Saturday, December 31, 2016

Happy New Year's Eve

This day is a time for reflection and gratitude. 

2016 was a year of ups and downs. At first, the year seemed lost to the negative funk, but then turned around at the end of spring. 

Then the year ended with a mix of highs and lows.  

So today is about releasing the negative and accepting the positive into our lives. To do that, make a list of what you are thankful for.

I wanted to take this moment and thank all of my readers, customers, and fellow writers. Your support and encouragement has been warmly received. I only hope to aspire to greater heights to entertain and inform in this next coming year. 

Thank you. I appreciate every good vibration sent my way. I am grateful for the opportunity to write for you. 

Have a great and wonderful day!



Wednesday, December 28, 2016

A Writer’s Guide to Writing Well

Writing is not about putting pen to paper or fingers to keys; writing is about conveying a mood, thought, emotion, or message.

Since publishing houses have control of the writing process, writers have become complacent about their craft. These days are replete with buying services from editors, publishers, and even other writers. As seen by so many professionals in the field, writing has become an industry that feeds upon itself.

More precisely, writing has become an industry that feeds upon the labor and creativity of the individual writer. Editors, publishers, and others have a hand out to give a writer a helping hand. Writers are now the commodity and the customer, yet have no voice in the process of either.  

What are writers to do when faced with an industry of corporate rules and regulations? Is there any room for innovation? Or is creativity doomed in the formulaic sanitarium called publishing?  

Education and experience dispel a pay to play scheme any day of the week. There are a number of ways writers can become decisive participants in their chosen craft. Writers must shrug off the pressures of the corporate institutions and seek out their own voices.

When writers become self-reliant, opportunities arise while opportunists disappear. To avoid the pitfalls of vanity editors and publishers, writers must mature from a combination of factors. Education and experience are the best directions to cultivate these hidden and natural talents.

First education must be sought. Noncredit as well as credit courses are invaluable to a budding writer. When writers learn from others who have been or are currently in the industry, realizations of reality can erase the romanticism of making it big overnight. Writing takes work.

I remember taking a noncredit script writing course. This course was taught by a professional Hollywood script writer. She had written for popular and beloved sitcoms. What I learned from her experience created a love of dialogue that I use in my stories.

Credit courses in reading, academic writing, and creative writing are also worthwhile for writers. A good education is learning from the writers of different eras and understanding what makes their writing literature. Classes help writers learn how to quote and cite from sources. In addition, a writer can learn from the masters not only in their creative fiction but their critiques of fellow contemporaries. Creative writing is more than making a fictional world; it is also about seeing fiction through a discerning lense.

A final exam of Edgar Allan Poe became a reading, critique, and academic paper of him. Did you know he was a critical thinker and critic of other writers of his time? To understand a creative work means understanding the person behind the stories. I learned how Poe envisioned his craft and he in turn helped me envision the craft of writing. 

As I took more courses, my understanding of poetry had been increased from a small town limitation. After I read some poems from Marlowe, Shakespeare, and other masters, an indelible comprehension fostered the love of rhyme, prose, and the economy of words, which have molded my skills. My poetry writing improved as I have been published and received awards for my efforts.

Writing is more than words on a page. Books are great to learn the fundamentals of any subject, but learning through experience is a requirement beyond measure. Professional writer’s groups help writers to learn how to tell a story through the eyes of others. Others are who will be reading and reviewing the work that is produced so groups of amateur and professional writers to critique are important to a writer’s development.

As has been discussed, a writer needs educational opportunities to cultivate their craft:

-a critique group
-professional writing/poetry group
-credit courses
-noncredit courses
-exposure to professionals in the field

Writing is also about observing the world. When a writer sits in a coffee shop to watch how people interact, communicate, and use body language that act helps create vivid and three-dimensional vision of writing.  

Reading and writing go hand in hand, so a writer may want to read a book then see the movie version. In contrast, a writer will need to see a movie then read the novel. This mirroring effect helps create an articulation by understanding the alternate takes on storytelling. This comparison and contrast exhibits how prose and dialogue can be used as a help and hinder.  

Other opportunities to experience writing in the professions is by going to the theater. The theater provides a writer with mood, setting, dialogue, reaction, and audience participation. All reference points a writer needs to advance their craft and stories.

If a writer wants a well rounded educational experience then movies and stage plays are but the beginning of their journey. Introduce musical theater, opera, dance, orchestra, and variety shows in the mix of exposures as a writer needs those visual cues.

The world is a stage. The writer’s stage is their world. So the theater is the place to open up the world to the writer.

Experience lies in the beholder, so a writer should avail themselves to a multitude of complements:

-theater plays
-musicals
-operas
-dance (ballet, jazz, flamenco)
-musical performances (symphony, orchestra)
-variety shows

When a writer has absorbed different styles, information, and refinements, the writer becomes the conduit and not merely the object for stories, characters, setting, mood, and dialogue. A writer who has been exposed to opportunities will know their strengths and weaknesses. Then a writer has the ability to outline their goals and needed support mechanisms. A writer becomes an active participant in their career. That leaves a writer open to options without becoming the victim of them.

Writing has turned into a business for monetary gain with many avenues to pay for services that may or may not be advantageous to the writer. Writers with a sense of self will avoid the pitfalls of vanity editors and publishers. With education and experience, writers can evolve into a discerning creator who will only pay for services that elevate their skills.

Let a journey into the five senses begin a career in writing.

Tuesday, December 27, 2016

Quick Write Competition Submission

I am excited about this 1000 word or less story. What can you write that is clean in less than that word count? So I decided on a children's slant. I am surrounded by my fur friends so I wrote about my black and white cat: Jack. 

The story is cute full of mystery and suspense. A wizard appears to a little kitty who is trapped in an attic. A good wizard who grants Jack a wish. 

I  am very pleased with how the write turned out. If I win or no, I believe I will create a book for Magic in the Night. 

What are you writing this winter recess? 

Have a great and wonderful day! 



Wednesday, December 14, 2016

What can Writers do to Change Society for the Better?

I came upon a celebrity's acceptance speech for an award she has earned as an artist, musician, actress, and entertainer. In her speech, she discussed how she was beaten down emotionally because she was a woman. She had witnessed how women are treated differently than their male counterparts. 

This trend is true in the world of writing as well. Women often change their names to male nom de plumes for a better receivership of their creative works. Men are given more latitude and praise. 

As writers, should we change society for the better by writing about situations that would not garner public outcry and allow our characters to discuss taboos? Is it our moral obligation to touch upon subjects that would otherwise be swept under the rug? 

I had hoped in the aforementioned celebrity's speech that she would have led by example. I would like have to heard her say: since I have endured sexism and ageism, I am doing x, y, and z to combat what I see as unfavorable treatment toward women artists. 

I was left with a sharp criticism but no real solution to the epidemic. 

Women need to support other artists in their field. If someone makes it big, then that woman needs to promote from within the female ranks of qualified and talented women in the pool. 

Women must understand that you can complain all the live long day and nothing will change. If you want to change, you must first be willing to stand up for the change you would like to see. Hate sexism? Hate ageism? Well there are plenty of women in those categories who would fit the bill to change the dynamics of what, or should I say who, is acceptable to be positive role models in our society.

Society does not change overnight. Society has to be guided onto a path of accepting the unseen voices of the world. In writing, literary works often touch upon these themes. In fiction, writers are given more leeway to investigate and expand especially in science and speculative fiction. 

So as a writer, how can you change the world for the better? 

Have a great and wonderful day! 



Thursday, December 1, 2016

Author Versus Writer

Let the games begin!

An author is someone who originates or creates. A writer is someone who is an author or writes stock options. The dictionary is a great place to reflect and gain knowledge. 

There is a school of thought online that states: if you are not optioned by a press or publisher you are therefore not an author. As seen by the two definitions above, that is a fallacy. Writer and author are interchangeable. 

For a long time, I used the term "writer" to identify myself because I had not published a book. When I had published my own writings, an article arose stating that self published writers should not classify themselves as authors. That in doing so self published authors were just giving themselves trophies for showing up. 

I assure you: I did not just show up. I have been writing since junior high school. I have many third party writing credits to my name as well as awards for poetry. I have several degrees that took the effort of writing to attain as well as I have taken college creative writing courses.

Then I pondered on the dilemma a bit further. Was this a case of publisher snobbery? You can only win the title of author if you lick the boots of some garish halfwit with a license?  

Publishing houses have been in control of the written word for a very long time. Writers have had to subject themselves to agents and supply chain demands and criticism for centuries. Now with print on demand technology and the internet, agents and publishing houses have some stiff competition called the free market. 

The monopoly is finished. No more social engineering people to write certain stories or outcomes. People can write for the simple joy of writing. 

But there are so many bad writers out there, how do we weed them out? 

The market will weed out bad writers. For the rest, writers could take a leadership role in making sure good writers are lifted into the public eye more readily by buying and reviewing their books online, creating and publishing anthologies at their own standards, and assisting fellow writers in the writing process. 

I have opened up Sonoran Dawn Studios to publish my own works as well as create and release short story and poetry anthologies in the near future. 

Writers have an enormous opportunity to shape the future of writing, if they stop depicting writing as an authoritative caste system deployed to bully and control the act of writing to the point where writers and authors mean two distinct ideas, then writers can become their own gatekeepers as well as mentor younger or less seasoned writers. But writers will need to take a stand to guide the market.

There is room in the world for literary and pop culture writing. 

Writers, authors must make sure that their field is free of hacks that seek to reign in writing back to the cloistered control system that has yielded profit before people. 

Writing is a craft. It must be developed, exercised, and studied. Writing must not be limited by small minds. 

So next time you think of an author... think potential. 

Have a great and wonderful day!


Also published as Writer Versus Author on Authorsden.

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