Texty Ladies » Articles by Jane E. Jones

Hello :)

Jane E. — Fri, 14 May 2010 19:23:57 +0000

Hi everyone!

The Textyladies are still busy regrouping and getting our busy lives in order, but we are talking about coming back to post when we can at TL.

I have a new book out. It’s called Sanctuary and I wrote it under the pseudonym Cassidy Hunter. Come by my website for more information, reviews, and for a chance to win a copy

I hope to see you there!

~Jane

TT: Just Talking

Jane E. — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 19:00:59 +0000

Hi everybody,

I have no prompts today, but I wanted to let you know that next week, I’m interviewing a writer named Diamond Taylor. Be sure to come by for that. She’s going to be giving out some posters and bookmarks, too. That’s Tuesday the 10th! I hope you’ll visit and say hello.

I’m doing NaNo this year, so if any of you have joined up, feel free to add me to your buddy list, or just come by to check out info about the new NaNo book, Strange Familiar. I can’t believe it’s been an entire year since last NaNo!

Also, I’ve submitted four books to three different publishers, and when I hear back from them I’ll let you know. If you’d like to check out my other books, please visit my website for information, links, news, my blog, my Cassidy Hunter website, links to my Etsy shop, a link to my free (erotic) read, and more. I’d love to see you!

Jane E. Jones

TT: ‘Letters’ From A Writer

Jane E. — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 06:04:15 +0000

During one of my visits to the Divas forum, I saw a fabulous post from an author named Fae Sutherland and asked her if I could post it here. I love it! As writers, I think we’ve all faced the same thing a time or two…

If you’re a writer, let us know what similar experiences you’ve had!

~Jane

——-

Dear Friend #1,

When you say, “I want to publish a story but have no idea how to go about doing that.” I want to facedesk. Instead I offer a couple of links to writers forums and agent/editor blogs and encourage you to research it and learn the business. When you respond that someone else pointed you to this awesome publishing company that only charges 500 pounds to publish your book, and that you won’t be needing my links/advice, I want to smack you. Instead, I’ll just let reality do the smacking for me.

Very little love,
Fae

Dear Friend #2,

When you email me and inform me you intend to “add sex” to your mystery/horror shorts so that you can then get published because obviously all that sells is smut, I want to ask what on earth makes you think I want to hear about it. I also want to ask why you think slapping a sex scene or two in a story is going to be your magic ticket to publication. Also? Denigrating the genre in which I write is both insulting and unnecessary. Good luck with tarting up your stories, but I’ll tell you now that if they weren’t publishable without sex, they won’t be with it either.

Not much love at all,
Fae

Dear Friend #3,

When you asked me to read your story and give you my blunt, honest opinion, I reluctantly agreed. I like you and I like to help if I can. However, when you email me 13,000 words lacking most punctuation, no capitalization, improper paragraph and POV breaks, mostly dialogue, and then tell me that it’s not done, you have yet to fill in the bare bones etc…I have to wonder what exactly you want me to critique here. Here’s my advice…do not ask for crit on something you haven’t even finished. Do not ask for crit on something you haven’t self-edited. Do not use me as a workhorse to tell you where to punctuate and capitalize and other such basic things. You claim to be an English teacher. This makes me very, very sad for our youth.

No love,
Fae

Dear friends in general,

Publishing is hard. It’s work. It’s not easy and the chances of making it to any level of success are as slim as your chances of winning the lottery. I appreciate that hearing about my releases and my working to finish a book aimed for agents is exciting and makes you want to do the same. That’s great, I wish you the best. But please stop assuming that just because someone you know, me, has gotten a pinky toe in the door means it’s easy or something. It’s insulting, to assume that “Well, if *you* did it so can I.” Maybe you can. But you’re a fool if you think it’s all easy peasy.

Please stop treating my career as if it were as simple as applying at the Quicky Stop. I have a big enough ego and am enough of a bitch to tell you to piss off, that I got here because I’m *good* and because I bust my a** for every little success. Either start busting yours or GTFO. Jesus, I’m not anywhere near most other authors in terms of success, but I’ve written a dozen books and stories that have or are going to be published. You’d think you’d at least respect the fact that *maybe* I know WTF I’m talking about. Just a little. Jeez.

Peeved,
Fae

_______

Thanks, Fae, for allowing me to post this today!

You can read more about Fae and her books by visiting her website at http://chasethedream.net/ and her blog at http://iniquityden.blogspot.com/

~Jane

Roadblocks

Jane E. — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:14:04 +0000

I’ve been struggling for days with a story that I’m 230 pages into. I couldn’t figure out why I was at a standstill, and agonized over it for days.

Something just wasn’t working. I skimmed over it countless times, trying to find the exact point where I lost it. I did everything I could think of and still I couldn’t pick up the story and continue on. Just could not do it.

I even began a new book, thinking the break might help. But I couldn’t get into the new story. I was afraid if I left the other book too long, I’d never get it back. Besides, my mind was firmly and stubbornly on the old book, and the new book wasn’t going to go anywhere. And that’s unusual for me. I routinely have at least two stories going at once.

I obsessed. I didn’t get anything else done because I’m rigid like that

I had to get past the roadblock, because I’m way too far into the story to give up on it. Besides, I like the story.

But I didn’t know what the roadblock was. I couldn’t get past something I couldn’t see.

You’re thinking there’s a happy ending to this little tale, yes?

Well, there is. Kinda

I took out the character sheets and GMC forms Jacquie gave me, filled them out, and somehow, right in the middle of filling out the conflict blank, I realized what was wrong. I don’t know exactly how I arrived at the realization, but when I finally let myself see it, it wasn’t pretty.

Maybe that’s why I hadn’t seen it. I hadn’t wanted to. It was going to require so much work to fix, and much cutting of lots and lots of words! My lovely, lovely words!

Sigh. I had to go back a good long way and take the story down a whole new path.

So that’s where I am now. And really, it’s not so bad. It’s not fun, thinking about all that wasted time, all those wasted words. I didn’t throw them away, though. That was the only way I could actually cut out such a big portion of the story. I saved the cut words, and I’m pretty sure that if I write a sequel, those words will be in it.

But they’re not right for this book.

Now I’m happily on my way once again, and this time, I can see where I’m going. That’s a great feeling!

What do you do when your book grinds to a screeching halt and you’ve no idea why?

~Jane

Characters and Dialogue

Jane E. — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 05:49:30 +0000

I’m a member of a Loose Id group hosted by one of the Loose Id senior editors, Georgia Woods. She writes some very helpful lessons and has graciously allowed me to post them here for everyone to read. Thanks Georgia and Loose Id!

Enjoy! I hope it helps you as much as it helps me.

~Jane

***

Characters and Dialogue

What is the most important thing to remember about characterization
and how your reader sees your characters?

It’s show not tell – your character should always reveal who they are
and what they stand for by action and dialogue, by what they do and
what they say, not by telling. Your characters also have to be “real”
in that they are both human and rounded, not cardboard cutouts.

One of the first things you do in your book is establish your
characters and their conflicts, show their human side, what they need
to overcome, and show them as sympathetic but human people. You can
have this tough killer-type alpha male that in the beginning seems
like a stone cold killer, then show him moving a kitten out of the way
of a battle and show a small hint that all is not what it seems.

Or you can have a heroine that is shown in prim and proper business
attire, every hair in place, coldly firing multiple people in a
business, cutting pay, etc., then have her turn to walk away and
someone glimpse a tear on her cheek when she thinks no one is looking,
so the reader gets a glimpse of who she really is, and that she’s not
as “cold” as she seems. then not only do they feel sympathy for her
and the position she’s in, they want to know what caused a nice person
to be in that situation to begin with. Then they want to see her get
someone special who understands her and loves her. It intrigues them
to see what happened, what caused it, and what will fix it.

It is crucial for the reader to connect to the character and care
about them. You have to make sure the things you reveal about that
character are acceptable to the reader. They have to have flaws and
special qualities, skills and talents, things they do well and things
they don’t, in other words act like real people
The basis for all fiction is conflict, so every character should have
conflicting ideas and thoughts, every book has to have conflict, every
part/scene has to have conflict. The very best stories are created
from situation where someone has to work very hard and almost lose
everything in order to get their happy ending. And the characters
have to be seen by the reader to deserve it. They have to go through
hell, admit and face up to their shortcomings, which is never easy for
anyone, and come to the place where they are willing to give up
everything to have that thing they need more than anything else, and
that’s love.
You also always have to have failure a very real possibility, and the
consequences to be extremely dire. Who wants to read a story about
mundane daily occurrences? Yes, letting the car run out of gas has
consequences but we’ve all done it. But what if we run out of gas
while flying down the road with a car full of mafia killers behind
us? Much more important.

I think the best stories happen when you have characters who are not
only challenging an exterior conflict, like a bad guy, but who are
also challenging themselves, their own ideas of who they are. And the
best scenes are where those characters confront a darker part of
themselves, and then make a choice. Or maybe they have to give up
something, some part of themselves they felt was important, but then
they learn something, or someone else, is more important, and they
have to let go of that part.

I also believe if characters are perfect, they are boring. We don’t
care about people who get everything they want without having to work
for it. But we almost always care about the underdog. Being the
underdog in a fight is not the same as being stupid, even if the
underdog knows they are going to lose. Those circumstances make up
some of the most powerful characters. There are things out there that
we’d go into battle for even knowing we are going to lose, and those
are the things that people want to read about. I mean, how many have
heard about mothers standing up against unbelievable odds to protect
their children? Even knowing they’ll lose, they have no choice, and
there are very few who would not feel for that mom and be rooting for
her.

So what if you have a great story, but the character is not working?
Or what if the characters are great, but the scenes feel “off”, the
plot and the way you have the characters working out their problems
isn’t working. You have to figure out why it’s not working. Is it
because they don’t have multiple sides? Or they seem one thing but
are really another and you aren’t letting that other side show? I
think if you go back to what it is you are hoping to accomplish with
that character, and then look at how you are setting the character up
to do that, you will at some point see why it doesn’t work.

Every character has a reason for being in the story, and if the
character is not accomplishing what they were meant to do, there has
to be a reason why. maybe that character has the wrong personality to
do the thing the story is asking him to do. Maybe you have a couple
who aren’t clicking, who are not working out. How do you know when
you’ve picked the wrong girl? My suggestion would be to get down to
why you picked her as his match. Look at his motivations and his
goals and what it is he needs, not what he thinks he needs, and see if
maybe you have set her up as someone who doesn’t fit those needs and
goals. If they aren’t butting heads, it won’t work.

It’s like the character in an upcoming book I’m editing about a
warrior woman – she’s alone for so long because none of the men are
worthy of her. She doesn’t exactly say it with those words or that
attitude, but I know what she means. I believe it would be impossible
for me to love a man I can’t respect and look up to, and if I can kick
their butt, sorry, I’m not interested. Most women would feel the same
way. But say you have a woman who is a better warrior paired with a
man who is a wizard with awesome powers and intellect, but whom she
doesn’t seem to respect because she can win a physical battle with
him? How would you work them out? Maybe you have her being the
physical one and him being the brains one, which can lead to
resentment on both sides, and also some delicious conflict. Maybe he
needs stronger magic to counteract that physical weaker stance. Maybe
something needs to happen where she sees all the passion and physical
power in the world is useless without direction and control. There
are all kinds of really cool directions you could take a story about a
man teaching a very strong woman about control.

Okay, dialogue…

The biggest thing about dialogue is that in fiction, actions speak
louder than words, but the dialogue is the life of the book. That’s
where you see a good book become great, and where you can also see a
good book get killed by bad dialogue.

Angela Knight said something one time that kinda stuck with me when I
read it… it’s that we as writers are actors in our own heads, we’re
putting on plays in our heads, then typing them onto paper to share
with others. So as we’re adding dialogue, remember to have your
“actor” constantly asking “What’s my motivation?” Why are they saying
what they are saying and when they are saying it? Your word choices
can sound like lazy drawling chitchat over the coffee, but every
single word shows something about that character that’s important, and
you can’t forget that.

Words are extremely important – word choices are crucial, and
expressions can do your characterizations a huge disservice or hit a
home run. For example… You have a group of people who witness a car
accident. Every single one of them saw the same thing, but the way
they express it will be different depending on who they are, what they
do, and even where they were raised.

I might say, “Wow, that pickup knocked that Lexus into next week!
Reckon anyone’s hurt?”

One of my detective buddies might say, “Hmm…the number one vehicle
ran the signal and hit the number two vehicle.”

A child might notice colors and shapes and things they are used to
picking out.

A cowboy might say, “That yokel just ruined a good pickup truck – git
a rope.”

They need to speak naturally, and their dialogue must be written
taking into consideration who they are. You must also take who they
are into consideration when writing their body movements, stance and
posture. An ex-military man might stand ramrod straight, and be
expected to be a bit anal about his things being in the correct place
and in good repair. A cop might be slow to join into conversation,
wary when it comes to meeting new people, and very conscious about his
surroundings. A female computer tech might have her eyes immediately
drawn to whatever computer or other technology is in the room, and
might be a gadget freak, etc. A female medical professional might
notice things about someone’s looks that others wouldn’t, like the
fact their color is a bit bluer than normal or their breathing was a
bit fast, might pay more attention to someone’s comfort and notice
when they are upset first.

So remember – characters are more than their sum parts. Characters
should be like real people, they have past sorrows and triumphs, past
friends and losses, lessons they’ve learned, training they’ve been
through, and all of it has added up into the person they are in the
story. You as an author are not going to be telling their whole
history – that would make for a boring book. But you can never forget
that all of that history makes them who they are, it affects how they
react, how they see the world, how they speak, and you must let those
things show in order for them to be believable.

Georgia Woods, Senior Editor, Loose Id

***

Loose Id is actively acquiring stories from both aspiring and established authors. We are a royalty-paying publisher, recognized by the Romance Writers of America.

Read Loose Id’s submission guidelines here.

TT: Not so talkative Tuesday

Jane E. — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 04:44:18 +0000

I’ve decided to cut the interviews down to one every other Tuesday, at least for now. With everything else I’ve got going on, the weekly interviews are kicking my butt.

I’ll post something on the alternate Tuesdays, I’m just not sure what yet. Next week is my interview with Dayna Hart, so check back for that.

Don’t forget to post your 200 word or less story, song, or poem with our latest picture as inspiration. We’re leaving it open for the entire week!

Have a great Tuesday, everyone!

~Jane

WW: Voices From The Past

Jane E. — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 06:08:09 +0000

This week I’m going to ask fun questions about you! We look forward to reading all about you and your voices from the past.

Just leave your answers in comments. (Copy and paste questions.) If you have pictures you’d like to share, email them to us at textyladies at gmail dot com. I’ll gather your answers and pictures and post them this coming weekend.

Have fun!

~Jane

***

1. If you could go back to your childhood, what age would you revisit, and why?

2. What did you want to be when you grew up?

3. What is the best piece of advice you received when you were growing up?

4. The worst?

5. Did you have a teacher who left an impression on you? If so, explain. Can be good or bad impression.

6. When you were growing up, what fashion trend did you follow that is embarrassing today?

7. What song did you love in the past, but can’t bear listening to today?

8. Describe your very first boy/girl kiss. Where, when, and what was it like?

9. Your favorite food when you were a child? Your favorite food today?

10. What was your bedroom like growing up? What was your favorite thing about it?

11. What was your favorite TV show when you were a child? Your favorite movie?

12. Name something (a scent, taste, sound, song, etc.) that triggers a memory from the past. Tell us about the memory, as well.

13. What is the most memorable day from your childhood?

14. Who are you most like, your mother or your father, and why?

15. What was the funniest or most embarrassing thing that happened to you as a child?

16. If you could go back, would you do anything differently? What?

17. Do you still have a favorite toy from your childhood?

18. Do you remember the happiest summer of your life? Describe it.

***

That’s it! Enjoy, and don’t forget to send pictures if you’d like! We’d love to see them

Wild Wednesday: Free Apps For Writers

Jane E. — Wed, 21 May 2008 04:55:17 +0000

Jane here with some free programs for writers. Don’t have Microsoft Word? No matter, you can download AbiWord and Open Office for free, and they’re great little word processors. I haven’t checked out all the programs, so read about them, do a little research, and if it’s the program you need, download it! They’re free unless marked otherwise.

~~*~~

AbiWord. A nice little full featured word processor. I’ve had personal experience with this one, and quite liked it.

Publisher’s Description of Abiword

From AbiSource:

AbiWord is a lean yet full-featured word processor. It features a familiar-looking interface, basic character formatting, paragraph alignment, a spell checker, interactive rulers and tabs, styles, unlimited undo/redo, find and replace, and image support. It can also import Microsoft Word 97 and RTF (Rich Text Format) documents, as well as support headers/footers, superscript/subscript, widow/orphan control and newspaper-style columns. Many plug-ins are available. Support for tables is currently limited.

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OpenOffice is another word processor I’ve used, and I loved it. Below are a few words from the publisher.

From OpenOffice.org:

OpenOffice.org is both an open-source product and a project. The product is a multiplatform office productivity suite. It includes desktop applications such as a word processor, a spreadsheet program, a presentation manager, and a drawing program, with a user interface and feature set similar to those of other office suites. OpenOffice.org also works transparently with a variety of file formats, including those of Microsoft Office.

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Adobe Reader. Good program:) The Publisher says:

From Adobe Systems:

Adobe Reader allows more securely view, print, search, sign, verify, and collaborate on PDF documents, online as well as offline, from your home or office. Reader has a completely redesigned interface, new tools, and new options for viewing information more efficiently. Access to an online, real-time meeting in seconds.

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Foxit PDF Reader. Fast and small, great reader!

From Foxit Software: The following is a list of compelling advantages of Foxit Reader: Incredibly small: The download size of Foxit Reader is only 2.55 MB which is a fraction of Acrobat Reader 22 MB size. Breezing-fast: When you run Foxit Reader, it launches instantly without any delay. You are not forced to view an annoying splash window displaying company logo, author names, etc. Annotation tool: Foxit Reader allows you to draw graphics, highlight text, type text and make notes on a PDF document and then print out or save the annotated document.

~~*~~

Jarte. Good replacement for WordPad. Compact and fully featured.

From Carolina Road Software:

Jarte is a free, tabbed word processor based on the Microsoft WordPad word processing engine built into Windows. Like WordPad, Jarte is fast starting, easy to use, reliable, requires little screen space, and creates documents perfectly compatible with Word. But Jarte reveals the WordPad engine’s true hidden power by adding many features Microsoft never made available in the WordPad program. Jarte can even be run directly from a USB flash drive.

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McGill English Dictionary of Rhyme with Verse Perfect 2. I’ve never tried this, but I think I will. Got some really good reviews.

From Bryant McGill: Rhyming dictionary and verse editor for songwriters used by over one-hundred thousand people from over 100 countries. Created by American author Bryant McGill, Adam Markowitz, Jim Karol, Chantelle Paige, Bobbi Billard and Jeff Kozlowski. This essential reference now ships with VersePerfect, a powerful cutting-edge editor for songwriters, poets, rappers, MySpace musicians, and creative writers.

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ScriptMaker for InnoSetup. Sounded interesting..

From HiSoft2000: Scriptmaker is a tool that helps you to construct and maintain installation scripts for Jordan Russel’s Inno Setup. InnoSetup it’s script based and can be a real help for the developers. This software is available in different languages.

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Story Master Pro 2.1. Free to try, but after your free trial is up you have to pay $99.95 if you want to keep it. Looks like a fun tool!

From Writer’s Harbor Software: Story Master Pro is a story development tool for writers. Its storyboard design provides a structured environment where you can plan, create and organize all story events. The easy to use interface will help give your story a clear direction and timeline, making it possible to write each scene with confidence. There is also a place to develop characters and solve the many what-if type problems you will encounter as you develop your story. Let Story Master Pro help you discover the advantage of referencing a well-developed storyboard as you write. Version 2.1 includes many design and interface improvements.

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The Sage English Dictionary and Thesaurus 1.4. Definitely going to try this. Great free program!

From SequencePublishing: TheSage’s English Dictionary and Thesaurus is a complete dictionary and a multifaceted thesaurus of the English language. TheSage can look up words directly from almost any program (IE, Word, Firefox, Outlook, Thunderbird) and is 100% portable. It runs locally, and does not use your Internet connection. Notable features include structured lookup display, advanced wildcard search, tabbed interface, anagram search, customizable user-interface, flexible copy-to-clipboard functionality, multi-session history.

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Treepad lite. Edit, format, store, search, and encrypt different kinds of data.

From Freebyte: TreePad Lite is a very intuitive and small, yet powerful personal database program, only 465 K in size. It allows you to store all your notes, e-mails, texts, and hyperlinks into one or multiple databases.

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WordWeb 5.2. Use thesaurus and dictionary to look up words from almost any program. Great ratings from users.

From Antony Lewis:

This thesaurus/dictionary can be used to look up words from almost any program. In addition to displaying sense definitions and synonyms, WordWeb can find sets of related words. The database has more than 150,000 root words and 120,000 synonym sets, many proper nouns, pronunciations, and usage tags. WordWeb works off line, but when online you can also quickly view web references such as the Wikipedia encyclopedia.

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Video Ebook Maker 1. Interesting!

From Video Ebook Maker: Video Ebook Maker is a free software application that you can use to create an unlimited supply of personalized video ebooks. The download package includes 12 video ebook templates that you can use for creating video ebooks that feature from 1 to 10 videos each.You can select the videos that will be featured in your video ebooks. Those videos will be streamed from YouTube.com in real time. The personalized video ebooks created with the software application can be given away, but cannot be sold. You can give them away to your friends or use them to help drive traffic to your Website. Included in the download are Activ Ebook Compiler rebranding tools.

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What free programs do you use? We’d love to hear about them!

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