Adventures Up North

Hi everyone! :) One of the main reasons I haven't been blogging as much over the last months is actually because I've been doing a lot of editing on my fantasy novel!  So I thought I'd give y'all a quick update on my writing project as a blog post this week. :) 1.  My NaNoWriMo 2016 project is on the back burner as I continue to revise my fantasy novel. For NaNoWriMo 2016, I wrote a contemporary spy thriller that was actually pretty cool.  The only problem was that I was also currently not finished editing my fantasy novel, Into The Desert.  I found out that I can't handle two projects at once, it doesn't work for me that well.  So I decided that I'm gonna finish my fantasy novel before starting anything new.  Meanwhile, I'm gonna leave my spy thriller for a while until I decide to pick it up again.  Which I do plan to do at some point. 2.  December, January, & February were a writing hiatus, for the most part.   I di...

Hi everyone, IT'S 2017!!!  And I'm back with a writing blog post!! Editing a first draft can be very daunting, especially for new writers.  First drafts are usually a complete mess, and it's scary to approach editing the first draft when it's such a mess.  But with a little preparation and brainstorming, you'll find that the editing process is much less overwhelming than you thought. I've been editing my current project for a while now, and I feel like I have found both helpful techniques and unhelpful ones.  So today I thought I'd share these tips!! :) 1.  After finishing your rough draft, LEAVE THE PROJECT BE.   Yes, I KNOW, you're dying to go back and reread that one scene in chapter 14, or make that data consistent that you changed halfway through the book.  But it really is best if you just leave your project entirely for at least a week or two and let your mind sift through everything before coming back.  You'll be less likely to burn ...

Hey there guys! My name is Sarah. Luke is one of my oldest friends and always a great encouragement when it comes to writing, so I was thrilled when he asked if I would write a post for his blog! And by thrilled I mean I thought it was really cool… But in the midst of life's craziness, this task kinda got lost in the pile of other things that I need or want to do. Now it's down to the night I have to send it in to Luke. It's now or never. Do I want to write it? Yes! Do I want to write it now? No… It's a Friday night. I want to curl up on a couch and watch a movie and drink hot chocolate. But instead, I need to write a blog post and I haven't even picked a topic. Hmmmm how about “How to write when you don't want to?” That seems applicable. I can't be the only one with this problem. The constant paradox of wanting to write but not wanting to write in that moment… What do you do in that situation? Tip #1: Write SOMETHING. How many articles/blog posts hav...

NaNoWriMo is less than two weeks away.  Cue panicky GIF: So for those of you who don't know, NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month.  NaNoWriMo takes place in November, in which around half a million people around the world attempt to write a 50,000 word novel in the 30 days of November.   To find out more, visit NaNoWriMo's About page. (Someone count how many times I say 'NaNoWriMo' in this post. :P ) Surviving NaNoWriMo is no easy task.  Believe me, I've participated since 2012 (and never been very effective at it either...the best I've ever done was last year with 30,000 words).  In order to stay alive this month, a Survival Kit is necessary.  Naturally, since each writer is different, each writer's kit will be different, too.  But these are that things I need to survive this November: 1.  Computer.  Now, technically speaking, I don't have my own computer, but our family's laptop is barely ever used by anyone else,...

The 21st Century is amazing in a lot of ways.  We have medicine and other medical technologies that help us remain healthy.  We have electronics that help us stay closer connected.  We've made our own culture, the likes of which the world has never seen before.  And we have Twitter.  Twitter is definitely the best part of the 21st Century. While many aspects of life now are much better, one of the hardest things about living in the modern age is the difficulty to connect to the past.  Even 100 years ago, culture was far closer to the ancient cultures of Rome and England, China and Egypt, to name a few.  In other words, our culture is so different from those we learn about in History class that it becomes hard to relate to them and envision them. This is especially difficult for writers because unlike  commoners  non-writers, many of us write historically-based works.  Some of us write about specific moments in history, like durin...

I was REALLY hoping to get tagged in this.  And then Hannah Heath tagged me in it. Go follow her right now.  Stop right there...no, no, I said stop!  Now, go click on the link, I know you can see it, and FOLLOW HER.  You will follow Hannah Heath.  This is a Jedi mind trick. Thank you, Hannah, for tagging me, I very much appreciate it. You're amazing. :)  You can also click here to see Hannah's post for this tag. Alright, let's get down to business.  So as you already know from the title, this is the Six Question Character Challenge.  But you probably don't know anything about my actual novel.  Which isn't good.  So let me introduce you to my story! My novel's working title is The Dragon Stone War .  This is a series title, actually, since I'm planning to make this story into a series.  So far, I've only been working on the first book and a bit on the second.  Anyway, the REAL title of my first book (the working t...

Hey Everyone! My name is Abby, and Luke asked me to guest blog this week. A little about me: I met Luke through our homeschool group, I could eat pizza everyday, I LOVE reading and writing books\stories, I have a blog but I don’t post there, I procrastinate alot, I like snapchat, I hate when people eat food loudly and I am probably going to be the youngest guest blogger here. Now that we are acquainted let me tell you why I decided to talk about writing life hacks. As I was mulling over millions of ideas (okay it was only 5 but...) the idea of trying some writing tips came to my mind. I had several ideas of things I could try, and several other ideas I had seen on Pinterest. However, then I remembered how on YouTube the whole “life hacks” and “trying ___” has been super popular! What better of a way then to kind of poke fun at it a little bit, and title this Trying Writing Life Hacks. Hack #1: Download the app Evernote I saw a lot of writers recommending this app, so ...

Last month, I talked about writing first sentences .  Thanks to all of you who read that post, and special thanks to Hannah Heath for tweeting about it!  I owe you. :)  So today, I'm going to continue that topic into something that includes the first sentence: the first chapter. Chapter One is IMPORTANT.  In many ways, it's the most important chapter in your entire novel.  This is because most readers won't keep going if they don't like your first chapter too well.  That's a lot of pressure on the author. The ultimate purpose of the first chapter is to introduce the story and hook the readers so they want to keep reading.  That's a lot easier said than done.  So without further delay, here's my list of everything that should be true of (basically) any first chapter: 1.  The first chapter should hook the readers in.  That doesn't necessarily mean a fast-paced beginning, however.  The hook can can come in all forms: an ...

First, a huge thanks to my friend Rachel for guest blogging for me last week!   She’ll probably be back in a few months, after I give my other friends a chance to guest blog for me first. :) One map is more helpful than an entire travel guide.   Maps visually reveal the location of important countries, cities, and landmarks, and even more important, where all those places are in relation to each other.   All that can be shown on one screen or sheet of paper.   That kind of information is invaluable. So obviously, then, you need a map for your novel! I have gone through several drafts of maps for my novel’s world (I drew my first map for the book I’m currently editing when I was thirteen), but the basic directional locations stayed the same.   Now, I’m completely satisfied with my novel’s map, and hopefully some of the tools and techniques I used can help you in some way. In my opinion, every novel needs a map, at least a reference map for yo...