Stories 4 You

Thursday, November 8, 2018

A NaNoWriMo Adventure

Christina Weigand

Earlier this week Tricia talked about signing up to participate in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). Today I want to talk to you about the experience. I have participated in NaNo for seventeen years. Some years I have achieved 50,000 words and others I haven’t. For a couple of years, while I lived in Washington State I was a municipal liaison in partnership with two other writers, one of whom is still my best writing buddy. Three of the books I’ve written during NaNo have gone on to be published. So what keeps me coming back? Why put myself through this torture once a year?

The first year I did it, 2001, I was a newbie writer, and I did this just for fun to see if I could do it. I didn’t reach 50,000 words, and in fact didn’t accomplish that until 2008, but I was hooked. Some years, especially when I lived in Washington, I was very focused and that is the period of time when I wrote: Palace of the Twelve Pillars (2008), Palace of the Three Crosses (2009) and Sanctuary of Nine Dragons (2010). Keep in mind those three books did not come out of NaNo ready to be published. I think that’s where the beauty of NaNo; you give yourself freedom to write the first draft, which by its nature is not supposed to be the best or final product.

Some other things that make the experience worthwhile: The companionship you receive from writers from around the world and in in your local community; putting away your inner editor and just writing and an organized group that promotes, supports and guides the writer.

I’m sure NaNo is not for everyone, but for me, I will keep doing it; maybe. There are years including this one that I have contemplated not doing it or didn’t have a specific project in mind. But somehow someone manages to convince me to take the leap and do it once again.

I may not have convinced anyone to do this, but that really wasn’t the goal. For me NaNo has been a fulfilling experience. There have been times that I have been in that zone, you writers know what I am talking about, where the words come faster than I can get them on paper. There have been times when I’ve felt as if I would never write a good word again. In those times the friends I have made find a way to talk me out of the slump.

So once again I took the plunge and will spend the next month writing or in my case rewriting. I went to the NaNo website today and saw my total NaNo word count for the seventeen years I have participated. It is 287,716, a lot of words but well worth the effort.

Now onto NaNo, to hopefully add another 50,000 words. I’ll see you on the fifteenth and give you an update on my progress.

If you are interested it's never too late to start. Here is the link to sign up or just check it out here: NaNo

If you know of a young writer or are a teacher that wants her class to participate in NaNo there is a Young Writers NaNo here: Young writers

For more info on NaNoWriMo you can check out Tricia's post here.

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Wednesday, November 7, 2018

Would you read this? Vol.2 #OurAuthorGang

Welcome back. See volume 1 of this series here.

I’ve written a lot of short stories in the last few years. Some have been published in a collection while others are simply awaiting their time to shine. As I considered how to organize my collections, I began to wonder if the stories themselves are worth reading on their own. As a collection, these short stories have the benefit of being part of something greater, but I want to know “would you read these stories?” if they were presented on their own. That’s also when I begin to consider that I write blurbs for the books I release, but I don’t write blurbs for individual stories in a collection, a tagline usually does the job.

Well, that’s about to change. In this series, I’ll be sharing unpublished blurbs to stories that may or may not yet be released. These blurbs are not meant to be used to pitch or sell these stories. This is just a practice on the concept of writing a blurb? I just want to know if the blurbs are any good. I may also offer some ideas of what cover designs for these stories may look like. I hope you enjoy this adventure.

For the second post in this series, I thought I’d start with the blurb for the first story I ever won an award for, In the Window. When I first started to dabble in short fiction I was part of an online writer’s group that also helped new writers publish their books. The group and site have since dissolved, one part ending altogether, the other part being incorporated into a new entity that’s still going on today. When I first published In the Window, it was part of a collection entitled, Unexplained. For the purposes of this post, I’ve prepared a new blurb just for this story, as though it was a full-length novel. I’ve also prepared a mock book cover to be compared with the original cover art for the Unexplained collection. Read below and tell me, would you read this? Which book cover do you prefer?

Derek knows this is the job that could clear all slates, but he can’t get over the living dead person in the window, distracting him from the clean-up.

Tobey has stood by Derek’s side for years through thick and thin, but if Derek can’t get his head right and stop talking about dead people in windows, Tobey knows they too may end up in a window.

Whether it’s a reflection in a window or a silhouette in a mirror, somethings can’t be unseen. For this pair of friends even what’s unseen will haunt them 'til the end of their days. However long or short that may be.

Forms response chart. Question title: Which do you prefer?. Number of responses: 9 responses.

Results as of 11/8/18

Don’t be shy. Your feedback is welcomed, but please be nice. 😌

Find out more about me, my work, and my inspiration at the following links:

Amazon | Goodreads | The ToiBox of Words | YouTube | See a list of my other posts here.

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COMMENTS

Erika M Szabo

2 months ago - Shared publicly

Spooky, but definitely got my attention to read the story. You're great with blurbs, Toi :)

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Toi Thomas

2 months ago

Thank you. I'm working really hard on them.

Erika M Szabo shared this via Google+

2 months ago - Shared publicly

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Tricia Drammeh

2 months ago - Shared publicly

It's a very intriguing blurb that makes me want to know more. I would definitely read it!

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Toi Thomas

2 months ago

Thanks.

Joe Bonadonna

2 months ago - Shared publicly

To answer your title question, Toi . . . yes! You're a very fine writer and you do great with blurbs. I always do the same: loglines or tag lines for stories in anthologies, and longer blurbs for novels.

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Toi Thomas

2 months ago

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Yes, long blurbs are best for novels. A good tagline goes a long away for a short story.

Joe Bonadonna via Google+

2 months ago - Shared publicly

#OurAuthorGang today features Toinette Thomas sharing some of her writing with us and discusses blurbs for short stories and novels in Part 2 of this series. There's even a section where you can choose which cover for her new book you prefer.

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