Life is like...

Spring Spring Spring. The buds are on the trees. The sun is warmer. 

The Spring storms have hit with a vengeance. Today landslips (from all that rain) caused two trains to collide north of Wellington...no serious injury. At least the snow has stopped and the rain has kept the hay fever down.

We are in the middle of school holidays and I find my good intentions of getting some writing done have being hijacked by either dispute resolution or transportation imperatives.

So it is a rather patchy collection of interesting links for your delectation this week.

Debbie Redpath Ohi has enjoyed some well deserved success this year and in a great post on time management and creativity she outlines how she juggles the many projects she does and keeps her sanity. One of her advice gems is to get an accountability partner. This is a good strategy that I have made use of now and again...nothing like having to justify why you are so slack, to get you moving again.

I have been looking at my Mars story and trying to isolate where the plot is going to go...I can head off in a few directions and I really need to nail down one direction to get the story finished. With this in the back of my mind I have found myself spending more time looking at back story and prologues trying to pull out the essential information and work it better. Two great posts on these topics this week have caught my eye.

Kristin Lamb part of Bob Mayer’s Warrior Writers group has written an excellent post on 7 Deadly Sins Of Prologues If you are tempted at all by using a prologue....take a look.

Laura Pauling has written a nice post on how to use backstory effectively and she links to Story Sensei who has a more in depth analysis of backstory writing.

In my quest to uncover marketing gems for you, gentle reader, I have often read lots of posts on blogging. I don’t usually share these as I figure each writer will find their own way if they want to blog. However I do read a few writer blogs and I know they read me so in the spirit of sharing interesting stuff on writing blogs, Tribal Writer has a post entitled How Fiction Writers can Turn Into Badass Bloggers

Problogger always has useful ideas on blogging and publishing and this week they have a great post on 11 Ways To Convince Readers To Buy Your eBook. (If you have an eBook...or even an eReader...) eBooks are just starting to appear here in New Zealand so if you are a sneezer (an early adopter of technology who shares the experience around) or a ‘wish I had the money to be a sneezer,’ you might be interested in this post.

Over on Craicerplus ( My Amplify Page)

In Defense Of Dead Parents In Children’s Literature.

5 Things A Writer Always Overlooks...(brilliant)

Giving Stuff Away Is Not A Strategy

Finding The Perfect Collective Supernatural Noun...(a very funny list)

Joe Konrath – The Acquisitions Editor. (This satire will make you laugh and make you think!)

Over at Adventures In Children’s Publishing they have a YA Giveaway happening and our own Brian Falkner has a book review on their site and a book to give away. Nice One Brian!

And for those counting down to the end of November there is a new Movie Trailer up.

enjoy

maureen

pic is chocolate....points for those who get the quote reference