Recently, while sending out my current work-in–progress (WIP) to the round of agents, I came across an agent’s blog that was downright scary. The spelling and punctuation were atrocious. She even violated a basic rule of using a plural verb form with a singular noun. It was quite annoying; after all, are we not told ad nauseum that a query full of punctuation and grammatical errors is sure to result in a rejection?

I passed on this agent feeling that if she could not even be bothered to proof read her own writing, then how could I be sure she’d go over my own manuscript with a fine-toothed comb? Also, I thought it was high time that I reviewed my own knowledge of punctuation and grammar rules.

There are two things in relation to grammar and punctuation that I am certain of:

1) “I” before “e” except after “c” (that is branded on my brain) and
2) I am pretty sure I was sick the day the teacher went over the whole lay/lie thing.

Like the new math that is part of the curriculum these days (isn’t 2 + 2 still 4?), there seems to be a slightly different approach to punctuation and grammar.

Semi-colons, a personal favorite of mine, are just about vilified among some writers and I noticed that they are shying away from calling a “period” a “period.” Now it is a “full stop.” My boys are learning it as a “full stop” in primary school and when I called it a “period” they looked at me like I had just grown a second head.

There is a joke circling the internet about how a comma (or lack of one) can be deadly:

“Let’s eat Grandma.
Let’s eat, Grandma.”

Twenty years ago when my sister and her then boyfriend used to fight (which was often), they would exchange notes. My sister and I would then go over his notes, correcting his grammar and circling his misspellings with a red pen, (I am sure he loved that) which reminds me of another quote I have seen floating around the internet:

“If you’re losing an argument, start correcting their grammar.”

Correct grammar and punctuation are essential for if your manuscript is riddled with misspellings and basic grammar mistakes, it will detract from even the greatest of stories.

To brush up on who/whom, of/have, between/among, than/then, who/that/which, and a lot of other good rules, check out GrammarBook.com. For rules on punctuation, I found Grammar.About.com really helpful.

Get a Plant

Improve the air quality while giving yourself something pretty to look at. Pick something easy to take care of and not so big it fights with your piles of paper. It should be something you truly love. African violets and spider plants make great offices mates. If you do not like spider plants, do not get one because you will ignore it and it will meet a quick demise. That in itself is bad Chi. If you are into vibrancy you can try a pre-made amaryllis package once a year for something special.

Post Inspirational Quotes

Get a two sided cork board. Use one side for your story planning and the other to post inspirational quotes with meaning for you, acceptance letters, thank you notes, a list of your favorite words work well. When you are not using your story board flip it so you can see them. Buy colorful magnets to attach notes to your filing cabinet or desk. The rim of your monitor is also a great place for inspirational post-it notes but do not clutter your monitor, pick a new quote ever month. If the post-it is still in good shape tuck it back in your drawer of post-its for future use.

Dust

Your desk, your bookshelves, any horizontal surface in your office collects all kinds of things including dust. You should be dusting your space at least once a week to remove dust and mites. You spend a lot of time in your space and should not allow yourself to breath in those nasty particles. Every time you move a slip of paper dust goes flying. It is not good for your health. It is not good for your books. And it is not good for your plant either!

Invest in a Good Chair

Writers sit for long periods of time. One of your second office investments must be a chair. You want to make sure it is ergonomic to prevent back, hip and knee pain. Make sure it has adjustable height and a built in curvature for back support. Try a few, your backside will thank you for it.

Heater / Fan

Temperature is important. Too much heat stagnates; too much cold turns your fingers blue driving you away from your work space. Get yourself a multipurpose heater/fan to help you stay cool in the summer and warm in the winter. If your body temperature is not comfortable you are not going to sit still long enough to write. Remember: when you are not in the room turn it off.

Good Lighting

So you can see when you write but more importantly so you do not get a headache from eyestrain. Who wants to write when they have a headache? In addition to an overhead ceiling light to bask the room you should have a directional desk light for closer work.

Open a Window

Bring in fresh air. Fill the lungs. Get the stagnant air out of your room at least once a month. In the winter too! There is nothing like fresh air to stir the lungs and the creative juices. It is like breathing in clean laundry off the line.

Variety

Go someone where else. You do not have to be chained to your chair, computer or couch. Go to the bookshop, park, library, gallery or shooting range for a change of atmosphere but go to write not to do errands or people watch. Focus is important.

Healthy Snacks

Have snacks ready for when hunger entices you away from your writing station. Like a veggie tray. Cut them up at the beginning of the week: carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, celery sticks, plum tomatoes, cucumber, and sweet peppers. Put them on a tray and keep them near by for your first snack choice. Give your brain some real fuel throughout the day and night. Feed Your Brain = Feed Your Writing.

Get a Cat

Save a cat from the Humane Society by adopting it. It will keep you warm as you write and dust your keyboards and monitor for you; sometimes while you are trying to use it. Pets are known to lower your blood pressure and your stress levels. If all else fails a pet will give you something to write about.

A happy workspace is a happy writer. Enjoy your space.

May 14th is set aside to celebrate our mothers’ role and dedication to nurturing. Not every mother has this instinct or desire so we can also celebrate the women who were the mother’s we never had.

Here are some prompts to work through your feelings on mothers:

Day One: Write about your mother’s greatest influence on you.

Day Two: Who was like a mother to you?

Day Three: What kind of mother do you want to be?

Day Four: List ten traits of a wonderful mother.

Day Five: Write about the best mother’s day ever.

Day Six: Sometimes we don’t like our mothers very much. Write about such a time… then let it go.

Day Seven: What are you going to do for your mother this year?

Responses are not meant to be one sentence answers, elaborate on your answers. Meditate, reflect and enjoy. You can find more writing prompts at The Write Prompts blog.

What is Rebels of the 512

Laid off from her job, thanks to Texas Governor Nick Harry’s most recent round of budget cuts, high school history teacher Suzie Jimenez does not get mad–she goes rogue. Joining a rebel band of ninjas in their quest to fight the power and the pirates that support it, Suzie is swept up in the ultimate battle between good and evil. Can one woman beat the system, or will Suzie be consigned to the dustbin of state history along with Cesar Chavez and her fellow freedom fighters?

Who is Laura Roberts

Laura Roberts is the editor of the sassy literary magazine, Black Heart, with a license to kill your darlings. A former sex columnist in Montreal, she is currently writing a second novel loosely based on her days in the Sin City of the North. To ward off ninja attacks, she resides in a post-apocalyptic bunker in Austin with her husband and literary kitty, Nedward Carlos Nedwards.

***
Topic Links
* Get a free copy of Rebels of the 512 from SmashWords
* Visit Rebels of the 512 official website
* Learn more about Laura Roberts at her website

However, trends, like the boom years of Ireland, are not really meant to last. Trends are as uncertain as they are unpredictable. When I started submitting my chick-lit manuscript four years ago, I received a staggering 44 rejections. At that time, I read of a New York agent saying that merely labeling your work chick lit was for certain a death knell. How fast the bloom fades off the rose! Currently, I am submitting my young adult (YA) novel and the rejections are rolling in and the word on the other side of the Atlantic is that U.S. editors are no longer interested in paranormal. Apparently there is an epidemic of vampire fatigue as well as angel fatigue and werewolf fatigue.

Luckily the UK follows the trends of the US by a couple of years, so there is still some breathing room on this side of the pond.

Right now, I detect a slight whiff in the air as to the next trend. Erotica. All everyone seems to be talking about is the viral hit Fifty Shades of Grey and for about 30 seconds, I thought, “Oh, I can write that!” Then I remembered two very important things: my mother is still alive and I was schooled by nuns for twelve years. The idea of me being the next Anais Nin is as realistic as teaching an elephant to fly.

Looking back, I do not think I was consciously following trends at the time although it appears that way. (I would have also written a female sleuth manuscript in the mid ’90′s). I always tend to write what I am currently reading if that makes any sense.

Do not let the current trends dictate what you write (although like fashions every thing seems to come back into favor eventually). By the time you write it, sub it and get it published, they have moved onto the next trend and you are left with enough rejections to wallpaper a room. It is best to write what you know and more importantly what you love and write from the heart. Chances are if you love it, someone out there will be sure to love it as well, regardless of what the trend is.

Years ago, I borrowed it from the library with a bunch of other books on writing and never got around to reading it. Well, in 2010 I won a copy of the book for participating in a Book-in-a-Week monthly writing session. As I started to read the first few chapters I felt a growing resistance to the information.

Goldberg was introducing the idea that “we all have a dream of telling our stories — of realizing what we think, feel, and see before we die”. I just wanted to know how to write the best murder mysteries. She was linking writing to meditating and learning more about our inner selves. I wanted to know when and where to place the clues so my readers would not find them too easily.

Then I read the chapters on the writing practice and it hit me. This was useful and could help with my biggest problem: writing every day. The chapters, “Composting” and “Tap the Water Table”, took two readings but I got it. The chapter, “First Thoughts”, was a different matter. All I can say is when I started this book I did not want to throw up my personal history and examine it with a microscope.

Since then I have returned to the book many times and each time found a new gem. No, I have not started meditating yet and my personal history is still unexplored but this book is something else and worth at least ten reads to find every nugget.

• Purchase Writing Down the Bones from Amazon.com.
• Purchase Writing Down the Bones from Amazon.ca.

The last four months of last year I entered my novel in two contests. and have been rushing to finish it properly (I have been working on it for the last two years). I just wanted to finish it and move on with my life but to do so I had to use all my resources and imagination and well, but it was finished, the well of ideas and imagination was dry.

Although the idea for the subsequent book germinates in my mind and dominates just about every thought, I continue to stare at the blank page. I am 10,000 words in and I have the ending sorted out. It is the deep chasm of the unfinished middle that haunts me. The image of one of those rickety wooden bridges over a deep canyon comes to mind: one side being the beginning while the other side is the ending and the yawning pit in between represents my unwritten middle.

One thing I do know at this point in my life is that I am happiest when I am writing, so this level of inactivity is unacceptable. To resolve it or to restock the well so to speak, I have started doing a few things that I am confident will help.

Writing Every Day

Just to get into the habit and discipline of writing everyday, regardless of whether it is used or binned. I love the prompts on this website as they give me different things to write about and they make me think. I strongly advise that you try them out. I also have a word goal of 500 words a day, whether it turns out to be crap or not, surely, I should be able to manage that.

Research

My novel is a young adult (YA) paranormal so I do a lot of research; I spend a lot of time reading about supernatural and spiritual elements as well as picking the brains of my teenage nieces to make my YA voice more authentic. The more research I have, the more I will have to draw on.

Plotting

Usually, I write without a plan. I do make character analyses on all the main characters but I do not do a plot outline just usually a one page summary of what my novel is going to be about. This time however, I am going to try and write up a plot outline or a chapter summary to see if I can stir the muse to action. After all, if I were traveling somewhere, I would not try to get to my destination without a map.

Clearing My Head

For me, I need to be near water to do this. I grew up a mile from Lake Erie and now I live on an island; being near water centers me and gives me an inner peace that is almost spiritual. It never ceases to inspire or motivate me. I will make a trip to Inch Beach within the next week or two and that should help as well.

Keep Reading

I read voraciously because I enjoy it and I do not feel that I could be a very effective writer if I did not read.

While I am confident that my plan for combating writer’s block will work, I am open to any suggestions as to how you deal with your writer’s block. Please feel free to leave me a comment with some ideas.

April 22 is Earth Day. It is a world wide event involving all age groups and socioeconomic backgrounds. Originally a political day for supporting policy changes to improve the environment it has become a day often forgotten except by organized groups. Visit the links for three great sites explaining the importance of Earth Day (Earth Day Canada, Earth Day US — Environment Protection Agency, The Arbor Day Foundation) and what you can do to celebrate it and improve our environment on a daily basis.

Here are seven prompts to capture your views of Earth Day:

Day One: What does Earth Day mean to you?

Day Two: How important are trees to you personally?

Day Three: Describe what you do to make our planet a better place to live.

Day Four: Describe the last time you littered.

Day Five: Think of ways to spread the importance of taking care of our planet to at least one other person.

Day Six: Contemplate the life of a tree.

Day Seven: Use these words to journal about Earth Day: cans, tree, oil, water, duck, community, recycling, truck, life, grandchildren.

Responses are not meant to be one sentence answers, elaborate on your answers. Meditate, reflect and enjoy. You can find more writing prompts at The Write Prompts blog.

Like the seasons you know you can rely on “tax time” to come once a year. For some this is an already stressful time of year made stressful by having to fill out tax forms and in the worse case scenarios… hand out some hard earned cash.

Here are some prompts to work through your feelings on your tax woes:

Day One: Do you think we should have to pay taxes?

Day Two: You’re getting a refund. What are you going to do with it?

Day Three: Oops. You’re not getting a refund. Write about what you could do for next year.

Day Four: Who does your taxes? Why?

Day Five: What are the benefits of tax time?

Day Six: Use the following words to write a creative entry about a woman named Megan: pink, Sunday, Moscow, goggles, dog, race, transcend, cacti, armoire, pavement.

Day Seven: You owe $10,000 in back taxes. How are you going to pay it off?

Bonus: What would you do with the money you didn’t have to pay taxes with?

Even though expressed as a question that may provide a one sentence answer, elaborate on your answers. Meditate, reflect and enjoy. You can find more writing prompts at The Write Prompts blog.

This is not to be confused with writer’s block. This is like a sub-paragraph, subsection A type of thing that has more to do with the structure of your novel rather than an inability to write.

The first thing to do at a dead end, is to step away from it for a prescribed period of time be it forty-eight hours or one week, but circle the date of the return on your calendar so it does not turn into six months (been there, done that). After a break, you will return with a fresh perspective and you can go back to square one; awful as it sounds, it has to be done.

Check the following:

• Is the theme/premise of your novel enough to sustain it? Is there enough meat in the plot and sub-plots to propel it to the 100k word finish line? Examine it critically (and honestly) and ask yourself if it would be better suited in novella form or short story.
• Do you know your character(s) as well as you should? What are their fears, motivations and feelings? What do they eat for breakfast? Are they night owls? Why do they act the way they do? Are their thoughts, feelings and actions consistent throughout? Do you have enough characters and sub-plots or too many?
• Have you tied up your loose ends too early? Your WIP should resemble an unfinished tapestry and not the orphan strands of yarn in your knitting basket that have absolutely no connection to each other. In the end, it should all come together.
• It would not hurt to have a few readers take a look and offer suggestions. Not your mother or your best friend but someone who can give you critical advice at this juncture.
• Have you done all your research? On your theme? Your setting? Time period? Do you know everything you need to know in order to write the story?
• Review or rewrite the outline of your WIP or prepare chapter summaries so you have a concrete plan and you can see what has happened and what needs to happen next.

If in the end, you have gone back to square one and exhausted everything and still arrive at the dead end, then it might be time to retire it to a drawer. Never regret it. Think of it as a learning experience.