and caused me to think about my own books in a different way.

I can't even fully describe it. I'm just glowing.

The more we read, the better we will write. It's just a fact.

And I am itching to get my hands on book two.

Read any good books lately?

tg

PS - The best part is that I got to read it under the guise of doing homework for my graduate level "Literature and the Adolescent Experience" class. I love my program.

Thursday, November 6, 2014

just write!

Saw this pic on twitter today:


It's SO TRUE!

Sometimes we feel (or at least I do) that we're not going to do a scene justice. That if we try to force ourselves to write, the only thing that's going to come out is garbage.

Okay, so we may get garbage. We may, in the future, end up highlighting a huge section of our manuscript and hitting "delete," as I talked about earlier this week

But sometimes, as unlikely as it seems, going through that garbage is what leads us to the uncovered jewels in our novels.

And if you're always convinced you're going to write garbage, you may miss the moments when you write something truly spectacular.

Has sifting through the garbage ever helped your writing?

♥tg

Monday, November 3, 2014

learning to let go

If you're anything like me, it can be hard to press the "delete" key. Sometimes, you know that a phrase or scene does not fit in your book, but you love the way it was written so much you can't bring yourself to get rid of it.

Here's my advice: the purpose of each and every word in your book is to further your story. If that word or phrase is not doing its job, you need to fire it! Get it out of there, because it's bringing the whole book down!

Now, what if it's not underperforming so much that you need to just flat out get rid of it? In that case, bench it. Copy and paste it into a separate document, and then delete it from your WIP. Later, you can see if it fits back in, but by that point you likely will have realized you don't actually need it anymore :)

The gist of it? Don't let yourself get attracted to phrases or scenes that aren't moving your story along. Cut them out like the poison they are, and replace them with new, beautiful words you'll fall in love with!

Have you ever had to delete a phrase or scene you'd grown attached to?

♥tg
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