define('DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT', true); define('DISALLOW_FILE_MODS', true); Learn how to write your story - MyBookTherapy

Cat Got Your Tongue?

I was recently sent a link to a blog post with a request to read through it. As I did, I felt eerily like I was reading someone else’s blog. It sounded suspiciously like the individual had taken on the persona of someone else in my community.

I don’t think this was a ploy to steal someone else’s work. Oh no. It was much more serious than that. This writer was actually being a literary impersonator. They were writing in another person’s voice, other than their own.

I pondered their reasoning for quite some time and the more I wondered about it, I couldn’t help but ask, “What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?” That’s the only viable explanation I could find for someone not using their own unique—and God given—literary voice.

I know there are many reasons why this happens. Most of those reasons are completely unfounded so I’d like to uproot them for you here, sort of my way of snatching your tongue back from Prissy the feline thief:

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Rachel Hauck, Princess Ever After

When The Backstory IS The Story

Sometimes writing a story takes a left turn.

The normal structure just doesn’t seem to work.

You can’t seem to get any life when writing scenes in the present day.

But every time you reference the past or the backstory, wow, things happen. The story pops. You’re excited about writing.

Sometimes a story’s backstory is so large it really IS the story.

This is different than backstory drifts where the author wanders off the main stage and “reminisces” of some past event with prose.

I’m talking about when the set up of the story, the life of the characters before the story opens is so large and complicated the present day story, the on stage scenes, really exist to highlight the backstory.

At this point, your book is about fixing and healing the past and bring the characters to a new place in life.

Most of the time, backstory sprinkles a story with motivation, helps expose the wound and lie and fear.

But it’s minor.

The problem on the stage, the present day story, is what drives the scenes.

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Do That One Thing!

I’ve been buried under an avalanche of frustration due to a software conversion. Have you ever been through one of those? During the first week of the conversion, the phone rang off the hook with questions and snags between the old software and the new.

I know having a sprinkling of gray hair is considered elegant, but I think I grew a whole new patch of gray hair in the last three months. (Seriously, ask my friends).

When we started this conversion I knew it was going to be difficult and I thought I planned accordingly. But I didn’t. Before I knew it, all of my writing time was lost because of the unforeseen problems that developed.

One day in the midst of pulling out my hair – a wise friend asked me.

“What is the one thing you can do to reach towards your dream today? What’s the one thing you can do in order to have forward motion?”

I looked at her at like she was crazy. Certifiable.

“Um, write?”

“Good, then go do

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Social Media Minute— 7 Tips to Get More Comments on Your Blog

Even today—with as many blogs on the Internet as there are—blogging is still a valuable part of building and maintaining an online community. But it’s rare for a blog to take hold and grow, if it’s not a place where comments proliferate. Almost no one likes to be lectured, and that’s what a blog can feel with it the conversation is only one-sided.

I’ll go one step further and add this comparison. Your blog is your Internet home. And because it’s your home, you are responsible for being a good host and making people feel welcome.

Facilitating conversation is just one of the duties of a good host, but it’s the one I want to concentrate on today as I share tips to get more comments on your blog.

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