TEMPEST Winner!

Happy Friday!

If you didn’t read the post Wednesday, we have BIG NEWS coming on the very near horizon. To build up the excitement for you guys (‘cos WE’RE already excited!!), we’ll be doing a bunch of giveaways for the rest of this month!! ARCS galore!!

So keep your eyes peeled for the next one–it starts TODAY on Twitter. All you have to do is retweet about the giveaway to be entered! NOT HARD, huh?

Just head here and RETWEET!

Now, to announce the winner of an ARC of Julie Cross’s highly anticipated novel, Tempest!

Danielle!

Email us  letthewordsflowblog (at) gmail (dot) com with your mailing address and we’ll ship this ARC to you ASAP!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

♥

the ladies at Let the Words Flow

LTWF Live Blog Word War for NaNoWriMo Begins!

See yesterday’s post for the low-down! Here’s a recap:

Beth Revis and Stephanie Perkins‘ latest writing war live blogged throughout the day inspired us to do our own!

Participants (or people who just want to watch the fun!) can connect with each other through a Twitter List, or using the hashtag #ltwfwordwar

Remember, if you’re participating (or even if you just want to be nice!), please visit one another’s blogs and cheer one another on!!

*Let Kat or Savannah know if you finished and aren’t marked as such below by leaving a comment!

List of Participants

1. Kat Zhang – Word Goal: 6,000 (US Central time)

Finished with 6,063!

2. Savannah Foley – Word Goal: 10,000 (US Central time)

Finished at 10,377

3. Jessica Lewenda – Word Goal: 8,000 (Australia)

Finished with 6,399!

4. Brittany Severn – Word Goal: 3,000

Finished with 3,162!

5. Amanda – Word Goal: 4,000 (US Eastern time)

Finished with 4,011!

6. Kae – Word Goal: 3,000-4,000 (US Eastern time)

Finished with 3,200!

7. Heather – Word Goal: 15,000 (UK) Kat’s note: I know folks, I’m scared, too 😉

Finished with over 15,000! Holy crap Heather totally won the word war!

8. Ellen – Word Goal: 3,000-4,000 (US Central time)

Finished with 3076!

9. Ashelynn Hetland – Word Goal: 5,000 (US Mountain time)

Finished with 6500!

10. Kayleigh – Word Goal: 2,777 (France)

11. Julie Fisher – Word Goal: 4,000 (UK)

Finished with 4,008!

12. Katelyn – Word Goal: 3,500 (US Central time) *Now with the correct link!

Finished with 3,572!

13. Adeeti Goswami – Word Goal: 3,000 (US Pacific time)

Finished with 2,518!

14. Asia Morela – Word Goal: 3,000 (Canada Eastern time)

Finished with 3,051!

The Rules

There are none! Just report your progress in regular intervals, and try to stop by the blogs of the others to post inspiring encouragement! Some participants, like Kat and Savannah, are taking a page from Beth and Stephanie and engaging in snarky commentary (this is a word war after all!), but only with each other. Don’t worry, you won’t get snarked unless you explicitly ask for it!

We’ll post tomorrow with everyone’s results.

Have fun, and thanks for participating!

Super-Awesome Announcement & LTWF Halloween Costumes!

Happy First Day of NaNoWriMo!!! For those of you who celebrated Halloween last night, we hope you had a wonderful time!!! Several of us dressed up, and we thought it’d be fun to share our costumes! Enjoy!

Vanessa DiGregorio (as Bo Peep…and her coworkers as the TOY STORY cast):

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Savannah Foley as a maenad:

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Jenn Fitzgerald as the Killer Rabbit from MONTY PYTHON & THE HOLY GRAIL:

Feel free to share YOUR costume pics in the comments below!!!

Onto the announcement….

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By Sarah J. Maas

 Okay, so I posted this on my personal blog, but I wanted to also make the announcement on LTWF, for those of you who missed it!

~~

So, I know I’ve been all uber-cryptic about all these Secret Projects I’ve been mentioning these past few months. And I know it’s been kindaaa annoying. Believe me—it’s been annoying for ME to have to keep quiet about it.But I (finally) got the go-ahead to make the announcement.And after so many months of having to keep my lips sealed, it’s actually really surreal (and a little nerve-wracking, to be honest) to tell you guys…

You won’t have to wait until Fall 2012 to read about Celaena Sardothien.

No, QUEEN OF GLASS isn’t coming out sooner. It’s still slated for a Fall 2012 release.

BUT…

Starting early next year, Bloomsbury will be releasing FOUR (4!!) QUEEN OF GLASS novellas, all set before the events of Book 1. They’ll be ebooks, and the first novella will release around January, with the other three novellas released every 1.5-2 months afterward, leading up to the Fall 2012 release of Book 1.

All of the novellas will be about Celaena, and are set in the 9 months leading up to her imprisonment (so about 2 years before the events of Book 1). While each of the novellas will stand on their own, the four novellas combined form the arc of events that explain how she went from being the world’s greatest assassin to getting captured and sent to the Salt Mines. And for my FictionPress fans—yes, Sam (formerly named Symeth) will be a major part of them, and YES, you will get to read about Celaena’s epic encounter with the Pirate Lord. 😉

I can’t even begin to tell you how excited I am for these novellas. Celaena had SO many adventures and met so many people before Book 1—so many, actually, that earlier drafts of QOG were rampant with flashback sequences just because I was ACHING to tell that part of Celaena’s story. It kinda killed me to cut them all out, but I always hoped that I’d get to write a QOG/Celaena prequel someday, perhaps years and years down the road.

SO, thanks to my amazing agent and the incredible, daring, and lovely team at Bloomsbury Children’s, I get the chance to tell those stories NOW.

SO…Sorry for all the secrecy these past few months, but…I hope that you guys are as pumped as I am about these novellas!!!! 😀

And side note to my FictionPress fans: I know it’s been a long while since you’ve visited Celaena’s world. A long, long while, actually. It’s been just over three years since I took the rough draft of QOG off FP, and some of you have been with me since the very beginning back in 2002.

A lot of things have changed since then—both in the books themselves and in the real world outside of them—but I just wanted to say THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart for all of your support and enthusiasm. It’s nearly impossible for me to put what I feel into words both because of the impossible depth of my gratitude and because I just get too emotional whenever I try to convey it. But…thank you all SO much. I would never have gotten the chance to tell Celaena’s story if it wasn’t for you. And for that, I’ll be forever grateful.

And for all of my new readers and friends—those of you who haven’t yet had a chance to visit the world of Erilea and meet Celaena…I hope these novellas get you as excited as I am for the release of Book 1! It’s been such an honor and a pleasure to get to know you so far, and thank you SO much for wanting to read my book (and thank you to everyone who has added QOG on Goodreads! All 2,450 of you! Holy crap.). Knowing you want to read my book means more to me than I can ever say.

Hooray!!!

~~~
Sarah J. Maas has written several novels, including QUEEN OF GLASS, a YA epic fantasy that will be published by Bloomsbury in Fall 2012. She is repped by Tamar Rydzinski of the Laura Dail Literary Agency, and resides with her husband in Southern California. You can visit her website here, and follow her on twitter.

Happy Halloween!!!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN, EVERYONE!

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For many of us at LTWF, Halloween is our favorite-favorite-favorite holiday! The costumes, the mythology…the CANDY!

So, in honor of one of our  most beloved holidays, we thought we’d share some of the urban legends/myths/novels that scare us the most! From ancient folklore to modern-day tales of horror, what truly terrifies us is as diverse as the LTWF community itself!

And we want to know: what stories/legends/books chill YOU to the bone?

Have a spectacularly scary (…and yummy!) Halloween!!!

~~~

 For me, the folklore surrounding Baba Yaga has always scared the bejeezus out of me. Old lady with IRON TEETH living in the wilderness, preying on unsuspecting travelers? Yikes. And her house…Oh, that house. It’s not enough for it to be a creepy-ass hut, but a hut on CHICKEN’S LEGS? Plus a fence made of human bones? Talk about petrifying. And then Baba Yaga herself is totally unpredictable–you’ll never know if she’ll help you…or eat you.

I could probably talk for hours about the symbolism of Baba Yaga and her connections to ancient religions, BUT…let’s just say that I both fear and love her (and love/fear her enough that various incarnations of her have made their way into several of my novels, including the QUEEN OF GLASS series). I can’t remember how old I was when I stumbled across Marianna Mayer and K. Y. Craft’s retelling of “Vasilisa The Brave,” but this illustration (see right…or a bigger version here) of Baba Yaga has haunted my dreams (and nightmares) for a long, long while.

-Sarah J. Maas

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 I know mine’s the CURSE OF CAMP COLD LAKE.

–Biljana Likic

(OKAY, I (Sarah J. Maas) have to interject here. SO, when I was really young and totally obsessed with GOOSEBUMPS, my parents went to my school’s annual fundraising auction. R. L. Stein’s kids happened to go to my school, and one of the auction items was to have your kids’ names in his next GOOSEBUMPS book. And guess who won. So, me and my brother are the protagonists of CURSE OF CAMP COLD LAKE. And, in case you were wondering, I die at the end of the novel. A horrible, horrible death.)

~~

 I think Ted’s Caving Page really got me. I stayed up for hours reading that, and then couldn’t have the blinds open in my house for weeks! I still think of those pictures, and the horror of the climax. It was truly disturbing.

It also made me go on a spelunking bender, lol. Like I’ve said in writing about zombies, I’m totally drawn to my fears and try to transform them into something enjoyable.

-Savannah Foley

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 I’d have to say THE SHINING by Stephen King. Honestly – that book TERRIFIED me!

-Vanessa DiGregorio

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 I’m going old school on this one — Edgar Allan Poe. THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH and THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO always scared the hell out of me.

-Sammy Bina

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 HOUSE OF LEAVES by Mark Z. Danielewski.

That book scarred me for life.

–Susan Dennard

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 SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK, not the scariest thing I’ve ever read, but it scared the crap out of me as a kid, so of course I kept re-reading it.

-Jennifer Fitzgerald

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I think I would have to say Mary Shelley’s FRANKENSTEIN. Though it isn’t the “make you jump” kind of scary, it has a creepiness that has never left me!

-Julie Eshbaugh

QOTW: Myers-Briggs Type Indicators

So, we thought we’d switch it up a bit this week and have some fun with the Myers-Briggs personality type indicators! We all took the test (and you can take it here!), and found that the results were eerily accurate! What was also interesting was seeing how many of us were either compatible or the same personality type (three of us are INFJs!).

We decided to share the results–along with lines from our personality analyses that especially resonated with us–and want to see if we match up with any of YOU GUYS.

So have some fun today–go take the test! And feel free to share your results in the comments! Do you agree with your analysis–or is it totally inaccurate?

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I am an INFP, a Dominant Introverted Feeling. From the analysis, I’d say the one line I really identify with/think embodies me is,

“They live for the understanding of others and feel deeply grateful when someone takes the time to get to know them personally.”

I think this explains why I love to write. I feel like I can fully share who I am and how I feel through my stories–my characters and plots wear the emotions I can’t express in normal conversation. Plus, I’m incredibly shy and meeting people has never been easy for me…yet I really enjoy it when I get the chance. So when people take the time to read my stuff, comment on my blog, or just chat for a little while on skype, I always feel incredibly, over-the-top happy. I know it sounds silly, but it feels like a real honor that anyone would actually want to talk to me. SO THANKS, GUYS! Joining LTWF was without a doubt the best thing that happened to me in the last year (yes, even better than my book deal). 🙂

-Susan Dennard

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I’m an INFJ, a Introverted Intuitive Feeling Judging. While the whole INFJ analysis was pretty spot-on, this passage really resonated with me:

“INFJs…are, in fact, sometimes mistaken for extroverts because they appear so outgoing and are so genuinely interested in people — a product of the Feeling function they most readily show to the world. ….At intervals INFJs will suddenly withdraw into themselves, sometimes shutting out even their intimates. This apparent paradox is a necessary escape valve for them, providing both time to rebuild their depleted resources and a filter to prevent the emotional overload…”

 As a writer, I feel like I often get the most inspiration just by LIVING–by going out there and meeting new people and seeing new things, by keeping myself open to anything and everything. But at the same time, I need that personal space (“alone time”) in order to sort out all of that–and later insert it into my writing (maybe). While a lot of the inspiration for my stories might come from the outside world, in order to WRITE, I have to shut out the world a bit, too. Which is why being around writers (and LTWF) is so amazing–I never really have to explain that kind of behavior to them. 😀

-Sarah J. Maas

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I am an INTJ, an Introverted, iNtuitive, Thinking, Judging. Mostly my reactions to my results were to celebrate the negative aspects of it, because it turns out a lot of the personality stuff I’ve struggled with in the past (excessive logic, lack of externalized emotion, inability to comprehend social interactions, etc.) were simply symptoms of a common personality type. What a relief!

But the part that I feel most embodies my personality type is this (taken from a different site):

“The internal form of the INTJ’s thoughts and concepts is highly individualized, and is not readily translatable into a form that others will understand. However, the INTJ is driven to translate their ideas into a plan or system that is usually readily explainable, rather than to do a direct translation of their thoughts.”

This passage truly shows my motivation in both writing and blogging. I feel driven to reassemble information in a way that is easily accessible and relatable to others. Sometimes that means passing down lessons I’ve learned in ways that resonate with people struggling with things I’ve struggled with. Other times it means making complex ideas and laws easy to understand for my coworkers. Noveling is another form of transferring information, hopefully in a way that will stick with you for the rest of your life. I’m so grateful to have a platform to get my message across, and thanks to the other LTWF members for putting up with my INTJ weirdness 🙂

-Savannah Foley

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I’m an INFJ too!!!

I thought this particularly described me:

“They are determined, perseverant, inspired and often see things just around the corner, into the near or far future.“

I am definitely a person who is always looking toward the future!

-Julie Eshbaugh

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I’m ISFP.

“They have good listening skills, are genuinely concerned, insightful, and usually avid readers. At their best, they inspire others to be themselves.”

HAHAHA, I totally am “usually an avid reader.” Understatement of the year.

-Mandy Hubbard

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~~

Like Sarah, Kat and Julie, I’m an INFJ! The test is freakishly accurate, but there was one point that really resonated with me:

“Their mind usually travels from the past to the future, seeking to fit a particular situation in a large context.”

I think that’s why I write the way I do. Only two of my stories have been contemporary — everything else was either historically based or set far into the future. It certainly might explain why I have such an affinity for dystopians! I love thinking about what comes next and how it relates to things I’ve already experienced.

-Sammy Bina

~~~

What about you guys? We’d love to hear what your results are! Again, you can take the test here.

Happy Friday!!!

Interview with Kiki Hamilton, author of THE FAERIE RING

by Susan Dennard

Guys, I am SO incredibly excited to be able to share this interview with you. Kiki gives some fantastic, thought-provoking answers, and…well…I haven’t exactly hidden the fact that I’m totally fangirling over her novel, The Faerie Ring.

If you want to read my review of this fantastic addition to YA fantasy, head here. Otherwise, onwards to the interview!

So, Kiki, when you started writing THE FAERIE RING, which came first for you: the characters or the plot?

The characters came to me first. Tiki was there and I knew she was a pickpocket. After she stole the Queen’s ring I suddenly thought – what if somebody else wanted the ring? And that’s when the faeries showed up.

Wow, I had the same experience with my own characters–they came first, and then I built in the plot. Very cool. When you sat down to write the novel, what was the biggest challenge for you?

To be honest, there wasn’t a hard part. The story just fell out of my head onto the page and I had to type as fast as I could to keep up!!!! However, I’ve had hard parts in other stories and there are a couple of things I do: 1) keep writing and see if I can get the momentum going again and figure I’ll fix any problems in revision. 2) Think up the worst possible thing that can happen to my main character and throw it in there, or 3) figure out where I got stuck – sometimes plots will take a wrong turn and if you go back and eliminate a scene, you can get things moving again.

Um, okay, I’m officially jealous. My first drafts are like giving birth…for 30+ days straight.  Once you had a finished book, what was your journey to publication like?

I think my experience has been pretty typical. THE FAERIE RING was actually my second book. An agent had requested a partial of my first book and I wrote TFR while I waited for her response. She asked for a revision on my first book and I mentioned I’d written a second book so she said send both back. At that point, (November 2008) the agent (Kate Schafer Testerman) offered to represent me and she went out first with THE FAERIE RING. We got close several times but it took about nine months to find the *right* editor at Tor.

And what a great fit it was! The end product for THE FAERIE RING was fantastic!  Now, as an eager fangirl, I have to know: What’s your next writing project?

I just finished writing a YA contemporary called THE LAST DANCE. That one just fell out of my head onto the page too. So much fun to write! I will probably write book 3 of THE FAERIE RING series this winter and I’m halfway through a historical kind-of steampunk fantasy right now.

Historical steampunk. Clearly you and I were meant to hang out at some point (I don’t mean that in a creepy fan-stalker way…er…not completely, at least). As a fellow historical/steampunk/fantasy writer, I am very curious what a typical writing day looks like for you?

It varies. I have to spend a lot more time with marketing now, so that takes up an enormous chunk of my day. Also, I’m a mom to a teenage girl so I spend a lot of time with her. Plus the cooking ,cleaning, laundry business. Yuk. But I write something almost every day – seven days a week. I do that instead of watch TV.

ME TOO! No TV, and 7 days a week of work. (I stand by my hanging-out declaration!) Do you have a critique partner or beta reader?

Yes, I have a couple of people who I trade manuscripts with.

As do most professionals, I think. And, when do you decide your book is ready for your agent’s/editor’s eyes?

It depends on the feedback I get from my crit partners. If their suggestions aren’t huge, then I know I’m close.

That’s a pretty good approach, methinks. So, now that I’ve finished THE FAERIE RING and am searching for my next read, I have to know: what are YOU reading?

I’m reading an ARC of Laini Taylor’s DAUGHTER OF SMOKE AND BONE.

ACK! That’s at the top of my TBR list! (These similarities are uncanny, Kiki. ;)) Now, before we wrap this interview up, do you have any final words of advice or inspiration?

If writing is your dream than you can never give up. The industry is VERY competitive and you have to go into it knowing that rejection is not personal. It will take time to sell your book. You might not sell your first book. (I didn’t.) One editor / agent will love a story and the next won’t. It’s subjective. But stick to it and write for the love of telling a story. There’s a lot to learn about writing and you will be well-served to take classes, join critique groups and attend writing conferences. Always be open to revising to improve the story and never give up!!

Ain’t that the truth? Never give up, never surrender! (Any Galaxy Quest fans out there? Anyone, anyone?)

Thank you so much, Kiki, for taking the time out of your busy, laundry/cooking/writing-filled life ( 😉 ) to answer my questions, and I can’t wait to more of your books in stores. (Um, and more Rieker–can you possibly give me some more of him too?)

AND NOW, to announce our giveaway winners…

Yeah, you read that right. I said winnerS, plural. There was such an overwhelming response to our giveaway last Friday, we decided to hand out TWO copies of The Faerie Ring. Because we had several people with the same name leave comments, we’ve put the date and comment time in parentheses.

And the winners are:

Amity (10/2 4:10 PM)

and

Victoria (9/30 8:04 AM)

Thanks to everyone who participated, and will the winners please email susan (at) susandennard (dot) com with their mailing addresses.

~~~

Kiki Hamilton is the debut author of The Faerie Ring (Tor Teen, 2011), and you can find out more about her on her blog, twitter, or facebook.

Susan Dennard is a writer, reader, lover of animals, and eater of cookies. She is repped by Sara Kendall of NCLit, and her debut, SOMETHING STRANGE AND DEADLY, will be available from Harper Children’s in 2012. You can learn more about her on her blog or twitter.

Giveaway! Win a copy of THE FAERIE RING!

To prepare for an upcoming interview with author Kiki Hamilton, we’re giving away a copy of her debut YA fantasy, THE FAERIE RING!

Debut novelist Kiki Hamilton takes readers from the gritty slums and glittering ballrooms of Victorian London to the beguiling but menacing Otherworld of the Fey in this spellbinding tale of romance, suspense, and danger. 

The year is 1871, and Tiki has been making a home for herself and her family of orphans in a deserted hideaway adjoining Charing Cross Station in central London. Their only means of survival is by picking pockets. One December night, Tiki steals a ring, and sets off a chain of events that could lead to all-out war with the Fey. For the ring belongs to Queen Victoria, and it binds the rulers of England and the realm of Faerie to peace. With the ring missing, a rebel group of faeries hopes to break the treaty with dark magic and blood—Tiki’s blood.

Unbeknownst to Tiki, she is being watched—and protected—by Rieker, a fellow thief who suspects she is involved in the disappearance of the ring. Rieker has secrets of his own, and Tiki is not all that she appears to be. Her very existence haunts Prince Leopold, the Queen’s son, who is driven to know more about the mysterious mark that encircles her wrist.

Prince, pauper, and thief—all must work together to secure the treaty…

I (Sooz) have read it, and let me tell you guys: it’s awesome. I’ll have a full review coming on Sunday on my personal blog, but the general lowdown is this:

This is one of those books you want to read curled up in your bed while the blustery wind blows outside.

It’s just got that atmosphere–you know the one I mean. That feel of cold and magic and high stakes and romance. It’s a definite must-read for fantasy lovers everywhere.

So if you’re interested in winning a copy, leave a comment below! The giveaway is open internationally, and we’ll announce our winner on Monday after the Kiki Hamilton interview.

One Book To Rule Them All

by Susan Dennard

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One book to rule them in all, and in the greatness bind them!

So, I got this idea from Molly O’Neill’s blog, and it’s such a COOL thing to think about, I wanted to share it here. That is:

If you could only ever publish one book (or one more), what would that book be about?

She calls it the One Book To Rule Them All (it’s a LORD OF THE RINGS reference, btw), and I knew instantly what mine would be. Which in turn, made me stop and consider why that one book isn’t the book I’ve already written or plan to write next.

The answer is pretty straightforward: I’m a coward. I fear I can’t do the concept or the genre justice. I fear that I do not have the skills needed to execute what I would want to be my crowning story.

And no, I won’t tell you what that idea is–what my One Book To Rule Them All is about. Suffice it to say it would be middle grade and so deliciously magical (though with no actual magic or fantasy in it) and brimming with atmosphere you would think about it long after you close its covers.

Well…that’s my dream about it anyway. Clearly, I don’t consider myself up to the task of actually producing that. YET.

What about you? Do you have an idea for that One Book To Rule Them All? Or do you even have an idea like that in mind? If so, what keeps you from writing it now–or have you written it?

~~~

Susan Dennard is a writer, reader, lover of animals, and eater of cookies. She is repped by Sara Kendall of NCLit, and her debut, SOMETHING STRANGE AND DEADLY, will be available from Harper Children’s in 2012. You can learn more about her on her blog or twitter.

Got Writing Prompts?

by Julie Eshbaugh

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There seems to be an on-going debate about the existence of writer’s block. Whether you believe in writer’s block as a full-blown phenomenon or see it as another way of describing “writer’s fatigue” or “writer’s fear” or even “writer’s laziness,” there are a few established methods of treating it. One of those methods is writing from prompts.
Prompts give you a chance to write based on an assignment, so you can worry less about getting it “wrong.” With a prompt, you just write. At the very least, it gets you putting words on paper in a very non-threatening way. And if everything comes together and magic is in the air, the right prompt might stimulate the right ideas, and you might find the seed of your next novel hidden in that free-write.
So here are some fun prompts. Each one combines an image and a scenario. You can stick with the suggested situation, (if you want to become a more disciplined writer, perhaps,) or you can just let your imagination run wild. It’s up to you. Have fun. Stretch your creative muscles.  And if you feel particularly inspired, please share your ideas in the comments.

Ready? Set… write!

You drive home. The day has been uneventful. But when you reach your neighborhood, you find everyone outside, and they are all looking at something. Look at the photo below and tell the story.

(Photo from http://www.danheller.com)

You have just signed up for a cooking class. You arrive at your first lesson, only to find the teacher being taken away by police. Inside, you learn that during his arrest, the police failed to find some contraband that they were looking for. A classmate presents a small container the teacher entrusted to him just as the police arrived. Tell the story.

(Photo still from the Korean drama KING OF BAKING)

It is present day, 2011. A note is left in your front door from your new neighbor, inviting you to stop over and introduce yourself. You go to the house next door and enter the scene below. Tell the woman’s story.

(Photo by the Los Angeles Times)

And I’ll leave you with this one…

You are driving to the airport when your GPS begins to malfunction. After a few turns that are clearly wrong, you begin to try to find your way home, but the road grows narrower and narrower. Eventually, you find yourself in the scene below. What happens next?

(photo from http://www.berro.com)

~~~

Julie Eshbaugh is represented by Natalie Fischer of the Bradford Literary Agency. You can read her blog here and find her on Twitter here.

How do YOU write?

Today’s post is actually a repeat from my personal blog, but it was so interesting to see people’s responses, I thought I’d share it again here! I mean, sure, we LTWFers know you guys through comments, emails, and chats, but it’s always nice to get to know you better! So, I’ve put up a bunch of polls, and if you’d care to share which answers you chose in the comments section, then we can all learn a little more about each other.

So yeah, today the floor is open to YOU.

🙂

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This is my office space. Do you have one?

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I spend over 40 hours a week writing. I KNOW, I’m kinda crazy, but I treat it like a full-time job. My goal is to get at least 2 books written a year. So far, so good…

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For this next one, you can choose more than one (since, you know, you would work on weekdays and work 5-7 days a week). I work every single freakin’ day–even on weekends. The week is devoted almost solely to writing/revising, and the weekends are for blogs, crit-work, and website stuff.

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If I could go anywhere in the world to write, I’m thinking this place looks pretty nice… Where would you go?

~~~

I’m half-and-half. I like to have a beginning, middle, and end in my mind before I start, and I typically sketch out a few scenes before I write them. Yet I also let myself follow a random idea and give my Muse freedom to run wild when she wants.

~~~

I definitely have a critique partner–a few, actually. They each have different styles of critiquing, and as such, they each catch different problems–I ♥ them very much.

~~~

Oh man, if I could have lunch with any of these three… I think I’d pick Isaac Asimov, Agatha Christie, and William Faulkner. Not only did they live in such exciting, changing times for publishing and writers, but they all had such distinct, kinda crazy (in a good way) personalities!

~~~

And so, my dear friends, what did you choose? You tell us in the comments–I can’t wait to find out!