So . . . Close. Help, Please.

So I entered a photo taken several years ago of my husband and one of our daughters into a contest for pictures of fathers. Winner gets a cool camera.

The finalists are voted on by the public. I'm close, but I need help to bump our picture up and win.

You can vote once a day through Sunday, so go back tomorrow, too!

To vote, write "I vote for Dad and Daughter" in the comments under the photo.

HERE'S THE LINK!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Word Nerd Needs Your Help!

Because I'm a nerd and like a challenge, I entered NYC Midnight's Tweet Me a Story contest.

The contest: Using a word they provide, using it exactly as written (so no making it past tense, shortening it, etc.) write a story that's no longer than 140 characters, including punctuation and spaces.

In essence: A story the length of a tweet.

Writers had to register in advance, and then we were placed in groups and assigned our word. We had 5 hours to come up with our stories, and we could submit up to three.

I was in group 13. Our word: special.

Something like 1,000 stories came in. The top 25 stories in each group were chosen by judges. They're now listed where readers vote to determine which ones proceed to the next round.

Here's where I need your help: TWO of my stories made it!

(Can I hear a WAHOOO?!)

Read my stories (and the other finalists in my group) HERE.

Then help me move to the next round. To vote for both of my stories, CLICK HERE.

Thanks in advance!!!

Post Script: I was on ABC4's Good Things Utah this morning showing another recipe from the book. I'll link over to the clip when it's available.

NOW VOTE! :)

Calling People Good with Titles

I lack the skill of inventing good titles.

It's one of several reasons I rarely bother coming up with a working title for my novels (the others include not wanting to go through mentally renaming my "baby" and the fact that marketing always changes it anyway).

BUT . . .

Some of you may recall that I'm working on a grammar, usage, and punctuation book. I'm not Strunk and White. I'm not Chicago. I'm not an expert.

But I am a writer and an editor and an English major who graduated cum laude. I'm affectionately known among friends as the Grammar Nazi. I do know a few things.

I'm writing the book because I've had so many fellow writers ask me questions, and when I offer an answer that's actually understandable, they tell me I should write a reference book on these things because they want it on their own reference shelf.

I'm in the final stages of writing it, and I hope to have it available real soon. Down the road, I'll likely do updates and new editions, adding new topics that readers ask and want included. For now, I've been keeping a running list of common questions on grammar, usage, and punctuation, including some of the topics I've used for Word Nerd Wednesday.

Now I need a title. And I'm coming to my peeps for help!

I'm totally stealing this idea from Luisa at Novembrance, who asked her blog readers to help come up with a title for her forthcoming cookbook. (I wanted to submit an idea for her, but as I said, I'm really, really bad with titles, so I sat back as others offered fantastic, witty suggestions.)

Here's the deal:
Throw out title ideas in the comment trail or e-mail them to me directly. I'm not averse to subtitles to go along with the main title. I might like having a subtitle, actually.

If I pick your title suggestion, you'll get a free copy of the book as a thank you.

So . . . help? Please?



Today's tour stops are two people who didn't used to give LDS Lit much of a shot. Glad they did this time:

The Dance
Crash Test Dummy Diaries

The latter is, in Crash's own words, an "unreview." Her way of telling how it came about isn't quite how I remember it. (She got the PDF file like all the other tour people, for starters.)

But I think I tricked her into buying the book. Bwahahahaaa . . .