Month: March 2017

Review of All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven

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All-the-Bright-PlacesAll the Bright Places puzzled me. While reading it, I was never sure what to think. After reading it, I’m still not sure what to think.

The story certainly shines with its own light. It’s about two teens, Violet and Finch, who meet each other on the roof of the school tower during a rough spot in their lives. It explores the irony of someone wanting to die but teaching someone else how to live and is based off a true experience the author had. It’s cute and funny–hitting upon some deep topics about loss and recovery in an elegant way. Continue reading →

What’s in a Name?

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printable-name-tags-r0zxxuni.jpgWith possibly the most cliched title ever, this post will discuss one of my favorite things about writing–naming characters.

A character’s name can speak volumes about who they are, or it can say nothing. Sometimes the fact that the name says nothing, says everything. But that’s getting too philosophical for a Thursday.

I believe there are two general types of names: ones that someone else made up years and years ago, or ones that you make up. Continue reading →

Whose Voice is That?

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IMG_20170316_165432There are a multitude of things that make up a character. Physicality, goals, fears, and looks are just a few, but there’s a big one that often gets ignored.

Voice.

Sure, maybe it’s obvious when a character has a specific way of talking, but what about when the entire book is written in the main character’s voice? Sometime’s it’s really obvious, but other times it’s so subtle that the reader barely notices. Continue reading →

Bullet Journaling–New-Age Craze

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The idea of keeping a journal or diary has been around since the invention of writing. Essentially, that’s why writing was invented–to catalogue information. Journaling just became a more private form of detail splurging; a place to connect with oneself on a deeper level, complain, and remember the good times.

The journal is exceptionally good at what it does. But it’s needy–it requires cultivation and it feeds off your time.

So the bullet journal (or BuJo) was invented.* Continue reading →

Dream Sequence!

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“Well, I was dreaming until you woke me up…”

Dreams are weird.

On second thought, the above three words seem vague. I might as well make statements like, ‘life is weird’ (it is), so let me go into some more detail on the subject of dreams.

I would argue that our concept of fantasy, and our ability to imagine fantastical situations, comes from dreams. It’s an interesting idea–one’s database of sensual information is all that’s needed to create a myriad of bizarre situations. Perhaps that is the only difference between a creative person and someone who is ‘not creative’. The person with the greater imagination is just better able to re-combine their memories while in a lucid state; they don’t have to be unconscious to make stuff up. Continue reading →