Don’t Mock Me! My favorite part of the Noah’s Ark story is not that he listened to his god and therefore managed to save mankind and the animals, and it’s not the rainbows, or even the dove as a symbol of divine peace and love.  My favorite part happens long before the rains begin to fall.  I love that no matter how much people laughed and scoffed at what he was doing; Noah still went right on bu...

Don’t Let Go Of Your Dreams – Not Again! Deep into the darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing,Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.Edgar Allan Poe You wake up screaming! Your spouse calms you down; reassuring you it was just another nightmare. Even as you settle back and start drifting into slumber again, you wonder why the only dreams you have nowad...

Don’t Clone your Book or Business Marketing Remember that the miracle of cloning sheep has its drawbacks. The main one–dying young. Don’t let your business die young by following the herd. Instead, think of the natural ways you like to market. Here are some marketing ideas that make big promises, and don’t always deliver. And, when followed by investing a large amount of money and time, only a ...

Done There comes a time in every manuscript’s life when it’s time to proclaim it finished. Done. Such a final word, that “done,” isn’t it? It means you’re not allowed to do any more tweaking, no more massaging the words to make them come out nicer. It’s time to let go and let those words, imperfect as they may be, go out into the world and become something separate from you. While you’re writing...

Does Your Novel Have A Heartbeat? PART I of The 8-Part BRING YOUR NOVEL TO LIFE Series You’ve read through what you’ve written—your first few scenes, your first chapter, your completed novel—and you’ve discovered that your words don’t move you. They don’t make you want to keep reading. They don’t make you laugh or cry. If writing is bleeding on the page, well, you might have scratched yourself, ...

Do You Remember Your Nursery Rhymes? Who hasn’t written a poem before? Even once? I believe most people go through a phase in life and it pushes them to pen a poem; ok, or something that resembles a poem. At an early age, we have been exposed to poems. Remember the nursery rhymes? They’re poems. Someone put melodies on them so adults can sing the rhymes to little kids and the little kids can rem...

Digital Storytelling In its most basic form, character animation is about storytelling. As you will see, characters drive a story, and, in turn, the story further defines the character. A good story gives characters motivation, conflict, and a path of action. Without these things, your characters will not truly spring to life. Story structure has a few important concepts. First, you need a chara...

Dig Deeper With Your Novel’s Subthemes Part V of the 8-Part BRING YOUR NOVEL TO LIFE Series By now, you have a solid grasp of the importance of having a theme for your story, of keeping it personal and hidden (to avoid writing the dreaded Message Book), and of hanging on to the courage of your convictions in writing it the way you need to, knowing that you cannot ever please everyone, nor should...

Description – How is it Done These Days I picked up a story the other day written in the 1950s. Here’s an extract: “Two storys high and built of granite, rose the Georgian house, but the porch and its pillars were of red, conglomerate stone. They broke the unbending gravity of the grey front with a touch of colour. Behind rolled blue hills, now melting into the splendour of gold and orange above...