Well I learned something, you all. I really should have picked a narrower topic for the 6 word story. Do you realize how hard it is to just pick 6 random words out of thin air and string them together into something sort of coherent? lol. I finally had to just sit down and write whatever came into my head. Believe me, that ended up in about 42 words of "meh". But, the plus side is that while I have my favorite (below), I'll also be nice and share a few of the other ones too...just because I'm sweet like that. haha! Ok so first one? 

Adoption: 
Empty Arms. We Adopted. Happy Hearts. 

Sniff...I'd adopt right now if I could! I just think adoption is amazing, and I love it so much. Giving kids a real home, and making them yours...there's just something extra special about it. So, it just was one of the topics that popped in my head. Ready for a couple random ones? 

WWII:
Bombs left books free for kids. 

(This is in reference to a picture I absolutely love from WWII Britain...a little boy reading books in the street outside a bombed out bookstore.) 

Oxygen: 
Hospital kid: Oxygen tubes and balloons. 

No idea where this one came from really. :P

Well that's all for today! How did your October writing challenge go, everybody? Did you have as much trouble as me? Leave me a comment below telling me what you thought! :) 

Have a lovely day! 
<3
Victoria

Hey my friends! 

NaNoWriMo is only a little over a week a way! And with #NaNoPrep comes tons of random notes, research, character sheets, etc etc etc. How on earth do you keep it all organized? I have two different ways I keep track of everything. One is on the computer, the other is with all my actual papers. 

So, first up, we have Evernote. You've probably heard me talk about this before! (I'm not an affiliate--this is the real deal, lol!) This is an absolutely great app--I've been using it for years! The best thing about Evernote for researching is a handy-dandy little thing called "Evernote Web Clipper". What is this? Well, when you're researching articles on the web, if you come across something that you want to save, instead of copying and pasting or doing some such inconvenient maneuver, you can click your Evernote Web Clipper! From there you can save your "clip" as either the article in its entirety, as a simplified article, as the full page, as a bookmark that will take you to the webpage later when you click it, or as a screenshot. You can pick from there what notebook to save it into, as well as the ability to add tags and write a comment along with the article. I find it super handy when researching--my most used way of the clipper is the Simplified Article, but they're all useful!

Once in Evernote, I usually have one notebook for each book, and stack notebooks for series. It's super easy to keep track of things with the ability to search within notes, add tags, or star notes for importance. You can do bullet or number lists, check-box lists, add attachments, make a table to fill in, or use different colors for your text. Evernote also syncs across devises and saves your notes on the cloud, so you'll never lose your valuable research and you can access it from anywhere.  The best part? You can do this all for free. Sure, there's a premium version, but I use Evernote extensively and have been very happy with just the free version. 

The other way is with divided folders. I have several cute plastic folders--some are just a slim pocket, and some have dividers in them. The ones I buy aren't as bulky as typical American ones, and I really like them for stashing my writing notes. I use one folder for a book, and these folders get used all the way up through the editing and publishing stage, as well as organizing my book tour info, schedules, etc. I keep the folders stacked on each other in little open filing drawers on my desk--where I can see the edge of the folders so I can easily pull it out, but they're kept out of the way and neat. 

So how do you organize your notes and research? Let me know in the comments below! 

You all have a lovely day!
<3
Victoria

There are actually a lot of blog posts across the internet on this topic. It's something a lot of writers have to deal with--how on earth do you start writing on that yawning whiteness that is the blank page? I tend towards two extremes. Either the story just flows perfectly out, and I hardly have time to think about what I'm actually writing. This is the best possible state to be in for me personally. The other side of beginnings, however, is not so pretty. That's the instances where I sit, type a few words, think "Nah..." delete, try again, repeat process at least seven times, then finally force myself into a dissatisfied beginning deciding to edit it later. (That's the messy side of me trumping the perfectionist side of me. It's a constant struggle lol). 

So as I sat down to write up this blog post I couldn't help wondering--what am I going to actually say about this? You either write happily or you write painfully. 

And that's when it hit me. That's exactly the point. However things go, you just. keep. writing. It goes hand in hand with Sunday's post on banishing your inner critic. 

Writing is not about perfection--it never should be. (Editing? Well that's a different story. But even then, 'perfection' is very illusive!). Writing is not about catering to some random, fickle muse. Sometimes the inspiration is running strong and you make your words work for you excellently. Other times you're just going to feel like chucking the novel in a drawer and forgetting it, because it's hard. That's when you have to say "I am a writer, and writers write." 

So if you're having trouble with that book's beginning? Here are a few ideas:

1. Start in the middle of the action. 
2. Introduce your character in a creative way.
3. Stay away from paragraphs of scenic descriptions, someone waking up/looking into a mirror, etc etc. Hard to get those cliches to work. 
4. Don't give too much backstory in the very beginning. 
5. Make the reader fall in love with your character. 
6. Cause the reader to ask "What happens next?"
7. Establish the voice, tone, and mood of your book right away. 
8. Don't bother copying other books' styles--do you!
9. Introduce the conflict of the story.
10. And if it's just not coming--jump right in and know you can always fix it later! 

So, to have a little fun, I thought I'd share some of my first lines in various books/WIPs etc. Some are alright, and some will definitely need editing later...but I wanted to show you that beginnings are meant to be just that--beginnings-- and they won't always be like what you'd expect to see as a first line in a published book. :). 

1. The lamp flickered, casting weird shadows across the dying man’s bed. Mrs. Ruth Morley pressed her husband’s hand between hers, glancing up from his face only to exchange a look with one of her stepdaughters. --A Novel 
2. The table groaned under the weight of fourteen year old Judah Green, and the boys below gazed up at the spectacle with unhidden curiosity. It wasn’t strange, actually, for Judah Green to be standing on a table. Nor was it strange that he had a crowd of onlookers. In fact, nothing was strange when one was speaking of Judah Green. --Judah Green, Book One.
3. “Stop the car!” I leaned out the window, the wind blowing my long dark hair into my face. I pushed it away. “Dad, please stop the car! Look at all those wildflowers! It’s beautiful!” --Kind Heart
4. Beatrix had never seen so much gold around her, not in all her twelve years. She wanted to squint, almost, in the brightness of it all, but there was so much to see that she felt it would be a crime to do so. --New Landing Series, Book One
5. A baseball came whizzing through the air. Eighteen year old Leo Nakano’s hand shot into the air and snagged it from the sidewalk. “Watch it!” He yelled cheerfully as he jogged onto the nearby vacant lot. “You nearly took my head off, Dennis.” --Two-Faced Man
6. “Most of all, she simply wants to live again.” Mrs. Lundell dropped back against the velvet cushions of the train seat and placed a gloved hand up to her perspiring brow. “My, but it is hot.” -- A Novel
7. Melinda almost couldn't distinguish the sound of the baby's cry from the howling of the wind outside. It whistled in through the cracks in the cabin, swirling in tiny eddies of snow. -- Melinda/Further Courage 2nd Draft 
8. Melinda Hamilton could not imagine how such two very different lives could have been twisted so unexplainably together. --Melinda/Further Courage 3rd Draft
9. The lamplight cast an odd, flickering glow across the wet cobblestones. “Hurry,” Midwife Hester Donahue whispered from a few steps ahead of her. Melinda took a leaping step over a puddle and slipped, clutching at Hester’s black Quaker cloak as she reeled backwards. --Melinda/Further Courage  Draft #3 and 1/2 
10. It was dark when Kit Lawler stepped out of his shabby front door praying for a cool, pure breeze. No lamplighter came down the streets in this part of London, and so the street was swamped with shadows--the kind that gather on such hot and smoggy evenings that you feel as though you might choke. --The Needlemaker

Whew! A good deal of editing needed there--that's for sure! lol. Leave me a comment below sharing one of your opening lines, or let me know if you ever struggle with beginnings. 

Have a lovely day! 
<3
Victoria

"You worded that really bad." 

"What are you thinking? I'm positive you already discussed the fact that fish made him gag!" 

"Your writing stinks."

Oh, the lovely voice of our inner critic! Over-bearing, exaggerating your faults, making you feel like you shouldn't be holding a pen at all. Why are we talking about this particular character? Because I want you to banish your inner critic from your head. 

Yes, you heard that right. Banish 'em. Just push them away--and don't listen to them. Ok, not forever. Let's just say that right now. A well behaved inner critic can be a valuable asset in the cycle of editing. (But you still have to keep that critic's mouth free from too much negativity!) But when you're writing, the inner critic has no business poking its head in on things. Especially during NaNoWriMo. 

Here's some reasons why you should get rid of your inner critic completely during your 1st draft. 
​

1. You will be able to write better.  How can you write better if you're turning out a really messy 1st draft? Because 1st drafts are NOT about polish and perfection. 1st drafts are about getting the idea out there. Letting your story just come naturally. Putting it on paper--capturing the story. It's definitely not going to be some award winning manuscript after the 1st draft--that's why we have the revision and editing stages. But if you try to smush revising and editing along with writing when doing your first draft, the words will drag, you can lose some of the best parts of the book, and it could take you forever to finish. The 1st draft, focus on TELLING the story--not styling it. 
2. It will help you stay more motivated to finish the 1st draft. Have you ever tried writing something with someone looking over your shoulder constantly trying to correct you, point out where you're going wrong, or change things? That's what it's like writing with an inner critic. Before long helpful editing changes you might think were great turn into beating yourself up because you're not "good enough". You can get swamped in all the stuff you have to fix that the details overshadow the story and you start feeling like you'll never get there. Not fun. 
3. In the long run, it turns out better books. Because if you write the 1st draft without an inner critic, let it sit for a week or two (or more) and then return to it with your handy-dandy red pen, you're going to be able to look at it without the fog of writing still hanging over you. You'll come to it fresher and with an open perspective, and you'll be able to catch mistakes much easier. Not only that, but you'll be able to see all the good points of your book that much better too! This provides for a more even, fair evaluation of your book, better revising and editing, and so therefore...a better story. 

So what if you're a writer who can't bear to leave a mistake? What then? That's what sites like Write or Die or The Most Dangerous Writing App or the Hemingway mode on Draftin.com are for.  How do these work? 

Write or Die: There is a premium (paid) version of this with lots of different settings that you can tinker with, but I'm going to focus on the free version. You can adjust by time or word count, then pick out of three different types of "Modes". Stimulus mode plays nice background ambiance as you type, but if you stop the page gradually darkens from white to red and the sound stops--prompting you to get back to writing. Stimulus mode is a gentler way of keeping you typing. Consequence mode is similar, only you don't have the background ambiance, and when you screen turns red, an alarm goes off until you start typing again. Kamikaze mode is the one with the most at stake--when you stop typing not only does the screen turn red but slowly letters start disappearing from what you've already typed--and continue to disappear until you start typing again, though the missing letters won't come back! 

The Most Dangerous Writing App: This site is way more intense! You don't just lose a couple letters little by little with this one--if you stop writing for more than a few seconds the entire portion of what you wrote is completely deleted. Ouch! Don't stop typing! 

Draft: This is actually a place where you can save documents as well, but I'm going to focus on writing in the Hemingway mode. There is no dangerous deleting of your words with this one...the only thing is once you start writing in the Hemingway mode the backspace bar...aka delete... is no longer functional until you finish. 


Not only do these apps/sites let you get rid of your inner critic as you write, you're forced to focus as well. ;)

Well that's all for now! Have a lovely day,
<3
Victoria

Last year I did an interview with Leo Nakano, my NaNoWriMo novel main character, and as it was really popular I decided to do it again this year with some of my main characters in a group-chat. :P 

I'm talking with the 3 most prominent main characters from the book Further Courage (We talked about it a little bit here folks!) It's a Revolutionary War Novel, set in Rural Massachusetts part time and the other half in Boston. 


Me: Hello you all! Why don't you introduce yourself? 
Melinda: My name is Melinda Hamilton, a full nineteen years old.  I'm the midwife's assistant in my small town of Kineworth. 
Kier: I'm Kier Malloy-- just your typical Irish slave with a crooked back. And I wouldn't know my age, so I won't bother with that. We'll just say I'm a young man.
Emmeline: Now, none of that sass, man. I'm Emmeline. They say I'm about twenty or twenty-one. I grew up in Kineshire as a slave. But not your Irish kind, please note. I'm black, though I'm more closely connected to England than Africa. More's the pity with this war going on, I think. 
Kier: We both work for Miss Whidden, the wealthiest woman in Kineshire.
Melinda: *groans* And absolute silliest. 
Me: * laughs * I've heard rumors stating it is so. Ok, let's go in a different direction now. What are your dreams? 
Kier: Slaves aren't allowed to dream. 
*awkward pause* 
Kier: haha, but who says I obey rules all the time? I love singing, poetry, and writing. If I lived in the time of the Celts I'd be a bard. But since I live the modern age of the 1770's I'm going to have to be content with making songs up in my head and singing them so loud and so often that nobody forgets them. Paper is costly, you know, I've never had more than one piece of it in my life for my own. 
Emmeline: Kier sings real pretty songs too, but Jasmine, the cook, has not quite forgiven him for discovering how to shatter glass with his voice. He broke all of Miss Whidden's crystal tumblers--although Miss Whidden still believes the vandal Patriots did it. 
Kier: *grins* I am a vandal Patriot. 
Melinda: You're not supposed to admit that, Mr. Malloy. 
Kier: Oh.
Emmeline: *ignoring them* If I could be anything I set my heart on, I'd marry and own my own house. Be the mistress. Hire girls to help me with the washing and cooking and dress in yellow with lace at the sleeves. 
Melinda: I should like to do something to help others--that's why I enjoy being a midwife. And ever since I was a small child I wanted to own a library room full of books, because I love reading. 
Me: That's wonderful. Now, for the last question, and this one is just for fun. What is the silliest or oddest thing you've ever done? 
Kier: Oh, that's easy. *chuckle* A year ago, when I first came here to the Whidden's house, Emmeline told me I couldn't be a spy for the Americans even if I tried--I was too obvious. Well after crushing my hopes and aspirations like that, I was determined to prove her wrong. So I stalked out the door intending to follow the first person I saw. It was, unfortunately, Pastor Laughlin, Melinda's brother in law, and I spent the next few hours stalking him and hiding in bushes. After coming out of the blacksmith's, though, he looked directly at me as I was pretending to inspect apples outside the general store and said, "Well, lad, I hope you're hungry--for the next stop is home and it's time for my supper. Susannah has baked a pie today." I was mortified. But, Melinda, your sister's pies are very delicious. 
Melinda: You went home with Laughlin? Shame! 
Kier: I did. What Irishman would decline food? Especially when offered by another Irishman. It was lovely talking, I can assure you. 
Emmeline: *laughing* And that is why Kier is not a spy. I do not tend towards silliness but one time Jasmine made this delicious looking cake. When I took it out to the dinner table though Miss Whidden just sniffed and said she thought she didn't want it after all and I was to throw it out. I was rather annoyed by this so for some strange reason I whispered, "Throw it, miss?" and then threw it across the room. She was very angry and slapped me, but the other girls and I ate so much cake while cleaning it up that it was quite worth it. The wallpaper still holds a faint stain from it, actually. 
Melinda: I have far too many moments like this to count, but most recently (last week in fact), my sister Priscilla said something about how my sister Meggy is always losing various personal articles, so I got this idea to hide everybody's right shoe or boot and see what happened. It is rather mad thinking back on it, but it seemed an excellent notion at the time, so I did it--all  the right shoes in my home disappeared and everybody was exceedingly cross the next day. In fact, it was such a bad joke that only Meggy laughed about it. 
Me: What adventures! Well, I guess that wraps it up for today. Thanks for chatting, everybody!
Melinda: Thank you in return. 
Emmeline: We enjoyed it. 
Kier: Good bye! *waves* 

Well that's all for today! Hope you enjoyed it! 
You all have a lovely day!
<3
Victoria