"Old" People Writing for Teens V

Bookgirl2021 · Aug 6, 2017

In writing related news: I'm finally making progress again! Also have a couple of SNIs.

In other news: I start grad school in a few weeks, and I'm kind of starting to freak out about it. I'm excited, but really nervous. Also trying to get an appointment with a neurologist so that maybe we can find out why I've had a headache since May. And the news I'm most excited about: I'm meeting Dick Van Dyke in about a month and a half! :snoopy:

CoffeeBeans · Aug 7, 2017

Way to bury the lede, BookGirl. Dick Van Dyke? That's so cool!

Also good for the writing, and I can totally understand worrying about grad school. Every time I think about maybe going back to school, I remember how stressed out I was and rethink.

My good news: the first draft that wouldn't end if finally done! Thank goodness. I also worried it'd be a million words long, but I finished the thing at 83k. Still too long, but I can work with that.

That means all the betas for me! I have three waiting, and I'm so excited to get to them. Wheeee!

borogove · Aug 7, 2017

CoffeeBeans said:
My good news: the first draft that wouldn't end if finally done! Thank goodness. I also worried it'd be a million words long, but I finished the thing at 83k. Still too long, but I can work with that.

That means all the betas for me! I have three waiting, and I'm so excited to get to them. Wheeee!

Yay, CoffeeBeans! That's awesome news. It must feel like such a relief.

I can relate to the feeling that the draft will never be done. I really, truly thought I'd be finished in the last week of July and would end up at around 80K. Now I'm at 85K, and I've still got a couple of scenes left to write. (And let's not talk about the second-draft revisions+additions already bouncing around in my brain.)

CoffeeBeans · Aug 7, 2017

Relief is the right word. I'm already thinking about everything I did wrong in the draft, but at least I found the end. The "hang on, what if I go back and..." is making me a little crazy, but I'm resisting. I have a great alpha I trust to tell me if those spots need anything or if I'm doing too much.

I had predicted a nice, solid 75. Then, I got to 80, and I started counting, and worrying. Thankfully, I hit the end at just under 84k. Ideally any adds will be compensated by trimming elsewhere, because there were so many moments in there just because I couldn't resist adding one more curl here or there... It's not my usual problem. I can't think of the last MS I wrote flat.

Just get to the end, Borogove! that's an achievement all by itself!

(eta: also if you have an alpha, you can hand it off and say, 'let me know if it's a mess' which is glorious.)

JKRowley · Aug 7, 2017

Coffeebeans, you have some great ideas for NaNoWriMo Write Ins!

I didn't realize Dick Van Dyke was still alive! What an honor to meet him!

I spent all of July writing a ghost story for an anthology my publisher puts together for Halloween. I sent it to my critique group without even reading it. They responded back pretty quickly, and I read it over tonight with their notes. It is quite nice. I do good work when I do nothing else for a month. Maybe I should work under those conditions all the time. LOL.

Bookgirl2021 · Aug 8, 2017

CoffeeBeans said:
Way to bury the lede, BookGirl. Dick Van Dyke? That's so cool!

Also good for the writing, and I can totally understand worrying about grad school. Every time I think about maybe going back to school, I remember how stressed out I was and rethink.

My good news: the first draft that wouldn't end if finally done! Thank goodness. I also worried it'd be a million words long, but I finished the thing at 83k. Still too long, but I can work with that.

That means all the betas for me! I have three waiting, and I'm so excited to get to them. Wheeee!

I have a tendency to do that. Sometimes it's even gotten me lectured, but I don't care. :tongue

There's only word to describe how I'm feeling about getting to meet him, and any fan knows it. :greenie

My goal for writing is to have it done before school starts. Difficult? Yes. But not impossible, so long as I kick my rear into gear and stop messing around the first hour or two I'm on the computer.

That's awesome you finished! Congrats! There's nothing wrong with an overlong first draft. I've heard a lot of people say they'd rather have to cut than add--and most of the time I agree with that. A lot of the time adding ends up feeling like pulling teeth.

JKRowley said:
I didn't realize Dick Van Dyke was still alive! What an honor to meet him!

Yep, he's 91 and still kicking. For his birthday a couple of years ago they did a flash mob with Mary Poppins songs, and he came down and joined in singing at the end. Here's a link to where he joins in. I love him so much; it's been a lifelong dream to meet him, and now I actually get to!

ETA There's also this video from last year, showing just how active he still was (and is, from all I've heard).

KiwiLady · Aug 8, 2017

Bookgirl2021 said:
so long as I kick my rear into gear and stop messing around the first hour or two I'm on the computer

So glad to hear I'm not the only one with this problem. I sat down an hour ago and have yet to write a single word. About to turn off the internet and get stuck in.

ManInBlack · Aug 9, 2017

Bookgirl2021 said:
In other news: I start grad school in a few weeks, and I'm kind of starting to freak out about it. I'm excited, but really nervous.

Congrats on starting grad school! As someone who's spent much of the past year dealing with grad school-related planning and decisions, I can imagine there's quite the mix of emotions going on there.

In my news: Got my first character portrait in! This definitely boosts my excitement, since I was never quite satisfied with any of the visual references I pinned, so having a definitive image for my main character is a huge bonus.

darrtwish · Aug 9, 2017

wtg, coffeebeans! I think too long is better than too short (which is what I worry this wip will be)
jkrowley, glad to hear you got positive feedback from betas!
bookgirl, congrats on starting grad school!

I haven't been around the past few weeks because things have been kind of hectic around here. I just finished physio after severely straining my knee, which means I have a tonne of housework to catch up on. Classes start up in a few weeks, so I have to plan my portion of orientation for my program (since I'm leading the student q & a part). I just started researching for my grad school application paper, and applying to jobs so I'm trying not to be too hard on myself for not reading/writing but urgh. I've definitely missed some stuff but I'm here now

Bookgirl2021 · Aug 9, 2017

This might be kind of weird, but... I'd like to invite you guys to join in on this thing I'm doing in memory of my mom. She passed away from skin cancer ten years ago next Saturday. What I'm doing is asking people to tie a flower with a yellow ribbon, and give it to someone else to brighten their day. It's the kind of thing she would've done. I hope by knowing me people kind of get a glimpse of her, and so know her by association.

CoffeeBeans · Aug 9, 2017

That's lovely Bookgirl! Do we do this on a specific day?

Bookgirl2021 · Aug 9, 2017

August 19th--the 10th anniversary of when she passed away.

Sage · Aug 9, 2017

That's a very sweet remembrance, Bookgirl.

Darrt, ack, a strained knee sounds awful. Did physio help out? Take it easy, even if it's over.

Congrats on finishing the draft, Coffeebeans! Is this for Stand-in?

I passed all my chorus audits (and apparently am one of the few who made the deadline, which is today), so I've calmed down a little. Still having the head voice/chest voice problem but I'm making progress there, and with everyone focused on notes and lyrics, nobody's calling me out for going into my opera voice, which is giving me time to work on it without feeling so anxious about the next rehearsal. Then, again, we're having an all-weekend retreat to work on music (Saturday is literally 9:30-9:30 of rehearsal) so vocal production will be on the menu then, I'm sure.

edutton · Aug 9, 2017

Bookgirl2021 said:
This might be kind of weird, but... I'd like to invite you guys to join in on this thing I'm doing in memory of my mom. She passed away from skin cancer ten years ago next Saturday. What I'm doing is asking people to tie a flower with a yellow ribbon, and give it to someone else to brighten their day. It's the kind of thing she would've done. I hope by knowing me people kind of get a glimpse of her, and so know her by association.

What a lovely memorial!

darrtwish · Aug 10, 2017

Sage, yeah it did. I was in pretty rough shape, I couldn't put any weight on it (which made CPR re-certification fun lmty) but my knee is now where it's supposed to be. I went for my first run in over a month last night, and honestly thinking of buying my PT a thank you present just for that alone.

Sage · Aug 13, 2017

Aww, darrt, I'm so glad it got that much better. I can only imagine the joy of going on that first run.

Guys, I am in such a great place. I spent all weekend at my chorus's at-home retreat. Every week, chorus rehearsal becomes a better and better place to go to. On Wednesday's rehearsal I let go of all that head voice/chest voice fear (moving me has made such a difference) and my director gave us the single best vocal production trick I have ever had in my life. Friday night with our retreat coach, there were more tricks that are going to make such a difference on certain vowel sounds that I just was unable to make sound the way our director wanted them to sound. So now we all match on these vowels and they're gorgeous. Everything right now is just nitpicky, making us sound from great to amazing, from an A-minus level (where we were in April) to A or even A-plus level. In barbershop, scores above 700 are considered amazing, which requires an 87.5 score from each judge on each song. Our coach was scoring us in the 90s all weekend long. I have never belonged to a chorus that sang at this level, and it's amazing to know that everyone's on board, and we're all just making tweaks to sound better, rather than still trying to get chords in order, two months out from contest.

Last night I went home after the 12 hours of rehearsal+prep, and I was ready to go to International right now.

But instead, I will go home and spend some time with my poor kittens who have only seen me all week at bedtime and getting ready in the morning (my family did get to spend an evening at the zoo with me this week).

Sage · Aug 17, 2017

Perfectly nice full rejection, 2/3 of which was complimentary, but I just feel dejected about my writing. TBF, I'm really tired and sore and am losing my voice :e2smack:

and a lot of things went wrong today, so it might pass once I get some rest. In a twist, she complimented my original title :greenie

.

I'd feel better if I could figure out what to do about my opening scene, which I'm really down about these days.

MaeZe · Aug 17, 2017

Sage said:
Perfectly nice full rejection, 2/3 of which was complimentary, but I just feel dejected about my writing. TBF, I'm really tired and sore and am losing my voice and a lot of things went wrong today, so it might pass once I get some rest. In a twist, she complimented my original title .

Sage said:
I'd feel better if I could figure out what to do about my opening scene, which I'm really down about these days.

My son liked what he's beta read so far except the opening. I'm not going to submit it until I'm satisfied which means I'll be rewriting the opening for the gazillionth time.

CoffeeBeans · Aug 18, 2017

Tea and rest, Sage! Everything will feel better after that. Glad the R was a positive one. How many more are out there?

I've been bitten by two plot bunnies since I finish my MS. My brain needs to slow the heck down. This is why nothing ever gets edited... I'm also on beta 3 of 3, and it's so good I feel absolutely useless. I feel like I'm doing good when I have something more constructive to say beyond ooh and ahhh. Then again, I adore the reaction comments when I get them, so...

Do I remember correctly, someone was working on an MS about cults? One of the bunnies isn't exactly about cults, but sort of touches on it. Most of the YAs out there I've seen are about escaping cults after growing up in one. Anyone read any good books (fiction or not) about the psychology of cult lifestyle? Something about daily commune life?

(ETA: I saw Stiger's book come up on one of the lists... but that wasn't who I was thinking of! also, not really that flavor of cult-y mindset. More Manson-y minus the murder bits)

KiwiLady · Aug 27, 2017

Its been kinda quiet in here lately...where is everyone? (Perhaps you're all just lurking, like me!)

I did a critique for a twelve year old who wants to be a writer last week. A teacher at my son's school knew I was a writer and asked if I would. It was really cool to help out someone so young - I haven't heard back from him yet, but I'm hoping he's now feeling excited about writing the rest of his novel.

CoffeeBeans · Aug 27, 2017

Glad you're here Kiwi, I was getting lonely!

I was 12 when I started my first novel. I bet the kid was super excited to have a real writer read it. I'm sure you gave him lots of encouragement.

I don't think I know of any Old People in the Houston-area, but if there are, I hope you're all staying safe.

KiwiLady · Aug 27, 2017

CoffeeBeans said:
I don't think I know of any Old People in the Houston-area, but if there are, I hope you're all staying safe.

I hope so too. Looks terrifying.

Bookgirl2021 · Aug 28, 2017

I haven't felt like I had anything to say, so I've been lurking. ...And I've been terrible about making progress on writing the last week or two, too. My brain basically decided to go into hibernation for the last couple of weeks leading up to starting school again. Now it's awake and freaking out. I'm not so sure I'm ready to be in a master's program....
:Shrug:

darrtwish · Aug 28, 2017

I've been trying to get as much housework/yardwork done as possible before I get busy. I started training for my new job (after school program at the Y) today, orientation is this week,I have an interview next week for tutoring, darts is next week, classes start next week, hockey the week after. It's a good thing my writing benefits from me being so busy, or else I might suffer

JKRowley · Aug 28, 2017

Bookgirl, if people waited until they were ready, nobody would do anything. You can do grad school, one step at a time.

Kiwi, that is neat that a 12 year old kid had a critique from a real writer! That has to feel good for you, too.

The flooding in Houston is occupying my mind and time so much lately. It is so frightening. I hear it may be worse than Katrina! I hope any Old People in the area are safe.

Doesn't help the Mr. and I saw The Inconvenient Sequel last week that talked about storms they call "water bombs." I do hear from those in the midst of Houston that neighbors are helping neighbors, and that gives me hope.

"Old" People Writing for Teens V

Bookgirl2021

"If I had a heart, I'd give it to you."

CoffeeBeans

borogove

CoffeeBeans

JKRowley

Bookgirl2021

"If I had a heart, I'd give it to you."

KiwiLady

ManInBlack

darrtwish

Bookgirl2021

"If I had a heart, I'd give it to you."

CoffeeBeans

Bookgirl2021

"If I had a heart, I'd give it to you."

Sage

Supreme Guessinator

edutton

Ni. Peng. Neee-Wom.

darrtwish

Sage

Supreme Guessinator

Sage

Supreme Guessinator

MaeZe

CoffeeBeans

KiwiLady

CoffeeBeans

KiwiLady

Bookgirl2021

"If I had a heart, I'd give it to you."

darrtwish

JKRowley