What throws you off INSTANTLY about a book?

Well, first and foremost, Happy New Years! 2012 has been a busy year already.

Look out for some great interviews coming up, and contests and tips!

So what throws you off about a book? Clearly not everyone judges books too much by covers, right? Well here is a list of some very common thing that we all should avoid so that your reader won't immediately shut your book and throw it at the wall. These things are quite personal, but hey, we all need a list to avoid.

Typos

This one is pretty self explanatory. I found typos in published novel and so have everyone I know living on planet earth. It happens, but to keep your book off the wall I suggest to try to remove as many as you (and your beta) can spot after like a million read overs.

Unlikable Characters

This was actually mentioned often. But it is a toughie. You can't make everyone like your character, can you? Is it really possible? probably not. But some characters which aren't described in a great sense and are very average tend to be disliked by the majority. Especially the perfect kinds.

Boring Set Up

Can differ from one to one. I don't suggest you start every single book with the twin towers being blown but hey, we do want some sort of suspense or an interest pull. Apparently a book always has to have conflict (cough)...

Repetition

It's good here and there. Sometimes. Sometimes. Here and there. Repetition is good. But too much repetition sometimes can make my head reel.

Infodumps

We all know this classic. I didn't at first. I was infodumping badly. No explanation necessary. Won't dump too much info.

So I hope this is a cool list to start off. Do you guys have any suggestions to add? I'm sure we all have more personal ideas. Some more personal annoyances for me tend to be characters that are super super tough and unlikable, characters which are emotionless, too emotional characters, slow starts and prose, and lets just say (I'm being honest) too much prose.

I actually have a couple agents interested in my novel now, and I'm revising so lots of stuff going on but how's it going? Ha, that was terrible. Basically, look out for my next post hopefully tomorrow about too many projects.



WINNERS!!!WINNERS!!!

Ok so if you guys remember I made that giveaway contest a couple months back....Yep it was THAT long and yep time does pass like mad when you are trying to squeeze everything into a short or long time frame. The contest HAS been extended previously, but I've gotten all the prizes here so that I can give them away to you. Sweet, right? Ok. Cool. Lets get started!

I decided to randomize the entries as this is a very comfortable thing to do because I don't pick favourites...lol...Of course not. Whoever had more points got more entries into the randomizer and this was an online thing since I didn't have much paper to write on...Shrugs. Believe it or not, I actually wrote my whole first novel on paper. Lined school paper. The good kind. Is there a bad kind? I wrote during French Class all year. My teacher took it away from me allot. But I always got it back in the end. It sucked. But it was my first writing attempt and I'm glad I didn't stop. I sort of started in the first place because I was bored...Off topic!!!

Back to the winners. So I am opening the randomizer right now. Typing the names in. I've got all the points and things and all that stuff and click. This one goes for first place. Its Loading. Loading. Loading. Is my computer THAT slow?

First place goes to...

Evangeline a.k.a Vangie

Congratulations!!

Second Place goes to...

FantasyGirl2000

Third Place goes to...

Kayeleen Hamblin

If you see this than e-mail me at arielemerald at rocketmail.com to collect your stuffs...HEHE. If you don't, I will come down to your blog to let you know...soon. Promise!

Cheers

Battle & Action Scenes

I thought that a post about action would be a great idea for today. Action is apparently, according to a couple agent critiques, the best part of my writing. I love action and I am speaking about the type of action that happens in battle and in war. Yes, truthfully speaking everything is action, even Jenny going to talk to Sally is an action. But today, I want to talk about battle. The epic kind.

                                            

1. Visualize. That is your #1 target. You really have to see every swift movement of the body, every slice of the blade and describe it in order to create a very realistic scene for your audience. The precision, the fear, the consequence. When writing battle scenes, I think that seeing the scene in your head is the best way to get better and better at them.

2. Research and analyze. I don't do this often but I suppose that watching movies with lots of battle scenes does act as visual research on some occasions. The only problem is...Battle scenes in movies are rarely realistic. Keep in mind that many of them I notice glitches and issues in. Still...Basically speaking, you cannot write about battle if you haven't seen any battles and most us that live in North America only get to see really high quality battles in movies. Thus, sometimes its better to speak to someone who has a knowledge of realistic battle. That is a perfect idea of how to learn to write about battles. But movies are still great tools. We don't need dry battle scenes. We are writing Fantasy here. Since visualization is the key to a great battle scene in a novel, watching epic battle scenes will really get you the idea of what you are aiming for and how it is done in entertainment. In case you are treading unfamiliar grounds, and have never had the thought of battle it IS a very good idea to pick up a novel that has scenes of war and read. It is costly to make errors when writing about battle. Especially errors that are unrealistic and long time Fantasy readers would immediately notice, not to mention agents.

3. Stay Tight. We want to know what senses your MC is feeling as he/she battles his/her way through the war field. We want to know the emotional aspect of life and death, but never focus too much on this as when people fight, they tend not to think too much. Over thinkers will die. Because if you think too much, you don't focus. But you have to keep your focus on the main action, don't describe the wind, or how the sky looks or whatnot. Eyes on the prize.

So with these three points in mind, go and get your buts in your chairs and keep writing those battle scenes, but before you do...Don't forget to scroll to older posts and enter my contest. It ends on October 13! Cheers!

Don't care. Write. Live.

When I first started out on my writing journey I was fourteen years old. Now, a few years later, I am not published like I imagined I'd have been. In fact, when I look back at my fourteen year old self I can't help but giggle because I actually had sent out three queries and thought agents would be fighting for my novel and a quick F.Y.I to my fourteen year old self, the query sucked! Go throw that query out!

Here I am now, and I've been offered representation which I've declined because it wasn't the right fit. I'm looking at things totally differently. Writing a book is like walking a long damn road, super long, and littered with broken glass. All those ugly or may I say kinda interesting chunks of broken glass represent all those obstacles of getting published. But hey, I don't care anymore. I honestly don't care. Hell, I am enjoying writing and reworking my book so much that I'd rather wait longer to get it published and now that I look at it, I wouldn't have wanted my fourteen year old self to publish. Why? Because everything pretty much sucked. It was like the very start to a skeleton which I've built on, and if I would have published that skeleton, I would have never been able to take it back. Yikes. So basically I don't care about getting published as much as I used to and believe it or not, its brought me luck. I mean, I have a great agent waiting for a rewrite and a request from another large agency. We'll see how that goes. Just this time, I'm not dying from checking my e-mail every 5 minutes. What have you learnt from your writing journey?

Finding Mr/Mrs Right

Finding an agent is like getting married. That's what they all say, and I am not even going into that topic because this post will be ubber long in that case. First thing first. We all start at that one level where we are freaking out when we just get one request. We squeal and scream and party. OK, maybe not all but some of us. Anyways, that's just the first step, getting noticed. Once you've polished your manuscript and have an awesome story to send out to the world you WILL get noticed and that is when YOU are the one hiring the agent.


When we are desperate, we do desperate things and sometimes go into a binding contract that leads to the wrong way. When you research an agent go into full depth because even though you are super excited and think that you are that close to publication you may not be. I've recently been in a situation like this and it IS quite upsetting but eventually you get over it. What about you? Still searching for Mr/Mrs right?

P.S. Don't forget to enter my giveaway! Its ending soon. I've extended it for now, though.

The WORST opener in the history of writing

This is my entry for the Absolute Write blog chain for July. This month's prompt: the Mini Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. The Mini Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest means trying to write the worst possible first line of a book or story in the spirit of Edward "It was a dark and stormy night..." Bulwer-Lytton. "Worst" in this case is subjective, but florid and ridiculous purple prose is probably closest to the spirit of the thing. Here is mine:
 
It was an unusually well told dark and extremely out of the ordinary stormy, because thunder groaned in the abyss like a mad man, night, and by night the vultures cried yelps of pleas for the melancholy in the air had built up and just wouldn't vaporize.

Please visit all the awesome participants...Cheers!

orion_mk3 - http://nonexistentbooks.wordpress.com

AuburnAssassin - http://clairegillian.com
dolores haze - http://dianedooley.wordpress.com/
Horseflye - http://thecozylittleplot.blogspot.com/
Proach - http://www.deannaproach.com/
BigWords - http://bigwords88.wordpress.com/
jkellerford - http://jennykellerford.wordpress.com/
Ralph Pines - http://ralfast.wordpress.com/
Euclid - http://euclid-thoughts.blogspot.com/
Diana Rajchel - http://blog.dianarajchel.com/
pezie - http://www.erinbrambilla.wordpress.com/
Guardian - http://daewrites.blogspot.com/
egoodlett - http://wordlarceny.blogspot.com/
Alpha Echo - http://writersramblings81.blogspot.com/

P.S. Don't forget to scroll down and enter my HUGE blog giveaway! Loads of prizes that range from brand new books, to Amazon gift cards, to critiques. Cheers!

HUGE Blog Contest!

I miss blogging so much. Life has gotten sooo in the way, and of course so has writing. I've been waiting to do this blogging contest and I did plan to do it earlier...No excuses. My bad. But by now, I've definitely stocked up on more things to give away! Woot!

Let me start with your fave part, and mine too of course. The prizes!
Oh and did I forget to mention that this is my 100th post? From now on, I'm going to try to make blogging daily. I'm really behind.

First place:

- A brand new copy of Divergent by Veronica Roth, Graceling by Cashore, and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo!!! That is not even all....Scroll down.



- You ALSO get a $50 Amazon Gift Certificate! Awesome!

- And a critique of your query and partial by yours truly, me. I have experience with these things and I was just recently offered representation which I'm putting on hold, but that is another post.

So that is that for the first place. I think I'd like to win that myself!

Second place:

- You still get a copy of Divergent, but you also get the chance to win my second $25 Amazon Gift Certificate.

Third Place: Last but not at all least! You get an e-book PDF version of Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card and a critique of your query and partial by me. Great book by the way, and the cover is sick!

The rules: There have to be rules, right?

To enter simply leave your name and e-mail in the comment sections.

To get extra points:

Add 5 points if you blog about this contest. You have to add a link and add up your points.

Add 1 point for tweeting about the contest. Once again, add the link please.

Add 5 points if you are an old follower or if you're new add 2(if you followed me before today).

Have fun!

Cheers!

***Contest ends October 13!!! so hurry!