NaNoWriMo, My Methods and Failures, and Your Way of Writing | The WriMo Blog, with Esther Hadassah

Hello, writer friends! Are you a NaNoWriMo participant (this includes Camp)? Do you enjoy challenging yourself to write 50,000 words in 30 days? If your answer is yes, you'll like today's post. Join me as I share my past NaNo experiences and reflect on the methods I've used when writing 50k.

NaNoWriMo 2020 Day 2: The Foggy Brain and the Cup of Coffee

 

New Cover! | #CampNaNoWriMo2016 Day 19

Family . . . What Would They Do Without Me?!

Happy New Year! 2016!

Reading, Writing, Nathan Sykes, and Nathan Sykes!

I just have to say this: though I did not enjoy The Wanted until recently, I love Nathan Sykes' voice. And my favorite song of his is Over and Over Again. So you all know, I have not actually watched the music video until a little while ago . . . I'm crying!

This week has been a rather writing filled week. But I have also been trying to pull together all that I can to know about self-publishing. I went to the extent of buying a new notebook (journal, really) to keep myself organized.

It fits me perfectly, at least I think so. A good friend of mine once called me a princess, a few years ago, on my twentieth, and the nickname sort of stuck. But I am not stingy ;) Anyways, yeah, I bought it to keep my notes together, and even organize myself for when I am ready to self-publish. (BTW, I made a second FB page, but to separate the book blog from the rising author, CLICK HERE) I am very happy with the information I have been gathering, and I feel that, with a little funds, I could publish a book or two. I could do it; I already have the know-how and the tactics to get my platform built, all that jazz.

Well, that is all for today/night. I will see you all on Sunday!

Earphones are Awesome!

Hello! Another week gone, and a new one arrives. I did not post on Friday because there was nothing really to blog about. Anyway, let me get this going!

So, last week was not really my prime writing week, and that's okay. I guess I needed the break. Taking a break from writing never hurt anyone, and I think I will benefit from that. I've taken several breaks in past years, and they benefit the author's mind. Sometimes, the brain needs a break to clear the imagination chambers. *winky-face*

I managed to get myself a nice pair of earphone, since my laptop speaker died a couple months ago. I was sharing earphones with one of my brothers, along with several other people, and it was just getting to me. Most of everything I do on my laptop involves some sort of sound. I can't do anything without earphones. So, I think my $10 were well spent.

I pulled out all my old notebooks and have decided that it is high time I finished some of those amazing story ideas. It will change the pace and get me back into the swing of writing. I think they deserve to be put out there for people to see and enjoy. Especially the stories that are halfway completed, I just need to TYPE them up. *rolls eyes* I don't favor typing after writing it on paper. Which I do a lot, when I have a brilliant idea and I am not on my laptop. (When my sister uses my laptop, it puts a small pebble in the road.)

As I often mention, I am looking into CreateSpace for my sister. I have learned all the ropes and I think the final thing to do is actually utilize the online publishing platform, and send myself a hardcopy "draft" of one of my stories to see what it looks like. Having a hardcopy of a story that I wrote would be awesome.

Well, that is all for now. See you later! God bless!

I won two new giveaways!!

Yes! I won two giveaways last night! Okay, so some of the authors for Entangled TEEN got together to celebrate the publication of a new book and I attended (social-media wise). I won a copy of Mia and the Bad Boy by Lisa Burstein. Okay, well that was my choice, since it was choice of an e-copy of one book from the Backstage Pass series. 

There are five books in the series, so far, and they all revolve around the boy band, Seconds to Juliet. Each book follows a member of the band and his love story. And each book is written by five different authors! 

The second giveaway was a $10 Amazon GC. Which I have already used and I bought the rest of The Living Waters series to complete the series.

So, yeah, I had to share that with you guys! I got more writing done these last few days. I am into the fourth chapter in Heart and Soul;  I have been working on my NEW idea quite a bit, but nothing to say about that yet. I have not moved forward more than fifty words in Pictures of You. That's okay, I will get back into it really quick. 

I saw The Best of Me! I loved the movie so much, I think James Marsden was a great choice for the older version of the character.

I'm gonna stop here, because I have nothing else to share, LOL. For now  . . . I will see you guys on Friday! God made you special, and He loves you very much! Bye!

I Am WAY Too Creative!!!

Hello everyone!

Well, what can I say? I am just way too creative for my own good! I am trying to get this chapter going for Pictures of You, and getting Heart and Soul going. I should not be coming up with a new fiction right now. But I did, and I really want to move forward with it. However, I have decided to keep it "unrevealed" until Heart and Soul is moving along, and until Pictures of You is finished.

Anyways, this new fiction is definitely going to up my writing and hopefully reach a bigger audience, since I am trying a different genre. Um . . . I am 22 years old, so I should not feel weird about this particular subject, but I kind of do, and my mom would think I am losing my mind because I don't write about this thing. I will not give too much away, but I will give you some details on how I came into this idea.

You all know that I fell in love with A Noble Groom by Jodi Hedlund. That is the inspiration for the my plot, but I am bringing it to a more modern setting, along with a dystopian twist, or two. Along with the "most wanted" theme, there is going to be a major point in the story where a character has to choose between two options, of which I will not go into detail about. And the story basically follows both main characters for an entire year.

That is all I will tell you about that. *Sneaky-grin* So, yeah, I am too creative for my own good. I have been on pause learning about KDP and CreateSpace. I think it is good to take a break now and then. Too much information does not help me retain it. But I have been busy practicing formatting books to be ready for print. That has been a lot of fun. I am still very choosy of which book I will test print, but it will be so cool to see it in print.


Well, I should get back to whatever I was doing before I got distracted . . . eight different times. I will see you all later this week! God bless!

Let the Weekend Begin!

Hello everyone! At this present time, I am learning to market books, using what I have. This is to help my sister in self-publishing her memoir, and I will be assisting her in the process. I have been goofing around with CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing (as I have mentioned before) and I have been learning the tricks of the trade, learning the proper formatting, everything. I have not gone to the extent of testing the published side of the deal, but seeing one of my stories with an ISBN is really awesome.

I have tried to see what my readers on Wattpad would think if I published a book next year. I got one response and it was pro-publishing. Of course, this reader said "If I had the money" which means it would go fine, but I would need to work at getting the book out there myself. Which I am already doing and learning more each day.

I am going to be rather helpful to my sister when the time comes that she will begin the self-publishing process. I may not be her editor, translator, and/or cover maker, but I will be her formatter and marketer. Which is my area of expertize, as well being a graphics artist. But my style of graphic is not exactly what she is looking for, as I have tried repeatedly to give her some examples. She has the platform and audience. Once they know she is publishing this memoir, they will be after it. She just needs to see that.

So what I have been doing this week is learning those tricks of the trade. I spend most of m mornings doing that before getting into my regular routine. Then after lunch I am spending another hour learning about the trade, and then an additional hour to add some writing before I let my sister use my laptop.

My writing is going pretty well. This weekend I intend to try and get more writing in tonight, and on Sunday. (And my dog won't leave me alone. He keeps coming into the forbidden dining room area of the house.) I have been following the NaNoWriMo participants' progress, to see how everyone is doing. I might just jump into the game later on, but not likely. I like writing at my own pace, and I am doing quite well for now. If, in the future, I feel more confident to enter NaNoWriMo I will. But I am happy with my current writing/word building process.

Scarred Hearts was my test-subject for learning how to format a manuscript to fit CreateSpace requirements for review. I did not submit the complete project, because I do not know if that is the book I will publish first . . . Yes, I do intend to publish my books, now that I am learning this stuff I cannot resist. I have a completed wrap-around book cover that I made, which you can see here -

Might not be the final product.

Granted, it is not the best, but I followed the guidelines from A to Z. This would be a pretty decent size book. I sized it 6x9 and learned how to create covers on MS Word. xD Yes, there are tutorials to make PDF (print ready) covers, which I am watching constantly. I am also very happy to say that my skills are probably only for personal use at the present time, but I am still open to requests, should I ever get any. I have a new link in the page(s) section that will direct you guys to a nifty site I made to index all of my social-media. Which means you can find the link to all of my graphics examples.

I think that my first published work will be Pictures of You, because it is meeting my high-set standards much better than I expected. I need to complete the novel, reach my goal of 80K+ words (because I am pushing my limitations and boundaries with this novel). By doing this, I will know my estimated page-count, word-count and will have more statistics for when I go to start creating the paperback. (Yes, the paperback will come first, because I love print books.) I am working on e-book copies as well, those projects are test subjects as well. 

Anyways, that has been my week thus far. Keep your eyes open for more updates from me. I hope to share more soon. Check out my FB page, you will get notifications from me. You will get my tweets, my GoodReads updates, my blog posts. Everything! I have it all figured out. Also, you will get links to giveaways that I entered or that I am hosting/sharing. 

Have a splendid weekend and I will see you all on Sunday!

New Month, New Week, New Day! New Books!

<By the time this post is live, it will be after lunch time?>
It is November 1st, and you know what that means! Its a new month. This year is flying by! This post is going to be just a "wrap-up" of what I did over the last week, and a brief update on what I plan to do this week/month. As well letting you all know that right after I posted my last post about the two books I was waiting for . . . they arrived five minutes afterwards, thanks to the landlord who brought the mail over. xD I am nearly finished reading Prophet by R.J. Larson. And I have already completed The Preacher's Bride by Jody Hedlund. Amazing book(s) that you need to check out!

As you all know, I had thought about participating in NaNoWriMo. However, the month of November has just been filled with a massive amount of family related things and I do not think I will have the time to sit and write excessively, nor would I be writing more than my usual quota. My sister still uses my laptop during the week days, in the afternoons, as well as a full day on Saturday.

Now, I have been making slight changes in the music I listen to, and one of my step-mothers (yes, we will get into that later) received a box of CD's from one of her friends and they are all artists I would listen to! I asked her if I could make a copy of them for myself, and she gave them to me! Here are the artists/albums I now own.

     

 I am super excited about listening to these albums. I already have a few songs from Misty Edwards, but I am so glad to have the entire album . . . . If I can get my stinking laptop to acknowledge the disc drive. . . . Okay it acknowledged. 

On another note, I am attempting to get my next book going so that I have some chapters ready and waiting when I finish Pictures of You. I have a little "poll" happening on Quotev.com, so that I can share then next two story ideas I have and see what my readers want more. I already have one vote . . . No, not my own, because mine do not count. If any of you would like to help me out, just click HERE. You do not need an account to take the poll, so if you would help me out, that would be fantastic. The two ideas I have in the poll are Escaping Reality and Seeking Shelter. The poll contains all the details about each book, so click that link and go check them out.

I have a few books that I need to get to reading, because they are either part of a blog tour, or I am reviewing them for someone. I really need to get to them ASAP, but every time I sit down to do them, my mind goes somewhere else and I end up doing my own work. I am not slacking, I am just maintaining that balance I was talking about . . . I am not requesting as frequently on NetGalley as I used to, because I still have so many books that I did not read before the protected files expired. I think I can open them again as  a "new" file, but I need to finish the other ones first.

I am thinking about making a FB page. I mean, I can handle a page. I am always updating my Twitter and Tumblr, which I can link to the page. Boom! Content for a FB page. But like I said, I am only thinking about it. I do not intend to actually upkeep a page.

You guys might notice that I have a new tab in this blog called: Sister Promos. Well, it is going to stand as a promotional blog/site to promote certain content. Not like my book blog, that is forever remaining as is. No, not like this personal blog. I am going to be a promoter in this family thing so I need to get something going for that. I am a big sister, I love sharing, so Sister Promos. Also, the #HashtagMagazine blog is still on hold. I may not keep that going.

My writing! I am on a roll with Pictures of You, with the exception that I have not finished the chapter I am currently working on. However, I do work on it in bits and pieces when I sit down. I have received some feedback on it, so I feel good about how it is coming along.

Well, that is all for now. I hope you are all well. Keep watch on my book blog this week. Really cool things happening! God bless you and see you soon!

What is MLHarper22 up to?

Hey all! So, instead of just waiting for you guys to comment, I decided to just throw together this post with what I am up to on my OTHER Wattpad account, MLHarper22.

The covers above are only a smidgen of what I have posted on MLHarper22. I shall take great care to explain each story, along with their cover. Let's get started!!!

 Country and City series
Is my Little House on the Prairie fan-fictions. I use all the original characters from the TV series (and the books) but add my own characters as well. The first cover is the book I had completed two years ago, and only recently I have decided to continue the series.

The Roleplay
As the cover implies, yes, this book was a finalist in the 2013 WattyAwards! This book is a crossover-fan-fiction, and I wrote while going through my Alex Pettyfer/Justin Bieber/Nick Jonas phase of my teen years. Yes, this book is that OLD. I had written it when I was 14 years old, and had deleted it, but then re-uploaded it to enter it into the Wattys2013. Learning that this book was a finalist gave me the confident boost I needed to keep writing. I had thought I sucked at writing and was ready to give it up. Thank goodness, I didn't, and look at me now!

Genetic X
Was my first "paranormal-ish" book, and I have not gone back to recreate any more such writings. This book was written during the Twilight hype, and I was trying to be the cool girl who could create something similar, without bringing actual vampires/werewolves into play. I call my characters Shape Shifters. I made this quite clear when I posted the story, and I completed this book . . . last year. I still have the notebook I wrote it in, and I plan to make it better, when given proper time.

My Dear Emma
Sherlock Holmes Fan-Fiction/Romance

Yes, I went as far as writing a fan-fiction from one of my favorite books. Using my knowledge of the original story, and the twisted movie plot(s), I came up with a story that I quite enjoy. I have not finished it yet, but I am just waiting for the right time to get to work on it again.

  

My One Direction fan-fictions!! Now, all of these are complete, with the exception of It Takes Two, because I started posting that book only a few months ago. Eighteen was written for a contest, the week that Zayn Malik left the band. So, yeah, that would explain why it is quite . . . dark.

Other than that, my 1D fan-fictions are quite popular, from what I can tell. My readers on that account are very quiet, unless they leave me a ♥ comment, or something. The Mommy Direction was inspired by a few things, but I shall not elaborate on it.

   

My very first short stories!!!! So, yes, that would be the reason why the pen-name is different. I experimented pen-names until I found one I liked. Hadassah Harper. All remain unedited, to show my progress in writing.

Well, hope you enjoyed this post! You can click HERE if you wish to read any of them. God bless and see ya soon!

What is HaddieHarper up to?

Good morning! So it seems that this post is being prepared an entire day early, but necessary.

Scarred Hearts has been doing very well. The reads have gone up A LOT over the last couple of weeks. At least 100 reads every four days. So, to me, that is quite a lot. I have not kept track of the SYTYCW15 o.o Which worries me. It just dawned on me. . . . *after checking* Okay, I am not in the top 55, which means . . . Yeah. Big whoop. I am still in the Wattys2015, and I can always self-publish. . . . Yes, I am considering it. I just lack a few things to get that going. I am reading up on KDP (Kindle Direct Publish) and Createspace. So, maybe I will be on Amazon after all.

Now I am feeling bummed . . . I really was eager to get far in SYTYCW15. God's will be done. Maybe that is not the route for me to take. Not everyone wants to read the content I write, and that is okay. I have my select audience somewhere.

Pictures of You
Is doing very well. In terms of writing, posting. I have not had feedback yet. But I love where I am headed with the plot. It is just flowing! As previously mentioned, the layout of this book is inspired by the books from Entangled Pub's imprint, Crush. I am thinking about submitting the manuscript to them when it is finished. But then again, I am thinking about self-publishing first.
As also mentioned, the protagonist(s) in this book reflect some people I know, or knew. They are best friends, but if you wish to know what I have twisted in the plot (because I have to rewrite my summary now that I am going a little off *wiggles eyebrows*). I honestly love what is happening in the story and hope my readers have been enjoying it. If you would like to read the book (updated weekly) click HERE. Do not ask me why it is marked as Fan-Fiction, that was Wattpad's doing, not mine.

 Escaping Reality
Is not going to move forward for a while. I am so engrossed in writing Pictures of You that I have not written much for this book. I have written the prologue and have chapter one sitting in drafts. What I do not have is chapter two on the move. This book is basically . . . for experimental purposes. Yes, Cameron Dallas is so cute and I could not resist using that image in the cover, (yes, I made that cover). I am trying to see how far I can take my writing, without going too far away. So . . . expect a bit of ROMANCE and some strong-ish content. If you would like to read the prologue, please click HERE.

Now, as for some of my other writing (on this particular Wattpad account) I am not working on them as much as the ones mentioned. However, I would love to share the covers, if you do not know what they are . . . .

      

Okay, let me give a brief description of these books.

What Faith Can Do was inspired the the song by Kutless, and I wrote that book quite a while back. It would be considered a short story, with a dash of pain and heartbreak, leading up to relief and blessings. This story is complete.

Rescued is my collection of short story (series) I believe I have shared all the story titles prior to today. It all starts with my short story Saved and continues from there. I have said that I am trying to get that all worked out into one book. I know that it would be a bit scattered in a way. Due to the fact that one of the "books" in the series consists of letters exchanged b the protagonists, and another consists of journal entries. Now, I may not put those portions in the book. I might just make those bonus books or something.

When Push Comes To Shove is a book I began earlier this year, but stopped writing because I did not know where to go further. It is kinda like a modern-day Prodigal son, with a few twists. I really do want to continue working on it, but perhaps when I have finished some of the other books.

Mother's Love was one of my first stories, which was partially written before What Faith Can Do. It is about a young man who tells the story of the love of his mother and her sacrifice that he would have life.

I have several other stories that are not mentioned here, but Change of Heart has been under construction for a long time. The original title was Strong, and my intentions were to encourage people, that though life seems to bog them down, to always look to the Heavens and thank God for everything.

Should I add some more of my work (on this Wattpad account)? YES!

   

Praises and Miracles (Honor and Respect: Sequel) is a One Direction Fan-Fiction, with a Christian twist. I wrote this a little over two years ago, and have a portion of the sequel in progress. This was during the 1D hype on Wattpad, and it was originally posted on an earlier account until I chose to move it to @HaddieHarper.

Atelophobia was created around the same time I started Change of Heart. It is about a girl (young woman) who is afraid to fail. Ergo, the title is self explanatory.

A Girl's Best Friend was one of my very first stories, one that I constantly put deleted and re-posted on my earlier account.  "Whoever said that 'Diamonds are a girl's best friend' obviously did not own a horse." - Unknown

Well, that is all for now. I will make another post like this for my other Wattpad account @MLHarper22. If you think I should do that, comment below and tell me! God bless you all and I will see you again soon. BYE!

More New Books! Again. . .

Good morning! Guess what?! Yes, I know, the title of this post gives it away. But I will say it anyways. I have more new books! I received two of my B&N book order yesterday. Books 2 and 3 in The Books of the Infinite series. xD Yes, Judge and King have arrived. I am already reading Judge, because I read the first book, Prophet a few months back, on my Kindle app. I have a review of that on my book blog. Just click HERE. It is very brief, but that was when I was just starting to get the hang of reviews.

Anyways, here are the lovely covers of the books, along with the covers of the other books I am waiting for.

 

 

Funny story about the last two books I am waiting for. I was originally going to get A Noble Groom on B&N, but the price rose at the last minute, so I thought I had run out of GC money. The same book was available on Amazon, but I could not afford it, since I had a 5$ GC I won. So, I was going to get The Preacher's Bride on Amazon, because it was under a buck for a used book. But then, A Noble Groom became available for my spending-cap, so I bought that instead and moved the other book to my wish-list for next time. So, if I did not mention this already, I found just under 7$ leftover on B&N and was able to get The Preacher's Bride!!! So now I am getting all the books I wanted!

That is my book talk, for now. I will have another update for that soon. On to my writing!

I have a new book that I am working on when I am not working on Pictures of You. It is called Escaping Reality. I am involving personal experience in a foster home to the plot. Now, not everything I chose to include in the plot is personal experience. I am experimenting with my writing, and I want to see how this works out. Here is the cover I made for it.

Well, that is all for now. God made you special, and He loves you very much! Bye!

New Books!!

Good morning! So, I do not remember if I mentioned my reading slump this week? Well, yesterday the landlord came to bring us our mail, and guess what most of the packages were! Books, for me! Yes! So, I got my signed copy of Catherine Banks' book, Daughter of Lions, and it is about a teenage girl who's father is the Alpha lion of the pride, but she is merely a hybrid and does not possess the ability to shift into lion form. I literally just finished it and plan to have a review on my blog. My point is, that book got me out of my slump. It was just what I needed to get me back into reading.

The next book(s) I got are the Jacoby novels by William Ritter. And the quote on the front of the book, from Chicago Tribune, says "Sherlock Holmes crossed with Buffy the Vampire Slayer." So I am guessing it is a paranormal/mystery. (My mom did not look too thrilled :s)These books were sent to me from Algonquin, Young Readers, but I honestly do not remember putting my name in. All the same, it is really cool that I got them. I do not know if the books create a series, but I have two books. The first book is called Jacoby and the second is called Beastly Bones and is an ARC. So, those are going to be very interesting. (I will have the covers posted at the bottom of this post)

I sometimes wonder if I should be sharing these book details on my book blog, but I have my system/routine going and I like having two blogs. I keep them running fairly well and I do not feel overwhelmed with the two.

So, my family (the choir and company) returned home last night. After a week of filming their new cover video. The director, K (whom I have mentioned before), along with his crew (of whom I only met C), did a great job. K stayed here the night, because it was too late for him to drive and everyone was exhausted. I think it will take a few days for everyone to get back to normal.

I am only just getting on my laptop today, and I have a bunch of things I want to do before 2pm. Yes, the regular routine is starting back up today. My sister was away all week and she needs to catch up with her stuff. That's okay, I have two new book I want to read anyways.

As promised above, here are the covers of the books I got yesterday. Aren't they gorgeous!

 

Well, that is all for now (or today). I will see you all again ASAP. God bless you, you're wonderful. By!

A Work of Art! (Self Promo)

Pictures of You
Christian Fiction
Hadassah Harper

"Remind us all of what we used to be . . ."
Ebony Zaveri met Merick when she had moved to Princeton, New Jersey. He liked to walk on the wild side, but she knew there was more to him than he was letting on. Growing up with him made life a roller coaster. Merick brought out Ebony’s fun side. Raised in a Christian home, she would share her beliefs with Merick, and he would listen. Merick Balin has one goal in life: Prove to his parents that he can be the man they raised. Not only did he accept Christ into his life, but also he was no longer the trouble-making teenager he once was. The only friend he was ever allowed was Ebony Zaveri, and even she was not allowed to be around him. Merick had known Ebony since middle school. She is his best friend, and the only one who had not gone running when everyone else did. Can the two keep their friendship intact when troubles come their way? Will Meick and Ebony look to God for a solution?
Wattpad

You all know that I have been working on this new book, and I am happy to say that I have come up with the final scene already. However, I am not going to reveal my final plans, because I think you all should check it out for yourself. I have three chapters posted, and a fourth undergoing editing.
I have three covers for this book, the one you see above was made by myself, and I have two more that I got from other Wattpad artists.

I was looking around ALL OVER the place yesterday for a tutorial on how to make the "If I Stay" style cover, and I have to say that the ones I did find were . . . complicated. I watched the tutorials and when i decided the method was too overbearing for me, I came up with my own method! See the gif below to watch the cover come to life!

The other covers I have are the following:

 

I really like these covers and I am doing a weekly rotation so that they have a fair amount of showcasing. Be sure to check out my book blog! New posts have gone live over the past few days!
God bless you all, and I will see you soon!