It's time for me to prepare to get my life in order, yeah I have to prepare for this, you know - mentally. There's a lot I want to do with my life and most of what I want to do requires me to start doing it now. As you may know if you've checked out my twitter, I consider myself much the writer type. I follow a lot of authors I respect and admire and have even had the honour of a few of them tweeting me personally - you have no idea how excited I was when N. K. Jemisin tweeted me! Google her. That'll be it for the name dropping... Anyway, I know that no one gets anywhere in the publishing industry without putting in the work - it's not about who you know (although it helps), it's about what you do, say and write.
So it's time for me to really start writing - up until now I've been writing disjointed irrelevant notes, tatty pieces of partial plots that mean nothing to no one - nice double negative there if I do say so myself! With all of that in mind, I have decided to set myself daily and weekly writing tasks. Starting from tomorrow, I aim to write at least two hundred words a day based around a particular theme, event or genre. The subject will change each week and so hopefully every seven days I will produce one short but cohesive piece of work that can be added to my - currently empty - personal writing portfolio.
I will post each piece of work here and at my writers forum for critique. I expect it to sting a little at first, but that is the point, if I am ever to improve, I have to know where I am going wrong. I want to start writing my main novel series by the time I hit twenty and it just wouldn't be possible with the level of skill I have - or lack - right now. Not putting myself down, just being realistic; I think it's good to acknowledge that we can and should improve ourselves in any area we feel personally lacking. I am going to appeal to my friends and twitter followers for theme ideas for this week - feel free to leave a comment if you have any ideas for this or any future themes! Thanks for reading!
I think you should write about the story of a young girl, living in Thailand who accidentally gets pregnant by her yoga instructor and has to figure out what she wants to do next, leave the poor, defenceless child in the Novice Monk school for young boys or to travel back to her home country of Ukraine with the small bundle of hatred....
ReplyDeleteI really like that idea - stranger I have never spoken to before ;) I actually do like it, maybe writing about that kind of event could turn out quite interesting. We'll see :P
ReplyDeleteI think you should write about a piece of jewellery which is mis-placed! Perhaps a necklace or even a ring that has some unforgiving power when placed in the hands of its master. The miscellaneous piece of jewellery is found, and is given to an under dog type of character to take for destruction. It would be a tale of camaraderie and woe, testing friendships and character. Maybe a three part epic...
ReplyDeleteThat would make a good book ;)
Since I didn't comment last time I dropped b your blog, I thought I'd better comment this time.
ReplyDeleteJacob, I think you should write about something that worries you and keeps you up at night, something that makes you angry. Find a way to explore the event using a point of view character that reveals why it makes you angry.
Rowena, waving madly!
Thanks Rowena, I think that's a really great idea - now I just need to think about what really makes me angry ;)
ReplyDeleteIf something moves you strongly, then writing about it will be a powerful way to explore it. Using a character who has been affected by the event gies you a chance to explore how it affects them.
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