The Girdle of Melian

elp Talli Roland's debut novel THE HATING GAME hit the Kindle bestseller list at Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk by spreading the word today. Even a few sales in a short period of time on Amazon helps push the book up the rankings, making it more visible to other readers. Amazon.co.uk readers go here , and Amazon.com readers here . No Kindle? Download a free app at Amazon for Mac, iPhone, PC, Android and more. Coming soon in paperback. Keep up with the latest at www.talliroland.com . About THE HATING GAME: When man-eater Mattie Johns agrees to star on a dating game show to save her ailing recruitment business, she's confident she'll sail through to the end without letting down the perma-guard she's perfected from years of her love 'em and leave 'em dating strategy. After all, what can go wrong with dating a few losers and hanging out long enough to pick up a juicy £200,000 prize? Plenty, Mattie discovers, when it's revealed that the contestants are four...

oom! Writing full on for NaNo - especially given my writing habits, which involve pen and paper, and typing it all up later - cut into all of my reading time, so that I was reduced to reading only during my commute to and from work, and one very late night, when I had to keep reading The Hating Game (look for Talli Roland 's Take on Amazon blog splash, coming Wednesday!). This past weekend, I returned to reading with a vengeance, finishing Dorothy Sayers' Clouds of Witness , kc dyer's Facing Fire , the Songs of Love & Death Anthology (featuring a new short story by Diana Gabaldon), starting A Christmas Walk by Zan Marie Steadham , Real Mermaids Don't Wear Toe Rings by Hélène Boudreau and The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan (thanks again Jenny !), and starting and finishing  Alan Silberberg 's Milo - Sticky Notes and Brain Freeze , the second of the local author MG/YA books I picked up at the CANSCAIP meeting last month . Milo is a great char...

did nothing yesterday. Nothing. Well, I wrote and plotted in the morning, then went to work, came home and did some chores. But after that? I read three days' worth of newspapers, a magazine, a couple of short stories and kc dyer 's Facing Fire . Imagine! Reading, for pleasure! Not for research and not while wracked with guilt for not writing. On the other hand, this is exactly how the slippery slope starts. Now that NaNo is winding down, and I don't have the push of other Forum writers barrelling or crawling through the process with me, it's easy to fall back into old habits of "I'll just read a bit tonight. I can get more editing done tomorrow, if I get home from work early and we order take out." That kind of talk leads to two years or more and no finished novel in sight. What are your tips for nipping laziness in the bud? For corralling yourself back to that chair in front of your notebook/laptop? logsplash for Talli Roland 's The Hat...

one! 51,300 words all typed and organized into the master file. Now, if only I could say the draft was complete. Not yet, by a long shot. The beginning is undergoing a major overhaul, the ending has yet to be written, and I just hope the middle doesn't fall out like the inside of a cake as I sit there holding up the sides. Happy Thanksgiving to those of you in the States. If you're feeling slightly overwhelmed by family and food, skip over to Margaret and Helen's and read their T hanksgiving letter to the family . First bit of advice: "If it jiggles, slap a girdle on it or leave it at home." Solvang and TerryLynn have both won the Middle Grade Giveaway ! Please send me your addresses.

eekends are slow during NaNo, at least for me. I typed up all my words but haven't written any new ones, either yesterday or today. Distractions abound as well - for instance, would you like to play Mad Libs with your characters? Do so here ! I did wake up with a Brilliant Idea for shaking up the beginning of the novel, but the lack of words was getting me down - I'm only 3,000 away from completing NaNo early after all - so in order to feel like I'd accomplished at least one thing today, I baked Kait's yogourt beer muffins (meanwhile, part 17 of Forsaken by Shadow is up !), which turned out very yummy, and was the easiest recipe I've followed in a long time. Also, I've been thinking of character names again. I originally blogged about this back in 2008 , where I was discussing the characters in my middle grade story The Face of A Lion . Even after all that, however, I'd never found a surname for the main character Austin. A couple of months ago, how...

eering away from word counts... There I was fretting about how to frame my blog post for the day – how many NaNo blog updates can a NaNo blogger write before NaNo readers get NaNoed out? – when my trusty sidekicks/whip hands/inspirational writing friends on The Forum came through once again! Here's Sheena's post for the day , wherein she quotes yours truly. Where else but on the Forum can you segue from NaNo to lycanthropy to Doctor Who to VCRs to Medieval Europe, and survive another day, to talk about Thanksgiving and seven league boot spells? In re Doctor Who, visit the BBC page for links to archival footage featuring the Second Doctor, Patrick Troughton, and Frazer Hines, here and here . How To Write Badly Well mentions Istanbul ! Middle Grade Giveaway is still up for grabs ! Don't forget to save a word ! Must dash... got an appointment with my notebook.

h, NaNo. Still going strong! My schedules have gotten a bit topsy turvy, so that I'm still writing every day, but with lots of family and friend (and, oh yea, work) commitments, haven't been typing up my words nearly every day. Cracked 30,000 over the weekend but have another 6,000 to type up tonight, to bring the novel itself to c. 120,000 - the longest I've ever had. Just look at my notebook! Frodo did: Here are my 15 Authors Who've Influenced Me (per the Facebook meme, off the top of my head, without overthinking it): 1. L M Montgomery 2. Jean Little 3. J R R Tolkien 4. C S Lewis 5. John Bellairs 6. Diana Gabaldon 7. Walter de la Mare 8. Agatha Christie 9. Dorothy L Sayers 10. Marchette Chute 11. Madeleine l'Engle 12. E L Konigsburg 13. Fyodor Dostoyevksy 14. Charles Bukowski 15. James Herriott Then I added in the comments that I'd forgotten Ted Keneally, Beatrix Potter, Louisa May Alcott, Kit Pearson, Margaret Buf...

es! Words, words and more words and haka! Yes, I know it's Saturday but I was up at 5.30 this morning, writing - bare minimum of NaNo words for the day. Then I typed up at least 3,000, but had to stop because I went out with friends to watch Scotland vs the All Blacks. If you haven't seen the haka yet, here's a taste . Also had a pep talk from John Green , author of the amazing Looking for Alaska , in my email - and just discovered that the brilliant Katherine Paterson has done one before as well. And what does Mr. Green say? "Go spit in the face of our inevitable obsolescence and finish your @#$&ng novel." So there you go. But if you're not writing - or watching large men on a field - head over to Kait's and read the next part of Forsaken by Shadow . And watch this space for a Talli Roland related blogsplash soon! And... enter the middle grade giveaway here . Off to type some more before my friend's party...

n Flanders Fields the poppies grow, between the crosses, row on row... Today is Remembrance Day, on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. It's also Day 11 of NaNo... Writing at this pace sometimes produces what Claire calls NaNoStupids - those phrases or words that you know you'll edit after but which seem to crop up more than usual as you write without second-guessing yourself. This morning I wrote a story based on many of those oft-repeated phrases : He looked at her. She looked at him. He frowned. She raised her brows. He turned away. She put a hand on his arm. He scowled. She rolled her eyes. He shrugged. She set her hands on her hips. He grinned. She quirked a smile. He leaned forward. She rested her fingers on his chest. He kissed her.

hisking by to report on progress. NaNo is going superbly! At least 3000 words per day and most of the time I manage to have them all typed in the evenings. On the other hand, work has heated up, with all sorts of overtime and extra projects; isn't that always the way? I hope everyone else who's doing NaNo is also having a great time. Some that aren't have exciting news to report, like Jessica, who's going to be published - congratulations Jessica! Help her choose a title ! Thank you to everyone on the Forum for keeping me on my toes, especially the ladies of All The World's Our Page . And if you'd care to read a long snip from Out of the Water , featuring a lover's spat, please go here .

tatistics on Day 6: Words typed in last five hours: 5,000 Number of times checked Facebook: 1 Number of times felt like checking Gmail/Facebook/Writer'sForum/etc. and did not: 5, and counting Days worth of newspapers caught up on in one sitting: 4 Today's discovery: while I love listening to music while writing, the set up works better if I listen to non-English music (such as Runrig , in Gaelic, or the Super Furry Animals , in Welsh) as it leaves me free to concentrate on my own words Original research for the day: listening to nightingales And so on. Total word count for week one: 12,650 In other news, the next installment of Kait Nolan's Forsaken By Shadow is up - here . And Alliterative Allomorph 'as an adventurous 'andout! By which I mean, she's hosting a contest; enter here . Meanwhile, here's a wee NaNo snip from Out of the Water, in the point of view of Rosa's love: He followed the others to the kitchen and stood by the he...

ay 3! Kristi did a fun NaNo list over on the forum, and I've created one for myself: Spanish classes skipped: 1 Lattes: 1 Cups of coffee: upwards of 10 (but that mostly because there's a symposium on at work and I get free coffee) Dinners made by me: 0 Pauses on the stairwell in the office to scribble ideas: at least 2 per day Replies given to friends and colleagues in character: 2 Dreams about writing while walking down the street: 1 Silent panic attacks: 1 Said panic attack calmed by coffee refill: 1 Scenes written that are required by the wip: 0 Scenes written that take the wip in new directions: 4 I could go on, but I'm too busy writing. Clarissa Draper has done a brilliant Chapter Critique (in her ongoing series) of a scene from Out of the Water ! Thank you Clarissa. Check it out, here . Don't forget to enter my Jean Little giveaway - and vote in Disgruntled Bear's Query Contest ! Also, How To Write Badly Well features Old Istanbul ....

nother NaNo post... I'll probably only do these once a week or so, as they'll simply be word count updates. NaNo is a lot more exciting this year now that more of the Compuserve Books and Writers Community members are participating. The fact that I'm not editing but still working on the first draft of my novel might also have something to do with it, of course. However, what with work and all, I only wrote the bare NaNo minimum today, plus two words (1,669). Though I've got at least three scenes percolating in my head that I might start working on tonight! My progress is slightly hampered by my working method - I wrote all my words this morning, then typed them up as soon as I got home. Composing on the computer still doesn't work for me. I debated what else to include here. A link to a fun contest, like Terry Lynn Johnson's book giveaway or my own Jean Little giveaway ? Summer's fun Show Your Workspace Blogfest ? (I can't really show mine as i...