Author Toney LA Tripp recently participated in an Indies Unlimited Freebie Friday. He was quite pleased with the exposure his book, All Jacked Up, received – which resulted in a surge of downloads. Since we here at Indies Unlimited don’t believe in tooting our own horn (much), Toney was kind enough to write about his experience, although it seems he was a bit nervous about revealing our identity. So I’ve helped out, just a tad. And now, author Toney LA Tripp:
The old cartoon shows the turtle moving faster than the hare. Well, for the last month and a half, my numbers might as well have been the hare. Which I guess would make Amazon the turtle. And the turtle was clobbering me.
However, a friend and fellow writer dropped me a line and asked me to participate in a blog post she has with some partners (that being K. S. Brooks and Stephen Hise at Indies Unlimited). Continue reading “Freebie Friday Testify! – Toney LA Tripp”
The previous episode was a bit of a list, a romp through options for action and suspense. This one is more of a story, which seems apposite. Heeding the body’s call to wind down, make meaning and finish is, when observed minutely, a relatively lyrical testament to what it means to be human.
Part 3: Dying Slowly (links for part 1 and part 2.)
I’ll begin with an explanation. I’d hate you to think, despite an apparently obsession with death, that I am a miserable person who gatecrashes funerals for the opportunity to wear black and be solemn. I’m actually quite happy, when not trying to produce 750 – 1000 words on something that makes you sound really weird. Continue reading “Getting it Right: Dying Slowly (part 3 of 3)”
[This is part 2 of a series of articles by Lin Robinson featured on Indies Unlimited. For part 1, click here.]
As foreshadowed in the opening column in this series, we’re going to examine the whole idea of “rules” for writing the English language, and examine how non-real rules get passed on and even amplified.
One way to look at this would be, “It you say that’s a rule, show me the rule book.” Because there isn’t one. This isn’t baseball or chess, it’s a living organ of humanity. You can whip out your Funkin’ Strunkin’ Wagnals–or better yet, a UPI stylebook–but is it such a great idea to write our novels in the style of newspapers or academic theses?
Here’s something the rule mavens don’t mention, and probably don’t even know: there are no official rules for English. Seriously. French and Spanish have official academies that issue the law for those tongues, but English doesn’t. Writers in those languages break the rules, too, but somebody could look it up if they want to be persnickety. “La Academia Real del Castellano dice que no.” “You imperialist Americaines wish to pollute the sacred Gallic tongue with your garbage Yanqui merde.” But you can’t do that in English, there is no governing body. It’s a democracy. Which means the people make the rules. The statement, “Everybody uses that word the wrong way,” doesn’t really make any sense in English. If people use it different, we change the dictionaries. It’s an organic, evolutionary process. That’s not a call for anarchy: there are grammar books (most of which agree with each other). But is grammar the main issue here? There is no grammatical rule against using adverbs or passive voice. They are just styles, not rules at all. Continue reading “Breaking the Rules (part 2) by Lin Robinson”
I’ll admit it’s contradictory. This is the first of a series of blog posts on the internet telling you the best way to keep your artistic integrity and sanity as a writer is to ignore all the lame advice you get from internet blogs. I can live with the irony if you can.
The woods are full of the advice I’m talking about. And not just the online neck of the woods either: all those books and seminars and webinars and conferences and retreats and coaches/advisors/mentors/gurus. All full of this stuff you just better not do. Much of it can be discounted because they are just rumors, passed on third or fourth hand by people trying to puff up their blogs and pretend they know diddly about writing. Which a glance at their profiles generally shows they don’t. Continue reading “Breaking the Rules (part 1) – by Lin Robinson”
