Tag: writer

Yammer

In case you didn’t know, I’m fascinated with words. The English language is amazing as the myriad of possible adjectives are beyond enumeration. (Exaggeration? Likely, I’ll bet someone, somewhere, has a count on how many adjectives are proper in our English.)
#WritersBrain #Write #Author #AuthorBrain #ILoveWriting #TheEnglishLanguageIsBeautiful #HowManyWordsMeanLove #OldMovie #Adjective #Noun #ILoveWords #WordsAreWonderful #PerfectWord #Yammer #IGetTooExcitedReadingTheDictionary

November 4, 2022

Yammer


In case you didn’t know, I’m fascinated with words.  The English language is amazing as the myriad of possible adjectives are beyond enumeration.  (Exaggeration? Likely, I’ll bet someone, somewhere, has a count on how many adjectives are proper in our English.) 

Nevertheless: Let’s dive into this rather funny anecdote.  

I’ve finished a project I’ve been working on for over ten years.  I started it with a cool dream and just wrote the outline in my head and fleshed out my main characters.  I let it sit for a while until my dad asked one day if I was working on any long projects.  Yes!  Always – I have this one and about fifteen others I choose to pick at depending on what mood.  Two more are close to completion now.  But at that time, for whatever reason, I highlighted this one.  

He kept asking how work was doing in it.  He wanted to know what this or that character was doing.  When was I going to introduce this or that concept.  Because of his research that parallelled mine, I kept working on this project.  I paused for almost three years after Daddy died because I’d cry just thinking about this project.  A few months ago, though, I started on what I call a “stint” – my brain just ran with connecting each of the parts and filling in all the gaps.  I ended up finishing a few days ago and proofing and finalizing.  

So, my craziness?  I was looking for a chapter name – in this project, all the chapter names are alliterative.  I needed a “y” word that meant something like dismay, cry of pain, whining, etc.  So I opened my old creaky dictionary and started reading the “y” section.  

Yammering jumped out at me! 

I was so stinking excited!  I asked myself, “how in the Earth am I so excited over finding one word?” 

Seriously!  But “yammer” means to whine or complain, to make an outcry or clamor, to talk loudly and persistently.  It was perfect!  I love the complexity and beauty of the English language!  I love how I can find just the right word for exactly what I need.  It’s like in “Mutiny on the Bounty” (1935) movie I watched over and over as a child; this guy writing a dictionary says, “how is it your language has so many words that mean love?” 

I used to answer with, “and English doesn’t?” (of course, the Byam couldn’t hear me). 

And that is why I love writing!  I love words, I love painting pictures with words, I love finding things that are super cool to say and mean simple things but make people give you the “huh?” face… Like ameliorate – it means “to make better.” 

My brother repeated it in sentences so often that my daughters at 2 and 4 years old used it! 

Anyway, I’m getting back to finding more perfect adjectives to match my nouns in all 40 of my chapter titles!  

Type at you next time!

~Nancy Tart

A Writer’s Character Secret

Writing is an outlet for emotional and logical discussions for me.  When no one wants to talk about what I want to work out in my mind, I write.  I write for relaxation. 

A Writer’s Character Secret

September 21, 2022

Writing is an outlet for emotional and logical discussions for me.  When no one wants to talk about what I want to work out in my mind, I write.  I write for relaxation.  It feels fun, challenging, and often makes me happy to be in my ”book worlds” I have made up. 

For me, my “book worlds” allow me to explore things I can’t in this life.  It’s like dreaming with my eyes open.  I switch from book in progress to book in progress – I am currently working on about 18 titles actively.  My mood in real life decides whom I want to step into in my brain.  I know where each of my characters are in the stories – I know where I left them.  Thus, I reread the last few paragraphs and dive in with whatever comes next. 

Like my teenage self – lots of writing done then.  I started when my father noticed I was “wasting” my school notebooks for stories, and he suggested I type them.  I had a shoebox filled with 3.5”disks containing three or four stories each! 

Imagine:

Her frustrations, emotions, dreams, adventurous spirit, and everything hidden deep within her as she worked her way through these books were laid out in her own stories tapped at a furiously increasing pace in MS Works on her father’s computer saved on a 3.5” disk.  Her first completed story was her take on a true abortion survivor story.  She became her characters.  Her characters acted out and solved the problems she was facing.  She talked and acted her characters and plotlines out while raking, mowing, or gardening in various locations.  She was Erakk.  Fighting to keep his character sound when faced with odd decisions he’d rather avoid.  She was Jordan.  Her desperate heart cry to be understood and learn how to teach bloomed from his soul in what was to become “Web of Deception.”  She was Kelly.  She was the girl struggling to lead and keep everyone together as their tiny band of outcast survivors developed a whole new world of peace and love.  She became Kelly.  The woman who mothers with an understanding she has gained from life and full dependence on Jesus.  She was Kalina.  She boiled with anger and frustration at not being allowed to do the things she desired with every fiber of her being and ended up learning that what she really wanted was only a small step in a journey back to what her elders had advised her to reach for in the first place.  She was Ethan.  An outcast in his own mind searching quietly for a sense of belonging he thinks he can make on his own despite the true reality that those close to him care deeply for him.  She was Jamie.  Facing challenges that feel too far above his age and making choices that defy the expectations of those above him; always choosing the answer of integrity and honor.  She became Philip.  Overcoming challenges in life that happened beyond his control yet bringing everyone along and pushing his family through to success in the end.  She was Jo.  Fiercely defending her sister from evils that trick the heart and destroy those close to her – blinding everyone except her.  She was Jason.  Defending his family from evils that weaseled their way into his family from years of incorrect choices by three generations behind him that build to forcing his father into being possessed into something he isn’t – now he has to choose to believe that the threads he holds onto are his father’s true self and force the evil away. 

The stories continue.  Some are finished.  Some may never be…

A writer puts himself into the shoes of his characters and wriggles his toes around.  We walk lifetimes in their shoes.  We put ourselves in each character we create. 

I always have a character in a book or series that I consider my shadow; sometimes it is the protagonist like Jordan in Web of Deception.  Sometimes it is a supporting character like Philip Duggar in Brantley Station Saga or Kelly in The Devonians. 

Oftentimes there are bits of me in each character.  Strange thoughts…

I know, crazy writer’s brain, but that’s what I feel.  That’s what it’s like to write for me. 

If you stuck through this one, thank you ever so much for reading!

Type at you later,

~Nancy Tart

Side Quests

September 16, 2021

Side Quests

Have you ever played those role playing video games (yes, I know they are called RPGs) where you are a character (or in the case of my personal favorite, Star Ocean, the Second Story, you are several characters)? Your job is to get from A to B solving stuff along the way so you can accomplish B successfully.

There are these fun little diversions called “Side Quests” that entice you to sidetrack. And yes, I do every side quest I can possibly do! I love these characters (I mean, seriously, who doesn’t love Dias’ tragic backstory and crazy loyalty?) and generally the side quests develop or highlight the character or relationship of one or more characters.

My mind does that to books too.

After watching “The Neverending Story”, I told my Daddy, “every story I like is neverending to me.” He laughed. But case and point: my girls and I are reading and/or listening to an engaging series by Flanagan called “The Ranger’s Apprentice.” I’m way ahead of them and dying trying to not give the story away!! We debate character, backstory, possible romantic interests, who will die, etc. In my head, I have taken bits of veiled hints and imagined child and teen escapades that Will and the other wards may have had. I dream of the life of Will’s parents. I wonder at Halt’s story. (Get to book 9 to answer part of that previous one.)

For me, “The Ranger’s Apprentice” is a neverending story.

Switch to writer brain…

Now, my uncanny love of fleshing out my characters with backstory and flashback experiences bombed when I had to cut more than 80% of “Web of Deception” during editing. While I perceived I was getting good at hinting instead of laying everything out, (aka learning to cut stuff) one of my proofreaders came up clutching the original first book in “Brantley Station Saga” and moaned, “what is the pirate baby story?“

…book one became book three because I needed to tell Ethan’s origin story in “Pirate Child” and “Little Thief.” It also gave me opportunity to build up and flesh out a secondary character in the series who becomes one of Ethan’s primary influencers.

A side quest turned into two additional books.

Now I’m constantly working on various huge books. One is codenamed “curse” and is actually an evil backstory. I have a spin-off of what may turn into actual books someday written to help me understand my characters better… All are backstory for one character in “curse.”

What side quests teach me about life is that often the character building moments in our lives come from what we perceive as inconsequential incidents. We may not understand at that moment that these side quests are really pivotal moments.

Anyway:

Enjoy life! With all of the bumps, dips, side quests, and shifts along the way.

Find your joy!

Thank you for reading!

Type at you later…

~Nancy Tart

Where Do I Start?

March 15, 2021

Where Do I Start?

Have you ever wanted to start writing and looked at a blank paper or computer screen and thought, “okay, how do I start?”

*Raises hand and waves it frantically*

Honestly, I just go for it. 

Maybe I’ll edit and cut or rewrite the start later.  Sometimes what is the start turns into a midsection, gets edited out, becomes a draft outline, or even moved to a later story!  In “The Symbol of El Adame” (book in the works!!), the first piece I wrote is buried in the fifth or sixth chapter.  In “Web of Deception: Child of Miny’lyra” I wrote over 120 pages of copy that was deleted or squeezed in somewhere as back story.  The original start was during an advancement in Ja’hline that doesn’t exist anymore except as a memory in Jordan’s mind (and mine).  The first line I wrote for the “Adventures of Long Tail” books became a draft outline that never made it to a book!  The first written paragraph for the “Brantley Station Saga” became the beginning of book three (Becky’s begging for the “Pirate Baby Story” changed that). 

I will say that every first line of “Five Alive: Stories of the Funny Sisters” books and “The Devonians” books stay the start.  I wrote all of the Five Alive stories on the fly remembering a specific event and knew how I wanted it to start.  All of the Devonians stories follow a huge overlay outline that plots the start and end dates of each book and the timelines within each for the specific book and the overall story.  (Yes, I’m really nerdy about continuity – so much so that I’ve paused this series indefinitely as I lost my “Devonians” folder with all my Devonian maps and building plans when we moved last.  When I find it or redo the entire structure of the Devonian world, I will restart on my favorite children’s book series.)

When you can’t think of something to start with, just put your thoughts on the paper. 

Don’t stress.  You can always change it later.  That’s the cool thing about modern technology or writing with a pencil and paper (and eraser).  You can just clear it and rewrite, rephrase, or start all over.  The control key + backspace is your best friend when drafting emails and texts.

Remember that in today’s world, once you’ve posted a blog or status or tweet, it can’t be undone.  There is no “Ctrl-Z” in real life.  There is no real deleting of posts, texts, or emails once they’ve been sent. 

Still facing that blank screen or paper? 

WRITE!  Just start.  Rewriting is 75% of the writing process.  Maybe more.  Write.  Proof, edit, rewrite, proof again, edit again, rewrite again (repeat until satisfied).  In my case it’s “repeat until you run out of time” because I never think my work is good enough.  Ever.  It can be just this blog post, a children’s book, or a novel.  I never am truly satisfied with anything I write. 

Hope this blog encourages you to write!  Let your story out (or write you school essay)!

Type at you later,

~Nancy Tart

Brantley Station Brain

October 19, 2020

Brantley Station Brain

You know, I’ve been a bit behind on posting blogs the past two weeks. This is because my brain has been in Brantley Station and Feli’tor and Devonia and Nilon. We just finished moving. I finally got my computer fixed after not having it for over a year and a half! (Writer in me dying because I have to borrow a computer and it’s never on my schedule!) The first weekend when we were done moving, I sat outside on the front porch watching Jillian, Lucas, and Thea play and wrote 5 pages in a notebook in my tiny, space-saving cursive with zero margins and front and back top to bottom. Louis came out and said, “you need a computer.”

It is also time.

While I was feeling dark, it was hard to write about happiness and peace. I did some freaky villain handiwork writing that almost freaked me out, but I couldn’t touch my children’s books that are bright and sunshine. I just couldn’t get back into their joyful world despite trying.

Now? I feel free again. I am finding joy everywhere. I am getting to play legos with Lucas and Thea, sit outside in the hot Florida wind and watch them play like the wild crazy children they are, read other authors, and build train tracks and work outside with my family.

Now my brain is back in my worlds.

I’m working on The Apprentice, which will be the fourth in the Brantley Station Saga following The Protector. In this book, Ethan will face another odd change and meet a new set of characters brought by the new cycle! I stepped back into Ethan’s shoes and wiggled my toes around. I’m so excited to introduce Makayla! (Sneak peek will come soon!) I put on Ethan’s determination to find positivity in every task. I looked at the new challenges through his perceptive logic. I felt his warmth at blooming friendships as he understands the connections he has never really noticed. The narrative shifts a little as Ethan begins to see his world just a little differently.

So I’m officially in Brantley Station Brain right now. My dreams are even about Ethan, Makayla, and Corey!

With so much flowing onto the keyboard (my keyboard! yippee!!), I’m hoping to have the final released just after Thanksgiving… in time for Christmas!

Got to go as my Brantley Station Brain is demanding I get back to the pilot barracks and finish Ethan’s next step!

Thanks for reading!

Type at you later!

~Nancy Tart

Improvising

April 10, 2020

Improvising

Sometimes things don’t go as planned.

So you have to learn to improvise.  In the words from a movie I used to watch with my Daddy, “adapt and overcome.” (Heartbreak Ridge with Clint Eastwood)  Daddy used that phrase all the time, along with “think outside the box,” and “look at it from every angle.”  He loved how the scientists and engineers basically dumped a box of items on the table in front of themselves when trying to bring Apollo 13 back to Earth and said “this is what they have, fix the problem with this.”

This kind of thinking is what I try to teach as an educator.  I try to have my characters in books use it to solve problems so my readers will grasp the concept that sometimes there are various ways of solving a problem and all of them aren’t obvious. 

These deep thoughts came from this: We wanted to watch a family movie and I wanted popcorn.  We always air pop popcorn with a new movie!  Not a kernel in sight (a 2nd Lieutenant and an Airman, but those wouldn’t work). 

Jaquline said, “I’ll make popcorn tangerines!”

She presented us with this

And we continued our family movie night.

Sometimes, you have to do with what you have.  Silly thoughts from no popcorn and eating tangerines from a flower instead, right?  That’s my crazy writer’s brain.

What have you done to improvise lately?  Something that you normally do one way but now are doing differently?

Thank you for reading.

Type at you next time,

~Nancy Tart

Lit and Relit

When big siblings are helping research baby names – sometimes there is silliness!

November 16, 2018

Lit and Relit

I’m sitting with Rebeccah trying to research the meanings of baby names when she slaps her hands and giggles evilly; “Mom, you need to name the baby Lucia Irene Tart so she can be LIT!” (we already had discounted all the L I T names for boys because all she could find was “Lucuis” and we already have “Lucas”)

“I love this name!  Lucia means bringer of light and so does Lucius, I’m going to find a guy whose last name starts with a T so I can have kids who are LIT!”

By now, she was writing names on her old Six Flags pass; using “Tank” as the last name.  Christina heard the boy name of “Lucius Ivan Tank” and exclaims from the barracks, “Becky!  Not Ivan!  All I can think of is Ivan the Terrible; please don’t call my nephew Ivan the terrible!”

So now her Six Flags card holds “Lucius Ivan Tank” and “Lucia Irene Tank” – and Christina is like, “seriously?  You just named your kids so they can have cool initials?”

Other such exclamations from the peanut gallery burst forth:

Jaquline: “You don’t even have a boyfriend, how do you know your end name will start with a T?”

Jillian: “I love Lucia Irene!”

Kimberly: “L I T; awesome, Becky!  But then you’d still be RLT.”

Lucas: “Aaaaahhhhhhh!” (I think his car fell off the train track again.)

Christina: “Yeah, she’d be ‘relit’.”

Rebeccah: “Relit!  I love that!  So I’m relit and my kids will be lit!”  *(Starts a funny sashay walk back into the dining room to put the permanent marker up)*

Just a glimpse into my funny world – and then as I start typing this, Becky shrieks, “Mom!  Are you seriously writing a blog about this??”

(Yes.  What else do I do with funny stuff?)

Thanks for reading!

Type at you next time…

~Nancy Tart

Biblical Film Adaptations

June 16, 2018

Biblical Film Adaptations

In this world, the entertainment industry often gets inspiration or ideas from books to transform into movies.  Of course, as a writer, I like to point out to the girls that every movie started as the written word (aka written or typed scripts).  One of the areas we discuss a lot is the differences between book and movie.  We watch many films which are based on a Biblical story.  Many times when people discuss Biblically-inspired movies, the main question is: “Is it accurate?”  This is an important question.  I also like to discuss why it wasn’t accurate – because I have yet to watch a retold Biblical-story-based film that was 100% accurate.

Below are a few of my thoughts specifically on Bible-to-Movie productions.

By far a favorite series in our house is the “Greatest Adventure” cartoons; stories that are close to accurate but obviously not due to the addition of three non-biblical characters and humorous exploits by said characters that just aren’t accurate.  Another favorite is “The Ten Commandments” – which although it’s a classic with great acting and brilliant pageantry, it focuses the majority of time on the portions of Moses’ life that the Bible does not cover, and omits or changes portions of the wilderness journey.  Even the more Biblically accurate “Moses” and “Joseph,” both with Ben Kingsley, omit quite a bit of the story.  Then there are the cartoon features like “Prince of Egypt” and “King of Dreams” – which are more about the lead character “finding themselves” and “fulfilling their destiny” which sounds more along the line of Star Wars than the Bible and they outright change the stories; the former appears to be all about “freedom” (good, but what about learning to obey God?) and the latter has less obvious inaccuracies with the poignant story of forgiveness extremely strong.  Mel Gibson’s “Passion”, while being graphic and realistic where you feel like an intruder through time due to the archaic languages used, has several added sequences that aren’t in the Gospels along with omitting sections that are.  “The Nativity Story” expands on just a few verses to create a realistic emotional journey that focuses on what the storytellers believe Mary and Joseph were feeling and experiencing in their culture; it is close to being Biblically accurate, but much is added into the story.  “Noah” was realistic as entertainment but flawed if one tried to match it to the Bible (though this was the first of any Noah story remake I’d seen where they’d included the fact that Methuselah died the same year as the flood).  “Samson” has an over-the-top villain that makes it seem cartoonish, the story is again modified, yet the film storyline is highly believable.  Three or four Noah remakes as musical cartoon shorts exist in our collection and provide many laughs – the only accuracy in those is this single story thread;“Noah and his family and the animals were saved by God in a boat,” the rest is singing, dancing, and cartoon animal gags.

Even our family’s absolute favorite because it captures the truth of the character of Christ as the Gospels portray, “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” leaves much to be desired if it were an exact retelling of the story (the girls always laugh at the poor cowboy Centurion but love the emotions in the face of the actor playing Jesus when he says “I am the resurrection and the life”).

The question begging is this: why are these things left out?  Why are stories shortened?  Why are portions added in?  Why create inaccuracies in a Biblical story?

In any film production there is the balance between budget, story, perceived audience retention, rating, and other factors that impact how the finished product turns out.  For the sake of the story, characters are sometimes added, omitted, or changed.  Consider in “Samson” how instead of foreskins he brings clothing (that was a nice change).  Sometimes stories are changed or details omitted to keep a film under a specific rating and therefore open to a larger audience.  When we realize that any retelling of the Biblical story will fall short of being the actual Bible, we can appreciate the retold stories as just that; someone’s retold story based on a truth from the Bible.  Granted, as with any film or story, we have to use our discretion – I don’t own a copy of “Sodom and Gomorrah” with Stewart Granger because it’s inaccuracies outweigh what I would consider worth the entertainment (really, hundreds of people escape those cities to follow the great leader, Lot?)

Sometimes accuracy is lost in retelling a story for a specific reason to craft a more palatable story or to engage a specific audience.  I’ve rewritten a few Biblical stories and no, they are not 100% accurate.

  • In “Katy Bear’s Request,” my main character is a talking bear – seriously? This is a child’s book written as a fantasy.  No human was around to witness creation so I picked a bear to witness God making Eve.  Katy Bear is a cub because my story was written for a preschool audience.  Accuracy was lost for fantasy.
  • In “Story From the Inn,” the inaccuracy comes from added details. In the Bible, there is no mention of the innkeeper’s family and no mention that Joseph and Mary are unattended when Jesus is born.  From those unspecified details, I developed the innkeeper’s daughter who sits with the midwife’s daughter to attend Mary and witnesses Jesus’ birth to retell the story to her grandchildren years later.  This inaccuracy is due to added details.
  • In “The Living God,” I actually took quotes from the Bible for the characters to speak, but I added two young palace slaves to observe Daniel and who, like Darius, is convinced Daniel’s God is the Living God. Caleb and Miriam were added because I wanted someone with whom my audience could relate.  They are not mentioned in the Biblical account, so those additions make it inaccurate.

These stories were purposefully made inaccurate to be more entertaining and to engage my audience easier.

Personally, I like to use all Biblical films as catalysts to open discussion regarding this very truth – films are simply stories retold to entertain us.  We discuss the differences between the film and the true story, the supposed reasons why these differences exist, and how the differences affect the story.  Many times, we enjoy a retold story even though we understand the truth is different.  We have two favorite films that are about the life of Ruth – and the girls enjoy watching and discussing both.

Discussion regarding movie versus book is something I do with every film we’ve seen where the girls have read the book.  I do like to turn any opportunity into a teaching moment.  Sometimes the reaction is, “The movie is much better,” (i.e. “The Hunger Games”, “Bambi”, “The Little Mermaid,” “The Count of Monte Cristo”) but most often the reaction is, “I missed xyz” or “Why didn’t they have such and such character?” ending with, “I liked the book better.”

With almost all Bible story depictions on film, the consensus is the Book is much better.

Thanks for reading!

Type at you later…

~Nancy Tart

 

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