Good afternoon and welcome to The Daily with Syl Stein on Anchor. I am Silvia Stein or Syl Stein, and welcome to The Daily. As I said yesterday, we resumed back with the book The Writer's Devotional, 365 inspirational exercises, ideas, tips, and motivations on writing. And we covered Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.
Monday, we had Writers on Writing, Tuesday, Motivation, Wednesday, Writing Class. For Writing Class, the assignment was to write a true crime story about a recent murder in your state. And basically, you're supposed to do your research by coming through your local and state newspapers, listening on newscasts, take notes on all of that, or the interviews. And I think that's the best way to do it.
Now, because I just assigned it yesterday, I'm going to probably resume back next week on this topic of the writing class. I'm going to be working on a case covered here in North Carolina, in the city of Raleigh, North Carolina, because I live in the town of Fuquay-Varina, but it's located in the Raleigh area, the Raleigh-Durham area, about a carnival worker who confessed to killing three women. It started in a totally different, supposed innocent way, where they thought he was the one injured, and then it turned into a very bad, they began to look back and they noticed that he had actually killed three women. So I'm going to be writing the story.
I will mention the story once I work on my fictional side, but I will talk about it more for the writing class. And this is just for the purpose of your assignment, if you want to work on it. It's just part of writing a true crime story about a recent crime or murder in your area. Or if you feel more comfortable just reporting a report on a crime that has occurred, that's fine too.
Just do your research and make sure that you work on it. It's like a writing prompt, but this is for writing class. Anyway, I'm going to be doing that research and writing more about that. And then on Thursday, for today, I'm going to begin with editing.
So that's what we're going to start with. The first part will be, actually, I'm going to talk about, give some announcements first, then I'm going to do the second part, will be about the Thursday editing, Friday biography, Saturday books to read, and Sunday writing prompts. So you'll have two, the writing class and the writing prompt. So I hope you'll enjoy.
And this is the intro. And for today, I just want to say, I hope everyone's having a great Tuesday. I know I'm excited about the shows we've been doing so far. And as I said before, you know, The Daily with Syl Stein is a podcast that I created mostly for writing tips, writing advice on editing, publishing your book, books to recommend, reviews, book reviews, things that have to do with the writing community, authors in general, and hopefully have some authors come in.
We've had a few and hopefully we'll get more. And that's the goal. Now, I'm going to be having more authors and writers come in, speakers, and coffeehouse writers, SNHU alumni, authors that I know in different areas of states and countries. So hopefully we'll have all that happen.
Sorry for the background noise. I am in my house. And if you do happen to hear that, that would be the laundry machine. So I have to do it all at once.
But anyway, I think Whitney Houston's song's name is All at Once. But anyway, I'm getting off topic again. But anyway, so now we're getting, this is the introduction. We're doing this, first of all, we did the intro and I hope everyone's having a great day.
We're going to start off now with the second part, which will cover Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. And then at the end, when I do give the wrap up, I will give a recap of the show. So we'll be right back. And I hope you'll keep tuning in to The Daily with Syl Stein on Anchor.
Thank you and happy Tuesday. And we're back here on The Daily with Syl Stein on Anchor. And I'm really excited to talk about the next part of The Writer's Devotional by author Amy Peters. And if you have not gotten this book, I think it's a book you should get.
It's highly recommended. It's, as I said yesterday, it's meant to hone your writing skills. And they do have it available through Kindle edition or e-book edition and paperback. And I really enjoyed the hard copy of the book that I have.
It cost me $10.95. No, sorry, I'm not reading that correctly because I'm not wearing my glasses. Give me a second. $17.95, sorry, men plus tax.
But it's so worth it. You're going to get a book. This would be the book to get because it's really, really good, especially to practice on writing and to keep your juices flowing when it comes to writing. So anyway, in any case, let's begin today with Thursday editing.
And this is from week 26. Avoid jargon. And this is taken from Frederick, I don't know if there's not enough light in this room or what, but I can't really see very well in this light. So let me put on my glasses.
Give me a second. This is from Frederick Crews, The Random House Handbook. This piece of advice may at first seem to fly in the face of an earlier lesson. And then it says to see week nine.
So I'm going to go back to it in a minute where I wrote about the benefits of using jargon or specific types of language when you are addressing specific groups of readers. Jargon is defined as the specialized or technical language of a trade, profession, or similar group. However, while it's okay to use jargon when you know that your reader will understand what you are talking about, it's not okay to use it in a context where you come across as the insider and everyone else is not. If you are writing nonfiction for a lay audience, you can introduce jargon as long as you include a full definition of what the word or acronym means.
This way you are bringing the readers inside the circle and teaching them something new. Otherwise, use the definition without the jargon and you won't have to worry whether or not you are sending your reader off to their dictionary or worse, away from your article. So it's very important to make the reader aware of what jargon is. So let's go back to week nine.
For those that have not listened to the series yet, let's go back to week nine. Let's see where that is. I'm trying to find it now. Week nine.
Okay, Writers on Writing. Okay, let's see what's in here. I don't see it here. Okay.
Okay, I think it covers it when it says this. Let me read that. Back in here. Let me make sure that that's what he's talking about.
It doesn't give it one week. Let's see here. Okay, well I'm going to go with the editing part here because I'm not looking at, I'm not finding anything that has to do with the jargon in here. So I'm not looking at it properly.
Okay. All right. When you are writing for an audience, you need to identify if they are coming to your work with a certain set of expectations. Okay.
That means you have to understand their needs and make sure that you give them what they want. All forms of successful writing are created with specific audience in mind. Each word, each sentence should be aimed at your target audience. A romance novel has an entirely different cadence than a thriller.
A military biography will use a different vocabulary than one written about a famous painter. The advice from a doctor is usually given in an authoritative tone. The advice found in a relationship book is much more relaxed. So give me a second here.
Okay. And now it says the differences are even greater in the magazine world. Take automobile magazines, for example. They're entirely audience specific and use descriptive language found in no other media.
The writers know that the readers get pleasure from thinking about cars in just this way. Without knowing your audience, you can write the greatest piece that will never get published. So basically, even though jargon is good for some people, if they don't understand the specifics of what those acronyms are, you're not going to be able to get anywhere with it. So be careful and be mindful of this.
That is for Thursday editing. So avoid jargon, but then you could also, depending on how you use it, if you're able to explain it, it is allowed in some cases, as Amy Peters points out from this random statement made by Frederick Crews from the Random House Handbook. And now we move on to Friday biography. Okay.
So here, see here. Here, I do not just write, I write what I am. If there is a secret, perhaps that is it. This is from Jose Saramago.
Okay, let's learn more about him. Jose Saramago, 1922, he was born in 1922 and died in 2010, was born in a small village of Azinaja, Portugal, 60 miles north, 60 miles northeast of Lisbon. He spent a lot of time with his maternal grandparents who were poor rural peasants while his parents went to work in the city. Though he was more than competent as a student, the Saramago family's financial situation prompted him to leave school at the age of 12 to pursue technical training as a car mechanic where he could faster contribute to the family income.
He then had a succession of jobs, including working as a welfare agency bureaucrat, a printing production manager, a proofreader, a translator, and a newspaper columnist. Saramago published his first novel at the age of 23, but nearly three decades would pass before he returned to novel writing. It wasn't until his employment options vanished following the 1975 counter coup that swept communists from power in Portugal Saturday books to read. Here it says The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen.
Funny and deeply sad, The Corrections is a testament to the range and depth of pleasure's great fiction affords. This is the quote or the review that is by David Foster Wallace. So let's learn more about this. When Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections was published in 2001, it was an immediate hit.
Critic James Wood likened it to a Dickens novel, or Charles Dickens, calling it a black house of the digital age. Oblique house, sorry. Oblique house of the digital age. Author Michael Cunningham favorably compared it to Thomas Mann's Buddenbrooks.
Others invoked Tolstoy. Brett Easton Ellis called it one of the three most important books of his generation. In 2005, The Corrections was included in Time magazine's list of the 100 best English language novels. The magazine lauded Franzen for taking up the mantle of Hemingway, Faulkner, and Updike by recreating the great American literary novel with a postmodern twist.
He masterfully straddled the gap between mainstream and highbrow. The Corrections brings to vivid life the story of a Midwestern family. At its heart are the family patriarch and matriarch, Alfred and Enid Lambert. Alfred is suffering from Parkinson's and dementia.
And Enid calls upon their three adult children living in the Northeast to attend one last Christmas to make decisions about their roles in Alfred's care. With The Corrections, Franzen established himself as one of the preeminent American writers of his generation. The novel won the 2001 National Book Award for Fiction, the 2002 James Tate Black Memorial Prize. So this is The Corrections by Jonathan, J-O-N-A-T-H-A-N Franzen, F-R-A-N-Z-E-N.
And it's called The Corrections. That's the name of the book to read. So if you have not read it, check it out. The subject matter sounds very intriguing, especially when you have to make those type of decisions with family.
It must be very rough. I know people that are not my family, but friends that have had to deal with that. And it's never easy. So if you want to read more about that book, please check it out.
Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections. And then, of course, there's also Jose Saramago, bestseller, international bestseller, Baltazar en Primunda. Now, Sunday, the last part of this is writing prompt. And the topic here is weather can affect my life.
So writing about weather and its consequences can make for a riveting story. The book The Perfect Storm, a true story of men against the sea by Sebastian Junger comes to mind as an effective example. Effective example. This book, Junger, reconstructs The Perfect Storm, which has entered our collective lexicon, referring to how a confluence of events can greatly, mostly negatively affect a situation.
The Andrea Gale was a 70 foot steel hold vessel that had to face unrelenting weather caused by a hurricane off Bermuda, a cold front coming down from the Canadian Shield, and a storm brewing over the Great Lakes. His images were so vivid that it was no wonder that it was made into a major motion picture. For this exercise, see if you can imagine or retell a day in your life where you were greatly affected by severe weather. The trick is to see if you can make the weather a fully realized character in the story, not just something that was going on in the background.
So this is very interesting, you know, because you have, she offers the writing prompt for Sunday, but then there's also writing class. So those are two great assignments to work on and to reflect on for next week's show. And like I said, you know, for the daily, it really is, it's amazing to get back to these books, especially to the writer's devotional with, with author Amy Peters. And you could even tie in how to begin to write a draft because these writing prompts can also interject with, with what, what that series is about because the writing prompt, the writing class, the motivation, and all the stuff that she talks about in this book can lead to you being able to work on your draft for those that have writer's block.
Or sometimes we get a little uneasy and where we're going or headed with our, with our, excuse me, with our writing and we don't know where to go. And this is a perfect example or the perfect exercises to help with that. So I really hope that you have enjoyed these, what we've covered this week on the writer's devotional by author Amy Peters. And we'll be right back for the wrap up.
Thank you. And we're back to the daily with Phil Stein here on anchor. And now it's time for the wrap up. First and foremost, I want to give a recap of what we've been going over.
Basically, we started back yesterday with the writer's devotional, 365 inspirational exercises, ideas, tips, and motivations on writing by author Amy Peters. And we started back at week 26. We went over writers on writing Monday, Tuesday, motivation, writing class. And then today we recapped on writing class, which we already said we're going to share about a true crime story about a recent murder in your, in your state.
Or if you wanted to write about a recent crime in the state, be sure to read the newspaper articles, interviews to create your story. And we're, I hope to share that with you guys next week. And then Thursday editing. And we talked about avoiding jargon and then how you can kind of use it.
If you go back to week nine, she kind of reflects back onto depending on what your audience, and you need to make sure you know what type of audience that you have. So make sure that you be sure to avoid jargon unless you're trying to explain it to the particular audience that you're speaking to. Then of course, Friday biography. We learned about author Jose Saramago of Portugal and his book and his struggles and what he did and his international bestseller book, Baltazar and Blimunda and how he won the Nobel prize for literature in 1998.
And then we moved on to Saturday books to read. And the book that was recommended was The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen. And it was highly recommended by David Foster Wallace, who said, funny and deeply sad. The Corrections is a testament to the range and depth of pleasure's great fiction affords.
So if you have not checked out that book, it deals with the family members, the parents, you know, they have the matriarch, the patriarch, the father, patriarch, and then the mother. And the father is dealing with dementia and the mother calls upon her children to make decisions about what will happen for their father. And this is a 2001 National Book Award, won the National Book Award for Fiction and the 2003 James Tate Black Memorial Prize also. So if you have not checked it out, look out, look for authors Jose Saramago and Jonathan Franzen.
And then we wrapped up with a writing prompt, weather can affect my life. And they started talking about the novel by or the book by The Perfect Storm, a true story of a man against the sea by Sebastian Junger. And as you know, there was a movie made about this, about this story. And it was so vividly described that the weather was like a character and it was made into a motion picture starring George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg.
And it talked about this boat, which is, I'm sorry, let me read, the Andrea Gale, which was a 70 foot steel hulled vessel that had to face unrelenting weather. And it was caused by a hurricane that was found in the off the Bermuda off Bermuda. And they had to deal with such, such dangerous circumstances. And if any of you are familiar with Deadliest Catch that used to show it on Discovery, a lot of these men that go into sea, you know, you see the different weather and how it plays a big part in what they do and how dangerous it can be.
And so this, you know, this took over. So basically the assignment is for us to try to use our imaginations or retell a day in your life where that you were greatly affected by the weather and try to make it into a character that's not just in the background, but present. So hopefully you can work on that. And I hope that those assignments keep you busy and you can share them on the show.
You can call the show, share, call in, leave a message or add it to the audio. And now you can do it from anywhere. I believe you can record it even on your iPad or your device. They've made it a little easier to do that.
Or you could also hashtag it on Twitter, writing community and hashtag, you know, writer's devotional, writing prompt, hashtag, do it like that or send it as an email to stillwriter07 at gmail.com. And I can read those for you on the show. So we have a lot of work that we can share and do. I hope that you will join us for another segment or another show of The Daily with Sil Stein on Anchor.
I'm really happy that you all were able to join me today on another great show. And of course, we have a lot of podcasts with the authors that have been here sharing about how to write or how they begin to write a draft. And I'm going to be having other authors and speakers come to the show. So, and they're also share still about how to write a draft.
And maybe I'll ask them questions about the writer's devotional and see where we go from there. But I hope to continue this segment. If not tomorrow, for sure, next, maybe by Monday. I don't know if Monday because it's Memorial day and we might be busy with our family over the