The Story Reading Ape makes us giggle with his Monday Funnies and Aunty Acid. Thanks so much for the laughter, Chris – even on a Wednesday. ❤
Day: May 15, 2019
Yecheilyah’s 3rd Annual Poetry Contest 2019: Rules, Guidelines, and Prizes
Check out Yecheilyah’s 3rd Annual Poetry Contest 2019!
It’s that time of the year again!!!
Submissions Accepted
Now – August 1, 2019
Winners Announced:
Friday, November 1, 2019.
Theme:
The purpose of this year’s theme is to use words that empower and inspire us to be the best version of ourselves. We talked about Self-Love last year and now it’s time we spoke it into existence and live it through our actions.
Choose any one of these words to dedicate your poem to.
Strength, Courage, Wisdom, Faith
Guidelines:
Continue Reading HERE
Six Superb Ways To End A Novel – Written By Lorraine Ambers
Lorraine Ambers provides us with six different was to end a novel, a blog post I immediately fell in love with and decided to share. Thanks for this article, Lorraine.
The ending of a novel needs to leave the reader satisfied and should reflect the pace and tone of the rest of the story. The truth is, endings are hard. The writer must conclude all subplots and bring clarity and resolution to the conflicts the characters face.
I’m going to share six of the most effective methods for concluding your novel.
To be continued…
This method is often used to entice the reader into continuing on with a series. So that the ending creates anticipation instead of resolution. I think this works best when the overarching plot remains and the characters continue onwards with their journey, for example, a looming war.
Warning: Conclude the subplots and character journeys set out for this particular story or the reader will feel cheated.
Continue reading HERE
Self-Publishing and Entrepreneurship – Written By Jami Gold
Jamie Gold tells us about Self-Publishing and Entrepreneurship. What are we – authors or entrepreneur? Thank you for your post, Jamie.
In many ways, a writing career has a lot in common with being an entrepreneur.
Even if we’re with a traditional publisher, we still have to manage our own branding, contracts, and acceptance of risk in ways that corporate employees usually don’t.
In the realm of self-publishing, the comparison to entrepreneurship is spot on.
Our writing and publishing endeavors create our own little company.
We’re responsible for assembling our team of editors, cover artists, and everything else—and we won’t succeed if we drop the ball.
Continue reading HERE
How To Help Stop Somebody Stealing Your Blog Posts – Written By Hugh W. Roberts
On Hugh’s Views and News I found an important blog post about how to help stop somebody stealing your blog posts. Thank you very much for all your efforts to help us bloggers! We really appreciate it!
I recently stumbled upon a blog where the author had copied and was using my blog posts. No pingbacks or mention that I was the original author, just plain copy and pasting of some of my posts and images. It left me feeling angry, yet I also felt honoured that my work must be good enough if somebody wanted to copy it.
Unfortunately, with the internet being such a vast and open space used by billions of people worldwide, the chances of that happening to any one of us who publishes anything on the internet is a distinct possibility. Whether it be photos, fiction, reviews, poetry, recipes or gardening tips, everything faces the chance of being copied and somebody else taking full credit for your hard work.
Read the entire blog post HERE
…’S’TRODN’RY!’ – Written By Seumas Gallacher
Read Master Gallacher’s blog post about the ‘birth’ of a new word. With all his humor and wisdom, Seumas Gallacher provides us with a wonderful blog post I just had to share. Thank you, Seumas.
…it’s not often that this ol’ Scots Jurassic scribbler has been present at the birth of a new word… but one such memorable occasion presented itself many, many moons ago… it happened during that part of my career when I was part of the legions of Financial Masters of the Universe, as the embodied historical photograph of the yesteryear money market/foreign exchange maestro in the dealing room in Hong Kong here indicates…
…part of the role of being a prominent F.M.U. entailed, (naturally), whizzing around the globe, ostensibly arranging mega-billions worth of deals (Master Soros, eat yer heart out!)… a trip from the Far East had my itinerary taking in financial institutional visits in London, then carrying on to Noo Yawk in ‘Murica, to repeat the exercise with some of our American banking friends…
Read the entire blog post HERE
Bad People Make Better Stories: Crafting the Perfect ‘Unlikable’ Character – Written By Kristen Lamb
Today I found a phenomenal blog post about crafting the perfect ‘unlikable’ character in a story. Kristen Lamb published a blog post in her own inimitable way, to teach us how to create a character that makes our story interesting. Thank you, Kristen!
Bad people make better stories. Why? Because I cannot say this enough, ‘Fiction is about one thing and one thing only—PROBLEMS.’
Who better to create a lot of problems than damaged, broken, unlikable, foolish and possibly even unredeemable human beings?
***I use the term ‘human beings’ for all characters because aliens, otherworldly beings, and any ‘thinking’ creature will possess anthropomorphic (human-like) qualities.
So why do ‘bad people’ make better stories?
Perfect people, first of all, are unicorns and don’t exist. Secondly, they are boring. Thirdly, we can’t relate to them because we aren’t unicorns (just deluded we are ).
What’s the story killer with perfect people? To be blunt, these characters have nowhere to grow. Since ‘perfect people’ handle every crisis with a level head and can be trusted to always do the right thing, the reader won’t ever worry.
If the reader never worries, guess what kiddies? You don’t have a story, you have a lot of words.
Villains are a whole other post. So is the Big Boss Troublemaker (our core antagonist responsible for creating the overall story PROBLEM).
Continue reading HERE
One Very Lucky Dog & Doris Day – Written By Darlene Craviotto
Today I found this really wonderful, heartwarming story about Doris Day and Mary Hartmann – written By Darlene Craviotto. I was weeping when I read the blog post and I thought I needed to share Darlene’s Memory. I’m sure, it leaves you with a smile – and tears in your eyes, just like me.
Doris Day died yesterday and that’s why I’m writing this post.
I wasn’t a friend, or a member of her family; just like everybody else, I knew her from the movies. I used to be a tour guide at Universal Studios, and I got to meet a lot of big movie stars there, from Lucille Ball (who hated it when the tour guides leaned on her Rolls Royce to talk with her) to Paul Newman (whose piercing blue eyes locked with mine one day at the studio commissary, and my knees have been weak ever since). I never had a chance to meet Doris Day on the Universal lot. But one rainy night in Hollywood she was a good friend to me and a beautiful Golden Retriever named, “Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.”
It was long ago, when I was a member of a struggling group of actors who worked all day at the tours at Universal, so we could work all night (for free) performing plays at a little theater on Hollywood Boulevard. Seven nights a week, one block down from the Weird Museum, above a toy store and Fredericks of Hollywood Sexy Lingerie, overlooking the stars of Ann Margret, Gene Barry, and James Cagney, we practiced our craft and shared the Hollywood dream.
Continue reading HERE
Scheduling can be Relaxed and Still Effective! #TimeManagement – Written By Renee Scattergood
I discovered an excellent article on time management on Renee Scattergood’s blog. Renee is a Dark Speculative Fiction author who published the ‘Shadow Stalker’ books. Thanks for a very educational post, Renee.
One of the biggest obstacles I have (and I’m sure you do as well) is time. Since I can’t stop the clock and give myself the time I need to get things done, I have to make the best use I can of the time I have.
It’s not an easy thing to do when you have a special needs kid who has to be homeschooled due to medical issues who requires much more attention and help than most kids her age. It’d nearly impossible to find time to get things done when I want to write, but I also have a home to run. Then throw my own health issues into the mix, and forget it.
When my daughter was little, I had given up trying. I just couldn’t seem to find the time or energy to keep up with everything. I refused to give up completely though. Writing is something I truly love, and I want to make a career of it. The last thing I wanted was to look back on my life and regret never giving it a go.
So I found ways to work around all my obstacles, including time!
The most effective way to manage time is to have a schedule, but schedules have never worked for me. There are too many variables in my day to stick to one. I never know when my daughter is going to need me for something, so I can’t plan for those, and she has to come first before everything when it comes to her mental health.
Continue Reading HERE
Blog Post Achievement On ‘Writer’s Treasure Chest’
I was surprised to see once again, how far ‘Writer’s Treasure Chest’ has developed. Yesterday I discovered that I got a new achievement ‘award’:
1337 posts published – this is amazing. (Even though I wonder, what the magic number 1337 stands for.)
At this moment I’m surprised, and I’m flattered. I know, without you all, followers, readers and in particular friends, I couldn’t have done that! The guest posts, the ‘Featured Author’ posts, the interviews, promotions and re-blogs; without all those posts, ‘Writer’s Treasure Chest’ wouldn’t be what it is.
I want to say ‘Thank you’ to you all for making my blog a success and for making blogging a true adventure for me!
Writer's Treasure Chest 
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