Everyone Needs a Creative Passion

I haven't talked about my writing in awhile. It's been a couple of months, actually, since I'm made more than a passing remark about The Sandcastle's Way, and I haven't talked about any other sorts of writing, either! What's gotten into me?!

So I'm here to change that. First of all, I am super psyched to announce that I made it into the top twenty finalists of Stephanie Morrill's writing contest! Stephanie Morrill is a published author who runs the blog Go Teen Writers, which is full of great advice, tips and information directed at teen writers hoping to write a novel and/or get one published. Every few weeks, she hosts a writing contest where she gives a prompt, and then teens and young adults write a short entry. The idea is to use the prompt to craft a one-hundred-word beginning of a story, almost like the opening of a novel. Something to hook readers and lure them in, but that doesn't try to tell the whole story.

Often, there are as many as eighty to ninety entries, and published authors judge them. This is how Stephanie explains the scoring system:

Recommended Read: The Girls of No Return

Title: The Girls of No Return

Author: Erin Saldin

Standing: Stand alone novel

Genre: Young Adult Contemporary Fiction

Publisher: Arthur A. Levine Books

Release Date: February 1, 2012

Source: My local library

Erin Saldin's The Girls of No Return is a lacerating young adult debut about girls, knives, and redemption. The Alice Marshall School, set within a glorious 2-million acre wilderness area, is a place where teenage girls are sent to escape their histories and themselves. Lida Wallace has tried to negate herself in every way possible. At Alice Marshall, she meets Elsa Boone, Jules, and Gia Longchamps, whose glamour entrances the entire camp. As the girls prepare for a wilderness trek, Lida is both thrilled and terrified to be chosen as Gia's friend. Everyone has their secrets – the “Things” they try to protect; and when those come out, the knives do as well. ~Goodreads

Thoughts

This is one of those novels that stays with you even after you put it down - or in my case, reluctantly return it to the library.

One Hundred Years and Four Days Later

Sunday, April 14, 1912. The night was clear and cold. There was no moon and no wind, and the enormous luxury liner, the RMS Titanic, was steaming across the Atlantic at full speed. Called "The Millionaire's Special" and "The Last Word in Luxury", it was nearly nine hundred feet long, held together with three million rivets and weighing over forty-six thousand tons when unloaded. Four days into its maiden voyage from England to New York City, it boasted two thousand, two hundred and twenty-three passengers, plus crew. Built with sixteen watertight compartments, it could still float if as many as four somehow filled with water. It was considered one of the safest ships at sea, and the builders claimed that even God couldn't sink the Titanic.

Ken Marschall has done many beautiful paintings of the Titanic, including this one.

At the urging of J. Bruce Ismay - president of White Star Line, the company that owned the ship - Captain E.J. Smith had kept the great ship moving at a top speed of twenty-one knots, despite the fact that they were steaming  into an area known to be full of icebergs. Ismay hoped to arrive in New York early and surprise everyone with the speed of the titan. But at 11:40 p.m., the lookout Frederick Fleet called the bridge with a message  - iceberg right ahead!

The Next Best Thing to Time Travel

My family goes to Old Sturbridge Village about twice a year. One trip is in the fall, on Homeschool Day, and one is in the spring. Our spring visit is usually a quiet one - we go during the week, while most people are either working or in school, and wander around pretty much on our own.

Most years, our spring trip is on Riley's birthday. This year, though, Riley's birthday fell on Easter, which  meant that her special day kind of got lost in the shuffle. So on Tuesday, we had a second birthday celebration for her by spending the day at Old Sturbridge Village. And, as usual, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves!

Read on to visit the Village!

The Reason Why I Moved At All

If you've arrived at this blog, I'm guessing that you probably migrated here from my previous location. And no doubt you're looking around my blog and wondering why I bothered to move at all.

Why, why, why? (Buy this print by TheBackPackShoppe on Etsy.)

The first thing you should know is that this is the same blog you're used to reading, at least in the ways that matter most. As you've probably gathered, I kept the blog title Perfectly Sensible Nonsense, and I expect to blog about the same range of subjects I discussed on my original blog. I've updated my blog pages, but other than that there are only two real changes: one, I have a GORGEOUS new design by Prim and Proper Designs! (Don't you love it?!); and two, I have a new URL - taylorlynnbooks.blogspot.com.

After a year at my old URL, perfectlysensiblenonsense.blogspot.com, I had gained a pretty steady flow of traffic, especially from Google search. Granted, most people seemed to arrive through searches for  "dorothea lange" and "peeta mellark shirtless"; but I got plenty of visitors regardless! Which begs the question: Why on earth would I bother moving?!