Vampires, Werewolves, Witches, and Shape-shifters; they live among us without our knowledge. Night World is their secret society, a secret society with very strict rules, and falling in love breaks all the laws of the Night World. A good comparison to Adrienne Monson’s vampire novel “Dissension” is L.J. Smith’s “Night World” published by Simon Pulse.

A young adult series that also features Vampires and other supernatural beings; the author also has a similar tone of voice to Monson’s. You might know L.J. Smith better for her bestselling series “The Vampire Diaries” – the books that inspired the popular TV show on CW.

Night World is comprised of four volumes, each including three separate tales. At first, these stories seem to have nothing in common, other than the fact that a human(s) comes into contact with a member of the Night World, the encounter changing the course of their lives forever. However, each tale intertwines into a rich tapestry of death, magic, danger, mystery, ancient civilizations, blood, and forbidden love.

In Volume One of this Saga the three tales are: Secret Vampire, Daughters of Darkness, and Spellbinder.

Secret Vampire: fun-loving Poppy discovers two startling truths: first, she’s dying of terminal cancer. Second, her best friend, and secret crush, James, is actually a born Vampire (she explains this concept in the book; you’d have to read it to understand). James could save Poppy by making her immortal, but it’s against the Night World’s law to make new Vampires. The punishment for breaking this law is death.

Daughters of Darkness: When three Vampire sisters are on the run from The Night World, they hope to take refuge with their estranged aunt who lives in a small human town… only to find out that their aunt has been murdered. With the help of siblings, Mary-Lynnette and Mark (humans), they set out to solve this mystery, all the while trying not to get caught by their own kind.

Spellbinder: Thea and Blaise, high school seniors, have been expelled yet again. The two witch cousins find themselves starting a new school in the middle of the school year. If they get into any more trouble they’ll be sent to stay with Aunt Ursula at her place, nicknamed “The Convent.” Everything would have been fine if Thea hadn’t met her true love on the very first day of school. Blaise, who’s used to getting all the attention from the opposite sex, can’t stand that there’s a guy in school who is resistant to her charm. It’s dark magic verses white magic as the cousins battle over Eric. But neither realizes that far more is at risk than just a broken heart.

Night World Volume 1 is a great read. It’s fast-paced, yet descriptive, with interesting characters and plots that grab your attention from the first page and never loses it. L.J. Smith’s writing is so well done that even someone like me (who’s picky about YA books) could enjoy it. Over all, I would give this book four stars! It’s a great escape from our mundane human reality.

Now go forth and give it a read. Each book in the series is even better than the last. You won’t regret reading it.

R.J. Craddock is the author of The Forsaken,book one in an urban fantasy series.  www.rjcraddock.com

In light of the recent ups and downs, insides outs, and tummy-turning squelches in society these days (think: Boston bombing, Venezuelan riots, Texas explosions, a whole slew of mother nature revolutions and, dare I even mention Africa?) It was remarkably serendipitous to happen across one of the most up-lifting, real, humorous and human stories I have ever read. In fact, its name relates the exact sentiment I felt when I reluctantly flipped over the last page and slowly relished the final few words. I just didn’t want it to end—it was wonderful.

“Wonder” is the debut novel of former art director/graphic designer R.J. Palacio. It follows fifth grader Auggie Pullman as he enters the uncharted waters of middle-school for the first time. Although this is new grounds for most kids his age, Auggie’s situation is certainly nothing like most. Born with a cleft palate, no cheekbones, asymmetrical eyes, and other deformities that give his face a look akin to the “drippings on a candle”, he has spent his life going in and out of surgery (27 since the time he was born), beating the odds and surviving. He is smart, engaging, kind and brave but is also sheltered, young and frightened of human contact. It’s hard not to feel incredibly pulled into the worries and concerns that he perhaps is going “like a lamb to the slaughter”, yet at the same time widely cheer on his bravery and applaud his parent’s for giving him options and encouraging him to try the unthinkable. It’s the kind of story that made me sit on the couch and randomly reach out for my little ones and squeeze them so hard their poor little eyes begin to bulge. It made me burst into tears and laugh out loud. In fact, it made me want to purchase hundreds of copies, stand on a street corner and give them out to unsuspecting passerbys—I just think that a story as real and touching as this should be shared and re-shared over and over so we can all be reminded of the fragile vulnerability that humanity provides and how courage can turn that vulnerability into character and strength.

August’s story is told in first-person narrative also using the voices of family members and classmates. In so doing Palacio wisely expands the story beyond Auggie’s viewpoint and demonstrates that his arrival at school doesn’t test only him, it affects everyone in the community…and everyone grows as the story progresses leaving the reader with a firm resolve to be better.

Emily Moody is an avid reader who loves a wide range of literature  ranging from children’s picture books to adult epic fantasy and anything in between. She loves the outdoors and being active. Moody is a stay-at-home mother of three children.

Whether you’re telling a story for the page or the screen, there are tools and methods that all writers can learn from and use for their own storytelling. Just because a screenplay will be turned into a film – and sometimes by somebody else entirely – doesn’t mean that the same blood, sweat and tears doesn’t go into creating the finished work. Here are some great ways that novel writers can use screenwriting techniques to help develop their own works.

Create an Outline or Treatment for Your Story

Screenwriters often create an outline or a treatment before they knuckle down to create their screenplays. This is essentially a road map or guideline that will keep the writer on track and keep them from going off in tangents that are likely to be cut or edited out when they go back to create the second and subsequent drafts. Having an outline or treatment also helps you to work out any plot holes, character issues or story problems before you hit the ground running. Ironing out the kinks before you start writing is essential, as there is nothing worse than a stop-start writing process. You could find yourself spending a lot of time in the pub with a half-finished novel gathering dust in a bottom drawer if you don’t keep that momentum going. An outline will definitely keep you from distraction and prevent you from hitting any road blocks. Except the self-imposed ones, of course.

Screenwriting Keeps Your Writing Tight

One of the key rules of storytelling for the screen is to cut out any unnecessary exposition and description and to keep the writing tight. This is a great method to put into your own novel writing, as the majority of readers would rather pick up a novel with one or two hands than have to hire a crane to pick it up because of all the unnecessary prose that could have been lost in the edit.

There is nothing wrong with having a long, spiralling novel. Some of the greatest novels ever written are chunky tomes. But there is a difference between a great story that is well written and strong, therefore justifying the length, and having a rambling mess of a story that heads off in too many directions and spends two pages describing something that could have been told effectively in a couple of lines. Learning to edit your work and cut out the writing that isn’t essential for the story is a crucial skill to have as a writer, and in the film world, a screenwriter has to learn to keep their exposition as tight as possible in order to have their work accepted by agents and executives.

For a great example of taut, concise writing for the screen, check out Christopher Nolan’s screenplays for Inception or The Dark Knight Trilogy. For films that all cost more than the entire budget of a third world country, the screenplays for these action packed blockbusters and very concise in their description. Writers of all forms can learn from the less-is-more approach of screenwriting.

Setting a Scene

Whilst being interviewed by Empire magazine, writer/director Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) was asked for some advice for screenwriters. His advice was to “start late and get out early, and don’t have a lot of people walking through doors”. Although the last part of that advice was a half-joke, the point that Wright was making was that to keep the pace and momentum of your story moving along nicely, all pointless exposition should be cut out in order to cut to the chase.

For example, if the chapter of your novel started out like this:

Tom walks through the door of his bosses’ office and sits down in the chair opposite the desk. His Boss stares back at him, and Tom tries to avoid eye contact at all costs.

The same scene in the screenplay version would read something like this.

Tom sits opposite his Boss, who is staring at him. Tom avoids eye contact at all costs.

You are only cutting out a line of description, but it sets the scene in exactly the same way. All that has been lost is Tom’s entrance into the office, which is completely unnecessary. On screen, that’s 5-10 seconds of screen time cut. On the page, taking the same approach could save you pages and pages of unnecessary exposition. Unless there is a character moment or story point happening, Tom entering the office is completely unnecessary. Cut it out!

Character and Dialogue

It is a vital part of any story – screenwriting, novel or otherwise – that the characters are rounded individuals who act and talk in a realistic manner. Get this wrong and every aspect of your story falls apart. The relationships your characters have won’t ring true and your readers will be thrown out of the story. Dialogue can often be the toughest part of storytelling for some writers, and screenwriting techniques can really help you work on getting speech patterns and dialogue exchanges right. You don’t have to worry about the ‘he said’ ‘she replied’ stuff either, just start playing around with exchanges and get your characters talking to each other. You will find it incredibly freeing and it could spark some great dialogue exchanges that help shape your characters for the better.

Storyboarding as a Way into a Scene

Screenwriters and filmmakers use storyboarding as a way of communicating their words to their collaborators, and this is also something that writers of prose can use to better form their stories. For example, if there is an action scene in your novel and you are having difficulty describing it in your prose, creating the scene in storyboard form first might unlock the way for you to describe the action in an interesting way.

Screenwriters don’t have to write much detail when it comes to action because the director and stunt teams will take care of most of it, but novel writers have to put across the totality of the story on the page, so adding a visual component can really help writers find a way into the scene. Some of the storyboarding could become illustrations in the book, if they would sit well alongside the story you are telling.

Daley is a writer and filmmaker who wants to help his fellow writers to get out there fully confident and armed with a great novel. He can be found struggling with his own career at www.daleyjfrancis.com

So I know Les Mis has been out for several months, but what can I say? I don’t have time for movies these days as much as I used to. So if you’re reading this, you’ve probably already seen Les Mis and have drawn your own conclusions by now. However, I still think my opinions can generate a pleasant discussion about this movie. Now that I’ve got that disclaimer out of the way, let’s move onto the review, shall we?

Before I tell you what I thought of the movie, I feel the need to apprise you of my history with this musical: When I was in sixth grade, I became obsessed with this soundtrack. One of my older siblings had bought the soundtrack to the London Broadway production of Les Mis, and I listened to it daily. (I know – total nerd! But at least it was good music, unlike some of the rap that my other friends got into.) This obsession lasted for a few years. For my thirteenth birthday, my mom took me to the Broadway showing at the Capital Theater in SLC, Utah. We were at the very back, but we’d brought binoculars and I could hear the music just fine. I loved it! It was fantastic to see the play with the music and I was further enthralled with this story.

I also read the unabridged book of Les Miserables when I was in ninth grade. The book was difficult to get through – not something I’d recommend to fellow readers unless you enjoy the classics, but I’m glad I was able to get the complete backgrounds on each of the characters.

Now that you have my background with this story, let me tell you my thoughts as I watched the movie on the big screen with some of my favorite actors (Hugh Jackman!).

Pros: It was incredibly well done. I appreciated that the director stuck with the story and didn’t get too carried away with doing some fantastical visual effects, like other movies tend to do. The actors were stupendous and I felt they portrayed their characters to the best of their abilities. If you’ve never seen the musical before, this is a great way to watch it. The story itself is full of hope, betrayal, and love, despair and faith. I don’t know if there’s a more moving story.

Cons: The music wasn’t as great of quality as it is on Broadway. As much as I love some of these actors (and they all did a terrific job!), some of them couldn’t reach the notes as perfectly as I wanted them to. And I felt that the song “Lovely Ladies” fell pretty flat. Another thing that bothered me (and this could just be me here) was when the characters sang their solos, the camera was in a close-up on their face almost the whole song. It got to be a little boring for me.

So, was it a good movie?  Yes – definitely! Would I recommend seeing it? You bet. Is it better than the Broadway production? No way. I think the Broadway production is still the best portrayal of this story. If you come for the music, you’ll want to see it on Broadway. But if you’re in it for the story, you should be satisfied with the movie itself.

What are your thoughts about it?

I’ve been noticing a lot of posts on Facebook and Twitter lately that have influenced today’s blog. It started with people changing their profile picture to an equal sign. Since I’m pretty out-of-the-loop on a lot of things, I had to ask a friend what it meant. She explained to me that it was people trying to show their support for gay marriage rights. I thanked her and moved on with my day.

After that, I began to notice a lot of “debates” on Facebook and Twitter about gay marriage. Some of the comments were just downright rude! And this was coming from both sides. It reminded me of when we had the presidential elections several months ago. A lot of posts and discussions turned into rude jabs about other people instead of issues in the campaigns. So after reading through some of these comments and posts, I felt sick at what people were doing with their time.

After all, if you feel strongly about something political, wouldn’t it be more worthwhile to contact your local governor or senator about it? People in the social media sites have pretty much decided their standpoint on whatever issue is current. Responding to their post and saying that they are stupid or ignorant is not going to generate any kind of productivity or change their mind. Yes, it WILL generate a big argument from people on both sides of the issue. And yes, it will generate negativity, but what’s the point of that? Is it because you feel that strongly about a political issue, or are you trying to get some attention? (Rhetorical question – please don’t answer.;))

I happen to be a very opinionated person myself. I hold strong beliefs about certain things. I’m not writing this to share those opinions, however. I try to keep those things to myself and intimate friends whom I feel comfortable talking with, even if we have opposing views. And the reason why I like to keep my opinions to this close circle is because I know that my selected friends will listen to what I say, respect me for my opinions, and then calmly share what their opinions are and why they think what they do. There is no condescension when I talk to these people. We all think highly of each other and are comfortable sharing our view points without the worry of being judged for them.

When I’m online, I do not express these opinions. I think of them as too personal to share publicly and try to keep online discussions about things that everyone can contribute to without it turning into an online mob-fest.

You know that old saying, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.”? I think it still applies to us today. Even though we have such wonderful modern technology and we can reach to people across the globe doesn’t mean that we can be rude to each other just because we’re not face to face. Let’s try to get to know each other, shall we? How about we have discussion that will help others see what you are like as a person, and keep political views out of it.

(Okay, rant over now. Thanks for indulging me on my soapbox!)