“Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.” Stephen King
Tag: inspiration to write
Good Writing, a Tip from E.L. Doctorow
Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader–not the fact that it is raining, but the feelings of being rained upon. ~E.L. Doctorow
January 2016 Inspiration to Write from William Wordsworth
“Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.” ~ William Wordsworth
Scared to Write Your Book? Let Your Fears Be Your Guides to Success
Afraid of writing your book because…? Go ahead and jot down a list of your worst fears. Scared of dying? Scared of failing? Scared of finding out you can’t write your way out of a paper bag? (Who needs to do that, anyway?) Scared of hurting others with your words? Scared of contaminating the world with darkness? Scared you’ll find out you’re a monster? Scared you’re just too scared to do anything? Fears. We all have them. You can’t put them in a bottle and cork it. You can’t reason with them. But you can shift your relationship to your …
#NaNoWriMo2015–Get to the Heart of Your Story (writing tip #18)
Seven inspiring quotes from the masters: #1) “Writing is easy. All you have to do is cross out the wrong words.” Mark Twain#2) “The first draft of anything is shit.” Earnest Hemingway#3) “Literature–creative literature–unconcerned with sex, is inconceivable.” Gertrude Stein#4) “James Joyce was a synthesizer, trying to bring in as much as he could. I am an analyzer, trying to leave out as much as I can.” Samuel Beckett#5) “Do you realize that all great literature is all about what a bummer it is to be a human being? Isn’t it such a relief to have somebody say that?” Kurt …
#NaNoWriMo2015–Get to the Heart of Your Story (writing tip #15)
If you are participating in NaNoWriMo, you are halfway through your month and you might be wondering if you’re going to make it all the way through your draft by November 30th. If you’re flagging, take a deep breath (and perhaps a nap) and give yourself the credit you deserve: you’ve taken on a big challenge and that’s a victory all its own! Did you take a selfie on Day #1? If yes, look it over, put it away, and take another selfie now, on Day #15. If you didn’t take an actual photo, picture what you looked like two …
#NaNoWriMo2015–Get to the Heart of Your Story (writing tip #9)
It’s the ninth day of NaNoWriMo2015 and by now you may be seated at your desk staring at your pages, feeling ecstatic! Or, alternately, you might be hiding beneath your desk in the depths of despair. It’s possible you even feel a bit of both. One of the keys to enjoying a long and productive writing life is to find that balance-point between both ends of the the teeter totter–ends occupied by “brilliant” and “blecchhh”. If you don’t, you will remain at the mercy of those two, leaving you exposed to manic highs and depressive lows. Not so fun. Chances …
BORN WITH A RUSTY SPOON
Colorado watercolor artist Bertie Stroup Marah contacted me awhile back, in search of coaching and editorial support. She had a story to tell, a book she needed to write, and she was in a hurry. Some of her family members were in failing health and this book would tell the rollicking, heartfelt and heart-wrenching story of a family growing up dirt poor and hard-scrabble in southern New Mexico. Bertie finished her book and it is now beautifully illustrated with her paintings and drawings and published by Plain View Press. Her signings at chain stores and independents are attracting crowds and …
Raise Your Voice to Break the Silence
When states in America raise the cry to censor ethnic studies, I shiver and pray that people everywhere raise their voices to louder decibels in protest. We don’t have to look far to find chilling examples of the evils of censorship. The excerpt below comes from Azar Nafisi’s eloquent book, READING LOLITA IN TEHRAN: “Our class was shaped within this context, in an attempt to escape the gaze of the blind censor for a few hours each week. There, in that living room, we rediscovered that we were also living, breathing human beings; and no matter how repressive the state …
Frosty Molecules of Story
“A shimmering Image is a memory that rises in your consciousness like a photograph pulsing with meaning…” Lisa Dale Norton, Shimmering Images, A Handy Little Guide to Writing Memoir Photo credit: Danny Lehman