Laurel Garver's Blog, page 21

Interior art basics for Indies

After picking up a book that includes pretty pen drawings, like Nina LaCour's Hold Still  (see image below) or Kristen Hubbard's Wanderlove, the thought may occur to you indie authors: I could do that.

photo by amberinblunderland.blogspot.comYou could. But there are a few things you ought to know about the technical side, especially for producing a print version of your book.

I've worked directly with printers on everything from full-color magazines to posters and brochures (as a managing...

Mine! Help with possessives

Today, I'm going to cover some of the basics of expressing ownership in writing, because it's something I frequently see mangled in shop windows, on billboards, and in manuscripts.

These rules apply to NOUNS only. For the rules on possessive pronouns, see this post: It's your day to master tricky possessives.

photo by Jade, morguefile.comSingular nounsTo indicate ownership, add an apostrophe and S to singular nouns (no matter what the ending consonant) Some examples are below.

John's box
Yeats's...

Writing when you can't write: the magic touch

image by penywise at morguefile.comWhat happens to your writing projects when you just can't write? Maybe your day job is suddenly demanding 80-hour weeks, or a family member is in crisis, or this week is the charity fund raiser, or you've been hit hard with an illness (that's me--bronchitis, very slow recovery). Most of the time, one abruptly drops the projects and runs to the crisis du jour. That's natural and sane. Running yourself into the ground does no one any good.

Yet, your writing pro...

Using meat, meet and mete

It seemed high time for another Phonics Friday post. Today we'll tackle a set of fraternal triplets of language, the homophones meat, meet and mete. Once again, I'll provide a definition, examples and mnemonic tricks to help you keep them straight.

meat
Photo credit: mconnors from morguefile.commeat (n.) flesh; the flesh of an animal used as food; the edible part or kernel of certain plant fruits (such as a walnut or coconut).

(n.) at the core of something; the most important part...

Writing lessons from The Desolation of Smaug (part I)

The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug has such a mockable title, it's not much of a surprise it didn't do well at the box office. I'd honestly had no intention of seeing it, but when there was a free screening on the campus where my hubby teaches, curiosity got the better of me. Sure, this was the most non-canonical Tolkien film in Jackson's oeuvre, but did that alone doom the film to failure?

Actually, no. I'd argue that poor storytelling is what killed the film.

The beauty of being a writer is that...

Mission accomplished: reflections on the A to Z challenge

I've never taken a physics course, but I know all too well the concept of inertia. One must exert force to overcome it. Those of us who have been blogging for any length of time will hit phases of either burn-out or simply lethargy in which we struggle to generate new content. In the former situation, my strategies have been to take a brief hiatus, reuse old posts, or solicit guest posts. In the latter situation, I've usually solicited topics from readers, experimented with not-my-usual appro...

Z: Zoo

Photo by GaborfromHungary, morguefile.comThoughts in a Zoo
By Countee Cullen (1903-1946)

They in their cruel traps, and we in ours,
Survey each other’s rage, and pass the hours
Commiserating each the other’s woe,
To mitigate his own pain’s fiery glow.
Man could but little proffer in exchange
Save that his cages have a larger range.
That lion with his lordly, untamed heart
Has in some man his human counterpart,
Some lofty soul in dreams and visions wrapped,
But in the stifling flesh securely...

Y: Yiayia

SUGAR
by Jessica Bell

You were Yiayia.
But I called you Zacharati.
That was your name.
It meant sugar.
Photo by Max Straeten, morguefile.com
Your parents must have known
that when you aged,
you’d litter your kitchen
bench with it,
when you’d make halva,
and wipe your hands
on your fraying apron
exactly seven times a day.

I’d count.
You’d giggle.
Papou would cross himself.

Every day I’d watch
you press baked almonds
into the squishy centers
of the diamond-shaped
brown sweets.

You were granting them hearts.

And that’s...

X: Xanadu

Kubla KhanOr a Vision in a Dream. A Fragment
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)
Photo credit: alanmort from morguefile.com
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sun...

W: The Waking

by Theodore Rothke (1908-1963)

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Photo by Alvimann, morguefile.comI feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs u...