WeWriWa's launch contest!

Would you like to win a PDF of of The Emotion Thesaurus??

On February 3rd, over at Weekend Writing Warriors, one lucky participant from our linky list will win that very prize, very generously donated by the fabulous ladies at The Bookshelf Muse!

WeWriWa is a brand new Sunday blog hop. You sign up on the linky list, post no more than 8 sentences from one of your works, and visit other participants on the list. There's no end to the fun when a bunch of writers get together to share short excerpts from their writing. Romance is a popular genre here but believe me, even those snippets are not all traditional :D

We've already got 30+ peeps signed up at the site -- are you next?

What I love about something like this is how it forces me to be concise. It's why you hear advice to study playwriting or movie writing: when you're backed into a corner, so to speak, you find out what's really necessary to say.

I wrapped up the scene I was using for Six Sentence Sunday when that marvelous blog hop came to an end, so now I'll be pulling excerpts from the novel itself. Who knows what cool things may emerge from this exercise!

Really hope you'll come by the WeWriWa site and visit us all. We love company :)

Contest winner!

Big congrats to Kelly W. who won the Catch That Typo contest! Winging its way to her right now is Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips For Better Writing by Mignon Fogarty.

Watch this space for more Catch That Typo editions!

The selection was

From now till the end of the month, take advantage of our free shipping offer, valid on any products side-wide. There's no minimum purchase and our usual restrictions apply.

The typo is side-wide, which should be site-wide.

Thanks to everybody who entered, best of luck with whatever you're writing, and keep your eyes peeled for typos :)

Grammar contest! With a prize! Woot!



Image courtesy of Kittisak /
FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Starting a contest! "Catch That Typo" will test not just your eyes but your knowledge of grammar. You're a writer, you say? Then these should be easy! Find the typo in the selection and mention it in a comment. [Contest change: send your guess in an email through the link in my profile. Other comments on this post are welcome, though!] Everybody who answers correctly will be entered in a drawing to WIN one of these books (you get to choose):

* Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss

* Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips For Better Writing by Mignon Fogarty

I'll collect comments for three days, starting today. On Wednesday August 15 I'll post the answer and the winner's name. [Contest change: send your guess in an email through the link in my profile. Other comments on this post are welcome, though!]

For my contest typos are defined as

• transposed letters ("foru" instead of "four"),
• use of the wrong letter ("richshaw" instead of "rickshaw"),
• apostrophes dropped, or added unnecessarily,
• malapropisms ("He had to use a fire distinguisher to put the fire out.")
• homophones (to, too, and two; you're, your, and yore)
• incorrect tense ("It's a shame his ice sculpture melted because he work hard at it"--should be worked)

I'm including all of those because a decent editing pass (not just relying on spellcheck) should catch them. If one of those mistakes makes it into print, somebody didn't do their job because it's avoidable in most instances.

Today's selection:

From now till the end of the month, take advantage of our free shipping offer, valid on any products side-wide. There's no minimum purchase and our usual restrictions apply.

You have until Tuesday night, August 14 to say what you think the typo is, in a comment [EMAIL]  to this post.  Good luck!