K is for Kindle

There's been a technological war going on in our house. My husband is ashamed of me - I want a Kindle more than an iPad. It's like I've turned against the Apple church.

I know he loves me, I've proof of that - he upped our download quota to 50GB per month, nothing hearts more than downloads :-). And he's not giving up on my Mac soul either, he scours the web for the zillion blogs and articles that support the holy iPad as 'The One'.

I fell in love with Kindle books a while ago. Now I read them on my iPhone. I LOVE that I have my book with me all the time, but the downside is the screen is so small and I need my font large enough, that it just shows a paragraph at a time. The backlight is also an issue for me, I find I can only read a couple of chapters before my eyes get sore.

The iPad is not yet released in Australia, almost the whole country will be waiting to see how cool it is when it comes out (except my dad who asked me 'What's an iPad?' when we were in the Mac store). And it's cool. I do want one (eventually), I want it for the cool apps, watching tv shows and the internet browsing, but my priority is an e-reader and that's where the iPad is not impressing me. I'm hoping the backlight won't be as intrusive as the iPhone, but I'm dubious. The only thing that has tempted be toward the iPad is that you get your books in colour. Come on Kindle, why aren't you fighting back with a colour version? Help me out here.

Want more comparisons?

Click on the picture for an article comparing the iPad vs Kindle vs a Weimaraner:

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Build Characters with Jung

J is for Join 

Have you joined the Wagging Tales book giveaway yet? if not click on the link to enter:

http://clancytales.blogspot.com/2010/04/e-is-for-enter-book-giveaway.html

J is for Jung.

Carl Gustav Jung is well known in literature for his creation of archetypes in his studies of psychology. The archetypes he describes are not types of people, but rather categories of characteristics, so one character could host several archetypes. These archetypes have been embraced by writers as a type of mould to begin with to build your characters and story. Christopher Vogler refers to these archetypes in many of his books and talks on using myth to structure your story.

Below is a chart I found at http://www.bethbarany.com (if you click on it you will get the full sized picture that you can print). I think this is great if you get stuck for characters, or more importantly a character's needs or desires. 

In the How To Think Sideways writing course I do, I am constantly asked, what does your character WANT? This is the drive for your story, they are after something, and an antagonist, the setting and circumstances will make it difficult for the MC to achieve what they want. By using the chart, you can work out what your character would want and how to make it hard on him/her.

You could also have a character arc from one archetype to another for example the 'Regular Guy' who wants to belong thinks he needs to connect with others, but when events force him to become an outcast, he may start to see his so called friends were not true at all, and he evolves to become the 'Sage' who would rather have honesty than popularity.

My protagonist in The Warracknabeal Kids will evolve from Outlaw/Jester to Hero/Caregiver. Can you see combinations that apply to your characters? Which ones would you use?

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I is for Imagination

What I wouldn't give for the imagination of an 8yr. old.

Last night my youngest daughter started writing her new novel. Chapter one begins with a young girl walking through a rough town with her brand new puppy. Some tough boys hassle her but the puppy attacks, you see this book is about Vampire Puppies. The girl gets a little older and when she is 13 she joins the spy academy (as you do) and comes up with some ideas for using the vampire puppies. 

I'm looking forward to reading this one, it will also feature zombie snails, which become fast when they're infected as zombies, rather than slow. Oh, and her main setting is a graveyard pet shop!

I'm also going to make a zombie recommendation (I never thought I'd hear myself say that). I downloaded  The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan Kindle edition to my iPhone. This book was mesmerising, I found the wistful style almost poetic, not at all what I would expect from a post-apocolyptic story that would also be able to horrify me most of the way through. I likes :-)

Have you entered my book giveaway contest yet? The draw closes on the 19th of April - so there's still time! You could win TWO of my favourite books for reading, writing and editing! Click HERE to enter! 

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H in Fiction

The H is Silent

Have you entered my book giveaway contest yet? It's easy and you could win TWO of my favourite books for reading, writing and editing! These are the books that helped me so much, I wanted to share them with you. Click HERE to enter! OR click on the image below:

I guess the ol' silent H routine isn't going to fly for this post :-).

Actually H should be easy for me, it's what I look for when I read fiction.

Humanity.

Regardless of whether the novel is about cats, aliens or trees, for me it has to be about humanity, how we deal with things and what we are capable of.

Humanity can be shown many ways and I have three favourites:

Humour.

Aussies are generally known for their sense of humour which can be a bit off-beat and probably stems from our strong Irish connection. We try to laugh off everything. Especially people who think they've got the upper hand, no one is above a ridicule. Even Chris Vogler refers to our 'tall poppy syndrome' in his book Using Myth to Power Your Story, Aussies don't like seeing someone get 'too big for their boots'.

Of course, not everyone is funny. But sometimes that character can be hilarious because they're not funny. In Good Morning Vietnam, Robin Williams' humour is contrasted with a binary character that thinks he's funny, but has absolutely no sense of humour. I laugh at that character a lot.

And there is a boundary (well for me anyway), somethings are beyond being funny. I really have to prepare myself to read a book that I know will show humanity's unkindness :-(.

Heart.

Even if I'm reading a book for children, I want to see a character with heart. Someone that will stand against the odds, even if failing is inevitable. I don't want it to be easy for them, that's what makes their actions meaningful - because it hurts to try. I heart the people. I want to find the best in them and sometimes that means showing the worst too, so we can see the journey for our character's true potential.

Hope. 

I don't have to have a happy ending to like a story, but there does have to be hope at the end for change. If things simply return to normal I feel like I've made no progress (hey, I was on the journey with the main character while reading, so I get to share in the credit for the outcome don't I?). Even in post-apocolyptic tales, I need to see humanity's hope at the end.

One of my favourite films for showing the potential in every person is Changing Lanes with Ben Afflick and Samuel L Jackson. This film starts with an accident between two seemingly very different people, but through the film we see the darkest things they are capable of and then we see the lengths they are prepared to go to when they try to right their wrongs.

I try to keep humour, heart, hope and humanity in mind when I write, but it can also be a topic to address in the editing process.

So, I HEART Humans, what do you HEART to read in fiction?

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G is for Giveaway and Gravity

G is for Giveaway!
Time for me to push my book giveaway again :-)

You have the chance to win two great books, you get to pick them from a selection of four books that I adore. These are my absolute favourite books for writing, editing and reading. If you haven't already entered then go and do it now! You'll find the contest on my post: 

E is for Enter the Book Giveaway!!!

G is for Gravity.

This is Earth and in our world we have rules. Gravity is a pretty good rule. You can't fight gravity - or can you?

When you do worldbuilding for a narrative taking place anywhere on Earth, you know that you have to adhere to the physical laws of this planet. If you taking the plunge into a fantasy world, then you get to create the world to suit your story (but not to suit your characters, you want the word to cause them much conflict).

Think about the physical laws of that world. What is the same as our world and what is different, this will provide the reader with binaries and parallels for their own experiences.

You may decide that in your world sneezes make you disappear, or sunburn can cook you, so characters can only go out at night. Decide on your rules.... and then break them.

You might not be able to fight gravity (despite the promise of many cosmetic companies), but through the ages man has been determined to defy gravity. If there is a 'rule' for your world, show the way that characters can defy those rules. Or have them attempt to defy the rules and fail, this would provide plenty of conflict.

Once man learned how to fly, our world changed. How will your world change? Conflict and change, those elements keep the narrative moving. In my post: Using Settings Effectively for Fiction I shared a tip I learned from the writing course How To Think Sideways, when you plan your world, you only need to ask two questions about every part of this world:

• Does this create conflict for the story?
• Does this force a primary character to change?

Do you have any challenging laws for your world, or have your read a story with a really interesting physical law that the characters tried to defy? An incredible example of worldbuilding is evident in Frank Herbet's Dune (the most amazing sci-fi book I've ever read).

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F is for Follow, Focus and Fetish.

In a blatant attempt to reach 100 FOLLOWERS, I'm hosting a competition to win books on writing and editing! See my last post for the entry form and details:

E is for Enter the Book Giveaway! (oooh, 99 so far!).

I've got a lot of projects on the go at the moment and I find that the days I stress about which to do first, I end up accomplishing nothing. I need to FOCUS on my tasks (I often say I prefer focus-tasking to multi-tasking) and FINISH what I'm on before being distracted by the other.

My current writing tasks include:

• Editing Dog Show Detective
• Writing Warracknabeal Kids
• Researching for Warracknabeal Kids
• Blogging
• Reading, book on writing and editing and all your blogs!

My project tonight is to do up a better timetable so I can schedule these projects to complete a little on a daily basis.  It does help me to keep my information for each task separate. Each writing/editing project has it's own notebook. This is how I discovered I have a FETISH. I will shop for days to find just the right notebook for each project. Dog Show Detective has pets on the cover, while Warracknabeal Kids has a plain brown cardboard cover. If I spot a notebook I love, then I have to have it. I give notebooks as presents. In short, I LOVE notebooks.

F is also for Funny pranks. My protagonist in Warracknabeal Kids is a 12/13yr. old boy who is a bit of a scallywag. Not having a boy's mind for mischief, I asked my husband for some inspiration. I won't go into too much detail but his idea involved a corpse, a coffin and a chicken.

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E is for Enter the Book Giveaway!!!

The contest has closed! I'll announce the winner on tomorrow's blog

  

   

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