I'm going to be taking up working on my book again

[mashuga31]

I've had nothing to do recently so I thought I'd add some more to my book. Fun times. You can read part of it here.mashuga31.blogspot.com/2010/04/druid-kin-prolougue-part-1.html

I currently have 9 1/2 to 10 pages written.

[Ryan]

You're writing a book? Me too. I'll read what you have when I'm at my comp and not on my phone, but that's still pretty cool.

[mashuga31]

Sweet, cool to see another author on the moon. If you ever feel like it you should let me take a read. You could just email part of it to me if you want. Or wait until it's published, either way is good for me lol.

[AkeR]

mmm
im writing a thing for my A-levels
i could post it here if you like but i cant guarantee a great read
tis only like 700 words though

EDIT: btw mashuga i like it very much ;D but ive only read the first chapter as im a bit short of time. ill get back to it at some point but great for the moment!

[mashuga31]

Apr 18, 2010 16:30:30 GMT -5 AkeR said:

mmm
im writing a thing for my A-levels
i could post it here if you like but i cant guarantee a great read
tis only like 700 words though

EDIT: btw mashuga i like it very much ;D but ive only read the first chapter as im a bit short of time. ill get back to it at some point but great for the moment!

Cool, glad you liked it. Those actually arn't chapters though lol that would be too short. The whole thing is only part of a chapter. Those are just sections. A lot of books do that. It's a great way to separate events.

[Ryan]

that's really good mashuga, well done

[AkeR]

first section then. whatever it was i liked it
got a very strong sense of the place and the style of the book.
anyway heres mine
ill put it in a spoiler so it doesnt fill the page to much

SPOILER: Click to show

THE FALL

Sometimes I wonder.

I think about who else is out there, if anyone will read this and who they might be.

It’s strange, I’d never been all that attached to this town, my hometown. In fact I had been eagerly awaiting the day I could move out of my mother’s house and into the high-rise apartment in Cardiff that stood like a milestone in my own life and presented so many expectations for me. I’d been looking forward to a new life and proving my maturity by living on my own. It was funny then, that the apartment block had been razed before I could move in, but I feel like I have both a new life and this sense of wisdom that you get when you witnesses the end of the world.

As I said, I had never really felt that strongly for this town, but now I struggle to leave. The familiarity of the roads comforts me and I know that I can always return to my mother’s house before dark, before it gets too cold to be out.

At first I had decided that it was important to protect history and literature. I had horded hundreds of books, ranging from classic novels to a newspaper dated the Sunday before the end of the world. I soon realised that my needs for kindling far surpassed my attachment to these symbols of life before. And it crushed me.

I remember the first feelings of dread that crawled up my spine and sunk my stomach. I remember feeling the tremors from the blasts that had torn down the buildings. I remember standing and watching the final colours of red and brown drop to the ground and change from crisp leaves to a dark red rotting, mulch that coated everything.

I hadn’t really taken in the magnitude of the situation, until I found myself standing on the platform of Penarth station. The LED sign that once displayed the train times jutted from the ground at a crooked angle, a remnant of civilization and order. That was when it finally hit home. There were no trains, and there never would be. I stood there, my feet were planted just behind the yellow line, I leaned over with ears straining, just to hear that high pitched squeal of metal on metal. There was no sound except the dull patter of rain about my feet.

On the first night, I found my way home and sank my key into the lock. I felt vacant, numb. I knew what I would find. My dreamy state propelled me forward. Nothing. There was nothing there. My family, neither my mum nor my brother were anywhere to be found. I searched the house and finally discovered a trace of life. My brother had left his lunchbox on the dinner table. The box was still fogged with condensation, still cold from the fridge.

So I’m sitting here, on a patch of grey grass, dry as bone between my fingers. I’m at the top of Belle-Vue road, overlooking the hill that winds down to the crumbling barrage. The barrage, cracked concrete and rusted metal barriers. It’s holding the sea back in a fight it will inevitably lose. There’s a car at the side of the road, a recent model, a Nissan from what I can see. It stands untouched, save the thin layer of dead and decaying leaves that blanket it. The old Sea Cadet’s building on my right has spilled out into the front yard. Bricks and mortar are spread across the concrete; shards of wood stick up like the masts of wrecked ships. From my vantage point, I can see the sun, it’s setting between the clouds of vapour on the horizon, the chemicals in the air filter the light, creating hues of green, purple and deep orange. It’s getting cold. I think I’ll start heading home.

Tom Pimlott

thanks for reading it if you did =)

[shufoopop]

The book is really well written, I love it ^^. It inspires me to write my own story, but I have allot of grammar issues to work out in my writing.

Love it, Love it, LOVE IT ^^

[mashuga31]

Apr 19, 2010 1:58:50 GMT -5 AkeR said:

first section then. whatever it was i liked it
got a very strong sense of the place and the style of the book.
anyway heres mine
ill put it in a spoiler so it doesnt fill the page to much

SPOILER: Click to show

THE FALL

Sometimes I wonder.

I think about who else is out there, if anyone will read this and who they might be.

It’s strange, I’d never been all that attached to this town, my hometown. In fact I had been eagerly awaiting the day I could move out of my mother’s house and into the high-rise apartment in Cardiff that stood like a milestone in my own life and presented so many expectations for me. I’d been looking forward to a new life and proving my maturity by living on my own. It was funny then, that the apartment block had been razed before I could move in, but I feel like I have both a new life and this sense of wisdom that you get when you witnesses the end of the world.

As I said, I had never really felt that strongly for this town, but now I struggle to leave. The familiarity of the roads comforts me and I know that I can always return to my mother’s house before dark, before it gets too cold to be out.

At first I had decided that it was important to protect history and literature. I had horded hundreds of books, ranging from classic novels to a newspaper dated the Sunday before the end of the world. I soon realised that my needs for kindling far surpassed my attachment to these symbols of life before. And it crushed me.

I remember the first feelings of dread that crawled up my spine and sunk my stomach. I remember feeling the tremors from the blasts that had torn down the buildings. I remember standing and watching the final colours of red and brown drop to the ground and change from crisp leaves to a dark red rotting, mulch that coated everything.

I hadn’t really taken in the magnitude of the situation, until I found myself standing on the platform of Penarth station. The LED sign that once displayed the train times jutted from the ground at a crooked angle, a remnant of civilization and order. That was when it finally hit home. There were no trains, and there never would be. I stood there, my feet were planted just behind the yellow line, I leaned over with ears straining, just to hear that high pitched squeal of metal on metal. There was no sound except the dull patter of rain about my feet.

On the first night, I found my way home and sank my key into the lock. I felt vacant, numb. I knew what I would find. My dreamy state propelled me forward. Nothing. There was nothing there. My family, neither my mum nor my brother were anywhere to be found. I searched the house and finally discovered a trace of life. My brother had left his lunchbox on the dinner table. The box was still fogged with condensation, still cold from the fridge.

So I’m sitting here, on a patch of grey grass, dry as bone between my fingers. I’m at the top of Belle-Vue road, overlooking the hill that winds down to the crumbling barrage. The barrage, cracked concrete and rusted metal barriers. It’s holding the sea back in a fight it will inevitably lose. There’s a car at the side of the road, a recent model, a Nissan from what I can see. It stands untouched, save the thin layer of dead and decaying leaves that blanket it. The old Sea Cadet’s building on my right has spilled out into the front yard. Bricks and mortar are spread across the concrete; shards of wood stick up like the masts of wrecked ships. From my vantage point, I can see the sun, it’s setting between the clouds of vapour on the horizon, the chemicals in the air filter the light, creating hues of green, purple and deep orange. It’s getting cold. I think I’ll start heading home.

Tom Pimlott

thanks for reading it if you did =)

Aside from a few spelling errors (Sorry I notice things like that...) it was really rather good. Maybe it's just my love of reading or just the whole end of the world scenario deal, but I think it painted a really good picture. Unless that's just my own imagination lol. Red, smog filled skies, crippled buildings ready to collapse at any moment, a world that's forgotten, as if lost in the past. So familiar yet so different, never again to resume the life it once lived.

Apr 19, 2010 16:25:54 GMT -5 shufoopop said:

The book is really well written, I love it ^^. It inspires me to write my own story, but I have allot of grammar issues to work out in my writing.

Love it, Love it, LOVE IT ^^

Wow, that's really a great compliment. I love being inspirational! :3

[shufoopop]

Well it is very inspirational to see such a great piece of literature. I don't write stories, but I blog. That's right, blog, not vlog . I find it helps fine tune my writing just a tad, plus all my English homework xD.

[mashuga31]

Apr 19, 2010 23:35:49 GMT -5 shufoopop said:

Well it is very inspirational to see such a great piece of literature. I don't write stories, but I blog. That's right, blog, not vlog . I find it helps fine tune my writing just a tad, plus all my English homework xD.

Blogging is a great way to express yourself and expand all sorts of English based things such as vocabulary, spelling, and general thought and opinion about a subject (My English class makes us do that idk). If you've got a good idea go ahead and write about it. And wow, great piece of literature??? That's about several 'miles' above the bar I was aiming for so thanks very very much so! I'd love to read whatever it is that you end up writing. My imagination makes up for everything else anyway so i'd probably enjoy reading it despite what the genre was.

[shufoopop]

xD, well, I really enjoyed your book so far, it's very well written, well, in my perspective anyway. I can't wait to read more of it ^^.

I actually just recently wrote this a few hours ago, it's titled "Who am I" where I try to touch the subject about why we can answer the question "Who am I?" xD. I was actually going to make it a vlog post, so it's written as if I was going to speak it, but I just decided to put it on my blog cause it seemed a lot more powerful by just reading it than me saying it xD.

[mashuga31]

Ok, I'll give it a read.

Edit: I sent you a PM

[shufoopop]

^^ If you have anything to say about it, anything at all, I'd love to hear it. It's my favorite one I have written up to date and I'd like to get some advice on it, including advice on my writing.

And thank you for reading it ^^

[mashuga31]

Announcement: When I actually 'do' finish my book, that'd be cool if the SPOTM book club featured it in their reading list. Easy to access, a good read apparently, and free (until it gets published), so nobody has to spend unnecessary money. (Not saying that books are though =P)

[bathanie]

I wish I was patient enough to write a book. :/ So that's awesome that you are, mashuga(: I'll read what you have when I get back from school, as it is time for me to go now. (:

[Leo McGinnis]

I'm also writing right now. But I've been working on the same story for over four years (on and off, mostly off).

A few years back I wrote over a hundred pages, then I decided to change so many things I had to rewrite it. So now I've got a nice new chapter layout and the first 3 chapters written (about 40 pages now, I think). Only 20 more chapters to go.

Still using some of the old stuff, but heavily edited. I learned quite a bit in the last three years, and can craft much better flowing sentences now, so when I read some of my old stuff I'm always thinking: "Ugh..."

Ah well, self editing is important. I wanna finish the whole thing before I let anyone ever read anything, though. I always go back and change older chapters constantly.

[mashuga31]

Apr 21, 2010 13:04:26 GMT -5 Leo McGinnis said:

I'm also writing right now. But I've been working on the same story for over four years (on and off, mostly off).

A few years back I wrote over a hundred pages, then I decided to change so many things I had to rewrite it. So now I've got a nice new chapter layout and the first 3 chapters written (about 40 pages now, I think). Only 20 more chapters to go.

Still using some of the old stuff, but heavily edited. I learned quite a bit in the last three years, and can craft much better flowing sentences now, so when I read some of my old stuff I'm always thinking: "Ugh..."

Ah well, self editing is important. I wanna finish the whole thing before I let anyone ever read anything, though. I always go back and change older chapters constantly.

Usually when I put down a word or sentence it's set in stone, unless I think i really need to change it.

[Nakor]

I'm pretty close to finishing the first draft of my second book now. I also have a second draft of my first book. The second first draft came out much better than the first first draft but the first second draft is better than my ongoing second first draft. If that made any sense.

I need to stay motivated to finish that off. Then I have to decide whether I want to focus on polishing my first second draft into something possibly submittable to a publisher, or work on one of two new story ideas that my brain has been screaming AWESOME over, even though I knew they'll turn into terrible first drafts when I could be using that time to make a great third draft.

Oh, and here's the deal for you edit happy people out there:

DO NOT EDIT MORE THAN ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY PRIOR TO FINISHING YOUR DRAFT.

Srsly. The best way to prevent your novel from ever being written is to edit-on-the-fly. I'm not saying don't correct typos as you go, but just keep what you've written. If you think you'll need to delete a section after, fine, maybe italicize it or something so you remember, but don't actually delete/edit anything until you've finished off the draft. Then once you have the WHOLE thing together, and actually know EVERYTHING that needs to be changed, THEN it's okay to go back and start the editing process. (Though I recommend letting the story rest for a month or so to clear your mind, then giving it a read from the start to really get a grasp of it start-to-finish after you've left it off for a while.)

Oh, and rule two: don't expect a first draft to be good. Just expect it to get finished, and you can, as above, fix it later. Ernest Hemmingway himself said, "The first draft of anything is SHIRT!"

[Leo McGinnis]

Apr 21, 2010 19:30:59 GMT -5 Nakor said:

If you think you'll need to delete a section after, fine, maybe italicize it or something so you remember, but don't actually delete/edit anything until you've finished off the draft. Then once you have the WHOLE thing together, and actually know EVERYTHING that needs to be changed, THEN it's okay to go back and start the editing process.

I agree, for the most part. But for me, this simply does not work. Part of the reason why I've been working on this for years is because I get new ideas for the story every week. And most, if not all of those changes REQUIRE me to edit EVERYTHING I've written previously, because it would create massive plot holes otherwise. And I don't mean little things like changing where a person lives or who they're in love with. I mean the actual main plot changes like every week. It's starting to even out as I go on, though.

I can't settle for simply creating the first draft, because as with your other ideas that "scream awesome" my new ideas do the same for me.

For everyone other than me, though; yes, what this person says is absolutely true. Don't edit too much, or you'll never finish.

Oh, and rule two: don't expect a first draft to be good. Just expect it to get finished, and you can, as above, fix it later. Ernest Hemmingway himself said, "The first draft of anything is SHIRT!"

Agreed.

Luckily I don't plan on ever publishing my stuff. The only deadline I set for myself is to finish this story before I kick the bucket, which should, hopefully, not be for a very long time.