Friday Randomness

First of all, I just spotted this newest foreign cover for Theo from the Italian edition. Love it. One of my favorite things is seeing all these wildly different covers.

In other news, I finally finished a book. In the last two months, I've only finished five of the nineteen books I've tried to read. V. frustrating! The definite downside to being on a writing binge. The book I was finally able to finish was Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins. Wow, oh wow. I am so glad I didn't read this book a year ago and therefore had to wait an entire year for book two. Amazingly great on so many levels.

~ ~ ~ ~

So I think next week, I'll talk about some plotting tools. It's funny, because as I was pondering doing that, I found myself feeling slightly defensive, as if plotting were only for those writers who aren't good enough at characterization; a crutch, a formula, (and one of the huge drawbacks to allowing too many nay-sayers in your head!) But, in a completely unrelated tangent, I picked up Julia Cameron's book THE VEIN OF GOLD, which I haven't read yet.

And of course, there it was. The perfect explanation for why I think plot and character are not separate but completely intertwined:

"Transformation occurs through action."

Duh! Something so simple that I let myself lose sight of it. Being reminded of that was worth the price of the book right there.

Plots are merely the actions that propel our characters to transformation. And we'll talk about different methods of orchestrating that transformation next week!