What's in your collection of most valued hints & tips?

What's in your collection of most valued hints & tips?

My cork board is covered in post-its of all the many 'hints & tips ' I've read in author interviews and writing articles.

I thought it might be fun if we all shared a few personal favorites.

Here's mine:

WISDOM BEGINS IN WONDER.

TO WONDER IS TO BEGIN TO UNDERSTAND.

ASSUME NOTHING, QUESTION EVERYTHING.

PLOT is a literary convention. STORY is a force of nature.

* Tell a story to a friend.
* Activate your readers dread: tap into your own fears
of what is taboo.
* Find theme: Answer life's big questions.
* What are people ashamed of?
* Find the truth inside the lie.
* Focus on detail - esp. Unconventional detail.
* Use all senses.
* Tell only wht needs to be told and no more.
* Write what other people only think.
* Write the book you want to read but cannot find.
* What if ...
* And so ...

-wisdomquest :snoopy

on mine

plastered to the doors of my upper desk, I have a number of far side and non-sequiter cartoons that deal with writing. My fav two are the one with the editor at the gates to heaven and he is holding a standard form rejection in his hands. The other is a very frustrated writer surrounded by post it notes etc., there is a note on his computer screen that says: Write best selling novel, with the next thing on the list being take out trash. The caption under the picture says--When Ralph began to see that Norma didn't really understand the writing process.

My agent's phone number.

A list of bill due dates.

A hand written note in block letters--you will not surf the Internet or play solitaire until you have written 2,500 words today,

A small white board on the inside of one door where i keep a running tally of words written per day.

A few rejection letters that were pretty funny--and clearly said they had not read the ms--one I keep that was the worst I ever got (this stuff doesn't sell, and your writing--it would be more useful if you took up one handed knitting!) I have the second worse I ever got, the guy was a bigot and wrote across the first ms page (I have a Native American character who drives a Jaguar) this editor wrote--I found your writing to be solid, your descriptions took me into the story, and your style and story voice are refreshing and unique--BUT, this story does not work. Indians do not drive Jaguars, put the guy in an old pickup or something and for god's sake; an Indian trauma surgeon? The story elements are just too unrealistic for this to sell.

Why do I keep them there? Good question, other then to remind me that rejections are not personal. Though I wonder if the bigot would have been so open with his bigotry if he had known I am Indian, but it still would have been there.

The nasty rejections, about the only two nasty ones I have ever received, tell me that selling a novel or a story depends a lot on editorial tastes, you can have a stellar story and still be rejected because you just have not found the right agent or the right editor.

So they are in a way my inspiration.

The other is another hand written sign: Light a fire, use your BIC. Most people don't get that one.

Shawn

Re: on mine

Shawn, can you confirm the rumor that Indians occasionally kill and eat acquisitions editors?

Re: on mine

I keep in front of me at all times a note that says:

This doesn't count
First drafts are supposed to be crap. :grin




ms pasquale

Re: on mine

Well, that bites--my post just got swallowed.

I heard somewhere you need to scalp them first. My method (i mean one method) would be staking to a hill of fire ants. Right after complete castration, and offering the victim (i mean honoree) the parts for consumption. The victim (I mean honoree) should arrive with all their parts in the next life so I can torture (I mean honor) them in the next life when I get there.

Is that the door bell? Opps, gotta hide that lock of blond hair sticking out from my desk drawer.

Shawn:ha

on mine

Ouch Shawn (for those rejections) I think I'd have crawled into a hole and stopped writing! I'm just insecure that way though....luckily my rejections have been basically form letters..until I started querying those who actually want Latina based stories.

I'm part Indian...but prefer the Mexican way of brujia to torture...I mean honor...my acquaintances. :grin

Oh..and I don't have a corkboard or notes of wisdom posted anywhere...maybe I should get some, eh?

Cork

My corkboard contains only two small slips of paper. One reads"

Discipline.

The temple of discipline
is built with tiny brick,
and laying them one by one,
the deciple's toughest trick.
--Isaac Solomon

The other slip reads:

O! know, sweet love, I always write of you,
And you and love are still my argument;
So all my best is dressing old words new,
Spending again what is already spent.
--Shakespeare

Re: Cork

I have a framed picture someone gave me a few years back. I look at it whenever I wonder if I'm doing the right thing by pusuing writing.


"We cannot discover new oceans unless we have the courage to lose sight of the shore."

I love it, it's on top of my computer.

Re: Cork

Mine is from Margaret Atwood's Negotiating with the Dead:

"Respect the page. It's all you've got."