Saturday 5 March 2011

Miscellany, Crusading group, the weather, and a short conclusion

I've been busy with blogfests lately, and those are all I've had time for! But I am sneaking this one in before I get around to posting the next lot of blogfests. So, FYI, this entry contains:
  • Miscellaneous links!
  • A list of my fellows in my Crusading group!
  • Some comments on the weather!
  • A very short conclusion.
Miscellaneous links!

Before I get started on the actual entry, here is a recap of the blogfests I've participated in very recently, for anyone who's looking for them (the links are to my entries):
  1. Race to 200 Blogfest (hosted by J.C. Martin)
  2. Gone But Not Forgotten Blogfest (hosted by a bunch of ladies I linked to in that entry!)
  3. Super-Snooper Blogfest (hosted by Alison Stevens)
And if you want to check out really old stuff, you can click on my label to look at past blogfest entries, or look at my list on my Blogfests page, which also highlights upcoming blogfests!

That said, now it's time to move onto part 2.

A list of my fellows in my Crusading group!

I have wanted to do this for a while, but I'm only just getting around to it! I'm in the Adult Fiction (Mainstream) Crusading group, and these people are too:
  1. Lola Sharp (Sharp Pen/Dull Sword) Adult fiction (mainstream), YA (urban fantasy and dystopian)
  2. Ann (Inkpots n' Quills) Adult fiction
  3. Charlotte Rains Dixon (Charlotte Rains Dixon) Adult fiction
  4. Zan Marie Steadham (In the Shade of the Cherry Tree) Adult fiction (mainstream), women's fiction, science fiction, devotional, non-fiction history
  5. Lauri Griffin (Lauri's Blog) Adult fiction (mainstream, literary), short stories
  6. Rachel (All the World's Our Page) Historical fiction, historical suspense
  7. Susan (All the World's Our Page) Adult fiction
  8. [me! (here!) Fantasy, contemporary romance, Science Fiction, MG]
  9. Linda Katmarian (Scheherezade's Journal) Mainstream fiction, literary fiction
As you can see, this bunch writes in a few different areas, and to me, Adult Fiction is a pretty broad category. Anyway, I'm excited to be part of this group with such a great bunch of ladies, though I really want to get to know them better throughout this Crusade. I suppose you could call that my mini-Crusade within the big one we're all on. :D

Some comments on the weather!

I live in the Southern hemisphere, pretty far south in it too. But having a fair number of Northern hemisphere pals, I find myself always interjecting when they say things like... "Hey, let's have a Winter celebration party!" or something. I have to interject with, "I wish, but it's the middle of bloody summer here right now!"

I'm not a summer person. I abhor the heat we get in my town. It's just too disgusting. When you feel like your eyeballs have been boiled all day long, you know it's too hot. When you're sitting in your tightly contained living room with the air-con blasting and you're still sweating, you know it's too hot. When you cry to yourself that you don't have a hammock to sleep outside in, you know it's too hot.

But anyway, back on track! I got a comment from Michael Offutt on one of my blog entries a little while back, saying that March has the first day of Spring. And immediately I felt the urge to point out that for us down here, it has the first day of Autumn! Yay! :D I love Autumn, Winter and Spring, by the way.

A short conclusion.
I started an A-Z listening task, and it forces me to listen to some songs I don't entirely adore in my mp3 collection. Right now I'm listening to "Alisha Rules The World" by Alisha's Attic. Sorry, but this song is getting on my nerves. But I will listen to it all the way through! Because them's the rules, man. :)

And now the entry is done!

8 comments:

  1. Oh my gosh--"when it feels like your eyeballs have been boiled all day long"! That's terrible, but it's an awesome description--you should work it into your WIP :)

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  2. I love the heat. Course, I've never really experienced eye-ball boiling heat. However, I have a high tolerance. 90 degrees is just right for me as long as their's shade. If I ever get successful enough with writing that it can supplement my income, I'd move from this cold climate to a land of eternal summer where I could leave my window open with just a screen all the time.

    Oh and thanks for coming by my blog. If I may be frank about the whole query process, I think it's pretty much b.s. I mean, you put all the work into your manuscript. Then, what is the query? Well it's you trying to sell...picture this... all the potential manuscripts out there are now microwaves and as you know...everyone owns a microwave. So all of these agents are now in your store looking for the next microwave. And suddenly, you're supposed to sell them a microwave? How is that anything like writing? You've become a greasy commission salesman. And here's the real kicker, you're not even guaranteed anything if they pick you up. Sure it improves the chances, but there are authors out there with agents and no book contract. It's good though that they can totally dismiss your manuscript and wait for you to sell them on a one paragraph letter. It's actually kind of brilliant really. Seems to me that the super charismatic people that aspire to be writers would be agents first, get paid while writing their own book and because they're charismatic, they get in good with the editors. Then bam, they cut the strings on editing and are off publishing. Meanwhile they've picked up a huge social following from starving writers who looked to them for representation. Now all those starving writers can buy their book :)

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  3. That's why I dread summer where I live in the USA - it's hot AND humid. Wouldn't want to go outside and sleep in a hammock.

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  4. I know the boiled-eyeball summer first hand, but then I live in Georgia. Give me spring and autumn! 95+ degrees and 95+ humidity is my version of hell! ; ) My preference is 65 to 85 degrees. Ahhh!

    Thanks for listing our group. Of course I got into three! And I volunteered. : D Oh, well. I didn't need to write anyway. ; )

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  5. We just had a 50-day streak of days over 86 f (which is 30 c), and most of them were over 97, a lot even hotter than that. It was really foul, because for some reason our heat is getting more and more humid. We used to have this dry heat which was horrible but at least more tolerable than this gross swampy humidity. NOT HAPPY.

    L. Diane Wolfe, yeah most of the time I wouldn't have wanted to sleep outside either, but it would have been at least a bit cooler than inside (no air-con in my room).

    We're far from the equator, it's not meant to be humid here!!

    Zan Marie, no worries :D I meant to do it sooner but other stuff got in the way. ;)

    Michael, nice rant on querying. Hehe. I see your point, and you're totally right. But at the same time I see query writing as a writing challenge like no other. It's yet another way of honing your skills, and also, it really makes you look at your story and identify the heart of it. Also synopsis writing I have found is pretty useful for identifying plotholes and/or making you think about whether you REALLY want to have those particular chapters in there. ;)

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  6. One of my closest writing buddies is an Aussie and it still wigs me out every time we talk and I realize we're working on complete opposite seasons. My brain just has such a hard time wrapping around the concept. I can deal with the fact that we're almost on opposite ends of the day, but not seasons. Too much. LOL

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  7. Hey Trisha yes I often hoot when the NH people talk about writing a story about snow when it's too hot to leave the house here! We should get smarter and retaliate by doing something outrageously opposite too, but like me you're too worn out with doing other people's blogfests to organise one of your own, ha ha. I've been wanting to do one since I reached 200 followers and I've just passed 400 and still dreaming about it...one day...

    Denise<3

    I too did the Race to 200 Contest and got worn out going around the entries 3 times to find no one else had posted. A few turning up now but I've wasted so much precious time...I'll wait til the last day now to finish...

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  8. I love the summer (though I don't seem to sweat, maybe that's why). I read a book set in Maine and they were talking about how the people were overheating and passing out. It was 75 F outside. I was like '0-0 that's almost cold'. XD

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Thanks for your words, me hearties! and don't forget to leave a link to your blog somewhere I can find it!