Temporary Hiatus

Hello friends. Due to a personal matter and being busy with writing, editing, and other things, I have taken a break from blogging.

When I return, the blog will hopefully have a new look, and there will be more diverse subject matter that incorporates my background in psychology as well as other subjects. But it will all go towards the goal of improving your writing.

Thank you for reading. In the meantime, please enjoy this picture of my dog, Morticia.

Yes, this is Morticia. She is possibly the friendliest Chihuahua on Earth.

The Rule of Three

A while back, I wrote about editing your drafts so you can submit your most polished work. But sometimes it's hard to look at your rough draft and make changes. How do you go about making it better?

Making this face doesn't help.

Image courtesy of MorgueFile.

I commit all my sins during my first draft, which includes TV and film references, telling more than showing, and ambiguity. After that, I have to let it sit for a few weeks while I work on other things, and then go back to make my edits. That's if I'm working alone. Sometimes, though, I have friends interested in taking a look and making suggestions and edits. That's when I'm really happy.

But I always like more than one person to look at my work, and have discovered that the magic number is three.

If you have three people interested in reading your work and can trust their feedback, you're in a lot of luck.

The Rule of Three for editing has become really important to me and it's helped me improve my writing. Oh, sure, I still commit all my egregious sins in my rough draft (because why not, it's just a rough draft and my main goal for a rough is to just get the story out of my head an onto the computer), but my final draft is a winner.

When you employ the Rule of Three, try it this way and see if it works for you:

• Send your rough to your three friends/beta readers/editors. Ask them for their honest feedback.
• Wait for their advice.
• If you find something that all three agree on for feedback, change it without question.
• If only one pipes up about something that should be changed, but you really like it, you might be able to keep it. But if two of them are piping up, you may want to seriously consider revising.
• If they disagree on certain changes, go with the one you prefer.
• Don't be sensitive. Take their critique seriously, but not personally.

I've found that taking their advice makes for a better story altogether. 

For example, I had written a passage about a character that was completely irrelevant to the story, but I really liked it and wanted the reader to have the background on his family. All three of my readers told me to take it out, and I refused because I was attached to it. Finally, it went to a publisher who picked it up (the anthology that features the short story is coming out in October), and the editor strongly suggested it be removed. I agreed to the changes.

To be honest, it's really a much better story with improved pacing since I removed it. Now I'm not so stubborn or attached.

Consider using the Rule of Three for your next manuscript. Remember, it's all about making your story better.

Writing Your Weakness

A few months ago, I wrote about endings.

Endings are my weakness. Well, they used to be my weakness, till I started focusing on them. Now they're often much better and stronger than my beginnings. With practice, I've managed to evolve a stronger ending with decent pacing, and that doesn't fall flat (most of the time. No one's perfect.).

The point of this post isn't actually about endings, though. It's about knowing your weaknesses as a writer. Where do you fall short? I know my rough points. I am a teller instead of a shower (which is okay, but can be a weakness at times), and tend towards ambiguity.

In order to defeat these tendencies, I practice, and I ask other people for their opinions.

I like to imagine that this is my reader, right now.

Sometimes, when I write, I try to catch my problems ahead of time, but when it comes to a first draft, it's going to need help anyway--so just writing it is far more important. You can do this, too. It's relatively easy, and even easier if you have a thick skin to critique from another person.

• Step one: Write your first draft. Don't worry about style. Just get it all out on your laptop, computer, tablet, notebook, loose leaf paper, etc. Just write it all out until you can't write any more.
• Step two: If you do have a beta reader or editor, send it off to them and wait for their response. If you don't, find someone. Preferably someone in the industry or someone who just loves to read.
• Step three: Take their critique seriously, but don't take it to heart. That's the key ingredient to feedback. Understand that YOU do not suck. Your work does not suck (maybe it does but ignore that because who cares--suck is a matter of opinion, anyway). Your work needs work. Everyone's does! Even Faulkner's first drafts needed work. So put your ego aside and take it all in as things that will make you better.
• Step four: Identify your weaknesses. This will help you with your next edit, draft, and even your next first draft.
• Step five: Keep practicing, and repeat as needed.

Seriously, that's all there is to it. Your biggest obstacle in this is you. You are the only one who can put aside your feelings and choose to learn. 

To this day, I enjoy it when someone edits my work. All they do is help me identify where I need to grow, and how I can turn the ideas in my head into something that other people will enjoy.

Don your thick skin and send that first draft to someone who can give you unflinching and honest feedback. Use it to enhance your writing and raise your awareness of your weaknesses so you can turn them into strengths.

I'm a writer and kind of foolish. If you enjoy absurdities and the occasional heartfelt post, follow me on Twitter. I'm also on Facebook.

Self-Publishing or Traditional Publishing?

This is a brief post this week about my personal journey to being published, and why I've avoided self-publishing to the point where I'm just about phobic of it.

Photo courtesy of MorgueFile.

I'm more terrified of self-publishing than of this spider. But that's just me.

Really, a person can get a great deal of success from self-publishing, and it is becoming a perfectly legitimate way to get your stories out to the public for consumption. The ingenious John Dies at the End by David Wong is self-published, and that means all the money went to him. No publisher, no agent, no editor, no other human being got in the way of himself and that sweet reward of food-granting nectar known as money.

But David Wong committed himself to excellent editing (or having someone excellent do it for him), constant self-promotion through Cracked, and the likely superhuman powers to make other people want to read his book.

So why won't I do it? Because even though I'm a pretty damn good writer, I know that the David Wongs of the world are rare gems, and there are tons of self-published people out there who are struggling to make ends meet. David (Jason) had a great vehicle through Cracked for promotion, and that's helpful. What I want is someone who can help me get into one of those great vehicles and then BOOM -- I can promote the hell out of myself.

My journey is to do the traditional publishing route, and hopefully secure myself a literary agent. Agents, to me, are worth their cut, because a good agent will work his/her fingers to their stubby nubs to get you published. They have all the experience, strategy, and marketing knowledge to sell you, your manuscript, and get your message out to a wider audience.

Isn't that what you want, anyway?

Whether you choose to self-publish, find an agent, or represent yourself to publishers, just be sure you follow through. Make sure you dot your i's and cross your t's. Keep moving forward, and don't stop when you get a rejection. Don't take it personally. Somewhere, there's an agent or publisher out there who will like your stuff and give you a chance. If you keep working at it, that is.

I'll let you know how it works for me when I get an agent for myself. Right now, I'm looking forward to October, when my short story comes out.

A Question on Quora

This week I'd like to share with you an answer I posted on Quora. If you like the answer and are a member, I'd appreciate it if you'd vote for it. Quora is an excellent Q&A site with a great number of experts on topics. I'm glad to be a part of it.

Now onto the answer, if you're too lazy to click on the link:

While I will say that some novelists can be arrogant (just as some filmmakers certainly are), most of us want readers to enjoy what we've put forward. We're proud of our work. When our work is made into a film, it's a huge compliment. But some of the things that we write don't translate well onto film and can only be expressed in the mind of the reader. When you read, you get to use your own stage/set, picture the characters without the hindrance of an actor's appearance, and be swept away with some carefully crafted words.

Granted, if you're too ignorant or lazy to read, go ahead and watch the movie adaptation of a novel. Ultimately, you'll only get to scrape the surface and enjoy someone else's interpretation of those words instead of diving in and immersing yourself into another world.

You may have a learning disability that prohibits you from enjoying a novel, however, so watching a movie may be the only way you can enjoy the interpretation of a printed work. Sadly enough, you may have to wait quite some time to get different versions of a tale.

One of the best adaptations of a novel, in my opinion, was the serialization of Stephen King's The Stand. Even though it was made for TV, and cut out many details, it was great. However, it still wasn't the same as the novel. That novel was amazing. I read it when I had the flu. My father gave it to me as a gift (he had a sick sense of humor which I've apparently inherited). Anyway, it's one of my favorites, but the film itself and the novel are separate entities.

Something I like to do is actually see a film first, then read the novel. For me, it's like going "behind the scenes" to find out what really happened, as if the author truly knows what happened, and all the extra details seem much more juicy and fun. If you haven't done this, try it with the Harry Potter serials, if you like that genre. I had a blast doing it that way with the first three films and novels.

If the question's intent was to insult writers/novelists by calling them arrogant, I would say that it failed (at least with me, because I was highly amused by the question). If, however, it was genuine, it's a great one, because it asks for definitive analysis and thought as to why we enjoy the things we enjoy.

Important Writing Tools

A fan via Facebook message writes:

What tools do you use to write?

There are a lot of people who want tools, gadgets, and apps to test out or play with while writing. Sometimes it lends a false sense of productivity, or an excuse NOT to write, but they can be useful.

Do you use Scrivener? LitLift? Jotterpad at all? Open Office? Have you tried Sunrise Calendar? Do you use a calendar at all? What dictionary and thesaurus do you use? Is there a certain website you use to research (Quora, Wiki, or just ask friends?), or a particular style reference? Do you use Word Counter's website, or just keep the count in Scrivener? I use Jotterpad on my phone when I'm in bed or away from a PC, but not everyone does.

I agree with the questioner — having too many tools, gadgets, and apps can give you a false sense of productivity, and actually become a crutch. For me, I keep it simple, and put everything into one tool.

That tool is Scrivener.

I don’t use a calendar for writing because I keep notes, either directly into Scrivener, and I write on a daily basis. If you do want a reminder to write every day, set an alarm on your mobile phone that has a note, “time to write.”

Writing for me is something I do on my laptop. I don’t use an app when I’m out and about, because when I’m out, I want to be engaged in my surroundings. If I’m at a café, I want to be enjoying my tea and biscuits, and taking in my reading or visiting with a friend. If I go to a bookstore, I will bring my laptop with me, but I don’t always use it for writing.

I like to write at home, by myself, where I can focus on my craft without distraction. I find extraneous tools to cause a major distraction. So, every morning, I sit down, boot up my laptop, derp around the internet for a bit, then settle down and write in Scrivener. I can format the way I want, keep my research there, and organize my chapters just the way I like them. Scrivener has formatting for graphic novels, screenplays, short stories, and novels. So I can do what I want!

For a dictionary and thesaurus, I just highlight a word I want and right click on it in Scrivener, and it brings me to thesaurus.com, and I can look up definitions there just by clicking on the ‘dictionary’ tab. If I’m not happy with the results insofar as definitions, I will consult both Merriam-Webster and Oxford English Dictionary. OED is great for word origins and when using British English, and Merriam-Webster is great for American English (yes, that’s a real thing, thank you Noah Webster).

When I need to do research, I will start with trying to find videos on YouTube. From there, it will help me develop questions and areas for further research. If I can’t find what I want or need, I’ll head over to Quora where a large number of experts share their knowledge and opinions. After that, it’s off to asking people I know what they think and know about certain subjects. After all that, I typically have a general understanding of the subject, and from there, it’s my own mistakes and/or poetic license.

My word counts come directly from Scrivener, although sometimes I like to check with Word Counter just to see if it differs.

I think that whatever tools work for you, you should use and explore. The only caveat I would give, however, is not to let your tools control you. YOU control your tools. The moment your organizational tools stop helping you organize and get your writing done is the moment you need to start trashing those tools and go back to basics.

Most importantly, keep it simple, and keep your focus on your creative craft.

Because that’s what matters.

Follow me on Twitter (@Spellvira) where you can read absurdities on an infrequent basis. You can also learn more and read excerpts of my work on my tumblr page.

The Importance of a Concordance

Writing a single short story doesn’t typically require anything more than a few notes so you can keep your characters straight (unless you have just one or two characters to juggle, and if that can’t be done without notes, you’re in trouble). But when you’re writing a novel, a series, or have plans to do so, a concordance is your best friends.

Ideally, your concordance will help you keep names of characters straight, as well as their backgrounds and details. It can also help you develop your story, keep track of land and landmarks, buildings, history of your fantasy world, and little things, such as where your character was injured during the war (I’m looking at you, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who couldn’t keep track of Watson’s injury location — shoulder or leg — or what his first name was — John or James).

Anyone who writes epic stories knows how important it is to keep track of your characters, because ultimately, some avid fan will chronicle your work, characters, storylines, etc. George R. R. Martin has a fan upon whom he can call for keeping his characters straight. A fan-based concordance, in fact. One that’s so detailed the author himself uses it. Not all of us will be lucky enough to have the brilliance of Martin’s incredible stories, or get a fan base so rabid, so it’s best to just do it yourself, and do it early enough so that you can keep track and not become overwhelmed.

So what should be in your concordance? I went over it a tad in the second paragraph, but here’s a handy list that will help you keep things straight:

• Characters - Main characters, side characters, even one-time characters belong here. Don’t forget to detail their lives prior to your story, and add anything you think is relevant.
• Landmarks - Got an old building you want to write about? Consider the landscape of your world, and if there are any special places your characters will visit.
• Maps - Along with landmarks, maps are handy to have even if you can’t draw well. Whether you’re superimposing your world over Google Maps, or drawing a world all your own, keep your maps handy. You don’t want to establish that Town is 300 miles from City, only to have your character arrive there by foot in just a few hours later on (unless they’ve got super-speed, or something).
• Factions - Any time you have groups of people and tension, you wind up with factions. They can be political, religious, bad hairdo people versus good hairdo people, etc. Just be sure to keep them in order so that you don’t wind up having a character switch factions (without explanation, that is).
• History/Timeline - During your story, things happen. Characters change, die, are born, reborn, move away, go to prison, etc. Make sure you add to your concordance as you go along. This will ensure you don’t suddenly bring back a character at the end of the story by accident. Unless your story is supposed to have that happen (and will be explained unless you’re going for something absurd), keeping track of your history and events is best done in a timeline.

Ultimately, your concordance will keep your story cohesive and is one of the best things you can do for yourself, especially when writing a series. But just be sure to keep your concordance as notes, rather than a highly detailed encyclopedia. Your story is what matters — the notes just support it.

Follow me on Twitter (@Spellvira) where you can read absurdities on an infrequent basis. You can also learn more and read excerpts of my work on my tumblr page.

Write Away

The week before last (couldn’t post last week due to other writing projects taking precedence) I went on a bit about needing a muse, or rather, not needing a muse.

That’s what this whole blog is about, after all.

In my personal life, I’ve been stressed out to my limits. I won’t get into why, but things have been looking pretty bad for my immediate family, and we’ve had some ups and downs. But I can’t let that interfere with my ability to write. No matter what, I have to get up, pick up my laptop, and work. Whether it’s for my personal projects or a client project, it has to be done and it has to be done well.

The way it used to be was, I didn’t think I could just sit down and write. I thought I had to be inspired by something special. I had to have one of those ‘aha’ moments and write a manuscript or an article in a flurry of abandon to produce a masterpiece that would be lauded long after I died.

Yeah. That worked out about as well as putting your hand through a mangler.

My writing stank. It was putrid. Forced, false, and stilted, full of cliches and overusing words. Blah. (There are a couple of reasons for this, actually, but I’ll go into that some other time.)

It wasn’t until I was in my mid-twenties when I realized that the lessons I’d gotten during a Shingon Esoteric Buddhist retreat that I could apply it to my writing.

During that retreat, one of the things we did was calligraphy — meditative calligraphy. Our Sensei taught us to write in Japanese kanji, and we were practicing one character throughout the week. Well, if you know me, you know I can’t draw to save my life. I can do a mean stick figure, but that’s about it. So, the elegance of the kanji calligraphy was way out of my league. But, an assignment is an assignment, so I sat there on my mat, ink brush in one hand, paper on the floor, tongue sticking out to one side as I attempted to imitate the strokes of the brush as our Sensei had done so effortlessly.

It looked like a little kid’s drawing...well, actually worse. It was bad.

Sensei looked over my shoulder. “Practice more,” he told me. I shook my head, discouraged.

“I just don’t have the talent,” I told him. He smiled at me.

“This looks like my first drawing when I was a child,” he said. “You can practice, and you can become good.”

So, all week long, I practiced. I brought my materials home, and I kept practicing. Page after crappy page. But I was encouraged and determined to show improvement. 

At the end of the week, we were sitting for meditative calligraphy again, for the same character.

Once again, Sensei came over and looked at my work.

“Much better,” he commented. “You’ve practiced.”

I nodded. It wasn’t perfect by any means, but it was a slight improvement over the chicken scratch I’d produced before. “Hope I get even better.”

“Practice ten-thousand times and you will be a master.”

That stayed with me. If you practice anything ten-thousand times, then, yes, you can achieve mastery over something.

So it is with writing. Practice, practice, and practice some more, and eventually you will master the craft. You don’t need to wait for inspiration, because inspiration will come to you when you practice. The more you open your mind to the possibilities of your stories, the more you’ll gain insight to your own words.

On the days you don’t feel like writing, promise yourself you’ll write just 500 words (that’s one page, come on already) about anything. I mean anything. Here are some prompts to get you started:

• A man walks into a bar and realizes he has a drinking problem.
• A dog decides to take up ice skating.
• A small group of people face having to eat one of their own to survive.
• Gorillas figure out how to shoot people.
• One beauty contest goes horribly wrong.

Pick one of these and do just 500 words about it. See if it turns into something, and go from there. That’s exactly what I do when I don’t feel like writing.

Now, I’m off to write a short story about a road trip. Let’s see where this road takes me. Write away.

This post is dedicated to Howard Mittelmark and Sandra Newman, authors of How Not to Write a Novel. Once they’ve inspired you, follow them on Twitter. But don’t leave me hanging! You can follow me on Twitter (@Spellvira), where you can read absurdities on an infrequent basis. You can also learn more and read excerpts of my work on my tumblr page.

Writing for Food - Writing for Fun

I once told a good friend of mine that I write to put food on the table.

That was true, but it’s not exactly the whole story.

There’s a difference between being a Freelance Writer, and being an Author. I wear both hats. Allow me to explain the functions of each one.

The Freelance Writer Hat
This is the practical baseball cap that I put on and wear when I’m writing for other people. It is the custom-tailored hat that is probably worn on a couple of edges, but it still looks okay. It serves its function.

There are deadlines, demanding clients, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) keywords and phrases, revisions, more revisions, ratings, tailor-made posts that don’t sound like anyone else, client’s clients and their sub-clients, and on and on ad nauseam. It’s the type of writing where if you don’t write, you don’t get to eat.

The Author Hat
I like this fit better, of course. This is my sexy, wide-brimmed hat that shields my eyes from the searing pain of the sun and lends an air of je ne sais quoi to my appearance. It’s the hat I wear when I write for pleasure. If it sells on the shelves, great! If it doesn’t, well, damn, but it won’t stop me from writing and enjoying myself.

There are some deadlines when working with a publisher, edits and revisions, more revisions, helping to market your work, and moving on to your next story. It’s the type of writing where you write, sometimes get paid for it, and hopefully just have a great time doing it.

Both hats are valuable, and they’ve taught me a great deal about the writing process. Not only are you creating art with words, you’re crafting them, too. You’re building a structure that will hopefully stand for a good long while. You might not build the Sphinx or The Great Wall of China, but hopefully you’ve built something that will house a few generations of readers.

I have also said that it is not necessary to have a muse in order to write. I still stand by it, that it’s 100% true if you’re dedicated to your craft. That doesn’t mean you’re not inspired or uninspired on some days, but I’ll write more about that later. I’ve been accused of having a Puritan streak for it (thanks, Frank!), but that’s not true, either. The Puritanical work ethic can play into it for some, but I prefer to think of it as a dedication to producing art. I am not a machine nor a beast of burden. I am my own muse.

I used to think that I needed a muse in order to produce a story. As such, I wound up not writing very often, just waiting for the “right idea” to come along. Then, I got into Freelance Writing to help pay my bills. There was no room for waiting with this. There were articles to write and deadlines to meet, but each article had to be original and unique, and not look like the generic crap that a bot can crank out in minutes. If you want to stand out in the world of freelance writing, you MUST produce work that has a twist to it. Infused with humor, excitement, and quality. Considering my consistent rating is five of five stars, I think I’ve got that part under control.

Doing it day in and day out gave me the idea that I could do the same thing with creative writing, if only I would sit down and write...anything. Start with a dream I had last night and see where it went. Take a character from one of my games and tailor them to become original. Use my imagination. BECOME MY OWN MUSE.

That isn’t to say there aren’t ideas, dreams, and other people who inspire me. There are plenty of people I admire and things people say that wend their way into my head and sometimes wind up in my manuscripts. But there isn’t an intangible thing out there that controls me and what I write. I draw inspiration from elsewhere, but I am the creator. If I had to depend on something or someone else, I’d never get any project finished. But I’ll write more about that next week. This week it’s all about author hats.

No matter which hat you choose, one or the other, or both, try to approach them in the same way, especially if you’re feeling uninspired, ill, or otherwise ‘just not in the mood.’ Put yourself in the mood. Think it’s impossible? I’m writing this very moment with a migraine. I created this piece and I’m pretty pleased with it. If I can do it under these circumstances, then you can, too.

Follow me on Twitter (@Spellvira) where you can read absurdities on an infrequent basis. You can also learn more and read excerpts of my work on my tumblr page.

Keeping Track of Submissions

This process has become so overcomplicated, it’s ludicrous. I mean, there are even apps out there and complicated doodads to keep track of where you’ve submitted. It’s insane.

Listen, you want to get published. Yes, of course! It’s only natural. But this should be the least stressful part of being a writer. Unfortunately, it’s often the most stressful for writers.

Whether you’re submitting to agencies or to publishers directly, you do need to keep track of your submissions. Some places don’t allow multiple submissions, and others get very snippy when you submit more than once to them. SO, you need a method that will keep it simple without tripping you up.

My method is simple, straightforward, and it might even work for other people.

I use my email folders and sub-folders to keep track of my submissions. Very easy. Easy peasy, even.

• Folder One: Query - Publishers
  Subfolder: Responses
• Folder Two: Query - Agencies
  Subfolder: Responses
• Folder Three: Publishing Agreements
  Subfolder: Responses

From there, I arrange the emails in them alphabetically. That way, I simply access the folder, and I can find to whom I’ve submitted already in just a couple of seconds.

Some people do the same, but with a spreadsheet. Now, while I love spreadsheets, to me, this seems like doubling my work. I’ve already got all the organizational tools I need in the email folders, so why take extra time getting out a spreadsheet and doing almost exactly the same thing there? For me, that’s going to take more time than I have.

Now, I’m not saying don’t use apps or spreadsheets. They may work for you. But what I am saying is, you’re a writer, not a professional submitter. Devoting too much time to this process just increases your stress and takes the focus away from your creative process. No one needs that!

Follow me on Twitter (@Spellvira) where you can read absurdities on an infrequent basis. You can also learn more and read excerpts of my work on my tumblr page.

Editing Your First Draft: A Tale of Terror

I once told you to go edit yourself after a break of about six weeks. So, let’s say those six weeks have passed, and you’re ready to start editing your manuscript.

So, there it is — 60, 70, 100, 200,000 words — all sitting there just staring at you, waiting for those first cuts or elaborations and clarifications. Where do you start?

Most read their own manuscripts through about five times, but I like to go through mine six. It’s not actually to be more thorough or a topper or anything. You’ll see why in a moment.

Step One: Read for enjoyment.

Here’s what I like to do when I start editing anything. I read it for its content. Just a read through as if I were picking up the book for enjoyment. This step is where you set aside all your judgments and just enjoy what you’ve written. Now, if you’re overly critical of yourself, you might find things during your reading that you don’t like, or catch a mistake in continuity, spelling, or grammar. If you can’t let it go, make a quick note of it and set it aside. Then, just keep reading. Read it through to the bitter end, or the happy end, or whatever ending you’ve written.

This is a healthy way to just get through and enjoy your work and what you’ve accomplished, and it will set you up to start gearing into editor’s mode in the next five steps.

Step Two: Read for supplementation.

This is where you need to add in what you forgot to in the first place. Did you describe a scene but find it lacking? Add details — sound, smell, sights — and the explanation of how characters got to be where they were wherever you feel it’s important. Yes, many people will tell you it’s not necessary to add anything to your first draft, but I’ve found that to be simply untrue. But don’t worry, you’ll cut it down later.

Step Three: Read for expurgation and condensation.

It’s later now...your third read should be finding all those ugly spots where there’s just too much exposition. If you lose between 20-25% of your manuscript, that’s fine. It’s expected. I’ve deleted entire chapters without hurting the story. Cut back on anything that’s getting preachy. You don’t want to mess too much with your story’s point.

You may also want to cut back things that got to be too much (too overtly sexual, violent, or factual). Use your best judgment. Did you really mean to have the family dog eat your antagonist’s manky bits? You might want to take it out, or not. Depends on what kind of mood your going for (and especially important in that case if you want your antagonist to have children). Of course, this will also depend on your genre. Erotica, slasher, shlock, and other genres may allow more graphic detail.

Tighten up your writing. Make your sentences pop, kill the verbosity when necessary, and get your point across.

Step Four: Read for content.

Hand-in-hand with expurgation and condensation, you need to do another read through for your content. Did one of your characters get stabbed on page 37 and is absolutely fine without reason on page 38? Did Sally J. mysteriously move from apartment #4 to #8? Oops! Now’s the time to fix it.

Make sure your timeline makes sense, and you don’t have characters meeting before they’re introduced (unless you’re going for a wibbly-wobbly timey wimey thing and totally doing that on purpose), and that your point of view isn’t bouncing around from one character to the other constantly (unless you’re going for that, but make sure it’s handled with skill to avoid confusing your readers).

Here is the ideal time to do your fact-checking. If you’re using anything in your story that is based in fact (for example, recently I needed to know some stuff about guns and helicopters), do your research. Google, watch YouTube videos, and ASK people you know to be experts. Get the information down and make sure your story makes SOME sense. No, you don’t have to be 100% accurate and can take license with certain things to fit your plot and drive it forward, but if you don’t even make the effort to be accurate, it will show, and your work will get called out for it.

Conversely, you can also write too much on the facts and lose the story — so go ahead and cut that back if you haven’t already in step three. Remember, it’s all about the story. Whether you’re character driven or plot driven, your main focus needs to be your story, not how many hours of research you’ve done or how many experts you’ve interviewed. Ultimately, it comes down to the story you’re telling.

That having been said, some people just don’t care and do it anyway — they just write whatever comes into their head, and damn the research. Unfortunately, it can ruin the fun for your audience. In this case, I would put a disclaimer in your author’s notes, preemptively asking for forgiveness. It can help massage the audience into a bit of forgiveness. However, I’m all for maintaining a balance between your facts and your fiction.

Step Five: Read for sentence structure and minutiae.

This read is where you do your real spelling and grammar check. Take out your fine-tooth comb and start scouring your pages for the correct usage of ‘too, to, and two’ and all that. Make sure that everything is consistent, too. Your dialog doesn't have to be grammatically correct at all, but it needs to be consistent. You don’t want your Harvard Professor Emeritus sounding like a rural Kansas farmer, right? The same goes for your punctuation. If you’re using the Oxford comma, make sure you’re using it consistently throughout your text.

Check to see if you’re using a single word too often, and take those out. “Quickly, Maynard went to the door and quickly opened it. The girl stood still, soaking wet in the rain. He quickly took her inside and wrapped her up in a towel.” Guess which word needs to go? (Hint: it’s NOT Maynard.)

Do a quick review to make sure you didn’t rename a town by accident, and make sure you spell your place names consistently.

Double check your sentences. Seriously. Make sure you’ve gotten rid of clunky sentences or fixed them in such a way that they’re nice and smooth. Get rid of trite crap.

You’ll also want to ensure that your paragraph transitions are slick and easy. Do this now.

Step Six: Read it to an audience.

When all of this is done, go ahead and find a victim...a willing one, please — and read your manuscript aloud. If you don’t have anyone, record it and play it back to yourself as if you were listening to an audio book. This will help you with your previous five steps. You can catch repetitive and/or awkward sentences here, and that’s a huge help for clarity.

Additionally, you’ll also be able to hear dialog better, and see if you can keep track of who’s speaking.

Finally, it’ll help your pacing, and you can go back and fix spots that drag or slow down anything that’s too rushed.

That’s it!

Congratulations, you’ve gone through your first revision. Now, it’s up to you to do further editing, or allow a second set of eyes to edit your work. This can be in the form of an editor or beta reader. It can give you a different, more detached perspective on your work that can help get your manuscript ready for publishing, and an agent or editor will appreciate it.

Okay...what are you still doing here? Get editing already!

Follow me on Twitter (@Spellvira) where you can read absurdities on an infrequent basis. You can also learn more and read excerpts of my work on my tumblr page.

Please Stop With The GOD DAMNED PANDERING!

Last week, I was unable to put up a blog post because I was unwell in the morning, and had to rest before going to see the wonderfully amazing and amazingly wonderful Eddie Izzard for his Force Majeure Tour. Without further ado, here is the post I wanted to write.

Yes, that title’s a take off on Bill Murray’s character from Scrooged, Frank Cross, when he yelled for the workers to stop with the goddamn hammering.

It’s fairly much expressive of the level of irritation I feel when certain television shows and films (that run in a series) start to pandering to audiences. Currently, it’s Hannibal (pandering to the Hanagram crowd) and Sherlock BBC (bringing back Moriarty) that have disappointed me by pandering to their fans rather than sticking to the quality material that have made them popular and beloved in the first place. Once a show begins doing that, it becomes sloppy. The writers stop feeling the magic that brought them there in the beginning. It shows. The series suffers, and the audience ultimately suffers except for the vocal handful who demanded dreck and nonsense from the writers.

This is not the same as listening to your editor. Your editor is there to help you make the best out of your work.

Of course, a big influence for television shows and films are the producers, who are the writers’ bread and butter. But that’s another post in and of itself.

So, dear fellow writer, why am I bothering with all this? Because I want to tell you to not give in to your fans if you have something in mind. If you do, your writing will suffer, and you’ll wind up with a work that leaves you utterly dissatisfied.

You are not a fan fiction writer when you’re writing an original work. You’re also not a fan fiction writer when you’re working on a reboot of an original work. There is nothing wrong with fan fic. I write it all the time. I love it. But when you write something, and you make it your own — whether it’s a reboot of a classic or an entirely original world, write it for you. Write it because you enjoy it, not because you have fans begging you to put James with Daria or so-and-so, but because you want to put James with Daria, or with Ken, or whomever you prefer. That’s just an example.

Admittedly, feedback from fans is invaluable at times. Sometimes, they have an insight into your characters that you’ve never considered. But it must be taken with a grain of salt.

It all comes down to this simple, seven-step program:

1. If you enjoy what you’re writing, write it. Others will enjoy it, too.
2. You will have detractors.
3. You will have fans who want something from you.
4. Continue to do what you want.
5. You will continue to have detractors.
6. You will continue to have fans who want something from you.
7. Continue to do what you want.

I recall an interview with someone from Warner Brothers (I saw this when I was a little girl, so I can only vaguely recall who it was) discussing a number of changes that “the people” would want them to make regarding Bugs Bunny/Merrie Melodies/Looney Tunes. His response was, essentially, that they ignored it and just kept doing what they wanted to do, and the shows/cartoons/etc. continued to be enormously popular.

Sometimes, you just have to keep doing what you think is best, producing what you want, and THAT is what will help you maintain your quality. THAT is what will keep you manufacturing your best writing.

Avoid pandering. You don’t need to turn your masterpiece work into something for others. Your contribution is what you make of it, and you don’t want your work to become weak and watered down just to please others (who will never be pleased anyway). Please your own inner reader, and the readers who can appreciate the quality of your work will, too.

If you want to keep up with my blog posts, follow me on Twitter already. I update about once a week for your reading and learning pleasure.

Write Something Worth Burning

A friend of mine once said (and he was quoting someone else, though I cannot recall the person he was quoting) that the best way to sell a book is to have it banned. While banning a book is not a marketing ploy, it is certainly an effective way to sell books. After all, once you hear a book is banned, don’t you want to run right out and read it just to see what all the fuss is about? (If you want to read some ‘banned classics,’ check out the ALA’s website.

A book worth reading is a book worth burning.

I love to go around finding lists of banned books, who wants them banned, and why...and then go out and read them or buy them. Perhaps it’s just the rebellious kid in me, but I really get a kick out of finding out what was so objectionable about the book. Plus, it gets me to think. I mean, really think, and even meta-think. “Why would they want this book banned or burned? What are they thinking?” It’s helpful to expand your mind in a variety of ways. Not only is the reader enriched by the literature itself, but also enriched by trying to think of why a book would be so volatile to some.

I see people who say, “these days, everyone has to be offended about something.” It’s true, but it is not unique to our time period. Take a long look back at history, and you’ll find plenty of people who have found offense with things. What happened? They were heard, things changed a bit, or they were ignored, and the status quo was maintained. Ho hum. Boring. Move along.

Today, all I ask of you is to be inspired. You don’t have to write something just for the sake of ‘being offensive,’ but write something that you’re passionate about. Someone will likely be offended by it, even if you didn’t intentionally infer anything at all. So, you might as well turn up the heat a bit and write about topics that interest you, topics that light you on fire and enjoy every word.

WRITE FOR YOU.

Remember, offense is taken, not given. I write horror. A lot of horror. I enjoy writing horror. One of my chapters in Silver Hollow is about a man who kills children. I bet there are people who take a whole lot of offense to that. Did I mean to be offensive? No. It’s a story, and that’s all it is. To me, it’s a truly disturbing story that was stuck in my head and I needed to write it. So, I did, and there it is. Certainly there are some people who would want to ban the story, some who will think I’m a nutjob, and some who will just read it and say, “meh, it was okay,” and still some who will read it and say, “that was XX minutes of my life wasted.” Am I responsible for their reactions? Nope. I’m responsible for me.

Now, if someone comes along and says, “your story inspired me to kill a bunch of people,” am I responsible for that?

Nope. That person just needed an excuse.

If someone comes along and says, “your story stopped me from killing a bunch of people and made me rethink my life,” am I responsible for that?

As much as I’d love to take credit for that, nope. Again, that person made a decision.

That’s not to say we don’t influence one another to think, or to act, but in my years spent studying psychology and working with patients as a supervised therapist, as well as reviewing hundreds of case studies and blah blah blah, I believe that we are ultimately responsible for the way we act and think. We just have to learn that we’re responsible for ourselves. Some people don’t know that, yet.

So, have you been shying away from that piece on abortion you’ve been wanting to write? How about that piece on going hunting? What about that work you’ve been putting off about heroin addiction?

What are you afraid of, that your book will get banned? That people will be mad at you? That someone will tell you that you suck?

Fuck ‘em. Write it anyway.

Elizabeth Bishop once wrote a poem on loss, called One Art. When I first heard that poem, I was 21 years old, and my father had just died. Oddly enough, I didn’t really think of it as a poem on death. But the last line really stuck with me for years (and still remains with me):

though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

That ‘write it’ right there? WRITE IT. That’s what I tell myself when I want to shy away from a certain topic.

It might not be the disaster you think it will be. But hopefully, your writing will piss enough people off to get them talking and thinking. Write with passion. Write with intelligence. Write to have fun and maybe even make a point.

Write because you want to, not whether or not it will be offensive.

But for the fun of it, love, tell yourself you’re gonna write something worth burning.

More About Grammar

During last week's blog post about grammar, I got some great feedback on Twitter from my friend, @flickguy. It was a quote (sent in a couple of tweets to me) from a NaNoWriMo experience he'd had in 2005:

If your spelling and grammar turns readers off right from the start, your thoughts and ideas are worthless because you've failed to communicate them to anyone.

The quote was attributed to Holly Jahangiri, a professional writer and author, and she's absolutely right. Have you ever picked up a book (typically self-published) and, just a few pages in, got rid of it because the language in it wasn't reaching you? Much of the time, it isn't because the writer is using circumlocutory language, but because they never bothered to edit their prose and correct their spelling and grammar mistakes.

Now, there are some really great self-published works out there, actually. Well-written, with excellent spelling and grammar, free of egregious mistakes. I'm not knocking self-publishing. I'm knocking writers who don't get their work copy edited before publishing because they don't want to pay for it and couldn't get their work published traditionally (likely because their query letter was so filled with said egregious errors, but that's for another blog post).

Basically, what I'm saying is this:

GET YOUR WORK EDITED, ESPECIALLY IF YOU'RE NOT GREAT AT SPELLING AND GRAMMAR.

But you can save that for the editing process.

Now, last week, I also said that dialog is a different matter altogether. Because it is. Essentially, don't forget to listen to how people say the things they say. Ever read V.C. Andrews? This sort of Gothic thriller fiction was great for me, especially when I was a teenager, but one of the things I couldn't stand was her dialog. Of course, it was purposefully crafted that way, but it was so stiff...so punctilious, it would get on my nerves.

Unless you're going for that kind of prose and dialog, I would suggest you listen to the way people speak to one another, and work from there. If you have to, read it out loud and hear how it sounds. If it comes across as too stiff, change it up a bit and relax. Unless your speaker is an erudite university professor, you probably want it to come off a tad more unrefined.

Don't let your hard work get pushed to the side by bad spelling, grammar, or overconscientious dialog. Get it edited, check it yourself, and be proud of the manuscript you've built.

Does Grammar Matter?

Okay, so you're writing a novel, book, literary piece, short story, etc. Typically that means you have something to say. Maybe you're not the best speller or grammarian in the world, but you have the right to tell your stories, just like anyone else.

So is the story more important than the spelling and grammar?

Yes, and no.

When you're writing your story, you're weaving a tale that, most likely, you will want read by more than just one or two people. Yes, yes, of course you're writing your story for you, but be honest with yourself: wouldn't you also like for other people to enjoy the story as much as you have?

If so, you're going to need to get a copy edit.

You want to present a polished manuscript to your publisher. It doesn't have to be perfect (no manuscript is), but you do want it to be as good as it can get so that the publisher doesn't take one look at it and say, "this is a mess, forget it."

There is an exception when it comes to spelling and grammar, though, and that's in your dialog. When characters (and people) speak to one another, they don't always follow the rules of grammar (they split infinitives, just as I did here, and they even do more than that) and the spelling may reflect their accents. They say, "I could care less," instead of the correct "I couldn't care less," and they say, "ain't," "carryin'" and "Australopithecus afarensis."

Just wanted to see if you were still paying attention.

So, with the exception of dialog, you want your narrative to be spelled correctly and use relatively proper grammar. Don't make it a mess. Turn on that spell check, and have a couple of people go through and edit your copy once you're finished.

Remember, even editors, when they go through your manuscript and make changes, are capable of spelling and grammar errors. No one is exempt. Always check your work.

Sometimes, it's the difference between having your work read and having it trashed.

In The End...

So I'm working on a short story right now.

It's going to run around 12,000 words when it's finished, and right at the moment, I'm working towards the ending. Those aren't easy for me, but they're something I've improved upon over the years with a lot of practice.

I have some choices to make.

I'm not really a big fan of happy endings. They can be a little too trite, sappy, or obvious. I'm a fan of fantastically disastrous endings, of gritty endings. Endings that rip your heart out and make you want to hide in your closet and eat comfort food.

Yeah, that kind.

I also enjoy ending stories with realistic and ambiguous conclusions. But happy endings? Yuck.

One of my favorite stories of Stephen King's is Thinner, and the reason it's one of my top ten King books is because of the ending.

Not the book.

Image courtesy MorgueFile.

If you haven't read it (which likely means you're not a horror fan or younger than 25 years), here comes a SPOILER alert -- they die at the end. They all eat the pie that contains the curse. The whole ending backfires so spectacularly it's beautiful. Of course, the whole story is just one cruel irony after another, but that ending...it's the icing on the cake. Or rather, the top crust on the pie.

Anyway, it stuck with me since the first time I read it (nine or ten years old), and my father asked me what I thought. I said "a happy ending."

He looked at me puzzled. "You think so?"

"For the Gypsies," I told him. He laughed. I had originally just been sarcastic, but it kind of evolved from there.

But it stayed with me. The ending was a calamity for the main character and his family. Just desserts, all over, and I found that to be much more satisfying than a happy ending where the main character gets away with all his or her bullshit.

So this ending coming up in my new short story...I'm having a hell of a time deciding what kind of ending I want to develop. I've grown attached to the two characters, but I've killed off characters I've loved before, so do I want to do it again? Possibly.

When I have a dilemma like this, I typically write three different endings, then find the ones that just don't work, and toss them aside. If it turns out that two, or all three of them work (which doesn't usually happen, but sometimes it does by a freak accident), I'll keep them all and let the publisher/editor decide which one to use. In my short story that's coming out in October, I chose just one ending and sent it in. Luckily for me, the editor liked it.

If you have trouble with endings, write those first. I used to have a lot of trouble rushing to the end or getting stuck and not writing one at all. It's something I still have to work on, but it's much improved than it used to be.

Practice. That's the craft of writing. The art is in the words themselves, but piecing the story together is the craft.

Go Edit Yourself

Okay, for the purposes of this post, we're going to pretend that you've finished your manuscript. So, now what? Do you submit it right away for publishing, let someone else take a look at it, or what?

Some of you already have an answer for this. You may have a beta reader or copy editor at the ready. Or, you might know a professional editor for a publishing company who is all too happy to have a look at your work for free and make changes (if so, don't bother reading further, but I have a feeling not all of you have an awesome editor on hand like that). But if you're stuck on what to do or the editing process is getting to you, try my method.

I have an idea that this is a common method among successful authors, and it seems to work for me, too (a semi-successful author...I'm getting there, damn it). You may find this works for you.

Put your manuscript away.

Don't look at it for six weeks to eight weeks. That's right. DO NOT GO NEAR IT. Treat it as if it's carrying a plague. Don't touch, think, or even glance in its direction. Go play. Enjoy your hobbies. Write something else. Work on your other projects. Set a chewing gum record. Anything you can do other than looking at the 50,000+ words you've just written.

You need a cooling off period. Why?

Because this manuscript is your baby. You've written thousands of words getting your story to just exist. To make sure your characters have their say. To wind up a plot that will, hopefully, make the reader feel something -- whether that's fear, laughter, tears, etc. doesn't matter -- you worked hard to create a piece that's as engaging as it is -fill in the blank-. Therefore, you need time away from it.

Even if you don't have a message to tell the world, you have a story to tell, and there are parts of it that might be intensely important to you that just aren't pertinent to the tale you're weaving. That's why you need to give yourself some space.

It will help you be objective for that first cut.

For me, that first revision is the toughest. I used to try to go after it right away, and would almost always find that I didn't want to cut or add anything. I would insist that it was 'just fine' the way it was.

Luckily my partner was able to knock the rose-colored glasses right off my face (metaphorically. She doesn't hit and I don't wear rose-colored glasses anyway.). She suggested the 'cooling off' period to me after something she remembered that a very successful author said (I can't recall who it was now, but am fairly sure it was Stephen King).

Giving a manuscript time to cool off so you aren't as in love with it is important to editing. After I took her suggestion, I found I was far less enamored with certain parts of my work than I was with others, and I found places that needed more details. I was able to cut more out and make better decisions. I had a clearer head.

That doesn't mean it's easy to know what parts to keep and what to lose, but it's certainly easier than just barreling through it all willy-nilly.

Two things to do once your writing is done:

1. Leave it alone for two months...six weeks, minimum.
2. Go edit yourself...after that period of time. Get it ready for another person to read.

After that, grab your copy editor or beta reader and let them have a turn at it. You might find you're much more satisfied with the results.

Picking Up The Pieces & Making It into Something Worth Reading

It's April, and that means it's time for Camp NaNoWriMo, where you can write novels, short stories, screenplays, and just about anything creative with words. That also means this post is going to be brief (or somewhat brief, you know how I get), because I'm working on a short story for this month.

Funny -- it's a short story I had scrapped about three months ago, thinking it wasn't going to go anywhere. The beginning was kind of slow, and I was beginning to wonder just where in the heck I was going with the damn thing. Sure, I had plotted it out and had an outline, and planned on where I wanted the characters to be, but something about it was just...fizzling.

I just couldn't seem to get it to work.

I was crestfallen about this particular story, because I really wanted it to work. But no matter what I tried, I couldn't get that story flowing. So, I gave up.

Now, I've scrapped a book or two when it hasn't worked, and that's okay. Just as long as it's not happening with every single venture you start. That's part of the writing process -- knowing when to let go and put the story away like the proverbial lame duck. Time to find a successor and work on that, instead.

But this one was just something I couldn't let go. The main character was too vivid to me. But, I put her away, too.

Then I just forgot about it and moved onto my other project -- an editing of one of my current books. I typically (split my infinitives) go through a few revisions before I have anyone else look at my work in order to get it to where I'm at least partially satisfied with it, and then have someone else take a look. A couple of beta readers, in fact. They copy edit me and make sure the story keeps continuity. Then, I revise it once more and make them go through it with a machete and tell me what parts need to stay, what needs to be elaborated upon, and what needs to be cut.

So, while doing my edits of this novel, and my normal work as a freelance writer and editor, I'd forgotten all about my horror adventure short story.

Until one night my main character decided to tell me her story in a different way as I was drifting off to sleep.

No, I don't get up and spring to my laptop or a notebook by the bed, because I follow the Stephen King rule of writing. If the idea is good, it'll still be there later on when you're sitting down to write. I've wound up scrapping too many works BECAUSE of the "holy gods I have to write that down RIGHT NOW" method, and it's only ever left me with a bunch of ideas that never pan out. A few of my friends can vouch for this.

I let my character tell me her story in a new way as I fell asleep, and when I woke up, I went to work. I did my normal freelance work, and then turned to my personal writing.

I trotted out the writing project and fished out the short story, and lo and behold, the idea was still there. So I reworked the beginning.

It's not finished yet -- still about 8,000 words away from completion. But I know that when it's finished, it'll be a good story. Certainly not the epic tales of Martin, Tolkien, Rowling, King, or Lovecraft, but it'll be a fun story that I loved writing. Hopefully you'll even love reading it.

For me, that's the point of writing and storytelling -- to have fun doing what I love most, and to be honest, if that's not why you're writing, then you're going to be miserable. Why be a suffering artist when you can just enjoy the hell out of it, instead? (Okay, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration of both sides, but we can work on that later.)

Okay, so this wasn't a brief post at all. The point is, essentially, that if you have a work that's fizzling out, go ahead and leave it alone. Ignore it. Feed your other projects that are  working. Eventually, you might come across a way to revive your dead or dying work and give it new life and purpose.

Dreading The Editing Process? Don't. It'll Make You a Better Writer

I am a sensitive person.

Many writers are sensitive people. Whether they cover up their sensitivity with humor, a tough, tacit exterior, gruffness, mystique, intrigue, or paper towels -- inside, you'll find a sensitive heart. Of course, that just applies to most writers, not all of them. Sweeping generalizations can get a person in trouble (sometimes).

But one of the things that I'm not sensitive about is my editing process, whether it's on my own or with an editor. (I actually love being edited.)

Why?

Because it makes me a better writer.

There are several objections that people have to being edited -- having their words changed on them or critiqued. NOTE that I use the word 'critiqued' and not 'criticized.' There is a world of difference between those two. Critique comes from the sincere desire to help someone improve their work. Criticism comes from the desire to belittle another person's work. So, for the purpose of this post, let's focus on critique and the editing process.

The two main objections I have seen from people over editing are:

• It won't be 'my' work anymore. If some editor comes in and changes whole paragraphs, adding and deleting sentences, then it's not 'mine' any longer.
• My work must not be very good if it needs this much revision. I'm just an untalented hack!

Well, let's tackle that first one. 

• It won't be 'my' work anymore. If some editor comes in and changes whole paragraphs, adding and deleting sentences, then it's not 'mine' any longer.

BULL CRAP. When I was doing my creative writing course in undergrad at the University of Vermont, my professor, Margaret Edwards, addressed this directly, and I'll paraphrase her here:

It is absolutely still your own work. Had you not penned those words to paper, they wouldn't exist for me to edit and revise. All I am doing is massaging the text to make it smooth and to make it stand out. These words are yours, not mine.

Let me put it this way. You give me a vase to examine. I put a flower in it and hand it back to you. It's still your vase, kiddo. Now it's just got a nice, bright flower in it to make people notice it even more than before.

The work is yours. It wouldn't exist if you hadn't written it in the first place. All editing is, essentially, is window dressing to make people stop in and ooh and ah at what a talented writer you are.

Okay? Okay. Next!

• My work must not be very good if it needs this much revision. I'm just an untalented hack!

HA HA HA! Okay, seriously, stop feeling sorry for yourself RIGHT NOW. This is what we call a 'cognitive distortion.' Emotional reasoning, all-or-nothing thinking, and labeling, specifically. Stop it.

The fact of the matter is, even the very best writers on earth who have lived and are alive now have needed serious revisions to their work. Sometimes they have to cut out entire chapters, and sometimes they have to add descriptions. They have to change phrasing, rewrite entire blocks of prose, and take a machete to their work. But they're still fantastic writers. They're top-notch. They'll even revise three or four times before submitting it for editing, and then the editors will do a number on the manuscript.

So stop thinking you don't have talent. If an editor is looking at your work and caring enough about it to make major changes, then you, my friend, are a good writer. You've got the craft and the art of writing. Shut up and revise that manuscript, and be glad that you've got what it takes to get the attention of an editor who sees tons of manuscripts every week.

Editing, essentially, is simply a process you need to make your work stand out and get the attention it deserves. Instead of looking at it negatively, look at it as an opportunity to grow as a writer. It's good for you, and, of course, the best flowers do grow after a combination of water and crap (yes, fertilizer. I sort of made a poop joke there. Enjoy.).

Now, get writing!

This post is dedicated to the incredible editor extraordinaire at Random House, Mister Benjamin Dreyer. You can follow his funny, sarcastic, witty, and insightful tweets @BCDreyer. While you're there, follow me, too, @Spellvira -- I am almost hilarious at times.