-Article: Songwriters Anonymous - Part Six by Mary Darwson
-Article: The Girls in the Basement by Lani Diane Rich
-Article: Learning to Write With a Sledgehammer by Alan Alda
-Book Review: Category 7 by Bill Evans and Marianna Jameson
-Article: To Outline or Not to Outline by Timothy Hallinan
-Article: Shoot the Rhino by Alex Keegan
-Book Review: The Taste of Night by Vicki Pettersson (Urban Fantasy)
-Article: Songwriters Anonymous - Part Five by Mary Dawson
-Book Review: The Alchemyst by Michael Scott (Fantasy/YA)
-Book Review: The Dark River by John Twelve Hawks (SF)
-Book Review: Pendragon: The Pilgrims of Rayne by D.J. MacHale (YA)
-Book Review: The Secret Servant by Daniel Silva (Thriller)
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Children's Writing Section
Do you think you might be the next J.K. Rowling? There are so many kinds of books
for children: from picture books to chapter books and everything in between. How
do you find the best resources on the Web for children's writing? Please
visit our Children's Writing Section. With articles,
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the information you need to pursue your dream of being a children's author.
How To Make It As A Songwriter
Mary Dawson's new book, How to Get Somewhere in the Music Business from Nowhere with
Nothing, gives you the inside scoop on how to make it in the music business as a songwriter. Mary
teaches you all you need to know to make your songwriting dreams a reality.
Jeffery Deaver's Ode to Outlining
To outline or not to outline, that is the question. Bestselling author Jeffery Deaver has some pretty strong feelings on the subject. He's firmly in the pro-outline camp. Just hearing him talk about his intense writing technique exhausts us: we think we need a nap. Jeffery's next Lincoln Rhyme book -- which has great buzz -- is Broken Window.
TheNextBigWriter Online Writing Community
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Gospel Music Legend Dottie Rambo Killed in Bus Accident
CMT Music reports that Dottie Rambo was killed in a bus accident early Sunday morning. She was 74-years-old. Dottie Rambo was a prolific songwriter and a legend in the gospel music industry. The Kentucky Herald-Leadersays Rambo was the queen of gospel music. She wrote over 2,500 songs during her lifetime and her songs were recorded by some of the biggests stars of country and rock including Elvis Presley, Dolly Parton and Whitney Houston.
Rambo, 74, was known as the queen of gospel music. Not only was she widely known for her own recordings, but some of the more than 2,500 songs she wrote were recorded by artists such as Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Whitney Houston, Vince Gill and Dolly Parton. It has been said that there's hardly a modern hymnal that doesn't have at least one Dottie Rambo song in it.
"It was hard to sing gospel music and not record a Dottie Rambo song," said gospel singer Kenny Bishop, adding that his family's first album included Rambo's song Too Much To Gain To Lose.
"Everybody knew Dottie's music," he said. "I've been around Dottie when there were bigger celebrities in the room and she didn't have to make her way to them -- they made their way to her."
Christian songwriter and comedian Aaron Wilburn said that Rambo broke barriers.
"She took gospel into country; she took it into pop ... I know in the Christian field she's the greatest female writer, probably of all time," Wilburn said.
You can sign Dottie's guestbook here on Legacy.com. Her official website can be found at dottierambo.net.
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Michael Bay Blasts SAG
Director/Producer Michael Bay (Transformers) is disgusted
with the Screen Actors Guild, which he says is trying to get its members paid more than the writers or the directors. He blogs:
Oh my god. SAG wants more than Directors and Writers? That's a smart tactic I guess. When are people going to understand, most importantly actors - we are at war -- we are facing a major recession -- our country is in dire need of being fixed - our country also has no money because we have given trillions to the Iraq war and we have NOT even started to pay for it -- it is just paid right now by printing more money on presses -- China owns our ass in every way. Why not strike on a business in a down fall. Just like the writer's they made pennies on the four extra months striking -- when you do the real math and they are paying the price for it still -- so many writer's (sic) out of work still!!! I want this business to thrive -- I know the studio heads and they will punish those that defy them. Okay, be an idealist -- but you will never get a better deal then the writer's (sic) or directors -- only the same -- the studio's (sic) will never allow it, don't kid yourself. The working actors don't want a strike - they have said so. Too many non working actors have a say which is crazy -- maybe there are just too many actors?? Gosh I'm even a member of SAG, but I don't feel I've earned the right to vote in this guild.
One hunch, the leaders of these guilds seem to like the limelight they get in the press, it becomes more about the ego in the room rather than something smart. Striking is not smart. Through the history in America, strikes in businesses have only gained the union worker 6% at the max -- so take the emotion out of it and go for the 6%. A path to strike is not smart for the the hundreds of thousands of people in this business. Sanity needs to prevail here -- talk real and talk the same talk as your union brothers -- not more!
Three of Michael's upcoming film project are remakes: The Birds, Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street. We predict that his Transformers 2 will make one zillion dollars. In the opening weekend.
The Associated Press on the story of disappearing audiences for television shows. The writers' strike is long over, but things aren't rebounding.
"The strike had a number of impacts," said Alan Wurtzel, NBC Universal research chief, "but as with everything it's never very clear or direct or black and white."
ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC had nearly 9 percent fewer viewers in April and May so far than during the same period a year ago, according to Nielsen Media Research.
Yet viewership declines are sadly typical for the big networks. Take the same period a year earlier, and the drop was more than 5 percent over 2006. People didn't watch less TV while the strike was on, they just watched cable more, said Steve Sternberg, an analyst for Magna Global.
Shows with ongoing stories seemed to lose the most momentum from the strike; ABC's "Grey's Anatomy" on May 1 had its smallest audience since moving to Thursday night. Decisions by NBC to keep "Heroes" for next fall and Fox to delay "24" until next season may prove prescient, unless people forget about the characters altogether.
Comedies were hurt least by the strike. CBS was so buoyed by the performance of their Monday night comedies that the network is considering adding comedies on another night.
CBS' rack of procedural dramas had done relatively well, at least until a week ago: "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" had its second least-watched episode for a Thursday original, and "CSI: Miami" hit a series low for an original.
"There's no question that it could have been a lot worse," said David Poltrack, CBS' top researcher. CBS' strategy was to make as many new episodes of existing shows as possible until the season ends later this month so people got back in the habit of watching again.
The explosive growth of digital video recorders, now available in 25 million homes, means more people are setting their own schedules.
We think that viewership is actually up, not down. It's just that people aren't watching network tv at the time that the shows are first broadcast. They are setting their TIVOs, downloading episodes off of iTunes and watching cable. Until the ratings systems evolve to track the actual habits of viewers, there will continue to be these doom and gloom stories.
The reality is that people love their tv shows, but they want to watch them on their own schedules with less commercial interruptions. With current technolgies, there is no excuse for the networks not to adapt to these new viewing habits. Adapt or die, we say.
Cartoonist Ted Key has died at the age of 95. He created the cartoon strip "Hazel" which was turned into a hit sitcom.
He died Saturday at his home in the Philadelphia suburb of Tredyffrin Township after a 1 1/2-year battle with cancer, his son Peter Key said Monday.
"Hazel" was a popular feature in The Saturday Evening Post from the time it debuted in 1943. It evolved into a prime-time series in 1961 that starred Shirley Booth and ran for four years on NBC and one year on CBS.
Key also created the characters Mr. Peabody and Sherman for producer Jay Ward. The time-traveling dog/scientist and his boy made their TV debuts in 1959 in segments on the animated show "Rocky and His Friends."
He created cartoon panels called "Diz and Liz" for the Jack and Jill children's magazine and produced a number of other animal characters. He also wrote a play for radio, authored and illustrated books, and had freelance cartoons appear in Cosmopolitan, Better Homes and Gardens and Sports Illustrated.
Key literally dreamed up the concept of his wildly popular maid cartoon.
"Like a lot of creative people, he kept a notepad near his bedside," Peter Key said of his father. "He had a dream about a maid who took a message, but she screwed it up completely. When he looked at the idea the next day, he thought it was good and sold it to the Post."
Key randomly picked the name for the maid and was flattered that it later became synonymous with maids, according to his son.
Key acquired the rights to "Hazel" in 1969 and the comic was picked up for syndication by King Features. King still distributes the cartoon today, using those drawn by Key before he retired in 1993.
"Hazel" was so popular that when the first collection of cartoons was published in 1946, E.P. Dutton sold 500,000 copies. In all, Dutton published eight collections of "Hazel" cartoons.
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