Friday Four!
1. If you haven't heard about March Madness yet, check out this post, because the Big Bad Goal-Setting day is coming your way this Monday! Why is it Big? Because it will take over your entire life, your friends and family won't even remember who you are!
Just kidding!
Because setting a goal is a huge accomplishment all on its own! And it doesn't actually have to be huge in the life-consuming sense. It could be as simple as "I'll turn off the Internet while I write for the month of March!" *Denise scurries to jot that down in her goal list.* Now why is it Bad, you ask? It's only bad in the ultra-coolest sense of the word! Trust me, you'll want to be back here on Monday, it's where all the really cool kids will be! Annnnd, I'll give away a pick of books from my bookshelves for one person who checks in with their goals within the first 24 hours (starting Monday morning).
What's on the shelves, you ask? Have a little look...
2. For a couple of years now I've been devouring books as quickly as I can possibly read them. But you know what I've noticed recently? The slower I read a book, the more I seem to remember it. I just recently finished a book that took me over five months to read. Honestly, I didn't really enjoy a good majority of the book, but I pushed myself to persevere because I wanted to read it for personal reasons. But upon reaching the end, I'm AMAZED at how much of the book stands out in my memory now. I'm thinking of a new strategy for the next couple of months. It'll be difficult, because there is SO MUCH that I want to read. But I'm going to choose my books carefully and read them really, really slowly - like a chapter or two a night at most - and I'll see if they're more memorable than all the others I've whipped through so far this year.
3. I'm off to teach my teen class more about novel-writing today. Sorry I didn't get a writing post up this week, but today's topic is Introduction to Characters, and we'll be having a lot of fun picking names for the characters in our new novels. We'll be talking about how multiple names with the same first letters can get confusing, and how different spellings of a name can seem to give a character a whole new feeling/personality. Hopefully next week I'll have time to share a few more thoughts on what we did and how it went!
4. As most of you have probably heard, we said goodbye to a friend from our YA community this week. LK Madigan (aka Lisa Wolfson) passed away on Wednesday morning. To be honest, my heart was so heavy about this that I just didn't feel like blogging on the subject. But I did go around and read other blogs and tributes, and what was truly wonderful and amazing was just how many lives Lisa touched. The hardest thing for her, I think, was leaving her husband and thirteen-year-old son. A trust has been set up in her son's name. You can donate by sending a check made out to the Nathan Wolfson Trust to:
Becker Capital Management, Inc.
Attn: Sharon Gueck/John Becker
1211 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2185
Portland, OR 97204
I hope you'll spend your weekend treasuring your life and being able to spend time with the people you love, as I will.
Just kidding!
Because setting a goal is a huge accomplishment all on its own! And it doesn't actually have to be huge in the life-consuming sense. It could be as simple as "I'll turn off the Internet while I write for the month of March!" *Denise scurries to jot that down in her goal list.* Now why is it Bad, you ask? It's only bad in the ultra-coolest sense of the word! Trust me, you'll want to be back here on Monday, it's where all the really cool kids will be! Annnnd, I'll give away a pick of books from my bookshelves for one person who checks in with their goals within the first 24 hours (starting Monday morning).
What's on the shelves, you ask? Have a little look...
2. For a couple of years now I've been devouring books as quickly as I can possibly read them. But you know what I've noticed recently? The slower I read a book, the more I seem to remember it. I just recently finished a book that took me over five months to read. Honestly, I didn't really enjoy a good majority of the book, but I pushed myself to persevere because I wanted to read it for personal reasons. But upon reaching the end, I'm AMAZED at how much of the book stands out in my memory now. I'm thinking of a new strategy for the next couple of months. It'll be difficult, because there is SO MUCH that I want to read. But I'm going to choose my books carefully and read them really, really slowly - like a chapter or two a night at most - and I'll see if they're more memorable than all the others I've whipped through so far this year.
3. I'm off to teach my teen class more about novel-writing today. Sorry I didn't get a writing post up this week, but today's topic is Introduction to Characters, and we'll be having a lot of fun picking names for the characters in our new novels. We'll be talking about how multiple names with the same first letters can get confusing, and how different spellings of a name can seem to give a character a whole new feeling/personality. Hopefully next week I'll have time to share a few more thoughts on what we did and how it went!
4. As most of you have probably heard, we said goodbye to a friend from our YA community this week. LK Madigan (aka Lisa Wolfson) passed away on Wednesday morning. To be honest, my heart was so heavy about this that I just didn't feel like blogging on the subject. But I did go around and read other blogs and tributes, and what was truly wonderful and amazing was just how many lives Lisa touched. The hardest thing for her, I think, was leaving her husband and thirteen-year-old son. A trust has been set up in her son's name. You can donate by sending a check made out to the Nathan Wolfson Trust to:
Becker Capital Management, Inc.
Attn: Sharon Gueck/John Becker
1211 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2185
Portland, OR 97204
I hope you'll spend your weekend treasuring your life and being able to spend time with the people you love, as I will.