The End of National Novel Writing Month

As you know, I made the unfortunate decision to not participate in NaNoWriMo this year. But many of you did, and as I'm writing this you have 23 minutes to finish up those 50,000 words. Good luck!

To those who have finished, congrats! You obviously worked very hard, and have a talent that I most definitely don't; the ability to sit down and crank out words. I have been working on my novel for months, and I still only have 11,253 words as of this moment. Every writer can take a leaf from you NaNoers book and practice the ability of sitting butt in chair and just writing. Me included. So good work!

To those who didn't finish, don't be hard on yourself. There are actually a few reasons why its good to not finish. First of all, you have a great start on a novel, but you can finish it and work it now at your own pace. That can enhance the quality of your work and just provide some major relief. Obviously you still have to write something, but there is no longer the break-neck pace deadline looming over your head. Use this to make your piece more publishable then it would have been if you had written it in a month.

I hope all you who did do NaNo learned something valuable about yourself as a writer, whether or not you finished. Just keep working and you will have a finished product that you're proud of.

Sarah Allen

Swine Flue Marketing for Artists

I've heard a little about this idea lately, and I think its something good for all kinds of artists to keep in mind in terms of getting publicity for their work.

The idea is that you take advantage of big news concerns, like the swine flu, and use it to get the word out about your product or business. Now, this sounds sort of cynical, but the idea isn't to manipulate people; its to show involvement and concern for society, and people want to get to know you more when they feel that you care about what they care about.

This has mostly been a small business thing, from what I can see, but I think it can apply to writers and artists just as well. Here are some ways you can use the swine flu 'viral' marketing system to market your creative writing:

-Write about it directly. For example, write a poem, personal essay or short story about swine flu, or whatever the big news item is. You can send it to any of the normal literary magazines you submit to, but you might try looking in to different types of publications, like news magazines or publications that address your topic specifically.

-Apply the news to previous work. You may not have a book about swine flu specifically, but you may have a scifi book about epidemics, or a mainstream book about living with illness. Blog about it, tell your friends about it, and people who may not have noticed your book before may notice it.

-Apply it to your personal life. If the big news applies to you or a loved on personally, use the internet, local news and whatever else you can think of to not just draw attention to you and your work, but to the issue itself, and maybe do some good while your at it. Win/win situation for everyone.

***Even if the big news doesn't affect you personally, still be involved, and address it in your social networking, blogging, local news, or whatever. Its good to convey to your audience that you are socially concerned and aware.

-Target Audience. Target the people the news sources that the big news affects most of all, and see if you can use those outlets to get the news out about your work. Obviously you don't want to spam the news sources and bug people, because that backfires. But as a member of the community and an intelligent person with something interesting to say, this can be another means of social networking, and that is always a good thing.

So use the news to your advantage and get your work out there!
Sarah Allen

More Creative Writing Title Ideas

A while ago I posted some creative writing title ideas, and I think for today it may be a good idea to do that again, as well as discuss the process of titling your piece.

For me, titling is one of my favorite parts of a piece. Its a very intuitive process, and what works for me may not work for you, but there are certain things that may help everyone. And remember, writing down prospective titles in the back of your creative writing notebook is a great thing to do. Remember to make your title match your piece. You don't want false advertising. Let your title hint at the issues in your piece, but don't give everything away. There are no real rules for titling, so do what works for you. But just as a starting point, here are some "formulas" that may give you some ideas:

-'The Noun' or One Word titles: The Mask, The Notebook, The Road, The Stand, Macbeth, Les Miserables, Twilight, Frasier, Lost

-Pairing: (if you pair quirky things this can be pretty fun) Guns 'n Roses, Cats and Dogs, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

-Person and Phrase: Dan in Real Life, Anne of Green Gables, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Fosters Home for Imaginary Friends

-Known Phrase: I can't really think of specific examples for this one, except I have one short story called 'The Title of My Life'. Also the title of the novel I'm working on is a phrase from a Shakespeare play...which I will reveal at a later date :-)

-Word + Qualifier: Star Wars, Happy Feet, Star Trek, Silent Spring

-Verb(noun) + Phrase: Running out of Time, Interview with a Vampire, Touching Spirit Bear, Pushing Daisies

Anyway, those are just some basic ideas that may help, and here's just a random list of titles from the back of my notebooks that you can steal/use to get your own ideas:
-I Love You, Take a Right
-Your Whole Death Ahead of You
-In Between Raindrops
-Dissonant Peace
-Pickled Down
-Dead of 87
-This Narrative Woman
Hope this helps, and hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!
Sarah Allen

Beauty and the Beast rose for Thanksgiving Creative Joy

Sending a red rose to you, originally uploaded by SivaTian.

This is just an incredible photo I found on Flickr, and thought it might make you all as happy as it made me. Happy Thanksgiving!

Sarah Allen

What I'm Thankful for as a Writer

Here is just a quick list of what I'm thankful for:

The Internet
Good books
The smell of books
Egg nog
The Macey's thanksgiving day parade
My black leather notebook
The dog show
Family
Good food
My computer
Brigham Young University
C. S. Lewis
Charles Dickens
God

Thanks everyone! Hope you have a fantastic day!
Sarah Allen

P.S. Here are my new GoodReads and Flickr accounts, if you wanna check them out.