Writing When You Don't Have Paper

Fellow writers, you'll understand what I mean when I say this. It's absolutely awful to go anywhere without a pen and paper. This is coming from the girl who snuck napkins and pens into her graduation because there were 1,200 people in her graduating class. (It literally took two hours to read all the names, so I thought this was acceptable.) However, there are times when I forget pens and paper, But it's not the end of the world! As technology has gotten better, I've used my phone countless times to jot down a story idea, part of a musical line or a few stanzas of poetry. When I wander around, my mind drifts to such places, and to prevent looking like a dork as I wander around, I find that jotting ideas down on my phone has been quite useful.

Then there's those of us who are a little old-fashioned who write on their hands, whether that's on your palm or on the back of it. I find that when I write on the back of my hand, it tends to stay much longer. I actually have a reminder for a school assignment written on the back of my hand right now. But in high school, writing on my hand more often consisted of random lyrics. I suppose I just dream and think way too much. That's not necessarily a bad thing, I guess.

That's my random little insight of the day. What about you? Do you write on your hands when you lack paper? Or have you turned to jotting things down on your phone? Please feel free to stop by, leave comments, etc.!

Graduation Anticipation

At the ripe old age of 21, I will be graduating with two B.S. degrees in Psychology and Child Learning & Development. Even though I stopped writing so much in college, I rekindled my love for the paper and pen recently, and I never want to go back to those days when I was in a total slump, surrounded by distractions that took me away from my true love. Originally I was going to go to graduate school for a M.A. in some type of counseling, whether it be Marriage and Family, Biblical, or otherwise. However, after a lot of time to think and after consulting people who know me very well, I'm leaning toward working for a few things first before I move forward. It's strange that I'm 21 and will have my first novel published within the year, weeks away from being a college graduate, and I don't have a personal car. So when I'm out of school, that's what I'm going to be focusing on. In my spare time, no worries. I'll keep finding inspiration because there's no such thing as shutting it out forever, and I'll continue my writing journey.

I'm not quite ready to leave college yet. It's such a special place. I've grown so much as a writer and a person here, and while I know that trajectory is bound to consider away from here, it's going to be different without a doubt. I look forward to it, yet it's terrifying simultaneously. For now, I'm editing Facades--as if that's anything new--but this time there's a clear path to publication on the horizon, and I can't wait to share this project that I've worked on for four years and counting.

See you all on the flip side!

Book Review: The Distance Between Us by Kasie West

Summary (as seen on Goodreads):

Seventeen-year-old Caymen Meyers studies the rich like her own personal science experiment, and after years of observation she’s pretty sure they’re only good for one thing—spending money on useless stuff, like the porcelain dolls in her mother’s shop.

So when Xander Spence walks into the store to pick up a doll for his grandmother, it only takes one glance for Caymen to figure out he’s oozing rich. Despite his charming ways and that he’s one of the first people who actually gets her, she’s smart enough to know his interest won’t last. Because if there’s one thing she’s learned from her mother’s warnings, it’s that the rich have a short attention span. But Xander keeps coming around, despite her best efforts to scare him off. And much to her dismay, she's beginning to enjoy his company.

She knows her mom can’t find out—she wouldn’t approve. She’d much rather Caymen hang out with the local rocker who hasn’t been raised by money. But just when Xander’s attention and loyalty are about to convince Caymen that being rich isn’t a character flaw, she finds out that money is a much bigger part of their relationship than she’d ever realized. And that Xander’s not the only one she should’ve been worried about.

Yays:

• The humor was fun, especially finding out that Caymen has the same humor as her grandfather.
• I enjoyed how Skye was involved in this story. (Although I still think she could've had more involvement.)
• I appreciate that Skye and Henry stayed together for the entire story.
• The doll shop element was unique. While I have had porcelain dolls ruined for me because of Talking Tina from The Twilight Zone, it definitely makes this book stand out.

So-sos:

• This pattern of a love triangle. It was incredibly obvious the whole time that she was going to pick Xander, making the need for a love triangle unnecessary.

Nays:

• Much of West's style involves telling the reader a lot of information, most notably whenever the readers meet Skye for the first time. The information should've been woven in and presented more creatively instead of listed.
• Use of parentheses was excessive, detracted from the story, and those should have been properly edited out.
• There was also an abundance of semi-colon use. Not only that, it didn't seem that the author knows how to properly use semi-colons. Semicolons can be difficult to use; they should only be used by people who know how to use them correctly.
• Xander wiping his mouth on his sweatshirt is uncharacteristic for a rich boy, and Caymen buying a magazine so thoughtlessly is not characteristic of someone who comes from a family with little money. I speak this from my personal life. Money is tight, and I think twice before even purchasing my food, let alone purchasing a magazine just to read one article. If she really is poor, it would be more in character to just read the article there in the store.
• "I don't know how I existed without him because his energy feels like my sustaining force in this moment." Cliche, too much reliance on the boy, and why can't girls have their own lives apart from their guys in YA literature?
• Some gaps in the story. For example, when Caymen's mom went to the Wednesday night thing, this whole part was completely skipped and glossed over.
• High-tension scenes were really short. When people argue, they usually do so much longer than they did in this novel. This detracted from realism and getting into the story.
• The chapter lengths. For some reason, a scene would be broken up into multiple chapters, when really it probably would make more sense to combine some of them. This was stylistically distracting, and perhaps not the best choice.

The thing that really saves this novel is that fact that at least it was funny. Also, the unique doll-store thing. Other than that, this book could have used a lot of cleaning up, and loses a lot of quality and potential that it could've had otherwise. Two jellyfish it is.

If you read the novel as well, please leave your thoughts! I would love to hear them.

Book Review: One Wish Away by Kelley Lynn

Summary (as seen on Goodreads):

Be careful what you wish for…

Lyra has always been ahead of the curve. Top of her class in school, a budding astronomer, and with a best friend like Darren she barely has time to miss the mother who abandoned her family years ago. She's too busy planning to follow in her father's footsteps, and to become the youngest astronomer at Space Exploration and Discovery. 

When a star goes missing Lyra is determined to get to the bottom of it only to discover her braniac dad is the mastermind of a top-secret government experiment. They promise to build a perfect world, one galaxy at a time, but with every tweak of the present, a bit more of the future starts to crumble.

Lyra has to go undercover to reveal the truth and let humanity decide if the consequences are worth more than wishing on a star.

Review:

This book had an abysmally large amount of typos. For example:

Nirvana, recently released another album, the first one... (unneeded comma).

"That someone in this room lead their team to a win at the State Academic Decathlon Competition." (wrong tense - "led" is past and "lead" is present).

He shakes is really old flip phone. (Assuming 'is' is 'his'.)

"Tell the Altair's..." (no apostrophe needed).

"We're very careful" Dad assures me... (missing comma)

"the boy's track team" (pretty sure this is supposed to be a track TEAM of boys, not one boy's track team. boys' track team [wrong apostrophe placement] - same in that come to the girl's games.)

I wonder why my Dad didn't come/that our Dad had picked me up/so my Dad has the ability ("Dad" is not supposed to be capitalized in these contexts - it's a proper noun when she is addressing him, but "my dad" should not have any capitalization. This occurs more often than just these instances, but if I included them all there would be too many to mention).

Also, on page 8 there is a backwards quotation mark.

The list goes on and on, but for the sake of getting to other parts of the review I'll just leave it at that. Needless to say, all of these typos will not help the book's rating.

This book also had very short paragraphs and abnormally short sentences. For example:

It's the eighth astronomy book I've searched, not to mention all the online research I did before I resorted to physical books. Not like anyone would really know what I'm talking about. Or care.

The above quote is only a minor representation of the abruptness of broken sentences. The last two sentences of that paragraph should have been combined for the purposes of flow. This is a pattern that is present throughout the entire novel.

I look past my reflection in the window, out to the night sky.

I guess if they don't want to talk about what's on their mind, I might as well ask them questions about what's on mine.

Those two paragraphs are right next to each other. The first one has one sentence, and the next only has two. Yes, short paragraphs are and can be effective, but when the story is literally only made up of short sentences and short paragraphs, the effect is lost and it interrupts the flow as readers move through the piece. Again, these are just quick examples of what is present throughout the novel.

The narration also heavily relied on telling rather than showing. For example:

she looks like she's going to say something else: what in her expression tells readers this? Readers cannot see this, and this looks different on every person's face. Is it in the eyes? The eyebrows? A hesitation shown by a scowl? This is entirely unknown to readers, who are forced to create their own mental image.

she says defiantly: Again, is it shown in the eyes? Crossing her arms? Does she take a step forward with a fist raised? Considering her niece is in handcuffs, at least some body language should be expected.

in a tone that portrays his desire for this to be over: most likely his tone is not the only contributor to this feeling. Maybe he moves his hand in the air like he's dismissing them, or shrugs his shoulders. Once more readers have no idea what they are supposed to see.

Considering the opening began with a victory of the state decathlon, it's very odd that this almost never comes up throughout the rest of the course of the novel. It should have had a much larger role than just serving to attempt to draw readers into the story. Therefore, a strange disconnect is created, making the beginning not very relevant to the rest of the story.

Darren is actually a wonderful character, and the way he and Lyra show their affection for each other before admitting their feelings is very realistic. However, after admitting their feelings it started to feel weird, and the pacing went a bit too quickly once they confessed to each other. The hints at his lack of money (which should have played a larger role in the story) and other aspects of his character were well done.

As for the story itself, in terms of world building the effects of each wish on the reality were well cataloged, explained, and noticed by the characters. The story was consistent with itself in terms of information; each character was very true to himself or herself throughout every situation. This is one of the greatest strengths of this novel; unfortunately, it is overshadowed by many other issues.

Finally, the novel ended on a cliffhanger. Normally this is fine, but there is no indication that another book will follow. Considering everything that happened, readers (including myself) probably feel cheated by this ending and expected more. The cliffhanger felt like a cop-out because whatever followed was too difficult to write. However, this may merely just be one reviewer's opinion.

Overall, the world building is solid and the characters are solid, but the story was not told well. The big picture idea is there, but the details should have been more thoroughly edited. Therefore, this novel will receive a two-jellyfish rating.

Please leave some thoughts below! I love hearing from you guys!

*I received this book free of charge in exchange for an honest review. In no way was my opinion influenced by this fact.

Book Blitz: The Sham by Ellen Allen

The Sham

by Ellen Allen 

Release Date: 09/07/14

238 pages

Summary from Goodreads:

When love leads to death, be careful who you trust…

Eighteen-year-old Emily Heath would love to leave her dead-end town, known locally as "The Sham", with her boyfriend, Jack, but he's very, very sick; his body is failing and his brain is shutting down. He's also in hiding, under suspicion of murder. Six months' ago, strange signs were painted across town in a dialect no one has spoken for decades and one of Emily's classmates washed up in the local floods.

Emily has never trusted her instincts and now they're pulling her towards Jack, who the police think is a sham himself, someone else entirely. As the town wakes to discover new signs plastered across its walls, Emily must decide who and what she trusts, and fast: local vigilantes are hunting Jack; the floods, the police, and her parents are blocking her path; and the town doesn’t need another dead body.

WARNING: THIS BOOK IS UNSUITABLE FOR YOUNGER TEENAGE READERS. IT DEPICTS ADULT SITUATIONS, MURDER SCENES, CONVERSATIONS ABOUT SEX AND PROFANITY.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: The idea for this book came to me in a nightmare... It was so vivid that I imagined I was 17 again, at school, in the same group of 4 friends that I used to hang around with. We were involved in a murder and cover-up. I started writing partly as a way to get it out of my head and then the characters turned into real people... and Emily and Jack were born.

As some of the early reviewers have stated, it is quite extreme in chapter one, and necessarily so. This is the incident that sets up the whole book; something awful happens that sets off a train of events for the characters. This book is a mystery in two ways in that we're: 1) trying to find out who killed Emily's classmate; and 2) trying to work out who Jack is. I hope you enjoy it!

Add to Goodreads

Buy Links:

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About the Author

I’ve just finished writing my first book, so I’ve been busy trying to work out how all the pieces fit together – the planning, the plot, the rules, the imagination, the characters, the grammar, the structure, the endgame… there’s too much stuff to remember and a lot of the information that I’ve discovered online about how to write isn’t that good or even well written (the irony in reading advice on writing that isn’t well written…)

So I decided I needed to find somewhere to store the good stuff. Then it occurred to me that other people might find it useful too. So here it is. My online reference tool of all the useful (i.e. good) advice for writers-to-be. I only post here when I have something really useful to say about the craft (Twitter is for daily musings, Goodreads to review and Amazon to buy my work); it’s all about the quality here, folks, not the quantity… Enjoy!

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