The Faceless Face of Facebook

Facebook has grown slightly pointless. So many people that I don’t know very well have added me as a friend that any status updates, etc. that I post have to be rather impersonal and shallow (well, they don’t /have/ to be, but I’m not keen on bearing my soul to near-strangers. I suppose it’s a convenient way to contact people, though.

I’m still (yes, still) reading The Watchers by Mark Andrew Olsen. The guy needs to join Clean Place and read MangyCat’s articles on various writing subjects. His writing is pretty bad. There’s too much telling instead of showing and he doesn’t seem to have much of a grasp at all on writing points of view well. A writer should immerse the reader in the character’s point of view. Mr. Olsen does not do this at all. You shouldn’t write like you’re telling a story; you should write in such a way that your reader lives the story. Mr. Olsen’s book is the former. Not to mention it’s hard to relate to, get to know, and like the characters when you never really get in their heads (this is the case with Abby. You do get in Dylan’s head more, which makes him a more interesting character, though he’s a bad guy [for now]). The writer also needs to balance dialogue with action, mainly in the first part of the book. When you write, don’t write pages of dialogue with very few actions. You will usually wear thin your reader’s patience, even if the character is talking about something fascinating (in this case, the character Abby’s dreams and visions). The only thing that keeps me reading is the plot, and the book has finally picked up the pace so I’m reading it more often now. The plot /is/ very interesting, and I think of Mr. Olsen improved in his problem areas, he could be a brilliant writer.

I should probably name this post “The Watchers” since I have a whole paragraph on it and about three lines on Facebook. Oh well.

Have an amazing rest of your life.
- WM

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We (Mom, Laura, a friend and I, and possibly some other people) might go to the Renaissance festival next Sunday. If not, on their homeschool day. I’m looking forward to it. I’ve been wearing my sword around the house to get used to it, so I hopefully won’t wack anyone with the end. I tried on several belts to see which is most comfortable with it and decided…to use the strap for my old camera case. The historically accurate people would have a heart attack and then excommunicate me, but it’s the only thing I have that’s long enough to wrap around my waist twice, so I prefer it to my cool-looking leather belts and a bruised hip.

We went shopping on Tuesday, and I got a new sewing pattern – Simplicity 6270. I’m going to alter (well, am planning on altering it) like this girl did with a similar pattern to make a sort of overdress/tunic thing. I also found a few shirts, and commented to my younger sister, “Aren’t you proud of me? I actually got something sort of fashionable.” She said something along the lines of, “At least they aren’t big t-shirts with writing-related things on the front.” Good-naturedly; she wasn’t being mean. But I /like/ my Clean Place shirts!

I was going to do Script Frenzy, but I didn’t remember it until close to the end of March, when I was rushing to finish my AAP story. Hence I had little time to prepare, and discovered I needed quite a bit more than that, since I’ve never written a script before. So I might check out a couple of books on screenwriting that someone recommended to me, and then try.

In the meantime, I have plenty of sewing I want to get done before the Ren. faire. I’m making a bodice out of brown microsuede, and if I finish that in time, I might make a chemise and/or hood.

Have an amazing rest of your life!
- WM