Call this my thousandth post…

After all, what’s a post or two between friends? 😉 In fact, I’m not quite sure exactly how many posts I’ve put up here at the Kelworth Files, but it’s definitely in the quadruple digits now. So, in another little retrospective, I’ve come up with a semi-random list of ten posts for your regularly scheduled walk down memory lane.

1. Feedback Swap Update
2. Nanowrimo Day 23 – jumping from story to story.
3. Crossover Banner: The Wizards of Roswell
4. Blog the Cat: Chapter Eight and wrap-up
5. NanoEdmo Update Week 3 (2011)
6. C is for Critters (A-Z challenge 2011)
7. J is for Just a Dream (A-Z challenge 2012, Script Frenzy)
8. Nanowrimo Spotlight 2012: Rhianna. Also, check out my guest post in Rhianna’s Bag of Holding!
9. A Day to Rest. (Sabbath thoughts.)
10. Nanowrimo Spotlight 2013: A Fairytale Heart Races Through November

So, thanks for hanging in with me. Stay tuned for the next thousand posts!

Nanoedmo – editing to the bitter end

Okay, so first off: the hour tracker is at just over 41 hours, which means I do have quite a bit of work to cram into the last 3 days of the month, but then, I’ve got the long weekend coming up, so it’s certainly doable.

I was making some good progress on the second novel I’m going through ‘How to Revise your Novel’ with, The Angel’s Charlie; I’m nearly finished the second lesson, promise counts, but I was also feeling that working on the novel was adding to my stress levels a bit. So, instead of working myself into a stress breakdown or giving up on EdMo, I decided to switch back to polishing fanfiction and see if that was better, and I’ve been enjoying it a lot and finding it restful by comparison. I’ve gotten a few chapters through the sequel to “Arrow through my Soul, A Roswell Alien in Metropolis. Not quite sure if I’m going to stick with fanfic through the rest of the month, or go back to HTRYN, but I’m sure I’m going to reach 50 hours one way or another!

And then it’ll be time for Camp Nanowrimo and my A-Z challenge. I think the lineup there is in pretty good shape; I have over 20 spotlight interviews already and more should be coming in soon. At least one of my Camp Spotlights is probably going to get held over until May, just because there won’t be room in the A-Z alphabet, because things never get slotted in quite that neatly. 😉 But they should make great reading even after Camp is finished.

My 750th Post count party!

Hey there, friends and followers. Today is my 750th post for the Kelworth Files, and even though it’s not a hugely round number, it’s a cool one, so I thought I’d throw a little party for it. Help yourself to anything at the bar, and there’s some pretty good cupcakes and pizza out on the coffee table. 😉

In case you haven’t heard it, ‘post count party’ is a term I came across on the SDMB message board – the forum software keeps track of how many posts members have made, so some people make threads just to congratulate themselves on their five thousandth post or whatever – and the mods do not always take kindly to them. 😉

So, it’s been about two and a half years since I started blogging, and I’ve had a great time here. This may not be the most successful blog in the whole world, but I kinda like it, and the friends I’ve made. I should probably concentrate on keeping up with some of my favorite bloggers, rather than just sitting here and doing my own thing… (Checks a blog randomly picked from memory in another tab, Trisha’s WORD+STUFF…)

Oh, man! Overcoming Adversity is today! Maybe I should wipe out this post and start working on a flash fic… I signed up for that, didn’t I?  Okay, yes, I signed up for it, but it spans two days. So stay tuned for my flash fiction on the subject of Overcoming Adversity, tomorrow on the Kelworth Files! 😀 We now return you to your regularly scheduled party.

Yeah, hmm… I do want to keep doing the blog hop thing. ‘Blog hop’ as a term seems to be getting more popular than blogfest, doesn’t it? That’s a good thing to keep in mind as I search for writers’ blog hops in 2013.

I’m looking forward to the craziness of the A-Z challenge, and I’m wondering if there’s going to be a Platform-building Campaign this year. Rach from Rach writes hasn’t posted anything since October.

And on that somewhat sad thought my train of thought rumbles to a stop. Except I still have enough brainpower to ask – what are you looking forward to, blogging-wise, for the rest of the year?

Z is for Zenxara

The Script Frenzy A-Z challenge so far…

Hi everybody. For the last day of my Script Frenzy A-Z I’d like to share a spotlight interview with a fellow A-Zer and Script Frenzier, Steph, who goes by Zenxara on Script Frenzy and Twitter. Zenxara reached 100 pages of her script on April the 16th, (Wow!)

How many years have you been doing Script Frenzy?
This is actually my first year doing Script Frenzy, I entered last year but couldn’t make it because of school work, but now that I graduated I have all the time in the world.

How did you first find out about it?
I first heard of Script Frenzy when I was doing NaNoWriMo in 2010. I was looking at what else OLL did besides NaNO and found Script Frenzy.

What’s your favorite thing about the script that you’re writing this year?
My script is about a magic bond and trust. My favorite thing that I love to write about right now is the HighLands, which is where the elves are. HighLands is the most magical place there is in my story. I love to write about the Elves.

What’s the hardest thing about participating in Script Frenzy?
There isn’t anything that I find hard really, it’s much easier then NaNoWriMo, but what I find really sad is that there is no one in my region that is doing the challenge so I’m writing alone.

Why should my blog followers join the Frenzy next year?
I went to a workshop once and they say that a script version of your novel is a great outline, because you have a description of the world or characters, you know who is talking and you can get the character’s voice. You can have the action and see them act. It’s much easier to write in script form then novel form and you can use it as an outline later! That’s what I’m doing.

Thanks, Steph, and congratulations on your successes this April!

Y is for Yumesandman

The Script Frenzy A-Z challenge so far…

Today’s spotlight is on Yumesandman, who is working on a comedy stageplay called ‘Love in Books.’

How many years have you been doing Script Frenzy?
This is actually my first year doing Script Frenzy.  I did National Novel Writing Month in November, and was 5,000 words from finishing, with two days off of work at the end of the month, when a personal emergency came up.  Frustrated that I didn’t finish, I decided to do Script Frenzy to prove I could make the deadline.

How did you first find out about it?
Through Nano.  I learned of it during the middle of March, and thought I would go ahead with it.

What’s your favorite thing about the script that you’re writing this year?
The Muses.  The play I’m writing involves a young girl who’s caught in between two men- one she loves but doesn’t want her, and another that wants her but she doesn’t love.  So to spice up an otherwise boring and cliché piece, I have two Muses who overlook the stage and comment on everything the girl does.  But they’re sarcastic and cynical Muses, so their dialogue is fun to write.

What’s the hardest thing about participating in Script Frenzy?
I’ve never written a script before!  I’ve always been a prose writer, and occasionally poetry, but I’ve never tried to tackle a script before.  The extent of my stage experience was making programs for my high school drama club.  Dialogue is my weakest area though, so in some ways this is great practice for me to learn how to better develop my dialogue.

Why should my blog followers join the Frenzy next year?

Because it’s fun!  But in all honesty, it’s a great exercise for improving your writing.  Whether you only write scripts, or you’re a prose writer like me, events like Script Frenzy are wonderful.  They help you learn to write on deadlines (important for business/school!), and one of the hardest things- to just put the words to paper, instead of wasting time analyzing them.  By being forced to write so much in such little time, you can’t waste time second guessing yourself, so you learn to just write and then go back to edit later.  It’s a wonderful thing to learn, so that you don’t spend three years on page one (which I’ve done!)

Good luck with your muses, Yumesandman!

X is for Xaeromancer2008

The Script Frenzy A-Z challenge so far…

Well, surprise surprise, it’s spotlight on a Script Frenzy participant again today, and I’d like you to meet Xaeromancer2008. Xaeromancer is working on a comic script called Bedlam, which he describes on his Script Frenzy profile as Sons of Anarchy meets Black Death. “A knightly order is broken and struggles for revenge during the crusades.”

How many years have you been doing Script Frenzy?
This is actually my first year of Script Frenzy, I’ve tried NaNoWriMo before but never succeeded (so far). I’ve had the idea for this script for about a year and it’s been kept on the back burner by other projects and my day job. Script Frenzy was an ideal opportunity to dust it off and get some words down.

How did you first find out about it?

W is for Webvideos and Webcomics

The Script Frenzy A-Z challenge so far…

Like other formats, Script Frenzy has a special forum for Webvideo and Webcomic scripts. I tracked down four of the Frenzies posting about their Web projects and asked them each a few questions.

Justangel24 is working on episodes of a web video soap opera called Vicious Lust. “It’s about the complicated relationships between 6 people and how lust winds up being viscious, dangerous and even deadly for them. I made this idea to be a closed ended web series so it’s kind of like a spanish telenovela format but made for the web.

“As of today, April 25th, I’m up to page 80. I know I am writing this for Script Frenzy so there’s going to be some stuff that I am going to change or that isn’t going to be logical to myself so I am considering that for when I start the drafting process after Frenzy ends. So far, however, I am sastisfied with how the story is developing.

“I have always wanted to make a web soap opera because I know the fanbase is very loyal. The creator sometimes has direct contact with the fans and if the fans like the show well enough, it will show in funding campagins, response on facebook and hopefully at We Love Soaps Indie Soap Awards if it gets that far.”

teax2 is working on two different web video scripts this April. One is an adaptation of last year’s Script Frenzy webcomic – Firework, which can be found at http://firework.the-comic.org. “It’s a swear-filled sci fi for teens.”

V is for Video Diaries

The Script Frenzy A-Z challenge so far…

One of the highlights of Script Frenzies are the little video clips that the staff at the Office of Letters and Light film and post on the website, talking about their own struggles with their scripts, to encourage the rest of us and start conversations on the discussion board. Here are some of my favorite videos from this year…

Some ‘Young Writers Program’ Script Frenziers made their own trailer for the event, which is pretty cool!

Lindsay does a little demonstration of script formatting in action! The script equivalent for the video is here.

U is for Uberskittlez

The Script Frenzy A-Z challenge so far…

Well, in this last week of the A-Z challenge, I’m going to be spotlighting some Script Frenzy writers and their projects. Yes, this was my clever strategy to find topics for the letters of the alphabet that I couldn’t think of anything else to cover. Feel free to swoon with envy.

So, today, I’m happy to shine the spotlight on uberskittlez, and her script Cirque, which she describes in her profile as: Water for Elephants meets a post-apocalyptic dictatorship. (Earlier this month, the working title was ‘Utopia’ – an extra bit of U appeal, but I guess uberskittlez didn’t stay with that title for long.) “Held captive in the questioning facility of a ruthless dictator in a post-war future, Tristian Roe tells the story of his time with the legendary rebel group ‘Cirque’ in exchange for his freedom.”

How many years have you been doing Script Frenzy?
This is only my second year doing Script Frenzy. I’ve been wanting to write a script for forever, and last year I decided to do it.

T is for TV scripts

The Script Frenzy A-Z challenge so far…

Television is one of the most popular script formats for Frenzy participants, even though you need to write more than one episode of a television show to get to the 100 page goal. (Or a mini-series.) And so TV scripts get a forum all their own on the discussion board.

There’s some interesting conversations taking place on the TV scripts forum this year:

• Asking about the BBC drama format of listing day numbers and times for scenes, and how to handle flashbacks.
• Talking about page counts and act breaks.
• Mourning the deaths of major characters.
• Debating the merits of working with an old plot bunny or starting from scratch.
• Celebrating Doctor Who, Sherlock, and some other favorite shows, (and discussing writing spec episodes for them.)
• Anime writers gathering together for mutual support.
• Talking about ‘the standing sets for your show.’
• The love of writing comedy.
• Crime drama – should the criminal escape?
• Tips and tricks for writing a pilot episode.
• How to create your cast of characters.
• Help – my miniseries idea has exploded in my brain, and it’s not looking so ‘mini’ anymore!

Have you ever wanted to write for television? What would you want the series to be?