Date A Girl Who Writes

This has just been posted on my wattpad, at http://www.wattpad.com/10623721-date-a-girl-who-writes , but I’m going to post it here too. It’s basically my tired, exhausted ramblings written at 1 in the morning when I should really be asleep, but it’s dedicated to Daf, who dated a girl who writes and apparently liked it so much he asked me to marry him! 

Date A Girl Who Writes

So there’s a post I found called “Date a girl who reads”, and it ends with the phrase “Better yet, date a girl who writes”. I’ve no doubt this has been done before, but this is my take on why it’s even better to date a girl who writes. 

Date a girl who writes, because she knows that just like her characters, you are more complex than just your experiences; your failures and achievements and what other people do and say to you. You are born with some aspects of your personality already formed; others will develop as you grow, and she will understand this. She will be encouraging and gentle, helping you to develop just as she helps her characters to develop. She will understand that, like her characters, she never really has full control over you, and she will never want it either. She will know that people, like characters, control their own lives and their own destinies, and that life, like stories, are more exciting when there are surprises.

Date a girl who writes because she’ll always see the other side. If you’re the villain, she’ll see the heroic side of you. If you’re the hero, she’ll see you as the demon you can be. Date a girl who writes because she will see you as a lover and an enemy, just as she sees her characters from the point of view of a writer, and from that of a reader. She will see you as the vile, vicious villain when you get angry at her, because she is the reader, and does not know enough about you. She will also see your troubles, and the circumstances that caused your outburst, and she will comfort you and love you because she sees you as your writer would see you.

Date a girl who writes because she’ll come out with pointless spiels similar to this, that make perfect sense and yet inexplicably, at the same time, make no sense at all. You can read it one morning and think “God, what pretentious crap is this?”, and then read it in the evening and think “Wow, this is so true”. Date a girl who writes because although sometimes she may forget to tell you, she’ll never run out of ways to tell you that she loves you.

Date a girl who writes, because a girl who doesn’t read will never know the joy that a book can bring. A girl who reads knows syntax, and cannot read a book without analysing it, tearing it apart into similes and oxymorons and metaphors and alliteration, until it becomes a lesson in English Literature – an experience few people want to re-live. A girl who writes knows these things, but she also knows that behind these similes and oxymorons, there are true emotions, that there is a reason for everything and no good writer uses a word without a reason. A wasted word is a heinous crime to the girl who writes.

Girls who don’t read can lie. Girls who read can quote. Girls who write can weave intricate tapestries of imagination, millions of thoughts and dreams in a beautiful silken spiderweb of threads, all of them linked by one common denominator – the girl who writes.

Date a girl who writes, because you’ll never struggle for a present at Christmas. She knows the true value of a pen and a pad of paper. Date a girl who writes, because conversations will never run dry. Date a girl who writes, because she will see the shapes in the clouds that no-one else can see, or animals in stars, forming constellations that haven’t even been discovered. She will take you on a new adventure every day, where every corner presents an opportunity for a story. Every person, no matter how quiet or shy or inherently plain they look, is a story waiting to be written, and the girl who writes will endeavour to write them all, whether physically or just in her mind.

Date a girl who writes, because she is never still. She is never quiet, nor is she ever inactive. Even when she is asleep, even when she is so engrossed in her writing, or in a book, or in a menial task, she is scribbling away in her head, turning every situation into prose, or poetry, or a novel, or a script.

Date a girl who writes, because she may not have the best vocabulary. A girl who reads can spout intricacies and delicacies and necessities like they’re going out of fashion, but a girl who writes will tell you that sometimes, details and nice things and things that need doing are just as good as those long words. Date a girl who writes, because she can make you sound completely illiterate with the inexplicably grandiloquent vocabulary she possesses, and in the next sentence, she can make perfect sense because she tells it just how it is.

Think of the future. Date a girl who writes, because her wedding vows to you will be incredible. Date a girl who writes, because you’ll never need to buy children’s books to read to your kids at bedtime. Date a girl who writes, because when your kids grow up, they won’t remember a very hungry caterpillar, or an owl who was afraid of the dark. They’ll remember the intensely colourful, incredible words their mother dreamed up for them, the characters who became childhood friends, the adventures that felt so real. They’ll remember the stories you won’t find in any book shop.

Comfort the girl who writes, when the words don’t look right and she can’t mould them to how she wants them to be. Praise the girl who writes when she reads you a piece she’s just written with pride blazing in her eyes. Love the girl who writes, when she gazes into your eyes and tells you that she loves you, for she above anyone else knows the fear, and the butterflies, and the sweaty palms and nervous breaths and ohmygodi’mgoingtomakeacompletefooloutofmyself of confessing a love for the first time, because she has written it.

Date a girl who writes, because if you date a girl who reads, your relationship will be based on a story. If you date a girl who writes, a story will be borne from your relationship – perhaps a story to be shared with the world, or perhaps a story to keep between the two of you. It will be unpredictable, the wildest story you’ve ever read. It will make you laugh and cry but above all, it will be true, because if there is one thing the girl who writes knows, it is life.

A girl who writes does not simply sit down at a computer, or with a pen and paper, and create a story. A girl who writes could be sitting on the bus, or in a cafe, or in school, or sitting on the toilet, or walking in the park, or visiting a zoo, or screaming her head off on a rollercoaster or comparing bags of frozen peas in ASDA, or watching a film in the cinema, or having intense, passionate sex, or riding a donkey on Blackpool beach, or doing the millions of things people do every day, and the story will course through her bloodstream, from her heart to her head, from her head to her fingers, and from her fingers to the paper.

A girl who writes knows how to use her head, but she also knows how to use her heart, and she knows that the two are so intricately connected that they cannot be separated. A girl who writes is passionate, even if she doesn’t show it. A girl who writes is expressive, even if she seems secretive. A girl who writes will bare her soul to the piece of paper or the computer screen in front of her, even if she won’t bare it to you. A girl who writes has the inexplicable ability to take her dreams and turn them into words – all kinds of words, short words and long words and beautiful words and ugly words, and words that will make you laugh or cry or feel happy to be alive or long for death, words that can change or reaffirm your outlook on life, words that will leave you feeling raw and vulnerable or rejuvenated and confident, A girl who writes knows feelings; she knows people; she knows you.

Date a girl who writes, because a girl who writes is a girl who laughs and cries and loves relentlessly, and trusts and hopes and believes and dreams and imagines and above all, lives.

 

NaNoWrapUp or, Winner!

So, my word count has been verified and I am a 2012 NaNoWriMo winner 😀 yes indeed, I wrote 50,000 words (and then some) in the fine month of November, and as we go into the last day, I hope anyone reading this who’s making that last push towards the finish line accepts my best wishes and cheerleading efforts, and a huge well done for when you cross that line and hit that target! For those who’ve already done it, congratulations! For those who didn’t quite manage – if you’ve got even the barest bones of a novel as a result of doing NaNoWriMo, you’re a winner in my book!

So how did my NaNo go? Well, it’s an interesting one. Originally, I had another idea for a story that was going to be my main NaNo, but a few days before it started, an idea came into my head. An already established character in Christopher Maine’s series, during her time at the Terra Firma Fleet Academy. A character I have an affinity for, because she’s based on me, essentially going through the upheaval I’ve been going through recently – leaving home, moving in with new people I’d never met before, making friends, going to new classes and learning new things. Those are the bare bones of the plot; I’ll leave the rest for you guys to uncover when you read it, hint hint 😉

So this was just going to be a little side story – my main NaNovel would be this idea I had a while ago, the one I’d been planning for and had even written a little bit of it (don’t worry, that bit wasn’t going to get used for NaNoWriMo, before I get accused of cheating!), and then when I needed a break from that plot and a little bit of light relief, I’d write about this character’s antics in the Academy.

How did that one work out? …. not like I’d planned it, let’s put it that way.

The original plans got shelved when I started writing this story, tentatively titled “Blue”, and realized that I loved it. Starting with an already-established character (and the blessing of her original creator, Christopher Maine, who gave me permission to create the origins story for her) really did help, because I already had the centre of my little universe – all I needed to do was build up that universe around her. At first I expected it to be difficult, but when it started, it came easily. Characters started appearing in my heads – some of them are ones you’ll recognize from the Christopher Maine books, as you should have all read them, I’ve pestered you guys enough! Others are ones who are entirely my creation – for example, two of her close friends were minor characters, both appearing just a couple of times in the main series. In mine, they’re main characters. However, her two best friends are completely mine, and they both have fairly well-rounded personalities and I’m really pleased with that, because characterization is something I usually struggle with a lot.

Another issue I’ve had this time is attempting not to Mary-Sue, but not with the main character – she has plenty of flaws, the real challenge is finding the good bits about her! (I’m totally kidding, she’s a lovely character but she definitely has her flaws) – it’s her best friend, who at the beginning was just a lovely guy and… yeah. Really vanilla, everything nice and sweet and kind about the world. I needed to find a fault for him, but instead of just throwing in a random one like being really nice and sweet and kind but having a random murderous streak, I looked at his positive aspects and figured out which ones could become negative. He’s loyal to a fault, doesn’t see when people are taking advantage of his kindness and his loyalty is often misplaced. I considered giving him a temper, but a) my main character already has plenty of that, as highlighted by the fight scenes I’ve put her in over the last few days, and b) that’s just not his personality at all. I’ve let the characters run away with themselves, developing their own personalities until actually, I find it hard to talk about them as characters – they’re more like people. I’m not saying they’re imaginary friends, I’m not in danger of having tea parties with them yet, but it’s been really useful because it means they write the stories, they decide what happens – I just have to get it all typed out before they go off on another tangent.

Usually, being ill during NaNoWriMo is a godsend – extra time for writing, yay! However, I’m ill at the moment and it’s not too shiny – I’m sure my wordcount would actually be even higher than the not-too-shabby number it currently stands at, which will stand as my NaNoWriMo final count unless I get any more done today (and manage to validate it in time). I’ve really just felt too ill to write at times, wanting nothing more than to curl up under my duvet and sleep it all away. I think for the last two NaNoWriMos, I’d stay up until stupid o’clock in the morning writing, but sleep has become a precious commodity at uni, so I’ve not been nighttime NaNovelling either (I’m on a bit of an alliterative kick at the moment, can you tell?).

So, what next? It turns out that there is life after NaNoWriMo, although it can seem pretty hard to believe when you emerge from that heady fog thinking “I just wrote 50,000+ words!…. now what?”. Well, there’s always NaNoEdMo – National Novel Editing Month, although for me I believe it’ll be NaNoFinMo, as I attempt to mould this novel into something publishable by June 2013 (I fully intend to take advantage of that CreateSpace offer I get for winning!). Once it’s finished, THEN the editing can begin! In short, this could keep me occupied for a long time.

When I started uni, I was worried I wouldn’t have much time for writing. I’ve found instead that actually, I have more time for writing than ever, because I actively make time for it. I don’t have homework – I set aside a little bit of time each day to work on my pieces for assessment, but once that’s over, apart from eating and sleeping, I can write all the time. Having the privacy of my own space is great, but so is being able to go into the lounge and socialize when I get bored of my imaginary friends and want to speak to some real ones for once 😉

So, onwards into December. If NaNoFinMo/EdMo isn’t your thing, it’s nearly Christmas! Oh, and there’s something called a life – I suppose it wouldn’t hurt any of us to get one, now that we’re not spending each day furiously scribbling/typing away, trying to hammer out these words. Now then, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to have high tea with some of my characters, they’re waiting quite impatiently for me.

 

Signing out (and watching the smoke rising from the keyboard as it breathes a sigh of relief),

Maddy x

(P.S – Want a better idea of what my novel is about? Buy Christopher Maine’s “Tales From The Terra Firma Fleet” series so far on your Kindle, tablet, smartphone or anything else with the Kindle app on it)

Dragon Flight: Renegade – http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dragon-Flight-Renegade-Tales-ebook/dp/B007B3CZF2/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1354267570&sr=8-5

Dragon Flight : Wrath – http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dragon-Flight-Wrath-Tales-ebook/dp/B0089CLIT8/ref=pd_sim_kinc_1

Dragon Flight: EndGame – http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dragon-Flight-EndGame-Tales-ebook/dp/B00A9HSQ8W/ref=pd_sim_kinc_2

(P.P.S – He also has a blog! www.christophermaine.wordpress.com )

(P.P.P.S – Thanks for reading!).

My Weekly Publicist Turn!

Yes, it’s that time once more where I slip on my publicist hat and tell you all to buy Christopher Maine’s books if you haven’t already – they’re available for Kindle or any device compatible with the Kindle Reading App eg iPad, smartphones, most tablets. They don’t cost very much at all and they’re fantastic books, and I really recommend them, it’d be great if you could buy them and support a fledgling independent author!

You can also follow his blog where he actually sticks to the description of a writing blog, unlike me where I chat lots about my life and boring stuff and rarely actually talk about important stuff like writing and news and charities. Please follow his blog – http://www.christophermaine.wordpress.com – and buy his books, at – http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dragon-Flight-Renegade-Tales-ebook/dp/B007B3CZF2 and http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dragon-Flight-Wrath-Tales-ebook/dp/B0089CLIT8/ref=pd_sim_kinc_2 !

Review: Kindle Vs. Book

Now, before I got my Kindle, I would’ve said “book”, every time – and part of me still feels that way. Nothing compares to the feeling of opening a new book and experiencing the feel of the paper and the smell of the ink, and it is lovely – but my reading life has been revolutionized by the Amazon Kindle, and I absolutely love it.

I’m a fast reader – I can get through books very quickly, so of course, if I’m going on holiday somewhere and plan on doing a lot of reading, I want to take lots of books so I don’t run out of things to do if we’re stuck in the caravan with nothing to do (not very likely but I like to be prepared). In the past I’ve had to take a massive bag as well as my suitcase, jam-packed with books and very heavy, clogging up space in the room. This year, I won’t have that problem, because all the books I want to read are on my Kindle, as well as an internet browser and an MP3 player! As much as I love books, I also love the Kindle, and I think people put it down too much without actually experiencing it for themselves.

The battery life is amazing – if you read for one hour a day, without the Wi-Fi turned on, the battery should last for up to two months without needing to re-charge it. Personally, I’ve had the wi-fi on, reading for about an hour most days and I’m not even halfway through the battery, and the last time I charged it was two months ago! It’s very quick and easy to charge, too – it hardly takes any time. You can get them from £89, but I love my keyboard one, which was £111 last year – I have the set texts for my college work on there, and I can use the keyboard to make notes that are stored on the Kindle! It’s great and has come in handy.

I got a case for it really cheap so it looks nice and is protected, and it’s really light and easy to take anywhere – it goes to college with me most days for reading on the bus and in between lessons, and if ever I’m going on a long car journey or something like that, I take it with me too. I also love that you can put your own personal documents on there – a lot of my writing is on my Kindle, so I can read over it and make plans for editing, and also so that I can show other people who want to read my writing. The e-ink screen is amazing – no matter what the sunshine is like or what angle you hold it at, it feels like you’re reading it off paper because the screen is so crystal clear, and there is never the problem of the sun reflecting off the screen like you get with phones and computers and things like that.

There are a great variety of free books including a lot of the old classics, and you can also get free e-books from Project Gutenberg – I have the complete works of Shakespeare on my Kindle from Gutenberg, for free. Most paid e-books aren’t that expensive at all, and it’s a great way for unpublished, independent authors to get their work seen and to make a little bit of money but, more importantly, providing a platform for their work to be read and enjoyed.

All in all, the Kindle is wonderful, and if you enjoy reading and writing, I highly suggest you get one if you haven’t already. The Kindle doesn’t try to replace books – it complements your bookshelf and makes reading on the go just as easy as reading in the comfort of your own home.