Don’t worry about a story that you haven’t finished. It’s okay to let it ‘rest’. There have been times when I have had three books waiting for me to finish. Just the other day I pulled up my GAN (great American novel) and realized that it had been ‘resting’ for over a year. Life and other stories had gotten in the way.
The good news is that it’s only about 50-75 pages from being a completed first draft. And, I am looking at it with fresh eyes. What a difference that makes. It’s almost like reading someone else’s work and I am revitalized and eager now to complete it and begin rewrites.
BTW, I am calling Song of the Yukon my great American novel, not out of ego but very much with tongue in cheek. Rather it is my largest effort today and took the most research, blood and sweat. As of this writing it is finished (with countless rewrites and edits) and published.
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“Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, and thought and speculation at a standstill. I think that there is nothing, not even crime, more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, ay, to life itself than this incessant business.” Henry David Thoreau
“It is a funny thing about life; if you refuse to accept anything but the best, you very often get it.” W. Somerset Maugham
“Ignorance is the night of the mind, but a night without moon and star.” Confucius
“Writing isn’t a calling, it’s a doing.” T. Sugarek
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Watch for more interviews with authors. November: Horror writer, Kevin J. Kennedy, December: Marc Cameron, writing for TOM CLANCY
Writers! Jump-start your day with more Monday Motivations!
Oh, so you think you will write all day, and beautiful things will happen? Think again, grasshopper. If you’re a one-person band like myself and most other indie authors, you will have to wear an editor, publicist, marketing, and publishing hat, to name a few.
It takes hard work and then some more hard work. But here’s the payoff: After eight years…yep..you heard me right…of consistent weekly blogging with relevant content, supporting other writers, and interviewing authors so much more famous than I am (well, I’m not famous at all) my posts are on page ONE of Google search, and my books are selling. This year a traditional publisher picked up my true crime series of books. Don’t misunderstand; when you get a publisher, DO NOT stop publishing your indie books. And most important of all: KEEP WRITING!
“If only life could be a little more tender and art a little more robust.” Alan Rickman, actor
“Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. Comes into us at midnight very clean. It’s perfect when it arrives and puts itself in our hands. It hopes we’ve learned something from yesterday.” John Wayne
“Writing isn’t a calling; it’s a doing.” T. Sugarek
‘As a writer, I marinate, speculate, and hibernate.’ Trisha Sugarek
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Want to see all of these (45) in one book? Click here.
He was, in my opinion, the greatest American fiction writer of the last half of the 20th century. Fortunately for his book sales, most think of him as the archetypal drunk, misanthropic male pig. Whatever else he was, he was also the archetypal writer, a force of nature who knew exactly what to do to a blank page.
Bukowski attributed so much weight to the single line that it eclipsed the writing philosophy of writing. If the single line was magnificent, the rest would take care of itself. In a 60,000 word novel, the working focus was on the single line. In the sex stories he wrote and sold to skin mags for money, the working focus was on the single line. In a small, immortal poem that 50 people might read, his working focus was on the single line.
Do you possess this kind of love for your words?Well? Do you? Possess this kind of love and respect for your work? Do you respect your craft enough to narrow your focus to the attention of a single line? It’s not easy. It’s not fast. “But this must certainly be a path to immortal (and powerfully influential) writing. If you can stomach it.” Robert Bruce when writing about Henry Charles Bukowski, Jr.
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I’ve encouraged to re-write and delete and edit so much in my blogging you probably want to take a
‘delete’ key to me! BUT! It’s what makes a so-so writer into a good or great one.
Experienced writers know this and value the rewrite more than anything. That’s really when the magic happens.
In a recent interview here with Jo-Ann Mapson, she said, “I love rewriting. Just thank God for it every single day, because that is where good writing pokes its head up.”
A word to you aspiring writers: I’ve been there, believe me, when I was terrified to delete a single word.
Not that I was certain that everything I uttered was ‘gold’…..far from it….no, terrified that I had nothing betterto replace it with. Now that I have found my ‘process’ I understand how I work. I write it in my head for days, then, when the moment comes I type (thank God for my Admin skills of 75 wpm in a previous life). Once the story is laid down, I begin the re-writing, editing, adding, deleting.
Re-writing and deleting: some of my best work has been born in the re-write. Some of my worst work has been deleted. Get it?
The Delete key: I know, I know, I’m a tired old record. But it can’t be said enough. Get to know and love your delete key. Every word you write isn’t going to be ‘golden’. Before you push your child (story) out into traffic (the world) you are the only critic and editor in the room. Be certain that you critique yourself; keep polishing, keep editing.
I’m of the school of writers that believes my work is never finished; I could and have found something to re-write in everything I have published. It’s a demon I have to live with.
The mocking bird had been following the cat all summer mocking, mocking, mocking
Teasing and cocksure; the cat crawled under rockers on porches tail flashing and said something angry to the mocking bird which I didn’t understand
Yesterday the cat walked calmly up the driveway with the mocking bird alive in its mouth wings fanned, wings fanned and flopping feathers parted like a woman’s legs and the bird was no longer mocking… (from his book of poetry: The Pleasures of the Damned)
Reprised from post 3/2013 writeratplay.com
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Watch for more interviews with authors. October: Simon Gervais for ROBERT LUDLUM, November: Horror writer, Kevin J. Kennedy, December: Marc Cameron, writing for TOM CLANCY
Q. Where/when do you first discover your characters?
DA. I need to know my characters before I start writing. I start by working out who they are and what their internal issues are, i.e. what is their wound? What needs to happen in the novel for that wound to be overcome or healed. I then spend time finding pictures of my characters on Google and adding in details like eye colour, hair colour, age, upbringing. While I discover my characters as I write, I need a fair amount of detail before I get started so they can become real in my mind. Sometimes news stories, novels or movies will help to inspire a character, especially if I admire or identify with particular personality traits.
Q. What first inspired you to write?
DA. I was a huge reader when I was younger and started writing books when I was around twelve. I don’t know what originally inspired me, but I was good at writing and enjoyed escaping into stories and creating my own worlds.
Q. What comes first to you? The Characters or the Situation?
DA. For me characters usually come first.
Q. Do you ‘get lost’ in your writing?
DA. When things are going well, I get completely lost. I often feel like the words are coming out of my fingers rather than my brain – that’s when my subconscious takes over and almost writes for me. I love those moments but it’s not always like that!
Q. Are you working on something now or have a new release coming up? If so tell us about it.
DA. I’m working on my summer book for 2023 at the moment and I’m about 30K words in so I’ve a way to go yet. Recently my 2022 summer novel The Little Cornish House was published and my first novel Summer at the Castle Café was published by Sphere into paperback. My pitch for The Little Cornish House is it’s The Great Pottery Thrown Down meets The Murder Club (only without any murders).
Thirty-year-old Ruby’s life is safe and predictable: no dramas, no complications, no men. And that’s just the way she likes it – there’s no way she wants to get her heart broken again. But her whole life is turned upside down when her grandmother calls to say she’s in danger of losing her beloved little Cornish House by the sea. She needs Ruby to come back to Cornwall and save the day…You’ll find everything in this summer romance – from a gorgeous hero and heroine, to a whole host of quirky characters, pottery, cake and real ale-
not to mention a mystery, twists, turns and romances crossing the generations.
Q. When did you begin to write seriously?
DA. In 2017 I was awarded the Katie Fforde Bursary. This was a huge honour, not only to be selected as one of Katie’s promising writers, but also because all of the authors up until that point had gained a publishing deal within a couple of years. I’d been writing on top of my day job for a few years by then, but having Katie’s endorsement, and knowing I didn’t want to let her down, I went down to four days a week at work and decided to treat my writing more like a proper day job. In 2018 I was offered my first publishing contract. I think I had to make the ‘decision’ to take
getting published seriously before this would happen.
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Join us next week for the conclusion of our Interview with Donna Ashcroft
Did you miss part 1 of our chat with Donna?
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Coming soon! August: Jay Hartlove
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As a playwright you better find some conflict in your story. Little Women had soft, cozy conflict but make no mistake there was conflict. Romeo and Juliet had glaring conflict represented by a family feud that wrought murder and mayhem. To be successful, you must have antagonists and protagonists in your plot.
CONFLICT: It is a challenge to write conflict with dialogue only. There is no description (like fiction) where you can tell the reader how angry and against something your antagonist is. Granted you have the characters right there in front of you, to tell the story with their body language but the dialogue carries the day and is the difference between weak writing and strong, successful writing.
Using examples from a recent play of mine, I will demonstrate conflict in simple, but successful (to the overall plot of the play) terms. A children’s play but the rules still apply and are no less challenging because it’s a kids’ play. Perhaps even more of a challenge.
Sub-PLOT: The sooner the plot is revealed the better. If you haven’t engaged the audience in the first three minutes, you don’t have a very good plot.
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Back in the day when there were truly ‘starving actors’ we started up theatre companies all the time with a couple of platforms and four ‘spots’ that one would use in a shop in the garage at home. This is a cheap ($12. a piece) adaptable, portable light. You can even attach a gel to the cone for a few pennies per gel. Use blues for night and warm colors (amber) for day. Each light has a wire running back to the control desk/booth and while you won’t have a dimmer option, you must be able to turn the light off and on.
When we started our own company, we had to be totally portable as our performance space could be an art gallery, a café, a gymnasium, or school auditorium. Anywhere they would allow us to use their space. All sites had to be vacated when the weekend was over and then loaded back in for the next performance date.
We could light just about any play with four of these clamp-on, shop lights. The purpose of any stage lighting is to light the actors and the set. If you don’t accomplish anything else, you need to make certain this happens. If your stage is in a very small space, it’s not super critical to light the actors brightly. Just be certain they stay in the light, which is where the director’s blocking comes in.
Even if you need to stick to the basics of simple illumination, lighting makes everything feel more professional and helps the audience to better focus on what is going on, on the stage. Theatrical lighting doesn’t have to be overly complicated. Lighting is about making certain that you can see the people on stage and that the moods of the play are represented and amplified.
Clamp lights aren’t the be all and end all. You’ll have to live with the shadows that they cast.
But remember, this is all you can afford now, and you’ll also need to be able to break it down and take the lighting with you.
I still remember the thrill when we could finally afford a couple of Klieg lights.
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Most theatres have a set designer who creates the set based on the director’s vision. But it is important that the playwright sees the set. Where your story takes place. If your set requires two different scenes/sets and you have structured the play around two sets you must think about time and money. Anticipate the cost because you want the director to choose your play to produce. But if the cost of more than one set is too much, your play might never be chosen.
An envelope design works nicely for the need of two locations/sets in one play. The first set in created on the outside fold of an envelope. When the scene changes the ‘flap’ is opened, like a tri-fold (by the stage crew) and a new set/location is used. Set pieces (Furnishings) have to be changed out and this calls for some cleverness on the director’s part.
One play comes to mind that I directed: The Cemetery Club. The main set was a living room of one of the female characters. But I also needed a Jewish cemetery. The four widows went there every month to visit their dead husbands and maintain the gravesite.
So what I designed was a single backdrop (scenery). What you might see out the living room window. Then I furnished the living room with set pieces. Sofa, chairs, coffee table, lamps, etc.
Upstage on a riser I created the cemetery with three graves. I designed starfoam monuments with the Star of David on the downstage side. The women would walk up on the risers and, while gazing at the graves, deliver their monologues. It worked because the actors believed it. Thus the audience believed it. The magic of theatre!
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Available NOW: How To Write a 10 Minute Play ~~ Journal and Handbook
Lots of great instruction about the art of writing a ten minute play. And over 250 blank, lined pages for your creative writing as you write your first or tenth 10 minute play.
Excerpt from back cover: ‘As you prepare to write your first 10-minute play, pretend that you have walked into a room and interrupted a conversation, mid-sentence. Or you have turned on the television and tuned into a sit-com, ten minutes into (late) a thirty-minute episode. That’s where your head space should be when you begin writing your play. Give yourself permission. Sit down and write.
This journal/workbook gives you not only the space to write down your ideas for a play but there are instructional sections to help you create your ten-minute play. Develop your story line. Create the characters. Try out different dialogue. 250+ blank, lined pages with famous quotes by actors, playwrights, and writers on each page to inspire the writer in you.’
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“Writing isn’t a calling; it’s a doing!” t. sugarek
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My weekly BLOG features INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! October: Life Coach, shaman, author, Jennifer Monahan, November: Susanne O’Leary, December: Mimi Mathews, February: Jennie Goutet, April: S. Brian Jones To receive my weekly posts sign up for my
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In writing my sample of a writing sprint (for this blogging session) it WORKED! I had been ‘resting’ from my creative writing; fiction, scripts, etc., but writing every day, my blog, etc. But after writing a couple of ‘sprints’ I seemed to have kicked aside whatever was holding me back and wrote a short, one act play in less than a week. And returned to an unfinished novel in my true crime series.
If you want extra accountability, start your writing sprint by posting “Starting a 30-minute writing sprint” on one of your social
media sites (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook) with the hashtag #writingsprint.
Before you start, double check one last time that you have everything you need to do your writing sprint. Preparation is critical to a successful sprint.
Once you are ready, start your timer. As soon as you start the timer, start writing and don’t stop until the timer stops. Don’t pause to consider word choice. Don’t stop for a sip of water (or wine). That can wait. Don’t think about what to do next (hopefully, you have planned it out earlier, so just implement your plan). It doesn’t matter what you write as much as that you keep your fingers or hands moving and words going down on the page or screen.
You can always edit your writing later. Remember: “Writing is not a calling; it’s a doing.”(t. sugarek)
Stop only when the timer goes off. Then celebrate your successful sprint (and motivate others) by posting your word count achieved on social media and in any group forums if you are participating in an event.
Finally, record your sprinting session to track your progress.
When to Do a Writing Sprint
There are certain times where writing sprints can be extremely useful.
• When you have writer’s block
• When you only have a limited amount of time to write
• When you want to increase your writing speed
• When you want to reach a specific word count goal by a specific time
• When you want to break out of editing mode
There is no right way or wrong way to do writing sprints. So you can’t write 500 words in fifteen minutes. So what? Just do your best. Stop over thinking it and just write as fast and furiously as you can. Put words down and see what happens. That blank page isn’t going to fill up by itself.
Did you miss Part I of this post?
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My weekly BLOG features INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! August: Veronica Henry, October: Life Coach, shaman, author, Jennifer Monahan, November: Susanne O’Leary, December: Mimi Mathews To receive my weekly posts sign up for my
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This beautiful journal/handbook is now available in Hardcover. Here’s a little of what you can expect inside. Plus hundreds of blank pages for your own writings and plans for a stage play.
1. Format is very important. If you submit your new play to anyone they will not read it if it is not in the proper format. There is software out there that offer auto-format but I found them lacking. The character’s name is centered. Blocking (action) is indented and placed in parentheses. Setting (indent once), Rise (indent once) and Dialogue is far left. Double space between character’s name and first line of dialogue. Blocking (action): is placed below the character’s name in parentheses. (indent x 3). A ‘beat’ is a dramatic pause to enhance the pace of the speech and is placed in the dialogue where you wish the actor to pause for a beat or two.
2. Each page represents approximately one minute of time on stage. So if you have a play that is 200 pages long, that won’t work. Audiences aren’t going to sit for more than one and a half hours unless you are providing a circus, a fire drill, sex, and an earthquake. You should keep your full length script to about 100 pages which equals 1.6 hours of stage time. For a one act divide that by 2. For a ten minute play your script should be from 10-15 pages. These times and figures are debated by others but this has been my experience as an actor/director/writer.
3. Leave lots of white space on the page. One day when your play is being produced, actors will need a place to make notes in the script during rehearsal. This is a sample of an actor’s (mine) working script. The
actor usually ‘highlights’ their lines and writes the director’s blocking in the margins. (in pencil, as blocking frequently changes)
4. The blocking is indented, in parentheses, and directly below the character’s name. This is where the playwright gives the characters instructions on when and where to move. But, keep it short and sweet. Remember there will be a director who has their own ideas of where he/she wants their actors to be. Be aware of costume changes in your writing. An actor can’t exit stage left and enter stage right, seconds later, if you haven’t written in the time it will take for them to accomplish a costume change.
5. Your script has to work on a stage. If your story takes place in more than one locale, you have to be aware of the logistics of set changes. So keep it simple to start. If you are ambitious in your setting buy a book on set design to research if your set is feasible. There are some wonderful ‘envelope’ sets that unfold when you need to change the scene. But you have to consider the budget; would a theatre have the money to build it? Always a worry.
6. Dialogue: Now here’s the sometimes hard part: everything you want the audience to know about the story and the characters, is
conveyed in the dialogue. Unlike a short story or a novel, where you can write as much description as you’d like, a play script has none of that. NO description.
Here is a Sample of formatting your script correctly. (Click link for details.)
Journal includes instruction on:
How To Begin How to Write a Play
Formatting your Play on the Page
How to write Dialogue
How to Create Rich, Exciting Characters
Designing a Set
Stage Lighting Stage Terminology
and more….. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My weekly BLOG features INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! August: Veronica Henry, October: Life Coach, shaman, author, Jennifer Monahan, November: Susanne O’Leary, December: Mimi Mathews To receive my weekly posts sign up for my
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Bigger and better. Revision 2021 newly released Journal/Handbook.
How To Begin To Write
How to Create interesting Characters
How To Write Fiction
How To Write a Stage Play
How To Write Poetry
How To Write Haiku Poetry
275+ lined, blank pages for your writings. Each page with an inspiring famous quote from actors, authors, playwrights, poets.
Review: Midwest Book Review
“Creative Writers’ Journal and Handbook begins where so many writer’s guides should: with the basics of how to pursue a dream job as a writer. The problem with most writers’ guides is that they assume some prior degree of excellence or experience; but this handbook poses something different: the opportunity to begin with no prior skill level or experience. All that’s needed is the desire and passion to be a writer, and everything flows from there.
So if you ‘scribble’, if you like words, if your stories ‘find’ you, and if you aspire to be something more (say, a published blogger); then here’s the next step in the process. From how ideas begin to how they are nurtured and written down, there to be refined until they see the light of day (i.e. other readers), this journal offers support, insight, and ideas for jump-starting the creative process and linking it to action.
White, lined journal pages offer a workbook approach that augments white space with inspirational quotes on the process from other, successful writers. So while you’re staring at the usual journal blank pages, inspiration can spark from others’ experiences and insights.
This isn’t just about prose, either: Sugarek includes sections on different formats, from Haiku Poetry to writing a stage play. Each section offers inspirational insights into format, structure, and writing challenges – then uses the journal/quote format to encourage readers to put something down on paper.
So if it’s nuggets of information spiced with the encouragement of fresh lined, white space that is needed, Creative Writers’ Journal and Handbook offers a success formula beginners can easily absorb, all packaged in a survey that assumes no prior familiarity with writing.”
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My weekly BLOG features INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! May: Jenny Colgan, June: Don Bentley writing for Tom Clancy, August: Veronica Henry and October: Life Coach, shaman, author, Jennifer Monahan. To receive my weekly posts sign up for my
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Don’t Be shy about about editing some of your older work. For example, Next! A Hollywood tale. This stage play is from 2009. Full length drama, for adults. What inspired me to look at it again was a little flurry of book sales for this play.
So I pulled it out, dusted it off and read it again. And found some interesting spots to make it better. In this latest revision I added a whole new scene, which was overlooked the first go around. I couldn’t believe that I had neglected to tie up a loose thread, which the new scene did nicely.
I have a philosophy; That is that no story is ever finished and I’ve never been shy about looking back and seeing if something needs a good polish or a rewrite.
This story is about ‘cattle calls’. Auditions that are open to the public; to anyone with a resume and a headshot. Grueling, harsh, and often cruel, the casting directors are ruthless and go through starving actors like a threshing machine.
Synopsis: Four young, brash actors come to Hollywood to live out their dreams of making it big in tinsel town. They are convinced that hard work and honed skills will bring them everything that they ever dreamed of. They discover that hard work and talent have very little to do with success.
This full length play tells the story of the unflagging optimism of these four actors. They never give up in spite of the daily exploitation and frustration. This comedic drama portrays the real story behind the auditions, the type casting, the ruthlessness and hidden agendas of the movie industry. How the beautiful people, with virtually no acting talent, become stars overnight while trained, talented actors work for years in menial jobs while pursuing a career in film and theatre. The four characters are representational of all the fine, new actors that Hollywood lures into its machination of heartbreak. The author purposely uses only first names as a symbol of how dispensable these young people are.
A surprising and shocking ending will keep the audience on the edge of their seats.
My weekly BLOG features INTERVIEWS with best-selling AUTHORS! January: Madeline Hunter, February: Mike Lupica, March: Lee Matthew Goldberg, May: Jenny Colgan, June: Don Bentley writing for Tom Clancy, August: Veronica Henry. October: Susanne O’Neal To receive my weekly posts sign up for my
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