Escape from YA Week + Giveaway [closed]
Hello there!
Welcome to the Escape from YA, hosted by Nicci over at Paper Dreams.
This event is dedicated to spreading the love for books that are not Young Adult.
I have decided to focus on adult short stories and short story collections.
This week I will read stories from the following collections:
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt by Aimee Bender
Hart & Boot & Other Stories by Tim Pratt
Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman
Anyone can participate in Escape from YA!
Head on over to Paper Dreams to learn how!
I’d love to see what other types of books y’all are interested in!
And how about a little giveaway to get things going?
Some rules:
-Must be over 13 years old. If you are under 18, you must have parent/guardian permission.
-Giveaway is international as long as The Book Depository ships to you. Check here.
-Giveaway ends on October 8, 2011 at 11:59 PM PST.
-Two winners will be chosen by random.org.
-You contact information provided on the form counts as your entry.
-You are not required to follow me to enter this giveaway, but it is appreciated.
I will send an email to each winner after the giveaway ends.
The winners must respond within 72 hours or a new winner will be chosen.
Now, what do you get?
I’m offering two of you your choice of one of the following short story collections.
(Click on a title below to find a summary at Goodreads.)
Willful Creatures by Aimee Bender
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt by Aimee Bender
Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman
Hart & Boot & Other Stories by Tim Pratt
GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED
Good luck everyone!
Thanks for stopping by!
Come back for more Escape from YA goodness later this week!
Remember to visit Paper Dreams to see who else is participating,
and what other giveaways are going on!
Making Time and The Clarion Write-a-Thon
In my writing posts I’ve discussed inspiration and process. A hugely important aspect of bringing those things together is making the time to write. Some writers simply wait until they’re inspired to go to the page. Other writers make time every day to focus solely on writing. While there’s no best method (or madness), the most consistent advice I’ve heard over the years from writers online, in writing workshops, and at author events is to keep one’s butt in the chair.
I heard the best argument for it from Aimee Bender, who I got the chance to meet a couple of months ago. She revealed that she sits down to write for a set amount of time everyday, no matter if she’s inspired or not. Because this forces her to play around with words and fonts, and with things she’s written previously, and leads to productivity. She’s published several books, so I trust that this method works.
As one might guess, I currently fall somewhere in the middle of the extremes. Yes, I follow my inspirations, but after that initial spark, there’s a huge chance the motivation may wane. (Unfortunately, sometimes I succomb to the ensuing ennui.) If I’m good, I just keep writing after that initial idea, everyday, hoping that the story will surprise me and keep me entertained along the way. That’s how I produced over 200 pages in less than two months. It’s a challenge (often), but I always surprise myself how just putting in butt-in-chair time adds up to Work Done.
However:
There was a period of time earlier in my writing life when one of my friends kept me on a short leash and made me write at least 100 words a day. Over time I came to expand that minimum to 500, then 1000 words a day. And you know what? It was spectacular. I’d suggest starting with 100 words a day if one would like to start up a writing habit. The great thing about it is that it’s actually so little, that there’s very little pressure. Not only that, there’s a high chance one will surpass the limit. And it’s really not that time-consuming. It doesn’t matter if it’s for a novel or a short story or a blog or what. It’s butt-in-chair time and it counts!
I hope to go back to that habit once the school year starts up and I’m low on time. For now, I’m putting weekly page goal on myself, with an ideal daily page minimum, so I don’t feel too much pressure every single day. Which brings me to the other subject of this post:
The Clarion UCSD Write-a-Thon!
What is Clarion UCSD? It’s a six-week workshop taught by big names in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy field. It’s a workshop for writing short stories. The Write-a-Thon is set up to raise money to support the workshop. I really want to be a Clarion student someday, so it’s an important cause to me personally.
I signed up as a writer in order to motivate myself. My end goal is about 180 pages for the whole six weeks. Week Three just started today. I have to admit, I haven’t written as much as I’d hoped to these first two weeks, but I fully intend to remedy that throughout the next month.
If you can spare even a few dollars, I’d be so grateful if you could sponsor me via my page here. I don’t get any of the money, it’s all going toward funding the program! Conversely, if you decide to sign up as a writer, let me know and I’ll scrape up some money to support you!
With that said, I’m going to go write! Keep an eye out for upcoming posts, including thoughts on my new nook, a few giveaways, and–of course–books!
Dipping my toe into the water: an introduction.
Well, I’ve been toying with the idea of creating a blog about being a graduate student for a couple of months. I know there are so many blogs out there that are pretty much writing about writing, but I’m hoping my academic experiences, library shenanigans, and book reviews will keep things interesting around here. I was also partially inspired by the Clarion Write-A-Thon to create a blog to track my my writing throughout the summer.
I started a new novel on Sunday (five days ago), and I intend to finish it in the coming months. I know I am capable of writing 50,000 words in three weeks if I am inspired, so here’s hoping that kind of inspiration magically appears again. At the very least, I’m aiming for an average of five pages a day. It’s doable. Rough, but doable.
There is another novel I started in December 2010. I’m a couple hundred pages into it, but stopped working on it when school got started again after the winter break. I’ve submitted excerpts to workshops and have gotten some very insightful comments, some of which I will use to inspire blog posts. This novel also needs to be completed before the summer ends. Mostly because I’m not sure which of the two is going to become my thesis. But more on my thesis woes in another post.
When I’m not going on about writing and graduate school experiences, I’m pretty sure my main source material will be my vow to read at least one book each week until school starts up again. I’m currently more than halfway through book the first, and I’m really enjoying it, so I’m excited to write my first review as soon as I finish it. I’ve never really written a full-fledged book review before, so I’m very eager to try on this new genre of writing.
One thing you have to know about me before we proceed: I may be in a MFA program, but I write fantasy stories. The level of fantasy varies. One of my screenplays is about stage magicians and the other was described by someone as “Inception meets The NeverEnding Story meets Tron.” Some stories of mine feature angels and ghosts, a couple of novels are epic fantasies. You can imagine what I like to read. A lot of it lately has been YA fantasy, because that’s what tickles my imagination. But, sure, I like adult stories, too. I love Neil Gaiman, Aimee Bender, and Tim Pratt. I also like Caleb Carr, Banana Yoshimoto, and James Baldwin. I’ve got great book recs from my professors, and I’m always open to more.
So don’t expect drivel from me, but don’t expect me to quote Kafka either.
Well, it’s quite late (or early) here, and I’ve got a graduation ceremony to attend tomorrow. I’ll end by posting an article on the contention over the privatization of libraries here in CA. It’s a very concerning issue, and may require a whole post in the future. We’ll see.
Thank you for reading. It’s a pleasure to meet you.
