May
13
2010
Naughty naughty!
Author: adminI was sitting enjoying a good book last night when it occurred to me that I haven’t written in my blog for quite some time now and I thought – oops, bad Eli! And not even a note from your mum to get you off the hook.
Hence the quick update now.
The “page to fame” competition fizzled out to a rather uninspiring end I’m afraid. After 258 ratings and 37% wanting to see the story elevated, I received my “kiss off” email telling me that the algorithm said no.
It has been a good experience though. There was no interaction with anyone who was reviewing the submission, so I don’t have anything from there to learn from, but I have however had time to think and as I watched I realised the errors in the submission which may have affected its chances of success. So out of the competition I learned that time is our friend and that if we are to rush our writing and editing processes, then it won’t be as good as if we take time to think.
Sounds simple, but it’s true.
The other adventure of recent weeks has been with my writing and the novel idea I’m working on. I have to be honest and say that I am still a far distance from anything I can write properly, however, I decided to just sit and write one day and the story took a whole different direction and one that I really like. So things are looking positive.
I know the main thing I need to work on is the main character, Sam. She far from real at the moment and is certainly 2 dimensional compared with Helen (who has haunted me all these years). I need to really work on Sam and get to know her, and I’m sure from there, the story will form.
If you remember a few posts back, I spoke about how I was finding the whole bits of paper and notebooks and scraps of ideas quite off putting? The untidiness and disorganization of it all was actually distracting me from writing. Since then I have been trying out some writing tools which are available for the computer and these seem to help a little.
This is essentially just some webs pace which allows you to write and organize from anywhere which has an internet connection. It’s really simple just a text editor with word count and dictionary, but that’s essentially all you need.
“Storybook” is a database essentially that allows you to structure your work and form your thoughts and ideas. It’s quite good at helping you see where you are going without prompting you in anyway. So allows you to create freely without any interference.
I have tried similar software programs but have found them to interfere in some way with my “way of doing things” and so they became a hindrance rather than a help.
The only negative I could say about using “Storybook” is that it is installed on your computer and so doesn’t really offer that “writing on the go” feeling. But I would still recommend it thoroughly.
Anyways… I guess I should stop gibbering on and get back to work :0)
