curation

Tipsday: Writerly Goodness found on the interwebz April 27-May 3, 2014

/ Melanie Marttila

Tipsday

As I compile this, I’m listening to “Hall of Heads” by They Might be Giants. Just to let you know where I’m at tonight 😉

Last week was a treasure trove of writerly goodies!

Publishing dish of the week: HarperCollins to buy Harlequin, from Publisher’s Weekly.

George R.R. Martin’s Rolling Stone interview.

Brent Weeks: New writing advice. This is really about process, and you know how much I lurve that stuff! Plus, he has a standing desk with a treadmill.

Mel’s note: I’ve finally placed my order for a standing desk (goodbye tax refund). I won’t have a treadmill, but it could be a future consideration. Good to know I’m in such distinguished company. Jane Friedman uses a standing desk and treadmill, too.

Elizabeth Gilbert on Success, failure, and the drive to keep creating.

 

K.M. Weiland’s back with part 11 of her creating stunning character arcs series: The second half of the second act. As with all instalments of her series, you can read the post, or listen to the podcast.

Are your plot points too weak? Also from Katie.

And here’s another, just for good measure: Why you should bully your protagonist.

Roz Morris on the long and the short of writing novels.

 

And … she shares her experiences creating My Memories of a Future Life audio books with ACX.

Then, Laura Pepper Wu interviewed Roz for The Write Life.

The root of prolific by Julianna Baggott on Writer Unboxed.

What are you doing to improve? All about continuous learning from Liz Michalski, also on Writer Unboxed.

One of my Australian writer friends, Gemma Hawdon, did a guest post for The Write Practice blog on emotional conflict.

Marcy Kennedy’s entry in the writing process blog hop.

Dialog tags of doom on Query Quagmire.

Chuck Wendig ‘splains why he speaks up about diveristy, direct from heteronormative white dude mountain.

Jim C. Hines, also on diversity and cultural appropriation. They were part of the same panel at Pikes Peak Writers’ Conference. Go figure 😉

Then Sword & Laser interviewed Mr. Hines. I met him at the Surrey International Writers’ Conference last year. Such a genuine, sweet man.

 

Kristen Lamb’s series on Flashbacks: Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

Felicia Day’s Vaginal Fantasy Hangout on Juliet Marillier’s Daughter of the Forest. Not only was this irresistible because DotF is one of my favourite books, but the discussion about rape scenes in fiction was also fierce. Very worthwhile.

 

Then Felicia got a tweet. This video was her response:

 

She just posted today that she watched her own video for inspiration 😉

Carly Watters offers her top 8 writing craft books. I’m proud to say I own and have read several of them 🙂

19 jokes only grammar nerds will get.

Gravitas. For the word nerd from Daily Writing Tips.

Enjoy!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the Interwebz April 20-26, 2014

/ Melanie Marttila

Thoughty Thursday

This week is video heavy. I think it just reflects my state of mind. Make of that what you will. *sits in corner drooling*

The ideal length for everything online from Buffer.

Hootsuite’s Game of Social Thrones.

Lindsey Stirling’s new video, Shatter Me, featuring Lzzy Hale of Halestorm.

Four Cats (as in Caterpillar heavy machines) playing Jenga from Boing Boing.

Cats + water = epic fun.

The 2013 Barkley dog family Subaru commercials. Giving the goggies equal time.

Thoughy? Meh. Inspirational? Not so much. Entertaining? I sure hope so 🙂

Every once in a while, you have to succumb to the brain candy.

Tipsday: Writerly Goodness found on the interwebz April 20-26, 2014

/ Melanie Marttila / 2 Comments

TipsdayLinking has won the day, if not the poll.

Got yourself a Franken-draft? There may be hope. Dianne K. Salerni on Writer Unboxed.

K.M. Weiland’s Creating Stunning Character Arcs series, part 10: The Midpoint.

9 tips to entice readers to your author blog from Anne R. Allen.

Everybody Arcs! How it all comes down to character. Kristen Lamb.

Carly Watters with 6 reasons you need an agent now more than ever.

12 realizations every writer must come to from 12 Most.

The Atlantic. The appeal of science fiction. A.K.A. why do people look down at the genre of Orwell and Atwood?

Is literary fiction just good marketing? The Guardian. More on the literary/genre debate.

Time. 21 women authors you should be reading.

And that’s it this week. Linking certainly makes for a shorter post!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz April 13-19, 2014

/ Melanie Marttila / 3 Comments

Thoughty ThursdayI’m going to try something just a touch different this week. I’m not just dropping links, but hyperlinking text. Experts say readers prefer it.

Let me know what you think, will you?

What students really need to hear from Chase Mielke. Affective Living.

How social media has affected our reading habits. From the Washington Post.

Grammar Girl Mignon Fogarty posted this fascinating article on the language of the minions. My interest in languages drew me in right away. LOVE.

Mindy Kaling featured on Upworthy. Backhanded compliments are so not.

Communication presented this bit of reverse psychology: 15 things highly confident people don’t do.

This post by Brenda Knowles on her introvert blog Space2Live was surprisingly controversial. At its core, it’s about the difference between being lonely, and being alone, but it sparked a small flurry of responses. Some people took exception to her association of decision-making with her masculine side and shopping with her feminine side. What do you think?

Upworthy presented Neil DeGrasse Tyson’s thoughts on marginalization in the sciences.

An amazing time-lapse video: the mountain.

Petflow.com share what a reporter discovered while filming beavers close to his house.

ViralNova’s 28 happy-making pictures.

Trending Monkey. Puppies cuddling stuffies. And get your mind out of the gutter! This is CUTE.

And that’s it for this week.

Off to watch Vikings—Rawr!

Thoughty Thursday: Things that made me go hmmmm on the interwebz March 9-15, 2014

/ Melanie Marttila

Thoughty ThursdayJust so you’ll have this straight, Tipsday is for writing-related finds and Thoughty Thursday will be for other interesting stuff. It’ll be a mix of science articles, health articles, and other stuff that might be cool for inspiration or research. Info of the public service announcement variety may appear here as well (I have my causes). Occasionally, there might be a music or other fun video in there, ‘cause you know, we all love the YouTube 😉

Oh, and BTW, happy spring, though up here in Sudbury, we’ve just had 10-15 cm of snow 😦 This is what the first day of spring looks like up here:

 

First day of spring in Sudbury

So here we go in 3, 2, 1—

Otters are bad-ass:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140306-otter-alligator-florida-predator-photos-wildlife/

David Brin shared this next amazing blog post and video.

Mr. Science, A.K.A. the hubbie, informs me that the ribosome moves around far more chaotically, directed by something called Brownian motion and bumps into the transfer molecules until it finds the one it needs for the sequence.

Still, this is supposed to be “real time,” so imagine how quickly everything is moving about in the stew that is you 😉

http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2014/03/04/285414954/watch-and-be-amazed-by-the-machinery-of-life

I love genetics.

One of the places I’d love to spend a month in someday. ‘Twas a lead-up to St. Patrick’s Day.

http://www.irishcentral.com/roots/travel/Stunning-travel-video-of-7-Days-in-Ireland.html

Clara Hughes, multi-Olympic gold medal winner in both summer and winter Olympics embarks on her latest journey to bring awareness to the issue of mental health. I admire this woman so much.

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/03/14/claras-big-ride/

The overwhelmed employee is foreseen as one of the new crises of the modern workplace. This is hard, researchy stuff, but it’s actually pretty fascinating. From the day-job file.

http://dupress.com/periodical/trends/global-human-capital-trends-2014

The health hazards of sitting. I’m still researching a reasonably-priced standing desk solution for my office.

http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/national/the-health-hazards-of-sitting/750/

Felicia Day tweeted something. And then she had to write this post.

http://thisfeliciaday.tumblr.com/post/79718617942/tiger-lily-doesnt-equal-human-torch-plus-a-very-long

And this was just fun. Ooh-la-la!

The Benny Hill soundtrack just makes this one shine. Oh, no, he di’n’t!

http://blog.petflow.com/this-dog-is-not-allowed-on-the-bed-this-is-what-he-does-when-his-owners-are-away-hilarious/

Until next week, my wise and witty friends!

Tipsday: Writerly Goodness found on the Interwebz March 9-15, 2014

/ Melanie Marttila / 5 Comments

TipsdayThough I had all of one respondent to my poll at the end of last month, I’m going ahead and curating for you.

Part 5 of K.M. Weiland’s Creating Stunning Character Arcs series. You can follow from the beginning, Katie is always good about posting the links to all that has gone before.

http://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/2014/03/character-arcs-5.html

How commenting on blog posts can help build your platform. Anne R. Allen’s blog (with Ruth Harris).

http://annerallen.blogspot.ca/2014/03/are-you-ignoring-this-simple-platform.html

How knowing your audience and identifying your category is critical to querying, placement of, and marketing your book. Roz Morris.

http://nailyournovel.wordpress.com/2014/03/09/is-my-book-paranormal-or-literary-and-which-age-group-is-it-for-how-to-categorise-your-novel/

Why you should pitch at conferences even if you don’t think you’ll succeed. The importance of Networking by agent Carly Watters.

http://carlywatters.com/2014/03/10/why-the-chances-of-you-meeting-your-future-agent-at-a-conference-are-slim-but-you-should-try-anyway/

The many roles of the editor.

http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2014/mar/12/writers-editors-eleanor-catton-booker-winner

Rejection letters that will give you hope 🙂

http://distractify.com/people/famous-people-rejection-letters/

You’ll see some regulars here from week to week. I read a lot more bloggage than I’ve shared here and I’ve even gotten some good material out of a lot of it, but I’m only gathering up the material that spoke to me enough to share on the interwebz.

Hope you enjoy these as much as I did.