WCMarchese

This is an interesting subject. Stephen King said (I use him a lot, it's just there was a time when I did a lot of research on him and know a bit about him) in an article--this after a youth did the unthinkable to students in Virginia Tech--about if his college writing would raise red flags. Steven said he probably would have been tabbed as mentally ill. The stories that come from a horror writer could definitely be used or recounted in a police report or news article as evidence against a person who commits murder, or becomes a serial killer. Some might say, "Oh yeah, that's no surprise." Some writing content certainly shows the output for potential violence of a person. There's the kid who is bullied and writes about getting even, he can't be on the football team, he's not "cool," everyone picks on him. He writes about characters that have the attributes he wants and one day polishes them and gets them published. He used his energy

Is daydreaming necessary to create?  Heck yeah! And a lot of other writers feel this way as well. Daydreaming allows you to tap into your sub-conscience and bring out a deeper world in your stories. When you write, you go into a universe inside your mind. You create something out of nothing. This place inside is just about as real as the physical world, and offers so much material for writing. The problem is getting there.  There are people who can go into trances in the middle of a busy city cafe, while some need quiet and concentration. To create a story there shouldn't be a lot of outside distractions, but in today's world that's hard to come by.  You may be able to pop out a burst of idea, a hook, or ending, or some really cool scene with these quick thoughts. Maybe even an underlying theme to a story you had no clue as to where it was going. It can happen at any moment: Running to catch a train, waiting online in a café, or simply walking on the street. Yo

Back when typesetters needed the extra space to show where the sentence ended, a double space was necessary. Typewriters later used monospaced letters which meant letters took up the same amount of space--so thin characters would get the same space as thicker characters and it would be hard to see where the sentence ended. Later, and still today, people continue to use double space as a rule they think is still in effect, or maybe they use it out of preference. I had started using double space myself a while back because I thought it was the right thing to do. A friend had finally convinced me that it was correct and I did a bit more research and found that a lot of people still did use it. So I jumped in and before long I became used to it.  Years later and I'm reading how wrong it is and how everywhere people aren't using the double spaced rule any longer. Agents and editors are more often even accepting different fonts with submissions, as well. Computer word proces

Are writers, musicians, actors etc. Possessed by spirits or paranormal entities when they work on their craft? Sounds like a conspiracy, but it appears to be more factual the more you look at it. Halloween is among us and creepy things tend to happen around this time. A subject of interest I run across from time to time is possession of artists by "demons" and other entities. Some claim that musicians are possessed by demons when they create their work. If you do a search on Google, and even on YouTube, you'll find some interesting mini documentaries on the subject--some questionable, some intriguing with the info they provide. I thought it might be fitting to take a closer look at this subject--being so close to Halloween and all. The videos and articles I've read talk about musicians who are possessed by an entity that works through their human form and creates the song, or story/content of the song. Sometimes it even transforms the musician into anothe

I admit, I have been a big time procrastinator. It's easy to put things off when life has so many things that need to be done. It's easy to get buried in the day to day grind. I really was shackled and pulled under the current on that one, for many years.  I finally said screw this and got to it. Life is too short. So I finished my first novel and then my second. They aren't edited, but they are done. A HUGE step for me. I debated if I should start the third while i'm on this kick, but decided to get to work on editing the first one and begin sending it out.  While I do that, working on short stories and social media fill in the gaps when I don't feel up to the editing. It's important to work on anything you can during the time you allocate for writing. If you can't do one thing, do something else, anything that moves you to your goal. You know how I feel about the social thing, but I do believe there is ideal time for it, especially with smartphones

It's been a few days. Not to many people are viewing this site yet, and that's okay. It will happen. Feels weird sometimes writing and talking to no one. Yet a part of me still feels that I am talking to someone. It's just going to be someone in the future.  It reminds me of something I wrote on not too long ago about making the time for all this social stuff. How if you are focusing totally on all the social aspect and not doing the thing (writing/creating) that all this social stuff is aiming toward, then what is the point of the social presence to begin with?  I used to scrutinize these posts for quite a bit, to make sure of what they were saying, their meaning, or would a reader take away a wrong impression about them. Would I sound like an amateur? Would I sound like an idiot who had no idea what he was doing? Then you hear all the comments about just do it, that you won't know what you are capable of until you try. And so I did. And now it's getting easier

A good episode of The Walking Dead aired this weekend, at least in my opinion. And sometimes it makes me think...are my stories good enough to go up against the ones at the top? Am I putting enough work into them? Is my dialogue stilted? I think about these things a lot, but it's best to be calm and get down to business. You can't please everyone...you know the rest. Do your best and edit and show other people your work--trusted people--and things will come together. Remember those writers at the top were once where you are, starting out, looking for that idea that would explode. Worrying about their grammar, or pacing. It takes time. Take Harry Potter. Imagine the agent before she found Christopher Little, or the publishing houses that turned her down? I can't even imagine how they feel, but it happens.  I love hearing success stories like that, because it proves anything is possible. They give hope, and that's something aspiring writers need these days. T

Even if you're out and about, there is still time for writing. A lot of the writing I do gets done while I'm on a train, or even on errands. My phone is a writing powerhouse, with apps to manage my social media and website, to Microsoft Word--which they put out not too long ago on mobile and saves documents in the cloud, or only on your device (for those skeptical of the cloud.) Even if I don't get everything done, I can start it off and finish it up later. Or if I have something that's just about ready to go, I can do some final editing while on the move. This saves time and allows you to be more productive with your writing. People will say, "Where do you get the time for all this?" And you can act as though it's all so strenuous, like those commercials where the person pretends to cook a full course meal only we find out its pre-made. :-D Hey, I wrote and edited this post in bed before getting up! Yeah it's the weekend, grab your smart

I'm a horror writer. My mother used to read them one after the other and I had always wanted to pick one up and start, mostly just for the feeling it gave me. I never realized what was inside those books with the scary, cool covers. Then my mom passed away when I was young. A while after, I found one of those novels, Pet Semetary by Stephen King, and I knew horror was what I wanted to do. She's probably looking down and waiting for my first story to come out. I had read other books before, in my youth, of course. I really liked the ones where you could pick your own path to the ending. There was just something about horror. Names like Dean Koontz, Ann Rice and Stephen King created a certain feeling inside. I was at home with this feeling, as though it had been there all along waiting to be found. It's possible that dark mood could be attributed to my mother passing at such a young age. I just know horror, good horror, has that feel about it. There is room for the gory

     It's a real thing, energy vampires. Ever been around a person that makes you feel drained? You don't want to hang out with them, or take their call, but they want to talk to you. They want to tell you every problem they have and tell you what they think YOU should do with your life.           They haven't done anything with theirs, at least not in the subject they are attempting to advise you about. Sometimes just the mere thought of them feels like someone slipped a piece of kryptonite in your pocket. You know the feeling, you got off the phone last weekend with the energy sucker and your positive mind made you almost instantly forget about the experience, as the brain usually does with traumatic experiences, and then, BAM, the phone rings and you see their name. Or you get a text and your heart sinks into your stomach. You don't want to answer, but you feel you have to, that you owe it to them because their life is worse off than yours. I mean, come on, didn

What is better for writing, typing faster or typing slower?  Some writers type slow, like Stephen King. I've read and seen him in action. He uses his two index fingers as he pecks away at a manuscript. Don't know he does it different now, but that's what I've seen.  I personally type pretty fast. I think that getting all my thoughts out and then looking at the words is more useful to me. Then again, I can see how writing slow can be beneficial, as well. For instance, when you type slow you are more into the sentence, seeing every word and knowing if it flows or works--then again a fast writer would catch all that during an edit. Typing slow could also hinder your thoughts, especially if you are a fast thinker. It all comes down to what works best for you and your personal writing style. Dean Koontz, I've read, types out a page at a time, then goes over that page, editing, then retypes that one page until he gets it right, then goes on to the next pa

There are people in the industry who want to help, seem to want to help, and some who want to take advantage. These last, and possibly even the ones you aren’t sure of, end up giving writers added anxiety and worry. There was once an article I had read from the Horror Writers Association from Edo van Belkom: http://horror.org/writetips/writetips-vanbelkom.htm This is a great piece from his book about writing, and it may come across as discouraging, but only to the ones not serious about writing horror fiction--or any fiction for that matter... Or let's even go further and say for anything in the art and entertaining industry. He keeps it real and it still comes across as encouraging.           There are others, though, that appear to want to scare writers into thinking they can't do it, that they need their expertise, or service. I'm not going to go deep into who, but they are out there. And if something seems too good to be true, it is.           Then