weathered things

The Useless Etymology of a Name A Vignette About my Name and its History The meaning changes whenever I look it up. One day it means peace, another it means olive branch, and yet the meaning behind the meaning stays the same: peaceful, weak. Throughout my life, the peace forced upon me by my name has led to injury—emotional and physical. The moment I began to be referred to as Olivia, it twisted me. My nature was calm, demure, matching my name, matching my blonde hair, matching my pale skin, and my pale attempts at strength. It was not always supposed to be a delicate word. The name was stolen from my great grandmother, Lila. Her middle name was a mystery, only known as O. My parents assigned the name Olivia to it, and, in her honor, assigned the name to me. Only after it was set in stone was it revealed that the O I was named after was Olive, not Olivia. A disgusting, sour fruit that very few have a taste for. While the fruit was not fully assigned as my name, it stayed as ...

Hello everyone! I'm posting on a Friday, shocking, I know. I just wanted to give an update on my un-scheduled hiatus. I am currently polishing the last draft of my book (for now, who knows if more edits will come), and that, along with directing a play which is bringing up interesting challenges. I plan to write a post when we perform that is gonna be called something like "things i learned by directing a play." Look for that around November 11th *wink wink*. It's actually making me think about making a new series called "things i learned" to chronicle my new experiences and things I learned (clearly). What do you think? It's my name! My book is going well, thanks for asking although I'm not sure you even did. As you all probably know, I'm represented by Hartline Literary Agency , specifically Cyle Young and Tessa Emily Hall. It's really weird to go onto the website and see my name listed––but cool too. I'm polishing it a...

So, for those of you who know about this, I am part of an international writing collaboration called Project Canvas . Project Canvas is a book for teen writers by teen writers, and in it we all share tips, tricks, relatable author life content, and how-to's (of course, all of them have very open possibilities since everyone writes differently. It is merely to give help to those who want it). My chapter in this book is called The Human Behind the Gun... and it is all about crafting a great villain. So, in this little post, you get a glimpse of my chapter and ten the headers in the chapter! Hope you enjoy it and buy the book when it comes out––I hope you all enjoy the book too. | | | DRAWN TO DARKNESS. We all love good a good villain. Some we love, some we hate, some we love to hate, and some we hate to love. But the villain we are presented with on the page or screen is just the product of layers and layers of planning. Sad backstories are only the basics, and sometim...

DISCLAIMER: This is a completely un-solicited review and book talk, all comments are honest. In other words, #notspon but I love it so I'm talking about it. | | | This is a short story by Kennedy Vega (I know her as @januaryrabbit on Instagram), and it is a Hades and Persephone retelling. Her plans are to have it out by the end of the summer, however she is debating on turning it into a full-length-novel. ~•~ Persephone is a beauty born with a curled foot, making her the family's least treasured posession and maid. When her younger sister, Anathema, is born with a blood disease destined to end her life before three years of age, Persephone's parents make a bargain with Hades, promising that if he pushes her death farther out (into old age), they'll give him Persephone when she turns 18. But, there's a catch. Persephone must choose to willingly go with Hades––if she refuses, he will bring back Anathema's blood disease and she will die. P...

Okay, I am super excited to share this: Caroline Meek and Olivia Rogers have created a collaborative book written by teen authors for teen authors. It is called: IT'S SO COOL! Basically it's a book for teen authors with tips from other teen authors! There's a section on world building, character development, and loads more! And the most awesome thing is that it's written by us--the teen authors. Have I said that already? Yeah. Lots. This is just such a cool idea, though! Cuz a lot of the time, the how-to books are written by adults. And that's fine, but being a teen you don't necessarily think the way adults do. And in that way, we sometimes figure out more things than them. Not saying that those books are bad. Just saying that this one is going to be awesome. It's going to have international availability, which I think is absolutely genius. But the reason for posting this (other than my OH MY GOSH ISN'T THIS COOL AHH reason) is to ...

Hello lovelies! Yes, this isn't posted on Monday, I know. I'm going to be busy over the weekend, and I want to get this out now, so... yeah. Due to the fact that my book is going to be available for purchase soon, I've decided to compile this little post in order to reveal a few things and explain! First off, I want to thank everyone who has supported me and been excited for this release. I'm so excited to finally share Harper's story with you, and I really hope I don't let you down. Before I get into any of the itty-bitty details and before the book releases, I just want to ask you to be honest. If you read it and you like it, let me know! If you didn't--say it nicely, but let me know (I'm pretty much an emotional squishy blob that is hiding beneath a robotic exoskeleton). If you like the book, please, please  share with friends! It means the world to me if you care enough to share it with someone else. Anyways... here we go. For constant ...

WOOOOOO HAPPY NEW YEARS! For those in the Central Time Zone like me, I'm posting this at midnight b/c New Years. WOOO! WELCOME TO 2017! Hopefully it'll be better than 2016. Sorry about not posting this last week, I was on Christmas break and I was working on finalizing my book so... I didn't have time to blog. Anyways! I did a lot of fun stuff this year, so let's recap: Life • June       • I started this blog! With the help of some people from the Minneapolis Young Writer's Workshop, I was able to get this up and running.       • I attended the Minneapolis Young Writer's Workshop! It was so fun. I met so many amazing fellow authors and I've kept up contact with most of them. I'm going to be attending again come June, and if you want to hear about my past experiences you can click here , and if you want to register to attend yourself, you can find that here ! The lineup for this year includes Jonathan Friesen, Sabaa Tahir, Shannon Hal...

I find it interesting that hearing a certain song triggers so many things: a plot in a book, a moment of life, a character or a real person. Music is honestly so cool. But how can we fit it into our writing? It's not like books have a mini speaker in the page that plays when you open it. Well, this is how I do it and why. 1. get the feel of the scene Find a song or a bunch of songs and put them on a repeating playlist. The songs make you feel a certain way, and you can put that into your writing. Personally, I write to a certain song on repeat. It has to fit the emotion I'm trying to convey, though. Like, if I'm writing fast-paced scene, I need some dubstep. If I'm writing a slow, sad, death scene... well, let's say I've got an entire playlist of songs that work for that. 2. get into a character's mindset If you're writing a story where the chapters shift points of view, I highly suggest making a playlist of songs that fit a character...

QUICK THING: True Colors, the cover by Justin Timberlake and Anna Kendrick (from the movie Trolls although the original was by Cyndi Lauper) is GORGEOUS and I like it so much better than Lauper's original version. The harmonies, the guitar, everything is much more emotion-evoking and meaningful. If you want to hear it, here are the links for the Film Version and the Professional Recording both are gorgeous and I suggest you give them a listen. As we get closer to my book being able to be bought (look here for more info on that), I figured I should share some quotes and stuff about it. First off, lets start with some aesthetic quotes. Harper's life makes me both sad and happy Jace is my darling son - he's turned out a lot sweeter than I had originally planned but THAT'S FINE my book isn't all sad... just mainly sad little bb Olivia makes a cameo - except my eyes are like a weird shade of green that changes color literally based on my m...

I’ve been crafting stories for as long as I can remember, but I’ve also been performer of some sort for most of my life. From learning to record myself on a cassette while singing along with an Olivia Newton-John 8-track at three years old, to childhood dance recitals and children’s choir performances, to high school musicals, plays, speech contests, and variety shows, to singing at weddings and special events and performing in community theatre productions as an adult, I’ve always been drawn to the stage. But it wasn’t until an approaching book deadline kept me from participating in my local community theatre’s annual production that I recognized a link between what I craft on the page as an author... and what I bring the stage as an actor.  The director of our small community theatre called to ask if I would consider attending a rehearsal to offer constructive criticism to the cast. The performance was only a couple of weeks away, she said, but it wasn’t quite “clicking”...

Okay, so it wasn't released at 1. I'm just so excited I bumped up the time! I am so excited to announce this, because it's something that's taken up my life that past two or so years. Well, let me fix that wording. I've been working on this 8th rewrite of it for two years. I came up with the original idea back in 2011. I cranked this thing out when I had a dream that turned into my plot (with a few additions and changes, of course), and I instantly went through and kept editing it. Now, on the eleventh draft, I've finally decided that I am going to publish it. Self-publish, that is. *deep breath* *pterodactyl screech* YES FRIENDS, I AM SELF-PUBLISHING MY BOOK. I cannot tell you how excited I am. Now, I know I said I'm looking for an agent, but honestly, none of them wanted it. They said "while this is interesting, I don't think it's right for my agency right now." All I can say is this: I've talked to so many people...

Hello lovelies! SO, if you're new to this blog (which I'm not sure if anyone is but if you are hey sup welcome), I do these every month to wrap up my goals for the month and what I accomplished. SO WITHOUT FURTHER ADO! Life • I've begun to be more outgoing. WAT AN INTROVERTED AUTHOR BEING OUTGOING WAT HAPPENED? I'm honestly just not filtering my speech as much. Usually I over-analyze literally EVERYTHING I say, and I'm not doing it that much. I've actually managed to make a few of those annoying little generic #swag boys in my school fear me because I've begun to speak my mind, and I am very proud of that. They're not good kids, and honestly I could see them being arrested for Sexual Harassment. I feel I'm doing my duty and protecting my fellow women, cus if they're scared of little 'ol me, they got a rude awakening. • I've begun to pursue my acting career. As I talked about in my  Life Choices  post, I plan on being both ...

In honor of the fantastic book INTERMISSION by Serena Chase (which you can preorder  here  and I suggest you do because holy freaking crap it is fantastic), I have decided to write this post on my life choices and what I plan on doing once I graduate. | | | We are starlight on snow. The reflection of something already beautiful—absorbed, reflected, and remade into something . . . more.  And this kiss . . . This kiss is everything I’ve needed to say . . . and longed to hear. Sixteen-year-old Faith Prescott eagerly awaits the day she will exchange her small Iowa hometown for the bright lights of Broadway, but her success-driven parents want her to pursue a more practical career, labeling “artsy” people—including their daughter—as foolish dreamers worthy of little more than disdain. When Faith meets nineteen-year-old Noah Spencer she discovers someone who understands her musical theatre dreams . . . because he shares them.  Faith’s mother despises everything about...