Heartbeats of New Orleans

HEARTBEATS OF NEW ORLEANS

"Filled with exotic and interesting characters, Heartbeats of New Orleans whisks the reader away to the alluring French Quarter. It is more than a simple book of poetry, encompassing the very soul that has allowed the city to thrive in the wake of devastation left behind by Hurricane Katrina. This book brings forth the life and light that naturally dwells within the hearts of the people of New Orleans."

Heartbeats of New Orleans by Jennifer Tucker is now available on Amazon.com. For more information about the book, the author, how to purchase, and a book trailer check out hfupoetry.com

For information on the publisher, which I'm interning for check out Key Publications.

The reason I'm announcing this book is because I've met the fellow writer and have even published my own poetry in a collection with her. She's a talented poet and her book is sure to please! Definitely check her out!

School Building

Hey guys,

I posted this workshop a while back at Key Publications Network. I'm head of the (YAWR) Young Adult Writers Rock group. Group heads were coming up with workshops and since I have finals and haven't been able to post very interesting things lately I figured that this workshop on "school building" could prove beneficial and perhaps even fun :]

School Building Workshop

Let’s face it. Every young adult is going through a learning stage. Whether it’s in middle school, high school, wizarding school, or just learning from the elder in a tribe.

The beauty of YA books is that they can be in any genre so there are many variations in how schooling can be portrayed. If it is just a YA romance..it may be drama filled at a high school. If it’s a YA fantasy then a school may not exist in that time period. A young adult may be under the instruction of just one person for one particular subject.

Think about the world J.K. Rowling created with Harry Potter. She came up with O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s to be like finals and the SAT’s. We have all these different genres why not create a genre-specific school. Take horror for example: A school for serial killers, masochists, and cannibals? How crazy freaky would that be? What would be the rules? Does it create these people or does it try to help them and turn them back into regular citizens?

For Sci-fi: What about a school for guys who need to learn how to impress girl robots because they are the only kinds of females on the planet left. (Oh! I may try that one!)

When writing a novel a common phrase to hear is “World Building” well, instead of world building, this week we will be “School Building”. Write in whatever genre you choose and create a school to fit that time. Remember, try something new; Like a school for werewolves or pixies? Just give it a shot :]

Happy Writing

ViNoWriMo- Vinyl Rhino

For those of you who didn't get to participate in NaNoWriMo fear not, you have another shot at crafting a novel in a month. Vicious Writers is hosting Vicious Novel Writing Month (ViNoWriMo) on their writers' site Key Publications Network.

Though this challenge is a bit more difficult than NaNoWrimo. For one thing you will have no idea what you will be writing about until New Year's Eve when the topic is announced. You have from January 1st to the 31st to complete your 50,000 word manuscript which must use the topic as a main theme. At the end of the month you submit your manuscript to be judged.

The first place winner receives $500 dollars and the opportunity to publish with Key Publications Network. They will be opening their doors in January with the release of Faith's Friendship by Nazarea Andrews. She was the winner of 2009's ViNoWriMo. If you are interested in checking out her blog I have a link to her blog under my links page.

**Now if you'd like to learn more about ViNoWriMo please click on the title of this blog post to visit Viciouswriters.com

Also, you must become a member of Key Publications Network to participate. A link to that is located beneath my links column as well. www.key-publications-network.socialgo.com

Best of luck to you all!

Published

So I have a poem and family recipe published in a cookbook. It was a collaboration of literary works and all kinds of different family recipes from Mexican to Italian to Belgian style dishes by 16 members of Key Publications Network. If you are interested in tasty recipes and great poetry and prose to go along with it-check it out.

**Just click on the title of this blog post and you will be transported to the Amazon link.

The name of the cookbook is:

The Pious Kitchen Lady Presents Vicious Recipes: a literary cookbook

One of the contributors, Nazarea Andrew's debut novel is due out sometime this January. It is a family saga titled Faith's Friendship. I'll definitely let you know more about her novel once the release date approaches. But if you are interested- check her out at: http://nazarea.livejournal.com/

Collaborative Writing?

So a friend on my online critique group suggested a co-writing project where about 3 people or so each write a paragraph and continue a story. I'm curious to see how it pans out and I may even have a go at it myself. But something I've always wondered about is how writers collaborate on an entire story.

Take for example The House of Night Series by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast. It is co-written by a mother and daughter. I can't really tell where they switch off but occasionally you can tell who is writing what. I read about two of the books and they weren't bad, but they weren't amazing either. Sometimes it felt like they were trying to make it so teenish. What with the language and all I kinda ended up losing interest. And I swear I thought their was a motherly lesson nestled somewhere in there. Perhaps, I'll re-read them and give an actual review. Then again they do have plenty of books out and so I'm sure they've learned one another's style more so as they've progressed with their stories.

As for the Peter and the Starcatchers by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson-I couldn't tell where one's writing began and ended. Their styles are so similar that together they create a great story. I think that for collaborative works to work out writers must really have an understanding of one another's styles and preferences when writing and try to bring those to light when working together.

Helpful Sites for Writers

Hello all!

I figured I'd put together a list today of some great and helpful sites. Along with an explanation of them.

Great database of agents:

http://www.agentquery.com

www.querytracker.net

www.writersmarket.com Although this requires buying a subscription.

Great information on how to write Queries:

http://queryshark.blogspot.com/

http://www.charlottedillon.com/query.html I personally love this site because it has TONS of links for query writing and will even show you winning samples of romance queries.

She also has a great one for a Synopsis: http://www.charlottedillon.com/synopsis.html

Seriously, just browse her site and you'll be sure to find something for you, even though most queries and such are for the romance genre you can easily apply them to your own work.

~Wonderful Writing Communities Online~

www.key-publications-network.socialgo.com I'm head of the YAWR(Young Adult Writers Rock) group there. It is an amazing online critique group for writers. Check it out you won't be disappointed.

http://writersdigest.ning.com/ This is the writer's digest community

Great E-zine

www.viciouswriters.com ---> soon to be renamed.


Check em' out. If I'm missing any feel free to post some other helpful sites :]