Haven’t done one of these in awhile (and yes I remember my broken promise of doing one every Friday, sorry), so I think it is time for more of writer’s blogs that I like who also serve as useful resources!
Bites: Donna’s book review blog. She focuses mostly on YA as does her main blog Fantastical Imagination. Entertaining reviews well worth the visits.
Fights of Fantasy: A blog about the fun of fantasy and a world of writing. A great little blog for the fantasy writer with such insightful posts as When does character deaths does not work and Becoming Magicians.
Writing Excuses: A podcast for and about writing with your hosts Brandon Sanderson (fantasy writer), Howard Tayler (webcomic illustrator) and Dan Wells (Horror Novelist). A great little podcast for the writer (novice or published) which is Fifteen minutes long, because you’re in a hurry, and we’re not that smart (their words, not mine). H/T to our fellow scribe Unfocused Me for original link.
Well that is all I have for now. Will post more later.
Donna over at Bites (she also is the excellent voice behind the Fantastical Imagination blog) has a little contest on her blog. Whoever can come up with the craziest Harry Potter induced fan act wins her copy of the complete UK editions of the entire HP series. I really want that Philosopher’s Stone one. I hated (and still hate) the name change. I hope I win.
Welcome to the February AW Blogroll. Lets start with the rules:
It (the blogroll)can be themed or not. This one will be.
The first person just makes a post on their blog.
The person following will take some element from the previous blogger and make their own post, including that element.
Please link back to the previous poster with a permalink and also include a link to the blog of the next poster.
The last person tries to tie their post to the first poster and to the previous poster
Please post the links in your blog of everyone participating in the chain, if possible.
OK, like I said this one is themed. And what better theme for the month pf February that love and romance. Or should I say love vs. romance.
Wait…what?
Oxymoron alert?
Not quite. In fact I find them to be diametrically opposite. I hate romance. Not the romantic interlude, or a character having a romantic interest, I just hate romance as seen today in books and movies:
I hate the ridiculous attempts by writers of sitcoms to keep the characters in a sitcom at arms length for the sake of “romantic tension”. If the only reason why people are still watching your show is to see if the two characters are going to get together, then a) you don’t have much of a show, and b) you suck as writers.
I hate all manner of love triangles, quadrangles or octagons. That’s not love, that is cheating. You can be attracted to a number of people, but you got to choose to be faithful or not. When is the last time you met someone who was in such a self-made mess?
To me a real love story is not about getting the girl, or the boy, but about keeping them. I’m willing to tolerate the artifice of the romantic story only in romatic comedies, which allow me to laugh with and at the whole ridiculous situation. As a character in my recent novel said “Romance is fantasy, love is real”. And nothing is more fake than St. Valentine. Should he be doing all of this every day or at any given time, not just on a given calendar day set by the greeting card industry to drive up sales?
I’ll take a real love story that deals with trials and tribulations actual relationships. Please keep the contrived scenes to yourself.
So what do you think? Love or Romance? Why do you like one but not the other? Or am I just a clueless hater? Care to prove me wrong?
I’ll leave those questions to the rest of our blogchain participants, starting with Razibahmed over at SouthAsiaBlog.
After nearly a year of hard work, I have a draft worthy of the name. I still need to clean somethings to fit the new chapters but the hard part is over. Now off to the Betas!
P.S. The video for the first song from the revamped soundtrack: Failure-Kings of Convenience
