Sarah Spradlin

Emotion is a hard thing for me to write, though it is definitely worth taking the time to write well because unrealistic emotion ruins the best story.

One thing which could help with emotion is to show the character’s thoughts as well as make sure the reader understands the villain’s emotional reason for wanting to kill the MC. If they can…[Read more]

No problem @sarah-h! 😀 The list I gave you is just to help ‘humanize’ your characters in your mind— if you can think about them as living, breathing, complex… er… problems, that’s half the battle. 😉

Does a character have to have a major flaw to be relatable and realistic? No. In fact if you think about it, there’s not a majority or…[Read more]

@gretald
We did have 8 goats (two baby bucks were sold this morning)… so now it’s only 6. And I think we have 7 chickens. Sheep, huh? They sound fun! 🙂 And don’t worry.. ha-ha. (when we started with our goats we didn’t know what we were doing either 😉 ) So, how many sheep do you have then?
@sarah-h
Thank you. 🙂 As far as structure goes, to…[Read more]

That’s a very good question, @sarah-h! And unfortunately, I don’t think I have a concrete answer to lay out in so many rules and statistics.
You can tell you’re missing something— that’s very good, that’s an enormous start. Now to figure out what that something is. 😉 😛

I think one of the things that makes this conversation so difficult to…[Read more]

@kate-flournoy: Yes! *rubs hands together* I love discussing things. 😉 😛

EXACTLY. Both of you. 😀 Both very astute observations.

Normally I wouldn’t use that word… (astute)… but I think I can on a forum of writers who will actually know what it means. 😉

Soggy pancakes.

I think… I just lost my appetite.

And indeed, @Daeus, that is the logical progression of the argument I’m making— with him, (you and I apparently both know who him is 😉 😛 ) because I couldn’t see him as anything other than noble, I couldn’t sense him feeling anything other than noble. I mean, it was there a little bit, but…[Read more]

@the-happy-bookaholic Oh, the ‘E’ just added an extra awesomeness to the name. 😛

@kate-flournoy: As a relatively new writer, I really appreciate that you’re willing to share mistakes that you made early on. If you hadn’t said something about this topic, I probably would have made the same mistake. Not that I’m not going to make my own mistakes… 😉

@faithdk: Yeah, seems like it! So how many goats and chickens do you have? We’ve had chickens for quite a while now, but just this year we decided to try raising sheep. It’s been interesting…(we have no idea what we’re doing 😛 )

@writefury
Haha…Thanks. We tried cows once. Didn’t go so well either. (My mom accidentally fed them clippings from a poisonous bush that we knew the goats could eat, but unfortunately, cows couldn’t) 😛
And yes, it was so awesome the newspapers actually published one of my articles! 😀 As far as pulling it off…Well, I follow a Mexican…[Read more]

Thanks, @jadamae! 😀 That’s awesome you play the violin too!

@gretald
Really? That’s neat. I guess there’s a lot of “farm folk” on here, huh? 😉
@sarah-h
Well, I’ve written quite a few different things…but I think fantasy/fiction novels are the most fun for me to write (although, definitely NOT the easiest…and I’ve never finished one 🙁 Sadly, I’ve picked up the bad habit of writing tons of book…[Read more]

The first one made me shudder. The last one was pure inspiration.

@Daeus

@faithdk, Cool! I paint with acrylics and watercolors most often, but I’ve done oil once before, too. 🙂
Oh, you raise goats? That’s so neat! I live on a small farm, as well. 😉

@hope
Well, I guess we have the farm girl part in common at least 😉 Haha.
@rolena-hatfield
I’ve only been playing since October, so I’m still an early beginner 😛 I really love it though. I mean, it’s hard, but about anything is when you’re still learning…That’s cool though, that this is your third year! Good job 😉 🙂
@gretald
I paint with…[Read more]

@hope
Well, I guess we have the farm girl part in common at least 😉 Haha.
@rolena-hatfield
I’ve only been playing since October, so I’m still an early beginner 😛 I really love it though. I mean, it’s hard, but about anything is when you’re still learning…That’s cool though, that this is your third year! Good job 😉 🙂
@gretald
I paint with…[Read more]