Robyn Heirtzler's Blog, page 4

Merry Christmas!

Yes, there are a few more weeks to go, but we're putting up the tree tonight and the kids want to read the Christmas story from the Bible before we decorate the tree ...

I'm a fan of Christmas. Not the holidays, but Christmas :). See, it makes me smile.

It bothers me when I go in a store where I know Christians work and yet they simply say, "Happy Holidays," to avoid offending anyone. Does it matter? Really? I'm not offended when someone wishes me a "Happy Hanukkah" or any other form or religious salutation. I'm actually thrilled that they want to share their passion with me. I'm not thrilled, however, when people reduce their religious beliefs just to be socially acceptable or politically correct. 

I think it's beautiful to have variety and I think we should celebrate it instead of reducing it to the simplest form of "Happy Holidays." Unless that's all Christmas is to you - just another holiday - but that's sad.

To me it's the opportunity to serve the less fortunate, to give and watch in delighted excitement as others experience joy. It's the feeling of caring and loving and sharing ... it's being able to demonstrate love for others as Christ teaches.

Yes, Christ, the reason many still celebrate Christmas. We still have our religious freedom and I think we should celebrate that freedom by exclaiming it on our store windows, on our social sites, in lights on our house (if we ever actually got around to hanging lights), and to our friends on the street.

It's seriously time to forget about being politically correct and embrace our beliefs without being ashamed of others knowing what we believe.

So, Merry Christmas everyone ... and remember, Wise men Still Seek Him, at least, that's what I believe.

Photo courtesy of imagerymajestic via freedigitalphotos.net

Finding Freedom in a Great Book ...

Enjoy new One United eCards and share them with your friends ... because friends don't let friends skip out on a good read :) 


Share Cards Here

Recent Praise for inDIVISIBLE:

"Any dystopian fan should give this a shot! Or if you are new to the genre, this would be a great introduction because the world our heroine, Brynn, lives in, is the definition of dystopian." -Alise, Readers In Wonderland

"For all you voracious readers out there who have family and friends who don't like to read because it is "boring", give them this book. It never slows down. The plot continues to twist and turn and I never really knew where the story was going to go next which kept me wanting more." -Kelly, Belle of the Literati



Become Part of the BuzzBuy your copy of inDIVISIBLE here.

Young Adult Fantasy Writing Critique - Storm Compass

Storm Compass
I didn’t mean to make my mom cry.  I like the opening sentence. It made me curious - but the next two sentences halted some of my excitement. Consider revising to something more visual or at least vary the sentence length. Each of these sentences is short and choppy. I can be pretty stupid when I open my mouth. But I was upset and reasonably so.
I mean, come on, you’d think I’d get something really cool for my seventeenth birthday.  Like a speeder bike. But, what do I get? A tarnished medallion from my grandfather. Perhaps we can "see" this through Jacobi's eyes instead of having him describe how he's disappointed about it. Ex: I toss the tarnished medallion onto my floor, wishing it was that red speeder bike in the sports store I coveted. It's my seventeenth birthday after all. It’s bad enough that I share his name, now I’m getting artifacts from my crazy, hallucinating, took-off-in-the-middle-of-the-night-relative.
“Jacobi! Get down here!” Add attribution. I'm assuming his mom is speaking since no other characters have been introduced yet.
From up here make this visual, perhaps "From my perch" on the *roof I assumed he was in his bedroom ... be clear in the opening paragraph where your character is or it'll slow the story when the reader becomes aware that it's someplace other than the one pictured in their mind - also, this is the perfect time to give some ambiance to the story. If it's a futuristic society and the roofs are made of stainless steel or plate glass, mention it where I've starred your text, just outside my bedroom window, my father’s loud bass voice sounds is muffled. But I still hear him, and my mom too. Although I can’t understand her words, her tone implies she’s trying to talk my father out of beating the rocks out of mentioned twice ... change one me. It's Pprobably a good thing he listens to her, seeing that I have my assessment test next week for my employment placement next week. It’s kinda consider changing to "kind of" hard to hold a pencil with broken fingers. Don’t ask; it’s not pretty. Not a fan of this sentence, but that's strictly preference.
Not that the placement test is going to do any good. I’m going to end up in the Senite mines like everyone else on this planet.
Lightning flashes across the sky and illuminates everything in the area everything is too broad. Take it out completely and just use description. From up here I can see (it's always implied that the viewpoint character is seeing, hearing, feeling, etc., so stating that he "sees" things is unnecessary) the little squat homes just like mine we don't know what his looks like so we need more info before you can compare them, popping up like lion flowers what are lion flowers? Can we have a visual? in unkempt grass I love the comparison of flowers popping up in unkempt grass. Although I am not looking, I know that "that" is rarely needed in fiction the larger homes and mansions are behind me on the hill. Those belong to the mine bosses and crew chiefs—people who have power over us whether we are in the mines or not. Nice way to show they are being controlled.
“Jacobi? Honey?” my mom calls from the other side of the door. She jiggles the doorknob. I sigh and put my head in the open window.
“Mom, please, I’m only half dressed!” I lie.I understand you're trying to tell this first-person and want it to be authentic to Jacobi's voice, but there needs to be more showing instead of telling. We need to be able to visualize this as we go. Consider doing some vivid world-creation and including the details a little at a time so we can feel and experience this new planet. Without some guidance, readers will struggle to become immersed in the story.
Thank you so much for submitting your first page and I wish you the best of luck with your story! If you'd like to revise and resubmit, you're more than welcome to do so!

_____________________________________Submitted and owned by Michelle Jeffries. Not for reproduction in full or in part on any other website or in print of any form. ______________________________________
Ryan Hunter is the author of inDIVISIBLE, a YA Dystopian reviewers are comparing to a modern George Orwell's 1984.

Middle Grade Fantasy Writing Critique

What is it about sinking one's teeth deep into the sides of a number two pencil that is so satisfying? Is it the feel of the crushing wood, or the crackly sound it makes? I love this opening, but don't care for italics in the first paragraph. Perhaps take the italics away and add something to tie it to the next thought (ex: I twisted the pencil for a second bite when the recess bell ...)
The recess bell rang. I scolded myself for not watching the clock more closely Consider syllabic editing. The few the syllables, the easier the read (ex: more closely =closer). Pocketing my pencil, I was avoid passive voice. Remove "was" and replace it with an active word, or reword the sentence to make it active (ex: I burst) out the door with a gym-ball, jacket, and a sonic-boom (I may have knocked over a desk) before my sixth-grade teacher had even turned from the whiteboard.
I was reword or replace on the playground, smugly tossing my dodgeball into the air and catching it, before any other kid again, consider shortening "any other kid" to "the others" or something similar made it out the door. For the seventh recess in a row, I would be the first girl to be it for the Nigel Elementary Daily Dodgeball Tournament. I smiled as the second, third, and fourth kid bumbled good description :) implies a few uncoordinated kids or the chaos of recess out of the building, each looking around as if expecting a bear attack.
I decided to be generally avoid terms like I decided, I thought, I saw or I felt generous and wait until at least ten kids were were is passive. Perhaps revise to something like "filtered out ..." out of the building before going in for the kill. I didn't want to lose the advantage of being first, but it was always more fun when a bunch of kids were part of the action (and of course, watching me win) I would personally take out ( ) and simply insert a comma after action.
“Five. . . six. . . seven. . . if formatting for ebook, consider changing your elipses to look like this: Five ... six ... seven ...” I said as each kid zipped out the door, running for cover.
THWUMP!
With a splash of white swirls, I found myself use something more visual sprawling to the ground, a welt instantly occasional use of adverbs is okay, just don't overuse them :) rising on the back of my head, grass and stars spinning in front of me "spinning in front of me" - consider this as an awesome opportunity for vivid description to give us a glimpse of your MC's personality. Would she see stars spinning or something else?.
“Well, if it isn't Lindsey Barchopious. Guess you weren't first today!” came the words of a snorty voice I knew all too well consider revising this attribution. I turned and saw It's assumed, from your MC's POV, that they are seeing everything you're describing, so it's unnecessary to state it. Barney Pendleton retrieving his own gym-ball. He must have left class before the recess bell to make it out before me. What a big fat cheater. Not to mention his ball must have been way over-inflated.
I looked around quickly adverb. My ball had been nabbed by a classmate who was now chasing a kid half his size.
“Looking for something?” Barney said asked.
I turned back at my bushy headed, freckle-faced attacker fun description - I like this :). He had his ball, but in his other hand, he held up my favorite #2 pencil. It must have fallen out of my shirt pocket when I got pegged I love this sentence and the visuals it creates. It also carries a bit of emotion because we know Lindsey values her pencil. _____________________________________Submitted and owned by Chas Hathaway. Not for reproduction in full or in part on any other website or in print of any form. ______________________________________
Thank you Chas! This looks like it's going to turn into a fun middle grade read! Please keep me informed as to your progress, and if you'd like to send in a revision, I'd be happy to go over it again with you. :)

First Page Critiques :)

I've had several people ask me lately for critiques of their first pages ... which I really enjoy doing, but if I can share those critiques with other writers, it helps even more than the one ...

Now, I'd like to offer the service to all of my readers! Call it a Christmas gift, that I'll keep giving all year round.

The critiques are FREE if I can post the finished critique on my blog. Reading critiques helps both the writer and others who are striving to fine-tune their own writing.

If you'd prefer a private first page critique, I can do that for only $25, payable by credit card via Paypal.

I look forward to seeing your first pages and giving you the feedback to help make them their best. :)

Email your first page to RyanHunter.45@gmail.com and specify if you'd like a public or private critique. 
Credentials: Ryan Hunter has worked for two newspapers as managing editor, copy editor and features writer. She has worked as a magazine editor, freelancer and is the author of four published novels. She works closely with a New Times Bestselling Author doing proofing, editing and formatting. 
Photo courtesy of imagerymagestic via freedigitalphotos.net

I am Grateful for Sports Massages :)

All my friends are sharing gratitude posts on FB. Awesome things like:

waking up in a cozy bed the sense to hear my girls laugh being surrounded by good friends for the friends who write to my husband who's on deployment for the strength my children make me have
Truly awesome, right?
I'm grateful too, for an awesome sports massage therapist ... because without his help, I wouldn't be running today.
Years ago I was told I had scoliosis. Running sent stabs of pain through my neck, the back of my head and down my right arm. I ended each run with headaches that often turned to migraines. I nearly gave up.
Then I hit a deer while traveling 75 mph on the Interstate ... talk about ensuing pain. I went to a chiropractor and massage therapists for the next six months or so - then I discovered this awesome sports massage therapist and my health improved faster than I ever expected. 
I began to run again.
This time I had a partner, my husband, who stayed beside me, encouraged me and eventually began to train with me for my first half-marathon.
Running gives me time to talk with my husband, grow closer to him and I'm grateful we have that. 
Now, my children run with me too! My daughter, who's preparing to graduate, runs and talks and laughs with me. It's time I relish, because I know she'll be gone, very soon, and I won't be running with her anymore. I'm excited for the changes in her life, her decision to teach English abroad, for the effort she's put into getting her associate's degree before graduating high school ...
But running has done even more for me and my family. My other daughter has begun running and now, my son. Sometimes we take up the entire road, but we're exercising together, talking, laughing, growing closer ...  
And then it happened, the half-marathon. I set a goal to run it in under two hours ... I made it in 1:55. My husband blew me away, but I'm just grateful I didn't have to match his pace! Next year I will be faster. Next year, my son is planning to run it with us. And for that I am also grateful. :)

They control us with fear ... a little rant.

I am not a fan of politics. I don't keep up with current events because they get me down and stifle my creativity. But I do notice the little things that affect me or my family and I think those little things fed into the creation of inDIVISIBLE on a subconscious level.

And those little things tick me off enough that here is my basic rant - I'm tired of being treated like the bad guy, having my rights taken away because people are scared. Yes, fear can be a helpful instinct, but when taken to extremes, it strips you of freedom and creativity.

I don't think it's right that we're all coerced into such fear of flying that we now have to subject ourselves to invasive scans or searches. I think it's blatant child abuse to require them to be palm-swiped before getting school lunch or requiring them to wear tracking devices. That's not to mention the monitoring of computers via remote-access cameras so school personnel can spy on children in their off hours.

But it's for our own good, we're told. It's to keep us safe from the terrorists, from the kidnappers, from our own children because they may wander off school campus and do something naughty and they can catch them via spying on them through their laptops ...

I would rather take my chances and have the freedom to choose rather than have the government choose for me and restrict me.

Yeah, I kind of rambled today. Maybe that's the free-writing I needed to get into writing the second book of the One United series today.

If you haven't read it yet, check out inDIVISIBLE and see what life is like when the government takes total control.

Download inDIVISIBLE now! 

Indie's Guide to Twitter - Richard Stephenson

I'd like to welcome Richard Stephenson to my blog today! Richard is the author of Collapse, book one in a four part series entitled, "New America." He's also a master "tweeter" so I'm excited to share his thoughts on using Twitter :)
The Indie's Guide to Twitter - Richard Stephenson

 When I started writing Collapse at the end of February, I did painstaking research on how to promote the book to the masses.  Most of that research pointed back to Twitter and that bothered me a great deal.  I couldn't understand Twitter for the life of me.  My opinion of Twitter up to that point was "If people want to know what is going on with me, they should just check my Facebook page."   I started up a Twitter account and set about writing my novel.  I checked back a week later and had gained a minuscule amount of followers (most of them porn or spam, would that be considered porny spam or spammy porn?)  
I was determined to figure out this mystery that was Twitter.  I had absolutely no clue how it worked.  I did so many Google searches it was ridiculous - What is this "RT" that people keep putting in their tweets?   Why are people using the pound symbol # and what does it do?  And the acronyms, oh the acronyms!  FF, DM, FYB, and many more.  I still find myself searching to find the meanings for these little twitter codes.
I've decided to share my knowledge as I understand it.  Please comment if you care to add some helpful information.
TWITTER BASICS
If you have the basics down, feel free to skip down to the next section.  This is for the people that were like me at the beginning and had to search for the meaning of "RT" - it means "Retweet" by the way.  
Followers - Your most valuable asset on Twitter.  How do you get followers?  We will discuss that in the next section.
Following - Are the people that you are following.  The easiest and most effective way to get followers is to follow people in the hopes that they follow you back.  At the start, you can follow up to 2000 people before Twitter enacts a follow limit.  As an indie author, who should you follow?  We'll discuss that later.
Tweets - The micro-blogging feature of Twitter.  You can send out tweets up to 140 characters.  
Hastags (#) - You can put a hashtag symbol in front of keywords or phrases to help categorize your tweets. This function helps people do searches for tweets by category.  More on this later.
RT - Retweets.  If you find a particular tweet that you like, you can hit the retweet button and share it with your followers.  This is also a very valuable tool in supporting other indie authors.
DM - Direct Message.  Other followers can send you direct messages that can't be seen by the public.  It is important to note that if you send a tweet to someone it is public for all to see.  
GAINING FOLLOWERS
This aspect is what puzzled me the most in the beginning.  I thought for some reason that I would just automatically gain followers as time progressed.  Like I mentioned earlier, I set up the account and came back a week later to discover the only followers I got were porny spam (I like that term better, LOL).
Simply put, you gain followers by following other people and count on them to follow you back.  As mentioned above, you can initially follow 2,000 people before Twitter before a follow limit is placed on your account.  After that limit is in place, some secret algorithm kicks in that allows you to follow between 200 to 500 more people than are following you.  You will want to weed out the people that you are following that are not following you back.  Some free websites out there tell you who's not following you back so that you can unfollow them.  One site that comes to mind is who.unfollowed.me.  There are a few others out there like it.   A word of warning, if you follow and unfollow large amounts of people too quickly, Twitter will put your account in Twitter Jail for "follow churn".  My advise, don't do both on the same day.  If you want to weed out your unfollowers, do it once or twice a week and never on the same day that you follow a bunch of people.
Who should you follow?  Well, if you are trying to promote your book, you want to follow people that read books.  Search for hashtags that will bring up book readers like #bookworm, #booknerd, #booklover, #bookaholic, #lovetoread, or terms like "avid reader" or "book suggestion".
SENDING OUT TWEETS
The best way to get word of your book out to the masses is by tweeting about it.  However, it is even more important not to spam your followers, which I was very guilty of in the beginning.  If enough people report you for spam, Twitter will suspend your account (commonly referred to as "Twitter Jail")  I had to learn this by trial and error since I had no clue what constituted spam.  During my free time I would sit in front of my computer surfing the internet and watching TV and would send out tweets every five minutes.  That is WAY too much.  A good rule of thumb is to send out tweets no more than every twenty minutes.  If you want to send out more tweets, I wouldn't recommend sending them out any less than every fifteen minutes.
Another important factor in tweeting is to have a long list of tweets.  If you send out the same three tweets at twenty minute intervals, your followers will consider that spam.  If you send out three tweets an hour, that is seventy-two tweets in a twenty-four hour period.  I would shoot for a list of at least forty-eight.  If you can bump it up to seventy-two, that would be ideal.
Make a list of tweets and ensure that they are no more than 140 characters.  Make a list of shortened links to your book and/or your blog.  I highly recommend using the website bitly.com.  Just copy and paste your link into the website and in return you will get a shortened link.  Some people use tinyurl.com and that's fine, however, bitly will give you a link that is on average five characters shorter than tinyurl  More characters mean longer tweets.   Twitter does have a feature that will shorten your links automatically, but I advise against it.  I used it for a while and many people responded saying the link didn't work.  Maybe Twitter has worked out the kinks?  Not really sure, I like bitly.com and use that exclusively.
What should you tweet about?   Well, you are a writer so I would hope you have the creative juices to come up with some on your own.  ;)   The key to tweeting about your book is advertising.  Draw people's attention and make them wonder about your book.  Make the tweet a little vague but not too much.  Make people question "What is this about?  Let me click on it and find out."  I would advise against empty claims about how amazing your book is  "Check out my book!"  "You can't miss this exciting read!"  "This is your next read!"  "Don't miss the next big thriller!"  The best thing to do is simply present your book and let people draw their own conclusions.  A word of caution, your list should not be  made up entirely of "buy my book." It needs to have more substance to it, promote other authors, promote your blog, add some flavor to it.
What genre is your book?  You can start there.  "Looking for a good romance?  Check out ..."    "Are you a fan of spy novels?  Check out ..."
Another good thing to tweet about are the reviews for your novel.   " (Title) has 23 Five Star reviews!"   "(Title) has been called  (insert snippet of review)"
You can also use pieces of your promotional blurb from your novel.   "Detective John Doe will find out that his next case will define his career"     "John Doe will discover the secret of a lifetime"   "How long before John Doe meets the woman of his dreams?"
Do you have a blog?  Drawing readers to your blog is another fantastic way to spread the word about your book.  Make up tweets about each of your blog posts.  You can rest assured that I will have a few tweets about the very blog post you are reading now.
Anyone in the advertising business will tell you that you need to come up with several tag lines that define your book.  For my novel I came up with several, the most effective one being   "In 2027, America Will Fall"   Other taglines were "Second Great Depression.  Terrorists On Our Soil.  Major Cities Locked Down." "Civilization is Fragile" and  "Are you prepared for the Collapse?"
HOW TO SPREAD YOUR TWEETS
Now that you've come up with your tweets, how do you spread them into the Twitterverse?  You can use several hashtags that indie authors use to help promote each other.  Just include them in your tweet and other indies out there will retweet them for you.  The two best ones that I know of are #BYNR and #authorRT.  Just include those hashtags and other indies will help you spread your tweets.  Ensure that you return the favor.  I have those two hashtags as saved searches.  I call them up a few times a day and retweet five to ten at a time.  Sometimes my tweets get retweeted up to ten times in a day.  Great way for indies to help each other out.
There are several twitter accounts that will retweet your tweets when you mention them in your tweet.  I know I'm only scratching the surface here so I hope that people will comment with more. The ones I use are @WritersRT and  @WritersReTweets.
A word of caution: don't use too many hashtags in your tweets.  Twitter advises two to three hashtags per tweet.  If you venture beyond that, your users will consider it spam.  I learned that from a very irate woman that sent me a tweet asking me to please die in a fire and stop spamming the hashtags.  (No joke, she actually tweeted that)  Lesson learned, while she was far from tactful in her request, she was in fact correct.  Try your best not to spam the hashtags.
The best way to spread your tweets is over at the World Literary Cafe.  Every day, you can sign up to be on a tweet team.  Each team consists of ten team members.  You post your tweet and include #WLCAuthor and the other nine members of your team retweet your tweet.  In return, you have to tweet the other nine people's tweets.  In addition, you must also tweet the Daily Tweets designated by the website.  You can be on as many teams in a day as you want, you just have to be sure to retweet everyone.  Fantastic group of people.  Really helps spreading the word.
SERIOUSLY?  THIS SEEMS LIKE A LOT OF WORK
Well, yeah, it is a lot of work and can consume time that is better spent writing books.  There are several great programs out there that will schedule your tweets for you.  You simply input your tweets for the day and either a specific time or time interval (remember my tip, every twenty minutes).  One of the most popular is Tweet Deck.
If you are looking for a program that does it all, I highly recommend Tweet Adder.  It cost a little money but it is worth every penny.  It does it all.  You can create lists of tweets and save them for later use.  It will automatically add followers based on search terms that you input (refer to the above section - Gaining Followers).  It will even unfollow people that have not reciprocated your follow for a certain amount of days (I recommend 2-3 days).
Good luck in the Twitterverse!  :)
If you want to hear more from Richard, follow him on Twitter at @CollapseNovel  and  @RStephenson5
Thanks for stopping by my blog today, Richard! I wish you the best!

I Always Love a Clever Storyline ...

"I really enjoyed this novel.  The plot is well-constructed and the characters are unique.  I always love a clever storyline, one that grabs you and makes you think--that's the case with inDivisible.  Not only is it well done, it's timely with subtle parallels to today's debates over social freedoms versus political power." -Amber Lea Easton

Read the entire review on Amber's awesome blog - Kisses, Caresses and Whispers in the Night.

Why do You Love YA?

Why do you love YA?

Don't be afraid to admit you read YA just because you're an adult. Seriously, the majority of YA books are purchased by adults. If you don't believe me, check out this post by the Atlantic Wire. 

And I love their reasons why adults read YA! 

To escape our frantic adult lives, to remind us of who we were and who we want to be ... and, put simply, they're good. 
I believe there's a bit more, at least more to the reasons why I love YA.

I love to read YA because it usually carries an element of hope. Adult novels often lack the optimism that youth captures and I long for that in a book. I also love to see growth in the characters I'm reading about and I feel, 
too often, that adults characters have no room left for growth - they're stubborn or cynical, or they get caught up in issues I'd rather forget about ... in short, I thrive on seeing a character's growth throughout a story.

I agree wholeheartedly with the Atlantic Wire's claim that adults read YA to escape frantic lives. Yes, I'm a Young Adult Novel reader and I'm not afraid to say it. Perhaps that's why I chose to write for the young adult market too.

So, why do you love YA? 

Give me an answer and you can click on this link to enter to win 50 Signed YA books! Okay, you can enter anyway, but it'll be more fun to participate in the conversation first. 
WIN 50 BOOKS.
You know it will. Do it. Remember peer pressure from those YA books? Now's the time to give in and join the conversation ...