Tag: Insecure Writer’s Support Group

#IWSG: I’m going on hiatus

woman lying in bed reading next to a stack of books
Featured ~ Nortina S. ~ 1 Comment

It’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group day! For those who don’t know, IWSG day is a time when we writers gather together on the first Wednesday of the month to share our goals, our insecurities, our successes, and our fears and offer a word of encouragement to others who may be struggling.

Participants can answer the question of the month or be inspired to post anything related to writing insecurities and triumphs.

March 1 question – Have you ever read a line in a novel or a clever plot twist that caused you to have author envy?

They shoot the white girl first.

This is the opening line in Toni Morrison’s novel Paradise. It captures you immediately and leaves you asking a ton of questions:

Who is the “white girl”?

Who is “they”?

What provoked this attack?

You have to keep reading to find out. And that’s the whole point, right? That’s one of the first things they teach you in fiction writing class: Hook the reader. Give them a reason to want to continue reading to paragraph two, page two, chapter two.

Another rule they teach you is to start in medias res, or in the middle of the action, preferably after the inciting incident that kickstarts the plot has already occurred. You can always backtrack and fill in the details gradually as the story progresses, which is what Morrison does in this slow-burn novel. It feels almost cruel—getting emotionally invested in these characters’ stories, knowing that a massacre is brewing. But if you’ve ever read Toni Morrison, you’re probably used to it. She knows how to pinch your heart with her storytelling and the often triggering themes she uses in her novels.

“Cocksucker motherfucker” was my favorite expression and at eight years old, I used it defiantly.

When I heard this was the first line in Viola Davis’ memoir, Finding Me, I knew I had to read it. Because, first of all (and this is probably my sheltered upbringing showing), where on earth did an eight-year-old learn those words and why is she saying them?? I haven’t read the book yet, but I plan to—it’s on my “To read” list.

And that brings me to my next point in this post…

Continue reading “#IWSG: I’m going on hiatus” →

#IWSG: Don’t Judge a Book by Its Cover

~ Nortina S. ~ 1 Comment

It’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group day! For those who don’t know, IWSG day is a time when we writers gather together on the first Wednesday of the month to share our goals, our insecurities, our successes, and our fears and offer a word of encouragement to others who may be struggling.

Participants have the option to answer the question of the month or be inspired to post anything related to writing insecurities and triumphs.

This month’s question is brought to you by the lovely co-hosts Jacqui Murray, Ronel Janse van Vuuren, Pat Garcia, and Gwen Gardner.

February 1 question – If you are an Indie author, do you make your own covers or purchase them? If you publish trad, how much input do you have about what goes on your cover?

Hmm, does having a story published on Kindle Vella qualify me as an indie author? I’m assuming it does. Currently, that’s my only publication credit, not counting the literary magazines I’ve had stories and poems published in and, of course, this blog.

The relieving thing about Kindle Vella is that we only need a square image for the cover. No title, no byline. Just snap a photo, if you’re the photography type, or snag one from any of the free stock photo libraries, and you have your Kindle Vella cover. Simple, right?

Continue reading “#IWSG: Don’t Judge a Book by Its Cover” →

#IWSG: 2023 in one word…

~ Nortina S. ~ 10 Comments

Happy first Wednesday of the month! You know what that means…

That’s right, it’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group day! For those who don’t know, IWSG day is a time when we writers gather together on the first Wednesday of the month to share our goals, our insecurities, our successes, and our fears and offer a word of encouragement to others who may be struggling.

Participants have the option to answer the question of the month or be inspired to post anything related to writing insecurities and triumphs.

This month’s question is brought to you by the lovely co-hosts Jemima Pett, Debs Carey, Kim Lajevardi, Sarah Foster, Natalie Aguirre, and T. Powell Coltrin.

Continue reading “#IWSG: 2023 in one word…” →

#IWSG: Holiday Marathons and December Writing Goals

~ Nortina S. ~ 2 Comments

It’s that time of the month again…

That’s right, it’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group day! For those who don’t know, IWSG day is a time when we writers gather together on the first Wednesday of the month to share our goals, our insecurities, our successes, and our fears and offer a word of encouragement to others who may be struggling.

Participants have the option to answer the question of the month or be inspired to post anything related to writing insecurities and triumphs.

This month’s question is brought to you by the lovely co-hosts Joylene Nowell Butler, Chemist Ken, Natalie Aguirre, Nancy Gideon, and Cathrina Constantine.

Continue reading “#IWSG: Holiday Marathons and December Writing Goals” →

#IWSG: The NaNoWriMo Curse

a woman with eyeglasses writing on white paper under a light
~ Nortina S. ~ 4 Comments

Good morning! It’s the first Wednesday of the month, which means it’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group Day! let’s get into today’s question, shall we?

November 2 question: November is National Novel Writing Month. Have you ever participated? If not, why not?

Ugh!

NaNoWriMo has been the bane of my existence for nearly a decade now. Why? Because I keep trying…and failing miserably. And even as the mere thought of participating in NaNoWriMo this year triggers violent regurgitations from the pit of my insecure writer’s stomach, the deranged masochist writer in me dares me to take the plunge once again.

Continue reading “#IWSG: The NaNoWriMo Curse” →

#IWSG: Give Me Something Twisted

thoughtful young woman with cigarette in hand
~ Nortina S. ~ 2 Comments

Good morning! And welcome to another Insecure Writer’s Support Group Day! I wait impatiently for these every month, so let’s get right to it, shall we?

October 5 question – What do you consider the best characteristics of your favorite genre?

This question is a tough one because I don’t think I really have a favorite genre. I do have a few genres that I don’t particularly care for, but as long as the book hooks me in and keeps me invested, I’ll read pretty much anything.

Continue reading “#IWSG: Give Me Something Twisted” →

#IWSG: The Reluctant Christian Romance Writer

~ Nortina S. ~ 3 Comments

There are four genres of fiction that I have always hated…

Historical Fiction

Romance

Christian Fiction

Fantasy

Read Part 1 about my reluctance to write Historical Fiction and Fantasy here.

This month for the Insecure Writer’s Support Group blog hop, we were asked the following question:

What genre would be the worst one for you to tackle and why?

Continue reading “#IWSG: The Reluctant Christian Romance Writer” →

#IWSG: The Reluctant Historical Fiction Writer

~ Nortina S. ~ Leave a comment

There are four genres of fiction that I have always hated…

Historical Fiction

Romance

Christian Fiction

Fantasy

Now regarding Fantasy, hate may be a strong word. My issue has always been lack of diversity, though that has been getting better in recent years—I love the Children of Blood and Bone series! However, I’m not the biggest fan of world building. If I have to learn a new language, new geography, new religion, new history, etc., plus 50 characters’ names, I check out.

I never got into Lord of the Rings, despite my dad “kidnapping” me and forcing me to watch the entire trilogy—I fell asleep 20 minutes into the first movie.

I also grew up a Church Girl, so books like Harry Potter were banned in my house!

(But I still managed to develop a secret vampire obsession. Hmm…)

As for the other three genres… Well, let’s just say I’ve read plenty of bad books in them, which makes my answer to today’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group question all the more ironic.

What genre would be the worst one for you to tackle and why?

Continue reading “#IWSG: The Reluctant Historical Fiction Writer” →

Insecure Writer’s Support Group: Daddy’s Girl

~ Nortina S. ~ 1 Comment

Good evening, Dear Friends, and welcome to another Insecure Writers Support Group Wednesday!

February 2 question – Is there someone who supported or influenced you that perhaps isn’t around anymore? Anyone you miss?

If you’ve ever submitted a short story or poem to a literary magazine, you’re familiar with writing a short, 3- to 5-sentence third-person biography about yourself. Nothing too detailed. Just a few fun facts about yourself—your interests, your hobbies, what inspired you to write, a list of previous publications (but not too many; we don’t like a brag). If your work is accepted, this biography will appear alongside it in the published issue of the magazine.

Over the years, I’ve spent time perfecting my bio, revising it as I discovered my voice and my creative niche. The final product sums up my life, my style, and my influence quite nicely:

Nortina Simmons has been writing since the age of three, inspired by her songwriting, guitar-playing father. Her stories and poems never quite fell into the category of ‘love.’ Love in the real world has restrictions, is wrapped in pain. Through her writing, she explores the characteristics of love the hopeless romantics remain ignorant to. Every ‘love story’ has a curse within. Nortina has stories and poems published in Agave Magazine, FishFood Magazine, Ceases, Cows, Meat for Tea: The Valley Review, fēlan, Twisted Vine Literary Arts Journal, and Minerva Rising.

As the bio says, my biggest inspiration was my dad. He died of lung cancer when I was 18, but his influence lives on in my writing. My dad was a triple-threat artist. He was a painter, a songwriter, and a musician. My earliest writing memory was writing a ballad called “Oh, Desire” and singing it for him as he played his guitar and my little brother smacked his tambourine in the background. I still faintly remember the lyrics.

Oh, desire for my heart forever.
Will you love me if we're not together?
Do you want to have dinner at a table to love each other?
Do you want to have dinner at a table for two?

At one point we recorded it on cassette, which may still be somewhere in my childhood bedroom. I found it once, several years ago, and listened to it repeatedly—immersing myself in the memory, rewinding the clock—until the cassette player chewed the tape (did I just reveal my age?). The next time I go home, I may look for it again.

In addition to writing music together, we also wrote stories. Often times I would do the writing, and he would do the illustrations. Memorable titles include “The Junkyard Kids” and “Children’s Island.” There was even an intergalactic space odyssey, but I think that was more his idea than mine.

Some of my fondest childhood memories were of us creating together. I owe so much of the writer I am today to him. Unfortunately, our real-life story didn’t have a happy ending. Life happened, and he moved across country with a new wife and family when I was barely a teenager. His diagnosis came a few years later. I saw him just once after that, and the next month he was gone. But those few nostalgic days we spent together, when we were reminiscing, and writing, and singing, and playing music, I will cherish forever.

After all these years, I still miss our collaborations. Even though he’s not here anymore, I read those lyrics from our song, specifically the first two lines, “Oh, desire for my heart forever./Will you love me if we’re not together?” and imagine younger me saw a glimpse of a future when I would have to write without him and thought to remind me, his love and support is always here, in my heart.

Insecure Writer’s Support Group: Quiet that Inner Critic

~ Nortina S. ~ 6 Comments

Good morning, Dear Friends, and welcome to another Insecure Writers Support Group Wednesday!

January 5 question: What’s the one thing about your writing career you regret the most? Were you able to overcome it?

Well, this is somewhat of a difficult question to answer, because at times, I don’t feel my “writing career” has started. Sure, I have a few short stories and poems published in literary magazines, and of course I have multiple books’ worth of content on this blog.

But when I think “career,” the first thing that comes to mind is making money, and although the time and effort I put into the maintenance of this blog, from the posts I publish to the look and feel of the page layout, often feels like a second job, currently, the only check I’m getting is from the 9-to-5.

One thing I do regret—as I believe it has, in a way, derailed my progress to publishing that first book and, as a result, stalled my writing career—is being too critical of my work.

You know how the saying goes: You are your biggest critic. Well, as a perfectionist, I’m ten times worse.

I have left so many stories unfinished because I feared the first drafts sounded too elementary, or the plots I’d outlined too unoriginal.

I write, and rewrite, then rewrite the rewrite, then delete everything and start over. (Prime example: there are currently three versions of Love Poetry on my computer hard drive as we speak.)

I’m constantly ripping through the thesaurus because I don’t feel my vocabulary is diverse enough.

I second guess whether I’m showing rather than telling.

I worry about my pacing in some scenes. Is it okay that I have a page that’s 90% dialogue?

I question if I’ve provided enough details in the narration for the reader to visualize the story:

  • How many ways can you say it’s dark outside?
  • Does every detail in the room need to be meticulously sketched out to set the scene? I mean, I’m not a screenwriter here.
  • Can I just say, “She got in her car”? Do I have to write every step? She grabbed her purse, walked out of the front door, descended the porch steps, walked (is there another word for “walked?”) across the yard to the driveway, and got in her car.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to realize that you don’t need a million pretty words to be a great writer. I’ve read books like that, and they were BORING! You also don’t have to be the next great American novelist to produce stories that people will still love and enjoy and want more of. That’s the one downside of taking those university literary courses. They assign you the wordy stuff, the dated stuff. Although classics, not many in today’s Internet age (the era of instant gratification) have the attention span to read them. Well, let me speak for myself, I don’t have the attention span to read them. Not anymore. So why am I trying to write like them?

Writing the drabble, the 100-word story, has helped me to eliminate those inessential words and descriptions that, although great for atmosphere, don’t necessarily move the plot along, so that all I’m left with is a story. Because that’s why we read, right? We want a good story.

On New Year’s Eve, I embarked on an ambitious challenge to write a marathon of Twilight Zone-inspired stories every hour, midnight to midnight. While I wrote some stories that were pure gems (I smile and get giddy every time I read them), there were others that I wasn’t 100% satisfied with. But I had one particular fan (okay, it was my mom) buttering me up the entire time, encouraging me to keep going, saying that she was enjoying the stories more than the actual marathon on TV. It was a great feeling, and I definitely want more of that.

So my goal for this year is to not be so critical. Don’t worry so much about the details. Perfectionism is an enemy of success, and do you really want to deprive your biggest fan?

Hi, mom! 🙂