Killing Your Main Character: Could you do it?

I think most of us will agree, there are lots of good reasons for killing off secondary characters. It can be used as a plot twist or turning point in the story. It can also bring about strong emotions like grief and revenge that can move the plot forward. But what about killing off your main character (MC)?

I don’t know if I could do it. For me, reading a book is an escape from the real world into a fantasy world. I want to go on adventures, fall in love all over again, travel to different worlds and experience the impossible. What I don’t want is to find myself a weeping mess by the end of the book. Personally, if I found out a MC in a book or a series ended up on the chopping block, I probably wouldn’t bother reading it. Why should I invest myself emotionally in a book if only to have my heart broken by the end? There are far too many good books out there that I could be reading instead. But maybe I just don’t ‘get it.’ Now of course you could argue it all depends on the story...but still, there something that feels terribly wrong about killing off a MC. Take the Harry Potter series for example. Do you think the books/movies would have been as successful if Harry ended up dying at the end? What about your book? Could you kill off your main character? Have you ever killed off your main character?

And on that charming note, stay safe Main Characters, stay safe.

Happy Friday all. (:  

Don't be a Cow

I live in rural France. 

It's nothing exciting and no different than a lot of rural places across the globe. Well, the trees are different. I grew up in the US, in Virginia, and the trees there are unlike the ones here. I miss the east coast, but I digress. A few weeks ago, the farmer up the road moved his cattle to a pasture next to our house. Moving the herd is fairly simple. The farmer closes off driveways and side roads with rope and ushers the cattle down the street into the next field. Now, most people don't live near cattle so they don't realize just how big and powerful these animals can be. Let me throw some numbers at you. The average weight of a mid-sized cow (Charolais pictured) ranges from about 630 to 1,130 kg (1,400 to 2,500 lbs). Keep in mind, that an older model Volkswagen Beetle weighs about 1,860 lbs. 

It's hard to see but the arrow is pointing to the thin white rope used to
section off the road and keep the cows from wandering
into my neighbors yard.

I thought about this as I watched the cattle hoof it down the road and realized the only thing separating the vertical me from the trampled, flattened me, was an old flimsy line of rope. That's it. And you know what? It worked. The herd went where they were supposed to go, and not a single cow tried to break the line to go into greener pastures. 

There they go. Moo . . .

People. Don't be cows. 

There are times in life when the only thing keeping us from greatness is just a flimsy line of rope that we've constructed out of fear, self-doubt or ignorance. Don't let these obstacles keep you from forging your own path and achieving your goals. It's fear that keeps us following the herd, whether it's going to Disney or off a cliff. So don't be afraid to question what's going on around you, be brave when you have to be, and don't let yourself be tricked into believing you can't, because guess what? You can. 

Don't be a cow.

Be a lion. 

Be a dragon. 

Or just be yourself, 

ready to break through the line of fear and doubt.

Then, be Great.

****

Have a great weekend!

(: 

Weather: You Crazy Girl

Whether you celebrate Easter or not, 

I hope you have a great weekend, 

preferably without the snow, 

unless you're weird and like that sort of thing.

See ya Monday. 

:D 

Lockmeupology

Have a great weekend everyone and hope it's productive. 

But if it's not, 

then I hope it's FUN! 

:D

The Unofficial Got Green Blogfest Post

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

I've been nagging my writer for weeks! Pleading with her to let me join Mark's Got Green Blogfest. I told her it didn't need to be complicated. All she'd have to do is whip me up a cute little green outfit, throw in an Irish joke, and maybe add a four-leaf clover somewhere. You know I've looked all my life, but I've never found a real four-leaf clover before. ): Sadly, the writer couldn't give two flips, she just kept mumbling stuff like, "Have to finish my edits . . . have to finish A-Z posts . . . I'm French/Italian . . ." bla, bla, bla. But whatever. I never gave up and just kept wearing her down, determined to get my four-leaf clover and green dress. 

Finally, she gave in and this is what she came up with: 

B****

Worst. St. Paddy's Drawing. Ever.

Happy Friday and an Early Happy St. Paddy's Day to all you crazy green beer chugging, Lucky Charms eating, green clothes sporting folks!  

>:D

Crackmeupology

Wasn't it Monday, yesterday? 

I don't know about you, but this week has gone by at light speed. 

Is it possible to slow things down over the weekend? 

Happy Friday everyone. (:  

Crackmeupology

Have a great weekend everyone, hope it's filled with vampire-nuclear-killer rabbits with happy colons. 

(: 

Alex Cavanaugh Cover Reveal and She Said What Winners

I am excited and honored to be part of Alex Cavanaugh's cover reveal today for his book CassaStorm! This book marks the last in the already successful Cassa trilogy that has Alex ranked as Amazon Sci-Fi Best Selling author!  

CassaStorm by Alex J. Cavanaugh

http://alexjcavanaugh.blogspot.com/

Cover Reveal
Release date: September 17, 2013

A storm gathers across the galaxy…

Byron thought he’d put the days of battle behind him. Commanding the Cassan base on Tgren, his only struggles are occasional rogue pirate raids and endless government bureaucracies. As a galaxy-wide war encroaches upon the desert planet, Byron’s ideal life is threatened and he’s caught between the Tgrens and the Cassans.

After enemy ships attack the desert planet, Byron discovers another battle within his own family. The declaration of war between all ten races triggers nightmares in his son, shaking Bassan to the core and threatening to destroy the boy’s mind.

Meanwhile the ancient alien ship is transmitting a code that might signal the end of all life in the galaxy. And the mysterious probe that almost destroyed Tgren twenty years ago could be on its way back. As his world begins to crumble, Byron suspects a connection. The storm is about to break, and Byron is caught in the middle…

Science Fiction - Space Opera/Adventure

Print ISBN 9781939844002

E-book ISBN 9781939844019

Congratulations Alex on this fantastic cover! 

CassaStar, CassaFire and CassaStorm look amazing all lined up together! 

***

AND THE WINNERS ARE . . . 

Before we get to the winners, Michelle and I want to thank you all for making this bloghop such a success. I was skeptical at first, unsure if people would want to participate, but it was Michelle's enthusiasm and encouragement that convinced me. And having 30+ people sign up for our blogfest is twice as many than we expected. Plus, you all really out did yourselves. Every single entry made us laugh, chortlesnort, giggle or chuckle in some form or fashion. And when you're sick with the flu, laughter is great medicine.  I hope you realize how creative and funny you lot are. The same comic strip with the optional bonus words yielded a wide variety of different scenarios. You had the girls tripping over rope, over feet, or just plain trippin (ahem Alex . . . (;  ). The girls were sightseeing, rushing to the mall, to the dance or running away with dragon loot! You blew us away by your creativeness and snark, so you can imagine how hard it was to choose winners. We'd like to share with you some of our favorite quotes from the fest (in no particular order):

"Who does he think he is Buzz Lightyear?"

"... hoist me up before the champagne and LSD start running out my nose."

"Did somebody say THONG?"

"... a talking dragon-dog."

"we've got stylish beach-babe hairstyles."

"don't get your panties twisted in a bunch."

"I give you Dragon GPS for Virgin Snack here."

"Vazz izt diz, Giantz Condomz!?!

"Get your ass cheek in here!"

"We look like we should be on survivor,”

"At least the blood will match my outfit!"

"There's a party at my cave tonight."

"I can't run in these heels." Clop! Clop! Clop!

"Next time remind me to stay away from hot air balloons, mischievous monsters and clumsy superheros."

"...Tetons. So distracting..."

"Hey did you just kill Brad Pitt?"

"V's buying, I took his wallet."

"I think I gave a frog a heart attack."

"Are these breasts or pockets?"

"After all we've been through, you went out and found another critique partner? Why don't I just tie this rope around my neck?!"

"We tangoed cheek-to-cheek with death and won!"

"...honour me with a kiss? And not on the cheek either. I mean, I just popped a tic-tac."

"Don't look, I'm wearing granny panties!"

"Captain V blows!"

"Oh honey...that grey thong doesn't look good on you."

"...if only I had paid more attention in airspeed momentum class instead of thinking about my tango lessons."

"...skirt's gonna flap down showing the world a set of cheeks it never expected to see..."

"and what's with the banana-yellow cape, dud? Like, vomit."

"I don't know why I travel with you. You're a train wreck waiting to happen!"

"Habz no fearz, Viagra Man'z heeeeerz!"

Speaking of knickers, I can see yours from here! Were they always grey, or do they need to be washed? 

"Hurry Elise, we need to get back behind our keyboards where it's safe."

"Virgin Boy to the rescue!!!"

"Dude, did you have to do that in the balloon? "

"This is so embarrassing. It’s almost as embarrassing as the time you–"

"Does my head look big with this seaweed on it?"

"Dudette, I know, get up in this balloon so we can getaway with her treasure!"

****

AND NOW . . .  Drum Roll . . . 

Honorable Mentions: 

Alex Cavanaugh Ninja Captain

 Cheryl Duffin at Texas Playwright Chick 

Julie from Emptynestinsider 

LG Keltner at Writing Off The Edge, 

 Melissa at 5-minute Piece Of My Mind 

Tara Tyler at Tara Tyler Talks

Winner for Most Creative entry:

Tammy Theriault at Writing one Petal at a Time

Tammy, you win a banner or badge sponsored by the wonderful Tara Tyler at Tara Tyler Talks! 

4 Grand Prize Winners: 

Nick Wilford at Scattergun Scribblings

PK HREZO at Fearless Fiction

Nick and PK get to chose one from the following list of books and we'll be happy to send it to you (email us for the details):

1. On Writing - Steven King

2. Bird by Bird - Ann Lamott

3. The Right To Write - Julie Cameron

&

Al Diaz at Father Dragon Writes

Mark Means at Left and Write

Al and Mark get to chose one from the list below and we'll be happy to send it to you (email us for the details):

1. The Elements of Style, 4th edition - William Strunk Jr and E.B. White

2. Save the Cat - Blake Snyder

3. 10$ Amazon Gift Card

Congratulations to the winners and a huge thank you to everyone who participated and SPECIAL HUGS to my Co-Host Sister M! 

Have a wonderful weekend 
(: 

Answers: You Write Like a Girl

  

If you missed Tuesday's post, then you may want to go Here first. On Tuesday I brought up the question of sex/gender with regard to writing style and asked the following question: Do you think you could read a passage from a book, without prior knowledge of who penned it, and determine whether the author was man or woman?  I gave excerpts from seven different authors and asked readers to guess for themselves which were written by men and which by women. 

Luckily, several of you guys came through for me, played along and shared your thoughts on the subject. Thank you! I got some really interesting results like one excerpt that most people guessed correctly and one that everyone kept guessing wrong. The post also sparked some thought provoking e-mail conversations, but I'll wait to share all that with you at the bottom of the post, I know you all are itching to find out who wrote what. So without further ado . . .   

1)  There's something else in their eyes, too, something that will haunt them, all unacknowledged, until the day they die, and cast its shadow over even their happiest days. The fear of what they did. What they did in the unremembered part of their shared dream."
     That's what keeps him where he is and makes him take the telephone even though he is sweltering, roasting, fucking melting. 

 -Stephen King, Dreamcatcher



2) Like and equal are two entirely different things.
      For the moment she had escaped from the power of IT.
     But how?
     She knew that her own puny little brain was no match for this great, bodiless, pulsing, writhing mass on the round dais. She shuddered as she looked at IT. 

-Madeleine L'Engle, A Wrinkle in Time




3)  Silence.
     You'll find your way. Trust me.
     Tentative, she inched forward blindly. Leap of faith? Katherine could not even see her hand directly in front of her face. She kept moving forward, but within a matter of seconds, she was entirely lost. Where am I going?
     That was three years ago.

-Dan Brown, The Lost Symbol



4) It turned its back on me and began to walk back the way I had come, toward the village, back to the empty house I had left that morning; and it whistled as it walked.
     I've been here ever since. Hiding. Waiting. Part of the bridge.

-Neil Gaiman, Troll-Bridge


5)  The horizon merged with the dunes into a single mass of dusty beige. Out here even the sky is sucked dry of all color. It is a smudge of pale taupe, paler topaz; a trace of blued-steel, met by the blade of the horizon. To the south, east and west there was nothing, miles and miles of nothing.

-Jennifer Roberson, Sword Dancer


6) At last, after some days, the sun again appeared and shone brightly over the white ground, but he went to bed again behind the mountains at a very early hour, as if he did not find such pleasure in looking down on the earth as when everything was green and flowery. But then the moon came out clear and large and lit up the great white snowfield all through the night, and the next morning the while mountain glistened and sparkled like a huge crystal. 

-Johanna Spyri, Heidi



7)"Ohhhhh . . ."
It was the long cry of a man gone over a cliff into Eternity.
It seemed we sat waiting to hear him hit bottom.
Far off in the hills in the upper part of the house, his door banged shut.
My soul turned over and died.

-Ray Bradbury, Any Friend of Nicholas Nickleby's is a Friend of Mine


Here's a quick breakdown, my analysis and thoughts of the results. 

First, no one got them all correct, however one person got pretty darn close and that was Tony Hunt, (aka. laughingwolf) at . . . paws and reflect. He got them all correct except for one, and I'll get to that in just a second.  But for now, Tony you ROCK! I don't know if it's the editor training in ya or if you just got a nose for writing styles but damn, color me impressed!

Just about everyone guessed #1 correctly as being male. Not only that, but Michael Offutt nailed it by naming the author right off the bat. YOU DA MAN Michael. (: Now, I think what gave it away in part, was the f-bomb. But before you start booing me for that, please understand I'm not saying women never use profanity in their writing. I know I have and will use it IF I feel it necessary. That being said, I believe in our society, it is generally less accepted for a woman to use profanity than a man. Again, that's not saying that women aren't allowed to cuss or don't cuss. I'll fucking cuss and say shit all the damn time if I please. But it's my opinion that men get slightly different reactions especially in public when they use profanity than when women use it. Women in the 1930s for example would never use profanity to the extent that women use it today. But nonetheless, the stigma is still there and society still frowns more readily on women who cuss than on men who cuss. I think it's an unwritten rule that can effect the way some women write. Just my 2 cents folks. I wonder how different the answers would have been had I left out the f-bomb from King's excerpt . . .   

The second excerpt was another one most people guessed correctly as being written by a woman. Michael Offutt even made the comment that it must have been written by a woman because "Men don't use the word 'puny'. And I agree with him in the general sense. Obviously, we're not saying no man has ever not used the word puny, but in general men would probably choose a different word. 

On the flip side, the one excerpt that just about everyone missed, even Tony (; was #7 Ray Bradbury. The only people that got it correct was SP Bowers, Celeste Holloway, and Melissa (all women by the way). Ray Bradbury in my opinion, is the master of all masters when it comes to using imagery and writing description. No one tops Ray. No. One.  I just have to share with you another example of what I'm talking about, it's one sentence long and a perfect description:

"The second night a dog trotted by, wearing his tongue half out of his mouth like a loosely tied red cravat, smiling at trees." Ray Bradbury, That Woman On The Lawn

Anyway, as for the rest of the excerpts, people were pretty much divided. Michael made the comment that descriptions are androgynous and it would be difficult to tell them apart. To which I respectfully disagreed and made some of the following points. I think you can SOMETIMES tell if a segment is written by a woman or by a man depending on word choice in the same way Michael said "men don't use the word puny." Take the sun as an example. How would you describe it? Like a ball of fire or like a sunflower. (Probably neither, but I'm trying to prove a point). It's my opinion that most men would avoid using the sunflower metaphor or any flowery type language because that tends to be attributed to a more feminine voice. Then Tony made a good point in one of his comments when he said "usually, the female writer includes detailed info of a scene, like the number of buttons on a sleeve, something a male, usually, won't mention." I agree with him. How many times have you heard the saying, "women notice everything" or women saying "it's the little things that count . . ." or "PUT THE TOILET SEAT DOWN!" To which Michael says, he sees my points but "I still think Atwood writes like a man." LOL!

Anyway, Michael made another interesting point. He noted that (and I'm paraphrasing a bit) male writers often bring their ideology into their writing more so than women. Michael calls this "writing with your Richard." xD Love it!  Now, of course women do this as well, but he sees it more often with male writers that use their story as a soapbox on which to stand on. Women, from what he read, tend to refrain from judgement and focus more on the emotional aspects of a scene and what it means for the characters. This aspects of male vs female writers really intrigues me and I'd love to dig deeper into this subject.   

There is one other aspect I believe effects the way men and women write. It's not a very popular idea, but I believe a lot of the differences we see stems from the fact that biologically/physically  men and women are different. One is not better than the other, we're just different and that fundamental difference will have a ripple effect (even if it's slight) that effects what we do and how we think. 

In any event, I believe with practice and training, a good writer can learn to write with a more masculine or feminine voice if they choose, it just takes time to develop. But what if you're a woman writer working with a male editor?! Ok, ok, I'll stop here because this post is already mega F****** long, but I find this subject fascinating and would love to hear your thoughts. 

Oh and last thing, I promise. The following is a link to the Gender Genie. As stated on their site, "the Gender Genie uses a simplified version of an algorithm . . . to predict the gender of an author." Basically, all you have to do is copy/paste text into their textbox and it will predict the gender of the author. Not sure how accurate this is but it could be fun to test out some of your POVs with.  

((((((HAPPY FRIDAY EVERYONE!))))))

if you made it all the way down here, consider this your virtual hug. 

Have a great weekend

 (:

Crackmeupology and Happy Nuts

I bought this in a local French supermarket. 

It made me laugh. Apparently, I'm easy with the lols. 

Anyway, I think everyone should eat happy nuts, 
don't you think? 

Psst . . . *shifty eyes* they were delicious. 

(;

Happy Friday and hope you all have a good weekend!

You are Awesome

Wishing everyone a rockin' Friday and great weekend! 
Also, a big thank you to everyone who has been able to sign up for our giveaway blogfest and to those helping to spread the word! 
:D

 

Okay, I was thinking about doing a little 1:06, then some 2:08, and why not some 4:50. 
Then maybe a few hours of 6:32 wouldn't hurt and a 7:31 drop to round out the weekend. 
Afterwards, I think I'll chill with a few of my friends at 8:04. 
So, what are you doing this weekend?  

 (;

The Morning Star, And a Poll

This morning during breakfast my kids and I were looking out the window. The sun was starting to come up and they asked me what star that was in the sky.  I wasn't sure. I told them I think it's actually the planet Venus, the morning star, but I'm not sure. Can anyone confirm that by chance?

The eastern sky at around 7:30am, November 30th.

Also, Mina Lobo over at Some Dark Romantic is conducting a poll to see what days of the week you guys are most likely to be catching up on your blog reading. It's real quick so hop on over and vote, if you get the chance.

Oh and one more thing!

Happy Friday everyone, and have a great weekend!

(:

Lockmeupology

Enjoy your last weekend in September.

(: 

Lockmeupology: Sounds Logical to Me

?!

Lockmeupology: On the Go

I'm going to be on the road for the next few days, apologies for not getting around to pollute comment on your blogs. Things should get back to normal by next week. I do have a prescheduled post for you so be sure to tune in this Sunday, same food time, same food channel. 

Have a great weekend!