Cindy Lynn Speer's Blog, page 7
December 13, 2015
fripperiesandfobs:
Costume designed by Piero Tosi for R...
Get to know me meme thingy
Name: Cindy
Nicknames: Cindy Lynn, Gabby (SCA)
Star Sign: Libra/Virgo cusp.
Gender: Female
Height: 5’ 4"
Favourite colours: A blue with a little purple, cranberry red, emerald green.
Time: 3:39 PM
Average sleep time: 7-9 Hours
Lucky numbers: 3, 44, 101
Last thing I googled: “Things to do in Chinatown”
Number of blankets I sleep with: Five. I live in a very cold house.
Favourite fictional characters: Athos, Porthos, Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Tom Pullings, Daryl Dixon, Jessica Jones, Buffy, Agent Peggy Carter, Kinsey Milhone, Sam Vimes, and I will shut up now.
Favourite bands: The National, INXS, and a lot of people who aren’t bands, Caro Emerald, Damien Rice and a billion more.
Dream job: To be a swashbuckling hermit who writers stories and fences when she is not pretending to avoid people.
What I’m wearing: Tank top, fuzzy pants.
When did I make my blog: A couple of years ago, I think.
Followers: 62 wonderful people.
What I post: I am a jackdaw. Anything that makes me happy. Mostly books, travel stuff, my book related stuff.
Do you have any other blogs: I have one on my author page, but I sort of turned it into a tumblr blog just so it would update.
Blog peak: Um. Whenever. Sometimes when I am at work and need a brain break. Mostly after work.
Asks on a daily basis: None, but I am super friendly and would love a few asks. 
Why did I choose this name: Because I like to pretend that I actually have book marketing plan in place. So I used my author name, which is my full legal name.
I tag: All the People!
December 11, 2015
poetictouch:
Sea Bean reads
Notes On The Art Of Poetry
...
Sea Bean reads
Notes On The Art Of Poetry
by Dylan Thomas (1914-1953)
I could never have dreamt that there were such goings-on
in the world between the covers of books,
such sandstorms and ice blasts of words,
such staggering peace, such enormous laughter,
such and so many blinding bright lights,
splashing all over the pages
in a million bits and pieces
all of which were words, words, words,
and each of which were alive forever
in its own delight and glory and oddity and light.
Steps to (not) Becoming a Successful Author
1. Participate in SFFPit.
2. Assume no one will like your tweets.
3. Someone does.
4. Find out you need a synopsis.
5. Panic.
I know better, I really do. To really become a successful author, you should have a variety of things ready.
I used to always have, shiny, and ready to go:
1. A strong query letter.
2. An outline.
3. A 4 page synopsis
4. A 1 page synopsis
5. The first 50 pages.
6. The first 3 chapters, since sometimes 50 pages and three chapters are not the same thing.
I did go through the #SFFpit tag and look to see who got liked…not out of envy, but to see what kind of tweets caught people’s interest in case I wanted to do it again. I liked the idea that you could set things up and walk away, so it might be worth trying. There are several kinds…I think one called #pitmass is coming up, and Pitmad.
So, now to write and re-write, and polish like crazy, a one page synopsis and hope that I can still come off looking like a serious professional worth investing time and effort in. Wish me luck?
December 10, 2015
literallyrad:
do you ever accidentally show too much emo...
do you ever accidentally show too much emotion or embarrass yourself and you literally can’t stop thinking about it
YES.
Then I remind myself, oh, 50 times, that they don’t care at all, and have already forgotten the incident. That I should trust my friends and that the rest don’t matter.
Not that that helps much.
Poke and Pray
There’s a phrase in fencing called “Poke and pray” — basically you thrust your sword at a person and hope that your tip lands before theirs does. It’s inelegant, it’s just flailing and hoping. On the field you want to be mindful, you want to use your skills, but sometimes, well. Sometimes life is not ideal.
And sometimes, the writing world is like that. You like to think that it’s all about skill, right? But it’s not. It is much more about luck and having a good day. For instance, I am experimenting with the concept of the Twitter Pitch. Today, for several hours, people will be using twitter to pitch their finished fantasy books to agents. You get a max of 10 tweets, and if an agent favorites you, you get to look up their guidelines and send in a query package. Here’s the site for it, in case you are interested: http://dankoboldt.com/sffpit/ It happens every so often, and there are others, like #pitmad, so you’ve not really missed the boat.
To me it’s a clever concept — hey, look, people who actually WANT new authors, instead of just making a guess and hoping! But it’s also daunting. I hate my tweets — I think I reduced my beautiful book to a bunch of tropes. So, I just scheduled a bunch of tweets and walked away. I am not sure if I even want to go on Twitter today. Tweeting and praying, I guess. *grins*
But we try. Sometimes the try is half closed eyes and flailing and hoping we don’t get killed.
(Don’t close your eyes on the fencing field though. Never a good idea with swords coming at you.)
December 8, 2015
The play’s the thing
Since I’m such a sucker for theatre history, especially Early modern theatre, we’re going to spend sometime with the history of props on the Early Modern Stage.
