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Weekly Recap – March 29th, 2013

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Hello friends,

I’ve tried not to beat anyone’s head over this, but Sunday is the final day for voting in LitReactor’s Teleport Us contest. Higher Minds could use your love!

I do apologize that you need to register an account in order to vote, but if you’re willing, I would be in your debt.

Thanks to those that have already done so. Your support means a lot.

Writing-wise, it was a decent week. I finished up another entry in my Techniques of the Selling Writer series, which I hope you’ve found useful. This last piece was surprisingly easy for me to put together. They won’t all be like that, but I think I’m getting better at this writing thing. I attribute my improved efficiency to focused practice, every single day“Practice makes perfect” doesn’t seem like such an empty phrase anymore.

I also had a lot of fun putting together my first “Life in Skyrim” sketch. This will likely be a regular series. As a gamer, I made a conscious agreement with myself a few weeks ago: If I’m going to spend some of my decompression time playing these games, I should at least find a way to incorporate it in my writing. The graphics in Skyrim are just so inspiring and the setting is rich for storytelling, so it seemed like a healthy marriage.

Outside of those two blog items, I’ve been plugging away on a new short story. It was inspired by single phrase I overhead while my wife was watching television. It’s funny how inspiration just strikes from the void. I don’t want to spoil anything right now, but I will share more after the concept has been fleshed out and the story has been prepped for submission.

Don’t worry (Stan), I haven’t forgotten my novel! A large stack of research books made their way into my house this week, and that’s only half of them. I’ll post a picture next week. I want to make sure this book comes alive in setting and detail while avoiding clumsy mistakes. Thumbing through one, I’ve already noted a few ideas

On the reading front, I finished my first pass of Outlining Your Novel by K.M. Weiland. It’s full of sage advice, not just from Weiland, but also other authors (there are interviews at the end of each chapter). I particularly enjoyed this Brandon Sanderson quote that opens one of her chapters:

“I’ve found that people who outline a lot spend more time up front planning. People who discover their story by writing it spend more time at the end revising. It tends to even out.”

That’s a good reminder that there’s no “one right way” to write a book. It depends on the story and it depends on the person.

Have a great weekend, and for those who celebrate, a wonderful Easter.

-Phillip


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