Good Links: September Edition

Well, September came and went, just like that. Now here we are in fall. Wah.

Here are some of the good links I came across this month.

Grammar, Style, etc:

Have you been wondering about spacing around your dashes and ellipses? I haven’t either, but I did discover I wasn’t spacing around my ellipses correctly when I read How Publishing Really Works’ article about it.

Along with spacing issues, do you wonder about which font to use? The Rejectionist pokes fun at Courier font while making a nice, valid point for not using that crappy old font.

Passive tense, anyone? Not sure what it is and why you should possibly avoid it? This article will help you out. (Passive tense can be more wordy, more convoluted, but it can also highlight the action instead of the agent performing the action.) Here is a nice little quote from the Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL):

You can recognize passive-voice expressions because the verb phrase will always include a form of be, such as am, is, was, were, are, or been. The presence of a be-verb, however, does not necessarily mean that the sentence is in passive voice.

What the heck is an Oxford Comma and where and when do you use one?

On Writing:

Is your character reactive or proactive. Do things happen to your character or does he or she make things happen? Rachelle Gardner explains a bit about reactive and proactive characters.

Finished your project and dreaming up that perfect title? While a perfect title is good to have in the querying stage, don’t get too attached to it. BookEnds Literary explains.

Brenda Hiatt shows us the money in publishing romance. And who says getting your work with a big publisher doesn’t pay?

More on publishing and money, this time the goods straight from a literary agency. Basically, you’ve got to sell a lot folks. And that means you, the writer, have to get your butt in gear and sell your work. It ain’t no free ride.

And here’s the pitch! Rachelle Gardner advises you to tell the actual story in your pitch. Is it an emotional journey? Big deal! What actually happens.

Guide to Literary Agents’ 5 Ways to tell if you and a literary agent are a good match.

Just for Fun:

Universal Studios unveils plans for a Harry Potter theme park in Florida. Thanks, guys. I think bloody ol’ England is closer to my house than freaking Florida.

How much time do you spend listening to muzak while trying to get a hold of a real person when calling a company? Ha! Listen no more. Here’s what number to push to get to a real person. Love it!

Rick Astley (remember him?) only has one dance move. Seriously, though, this is a fun mash-up between Rick Astley and Nirvana.

Cow abduction is a very serious problem. Please check it out and be sure to offer your support for the cause by clicking on the cow. (Some folks have way too much time on their hands and I love them for it.)

And there you have it, September in a nutshell.

Good Links: June Edition

Hey, it must be revision and how to write list month. A lot of the links I came across this month that are worth mentioning have to do with editing. Or maybe it is because I have been editing all month and that is all I see now. You know, editing when I’m not automating a library, critiquing, or building a garage. Laundry? Nah, we don’t do laundry here anymore. There’s no time! There are tools in the fruit bowl, for Heaven’s sake!

Nathan Bransford over at Curtis Brown has a nice revision checklist which is a must-read for any newbie and will serve as a nice reminder checklist for those who have been in the game a little longer.

Along the same lines is a helpful list of rules as compiled by Elmore Leonard and sits over on Modem Noise.

Editorial Ass also has a post on editing and whether you should hire an editor or not. It sounds as though fewer and fewer publishing houses are including editing in their acquisitions. That means you and your agent need to have your puppy ready to publish. Career tip: if you are good at editing, there’s a growing market for editing!

Along the same lines, Rachelle Gardner, an agent with Wordserve Literary, discusses hot, great and good projects that come across her desk and how she reacts to them. So, if you are wondering why some folks get picked up and published in no time at all while you are finally getting a reply to your query a year later, this post might clarify things for you. She also has a second part posting to this topic.

And if you are wondering how to open that scene in a character’s viewpoint, Camy Tang has a great little article that gives you some do’s and don’ts.

Finally, because we all wonder this every day we write: How to Write a Bad Novel. A tongue in cheek look at mistakes to avoid while writing. It’s worth a read.

Best news of the month: critique partner Calista Taylor signed with an agent! Go Calista!

Good Links, April Edition

Oops! I missed posting these at the end of April. However, they are still good links, so up they go.

On Writing:

Best Ever Article in Terms of Improving Your Writing: The Ten Mistakes over on Holt Uncensored. If you are a writer, read the article, then go look at your manuscript and edit. Seriously. Almost everyone is going to find something they can improve.

Agent and author Donald Maass talks about originality over on Writer Unboxed. He finds “many manuscripts go wrong… [if they] …do not go far enough in mining the author’s experience for what is distinctive and personal.” As well, if you (the writer) “ignore yourself…your story will be weak.”

Romance Writers of America (RWA) online classes. Everything from classes on writing the synopsis, to making a book commercial, to writing queries, to making a kick butt heroine, to how a forensic lab operates…. The list is endless and the classes are affordable (most expensive one I’ve seen so far has been $30 US). You don’t have to be a member and you don’t have to be a romance writer. You also don’t have to leave your house–all class lectures and assignments come to your email inbox.

Come In Character Blog: Come as one of your characters. Regular blog posts include prompts to get you thinking about who your character really is. (Or maybe even yourself.)

Autocrit has a free trial of their wizard. Pop in a few paragraphs from your manuscript and it will spit out info on the length variation of your sentences, overused words, repeated phrases and more. (You get EVEN more with a subscription.) It’s a great way to mix up your writing as well as pinpoint where you might be echoing yourself.

Along the same lines is Topicalizer which is quite the little analyzer as well. This puppy checks a section of pasted text for most used words, phrases, etc. Similar to Autocrit but also includes readability level of the pasted text.

Business Side:

Editors, Agents and Blog, Oh My! A blog with interviews with agents and editors. A great place to learn more about those folks in the world of books as well as the world of publishing.

Penguin Authors Guide to Online Marketing. This is a big ol’ 64 page PDF with piles of tips on how to get noticed online.

For fun:

Author Diana Peterfreund takes on the character of Prince Charming (who is flat and without personality) in this amusing guest blog feature over on the Knight Agency blog.

Enjoy!

Good Links, February Edition

There have been some great blog posts online this month, so I thought I’d share some of the one’s I’ve enjoyed the most(and can actually remember at this moment in time).Today I donated 99 cents ($1.30 Canadian) to help a writer replace his GPS. Seriously. The story sucked me in. Pulled at my heartstrings, made me laugh. All that good stuff. I even navigated around my computer’s security software to make my donation. And then, guess what? I discovered I got something for my $1.30. Huh. I was actually a little disappointed in that my goodwill was going to get me something directly (not karmically). But I got over it quickly because I got a book. Shot of Tequila by JA Konrath. Uh, huh. So there you go. Check out the story and get a PDF of the book. Woo!

In other news, JA Konrath also has a nice checklist for writers. Are you delusional about your abilities as a writer? Maybe confident? Unsure, check it out. It is a good attitude check if nothing else.

Over at Bookends Literary blog, I discovered a fab querythat really helped me with my own. (The post is actually from January, but I only discovered it this week.) The query also wants me to buy the book which is part of the Gray Whale Inn Bed-and-Breakfast mysteries. This is the sentence that made me sit back and go ‘cool’: “But she’s barely fired up the stove when portly developer Bernard Katz rolls into town and starts mowing through her morning glory muffins.” Good stuff! Voice and all that jazz. Plus, her query packs in the protagonist’s stakes in the story. Good job!

If you are working on your synopsis, Kristin Nelson has five helpful things to keep in mind when creating that summary masterpiece over on her Pub Rants blog.

Nathan Bransford (literary agent with Curtis Brown) has a post on characters. He discusses sympathetic and unsympathetic characters and the issue of redeemability. “We’ve all read moments where this happened: a character did something so horrible and shocking and irredeemable that there was no going back. We’re officially done with that person.” That’s pretty much what happened with a book I’m reading right now (but I won’t disclose which one it is). But it has to do with these twisted, evilish little kid twins. And freakishly enough, it isn’t the first instance of twisted, evilish little kid twins that I’ve encountered in a story this year. So, if you think you know which book I’m talking about, think again. It seems to be a popular subject, but sadly for me, not enough conflict to keep me engaged in a story.

And news of my own: I finished the website It’s All Kids’s Play (dot ca) last week and have been listing activities on the blog. Be sure to check them out. There are over 700 activities waiting for your kids to try out!

If you are looking at an easy, fun way to improve your writing, check out RWA’s list of online classes. There are a handful of great, helpful classes being offered each month for reasonable prices. And they are great. I’ve taken two and am signed up for two more. You don’t have to be an RWA member, nor do you have to write romance to get something out of their classes. Very recommended!

And last but not least, some depressing news if you were ‘delusional’ as Konrath would say, and thought you’d make a mint being a writer. Thanks to Nathan Bransford for breaking it down for us aspiring-in-the-dark writers. Now I know I’m really going to have to work hard to sell those books when I get published!

Okay, I can’t really leave you on that depressing note! Let’s think of something fun, like make your own superhero! Yay! Thanks to agent Kate Schafer Testerman and her blog followers for this one.

Enjoy!