Sunday, March 13, 2011

More Stuff Coming

So I've been doing some experimenting the last few weeks. I'm sure you've spotted days with lots of posts and days with just the one. Folks seem to like the extra posts, so starting tomorrow I'll be going back to those. So you can expect:


Morning Writing Posts: 6am (EST) topic on writing, my main meaty post of the day.

Lunchtime Links: 12pm (EST) posts that link to something cool I've read elsewhere. These will also include older posts from my bookmarked files and great stuff no one has seen for years because blogs are very "what's new is what's read." Discussion here is highly encouraged.

Evening Spotlights: 6pm (EST) Something writing related. Workshops, conferences, contests, cool sites, cool writing books, etc.


Evening Two for T-Days: On Tuesdays and Thursdays, the evening spotlight will be replaced with a repeat writing post from the archives. The post time might vary on this one since Blogger has issues with changing dates when you re-post something old. Tech-Guru Tom is working on this, but posts might be as early as 4pm (EST).

Weekend Blog Tour Re-Posts: About two months left of these, then it'll go to regular writing posts every morning on the weekends.

Regular Columns: Still doing these, and there's a new one now.


How They Do It Tuesdays: The "love to, thanks for asking" response was so awesome for this that I have enough to post them once a week. I also have a dynamite line up of authors for you, with quite a few that have "NY Times Bestselling" on their book covers. We've also added these posts to the rotating box list at the top of the site (box four) so you can benefit from last year's selection more easily as well.

Re-Write Wednesdays: For brevity I'm not titling these, (except in the tags) but Wednesdays are still all about re-writing and polishing your work.

Find Your Plot Fridays: Ditto here, and Fridays are all about plotting and story development.

Real Life Diagnosis:  No one has sent me anything in a while, but if anyone has a question about their work and wants to send it in, here's an official call for submissions. See the full rules here.

And that's about it for now. We'll continue to tweak and fiddle, (looking at a few ways to make better use of the full depth of information on the site), and suggestions are always welcome.

9 comments:

  1. Wow -- that's a lot of blogging! I find it hard to keep to my 2X per week schedule, but I'm happy to read more of your posts. Always something interesting.

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  2. Superb Janice. Thank you so much. I have a question about using brand names such as McDonald's, Coke, famous department stores, even fictionalizing a meeting with a famous person dead or alive. Does permission always have to be sought to use names and brands? I did a class where the teacher said just don't do it. But then you see coke and cornflakes used in loads of books. What is the definitive rule on this? It would be great to see a post if possible.

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  3. I'm in awe, Janice. Not only is that a lot of blogging but you've managed to keep up the great standard we've come to expect. You're kinda making the rest of us look like total slackers here.
    - Sophia.

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  4. Janice you rock!!

    You're a great blogger and from what I've read of Shifter so far, what you achieve in your novels back up all the good advice you've shared with us here.

    I'm still working on balancing my blog writing with my non-blog writing, and my non-writing ME time, which after years of late nights and constant hours of revision that made me lose it as much as my skills did improve, I've EARNED a little me time.

    I just need to be careful not to overdo it, I've played my DS more than I had last year, I forgot how much fun and distressing video games can be when I stopped playing them like I did when I was younger before I focused on strengthening the weaknesses like better query letters.

    I just need to balance it better. Some days I don't play, but I need to catch up on my reading too, because I now can read books for fun without the rival complex getting in the way. Can you say, "Hallelujah!!"

    I still want to learn from whatever I read, but I'll let it come slowly and naturally.

    I hope to get some things up on my blog before bed tonight. If not, I still have a post finished and set to post tomorrow at 7:00 AM sharp EST.

    Ciao for now,
    Taurean

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  5. Oh Cheddar Chips, I meant "I forgot how much fun and DE-stressing video games can be.

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  6. Wow, that's gonna be a feast for all of us!! literally!!

    lots of posts => lots of fun, lots of insights and lots of advice!!!

    with warm regards
    http://arandomarticle.blogspot.com

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  7. Amanda: I have specific blog days where I get most of them done in one sitting, so it's not as much work as it seems. I can do all my links and spotlight posts in an hour or two. I've been saving them for a while now, knowing I was heading in this direction. As long as I write my posts ahead of time I can stay on track. It's the weeks when I fall behind I start cursing the blog, LOL. Playing catch up is rough.

    Anon: There's is no rule, but I actually heard both an agent and two editors talk about this recently. They said that those names are trademarks and fall under copyright law. While most of the companies won't care if you use them in a book, there are folks (Like Disney) who are VERY vigilant about their property. They go after people for using them illegally. These agent/editors said they prefer to err on the side of caution and turn the brand names into generic names. Levis becomes jeans, etc. It A) helps keep the work timeless, because what's popular now might not be by the time the book comes out, and B) ensures that no one will come after them for a copyright issue.

    My call, unless that brand is absolutely vital to the story, you're probably better off just not using it. I doubt it would hurt you though, since you can always edit them out later if you sell the book.

    Sophia: Bah, nonsense! Not slackers at all :) I'm trying to do something very specific with my blog and not everyone is going to want to do the same. And they don't have to. You can have a fantastic blog that posts once or twice a week and be very successful in your blogging. You're just doing something different from what I am and have different blogging goals.

    Taurean: Thanks so much! Me time is so important. You need that to recharge and de-stress. That's awesome that you're reading for fun again. Grats!

    AllMyPosts: And I hope everyone enjoys the feast :)

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  8. Wow, it sounds great. I hope I can keep up with it all. You too. If it's too much, cut back a bit. The once a day posts were already awesome.

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  9. Natalie: Thanks, me too! I imagine there will be days where I need to skip one or two, but I hope I can manage a schedule where my blogging gets done in chunks and keeps me ahead of schedule. We'll see how it goes :) The extra posts aren't that hard really. I have so many great posts saved it's easy to link to them.

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