Mindy Hardwick's Blog, page 46

STAINED GLASS SUMMER is a Finalist in the EPIC Awards

I’m very happy to announce that STAINED GLASS SUMMER is an Epic Ebook Award Finalist in the Children’s Category!

The EPIC ebook awards are sponsored by the EPIC, the Electronic Publishing Industry Coalition  which was established in 1998 to provide a strong voice for electronic publishing. EPIC includes hundreds of professionals from all facets of the electronic publishing industry: authors, publishers, editors, artists, and others. Our members work together in a unique collaboration to further the industry. EPIC exists to help industry professionals network and share information about industry trends, promotion, and the boundless opportunities ePublishing offers.

One of the things I love about EPIC is they also sponsor a New Voices Young Writers Competition.

Other finalists for the EPIC Book Awards include: Hope Clark (Funds for Writers) for her mystery, LOW COUNTRY BRIDE,   and Musa Author, Liese Sherwood Fabre for her Suspense/Thriller entitled, SAVING HOPE.

The Final Awards will be presented at the annual EPIC Conference on March- 14-16-which lucky for me is in Vancouver, Washington this year!

You can see a list of all the finalists here.

RWA Seattle Book Fair

I will be participating at the Emerald City Romance Writers Conference Book Fair on Saturday, October 27. The book fair takes place at the Westin Hotel in Bellevue from 4:3 p.m.-6:00 p.m. The book fair is open to the public. If you’re a romance reader, the Book Fair is a great opportunity to browse and purchase books from all genres romance writers.

Ebook authors will be handing out our bookmarks and postcards. PLUS, ebook authors are going to be handing out charms! That’s right! Come visit all the ebook authors at the RWA Bookfair and pick up a charm from us that can be worn on a charm bracelet. The charms I will be handing out are sailboats to go along with the Sailor theme of my two romance novellas, LOVE’S STORM and LOVE’S BID.

It’s a great way to meet a lot of ebook authors and talk to us about our books.

And guess who will be one of the big authors at the bookfair……Susan Wiggs is one of the authors signing books at the Book Fair!

Publisher Open to YA Submissions

Thanks to Cindi Myers Market News for this tip of the day:

Spencer Hill Press publishes urban fantasy, science fiction and paranormal romance for young adults. Beginning December 1 they will open to submissions from unagented authors. They’re interested in young adult, new adult and middle grade stories. Beginning December 1, you may submit the first 10 pages of your manuscript, in the body of an email, to editor Patricia Riley at submissions@spencerhillpress.com. Get the details here.

Good Luck!

Writing Prompt–Historic Home Dollhouse

The other day, I was browsing the shops of Snohomish. Snohomish is a great, historic river town in Western Washington. There are some wonderful antique shops, gift shops, coffee houses, and restaurants on the main street. I parked my car in-front of a shop with this dollhouse in the window. The house is made to look like one of the historic homes in town.

But, I thought the dollhouse makes a great writing prompt. Plus, it’s just about the holiday season, and this house just screams Fall, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years!

So, here’s the prompt. Choose any of these questions and expand…..

Choose one of the holidays listed above. Who owns this house? Does anyone live in it? Do they enjoy living in the house? How did they acquire the house? What room has a secret? Which room has a terrible tragedy? Which room has a first kiss? Which room witnessed an argument? Which room is neglected? Which room is used the most? Which room has the happiest memories? Which room has the saddest memories?  What will happen to this house in twenty-five years?

Feel free to post your writing in the comments!

Writing Workshops in Cannon Beach

My favorite time of the year to go to Cannon Beach on the Oregon Coast is not the summer (Well, okay, the Fourth of July in Cannon Beach is pretty fun),….but, my favorite time to be at the beach is the Stormy Arts Weekend in November! It’s a weekend full of artists in galleries, but what makes it so wild are the storms! The winds howl. The rain slashes sideways, and after the storm passes, there is white foam on the beach which shimmers in the wind like small monsters who are resting on the sand.

This year, I’m teaching two writing workshops on Friday, November 2nd with the Tolovona Arts Colony.  The good news is the workshops will be over before the Quick Draw starts and kicks-off Stormy Arts. So, come early to the beach and see how much fun stormy weather is for stories! Both workshops take place at the Tolovona Community Hall (on the South end of Cannon Beach).

Creating Characters for Novels

You’ve got an idea for a character rattling around in your head, but you’re not sure where to begin. Or maybe, that character has been keeping you up all night whispering his/her story to you. Now, it’s time to let the character out of the bag! In this class, we’ll look at various methods to crafting a strong story character such as:  character interviews, how to use character’s backstory to create internal conflict, how to motive character by their goals, and how character flaws create conflict. The class includes writing exercises with an opportunity to share our work. The class is open to students writing in any genre of fiction.  Students do not have to attend the afternoon workshop, Structure and Plotting the Novel, to enroll for the Creating Character for Novels class.

10 a.m-Noon. Cost: $35.

Structure and Plotting the Novel

You’ve got a fabulous idea for a story, but what happens in the middle of the story? Are you stuck with that murky middle? Or, have you sailed through the middle, but now you don’t know how to tie up all the bits and pieces and bring the story to a satisfying ending.  In this class, we’ll look at various ways to structure a novel such as the Hero’s Journey and Aristotle’s dramatic structure. The class will include writing exercises and we’ll have opportunity to discuss our work.  The class is open to students writing in any genre of fiction or memoir. Students do not have to attend the morning, Character Writing Class, to enroll for the Plotting Class.

1:00 p.m.-3:00 p.m. Cost: $35

Kids Writing Market

The following comes from Hope Clark’s Writing Kid Newsletter. It looks like a great opportunity for kids who want to submit their work!

KIDSWWWRITE

http://www.kalwriters.com/kidswwwrite/write.html

—

KIdsWWwrite is a non-profit Web anthology developed to publish

young authors’ work. Its aims are to:

Encourage children to read and write for enjoyment.


Enable children to share.


Celebrate children’s writing.

A new issue is published during the first week of each month.

Submit stories and poems if you are 16 years of age or younger. Submit up to 4 poems (not exceeding one page each) or a story of up to 1,000 words per month. Submit only stories or poems that you have written yourself!

Submission Guidelines can be found here

Unreliable Narrator in YA

Today, I’m teaching a one-day workshop at the Muse On-Line Conference entitled, “The Unreliable Narrator in YA.” The workshop is based on my YA novel, WEAVING MAGIC.

 WEAVING MAGIC is told in alternating viewpoints between sixteen-year-old Christopher who loves magic and is trying to stay sober and fifteen-year-old Shantel who loves romance and is struggling in the aftermath of her mother’s death. In the story, there is a crime which is committed and everyone assumes it has to be Christopher who is the criminal. However, things are not as they seem, and as the story unfolds, it’s revealed that Shantel has a little more to do with the crime than first believed and it’s soon discovered Shantel is not quite telling the truth.

You  can find out more about WEAVING MAGIC on my website here.

What are Unreliable narrators? An unreliable narrator is a narrator who has a lack of credibility or understanding of the story. “An unreliable narrator works under the constraints of limited knowledge to convey information that may seem justifiably suspect to the reader.” Some factors may include mental illness, personal involvement with the situation, or lack of morality. Unreliable narrators may be written in first or third point of view.

If you’d like to learn more about Unreliable Narrators in YA, feel free to download the handout here:

Unreliable Narrator Handout

Here are some writing exercises for you to try with unreliable narrators:

From your character’s point of view, write about a lie you tell out of loyalty to your family, your friends, your community, your society, etc.


From your character’s point of view, write about a time when someone lied to you. How did you feel? Where were you? When did you find out they lied? How did you find out they lied?

Family themes/secrets writing. 

Create a family secret for your character Is there a secret in your fictional family? How has this secret created anxiety in the life of this family? How can this secret affect your story? Who are the family members who bind the secret? Continue to keep the secret going? Who are the family members who try to break away from the secret? Why does the family have this secret? When did it start?

Secrets might include: Abuse, addictions, missing persons, financial problems, pregnancies.

Write a scene where two characters from the family are at odds about this theme. Have one character try to convince the other to make a choice that will allow the character to break free from the theme. Have the other character resist.

Look at the family secret again. Is there an unreliable narrator lurking in that secret?  Can he/she tell a story

 

Musa Anniversary Blog Hop Winners

I am happy to announce Yvette as the winner of STAINED GLASS SUMMER in the Musa Blog Hop!

To find out who won the Kindle Fire and the bag of Musa Swag, head on over to the Musa blog here!

Author Visits

I’m presenting an Author Visit at Northlake Middle School today.  So, what does an Author Visit look like at a school? Usually, I present to two or three groups of students for about 90-minutes. Most of my visits are to kids in middle school (grades 6th-8th), so I tend to focus the most on STAINED GLASS SUMMER rather than YA, WEAVING MAGIC.  The high school author visits tend to be more group visits with other YA authors and we speak on panels to the teens. The exception to this is when a high school specifically hires me to do a poetry workshop with a group of kids.

The school librarian, who sets up the visit with me, will select kids across all grade levels to attend the workshops.  If a teacher sets up the visit, most likely, I present only to her/his classes. In this case it was the middle school librarian who set up the visit. Besides from the workshops, there will also be ten kids selected to have “lunch with an author.” At the lunch, they can bring their writing and/or ask me anything about writing or being a writer.

During the school visit, I show my powerpoint slide show. The pictures include me as a child with the emphasis on reading and writing as well as pictures about my books. I show the kids the glass art pieces which inspired STAINED GLASS SUMMER (you can read and see those pictures here), and I show the kids the stained glass I made in the class I took while researching the book.

This is the suncatcher I made–just like the ones which hang in the window of the library on the Island in STAINED GLASS SUMMER. The second picture is the more advanced piece I made.

I also show the kids the progression of the cover art for STAINED GLASS SUMMER. I show how the cover art was uploaded to Musa’s Delphi system and then the editors, cover artist, and I all discussed what worked and what didn’t work. The cover art had three versions, and I show the kids all three versions. I handout bookmarks of STAINED GLASS SUMMER and we discuss the final cover compared to the earlier versions.

Then, I end the last twenty minutes with writing exercises. It’s Fall and so these writing exercises are focusing on writing “scary, suspenseful, stories).

1. Mysterious Place: Think of a place you know well. This can be your house, your family’s cabin or cottage, or your school. Is there somewhere in that place which is a little “mysterious?” Write about that place. Describe using the five senses. I give the kids an example of my house growing up which had a manhole leading to the basement cellar. We accessed the manhole in the garage. It was a good way to get into the house when you got locked out–as long as the cellar downstairs was unlocked!

2. Building Suspense:

Part One: Imagine that your character is in a place they know well. Maybe they are swimming or hiking. Maybe they are in an art studio. Everything is peaceful and calm. Describe the scene from the point of view of your character. Be sure to include all the five senses.

Part Two: Imagine your character still in this place, but one little detail is out of place. What is that detail? Describe the scene now that it’s changed.

At the end of the author visit, we do a drawing and prizes with the kids. The librarians usually ask the kids to familiarize themselves with my website, blog, and books before I arrive. During the visit, the librarian hands out raffle tickets to kids who answer questions correctly. At the end of the workshop, we do a drawing for various prizes. Most of the time, the PTSA funds the prizes and they can include anything from gift cards to art supplies. This time, I had extra chalkboard doodle clipboards and a couple art journals left over from the summer workshops, so I’ll toss those into the giveaway prize as well as a copy of ebooks STAINED GLASS SUMMER and WEAVING MAGIC.

Artist Date

In Julia Cameron’s book, THE ARTIST WAY, she talks about the “artist date.” An artist date is “a block of time, perhaps two hours weekly, especially set aside and committed to nurturing your creative consciousness, your inner artist. The artist date is an excursion, a play date that you preplan and defend against all interlopers. You do not take anyone on this artists date but you and your inner artist.”

I used to do artist dates all the time. And then I became an “artist” (writer), and artist dates stopped. Why did I need an artist date? My career was an artist date, wasn’t it? I didn’t have time for artist dates anymore. I had more important things to do–blog interviews to write, stories to edit, workshops to teach. Why on earth did I need an artist date?

And then, I hit the wall.

It’s been an incredibly challenging last two months. My Grandfather died, there was a trip back to the Midwest, a few weeks later, a good friend from college died suddenly, and then last Sunday, I found my cat torn to shreds on my front door step. I rushed her to the emergency vet to be told she looked fine on the x-rays and they would stitch her up. I could pick her up in the morning. At midnight, I got a call, she had died suddenly coming out of her pain medicine. She was two.

Somehow, through all of this, I met my writing deadlines. I am a writer, by gosh, and I’ll meet those deadlines! I turned in a Christmas Romance Novella which is third in the sailor series. I turned in a spin-off Christmas story to STAINED GLASS SUMMER, and I lined up school visits and workshops for the Fall. I answered my emails, posted blog entries, and carried on like everything was fine.

And then, I hit the wall. As a small business person, I don’t have “weekends.” There is always something I need to do to keep the balls in the air. The added” benefit” of being able to check email, etc by phone doesn’t help with the lack of weekends.  Usually, I think this works fine. Until lately.  And so, on Tuesday, after a morning yoga session, I put the dog in the car and we got on the ferry to Whidbey Island. We’ve been having a beautiful Fall and I feel as if I’m missing the whole thing in a sea of fog.  It’s amazing to me how it doesn’t take much in the Pacific Northwest to get away from the hustle and bustle. There was no line on the ferry. It pulled out of the dock in ten minutes, and suddenly, I was awash in blue water and mountains with a very clear sky.

I spent the afternoon on the Island. I browsed the shops. I looked at books and got ideas for my yard.  I ate a piece of pizza. I took the dog to the off-leash beach. He ran off-leash and chased his ball. I drank coffee. I took the dog to an off-leash trail area and he played with a couple island dogs. I only thought about a story idea–once. (Sometimes it’s just hard to turn that part off) And then, at sunset, I got back on the ferry and rode it the 20 minutes back across the water. I only checked my email on my phone once. Just once.

It was amazing what a little trip across the water on a ferry can do for one’s creative soul. And it reminded me….a working artist needs artist dates, too.