Joseph Hunt's Blog, page 24

Yours Faithfully, Joseph

Dear Reader,

I've failed myself, and I feel like I've failed you. As you may know if you've been following my blog for sometime, I was headstrong and peaking in positivity for my NaNoWriMo project, however, I have reached a point where my project is just unsalvageable…not because it went wrong somewhere, but because I have too many projects to deal with and trying to churn out a novel in a different genre just wasn't going to happen.



I'm not the kind of writer who likes to let everyone know when and at what time I'm writing, or my current day-to-day word count. I write and I like to be secret about it, yes, I share what I'm writing, but then there's that pressure, it's a horrible thing, and in this apology note for building such hype up on my blog I feel like I can get on with the things in my life.




Looking up though, past the pasty glaze on my face, someone on my Facebook Page (Joseph's Writing) suggested that I don't feel down about not being able to produce the work and dub my edition, NaNoEdMo as throughout this month I've done nothing but EDIT!




Yours Faithfully, Joseph




If you are doing NaNoWriMo then keep at it! I also suggest that writing in a new genre should be done at a different speed and not at the same time as a HUGE event like NaNo because it might just drive you craaazy!

The #NaNoAdventures! Day 6!

Dear NaNo Diary,





Day 6! 




Again, today, I've not been able to write a word of my NaNo project. However, today's reason is totally acceptable. I'm ill, and I've only just got out of bed, but I am feeling a little bit better now and that's why I'm writing this post.



So what's wrong with me? I have a headache (more like migraine), swollen glands, earache (might be an ear infection) and a blocked nose. It's actually not unusual for one to flare the other because the nose, ears and mouth are all connected…I know this from my hundreds of visits to the doctors with similar symptoms.



I do hope I can pick up the slack of the past week and I hope that I'm not completely ill for ages because I am doing the task of also having a social life through the month of November! I hope that you guys are doing better than I am! And I hope I get some word count in tomorrow!



Keep writing!



-Joseph

The #NaNoAdventures! Days 1 – 3!

Dear NaNo Diary,

I've become very lax in my posting! I said that I was going to be posting in the 9 days up until NaNo starts, but I feel behind on that, and I do have those posts ready and waiting, I've planned them, I just need to write them, and I'll be posting them as the dates for which they were due.


Day 1! 

I started quite late in the afternoon…I woke up with a hangover and about 15 text messages on my phone. It was a great night out, I put red food colouring on my face in fact I have a photo, which I'll take from my Facebook--oh wait, it's got other people in :/. And now I can't get it off!

Let's take a look at the word count for the end of the day: 2,089


Day 2! 

Another crap NaNoWriMo day! But I did get to watch the new episode of Glee, and I also figured out that I should be getting £2k a term from Student Finance which I haven't yet because they're driving me crazy! Stupid paperwork this, paperwork that!

Anyway! More to my second day of NaNoWriMo, it hasn't been a good day for writing at all but I did get in around 600 words.


Day 3! 

I'm not sure how many words I wrote, but I can tell you something…it was shocking. I'm guessing that it's because it's a new genre and it's uncomfortable to write in it. But I did finish a chapter and halfway through Chapter Two and it is quite fun...I'm just going to let go of my inside editor and try to bring a new sort of editor in who lets everything free flow, especially in the new genre.

Final word count: 3,365


Keep on writing guys!




-Joseph

The #NaNoAdventures! Days 4 – 5!

Dear NaNo Diary,




Day 4 & 5! 


I'm going to cut this short…the NaNo lifestyle hasn't been treating me well at all! I've not wrote a single word over the two days. I have however come bearing good news; I've picked up some slack on the edits for Lumen and I would like to propose that I release it in December!



Please, push me! I need some pushing and some "Joe! Do some edits!" or perhaps if I keep on talking about it here it'll be some self-motivation…let's go with that!



And if you're not really sure what Lumen is, check out my page for it, also, get ready for a new cover reveal SOON!!



Keep on NaNo-ing and keep WINNING!



-Joseph

The Award Goes to....

So I've been avoiding you blogger...and I'm sorry! I just can't face to click that orange 'B' button at the top of my screen because I haven't wrote a single blog post for you...including the four backdated in preparation for NaNoWriMo, which I have planned, so I'm not going to waste them, probably just incorporate them into my NaNo Diary, which I've also been lax on, sorry!





Let's get to business, to regain some blogging momentum I'll be doing this post first! When I complained about failing at blogging, social networking altogether and NaNo, Eveli, informed me that she'd award me with this award! Yay! I love awards! So all of you go and check her blog out! http://acostaeveli.blogspot.com/ she's great!

I've seen this given to blogs before and never really knew what it was for, but now I do and it's actually a really great pay-it-forward thing, it's an award that focuses on up and coming blogs, with less than 200 followers, and given to the top-5 blogs that they follow.

The rules of accepting and receiving The Liebster Blog Award are:
1. Thank your Liebster Blog Award presenter on your blog.
2. Link back to the blogger who awarded you.
3. Copy & Paste the blog award on your blog.
4. Reveal your 5 blog picks.
5. Let them know you choose them by leaving a comment on their blog.



I've thanked Eveli, and will thank her again! Thanks!



Now my 5 blog picks...it's really hard, I have a lot of blogs that I read and I love a lot of them, but if it boils down to five, then I suppose I must make a pick...and in no particular order!



T. R. Stoddard - http://t-r-stoddard.blogspot.com/ - She posts her poetry on her blog, and she's really talented, she's also doing NaNoWriMo this year (yeah!) and she's writing a gay novel called Don't Ask, Don't Tell! I can' wait for it!



Katherine Hawkings - http://katherinehawkings.blogspot.com - her blog is really good, not only is she a writer but she also blogs about movies and books, she's also wrote her own novel, and I'm awaiting her new cover reveal...I really can't wait for it!



Stephen King - http://theotherstephenkingonwriting.blogspot.com/ - I love reading his blog, although I don't comment that often, I always read his posts, and he's just signed a contract and is publishing his first novel, Cataclysm.



Sabina Ostman - http://sabinaostman.blogspot.com - she's great! From Sweden studying Creative writing in the UK and blogging about her university experience. It's great, and she has great English!



Dominique Weldon - http://dominiqueweldonsbooks.blogspot.com - Dom isn't as active as a blogger but she's great, and I love her Facebook page, she's also only 17 and I know that with a push (from me) she'll do more blogging!



Keep on blogging! All of you great bloggers out there!



-Joseph

NaNoWriMo: Be Positive!

Motivation is key to NaNoWriMo, and I addressed that in a different post, but this time I'm going to be getting to the core of people who are feeling demotivated to participate in NaNoWriMo, as for every positive thing that is said, there is bound to be someone who disagree or puts a negative spin on it.

Well I'm that positive guy, and although nobody has told me directly that you shouldn't do it for whatever reasons, I have read conversations where people are just downright haters. I've heard that NaNoWriMo encourages people to keep word count in mind rather than the quality of what's being written.

I do suppose that it does encourage people to keep their word count in mind because it's about writing a 50,000 word novel in a month, and like the tag says "Thirty days and nights of literary abandon!" there, we know what it's about, so why are people able to so easily discourage one another from participating in such a fun event.





If you don't want to do it, then don't do it! I would not recommend it for the weak willed, I wrote my novel Lumen in under a month and that was a tough thing to do, so although I haven't done NaNoWriMo before I'd like to think I know the stress of writing a novel in a month's time.

Now, some reasons why you should be doing NaNoWriMo! Because you're a writer and let's face it, that first novel of yours is going to suck, so why not have some fun while you write it! And if it's not your first go, and you don't have an idea of what you write, then do something fun, do something spontaneous, write anything, don't plan, just open that document at midnight and type what you feel, maybe a story will come out of it. If you want you can always tell yourself that every 5th day of this month a character will die, so every 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th, 25th and then the 30th it could be something as predetermined as that.

Yes, it might be 'literary abandon' but it's only once a year that we get to celebrate National Novel Writing Month, so write a bloody novel!




NaNoWriMo is what you make of it!


Keep Positive!

-Joseph

Writing My English Essay @ Uni

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I think it's my fifth week at university this week, and I'm already handing in my second assignment. I'm not complaining or anything...well, yeah I am actually complaining because this assignment is due in today and I finished it, or I wouldn't allow myself to post this.

So the essay was to write 2,000 words on a chapter from Charles Dickens novel, Hard Times. I'm not a fan of these classic novels because they're all about history and times before my grandparents were born.



I do not mind at all writing fantasy novels that incorporates its own history because that's creative, and I love being creative, but what I really cannot stand is history this and history that and stuff that actually happened. Maybe as I get older I'll warm to history, BUT I don't hate all kinds of history, just the history that I've grown up to have shoved down my neck like World War etc. I really would not mind learning about the Greeks or the Egyptians.




I'm really not sure where this post is going...so I'll continue anyway, and you shall receive an insight into the workings of my mind somewhat.




So it wasn't the historical part of the novel that I had trouble with, because it's set really close to home and in the Victorian era where religion was really big, so I had a pretty fundamental knowledge of the historical contexts behind it. Now, what I had the problem with, and my original intention of this post, was trying to figure out what Charles Dickens meant in the first place...I'm not him, so I don't know what he meant, and the only person who does know is him!




Nobody knows what an author/poet was thinking when they wrote THAT word! You can interpret, infer, deduce, (whatever) from the words on the page, but that's all it is, words, and you can say semantics this, lexis that, but at the end of the day, nobody knows what he was thinking at the time...for all we know, Charles Dickens could have smoked drugs and hallucinated a lot, but we don't, and nobody will ever know someone as well as they think they do.




Just sayin'




-Joseph




p.s. you might not be able to make sense of my rantings and I'm not feeling motivated enough to reread it because I'll probably change half the words and this is bottled emotion guys, bottled emotion!

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5 Days until NaNoWriMo!

Woo, only 5 more Days until NaNoWriMo!!



If you've read my blog before you'll know that I am a very huge planner! I love to plan my novels out completely before I set a word down in that pristine white document headed 'Chapter One'. However, you could also say that I do go off on tangents and start writing passages that I haven't planned. Some people swear by this method, coined 'pantsing', rather than actually planning out what they're going to write.



So it might be obvious to you guys, but this post is going to be about letting your writing come naturally with or without a plan.



I covered reaching the 1,667 words a day in a previous blog post [insert here] where I said that you shouldn't push your words because you won't like what you're writing and you'll end up falling into the EDITING trap!



I've heard a few writers swear by pushing their words out because if they don't then they'll become lazy and they often quote Stephen King by saying how he locks himself away for 12 hours while he writes. And wouldn't that be great if you had enough space or freedom to just hide away and write for 12 hours without being disturbed by life.



I'm a pusher! I push my writing but I never read over what I've written. That I swear by. My key to letting things come naturally is to push yourself even if you're not in the mood, something you write will spur you on to keep writing. However, that's only if you've planned it and you know what you want to write.



Now I've never written anything that hasn't been planned, I always brainstorm and that makes writing flash fiction hard. But there are perks to being a pantser, and one of them is being able to write flash fiction and creating without the need of prior planning (except I can imagine that there is an internal plan).



Now, for the many pantsers of the world, you'll all have your own paces and your own ways of making your muse speak! But pushing your writing isn't such a bad thing, especially for NaNoWriMo as everything will need to be fine tuned in revisions (if you choose to take it that far) so what's to lose?



In the past when I've tried to write flash fiction I go to the internet and go through various aesthetic pictures, be it inspiration through a setting, a person, or writing prompts and words that spark your interests.



So if you're getting stuck for stuff to write this NaNoWriMo, or you're just struggling to burst the cap on your word count, you might wish to stop writing it and start something new for half an hour or so.



I hope something I said here makes sense and I hope you get some use from it!



-Joseph

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NaNoWriMo: Why?

Six days until the MAIN EVENT! It sounds like the Olympics, and I'm a competitor, my stomach will not settle and my palms are getting sweaty, I'm taking deep breathes, but I'm not competing against anyone, except myself.



That's it! That's the only motivation that I need! And to be honest, you can't fail it, you can only stop trying. Everyone can hit the 1,667 mark a day...so no excuses!



Today's blog is about getting yourself motivated and knowing why or what you're doing NaNoWriMo for.



When I say getting yourself motivated, I mean realising your motivation early on in the game and being able to pull on that when you're slump hits, if it does, and when it does, you'll have this little pot of motivation to pick you up.



Let's start by asking ourselves a couple of questions, and it's best to do it early on and scribbling the answers down on a piece of paper and then pinning it up or have it on your pile of paper for NaNoWriMo that's grown quite considerably in the past few weeks.



The first question: Why are you doing NaNoWriMo?



For me, I'm doing it because I'm trying out a new genre, a genre that I've been daring to get into for some time now but I've never had the guts to even tiptoe into it. I also love the fact that I'll have written this novel in a month, even if I do have to push myself, that's what's so great about it!



The second question: Who or what got you involved in NaNoWriMo? (This is partially for the blaming process half-way through.)



Ever the masochist, Joe! I brought this upon myself, every November passes and I just forget about it. Not this time, this time I welcomed, in fact, I embraced with it both hands and a bear hug. I will probably regret telling you guys that I'm blogging daily, but in the end I know it's all going to be fun!



The third question: Are you writing for anyone in particular?



Nope. I'm writing for myself, because this novel is something I would love to read and I've heard that's the best way to go. I'd also like to say that I'm writing for you guys as well (which is a little obvious if you count blogging, hehe).



The fourth question: Are you going to try your hardest?



Yes! Of course, if I didn't then what would be the point…there wouldn't be a point. I know it's easy to say yes now, but I honestly believe that because this novel has been burning inside me for some time I just need to write it and I'll gladly accept a WORLDWIDE challenge to do it.



Why don't you post your answers in the comments below! I'd love to hear why you're doing it and who or what your driving force is.



-Joseph

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Creative Writing @ Uni

This is kind of old news, but whilst writing a post for my #NaNoAdventures section I remember this and realised that I can tell you guys about it!



It was my fourth creative writing class at university and my teacher is really nice...she's your very stereotypical wacky, dyed orange haired teacher and I love any teacher who is that wacky. However, what I hate is when a teacher looks around the room and then goes BAM!




"What did you think of [insert fake name here]'s piece?"




And if any of you know me, like know me personally and not just from what I post on the internet, then you'll know that I am not at all very confident, in fact I hate public speaking, I even hate speaking in class with people that I know, and I suppose that university is an experience to get me out of my comfort zone and stuff, but I'll come out of it when I want to...I do not want to be pushed, and certainly not when I can barely string a sentence in my head, my heart starts to pound, my face flushes red and everyone is staring at me, thinking to themselves oo, what does he think about that? Or is he going to say something bad about it?




I do have an opinion about most things, and yes, on occasion I have been called a bitch because of them, so it's not just for me why I keep my tongue bolted in the classroom, it's because once I start speaking I don't know when I'm going to stop or who I'm going to insult and I don't like making enemies, I really don't.




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Do any of you have tips on how I can get better at public speaking or restraining my tongue from spinning little whorls of conflict? 




I should really have started this off as a 'Dear Diary' hehe.




-Joseph

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