It's Monday! What Are You Reading? and Mailbox Monday - Apr 8

Welcome to It's Monday! What Are You Reading? and Mailbox Monday.   

 

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? is a place to meet up and share what you have been, are and about to be reading over the week. It's a great post to organize yourself. It's an opportunity to visit and comment, and er... add to that ever growing TBR pile! So welcome in everyone. This meme started with J Kaye's Blog and then was taken up by Sheila from Book Journey. Sheila then passed it on to Kathryn at the Book Date.   

Posting early this week since the morning is busy. Still wishing you all a happy Monday. I hope you had a nice week. My week was filled with meetings and appointments, but I came away feeling productive because I reworked some of my marketing materials for consultations.

We are dog sitting for a couple of days while my brother-in-law takes his family to see the eclipse. Anyone else traveling for it?

You will see Travis is up to his old tricks of hopping into any open door or cabinet.

In my Facebook memories, the last photo of Yia-yia popped up. Today marks one year since she left us. I had no idea when I took this photo it would be the last one. I only took it so my daughter, who was coming home the next day, would see she was safely with us. I'm glad I was inspired to take it, because she had such a great day with us. It was almost like she was her old self before her dementia diagnosis. 

I listed a few books for sale on eBay. You can find them here. 

With my busy week, I didn't read a ton, but here is what I accomplished. I'm over halfway through this one on Audible. Book club is Wednesday, so I will have to finish it while driving to appointments this week. 

I didn't read any from this graphic novel approved by NetGalley. 

I read some of this one. 

I didn't read from this one last week. 

Didn't read this one on Audible because I need to finish The Secret Garden.

I started this one.

This one might be next after review books. 

This week at Christmas Year Round, we talked about the Christmas in April organization. You can find the post here.

Upcoming virtual book tours:

• It Will Have Been So Beautiful by Amanda Shaw - Apr 25 (review) 
• My Career Journal by CareerTuners - May 1 (review) 
• Be Resilient in Your Career by Dr. Helen Ofosu - May 16 (review)
• Mastering Your Scenes by J. A. Cox - May 17 (review)
• I Will Ruin You: The Twisted Truth Behind the Kit Martin Murder Trial by Emilio Corsetti III - May 31 (review)

 

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week. Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.

This arrived mid-week for my May review.

So you want to write an engaging scene, do you? This book was written with one main to help give authors a creative boost in their scene writing and toss writers' block into the oblivion of the abyss. In order to accomplish this, each chapter is written in a workbook-like format so that the steps provided can easily be implemented after they are explained. For each element of scene writing that is presented, J.A. Cox explains the How, Why, and When of its use along with his own description so that the information is easy to assimilate. He provides copious examples from his own writing of these elements in action as well as from shows and movies.

Here are the elements that you will be learning:

• Sketching
• Location
• Time
• Characters
• Perspective
• Resistance
• Objective

No new-fangled way of writing is about to be forced on you, but advice offered to help you realize things you are likely not seeing as you struggle to come up with ideas. As you make your way through these pages and consider these elements, you will end up in a state where it is difficult to shut down the tsunami of ideas that will come your way.

Finally, there is a completed outline format that can be used over and over for every scene you write to keep that creative pump primed. Therefore, you will no longer have to fuss over figuring out what prompts or hooks to use to start a chapter as your answer will come to you as you outline your scenes from the various questions provided for you to ask with each element.

This book will revolutionize the way you look at your scenes in the future...

That is all from my end of the world. Hope you have a fabulous day. See you around the blogosphere.