Lost My Mojo Goals

Posted on February 14, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz

(The song above caught me on Pandora, TV, and the radio every day this week.  So I’m posting it here to make it go away.  Added some Fullmetal Alchemist in too because.)

This was the week I was going to dive into Book 10.  I was going to get back into my writing and get some stuff done before the upcoming Winter Break, which is totally different than Christmas Break and 1.5 months before Spring Break.  Yup.  That was the plan . . . I failed on 5 out of 6 goals.  All I did was post the excerpts on the website and I’m not even sure I did it right.  Only reason I ‘failed’ the consoling of the son is because he ‘called’ his new friends every day on an old cellphone to tell them about his day.  So in his mind, they weren’t very far away.

I can’t think of a clear way to explain myself right now without garnering some level of pity or being so vague that people ask for a ‘dislike’ button.  To put it simply, I just can’t get myself to touch Legends of Windemere.  Probably just need some time away from it all, but I’m having mental blockage and, to be honest, fear.  Maybe I’m thrown off because this sensation is new to me.  I’ve never been blocked by my own mind for more than a day and that was usually because it was too busy fiddling with an idea.  I’ve never really had a problem accessing the imagination or been too afraid to write a story.  This coming week might be good for me to shrug off whatever this is.

Did I accomplish nothing this week?  I begrudgingly admit that I got some stuff done.

  • I wrote preliminary blurbs for the published books that will be better than the last.  The one for Beginning of a Hero should be up, but I need to run the others through a few people first before putting them up.
  • I went through the future idea list and tried to carve things up.  The thing is still at 35 series and one-shots though.  It seems trashing Project Phoenix and keeping the parts I liked simply undid what few things I tossed.  On the plus side, that 16-19 book monster isn’t hanging over my head.  Just a few trilogies and one-shots from the survivors.
  • I figured out why one book is named what it’s named.  I’ll be spending tonight trying to urge my hands to write it down.  The few times I’ve tried have been met with me just wandering off or freezing.
  • I came up with a new character/series that I might write over the summer.  It’s a short story type of thing that is reminiscent of the old Conan the Barbarian stories.  I go more into detail during my Wednesday rant.  This will be a moody blog week even if my demeanor improves.

So that was my week and it could just be loneliness.  I miss the guests who were here last week and feel like we didn’t have nearly enough time.  Might be that I feel a little lost, which makes the most amount of sense to me.

Now what are the goals for this week?

  1. Recover my mind and try to get myself back into writing shape.
  2. Spend time with son.

That’s it.  Nothing complicated because I don’t think I can handle it.  If I can’t get back in the game by the following Monday then I’ve got no idea what to do.  Probably just a wait and see what happens, but I’m hoping it doesn’t go that route.  Fingers crossed and hope everyone has a fun weekend.

Addition:  Happy Valentine’s Day, everyone.

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The big day is here! ‘Death in the Family’ is released today

Posted on February 14, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz
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Two Book Exclusive Fairy & The Dragonfly Giveaway

Posted on February 14, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz
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How To Help Your Stay At Home Spouse?

Posted on February 13, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz

Mr-MomYou know, there’s a lot of memes and pictures out there for stay-at-home mothers and not much for stay-at-home dads.  This movie came up a lot, but I guess that’s how it works.  It would explain all the times I heard someone say ‘women are simply better at child-rearing than us’ while they watch my wife tend to our son.  I’m going to avoid getting into that fight though.  I’d be here all day and I have writing to do.  Besides this is a gender neutral list of things you can do to prevent your stay-at-home spouse from going on strike or striking you with the nearest blunt object.

  1. On a day off or an early return day, take care of dinner.  Learn even a handful of recipes for you to do or just memorize your spouse’s favorite dishes of each takeout place.  It doesn’t even have to be fancy.  On days that you come home early, you need to warn your spouse that you’re doing this.  Coming home with pizza while they’re in the middle of cooking a lasagna from scratch is not going to end well.
  2. Accept a chore and take care of it without having to be reminded.  The more annoying or gross the chore, the better you’ll do.  For example, be the one to clean the bathroom and don’t pull the ‘I have it’ for several weeks.  If you promise to do a chore and your spouse does it because you kept forgetting, you might be hit upside the head with a toilet brush.  Oh and the towels will disappear while you’re showering to clean after the first attack.
  3. Don’t act like watching the kid(s) for a day or an evening is either a challenge or a piece of cake.  You being home to play is a treat while the parent always at home is seen as the authority.  Also, try to learn the system that the more present parent has set up and any new habits that your child has developed while you were out. There’s nothing more frustrating that the delicate system of power being shattered by an extra cookie or by pushing an old tactic that stopped working months ago.
  4. If you or the child makes a mess, don’t call the other parent to clean it up.  The kid will tell on you, so just grab a paper towel and get on your knees.  You can call for help if it’s a big mess though.
  5. Don’t promise that you’ll let the stay-at-home parent sleep in and fail to make good on this oath.  If the other parent still has to get up, prep breakfast, prep child, and handle morning stuff, you failed.  If you make enough noise to drown out a stampeding elephant and let the child run around the room, you failed.  If the sounds of crashing dishes and screaming erupts from downstairs, you failed.  In other words, you better not make a promise that you can’t make good on.  Otherwise, you will have a borderline psychotic spouse on your hands who will no longer care if there’s a child in earshot.
  6. Learn to read your spouse within seconds.  Seeing a disheveled human in the kitchen or hearing screams of battle in the bathroom should be more than enough to tell you how their day has gone.  Same with a happy spouse, but keep your senses peeled for the scent of alcohol.  Act accordingly with all scenarios, which will take some trial and error.  LEARN WHEN YOU ARE MAKING THINGS WORSE TOO!
  7. If you go out for errands, do your best not to forget anything.  If you do forget then don’t turn it into a chore for your spouse.  The list might be cooked for your dinner with a side of Rice-A-Roni . . . still in the sealed box.  Also, try not to adlib parts of a shopping list unless it’s for you alone or you can show evidence of a sale.
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Author Pamela Beckford Offers Some Poetry to Set Your Heart Aflame This Valentine’s Day

Posted on February 13, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz

Just in time for the holiday weekend.

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Shannon A. Thompson Guest Post: Balancing the Editor’s Life with an Author’s Dream

Posted on February 12, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz

Today I have a guest blog from Shannon A. Thompson who is both an author and an editor.  Below you’ll see what she has to offer and how one balances the two roles.

servicsI started off as a writer who didn’t know much about editing (or grammar, for that matter). I was only 16 when my first work was published, and I still shudder at the mistakes littered across the pages. Back then, the Indie market wasn’t even really a market yet, so it was nearly impossible for my Midwest-self to find an affordable editor on my tips working as a hostess at a local sports bar. Now, eight years later, the industry is very different. Supportive writers group together across all social media boards, and they aren’t alone in their goals. Editors, cover artists, book bloggers, and an endless amount of readers have unified to create an unstoppable (and talented) Indie industry – all independent and beautiful.

With these changes, I found my own life changing. I changed publishers – not once but twice – and I began working as a publisher’s employee. Without even knowing it, I acquired the “skills” for social media, and I was hired as a Social Media Marketer because of my blog’s success. From there, I learned more than I could’ve ever predicted, mainly because I stumbled into my constantly-on-my-computer life, awkwardly trying to survive and find my way as I went. Digital development, formatting, and editing all came into play, and soon, I found myself living two lives: one as an author and one as an editor.

Now, I do both full-time, and I have to make sure one does not affect the other.

As an editor, I must adapt to a writer’s specific style – whether that is diction or syntax or overall goals – and I have to stop myself from suggesting edits outside of their style. If I have any questions about their style, I resolve that by asking the author, and we always move forward together. Being an editor is being a partner, while being a writer is being independent (until, of course, you’re working with an editor).

On the contrary, there are times as a writer that I must stop myself from editing too much. While editing is always necessary, I do believe that the writer, first and foremost, needs to just write. Get it out. Write it out. Then, you can worry about whether that comma needs to be there or not. After many years, grammar will happen more naturally. If you worry too much now, especially if you’re a new writer, you might only slow yourself down or scare yourself from continuing forward or a number of other things that could happen. I also have to remind myself that my editing will never be enough for myself. I always have to hire another set of eyes (or three), because we are all human, and we will all make mistakes.

As a writer and an editor, I learn every day. I balance my schedule by cutting my day in half – my morning is dedicated to editing as well as my other author services, and my free evenings are filled with writing. If my balanced schedule fails, I try not to fret too much. There are days that I spend more time editing than I should, and there are nights I stay up too late writing, but I am happy to remind myself that I am working with words every day, and words bring editors and writers together. We both love the same thing.

In the end, it’s all one dream, living a life day by day until the next novel arrives.

~SAT

Shannon A. Thompson

Shannon A. Thompson

Bio:

Shannon A. Thompson is a 23-year-old author, avid reader, and a habitual chatterbox. As an award-winning novelist, poet, and blogger, Thompson spends her free time writing and sharing ideas with her black cat, Bogart. Between writing and befriending cats, she graduated from the University of Kansas with a bachelor’s degree in English with an emphasis on creative writing, and she travels whenever the road calls. Thompson is currently represented by Clean Teen Publishing, and Minutes Before Sunset releases on July 28, 2015.

.

Website: http://shannonathompson.com/services/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorShannonAThompson

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShanAshleeT23

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What Can You Do To Help Your Author?

Posted on February 11, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz
The Shining

The Shining

I had goals before the storms hit.  Nothing major.  Write a chapter section or two.  Review an outline.  Hash out an idea or three.  Schedule some promos.  All within the realm of possibilities.  After all, a day of snow or a holiday doesn’t keep me home from work.  I shouldn’t be falling behind in my goals . . . Oh yeah, I don’t live alone.  There are other people here and disruptions in their schedules means a disruption in mine.

That’s the ‘danger’ of not having an office at home and still wanting to get work done.  You rely on others to stay out of your way and keep some things under control.  For example, one would expect another adult to entertain the kid after you request some time to check your email, respond to blog comments, or do a little work.  Some people don’t really let this happen and you find yourself writing tweets while tickling a laughing kid with your feet.  I’m sure other people have been in that kind of situation.

So, what can you do to help your author get work done on a day where the house is full?

  1. Realize that even though the weather or a holiday has given you a day off, a person who works from home doesn’t have this luxury.  Not even just for authors here.  They can’t say ‘my wife/husband has a day off’ and expect their own workload to understand.
  2. You can enjoy your sudden day off.  Just don’t plop down an itinerary of events as if the author is sitting there with nothing to do.
  3. If you see the author on their laptop, with pen to paper, or lost in thought, DO NOT INTERRUPT!  You can say ‘are you busy?’ or ‘do you have a second?’, but don’t push further than that.  An author in the zone will not be happy with a derailment and you might find yourself tossed into the blizzard for a few minutes . . . without boots.
  4. Leaving the author alone and being quiet does help.  This is the most precious gift you can give an artist of any kind.  Just don’t end the day going ‘I left you alone, see?’ as if you’re owed a cookie or went so far out of your way to accomplish something that is nothing more than the kind version of the silent treatment.
  5. If you’re not doing anything and the author is stressing about things, take some chores off their hands.  You might not realize that this stay-at-home person is working and maintaining the house.  This goes for stay-at-home parents in general.  An occasional easing of duties can say more than a gift or thank you.
  6. Don’t use an author’s notebooks, pens, pencils, and other supplies as if they’re communal.  A visiting relative can be forgiven for not realizing a notepad contains part of an outline, but you live with the author.  If you don’t recognize their tools then you’re in for a rough mood swing.
  7. Don’t break their lucky stapler.  I don’t care if it was an accident.  It’s why you can’t use it again.  Right up there with the one time I lent you my winter jacket and you broke the zipper thingy . . . moving on!
  8. If the author is on the phone with his/her editor after struggling to make the time, try to keep the noise down.  Besides getting work done, this is one of the few times they can talk shop with someone that is on a similar wavelength.  That can be easily disrupted by shouting up the stairs about a mystery water bottle or the barging in of a child.
  9. Never say ‘you care more about your writing than me’ to an author.  Surefire way to be proven right, start a screaming match, or push your own hobby into the spotlight.  Many times an author is carving out what little time they can and they aren’t ecstatic about missing out on family time.  It’d be no different than us going into an office for work and then coming home.  The less time we’re given to work, the less time we get to spend with family.  Same as any other job, but we’re still in the house and that makes it a lot more ‘painful’ for the author.  You think we really enjoy hearing the fun and making the decision to keep working?

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Follow-up to #Authors #Marketing Yourself and your Work article…

Posted on February 11, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz

Chris The Story Reading Ape's avatarChris The Story Reading Ape's Blog

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As a demonstration of how to put into practice; and get results from, what Susan Toy was telling you in her great 5 day series, we decided that a few statistics, based on the series, would be interesting:

TO DATE:

Part ONE has had 351 views, 104 likes, 60 Comments, 54 tweets, 58 uploads to Facebook, 33 uploads to LinkedIn and 13 reblogs

Part TWO has had 232 views, 88 likes, 57 Comments, 34 tweets, 56 uploads to Facebook, 21 uploads to LinkedIn and 11 reblogs

Part THREE has had 186 views, 73 likes, 38 Comments, 23 tweets, 51 uploads to Facebook, 22 uploads to LinkedIn and 9 reblogs

Part FOUR has had 155 views, 66 likes, 36 Comments, 21 Comments, 16 tweets, 31 uploads to Facebook, 26 uploads to LinkedIn and 7 reblogs

Part FIVE has had 172 views, 72 likes, 18 tweets, 47 uploads to Facebook, 25 uploads…

View original post 306 more words

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Kickstarter for “Pause of the Clock”

Posted on February 10, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz

(Ionia is having computer problems, so I’m posting this on her behalf. Her friend is finishing a movie that he has been working on for 20 years. Please read the post, lend a hand, and spread the word.)

Shot in 1995-1996 on 16mm, “Pause of the Clock” is a feature-length film about friendship, secrets, and the power of stories.

About this project

My film is a living time capsule.

On November 1, 1994 I finished writing the first draft of a screenplay called “Pause of the Clock.” I was a 19-year-old film student at Columbia College in Chicago. I showed the screenplay to some faculty advisors and friends, then started fundraising and assembling a cast and crew. In January 1995, using 16mm film equipment from various colleges and rental houses, we started shooting the film in Colorado. Filming would continue in Chicago, in fits and starts, over the next year. Finally on May 19, 1996 we shot the last scene.

And then, basically, the film sat in my closet for the next 18 years. Paused.

Until now.

Pause of the Clock is a film about friendship, secrets, and the power of stories. Rob, a college student, gathers together a group of friends to make a film called “Crueler Than Truth.” Among them is his roommate Dylan. Unbeknownst to Rob, Dylan discovers his diary and begins reading it. The Rob he discovers in its pages is a much different person than the friend he thought he knew.

CLICK HERE FOR KICKSTARTER SITE

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SEVEN FREE BOOKS FOR YOU TO ENJOY

Posted on February 10, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz
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