Nancy Kelly Allen's Blog, page 46

The Funny Business of Writing Humor for Kids, Contests

How much did the pirates pay for their earrings?
A buccaneer

Want to capture a kid's attention and hold it with your writing? Try adding humor to your text. Today's blog is part I of my article, The Funny Business of Writing Humor for Kids.

Kids love stories that make them laugh. Editors and parents love stories that make kids laugh. Humor is that delightful element that makes a story funny, but writing humor is serious business.

To create humorous stories for children, writers must consider t...

Guest author Tisha Morris, Feng Shui, Writing Space, Contests

My guest author today is Tisha Morris. Her book 27 Things to Feng Shui Your Home (Turner Publishing, 144 pages, ISBN: 9781596525672, $9.99) explores 27 ways to make changes in your home that will also have a direct impact on your life.

Tisha lives in Nashville, Tennessee, where she works as a certified life coach, energy healer, feng shui consultant, and yoga instructor. After ten years of practicing law, Tisha obtained a Fine Arts degree in Interior Design. She blends traditional feng shui ...

Avoid Clichés, Contests

Clichés. Boooorrrrrrring! One way to eliminate boring text is to avoid clichés like the plague. Oops! Like the plague is a little dull from too much use. It's as dull as a beige shirt from the All Taupe Shoppe.

A cliché is an overused phrase or expression, and we sometime use them because they pop into our heads and fit the text like a glove. The problem arises when the reader knows the next words in a sentence before reading them. Clichés drain the excitement and wonder of words that make re...

Turning Ideas into Stories, part III, Contests

This is the third and final part of my article on techniques to turn your ideas into stories. These ideas work equally well for professional writers and writers in the classroom.


Add dialog to give life to the character. Dialog should sound real, not be real. When people talk, our words usually flow freely out of our mouths and the conversation can be boring reading. We often add uh and um and get sidetracked in our thoughts. Dialog should stay focused.

Develop a plot outline based on your id...

Turing Ideas Into Stories, Contests for Adult and Student Writers

Today, I'm continuing with part II of my article on techniques to turn your ideas into stories. These ideas work equally well for professional and student writers.

Choose a perspective. Who is telling the story? Try different characters to determine which could tell the story in the most compelling way. If three kids and a dog were lost in the mountains, which character should you chose to tell the story. The serious kid? The smartest kid? The funny kid? How about the dog?

Try word...

Developing Ideas into Stories, Audience, Ask "What If", Call for Submissions for Writing by Kids, Writing Greeting Cards

An idea for a story just popped into your head. A phrase, a feisty character, or maybe a situation. The more you thought about it, the more the story played like a movie in your mind. Days, weeks, even months passed and the story wouldn't go away. Like a pesky mosquito, it buzzed around in your brain. Sound familiar?

Writers use many techniques to develop story ideas. Some let stories mentally evolve until the characters are strong enough to come to life on paper. Others take an idea and imme...

Maximize Writing Time, Call for Submissions, Contests

Have you ever wondered what makes some writers more successful than others? One common denominator of successful writers is they produce a lot of writing. They write every day. One of the best ways to get in the habit of writing daily is to have a plan. Some writers set a goal of a certain number of hours per day. Others prefer a word or page amount. Here are some ideas to maximize your writing time.

1. Use bum glue. Glue your bum, not literally, to the chair and write. Writers write. There is...

Kentucky Arts Council Grant, Southern KY Book Fest, Writing with Pictures, Contests

I'm happy to announce that I won a 2010 Individual Artist Professional Development grant from the Kentucky Arts Council [KAC:], the state government agency responsible for developing and promoting support for the arts in Kentucky. KAC creates opportunities for people to find value in the arts, participate in the arts and benefit from the arts through programs, grants and services.

Saturday, I was a guest author at the Southern Kentucky Book Fest, another Kentucky treasure. Some of the headliner...

Rejection, Writing End to Beginning, Call for Submissions

Rejections letters. Eeuuu, nobody likes them, but a few rejection letters specifically state the problems, such as The ending was not realistic. You now know where your story may be lacking and also more about the type of story the editor is selecting. Seriously consider the comments made by an editor. Editors know what manuscripts work for their publishing houses. The best rejection letters request you to submit a revised manuscript or offer to review some of your other manuscripts.

If rejec...

Rejection, Timed writing, Call for submissions

When I think of my early writing days--seven years to land the first contract; five years to get the second one--I realize that being a librarian and working with kids and books on a daily basis is what kept me inspired, along with the driving desire to write and get published. In twelve years I accumulated two contracts and a mountain of rejection letters. My career momentum has shifted to a higher speed since then, but each time I get a contract, a troublesome little question pops up like a...