Laura's blog

This summer kicks off Ready. Set. Write! Hosted by Jamie Morrow, Erin Funk, Katie Upperman, and Allison Miller, Ready. Set. Write! is a weekly blog hop about summer writing goals. Anyone can participate, and we all give help and encouragement along the way.  This is the goal-setting week (which I'm coming slightly late to). For this week, I will: Return to my editing journal for The Book  Add 500 NEW words -- not edits or revisions -- to The Book Add another 1,000 words to Contracted In the following weeks, I'll update with these headings:  How I did on last week's goals Goals for this week   A favorite line from my story The biggest challenge I faced that week Something I love about my wip Since I will be moving this weekend, I am not sure how much I'll be able to get done. I might have problems with updating the blog as well. When things settle down a bit, I'll be back. Until then, have a great rest of the week! :)

Everyone has their writing "thing." Some people like notebooks -- college-ruled only. Some people have to listen to the same song over and over again while writing. Others make playlists. Some people use only pen, some pencil, and others only type. I've heard from people who prefer to use typewriters when drafting. Some people have to find the "right" font for each story. I used to think that a lot of this was just silly at best, and ways to procrastinate at worst. Weird writing "things" seemed like just more stuff to get in the way of actually writing. What did it matter if you used blue or black ink? Did it really make a difference to use Arial instead of Times New Roman? It all seemed like a lot of sugar pills to me. I don't believe the "Muse" is real or necessary to start writing, and I used to think of all these writing "things" in exactly the same way. I thought people just made them up to make themselves look special,...

The  #WeNeedDiverseBooks  hashtag began as a way to draw attention to the importance of representation in publishing, whether it's representing a diversity of characters or publishing a more diverse array of authors.  This blog tag's rules were: 1. Post a diverse book. 2. Say why you liked it. 3. Explain what the diversity meant to you. 4. Link to the post that tagged you and tag someone else! My book is: Mister Monday by Garth Nix What it is/Why I liked it This is the first book in The Keys to the Kingdom series by Garth Nix. It's an MG fantasy series of 7 books about a kid named Arthur who's chosen to be the heir to the universe because of a bureaucratic hiccup.  Arthur unwillingly attempts to fulfill his Chosen One role in order to get the minions of his competitors to leave him, his family, and Earth alone. I really enjoyed the extremes of imagination that went into this book and the whole series. It was a wild ride from start...

What's Up Wednesday is hosted by Jaime Morrow and Erin Funk, to help writers and bloggers keep in touch as we scribble. :) What I'm reading I'm relishing the chance to sit down with Fragments by Dan Wells, the sequel to Partials.  It's a post-apocalyptic science fiction YA series, and it's phenomenal. Dan Wells' world is the most well-thought-out, detailed, and possibly most scientifically accurate vision of the post-apocalyptic Earth that I've ever read. Also, I love these characters, and my recent favorites are some new introductions. I love seeing how the changing circumstances affect these characters and their relationships. What I'm writing I'm on break from writing right now. I wrote up until when I would have to write the awkward sex scene and the really complicated public event scene. Those scenes will be harder technically. I don't have writer's block; I'm just avoiding them. I'll admit it. In the meantime, I'm p...

Yesterday, I graduated from college with my B.A. Hooray! Finally. Thank God.  I wish that I could say college was the "best four years of my life," like people kept telling me it was going to be, but first of all I hate that saying, and second of all, it wasn't. It was good, of course, but it wasn't the best. Trying to classify parts of your life as "best" just leaves you constantly disappointed. So I try not to think of things in terms of "best." I had a post planned out about things I did and learned while in college, but I'd like to keep some of that to myself for now.  I started this blog as a freshman. Somehow, I managed to keep it up. If I could do it again, I'd rename it something less cheesy and more truthful. The "voices" in the title were meant to refer to the different characters I had knocking around in my head -- yet, specifics about my writing are one of the things I hardly ever talk about on here. When I...

What's Up Wednesday is a weekly blog hop hosted by Jaime Morrow. What I'm Reading I've been assigned The Covenant with Black America by Tavis Smiley for class. It's an engaging read. It's different from other non-fiction works I've read in that it is a proposal for a plan of action, on the individual, local, state, and federal levels. Other non-fiction I've read has mostly been "here is this cool true story" or "did you know these facts?" or "you should do this thing here do it based on my opinion no really it's totally the thing you should just do." The Covenant beats all of them out of the park. (Is that the correct expression?) I also finished The Year of Shadows by Claire Legrand. I have a soft spot for angry characters, and Olivia's arc was complex and emotional. She was a character I related to on a more personal level than I usually do.  At one point, she's being taunted by shades who fling insults at ...

Well, it's been a while since one of these. I thought I'd ease back into blogging with a What's Up Wednesday, a weekly blog hop hosted by Jaime Morrow. What I'm Reading I'm nearing the end of The Year of Shadows by Claire Legrand. I really love this one, and I also loved Ms. Cavendish's Home for Boys and Girls. The Year of Shadows is an MG ghost story, while Ms. Cavendish is MG horror. I have a feeling that Claire Legrand will become a favorite author of mine. Both these books are so good, and so different. What with this and the new Nick and Tesla, I've been reading mostly MG. However, I still have a big TBR pile to get to, which includes a mix of genres and age ranges. What I'm Writing Reviews and blog posts! I just reviewed the ARC of Nick and Tesla's Secret Agent Gadget Battle, an MG mystery. I'm also getting ready to jump back into writing Contracted . I was really overwhelmed with spring semester stuff, but now that it's the s...