Keeping Motivated Between Boosts

Every once in a while, something happens that validates your efforts. Like sign posts, they tell you you're on the right path.

You finish your novel.
You get a short piece accepted by a literary magazine.
Your university gives you a creative writing scholarship.
You place in a creative writing competition.
You get a positive, personalized rejection or sample request from an agent.

These moments are great. They are like water in a desert.

However, I've been realizing more lately that to really find success, motivation has to come from a place that's a lot deeper and a lot more internal. If we rely only on these kinds of circumstantial boosts, however important and lovely, we may run dry. We can't control when these things are going to happen, and if we're going to have consistent and long-term success, we need to be motivated and productive in the between times too.

It's hard, though. I feel like the boost moments can bring your end goal into sharper focus, make it feel more concrete, and going for a long time without them makes it feel fuzzy and so far away. That can spell death for ambition and motivation. Or at least put pressure on your reserves of strength.

So how do you keep going when it feels like you're on empty? I've found that talking with writer friends really helps to keep each other motivated. They know what I'm going through and their excitement can be contagious. Its also important to keep focused on the project at hand and let the writing itself be exciting and important and motivating. Because it is.

Sometimes I think it comes down to simply just doing it. Make a schedule for writing, submitting and networking. A little bit every day, even when its not fun, not exactly what you want to be doing, even when you'd rather be sitting on the couch watching Animal Cops.

The cool thing is, after a while of powering through on empty, that's exactly what will get you to your next boost.

Sarah Allen

Who Are Your Favorite YouTube Artists?

No denying it, YouTube has become one of the premier artistic platforms of our age. It's got everything. Poetry, book trailers, music videos, dancing, animated shorts, all of it. Even us writers, whose medium is the written word rather than video, can find an overwhelming amount of beauty and inspiration. Here are some of my favorites:

And even some incredible educational videos that also manage to be entertaining:

I know that's a lot of videos, but they are all SO WORTH IT. Take some time this weekend and enjoy.

The real reason I wanted talk about this, though, is to get recommendations. So take a minute and browse through your watch history and your likes and your favorites and tell me: Who are your favorite YouTube artists? What videos have most inspired you? Which do you come back to again and again?

Sarah Allen

Books My Younger Siblings Like

I took two of my siblings to the library last night. I took my little sister S, which is fairly normal. She and I are the bookworms of the family, and I take her to the library with me a lot.

I also took my brother J. That was a miracle. It seems like he's been having a rough couple days and he's found himself with a bigger chunk of free-time now that basketball seasons ended. He came and asked me for a book to read which, you guys know, is about the best question a person can get. He was almost shy about it. It was pouring rain but my mom looked at me with a take-this-chance-and-run look and said, "Take him to the library before he changes his mind." Of course S wanted to come too, and we went.

So, okay. S is eight years old, right? I was picking out books with J while she walked through the kids section. She hurried up to me with one of those white hardcover abridged-for-kids books, Great Expectations. I said, "I'm impressed you picked Dickens."

She smiled and said, "This is the one she reads in Matilda, right?"

I told her yes, sort of, but that this wasn't the real version. She looked crestfallen for a moment and then asked where the real one was. "It's long," I warned her. She wanted to see it. So we went and I pulled out some shorter Dickens, but she wanted that one. So I gave her Great Expectations and she took it to the kids section and began to read.

Now, J. In the past, he has really enjoyed listening to the Harry Potter audio-books. He has also enjoyed the Redwall series by Brian Jaques, the Percy Jackson series, and Levin Thumps. But he is fifteen, and its been a while since I've seen him pick up a book for fun. I've recently kept audiobooks going in my car and on the occasions when I'm driving him somewhere or picking him up from school, if I haven't turned it to the radio before he gets in the car, he'll turn it for me, or put up a fuss until I let him. Last week I had playing in my car The Witches by Roald Dahl. Maybe I was just feeling particularly stubborn that day but when I picked him up from school I told him we were listening to the book and he couldn't do anything about it. Whether it was Dahl's delightful writing or the fabulously British narration, he didn't throw too much of a fit. The next time I picked him up the radio was on. He switched it to the audiobook.

Last night at the library, with the very helpful recommendations of my go-to book recomenderer, we ended up with The Graveyard Book and Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman, and Enders Game. We'll see how it goes.

S ended up with Ingrid Law's Saavy rather than Great Expectations, but she'll get to Dickens eventually, I have no doubt. She has to finish Among the Hidden before she starts on Saavy, and she plans to finish all the books in the Shadow Children's series too.

Here's the quick-list of some books my younger siblings have read and loved.

Redwall, Brian Jacques
Percy Jackson and the Lighting Thief, Rick Riordan
Leven Thumps, Obert Skye
The Witches, Road Dahl
Among the Hidden, Margaret Peterson Haddix
Bud Not Buddy, Christopher Paul Curtis
Sideways Stories from Wayside School, Louis Sachar

What would you guys recommend, next time I rope my younger siblings to the library?

Sarah Allen

10 Weird and Creepy Places to Set a Novel (Part 2)

Welcome to Part 2 of 10 Weird and Creepy Places to Set a Novel. In Part 1 we focused a lot on the creepy, and today we're going to focus on the weird. That being said, these places definitely still have a good amount of creep factor, and in many cases you don't have to travel very far.

6. Arthur Kill Ship Graveyard

Just off Staten Island, the bay has become a graveyard for old unused and dismantled tugboats. Over the years many ships that are no longer in operation have accumulated here and been left to rot. It makes me feel sad, a bit, and also curious. I imagine characters climbing barriers and exploring, and who knows what they might find.

7. Dead Horse Bay

An ideal place for collectors, Dead Horse Bay is hopefully not as creepy as it sounds. Once an area of horse processing plants (hence the name, I think) it eventually became a landfill until the cap burst, spewing trash onto the bay and into the ocean. Although you never know what you may find among the rubbish.

8. Republic of Molossia

So apparently some people can get away with being like, "Hey, I'm making my own country," and then it happens. Such is the case with the The Republic of Molossia in the heart of Nevada, founded by Kevin Baugh. It originated as a childhood game and then developed into an actual territory of about 1.3 acres. Allegedly, Kevin Baugh accepts cookie dough as legal tender, and his little micro-nation is still in a state of war with East Germany. And he doesn't pay taxes.

9. UFO Watchtower

In Hooper, Colorado, Judy Messoline has capitalized on the enthusiasm of Southwestern UFO enthusiasts. You can come here to camp and watch for UFOs, or at least the beautiful desert sky. The campground is complete with rock gardens, a gift shop, and Judy can even legally officiate a wedding. Now what type of characters would go for that?


10. Trinity Church, King George Island

A church in Antarctica? Sure, why not. In the 90's a charity called "Temple for Antarctica" began collecting funds all across Russia and the church was finished and consecrated in 2004. It is manned year round by two volunteer Orthodox priests (now they would be fascinating characters) who pray for the souls of Russians who have died on polar expeditions and service the spiritual needs of the people at the Bellinghausen Station. They've even performed a wedding.

There you have it! Ten weird and creepy places to fire your writerly imagination. Any others you would recommend?

Sarah Allen

10 Weird and Creepy Places to Set a Novel (Part I)

1. Isla de la Munecas

Perhaps the creepiest place I've ever heard of. Apparently this little island in a canal in Mexico was home to one man, Don Julian Santana. He discovered the body of a drowned girl (whether in reality or in his mind, its up for debate) and decided to honor her memory by...hanging up dolls? The result, all these years later, is a island draped with armless, eyeless, decomposing dolls that you can only get to by paying tour guides to take a detour. I'll never feel the same way riding Small World again.

2. Winchester Mansion

So, I've actually been to this place. It is truly bizarre. Apparently a recently widowed Sarah Winchester was told by a fortune teller woman that she must travel west and build. And build. That she would live as long as she kept building, but that if she stopped she would die. See those stairs? Yeah, they go nowhere. Obviously this house is prime territory for ghosts. When we lived in California our house was almost 100 years old and had hidden rooms and a window downstairs with surgical tools embedded in it. So when we visited the Winchester Mansion it was a little too...close to home.

3. Sedlec Ossuary

The Sedlec Ossuary is your average Czech Catholic chapel. Just, ya know, with unique interior design. Yes that is an actual chandelier. Yes, it is made with actual human bones. Apparently in the 13th century holy land was sprinkled on the grounds of this chapel and then during the period of Black death so many people wanted to be buried here that it became sort of a mass grave that was exhumed centuries later to make room for expansion, and then the bones unearthed were used for decoration? The coat of arms is also made of bone. This place has been used in several movies and documentaries. It's easy to see why.

4. Hellingly Hospital

Is there anything creepier than an abandoned hospital? How about an abandoned lunatic asylum? This place opened in 1903 and was used off and on until it was abandoned in 1994. Which is incredibly recent, in my opinion, and, looking at pictures, looks like suspiciously fast deterioration. Sure vandalism hasn't helped, but I don't think spirits of the insane dead have helped either. And hello, it's called HELLingly.

5. Takakonuma Greenland Park

There are quite a few abandoned amusement parks, but not too many shrouded in as much mystery and cover-up as Takakonuma Greenland Park in Japan. It is not on any maps of Japan and there are very few current photos. It was built in the 70's, only opporated for a couple years before being shut down, and is associated with several mysterious deaths. And nowadays its too close to the nuclear meltdown at Fukishima to be readily accessible. Bumper cars, anyone?

Come back tomorrow for part 2!

Sarah Allen