On Writing

• Roni Loren on the 10 Things She’d Do Differently. I’d like to bold and italicize numbers 5 and 6. We need these branded into our foreheads.
• What I talk about when I talk about revisions
• Is your first person narrator overpowering your story?
• Author Myra McEntire on Brainstorming

On Writing…but not.

• 20 Most Awe Inspiring Writer’s Rooms – I’m partial to Agatha Christie’s summer house myself.
• From Flavorwire- What your favorite kids book then says about you now. Mine was probably A Wrinkle in Time. I think it says I probably have a hard time keeping grounded with the here and now of this world, and it’s true. There are too many other worlds to visit and save!
• 100 Best First Lines from Novels
• 10 things you can do to let the world know you like a book
• First look at the upcoming Charlize Theron movie “Young Adult” about a YA writer – actual YA authors weigh in

On Publishing

• Anne R. Allen asks: What will publishing look like in 2021? Interesting ideas. What do you think?
• Agent Jennifer Laughran talks book tours – what to bring, what to do, how to keep it together and asks for advice to share with the rest of us. Great ideas, I particularly like the idea of keeping a book to keep track of event coordinators and stores authors go to.
• Simon and Schuster *shakes fist at sky* has decided to drop Rick Yancy’s Monstrumologist series and I couldn’t be more heartbroken over it. You have no idea how great these books are, seriously. I love the Monstrumologist!!! And the original hardback cover art was fan-freaking-tastic. Stephanie Reads shares my pain. *****EDIT!!!! At 7:19 this morning I read the news on Rick’s facebook page – Simon and Schuster received a strong reaction from readers including a letter campaign about the cancelation of this series. They have decided to publish the fourth book! READERS ARE SO AMAZING!

Social Networking Gossip

• Another great post from Roni Loren – what do readers want from an author blog? I love this post – it covers a lot of tough concepts that I still struggle with every day.
• Kate Hart guested over at The Other Side of the Story and talked about everyone’s favorite subject: how not to go crazy and still keep up online. (Hi, if anyone figures out the secret, please teach me.)

Contests! Presents!

• Dot Hutchison is giving away a copy of Lauren Oliver’s Liesl & Po. It’s got such a great cover!

Wicked & Tricksy

•  What Buffy taught me about stakes – the plot kind.
• When fools rush in: writing a ‘spanner in the works’
• Mad Science: Inside the mind of an extreme planner
• Those themes you cannot get rid of

WriteOnCon Highlights

Day 3

• R-E-S-P-E-C-T by author Kiersten White
• Pacing by author Tara Hudson
• An editor’s perspective about what authors should and should not talk about online

Good for the Soul – Bad for Your Productivity

• PHRAS.IN is this fun little tool that has you put two phrases up against each other in mortal combat (or possibly search engine results?) It’s sort of like writing by popularity, the phrase most used must be the right one, right? There can be only one, now fight!

• TRANSLATION TELEPHONE!!! I love this so much! I could waste days on this site, I swear to god. Ok, so you put in a few phrases and hit GO and the program runs what you typed in through 20 different language translators in Google. What comes out is a brand new form of WTF. I especially love when it translates the pronoun SHE into HE which happens more often than you’d think. Give it a whirl!
• The Woman in Black: Creepy. CREEPY CREEPY CREEPY. Also: Daniel Radcliff.

center>

Question for you guys:

Hey blog friends! So, there’s a blog out there that I THINK is just YA-centric that has a pretty big list of current blog contests and blogfests going on. I used to have a link to it and now I can’t find it and I can’t remember what the blog name was. If you know what it is, can you send it my way? I’ve been beating my head against the wall trying to remember. Help help!