Actually helpful writing sites

I keep wanting to write a post about actually helpful writing sites because it's rare to find a parent who has the time between marketing him/herself, social networking, earning a living, and actually (ahem) getting some creative writing done, to browse random writing websites in search of helpful places to bookmark.

So back in June, I started trying to collect websites that I found actually helpful (as opposed to those that are good for marketing - like Goodreads and LinkedIN - both are very useful, but not particularly helpful. They tend to suck your time as often as not.)

Well, I did find this great website called WritersWin.com - it seems to have a plethora of good advice and doesn't demand a membership fee (always nice).  But other than that, I found a lot of fantastic articles spread out across lots of various writing websites. So I approached it differently, I tried asking this question as a poll on Facebook and then on LinkedIN, but I guess people don't do polls.

In my own browsing I found a lot of sites that claimed to be great, but they were often rehash of the same lame articles "how to get an agent" and "how to write a character" - these are questions better asked in the Google Search bar because you'll get a list of articles that actually refer to your issue.

And that's what I left off at - we who hardly have time to get through an issue of the New Yorker, much less checking a website every day or two will likely do best by just Googling our questions at the universe. Someone has certainly written an article about every one of our writing issues.

Yet, in this age of something-for-everyone, I keep wishing there was some website that was just perfect for me, as a writer.

So, dear reader-of-this-blog, I leave it in your capable hands. What is your favorite website that is actually helpful to your writing? Maybe the question is too broad because a beginning writer and one that is published several times over might need different advice.  So I'll alter it a bit: what is your favorite website that is actually helpful to your writing--and why?

Hey - hope everyone had a great July 4th.

So...

Social Media for writing parents.

I don't actually know where to begin on this one. I guess the inspiration for this post was reading this amazing/cynical/professional/depressing guest blog entry by a thriller writer who has "figured out" Twitter.

Here's the link.

It's amazing, because he's got more than a quarter million followers and he seems to actually interact with a lot of them.

it's cynical because it's not about him Tweeting what his kids do (I don't even know if he's got kids, I'm going to guess not, because he had the time to come up with a Twitter-method instead of just Tweeting what his kids do -- or for that matter, what he's writing.) Presumably he does write; after all he's got three books listed in his bio. Presumably he uses Twitter to engage with a quarter of a million people about what he's doing from minute to minute. But it still feels cynical. Taking something silly and fun and free and social and turning it into a marketing tool.

Which is professional. Of course we as writers have to use all the tools available to us. And as parents, nothing is more available than our cellphone. I don't know about you, but any time I feel close to throwing in the towel with my kids, a quick diversionary check of email or Tweet or Facebook actually gives me the mental space to not kill them. Um. I meant to say, to not shout at them.

Oh come on. Tell me you have never in your life shouted at your kid. (don't worry, they'll eventually forgive you. probably.)

Point is, parents tend to use social networking in a very social way - we post photos of our kids, we talk about the funny/silly things they did. We blog about them. But how is that helping our writing careers at all? It's not. For marketing purposes, we have to concentrate on the "networking" part of the social networking.

So what can we do?

Follow the link and maybe come up with an Author Twitter Feed that you use solely for your work. No photos of kids. Nothing but Tweets about your writing career. It is a tool, and this guy anyway, suggests that a professional writer in this networky-day-and-age should have a large Twitter following. He makes a good point about that too.

And why is this depressing? I don't know about you, but I always thought (wished, believed) that I would gain followers because what I wrote was good. Was pertinent and true and helpful and/or funny.

Nope.

(see? depressing.)

I don't like to end on a down note, so I'm going to go get an ice cream cone. Want one?

OH! by the way -- Here's something GREAT!! Spread the news that BOOKS AHOY: a literary celebration for little mermaids and pirates is coming up!! See you (and your kids!) 2pm - 5pm open-house style on Saturday, July 28th on the deck of the Lilac, which is permanently moored on the Hudson at Pier 25 in Tribeca (off North Moore Street). Great playgrounds with water play. Great snack bar with ice cream (that's what reminded me). Mini golf. And at our event there will be a great line-up of fantastic children's book authors (for kids 3-10) reading for the kids!! Also art, play, and nautical themed face painting! Kids are encouraged to come in costumes! (rain date sunday the 29th)

10 things I never thought would keep me from writing...until I had kids.

Need a laugh? Here are ten things I never thought would keep me from writing...until I had kids:

1)   Laundry. What the hell? I used to pile laundry to the ceiling of my dorm room. I used to buy new underwear rather than washing my clothes. Now? I am stuck on how to get a character out of a diner and into a conversation with a cousin in a forest, so I run a delicates cycle and actually bother to air-dry the stupid things. Pathetic. And who are all these people in my house that need clean clothes all the time? You're just going to wipe pizza on them. Sigh.

2)   Eating. Gone are the days when I would look up from typing having missed two meals. Now, I’ve just finished a salad and already considering a dinner menu. Yes, this has to do with how long it will take me to cook for myself, my picky husband and our two kids, but still. Gaack. 

3)   Shame. Hello! I once published a piece of erotic fiction from the point of view of a stalker! I won an international horror competition about adults gouging out kid eyes on playdates! So why am I all of a sudden squeamish when I see a post-it note that says the next scene will be “Mason kills a small animal out of curiosity.” What am I afraid of? Prophecy? No: every time I write a scene where a kid acts horrific, I have a brief flash of fear that my own kids will wave the passage as justification for their own horrific actions. Repeat after me: just because I wrote it doesn’t make it right.

4)   The clock. Oh crud. School ends in four minutes. Guess that’s the end of that scene until tomorrow. Sound familiar?

5)   Other people’s vomit. The crazy stomach-flu that’s been going around for three weeks and has hit hard. Maybe I can manage a sentence between cleanups and carrying pedialyte to the sick room.

6)   Whining. Yes. This is a big one. It’s not that my kids are whining AT me. It’s that they’re whining NEAR me. It’s very hard to get a thought onto the page when someone is telling someone else how unfair life is. How do lawyers ever get any work done?

7)   Social Media (okay this isn’t a parenting thing) but really? I am somehow able to tell my friends I’m too busy to go to a quick lunch with them, but unable to keep myself from checking out the photos they told me they just posted on FB of our kids playing together on the beach. That’s just…sad. Just wait until the kids are old enough that I have to check up on THEIR statuses. Yeah, that’s going to be productive.

8)   Field trips. Why why why do I keep chaperoning these things? Five hours of which three are spent on a school bus trying to get kids to stop throwing paper. One more hour is spent in various lines, moving kids from a door where we will patiently wait for a teacher to do the requisite paperwork, and then, finally, one half hour is spent on learning something about pilgrims or birds. Plus half an hour of bagged lunch. Why?

9)   Exhaustion. Expected the baby years to be rough, but shouldn’t I have caught up on sleep by now? Why is it so physically and mentally draining to say “guys, can you keep it down” sixty times a day? Shouldn’t I be on autopilot by now, just breezing through discipline? Not. They are finally in bed, tears dried, and teeth brushed, and instead of productive time, I stare at my writing and wonder if the mom in the story shouldn’t be a little bit nicer every once in a while, maybe take the kid out for ice cream.

10)                 And finally: Parasites. Really – school is like a third world country. Lice, pinworms, hoof-and-mouth or is it hand-and-mouth disease…random contagions I’d never even heard of until the green Xerox came back from the school warning me a kid in my kid’s class has __(insert creepy sounding condition)___. And each condition becomes a pandemic that sweeps every grade and every kid in every class. And requires hours and hours of medication, care, and probably…laundry.

So there it is. That’s my list. What’s yours?