In Which I Gain Writer-Cred

“Writing: a scrupulous attempt to preserve something, to make something last–plucking a few exact fragments from the deepening void, leaving somewhere or other a furrow, a trace, a mark, a few signs.” - Georges Perec


My sister's friend's mom, who works at a library in my county's system I've never been to, knows a lady at that same library who is putting together an Event. And yes, the capitalization is important.


My sister's friend's mom mentioned me to this lady, and I have been invited to be a Formal Presenter at a Panel regarding NaNoWriMo, publication, and "my writing process" along with one other teenage author (who may or may not be "properly" published, which is a maybe I find a bit intimidating).


This Event is actually part of a series of programming designed to inform adults and teenagers about the writing and publication process, with a special focus on NaNoWriMo.


And I have been asked to Speak. I am a Panelist. I am a Presenter. I am a "Formal" Presenter. It is going to take some time to process this.


(Also: OMG AHHHHHHHHH!!!)

Will Grayson Will Grayson: The Counter Counter Counter Post

"Fanaticism consists in redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim." - George Santayana, the same guy who said those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.


Rock4ever95 has had the audacity to call me audacious in countering his review, and therefore I must counter it once again. Or through some form of skewed reasoning like that. Here is his post.


He says "The real way to push the envelope is to give readers a plot that makes them question things and is clever and new and edgy and progressive. If only someone had written a book like that. Oh, wait, someone has. It was called Boy Meets Boy and it was written by David Levithan."

Looking for Alaska, and Paper Towns did make me question things. Maybe they're not new or edgy or progressive, and maybe they are, but they succeeded in the questioning category. WGWG didn't so much make me question, but it made me think, but the things I am referring to are rather personal and probably don't apply to you/most other people. Maybe it's not progressive or new or edgy. However, I enjoyed reading it a lot. 

I loved Boy Meets Boy. I will not dispute its quality. But when did this turn into a competition between Green and Levithan? I agree with you that Levithan is an excellent author. You might remember that collaborating on a book is not a competition. They each wrote their own chapters about their own characters, but that doesn't mean they didn't work together on the character development or the plot. More on this later.

"If the characters are very similar,the style is the same, and the plots are really alike then why bother reading the new books? Why don't you just reread the old ones? Why bother writing anything new? What's the point? If a writer is just writing the same thing over and over then how can you say that they are still a good writer? I used to love Caroline B Cooney but recently she is basically writing the same plot over and over and over again trying to get a hit and she isn't very good anymore. A good writer actually, again not to be flippant, but a good writer writes. They create new things, they don't just reinvent the wheel. The stretch and create characters who are different from each other and different from the author. So if the author were, say, a gay man, he might write a book about two straight brothers. And he might call it Are We There Yet."

I never said that all of his characters and all of his plots are really alike. I said the plots of Paper Towns and Looking for Alaska are similar, and that Quentin and Uppercase Will are similar.

I will repeat my point that there are different lessons to be learned from each of the four books. Some elements are similar, but that does not mean that the books are.

As I said, sharing similarities does not mean they are clones. We share 97% of our DNA with chimpanzees, and 99.9% of my DNA is identical to yours. Yet we are very different people.

Before I Fall is the same thing written over and over and over again. That is why it is not a good book. (And for those who liked it, yes, it has its merits, but that is a discussion for another time).

A good writer is a writer who writes well. A good career novelist shouldn't write the same thing over and over. 

Now the "different from the author" bit. That is a good point. 

Yes, the gay man might write a book about two straight brothers and call it Are We There Yet. That book might be a very good book. That does not mean that a different book the gay man writes with someone else isn't also a good book in different ways.

"Elfarmy went on to write

""Nothing happens in this book." I guess it depends on what you want to happen. It's a book about teenagers doing stuff. There aren't any vampires, or evil governments, or parents who are Greek gods. There's nothing to make them unique. They're just people. Some like to read such books, and some don't."

Interesting thing about that, I do like to read those books but normally something happens, there is a point. And looking back at WGWG here is what happened: lowercase Will struggled with his sexuality and went out with this weird character Green created and fought with this weird girl. And that was about it. Uppercase Will had problems with the weird character who Green created and wanted to go out with a girl and a school play. So all of that could have been interesting if it had been done better."

First off: Don't diss Tiny Cooper.

Here is something the authors agree on: Tiny Cooper was raised by two dads. John's just the one that "birthed him." And that's almost a direct quote. Again: this book was a collaborative effort. Tiny Cooper was introduced in an odd-numbered chapter. That doesn't mean he belongs solely to the odd-numbered chapters.

What happens in The Catcher in the Rye? A guy leaves school, talks to some nuns, thinks about metaphorical ducks a lot, feels lonely so he calls people, but no one wants to talk to him, and he decides that he wants to spend his life metaphorically standing in a rye field making sure kids don't fall off cliffs. Not much happens there either. It's just that lots of people identify with Holden and get stuff out of the book.

Maybe there's nothing inherently special about WGWG. I quote from John Green: "My part of the book is only half the conversation." I agree that he didn't make Quentin and Will the same to show that everyone is the same. But guess what: that's something I learned. Something he inadvertently made me think about. Therefore even if the merits of the book aren't intentionally placed there, it is still a good book.

Now, if they aren't intentional, what does that say about the authors? You're going to say it's lucky chance and I'm looking for stuff to learn to prove my point. I'm going to say that in this case (Will and Quentin being similar), it was a lucky chance, but for some other things, it was subconscious skill.

Then, of course, there are the intentional ones, which can be attributed to conscious skill.

 "And I have to say, Uppercase Will is kind of a jerk. I mean, the way he treats his supposed friend is pretty shameful. If he had been nicer and gotten more involved in the school play the book would have become way way way way way way better. But no, John Green did not do that for whatever reason. He apparently did not realise that the school play could make for a really really good main plot and the other stuff could make for an acceptable sub plot."

Yeah. Uppercase Will is a jerk. You're a jerk sometimes. I'm a jerk sometimes. You can't say a book or an author is bad just because the main character (or one of them) annoys you. That just means you didn't enjoy the book. 

You keep blaming flaws within the book on John. David Levithan worked on this book as well, and you can't attribute only the good parts of it to him. 

The play could have made an excellent main plot. But that's not what the book is about. The book is about learning to deal with people, which is something Uppercase Will isn't very good at, nor is Maura.

"Elfarmy then wrote

"You can't give good author-cred to someone just because they mention musicians you like."

My response: Heck Yeah you can, and I just did. IN YOUR FACE!!!!!!"

That's complimenting the person, not the author.

"Also, on a side note, Eragon and Eldest are almost scene for scene rewrites of Star Wars. Think about it and you will see that I am right (I spent a lot of time thinking about this)."

I will think about this and most likely see that you are correct once I've written those short stories for my deadline. Who has author credit now? I do. In YOUR face. ;)

Yes, those of you who aren't in my writing group, I have a deadline. However, I won't be saying for whom or with what yet, since it's not official and I don't want to announce it online and then have it not happen. It's not for The Clockwork Experiment, though. I'll tell you that much. 

Those who do know, please don't leave details in the comments. Thank you.

Epic YouTube Announcement

And now it is time for the announcement I told you I'd have by the end of last week. In my defense, this is within a week of my saying that.


I am starting a new YouTube channel. Here is where I descrive what and why:





Juliet, Naked was recommended to me by rock4ever95. So thanks to him.


I don't really know much about "reviewing" books. Just how to talk about them. So we'll see how this goes.

Thoughts On Life: ONLINE

"We can't command our love, but we can our actions." - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle


You know that book I got self-published via Createspace back in June?


It is FINALLY AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE!
Someone told me it wasn't on Amazon, so I went and looked around on my account, and it turns out that I didn't enable that feature after all. It will be on Amazon soon, but for now, you can buy it right here.


[activate menacing voice] I expect to find several thousand dollars in my bank account by Monday. You, my slaves, must advertise this to your friends, or else I WILL FIND YOU. [deactivate menacing voice]


Unfortunately, there's a bunch of typos I didn't catch while editing, since I was in a huge rush to get it put together before the discount code expired to get a copy sent to my grandparents. So I'M SORRY FOR THAT.


Rest assured that I will alert you as soon as it is on Amazon.


So while Thoughts on Life doesn't count in my books (lol, pun) as "real publishing," I can now make money from my writing. Very little money, since I have a grand total of ZERO marketing, but potential money all the same. Yay for meager income!


I would laugh so hard if my total earnings off of this ended up out-weighing my total expenses from now until the end of the year. I hardly ever buy anything, and I can usually get some cash from my parents, depending on what it is. Example: If I want a book my dad also wants, he will pay for it. If I want to go see a movie he wants to see, I don't have to pay for that. It's just when I want to go with friends that I sometimes have to delve into The Wallet Of Destiny.

An Epic Announcement Of Some Level of Epicness In Relation to the Last One

“Real gangster-ass Nerdfighters don’t run from nothing… ‘cause real gangster-ass Nerdfighters can’t run fast.” - John Green


The finishing of NaNoWriMo is going to have to wait, because I have a new baby cousin. I have less than 4,000 words to go, so I expect to finish tomorrow, though.

Upcoming Interview!

Okay, so you know how in my last post I showed you a video of me talking about the Quad N? 


Well, I also sent it to the Office of Letters and Light (the people who run NaNoWriMo).


They liked it. They plan to tweet the different episodes. They asked me if I wanted to be interviewed for their blog.


Now, being a 15 year-old with no press experience other than a picture in the newspaper of me in costume at the Half Bood Prince midnight release party, my initial response was OH MY GOD- OF COURSE I DO- I'M GOING TO BE INTERVIEWED!!!!!


I didn't actually write that in a reply. I haven't written back yet. But I most definitely will.


So that's exciting.


Friday's Quad N debut can't come soon enough now. My week is going to be so busy. Debate team, Ranger's Apprentice 9, my birthday, baking brownies for writing club for said birthday, lit-magazine meeting...


This is an Important Event.

Elementary, My Dear Watson. Elementary.

Which doesn't have the slightest thing to do with this post, but I thought it was somewhat clever, because once again, I am at the elementary school. The teachers started work yesterday, and I've been helping them out in getting ready for the new year.
I was moving locator cards to different binders this morning (why they keep all of the old locator cards I don't understand- all of the parents have to fill out new ones anyway), and then I called Emily after lunch about writing club. Elementary school writing club, that is.
The teacher who was doing it last year isn't working here anymore, but we have loads of great ideas and want to manage it ourselves. We're thinking of having it on Fridays so we don't have to worry about getting our homework done, and because Emily doesn't have marching band practice on Fridays.
So I talked to one of the other teachers who helped out last year to see if she would be our adult supervision (since we aren't allowed to be alone with a bunch of kids). She thinks she'll be too busy with meetings and stuff, and since her department is math this year instead of writing, it's not even related. (Errant thought: ooh, it's raining. I love rain.)
She said maybe the Writing SIP (school improvement plan) committee would be interested, and (I think) she'll talk to them, so hopefully it will be a go.

Some of our plans for them, assuming we get to do it:

• The YWP. Yes, I know, I'm insane trying to help 30-odd elementary schoolers through their versions of NaNoWriMo while simultaneouly trying to finish my own. But I think it'll be fun, and it won't be mandatory for them to do it. If they don't want to, they can just come to meetings and write other stuff as per usual.
• Making books. Emily's step-mom knows how to actually make certain types of mini-books, so we might be able to get her to come in sometime and do a workshop sort of thing.
• Poetry contests (a few kids did them last year)
• Maybe the bare books that we did last year, but I don't know how to get them and that would involve collecting money from the kids, which is a thing I'd rather stay away from
• Writing partners. In addition to the small groups we had last year (which I think is a good idea), we were thinking of maybe pairing up the kids with each other to write stories together. Kind of how Emily and I are working on the Peace/War poems together, but probably not of that ilk. My grandpa and I wrote a story together over email when I was in kindergarten and drew pictures for it in Paint. It'll probably be more like that. Some of them will be paired up with kids their own age, and some older kid/younger kid groups.

So that's what we've discussed so far. The next list is random brainstorming I'm doing on the spot that Emily and  I have yet to discuss. And I realize this bit sounds like one of those boring curriculum guides. But I'm surrounded by teachers, so their mental waves are probably rubbing off on me or something.

• Emphasis on reading other books and applying them to the students' writing
• Learning about quotation marks (which might not be appropriate for them. I don't know, because although I first learned about them in first grade in a small group with two other AG students, I'm sure most kids take longer.) I really enjoyed that, and it's good to know.
• More usage of the small group model. I feel like we get a lot of good stuff done in our writing club, and even though we're a bit older, I think they can get some benefit from a similar sort of thing as well. So what if at the beginning of the meeting they get into their groups and read to each other and give feedback? Not for very long, of course, since there's other things to do. We only see each other once every fortnight, yet I think we know each other pretty well considering it's only that often. Therefore I'm inclined to think that sharing writing= bonding of some sort, or at least familiarity.

I guess what I'm wanting is for this year to be more writing-centric, specifically improving it (the students' writing). And maybe what I have in mind is a little too intense and serious for the average elementary schooler. But it's what I would want, were I one of them instead of a manager/leader person.
Last year was pretty lax, I guess. Not much work was done. Mostly the kids just talked to each other about random stuff (and who am I to judge-that's what we do, too!) but our meetings aren't about doing the writing- we do that on our own time. These meetings are, however, and I want stories/poems/whatever to come out of them.

I was just called over into the media office where my mom's working, and there has been an email from my couselor (for those of you who read my massive rant before I removed it due to the fact I had calmed down and didn't need people to hear my anger anymore). Child Development has been removed from my schedule and Computer Programming has been inserted. Computer Apps (which is second semester) can be discussed in October. Apparently I am "very fortunate" that this change in schedule could be done. Ms. O'Riordan, in the words of those aliens from Toy Story, "You have saved my life (not really)- I am eternally grateful."
So there's some massive amounts of happiness.
And at the moment, my second semester seems pretty easy. I mean, sure, I have to start learning Latin, but I'll just park my TARDIS below the classroom and it can translate for me. So no sweat there.

Reaping The Rewards

Well that's that, then. I'm a published author...sort of. Not really. More on that later.


Last November I worked insanely hard to write 50,000 words in 30 days. And I did it. CreateSpace was kind enough to give me a code to receive a free proof copy of any given thing I chose to upload. Which I did.

See? It just came in the mail today. I didn't expect it to arrive for another week at least. It's a present for my grandparents, so I won't be taking it home with me, but Mom's going to let me order another one for myself (it's registered with her credit card.)


Yes, it's just vanity publishing, so it doesn't really count and it shouldn't go in query letters or anything...but I still think it's awesome. I plan on compiling the stuff I write in the next year to give to them in a "Volume 2." But don't say anything to them. Of course, I include the link to this blog in it, so maybe my grandma will check it out and find out, and none of you know how to contact her, but let's not push it.


It's about 120 pages.


I'm sort of afraid that if I've had this reaction (which you hopefully won't be able to glean via this post- it's been a lot of staring at it and giddy smiling) to this, how will it go if/when I get something "properly" published? I think my reaction is completely valid, but still...
Plus, my sisters have been laughing at me.

The End is HERE!

I finished the first draft of The Clockwork Experiment!!!!!!!!!!


The thought of finishing was infinitely better than actually finished, though. Now all I can think about is the editing and how much more I have to do before the book itself is actually done.

Anecdote:

My dad told me I need to start reading Snow Crash this morning. I told him there are 33 minutes left of this morning (which there was at the time). I said "I have only one sentence left before I am done with the first draft of my book and you will let me write it!" Of course, then he grabbed my wrists so I couldn't type.

But I got it written. Ha.

But now I should probably go play Super Smash Bros. with my cousins. My parents don't want me on the computer all day.

An Epic Announcement Less Epic Than The Last One

This Epic Announcement has nothing on the birth of Henry Green, but I'm pretty excited about it.
Are you ready for it?

I finished editing what I have so far of the first draft of The Clockwork Experiment!!!! YAY! I actually enjoyed editing it and making it better, but the fact that I completed that undertaking makes me happy.
My sister kicked me off her laptop (I prefer to write on the computer downstairs on the couch rather than here in my room), so now I'm back up here. Speaking of me being back places, I'm back to writing new material for it.

Not that this has any effect on all of you, since next meeting you'll just hear chapters 4 & 5 (and maybe 6, depending on how long they are. I'm not exactly sure).

On chapters, I happen to write rather short ones, so Clockwork is at around 57,300 words with about 50 chapters. (Well, I'm technically not done editing what I've written so far, but I've decided that a certain scene needs to happen after some things that I haven't written yet, so I'm not editing that part yet).

Oh swain. I was just looking at the sticky notes stuck to the outline that is still taped to my wall...and I realized there is an important thing I need to add that I didn't come up with until last Monday, so it never made it into the first edit. I'll have to do that before reading you that part.

The magic has removed itself from the book considerably more willingly than I expected it to. Everything has worked out (well, all of the major things).

I've had a very productive day, actually. I went sledding and had some fun in the morning (by the way, I never did have eggs again for Third Breakfast. I had some English Muffin bread instead), wrote another two Character Profiles for school, and then did all of the stuff I've just been telling you about this afternoon. Oh, and I also worked in some Super Mario Bros. Wii in there too. :)


The following will be completely unrelated to the above. I'm just putting it in the same post.

I did a review of sorts for the first episode of Syfy's Caprica, so why not another one?

It was very cool how they balanced showing the robot sometimes as a robot and sometimes as Zoe, since Zoe's Avatar (from the virtual nightclub) is trapped inside. The humans aren't aware of it. I am wondering whether or not she's aware that she's a robot. There's some points where I think she thinks the people are treating her the way they do just because they know she's not the real Zoe.

My dad and I were discussing the virtual nightclub, and he says all of the stuff inside (like the death-cult people thing), as well as the polytheism throughout the show, is to represent the ancient Romans and how they went way too overboard on the "living in the moment" slogan.
When I hear that, I think it means to enjoy everything you do. Apparently when the Romans and the people of Caprica hear it, they think "always do something I enjoy."
I asked him what the robots were representing, and he didn't know, but that's not terribly important. We know they end up rebelling and taking over because they don't want to be slaves. Old plot, but apparently it was new when Battlestar was first thought up.

Dad says his friend told him that the kid ends up being the hero in Battlestar, so that's good. The way things are going for him, I was afraid he would end up being semi-bad, or at least detrimental to the cause of good in the show. Speaking of the cause of good, are we supposed to be rooting for the robots? Zoe seems to be the protagonist, even though she's part of a terrorist organization. It's so confusing.

My mom says the show is "weird." I think the concepts of widespread polytheism and socially accepted group marriages (there was one of those mentioned in the episode last night) bother her.
I like it. I also like that it is on Fridays, so its okay that it keeps me up past 10:30 (which is something I avoid on school nights).