Jan Christensen's Blog, page 8

CHRISTMAS 2014

Marielle Frigault https://www.flickr.com/photos/marielle_frigault/

AROUND THE WORLD PICTURES FOR YOUR ENJOYMENT:

http://www.columbian.com/photos/galleries/2010/dec/24/christmas-around-the-world/

A FAVORITE COOKIE RECIPE WHICH GETS RAVES AND IS UNUSUAL:

HOLIDAY FRUIT DROPS

Yield, 6 dozen

Oven temp. 350 degrees

3-1/2 cups sifted flour

1 teas. baking soda

½ teas. salt

1 cup soft butter or margarine

2 cups packed light-brown sugar

2 eggs

½ cup buttermilk

1 teas. vanilla

1-1/2 cups chopped nuts

2 cups halved candied cherries

Sift together first 3 ingredients, set aside. Mix together butter, sugar and eggs, beat until mixture is light and fluffy. Add buttermilk, extract and flour mixture. Mix well. Stir in nuts and fruit. Drop by teaspoonfuls on lightly greased cookie sheets. Bake at 350 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned.

From our house to your house, MERRY CHRISTMAS!

BAD WRITING COSTS THE WRITER MONEY

Grammarly, the grammar checkers, did a study, which was posted on Huffington Post not too long ago.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/05/grammar-infographic_n_5767902.html

Grammarly proofread 400+ freelancer profiles from all eight categories of the Elance platform for grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors. To adjust for quality of work, they only selected freelancers with an average rating of four stars or above. Then they looked at correlation between earnings and number of mistakes. They hope the direction of the data spurs some thought and conversation about the importance of good writing. Their goal is to raise awareness for the importance of good writing. Here’s the chart with their findings:

Here’s the link to the Grammarly site in case you’d like to check some of your own writing for errors: It couldn’t hurt!

http://www.grammarly.com/grammarcheck

Here’s to good writing!

P. D. JAMES

I woke up to the news today that P.D. James, at age 94, has passed away. I was very sad to read this since she is on my personal list of top ten writers, so unless they pull some older works from a drawer or trunk, I won’t be able to read anything new by her ever again.

What made her stand out for me was that she delved deeply into her characters’ lives, especially their psychological lives. Then there was the mystery, of course, always extremely well plotted. If you haven’t read anything by her, I strongly suggest you do.

Here are some links to learn more about this amazing woman and writer.

Her official webpage (check out the library tab for a list of all her books):

http://www.randomhouse.com/features/pdjames/

The Wikipedia entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._D._James

Her Amazon author page (in case you didn’t realize this, most authors have a separate page on Amazon that lists their books, a bio, and other info about them and their work—yes, including me):

http://www.amazon.com/P.-D.-James/e/B000AP5NPM

Interviews:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/authorinterviews/7894385/PD-James-interview-I-have-lived-a-very-happy-and-fulfilled-life.html

http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1627/the-art-of-fiction-no-141-p-d-james

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/jul/15/pd-james-author-interview-readers

Fabulous quotes with many pictures of the author:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/danieldalton/9-pd-james-quotes-every-writer-needs-to-read

And sadly, a few obituaries:

http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-30232569

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/nov/27/pd-james

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/nov/27/pd-james

Anyone else have a great link to share? Rest in peace, Phyllis.

A BROKEN LIFE, JUST PUBLISHED!

Out this month, A BROKEN LIFE is now “live.” Click on the cover image anywhere on this site to learn more.This is the second book in the Paula Mitchell, PI, series. Treat yourself to a new mystery novel. And of course, reviews very welcome.

A BROKEN LIFE

While in the middle of investigating a domestic case, Rhode Islander PI Paula Mitchell finds an old friend, ragged and homeless. Paula learns that Martha Hendricks is the victim of identity theft. Three years earlier a woman, with ID confirming her as Martha, was busted on a drug charge. After Martha’s boss found out about it, he fired her.

Soon Paula begins to receive threatening phone calls. The doctor Martha worked for is murdered. And Martha disappears–until Paula finds her, beaten and left for dead, in her own backyard.

For two days, Martha is unconscious. As Paula investigates further, she learns more about the doctor’s employees, meets Martha’s old boyfriend, and one of her former roommates. Paula’s suspect list grows. When she’s almost run down in a parking lot, her lover pleads with her to stop her investigation.

Paula refuses. Not only is Martha in danger, but if Paula doesn’t push harder for answers, she knows she’ll be the next person on the killer’s hit list.

Grave Matters

BURIED UNDER CLUTTER

OF CLOCKS AND TIMERS

Time is intangible. You can’t see, smell, taste, hear, or feel it. So, it’s hard to pin down. Probably one of the reasons clocks were invented.

Timers can be a great help for keeping track of our time. Decide you’re going to work for an hour, set the timer, and you don’t have to think about time again until it goes off. Smart.

Clocks are not nearly as helpful, but if you check them often enough and pay attention, you may learn to “feel” how much time has passed and be able to guess pretty accurately what time it is. (I can actually do this, probably because I used to be very time conscious about everything, so I know it’s possible).

But I recommend using a timer. The benefits are many.

[image error] Here’s one example. You need to tackle a job that can take hours that you hate (cleaning out the kitchen cabinets and scrubbing them down, cleaning out a closet, or the garage, for example). Tell yourself you’ll work on it for fifteen minutes every day until the whole job is done. Every day at a set time, get ready, set your timer for fifteen minutes, and begin. You can stop at fifteen minutes, or if you feel like it, continue for a while. But don’t push yourself or you won’t want to put in your fifteen minutes the next day. You can always stop at fifteen minutes. Because tomorrow you going to do it for fifteen minutes again, and you know it will eventually be all done.

Or perhaps you want to do a big project, and you really like doing it, but you keep procrastinating. Again, set a time of day to start, put your timer on one hour, and go. At one hour, do stop. If you’ve been sitting, get up. Stretch. Do a small chore, grab something to eat, freshen up, make a phone call (standing). If you’ve been on your feet the whole time, sit down with a snack, file your nails, make a phone call—anything that takes about ten minutes Then you can call it a day, or go for another hour, then take another break. And so on.

You can use the same method to get a lot of small jobs done all at once. Set the timer for half an hour or an hour, and work on that list until the time is up. Tomorrow’s another day.

Hope this is helpful.

FICTION WRITING RULES FROM FAMOUS WRITERS

I thought it would be fun to compile a list of lists of rules for writing fiction. We can, of course, start with Elmore Leonard’s famous list. Many people disagree with some of his rules, but it won’t hurt to read them carefully and make up your own mind. What do you like as a reader? Maybe some of the things he’s against, you like to see when you’re reading. Nothing wrong, in my opinion, in breaking some of his rules, or any others in the rest of the lists below. In case you’ve never seen Mr. Leonard’s, here’s a link.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/07/16/arts/writers-writing-easy-adverbs-exclamation-points-especially-hooptedoodle.html

You’ll love Margaret Atwood’s ten tips:

http://www.literautas.com/en/blog/post-755/ten-rules-for-writing-fiction-by-margaret-atwood/

Here are ten (or so) more from William Safire, also humorous:

http://www.watermill.uk.net/blog/?p=5288

Of course, Mr. Hemingway had a set of rules. See all seven here:

http://www.openculture.com/2013/02/seven_tips_from_ernest_hemingway_on_how_to_write_fiction.html

Here are six from George Orwell, compiled using one of his essays on writing:

http://www.writingclasses.com/InformationPages/index.php/PageID/300

And then there is the famous Lester Dent  formula, a master plot, for any 6000 word pulp story. This is not a list, but no list(!) would be complete without looking at Mr. Dent’s formula. If you spread it out, it will work for any story, short or long:

http://www.paper-dragon.com/1939/dent.html

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Final rule from Jan Christensen:

Trust yourself. Yes, learn the craft, read and ponder the rules. Read a lot of fiction. After you do that, you can  trust yourself to know what works for you and your work.

 Good luck!

COLLECT LIKE TASKS TOGETHER TO SAVE TIME

You need to pay the bills. I’m pretty sure you don’t sit down at your desk, pay one bill, then go and clean the toilet. Well, maybe you do. But probably you sit down and pay all the bills all at once, writing out the checks, stamping the envelopes and filing away the invoices.

Try using this system—it is a system—for other like tasks. For example:

Telephone calls.

Replying to emails

Running errands

There are two ways to clean a house. One way is one room at a time. It’s nice to have one room completely done. Another day, you do another room. But this is not the best system for saving time. For each room, you have to gather your equipment—vacuum cleaner, dust mop, dust rag, cleaning solution(s), high mop–and take them to the room. Then you have to put them all away. Next room, another day, repeat. What I do is vacuum the whole house one day (I also wash the kitchen floor that day). On another day, I dry mop the floors and dust. Another day, I clean the bathrooms and kitchen. Done on a regular schedule, everything remains clean enough for company.

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There is something called mindfulness. For me this means paying attention to what you’re doing. Take stock every so often. Then see if you can figure out a better way to do the routine things you have to do every day, week, month, and year. This is a great way to get your life streamlined, leaving you time to do the things you enjoy the most.

Have you ever done this with a particular chore? Tell us about it in the comments. I love learning new tricks.