Jennifer Crusie's Blog: Argh Ink

This is the sixth in a series of Three Goddess Chats, brought to you by Krissie (aka Anne Stuart and Kristina Douglas), Lucy (Lucy March aka Lani Diane Rich), and Jenny (Jenny Crusie), who meet in a chat-room called ThreeGoddesses to talk about everything. Most writers have discovery methods, techniques they use to brainstorm their stories and keep them in the world of the book. The Three Goddesses favor soundtracks and collage, and today’s topic is collage. (Click on the images to see them full size.)

Jenny: Collage is basically cutting and pasting your notes for the book in picture form. It’s a way to get past words, which we’re already using a lot of to write the book, and go to images and objects that evoke the tone and spirit of the book, the same way soundtracks do. In fact, collages with soundtracks can be lifesavers for novelists. read more >>

This is the fifth in a series of Three Goddess Chats, brought to you by Krissie (aka Anne Stuart and Kristina Douglas), Lucy (Lucy March aka Lani Diane Rich), and Jenny (Jenny Crusie), who meet in a chat-room called ThreeGoddesses to talk about everything. Most writers have discovery methods, techniques they use to brainstorm their stories and keep them in the world of the book. The Three Goddesses favor soundtracks and collage, so these next two chats are on music and pictures. Today’s topic: Soundtracks.

Jenny: So let’s talk about brainstorming. You both use soundtracks for your books, right?
read more >>

So Mollie, who is a genius, emailed me and said, “Are you on Pinterest?” And I was because Lani and inkgrrl had harassed me until I joined. I was pretty much just sticking stuff up there without a plan, but Mollie said, “You should put up a board for Liz.”

Now that was interesting: read more >>

Susan Elizabeth Phillips just cleaned out her office and sent me a picture of it to show that she is once again superior to me in every way. I love her, but I fail to understand why she thinks a clean office is a good thing. She’s never going to find a rough draft on there that she suddenly knows how to fix because she lost it at exactly the right time. She’s never going to have everything she wants right under her fingertips (and elbows and keyboards) because she’s put it all away. She’s never going to have the delight of finding a half-eaten Snickers bar just when she needs it most. Really, is there any point in working in a place like this?

I think not.

This is the fourth in a series of Three Goddess Chats, brought to you by Krissie (aka Anne Stuart and Kristina Douglas), Lucy (Lucy March aka Lani Diane Rich), and Jenny (Jenny Crusie), who meet in a chat-room called ThreeGoddesses to talk about everything. Lucy and Jenny tend to write heroine-centered books (heroine as protagonist) like Lucy’s newest book, A Little Night Magic, in stores on January 31, while Krissie tends to go for hero-centered books, as in new series about fallen angels, The Fallen (Raziel, Demon, and Warrior, out in April 2012). So once again we got together in our Three Goddesses chat room to talk about what we know about heroines, heroes, and protagonists in general. Today’s topic: Heroes.

Lani: Heroes. What’s essential in a hero? You know, a lot of the same things I look for in a heroine. I want him to be smart, brave, have a sense of humor. read more >>