When I read something I love, I can’t just enjoy it. I have to study it. Pull it apart to see what worked. Put it together again just to see if I can do it too.
It’s how I process and it’s how I learn. And it’s something I did recently with a new favorite series, Red Rising. Continue reading
Do you ever love something so much you actually hate it?
Example: Amazing book. Tears out your heart. Shreds it with sharp fingernails and hands it back to you with a serving of thematic truth, raw emotions, and a glaze of carefully crafted prose and self-doubt. Continue reading
Have you ever read a book that claws through the foundation of everything you ever thought you knew about fiction?
And when the ground finally gives way, you find yourself falling through the abyss of space and you can’t breathe but at least you’ve never seen stars like these before. Then you realize they aren’t stars at all but flaming wreckage hurtling silently toward you and there’s nothing you can do but hope that something will survive the storm. Continue reading
Writers aren’t always inspired artists with words spilling from their fingertips to paint an imaginary world in a thousand and one shades.
Correction.
Writers are rarely inspired artists with words that just flow. We have the picture in our head, but the word part is a bit more difficult. Continue reading
Nothing is ever enough, have you noticed that?
The money we make. The respect we earn. The satisfaction in a job well done. No sooner do we accomplish one goal than we make ourselves another. And in the end we are left, surrounded by all we have gained and wondering one question. Continue reading
I have to admit. I’m biased.
I absolutely adored Leigh Bardugo’s previous duology, so when I got my hands on her new one this year, I couldn’t put it down. Continue reading
Everyone says it. Over and over.
Sure, there are exceptions. But it is generally a good tip, even if overused.
Show, don’t tell. Continue reading
I don’t generally like ‘clean Christian fiction.’ Not reading it. Definitely not writing it.
My goal when I write is not to keep the story ‘clean.’ My goal is to reveal truth. Truth means a messy tangle of this thing we all call life. Continue reading
Humans are good at excuses.
Especially teenage humans. I work with *counts on fingers* fifteen of them at the moment.
If personal responsibility was a diamond glittering at the side of the road, they’d cover it with palm fronds and hurry on before anyone could ask them about it.
Life isn’t normal. People aren’t normal.
There’s a dryer setting labeled ‘normal’ but if you’re using a Dominican dryer and want your clothes to be dry before you walk back down the mountain to check them, you might want to turn the heat to high instead.
Point being, everyone has different versions of how things should get done. Hence this post. Life hacks from life in the DR. From the perspective of students, myself, and Scarlett alike.
