Wednesday Writing Wrap-up

Still no actual writing from me (get it together Alex!) but I do have some interesting things in the realm of writing.

My new job has allowed me financial freedom again. This means that I recently purchased tickets to the Nebulas. They are in LA this year so it was killing me that I might miss it due to not being able to afford it.

The Nebulas is a writing conference out on by SFWA, the science fiction and fantasy writers association. They are a professional organisation that helps writers in their careers. They have an emergency medical fund, legal help, advice columns, advice for non members and more. They obviously have their problems like any other organization but they’re working hard to make the changes they want to happen. Membership is limited to writers who have made at least a novel or two professional rate short story sales. So in my mind, being able to join is a huge sign you are making it.

I loved the last writing convention I went to. This time it’s a conference so I believe all the panels will be focused on business aspects. I also signed up for the mentor program they have. Established writers link with newbies to give them info and advice. I’m super excited to see how that goes.

I’m asking for the Friday off from work, though I’m still going to be quite new to the office. I think I can get the one day off. I’ll miss some things on Thursday but I’ll be able to be there period which is awesome.

Also in the interest of learning more about writing, I read 45 Master Characters. It’s a book describing feminine and masculine archetypes and how to have a character arc using these archetypes.

Overall, I wasn’t as impressed as I thought I would be based on recommendations. I think it might have helped if I’d watched more of the movies and TV shows the book used as examples of the characters. The archetypes seemed flat. Sure I’ve seen many of them in stories before but the basic description seemed to be missing something. I think combining a few examples might help with the flatness.

What I did find interesting was the character arc write up at the end. There were two main arcs, the feminine and masculine. Theses aren’t necessarily male or female arcs but more of internal and external. Feminine arcs generally consist of finding your inner strength/truth while masculine arcs are the heros journey, saving the world etc.

I liked how the author broke down the arcs and gave a “gender bending” example as well.

Overall, it gave me a lot to think about. Books aren’t the magic answer. They are tools and should be used as such. Even if it’s not my favorite, I really enjoy reading books about writing as well as writing.