E.A. McKenzie's Blog, page 3

Still loving you guys

We've been updating our home. What a process. It's been a lot of fun and the funnest part is doing it with my husband. It's kind of like re-bonding. I told him before we even started not to get impatient and snappish. He didn't; he was wonderful. What's that got to do with writing? Will, it gives me a great procrastination excuse, though weak.

I'm in a slump. Can anyone give me a reason to continue with my work in progress, or more importantly, promote my novel that has been on the market for ...

Ever just don't feel like it?

I love that I have a blog, and I love that I have so many peeps. I am pleasured to be semi-starting a new phase in my life--semi retirement. Once I get over the guilt of working part-time It's going to be a blast. But sometimes I just don't feel like doing anything. I've been lazy and loving it. Finally got motivated, though. I'm not sure exactly when, but our next huge step will be to sell our house. That's after we get our travel trailer and my husband retires from his job. Dosen't matter, ...

Blog Problems

Hi everyone, did you miss me. I'd like to blame my absence on Google because they blocked my blog, but I don't know when that happened. I've been avoiding it is the real truth. Why, because I've been avoiding everything, my writing included. I think I was suffering a little depression.

Good news, I am going into partial retirement, finally. Heck, I'll still be at home as much as I'm at work, but I'm looking forward to getting our house ready to sell. We've been in it for fifteen years and it...

Are these really glaringly incorrect?

Here's a few tips that most people know, but sometimes forget. Enjoy:

Here are seven simple grammatical errors that I see consistently in emails, cover letters and resumes.

Tip: Make yourself a little card cheat sheet and keep it in your wallet for easy reference.

You're / Your

The apostrophe means it's a contraction of two words; "you're" is the short version of "you are" (the "a" is dropped), so if your sentence makes sense if you say "you are," then you're good to use you're. "Your" means it b...

Writers are human, too

This article is from a blogger, writer, Ali Luke at Aliventures Here I hope you enjoy it. It's proof that writers are human, too.

A few years ago, I'd look at published writers and think that they were somehow different from me. After all, their books were gripping and fluent – unlike my stumbling attempts at first drafts. Their blogs had hundreds or thousands of readers.

They were real writers. And, deep down, I was afraid that I could never really become one of them.

But as I've taken more and...

Blogger is giving me headachs

I've read other peoples woes about Blogger, but those things don't happen to me, right? Wrong. I'm having a wicked hard time and having to jump through hoops just to log in. Grrrr.

I'd like to talk about punctuation. It's a pain in the bazooka. Next subject:

That Girl is getting a makeover. I did a little research and found out I didn't really know my subject too well, so I've had to incorporate the truth into the story. Imagine. First Blogger, now, my story. I'm almost back to the original st...

Lessons Learned

Now the work begins. I've finished the first draft. I just made it to my word count goal. But I think it will continue to climb, no worries.

The differnce between That Girl and Bum's Rush are a lesson well learned. Bum's Rush took me three to four years to complete, then another six months for editing and publishing. I went from 90K word count to just over 70K word count. It was my first novel and will always be special to me. That Girl The first Draft took six months to complete. I don't kno...

A Tribute on Father's Day

My father has been gone since 1984.

My father was a gruff, man who said little about himself, but had opinions about everything. He enjoyed a lively conversation about all the things we're told not to discuss in life.

After WWII, where my father served his country as a PT boat driver in the Navy, he worked in a sawmill for 30 plus years. When the sawmill burnt to the ground, twice, he found work doing anything to support his family, sometimes he had to work two jobs while the mill was being reb...

Moving right along

So far, I have managed to avoid writer's block while writing this book. I'm kind of stymied at this point, though, because there's so much left to do. The book is basically done. The rewrites are going to be massive, but I'm now confident, I'll hit my word count goal, if not go over it. I'm thinking I should post some excerpts, but do people really read them?

It's interesting where I live. The Missouri River is causing havoc along it's shores, or should I say, it's former shores. It's been un...

Crying my way through a scene

Yesterday, I wrote a scene that made me cry. Wow, why would I do that to myself. But then I reread it and cried again. It still needs work, so I'll be crying my way through it a few more times. Writing the ending to a books is tiresome and just plain hard. That's why I put it off. That and the story changes in the process of writing it, which affects the ending. I'm about 82% done, probably more because I have fifteen thousand more words till I reach my goal and I don't think I need that many...