Brandy Potter's Blog, page 9

Winter blues

So.. I wanted to update everyone on my projects......

The books are SLOWLY coming together. There have been so many
personal, professional and family issues going on that I have just not
felt the creative juices flowing as of late. Writer's block is not even
the word for it.. but I keep tweaking and writing and things will
eventually flow again.

Winter is not helping either. All of this snow is sucking the energy out of me. Come on Spring!

Another block has been Written BY...


It did not become the vision that we had hoped for, we wanted a
platform that gave writers wings and had them stand out. Also, it put
their names on another social media platform... YouTube.


However, we did not have many takers. While we are disappointed that the
independent authors seem to still not understand what a huge leap this
could have been for them, we are trying to figure out EXACTLY how we
want to revamp it, but we know we want it to be a VBT stop for our
fellow independent authors. So it is not going to die!

For now, we will be transforming that to a review/virtual book tour stop only.


We will each be reviewing 1 book a month and we are adding a
generational element to this. My daughter Cheyenne, a budding author
herself, will be reviewing books appropriate for teens/pre-teens/and
children.... her first review will be this month for 'An Alien Mind' by
Virgina Lori Jennings.

We will continue to review 1 book a
month whether it is, as we hope a book from the Indy author market, or
something we simply picked up to read. However, it is going to happen
as it does not depend on people outside of the magazine and it will be
video based (at least for reviews.... we have not worked out VBT stop
stuff yet)

But on to happier things!
..................................................................................................................

We are 37 days away from going to my happy place.. the most wonderful place in the world Walt Disney World and I am hoping it gets me back to what I love... writing...


Also, Liz, Chey and I are going to start a VLOG for top ten lists,
music, art and event reviews... all things Disney (you know me) so I
will le tyou know when that gets going.. should be a BLAST!!!!

However, I want to acknowledge the people behind the scenes that keep me as motivated as I can be:

My sister, Elizabeth
and my daughter Cheyenne.. they are my muses, my laughter, my battle
buddies an most importantly, my soul mates! We got each other so we got
this!

Leon, Dan, Dezinald and Jenn you guys are keeping it real and keeping, Liz, Chey and I together!

Thank you for being there! Jo Linsdell- Feliciani and Virginia Lori Jennings...
they post stuff to me and about me, they haven't lost faith in me a
they light a fire under me when I think a spark has gone out. And they
continue to support me in my abstention....

....................................................................................................................

Please check out Lizzie Death, Jo Linsdell, and Virginia Lori Jennings, Author's
pages and support them. They provide valuable insight in their blogs,
not all writing, but still creative, and are an inspiration.

Please join us at Where Writers And Authors Meet for helpful people who like to keep writing alive.

If you are interested in our review services hit us Offical Page of Author Brandy Potter or the contact us page at http://brandypotterbooks.wordpress.com/

Oh and don't forget to check out www.brandypotterbooks.com.

Until I find my muse again.... all my love and good thoughts,

be happy... be healthy and remember... to walk with out dreams is to walk blind!

~ Brandy

It's Christmas..... again!

So here we are... another year getting ready to exit. I have been absent from both Written By..... and Brandy Potter books, but we have had LOADS going on. Nothing exciting for you guys but keeping Chey, Liz (My sister and co-editor for Written By...) and I very busy! The biggest and best news is that Liz's cancer is in remission and she has made the move to Philly to start college so so proud of her.

 

I spent my 38th (ugg) birthday in Philly with Liz and the Muses have decided that And They Lived is going to be set there instead of NY. Nothing against NY but I just felt that having both Ties and that book set in the same city was too much.

 

During the holidays, it's very hard to find time to write. I try to write for at least 1 hour every day, but the muses for BOTH of my books are telling me I am headed in another direction than originally written so both Ties and And They Lived are getting face lifts.... wish I was.. well not really but

 

I asked Santa to bring me some peace in my life so that I can get on with it! This Writer's block is KILLING me, but for now I will revamp the books towards the muses' guidance and move forward. Well that and Norman Reedus or Tom Hardy, but I doubt that I am getting either of them hahahah.

 

Written By... got pushed to the back burner a bit and I think part of the problem was that we had a lot of Ideas and no time for it. I am going to revamp it a bit and strictly make it a video blog. I think trying to put a video mag together with Liz in one place and me in another is just way to hard. So look for those changes after the New Year.

 

Anyway this hoilday, I wish all of you happy tidings... but whether you celebrate Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanza, Festivus, Yule, WInter Solstice or I am going to eat all this stuff and buy gifts because I can ... remember we all have our own beliefs (or lack there of) and traditions and no one is wrong in them.

 

I hope you get everything you asked Santa for....

 

What does my story need????

Ok so you have begun to write……. great…. Or you maybe one of those people that want a written guide on what to write before you write.......... 

What are the most important things to any writing project? If you MUST have a list….. then…..

 

Plot – Now I find that this is very closely linked to all of the elements that follow. However the plot is what is happening in your story. There has to be a conflict internal or external. Internal conflict can be something like a commitment phobe falls in love. Or grief etc…. External would be a mystery to solve, or a way to save a lover or to plan a crime. The list goes on and on. There should also be an end to the conflict one way or another at the end of the novel or series.

 A plot can be a simple or complex as you want it. However I find that when writing for an adult audience a simple plot requires complex characters to hold interest. However that is just my opinion and we all know about those

 Character – To me this is the meat and potatoes of the story. Characters drive many if not all of my stories (the Mafia work being the exception at this point). But if your plot is your meat and potatoes a simple bio and description may be enough. Back stories can complicate things but they make for interesting reading… again opinion….

Setting – WHEN is something taking place? WHERE is it taking place? This is what is meant by setting. Where meaning what city, town, country not necessarily the settings of individual scenes. For example, if you want to have someone speaking or dressing in Victorian fashion, you probably don't want to have the story take place in Elizabethan times. I was going to use modern times in that sentence but my best friend Liz will say that Steam punk IS Victorian and IS modern. SO out of respect.. but I digress…..

Ok so the time is right but where are they…. A story about the French revolution can hardly take place in China... Right now I know you are saying Brandy.. this is obvious but you would be surprised at how many people try to do these things… seriously. 

Oh and one other thing that myself and other history nuts find INCREDIBLY annoying… if you are going to write historical fiction (defined as any fiction set in a specific time in the past, i.e. the 80's) DO YOUR RESEARCH! Read a story from someone asking for me to give an opinion and I couldn't get past the first three paragraphs…. Why? It was set in Scotland in the late 1600's with Charles I as king…. In fact during the time it was set Charles II was on the throne and since my great great grandmother's maiden name was HYDE (Charles' sister in law Anne Hyde married to James II of England (VII of Scotland) and yes we are very distant relatives) I was more than well aware of the historical faux pa… Another story by another author had a "King of Germany" who's family had been kings in Germany for centuries.. . oops digressing again.. you get the point….

Writing style – Are you descriptive ie Steven King or dialog/action driven ie David Eddings….. Translation do you describe every little thing in extensive detail or do you allow the details to be filled in as the plot develops…. Are you going to write in 1st, 3rd or the almost impossible second person? What dialog are you going use? Are you going to write in prose or poetry? Is this going to be a screenplay, a script, a novel, a short story, a graphic novel, a comic book? Is this fiction or non fiction? Etc Etc

Now all of that being relayed; understand 1 thing…. As I said in my 1st blog post…. Write the story you want to read… write for yourself. All of these 'technicalities' will work themselves out as the story flows. If not then you can always edit later….. Just Write!

Start Writing

So you want to write……



Great!



So….. How do you get started? Well the standard answer is that you just do and while that may seem to be over simplistic it is the way that you start.



So many people say to me “I want to write a book about xyz, but how do I know it will sell.”



The truth is you don’t and the odds are it won’t. Discouraging I know but it is in fact the truth. Publishers do not take risks on unknown unrepresented authors and agents do not usually take unsolicited materials. How does one break in you may ask, well it takes a lot of persistence and a TON of luck. I myself have written three novels and only have one published by a small company. I do not write to sell books. I write to write and that is the truth of it.

If one sets out into writing to sell books they may as well go to the Harlequin website and look up what books they are looking for. Hell, Harlequin even gives you a formula for how they want their books written.

The key to writing is that you write what you think you need to write. Now, I have not ventured into the world of non fiction far enough to give a good dissertation as to how to write it. What I can tell you is that if you think the world needs a book about how to change the carburetor in a ’67 Chevy, and then write it. This blog will deal primarily with fiction and so you can take things that work for you out of it I will be very pleased if you do.

However, the key to getting started with writing fiction is simple. Write a story that you will enjoy reading again and again. After all the best books are those that you find yourself reading more than once, not the ones that you read once and never pick up again. For me that includes descriptive writers that use witty dialog and strong characters. For others it will be something else.

Here is an example: The author of the current world famous sparkly vampire series had a dream about two people in a meadow and wanted to write the story of how they got there. That translated into 4 more books. The author of the most famous wizard series came up with the idea on a train and most of the world knows that the famous ring trekking novels came about to explain a language that the author had made up.

So you can get an idea from a novel from anywhere. Venomous Lives, my current published work, came to me after coming across some letters that were written between myself and a friend of mine in the 8th grade where we talk about our childhood crushes on hair metal bands and our admiration of people like Lita Ford and Vixen. I took that idea and created a story that to this day intrigues me. If I hadn’t written it, I would have bought it.


Ok so that’s how you get an idea Brandy, I already have an idea. How do I start?

Well Venomous lives started with the first scene… I wrote that and then outlined the rest… most authors out line and I do typically as well at the beginning of a project. Here is the problem with outlines for me…… I write them and RARELY stick to them. As the story develops most of my original Ideas don’t make sense for the characters that I have developed…. Venomous lives developed chronologically because the 1st scene was the scene that drew me in. a girl looking at the posters on her wall… how she felt why she loved the bands etc….

Now my current two projects and other novels are very different in their conceptuality….. I am working on a murder mystery and a mafia book. Both with strong female characters and their families or friends. Chick lit if you will seems to be my forte… here is how I got started…

Sci-Fi Fantasy – I love the fantasy genre. Unfortunately for me, I finished this 3 year labor of love right about the time that the wizard movie and the ring quest movies were coming out in theatres... this meant the genre was over run with new authors… how did I start.. Well I wanted strong female characters... the genre is over run with knights and wizards etc but strong woman are almost unheard of. So, I started figuring out what the races would be, what the structure of the rulers of the world would be and the map… then I created the characters and wrote scenes as they came to me, no real order of things. It works though. The books makes its way around to my sci-fi friends every couple of years and they all say I should re type it (as the original got lost in move) and submit it.

Mafia book – this is scene driven. I dreamed (cliché I know) about a scene in the book and now I am writing the story that will bring that scene about. The first thing I did, I pulled out my writing journal and wrote that scene. Hand written... Raw but it is where this book is headed.

Murder mystery – Again a concept… wanted to have a certain character murder another frame another and I am going for how to prove that. I know the ending. I created characters to bring about that ending… How did I start? I wrote an outline… I am trying very hard to follow it, because it makes logical sense to the ending I want but the characters are dictating other things. There are also scenes that come up in my head that I write in my journal that may eventually make it in, but now I am rewriting b/c I am eliminating a main character in that book that appears in the Mafia book (made more sense for them to be there)


So…. As you can see. The best way to start writing is to write. write your concept/scene/character description what have you and then create a word for them/it to live in that make sense… you have to start though.. You can’t say I want to write a book about this dream I had and then never put pen to paper. When you have the dream….write it down. Once you do that, you will find it easy to begin and never mind about what will sell. If you do that you never will.



Hope this helps and happy writing!

 

BLOG!!!!

HEY YOU GUYS!

Sorry Goonies on the brain..

Ok So here is my newest idea.....

I have a TON of people asking for help with their writing. In order to assist with this, I am going to start a weekly blog about Writing begining on Sunday 1/20/2013. These blogs will include things that are "industry/School" taught and the things I actually do.

I invite everyone who wants to write to come by and read and comment!

 

New works

Hi all!

Long time no see! Well I am currently working on 3 projects...

1) Work continues on the Cynthia Lennon screen play.

2) Still working and halfway finished with what has a working title of The Ties that Bind... that title, being too cliche will change but for now that is the Murder mystery.

3) Working on what has a working title of And they Lived.... (chapter titles are gonna reflect the title you'll see good concept) This is a much darker piece for me. More violent and less plucky comic relief.

Editing complete

The final round oif Edits on Venemous Lives has been submitted to the publisher. I have seen the E-book and the Cover. Both are awesome if I do say so my self. Can't wait won't be long now!