Scarecrow28's Blog

*Note:This is just a copy of postings from my normal blog, the Thriller Writer's Guide. It wasn't really intended for the forums, but I figured I would just post it on here to share it with some of the other members. It's really just intended as a blog geared towards thriller writers to discuss thriller writing in general and help others improve their skill.*


Hello and welcome to the Thriller Writer’s Guide. In this posting, I’m not actually going to get into the thriller writing process, but rather just give a brief introduction to the blog itself and try my best to give you all a general idea of the blog’s purpose, where the idea came from, and where I hope to take it in the future.
Before we get started, I guess I’ll just tell you a bit about myself. My name’s Jonathan and I practice thriller writing as my main hobby and, hopefully, can someday practice it as a profession. I just finished the rough draft of my first novel and plan to start editing and revising it sometime in February before pursuing the possibility of getting it published. I’ve been writing for around seven years and I got into thriller writing four years ago when I was introduced to Clive Cussler. I didn’t get into writing seriously until around two or three years ago and since then I’ve dedicated the majority of my free time towards writing. I am, by no means, claiming to be some kind of expert on the subject. This blog is just meant as a place for me to share my personal experiences and some of the other knowledge I’ve picked up along the way.
The idea to do this blog came when I was browsing around several months back in search of some recourse for thriller writers. I found some sites dedicated to thriller authors, but none geared towards thriller writers intending to improve their craft. I just decided that I might as well give it a try and just share some of the knowledge I’d picked up while writing with other writers. This project is coming at a great time because I’ve been looking for some activity to occupy the time period between now and when I begin the editing process. I am doing whatever possible to stop myself from working on the book and just taking a break so my mind is refreshed when I actually begin, but I need some kind of project to keep me occupied in the meantime. And, for now at least, this blog should give me something to do.
In all honesty, I have no clear idea how long this project is going to run for. It may only be for a few weeks, although it could very possibly carry on for several months or even longer than that. Hopefully, I’ll be able to make a bit of time every several days to update the blog and keep things up and running for a while. Like I mentioned above, I need something to occupy the time when I’m not writing and this is basically my second little project aside from writing novels. Although I will not be making any promises, I would like to keep the blog going for as long as I am writing, which should be quite a while.
The two biggest factors in whether I continue posting and, if so, how frequently, are the response I receive to the blog and the amount of free time I’ve got on my hands. Response from you, the reader, is going to be a critical element in the success of the blog. Although I may be the one that’s doing the actual postings, I’m going to need your help if this blog is going to meet it’s full potential. You can send me comments, questions, or suggestions to thrillerwritersguide@yahoo.com. The amount of time I have is also going to have a large impact upon the frequency of blog updates. I am, after all, a writer and will choose writing over updating the blog. Hopefully, I’ll have the time necessary to frequently update the blog. At the moment, I’m taking a break from writing so the updates will be more frequent. But, after the next month or so, the frequency with which the blog is updated will most likely decrease. My goal is to post at least once a week, if not more. If I haven’t released an update for a while, I may post a mini-episode that will just briefly cover a topic.
Most of the postings will be fairly extensive. I would like to keep them as compact as possible, but there are many topics that you can’t just briefly cover. But if there is a topic that I have to get in-depth with, I’ll most likely just break the updates covering this topic into several shorter episodes within a “series” or sorts
My plan is to cover all elements of thriller writing over the course of the blog. I’d like to cover everything from forming a basic plotline to the actual writing process to editing and revising the rough draft of your work. Depending, I may even do a few postings upon publishing although I’d prefer to wait until I have gained more experience in this specific area. If there is enough response and I have enough time, I may even create a pod cast edition of the blog and basically read through the episodes so that you can listen to them on the run instead of having to sit down and read them. Again, this is going to depend upon the response and the amount of time I’ve got.
That’s it for this episode: thanks for reading. Check back soon for new updates. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions related to the blog, please send them to thrillerwritersguide@yahoo.com. Next time, I’ll be discussing and explaining what exactly a thriller novel is.

Well, sort of...
As some of you may know, I've spent the last 3 months scrambling to finish my novel. I started last Christmas, but hit a series of dead-ends in the plot and wasted away the majority of the year with outlines and irrelevant research. Finally, somtime around the middle of September, I just said, "Just write" and I did. I didn't restart every chapter because I didn't think it was good enough; I just fought through it. And, in the three months since then, I've written around 500 pages with a total wordcount of around 110,000 words.

The novel is, by no means, finished. I'm taking the next month off of writing in order to clear my head and study for finals. After that, I'm going to start editing and revising with hopes of finishing by June or July and begin to pursue getting it published. Although I know I still have a ways to go, it's just amazing to me that I actually wrote a piece of writing that is long enough to be considered a novel. I always tried to write novels and failed after ten pages when my interest waned. But now, I've got a binder containing hundreds of pages in front of me and a few months of editing ahead of me. It still feels great just to know that I, after years of trying to write a book, did it. The best part of all of it is that I'm giving a copy of the rough draft to my grandfather. He was the one who first introduced me to the thriller genre and many of the author's that inspired me to become a thriller author. So it's just like a big, 500 pages "Thank You" gift for him.

After I'm done editing and begin trying to publish, I'm hoping to begin another novel in the same series. My main character is pretty fleshed out and I have the basic concepts for 9 or more full novels and dozens of short stories centered around him, so I hope to change this one book into an entire series. I've already got two novels fully outlined in the series that I was writing before I switched to this one, so my plan is to work on them while trying to get published.

P.S: Merry Christmas everybody!

I'd started a little sci-fi, X-Files kind of story a few months back with hopes of submitting it to a sci-fi fiction magazine. I stopped once I found that most of the ones I was looking at weren't accepting submissions for a while. But I decided I might as well write last night and I wrote 2,000 words in a good 30-40 minutes and finished it. It's pretty rough, but I think it might have some potential. I didn't think of it as an individual project but more like a break from my novel and it all just fell into place. My plan now is to do some editing in my spare time and possibly post it up here for some opinions before looking into possible publishers, if I decide its good enough.

In case anyone actually does read this, do you know of any (hopefully paying) fiction magazines that would accept sci-fi/action stories? I've been browsing, but haven't found all that much. Thanks!

I'd started a little sci-fi, X-Files kind of story a few months back with hopes of submitting it to a sci-fi fiction magazine. I stopped once I found that most of the ones I was looking at weren't accepting submissions for a while. But I decided I might as well write last night and I wrote 2,000 words in a good 30-40 minutes and finished it. It's pretty rough, but I think it might have some potential. I didn't think of it as an individual project but more like a break from my novel and it all just fell into place. My plan now is to do some editing in my spare time and possibly post it up here for some opinions before looking into possible publishers, if I decide its good enough.

In case anyone actually does read this, do you know of any (hopefully paying) fiction magazines that would accept sci-fi/action stories? I've been browsing, but haven't found all that much. Thanks!

My plan is to finish the very rough draft of my novel before Christmas. Today marks the 50-day countdown. I'm around 40,000 words into it (I haven't been writing much at all for the last two weeks) and have been able to do 1,000-2,000 words occasionally during the workweek with 5,000-10,000 over the course of the weekends. As sad as it sounds, especially considering that I tend to consider writing the novel as a recreational activity, I'm feeling a little stressed. My minds constantly telling me to write, even at the most strange of moments. I guess only time will tell if I reach my self-imposed deadline.

Just thought I'd provide a small update on my progress with my novel. I began working on the story around a year ago, but hit many problems pertaining to the historical backround and innacuracies. After several months of investigation, I'm finally back on track. I've got around 41,000 words done and have written around 120 pages of material. I've been trying to write 1,000 words every day of the week and have beeing around 5,000 on Friday and Saturday nights. I hope to complete the first draft around the end of the year. If I continue to write at this pace, I should be done. I'll post another update when I have anything to share.

Hey everybody! This first blog is just going to be an intro so I can learn a bit about me. I'm an aspiring fiction writer with hopes of becoming an action/adventure novelist. My favorite authors include Clive Cussler, James Rollins, Matthew Reilly, Vince Flynn, Stephen Hunter, and Brad Thor. My live revolves almost entirely upon writing, reading, and school and I am currently in the process of outlining and beginning my first novel.

I'm an ameutur guitar player that likes progressive rock like Coheed and Cambria, Tool, A Perfect Circle, and some alternative bands like Green Day and Death Cab For Cutie. My favorite movies include the Indiana Jones films, Saving Private Ryan, Casino Royale, and the Die Hard series.

Well, thats about it for now. I'll probably post another one either today or by the end of the week. Bye for now!