Marie Dry's Editing Journey Part 2

Marie Dry is back with the second part of her editing journey! Let's welcome her...


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Marie is a proud member of ROSA, Romance Writers Organisation of South Africa.







I promised to talk about Lori Wilde, Margie Lawson and a few other craft books and places. Oh and body language for dialogue tags.
Cassandra and I both did a course with Lori Wilde that entailed plotting, rough draft and editing. If you ever get a chance to do this course with Lori Wilde, take a loan on your house or something because it will be worth it. The course was offered by www.savvyauthors.com  Unfortunately she haven’t done it for a while due to work pressure but if she ever offers the course again I might just do it again. The thing I liked most about her was her work ethic. I don’t think that woman ever sleeps. She set deadlines and stuck to them. I think there were at least more than twenty of us in class and she read each and every assignment and gave feedback. ON TIME.  So you had time to do changes and keep up and learn a lot if you put in the required hours every day. 
The funny part was that she did not know paranormal romance. She did not write it or read it so certain concepts were strange to her.  She admitted this up front and even so, this course was excellent for Cassandra and me because we both write paranormal romance. It was hilarious because sometimes she asked questions or gave feedback on things that someone who read paranormal would immediately understand. Sometimes Cassandra and I just shook our heads good-naturedly. However, for a pantser like me she taught how to do more plotting, the tools available for plotting. Enneagrams, the hero’s journey, the heroine’s journey, Michael Hauge’s plotting method and the three part plot etc.Next up Margie Lawson. She offers excellent courses although if you are living in the US try and attend one of her immersion classes. I am drooling over those. If I ever get to attend the RWA conference I will try my best to hook an immersion class onto that. She offers all her lecture packages on her website and it’s worth every dollar. www.margielawson.com  I took a few of her classes and I could see the difference in the quality of my writing after each course. She really pushes you a step higher. And yeah, you guessed it, Cassandra steered me to her classes.
Body language is an indispensable tool for a writer. There is a series ‘Lie to me’. It is about a company that specializes in body language. I cannot remember the name of the actor but he is the owner of this company and has a daughter he is very protective of. I watch this programme every few months and it’s amazing the  subtle nuances I can add while editing when I am just more aware of body language.  You get to watch a great series and sharpen your body language skills at the same time. There are many books out there about body language and I don’t think you can ever have enough. I ordered one written by Desmond Morris and of course that would be the time we had the post office strike in South Africa. I’m keeping fingers crossed it still gets to me.
I mentioned WriterU in the previous blog and here is the link to their website.  www.WriterUniv.com Lori Wilde sometimes do classes with them as well as Mary Buckham so it’s worth it to check their schedule every now and then.
Lastly a list of books I found helpful. It was great chatting to everyone and thank you so much to Kelly Steel for the opportunity to do this blog.
Scene and Structure – Jack M. BickhamGoal motivation and conflict – Debra DixonSelf editing for fiction writers. – Renni Browne  and Dave KingDialogue – Gloria KemptonWriting the breakout novel – Donald MaasThe emotion thesaurusWriting active settings – Mary Buckham (Keep an eye out, more of her craftbooks are coming)


Marie Dry's latest release...
In a bleak and apocalyptic future, Julia Benzoni flees the violence-saturated world of her mafia family to build a peaceful life in a No Name Town, Montana. Now, while civilization disintegrates into anarchy around her and evil men prey on the innocent, she’s pursued by an alien, whose warrior life thrusts her back into the world where might makes right and violence is the order of the day. Torn, she now has to choose between her need to distance herself from war and violence and the alien warrior who holds her heart.You can purchase Alien Mine from the following stores:
 
Amazon.com | Barnes & Noble | Smashwords
Black Opal Books | Kobo Books | All Romance Ebooks