Come ‘Like‘ my Facebook Fan Page and join the fun!
CHECK IT OUT! Click the link and cast your vote for your favorite short story
The countdown: Only 10 DAYS left to participate, read and vote!
Don’t miss out on your chance to win a free copy of my book by posting your winning micro-story.
I’m very excited about the entries we have so far, I will be casting my own votes next week. Click the link now and check them out!
** Writers,
Be sure to share again and get your friends to read and vote for their favorite entry **
Shameless Plug : The Drive – New Release!
Brian Hadley began to recognize that he was losing everything he had been working his whole life to build. He realized he needed to reconnect with his family before it was too late. In hopes of salvaging what is left of their slowly dissolving and parting relationships, he designed what he thought to be the perfect family get away; a road trip to a remote mountain Lodge merely a few hundred miles drive away from their home.
Along the way Brian, his wife Kathy and their three children discover much more than a rekindling of their family bonds with each other as they attempt to escape the deadly and treacherous landscape surrounding them.
Their holiday away to discover each other rapidly becomes a struggle for their very survival when they are suddenly thrust into a wild and unpredictable land filled with unnatural and deadly threats at every turn. A place shrouded in dense unforgiving fog and seemingly determined to destroy them as they endure one torment after another.
The question is no longer will they regain what they have lost from each other, but rather how will they survive, the drive.
The Micro-Story Writing Game on FB
The Micro-Story Writing Game on FB
Fantastic stories, we’re just missing yours!
Only eighteen days left to participate, read and vote. Don’t miss out on your chance to win a free copy of my book with your micro-story.
We have some excellent story submissions from very talented writers. Click the link now and check them out!
** Writers, be sure to share again and get your friends to read and vote for your entry **
Join the Fun!
The Micro-Story Writing Game on Facebook.com
Books by S.J. Johnson
Top 5 ways to open up your creative flow
1. Trust your canvas: don’t fear the blank screen.
With even a single glimmer of an idea, don’t hesitate until you’re overwhelmed with ideas, start writing about it in the simplest form possible right now. Start with an outline, in the middle, the ending or the first line of the first page. Picture a scene or interaction between just two characters or the thoughts of only one character and run with it. Then go back and copy and paste it into the proper place if you need to. It doesn’t matter in which order you create it, as long as you keep writing you’re moving forward with the story, even if you work from somewhere in the middle outward. *Hint: A lot of mystery writers write backward on purpose through their stories to fold up the storyline plot twists.
2. Inspiration is everywhere: stop, relax and listen to your inner voice.
If you already know your characters then explore them. Read about or research where they live. Imagine what they might eat, how they dress, their hobbies, interest’s or dreams. Make them very real in your mind so that they are easier to envision in certain situations.
If you don’t have an idea for a story and you’re starting from nothing, know that your story can come from anywhere. Looking for divine inspiration is easier than you might think. What inspires you? What makes you want to…? What thrills you or makes your heart skip a beat?
Think about your favorite book, movie or something interesting you found on the web. A personal story you overheard. Imagine how you can change it in a way to make it better or more interesting. Think about the hero/heroin and then imagine the plot as if it were you in their place. How would you have done things differently? How should the story have unfolded?
3. Give yourself subliminal encouragement: become a Post-It junkie.
Use an entire pad of post-it notes and on separate pages write out different scenario’s, scenes, ideas, characters on each note. Now do this every time you get inspired by something else inside your story. Post them somewhere within sight of where you normally write. Put them where you will see them throughout the day to give yourself encouragement and future inspiration. Leave ideas in your wallet, car, and pockets. Leave the posted ideas, plots and story builders for yourself everywhere. It will not only help to keep you inspired but will also rekindle your desire and make you want to take a time out to write.
4. Eliminate distractions, concentrate: find someplace comfortable, turn off Internet!
If you don’t absolutely need the Internet to do the task before you, disconnect. Literally pull the plug. This may sound drastic, but really, the Internet is the biggest time-waster ever invented (which is why I love it). It will suck you in and never let you go. It’s like crack, but with an educational and entertaining value. Turn it off.
Now focus.
5. Find your timing: pick your schedule, don’t wait for it present itself.
It makes very little sense to try to sit at the keyboard or with pen and paper to concentrate on the next greatest novel while the children are ripping through the house screaming about the tardiness of their next meal, just before your roommate decides to throw another impromptu party or your boss is waiting for you to finish up the task at hand. Pay attention to your daily routine and find an opening. Really listen to yourself and discover when is the best time for you to be able to open up your ideas and create. If all you can find is an hour a day, or one day a week, then use that time. Do not ‘wait until there’s a better time’, because let’s face it the better timing won’t happen until it’s too late.
Sometimes the creative flow picks bad timing for us and it strikes somewhere outside the schedule. Don’t fool yourself by thinking, ‘I’ve got to remember that’, because as good as your intentions are, you will forget that great idea and frustrate yourself even more by crashing your creative flow with the process of trying to remember. In these instances I have a cheap notebook in my purse, by my bed and in my car so that I can quickly jot down a really good spontaneous idea. Not a novel worth, just some quick notes to help refresh my memory. I also text my own cell phone with unexpected inspirations that I really don’t want to lose. Later, when the creative juices seemed to have dried up, I refer to these fantastic ideas.
Instant creative flow!
Good luck to you in your endeavors to write. Don’t stop. If there is a will, you will find a way.
S.J. Johnson
I’m sexy and I know it ! Hillarious way to start the day !
Got to love Mr Bean
Facebook Micro-Story Writing Game
Click here for all the details:
I get so excited about hosting these games. They are so much fun, even if you just read the submissions, it gets hilarious!
And now for something completely different…
This particular blog post has absolutely nothing to do with writing or publicizing my new novel or promoting anything other than some rather ridiculous fun.
Over the last few weeks I have become slightly obsessed with ‘new to me’ foreign foods, or more to the point what I consider to be bizarre foreign foods.
I would consider myself to be a typical American foodie with a decent palette for diverse delicacies. Rather than allowing myself to become stuck in a rut, I really enjoy mixing up my culinary indulgences by trying new cuisines and flavors from around the world as often as possible. I have found many new favorites, as well as some things I will never eat again including some I can’t even think about without a tiny gag, but it has been a delicious and fascinating journey so far and I don’t intend to quit stretching my curiosity any time soon.
Okay, so I cannot place myself in the same category with the ‘professional taste testers’, and definitely nothing nearly as extreme as Andrew Zimmern. I think he stands is in a league of his own when it come to strange and exotic tasting curiosity.
I do have my limits and they definitely stop far short of Cambodian tree slugs, but I do like to explore new things and food is just one of the many guilty pleasures I like to experiment with.
As well, I’m sure there are many more people in the world that may have a like mind and might appreciate the possibility of at least looking into the new and unusual edible possibilities from around the world. I believe that some of the foods from right here in my little home town might seem strange and unappetizing to others from various cultures too.
I decided this morning that maybe others out there might enjoy a bit of a cultural food knowledge exchange, so I have delved into some of my favorite sites and gathered some of the things I thought you might enjoy.
I don’t usually make resolutions because I rarely keep them and feel as if I’ve set myself up for a bit of a failure. But I have decided that with the coming new year 2012, I will reside to resolute in trying some of these interesting offerings from around the globe. If there is even an ounce of interest, I will post my discoveries and my reactions to these said experiences throughout the coming year.
I’m not saying that I will be trying all or any of these delectable choices, this is just to expand exposure to the possibilities available.
In the mean time, feast your eyes on these vids, pics and links that I kindly submit for your enjoyment, they make me giggle, curious or repulsed. I have done my best to authenticate the following products to ensure that these are actual edibles available to purchase.
In addition, I’m not making a joke of and no insult intended to any culture or ethnicity, it’s all in good fun.
I really would love to hear what you think.
S.J. Johnson
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Yumm! Haggis and Black pepper Potato chips. I bet this would be fantastic with a tuna sandwich and pickle.
***
I would have never imagined this flavor combination. Ginger-ale and chocolatey Krispy Kit Kat.
***
Sounds interesting.
***
Imagine the possibilities at your next Bar-B-Que! I think this one is definitely worth a try.
***
Who in their right mind would do this to chocolate?
***
Intense Dill Pickle? Seriously?
***
All the flavors of a calorie infested dinner without the hassle of gaining any of the pounds, and no pesky after dinner tryptophan coma. Fantastic idea!
~~~~~~
I must also include this “Emmy: Made In Japan” video. I really love her YouTube vids, very engaging, informative and entertaining. Exposing me to this fascinating world of Japanese candy actually made me want to go to our local Japanese market to get some and try it for myself.
All I can say is Popin’Cookin’ brand candies are really fun for kiddies to be able to make their own sweeties, tastes just terrible.
Not so ORIGINAL IDEAS…
The process begins.
You’ve invented this incredible story idea and you decide that you must write it.
Maybe it’s about a past experience that you need to share, or a really good idea that is an accumulation of many people’s life experiences. It could be a complete piece of fiction which originated from a childhood fear or the culmination of multiple fears. Your story could be a plot derived from a book you read or a movie you saw and thought, “I could have done that so much better, I would do it this way…”
Regardless of however the story comes into being, you know it’s a good story and the passion to create it begins to build.
In your mind these people come to life. The landscape begins to form, the plot thickens and evolves into something rich and engaging. You can see the entire sketch of this new reality from beginning to end. You know these characters and the occurrences inside and out. The characters become real, you know everything about them; how they look, how they react, how they think.
The story, inside your head, has already happened. Now you just need to walk the reader through the events one page at a time and acquaint the observer with the tale, carrying them clear through to the blissful ending.
The process continues and you begin to write.
Maybe it happens slowly at first, until you begin to fall in love with one or more of the main characters, then the story unfolds like water pouring from a bucket and at times it happens so fast that it’s hard to keep up with pounding it out on the keyboard fast enough before you lose your train of thought. Or maybe it’s a fight to find the next step in the plot, or even the next line in the paragraph but it becomes a labor of love which forces the need to finish telling this tale. Either way you are now committed to immortalizing this story.
The creative process is a strange a mysterious place, but oh so wonderful when you become struck by its power.
Then just as you get into the swing or even halfway through the process of crafting out this masterpiece, you discover that something similar already exists. A movie that is being released next month, a new book being promoted by a popular writer or a friend tells you about story written many decades ago and your heart sinks in your chest because it’s ‘your’ original idea.
Someone at some point imagined the same story and beat you to the punch line by telling it first. This is where a lot of would be very good writers will succumb to the self-doubting process that all creative minded people share. They allow themselves to stumble and fall and let their story die without so much as a brief glimmer of existence because someone else also thought it was such a good idea they were compelled to tell a similar story.
You cannot give up. Know that this is just a hurdle in being a writer.
This is the point where you must forge forward despite the fact that someone else is doing it or has done it. Even if your story line has ‘similar’ features, even though there are a couple of coincidental occurrences, you must remind your inner doubt that your story is still just as unique and individual as you are.
The story of “Romeo and Juliet” has been told thousands, if not tens of thousands, of times throughout literary history. “Beauty and the Beast” has been resurrected in a magnitude of different genres with many different equations mixed into it. The eternal battle between good and evil, the dark and the light, will be retold countless times before and even long after you’re no longer alive to tell your version of the war.
What you need to remember is that you are writing your story. Inside your mind these people, this place, these trials happen from your point of view and no one on the planet can tell it from that vantage better than you can.
As your story continues to progress changes will occur, growth in an unforeseen direction will present itself and your story will come to life in a completely different light. Even during the editing process the storyline changes and plots twist in new ways that you can’t possibly conceive of at the moment of conception or during the rapture of creation.
The source for your inspiration lives only inside you.
Whatever you decide, don’t stop writing. Finish it, read it through and only then should you decide if you want to or need to change anything.
Never stop moving forward in your journey simply because someone else has walked the path before you.
Good luck and keep writing.
S.J.
Come ‘Like’ my Facebook Fan Page and join the fun!
