Ready for Camp Nanowrimo July 2014

Editing is full on and with my first draft, second and third draft of my first novel in a YA Time-Slip Series editing continues. In the meantime  I need to advance and flesh out book two as well as the rest before trying to market the series. So to get back into some seriously fun writing I’m going to do Camp Nanowrimo in July. I had no idea that there are camps in April and July as well as the November Nanowrimo.  A critique friend of mine, Dee Strange, mentioned it yesterday and it’s my aim is to get the first draft of the second novel complete. So join me or give me your thoughts, fears, experiences, advice of how I should tackle 40-50k words in one month, thank you. Oh, hang on I must be nuts, maybe I should aim for half this figure and go over two months. I have kids, a job and another novel to carry on editing as well as a husband, hummmmm…

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How I Read Slush: 3 Lessons for Writers

Lessons to live by when submitting a tasty morsel into the slush

Carly Watters, Literary Agent Blog

Agents talk a lot about query letter writing and how we manage the slush pile. There’s the flip side of that too: once we request your material what happens? Well today, you get inside my brain. This is how I read requested material and how you make yours stand out:

1. I read on my iPad

I don’t print manuscripts out until I sign them and start to work on them. So I’m trying to see if I enjoy the writing and pair the writing with a name or book title to distinguish one manuscript from the other.

Lesson: Formatting! For the love of pete number your pages and title your file something like: Author Last Name BOOK TITLE. I don’t want to play a guessing game about which manuscript matches which query. The last thing I want is confusion when I’m trying to organize my slush. I also ask…

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Revolution

I scrape the mud from my eyelids and breathe relief with the invaders gone. Peasant clothes and riverbank mud save me from certain slaughter. I am ashamed of my cowardice.

A popular revolution put me, King Merval of Uttimon, on the throne aged seventeen, my rise monumental. People prospered with plentiful summers and substantial stores through harsh winters. They celebrated and danced in the streets. Considering exiled King Stanphic had been an all consuming dictator I fully appreciated their joy.

Five years later King Stanphic has invaded my lands, smashing crops, lives and villages. I fought alongside soldiers as my kingdom fell. Ordered to save myself I fled to the fields with armour gone and simple clothes on my back. I slipped away unseen.

Splashing alerts my heart, fear courses through my veins – have I any right to be scared? I flatten against the riverbank. A young girl runs through the shallows. She turns stumbles and falls. Horses gallop splashing downstream. The girls scream slams my ears.

They will kill her.

My fists tighten and heart quickens. I throw myself over her.

Hooves thunder past then fall silent. I drag her to the bank and hold her in my arms, my hand over her mouth. We are exposed, my river mud gone, and our faces pale. They slowly retrace their steps. An armoured solder dismounts sword drawn. I stand tall.

“My king, thank goodness, we’ve found you.”

The young girl stares up at me and then curtsies – time to take back my peoples liberty. I mount a strong midnight stallion. A sword and shield are thrust into my hands.

“For your freedom,” I speak directly to the girl, kick my rides hind and as the beast rears up, I signal the men, “this day we will prevail and my kingdom will be yours once more.”

Entrée

Anyone for sun-dried grasshopper?

The Writers Place to be…

I am Lorraine Slim, mother, sister, wife and writer not necessarily in that order. So I decided this was the happening place to blog, many other writers and authors have WordPress pages, like a sheep I join the flock. Sheep! Humm, usually I steer  away from following the crowd but today I make an exception to my own rule. Well rules are there to be broken. Follow my as I navigate the word, sentence, in fact the whole damn library that is an authors journey. One day I hope to be a shepherd rather than a sheep. baa!