John Caliburn

How to show Emotions in your Characters

2012-05-30T06:34:00.000-07:00

Billy is about to have a threesome. He is so happy.

Happy. Happy? Is that the best you can do to express the emotion of your character? Happy is no better than simply writing that he was sad, or angry, or etc... If you want to be an amazing writer, you've got to do better than that.

Now unless your characters are cardboard cutouts, they will experience emotions through the course of your novel. He will be angry at the death of a loved one. She will feel sad when her boyfriend breaks up with her. They will feel happy when rain finally falls over their desert. Etc...

But when you write down these emotions, you can't just say, "He was angry" or "She was sad" or "They were happy". That would be telling the readers what your characters were feeling.

And when it comes to emotions, you should follow the rule: Show, Don't Tell

So how do you show the readers the emotions of characters? I'll show you in 3 easy steps:

1) Find the emotion in your scene. Look through your work and see if you can find a scene where one of your characters is experiencing an emotion.

Example:
After breaking up with her boyfriend, she felt sad. (Obvious alert: She felt SAD in this scene).

2) Go to this blog The Bookshelf Muse and look through the Emotion Thesaurus samples. In this thesaurus, you will find a list of emotions. For this example, go to the sadness/grief section. This section will provide you with a list of words or phrases that you can use to replace the word "sad".

Example:
-stiff eyelids
-uncontrollable crying
-a scratchy throat
-suicidal thoughts
-tears
-etc...

3) Use one of the words or phrases in your scene. In your scene, replace the "sad" word with a variation of one of those words or phrases you found in the thesaurus. You can also improve your scene even more by adding little things that your readers might associate with sadness.

Example:
Tell: After breaking up with her boyfriend, she felt sad.

Show: After breaking up with her boyfriend, she bought a tub of double chocolate ice cream, drove all the way home, and then watched Casablanca while tears ran down her face. The ice cream tasted salty.

In this scene, I was showing how sad she was, yet I didn't use the word "sad", or "depressed", or "sorrowful". However, you can still feel the emotion she's experiencing. So with just a few little tweaks and a fantastic thesaurus, you too can also improve your writing. And that is how you show the emotions of your characters.

Oh, and before I forget:

Billy is about to have a threesome. He felt like jumping up and down. But he didn't, because a player has got to play it cool. Although that didn't stop the huge Cheshire grin on his face.

You should check out The Bookshelf Muse. Their thesaurus is amazing!

They also have a more improved version in book form. Check out the Emotion Thesaurus on Amazon.

Tips on writing horror stories (Guest Post by Michael Crane)

2012-05-21T06:00:00.000-07:00

Click on pic to read synopsis of this book

I am a fan of horror stories. In fact, I'm currently working on a horror anthology right now. So I've asked a horror author to guest post for me today to teach me and you guys some things about horror. So here is Michael Crane:

I feel a bit out of my element here, I won’t lie.

I still can’t wrap my head around the fact that I can be considered a horror writer. For the longest time, I’d only written horror stories when I was very little. All of it bad, and almost all of it ripping off Stephen King in some way. I had fun with it, although as I grew older it became painfully clear that I was no horror writer. I would have to settle with the fact that I was a short story writer who wrote slice-of-life pieces. I was quite happy with that.

That all changed in October of 2010 when I decided to try my hand at drabbles; 100-word shorts. A fellow author asked if I had ever attempted them. Of course, my response was, “What the hell is a drabble?” When I found out, I realized that I had read a book of 100-word shorts not too long ago, THE LAKE AND 17 OTHER STORIES by David McAfee. A book I really, really enjoyed.

I decided to give it a shot, and since it was October I thought I would try my hand at horror once again. Another reason I wanted to do it was because it’d be outside my comfort zone. It’d been years since I tried to write something scary or morbid.

And I think that’s the important key to horror. You have to write outside your comfort zone. You have to go somewhere dark in the back of your mind. You know you have it. We all do, even if we pretend it doesn’t exist. We remember those horrible nightmares we had when we were younger.

Horror makes you dig deep into your darkest fears.

Afraid of bees? Use it. Have a fear of heights? Create a story. Terrified that somebody might break into your house one night when you’re home alone? Use that as a stepping stone to create a terrifying tale.

Do children’s dolls creep you out? That could be your next character. Explore why that person has such a fear, and if that fear ends up being justified. Is he/she insane? Or does some kind of evil really exist in the playroom?

If it makes you feel uncomfortable, then you’re probably doing it right.

While I don’t pretend to be an expert on horror writing (there are far better authors out there), I can tell you all of that runs through my head when I begin a new story. One of the greatest things in the world about being a writer is you have an outlet to face your demons and nightmares head on. Whether you decide to tell a sad story or a scary story is clearly up to you in the end.

I would like to thank Michael for his guest post today. Michael Crane is the author of many horror stories, such as Evil Puppies and Dark Tomorrows and the Lessons series.

Visit his blog: Michael's Babble

Visit his Amazon page

When to give up on writing that Novel, and move on to the next one

2012-05-07T10:16:00.000-07:00

Source: Write in the Light

You're a writer ... and you've been working on a novel for months, maybe even years. You developed the idea in your head with characters and plots and stuff, and then you wrote it down with your blood and tears.

But is that novel going anywhere? Is it getting any better? If the answer is a big fat NO, then you better give up on it. Let's face it, your novel is stuck, like pond scum over stagnant water.

So how do you know that your novel is stuck? How do you know that it's time to give up on that novel?

You should give up on that novel when you have these 3 feelings in this order:

1) You get the feeling that your novel sucks

2) You get the feeling that your novel could be better

3) You get the feeling that you don't have the skills to make it better.

What I'm trying to say is that it's not the novel's fault that it is stagnant. It's more likely that you don't have the skills to bring the novel to its full potential. Therefore it gets stuck because you can't make it any better.

Does this mean that you're a bad writer? No.

It only means that you're not a good enough writer ... yet.

It's nothing to be ashamed of. This happened to Stephen King too with his novel, Under the Dome:

Explaining how the book came to fruition, King says he tried to write 'Dome' in 1976, but that it went on the back burner until three years later -- but even then, King wasn't ready. "It's kind of like a baseball player saying, 'I missed a really fat pitch and I'd really like to have another chance.' "

(Source from Popeater)

Stephen King managed to finish writing Under the Dome and publish it in 2009. As you can see, he got the idea for that novel around 1976, but he knew he wasn't good enough to write that novel...yet. But his skills improved until he was able to write a novel over 1,000 pages long with over 100 different characters.

So don't feel bad if your novel sucks or your writing skills isn't great yet. You can only improve as you keep trying. At least that's what I tell myself.

I was writing a novel called Lycan Island. The keyword here is "was". Even though I've been working on that novel since 2005, I decided to give up on it. Why? Because it was a terribly written novel with lots of problems in it. Especially the main character. I realized over a year ago that my main character was so boring. Today, that main character is still boring. And I didn't have the skills to fix it, even though I've been working on it for years.

So I'm giving up on it...for now. At the moment, I decided to write a few short stories, and maybe even a novella, to help me improve my writing. Then when I'm ready, I'll work on a full-blown novel.

You just got to know when to give up on a bad novel, and move on to the next one.

The Casual Vacancy by JK Rowling ... and why I think it sounds boring

2012-04-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

I know it has been like 2 weeks since they already announced the next novel by JK Rowling, The Casual Vacancy. If you haven't heard of it yet, then stop living under a rock. Anyway, here is a synopsis that they released:

When Barry Fairweather dies unexpectedly in his early forties, the little town of Pagford is left in shock.

Pagford is, seemingly, an English idyll, with a cobbled market square and an ancient abbey, but what lies behind the pretty façade is a town at war.

Rich at war with poor, teenagers at war with their parents, wives at war with their husbands, teachers at war with their pupils…Pagford is not what it first seems.

And the empty seat left by Barry on the parish council soon becomes the catalyst for the biggest war the town has yet seen. Who will triumph in an election fraught with passion, duplicity and unexpected revelations?

Blackly comic, thought-provoking and constantly surprising, The Casual Vacancy is J.K. Rowling’s first novel for adults.

(source of synopsis)

I had mixed feelings about this book after reading the synopsis. It sounds so ... bland. First you got some guy that died in a small town. Then it goes on to mention a war between rich/poor, teens/parents, etc... which sounds pretty common throughout the world. And the death of the guy supposedly starts a huge war for some reason. It all seems so boring.

I know that JK Rowling already announced that she wasn't working on a fantasy novel (because she wanted to take a break from fantasy for awhile), so I wasn't expecting a Harry Potter repeat. However, I still thought that her next book would be amazing. But it doesn't sound that great. It just seems to be some boring mystery novel that could be about secrets and politics and stuff. And it's not the exciting kind of mystery with guns and criminals. So I'm not sure how I feel about this upcoming book.

But even though this book sounds boring, I'm still curious to see what JK Rowling has written. So will I read her next book? Definitely.

The Casual Vacancy by JK Rowling will come out on Sept 27, 2012.

In regards to "How to Write" books that fail to teach aspiring authors how to write ...

2012-04-02T08:00:00.000-07:00

(this post is sort of a review of How to write Science Fiction and Fantasy by Orson Scott Card)

I used to think that the only "how to write" books that mattered are the ones written by authors who have also written novels that you enjoyed. If your favorite author wrote a novel that you liked, don't you wish you could write a novel like that too? So when that author publishes a "how to write" book, you can read it and learn from it.

For example, I like most of the novels by Stephen King. So when he wrote a "how to write" book (On Writing by Stephen King), I picked it up and read it. It was brilliant. I learned a lot.

But now let's get to what this post is really about. There is a novel out there called Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. Perhaps you've heard of it. It's one of the most well-written and famous scifi novels in the world. It got a lot of good reviews and won a bunch of awards. When I read this book, I wished that I could write a book like this.

Then I heard of a "how to write" book called How to write Science Fiction and Fantasy that Orson Scott Card also wrote. I couldn't believe it. I wanted to write a scifi novel as amazing as Ender's Game and here is the book that can teach me that.

So I read it.

It sucked. I mean it really sucked. I'd give it 2 stars out of 5, and I'm being nice about it. So why do I give it such a bad rating. Well, there are 2 major things wrong with this "how to write" book.

1) Only the first two chapters give any advice that remotely have to do with the scifi/fantasy genre. The rest of the book only gives generic tips that are vaguely useful. Seriously, why call a book How to write Science Fiction and Fantasy when most of the book doesn't even talk about science fiction and fantasy.

2) Close to the end of the book, there is a lot of outdated information. I know this book was written in 1990, so it's not the book's fault. But it's still one of its negative points. It talks about writer's groups and workshops that I'm not really sure still exist anymore. And of course, this book was published before the ebook revolution, so you won't find anything in there about it.

So now I know that a "how to write" book written by your favorite author is not exactly the best way to find a book that can teach your how to write. I realize that some amazing authors out there don't know how to convey their craft to their readers.

So how do you find useful "how to write" books?

10 Ways to NOT start a Novel

2012-01-19T06:00:00.000-08:00

So you're writing the first chapter of a novel. Here are 10 things you shouldn't start a novel with:

1) Weather: Don't write about clouds or how sunny it is. Also (and I know that this is really obvious), don't start with the cliche "It was a dark and stormy night".

2) Dreams: Your MC is running for his life, or he slayed a mighty dragon, or his clothes disappeared while he was in school, etc... and then your MC wakes up. It was all a dream. ....That is Bull(Manure)!

3) Info Dump: Some of you are writing fantasy or scifi or whatever. You've created this world that the readers are not familiar with. So you feel compelled to dump your readers with everything about your world to set up the story. If you do this, I swear your readers will forget everything by chapter two.

4) Morning Routine: Your MC woke up, got out of bed, brushed his teeth, ate his breakfast, and then goes to his job where he shoots zombies for a living. ...Boring. Just skip to the part where he starts shooting zombies.

5) Abundance of Characters: Don't start your novel by introducing 19 or 100 characters in the first few pages. Your readers aren't going to remember all those names.

6) The MC Dies: Oh no! Your MC died! ...You do realize that the readers just started your novel so they didn't develop any emotional connection with your MC yet. Why should they care if he died.

7) Introductions: Don't introduce your character by starting with "Hello, my name is..." whatever. Might as well start with "Hello, I'm a character created by a writer that can't think of a better way to introduce me to the readers, blah, blah, blah..."

8) Flashback: Do you really want your readers to start your novel with a slow, boring back story? I don't think so.

9) Once upon a time: I know it's obvious, but don't start your story with "Once upon a time". Unless you're using it as a title for a great tv show.

10) Prologue: In my opinion, prologues are unnecessary and is just a crutch that lazy writers use. Most readers just skip it. So why waste your time starting a novel with a useless prologue if your readers aren't going to read it.

These are some of the no-nos that you shouldn't start a novel with. If the rest of your book is fantastic, then why can't the beginning be incredible as well. So try to avoid these when you start writing your story.

Note: I must admit that there are exceptions to these rules. I've read a few brilliant works of literature that started out with these in the first chapter and they were quite interesting. So if you really, really want to start your novel with any of these beginnings, then break the rules and make it spectacular!

Now get out there and start your novel.

Why Writing Advice is Useless

2012-01-15T07:00:00.000-08:00

Writers often look for writing advice to improve their craft. They would do things like:

--Browse through writing articles

--Watch author interviews on Youtube

--Read the best books about writing
( I recommend On Writing by Stephen King. It's very helpful )

You can learn some great things if you do this. For example, you'll find out how to develop your characters, or how to build suspense, or how to edit through all that cow manure you call a rough draft. However...

Even the best writing advice in the world is useless ... if you don't spend any time writing.

What is the point of cramming your brain with all that knowledge if your fingers aren't flying across the keyboard to write your story? Do you actually think that if you sit around your computer, watching interviews of JK Rowling, a book will just magically appear on your word document?

There's a difference between learning how to write and actually writing your story.

Right now you're reading this brilliant, life changing, modest blog. HUGE waste of time. You might have picked up some writing tips here and there, but how many words have you actually written today?

So close this window and start writing.

Don't worry, it won't hurt my feelings.

I don't believe in Destiny

2011-11-22T06:00:00.000-08:00

I don't believe in Destiny ... and I politely laugh at anyone who believes in it.

If Destiny was real, then we would have no control of our future.

Here is an example:

If Destiny was real, then everything in our future has already been decided for us. So let me ask you this. What if Destiny decided that you'll never find love? What if Destiny decided that you'll just grow up to become that crazy cat lady that lives in the creepy house down the street?

...and here is the worst part. You'll have no choice. If Destiny was real, then you can't fight against it. You'll end up with the future that Destiny decided for you.

What I believe in is being responsible for my own future. I believe in freedom of choice. ...And here is what I believe. I believe that if I work really really hard and get really really lucky, I'll become a famous writer that will become a household name.

That is what I decided is going to happen to me. And I'm working on it right now.

Quitting NaNoWriMo...

2011-11-18T05:30:00.000-08:00

We're halfway through NaNoWriMo, and I quit.

If you've been following my blog, you'll know that I decided to finish editing my anthology in November. It's 30,000 words and I'm not finished with it yet.

Still, I decided to quit.

Why? Because of this:

That's right! I finally got my copy of Inheritance by Christopher Paolini. I've been waiting YEARS to read this. So I'm going to take my time and enjoy it.

Goodbye, NaNoWriMo.

I'll see you next year.

Overrated Book?

2011-11-15T05:30:00.001-08:00

There are books out there that are amazing! So amazing that there can't possibly be a person who doesn't like it. However, are these books simply amazing, or are they just overrated?

For example, I don't like Shakespeare. I think his work is overrated.

OH MY GOD! YOU DON'T LIKE SHAKESPEARE? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?

Whenever I tell people that I don't like Shakespeare, they always look at me funny. They ask me how can I not like Shakespeare. Shakespeare is the pinnacle of perfect writing. He writes stories that resonate across the ages. He displays love, or revenge, or etc... so beautifully in his work.

How can you call yourself a writer, but still not like Shakespeare?

I'm sorry. I just don't like Shakespeare. I fall asleep the moment I pick up something written by him. It's gotten to the point where I have to make sure there is something soft for me to land on before I pick up King Lear or Hamlet, etc...

It's not that I think he's a bad writer. It's just that I don't enjoy reading his stories. I have to struggle and claw my way through the book just to finish it. If the story doesn't entertain me, then I simply don't like it.

In my opinion, Shakespeare is overrated.

Which books do you think are overrated?

Muse ... for Writers

2011-11-13T05:00:00.000-08:00

Writing is very difficult. A lot of writers sometimes get stuck or just give up. So here is something I found from Michael Crane's facebook that I hope will help inspire you to write.

Inheritance!!!

2011-11-08T05:00:00.000-08:00

Inheritance by Christopher Paolini, the final book of the Inheritance Cycle, is finally out today!

Weeee !

No NaNoWriMo this year

2011-11-01T05:00:00.000-07:00

I'm not participating in NaNoWriMo this year. At least not in the usual way.

Instead of trying to write a 50,000 word novel, I'm just going to try to finish writing my horror anthology before the end of the month. The anthology is about 30,000 words.

I know that it doesn't sound like a lot. But writing short stories is harder than novels. Who knew?

P.S. - I'm also going to post on my blog 3 times a week, instead of the usual 2. So I'll be posting on Sunday, Tuesday, and the Hunger Games chap review on Thursday.

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T05:00:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the short post, but if there is a choice between working on my blog or going out and getting candy. I choose candy!

So I'm just going to leave you with a pic I found from Sherry Soule's blog:

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Angels in, Vampires out

2011-10-24T06:00:00.001-07:00

Around the time Twilight by Stephenie Meyer came out, there has been a trend with vampires as romantic creatures. However, that seems to be dying down. Now the new supernatural romantic being is ...Angels.

This is according to Anne Rice. Here is what she has to say:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/oct/26/angels-vampires-anne-rice

The most recent paranormal romance novels featured angels. Such as Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick or Fallen by Lauren Kate.

I don't know why angels are the new trend, but they definitely fit the criteria. Angels are immortal, supernatural, mysterious, etc.... just like vampires.

But angels are kicking the vampires out.

So with angels moving in as the new paranormal romance, the important question now is:

What do you think the next trend of romantic supernatural creature is going to be?

I think it could be mermaids, ...or krakens.

Do you skip to the End?

2011-10-10T05:30:00.000-07:00

Hi Blog readers,

Did you know that some people skip to the end of novels before they decide to read them? It's true.

I'm guilty of this.

Whenever I find a book by a new author, I would read the first few pages to see if I like it so far. If I like it, then I will skip to the end and read how the book ends. And if I still like it, I'll decide to read the whole novel straight through.

Of course, I only do this when I pick up a book from a new author that I never heard of before. Because there are a lot of new authors out there and some of them are amazing. So I want to give them a chance to see if I like them. However, there will always be a few out there who write books that don't fit my taste, or have terrible endings.

That's why I skip to the end when I try out a new author. I'm not going to waste my time reading a new book, only to have it burn my eyes with a terrible ending. And I have been burned before.

Here is a book I recently read that I didn't like:

(Reasons why I don't like it: Unlikeable MC and it had no real ending. Can't believe I wasted my time with this novel).

And here is a book by an author (that I've never heard of before) that I'm going to try:

(Reasons why I'm going to try it: Girl goes to boarding school for students with special abilities. It sounds very interesting. Also, because of this post on Inara Scott's blog).

So many of you might ask: If you skip to the ending before you decide to read the book, doesn't that ruin the whole story?

My answer: No, it doesn't. For some reason, even if I know how it ends, the book still turns out amazing.

So here's a question for you guys: Do you ever skip to the end of a novel before you decide to read it?

(Twilight) Book Covers...

2011-10-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

So I found this pic from Kaleb Nation's tumblr

I don't know about you, but I think it's hilarious!

I was Naive...

2011-09-26T08:11:00.000-07:00

If you look on the right side of my blog, you will see that my 'works in progress' section have not changed for months. The reason for this is because I was naive. When I started writing my novel, Lycan Island, I thought that I could outline it, write a rough draft, then edit it in one year. And at the end of that year, the novel would be polished enough so that I can start querying it to agents.

I was wrong. It is now 1 year and 5 months since I started my novel, and I'm still in the editing process. So it's been slow. I mean really slow. The reason for this is because 1) I'm lazy, and 2) I have a thin skin. Every time I try reading over my rough draft to edit it, I just look at the words and I cringe. Did I really write such crappy words? So writing a novel isn't as easy as I thought it was.

But I did learn a lot of things from this experience, such as:

1) I really suck at characters. (Of course, as an aspiring writer, I expected a lack of skill in every aspect of writing, but I really, really, really suck at characters). I know this because my main character is so boring. I find that if I were to kill my MC, I wouldn't feel a shred of sadness at his funeral. If I don't even care about my MC, why should I expect my readers to care about him.

2) I hate editing. I really, really, really hate editing. I don't understand other authors when they say that they love the editing process. For me, I love to think of ideas, and then outline those ideas for my novel. And the process of writing a rough draft is ... okay. Not that bad, but not that great. But editing. I really hate editing. Those horrible unpolished words just get under my skin.

So that is what I learned so far. This has showed me how unskilled I am as a writer. So I'm going to put the novel on hold for awhile. It's not that I'm going to be lazy (again). I just decided to work on the short stories in my anthology, No Reflection, instead. I believe that I can use these short stories as practice for my writing (I know that writing short stories and writing novels are two different things, but I already began to see some improvement in my writing).

Everyone says that the hardest part of writing is just getting your novel down on paper. People give up before they even finish writing the rough draft. This means that I have no reason to complain because I at least reached the editing process. So I believe that even though my writing skills suck, I at least have some hope for the future.

Thanks for reading,
John Caliburn

P.S. - Writing short stories is much harder than I thought it would be.

Character flaw in Drop Dead Diva

2011-09-19T07:53:00.000-07:00

I've been watching Drop Dead Diva lately. If you don't know what that is, it's a tv show about guardian angels, and lawyers, and body possessing, etc.... I'm not describing it that well, but we're not here to talk about the plot. We're here to talk about the characters. One specific character from Season 1, Episode 2 (The F Word).

The character is Lucy Tyner.

In my eyes, she is a flawed character. And do you know why she is flawed? Well let me tell you about Lucy. First off, she is fat. That is the first impression you get when you see her on the show. But that is not why she is flawed. She is flawed because the writers of the show focused too much on the fact that she is fat.

On this episode, Lucy became a client for the law firm. Her case was that she got fat so she was fired from her job as a waitress from the SunBar (being fat won't attract customers). So she decided to sue them because she really needs her job back.

And the reason she needs her job is because she has two children to support. Her husband had just left her, and she barely has any money left. She even mentioned that she needed to borrow money from her mother to help pay the rent. In other words, she really needs that job.

So when the case went to court, the first strategy that Jane, the lawyer (did I mention her lawyer's name was Jane. Well I should have because she is the main character of the entire series), used was to try to classify being overweight and fat as a disability. If it is labeled as a disability, it becomes illegal for the SunBar to fire her. So Lucy gets to keep her job, and also get some backpay. Yay! Money!

However, Lucy decided against this strategy because of one reason and one reason only. It is because classifying being fat as a disability makes her seem ...undignified. It makes her weight seem weak and pathetic, like it is saying that she is incapable of doing her job, so she needs special treatment or something. It makes her seem like she's not proud of who she is and what her body type is. It is an insult to fat women everywhere. And because of that, she refused the disability strategy.

That is stupid.

Yes, she is fat. And a proud, fat woman would act like that. But that is not the only thing that describes her character. Because in this episode, Lucy is also the mother of two children going through hard times in a bad economy, with no job and a runaway husband. Don't you think someone like that would jump at the first chance she can get to win her case if it would get her job back and help support her and her children.

That is why she is a flawed character. She cares too much about her pride as a hefty woman. She doesn't want to be labeled as disabled because calling her body type as disabled is an insult. But if you were a single mother, wouldn't you care more about the welfare of your children, rather than your pride.

................

Of course, in the end Jane figured out a second and better strategy to win the case that allowed Lucy to get her job back and keep her dignity as a hefty woman. So it all ended well. ...However, they didn't know that there was a better strategy out there. I mean what if there wasn't a second strategy that could have won the case for her. And since she didn't want to go with the first strategy (disability strategy), she would have lost her job and the means to support her children, all because she didn't want to be classified as disabled because of her weight.

In other words, the writer's of the show focused too much on the fact that she is a fat woman, and not enough on the fact that she is a single mother. In real life, a mother would care more about her children than anything else in the world. But Lucy didn't care about her children more than how people label her and her body type.

And that is why I think she is a flawed character.

A New Beginning...

2011-09-14T07:39:00.000-07:00

Dear Blog Readers,

Sorry, sorry, sorry, SORRY! for not updating my blog all these months.

I've been super busy .... I'm sorry, that was a lie. I wasn't super busy. I was just extremely, monumentally lazy.

Monumentally ... hmm ... that's a great word.

Anyway, again, I'm sorry. Just let me explain. This blog started to lose its appeal to me. If any of you have been following me from the very beginning, you know I had another blog before this one. And when I started that other blog over a year ago, I began doing things like follow other blogs and ask them to follow me back. I signed up for a twitter and facebook and youtube account. I've been on goodreads, and I've joined nings and stuff. When I did all that, I managed to get over 200 followers.

But then one day, I decided to remodel myself and start this new blog. And when I did, I told all my followers to come follow this blog now. And you know how many people follow this blog now. Only 13.

In other words, out of over 200 people, only 13 of them actually read my blog.

That was a huge blow. It turns out that just because people push the follow this blog button doesn't mean that they actually follow this blog.

So after that, this blog started to seem pointless to me. Not a lot of people read it, so why bother. But that didn't mean I forgot about this blog. Now after all these months, I'm back. Yay!

I would have come back sooner, but I'd just discovered the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett(there's like over 40 books in the series). And I've been watching these tv shows, like Doctor Who, Torchwood, Drop Dead Diva, Sanctuary, Masterchef, Eureka, Warehouse 13, etc.... It's not that my readers are less important than tv, it's just that tv is very distracting. And entertaining.

But now I'm back. And I'm going to start up this blog again. But this time, I'm going to add some new resolutions:

1) My first resolution is to be more consistent with my blog entrys. I now plan to update my blog once a week. In the past, I either wrote on my old blog 3 times a week or once every 2 months. But now, once a week will do. It will give me more time to work on my novels.

2) My second resolution is to stop with the twitter, and facebook, etc... Before, I spent too much time on social networks and such, and not enough time writing my stories. I told myself it was all for the good of building a platform, but that turned out to be a waste of time. So now my only online presence will be just this blog.

3) My third resolution is to diversify the topics I put on my blog. Before, I only wrote about the progress of my novel, and writing techniques, and book reviews, etc.... But now I decided to also include things on my blog that vaguely have to do with writing. I guessing that on my old blog, I was too restricted with my choice in topics to blog about, and that didn't bring in much readers. So from now on, look forward to those new topics.

4) My fourth resolution is for no more book reviews. Before, I would read a book, then review it on my blog. But to be honest, I just did those book reviews because I didn't have anything to write about. In other words, they were just fillers. And guess what? I don't think that many people cared about the book of the week I was reading. So no more book reviews .....unless it was a book that was really, really, really amazing, and I truly wanted my readers to know about it.

5) My fifth and final resolution. Work on my novels. Nothing else matters.

And that's it.

To be honest, I don't know how many people are going to read my blog. ...and I'm scared of the future. If practically no one's interested in my blog, why should they be interested in the books I'm going to write. I'm starting to think that my words are boring.

I mean do you know how many aspiring writers fail to publish a novel? And from those who do manage to get published, do you know how many fail to become successful and just get backlisted?

Even as I write this, I'm reluctant to face my future as a writer. I know that right now I'm just naive and stupid, but at least I can still believe that I might become successful someday. But if I actually do start writing, and then I fail, I can't believe that anymore. My future won't be a world of possibilities, it'll just be a single fact carved in stone. And what if that stone said that I'm a failure.

...But if I don't do this, then "What If?" If I don't do this, those two words are going to haunt me for the rest of my life. What if, what if, what if, ..... Damn, those two words are so annoying. I just want to set them on fire.

Anyway...

... ... ...

'deep breath'

... ... ...

I'm just going to go for it.

Wish me luck everybody. It all begins here...

Sincerely,
John Caliburn

Books... Where have you been all my life?

2011-04-07T05:38:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

Sorry I haven't been posting in awhile. After finishing the rough draft for my novel, my plan was to start editing my short stories. But I kind of got a little sidetracked. For the past month, I have been doing nothing but... reading.

reading. Reading. READING!

When I was writing that rough draft, I discovered that I didn't have a lot of time for books. My TBR pile has been growing and growing, and I couldn't touch it because I needed to focus. But now the flood gates have opened and I'm devouring books left and right. Seriously, they're running away screaming from the book eating monster.

BOOKS!!!

My need for reading was like breaking up with my vegetarian girlfriend who forced me to eat nothing but tofu and celery. And now I can FINALLY sink my teeth into a huge, juicy burger that has been calling out to me for the past year. (this is only an example. I never had a vegetarian girlfriend)

But now I'm back. And I even managed to edit at least one short story so far. Jen, if you're reading this, I will be sending you my short story, No Reflection, for beta reading. Please be gentle.

And since it's April, I should start editing my novel as well.

....

....

....maybe I'll read one more book before I get started.

From the book eating monster,
John Caliburn

P.S. - READING!!!

Finally.......

2011-02-26T12:06:00.000-08:00

So I finally finished writing the rough draft of my novel, Lycan Island.

It has been a long journey. I think I first got the idea for this novel around 2005. Ever since then, I've been planning out the whole story (that's another way of saying I was procrastinating). Now 5 years later, in 2010, I actually started writing the novel. It took me about a year to finish the rough draft.

Now I'm going to go bury it somewhere for 6 to 8 weeks. This will allow me to refresh my perspective of the story when I pick it up again to edit it. So goodbye you piece of cow manure that which has stolen away my sleep. I'll polish you into a diamond later when I start the editing process. See you in April.

*Goes off to find a shovel*

And for those who are curious, here is a terribly written description of this novel:

When a survival contest is announced with 10 million dollars at stake, Jake Kryner jumps at the opportunity. Now him and 29 other contestants would have to face each other and the dangers of the island, all for the chance to win the prize. Along the way, Jake makes some friends and faces some enemies. But that is not their only challenge. Something is stalking them from the shadows. A creature soaked in the myths and legends, now come to life. What is this creature? And what is the secret of the contest and the island? Jake and his friends would have to solve the mystery if they are to survive. (plot may change over time)

Hi Everybody! ....Let's get started

2011-02-23T10:09:00.000-08:00

Welcome to my new blog!

Hi, I'm an aspiring writer who is trying to get published. My real name is Trung Nguyen, but I don't think that it sounds like an author's name. So I decided to go with a pen name instead. You may call me:

John Caliburn

I know you can't see me right now, but I'm enthusiastically waving hello to you and everybody else who are reading this blog post. Of course, then I have to quickly put my hand down because there are people in the room who are staring at me, wondering why I'm waving at a computer screen.

Anyway, I have just finished writing the rough draft of my first novel, Lycan Island. Now I am one step closer to getting published. And so I created this blog so that I can tell the world of my journey from being an aspiring writer to a published one.

Come follow me and thank you for all your support.

Welcome to my journey,
John Caliburn

P.S. - For those of you who don't know, Caliburn is the Welsh name for Excalibur. YAY!