It's Friday. What a perfect time to write a post. One of my clients didn't show up for their appointment, so why not utilize this time for something like...a blog post?
Tomorrow, Saturday, my husband is going to compete in the Warrior Dash. This will be his second year of sliding through muddy water and then running through obstacles for over three miles. Crazy much? Yeah, he is. I'd like to join him, but, uh, I have a, uh... Well, someone needs to take pictures, right?
Rain Boots Required YA Author Tour now has a Facebook Page. Check it out and "Like" it. I hope people show up for our stops. Wouldn't that be crazy sad if no one showed? Eeek. Let's think positive now. There are three fabulous authors who will be on the tour with me, so I'm sure they have fans who will want to visit us. :)
We have added a new author to the tour. Laura Elliott. She'll be joining us at a couple of our tour stops. I'll have the exact locations later this week. Her debut novel, Winnemucca, is now available. She also has a new book, 13 On Halloween, that will be available at the end of September. How exciting!
Here's a recap of the Rain Boots Required YA Author Tour
Authors Involved
Stacey Wallace Benefiel
Me!
Lisa Nowak
Rebecca Knight
Laura Elliott
Dates and Locations
October 1st, 5-6:30 pm
Cover to Cover Books
Vancouver, Washington
October 7th 6:30-8:15 pm
West Linn Library
West Linn, Oregon
October 8th and 9th, all day
WordStock Festival
Portland, Oregon
October 17th, 7 pm
Interzone, Inc.
Portland, Oregon
October 20th, 4-5 pm
Beaverton Library
Beaverton, Oregon
October 22nd, 1 pm
A Children's Place Book Store
Portland, Oregon
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Also, for those peeps who don't have an eReader or who would just prefer to have a paper copy, Loramendi's Story is now available in paperback! You can buy it here for only $9.99.
It's almost time for my next client, so I'm outta here. Have a great weekend!
Showing posts with label portland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label portland. Show all posts
Friday, September 9, 2011
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Dreaming of Wordstock
The Wordstock Festival here in Portland has been around for about five years. Every year of its existence, I've wandered the aisles of beautiful books and writing services being promoted and celebrated by local authors, publishers, editors, and the like. Then I'd sit in on a reading or two and get uber-excited to meet the authors.
While listening to the readers, I'd also fantasize that someday I'd be up there reading my pages. Lets put a little emphasis on the word FANTASY here because if I were to ever get up on a stage to read my pages, mouth farts, drool, and hiccups would probably be the only thing exiting my lips. Stage fright anyone? In Autumn's words from my novel, Dream Smashers, "One can still have hope." And in my words, "One can still dream."
This is my first year to have a published novel. I thought for sure they would definitely let me read at the festival this year, because, well, I have a published novel, darn it. Plus, I'm from the same area the festival is held, total shoe-in. Plus, plus, I whispered nice things to the book, like, "Please impress the peeps responsible for inviting authors to the festival," and "Don't fail me now," before sliding it into the bubbly envelope and addressing it to the Wordstock powers.
I waited patiently everyday for the mail-person to deliver my invitation to the ball. Did I ever receive one? Sadly, uh, it probably got lost somewhere and should arrive any day now.
Disappointed by the loss of my invitation, I scrolled through the very impressive list of YA and Middle Grade authors whose invitation didn't fall through the door panel of the mail truck. OMG! No wonder mine got lost.
Take a look for yourself: The List of YA and Middle Grade Authors attending Wordstock 2011
How is a local author supposed to compete with that? Sigh. Well, there's always next year, right?
Oh, and did you see on that list one of my favorite authors? Maggie Stiefvater! How cool is that? Very.
Chin up, peeps, we'll get there someday. Peace out for now.
While listening to the readers, I'd also fantasize that someday I'd be up there reading my pages. Lets put a little emphasis on the word FANTASY here because if I were to ever get up on a stage to read my pages, mouth farts, drool, and hiccups would probably be the only thing exiting my lips. Stage fright anyone? In Autumn's words from my novel, Dream Smashers, "One can still have hope." And in my words, "One can still dream."
This is my first year to have a published novel. I thought for sure they would definitely let me read at the festival this year, because, well, I have a published novel, darn it. Plus, I'm from the same area the festival is held, total shoe-in. Plus, plus, I whispered nice things to the book, like, "Please impress the peeps responsible for inviting authors to the festival," and "Don't fail me now," before sliding it into the bubbly envelope and addressing it to the Wordstock powers.
I waited patiently everyday for the mail-person to deliver my invitation to the ball. Did I ever receive one? Sadly, uh, it probably got lost somewhere and should arrive any day now.
Disappointed by the loss of my invitation, I scrolled through the very impressive list of YA and Middle Grade authors whose invitation didn't fall through the door panel of the mail truck. OMG! No wonder mine got lost.
Take a look for yourself: The List of YA and Middle Grade Authors attending Wordstock 2011
How is a local author supposed to compete with that? Sigh. Well, there's always next year, right?
Oh, and did you see on that list one of my favorite authors? Maggie Stiefvater! How cool is that? Very.
Chin up, peeps, we'll get there someday. Peace out for now.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
My Experience at the 2010 SLEDGEHAMMER 36-HOUR WRITING CONTEST
36 hours. That's how long they give you to find four prompts via a scavenger hunt through the beautiful city of Portland (sigh--I heart P-town, yo), and then write a story using all of the prompts. Easy peasy, right? Not so much.
First of all, I may love Portland, but I am HORE-EE-BL at scavenger hunts. I totally got stuck on the clue to the third prompt and almost gave up! But thanks to the blessings of Powell's Book Store (I will never reveal exactly what I mean here), I finally figured out the location of the third prompt. I'm not quite positive, but I may have been the last person to get there. Most likely, you'll read the clue and think I'm missing brain cells, which I may be, but still.
Clue to Third Prompt
Sledgehammer Contest 2010:
"They say that little girls are made of particular things;
They say little boys are, too.
But what about people who play Sledgehammer--
What about you and you and you?
This week's rain reminds you of that Evening in Missoula...
It shouldn't be raining here in Portland, yet.
Start in on your indoor projects: Darn your socks with
Organic Silver Needles, over an Irish Breakfast. Restring
your grandma's old necklace with fragrant Dragon Pearls.
Living in our fair city, you must believe in the Magic of Roses,
And we bet this present turn of season makes you positively
Organic Avongrove Autumnal Flush."
Say what?!?! Exactly.
Any-h0o. I finally found all four prompts and then rewarded my self with shopping at Powell's (yay me!) and awesome pizza! Did I tell you that I heart Portland?
Second of all, oh yes there's more, I've only written like, three short stories in my entire life. (That's because I spend so much time writing my novels. Don't fret, I'm working on rectifying the lack of short story file) My main objective was to create a story about compassion. Hmm. What to write about, indeed. Think, think, think. I came up with my idea when I could think no longer. And then I wrote around the prompts:
Prop: Sunscreen
Dialogue: "What you need is a nice..."
Character: Delivery Person
Action: Climbing a Tree
I wrote and wrote and wrote and edited and cut and slashed.
My second objective was to write it lean, meaning, no unnecessary words and zero passive writing. Hopefully, I accomplished at least some of that. I finished Sunday morning around 3 am. Sunday was a day full of grocery shopping, house cleaning, napping, re-reading and figuring out how to burn the story to a disc. Yes, I'm that lame.
I arrived at the drop-off location around 9:30 pm. The warm summer air felt wonderful. The city streets still held mega amounts of people, and music echoed off the buildings. I love Portland. I wore my sweats as I had been writing and cleaning and doing no-work-day-stuff all day and it was Sunday and I wear sweats most of the time because I'm into comfort like that. A giant pimple graced the center of my face because I'm cursed that way. My hair looked like Medusa's when she has visitors.
When they opened the doors to the covert-story-drop building, a man with a camera snapped photos non-stop. I probably didn't smile.
The end result of my story, HUMAN, along with fifteen other stories can be found here:
First of all, I may love Portland, but I am HORE-EE-BL at scavenger hunts. I totally got stuck on the clue to the third prompt and almost gave up! But thanks to the blessings of Powell's Book Store (I will never reveal exactly what I mean here), I finally figured out the location of the third prompt. I'm not quite positive, but I may have been the last person to get there. Most likely, you'll read the clue and think I'm missing brain cells, which I may be, but still.
Clue to Third Prompt
Sledgehammer Contest 2010:
"They say that little girls are made of particular things;
They say little boys are, too.
But what about people who play Sledgehammer--
What about you and you and you?
This week's rain reminds you of that Evening in Missoula...
It shouldn't be raining here in Portland, yet.
Start in on your indoor projects: Darn your socks with
Organic Silver Needles, over an Irish Breakfast. Restring
your grandma's old necklace with fragrant Dragon Pearls.
Living in our fair city, you must believe in the Magic of Roses,
And we bet this present turn of season makes you positively
Organic Avongrove Autumnal Flush."
Say what?!?! Exactly.
Any-h0o. I finally found all four prompts and then rewarded my self with shopping at Powell's (yay me!) and awesome pizza! Did I tell you that I heart Portland?
Second of all, oh yes there's more, I've only written like, three short stories in my entire life. (That's because I spend so much time writing my novels. Don't fret, I'm working on rectifying the lack of short story file) My main objective was to create a story about compassion. Hmm. What to write about, indeed. Think, think, think. I came up with my idea when I could think no longer. And then I wrote around the prompts:
Prop: Sunscreen
Dialogue: "What you need is a nice..."
Character: Delivery Person
Action: Climbing a Tree
I wrote and wrote and wrote and edited and cut and slashed.
My second objective was to write it lean, meaning, no unnecessary words and zero passive writing. Hopefully, I accomplished at least some of that. I finished Sunday morning around 3 am. Sunday was a day full of grocery shopping, house cleaning, napping, re-reading and figuring out how to burn the story to a disc. Yes, I'm that lame.
I arrived at the drop-off location around 9:30 pm. The warm summer air felt wonderful. The city streets still held mega amounts of people, and music echoed off the buildings. I love Portland. I wore my sweats as I had been writing and cleaning and doing no-work-day-stuff all day and it was Sunday and I wear sweats most of the time because I'm into comfort like that. A giant pimple graced the center of my face because I'm cursed that way. My hair looked like Medusa's when she has visitors.
When they opened the doors to the covert-story-drop building, a man with a camera snapped photos non-stop. I probably didn't smile.
The end result of my story, HUMAN, along with fifteen other stories can be found here:
2010 Sledgehammer 36-Hour Writing Contest Entries
Check them out and vote for your favorite three!
Two days after the deadline, the contestants gathered at Black Bird Wine and Atomic Cheese to read 5 minute excerpts of their stories and drink wine. It was rad!
Here are some photos that I took along my journey. Note, I am in none of them.
Two days after the deadline, the contestants gathered at Black Bird Wine and Atomic Cheese to read 5 minute excerpts of their stories and drink wine. It was rad!
Here are some photos that I took along my journey. Note, I am in none of them.
The journey started here:
MULTNOMAH COUNTY LIBRARY
Lovely Buildings
AWESOME BIKERS
(Because we're green like that here in the Northwest)
RAD ART
(I totally want this chandelier. Can you even see it?)
AND THE BEST PART OF ALL!!!
+
=
Awesomeness
I had a blast and am looking forward to next year. You should join me!
Peace out!
MULTNOMAH COUNTY LIBRARY
Lovely Buildings
AWESOME BIKERS
(Because we're green like that here in the Northwest)
RAD ART
(I totally want this chandelier. Can you even see it?)
AND THE BEST PART OF ALL!!!
+
=
Awesomeness
I had a blast and am looking forward to next year. You should join me!
Peace out!
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