writing Archives | Official Site for Heather Justesen and Heather Tullis

How do You Train the Monkey?

Heather — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 19:16:00 +0000

I was reading a book recently and came across an interesting passage where Fo (short for Forest) talks about the difference in the way his best friend reacts to himself versus other people. In it he refers to that reaction as how they ‘trained the monkey.’ I thought it was a really interesting way to […]

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Write Campaign flash fiction challenge

Heather — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 22:10:00 +0000

I’ve never participated in flash fiction before, but since I was challenged to write something for the Writer’s Platform challenge #1, I thought I’d explore a snippet of an idea that came from a dream a few nights back. It’s YA and sci-fi? dystopian? AU? Not sure, exactly, but it’s intriguing me more than I […]

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Story Structure: Ocean Waves or Stairsteps?

Heather — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 03:23:00 +0000

I’ve spent quite a while mulling over one of my writing projects lately, trying to decide what wasn’t working. Now don’t get me wrong, the characters are terrific (if I do say so myself), the set up is good, the chemistry between all of the players is working nicely, but I still felt like something […]

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Writer Neurosis

Heather — Tue, 05 May 2009 10:15:00 +0000

Today in my writing forum one of the ladies posted about how she was preparing a query for one of her books and how frustrated and discouraged she was. She said her book felt like trash compared to other things she read in the market and she wasn’t sure whose books hers was most like […]

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Making Description Stand Out

Heather — Sat, 02 May 2009 22:11:00 +0000

I’ve been receiving David Farland/Wolverton’s Kick in the Pants for Writers enewsletter for a few months now and always enjoy the tidbits he has to share. The latest edition is all about description and characterization and how to make it work. We’re probably all familiar with the term less is more–and sometimes that’s right, but […]

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Don’t Quit!

Heather — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 22:00:00 +0000

I promised more information about the awesome writers conference I attended this past weekend. First, let me say that I have been to all six of the LDS Storymaker’s conferences, starting way back in the Little Brown Theater in 2004. There were 42 attendees that year, and it made me feel inspired and excited to […]

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Writing Update

Heather — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 01:34:00 +0000

Okay, we’re 9 days into the new month and as I look back on my writing goals, I’m shaking my head. I did actually finish an edit to a book to send to critiquers, but that only showed me half a dozen scenes that need to be written/rewritten. I have about half of my nearly-polished […]

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BIAM challenge results

Heather — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 11:38:00 +0000

Well, Tristi‘s challenge is over and the results are in: my word count for January is 14,430. It’s not what I would have liked, but with other distractions, I’m happy enough. I actually finished my book, though I need to rework the last couple of scenes and I managed to edit most of the manuscript […]

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Editing is the Pits

Heather — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 05:56:00 +0000

Yeah, I’ve heard some people say how much they hate drafting their books, but they love editing. I’m precisely the opposite. Yeah, I love my book so much more after doing a big edit, but in while the edit is underway I can’t help but hate it. I recently received back most of the critiques […]

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Writing update and guilty secrets

Heather — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 10:24:00 +0000

Well, the month is half over and my writing goals are coming along nicely enough. I got my manuscript out to all my readers (which they promptly told me they loved except that I need to do a major rewrite–and no, Danyelle, it wasn’t just you). I still have some feed back coming in, so […]

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