My Blogging Voice

I have no idea how long it's been since I started working on my writing voice. I remember a college paper getting marked down for my 'exuberant' tone. Obviously I had my priorities straight! I feel a lot more confident about my voice now than I did then, but it doesn't change one important thing. I still have to find a blogging voice.

Blogging has been an adventure. As I've been doing this I've been struggling to develop the ability to speak engagingly but authentically. Being authentic to myself isn't something that's really important when writing novels. I need to be true to my characters and my story. My narrator's voice matches the voice of the characters, especially in first person. While it has flavors of me it's not me, not completely.

In blogging I need to be myself. The trouble is that the real me is nowhere near as engaging as the narrators I come up with. I'm sometimes funny, but I can also get really technical. Or whiny. Or brain dead. Do I want to portray that on my blog?

The answer for me is yes. I guess I don't feel confident enough in my 'skills' to try to create a new person. I can maintain a voice over the course of a novel. I don't think I can maintain a fake me indefinitely. I'd rather run the risk of not engaging readers by being myself.

I'm not saying that's the only choice, just that it's mine. Like all things it's an experiment. Wish me luck!

Inauguration Blog Post

How do you start blogging? This is my current conundrum. For all that I am a perpetual oversharer I’m terrified of putting myself out there for the whole internet. I was hoping to find a brilliant idea to start this out but no such luck. Instead it’s just me. Might as well start as I plan to go on! I think today will focus on writing since this is a writerly blog and other things can come later.

So what is the purpose of this blog? My name is Jennavier Gilbert. I’m a very hopeful writer of YA. If I wasn’t extremely hopeful and slightly delusional I wouldn’t be traveling the road to publication. I’ve been at this for about 11 years. Sometimes I think I’m trapped in a Mel Brooks movie and just don’t know it. Every time I think I know everything that the writing life has to teach me I find out how much I still have to learn.

For example I just finished Nanowrimo for the second time. Two wins out of four tries, not too shabby! There were no hiccups, everything was going smoothly, and I was thinking how easy edits were going to be. I was already fantasizing about querying it because obviously it was The Perfect Novel. Then it ended with a bang… at 42 thousand words. About twenty thousand words short. Seriously. I’m now going to have to completely rework the plot so that there’s actually progression. In the words of another Christmas grump bah humbug!

Now that I’ve been properly humbled by Nano it’s time to move on to edits. I’m pulling out an old first draft that I can’t get out of me head. I’m crazy nervous about trying this! I’ve tried to edit my WIP’s before but never had the skill level to do anything rather then mess around. You know how a great painter adds details to the painting in the final go around? They’re barely perceptible but make a huge impact.  Sadly I’m nowhere near that stage yet. With Chaos Rules, the novel I’m editing, I’m going to have to gut it and start almost at square one. My first draft will now be an example of What Not To Do. Wish me luck!

I think that’s enough for today. I’m going off to wade into the writing swamp. See you next time!