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papersynthesis

papersynthesis - handmade paper items & prints - florence, italyBy Lisa McGarry

november

papersynthesis ~ handmade paper items & prints ~ florence, italy ~ Lisa McGarry

papersynthesis

tuesday

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Two writing-themed books I have found useful, both by Philip Gerard (Story Press):

Writing a Book That Makes a Difference

Creative Nonfiction: Researching

and Crafting Stories of Real Life

A new Month . . . A New Challenge

As midnight marked the end of Halloween & the beginning of November, I met my daughter in the living room. On the table between the armchairs she had set out fizzy drinks garnished with slices of orange and colorful straws. We clinked our glasses, and got straight to work on our novels.

This is because today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). I’m more comfortable with writing non-fiction, but have always wanted to try writing a novel (who hasn’t?). This month we all have an excellent excuse. The challenge is to produce 50,000 words, but there’s no pressure to write a perfect novel. In fact, it’s all about quantity over quality, a philosophy that I normally shy away from (yet, in this context, I recognize the benefits of such a mindset). For once, I’ll try to simply focus on getting the words out, even if all I have at the end of the month is one of those “shitty” first drafts that writer Anne Lamott refers to in her national bestseller, Bird by Bird.

While I have always been intimidated by the idea of writing fiction, I’m keeping at the back of my mind that most basic of rules, to ‘write what you know’. For me, this translates as ‘fiction is actually about putting down the truth as you know or observe it to be,’ which means it’s basically non-fiction at the end of the day. (Experienced novel-writers may be rolling their eyes at this statement . . .) I know there’s a lot more to a novel than that. But the first step is, after all, to begin—however that may be.
We’ll see where the month leads us . . .

Click HERE
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