Barnes and Noble Weekend Book Sale

This morning, I found this great book offer and thought I'd forego my follow Friday today just to share it with you. After all, A Blogger's Books is about blogs and books, right.





If you need to buy books from Barnes and Noble, this is the time to do it. They've always got fantastic offers on, but at the moment, they're running a special 15% weekend discount for the most expensive item you purchase. 





This specific sale is only good for 3 days: February 26th to March 2nd. Click to get your voucher number before you buy. When I visited the site I also noticed that they have a 50% offer on all DVDs. It's an offer I'm not going to miss.

Can You Write For Young Kids?

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I once planned to write a series of books for kids. I ended up writing just one before I aborted the idea. The hardest part of the exercise (for me) was choosing the right words and phrases to suit my targeted age group. Writing a story is one thing. Researching words your young audience will understand and approve of is quite another. 





An original idea





Kids aren't long suffering (I've got three). If there's even a slight resemblance to a story they're heard before they'll be happy to let you know. Your story has to be an original idea because unlike adult readers, they won't appreciate the  reference to Joyce or Wordsworth. The idea also has to be sustainable and kept at the same pace all the way to the very end. There's to be no let-up - no slow parts where you're allowed to give your reader a back-story. Kids don't do back-stories. As the popular snack saying goes, 'once you pop, you can't stop.'





A talent for drawing





Some kids' writers do the illustrations themselves. When the potential agent asked me to send my story, she requested that I sent some drawings along with it. I got my oldest daughter and husband together and quickly organized a draw-fest between the two, as they're the best artists in the house. The simple fact is that in these financially unstable times, agents/publishers would prefer to hire someone who can do both. I was told that illustrators charge a handsome fee (which is why they wanted me to present the drawings). It's also beneficial to meet with them and talk through exactly what you want. This, of course is not an easy feat. Of course, many children writers do not draw, but these are either already well-known or established. In case you're wondering, the agent did not take me on.





Page turners





For parents who read to their kids and for kids who read by themselves, you have to think carefully about where the page turns will be. Everything has to be strategically placed so there's a small cliff hanger at the end of each page. Kids get distracted very easily. Unlike the adult who'll wade through thousands of pages to find out who's responsible for the dome in Stephen King's latest book, the child doesn't care about the end of the story unless the writer makes her/him. (Did I say I have three kids?) Kids need incentives to keep reading the story, and no amount of skilful prose or grandiose delivery would do the trick. They want words at the end of each page that says in no uncertain terms, 'turn me.'





Involvement tactic





Kids want to be involved within the stories they're being read. Parents want to be entertained while they read them. The Gruffallo is a perfect illustration of this. Kids are fascinated by this creature with the poisonous wart at the end of his nose and the turned out claws. Parents are entertained by the snake, owl and other animals as they try to trick mouse into getting into a position where they can devour him. As the story unfolds, mouse is cleverly victorious. The Grinch involved exactly the same idea, while playing around with language in a very amusing fashion. This encouraged  both kids and parents to 'live' the tale over and over. Hairy McClarey is another favourite of mine. This is a very simple book that uses repetition and masterfully clever illustrations to draw in the older readers and young listeners/readers alike. After about 4 reads, my kids and I could say the book out loud with confidence.





Have you got tips for writing for children to share? How do you cope with finding the cliff hangers and what style do you employ to keep your young listeners/readers interested?

My Follow Friday - The Write Worship

I came across The Write Worship some time ago by accident. The striking thing that first impressed me about this blog was the charming and peaceful way in which the writer conveys her thoughts. I follow the blog, not only because it beautifully outlines the path to being published, but because of the way the author demonstrates her talent in weaving the most beautiful phrases and sentences.

 

The Write Worship is a place where writers and readers meet and discuss their love and passion for the creative side of writing. The blog writer, Tamika, also has a tremendously positive way of looking at life and the ways of the world.

The write worship is indeed a place to go when you feel blessed or when you're stuck for inspiration of what to write next. This blog is an all encompassing site to fill your spiritual needs as both a write and a reader. You're guaranteed to come away filled and inspired. 

How Writers Build Their Characters

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Ideas for stories swing by very often in a writer's head. So do setting and dialogue. One of the hardest things I find about writing is developing my characters. No matter how gripping and original your story is, if your readers don't feel, or can't relate to your characters' plight/position, they cannot completely engage with your novel.

So how do writers build their characters? Where do the ideas come from?

Real life

Of course you won't write a character based entirely on someone you know - unless your story is non-fiction. However, 'stealing' something here and something else there can make up a very interesting character indeed. Use people you love and people you dislike for a good mixture of characters. Diverse characters encourage more real-life situations and interesting conflicts in your story. Make sure that originality stands out.  

• Example: you want to use your mum as the skeleton for one of your characters. Your mum is a great cook (which is fantastic for you) but in terms of a character, a mum who can cook is slightly boring. You may want your 'motherly' character to feed her family with TV meals. She may not cook meals, not because she can't, but because her dad used the cooker to punish her when she was naughty. The possibilities you can get from this are endless. A mum who can cook, is a mum who can cook. Period.

No extremes

Avoid using extreme characters. We see a lot of those on TV ads and dramas these days. Writers want to get away from traditional characters like the stay-at-home mum so they write their leading ladies as hard, masculine, career women who can't boil an egg without burning it. This is overdone and frankly, boring to say the least. 

• Example: if your characters are evil, they should have a touch of humanity. They may have a soft spot for a dog or are prepared to catch a spider and gently release it outside rather than stepping on it. This 'show' of gentleness serves not only to highlight their cruelty, but to flag the reader to the stay of humanity that's somehow buried deep inside your 'baddie.' Being kind to a spider does not make your bad a guy good. It makes him more evil by way of comparison. Your reader will bear in mind the gentleness he showed to the insect the next time he beats the face off his old girlfriend. This makes him complex and more scary. A bad guy doing only bad things is a one-dimensional thug.

Watch people

Always pay attention to what people do. Does your daughter pull at her hair when she's lying to you? Does your boss go bright red when he gives a speech?   What about your local shopkeeper? Does he spit when he talks to you? All these attributes help you to write fewer words. They help you to show the story as opposed to telling it. For example, if you know what your character does when she's lying, you could make her do that instead of telling your reader she's lying. As long as you let them know once that she bit the skin off her lip when she lied, they will 'suss' her out the next time she's nibbling on her lip.

• Write down certain things you see strangers do. Do you need to be told the woman at the supermarket this morning was an alcoholic? No. Likewise, show your reader the jaundiced woman with trembling hands, who had clinking bottles in the bag she clutched to her chest. Her oily hair and skinny legs and whiff of vodka are just extras to confirm your suspicions. 

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Feel for your characters

Feel scared. How does your body react? Now write your character's scared episode. The eyes grew bigger, the heart beat faster, the palms felt moist, breath came in short spasms. It's a lot better to say this than just to report, 'Susan was scared of him.'

Having said this, remember that your characters are different from you. They will behave differently so you have to let them. Otherwise, they all will react in exactly the same way you would. Just know them inside out so you'll know that while Susan is a little like you and will freeze when scared, Jill will scream and take flight. 

How do you write your characters and what helps you to 'understand' them better?

Predictive Dialling

How do you respond to events and occasions that peel your concentration off your writing?





Lately I've been receiving a lot of phone calls with no one on the other end. The phone rings until I pick it up.  I say 'hello, hello', but there is no one on the other end. I can sometimes hear a slight noise in the background, but nothing else happens.

This is particularly annoying because it happens in the middle of the day when I’m completely engrossed in writing. I usually have to clear my head and readjust my thoughts to what I was doing before I was interrupted – for no reason at all.

Lately I’ve found out that  call centres use something called the predictive dialer Your number is stored in the system and is not necessarily rung by a 'person' at the other end. With this automated system, it's sometimes possible to be called when a live operator is not in place to take the call. 

I find this appalling, especially since I do my writing work from home. Many times I ask for my number to be taken off their system. I'm always assured that this will happen, only to be called a few days later by the same company. And the cycle begins again....





Have you been caught in the wave of predictive dialling? As a writer working from home, how do you deal with this?

Second Hand Books

On occasion, I share worthwhile information on books, publishing, writing and writing jobs here on A Blogger's Books. After all, that's the very purpose of this blog. How can we become great writers if we do not first read good books? How can we develop our novel skill if we do not first test out our abilities in small chunks of writing work?

I recently came across a really useful website which enables students to buy and sell used college textbooks at fantastic rates. In this current economic climate, this is the perfect solution for excessive student bills and added costs of studying. My husband is a University lecturer, so I’m aware of many of the difficulties college students are carrying around on their shoulders.

If you're finding it difficult to keep up with costs, this is certainly a site you'll want to check out. It's terribly easy to navigate around and stocks over 100 million books, on a wide range of subjects. 

Worst Fairy Tale Parents

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Part of what makes a particular piece of writing stand out, is the author's ability to create memorable characters. 

Most writers have fun playing around with naughty characters. Others seek to romance the reader with heroes so gallant, they wish said heroes could materialise and sweep them off their feet. Fairy stories on the other hand, are notorious for getting criminal characters misclassified as heroes (as discussed in the linked article). 





What I'd like to discuss today is the portrayal of a number of parents in traditional fairy tales. While reading the following stories to my children, I wonder over and over again, why the parents failed to do something about their children's dilemmas. 

Here's the countdown to my worst fairy tale parents.





Cinderella's dad





After his wife's death, Cinderella's dad hooked up with an awful woman who had 2 spoilt brats of her own. The new mother-figure he chose for his impressionable daughter, still traumatised from her mother's death, was a woman who knew nothing about raising children.

After all, she'd let her own two run riot. In an age where a woman's place was doing house work and bringing up kids, her daughters couldn't even tie their own shoe laces let alone style their own hair. He gave this stranger power over his household and free rein to physically and mentally abuse his own child. Call the social services. Mr. Cinderella is one stroke short of a full midnight!





Rapunzel's parents





They agreed to give up their own child to a woman they knew dabbled in black arts. Whatever happened to protecting your child at all cost? For a silly little pregnancy craving, a little girl was 'sold' to spend the rest of her life in a tower all by herself. There's no fairness in that. Parents who put up less than a fight for their beautiful baby do not deserve a strand of pity. 





Hanzel and Gretel's dad





Here's another man who made bad personal choices and caused his children to suffer because of it. His wife died, leaving him with two kids to look after on his own.  It was obviously a difficult time for him. Not only did he lose his wife, but he hadn't work in such a long time, it was getting difficult to feed his own family. His new wife came up with the bizarre solution to the hardship problem which solely involved straying the kids. In our day and age, people who stray animals are classed as criminals. As the story goes, it didn't take him long to be convinced that 'losing' the kids in the woods was a pretty good idea.

In the end, this lazy loser-dad succeeded with his dirty deed, causing no end of trouble for the youngsters. It was only through Gretel's strong will and quick wit that they did not also lose their lives. Did their father take them back once they returned home with gold and other treasures? You bet he did.





Snow White's step-mother





Do you see a common trend? Fathers in fairy tales don't seem to take any responsibility for their kids. Here is one who remarried a narcissist so involved in herself that she was prepared to kill her young step-daughter merely for being prettier. Where was the father in all this and why didn't he put a stop to the crazy campaign? This evil step-mother hitched up a terrible plan of poison, cruelty, abandonment and attempted murder. Any mother mirroring this step-mother's example of child abuse and neglect is bound for prison in my book.





Jack's (from the beanstalk) mother





Here is a mother the social services would love to get their giant, collective hands on. She encourages her son to first of all steal (repeatedly) someone else's treasures they'd worked hard to build up. If that wasn't enough, when the big guy came calling to retrieve his possessions - and he had every right to - she assisted her son in murdering him!





We can't do anything about these parents or the way they've behaved with their kids. After all, they're merely fictional people. But how do we write parents' characters these days? Are they people with faults,  or are they literary errors (like the ones we've just looked at) wearing an illusion of human nature?

Blogger Tutorials: Lesson 2 - Blog Posts

So you've started your blog and have been careful to use targeted keywords to write your tag line and describe your site. The next step is to write your charming and entertaining blog post.





How important is your post





It's the nutrient to your site. Your post is what keeps your visitors coming back and paying interest in you and what you write. Think carefully about what you create and who you're creating it for. Read these punctuation lessons and make sure you're at least competent. Interesting and compelling content is marred if it's littered with grammatical and punctuation mistakes. Furthermore, blogging about things that do not hold your interest will eventually seep through your writing and cause your readers to lose interest too. 

• Teach your readers. People surf the Internet to gain information.


• Question them. Always leave them with something to think about.


• Help them. Readers appreciate this.


• Show them something new - a different way of looking at old beliefs.


• Entertain them. People like to laugh.


• Be original. Always add your personality into what you write. 

What do you post





Of course it's your blog, so you have a right to post whatever you want. However, keep in mind all the research you put into naming your blog and resolve to make blog posts about your targeted subject. The only way search engines will offer up your site when people search for terms you cover, is if these phrases can be found intelligently scattered all over your blog.





Try to approach your subject from different directions to satisfy your own curiosity and that of your readers. Use pictures to depict scenes you want to tackle, and make sure your research is backed up by figures and links to validate your claims. Always remember that there are free image sites where you can get pictures to use on your blog, even though most pictures on the Internet are claimed by someone else. Please give credit to the owners of the pictures you use by also including their site link under the image. 

• Intelligent blogging is key.


• Targeted subject matter makes your blog more successful.


• One picture tells a thousand words.


• Don't be a rude blogger by stealing other people's work and images.

Where to find inspiration for blog blog posts





This is the hardest part. Many people lose interest in blogging after they realise that it's not as easy as it sounds. Having an online diary is of no interest to anyone but yourself. However, if you want to have a site buzzing with visitors and comments, you have to dedicate more time than simply rigging up your next shopping list, or a detailed account of what your dog did yesterday. 

I recommend taking inspiration from life for your articles. This is the only way you will have original posts. Having said this (as a person who manages 4 blogs) I realise that one sometimes need visual prompts to get the creative juices flowing. Here are some I've successfully used in the past.





Alexa This is a site that tells you what is popular at the moment. It gives you general or specialised subjects, so you can search for your targeted topics too. If you need a quick blog post idea, have a look at some of these topics. Do your research and write your own point of view. Remember that your blog post has to be your own. The reason why people read your article on your site is because they want to hear your individual take on the matter. Don't use other people's material.





Radio - News and reviews will spark ideas of your own. In addition, other people hearing about those particular events will be searching the web for more information. This is where your research and blog come in. 





Newspapers - Reading always helps us write better. 





TV guides - Search your TV guide for upcoming topics of interest to you and your readers. You may find something inspiring, timetabled to show at the end of the week. Cover it in your blog today so you can catch the traffic when the searches start to flow in at the end of the week.





Part one of this blog tutorial is here.

Whinging Wednesday - Mobile Phone Nuisance

My husband often travels to work by train because his office is in a city which is two and a half hours away. His favourite complaint is about noisy people in 'quiet' carriages. They actively ignore carriages where everyone is chatting and playing with their phones, to sit in  the designated 'quiet' carriages to indulge in loud activities. One would think that if you plan on being noisy, the last place you'll choose to sit is in an area other than the quiet zone.





Anyway, last week I had to go to Wales on the train. Usually, I do this trip by car, but because I was going to an entirely new place and wasn't sure about how to get there, taking the train was a better option for me. I'm usually a stressed traveller. I'm terrible at finding my way around so I depend heavily on directions from the station announcers and arrival/departure boards. In the waiting area, was a woman sitting beside me loudly chatting on her phone oblivious to everything around her. Trains came and went, doors slid and shut, but on she went, babbling and cackling on her little sweet box glued to her ear.





There was a slight change in the my train journey. While the boards were being updated, the announcer informed us of the new plans. As the voice on the loudspeaker rose, the woman beside me talked even louder into her phone. I strained my ears to hear what was being said about my train, but the constant squealing next to me drowned out any chance I had of comprehension. When the voice paused for breath, so did the woman. As the voice started to speak again, so did she - into her phone. When the voice rose in pitch, so did she (I suppose so that the person with whom she spoke could hear her better). She ignored the fact that people sitting in the waiting room with her actually wanted to hear the announcement. The only thing important to her was passing time chatting about nothing on her mobile phone.





How inconsiderate!





Years ago I remember thinking how convenient mobile phones were. Now I think they're a big fat nuisance. Inconsiderate people everywhere have found their place in society. They pollute the world with their consistent and inconsequential babbling. Now that they have mobile phones, we all have to suffer as we listen to them go on and on and on; constant rubbish tumbling out of their mouths.



Whinge finished. What winds you up?

Free, Quick English Lessons Online

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Speaking from the point of view of a former TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) teacher, I’ve created a series of writing tools as reference points for both students seeking to better their use of the written English, and also for speakers of foreign languages learning to write English correctly.

These tutorials are in no way all-encompassing. They are basic lessons expressed in the simplest way possible to help the target audience achieve their goal.

Below are the five parts of the tutorial. Click on the one you wish to view.

The Art of written English



Written English Part 1: The apostrophe

Written English Part 2: The Comma and the Full Stop

Part 3: Semi colon and hyphen

Part 4: the dash, question mark and exclamation mark

Part 5: the inverted commas, brackets and capitalization