The Pen of a Ready Writer

This post will be brief but awesome. Did you know that there are little insects that glow (like lightning bugs/fireflies) underground in caves? Well, there are.      They use a chemical process called bioluminescense, just like lightning bugs do.  See them?  They are clustered - hundreds of them - along the ceiling of this cave over the water. My imagination is spinning with possibilities... Yes, there will be glow worms in my story.

Eli Wallach via Pinterest      I invented a chart last week to track my character's relationships.  It was awesome and really helped me with my story.  Here's what I did:      I made myself a chart with columns and rows.  Each column was titled with the name of a character or group of characters.  For Droben's chart, the columns are titled: Calene, Petura, girlfriend, lords, commoners, rebels.  They are the people who Droben interacts with most in my story, and I want to mark how he sees his relationship with them.      Here is part of Droben's relationship chart: Calene Petura Girlfriend Lords Commoners Rebels Irritated with controlling brother Amused by greenhorn Loves her (and others) He can handle them. Some have very real complaints.  Should be respected but not allowed to rule you.  Treat with resp...

     Today is going to be a fun day.  We are going to look at water scenes deep underground. There are several places in the Wheston caves that have still or running water.  Amos visits a few of them in his first few days in Wheston. If you were wondering last week where the water (for the rock formations) comes from, well, here it is. And it's just so gorgeous... As you can see, in some places the ceiling vaults high above the water, and in other places it hovers low. In places where the water flows near the surface, you may have bits of sunlight trickling down. I love this picture!!! But in other places, you are obviously deep underground. How cool is this??? So, there you have it!  Water scenes from deep underground -- things like Amos might have seen in his years of caving. Again, you cannot make up a more fantastic world than this one. Join me next Friday so I can show you a unique creature that ...

     Katie leaned her head against her locker and groaned.      "Really? Your horse bucked you off?  Right in front of the judges?" Hannah stuffed her books into her locker.      Katie nodded, rubbing her headed against the locker.  "I'm thinking about including 'my personal experience in aerodynamics' in my spring science project."     "Wait!  There's a spring science project?" Hannah slammed her locker door shut.  "How come I don't know about a spring science project and you do?"      Katie swiveled her head to one side, maintaining contact with the locker, and grinned at her friend.  "Because I have an older sister and you don't."      "And...?"      "And she was in Mr. Goven's science class last year." ***      I dropped in on Anne Elisabeth Stengl's blog on Saturday to see if she had posted any word of the F.E.R. progress.  I wa...

I am linking up with Rachel Heffington's Chatterbox Event.  You can see this month's Chatterbox post on her blog: http://inkpenauthoress.blogspot.com/2015/03/marchs-chatterbox.html  "Amos says that Wheston has a legend about you."  Grayun lowered himself onto a seat and breathed in the aroma of Hilma's herb room. "The people of Wheston are fools."  Hilma crinkled her lips in scorn as she held a leaf over her fireball and watched the tips curl and blacken. "No doubt the story has grown over the years." "No doubt.  Such is the nature of legends."  Hilma carried her scorched leaf to the table.  With the precision of an artist, she touched the burnt tip with her forefinger.  It instantly powdered in a dusting of ash on the table.  "People know pieces of the whole; and they make up what they do not know, spreading the imaginary parts mixed into the truth as though they were one and the same.  Then, as each tries to outdo...

     Interesting title -- perhaps I should explain.  You all, I presume, know Anne-girl...and if you don't, you should immediately skip over to her blog at http://scribblingskeyboard.blogspot.com and get to know her right away.  Anne's blog has been my favorite for a long time.  I don't know why.  I just like it so much.  Her stories have meat to them...and adventure...and not too much mushy stuff.      Sooo...anyway, she started talking about book butterflies...which are like plot bunnies...only not exactly.  Plot bunnies and book butterflies can look alike, but it seems to me they have a subtle difference.  Here is how I explain it: Plot bunnies are stories ideas that bounce into your head while you are working hard on your WIP.  Their goal is to distract you from your goals -- giving you a grass-is-greener-on-the-other-side-of-the-fence complex.  They make your current goal look stale and b...