DORI: This week was memorable. Thursday I had a BIG birthday. Won’t mention what age, but my daughter gave me permission to be perpetually 49. I saw my birthday as affirmation that my life was on the downhill side making achievement of my long laundry list of goals unlikely. Near the top of that list was being published. My focus has been to finish and publish a novel, but in the meantime I finally decided to try writing a short story. I was thrilled when it won accolades in a couple of contests, but was elated today when I received copies of that story published in the Connecticut Lawyer. Hard to describe how it felt to see my story laid out across the pages of the magazine. Made me realize that I may be getting older, but it’s never too late to pursue a writing career—if you want it enough.SARAH: Wah-Hoo and congrats, Dori!! How amazing! Friday Night Write has a published author in the house! Hope you celebrated big time, lady! Ha! Just don’t eat the chocolate in front of me. J I’m feeling you on the desire to see goals realized. Writing is hard work. It takes the Double D’s!! (No, not those kind of D’s lol) I’m talking Dedication and Discipline. You’ve got both, Dori. I know you’ll succeed. One thing is for certain, you sure set the “bar”!!
JUNE: Wonderful! Wonderful! Such great news Dori. I’m so glad you are in print!! The photo layout is great. All your hard work is now visual proof of your talent. You worked long and hard on your story, through many revisions and slicing down your word count when you just knew you couldn’t take out another word. Winning or placing in past contests was just as wonderful but now you have attained the next level of wonderful. Like I said, as for your birthday, don’t sweat the small stuff.
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DORI: June’s birthday is a week after mine so we thought we would celebrate by going to see the movie Sherlock Holmes then analyze it afterwards. The casting was excellent, and the relationship between Holmes and Watson was both humorous and touching. A reminder that when we tell our stories, through our writing, we have a chance to “cast” the perfect characters. We have the opportunity to bring to life our own Holmes and Watson. SARAH: One element I liked about the movie was the characterization of Sherlock and Holmes. We weren’t spoon-fed the tidbits, the character affectations brought the sleuths to life. Gestures, mannerisms, and expressions made the characters. It was a classic example of “show don’t tell.”
JUNE: The first fact I liked about the movie was the use of humor to lighten the serious subject plotline of the film. Taking over the world is always a tough theme. This movie stepped up the relationship between the two main characters to the point where they resembled and old married couple as the cliché goes. The banter or dialogue was crisp and bounced back and forth like a ping-pong match. Throw in a good dose of action while thwarting the evil bad guys and I liked the pacing of the story. So all this tells me the same basic writing goals. You need good characters, sharp dialogue, and lots of conflict. Now all I have to do is write the next blockbuster novel that will be made into a movie.
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JUNE: I finially got a chance to try setting the mood for my writing with music. We have talked about this before but I never tried listening to something outside my usual box. My novel is a historical romance set in Texas in the late 1800’s. I don’t normally listen to country music but decided to give it a go. I picked out a few artists whose music was a little closer to my usual rock & roll taste and used an internet radio station to pick a list of other artists with similar styles. I have listened to this music all week and have been pleasantly surprised by how mush I have gotten into the feel of the rhythms and the stories. I think this experiment has worked out and will try this again with future writing projects. DORI: I’ve heard the advice before to listen to music that sets the mood for your genre. Question is what king of music goes with writing thrillers? I inherited my daughters old IPod and want to figure out how to use it while I write. My desk, unfortunately, is in the thick of things in the house. I can’t close the door and have piece and quiet, so having music to drown out the noise would be helpful. Now if I can find someway of blocking out my view of all the housework that screams out to be addressed.
SARAH: For writing thrillers, what about watching some of your favorite movies and pick the songs you like. With the internet, you can google the titles. Easy-peasy!!
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