Pinterest secret boards

I am currently doing camp nanowrimo. I have set myself a total of 80k words for the month. It’s a big project and that is only part of it. It is also a very visual project. In scrivener (my writing program) I can load in pictures and I can have a split screen open. So that as I write, I can see the photo I have as inspiration for my lover, or a sexy image, or a travel photo of where they are, or whatever.

You get the idea.

I have been searching for a program that would allow me to make a kind of scrapbook of inspirational images that help me to write. Most of my photo websites didn't really do that and the last thing I needed when I am pushed for time was to start trying to learn Gimp again to make my own collages. Really… I've tried and it is too hard for me. *lip wobble*

I knew of Pinterest but I avoided it because I imagined that I would just get caught up in pretty images or feel guilty about all the fabulous house projects I would ‘pin’ and then never make. Also some of the images I need may not be final things. I might have three options for my love interest and change them as I write.

And then I read an article. (link below**)

And then I saw another article.***

And then I gave up and joined Pinterest.

And I think I am sold.

And the secret is… well, it’s a secret. Pinterest lets me keep a ‘board’ of images secret. I am the only person who can look at them unless I specifically invite other people to see them. I can make as many boards as I like. I can make them public, but obviously, can’t undo that action once I have done it.

If I can’t find things on the site, I can google search normally and pin them very easily with a tool added to my browser. Almost too easily.

If this project gets off the ground, I can share my board with a cover-maker and they can see exactly what inspired me, or where my characters visited. And maybe, one day, I can make my boards public and readers can see what inspired me.

As I write, I can open a pinned image, and the program keeps the link attached. If I want to check how tall my model is, I click on the picture and go to the original website. What do the bathrooms look like in this hotel? Click. And I'm there. It is very easy to remove pinned items from a board if I change my mind.

And it is really working for me.

Now all I need to do is stay away from the public boards and those craft projects.

Yeah right… that can’t be hard?

Ooh… quilts…

Links:

Scrivener

Pinterest

**Growing social biz

***Andrew Lownie literary agency

World building

I saw this quote recently:

“I think the tendency to over-explain and over describe is one of the most common failings in fantasy. It’s an unfortunate piece of Tolkien’s legacy. Don’t get me wrong, Tolkien was a great worldbuilder, but he got a little caught up describing his world at times, at the expense of the overall story.”

—            Patrick Rothfuss (via writingquotes)

I kind of agree. I have been struggling with world building recently but I keep reading how incredibly important it is and how you shouldn’t even START writing until you’ve sorted out your whole world etc. See this recent article from io9 http://io9.com/7-deadly-sins-of-worldbuilding-998817537

Number 6 on their list is: “Not really giving a strong sense of place, like what it smells like after it's been raining.” Surely they are kidding?

Kid 3 wanted a book to read and I handed her the first part of the Dragonriders of Pern by Anne McCaffrey; a series that I adored when I was the same age. She complained that there was no explanation of why things happened. And I thought no… not for another three books or so do they even work out what thread is, or where it comes from and it didn’t matter to the story. It was there are you had to fight it and the dragons could do that, even though the people had almost forgotten how. It didn't matter to me why it existed, clearly it matters to her. Is this an affliction of modern readers? 

Or if the writer has believable people who inhabit a believable world, then do they need to explain everything? In our world you drop an apple and it falls. Do you tell readers what gravity is? Or do you assume they know? They do live in this world, I suppose unlike some fantasy worlds.

Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight vampires walked in daylight and didn’t have fangs. She never explains why. But without that, Bella would never have met Edward in the well-lit and safe school cafeteria, not the dark and scary cemetery at midnight. SM literally defanged her vampires and made them sparkle. Admittedly her world has some major issues, (how exactly can a vampire get a human pregnant?) but I don’t need to know who takes out the garbage to imagine the characters walking around the town.

In the Hunger games, it doesn’t make sense that thirteen worlds would be evenly separated and have totally different environments and produce different things, but it isn’t a deal breaker for the story. In fact, she needs to have the worlds set up like that, so that district thirteen can fall off the map. What? It’s gone? It was here a minute ago. Is this a flat earth? Was there ever a district fourteen and if so, what happened to it?

Or in another example, every person takes a crap but a writer doesn’t describe it, unless going to the bathroom is necessary to the story, so why would I be dropping in which night is bin night? Characters also eat and drink, but I don’t need the recipe for dinner. 

I don’t call that world building, I call that clutter.