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From the category archives:

WB3--World Clinic

What About YOUR Success Story?

by Holly Lisle on February 27, 2008 · 1 comment

in Books, CRITICAL SKILLS SERIES, Create A Plot Clinic, How To Find Your Writing Discipline, NONFICTION, WB1--Language Clinic, WB2--Culture Clinic, WB3--World Clinic, Worldbuilding Clinic

Have you had success with one of my courses? If you have, I really want to hear about it. Please tell me below.

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Members-only Sale Updates

by Holly Lisle on February 26, 2008 · 14 comments

in Administrivia, CRITICAL SKILLS SERIES, Create A Character Clinic, Create A Plot Clinic, How To Find Your Writing Discipline, NONFICTION, WB1--Language Clinic, WB2--Culture Clinic, WB3--World Clinic, Worldbuilding Clinic

If you’re on the Writers’ Updates newsletter and you have questions about or need help with the February Sucks sale, you can ask or post here. I’ll be checking the blog all day. And all day tomorrow. And by putting everything here, some questions might be answered that folks participating while I’m asleep might need.

If you’re not getting the newsletter, it’s not too late to join. Still about twenty minutes left on the countdown before things actually start.

Added.
Typing in the live countdown by hand. Four minutes left.

10:21

Gone In Seven Minutes

The Hawkspars and All the Talyn Hardcovers plus the Talyn ARC were actually gone in seven minutes.

Lots of stuff left. I’m doing a mad cut and paste just to keep people up with the book they got. Thank yous will go out when things slow down.

Holly

Last 13 Books

I can’t believe it, but I’m already out of all the books but the last thirteen, which are one-offs. I got caught up on the notifying folks of which book they got (check your PayPal email if you haven’t heard from me yet), but I haven’t had time to send out thank yous. This is the first time I’ve had a chance to breathe.

Corrected Hawkspars

Uploaded the correct versions of the Hawkspar First Draft Manuscript and the Hawkspar Revised Manuscript. Very sorry about the error. Weather here is unreal, but for now, power is still on.

Power Went Off, Came Back On

We’re through the first line of storms, but there’s another even bigger one behind in. Keep your fingers crossed that the hamster stays healthy.

Have Lost Internet Twice

And the next line of storms is almost to us. I’ve been answering e-mails in the meantime, but I’m not holding my breath on us having either internet OR power when the next storms come over.

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Getting there on the site

by Holly Lisle on October 6, 2007 · 1 comment

in Administrivia, Affiliate, Articles on Writing, NONFICTION, WB3--World Clinic, Writing Life

I’ve reclaimed the early morning hours for writing, which has done wonders for my mood. The rest of my day, however, has been split between homeschooling the kid (fifth-grade science is wonderful!) and doing an enormous amount of work on the site behind the scenes.

The day before yesterday I completely rebuilt the site templates, stripped out all the old code by hand, attached the pages to the new templates, and reloaded whole site. Now it works with a lot fewer errors.

Yesterday I got the Affiliates’ board working (thanks to Margaret for help on a weird PHP 5 bug) and got the Courses mailer set up.

Today I’m doing my best to create new ad campaigns for the rest of the lost ads for the affiliate program.

I’m also hoping to get the first couple of lessons for the affiliate program written.

Once the many ripples from last month’s exhausting double-move of the site have died down, I’m going to get back to work on the third Worldbuilding Clinic , Create A World. And do the first of a few free e-mail writing courses.

My to-do list is still pretty awful. But I’m getting there.

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Your Menu Options Have Changed

by Holly Lisle on August 30, 2007 · 20 comments

in Books, NONFICTION, WB3--World Clinic

Holly Lisle’s Create A World ClinicMy favorite (insert glyph of rolling eyes here) phrase when dealing with inescapable, interminable, utterly frustrating automated phone answering systems—”Please listen carefully, as your menu options have changed.”

This should be a whole lot less painful.

Look to the Works In Progress block to your right on the weblog. Two, and only two, books are now in progress. Moon and Sun II, currently and temporarily titled The Moonroads, and Holly Lisle’s Create A World Clinic. I finally figured out how to do the world-development book without burying everyone in way too many illustrations. And done this way, it should be as much fun to go through as Plot Clinic, and have as many useful tools.

ADDED LATER: Have posted this small version of the cover art, too. I was thinking “chocolate, chocolate, must have chocolate,” at the time.

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Wandering Ways

by Holly Lisle on February 21, 2007 · 6 comments

in Books, C: The Secret Project, NONFICTION, ON SPEC, SFTD Screenplay, Snippets and Stories, The Ruby Key, WB2--Culture Clinic, WB3--World Clinic, Writing Life, YA

I’m almost done with the first draft of The Ruby Key. Due to the fact that I left out a lot of important and exciting things in the middle portion of the story (because I write very, very tight in first draft and almost always have to expand in revision) I’m going to end up wrapping the first draft at around 55K, and then going back and adding in. The story might go a bit longer than that, but my editor, Lisa, assured me that organic writing and running long was okay with her, so long as I didn’t go over 100K. Since I’m pretty sure I can do what I need in 65K, I think I’m good to go on this one.

But that’s not all I’ve been doing. C—The Secret Project is
back in my life. I cannot leave it alone, which tells me that I shouldn’t try. I’ll give you the first two paragraphs; maybe those will tell you why this story is still eating at me after years of playing with it. (Maybe not. If not, then I concede the possibility of insane obsession. Otherwise, I’m holding out for sane obsession.)

Down the red clay road, dirt bone-dry and hard beneath her feet, with dust kicking up behind the heels of her cowboy boots, Kay strode with purpose. Blood on her palms, tears on her face. In her pocket, two wedding rings, a silver pin, an old harmonica. In her right hand, a shovel.

She’d left her purse in the car she’d abandoned a mile back. All her ID was in it: credit cards, driver’s license, birth certificate, a load of things she was leaving behind. This was the last shot, last time, last gasp, last hope. And how much hope was it really, hoping to be reborn but being ready to die, too, if that was the way things went?

I’m slowly putting together the paperback workbook version of Worldbuilding 2: Culture Clinic.

And I’m outlining WB3: Build-A-World Clinic.

Add in homeschooling the kidlet, and I’ve been a shadow of my former self online. But beneath the silence, a lot is going on.

Oh. And the business-related stress that had be tied up in knots for a couple of weeks? Resolved, all good, and there is a reason you want the very best agent you can get—and a reason I am grateful every day to have the best agent there is: You the writer are one lone, insignificant flyspeck in the universe of megacorp publishing—the industry that eats its young—and when you’re making deals with the giants, you want a master duellist negotiating for you.

ADDED LATER: Forgot the Sympathy for the Devil screenplay. Doing that for the film school kid, who’s finished film school, is casting for her second short, and to whom I promised a screenplay. I figure one from one of her favorites of my books would be good. At the moment, I’m notecarding that, which means lots of words but no visible progress.

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One-Day-Only Hump Day Sale

by Holly Lisle on January 24, 2007 · 5 comments

in Books, Create A Character Clinic, NONFICTION, WB1--Language Clinic, WB2--Culture Clinic, WB3--World Clinic, Worldbuilding Clinic

SALEWednesdays suck in general. Today, mine is worse than usual, so I decided to do something good to offset all the bad karma.

There’s a one-day-only Hump Day sale on my writing books—15% off on any of them that you buy. Buy one or all three and get the discount.

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Updating the Schedule

by Holly Lisle on August 18, 2006 · 12 comments

in Books, C: The Secret Project, Hawkspar, NONFICTION, ON SPEC, Project Blue, The Ruby Key, WB2--Culture Clinic, WB3--World Clinic, WORLD OF KORRE, Worldbuilding Clinic, Writing Life, Writing Neep, YA

So around June, I had everything planned out. And then I needed to write one book a full year earlier than it had been planned. And I did. But doing so wrecked every other item in my schedule. Obliterated. Toasted. Annihilated.

Turns out, I could do the insane “everything at once” provisional schedule only for a few days, and then my brain shut down, and I had to step back. I got the Language Clinic and NIGHT ECHOES written. And will finish the write-in of NIGHT ECHOES today, and the type-in in the next couple of days.

But that leaves a lot of stuff languishing. I have a student thing that’s been hanging fire; that’s next. Then the final HAWKSPAR edit, a lot of which is done—that had a lot front-end problems that went away by the end of the book, so having most of the front-book issues already finished, I’m thinking (just thinking here) that the rest of that will go more or less smoothly.

And then what?

Create A Culture Clinic (Worldbuilding II)
The Ruby Key (Moon and Sun I)
Create A World Clinic (Worldbuilding III)
Project Blue
Create A Plot Clinic
Moon and Sun II
Storyshowing Clinic
C, the Secret Project
Finish the Book Clinic

And more stuff after that…God willing and the creek don’t rise.


NOTICE: The Surgeon General has declared that creating schedules can be detrimental to your health and sanity, and that schedule dependence has been linked with weight gain, weight loss, hirsutism, hair loss, nervousness, nausea, vomiting, auditory hallucinations, angina, GERD, hypertension, hypotension, insanity, and death. Pregnant women, women who might become pregnant, persons with preexisting liver or kidney or heart conditions, and people with eyelids should avoid scheduling. If you experience side effects from scheduling, stop immediately and consult your doctor.

DISCLAIMER #1: This schedule is subject to Life, which happens while one is making other plans.

DISCLAIMER #2: (Marine Adage) No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy.

DISCLAIMER #3: (Yiddish Adage) Men plan, God laughs.

DISCLAIMER #4: (Nursing Instructor Adage) CYA

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