NINE days!!!!!!!

According to my countdown ticker, I have only nine days until the Storymakers Writers Conference. I am so excited!!!!! I am signed up for some awesome classes and can't wait to see my writer friends.

On another note, this is Post #275 I have 80 followers, and my birthday is just over a month away. Time to have some fun. I'll think of some awesome things and get back here. I have a signed book to give away and possibly some other awesome stuff.

I have so much to do in 9 days!!!!!!! AAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!

The Magic of Miracles

When you have been doing the writing, trying to be published thing for almost seven years, with no major successes, it gets a little discouraging. Every once and a while I get a subtle message that assures me that my writing is often inspired.

I did alot of research as I was writing Emergence. I scoured websites books and Google Earth among other things. I picked up a little tourist book about Japan and found in the Kyoto section, a picture of a Monk dressed just as I described him. I didn't know exactly what a monk would dress like but I thought I remembered something and went on that memory. Well it turns out I hit the nail on the head.

I know it was inspiration, there's no other way to explain it. Just realizing it makes it easier to keep going. I would be negligent if I didn't openly recognize it and voice my thanks.

what makes a bad boy?

So I am trying to start a new book since I am now shopping my polished MS.

I have found a road to travel down and a brand I am comfortable with using my name
on.

I have a few questions tho. I hope you will help me out here.

What is diferent between the true villan of the story and the bad boy
protagonist?

What makes the bad boy appealing?

what makes him a bad boy?

What behavior in the bad boy is acceptable and not acceptable?

I may have to draw a name from the comments for a bag of chocolate. :)

Learning about writing

I spent Saturday in Ephiram UT at a writers conference. While most of the classes were about what I allready know, I did learn something new. Besides, a side benifit of going to this conference was to hang out with my writerly friends.

I don't think there was anything wrong with the confrence, there were alot of teens and first timers and they were probably sucking so much of it in that their brains were about to explode. I've been there myself.

I'm far from the perfect writer and know I still have alot to learn. That is why in less than 30 days I'll be going to another conference in SLC this time and I am sure to be one of those beginner, head exploding people at this one.

If you are serious about writing, you need to go to things like this. Not only do you learn so much, you get to meet people and network. I've come home before and felt as if my brain had turned to mush and needed a few days to unload and reorganize everything i was taught.

Even if you went and just listened and had epithanies about your book it'd be worth it.

By the letters

Alot of my friends are doing an A-Z blogfest where each day of the month's post is based on one letter. While the idea is intriguing and their posts are great. I didn't have time to go through over 200 participants posts every day. I barely have time to get online with all this new baby demands. So using their idea, (shamelessly) I will do a little alphabet of my own and call it good unless I see the necessity to do more.

The writers ABC'S

A is for Aspire. So you want to be a writer, you have these great ideas and think they'd make a great book heck maybe even a movie. So you sit your butt in a chair and start writing. By page 50 you hate it and think its blather. A should be for ambition and application. Learn your craft. Realize every writer gets tired and sick of their writing were a huge bunch of chickens. The diference between a writer and a published author is the time spent working your BUTT off to not only finish the bloody manuscript, but to go back again X 10 and revise.

B is for Butt. Get a comfy chair a snack and a large glass of what ever you fancy and write. Don't get up to answer the phone, don't get on the internet, don't turn on the TV. Just write. The surprise success of so very few authors is an accident. Those that go on to be successful time and time again work. Writing is their career, their first or second job.

C is for Craft. Learn how to write. Learn how to edit. Learn how to revise. Learn how to critique and take critiques. Learn how to get a THICK skin. Then learn how to write synopsis' and querys and send it out.

D should be for Determination but I think you get the point all ready. D is for details and dialogue. Learn the ins and outs of both and apply them.

Last but definitely not least on this post.

E is for Enjoy. Learn to enjoy all the parts of being an author even revising and writing things like querys. I love editing, I know it sounds strange but I love making my work really sing. :)

Hope you enjoyed my little soapbox post here. Now its time for me to follow my own advice. I need to get my MS out and work.

KiTE by Bill Sears

Please note, while I was given a copy of this book to review it the opinions expressed are my own and not influenced by the gift of the book.

Today it is my turn to add my review to the blog tour of KiTE by Bill Sears.

Purchase link HERE

Authors website HERE

KiTE, by Bill Shears, is a science fiction novel set in Earth orbit. Mason Dash, operator of Kite, the flagship of Earth Orbit Maintenance Department’s debris sweeper fleet, suspects spacejackers on an abandoned space station may be using it as a platform for a terrorist attack on Earth targets. Sheila, his beautiful virtual companion, has been “enhanced” with an experimental free will module. Inside the computer system of Kite a digital uprising is under way. Sheila goes off on her own adventure and finds she’s forced to split her focus between Dash’s situation in the “real world” and an ambitious virtual tyrant who has also taken a fancy to her, and who wants to expand his empire beyond Kite. Meanwhile Dash finds the spacejackers are not what he suspected, maybe worse. And it’s just then that humankind’s first unearthly visitor appears in Earth orbit, who is none too pleased. Earth’s fate hangs in the balance.

I was intrigued as I read the promotional material about the book. Artifical Intelligence is something I write about myself and I was curious to see how others wrote about it. I am also a seasoned sci/fi reader and looked forward to reading about another adventure in space.

About ten pages into the book I paused and wondered if the writer was either trying to emulate Douglas Adams and Hitchhikers Guide or he was just heavily influenced by Adams writing style. Either way, it is pretty constant in the book. I don't blame him, (Douglas Adams is an awesome writer for those who like his style) I think the story would have been better told if Mr. Sears had developed his own voice.

While the story was unique and interesting, the execution lacked the profesionalism I am used to in published work. The manuscript needed a serious editing before being sent out to the masses. I also was very put off by the chauvanistic and abusive ideals of the male AI character in his regard to the females in his reach. I actually put the book down at that point and had a hard time picking it back up. This book would definately be rated PG 13 on my scale.

Critiques aside. The story was interesting. His science was well thought out and as someone who writes sci/fi I know that it is one of the hardest genres to write. You have to be smart to write science and technology. Mr. Sears knows his technology and his science. I also loved the MC Dash. I love his attitude and the deep characterization Mr. Sears gave this anti hero. Each of the characters is well drawn.

If you are wanting unique sci/fi, deep characterization and well executed science and technology, this is a book you might consider reading. However if grammar errors or abusive situations throw you out of a book then you'll probably want to pass on this one.