Guest Post—Whose Point of View Should You Write From?

Today, I’m guest posting over at Ravens and Writing Desks! This month, they’re focusing on helpful tips for book building—to help the writers who are doing NaNoWriMo this November. I was very privileged to be a part of their “NaNoPlaMo” (National Novel Planning Month), and I’m excited to share my thoughts with you, as well.

Whose Point of View Should You Write From?

This question could also be reworded—whose point of view should you not write from?

I love writing. I think everyone who reads this blog loves writing, too. And as we’re building our stories—layering the different threads of plot, subplot, characters, and setting like cheese and lettuce on a sandwich, we inevitably come across the question. Which point of view would be the most exciting? Which would add the most depth to the story? Today, I want to share with you the two main questions I ask myself when choosing who should have the microphone in my story.

          Who changes the most internally?
     By now, you probably have a fairly good idea (or else you don’t!) of who your characters are. You know who the good guy is, and who the villain is. Hopefully, you even know what the good guy does that sets him apart as the “good guy”, and what the villain does to earn that title.

…read the rest here! :)

I really enjoyed doing NaNoWriMo last year, and although I won’t be doing it this year due to other projects I’m hoping I can next year. How about you—have you ever heard of NaNoWriMo before? If you have, do you ever think you’d participate?

Until next time
Esther

Preparing

Preparing to review these books this next week for Learning Resources Directory (the name of my website—yes, I’ve decided). If I was a baby, I’d be drooling over these (but I’m not). These books are all so…good! Hopefully I can write the reviews without too much gushing.

And just FYI—Vivaldi is wonderful to listen to while you’re working on projects like this. :)

–Esther

Funny of the Week and Editing Update

Funny of the Week:
     Last Sunday, on our way to church, I had some peppermint tea in my travel coffee mug. I usually take coffee in it, and often my youngest brother (who sits next to me) gets a sip or two as we go. Sunday was no exception, and he asked for some. So I gave it to him. He took a drink.
     “Tea!” He said, in a very disgusted voice, “Mint tea!” (Try saying it out loud, adding emphasis to the “tea” part in the most offended voice possible and you’ll understand how he said it.) The poor boy. He was expecting coffee, and he got mint tea! I had to chuckle, because while he likes all kinds of tea I hadn’t thought about the fact that he would have been expecting coffee!

Here’s Another Recent Funny:
     We had a rainy day earlier last week, and one day it cleared some. Then a dark cloud came up, threatening to rain again. It was coming pretty fast, so we had to hurry and get the laundry in before it started raining. I remember saying something about it going to rain soon, and my second-youngest brother was very unimpressed.
     “I don’t want rain!” He said, a scowl on his face, “I want weather!” He was sure that he wanted weather instead of rain. I didn’t take time to correct him on the fact that rain is weather.

Editing Update:
     You saw the stack of papers I had to edit a few days ago. Today, I knew it had to be done, but around 11:30 this morning I still hadn’t started and I was rather annoyed with myself because it wasn’t getting done. Rachel was online at the time, so I asked her to pray for me that I could get something done today. She was having troubles staying motivated today, too (and I hope she doesn’t mind me telling about her!), so we kind-of swapped prayers. :) And…

     …praise the Lord, I was able to get it all done! I’m so thankful I took time to ask her to pray. I’m sure that was what got me through. I was able to get 118 pages edited today, the most I’ve ever done in a day. It was just read through and note everything that needed changing, but it really felt like a big job. I’m very thankful it’s done now.

     My writing desk today. I sat in bed, away from the computer (and away from distractions!), and used the slider my keyboard and mouse usually sit on as a desk. It worked well—I might just use it again one day!
     Now I need to do the next thing on my to-do list: Fix all the places noted. There are lots. But I’m thankful I could print it out and mark it that way—it’s a lot easier to edit the small bits that way, I think. And after that, hopefully, I can get it sent off to the printer for a few Beta Reader copies! :)

Thankful for all He’s done,
Esther

Five Reasons You Should Write 100 Words Every Day

Beginning on Monday (the 15th), Go Teen Writers will be holding their fourth 100 words for 100 days challenge! Next to NaNoWriMo, the 100-4-100 challenge rates as my favorite one of the year. It’s simple; 100 words generally takes about 10 minutes to write. And with those 100 words, times 100 days, you end up with about 10,000 words in the story you’re writing!

I joined their second 100-4-100 challenge, back in 2012 (remind me if that’s the wrong year). That year, I did it for a couple weeks and flunked. Then, last year, I joined again, and that time succeeded—in total, for those 100 days, I had about 4 days off total that I didn’t write.

So while it does take a little time, if you’re a writer who would benefit from any of the following things, I think you ought to join as well.

• Fresh inspiration, which generally only comes for me only after I’ve been writing for a little while (not always, but most of the time). Something about writing juices getting going again….
• The knowledge that there are others who are doing it—and succeeding at it, and you can too—an encouragement when it seems like the only progress you’re making is backwards.
• Having the sheer thrill of feeling a story grow through your fingertips, and knowing that you are an author, after days or weeks or however long it’s been since you last wrote anything.
• Realizing that it is possible to get closer to the end of your story—even if the end seems a long way away, and it’s been sitting in basically the same state for a long while.
• Getting into a daily habit of devoting 10 minutes—or however long it is for you—to honing the craft you love working on, something that is invaluable to writers.

That’s just a few off the top of my head right now. I know there are other reasons as well. But, this is my bottom line: If you’re a writer, and you can make 10—or 20—extra minutes in your day, I think you should join the challenge.

Signing up ends Sunday night—don’t put it off until too late! Otherwise, you’ll have to wait a whole year!

(There are rules to the challenge—visit their page to find out about them.)

~Esther

Preparing to Edit

Today, I have officially started editing the 4th draft (or is it creating the fourth draft?) of my book.

A delicious cup of coffee (which has been long gone by now), some nice music playing, water close by, and lots of tools. This is the way I like to edit.

Although you can’t see it in the picture very well, the green folder has lots of other writing-related papers in it. The left hand side has miscellaneous research bits for different stories, along with a few helpful writing-related blog posts that I’ve come across in the past. The right hand side is devoted solely to things relating to A Living Shield. It has lots of research papers, history and bits and pieces of things about 66 AD. I also keep the tools I’ve used over the previous edits in there as well.

Editing tools, from left:

• Calendar of the time period (I found it here). I used this extensively when I was working on the the third draft. Since it’s in paper form, I can use a pencil and eraser wherever I need it. This is really helpful in keeping all the times and dates straight! This particular calendar has everything as it’s happened time-wise in the book so far, and currently is accurate. Except that I am changing things, so I needed a…
• New calendar. This is blank, and ready to mark up. I’m sure I’ll be changing some things date-wise as I go, so this will be essential.
• To-do list. This was something I made up in preparation for the 3rd draft. I didn’t use it much, but since I have it I’ll probably refer to it some. It is sorted by color according to how important the item is, which is helpful.
• Plot outline. This is something that I used a LOT last edit. I have everything sorted by chapter, then each bullet point is the synopsis of a particular scene in the chapter. With this, combined with Scrivener, it’s very easy to switch between parts of the book so I can focus on one thing at a time to change. This is just about a life saver.

And you can’t see it in the picture, but I have several other tools that I’m using quite a bit—pens (a friend gave me some fancy pens that I love using for things like this), a good sharp pencil, and two highlighters (which are two different colors). The highlighters were a birthday present, and since they are different colors I can use one to mark “very important” and one for “optional”. I used them to mark the places that really need attention in the plot outline.

Now, I need to get to work again.
~Esther

P.S. The ideas for most of the tools I’m using came from the book 2k to 10k: Writing Faster, Writing Better, and Writing More of What You Love. If you’re interested in getting some wonderful writing tips, then I’d highly suggest you buy and read this book.

Camp NaNoWriMo and Scrivener

I can’t believe that April is almost here already…where DOES the time slip away to? The last couple months since our move, I’ve been slowly working on the first stages of editing my book. And it’s gone s  l  o  w.

First, I read through the whole thing, taking notes of everything from the wrong word choice to the places where some scenes needed to move to. It took a long time. But eventually I got through it. Then, I had to start the real editing! Not too long ago, I heard of a free program called “yWriter”. yWriter was built with writers in mind, making it possible to break the book up into individual scenes for more bite-sized chunks to work with.

So I downloaded yWriter, and set to work. After doing some main editing (moving a whole chapter several chapters down, breaking up the main text into smaller scenes, etc.), I realised I had made a bad formatting mistake that would require hours of work if I didn’t correct it now. But to correct it I had to forget about all the changes I had done so far and redo them later! Argh. To say the least, I wasn’t very happy about it at all.

Just after I found the problem, I saw somewhere that Scrivener was on a half-price sale for a very limited time. And that got me thinking…I had seen somewhere that if we won NaNo, we would get a coupon with a 50% discount on Scrivener. So I looked it up, and long story shorter, I found out the coupon was still valid (although they said it wasn’t!), and I was able to get Scrivener for half price.

Last Friday, after figuring out how Scrivener works, I was able to rescue all the changes I had done so far on yWriter, and get it all done (with the formatting corrected!) in much less time and sweat than it took in the first place. So it’s an understatement to say I’m hooked on Scrivener! It makes the job SO much easier!

My goals at this point are to be done editing by the end of April (not impossible, but challenging), work on the finishing touches and read through it again in early May, and from there I either want to ask some friends for a heavy critique or go ahead and order some free proof copies from CreateSpace (another “prize” for winning NaNo).

All that just depends on how things go. I’m joining Camp NaNo next month, and hopefully that will be encouraging enough that I’ll be able to get the editing finished. I only have about 3 scenes to do a day, so surely that won’t be too hard? :) Depends on how much changing needs done, I guess. And how much time I have to work on it.

Well, I better be off. Editing awaits me tomorrow.I don’t want to fail, and yet I’m feeling a bit of the “I’m not sure I can do this!” feeling that I had before starting NaNo in 2013. Through God, though, I know I can. :)

Keep writing!
Esther

P.S. I’m thinking about trying to do a small update each day during Camp NaNo, like I did during last November, just to keep me a bit more accountable. :) How do all of you feel about it? Think I should try, or not bother? Would you read it? Thanks!

Baptism + Rain Storm (and miscellany)

Well, this poor blog seems to have died over the last month. Can I blame that on moving? And having a short-term part-time job? Anyway, I seem to recall a long while ago promising to share pictures of my third brother Elijah’s baptism. So here goes.

December 28 2013 dawned cold and wet here in New Zealand. December is where summer weather is supposed to come here, but…well, it wasn’t here that Saturday! We bustled around preparing anyway, and prayed very hard that God would stop the rain just long enough for the baptism to take place without everyone being baptised!

And guess what? As 1 Peter 3:12 says, “For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers….” That’s exactly what happened. All around us, even just a few kilometres off, the rain bucketed down. But for those few hours when we were down by the river side it was dry—and actually pretty warm considering the circumstances! God definitely put His hand over us that day.

Singing a hymn together (Elijah is in the middle).

 

Wading out….

 

“It’s c-cold, b-but I c-can stand it!” The river wasn’t as warm as it could have been but it still wasn’t as cold as Simon’s or mine which both happened in early October several years ago (Simon was two years after me or so, and a year before Elijah).

 

The old man dies…

 

…and the new man arises!

 

Praying and blessing him afterward.

This was very special to watch, remembering my salvation and baptism in 2010 and Simon’s in 2012. It was beautiful to hear the same vows told, and to repeat them in my own heart along with him. There’s just something special about a baptism that is humbling and yes, maybe a bit sad. But it’s even more exciting and very, very joyful. Another lamb in God’s fold. Another soul bound for the Promised Land. One more person to spread the good news all over the earth—until everyone has the chance to hear it.

This was the third time Dad has had the privilege of baptising his children. And I pray he will be able to continue to do it in the future. I found it very special to be baptised by him, and I’m sure the boys feel the same. :)

God is good.

-   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -

And now…on to the rain storm! I can’t remember, but I guess the rain kind-of cleared away the day after the baptism. On the 30th, a thunderstorm rolled through and we really got quite the downpour! Our veranda roof had decayed (it was made of plastic), so the rain just poured through it.

My eldest brother ran through the rain to retrieve his gumboot. In about 30 seconds, he got drenched!

 

Watching it fall was an amazing experience!

The rain lasted for about 10 minutes, and then cleared away. Since then, we’ve had a few showers but for the most part it’s been very, very dry. We’re now wishing for a little rain to come through!

Well, I should probably go. This concludes all my pictures of 2013, and now I can start posting some that I’ve taken this year. Hopefully, I’ll be able to catch up shortly! We’ll see. Currently, I’m working flat-out trying to get my novel edited before February 29th, which is the deadline for getting a free hardcover copy of the book. I read through 50 pages today which is an all-time record so far. Woo-hoo! Just 33 to go!

I probably have work at the vineyard in a couple days, so we’ll see how much editing I end up accomplishing. Oh yes—AND I’m supposed to start school this week. We’ll see how THAT goes as well! :)

Oh yes—an update on the moving: We’re getting everything settled in. A lot of the boxes are all unpacked, and the place is growing more homelike by the day. Maybe someday, once I’m all done with school and all caught up on JOJ and all done writing…maybe then I can do a tour through this place so you get an idea of what it looks like. ;) Or…maybe not. We’ll see how much time I have.

Mum keeps saying things will slow down soon, but in the foreseeable next week or so it doesn’t look that way. Maybe when winter comes? Hah, what a hope. Then I’ll be saying, “Maybe I’ll have time when summer comes?” I’ll just have to keep remembering to take time.

It’s late now, and I need to get my rest.

Until later,
Esther

Thirteen Years too Late—and a Writing Challenge

Today, I participated in Monday’s Minute Challenge—started by Tessa Emily Hall over at Christ is Write. She’s planning to post a writing prompt every Monday this year, and it’s open for all to join in!

This week, she started with three prompts (you only have to use one of them):

• Write a letter to yourself that you will read in December. If you could ask yourself anything, what would it be?
• If you could tell yourself anything this time last year, what would it be?
• Finish this: I never imagined this would be the way my new year would begin.

I thought about doing the second one, but after thinking all afternoon about it I finally decided to do the last one. And it got a bit…intense. I cried while writing the letter.

-  -  -

Thirteen Years too Late

I never imagined this would be the way my new year would begin. The little slip of paper. Written in a childish hand. The date—January 1st, 1993. Exactly thirteen years to the day since it had been written.

“I’m sitting in the corner. Confused. Ready to scream. Oh Daddy, where are you? Where were you when I cried for you last night? When all hope drained out of me as I saw Mummy fight for her last breath? When I saw her close her eyes for the last time? When her chalky face turned cold and unmoving—forever? Oh, Daddy, what happened? Why didn’t you come? Don’t you know? Am I still your child? Do you even care? Do you even remember that you stumbled out of here, drunk, as the clock struck midnight? The bottles still lay on the filthy floor where you left them. Oh Daddy, Daddy, will you ever remember that I’m still here—waiting, waiting, with nowhere to go and nothing to keep me alive? Daddy, Daddy, come home! Remember, let your mind wake up, and come home!    Charlene.”

I crumple the paper, and it patters to the floor. Exactly thirteen years too late. Thirteen years too late. The chant seems to repeat itself over and over as I pace the small room. My fists clench against the terrible horror. Heartache. Memories. Thirteen years too late. Thirteen years too late.

-  -  -

As you can probably tell, it got my brain working at full-tilt. :)

So now…do you want to join in the challenge? I think you’d enjoy it, like I did! Check out the original post here.

Along another line—what have you been up to lately? We’ve been working at the new house quite a bit, and also trying to knock back the weeds in the garden.

Just the last few days I’ve been trying to get through the twelve books I have checked out of the library—all of them historical fiction. Bliss. :) I’ve finished three so far, and now I’m trying to decide which one I should read next. They all look so interesting! :) Maybe a cup of chai or mint tea would help me decide….

~Esther

20 Reasons for Why I’m a Writer

What do you do when a friend of yours sends you a quote like this?:

“I can’t understand why a person will take a year to write a novel when he can easily buy one for a few dollars.”
― Fred Allen

(and no, my friend was not Fred Allen)

I do not understand this kind of theology. At all. So I wrote up a list of the reasons why I’ve decided to be a writer—to do it the “hard way” as Fred Allen implies it to be.

1. It’s fun.
2. It stimulates my brain.
3. It’s fun to come up with what will happen next.
4. I can develop better my daydreaming abilities.
5. I can create new worlds.
6. I can live in new worlds.
7. I can meet new people.
8. I can jump into other people’s brains.
9. I can make horrible things happen to people, and no one complains. (Wow…that sounds bad!! :))
10. What I’m writing has never been written before.
11. The first draft has so many possibilities—it’s fresh, original, inspiring, wonderful, and just a bit messy.
12. You could possibly earn money from it if you ever get published.
13. As soon as I set fingers to a keyboard, I know that what I write is all mine. Every little letter of it.
14. I can live in a world of dreams.
15. I can visit a place I’ve never been before, and enjoy myself immensely while I’m there.
16. I can use the most colossal, enormous, extensive, gigantic, humongous, immense, magnificent, mammoth, massive, monstrous, monumental, towering, tremendous, vast, behemothic, bulky, cyclopean, elephantine, immeasurable, jumbo, leviathan, mighty, monster, mountainous, oversized, planetary, prodigious, stupendous, titanic, walloping, whopping words when I write, or I could use the simplest. It’s all my decision.
17. I can use the license of being a writer and an author.
18. I love words.
19. I love being creative.
20. I love being an artist.

That is just a handful of the many reasons why I’m a writer. Why I take years to write a book. I understand that not all people have the time to write. Or have the ability or patience to write. Or mental strength. (I’m not saying I have all of those yet—but over all, I think those are some basic things you need to have to write.)

I write because I love to. Not because I’m necessarily good at it (I’m not), but because, like Jeremiah, I have a “fire in my bones”. A burning desire to get the story in my head out on paper (er, computer screen), where I can twist it and churn it and make it into something good. Something inspirational.

I think the ones that write quotes like that might be a bit lazy. Lazy in the fact that they’d rather someone else do all the hard work for them. But that would mean I’m lazy, too. Or impatient. I love writing, coming up with new characters, building new worlds in my mind, coming up with terrible problems for my characters to get through. I love it. But I, too, also like taking time off to just sit down and read a good book.

Being an author is hard. It’s also fun. And scary. And, yes, at some times we feel complete defeat. We feel like the story is going nowhere, as if it’s a broken down car way out in the boonies somewhere. It feels like we can never get out of that hole. Sometimes, it’s good to just take it easy. Take a break for a day, or an hour, or a minute or two. But after that break, we’ve got to push ahead. We can’t forever wait.

If you don’t know how to get from point A to point B then try to write down every possible solution there is to the problem. Then choose the craziest or the best fitting, and go on in the story. Grab a strong hold on the story world, and immerse yourself in it as best as possible. That’s a big plus of NaNoWriMo, especially if you’re doing around 30 – 50,000 words. You’re working so hard to get to the word goal that you just about have to be in the story world at all times. And that’s really good, because you can describe things 1,000x better.

But sometimes the story feels so bad that you’re sure you’ll never be able to make it good. I don’t really have any advice for there, really. When I faced that problem I just scrapped the entire plot (which really was so weak that was easy) and came up with a much stronger one. And I focused on the characters a lot more than the history.

I’d just like to encourage you, if any encouragement can be gained from that rather unkind quote—don’t give up. Keep writing. Maybe some people will end up buying and reading your book! You are an author. Don’t let anything tell you otherwise. And if it’s as hard to write as Allen implies (and I know it is), then you have even more reason to claim the title. Because you’re doing the hard work. It’s the kind of work that will pay off in the end.

Why do you write?
~Esther

What I’ve been reading lately….

How to Write 50,000 Words in 24 Hours
      I know. It sounds crazy. But this man did it. Just read the post. He’s got some good tips there.

5 Tools for Building Conflict in Your Novel
      Some very good tips here! The Novel Journal intrigues me. I’ve heard about it/similar things a lot. I really should try it.

Inkygirl Wordcount Challenge
      I like the idea of getting badges. And those links at the bottom look great. That’s part of the reason I’m saving this. Another reason is because it looks really helpful—especially if you’re behind on your goal, or it’s not NaNo-time and you still want to write a novel.

On Word Counts and Novel Length
      Okay, folks. I tell ya, this is a post that I’ll definitely be coming back to! It was written by a former editor or agent (can’t remember at the moment), and it gives the average word counts for a lot of different genres. She didn’t include Historical Fiction, though, so I asked her about that. But I was glad to see that for Young Adult Fiction, the book I just finished has the perfect wordcount. (That is, if my wordcount machine counts right!)

The Go Teen Writers Ebook is On Sale!
      I think this is the best one so far. Because really, how often does a book like this, from a blog like this, go on sale for $0.99? I bought it just about as soon as I knew. :) And I’ve already started reading it. So far, it’s great.
      The funny thing is—just yesterday we were at a writing group, and some homeschool boys we know did a presentation on writing. This was one  book they mentioned. Both Tiffany and I  looked at each other and smiled, because we both read the blog and have both have really enjoyed it!
      I’ve always wanted to get the book, but never got around to looking at the price (usually around $15 or $20, I believe). Now with the sale, though, I’ve gotten it for a much cheaper price! Thank you, Lord!

Okey-dokey, that’s all for today. It’s all writerly stuff, but hey…I’m a writer! :)
~Esther

Oh, and P.S. I won the 100-4-100 challenge! Finally! After trying…3 times, I believe.

Three-Dimensional Characters and Inspiring People

Today’s prompt:

Someone (or more!) who has inspired you this year.

1. Hudson Taylor. I listened to a book called Hudson Taylor’s Spiritual Secret this year. It was very, very, good. Much more interesting and relatable than several other books I’ve come across this year about other missionaries! I think the main thing that inspired me about Hudson was his complete trust in God. Although he was in the middle of China with no money and hostile people on all sides he still trusted that God would come through—and He always did. Pretty profound for me.
2. My mum. It’s pretty inspiring to see how she faithfully cares for all of us, day in and out, asking for nothing back. Thank you, Mum.
3. David Livingstone. I started to listen to an audiobook about him a while ago but never got through it because it was SO boring! But one thing I did get out of it was his devotion. He left all—his family, wife, children, home, everything—so that he could share Jesus with (until then) unreached Africans. Pretty powerful story!
4. George Mueller’s wife. Her name escapes me now, but her willingness to follow her husband’s leading—although it could mean complete poverty—is very, very inspiring. She’s a good roll model if I ever have read of one!
5. Corrie ten Boom. I’ve listened to The Hiding Place over and over. Her story is so…encouraging and inspiring! And I love the place where she tells about the time she had to forgive one of her guards after the war…very touching and eye-opening.
6. A dear old man in our congregation. If you got to know him just in passing you’d think he was just an elderly Kiwi farmer who loves Jesus and is trying to serve Him. But just last Sunday, we learned a little more of his backstory. And I’m amazed to realise just a little more—like getting to know a character in a book—what the things are/were in his life that made him the person he is today (a little more on this later).
7. Simon Peter’s wife (the Peter in the Bible). Imagine how it would be to have your husband suddenly start following this perfect stranger all over the place…and then have him begin acting strange after Jesus went back to heaven…and then him going all over the country speaking about Jesus…I think I would wonder what happened to him! But maybe she was behind him all the way, I don’t know. It definitely would have taken a lot of devotion and forbearance as his wife to experience those things! I’d like to write a story about it one day, perhaps.

Well, it’s rained today. When I last checked it this evening we had gotten about 32 mm. (1 1/4 in.) so far! Praise the Lord!

Back to our elderly friend. I’m afraid, since writing this latest novel, I’ve been more writerly-minded than ever. And I suppose that isn’t all bad. But I’ve been comparing A LOT of daily life with writing things. So it was kind-of interesting as we were on the way home after a good day of fellowship to listen to what my brothers had to say. They spent a good part of the afternoon with another friend, who was telling them some very interesting stories.

One was about this man in our congregation. He was in a bad accident about ten years ago, wrecking his motorbike (fourwheeler) completely and getting severely hurt himself. I don’t know exactly what all was hurt, but I know quite a few ribs were crushed and his lungs were crushed and he ended up losing a shoulder blade in the whole mess. The doctors told him he’d never be able to walk again.

He’s been a farmer a good bit of his life. After hearing what the doctors said, he has progressed and now walks normally (at least, as far as I can tell). Apparently, after losing a shoulder blade however, it became very difficult to raise his arm. It hurt a lot to even raise his arm to a 90° angle from his body. But he managed to rig up a kind of pulley system in his house, and even though it hurt a lot today his arm is strengthened enough that he can raise it as high as any normal person could. But it took a long time, and a lot of painful work to get it back to a semblance of what was before.

Now the point I’m trying to make here is that sometimes your book’s characters have a LOT more in their history than you’d ever imagine. I had no idea that this man in our church had ever been through such a terrible ordeal. Imagine—trying to lift your arm when it screams in agony at the slightest movement! But he endured that pain, and now he can use it again. I don’t know if it still hurts or not, but I’d imagine that it would at least sometimes.

I didn’t know anything about this part of him. Now that I’ve found it out, though, it makes him into a more rounded character. (Oh, my…this is making it sound like he’s just a character in a book!) I’ve gotten to see another layer of his personality, the things that make up who he is as a person. By getting to know this side of him a little more, I think it makes it more possible for me to understand him as a person better. To sympathise with him a little more.

So, if you’re building a character for your book right now, try to dig deeply into who he/she is. Come up with both possible and impossible things that they might have experienced. Get to know them inside and out—not as flat characters, but as living, breathing, three-dimensional characters. I promise, it will be worth it in the end. Getting to know them as early as possible really makes it real for when you’re writing about them. Maybe they had something happen that affected their vocal chords, so they speak strange. Maybe they were emotionally hurt sometime in childhood, and they’re still angry and bitter about that today. Whatever it is, you need to dig it out of them. Bring the things that build up who they are to light. It will be worth it in the end.

Alright, I think I’ve talked about characters enough for now. I need to start working on some of the ones in the book I’ve just written—most are pretty flat and boring. So this was addressed to myself as well as to you. And I sure hope you’re a writer so you can understand what I’m trying to say and take it to heart. ;)

My question to you today: Have you ever had sudden revelations like this? And, if so, what did they teach you?

Hope you’re having a wonderful last week of November! :)
~Esther

Day 9. Yep, it’s Mid-November.

Well, okay. Maybe it isn’t mid-November. But if you are doing NaNo, then you might be able to agree with me: yes, it feels like mid-November. But I’ll talk about that more later. For now, here is my thankful list today:

1. A patient Mum. I don’t know what I’d do without her. I’m so glad she’s willing to listen to my wild explanations of what’s going on in my story at the moment, and try to offer advice!
2. Chairs. I couldn’t imagine sitting on the ground all the time.
3. Lights. I know I’d probably get more sleep if we did without them, but I am so glad that we have lights to see by!
4. Today’s verse on the calendar I made. It’s Daniel 5:5. “In the same hour came forth fingers of a man’s hand, and wrote over against the candlestick upon the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.” The encouragement for today was very encouraging, too—“All authors of the Bible’s books received their inspiration from the same source, God, who even had a ‘hand’ in writing the Bible, literally. Those writing fingers belonged to The Author of Authors, God.”
5. Little Nate, who loves to pick flowers. The roses along one side of the house are all out in full bloom, and he loves picking them to take to Mum. Tonight, Seth brought him in and he had a flower as big as his face. He kept sticking it in his face to smell—so cute!
6. A friend to call on the phone. Even though we can email, it’s really special to talk over the phone, too, since we’ve only met face-to-face once (long story there!). I’m so grateful to God for such a wonderful, Godly friend.
7. Faith. I’m so glad that God gives us faith, even when our trust is waning. I don’t understand how He does it, but He does. And I’m so grateful.

Well, I think mid-November doldrums has struck. I didn’t get anything written this morning, although I did sit down to write several times. I really didn’t have any ideas as to what to write and how, and so I spent a lot of time putting off the time I’d actually have to sit down and blast it out. I know I didn’t have writer’s block, I just had writer’s not. (Yes, there is such a thing. It’s possible to not have writer’s block, but have writer’s n0t which is just NOT writing.)

So I didn’t start writing until four this afternoon or so. I had talked to Mum about it, though, and she had given me some ideas. And this morning I had done some brainstorming, so I think that helped a little. But I think the big thing was that I prayed about it. I’ve been praying all along for this novel, but I know it really helped to just sit down and ask God to give me inspiration.

The last few mornings, I’ve also followed a tip Rachelle Rea shared on Every Good Word. She said that before each write, she does a warm-up session just to get her internal writer up and going, and also reads a bit of what she wrote the day before (if not the whole thing) to get her prepped and ready to spout out another thousand words or whatever she was planning to write. (There were several other good points in that article, too—just read through it and I think you’ll find encouragement.)

I think this pre-writing has really helped. I’ve been using 420fables.com to do my warm-up, because 4 minutes, 20 seconds isn’t that long, and yet it’s long enough to write something meaningful. Then after that I re-read the last paragraph/sentence or two from the last day’s writings, and work on getting out 250 words in 10 minutes or less. I’ve been using Write or Die every single day so far, because it’s so much fun to have the time bar and the word count bar side by side and beating the time bar by minutes. :) Write or Die at $10 US was a very, very, very good investment. I highly recommend it.

To sum all that up, I was able to get my total word count up to 22,000 words today—44% of the way! So I was happy with that. :) Hopefully I’ll be able to write more tomorrow—if not, at least to work on the story in my head, read up on some history that I printed out today that will come at the end of the book, and give myself some pretty stiff pep talks so that I’ll be raring to go Monday when I sit down to write. :)

Alright. I think it’s high time I land in bed. Over all, I think today was my hardest in writing for NaNo so far. But I still managed to do it—with God’s help. I hope that the following days will go better than today did.

~Esther

Wind, Spring Pictures, and Novel Titles

The flowers are out in full brilliance—even if this picture was taken about 2 months ago! They’re still blooming beautifully. I love spring. :)

 

I love plum blossoms. They’re so lovely and beautiful!

 

 

Lambs in August. SO cute!

 

I can’t remember the name of this bush. But the flowers are lovely!

 

 

 

Wonder what he’s cooking up?

 

My two cute little brothers, both reading books. I love the face that Nate is pulling!

 

Did you know that I have three brothers named James? (I was trying out the panoramic setting on my camera.)

 

Handsome little brother!

 

I love daffodils.

 

 

 

Before the chickens were put in summer housing, they enjoyed dust-bathing under the trees.

 

Two of my favourite things: deep blue New Zealand sky, and plum blossoms.

 

Two of our calves, soaking up the sunshine.

It is really, really windy here at the moment. So windy, in fact, that when I went out an hour or two ago to take down the laundry I had a hard time keeping my balance. Poor Nate is housebound until the wind has calmed down—it just knocks him over. Mum wants to work in the garden, but as soon as she would loosen the soil I’m sure it would blow away.

I’ve been working on coming up with a novel title lately. I like to believe that it’s best to find a title after you write a novel, but then at the same time it’s nice to have something to weave in as you go.

So today I was thinking about it, because there’s a 30 covers, 30 days project going on where you put in your novel’s title and synopsis, and are entered in a drawing for a free cover design. I came up with the title:

“The Living Shield”

I don’t know if this will end up being the final title, but it’s a great working title. And definitely a lot shorter than the one I had last year (A Rose in Spite of Thorns)!

In trying to find a title, I looked up Jewish symbols. I was just curious, and I’d like to have some kind of symbol in my story anyway. I’m sure all of you have seen the star of David, and each place I looked mentioned that. Apparently, the star was actually a symbol on David’s shield. I don’t really want to use the star itself in my book because several different books I’ve read about Jews had that in them, so in my eyes it’s almost an over-used symbol. The shield part intrigued me, though.

The other symbol that I liked was “Chai”. Now, I know that’s a type of tea, but in Hebrew it means something much different—it’s the Hebrew word for “living”. One of the sites said, “Some say it refers to the Living God; others say it simply reflects Judaism’s focus on the importance of life.” Whatever it refers too, it is a very beautiful symbol.

So I thought of combining the two. Then after thinking about it, I decided to look up “God as our shield” in the Bible. Here’s what I came up with:

1. “The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I praise him.” —Psalms 28:7
2. “After these things the word of the LORD came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.” —Genesis 15:1
3. “Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people saved by the LORD, the shield of thy help, and who is the sword of thy excellency! And thine enemies shall be found liars unto thee; and thou shalt tread upon their high places.” —Deuteronomy 33:29
4. “Our soul waiteth for the LORD: he is our help and our shield.” —Psalms 33:20
5. “O Israel, trust thou in the LORD: he is their help and their shield.” —Psalms 115:9
6. “Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him.” —Proverbs 30:5
7. “For the LORD is our defence; and the Holy One of Israel is our king.” —Psalms 89:18

Like I said, this is only a temporary title, but I really like it. I can just see (not quite taste it yet, but I can see it) how it would fit in the book.

Well, I should probably go. I need to finish planning the novel, and I only have (oh horrors!) only six days left. And I might be working one or two of those days. So I need to keep myself going.

~Esther

P.S. Do you want to look at some of the different interesting Jewish symbols? Go here: http://www.jewfaq.org/signs.htm.

The North Wind, the South Wind, and the Rooster

my most recent story

Once upon a time, a long time ago, the north wind had a quarrel with the south wind. Days passed. For a while, it seemed that the south wind was winning, but the north wind refused to accept defeat. So they decided to go ask a rooster to be the judge between them.

Huffing and puffing, the two competitors came to the chook run. “I’ll talk to him first!” the south wind announced, trying to grasp the latch.

“No you won’t!” the north wind shouted, grabbing at the door handle and trying to wrestle the south wind’s hand off it.

“Ouch! Your hand’s hot!” The south wind screamed.

“Brr! Yours is freezing!” The north wind complained. The two continued fighting, neither managing to open the door, but both getting terribly annoyed.

Suddenly, “Er-er-er-er-er! What’s going on here?” The noise came from right above them. Both winds stopped for a second, and stared, open-mouthed, at the cock who was dressed in the latest fashion.

“We, ah, we’re going to see the judge.” The south wind said, fumbling with his words and trying to protect his eyes from the brilliant sun behind the rooster.

“I see,” the cock said, flying gracefully to the ground. He adjusted his glasses, picked up his gold-headed cane, and motioned toward a door to his right. “Follow me,” he said crisply, and stepped majestically through the door.

Looking at each other strangely, the two winds followed, and soon found themselves in a dark, musty room.

“Sit down.” A stern voice said, and the two winds found seats on the dirty straw. Looking around, they saw no-one, but the room was so dark it would have been hard to tell if there was anyone there at all anyway.

“Now, what’s the problem?” The voice asked.

“The south wind…” The north began.

“I don’t understand why the north wind…!” the south wind said angrily.

They both continued talking and shouting until the judge cut in loudly, “Stop it, both of you! One at a time, please. North wind, you speak first.”

The north wind spoke quickly, stating his case. The south wind tried to butt in several times, but he was always told to be quiet by the judge. When his turn finally came, he angrily told his side of the story.

The judge was quiet for a moment. A ray of sunshine shone dimly through a filthy window, and the winds saw the judge for the first time. The light showed the shining grandeur of his red and gold feathers. Finally, the judge rose pompously to his feet. “The south wind is right. North wind, you must give in to him!”

The north wind rose in protest. He spouted angry words at the rooster, but nothing he said would change the verdict. Puffing violently, he blew all the cock’s feathers askew and marched out of the room. The south wind followed slowly.

Ever after that, the south wind has always won all his arguments with the north wind, and Dianne’s (one of our friends) rooster has always had ruffled feathers that stick straight up. No matter how much he’s tried to smooth them, they always stay rumpled. And that is the story of The North Wind, the South Wind, and the Rooster.

~Esther

P.S. We’ve just published issue #7 of JOJ! Go here to read it.

Saturday Spotlight #5

Zev Hoover, Age 14: Homeschooled Photo-Artist Makes it Big Online
Pretty amazing what one boy of fourteen can do! And I especially like the fact that he can do good creative designing. :)

Stop Moving the Goal Post
Good thoughts on prioritising. I really enjoyed this post.

When Worry Has Its Way
God is so much bigger than our worries!

Don’t get Stuck
Romanticizing the past…I never thought about it that way, but it’s certainly true!

Secret Fore-Edge Paintings Revealed in Early 19th Century Books at the University of Iowa
So neat! Pretty amazing!

How to Push Through When You Want to Give Up
Keeping going when you’re writing, even when you don’t feel like it. I’m sure I’ll be thankful for this post when NaNoWriMo comes around!

Instead of Granola Bars
I tried these, but forgot to put the cocoa powder in. Even without it, they were delicious! Might want to remember to keep them in the fridge, though, and/or add some coconut oil to hold it together better.

I Published My NaNo Novel! Jason Hough on the Denial that Comes With Being a New York Times Bestseller
Good thoughts—would be good to read over after NaNoWriMo. I really don’t know anything about Jason Hough, but I did like the story about someone winning NaNoWriMo and publishing their book. :)

6 Scrivener Alternatives
Looks like a useful list to have sometime!

Story time...
A very good reminder!

Pinteresting Wednesday {Writing Your Hurts}
Great advice for writers. :)

20 Healthy Granola Bar Recipes
These look scrumptious!

I Don't Have To Worry
I don’t have to worry! Very thought-provoking. I could identify! :)

Along the Dusty Road
Very interesting article/story.

Online Resources (for writers)
This is a HUGE list of resources for writers—I’m sure this will come in handy sometime!

Silk – Interactive Generative Art
Something fun—and neat—for you to look at. I love the symmetry!

Alright, that’s it! People must have been especially inspired this week. :)
~Esther

An Update…and NaNoWriMo!

First, an update. Last week was quite eventful for our family.

Picture taken by Sayna.

Sunday, we went to a friend’s place about 2-2 1/2 hours from here. We had LOTS of fun! You can read Sayna’s post about that afternoon here.

Tuesday, some of the family went to homeschool writing group. I stayed home with James, who was sick.

Wednesday, I got a new camera—that was exciting! And just in time for….

…taking pictures of a whale (this one was my favourite).

Thursday, we drove up to Kaikoura, to go on Whale Watch. Sadly, the sea was too rough to sail that day, so Friday we got up early again and headed up to Kaikoura. Thankfully, by then the sea had calmed enough that we could go!

We had an amazing time, and I’m hoping I can get some pictures up here soon. For now, you can read Mum’s two posts—Whale Watch and Dolphins (a video of the dolphins that actually turned out pretty good!).

This week has been nicely quiet and relaxed. :)
Next week, also, looks pretty full—to Kaikoura Sunday, for church. Then writing group Tuesday, close to Christchurch. Thursday evening, Lord willing, we will have the privilege of hosting Dr Tas Walker from Australia here in Cheviot for a Creation meeting. Dr Tas works for Creation Ministries International, and he’s making a tour of the South Island.
When we saw there were openings, Dad contacted CMI and eventually we were able to arrange for him to come here on the 5th of September! We’ll have a barbeque at 5.30 pm, and then at 7.30 Tas will speak at the Community Hall.
Tas and another man that is going with him will spend the night here, Lord willing, and then head on south the next day.
So, our next week is looking pretty full! :)

And now…NaNoWriMo!

I saw yesterday that National Novel Writing Month is coming up fast…kinda scary, and definitely exciting! :) And I’ve joined…hopefully this time I’ll have more of a chance to get a plot laid out before November starts. :) Last year, I had 3 days to prepare. This year, I have just over two months. So hopefully this time I will be able to get things together before I start writing. :)
I think I’ll work on my Israeli girl story again. I do have several other ideas, but I’d like to get this finished before I start anything else. :)
Be sure to check out the post about it! :) Will you join me?

~Esther

Saturday Spotlight

Here’s some encouraging articles I’ve come across lately (well, most of them lately anyway).

The Other Answer
A good poem, very thought-provoking.

In Your Perfect Time
Good thoughts on God’s time vs. our time.

Thankful Thursday ~ Give Thanks
Thinking about doing this…sounds like fun! :)

Tune In, Zone Out - Part 1
and
Tune In, Zone Out - Part 2
(some posts about writing, and using music when you’re writing)
I found these posts very good. Nice to refer back to sometimes.

The Beauty of Meekness
Good thoughts about meekness.

Reading Through the Book of Mormon
Even though I don’t agree with everything Lauralea says, I did find this post interesting—and a little funny! :)

Top Ten Writing Tips at KayeDacus.com
Here are all of the posts: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10.
I’m finding this set of posts really interesting—check them out!

A Touching Testimony
I’ve seen this elsewhere, and really appreciated it.

Being a Voice Not an Echo
Good thoughts about writing with your own voice, not just echoing what other people are saying.

Have a good day!
-Esther

A Smile for Your Day

At least, this put a smile on my face! :) This story was written back in 2010, basically 3 years ago (has it really been that long?!) in May, for school. I love looking back to what I wrote then—and I still remember the excitement at realizing that I had written my first story! Enjoy, and chuckle at my ignorance back then of how a school works. :)

(Note: this is completely unedited—although I’ve corrected a few spelling mistakes.) :)

Anita and the Terrible School Day

Anita walked into her room and threw herself on the bed, sobbing. If she had only been faster getting up this morning, and had eaten breakfast faster, she would not have missed the school bus. Why did it have to be today, of all days, when her class was going on a field trip to the nature museum?

She suddenly sat up, and grabbed her back-pack. Running outside and down the street, she saw school bus #8 (the kindergarten bus) stop at the McKenzie house, 2 blocks away. Running as fast as she could, she flagged down the sympathetic driver and got to school ½ hour late. (“not too bad,” she thought, “we usually don't start for ½ hour or so after we get here, anyways”)

After putting her coat in the locker, she raced down the hall as fast as she could without making too much noise. Bursting into her science class, she realized that they had started a ½ hour earlier than usual, due to the planned field-trip over lunch time.

LUNCH! It suddenly hit Anita that she had forgotten her lunch! She leaned over and whispered to her good friend, Susanna, when the teacher wasn't looking,“I forgot my lunch! Don't tell teacher that, though, I'll pretend I'm going out in the hall for something, and run home quickly and get it!”

She raised her hand. “Yes”? Teacher Ruth said, raising her eyebrows.

“Miss Ruth, may I go and get a drink?, I'm thirsty.” Anita said, eyeing the clock. She would have exactly 30 minutes to get home and back before they started to the nature museum.

“Yes, you may. Anita, why were you so late this morning?” Teacher Ruth added, noticing her look at the clock.

“Well, I suppose it was because I got up so late this morning.” Anita admitted, shame turning her face a crimson red.

“Hopefully you will be on time next time,” Teacher Ruth encouraged, giving her a smile.

Once in the hall, she almost ran to the door, and down onto the street. Running down the street, she wondered why in the world she had forgotten her food. As she neared home, she saw that her mother's car was gone from it's usual place on the street.

“Wonder where mom went?” She thought to herself, “If she goes anywhere, she goes shopping, and I didn't see her as I came, so she must have gone to visit a friend.”

Upon arriving home, she looked on the counter, where she was certain that her mom had put her food. It was not there.

“Oh, no!” Anita thought, “I promised Emily's mom that we would supply food for her lunch today!” Remembering that she had told mom, she breathed a sigh of relief.

“Now, where did mom put the food? I know she packed it, I saw her put it here!” Glancing at her watch, she was horrified to see that she had only 15 minutes to get back to school. Rushing to the refrigerator; she found some sandwich meat and mayonnaise. In another cupboard, she found a loaf of bread, and made two sandwiches. 10 minutes left! Stuffing the sandwiches in a plastic bag, she ran out the door and down the street.

As she neared school, she saw a school bus pull out, and disappear around the bend. “Oh, no!” She thought, “I won't get to go after all!” She slowly walked up the walk, and was just about to enter, when she, hearing a crunch of gravel behind her, turned around, just in time to see her mother drive into the car park and stop.

She ran over to her mother, and her mom rolled down her window, saying, “Just thought you might want this” And handed over the lunch box.

***********************************

“Thanks, Mom, too bad you were not here before!” Anita finished, after relating the recent events of what had just happened.

Running inside, she ran into Miss Ruth, and the entire class headed for the door. Stepping back, surprised, she said, “I thought that you had just gone!”

The whole class burst out laughing. “No, we didn't! That was the high school class going to the history park! We had to wait for them to go before we could! We couldn't leave you, anyway, Emily’s hungry!”

 

So—do you think it’s a keeper? :) I had almost totally forgotten about the story, but when I found it in my writings I knew I should share it. That last sentence is so funny! :) Wonder where I got the inspiration…?

I've got a {BIG} problem.

I'm supposed to write a short story. 1-2 pages. Easy, right?

NO.

The problem? It's been so long since I've written a "short" story that I've almost forgotten how to! 

All the plots I've come up with so far are almost too complex, too much for a short story! Help!!!

I remember the day when writing even a paragraph was the worst work anyone could ever make someone do! Now I'm choking at two pages, wishing I could just get a novel out! (well, something longer than a two-page story, anyway...)

Oh, well. I guess they say the worst thing a writer could do when writing a story is procrastinate, and that's exactly what I'm doing. So I'd better crack the whip on myself and get those two pages written (or however many they turn out to be.... ) 

This Writer's Life

(Taken from my diary)

21/03/2013 (10 pm)
I just had a most terrible thought. What would happen if I killed all of Taliah's family in the Florus massacre? I'm terrified! I hate the idea! But....

I don't know now. It's such a horrific thought! I shiver. I didn't know I was so involved in my story. I haven't even written in it for over two months!

What if...NO!!!! I couldn't do it! But....


yup, that's about how it goes....