Tiny Victorian Cottage
With only $3000 on renovation and furniture, Sandra Foster transformed a Catskills hunting cabin into this romantic 9-by-14-foot Victorian cottage. She did all the carpentry work herself, using vintage columns, flooring and wavy glass windows. via nytimes
Are you still stuck for ideas for National Novel Writing Month? Or are you working on a novel at a more leisurely pace? Here are 102 resources on Character, Point of View, Dialogue, Plot, Conflict, Structure, Outlining, Setting, and World Building, plus some links to generate Ideas and Inspiration.
CHARACTER, POINT OF VIEW, DIALOGUE
The Universal Mary Sue Litmus Test
Priming the idea pump (A character checklist shamlessly lifted from acting)
Handling a Cast of Thousands – Part I: Getting to Know Your Characters
Establishing the Right Point of View: How to Avoid “Stepping Out of Character”
How to Start Writing in the Third Person
Web Resources for Developing Characters
What are the Sixteen Master Archetypes?
Fiction Writer’s Character Chart
Fiction Writer’s Character Chart
Villains are People, Too, But …
Top 10 Tips for Writing Dialogue
Advantages, Disadvantages and Skills (character traits)
How to Write a Character Bible
Character Development Exercises
All Your Characters Sounds the Same — And They’re Not a Hivemind!
Writing the Other: Bridging Cultural Difference for Successful Fiction
Family Echo (family tree website)
Interviewing Characters: Follow the Energy
100 Character Development Questions for Writers
Lineage Chart Layout Generator
PLOT, CONFLICT, STRUCTURE, OUTLINE
How to Write a Novel: The Snowflake Method
Effectively Outlining Your Plot
Conflict and Character within Story Structure
Ideas, Plots & Using the Premise Sheets
Creating Conflict and Sustaining Suspense
Plunge Right In … Into Your Story, That Is!
Fiction Writing Tips: Story Grid
Tips for Creating a Compelling Plot
The Thirty-six (plus one) Dramatic Situations
The Evil Overlord Devises a Plot: Excerpt from Stupid Plotting Tricks
The Hero’s Journey: Summary of the Steps
Outline Your Novel in Thirty Minutes
SETTING, WORLD BUILDING
The Art of Description: Eight Tips to Help You Bring Your Settings to Life
Creating the Perfect Setting – Part I
An Impatient Writer’s Approach to Worldbuilding
Fantasy Worldbuilding Questions
Character and Setting Interactions
Creating Fantasy and Science Fiction Worlds
Maps Workshop — Developing the Fictional World Through Mapping
IDEAS, INSPIRATION
Solve Your Problems Simply by Saying Them Out Loud
Writing Inspiration, or Sex on a Bicycle
Creative Acceleration: 11 Tips to Engineer a Productive Flow
The Seven Major Beginner Mistakes
Complete Your First Book with these 9 Simple Writing Habits
Free Association, Active Imagination, Twilight Imaging
Story Starters and Idea Generators
REVISION
One-Pass Manuscript Revision: From First Draft to Last in One Cycle
Revising Your Novel: Read What You’ve Written
Writing 101: So You Want to Write a Novel Part 3: Revising a Novel
TOOLS and SOFTWARE
My Writing Nook (online text editor; free)
Bubbl.us (online mind map application; free)
Freemind (mind map application; free; Windows, Mac, Linux, portable)
XMind (mind map application; free; Windows, Mac, Linux, portable)
Liquid Story Binder (novel organization and writing software; free trial, $45.95; Windows, portable)
Scrivener (novel organization and writing software; free trial, $39.95; Mac)
SuperNotecard (novel organization and writing software; free trial, $29; Windows, Mac, Linux, portable)
yWriter (novel organization and writing software; free; Windows, Linux, portable)
JDarkRoom (minimalist text editor; free; Windows, Mac, Linux, portable)
AutoRealm (map creation software; free; Windows, Linux with Wine)
screaming
hellloooo
The rewriting stuff is exactly what I need for my coursework right now
The awesomely insane Heaven and Hell nightclubs of 1890s Paris.
In modern times, you can find a stray cabaret or goth club in most modern metropolitan areas. But back in the late 19th century, your options were limited, albeit merrily deranged. Paris of the 1890s had several supernatural nightlife options, each of them with marvelously outlandish gimmicks.
At this gothic nightspot, visitors pondered their own mortality as they drank on coffins and were served libations (named after diseases) by monks and funeral attendees. Recalls Morrow:
“Large, heavy, wooden coffins, resting on biers, were ranged about the room in an order suggesting the recent happening of a frightful catastrophe. The walls were decorated with skulls and bones, skeletons in grotesque attitudes, battle-pictures, and guillotines in action. Death, carnage, assassination were the dominant note, set in black hangings and illuminated with mottoes on death Bishop said that he would be pleased with a lowly bock. Mr. Thompkins chose cherries a l’eau-de-vie, and I, une menthe. One microbe of Asiatic cholera from the last corpse, one leg of a lively cancer, and one sample of our consumption germ!” moaned the creature toward a black hole at the farther end of the room. Some women among the visitors tittered, others shuddered, and Mr. Thompkins broke out in a cold sweat on his brow, while a curious accompaniment of anger shone in his eyes. Our sleepy pallbearer soon loomed through the darkness with our deadly microbes, and waked the echoes in the “Drink, Macchabees!” he wailed: “drink these noxious potions, which contain thvilest and deadliest poisons!”
But Cabaret du Néant wasn’t the only creepy nightspot in Paris. Later in Bohemian Paris of To-day, Morrow described his evening at the Cabaret de l’Enfer (“The Cabaret of the Inferno”), a Satanically themed nightclub in Montmartre that abutted another cabaret. And according to the author’s account, it was perhaps the trippiest hangout of La Belle Époque:
“”Enter and be damned, the Evil One awaits you!” growled a chorus of rough voices as we hesitated before the scene confronting us. Near us was suspended a caldron over a fire, and hopping within it were half a dozen devil musicians, male and female, playing a selection from “Faust” on stringed instruments, while red imps stood by, prodding with red-hot irons those who lagged in their performance. Crevices in the walls of this room ran with streams of molten gold and silver, and here and there were caverns lit up by smouldering fires from which thick smoke issued, and vapors emitting the odors of a volcano. Flames would suddenly burst from clefts in the rocks, and thunder rolled through the caverns. Red imps were everywhere, darting about noiselessly, some carrying beverages for the thirsty lost souls, others stirring the fires or turning somersaults. Everything was in a high state of motion.”
And right next door to the Cabaret de l’Enfer was Cabaret du Ciel (“The Cabaret of the Sky”), a divinely themed bar where Dante and Father Time greeted visitors and comely ladies dressed as angels pranced around teasing patrons. As Morrow recalled, the evening’s entertainment was presided over by St. Peter himself, who anointed the boozy crowd:
“Flitting about the room were many more angels, all in white robes and with sandals on their feet, and all wearing gauzy wings swaying from their shoulder-blades and brass halos above their yellow wigs. These were the waiters, the garcons of heaven, ready to take orders for drinks. One of these, with the face of a heavy villain in a melodrama and a beard a week old, roared unmelodiously, “The greetings of heaven to thee, brothers! Eternal bliss and happiness are for thee. Mayst thou never swerve from its golden paths! Breathe thou its sacred purity and renovating exaltation. Prepare to meet thy great Creator and don’t forget the garcon!”[Later], without the slightest warning, the head of St. Peter, whiskers and all, appeared in a hole in the sky, and presently all of him emerged, even to his ponderous keys clanging at his girdle. He gazed solemnly down upon the crowd at the tables and thoughtfully scratched his left wing. From behind a dark cloud he brought forth a vessel of white crockery (which was not a wash-bowl) containing (ostensibly) holy water. After several mysterious signs and passes with his bony hands he generously sprinkled the sinners below with a brush dipped in the water; and then, with a parting blessing, he slowly faded into mist.”
more at http://io9.com/5910963/the-awesomely-insane-heaven-and-hell-nightclubs-of-1800s-paris
-____-” Really?
Sleep heals your body physically and mentally Kids~~
So get a good nights sleep as often as possible. Deep sleep (REM-sleep) aids your braincells in recovery - and if you don’t get a deep sleep for a long period of time you’ll eventually start to develop psychosis.It takes your body roughly a month or so to recover from one all-nighter.
Oh bugger.
Infographic: Celebrating Towel Day - May 25, 2012
Lemon.ly has a hoopy little infographic about Towel Day which falls on this Friday, May 25th.
If you don’t know much about Douglas Adams, the most important
thing to know is that he wrote humorous and fun science fiction books. This May marks the 11-year anniversary of Adams’ death. Two weeks after his death, his fans decided to commemorate him by making May 25th, Towel Day, and it turns out Lemon.ly’s designer, Ana, is one of those fans.Great work, Ana, and one should always know where their towel is.
(via Lemon.ly)
