Oooh! Just a quick note to let y'all know I'm going to feature some author interviews and giveaways real soon. Watch out for it!
Cheers!
;-)
16 January 2015
Sugar Rush!
It's the second day since I've seen this video and I still cannot get over it. Hahaha!
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I'm actually writing a story with Adam as a peg ;-) It's called Dare to Love Dangerously and it's set in Laguna, Philippines. Please check it out if you've time. I'd really appreciate hearing your feedback. Cheers!
Adam Levine. Sigh.
But seriously, that was a really nice thing to do! I bet all those couples were tickled pink to have him crash their wedding party. I know I would.
I actually told my husband I wish we had been married in LA on 6 December last year.
And yes, nabatukan ako ng bonggang bongga.
And oh, we just celebrated 10 years of married bliss last December. Hahaha!
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Gosh, I've listened to this song so much that I heard my youngest belting "Sugar! Yes please!" as he ran down the hallway a while ago.
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After watching the video for the nth time…
Me: Grabe, one of those brides looked like she wanted to lunge at Adam
Hubby: Oo nga e
Me: God, I understand. I'd totally do that. (after a few minutes) If ever I do that hon, I apologise in advance.
Hubby: Don't worry, it's ok. I'll even apologise to Adam after I've peeled you off him
Hahaha! That's love and support for you :-)
+++
I'm actually writing a story with Adam as a peg ;-) It's called Dare to Love Dangerously and it's set in Laguna, Philippines. Please check it out if you've time. I'd really appreciate hearing your feedback. Cheers!
+++
Okay … one last view of the video before I sleep … Zzzzz …
Have a good weekend everybody!
14 January 2015
Once upon a time
My son seems to share my penchant for stories. The other night before bed, my almost-two-year-old decided to tell me a bedtime story:
I-chan: Once (upon) a time, there were three zebras. Papa zebra, Mama zebra, and ... and Kuya zebra. The three zebras love to eat banana(s).
Mama: Okaaay. Then what happened?
I-chan: Knock, knock!
Mama: Who's there?
I-chan: It's a Goldilocks!
Mama: And then?
I-chan: (whispers) Sosoree!
In case you're wondering, this is a super edited version of The Three Bears (it keeps changing. So far he's had versions with giraffes and ostriches---who all like to eat bananas!). And the last part is the Duke's line from Frozen (when Elsa's powers are revealed).
Hope we made you smile!
☆*:.｡. o(≧▽≦)o .｡.:*☆
12 January 2015
Getting artsy (again)
It's so much fun to be working with my hands again!
So, I know I've been saying this for ages, but Ana and Ken's story will be out on Smashwords by the end of the month. The whole manuscript has been edited and laid out. And in honor of it all, I'm revamping the cover (Yay!).
I asked Odette, a good blog buddy, to do the calligraphy for the title while I played around with the graphics. I had my heart set on something Art Deco / Alphonse Mucha-ish, but decided on something simpler instead. A couple of friends and I even did a fun photo shoot and some artist friends offered to do the cover, but in the end I decided that the images in my head would translate better through my own hands. The one above is a sneak peek of the production process---from pencil sketch, to edited photoshop
image. I'll reveal the final copy that I did on Illustrator soon :-)
But in the meantime, don't you think these two look sweet? Heehee.
90s flashback!
We are all stardust :-)
Happy New Year everybody! :-)
Any plans for the coming year? I signed up for Mina V. Esguerra's YA writing class for the first quarter of the year. Yay! So very excited about it! She's been emailing us reading and viewing lists and I've really enjoyed them so far.
Me: Hon, I've got to watch some movies for that class I'm doing...
Hubby: Okay, what do you need to watch?
Me: Clueless, She's all that, 10 Things I hate about you, She's the One, Before Sunrise ...
Hubby: Huh? E diba kabisado mo na yun? (But don't you already know those by heart?)
Me: I might have missed something ...
Hubby: *rolls eyes* Fine.
Heehee. So I just needed an excuse to review some of my fave college-era movies. (Obviously the hubby is not a rom com fan, but he has no choice but put up with me)
It was just lovely to revisit all those great movies!
Before Sunrise has always been one of my faves. Skipping over the yumminess that is Ethan Hawke, I just love the whole rambling script! It has always been one of the things I wished had happened to me. Heehee. On one of my first trips to Europe I took the Eurail from Zurich to Vienna. I attended a conference in St. Gallen and decided to go on a side trip before returning to Tokyo. I didn't really think I'd see an Ethan Hawke doppelgänger, but you never know when you could get lucky, right? Alas, nada. But I had fun in Vienna anyway :-) Although my Tito and Tita were lost whenever I'd go, "This is the bridge where they asked for directions!" or "This is the Ferris wheel they saw the Danube from!" Hahaha!
And Clueless! As if! Whatever!
And Freddie Prinze Jr.!
Oh darn. I think I should've been paying more attention to the plot. Hahaha!
xoxo
02 December 2014
29 November 2014
Otsukaresama
So okay, I'm about 7,000 words away from my goal and I've about 28 hours left to write. It's below 10 degrees and it's drizzling outside. I've got a slight cough and the sniffles and next week the temperatures might drop below 5 degrees.
I think I'll quit while I'm ahead and say that I'm quite happy with my output this year. And I am. I'm actually amazed that I've written this much in the span of a month.
Without yayas. Hahaha!
So otsukaresama to all my Nano buddies. We fought a good fight, but now it is time for me to retire and recoup.
Until we meet again next year!
02 November 2014
NaNoWriMo 2014
It's NaNoWriMo time again!
What the heck am I doing blogging when I should be writing? Hahahaha!
Ok, ok, break time over ;-)
What the heck am I doing blogging when I should be writing? Hahahaha!
Ok, ok, break time over ;-)
28 October 2014
On improving our craft
Someone asked me lately how one gets better at writing.
For a moment, I was at a loss for words. And for a writer, that's kind of ironic. Hahaha!
I guess there's really no step-by-step process to writing. It's really a process of trial and error.
All my creative writing classes were the usual ones taught in high school. I remember I tried countless times to get published in our school paper, and only managed to get an article in on my final year. In college writing took a backseat to the drafting board, though you'd sometimes be surprised at how architects employ creative writing when outlining a project proposal. Hahaha! And before getting published on Youngblood, I had numerous rejected articles.
I tried writing my first book after a summer of immersing myself in Nancy Drew. I think I was eleven or twelve at the time. And fortunately for everybody, that story won't ever see the light of day. Hahaha! But I'm reminded of my early efforts whenever I see stories posted by tweens on Wattpad. I sincerely admire the courage of the young authors who post their work on the site (when I was a kid, no one could peer into my notebooks on threat of death) and open themselves up to critiques. It's harsh sometimes, but if they're open to learning, it's bound to be a great learning process.
But I hope they keep writing. For writers and authors, writing is our exercise, it's how we get better.
Another way is to experience life.
In our first year of college, one of our professors told us to go out, go to discos and motels, attend parties, and island-hop. We were all surprised, weren't we at school to learn? He just laughed at our incredulous faces and said, "You want to be architects? How will you design a disco, a hotel, or an airport if you've never been to one? How can you be an effective designer if you've never experienced using those buildings?"
And he was right. I can still remember my guy friends laughing over a drive-in motel I designed in my second year (I just couldn't get why it couldn't have communal parking. Hahaha!).
I think it's the same with writing. How can you write of heartbreak when your heart has never been broken before? How can you write of pain and of loss and of being deprived when you've been pampered your whole life? How can you write about the romance of the cobbled streets of Rome when you've never tread them? How can you write of sunsets on the beach when you've never been outside the concrete jungle of the city?
Don't get me wrong, some people CAN. Some people have wells of imagination so deep you could drown in them.
But for us who weren't blessed with such imagination or a trust fund to enable us to see the world? Well there's always Google ;-) And don't underestimate the things you can learn from talking to people (with an emphasis on listening).
And read.
I think all writers are readers at heart. And this is another good way to learn, not only about places and people, but also about technique. If you like a particular author, try to analyze what that person is doing right and emulate it.
I say emulate, not copy, because every writer has his own unique voice. All artists start out the same, visual and performance artists start by learning the techniques of masters who have gone before them. Only after they've learned and perfected those techniques are they able to develop techniques of their own. I think there's a parallel in learning how to write.
You want to write romance? Read romances. You want to write sci-fi, mystery, or horror? Then read up on those genres. Soak up the techniques of great authors and let your own voice out.
in the end though, the bottom-line is still this: WRITE
Writers write.
They write when they're happy or sad. They try to capture in words the things they see when they travel. They can make you feel hungry or make your heart race by the words they put on paper.
They write because they need to, because they cannot imagine not ever writing.
So flex those muscles and get writing ;-)
For a moment, I was at a loss for words. And for a writer, that's kind of ironic. Hahaha!
I guess there's really no step-by-step process to writing. It's really a process of trial and error.
All my creative writing classes were the usual ones taught in high school. I remember I tried countless times to get published in our school paper, and only managed to get an article in on my final year. In college writing took a backseat to the drafting board, though you'd sometimes be surprised at how architects employ creative writing when outlining a project proposal. Hahaha! And before getting published on Youngblood, I had numerous rejected articles.
I tried writing my first book after a summer of immersing myself in Nancy Drew. I think I was eleven or twelve at the time. And fortunately for everybody, that story won't ever see the light of day. Hahaha! But I'm reminded of my early efforts whenever I see stories posted by tweens on Wattpad. I sincerely admire the courage of the young authors who post their work on the site (when I was a kid, no one could peer into my notebooks on threat of death) and open themselves up to critiques. It's harsh sometimes, but if they're open to learning, it's bound to be a great learning process.
But I hope they keep writing. For writers and authors, writing is our exercise, it's how we get better.
Another way is to experience life.
In our first year of college, one of our professors told us to go out, go to discos and motels, attend parties, and island-hop. We were all surprised, weren't we at school to learn? He just laughed at our incredulous faces and said, "You want to be architects? How will you design a disco, a hotel, or an airport if you've never been to one? How can you be an effective designer if you've never experienced using those buildings?"
And he was right. I can still remember my guy friends laughing over a drive-in motel I designed in my second year (I just couldn't get why it couldn't have communal parking. Hahaha!).
I think it's the same with writing. How can you write of heartbreak when your heart has never been broken before? How can you write of pain and of loss and of being deprived when you've been pampered your whole life? How can you write about the romance of the cobbled streets of Rome when you've never tread them? How can you write of sunsets on the beach when you've never been outside the concrete jungle of the city?
Don't get me wrong, some people CAN. Some people have wells of imagination so deep you could drown in them.
But for us who weren't blessed with such imagination or a trust fund to enable us to see the world? Well there's always Google ;-) And don't underestimate the things you can learn from talking to people (with an emphasis on listening).
And read.
I think all writers are readers at heart. And this is another good way to learn, not only about places and people, but also about technique. If you like a particular author, try to analyze what that person is doing right and emulate it.
I say emulate, not copy, because every writer has his own unique voice. All artists start out the same, visual and performance artists start by learning the techniques of masters who have gone before them. Only after they've learned and perfected those techniques are they able to develop techniques of their own. I think there's a parallel in learning how to write.
You want to write romance? Read romances. You want to write sci-fi, mystery, or horror? Then read up on those genres. Soak up the techniques of great authors and let your own voice out.
in the end though, the bottom-line is still this: WRITE
Writers write.
They write when they're happy or sad. They try to capture in words the things they see when they travel. They can make you feel hungry or make your heart race by the words they put on paper.
They write because they need to, because they cannot imagine not ever writing.
So flex those muscles and get writing ;-)
How do you write?
Hi everybody!
I wonder if you're like me and story lines and scenes seem to pop out at the most inconvenient of times. Like when you're washing the dishes or changing a dirty diaper or when you've almost fallen asleep after hours of rough housing with the kids?
How do you make sure your ideas don't slip into oblivion?
The hubby handed me one of his portable voice recorders the other week. He's an amateur songwriter, so he uses them to record snippets of the songs he writes. But I don't know ... it just didn't work for me.
I guess I'm more visual than I thought. I like seeing the words appear on screen as I type them out. I just adore the physicality of words, whether typed or written. When I'm in front of a keyboard and screen or have a pen and paper in front of me, words just seem to flow ... characters become more real ... scenes come alive ... well, for me at least ;-)
How do you write?
I wonder if you're like me and story lines and scenes seem to pop out at the most inconvenient of times. Like when you're washing the dishes or changing a dirty diaper or when you've almost fallen asleep after hours of rough housing with the kids?
How do you make sure your ideas don't slip into oblivion?
The hubby handed me one of his portable voice recorders the other week. He's an amateur songwriter, so he uses them to record snippets of the songs he writes. But I don't know ... it just didn't work for me.
I guess I'm more visual than I thought. I like seeing the words appear on screen as I type them out. I just adore the physicality of words, whether typed or written. When I'm in front of a keyboard and screen or have a pen and paper in front of me, words just seem to flow ... characters become more real ... scenes come alive ... well, for me at least ;-)
How do you write?
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