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The door was open.
I hesitated halfway down the staircase, looking into the yawning cavern. Mom kept the door shut because you could see right into the room.
Soft reminders echoed in my ears.
“Close the door. I don’t want to see.”
“Close the door. I don’t want the reminder.”
“Close the door….just….close the door.”
It was one of those fall evenings where the light starts to fade earlier and everything feels much later than it should be: the night, the projects due, the dinner that no one’s gotten to yet. The symposium had gone well…what little I could understand of it. Sometimes I wondered how I even got into college and even now I felt like an infiltrator, sitting in the back of the classroom, pretending I could actually be a part of this world where people defended their papers to their peers.
I’ve been reading through Pat Schneider’s Writing Alone and with Others, which has been a super helpful resource in getting me over writer’s block and back on track in seeking publication. She has a lot of different exercises at the end of each chapter and one of them was “write about a time your writing got rejected.” So I decided to give it a shot…bear with me as I recount the tales of a woe-begotten nine-year-old. Continue reading
A good writer knows that the one of the best ways to write better is to read more. Exposing yourself to good and bad writing helps you to recognize what does and doesn’t work in a novel. Here are few key authors who have helped me become a better writer:
Writers typically fall into two camps when it comes to creating by imitation. One side proclaims, “You can’t ever learn anything if you only imitate, you must be original. You must create your own voice.” The other side of the camp says, “Art is imitation. It is only by imitating others first that we can be original.”
I recently discovered the musical, Hamilton. For those of you who are like me and want to dismiss it out of hand just because it is popular…please don’t. It really is just as amazing as people claim and well-worth listening to, even if you don’t like rap/hip-hop. The album gave me a new perspective on several situations in my life, but one song in particular resonated with me: “Wait for It.”
(This post is an updated version from my old blog, but since it had to do with writing, I figured I’d bring it over here.)
(Image take from here)
We’ve all heard that to get better at writing, we have to write more. But what do you do if, on some days, you don’t want to write?
Even as I sit here blogging about what to do if you don’t want to write, I’m fighting the feelings of not wanting to write.
Every skill and craft worth learning is going to have its fair amount of drudgery. Writing is no different. Over the years, I’ve learned a few tips and tricks that help me to work through that drudgery. I thought I would put some up here in case anyone else needs a boost to put that brain to work.
(Photo taken from pixabay.com)
As a writer, I get asked a lot, “How do you write? Do you already have an idea in mind or do you just sit down and start writing?”
So I thought I’d give a little break down of my process.
I have not written many short stories as a writer. I’m more of a novelist than a short story writer, but I thought I would share an excerpt from the novel that I am currently working on. It is tentatively titled Severance.
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Start a blog, they said.
Writers need exposure, they said.
You have to engage in social media, they said.
I’ve tried, I said.
Try again, they said.
And here we are.
ali oleary 
