Published on Saturday, June 2, 2012 by Harriet Gausman It's hard being a writer. Let's face it, when the dreaded writer's block comes a calling it's like the end of the world. Will I ever write again? Has my muse gone AWOL for good? How will I rebuild momentum? Different writers have different ways of dealing with it. You might just hole up for the duration, cover yourself in a comforter and hibernate. Or maybe you're ...

Published on Sunday, October 9, 2011 by admin Through the years in Second Life® there have been few places I have come to personally admire as the Campus d'Art. It has been the passion of Cecilia Delacroix to piece together this gem of education, history and culture of the great artists of our time. The Campus d'Art comprises a large 4 story museum and 20+ other separate buildings, which are set up to sp...

Published on Friday, October 22, 2010 by Shon Charisma In its basic definition, setting is a story's time and place. Setting can help illustrate an historical moment or create a story within a particular social context. Years after 9-11, writers began to integrate this horrific event into stories and use hints of the tragedy to reflect societal issues that erupted after the event, such as fear, safety of one's self and ...

Published on Saturday, October 2, 2010 by Shon Charisma Many writers often start a story with a character that has been speaking to them, begging the writers to develop a story around the character. Sometimes, it's good to start with the setting because place, time, history, context plays a lot in how a story might be written. For that reason, I decided to pick a roleplaying locale in Second Life® that is steeped in histo...

Published on Friday, September 3, 2010 by Shon Charisma To become a better writer and student of the craft, many writers take to buying books on character, plot, voice, and setting; take to attending workshops; and take to consulting with writing coaches. None of these things are bad; in fact, I do many of these things, and I also coach writers and write articles to help them in many of the areas regarding writing and p...

Published on Thursday, August 5, 2010 by admin FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Steampunk Adventures Magazine Soon to Arrive at Virtual Newsstands Everywhere The partners of Steampunk Adventures in Winterfell Anodyne (http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Winterfell%20Anodyne/46/32/22) have put together their combined talents to publish a new magazine for distribution in Second Life® and via the World Wide Web.  The ...

Published on Friday, July 30, 2010 by CathyWyo1 Haystack In the past several weeks I have been overwhelmed by all the good fortune and things I have to do, not only in real life but Second Life® as well.  My experiences and contacts I have made in Second Life® have done more than enrich my life.   A few months ago a friend of mine suggested that we go together with others and purchase Anna Darwinian’s Steampunk Adven...

Published on Saturday, July 10, 2010 by admin Vivake Pathak On 30th May 2010, real life writer Vivake Pathak (who is known as Flint Rodas in the 3-D virtual world Second Life®) joined us at The Milk Loft, Milk Wood to attend a Virtual Meet and Greet. Vivake read from his newly published book God and Destiny and told us a little about how it all began for him. Harriet Gausman: Thank you so much for joining us ...

Published on Friday, June 25, 2010 by admin Last time on WOTW, I talked about a writer's social solar system. The sun all my social networking revolves around is Google, with their full suite of messaging and collaborative tools. Then we have our major planets, Twitter and Facebook, with their large populations and diverse options for extension, through websites and APIs meant to work with them. This article ...

Published on Thursday, June 3, 2010 by admin Social networking has become a major avenue to promote your writing, but the sheer amount of services can be overwhelming at first. All of these sites have their use in a writer's social network, the trick is to not end up spending so much time networking that you never get any writing done. I like to think of all the social networking sites as a collection of plan...

Published on Sunday, May 23, 2010 by admin Saturday evening is a great night for live music in Second Life®. Music is the purest form of escapism and inspiration for me, so much energy comes across from the performers. A great live show will always invigorate and enhance my writing. To start my Saturday of musical inspiration, I took a trip over to Cisum (now unfortunately mid-move) to check out the sweet ...

Published on Monday, May 17, 2010 by admin There are many conflicting opinions on what one should read as a writer. Some authors-like David Eddings-claim to never read in their genre. Though he contradicted himself when he wrote of his love for the forms of medieval romance in the Introduction to The Rivan Codex. He was heavily influenced by this classic genre, and it shows in the similar plot structure of his...

Published on Monday, May 3, 2010 by admin Building a realistic world for your characters to live in is a complicated thing, requiring planning, organization, research, and a great deal of writing that never sees a reader's eyes. It is worth it, when your description becomes more precise and knowledge of your character's motivations deepen. All of this work makes a world seem yours, and it is easy to get att...

Published on Tuesday, April 27, 2010 by admin Last week I discussed my little 3X5 file box of index cards. It is a handy way to store all my random notes for novels in categories that make sense - and make these notes useful while writing because they are easy to access. I also mentioned a technique for expanding the Character section of your note card box to file folder flip cards. The box of notes with the...

Published on Tuesday, April 20, 2010 by admin of Ms. June M. Stormcrow. There are two general ways to go when planning a novel. You're either a plotser, or a pantser. Yet middle ground exists in most of life. It allows a certain fluidity to the writing process, but a lot of scatter brained organization as well. I came to the hard realization this week that my current work in progress needs to be shelved until...