Writing Words for Nerds #AtoZChallenge--N is for (use the) News

The news can be a double-edged sword.

On the one hand, it can make you more aware of what’s going on, which is good. For a fiction writer, it can inspire ideas for stories. It was a news story that inspired my YA romantic ghost story, Ride of Your Life, and science news helps inform the science in my teen science-fantasy comedy series, The Legend of Gilbert the Fixer.

But then there are the drawbacks: being obsessed with the news can gobble up time that would be better spent doing other things, like writing. The news tends to focus on bad news, too, which can be depressing and troubling. There’s also a lot of misinformation and bias. The news rarely gives you the “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” There are always those who will manipulate the facts, or even blatantly lie about what the facts are. You can get media burnout just trying to find out what the real story is.

I know about the news from both sides. My family has been in newspapers for five generations, and I don’t mean we ate fish and chips in the UK (where it used to be sold wrapped in newspaper). No, I mean we’ve been working in the newspaper business that long. I was a consumer columnist and arts-and-entertainment for the Jerusalem Post. Before that, I was an editorial cartoonist, a job that requires a deep and current knowledge of the news. My mom edited the women’s section of two different newspapers between the fifties and the start of this century. Her father was a newspaper writer and editor. Her grandfather (on her mother’s side) was a newspaper writer and editor. And finally her great grandfather on her mother’s mother’s side was a newspaper writer and editor. Five generations all leading up to me.    

I’ve seen both sides of that sword. It’s been a blessing and a curse. I love the news when it’s honest. Today the journalists with integrity stand out, because they’re very much in the minority. I also love little stories about ordinary people accomplishing great things, humorous news, and learning about scientific discoveries and breakthroughs. I hate the news when it’s deceptive and manipulative, and that just seems to be getting worse and worse. Most people don’t trust the media nowadays, and to the most part I can’t blame them.

Today’s news gives you a lot of material for writing fiction, most of it in the area of satire and dystopian science fiction.

Want to know how to write either?

For satire, check out my post: Writing Words for Nerds #AtoZChallenge—H is for Humor. I came up with my House of Funny formula when I was an editorial cartoonist, which is basically like writing political satire in a drawing or two and ten words or less.

For dystopian fiction, you only have to take one bad or even potentially bad news item, look at it through a microscope so that the tiniest thing becomes huge, and then project it into the future. Of course, you better hang on tight, because that is going to be one scary ride. Or you could just listen to the current presidential candidates. They all seem to have doomsday scenarios for what’s going to happen if you don’t vote for them. Although I think it’s probably smarter to trust your own gut over what any politician tells you.

My name is Shevi, and I’m a news-aholic. 

Writing Words for Nerds #AtoZChallenge--B is for Books

 Too Many Books?

by Shevi Arnold

Books, books,

I have books,

On all the shelves,

In all the nooks.

Books on writing,

Books on art,

Books by the boxful,

Books by the cart,

Books in a stack,

And more in the back.

Books I’ve written,

Books I’ve read,

For when I’m sittin’,

Even books in my head.

Some say I’ve too many.

I know that’s not true!

I need more books...

And more bookshelves, too.

Writing Words for Nerds #AtoZChallenge--A is for Action

Five days left to the A to Z Challenge.

There are only five days left to the A to Z Challenge for April of this year.

What’s the point in even starting this late?

I only found out about the challenge a few days ago. I noticed this hashtag on Twitter, and so I asked one of my friends who tweeted it. “What’s the #AtoZChallenge?” She didn’t answer me, but a few days ago I saw it again. So I asked again. This time a second friend shared the link to the website. 

The A to Z Challenge is similar to the NaNoWriMo but for bloggers.

As with NaNoWriMo, people commit themselves to writing something within a month. With NaNoWriMo you commit to writing a 50,000 word novel during the month of November. With the A to Z Challenge, people commit to writing a blog post for every day in April except for Sundays. 

People sign up in March and choose one of a variety of themes. There’s a theme for pretty much everything, from animals to writing. Even humor and personal writing are options. Bloggers then go through the alphabet based on their chosen theme. For example, a blogger who chose humor could write about airplane travel on the first, boogers on the second, and California on the third.  

 And because of Passover--and the fact that I only found out about this right before Passover--I didn’t have time to start working on it until last night.

Why start at all then? 

I mean, I’m not a time traveler. (Not yet, anyway. Not that I know of. Future me might disagree.) I can’t go back to the first of April to start writing and posting an article a day.

And very strangely, this segues very nicely into my first blog post. My chosen theme is writing, specifically, "writing words for nerds." 

And my first blog post in the A to Z Challenge is about...

  

A is for Action

You can edit a page of garbage, as writers say, but you can’t edit a blank page.

Recently, my blog has been a series of blank pages. 

You see, I want to use my blog to help other people, or as Gilbert Garfinkle would put it, “fix the world.” 

If you look around you’ll find serious posts about how to write funny, whether to submit your work to traditional publishers or indie published, a step-by-step guide to publishing a picture book, and lots more. 

So when it comes to writing a new blog post, I find it hard to compete with myself. I find it hard to match that same level of helpfulness as the posts I've already done. 

Yes, I could write a hilarious blog post about cats or about my book addiction. (I blame my heritage for the latter. I grew up in a house where we used bookcases in place of wallpaper, and one of my great grandfathers died when he tried to reach a book on a high shelf and the entire bookcase collapsed on his frail old body. I also have an uncle who died when he was packing up his books to donate them to a library. My family lives by the book and dies by the book.) I guess they could fix the world in a small way by giving someone a laugh. The more laughter there is in the world, the better. 

But how does that compare to helping people publish their books or make life-altering decisions?

It doesn’t.

But neither does a blank page.

So A is for Action.

A is for doing.

A is for writing those pages, even if they’re garbage.

A is for starting the A to Z Challenge, even if it is April 26^th and you only have five days left to write 26 blog posts.

It doesn’t have to be great. It can be absolute garbage.

The only thing it can’t be is a blank page.  

~*~

Now to start working on my next Writing Words for Nerds A to Z Challenge: B is for Books.