Ben Dykes

@emberlynn Hello, hello!

I’ve been doing orchestra for about… 6 years? (I honestly can’t remember.) I started in high school and continued into college. How about you? Do you have a favorite kind of music you like to play?

Also, Japanese is so cool!! It’s always fascinated me, even though I haven’t the faintest idea how the language works.…[Read more]

@kathleenramm That’s such a difficult question to answer, because, like most things in writing, it depends. I used to not be able to write without a soundtrack, but lately I’ve found that I often write fastest in silence.

However, when I do listen to music, I usually like listening to music with lyrics that put me in a happy mood, even if it…[Read more]

@kathleenramm Heh, that’s an excellent question. I have a one-sentence summary, but that doesn’t exactly do my poor convoluted characters justice. So:

Horace has a problem. His half-brother Rand was on schedule to marry Lady–er, Queen Tinumali in a week and forge the strongest political alliance of the decade, but Rand is nowhere to be found…[Read more]

@gracie-j I’ll be back with More Thoughts™ but the piece of advice that has helped me the most (shoutout to my high school screenwriting teacher) is to give your first drafts permission to be absolutely awful. It’s never as bad as you think, but it’s okay even if it is. Just let it kinda suck. You can make it pretty later.

Hello Emberlynn! Welcome to the lovely Kingdom of Pen. My name’s Elizabeth, and I’m one of the interns here. *high five for fellow homeschool grad* *high five for fellow orchestra person* (Violinist here, but I can sort of halfway stumble along with the cello, so I’m very jealous :P)

Middle grade fiction is such a lovely genre (is genre the right…[Read more]

I think I’m in a similar boat with you, Kathleen–I used to think I had to outline everything, and would be scared to start writing until I had every plot point perfect. Then that didn’t work, and I switched to writing without mapping out anything, but that left me with a lot of plot points that I had to later cut out. Nowadays I try to figure…[Read more]

Hey Libby!! Welcome to the lovely Kingdom of Pen! *pours you a cup of tea and offers you a seat on an overstuffed armchair*

That’s so cool that you’re a pianist! I used to play quite a bit, but have fallen out of the habit. What genre/style of music do you most like playing?

As for me, I’m a college student who loves writing, dissecting complex…[Read more]

@allisongrace

Hey! I know we’ve technically met, but I just wanted to say that Team Iron Man is the correct team *firm nod* *realizes that I’m currently wearing a Captain America shirt* …oops.

Also plants are so neat!! What’s your favorite plant that you have?