I completed Clive Cussler’s White Death. The story was good in that it moved quickly, it kept me turning pages. Overall it was okay. Clive is old school with the hero being this macho male chauvinist type with a hint of James Bond. I like Michael Crichton stuff better. The characters are more realistic and he’s really good at world building, but the master of character and world building is still Stephen King.
I have not yet finished the two writing books, but I did start Journal of a Novel: The East of Eden Letters by John Steinbeck. You really need to be a true Steinbeck fan to get through this book for the few tidbits and insights Steinbeck shared when creating East of Eden. I am a big fan, but I found this book a tough read. At 186 pages, it’s short, but it is very repetitive, and drags in places. It doesn’t live up to the expectations I had of it. I had hoped the book would have supplied detailed notes of the thought processes and the outlining of this, one of his greatest works. Alas, it was not to be.
I think that Chris Tolkien’s book The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien is much more revealing of the creative process J.R.R. used in creating the Lord of the Rings characters and Middle Earth itself.
You may recall that late in April, I was to begin a writing class called A Novel Plan. Well, that whole thing went bust. I was all eager to go, and only a couple of days into it the woman who began it (Angela) took down her website, and her forum and disappeared. We thought something bad had happened, but we found out from one of her friends that Angela became completely overwhelmed and simply took a sabbatical from computers altogether. It’s not like this was the first class she ever held. This was to be the third iteration of this class.
As I said before, I had subscribed to Angela’s newsletter for many years. She has had an extraordinarily tough life, which included a drama where her abusive husband was shot and killed right in front of her.
When she took a break from her writing site a couple of years ago, to find herself, I was a bit bummed because you correspond with these people and you get to know them a bit. I understood what she wanted to do and she handed over the reigns to others to run the websites for her, but was never the same. She only returned late last year.
With this latest disappearing act, I wished her all the best and bid her good-bye. I need more stability in the writing sites I patronize. My main two sites now are Angela Hoy’s http://www.writersweekly.com/ – a site and newsletter I have subscribed to for at least six years. Angela is a former Texas news reporter, who now lives up in Augusta, Maine. She has a great newsletter, and shares her family with everyone. You really do get to know them. I have followed her through a divorce, struggling to keep her writing and website business going, getting re-married to Richard Hoy, and having her fourth child, Max, two years ago. The business is a big success now. She home schools her kids and brings her readership along as they travel the U.S. in their small motor home. The best thing about Angela is that she is a true writer’s advocate. She believes that all writers should always get paid for their writing all of the time.
The other is Jenna Glatzer’s http://www.absolutewrite.com/ . I have subscribed to Jenna’s newsletter for at least four years. She lives on Long Island, New York. I have watched as she too struggled to build her web business while trying to make a name for herself with her writing. I have watched as she dealt with overcoming panic and anxiety disorders, slowly but surely building an ever more successful writing business, getting married, and landing a contract to write Celine Dione’s biography. She is prolific, having written several books over the past few years. Jenna is now writing the biography of another famous celebrity – which she is not allowed to divulge yet.
Posted by WFMeyer 
