35 Day Blog Challenge - Day 11: Planning for Pantsers - scene setting

As pantsers we tend to write our stories chronologically. To be able to do this, we sit down and read what we wrote the previous day and then simply continue where we left off. This is a simple process when you write every day and keep the story and characters alive in your head while you are writing.

But what if you did not write yesterday? Or the day before? What if you had to work overtime for two weeks and was simply too exhausted to look at your story? How far do you go back to pick up the plot?

The major plot would probably stare you in the face during the last scene, but now the finer details of the sub-plots are gone from your memory. Do you start reading from the beginning, or is there some way to help you keep track?

If you need to read many pages every time your writing is interrupted, you will be frustrated because you are reading instead of what you want to do...write.

But there is help and it's not so complicated as you might think:

1. Use visual images to help you with the setting of your story. A Pinterest Board is an excellent tool to gather and pin landscapes or seascapes, or a city, or spaceship where your story is taking place. Even fantasy or imaginary graphics could help you. The world is filled with exceptional artists and pinning their work to your board could help you create the most interesting settings for your stories.
2. If you cannot find what you are looking for, make a drawing. It doesn't have to be a masterpiece, it is only an aid to keep your story straight. I did a drawing of the village of Akan for my Nations of Peace series so that I could remember the lay of the land. Where the forest was, the houses, the school of Magic and Knowledge, etc.
3. Another way is to sit down and describe the city, town, farm, asteroid or spaceship in as much detail as you can. The lights, the smells, the sounds, the odd green colour of the walls, etc. Describe each room. Or specific place (such as the barn) where your story could have a scene. You are not going to use so much detail in your story, but writing it all down helps to fix the setting(s) in your mind. By adding the details you can add depth to the story via the experiences your characters have in that environment.
4. All the points described here are especially helpful when writing a series where the characters or stories have the same setting in common.
5. It will also save you a lot of reading time to refresh your memory when you have not written for prolonged periods of time.

Keep all your notes, planning and preparation in the same place for quick referencing to save time. You can then focus on writing, instead of constantly backtracking to search for details about the setting.

See you tomorrow!

If you want to see what the other participants are blogging about, you can find their blogs here. Why not pop on over and leave a comment?

35 Day Blog Challenge - Day 10: 6 Easy SEO tips for bloggers

Linzé's Google Result

Search Engine Optimisation or SEO is the technique used for websites, and blogs, to be found by Google or any of the other search engines. While most people know about keywords, it is one of many algorithms used by the search engines to find your blog and list it on the results page if someone searched for something.

For authors the one thing that we want others to see is our books, isn't it? Whether the searcher types in the title you want yours to be listed first. Problem is that book titles are far from unique.

With almost two hundred thousand books being published every year (yep, it is that many and growing!) the probability of duplicated titles are getting higher and higher. So if you want to have a high ranking, you have to the be keyword. Sounds weird I know, but you are your brand and unless you are writing one book and one book only, the title is not going help you much. Unless you think of something completely new and catchy - which of course, I hope you do - your name is the only keyword that will help with search engines.

Here are some easy SEO tips for bloggers to get going:

1. Your blog has a theme. Make sure the majority of your posts are about this theme. I would say >90% of posts should be about the theme your chose for your blog.
2. Plan your post content and use the keyword a maximum of five times in a sentence that make sense to the reader. The shorter the post, the fewer the number of keyword sentences. In a post of 500 words, 5 times could work. In a short post of 300 words or less, don't use it more than 3 times. If you do more, it will only irritate your reader.
3. Use the keyword in the title of the post.
4. Use the keyword in the first paragraph of your post.
5. If you use a graphic image with the post, make sure to add its metatags too, since the web crawlers cannot see images, only recognise the text associated with it.
6. Don't use your name all over, use it to tag book covers. The images are just as important as the text on your blog.

Is there more to SEO for bloggers? Yes, there are many ways to help your blog to be visible and gain a high ranking in a search, but using keywords and metatags is an easy way to start and not technically challenging for even the most inexperienced blogger.

See you tomorrow for the first of my Follow Me posts - I am on my way to #ROSACon2015

If you want to see what the other participants are blogging about, you can find their blogs here. Why not pop on over and leave a comment?

35 Day Blog Challenge - Day 9: Planning for Pantsers - backstory

Photograph and cross stitching by Linzé

Planning for pantsers might sound like a contradiction in terms, and to some extent is it. However, without at least some planning the amount of editing that a pantser has to do, is exponentially more than that of a writer that plans her story in detail.

As a fiction pantser, and a non-fiction planner, I have learned that there is a way for a pantser to plan without going into details about the story. I am a pantser because I don't want to know how the story is going to end until I write...the end.

link to VISUAL TOOLS FOR PANTSERS

That still leaves a round or two of editing that the planner may not have to do, but it significantly cuts down the number of edits you have to do, if you plan at least some aspects of your story.

link to CHARACTER PLANNING FOR PANTSERS

Backstory is a tricky thing for pantsers and planners alike. This is especially important when you write a series of books, with either the same lead character or group of characters. You need to keep your story straight so to speak, or your readers will call you out for inconsistencies and boo-boos.

Each and every single writing course will tell you that backstory needs to be woven into the thread of the story. That means you don't start with 10,000 words explaining the main character's childhood abuse or bullying or sexual history in detail before the story starts.

You have to write the story and add a sentence here or a small paragraph there to fill the blanks. Like the thread that holds the tapestry in place for the stitches to be sewn into. In the back. You are aware that it is there, but you don't look at it, nor does it stand out to compete with the image.

Good backstory telling works the same way. Your reader will read it without noticing it. It is there; it provides necessary colour to the story, but it is NOT the story.

If you have this habit of writing 10,000 words before getting into the actual story, then do that, just remember to cut the words and save it another file for you to reference. Or leave it in your first draft, and cut it when you start editing. Just remember to draw those threads into the story when you cut the backstory text.

If you don't do this, then you need to write the backstory anyway. You need to have the history of your main character (at least) done before you write. What made him the man he is today? How did she get to the place/time where the story will start?

This is not a character sketch, but it is history and experiences that your character(s) have had to make them the way your define them in the character sketch.

See you tomorrow!

If you want to see what the other participants are blogging about, you can find their blogs here. Why not pop on over and leave a comment?

35 Day Blog Challenge - Day 8: Make it a good morning, and a great day

Earlier in the year I started reading The Artist's Way with the intention to follow the program this year. To my shame, I have to admit that I have not progressed further than Chapter 4. The one thing I did start, and am still doing is what the author calls morning pages.
While I have been keeping a diary since I was very young, the idea of morning pages struck me as a better approach and I have since converted to the practice.
For those of you not familiar with the term, morning pages is written first thing in the morning for about half an hour. It is a brain dump basically. Anything and everything that pops into your brain can be written down, there is no structure nor any other rules. The idea with morning pages is to get your brain cleared of all kinds of stuff so that you can then focus on being creative for the rest of the day.
Since I start work at 6am, I have no time to do this "first thing" in the morning. So I do that as soon as I get to the office. While I wish that I would have 30 minutes available, ten is about as far as I get.
But, 10 minutes is better than nothing, and I find that even that small pinch of time makes a difference. Not only does it help me get clarity on the issues inside my head, I have upon occasion gotten an idea for a story. That alone makes the effort worthwhile. And I get to write every day.
The one other pleasure I gain from the experience is writing by hand. And in long hand too!
If I have a little time, usually over the weekend, I will use a fountain pen or even a nibbed pen to pen my thoughts.
Morning Pages is journal writing at the next level, and that alone makes me grateful that I found The Artist's Way.

See you tomorrow!

If you want to see what the other participants are blogging about, you can find their blogs here. Why not pop on over and leave a comment?

35 Day Blog Challenge - Day 7: Review a book (part 1)

Photograph by Linzé

This is the first of three posts about book reviews. The second will be aimed specifically at reviewing erotica or erotic romance, so watch out for that if you need some guidance. The third will be about reviewing non-fiction.

I am a blog host for two websites, and every now and then I volunteer to read and review books for them. While my first choice of genre is romance, I also read and review mysteries.
So how do you review a book that you liked?
That is the easy one. But I have a request: please don't tell me the story...seriously! I really can read. Rehashing the synopsis or summarizing the story (without giving away the ending, of course) is really not helpful. That is why the author/publisher adds a summary/teaser to the book or website so people can see what the story is about.
What I want to know when I read a review, is what you liked about the characters, or the plot, or the story. Why should I also read this book? Is the hero hot and sexy, yet an interesting character to read about? Is his enemy a multidimensional character with his own issues, making you almost want to root for him instead? Is the story believable? Does the plot keep your attention to such an extent that you lost sleep in order to finish the book?
Do you like the way the author wrote the story? Can you smell the roses? Will you pay money to read another book from the same author?
The answers to these questions tell me what your experience was when you read the story, and that is what I want to know.

But how do you review a book that you wouldn't normally read? I am honest, I do not like reading out of my preferred genres, but sometimes someone asks and then I say I will do it.
Since I am a romance lover, happy endings are part of the definition of the genre. Now I read  a book where a happy ending is not a guarantee, and oftentimes it can be tragic. Okay, so I don't like the ending, now what? Do I shoot down the book? Of course not.
I don't give the ending away, but if I am not careful in writing my review, the tone of I might give my displeasure of it away and that would be unfair to the author.
So how do I tackle a review, of say a literary novel, where the ending may not have been to my liking? I do it the same way as a review of any other book.
The characters, the story and the writing. Just because I may not have liked the book, does not mean that the book has no merit and cannot be enjoyed by a number of people.
So instead of shooting it down outright, unless the writing is bad or the characters one dimensional, I will say what I did like. Even if you don't know the technical details of creative writing, you can still write a positive review.

See you tomorrow!

If you want to see what the other participants are blogging about, you can find their blogs here. Why not pop on over and leave a comment?

35 Day Blog Challenge - Day 6: Another Follow Me Tour

One thing that I love about blogging is that I can show you my country as I travel for work or pleasure. Or in this case a writers' conference. Yep, I am grinning like an idiot, as it will be my first local conference. Local as in the same country, but not the same province. I live in Pretoria in the Gauteng province and the conference is in Stellenbosch which is in the Western Cape province. For my non-South African friends - if you can find Cape Town on a map, you will see that Stellenbosch is not far away.
Since I am not much of a travel writer, I will beg your indulgence as I do my tour guide impersonation from 24 to 27 September. One thing I should mention in my favour is that I can take good photographs, so at least the pictures will be something to look at. And I should warn you, this is one of the most beautiful parts in my country, even if the region is famous for its wine making. Cheers!

"Stellenbosch fan Papagaaiberch grut" by Fmalan at en.wikipedia.

In the meantime I have to finish preparing my presentation. Yep, I will one of the speakers at the Romance writers Organisation of South Africa (ROSA) Conference. My talk will be on marketing for writers, and it will focus on the things a writer have to do to get started on marketing.
I will be talking about topics such as branding, blogging and social media. The contents of my presentation is an extract from Chapter 6 of my book, Indie Author: The Good, the Bad and the Hard Work.

PS: I will email a PDF of the presentation to my blog subscribers after the conference.

See you tomorrow!

If you want to see what the other participants are blogging about, you can find their blogs here. Why not pop on over and leave a comment?

35 Day Blog Challenge - Day 5: Suddenly the challenge is too much, or is it?

Linzé Brandon (photograph Francois A Venter)

Most writers work full-time to pay the bills and write after hours to indulge in their passion. I do the same. Only writing to me is not just a passion, it is an escape from the stressful hours I call work obligations.

I have often heard that people say they didn’t write or have stopped writing because real life interfered. And I think, seriously? If your writing is not part of real life, then what is it a part of? A fantasy? A dream? Of course, bad things happen, and it happens to everyone.

Think about it. If you or you child gets sick, you get time off from work. If someone close to you passes away, you are allowed time off. My employer allows me time to take care of myself or other issues, but then I get back to work. Right? The question I then ask myself, why should I stop writing if something happens? Is there not anything more to writing than spinning tales in book format?

Unlike my job, I find that writing can be therapeutic and healing. It doesn’t have to be the next book in my fantasy series that I write; it can be my journal. Sometimes it is only my journal and nothing else for days. The need to write has become such a part of me, that even when ‘real life’ happens, I have to write about it. Yes, I share my pain with people I love, but it is not the same as pouring out everything onto paper.

Paper never gets impatient with me. It never tries to ‘help’ where help is often not what I need. Sometimes people understand, sometimes they don’t. But in writing I can let go in a way I cannot do with another person. Perhaps that is just me, or perhaps you are the same, but it works for me. Writing is my ‘real life’ and the longer I do it, the more it becomes part of the way I define myself.

See you tomorrow!

If you want to see what the other participants are blogging about, you can find their blogs here. Why not pop on over and leave a comment?