Welcome to the private blog

The Group:

Thank you for joining my reading group. I appreciate your time and thoughtfulness in reading and commenting on my novel.

Writing this horror fairy tale was inspired by a comment that Nate made about a book that he finally enjoyed reading. I thought, "I can write that." The common fairy tale, I say common because there are a lot of strange fairy tales out there, is a story of redemption. And we're attracted to horror stories for a variety of reasons, part of which is to identify with the main character who usually escapes the horror, but often at great cost. This is another type of redemption story. Whether you know it or not, as you watch a movie or read a book you root for the main character to overcome the trial before them, and wonder how they will prevail.

I hope to give you a good adventure of how Cecelia is brought into a place of true horror, and finds her way back out again.
My process here in this blog will be in three phases--at least this is my plan. Currently I am in the rough outline phase. I am writing with details, action, and dialog, but my main focus is really figuring out the story line and how the characters intersect. My second phase with be the draft phase. In the draft phase hope to refine the storyline, figure out the order that it will be told in, work more on setting and dialog. The final phase will be nearly publish-ready, though I will still want feedback and may make changes on many levels.


I would like to ask each of you to do the following:


1. Subscribe to the blog so that you can be notified when I publish a new post.
2. 
Read each post within a week and comment on it. I will try to publish weekly, and will appreciate your complaints if I fall behind.

3. Give me critical comments. Saying things like "I liked it" are not helpful. Telling me something like a character doesn't sound convincing and why is really helpful, or that maybe that the setting doesn't seem real, etc. Constructive criticism is key. All comments and thoughts are important--everyone comes to this with a different perspective so please bring your unique ideas to the table.

4. Dialog with each other in the comments. It's fun to have differing opinions, and will be really helpful to me to see your different ideas. I will likely make comments too.
5. 
Pay attention to the category--whether I've published the post under "rough outline", "draft", or "final". This may guide your expectations and thereby your comments on each post. But feel free to make comments as if the rough outline is a final draft; that may just be a bit of information or inspiration that I need.
6. 
Enjoy. I hope this experience will be fun for you. Have a glass of wine, or a bite of chocolate and reward yourself for a job well done.


To start with, please introduce yourself in the comments below. Maybe you'd like to tell your name, where you live, how we know each other, some interests you have in your life. This is a closed page, so only the select few who have been invited will be able to see this, comment on it, etc. There will be no trolls here.


Thanks again for going on this journey with me. You are providing me with accountability, inspiration to keep at it, and valuable feedback.