What are you reading this weekend? I just finished the first book in the Daughter of the Pirate King duology and can't wait to start the next! It took me a bit to get used to the present tense writing style, but I'm glad I stuck with it. The main character is resourceful and just plain fun to read. Sign me up for more strong female pirate stories! #fantasyfridays #daughterofthepirateking #youngadultbooks #amreading

When it's -24 outside, my dogs are very appreciative of the heat coming from my laptop lol I've got about 70 pages written and 36 of them are revised already. Things are moving along nicely. It'd be easier to write without a dog on my arm though lol Time to write some new pages before I get stuck in an editing loop trying to make the early ones better. #amwriting #writing #writingwithdogs

I'm getting the hang of this writing thing again lol almost 10,000 words in 4 days. Now that's progress! Hopefully I learn to spread it out over the whole week instead of having a really busy weekend though. That's step 2 I guess haha How's your writing going? #amwriting #writing #writinglog

I've been using 4thewords.com to help keep me motivated to write because of their gamification of writing (you write words to defeat monsters and finish quests). Turns out I've been using it for a year now and it says I've written 120,528 words! Wow. That's impressive in a year. I can't imagine how far I'd be if I hadn't changed stories three times and thrown out 110,528 of those words lol It's a painful lesson, but it's good to realize how much time and effort I've been wasting because of indecision. First drafts won't be perfect. I can never even make them good if I don't stick with an idea long enough to get to that magical "the end" moment. I'm determined to stick with this idea to the end. To let my effort actually count for something. I'm ready to see results from my years of writing instead of seeing dozens of versions of the same half written novels. This is the year I'm going to reach the end and publish some books! 4thewords will help me do that. Other people, like my awesome book coach, will help me too, but at 5am there's nothing like battling an owl curator of the library to get me to actually write some words lol speaking of which, I need 963 more in the next two hours to defeat him.... #4thewords #amwriting #writing

#4thewords has such a cheery level up when you write enough words! Gamifying my writing has helped me get so much more done. Trying to finish a quest can keep me at my computer writing for hours longer than I usually would. I also just got to the big midpoint scene in my novel! That'll be an exciting one to write, and hopefully to read too. #amwriting #writing #writerssupportingwriters

What are you reading this weekend? I've heard a lot about the Dresden Files, so I'm finally starting it. I'm also watching the tv show, but it's apparently really different than the books. Sometimes different is good. Not so sure that's true this time though.... Reading is the best way to learn about good storytelling. I think it gives me an instinct for what parts of my own stories are good and which need work. #amreading #dresdenfiles #books