"Old" People Writing for Teens V

Argh! I can't stand to hear about people giving everyone's books away. My brother used to loan my DVDs to his girlfriend and she'd break them or never give them back and it drove me insane. But I'm much more possessive of my books than I was of the DVDs, so I would've absolutely lost it if he'd loaned my books without asking.

Sorry to hear about the interruptions, Christabelle. I'm ridiculously easy to distract so I need lock all my doors or go to a library to have any hope of getting work done. I just bought Freedom today, though, which helped me get a 2-hour writing block done. So, yay! I hope you can get to the cafe this evening!

Stiger05 said:

Thanks, guys! I'm excited! This means I now get to go to San Diego in November and speak on a panel at conference. Honestly, I'm more excited to visit the San Diego Zoo than anything, though! It has been a dream of mine since I was a kid.

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I actually went there as a kid! It was the ONLY time my family went on a vacation that didn't involve waterfalls in Michigan's UP! First time on a plane, spent a week in California and I have so many memories. Unfortunately, the only thing I remember about the zoo (and this was from the 80's) was that they had some kind of wildcat that looked like a very close relative to my housecat back home. I think they were Scottish wildcats.

Becca C. said:

The most annoying part is that her room is next to mine! Is it so hard to move the books the whole three feet from your shelf to my room? Gahhhh.

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You'll have to search her room before you move out into that new apartment you were talking about. And based on what ev eryone else is saying, don't leave anything behind or Mom will throw it out!

paintitreadbooks said:

I was very upset when I found out that my mom got rid of all of my childhood books--all my Babysitter's Club, Babysitter's Little Sister, all of the different Sweet Valley series, etc. Over the years, I have slowly been collecting them again, picking them up at goodwills and garage sales and stuff.

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What is this getting rid of books thing? I took everything with me when I moved out, so Dad didn't have a chance to mess with my stuff, but my daughter has stuff in our basement and I wouldn't discard it without her permission. I might say get it out or I will, but I'd give her a heads up!

So I was all excited because I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo this year, and Nov. 1 is a Saturday, and Hubby's cousins have a cabin I can borrow whenever they aren't using it, so I was planning a writing retreat to kick of NaNo . . . when I realized that means Fri. is Oct. 31. Halloween. And that's a big deal at our house. We travel two hours to trick-or-treat with family in Detroit, spend the night if possible and visit Yates Cider Mill the day after. It's tradition. And it may be the last time we do it since everyone else's kiddos are almost grown. We have the only little ones left, so I don't plan on the big trip when it's just my kids trick-or-treating. Anyway, I may have to have my retreat the next weekend and kick off NaNo in a quieter-fewer-words-written kind of way.

Hello!

jtrylch13 said:

So I was all excited because I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo this year, and Nov. 1 is a Saturday, and Hubby's cousins have a cabin I can borrow whenever they aren't using it, so I was planning a writing retreat to kick of NaNo . . . when I realized that means Fri. is Oct. 31. Halloween. And that's a big deal at our house. We travel two hours to trick-or-treat with family in Detroit, spend the night if possible and visit Yates Cider Mill the day after. It's tradition. And it may be the last time we do it since everyone else's kiddos are almost grown. We have the only little ones left, so I don't plan on the big trip when it's just my kids trick-or-treating. Anyway, I may have to have my retreat the next weekend and kick off NaNo in a quieter-fewer-words-written kind of way.

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Aww, sorry it messes with your NANO kick-off! That sounds like a fun tradition, though!

I'm SO glad fall is here! I don't have any traditions as fun as jtrylch, but I do make wassail and carve pumpkins every October. And fall decorations are the best! Since Hubs was gone last week, I haven't gotten my out yet (I'm afraid of the very tall ladder to the attic, and would probably break something trying to wrangle the box down alone). This weekend, though!

belatedly, Stiger05, congrats on the promotion!

jtrylch13 , the Nano-kick off/Halloween thing bites me every year. I organize for my part of the state, and we have lots of teens/parents-with-kids, so kick off night is a "come in costume! Come between parties! come by after trick-or-treating!" kind of thing because there's no other way people can show up. Your plan sounds like a lot of fun. Nano goes a month, you'll get your words in

Over 1/3 through the revision on the SNI. Somehow, this chapter is just less good than the ones that came before it. Oh well, that's what revision is for, right?

I'm anxious over the mess of a query letter I've been working on, and scared of dipping toes back into beta-waters. I really like this one, and I'd hate to hear that it isn't doing anything for other folks. I have to the end of the revision to just dwell on that possibilities, so on with the revision, I suppose.

Ah, NaNo isn't going to be my thing this year. I'll be in the thick of final revisions on one of my novels then, so no use in participating. I guess I could go rogue, but I don't really feel like it when I don't have anything new to work on. If I had a 'text in progress', I'd definitely participate. I've really benefited from NaNo in the past, and this year's CampNaNo in July made wonders for one of my WIPs.

Speaking of lack of reading among the people and co-workers who surround us: Husband rarely reads, but got a new book in the post today and has started it already. It's a (non-fiction) travel book by the only man on record in the world who has visited all 198 countries in the world. Book is called 198, of course. 20 pages are devoted to when he first started racking up the tally of countries in his late teens. And who was his companion for three weeks around Europe? My husband! I look forward to reading those pages and see if I recognize any familiar traits of said husband as a teen, haha. I've heard about that trip many times, so I suppose I'll read some familiar stuff, but it's cool to see him featured in a book

EDIT: the travel writer is the youngest in the world to have visited all 198 countries... not the only one.

Oh jeez Coffeebeans, I hope that's what editing is for, because I've reached the dreaded "middle" and it's all downhill from here...

I do not think I will be doing NaNo this year. I've done it for like nine years and to be honest I think I've gotten all that I can from it. My time would be better spent doing something else... maybe I can crank W1S1 into high gear so I won't feel left out?

Anything can be fixed in editing, if you edit long enough!

Speaking of editing, I EDITED WORLDSHARD!

It gained 10,000 words and a better character arc for Pan!

Ellaroni said:

Speaking of lack of reading among the people and co-workers who surround us: Husband rarely reads, but got a new book in the post today and has started it already. It's a (non-fiction) travel book by the only man on record in the world who has visited all 198 countries in the world. Book is called 198, of course. 20 pages are devoted to when he first started racking up the tally of countries in his late teens. And who was his companion for three weeks around Europe? My husband! I look forward to reading those pages and see if I recognize any familiar traits of said husband as a teen, haha. I've heard about that trip many times, so I suppose I'll read some familiar stuff, but it's cool to see him featured in a book

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That's so cool! What an awesome claim to fame! I'll have to check out the book, that sounds fascinating.

CoffeeBeans said:

I'm anxious over the mess of a query letter I've been working on, and scared of dipping toes back into beta-waters. I really like this one, and I'd hate to hear that it isn't doing anything for other folks. I have to the end of the revision to just dwell on that possibilities, so on with the revision, I suppose.

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I'm anxious over my query too. In fact, I let it sit inn QLH for days instead of checking critiques because I don't really want to hear them. But I do. But I don't.

Ellaroni said:

Ah, NaNo isn't going to be my thing this year. I'll be in the thick of final revisions on one of my novels then, so no use in participating. I guess I could go rogue, but I don't really feel like it when I don't have anything new to work on. If I had a 'text in progress', I'd definitely participate. I've really benefited from NaNo in the past, and this year's CampNaNo in July made wonders for one of my WIPs.

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I wouldn't be participating if I wasn't actually ready to start something new anyway. In fact, I'm not going to be too gung-ho about it. I'm not even sure how many words I write in a day because I've never checked.

Ellaroni said:

Speaking of lack of reading among the people and co-workers who surround us: Husband rarely reads, but got a new book in the post today and has started it already. It's a (non-fiction) travel book by the only man on record in the world who has visited all 198 countries in the world. Book is called 198, of course. 20 pages are devoted to when he first started racking up the tally of countries in his late teens. And who was his companion for three weeks around Europe? My husband! I look forward to reading those pages and see if I recognize any familiar traits of said husband as a teen, haha. I've heard about that trip many times, so I suppose I'll read some familiar stuff, but it's cool to see him featured in a book

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That's pretty cool. He can tell everybody he's featured in a book. Awesome bragging rights.

I think I'm going to start No Name's second book for NaNo, but I kind of want to start something completely new too. I have several ideas, but nothing with a real plot, just ideas. Like I said, I'll probably just work on Book 2. At least that one is almost entirely plotted in my head.

I doubt I'll do NaNo this year. I participated last year, but I didn't finish. It was a good jump start on my project, but between work, my little one, and trying to finish up/revise my manuscript, I don't think I can focus on something else. I need to finish my MS and get it ready, and then I have my WIP to work on after that. I don't have anything new. I guess I could go rogue with the WIP, but there's still the time constraints with everything else that's going on.

I wrote the scene I'd been avoiding two nights ago. It's not great. It's definitely not where I want it to be, but it's really the crux to reach my ending. I didn't want my characters to have this fight, but I think that's why I couldn't get the ending right when I was avoiding it. So now it has happened -- AND I'M NOT REVISING IT OBSESSIVELY! I'll revise when I'm done.

No NaNo for me this year. There's just no way I could make 50K in a month. The last time I won NaNo, I wrote 2+ hours a day.

But maybe I could do my own half-NaNo? It would be really good for me to get some solid momentum on a new project and get into a habit. Mayhaps I'll chat with the hubby about this.

I have a couple of ideas for books. But I recently got an idea-ish that is really dark. I'm not even sure it would work as a book, really, but it might be fun to have a sekrit project.

Speaking of lack of reading among the people and co-workers who surround us: Husband rarely reads, but got a new book in the post today and has started it already. It's a (non-fiction) travel book by the only man on record in the world who has visited all 198 countries in the world. Book is called 198, of course. 20 pages are devoted to when he first started racking up the tally of countries in his late teens. And who was his companion for three weeks around Europe? My husband! I look forward to reading those pages and see if I recognize any familiar traits of said husband as a teen, haha. I've heard about that trip many times, so I suppose I'll read some familiar stuff, but it's cool to see him featured in a book

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This sounds so cool!

ETA: jtrylch13, your Halloween tradition is adorable. How nice that you get together like that. I had a big family as a kid and spent many years trick or treating with cousins. It was always a lot of fun.

Yeah, Wampuscat, it is a lot of fun! We trick-or-treat in big (wealthy ) subdivisions so the kiddos have a blast running from house to house. It used to be that even the teens all the way into their college years would participate plus all their friends. We'd drive a haywagon behind a lawnmower for in between longer stretches and they'd stash extra candy so they didn't have to carry it all. But that's fallen off in the last few years. Now it's just my three little ones, their ten-year-old cousin, his friends and maybe my great-nephew if we can get him (divorced parents). My new great niece will probably come, but she's not even one yet. We'd transfer the tradition to our hometown, but honestly trick-or-treat is lame here. We did it once and probably never again. I think it's because our campground has two Halloween weekends where people camp and then hand out candy on Saturday, but those are before Halloween. people get really crazy decorating their camp sites. i think they're burned out by Halloween, and it's a small town. No one wants to drive between farm houses.

jtrylch13 said:

Yeah, Wampuscat, it is a lot of fun! We trick-or-treat in big (wealthy ) subdivisions so the kiddos have a blast running from house to house. It used to be that even the teens all the way into their college years would participate plus all their friends. We'd drive a haywagon behind a lawnmower for in between longer stretches and they'd stash extra candy so they didn't have to carry it all. But that's fallen off in the last few years. Now it's just my three little ones, their ten-year-old cousin, his friends and maybe my great-nephew if we can get him (divorced parents). My new great niece will probably come, but she's not even one yet. We'd transfer the tradition to our hometown, but honestly trick-or-treat is lame here. We did it once and probably never again. I think it's because our campground has two Halloween weekends where people camp and then hand out candy on Saturday, but those are before Halloween. people get really crazy decorating their camp sites. i think they're burned out by Halloween, and it's a small town. No one wants to drive between farm houses.

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I grew up in the country and we had the same problem. Our church started doing a Trunk or Treat, where people would park at the church and decorate their truck beds or car trunks and hand out candy. The church always had snacks and games too. If you wanted to drive into town, the stores downtown and in the mall did something similar, decorated and dressed up and handed out candy.

I live in a subdivision now and hoped we'd get a lot of trick-or-treaters, but we live on a side street and kids rarely venture down our way. We even have this big inflated pumpkin that looks like Pac-Man about to eat three ghosts.

Sorry about the no trick-or-treaters Stiger! I've never actually had one either, but that's partly because we always live out in the country and partly because we aren't home anyway. i even stopped leaving candy in a bowl on the porch because no one would take it. I grew up in the country too and did the whole drive around and maybe get to 15 houses thing. We still lived in my home town when my first two kids were small, and by then they did a huge Halloween thing at the high school with games and candy and a costume contest and photo ops set up. Once I met my hubby, it was always down to detroit and the family thing. It's pretty difficult when Halloween isn't on Thurs. - Sat. I'd even let my kids skip school on Fri if it was on Thurs. Family is sometimes more important.

Getting more warm fuzzies from QLH. I know they'll wear off when I actually try to implement the helpful suggestions, but I'm going to enjoy them for now!

Stiger05 said:

We even have this big inflated pumpkin that looks like Pac-Man about to eat three ghosts.

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That's adorable! I love Halloween. I always lived in fairly populated areas growing up, so I never had to go far to get candy. The year I lived in an apartment building was definitely the easiest, though

Does anyone know what they're going to dress up as, yet? I started going through my boxes of random costume bits and pieces. When I was a kid we used to go to lots of rummage and church sales and buy old clothes for my dress up. Now that I'm grown a lot of the clothes actually fit me perfectly. I was living in Princeton, NJ at the time, which has a lot of old money, so the rummage sales would have some pretty fantastic stuff. I found a huge old wedding dress in the garage that looks sort of Elizabethan, so I think I'm going to modify that into something fun for my costume.

I probably won't do NaNo either, because I'll be knee-deep in revisions. I did have fun last year, though, so I might try to swing it.

I've never been trick-or-treating. It's just not that a big thing in the UK.

I've never been that huge on Halloween. In my neighbourhood we only get a handful of kids since there aren't that many young kids around anymore. Just my next-door neighbours who have two super adorable ones. When they knock on our door, it's the best. The place I'm moving to has a front door at the back of the house, down some stairs, so I won't get any trick or treaters there for sure. I'm okay with that though.

I will be doing NaNo, but probably as a way to finish my current WIP or revise it or something. My best friend's family are members of Club Intrawest, this super-exclusive resort vacation club dealie, and she's spending some of the family points for her and I to have a mini writing retreat in early November at the Whistler resort. I'm beyond stoked for that! I've never been on a specific trip to write. And Whistler is ridiculously nice (and only like 40 minutes from my house, so yay).

What's Beggar's Night?

In Detroit we have Devil's night. It's supposed to be just a night to pull pranks, but morphed into people burning down abandoned buildings. I think the police and firefighters have pretty much shut that down now.

Becca - Yay! on the writing retreat. That sounds awesome! My husband loves Whistler (I'm assuming the place you go skiing?) He used to go skiing all over the country before wife and kiddos got in the way. But he loves us. Someday he can't take the boys.

I don't know if anyone here cares, but The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson is free on iBooks right now