Guest Post - Michelle Dennis Evans, Spiralling Out Of Control

Today I have the great pleasure of talking with Michelle Dennis Evans, fellow Christian writer and author of the newly released Spiralling Out of Control:

Spiralling Out of Control:
Temptation, depression, seduction, betrayal ... Not what Stephanie was expecting at fifteen years of age. Uprooted from her happy, all-girl high school life with a dream filled future and thrown into an unfriendly co-ed school, Stephanie spirals into depression. When charismatic high school senior, Jason notices her, Stephanie jumps in feet first and willingly puts all her faith and trust in him, a boy she barely knows. Every choice she makes and turn she takes leads her towards a dangerous path. Her best friend is never far away and ready to catch her … but will she push Tabbie too far away when she needs her most?

We met last year at the Caleb Christian Writers conference, and caught up again last week at this year's conference, just before she released her new book. So I quizzed Michelle on her writing process (one of my favourite topics to ask other writers). Sit back and enjoy!

I feel so honoured to be here today on Buffy’s blog. The writing process is such a personal and unique thing for everyone. Years ago I found I was great at coming up with ideas, good at starting to write a novel but terrible when it came to finishing. Back in 2009 I found NaNoWriMo, an organisation that supports authors get the story down by writing 50000 words in 30 days during November. In 2009 I drafted my first complete novel from start to finish. That draft would become Spiralling Out of Control.

Nanowrimo is now an annual event for me. It’s like an extreme sport for writers. For me, it works. I put months of thought into a new story with an intriguing plot and sub plots. During this time the characters develop in my mind and I begin to really know them like you would know the person you live with. Then, during October (sometimes October 31st), I write one or two pages of basic notes in point form to give me a little direction on how I would like the story to go. When I begin to write, I let the characters take over and often they take the story to places I would never have dreamed.

The not so good side of Nanowrimo is the mess that I am left with after writing without caution for thirty days. Some sentences are almost perfect … but most need a lot of work. So generally, I spend eleven months revising and editing the mess I write in November. This year I also wrote a verse novel using a similar process. I joined in with Kat Apel’s Month of Poetry in January to force myself to write a poem every day and get my verse novel written. For me, working with a community keeps me accountable and helps me to get to the end. Do you prefer to work on your own, or are you a community kind of person?

Michelle writes to inspire, take people on a journey and escape their world. She is married to an amazing man, with four adorable children and loves living in paradise on the Gold Coast, Australia. www.michelledennisevans.com



Let us know whether you prefer hermit or community writing. I'm offering a copy of Michelle's book to everyone who comments with their thoughts before the end of October. 

Queensland Baby! Goodreads Giveaway, New Books Available, and My Last Chance Prayer

Hello from beautifully sunny Queensland!
Yes, that's right, I've left the (not so cold now) weather of Melbourne, and flown the two hours up to Brisbane for the annual Caleb Christian writers conference!
Have been working my little backside off trying to get ready for this conference for the last few weeks, as I'm actually getting a table and selling books! My first physical event as a bookseller. Pretty exciting, no?

I have a lot of little things I want to cover just to keep you all updated, so I'm just going to lay it out.

GoodReads Giveaway:

First of all, big thank you to everyone that entered the Goodreads giveaway for the hardcopies of The Five Day Writer's Retreat. Over 1,000 people entered! It was really amazing.
I've sent out the five copies, but apologise to the winners in the UK, as it won't arrive until early December. 

I am sorry that only 5 people could win the hardcopies. However, to make it up to the rest of you, I'm offering 50% off the Smashwords' electronic copy of the book. This can be used by absolutely anyone until the 10th November, 2013. All you need to do is go to Smashwords and use this coupon code:

WD79W

 

You are more than welcome to share that around. I appreciate the support, and want to share the fun.

 

Colostrum - A Handbook of Spiritual Antibodies for New Christians.

 

I've finally published my father's first book! It's available as an ebook at Amazon, and soon will be coming as a hardcopy (I'm testing out Lightning Source rather than Createspace for it, and will give you a full report on the two once I get the proofs and hardcopies of Dad's book). 

Dad's been an Anglican minister for over 30 years, and has put together a handbook of the worst heresies that tend to shipwreck new believers. From experience he passes on the spiritual antibodies needed to fight these diseases. 

It was so much fun editing this book for Dad, largely because it was just so... Dad! Reading it is just like listening to him speak. I could even imagine his gestures and facial expressions. It is colloquial, and excited, theologically sound, and sensible. Highly recommended for all new believers, and would make a perfect baptism present. 

If anyone would like a review copy, sign up for my reviewers' list just on the left hand sidebar of this blog to always be offered free review copies, or send me an email at b.greentr@gmail.com.

Prayers, Please!

Finally, tomorrow night is the Caleb Dinner, where the winners of the Caleb Awards will be announced. My Christian Young Adult Supernatural, Sally Hunt Vs. God is a finalist in the unpublished manuscript section. To be honest, if I don't win I don't mind in that I get control of my manuscript and can publish it myself. However, at some stage I do want to be a Hybrid Author, with a combination of traditionally and self-published works. Largely, I want to see the difference and how well traditional publishing now compares. This would be a great opportunity. 

Also, just knowing my writing is of winning standards would be nice.

In a similar vein, I've entered the first chapter of After The Winter, the 1920's historical romance I did as my first draft for NaNoWriMo last year, into the Harlequin 'So You Think You Can Write' competition a few days ago. Little did I realise that if I get through to the next round, I need to submit a full manuscript by mid October! I have 50,000 words, but I never actually completed the first draft. So, pray that I do get into the next round, and then that I can get the manuscript written to a high enough standard in just a week! 

 

If you want to read the first chapter, check it out at: http://www.soyouthinkyoucanwrite.com/manuscripts-sytycw-2013/after-the-winter/

If you were wondering what my ROW80 goals for the next week... well, you can probably guess now. Intensive romance writing!

 

Anyone that will be free in a week or two to do some quick beta reading, I would love you long time!

 

Stay tuned for updates!

And You Thought NaNoWriMo Was Insane...

So, there are a lot of people out there who think that the concept of NaNoWriMo is insane: to write the first draft of an entire novel (at least 50,000 words) in a month. 

I was therefore pretty proud of my efforts to write a draft in two weeks, until I saw this...

NaNoWriWee: Write a Novel in a Weekend (aka The 30 Hour Novel)

So it's slightly tongue in cheek, but over the weekend of 26th-27th of Jan, some crazy Brits are planning to sit down for 15 hours a day and see what they can produce. 

Now I count myself pretty insane in writing terms, but I don't think I've done more than 6 hours of writing in one day, and that leaves you almost blind with the inside of your brain twitching. 15 hours just seems ridiculous.

So ridiculous that I might just have to try it!

Who's with me?

(Was that crickets I heard?)

I've actually got 2 weeks leave starting that weekend, and for the second week am off to a health retreat, which is going to be awesome, though I don't know if I'll be doing much writing. So spending two days to knock off that fortnight's novel would then leave me time to do other things during the week. 

I won't have any particular word count in mind, because honestly I have no idea how much I can do or even what sort of novel I'll be turning out. 

But I am accepting the challenge that for two days, and two days only, I will sit down and write for 15 hours a day. So sorry world if you wanted me to do anything else. 

Don't have anything planned for it at all, because the projects I have lined up will either need a bit more time, or I've already got a little bit started. However, for Christmas my little sister gave me 'The Mammoth Book of Celtic Myths and Legends', so I thought I might start reading that and see what my creative youth came up with. It will be completely discovery writing, no plotting at all. 

If you are also looking for something to just blow your socks off, check out their website and sign up for the challenge: http://www.kernelmag.com/scene/3669/the-30-hour-novel/

One added benefit is that it will make NaNoWriMo in November seem like a breeze :D

The End of NaNoWriMo - Did You Make It?

November 30th, the D-Day for all of us doing NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). Was the month everything everyone expected? I'm guessing not.

My journey: not a smooth as I had planned. Yes, it was meant to be a breeze, work a bit longer, write just in the evenings... ah, so pleasant. Did not count on getting sick, family overload, and break down of my writing system.

Were they still some of the best things that could have happened to my writing?

Actually, probably.

Well, not the getting sick, or the family overload, but having my writing system break down on me for no discernible reason (at the time), and struggling with my purpose in life and place in the universe helped me to identify the issues and get back on track.

On November the 25th I hit 25,000 words, the halfway mark. Not really a good sign.

But since then I've been opening up a blank document everyday and just letting my subconscious go for it with as little interference from me as possible. My word speed has increased dramatically (back up around 2,000 words per hour), my enjoyment at writing is rebounding, and some new characters and events that I had never imagined have appeared and become much loved.

I'm particularly interested in the fact that my joy and excitement at writing has returned. Two days ago I even woke up and was reading a non-fiction book (Career Management for Creative People, reasonably interesting. When I've finished, will do a proper review). But then I got the feeling, that little prompting that said 'I don't want to be reading this, I want to be reading that other book I'm in at the moment.' And I was like 'what other book?' And my subconscious said 'you know, the one that feels like this...', 'and I was like, 'but I'm not reading any other book...' And then I realised: My subconscious wanted to keep reading the book I was writing! It wanted to find out what happened to my characters (even though I've actually written the last page, I think, but still)!

I had developed an emotional connection to my book that made me want to keep going. (Well, keep reading, but that involved writing, which is slightly harder).

And all that was because I let my subconscious write the story, rather than trying to wrestle it away and make it a more conscious creation. Of course, the conscious creation will come about when I have to edit it, but I will ahve a full manuscript by then.

And now it is the 30th of November, and I'm to 48,309!

I just have to go home and do 2,000 words more and I will have completed my first ever NaNoWriMo. So unless the world falls apart or something serious unlucky happens to me, I'm actually going to make it, and get a good night's sleep.

How did you go?

If you even managed to start, I'm counting that as a win. You have a story idea and an introduction. Now keep going!

To encourage you to keep going, whether you finished or not, I'm giving away a writing journal to anyone who lists below the word count (be it 100 or 100,000) they achieved during NaNoWriMo.

This is open until the end of the year (2012), so even if you are reading this a bit late, put your name down.

Discovering Plot - Being the Designated Typist

Was reading Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird this morning on the train and came across a wonderful description of how to do discovering writing.

 

She is discussing how to develop plot, and her major point is that plot should be discovered based on getting to know your characters and seeing what they do. She then continues:

 

P. 56.

‘This is how it works for me: I sit down in the morning and reread the work I did the day before. And then I wool-gather, staring at the blank page or off into space. I imagine my characters, and let myself daydream about them. A movie begins to play in my head, with emotion pulsing underneath it, and I stare at it in a trance like state, until words bounce around together and form a sentence. Then I do the menial work of getting it down on paper, because I’m the designated typist, and I’m also the person whose job it is to hold the lantern while the kid does the digging. What is the kid digging for? The stuff. Details and clues and images, invention, fresh ideas, an intuitive understanding of people. I tell you, the holder of the lantern doesn’t even know what the kid is digging for half the time – but she knows gold when she sees it.”

This is a method of writing which I practise so find her suggestion very useful.

 

And I know that there are writers who are extensive plotters, who like to have an entire outline before sitting down to write. However, I haven't actually come across a good description of this process in the writing books I've read so far. Particularly I'm interested to know whether it requires a full understanding of your characters before you start plotting? Is one of the dangers of this method that it will stifle the character as they must act along certain lines, or is that my bias as a discovery writer?

 

Anyone practise this method or read more about plotting and character?

 

As to my writing, I met up with friend and fellow writer Bec Butterworth this morning at Koko Black to write together for NaNoWriMo. (Bec's actually working as a writer, and has articles published and stuff! Check her out at http://becbutterworth.com. Also she has an upcoming article in Women's Health.) 

 

Koko Black is a wonderful place for the inspiration, but not so good for the waist line, though I tried to stay away from the chocolate by having a coffee affrogato and then an iced tea (with strawberries and mint!). However when the very nice waiter brought us over two free chocolate dipped hazelnuts, I had it in my mouth before I remembered... and it would have just been rude to spit it out then. The nice waiter was also working on a novel, but thought the concept of NaNoWriMo was insane, so I didn't tell him about my two week drafts.

 

My writing time has been cut into as I've started going to work again at 9am (work needed people to do overtime, and I felt bad others were doing overtime when I was waltzing in at 10.30am, so good bye morning writing session until the end of the year, or I collapse). So what with handling the two blogs, and having my evenings cut into by family, friends, Bible studies, gym, etc., I'm only just keeping up with NaNoWriMo at the moment. I'm 12,000 words into my historical romance, but hope to get a bit ahead this weekend. That's the aim at least. Though with it all, I've also been cutting into my sleep which is going to come back and bite me soon.

 

Other WriMo's out there: one week down, how are you managing?

 

 

November: Grow A Mo And Get Stuck Into Your Novel!

November is a great month to try and get something useful done for the year.

 

As always, I promote the growing of a moustache for Movember, not just because you get free burgers from Grilled (not sure they are still doing that this year) but also I see it as a release valve so all men can see what they look like with a moustache, realises exactly how disgusting the majority of them are, and shave it off come December.

 

November is also NaNoWriMo: National Novel Writing Month. I've joined up to the official site, and am excited about the events going on even in Melbourne. Particularly exciting is the fact that there are cities all over the world having 'Word Wars'. Evidently Melbourne has been challenged by Sydney (no surprise there), Brisbane (tell them their dreaming), and even a few American cities!

 

Mostly, I'm excited about writers being free to let down their hair, stock up on junk food and tell the world to leave them alone for a month! We are are throwing over the conventions of society and giving into our deeper, darker Liteary Angel of the Night (Gerard Butler, where are you?... long story).

 

So, even if the thought of writing an entire novel in a month is so large and scary that it makes your brain melt and come out your ears, set some goal, even if it is just to write every single day of November for 15 mins.

NaNoWriMo Is Almost Here!

30 Days and 30 Nights of Literary Abandonment!

How can you go past an intro like that?

Yes, it's that time of the year again: National Novel Writing Month.

From Nov 1st - 30th, people all over the world will be together in their madness as they try and write a novel in a month.

Here is the gist of it from their webpage for those who haven't heard of it before:

How NaNoWriMo Works

1) Sign up for the event by clicking the “Start Here” button at NaNoWriMo.org.

2) Follow the instructions on the following screen to create an account.

2.5) Check your email for the account validation email and click on the link included.

3) Log into your account, where you’ll be prompted to finish the sign-up process.

4) Start filling out information about yourself and your novel in My NaNoWriMo.

5) Begin procrastinating by reading through all the great advice and funny stories in the forums. Post some stories and questions of your own. Get excited. Get nervous. Try to rope someone else into doing this with you. Eat lots of chocolate and stockpile noveling rewards.

6) On November 1, begin writing your novel. Your goal is to write a 50,000-word novel by midnight, local time, on November 30th. You write on your own computer, using whatever software you prefer.

7) This is not as scary as it sounds.

8) Starting November 1, you can update your word count in that box at the top of the site, and post excerpts of your work for others to read. Watch your word-count accumulate and story take shape. Feel a little giddy.

9) Write with other NaNoWriMo participants in your area. Write by yourself. Write. Write. Write.

9.25) If you write 50,000 words of fiction by midnight, local time, November 30th, you can upload your novel for official verification, and be added to our hallowed Winner’s Page and receive a handsome winner’s certificate and web badge. We’ll post step-by-step instructions on how to scramble and upload your novel starting in mid-November.

9.3333) Reward yourself copiously for embarking on this outrageously creative adventure.

10) Win or lose, you rock for even trying.

That’s all there is to it! Occasionally, participants write in to ask about the rules of the event. We don’t have many! But because we’ve found that creativity is often heightened by constraints (and communities bolstered by shared goals) we have evolved a handful of rules over the years. The rules state that, to be an official NaNoWriMo winner, you must…

• Write a 50,000-word (or longer!) novel, between November 1 and November 30.
• Start from scratch. None of your own previously written prose can be included in your NaNoWriMo draft (though outlines, character sketches, and research are all fine, as are citations from other people’s works).
• Write a novel. We define a novel as a lengthy work of fiction. If you consider the book you’re writing a novel, we consider it a novel too!
• Be the sole author of your novel. Apart from those citations mentioned two bullet-points up.
• Write more than one word repeated 50,000 times.
• Upload your novel for word-count validation to our site between November 25 and November 30.

So I'm going to put the horror story on hold for a bit, and find a new idea and start from scratch. I'm going to give myself the full month to work on it, and hope to have it in its second draft stage and maybe ready to be edited and sent out into the big bad world by the end of Novemeber. (It will probably be a self-published for fun piece, but I'm happy with that.)

At the moment I'm thinking trying the historical romance genre again. I know I can write it, I've done it in the past, I just need more time to get myself into the mood of it all. So, that's my plan.

Anyone else excited about it?

Since you are reading my blog, I'm assuming you are interested in writing first drafts.

As I've proven, the two week draft can be done but it is really, really difficult and I haven't been able to replicate the results since my first two drafts were completed.

However, I think a month is a nice amount of time.

So, if you have thought about jump in and giving this whole first drafting super quickly thing a go, NOW is the time my friends.

And I'm here to support! Tell us about yourself, what you want to write, and keep us updated on your word count.

I will be running competitions throughout the month to support those who have signed up, so sign up now if you want to be included!

Sign up.

Sign up.

Yes, right now.

You know you want to.

Sign up..........