New Blog
For the followers …
I’ve moved address! While I love my zombies, I don’t think I could handle a blog for every bit of culture and research I get into now or in the future, so it’s all gone to one place.
While zombies will still be a major feature, there’s bits and pieces of other speculative fiction, tv, media, the book industry, whatever conferences I end up going to, things like that.
Getting in the zone – don’t wait for the zone to come to you
How to write by awesome and award winning author Angela Slatter
Last night during Masterchef I kept an eye on my Twitter feeds for #phdchat, started by the Thesis Whisperer. Although I’m not a PhD student, it is important to not only learn about the community I want to join and the people around it, but also the issues that come up when writing a massive thesis and being a researcher and academic.
So the conversation yesterday revolved around keeping in the writing mood and getting it done. There was a lot of mention of chocolate and treats!
I started out writing fiction from when I was around twelve. I’ve got a shelf of books dedicated to writing characters, plots, action scenes, and a few around writing articles or specific genres (of course, mostly fantasy). Right now I’m not in the fiction writing sphere, but if I learned anything from fiction writers it’s this: everyone is different! You may plan every step of the way, or free-write the first draft. You might focus on quantity, you might focus on quality. The below suggestions are ideas to help you figure out what your style of writing is. An absolute blank wordprocessor may be what works for you, where I at least need a selection of fonts (I write in pretty fonts, and then strip the format when I’m done to make it appropriate font-ed). One of the things you can’t rely on is only writing when you feel like it. You HAVE to write. You don’t have a choice at uni or in a research course about ‘aww, I don’t feel like it today’. Another thing, that was also mentioned on the hashchat, accept that whatever you do will need editing. It’s very rare the creature that writes one draft and that’s it. That’s partly why publishing books takes so long, it’s revising the editing between the editor (freelance or in-house) and the author.
Here’s my notes from last night:
- The Pomodoro Technique: Setting short time goals and rewarding yourself with breaks. Join a group for Shut Up and Write
- Set word based goals – 1000 words a day, 500 words a day – even if it’s a crap 500 or 1000 words, it’s still writing!
- Use Wordle to analyse even a sample of your writing to see the words you are using too much unconciously, or use the Writer’s Diet Test
- Edit finished text in a new file
- Write the PhD question on the header of every page to keep it in mind and help stay on track
- Use mind maps or concept maps to plan
- Put research/paper in progress/additional info on DropBox so you can access it anywhere
- Utilise verb lists. Try the Academic Phrasebank.
- Plan your writing a day or even week before your writing session
- End each writing session with a bullet point list of what comes next.
- Outline sections to help focus writing
- Write like Leonard, Edit like Sheldon
- Disconnect yourself from the internet. Use paper and pen, or if you need to be online, use something like Chrome Nanny to lock yourself out of social media.
- Blog, get some writing buddies or a group together – responsibility to share with others as a motivator for writing. Set yourself deadlines.
- Attend writing workshops or go on a writing retreat.
- Don’t write linearly – put in titles and develop ideas in sections, then review and revise between sections
- Take a break! Go for a run or to the gym, or go take a shower or bath
- Good to write conference papers and articles during PhD
- Read about writing as well as content and research processes
- Writing is something you learn as you go along, you won’t know it all upfront.
Suggested Programs:
Also check out:
NaNoWriMo – Rather than writing a novel during the month, write a thesis!
How to create a science blog
Developing Effective Research Proposals by Keith F Punch
Guilty Pleasures
Not specifically on undead, but relative to the romance side of paranormal/zom romance!
I’ve read a few comments and reviews on this doco and it’s been mostly negative. That the direction of the documentary shows those into romance books to be pathetic, sad sacks of loneliness or desperate for romantic attention, and ignores the range of romance readers. There’s one at Dear Author, and one at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books.
It’s available online at SMH.tv (maybe only for Australian viewers? If you are international, it might not work for you)
Despite or maybe because of the negative images around it, I decided to watch it. I’m still new to admitting I read romance (mostly historical outside paranormals and zombies), but a lot of my friends are romance – particularly paranormal – readers and I do wonder about the difference between the stereotyped Mills and Boon readers and the real readers I know. What is it about the books we like?
So I’ve jotted down some quotes and comments onthings that happened in the doco.
Note: Words not exact because the video was being evil for me and I couldn’t go back to get the words right :S
~
Women make male or neutral pseudonym for sci fi (and other genres) – men make female pseudonyms for romance books
“It’s okay for her [my wife] to read these novels to compensate what I can’t give her” – a reader’s husband
Men must be alphas, have to look imposing, got to present a good physical appearance, got to be fit, never fat. The kind of man every woman would fancy – Romance writer
Mills and Boon readers are usually past the bloom of youth, intelligent, and have steamy determination – Romance writer
Sometimes are accused by ardent feminists of being anti-feminist, of promising women things that they will never have, which I think is ludicrous. Readers know they are reading a work of fiction, they don’t expect it in real life. – Romance writer
A reader takes up ballroom dancing inspired by the novels she reads. She admits to dressing up specially for her private tutor, but not so for her husband.
‘It gets hotter and hotter’, ‘Why can’t we expect that in real life?’ – a reader and her friend
‘There was a lot missing in my life and that’s why I enjoyed reading the books. I think it’s escapism. You just indulge yourself in them and think ‘wow, I wish that was me’ – A reader
Romance reader who likes ballroom also watches competitions and seems to admire other men who are tall and Harlequin-heroesque, pointing out features of men not her husband that she likes.
Writer takes notebook to cafes and restaurants and will note down snippets of discussion or movements. That’s what readers like, little things rather than big things, little words, little looks.
Of course she likes reading. It’s a harmless past time. – Reader’s husband
You used to get a sex scene that faded into dots … but now it’s very different – Writer
The idea that any fool can write a Mills and Boon is a mistake – Writer
The sex scene must always be in the context of a loving relationship. – Writer
This is all fantasy, it’s not the real world. It’s a nicer world and we want to maintain that image – Writer
That’s why you read the books. You want all that romance … At the end of the day, you live in the real world and everyone has their downfalls. – Reader
A Mills and Boon book is not just happy and straightforward – they have to work through trials to get to a happy conclusion – Writer
Why do men find it so hard to say ‘I love you’? Maybe because it’s so trite, everyone says I love you. There’s almost an in-built fear of commitment, they don’t really want to say something that will tie them down. – Writer
She’s an extremist [about reading Mills and Boon]. Militant, feminist. – a reader’s separated husband
The dancing reader is not happy. Her husband has joined her in dancing so she can go in competitions, but she envies those couples where the husband/male teaches the female. The husband is nervous, but excited to be working with her.
Women are more interested in relationships and talking about relationships than men. Women like to be told things over and over again. – Writer
We’re all yearning for love … I think a fraction of 1% get to meet their true love. It’s so powerful it’s unstoppable. You have to believe in that. – Model
In every book I write there is a development in the character. The person at the end of the book is not the same as at the beginning, they’ve both learned something about themselves. – Writer
Mills and Boons create an excitement in my life … but it’s not something I’m setting my heart on, because real life is about different things. It’s about romance in your self, that will save you. Relationships will come and go … but it’s the relationship with yourself and how you develop that – Reader
If you think it is getting a bit stale, you have to throw something in there – Reader’s husband
We celebrate, in every Mills and Boon book, the emotion of love which is in everyone’s lifes – Writer
Real life begins where the Mills and Boon ends – Reader
~
After thoughts:
So a lot of this was about true life love and relationships and not just the romances. It feels a bit awkward to have watched someone else’s unfulfilled relationship.
I’m not so sure that reading the romances gave the women an unachievable relationship to desire as the film seemed to suggest. They wanted to be respected, to have some fun in the times they spent together and to enjoy each other’s company and work with their passions.
I didn’t think there was enough breadth in the film – there was no happily married/together couple of which one reads romance, there had to be something lacking or different in the relationship. The people were set up to be seen as trying to live in their own fantasy world, but I didn’t feel that’s what was really going on. Also, the restriction of only connecting with Mills and Boon romance – there are soooo many other imprints and publishers and types out there.
And none of them seemed to read or write or model for paranormal romance. Mores the pity, because I think it brings a new dimension in. I particularly love when the female is the special paranormal, and the male is lesser aware of the paranormal because all too often, it’s men as alpha weres/head vamps and women as the humans. Where once a woman had to be a lady to marry a lord – and there’s more than enough stories about lower class women and higher class men – it’s about changing an entire life-state, not just being able to pick nice clothes and not insult a royal guest. Could argue that romance is the same all around, it’s just paranormal types ramp up the problems that can be had in any normal relationship. Still, I think it’s a missed opportunity to show only one kind.
Undead Studies 