Creative Differences is a collaborative blog but I'm really starting to call it my own. Finding prompts that aren't childish is sometimes difficult but I'm having a blast with it. I hope Steven is as well. Have you visited CD yet? You should go now, check it out, and leave some love!
Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS
Showing posts with label Booksteve. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Booksteve. Show all posts
Monday, March 18, 2013
Monday, March 11, 2013
More from CD
We've found some pretty awesome "quote-ables" over at Creative Differences this past week. Check the blog to see what I mean. Get in on the action by writing your own response to the prompts this week. I might choose a favorite and give a shout out here on Dee Declares...!
Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS
Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS
Monday, March 04, 2013
New Posts on CD
Creative Differences has 40-something posts to date and that number will continue to grow each week. I hope you'll take the time to go visit the blog, show Steven some love, and maybe even get in on the action yourself! If you find a writing prompt that grabs your attention but in a way different from Steven's response, feel free to write your own response to the prompt in the comments. We both love connecting with other creative types and welcome the interaction. :)
Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS
Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS
Monday, February 25, 2013
Creative Differences
Are you running out of things to read on the internet? Have no fear, Creative Differences is here! The blog is part of the baker's dozen blogs from Booksteve aka my friend and editor extraordinaire Steven. I have a few posts there myself, including that Firefly fanfic that was short story RED DOTS from a few months back and the 1st chapter of my children's story THE CLOUD WALL. Check Creative Differences for my writing prompts (found on Writer's Digest, Tumblr, various other websites, writing prompt books, and my imagination) and Steven's responses. He never fails to amaze me with what he has managed to write. Steven also posts some of his creative writing from childhood (with pictures!). Steven tries to post something nearly every day and I try to send him a writing prompt daily, though I do tend to forget frequently and he has to remind me semi-often. We already have more than a dozen prompts and responses spread over 30+ posts. If you want something new to read, go to the blog!
Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS
Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS
Friday, April 06, 2012
Friday Five: 5 Questions with Steven part 2
...about blogging.
It is Friday, Friday, Friday. Gotta get dow-... Okay, I'll stop, that was pretty lame, I know. But, Friday is a wonderful day, rain or shine. Today's Friday Five continues my 5 Questions series with the second installment of questions with editor and blogger Steven Thompson. Steven runs 12 very popular comic/pop culture blogs and writes a regular column on a 13th. He has been recognized around the world due to his blogs. Check out Booksteve's Library here and find the links to his multiple blogs!
Q: When did you start blogging?
A: I had enjoyed reading blogs for a few years. Kate Worley, a comics writer who had befriended my wife an I back in 1990, died in 2004. I was searching for information on her passing and found a blog by Reed Waller, her ex-partner both in life and in comics. Although they had long since broken up, Waller wrote eloquently of his friend and I thought, "I wish I had a forum like this." Then I realized how easy it was to get just such a thing.
Q: Why do you blog?
A: All I've ever really wanted to be was a writer. My wife has always said that, with all my arcane knowledge of trivia and minutiae, I should be a teacher. I decided that blogging was the best way I could write and at the same time teach people about some of the weird things I've enjoyed over the years.
Q: Why do you have so many different blogs instead of putting it all together in a single location?
A: Well, my first try at a blog didn't take. It was aimless and abandoned after only 3-4 posts. Eventually I deleted it entirely and figured I was through with blogging.Then I came up with the idea for a new blog centered on sharing books, movies, etc from my own personal library. It slowly became quite successful and was my only blog for the first three years. Then I found myself a victim of the economy, depressed and with time on my hands. So I started a second blog specifically aimed at a different audience. In time, some ideas hit me that just wouldn't fit in on my regular, all-purpose blog--my high school journal for example--so I gave them each their own blogs! I currently have 12 (and write a more-or-less daily column for another) but there have also been four more that I created, abandoned and eventually deleted along the way.
Also, it doesn't hurt that more blogs, appealing to somewhat different readers, tends to elicit more ad-clicks and thus more money for me.
Q: Do you have a few favorite blogs of your own or others you'd like to share?
It is Friday, Friday, Friday. Gotta get dow-... Okay, I'll stop, that was pretty lame, I know. But, Friday is a wonderful day, rain or shine. Today's Friday Five continues my 5 Questions series with the second installment of questions with editor and blogger Steven Thompson. Steven runs 12 very popular comic/pop culture blogs and writes a regular column on a 13th. He has been recognized around the world due to his blogs. Check out Booksteve's Library here and find the links to his multiple blogs!
Q: When did you start blogging?
A: I had enjoyed reading blogs for a few years. Kate Worley, a comics writer who had befriended my wife an I back in 1990, died in 2004. I was searching for information on her passing and found a blog by Reed Waller, her ex-partner both in life and in comics. Although they had long since broken up, Waller wrote eloquently of his friend and I thought, "I wish I had a forum like this." Then I realized how easy it was to get just such a thing.
Q: Why do you blog?
A: All I've ever really wanted to be was a writer. My wife has always said that, with all my arcane knowledge of trivia and minutiae, I should be a teacher. I decided that blogging was the best way I could write and at the same time teach people about some of the weird things I've enjoyed over the years.
Q: Why do you have so many different blogs instead of putting it all together in a single location?
A: Well, my first try at a blog didn't take. It was aimless and abandoned after only 3-4 posts. Eventually I deleted it entirely and figured I was through with blogging.Then I came up with the idea for a new blog centered on sharing books, movies, etc from my own personal library. It slowly became quite successful and was my only blog for the first three years. Then I found myself a victim of the economy, depressed and with time on my hands. So I started a second blog specifically aimed at a different audience. In time, some ideas hit me that just wouldn't fit in on my regular, all-purpose blog--my high school journal for example--so I gave them each their own blogs! I currently have 12 (and write a more-or-less daily column for another) but there have also been four more that I created, abandoned and eventually deleted along the way.
Also, it doesn't hurt that more blogs, appealing to somewhat different readers, tends to elicit more ad-clicks and thus more money for me.
Q: Do you have a few favorite blogs of your own or others you'd like to share?
A: Oh, I have scores of them. Other than yours [You are so freaking sweet!] , a few of my favorites:
http://martingrams.blogspot.com/
http://www.bionicdisco.com/
http://www.newsfromme.com/
http://my-retrospace.blogspot.com/
Q: What advice do you have for a newbie blogger or someone that is thinking about starting a blog?
A: It's the simplest thing in the world nowadays, even more so than when I started blogging six years back. Everyone has a voice and blogging is a unique and simple way to get yours heard. Blog about politics, family, life, death, books, movies, dental work, Lindsay Lohan, Justin Bieber [please no], the history of the telephone, how to bake lasagna. There is quiet literally no limit to the subjects you can choose. Maybe only two people will read your posts but on the other hand, there could be thousands. But you aren't writing for them anyway. You're writing for yourself. Now, go. BLOG! [Yes sir!]
Have any other questions for Steven about blogging? Post them in the comments section and I will forward them to him. Or, since he is over here pretty often, maybe he'll answer them himself! It is always nice to hear it straight from the source rather than a 3rd party don't you think?
http://martingrams.blogspot.com/
http://www.bionicdisco.com/
http://www.newsfromme.com/
http://my-retrospace.blogspot.com/
Q: What advice do you have for a newbie blogger or someone that is thinking about starting a blog?
A: It's the simplest thing in the world nowadays, even more so than when I started blogging six years back. Everyone has a voice and blogging is a unique and simple way to get yours heard. Blog about politics, family, life, death, books, movies, dental work, Lindsay Lohan, Justin Bieber [please no], the history of the telephone, how to bake lasagna. There is quiet literally no limit to the subjects you can choose. Maybe only two people will read your posts but on the other hand, there could be thousands. But you aren't writing for them anyway. You're writing for yourself. Now, go. BLOG! [Yes sir!]
Have any other questions for Steven about blogging? Post them in the comments section and I will forward them to him. Or, since he is over here pretty often, maybe he'll answer them himself! It is always nice to hear it straight from the source rather than a 3rd party don't you think?
Friday, March 30, 2012
Friday Five: 5 Questions with Steven
...about editing.
The next few weeks of Friday Fives are going to consist of mini-interviews with my friends and extended family of people within my industry. I am hoping for a variety of interview subjects. Since my group of friends/family is somewhat small, expect some people to reappear within the Friday Fives speaking about different subjects. This should be a quick interesting glimpse into the realm of all-things-writing.
My questions are in bold font to make it easier to see. Answers follow the bold A: and my comments follow in red brackets.
My friend and fantastic editor Steven Thompson agreed to be the first Friday Five subject.
Q: How do you approach a project?
A: First, I avoid approaching it at all for as long as possible. [lol] Then. once I make the decision to do so, I jump in wholeheartedly and just get right to work.
Q: What kind of enjoyment do you get out of editing?
A: Honestly, I'm not some great expert on the right way to do things and I know that. But I do tend to recognize the WRONG way when I see it and it makes me feel good being able to steer someone away from that at least.
Q: What advice do you have for your writers that would make your job easier?
A: It's not the writers' job to make my job easier. It's the writers' job to be creative and that's all I ask of them. My job is to take that rampant creativity and clean up after it.
Q: What is the most difficult thing to deal with as an editor?
A: The writer…present company excepted. [D'awww. Thank you!]
Q: In your opinion, do/should all writers make good editors?
A: Well, there's no need for it, I suppose…but I think it's inevitable in most cases. A writer is rarely the best editor for their own work but I think the simple process of writing itself makes one acutely sensitive to mistakes in grammar, spelling, continuity and other issues, in essence making them a good editor whether or not they realize it. [I think that goes along with a writer should always take the opportunity to read anything they can get their hands on, especially works outside of their genre. We learn just as much by observing the mistakes of others as we do by making the mistakes ourselves.]
Have any questions for Steven about editing? Post them in the comments section below and I'll try to badger him into answering them when he gets some free time to do so!
Stay tuned for next week's Friday Five when Steven talks about blogging. And yes, he is qualified to talk about blogging since he runs/writes a baker's dozen.
The next few weeks of Friday Fives are going to consist of mini-interviews with my friends and extended family of people within my industry. I am hoping for a variety of interview subjects. Since my group of friends/family is somewhat small, expect some people to reappear within the Friday Fives speaking about different subjects. This should be a quick interesting glimpse into the realm of all-things-writing.
My questions are in bold font to make it easier to see. Answers follow the bold A: and my comments follow in red brackets.
My friend and fantastic editor Steven Thompson agreed to be the first Friday Five subject.
Q: How do you approach a project?
A: First, I avoid approaching it at all for as long as possible. [lol] Then. once I make the decision to do so, I jump in wholeheartedly and just get right to work.
Q: What kind of enjoyment do you get out of editing?
A: Honestly, I'm not some great expert on the right way to do things and I know that. But I do tend to recognize the WRONG way when I see it and it makes me feel good being able to steer someone away from that at least.
Q: What advice do you have for your writers that would make your job easier?
A: It's not the writers' job to make my job easier. It's the writers' job to be creative and that's all I ask of them. My job is to take that rampant creativity and clean up after it.
Q: What is the most difficult thing to deal with as an editor?
A: The writer…present company excepted. [D'awww. Thank you!]
Q: In your opinion, do/should all writers make good editors?
A: Well, there's no need for it, I suppose…but I think it's inevitable in most cases. A writer is rarely the best editor for their own work but I think the simple process of writing itself makes one acutely sensitive to mistakes in grammar, spelling, continuity and other issues, in essence making them a good editor whether or not they realize it. [I think that goes along with a writer should always take the opportunity to read anything they can get their hands on, especially works outside of their genre. We learn just as much by observing the mistakes of others as we do by making the mistakes ourselves.]
Have any questions for Steven about editing? Post them in the comments section below and I'll try to badger him into answering them when he gets some free time to do so!
Stay tuned for next week's Friday Five when Steven talks about blogging. And yes, he is qualified to talk about blogging since he runs/writes a baker's dozen.
Saturday, March 03, 2012
Immo1 Update
I am very happy to announce that my first novel, Journey of Shadows, the first book in The Immortalis Trilogy, is finished. At least, my transcription is finished. If you recall, I printed my last draft out (draft #8 I think) and edited it by hand. I retyped the entire file since I made so many changes. The paper was a sea of red ink. In the middle of my transcription... or well, probably 1/3 of the way through more likely, my computer crashed. It took several agonizingly long weeks for me to get my files back. Anyways, I finished the transcription and it is now in the very capable hands of my editor, Steven. He has a lot of work to do, as I am notoriously impatient and tend to miss a lot of suffixes and/or make up words.
We are all very excited about the upcoming release of my novel, affectionately called Immo1 if you have read any other posts about it. A little background on Immo1... Immo1 started as a single line of thought while I lounged in the bathtub in September, 2009. That single line became a very rough story beginning. It was headed to my unfinished story pile when I shared it with Steven later that month. With his encouragement, I developed it a little more and it became the first draft of my prologue. That November, I finally did what I had said for years I wanted to do: I wrote a novel for National Novel Writing Month using the prologue as a stepping stone.
Since November 2009, Immo1 has undergone an incredible transformation through the love and dedication of Steven, his wife Rene, and my beta readers Raven and Philip. I fit in there somewhere but seriously, I know I would never have finished it without any of them. They all hate when I try to give them credit for Immo1 but it really didn't come alive to me until they read the early drafts and encouraged me to keep working on it. The best part was none of them gushed about how amazing it was and how it would win a Hugo some day. Okay, well, maybe Steven did... but he is biased. They gave real feedback: constructive criticism, suggestions, research information, etc. So they really are a huge part of this.
Since then, I have been fortunate enough to find an amazing artist to do the cover for Journey of Shadows and I was astonished with this man's professionalism and artistic vision. Alberto Ramirez Jr. is an incredibly talented man with a fantastic ability to take a text description and make it come alive in art. Here is the finished cover:
To me, it reminds me of the original Nancy Drew covers. I freaking love it. It is 100% what I envisioned when I told him "a Wizard of Oz-type dog with a human shadow sitting by a fire in the woods" and then some. Alberto is a professional and he takes pride in his work. I can only hope my novel is good enough to be represented by such an amazing piece of art.
Stay tuned to find out the exact date of release for Journey of Shadows. It is coming very soon! Yay! for a March release... quite a birthday present for me indeed. What do you think of the cover?!
We are all very excited about the upcoming release of my novel, affectionately called Immo1 if you have read any other posts about it. A little background on Immo1... Immo1 started as a single line of thought while I lounged in the bathtub in September, 2009. That single line became a very rough story beginning. It was headed to my unfinished story pile when I shared it with Steven later that month. With his encouragement, I developed it a little more and it became the first draft of my prologue. That November, I finally did what I had said for years I wanted to do: I wrote a novel for National Novel Writing Month using the prologue as a stepping stone.
Since November 2009, Immo1 has undergone an incredible transformation through the love and dedication of Steven, his wife Rene, and my beta readers Raven and Philip. I fit in there somewhere but seriously, I know I would never have finished it without any of them. They all hate when I try to give them credit for Immo1 but it really didn't come alive to me until they read the early drafts and encouraged me to keep working on it. The best part was none of them gushed about how amazing it was and how it would win a Hugo some day. Okay, well, maybe Steven did... but he is biased. They gave real feedback: constructive criticism, suggestions, research information, etc. So they really are a huge part of this.
Since then, I have been fortunate enough to find an amazing artist to do the cover for Journey of Shadows and I was astonished with this man's professionalism and artistic vision. Alberto Ramirez Jr. is an incredibly talented man with a fantastic ability to take a text description and make it come alive in art. Here is the finished cover:
To me, it reminds me of the original Nancy Drew covers. I freaking love it. It is 100% what I envisioned when I told him "a Wizard of Oz-type dog with a human shadow sitting by a fire in the woods" and then some. Alberto is a professional and he takes pride in his work. I can only hope my novel is good enough to be represented by such an amazing piece of art.
Stay tuned to find out the exact date of release for Journey of Shadows. It is coming very soon! Yay! for a March release... quite a birthday present for me indeed. What do you think of the cover?!
Friday, July 22, 2011
RIP Borders
I considered writing a statement about the looming closure of Borders, but my friend wrote a eulogy that is so sad, funny, and full of history that I'd rather share his instead. Booksteve spent years working for the chain under several names, logos, and positions. His insight into what would eventually lead to the demise of this chain is undeniable in a literary world. Check Booksteve's blog/eulogy here.
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