Uncategorized

AWW2018 roundup and 2019 launch!

/ HM Waugh / Leave a comment

AWW2019.jpg2018 is so last year! It’s time to rise to a new challenge! #AWW2019 is on, people!

I’ve taken up the same challenge – to read ten books by Australian women writers and review six – and I’m likely to blitz it (again). How can I not, when we have such amazing female writing talent in Oz?!

Here are the links to my #AWW2018 review blogs, covering 16 fab books by Aussie women writers:

It was a super year with huge talent. Bring on 2019, and more great reads by Aussie women!

xx

Three reasons why your writing goals should be elastic and your imagination free

/ HM Waugh / 5 Comments

pablo (1).pngI love to treat my goals a little like my plotting. Give them freedom, and watch them grow and mutate into something better (preferably with superpowers or rainbow hair).

I feel the point of a writing goal is to give yourself a basic framework so you ACTUALLY START WRITING and then you can feel free to escape on the tail of whichever idea takes you.

Remember that little goal I set myself for January? Janowrimo? Newsflash – I didn’t make my 50,000 words (I wrote 35,000). And I’m not disappointed in the slightest. In fact, I’m totally stoked with what I achieved!

So, why shouldn’t you mind if you don’t achieve your writing goals?

1) You got in there and wrote! *celebrate!*

Okay, so when I’m suggesting you didn’t achieve a goal, I’m presuming it still inspired you to write and connect and plot and create. If you wanted to write 50,000 words and you managed 400 before giving up and turning the tele on, your goal clearly hasn’t worked at all. Go find yourself a more awesome goal. Continue reading →

Janowrimo – the busy writer’s solution to a hectic November!

/ HM Waugh / 10 Comments
IMG_20171223_181824493

I spent Christmas holidays on Rottnest Island – glorious!

There’s so much going on at the back end of a year. Study, end-of-school stuff, holiday prep… rush, pack, buy, wrap, plan…

Sometimes, November just doesn’t feel like the best month to decide to write 50,000 words (Even though I do love Nanowrimo!!)

So I’ll share a little thing I like to do. I call it Janowrimo.

I mean, wow, how inventive am I??

I sit down and write 50,000 words in January. It’s a marvelous month where Christmas is over, school hasn’t started yet, and that heavy headdress of end-of-year strain has been replaced by a marshmallow-and-rainbows sort of freedom from whence springs great writing.

Last year, I didn’t manage to do Nanowrimo at all because of study commitments, so my 2018 Janowrimo is twice as important. I’m breaking with tradition this Janowrimo, and NOT (shock! horror!) aiming to write a single MS over the entire month. The first thing I’m aiming for this month is a chapter book involving some splendid gardening and unlikely friendships.

Wish me luck! Maybe even join with me?

Back on board… the keyboard that is!

/ HM Waugh / 3 Comments

Uni is over. And I don’t just mean the semester. Or the year.

I mean The Whole Thing! 

pablo

I’ve spent this year getting a Grad Dip in secondary teaching, and last Friday I finished my final prac! Done, over, ended, complete, passed it (aced it!). I’m so proud of myself.

And… I can be a writer again. Because, believe me, much as I love it… writing had to take a back seat this year. And when I say back seat, I mean eventually it got thrown off the bus and had to walk home.

Through a freak hail storm.

Without even a hat.

And then some dude drove past too fast through a puddle and my writing got oily grit all over it…

 

Anyways… I’ve got some fab storylines in the back of my brain, and a crisp and up-to-date idea of how high schools operate these days.

As well as TIME (so vital!).

So, keyboard, brace yourself…!

How to take critiques without crying – 5 steps to awesome

/ HM Waugh / 6 Comments
pablo (1).png

Made by me using pablo…

Critiques and beta readers… they’re how our craft gets richer, our writing more fab-tabulous, and our manuscripts closer to published. But do we all know how to accept the feedback when it comes?

I didn’t.

I think I’m better now. I’ve taken a crash course in how to receive feedback. Here are my top five tips:

1. Take it and nod

Seriously people. Someone’s just taken the time to read your work and give you feedback. That’s huge. So maybe the feedback isn’t what you wanted to hear…? Continue reading →

Totally, woefully lax… but I have an excuse!

/ HM Waugh / Leave a comment
pablo

made by me, using pablo :o)

I know. I used to be posting every week and browsing through all your awesome posts. And then suddenly… nothing.

It’s like I walked off the edge of a cliff or sailed for Mars or something. Fear not… I’m still here, and I’m still sitting at the same desk. Just doing different stuff.

You see, I blog about books I’ve read…

…and writing I’ve done.

And basically, the only books I’ve read this past month are textbooks (and you don’t want me to blog about those)…

…and apart from a few stolen moments, the only writing I’ve done is academic.

(And trust me, you don’t want that either!)

So this is me, checking in, giving you all a high five because you’re all fabulous, and then logging back out to finish my current uni assignment.

Because if I don’t, this blog will morph into procrastination, and we don’t want that, do we!

Take care awesome people!

When writing and maths don’t gel: cutting your word count

/ HM Waugh / 4 Comments
pablo (10).png

Made by me using pablo…

So, I want to shed 7,000 words from one of my WIPs. It’s about 350 pages long…

Ever the mathematician, I figured it was as simple as deleting 20 words per page and – hey presto – I’d be at my magical number.

100 pages into my cull, and I’m down 1,500 words. Roughly, that equals NOT ENOUGH.

As one of my bosses used to love to say: “Toughen up Princess”. This is not even murdering my darlings, this is just 20 puny words per page. I can do this!

Step 2 is going to be Murdering Some Of Those Darlings (hey, why hold back? entire scenes even??!), so I hope I can step up the word removal before I get to that. I want this draft to be within the accepted norm for word count for a Young Adult.

Cut cut cut!

Fist-pump for 40K!

/ HM Waugh / 7 Comments

Fortyk_earnedI have a hot pot of tea at the ready, plenty of mind-nurturing snacks on my desk, and my MC is literally falling off the side of a mammoth mountain and I need to save her.

This is no time for procrastination.

(‘What did you just call me?’ asks my blog.)

 

However, I also just tipped 40,000 words on the SnowNaNo, so…

Whoo hoo! Pat myself on the back!

 

Now, get back to it…