Skill a Day! (Focused practice to increase your writing adroitness)

Ah, I just started posting information on this, and now it's gone. I'll get it all back up soon, don't worry. I should have planned ahead for that.

For those of you who haven't heard (which I'm guessing is about all but 20 WriMos), I had this idea of how to improve our writing even more this November. Practicing every day will improve our skill. But my idea is to practice with a specific, different target in mind every day. These won't be based on genre. For example, one day we will focus on imagery, the next day will focus on setting, then character development, then using descriptive details to set the tone, then creating tension within a scene, then dialogue. (These are just a few of the ideas I've had. If you want to see something specific, please please please write a comment! I would love to hear what you want to work on.)

Since I'm (very) far from being an expert on any of these topics, I'll be using my mad google skills to locate what I think are the best writing articles on the subject. I'm planning on digging up 25 articles for the month. I tend to take Sundays off, but if you don't, feel free to use Sundays as a free day to practice anything you want, or just get your word count up. Of course, you could just drop by and read the articles for reference. I won't judge. ;)

I hope to see many of you in the next few weeks!

If you have any questions, please let me know!

I think I'll give this a try. And I remember getting emails when you posted (I'd subscribed to the other post) and thinking, "Oops, the site's going to have the reboot tomorrow and those are not going to be there any more" - however, I do have all those links in my in-box from being subscribed, so let's see if the quote tag works:

Quote:So I've got some links for you!

https://bubbl.us/ I just discovered this site and I love it. It's easy to sign up (and not even necessary if you aren't planning on saving as you go), easy to use, and I've found it very helpful. It's a brainstorm/mind mapping tool. You can save, print, and move your bubbles around if you choose.

http://www.web-writer.net/fantasy/days/index.html World building! This is geared more toward fantasy world building, but it would work very well for science fiction as well. And some pieces would be useful for any genre.

http://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/art/snowflake.php I've heard rave reviews about this method. You start with a little seed and expand it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcmiqQ9NpPE (Part one of five.) This is a very systematic, structured approach to plot. As the presenter describes, this will give you a skeleton to hang the rest of your story on.

http://pbworks.com/ Do you have a lot of notes? Do you want to keep them organized? This site lets you make your own wiki. You controls who sees it, who can edit, etc. Go to the top and click "get started" and then hit "Personal User." From there you can pick out your domain name, it'll be www.______.pbworks.com. From what I can tell, you can make more than one wiki, if you want to.

http://babynamesworld.parentsconnect.com/ Baby names! I added this one because you can search by name meaning.

http://bluecentauri.com/tools/writer/common.php There are a lot of name generators out there, but most are geared toward sci-fi and fantasy. This one is a common name generator. Abbie Cohen, Monica Townsend, or Jake Butler anyone?

These websites have some great information, and lots of articles. My personal favorite is the first one, but the others are in no particular order. A lot of the articles I'll be posting are likely to come from these places.
http://www.writingexcuses.com/
http://www.writersdigest.com/
http://writermag.com/
http://www.fictionfactor.com/articles.html
http://fictionwriting.about.com/

Quote:
http://DIYMFA.com/ Ah, I knew there were others. Lots of articles up here too.

This is a really good idea. I'd definitely go along with it. Sounds like a great way to focus on things I probably wouldn't otherwise think to try and improve

I'm definitely up for this, it sounds like a great idea.

Count me in!

Me too, I really need to get something to keep me writing, and considering my Creative Writing textbook has actually been what's gotten me into Nano-mood recently, something like this sounds like a perfect fit xD

I concur with all the other concurrenceses. I know there are things that I struggle with (pacing, not giving enough information, tension) that will absolutely KILL my story so I think this sort of practice would be HEY-STREMELY helpful.

I'm in! :)

I'm up for it! (This is for November right?)

Count me in!

I'm in :)

I might have to get in on this!

I think this will be great!

I think I'll try this. I already liked the "Write 1K a day, 100 words at a time) thing someone posted in a Camp Nano thread. Helped me reach it fairly painlessly.

This is a really good idea. I feel like it'll help me from feeling like what I'm writing is total crap at least :D If I'm focusing on making one thing well done.

I love reading about writing skills, so count me in! I always leave out descriptions... that's my weakest point. What do you mean, people don't see the image in my head? :P

Hope you've got 30 lined up ready to roll!

Working on it! I think I have enough to last the first week, anyway! What is NaNo but a fly by the seat of your pants expedition?

(Seriously though, I am hoping to have everything lined up by the time November starts.)

This is a great idea! I will definitely be joining in next month!

First article will go up in 11 or 12 hours! I want to put them up the night before, so if you want to start at midnight, it will be available for you.

I'm going to put up a word count goal each time too, to let you know where you should be if you are doing the 1,667 words a day approach, or the 2000 words a day approach (one day off per week, which is what I do).

I'm finalizing the list of topics and articles, so this is the last chance for requests!