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Is this a better and faster way to write?

Published on March 9, 2016March 7, 2016 by Jean M. Cogdell30 Comments

No, in fact it scares the beejesus out of me!

The very idea, writing something only to take a breath and have it vanish into thin air scares me spitless.

Writing is scary enough without writing with disappearing ink. And when I first began writing on the web that’s how it felt every time I sent a story out into the world-wide vast mysterious internet.

Now comes along a new app, “The Most Dangerous Writing App”.

This app is designed for you to write without stopping, without thinking and without giving in to writer’s block. If you stop typing for longer than seconds, all progress will be lost. You can set the timer for 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 or 60 minutes.

This means, no bathroom breaks. Take a pee break and a blank screen will greet you when you return. No breaks to sit back and argue with your protagonist. Because by the time the two of you resolve your differences, poof, the story is gone.

If you are fortunate enough to beat the timer the text remains and you can copy and paste the text into another document.

Now I don’t know about y’all, but writing is hard enough without feeling as if I’m trying to outrun a high-speed train. No, for the love of God, I do not need an app that will delete my writing, should I stand, stretch or go make a cup of coffee. I forget to save things too often as it is.

The intention is a good idea, to enable the writer to shut down the inner editor and get into a state of flow. But we’ve all heard about good intentions.

Third try, and I beat the 5 minute timer!

My hands are shaking, my neck is locked at a weird angle and my eyes bloodshot. But I beat the SOB! Talk about pressure! Sheesh! After the tenth or so sentence, not much else makes sense. OMG, my eight year old grandson could write something more coherent that this gibberish. Nope, won’t be posting this anywhere.

Bottom line, it’s clever. But I doubt it’s something I’ll use. If I want to challenge myself, I can set a timer and pretend. LOL

You can purchase the Flowstate app through Apple.

Or if you’d like to try the app on your computer, here is a free version click the image below.

Read what other people are saying.

My attempt to beat the “World’s Most Dangerous Writing App” by Peter Shankman

The Most Dangerous Writing App’ Is A Terrifying Productivity Tool The Huffington Post UK | By Thomas Tamblyn

This writing app will delete your work if you stop typing by ABHIMANYU GHOSHAL

Okay, now your turn.

Did you try it?

What did you think? Is this something you will try again?

Thanks for stopping by my blog. You can find me on Twitter @jeancogdell, Facebook at jean.cogdell and Amazon.com, stop by and say hey! Please remember to click and share this post with your Twitter peeps and Facebook fans.

Do you need help with structure?

Published on February 22, 2016February 21, 2016 by Jean M. Cogdell16 Comments

I do! And I’m still learning how to outline a story with a structure that doesn’t collapse at the first strong wind of criticism.

Have you ever loved a story, but wondered why no one else did?

Me too.

Often.

I’m a pantster. Nothing better than sitting down and letting my muse loose on the keyboard. Too bad, writing by stream of consciousness often ends, as do most streams, into a raging uncontrollable river. And where do rivers end? Into a vast ocean, that’s where.

Then after spending hours, days and sometimes months writing thousands of words, all I can do is try not to drown amid the ocean of a rambling story. So I give up and decide to fix it another day. I’ve no idea how this happened.

Does any of this sound familiar?

I’ve begun to fear; my problem may be lack of structure.

If you’re a pantster, don’t go to yelling just yet. I’m still a pantster but, I’m learning to use structure. Because I believe there’s a way to marry both the outline structure and write pantster style.

Got a story that just aggravated you almost to insanity? Nothing is working? Take it and try breaking it down into 3 simple acts and then break those acts down further.

Got an idea for a story? Start by simplifying it with 3 acts. Then one idea under each act and an idea under each one of those headings.

Here is the basic outline I’m working with.

Act I – Opening

Hook – conflict
Protagonist in daily life before transformation
Opportunity to change
Resistance to change
Point of no return
Opportunity accepted

Act II – Entering the new situation

Location
Meeting friends, enemies, romance;
Transformative experiences
Problem brings them together
Problem drives them apart
Crisis Hits

Act III

Terrible Secret Revealed

By breaking down the story little by little, I’m giving it time to grow and hoping to find more freedom and inspiration with smaller chunks.

One of my favorite books is Save the Cat Kindle Edition by Blake Snyder and although the book is primarily focused on script writing the principles can be applied to writing a story.

So tell me, do you use the 3 Act structure or a more indepth outline?

Do you write with or without an outline?

You can find me on Twitter @jeancogdell, Facebook at jean.cogdell and Amazon.com, stop by and say hey! Please remember to with a click and share this post with your Twitter peeps and Facebook fans.

Jackimo’s Bananas, or, How to Plot a Novel

Do you think free & unlimited books are better?

Published on February 17, 2016February 16, 2016 by Jean M. Cogdell16 Comments

Well, let’s admit it. Everyone loves to get a good free book.

But how about the writer?

Does giving away a freebie help or hurt?

Are we becoming the McDonalds of writing?

God! I love their fries!

I’m a member of Kindle Unlimited and I love downloading and reading books for FREE through that service. When I first became a member there were a lot of good books to choose from, however, now it seems there are less and less. Not everyone seems to want to get into the program. I’m not sure why. Maybe it has to do with the pages read payment system.

“You’re eligible for royalty payment from Kindle Unlimited (KU, or Abonnement Kindle in France) and the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library (KOLL) for pages an individual customer reads in your book for the first time. A customer can read your book as many times as they like, but we will only pay you for the number of pages read the first time the customer reads them.”

This is not necessarily a bad thing. At $.57 cents a page, when a book is read cover to cover that can add up to serious money.

But, and this is a big but, the serious money only comes when enough people read your book cover to cover. However, I guess that could be said about the number of people who buy a book too.

I’ve read a lot of wonderful books for Free, and I’ve started and not finished a lot of mediocre books for Free. At first I felt guilty about not finishing a book, but then I remembered my time is valuable too.

On the whole I think it’s a good system if you’re going to make your book available for FREE.

Will publishing ebooks lead to longer books in general?

What If Authors Were Paid Every Time Someone Turned a Page? by PETER WAYNER

Kindle Unlimited Paid Authors $0.0058 Per Page Read by Nate Hoffelder

Into Kindle Publishing? Under New Payment Rules, You Should Write Longer Books By Kristen Pope

Writers what do you think?

Here are the Free, Info Templates I promised

Published on February 15, 2016February 14, 2016 by Jean M. Cogdell12 Comments

Not one, but two!

Two templates for you to use.

Just fill in the blanks of the Author Information Sheets located at the bottom.

But first I wanted to share with you the ones I’ve been working on for my book.

A local Author Con is coming up in May and I’ve been busy working on some AI Sheets for my book. I like the Sheet 2 best, although the Sheet 1 contains more information. I’m not sure more is always better.

What do you guys think?

With these templates you can make your very own customized AI Sheet. For the basics, I’ve made it a simple click and fill in the form type of templates. But you should be able to adjust these templates by adding or deleting information to make them more personal for your book.

Now go forth and have some creative fun. And do let me see some beautiful flyers!

Just click on the thumbnails and download. (Fingers crossed this works!)