Daisy Whitney's Blog, page 17

Win "The Naughty List" by Suzanne Young

One of my favorite novels released so far this year is Suzanne Young's romantic comedy "The Naughty List." It's a story of a secret society of cheerleaders who catch cheating boyfriends. I'll be giving away three copies of this yummy story to the best contest entries received all week long! So here's how you win!

In five words – no more, no less – name a spot where cheerleading spies might catch naughty high school boys with another girl!

(And, keep 'em clean!)

Win "The Naughty List"

I'm going to be hosting a super fun, super easy contest to give away three copies of Suzanne Young's yummy novel "The Naughty List" very soon. So check back here next week!

I bow down before the kissing master

I have officially declared Elizabeth Scott Master of the Lips-a-Verse when it comes writing GREAT kissing scenes.

She was already Supreme Ruler of the Smooches based on her contributions to the Writing-Great-Kisses canon from her novel "Perfect You." But she outdid herself in her most recent novel "The Unwritten Rule."

Kiss, kiss, swoon, swoon.

Elizabeth, you are inimitable.

One change lead to another

Remember last week when I said the character development I was working on in my work-in-progress wasn't focused so much on the main characters?

Guess what? I was wrong!!!

You see, when you flesh out one character it has a ripple effect. Because that supporting character interacts with the main character. So when you shape and mold and refine the supporting player, you don't just get to keep the main character as she was before. She has to bend and flex in response to the new wrinkles in her...

A Metaphor is Like a Strong Spice – You Only Need a Dash

So the other night I sent a snippet from my work-in-progress to my writer friend Victoria Schwab and asked her if I was mixing metaphors.

Nope. I wasn't mixing them. I was overusing them. I was rocking FOUR separate metaphors in one paragraph.

Allow me to share some of them.

like a thick coat of dust.
like a bad cough.
They became weeds in my memory
excise them like a surgeon would a tumor

Bit much, don't you think?

Naturally, Victoria did what any good writer friend would do. She reminded me...

Existing with Uncertainty

Being a writer means you have to learn to exist with uncertainty. I suppose that could be said of every profession. But I don't blog about every profession. I blog about writing. So I'm going to talk about uncertainty as it applies to writing.

This is something I think about a lot. For those of you writing a first draft, there's the uncertainty over finishing, over quality and over the eventual hunt for representation. When seeking an agent, there's uncertainty over whether you will land one. ...

Every scene must be dramatic

Every scene must be dramatic. Every single one.

That's the advice of playwright and genius David Mamet in a letter to the writing staff of the now-cancelled CBS show "The Unit," according to this post on Slashfilm.com. The wisdom he shares is useful for EVERY writer. Go read it.

What is drama?

"EVERY SCENE MUST BE DRAMATIC. THAT MEANS: THE MAIN CHARACTER MUST HAVE A SIMPLE, STRAIGHTFORWARD, PRESSING NEED WHICH IMPELS HIM OR HER TO SHOW UP IN THE SCENE."

Yeah, the all caps are his. I left 'em...

Characters that pop!

I've been working on the first revision to my just-finished-work-in-progress and one of the elements I am focusing on is character development. This doesn't so much apply to the two main characters because those two are mostly fully fleshed out on the page (though of course, there is always room to grow). But a handful of the supporting cast definitely needed a lot more shape and sizzle to them.

The best friend character, for instance, was very amorphous in the first draft. She's starting to ...

"The Mockingbirds" and "Anna and The French Kiss"

Look! People who pre-order "The Mockingbirds" on Amazon are also buying Steph Perkins YA romance "Anna and the French Kiss."

I couldn't be in better company!

Would you rather have a perfect half of a book or a flawed whole?

Such was my dilemma at the start of this month.

Last spring I had started a novel and managed to churn out about 35,000 words by August. But the novel was flawed. Very flawed. I shelved it. Put it aside. Figured it would be my Frankenstein novel, a half-done, mished-up mash of parts that never quite went together. But the characters stayed with me. They hung around my house and my home and they were present when I do my best novel-planning — when I walk my dog. It was as if the characters...