Tuesdays with Story

Writer’s Mail for October 28, 2010
by Pat Edwards

“Me fail english? Thats unpossible.” – Ralph Wiggum, The Simpsons

The Pumpkin Challenge
In honor of the upcoming holiday, Webook.com is doing a pumpkin challenge. Your pumpkin can take any form (carved, cursed, animated, giant, murderous, a pie) but it must cause terror in a person or group of people. Real terror. None of that mushy “moderate fear” kind of thing.

Write a scary story in which a pumpkin is the main catalyst for terror. (max 300 words)

The WEbook editorial staff will pick our three favorite submissions and award the authors free entry to PageToFame. Go to http://www.webook.com/project/The-Pumpkin-Challenge for rules and information.

Who’s up Next?
November 2: Amber Boudreau (chapter 16, young adult novel), John Schneller (chapter 2, Final Stronghold), Greg Spry (chapter, Beyond Cloud Nine), Randy Haslow (chapter, Hona and the Dragon), Judith McNeil (???), and Jerry Peterson (chapter 4, Thou Shalt Not Murder).

November 9: Kim Simmons (chapters, City of Winter), Randy Haslow (chapter, Hona and the Dragon), Annie Potter (memoir), Carol Hornung (scene, Sapphire Lodge), and Sariah (???).

November 16: Greg Spry (chapter, Beyond Cloud Nine), Pat Edwards (poems), Chris Maxwell (rewrite, short story), Cathy Riddle (chapter, Beer Crimes), Aaron Boehm (chapter, Hell Cage), and Kim Simmons (chapter, City of Summer).

December 7: Clayton Gill (chapter, Fishing Derby), Justin Schober (chapter 1/part 2, sci-fi novel), Jen Wilcher (chapter), and Jerry Peterson (chapter 5, Thou Shalt Not Murder).

Publishing Lawyer Lincoln
From Alicia Connolly-Lohr
I just self-published my historical fiction novel Lawyer Lincoln In Transit to Freedom on Amazon in the Kindle store. I’m currently working on my Author Central page for Amazon. I have also submitted the book to createspace.com (owned by Amazon but run as a separate business). There it will be available as a publish-on-demand book. Just awaiting the proof. Although TWS in on my acknowledgements page, I want to pass on special thanks all who helped with critiques. Thanks so much.

Need a Character Name?
Why waste precious intellectual energy creating names yourself? This absolutely wonderful site has several random name generators. There’s a pseudonym generator, a fantasy name generator, an elf name generator, a superhero name generator and a lot MORE! My new evil twin name is going to be Savage Acholateezit, courtesy of the evil name generator. Here’s the main site link http://online-generator.com/index.php Don’t miss the “business section,” which includes project names and band names. What kind of music do you think the The Homeless Clouds create?

“I sold my NaNoWriMo novel!” A Q&A with Pete Twohig
Here’s an interview with Pete Twohig, whose 2009 NaNo-novel, The Cartographer, was just acquired by HarperCollins. Pete lives on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, where some of the world’s best surfing may be had, rides a Moto Guzzi California, and writes full-time.

Can you tell us a little bit about The Cartographer and where the concept for the novel came from?
The Cartographer is the story of a 10-year-old boy, and is set in inner (working class) Melbourne in 1958. The boy witnesses a murder and is seen by the killer. Though he knows the murderer may be out there looking for him, he is compelled to continue his explorations. His solution is to draw a map of the route to the murder house, to take on future explorations, to help him to avoid the place. As his explorations increase, so does the map, with which he becomes obsessed. His obsession, and his compulsion to explore, soon get him into serious trouble. His solution is to reinvent himself as a series of superheroes: The Cartographer, Railwayman, and The Outlaw. In desperation, he finally adopts the persona of his recently deceased twin, for whose death he feels responsible. The boy tells the story himself, and weaves the story with a tangle of references to 1950s music, radio and TV drama, movies, comics, and pop culture.
The concept came to me suddenly while I was out on my motorbike in April of last year. I wrote a one-page synopsis, then put it aside because I was working on another novel (which I finished on October 31).

Do you tend to plot your writing in advance or do you prefer to fly by the seat of your pants?
I prefer to write a brief synopsis, then break it down into sentences, one for each chapter, then enlarge each into paragraphs. Then off I go. I do research and characters as I go. I test new characters not by doing some kind of technical delineation (age, sex, preferred car, etc.), but by writing a few pages of dialogue, to see what he or she sounds like. Then I have a new voice to play with. Once I have the voice, the face takes shape, the clothes, the name, and so on. I do a lot of dialoguing.

How complete was the novel by the end if NaNoWriMo 2009?
I began the novel on November 1 and ended it on November 30, having written 23 chapters for 78,000 words. It was complete, except for corrections.

Read the rest of the interview at http://blog.lettersandlight.org/post/1374344296/i-sold-my-nanowrimo-novel-a-q-a-with-pete-twohig This could be you next year! Sign up for NaNoWriMo 2010 here http://www.nanowrimo.org/

Wordsmith.org
The Magic of Words

A genus of protozoans is named after Stentor owing to the trumpet-shaped appearance of the microorganisms.

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg
stentorian
PRONUNCIATION: (sten-TOR-ee-uhn)
MEANING: adjective: Loud and powerful.
ETYMOLOGY: In Greek mythology, Stentor was a herald in the Trojan War and noted for his loud voice. In the Iliad, Homer described his voice to be equal to the voices of fifty men. He was put to death after his defeat by Hermes in a shouting contest.
USAGE: “David Beckham’s legendarily stentorian and commanding voice would lend itself perfectly to a career as a rapper.”- Alexis Petridis; Tara Newley’s Gritty New Film; The Guardian (London, UK); Sep 9, 2010.

No Excuses Writer’s Tool
LogiPen NOTES is a combination ink ball and digital pen that captures everything you write or draw electronically for later editing, managing and sharing on your computer.

You attach a receiver to any pad of paper, create content in your own handwriting on any surface, then in a matter of seconds lets you convert it into digital format and upload the information to your computer into any Microsoft Office program via a USB connection.

See How It Works Here.
For $98.50, this tool could save you hours retyping, scanning, and reorganizing information. Check out http://www.logipen.com/ for more information.

The Last Word
“I wrote my first novel because I wanted to read it.” – Toni Morrison