I don’t really have an introduction for this. I’m just going renegade on my own blog and talking about blogging instead of fiction this month. It’s a playground Remember in grammar school when the bell would ring and everyone’d spill onto the playground at once and the volume of voices… Read more“11 Things I Wish Someone Had Told Me About Blogging”
Author: Victoria
Everything Else I Know about Social Media I Also Learned from the Bloggess
We’re in the middle of a post that was, originally, going to “very quickly” teach you everything I know about social media, all of which I learned from Jenny Lawson, the Bloggess. This all started when I asked myself, “Is blogging over? Should blogs now be books?” and then, “But… Read more“Everything <em>Else</em> I Know about Social Media I Also Learned from the Bloggess”
Everything I Know about Social Media I Learned from the Bloggess
I just got back from a week in the beautiful Columbia River Gorge and a very long drive between Washington State and my home in Northern California by way of Powell’s Books in Portland. I’m wiped out. I left you pondering whether blogs are dead or just evolving into books,… Read more“Everything I Know about Social Media I Learned from the Bloggess”
2 Things to Consider about Blogging & Books
There’s been a lot of talk in recent months about the demise of blogging (and, oddly, the demise of commenting, although they couldn’t prove that by you guys), which was brought home to me recently by a friend who said, “Just when I decided to start a blog I was… Read more“2 Things to Consider about Blogging & Books”
Listening & not listening to beta readers
In my completed novel (currently on query to an agent), I have a scene where two people have flat tires, one the protagonist and one a girl he meets who becomes his girlfriend. I don’t say in the scene that both flats were purposeful. The girl did her own flat… Read more“Listening & <em>not</em> listening to beta readers”
3 Things I Learned from Henry James
First things first: I’m being interviewed by Katie Weiland over on AuthorCulture. Have you ever wondered whether or not independent editing means staying home all day in your jammies? Now’s your chance to find out! Second: I promised you guys back in December that whatever I learned from the fabulous… Read more“3 Things I Learned from Henry James”
Growing plot out of character, situation out of need
So, a scene with hardly any exposition would consist of dialog and description of people and places? That’s like real life: we look at and listen to and feel the “scene,” where we are, and somebody talks to us and we talk back. There is no running commentary that informs… Read more“Growing plot out of character, situation out of need”
6 Things I Learned from Dashiell Hammett
I’m still studying Shirley Jackson, and if you don’t know why you can easily find out. I spent yesterday doing a scene-by-scene analysis of Chapters 5 and 6 of The Haunting of Hill House that turned into line-by-line—that’s how fast she switches gears in her most profound passages!—and at some… Read more“6 Things I Learned from Dashiell Hammett”
5 Things I Learned from Shirley Jackson
Now, you all know who Shirley Jackson was, and if you don’t you can find out from last week’s post about Stephen King. She was most famous for her story “The Lottery,” in which the citizens of a small American town draw an annual lottery to stone someone to death—a… Read more“5 Things I Learned from Shirley Jackson”
7 Things I Learned Last Week from Stephen King
I love ghost stories. Particularly the whole gothic genre of the nineteenth century: intense questioning of reality layered with beautiful houses and dramatic landscapes and sometimes hilariously-dated kitsch. I’ve read all of Mrs. Radcliffe. Whooee! I especially love the concept that my love for ghost stories is the other side… Read more“7 Things I Learned Last Week from Stephen King”