Writing Groups

Although many writers prefer to write alone in their rooms, it is always a new and refreshing experience to write with someone else. Whether you join a large writing group or just write a poem or short story with your friend, the experience is rewarding and can unveil things that you could have never thought of alone. As they say, two pencils are better than one! (Okay, no one says that)

Joining a writing group doesn't even mean that you have to write with other people! Most of the time, if you have a writing group, you mainly write in a room and share feedback. In my writing group, one that I have with my best friends, we mainly just post our poems and stories onto our website and share feedback.

Writing novellas or novels with friends can be really fun as well. You and your friend can write each chapter together, or switch off. It all depends on what both of you agree on. Writing with other human being (so not your dog, even though he might be your best friend) allows you to grow as a writer by taking other people's ideas and critisim into account.

If you end up writing with a partner, remember that you can't be in charge the whole time. They have brilliant ideas, just as you have brilliant ideas, too. Somehow, you must forget about being right and combine both views to create a wonderful story.

Good luck!

I am currently writing a Warrior Cats fanfiction with my friend. You can find our story, River's Descending, here, if you have a Wattpad account. We hope you like it! 

-- Brooke_Writer and lynxkitten65

Reading List #9

Here is the ninth installment of my Winter Break reading list. I will be posting a series of my top ten winter break books until January 1, 2016.

9. Polly Wants to be a Writer

If you want to be a writer like the main character Polly, read this. If you do not want to be a writer, keep reading this. It is NOT an instruction guide, some moldy old textbook. It is a novel that is unlike any other, with writing tips and exercises embedded in the pages. This is an amazing piece of work that combines fiction, well-plotted characters, and detailed settings.

Echoes of the Past

Echoes Of the Past by Sylvia Nica

2 stars

Echoes of the Past is a self-published book, so the writing is not as professional as you might see in other, traditionally published books. It is an okay piece of literture. The story is a complex tale of a twelve year old girl who gets trapped in the past. The only bad parts about it is that I began to lose interest quickly, for the writer tends to drag the story on with little or no action. I ditched this book in the middle, and forced myself to read the rest. I would not recommend this book.

Polly Wants to be a Writer

Polly Wants to be a Writer by Laura Thomas

4 stars

         If you want to be a writer like the main character Polly, read this. If you do not want to be a writer, keep reading this. It is NOT an instruction guide, some moldy old textbook. It is a novel that is unlike any other, with writing tips and exercises embedded in the pages. This is an amazing piece of work that combines fiction, well-plotted characters, and detailed settings.

Literary Dragons

In my page Books to Read, I recommended the book Polly Wants to be a Writer: A Junior Authors Guide to Writing and Getting Published by Laura Thomas. I want to tell you just a little more about the book because I extremely enjoyed it, and I am pretty sure you will too. This book is about a girl, Polly who wakes up with a dragon in her bedroom. The smelly, snakelike, alibino dragon named Scrum, is a huge critic of Polly's writing. Polly seeks help with her unruly dragon with Ms. Whitford, proffesinal draogon trainer and author. While Polly struggles to write a story from start to finish, she becomes part of a plot that could result in no writers.  Ever again.

This story is a great read for kids who want to be writers because unlike most writing textbooks, this one is a great novel, like the ones that you normally read. This also has small tips that get absorbed very quickly. Afterreading this story of the slef -doubting girl you will find yourself saying," If Polly can do it, why can't I?"

The literary dragons that Polly has in her writer's world is supposed to represent that tiny voice inside our heads that tells us while looking at something we had just written," You're stupid, that's no good," or," Why do you even bother being a writer? You're horrible." Everyone has experienced this before. And although this can be helpful in judging story lines or the technique of our writing, it can be disastrous in first drafts or just thinking in general. 

After reading this book, I designed my one literary dragon to represent the voice in my head. My dragon was so critical of my writing during 3-5 grade that I only wrote to do schoolwork. Here is a picture of what I think my literary dragon looks like:

His name is Draco, whom I named after my 2nd favorite character in the Harry Potter series AND it means dragon. Go figure. He is very slippery, often disappearing and then reappearing just when I think my idea is good. WHY DRACO, WHY? But I've learned how to train him, at least. 

I got this template from the website Doll Divine. Here is the link if you want to create your own literary dragon!     

http://www.dolldivine.com/dragon-maker.php

Writing Contests

If you are a young writer like me, you should know it's pretty hard to get our work out into the world of adults. Usually we enter into contests our magazines. I do contests usually, and here are links for very good contests:

http://laurathomascommunications.com/juniorauthorscontest/

http://laurathomascommunications.com/junior-authors-poetry-contest/

http://www.thebettyaward.com'

http://www.adventurewrite.com/kids/contest.html