Writing tips

New Works, Benefits

/ Damean Mathews, Author / Leave a comment

Hey there friends and fans! What’s happening in your world this year? So far things have been going well for me. As you all already know I have started vlogging and writing a few new ideas. Those things are going pretty well, although I’m getting almost no views on my vlogs. It’s a good way to keep my head straight though. It helps me organize ideas and rant and vent. In a way I suppose the benefits are almost the same as those of writing in a diary or journal. I have put the links to the vlog in previous posts, so if you want to check it out, I welcome you to. Also, I have begun working on Wattpad in order to find myself in a new genre and gaining a new audience. I am working on a Fanfiction piece there. It’s a sequel to the film “Near Dark”, which is an absolutely fantastic movie. I feel it really deserves a sequel, so I took it upon myself to work on one that I hope will do the original storyline justice while giving it a modern touch.

In my experience so far, I feel like both of these are very good ways for authors and artists of just about any kind to work on their craft. It’s good to be able to vlog and share some things on Youtube, because there are obviously millions of viewers out there leaping for new things. It’s similar with Wattpad. It’s a good way to work on branching out and trying your hand at new types of work or putting a couple of chapters out there for people to read for free so you can see how well it is liked. This all being said, you have to be very careful with exactly what you share, of course. You don’t want to publish an entire novel on Wattpad and then try to get it published. People won’t want to pay for what they don’t have to. After all “why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?” Also, you don’t want to give to many plot ideas or any huge details of any works you may talk about in a vlog. All of that, of course, is up to you. But both are helpful. I feel that, just in the last few weeks, the use of these two things has helped me to branch out more as an author, which is what you want to do. You want to gain as much of an audience as possible, which can be very hard in a world where literature and literacy are falling deep into the recesses of technological advancement. But that’s a rant I’ve had more than once, and -spoiler alert- will certainly do again in the future. Everyone, have a great night, a great week, and I’ll post my Wattpad link below. Please read, subscribe and rate. Also, remember that anyone who gives me a review online between now and April will win a free copy of my next published work!

http://www.wattpad.com/user/DameanMathews

Big Things!

/ Damean Mathews, Author / Leave a comment

Greetings friends and fans! I know, I know, absences of late have been dreadful, but what can I say? School and work have been taking a great deal of my free time, and what they haven’t consumed I’ve been spending working on a number of things ranging from my three jobs, NaNoWriMo, and life in general.

Number two in the list of awesome things I have to tell you guys is the most recent and the one that may not excite any of you (although I sincerely hope you’ll all check it out). I have started my very own vlog series, to give everyone a glimpse inside the life of a college author (don’t you just love it when they use the title in the work itself…) and to show my friends and fans who I really am. Too long have I remained just a voice in the black and white, a light in the darkness (at least to me), now I want people to really see me for me!! So here’s your chance;
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2EU_YW9qBDfFWAB01Nc6wA
Finally, the very exciting and next to oldest news; I have been asked to be a presenter at the 2015 Appalachian Heritage Writer’s Symposium at SWCC! The Appalachian Heritage Writers Guild reached out to me and asked me to do a presentation relating zombie, the undead and horror fiction to the Appalachian region. They literally told me that they feel I am successful enough in my genre that I am fully ready and capable to teach it to others! The feelings that gave me! I couldn’t describe if I tried! I was elated and honored and touched and moved and excited and scared…and so many other things! Anyway, more information on all of these things is to come, but in the meantime you have the link to my Youtube channel so please subscribe and view and interact all you wish! In case anyone might be interested in attending the symposium this summer, here is the link to that information; https://appheritagewritersym.wordpress.com/

Thanks for reading and being a part of this, guys. I really hope you all participate and stay in touch!

New ways to broadcast yourself!

/ Damean Mathews, Author / 3 Comments

One of the most important things to any up and coming author or artist of any sort is finding an audience, reaching your audience, getting your name and work out there. However you want to phrase it, that’s the issue. In honesty, it shouldn’t be as much of an issue as it is, given today’s society and technology, etc. But that’s really where the problem comes into play. Not only are there a plethora of people in the world today, there is an untold number that want to be artists and writers and all manner of things. Unfortunately, however, there are so many ways and places one can be placed online or advertised online that it is easy for others to overlook them, and in turn overlook their own opportunity and so forth. I want to share a little bit of information that I have found somewhat helpful in the last few days especially; blogging having your work advertised on other sites makes an unequivocal difference. One of the best things to do on blog sites, actually is to network and share. Which is where I think we could all help each other here. We need to share each other’s work and blogs and everything that we can. This will help each and every one of us to reach a new network of people, and if those people are asked to do the same, soon we will be in the presence of audiences we never could have reached on our own!

Recently I have submitted my work for display on two very important and high-traffic literature sites in the hopes that it will help spread my name, and so far it’s worked fairly well. I encourage each and every one of you to do the same. Goodreads.com and Authorsden.com are great places to advertise your work.

Another thing that is immensely helpful, as I’ve said, is blogging. Ask other bloggers to share your work and your sites and give you reviews. If you have shares, reviews and a fan base, others will be attracted to your work. I really want to help everyone here, so I’m going to extend the first invitation. If any of you would like me to share your blog, a portion of your work, or even just mention your name anywhere in my own network, please let me know. All I ask is that the favor be returned. Share my blog, my website, my name, anything and everything you can in your network and we will share the links with one another so we can see how many people see it. This can seriously start a chain reaction if we treat it right and can lead to a great number of us getting in the market in a great way. One of the biggest things we absolutely have to remember is that we are indeed a team, and teamwork is sometimes exactly what it takes to move mountains.

So there is your challenge, fans. Tell me you want me to boost or promote you in my own network, and do the same for me and we will both reach a broad new fan base. In addition to promoting you, I’m going to go further and commit that anyone who shares my work and I see it or get a link for it, etc. you will receive a free copy of my next publication, just because. Here is the link to my Author’s Den profile for your own viewing and to give you all an idea of what to put in your own.
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/author.asp?id=183154

Just to refresh your memory. The ways to reach new audiences;
1) Broadcast! Talk about and share your links and work anywhere you can
2) Author’s/Artist’s profiles; there are a number of web sites that exist only to help promote the starving artist- use them!
3) Coordinate; Help each other, advertise for each other, promote each other. Become a family and work together for the better of everyone
4) Blog; Share your work on your blog, share your blog on other sites, and especially reach to bloggers (particularly professional bloggers who a lot of people listen to)
5) HAVE CONFIDENCE AND FAITH! You have to believe in yourself and your work in order for someone else to do the same. Be proud of your work, it’s who you are. If you love it, others will too. Just share it and spread it and help spread that of your peers and let them do the same for you and let the fear of inadequacy or failure or whatever it is you’re afraid of melt away.

As always, thanks for reading and comments are very welcome. Please share my work and allow me to share yours, it really can change a huge number of lives.

Keeping Your Work

/ Damean Mathews, Author / 2 Comments

Have you ever let someone read your work and asked them for feedback and just be mesmerized by what they said? More specifically have you ever listened to their suggestions and just thought “that changes the whole meaning and purpose of the story, why would I do that”?

Those situations are among some of the ones you have to be most cautious about when writing. Your work is going to have to be something you make your own, no matter how different that makes it from someone else’s and no matter how many people you encounter who may not exactly prefer your style. There are over 7 billion people on this planet and there is certain to be at least one other person in the world who will love your work for what it is. That is your audience. That’s not to say that that is necessarily the person you are writing for, by any means. You are always writing first and foremost for yourself. The work you do is yours to do. The idea came to you, after all, didn’t it?

That is one of my biggest purposes with this post; to remind you all that your work is yours. I can never emphasize that enough. So many times young authors meet resistance or differences of opinion regarding their work and they just give up their ideas to conform to those of others. Originality is one of the most important things to strive for when it comes to the craft of writing. It has been said by many that there are no new stories, just new ways to tell them, and to an extent that may be true. But it is our job, or if you prefer, our blessing, to give every story a new twist and make it our own.

No one else can write our work for us. That is why the ideas came to us. They are our own, and it is our duty to write them and spread them to the world. That is why it is so important for us to not allow ourselves or our ideas to be compromised by the thoughts and opinions of others. They can’t write our work for us, if they could the ideas would have come to them and not us. Granted that is not to say that we should just ignore and blow off all criticism and feedback. We can’t do that either. The key is to find the proper median, and this time, that line is a bit more prominent than others. The limits are similar for every writer in this respect, if they hope to remain unique and individual and not just generic and over-used.

The line is really quite rock solid, but as usual is never as simply cut-and-dry as some may prefer. We must listen to our feedback, look at what we know about our work, and examine the work using the knowledge of our intentions and the thoughts of others. After this we must use our conclusions to either keep, tweak or change our work while keeping both our own wishes in mind and the opinions of our audience, but no matter what we absolutely can not change the real essence of our work. If we compromise our work by making it what someone else wants and losing what we want then we have wasted our gift and really compromised the sanctity of the craft itself. I will write more on this subject and a lot about maintaining the sanctity of literature with my next post. I hope this has been helpful.

Working on a Masterpiece (part 2)

/ Damean Mathews, Author / 3 Comments

As I mentioned before, passion is a very crucial thing when it comes to writing. Your passion will make your audience love your work even more, which is going to help you in the long run of course. But another bit of caution I must throw out there in relation to this fact, and to the first half of this post has to do once more with rejection.

There is a very good chance all of us are going to be rejected at least once at some point or another and we must learn the best way to react. There are a number of ways rejection can happen, just as there are a number of ways we can take it when it does (and yes, one is likely going to rely on the other). One thing that you must not do, however, is despair. Rejection does not mean your career is over. Not by a long shot. You have to keep trying. You’re never going to get published if you don’t get your stuff out there. That is one of the truest things I could say to you, really. You have to try and spread your work before your work can reach the world, and I have to remind you again; the world deserves it. If you don’t send your work out there, it will never get the chance to gain an audience. Rejection does not mean that you are a failure by any means. It just means you have to try all that much harder. The world deserves it, your work deserves it; You deserve it.

Your reaction to rejection is a very deciding factor in your career. You can’t just receive a rejection letter in the mail and then throw your work away and quit. That suggests that writing was never really anything more than a route to fame; which is usually the air mark of someone who wasn’t really destined to write anyway. Your rejection may give you a chance to fine tune your work and turn it into something even you didn’t imagine it could be. There are many possibilities for improvement that are presented us, and we can’t take every rejection as a shutting down of or a direct attack on our work. That will only lead to bitterness and a loss of the real essence of the craft, which is shameful. Too much has been done to the art of writing over the years for those who are meant to continue the legacy to join in on the cheapening of the craft, but alas that too is a different post.

Largely the point of this post is going to be summed up here. Passion is typically the ruling factor in things of the heart, which is what real literature is; a direct line to the writer’s heart and soul. We are all going to be passionate about our work at some point, and many of us are going to be passionate about all of our work all of the time. That is why it is crucial for us to keep a level head when we feel our work come under scrutinization of any sort. If we react harshly it could basically ruin our potential career. I’ve heard of people who have been rejected who’ve gone off on the person who rejected them, taken helpful criticism as cheap shots to their work, given up on the craft of writing and even destroyed their work. This is the exact opposite of what we as authors should do. We, who are supposed to be lovers of the craft, should respect it, and by respecting it we should be able to handle criticism and opinions of our own work and actively work to fix whatever problems that may exist in order to better honor the real art of writing.

My next post will, I think. be about maintaining the sanctity of our own work when under criticism, and making sure our work remains our own. As always feedback is welcome in any form. Hope this was helpful.

Working on a Masterpiece (part 1)

/ Damean Mathews, Author / Leave a comment

Your work has to be what you love. I’ve said that enough that you are all probably very tired of hearing it, but that doesn’t make the information any less relevant. The best piece of literature is going to be written by someone who is passionate about it. “It” being both literature in general and the specific topic the work is centered around. Granted, it also tends to be very enjoyable to read the work of someone who is experimenting with an idea they are interested in, the best work is going to be completed with and full of passion.

Passion is the biggest deal maker, and deal breaker, in this field. That is the big purpose of this post really; to discuss the truth of passion. Passion can give the world a work of art unequaled in its excellence, but without the proper means of distribution the world won’t know it. With your passion will come a very defensive nature regarding your work, and that is what can be our seller- or our killer.

When we attempt publication of our work, we have to find the real market for what we’re trying to sell. That is a very key element of publication. Your audience knows what they are looking for, and they know where to look. What is left to you is to first find the proper agent, company, self-publishing venue, whichever method works for you, to publish your masterpiece and put it out in the proper markets.

In this search you are very likely to meet the bane of an author’s existence; rejection. Whether pushing for a short story, poem or novel, you are more than likely going to meet the face of rejection. This is not necessarily going to be anything against you or your work. Perhaps the person you submitted to just doesn’t accept the genre you write in, or they were just full already. The list of possibilities is endless, but the biggest thing you have to keep in mind is that you just can not give up. If they give you feedback and ask you to make changes, make the changes- but if you do make changes you have to make sure that your work remains your work; you can’t let them take the essence that makes it unique and gives it the feeling you want it to have. But that will be another post.

Rejection is hard to handle, believe me I know from experience, but it happens to the best of us. One great example is Stephen King. In his book “On Writing” he talks about his history with rejection. He got so many that he began putting them on a nail on his wall. Eventually the nail got so full that he had to trade it out for a railroad spike. A railroad spike! And this is Stephen King we’re talking about! My point is that rejection does not mean we give up. Nothing justifies that. Now, I will be back with the other half of this post tonight. As always feedback is welcome.

Apology

/ Damean Mathews, Author / Leave a comment

I have to apologize for my absence of late. I have been working hard at my research and trying to regain the full level of my inspiration by immersing myself in all things vampire. I have been reading Dracula and preparing to read its sequel and looking over legends and myths that give me the true essence of my work. In addition to this, I am looking very hard for a publishing deal and all of the required additions to put my first novel Maverip on the market and make it available to you all. I’m currently considering trying my hand at self-publishing/e publishing one of my early short stories, and if I do I will be sharing that link with you all on every venue I have. I hope you all can relate to my dedication to my work, and I hope you all understand. I’d love to hear from every reader to see how their work is going, how this blog has or has not helped, or anything else you would like to say. I promise to post more helpful tips as soon as possible, and I thank you all for bearing with me through my obsession. More is definitely coming soon, and I again welcome every bit of feedback you are willing to give. Thanks,

Damean