I’ve had lots of advice. Tons. On every aspect of writing, editing and storytelling. Grammar. Sentence structure.
You name it,  I’ve heard it. I’ve been told how, and how not to.

While I was writing Vezien’s story, I got so bogged down with all the things I shouldn’t do, that I didn’t actually do any writing.
I got stuck.
Seriously stuck.
Couldn’t do a thing for nearly 2 months with that story and it drove me nuts. I didn’t know what was wrong with me. It had flowed, nicely, steadily and consistently — and then WHAMMO. Brick wall.
Could I work out what was wrong?
Nope.
I bugged my crit partners. I drove my other half nuts. I kept looking at the last page, wondering why I got stuck and how to unstick my brain.
Nothing worked.

And then, suddenly… it clicked.
I ignored all the advice. All of it. The whole kaboodle. Every little piece of wisdom, every "you shouldn’t/mustn’t/can’t" all the "don’t do this, that and the other" and the "You should’s".
Yup, I threw every shred of it out of the window.
Why?
Because I was so caught up in what I shouldn’t do, that I forgot what I must do!

I had to write, without distractions, without words of wisdom. I had to let the story flow the way it wanted to flow.
That is what I was really doing wrong. I listened to everyone — except myself. Or my characters. Or my story.
And as a result, I lost the plot.

So if you listen to one word of advice — namely mine — it is: WRITE.
Ignore everything, ignore all the other advice, and just write. From your heart, from your brain, wherever your story comes from. Let the words flow onto the page the way they want to. Let your characters do what they want. Let the plot fairy take you where it thinks is best.
Let it all hang out, let your hair down. Go wild.

And when it’s done, when you got the first draft down, and you’ve typed "The End"
Put it aside. Shove it into a drawer. Ignore that Word Document.
Let it breathe, don’t pick it up. Just leave it alone and get some distance.
Most of all, give yourself a rest.
After a week or two (or more), go back and read it.

THEN listen to all that advice you’ve been getting and fix what needs fixing. It’s a lot easier to see errors and where you can make improvements when it’s not fresh in your mind.
But…
Do it in the SECOND draft.
And not a second sooner. 

I hope, if you are stuck, this will help you clear your mind a little.
Don’t be so scared of "Doing it wrong" that you forget to do what you really want to do: Tell your reader a story. From beginning to end. With all the pitfalls, terror and heartache it entails.

Give yourself a break and just once don’t listen to advice.

I’m slowly building up an area with static pages, accessible from the top menu.

You might want to check out "Writing Tools" which contains various things already.
Hair Colors, Collective Nouns, Manuscript Formatting, Cover Letter Layouts…

Dig in.

There is more to come.

I did it.

It’s finished.

I’m still in shock, I think.

97,595 words. WAY too long probably, but damn…

"I can’t stop, no I ain’t a quitter. I’m on fire, ah baby I’m a home run hitter."
    — Jackyl

So.
I knew I know. I sat down. I looked at the page.

And I wrote. And wrote. And wrote…

I’m taking a break after 2 days typing.

17.5 hrs on Saturday.

11.5 hrs today (so far)

Result?

15,045 words.

I’m still in shock. I’m nearly done, the end is truly nigh. I’m about 5 or 10k away from typing "The End", and I know where it’s going, and how it’s getting there.
Holy crap.

I think I’m buying myself a bottle of champagne tomorrow.

I’m full of it again.

Sort of. I know how Vezien ends now. I just have to get there first.
The past few months have been tough on the writing front, it flowed and flowed — and then it all came to a crashing halt.
I dried up.
I hated the story.
I put it aside and wrote other stuff, feeling guilty for abandoning a nearly finished manuscript.
The guilt rides me every day. I walk to work, plotting while I plod. I walk home. Plotting while I plod.
It’s all there, in my head, but it isn’t "hot" enough to write yet. I know how it will come to the final earth shattering conclusion, but the words aren’t quite ready yet. I know what will happen, I know how it ends.

It’s driving me mad.

The book is at 71k words now and the final 20k are in my head.

Soon they shall be on paper, which means the second in this series will be finished.

Then comes the editing. I already dread it, because I know I will have to cut a lot of stuff out.

Still, I’m going to do it, come hell or high water. I suspect it’ll be hell.

I’m incredibly slack these days.
I said I’d blog more, and write more and… well.
Good intentions, and all that.
Fact is, I’m bored.
Bored with my writing and bored with life, at the moment.
I sit down to write and… nothing. I re-read and… nothing.
I start something and abandon it.
I need to read more, crit more, DO more.

Maybe it’s just me, maybe I get into a rut sometimes and forget to reignite the fire.
The trouble is… I seem to have mislaid my matches.

Setting goals is all very well, but then I set them too high.
I said I would write a minimum of 250 words a day.
Did I stick to it?
Of course not. It lasted until the end of January, then the novelty wore off.

Argh.

I read a blog recently. (I do that, occasionally…)
The author had a "25 things about me" thing going.
I thought that was kinda fun to read, but I won’t step into those boots.
I’m just not that interesting, honest.
Instead, I’m going to try and do a 25 things I learned about writing.
I write paranormal romance, so some of this pertains to romance writing. Most of it is useful for all writing, no matter which genre you aim for.

1. If you want it to sound authentic — do your research.
2. If you make it up as you go along — keep a record of what you make up.
3. Try to establish a sense of time and place in the first paragraph.
4. Don’t describe something just for the sake of description.
5. GMC (Not the car company!) Goal, Motivation, Conflict are what moves the story. It needs each to progress and without GMC you don’t have much of a plot.
6. Suspense. You need it. It doesn’t mean a dramatic event, it just means you need to keep your reader reading. Keep the anticipation alive!
7. A book is (usually) about a person, not an event. Therefore you need to have a strong central character whose story you tell.
8. Avoid passive verbs.  Adam held the rope. vs. The rope was held by Adam.
9. Adjectives are the devil. (Allegedly.) (Don’t ask. I have no idea what I’m talking about! The link is a list of them.)
10. Adverbs are the devil. (That’s the ‘ly words, in case you wonder which I mean.)
11. You’re the reader’s entertainer. Not the lecturer.
12. Try to make dialogue sound natural, but don’t overload it with information.
13. Don’t tell me Eva cried. Show me the tears running down her face. 
14. Know thy Enemy. It’s not enough to know all about your protagonists. You need to know the antagonist very well too. You need to know what makes him / her tick, flaws, strengths and motivation.
15. Make it immediately obvious who the hero and heroine are.
16. You need a black moment where everything is lost. It’s the turning point, the place where the ending starts.
17. Read the genre you intend to write. Just because you think you can write something, you need to know the market you write for, know what’s out there.
18. If you get stuck, put it down, put it away. Let it rest. Don’t look at it, do something else. Come back a week later and look at the story with new eyes.
19. Avoid unnecessary subplots and superflous characters. (GUILTY!) If a character only shows up once in the story — consider killing them. Unless it drives the story forward, and is integral to the plot, cut it out.
20. Don’t stereotype your hero and heroine. Make them stand out. Give them quirks. Know them. 
21. If your characters sigh with relief, gasp in surprise, jump in excitement and burst out laughing a lot.. then you’re guilty of clichés. I know I am. I’m going to get a damn book on the things and try to weed them out.
22. Use clear action words. Adam ran toward the car. Did he? Or did he dash? Jog? Barrel? Race? Flee? It gives an entirely different feel if Adam fled toward the car.
23. Said. Sometimes… people just say things. I try to have action tags, rather than said’s. (That goes for gasped, breathed, choked etc too.) I could do better, but at least I’m aware of it.
24. Edit. You have to. We all sometimes write complete tripe and it needs to be cut or restructured.
25. Never, never throw anything out. If you cut a scene, save it in another file. Just because it doesn’t fit the current story — it might come handy for another one. Did I say never? I mean it.

Well hopefully you’ll find these useful.

I’ve blogged about Backups and things over on Passionate Critters.

Go check it out! (You won’t regret it, I promise)

I used to read (still do, occasionally) Edgar Allan Poe.

When I was in school, we were given a choice of poets, and he was the one I picked.
I don’t think I’ve found any poem I didn’t like.

However, every now and then I trip over something I like (and I’m a morbid person, so watch out) and add it to my favorites collection.

One of the ones I like, and think people should read at least once, is "The Bridge of Sighs" by Thomas Hood (1789-1845) (I like quite a few of his.)
Another is "The Sleeper" by Edgar Allan Poe. I’m sure everyone knows the famous Raven, but how many know The Sleeper?

There are many others out there, which ones do you like?

Today I found myself writing a letter to someone I’ve never met, to someone I don’t know.

The guys at FPN (The Fountain Pen Network) decided it’ll be a good idea to put our pens to work and write… postcards.
Not enough with the postcards keeping the postal service busy, it now progressed to letters.

When all this started, it got me to thinking.

When was the last time I wrote a letter?
By hand?
A personal letter, that is.

I struck a blank.

Then I realized the last real, proper letter I’ve written and sent… was to my other half.
Twenty years ago!
That’s just bloody scary.

Now, those letters… I dug them out over the weekend and read them.
They are love letters. Mine, and his, bundled together, with a ribbon around them.
Yup, we actually wrote proper love letters to each other.
He was in the UK, I was in Germany. For three months, we corresponded by postal mail. This was pre-internet, pre everyone having a computer, or mobile phones, or whatever else you could name.
We’d barely progressed beyond carrier pigeons!

So.
What about today?
People correspond by text messages and emails.
Not very enduring for memories, is it?
There is something about seeing your loved one’s handwriting, knowing he or she took the time to put pen to paper and compose their thoughts, hopes, worries so you can read them. And seeing those letters twenty years later… wow. Amazing. I’m glad, very glad indeed, that my dad kept yelling "Write a postcard" the second I picked up the phone.
Do you think the lovers today, who keep texting back and forth, will still have those text messages in twenty years time? I doubt it.

So lets all just realize something.
The letter you write today is more than just a letter to a friend or a loved one. The letter you write today is a memory in the making, a record of your life, a snapshot in time which would otherwise be lost forever.

Get writing those letters, so my postman doesn’t have to knock on the door and hand deliver a letter with the words "You’re the only person on my round who still gets personal letters, hand written and hand addressed. I just wanted to see who they go to."
That’s the really scary part.
The postman noticed!