Good news! The second critique of my novel was just as positive as the first one! My classmates reviewed the next section of my book – five pages that introduce the antagonist and describe a battle scene. Overall the comments complimented the scene setting and character descriptions as well as expressed enjoyment of the pacing […]
Category Archives: Uncategorized
February 12
Saturday, February 12, 2011
From Setting and Tension we are on to Dialogue and the Three Act Structure of building suspense over the period of the novel. Dialogue is, of course, that which the characters use to communicate amongst themselves. “The progressive era was neither progressive, nor an era, discuss.” Dialogue should add to the story by building tension, […]
February 5
Saturday, February 5, 2011
We are moving from Setting into Tension. In wrapping up with setting we discussed the cultural side of it. This brought me to the realization that all of my characters are white, of more or less Anglo Saxon descent, and all heterosexual. It opened my eyes to the fact that while my setting may be […]
January 29
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Week four of the class has me focusing on Setting and Theme. I will start with theme because I believe I am the second kind of author. The first kind being those that start a book with a theme or message in mind that they want to convey. The second kind, including myself, write a […]
January 22
Saturday, January 22, 2011
This week is focused on fleshing out Antagonists, and adding plot layers or subplots to all secondary characters. Everyone has read the book where the Antagonist is a two dimensional “very bad man.” While this keeps things simple, it does not always make for good reading. The challenge is in creating a bad guy that […]
January 15
Saturday, January 15, 2011
So the critique went much much better then I thought. After I got over my full body flush and heart palpitations; it turns out my class mates liked my writing. There was of course the minor detail of not having a description for my main protagonist. But who needs them? Right? This week I will […]
January 8
Saturday, January 8, 2011
This week I am doing my first read through of my rough draft. As I go through I am supposed to make comments to myself about what I like and what I don’t like. The point is to get a full read through of the manuscript as it stands in its raw form. This helps […]
January 1
Saturday, January 1, 2011
The class has started and I am suddenly very anxious. What if my writing is absolute crap? What if I have no talent at writing? What if I will be forced to do something for a living that does not fulfill me at all? The anxiety builds and I find anything and everything else to […]
December 10, 2010
Friday, December 10, 2010
The excitement of finishing my first draft for my first novel has worn off. What the (enter expletive here) am I supposed to do now? Everyone I have spoken to advises to lock it away for a month so that I can get some distance from it. I have signed up for a revision class […]
November 28, 2010
Sunday, November 28, 2010
It is done! 50,064 words, and a whole two days early! I will regale you with how it happened, as it was quite epic. Erin and I had been visiting her parents for the holiday and I was within 4,000 words when we got to the airport. I could not concentrate with all the people […]