Tag: podcast

Hey Baby, What’s Your Back Story and why we are running around so much

Hey baby, what’s your back story? 

It should be a pick-up line at a bar, yet it somehow is not a pick-up line at any bar that I know of except maybe in a New Yorker cartoon or a bar in a town where there’s one of those MFA programs in writing literature for literary people doing literary things. 

Anyway, it’s a term writers throw around all the time and it is basically just how we imagine our characters’ lives went before they are in the actual story that we’re writing. 

I know! How can you imagine that your character had a life before your story? It’s like imagining your spouse had a life before you that wasn’t totally centered around you. Us narcissists have a hard time with that. 

Do you know, in nine hundred years of time and space, I’ve never met anybody who wasn’t important…

Steven Moffat, Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol

According to a post on Now Novel there are three uses of back story.

  1. Developing the understanding of the characters. Like if your dad died of a heart attack in front of you and you couldn’t save him, then your character might have a savior complex. It helps the reader understand your characters’ motivations. 
  2. It can heighten the stakes and the suspense. You were once addicted to dating cops. Cops were always bad for you. Will you date this one? NO! YOU MUST NOT. 
  3. It makes it real damn it. By the time, you make it into a book, you’re not going to be a blank slate, born out of Zeus’ head or a clamshell fully formed on page 1. We all have prologues. 

Standout asks how much back story does a story need and answers its own question pretty simply:

If judged solely on complexity, the answer to ‘how much back story should I include?’ would be ‘enough to pay for the reader’s efforts,’ however you also need to consider immersion.

Standout

Ah. Okay?

Here is our advice: 

  • Don’t be fake. Don’t be pretend. We all know people who show up at a party, engage in small talk about absolutely nothing other than the weather, the traffic, where they work. There is no underlayment. It’s like they are a rug thrown on the floor, but if you touch that rug it will just slip away because there’s nothing holding it there. 
  • Do not let your characters be rugs. 
  • Ground those suckers with nails and staples if you have to. ModPodge them to the floor, give them a life before you. 
  • Don’t tell us everything about them. We do not know that they prefer Aquafina to Poland Spring water or that they had an ingrown toenail when they were twenty-four any more than you want to know about the guy at the party’s hemorrhoid treatment unless it’s really good. Be sparing. 

The most important things to remember about back story are that (a) everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn’t very interesting.

Stephen King

Writing Tip of the Pod 

Find the balance in your backstory and your life. 

Dog Tip for Life

Run through adversity. Don’t give up. 

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp! 

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

  • Miss Cornelia’s Muses – Time Stoppers
  • Climax of Enhanced – Flying Series
  • Road to Aurora – TIME STOPPERS
  • Heading to Save the World – FLYING series
  • Acadia National Park Time Stoppers Joy
  • The yellow
  • Pixies Beyond – NEED series
  • Time Stoppers
  • Christina Baker Walks
  • Freedom
  • Walking Beneath ANP mountains
  • Maine Light House
  • The Life – ANOTHER NOW
  • Beyond the branches

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 



Hey Baby, What’s Your Back Story and why we are running around so much

 
 
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Passive Aggressive Much? And How to Become More Awesome in Just 30 Minutes a Day

Over on the random thought part of the podcast, we hear about Carrie being passive-aggressive at the campground bathroom, Shaun sing, and random people at Smokey’s Barbecue and Lobster.

But here is the more intellectual stuff. Um. Slightly more intellectual stuff?

This guy Malcolm Gladwell wrote a book Outliers and in it he outlines his belief that if you practice something for 10,000 hours and do that in a deliberate way, then you’ll become a top performer.

Who are the outliers? They are the best and the brightest. 

We don’t want you to freak out over that 10,000 hours bit because that’s like saying, “Hey Shaun, I know you can’t run more than 60 seconds right now, but this Friday you’re going to run for 93 minutes.”

Spoiler alert: Shaun ran for 93-minutes straight on Friday. Carrie did too.

Anyway, this guy named Danny Forest who writes on Medium breaks it down to something that feels a bit more doable. He says that he can learn soft skills in about eight hours and breaks it into working 30 minutes each day on those skills. 

That seems a lot better than 10,000 hours, right?

There’s a difference between competence and brilliance, but that half-hour concentrated focus is how so many of us build our skills. Even dogs. 

So, inspired by Mr. Forest, the Farrar has three things he wants to learn: 

  • Make movies on Adobe Premiere
  • Spanish
  • Stained glass stuff
  • How to be a better parent

And Carrie also made a list:

  • Make movies on Adobe Premiere
  • Make felted paintings
  • How to self publish
  • How to draw
  • How to write travel stories
  • How to be Anthony Boudrain
  • Spanish
  • How to cook in the French style, but also to make kick-butt saltanas and samosas and all things in pockets, basically.

What do you want to learn? To do?

For writing, focusing on writing or reading about writing for a half hour a day is really an essential tip to becoming a better storyteller. You see that advice everywhere and you see other people countering that advice saying to ‘ignore all advice,’ which is also actually advice. 

Yes, do your own thing and do what works for you. That should be obvious. But don’t forget that you can’t become a brilliant guitar player if you’ve never picked up a guitar. You have to put in the time. 

Writing Tip of the Pod

Practice what you want to be good at. Do it in small bites. You’ve got this.

Dog Tip for Life

Dogs are good at sleeping and practicing that. Be like a dog.

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp! 

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 


Passive Aggressive Much? And How to Become More Awesome in Just 30 Minutes a Day

 
 
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Old Rockers Rocking and Trust Issues

As you heard in our random thought, this week we went to see some early 1990s bands in concert. They were – well, they were old. The concert hall wasn’t even half full. 

That sounds depressing, right? 

It wasn’t. One of the lead singers has had cancer three times. His wife has had it once. They were both on the stage giving it everything they had. 

And the lead singer? 

He was smiling the entire damn time. 

The Alarm at Portland’s Aura

Here’s the thing. In life and in story, we have to face crap, deal with it, and sometimes we are lucky enough to survive. And sometimes we are lucky enough to choose to survive joyously. 

A story is no good if there’s no conflict, no obstacles to overcome. It’s hard to root for the characters or care for the characters if nothing happens. You don’t want to turn the page. 

Obstacles make us stronger. 

Overcoming obstacles gives us courage.

Courage and strength gives us freedom. 

It’s not enough in our lives or in our stories to be incensed, to shake our fists at the sky, to rage about circumstance, we have to do the next step – action. 

Without the action, we are just shouting for no reason, inciting without purpose. 

Don’t be afraid to go to that next step in your life or in your story and if you can? Do it with joy and with kindness. 

In the random thought, we talk about trust (Should you? How we establish it) and connections and how people kept introducing themselves to Carrie whenever Shaun left during the concert.

Those links are here: 

Writing Tip of the Pod

Obstacles make the story worth it. Actions keep the story moving. We want to root for someone. Make someone for us to root for. 


Dog Tip for Life

Joy. Embrace it. Wag your tail for everyone to see. Don’t be ashamed of it. 

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp! 

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 

When Good Dogs Go Bad

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Download file | Play in new window | Duration: 00:22:30

Old Rockers Rocking and Trust Issues

 
 
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When Good Dogs Go Bad

So, a long time ago Carrie had a dog named Scotty, and she used to fill in at the police department as a dispatcher. For those of you who don’t know, she dispatched part-time because even though she made enough money writing (right then) she got worried that:

Carrie’s Worries

1. I will suddenly make no money at all

2. I need to build up social security benefits

3. I will forget how to interact with other humans if I’m always at home. 

ONE DAY HER GOOD DOGS WENT BAD

So, she worked from 3:30 to 11:30 pm and when she came home Tala and Scotty, her dogs, greeted her at the door, all doggy happy.

Scotty was her new dog and he was a rescue dog from Alabama who was in a kill shelter, and for a long time we have thought that he was perhaps a grandpa who liked crawfish and Bud Lite a lot and was somehow caught in a dog’s body – like he was a shapeshifter who got stuck.  He had a puncture wound in his neck when he got to Maine, two small holes. So, a vampire with a shapeshifting virus was possibly to blame. 

Carrie had decided this was a true possibility. Already, she’d witnessed him:

1. Get ice out of the refrigerator.
2. Use his paw on a door handle to open a door.

And then when Carrie came home late, she saw a drawer that had been COMPLETELY shut when she left the house, and it was now open. Food was strewn everywhere. This meant Scotty grabbed the drawer with his mouth and got it open at least a little bit and then he either wedged his nose in or something and opened it more. 

Why would he do that? Oh, he was probably sick of dog food and bored because she was gone. Which is doggy behaviour, we know,

Side note: Dog saliva combined with powdered sugar on a wood floor creates a glue-like paste that is impossible to vacuum or mop up. It must be attacked with Clorox bleach wipes. Carrie swears. She did not know this until that night. 

And finally, though they ate peanut butter chips and brown sugar and confectioner’s sugar and Crisco shortening and Shepard’s pie mix and Italian seasoning mix, they did NOT eat chocolate!

Chocolate KILLS dogs. 

And the dogs left it, only tearing open the end.

Carrie sort of imagined Scotty holding Tala back and saying, “Baby. It smells good, but it’s poison. It will kill us. Lets go lick up the sugar.”

He’s totally human

You know it, baby. Now go get me a beer while I lick the sugar off this here rug.

Writing Tip OF THE POD

What does all this have to do with writing? It’s like what we were talking about in our Random Thought in the Car (you have to listen to hear that and about Carrie’s accident). All stories aren’t good ones. All people aren’t perfect. The best writing is when those little imperfections about character or people peek through.

And use everything for your stories. Mine your lives and your dogs’ lives, too.

Dog Tip For Life

Dude. Do not eat the chocolate. Have some self control.

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp! 

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 

When Good Dogs Go Bad

 
 
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How Not to Write Your Novel

It’s a lot like life honestly.

Here’s the number one hint.

Wait forever to start writing.

Don’t wait to start. Don’t expect lightening to strike or a muse to come down from the heavens.

Just write. Call it practice if ‘writing a novel’ seems too big a task. Trick your mind into being chill about it. If you want to do something, you have to do it. Don’t wait for permission. Just do it.

As long as it’s legal and doesn’t hurt other people. Obviously that sentence up there about not waiting for permission doesn’t apply to all things.

But it does freaking apply to art and writing and joy and fun.

Again, as long as your fun doesn’t hurt other creatures.

Back to the point. We wait all our lives for inspiration, for a prince or warrior-queen to come sweep us off our feet, for the muse to bless us with the perfect novel or poem or family or painting or child. But we have to put in the work. We have to be brave and actively go after what it is we want.

We might write a ton of sucky sentences. We might forget how to use a comma. We might fail and get rejected a million times.

That’s what makes the quest good though. That’s what makes the goal worth it.

So if you want to write a novel? Write it. Just get started.

If you don’t want to write a novel? Don’t.

Study craft. Push yourself. Think about who your story is about and how they relate to the world. Just write down the words you hear in your brain, the visions you see. Start it.

You’ve got this.

Writing Tip of the Pod:

Everything up there, man.

Dog Tip for Life

Dude. Hang out in the truck.


SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp! 

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 


How Not to Write Your Novel

 
 
00:00 / 00:25:44
 
1X
 

Dead Butt Syndrome

People, you have got to get your butts out of the chair, or the bed, or whatever. Seriously.

Your butt is breaking! Sorry Dying. Your butt is dying!

According to a Huffington Post article by Nicole Pajer, “Americans are sitting so long that their butts are literally falling asleep. “Dead butt syndrome,” or gluteal amnesia, is a condition that occurs when your gluteus medius gets inflamed and forgets to function normally.”

Pajer’s article, ‘Dead Butt Syndrome’ Is A Real Thing. Here’s How To Tell If You Have It” was a big deal back in 2018, but I swear, we are not listening and our bottoms and our entire bodies are paying the price.

Yes, writers, I know that you’re thinking, “Isn’t the whole point of being a writer about making up imaginary worlds, sitting all day, and putting your butt in the chair?”

Spoiler:

There are a lot of writer quotes expressly about how you have to put your ‘butt in the chair’ to get your writing done.

Tangent:

Writers, there are actual books call “BUTT IN CHAIR!”

Second tangent:

Putting your butt in the chair, doesn’t make you an awesome writer. It just means you’ve put in some time with your bottom in a chair, typing. Writing is about craft, understanding humans, understanding language, and story.

Back to Butts

An article by Anthea Levi, entitled “Dead Butt Syndrome Is One More Reason You Shouldn’t Sit All Day” stresses that sitting all day isn’t good for anyone’s butt, not even a writer’s.

Sitting all day is not good for your bottom.

She quote says chiropractor Andrew Bang, who works at Cleveland Clinic’s Wellness Institute.

Dead butt syndrome has to do with reciprocal inhibition—the process that describes the give-and-take relationship between muscles on either side of a joint. “In general, when one muscle contracts, a nerve signal is sent to its opposing muscle to relax,” says Bang. 

Levi

Give-and-take relationships aren’t just the talk of couples therapy for writers who are having a hard time. It’s also about the body and the self. Our muscles work together but sometimes, they don’t.

When we sit down too long, our butts get out of shape. The main muscles do a lot of beneficial things and when it’s dead or not strong? Our pelvis isn’t as stable. We can get pain in our back and hips. Our knees and ankles act up.

It all can go bad.

Levi’s article talks all about the health dynamics and causes of that and you should check it out. Pajer’s article talks about the signs of dead butt syndrome.

Writer’s Tip OF THE POD

Sitting in your chair all day is putting in the time, but crafting great writing is about more than that. It’s about understanding people, story, life. It’s about living. It’s hard to live in one place, sitting down.

Keep your butt healthy, your heart healthy and your writing healthy.

Dog Tip for Life

Moving is good.

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp! 

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 

Dead Butt Syndrome

 
 
00:00 / 00:22:48
 
1X
 

Big Feelings and Dropping Your Child in the Woods

Sometimes us writer people feel broken. We maybe got rejected one too many times. We maybe got a horrifying review. We maybe are stuck on Chapter 7560 in our epic fantasy WHEN THE BUNNY OF DOOM FELL IN LOVE WITH THE HAMSTER OF GLORIOUS GLORY. 

This is normal. Creative people have a lot of big feelings. People who aren’t super creative also have a lot of big feelings. People feel. All of us. And sometimes? Well, sometimes those feelings aren’t always positive. So what do you do? 

  1. DO NOT MAKE YOURSELF HURRY. Remember that feeling better can take a little while. So, can writing or revising a book. 
  2. FORGIVE YOURSELF THE WAY YOU’D FORGIVE YOUR DOG. Give your soul a hug. Seriously. But it’s okay to be kind to yourself the way you’d be kind to a friend. Don’t make yourself suffer forever for a mistake you’ve made. 
  3. REMEMBER EVERYTHING CHANGES. It might be pouring outside. You might not know how to finish your chapter. You might have forgotten to buy dog treats. But all of that can change. It will change. 
  4. LOVE IS THERE WHETHER YOU WRITE THAT DAMN BOOK OR NOT. Seriously. Your worth isn’t about your productivity. You are wonderful and beautiful and amazing and smart. And you have to believe that you deserve good things. You do. Being a writer isn’t the only thing you are. 
  5. DO OTHER THINGS. Seriously. Do not only write. Go out and live your own life, too. It makes for better stories. 
  6. GIVE UP. Yep. You heard me. Look, you can’t control reviews, outside marketing, subjective tastes about people who don’t want to read books about a hamster falling in love with Mike Pence’s rabbit. You have to let go of that, give up trying to control everything. You can only control you and your reactions and thoughts. 

Dog Tip for Life

Dude. Just be. 

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp! 

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 

Big Feelings and Dropping Your Child in the Woods

 
 
00:00 / 00:21:55
 
1X
 

Taco Bell Leaks, Rainbow Unicorn Golf Carts and How to Spend Your Book Release Day

What to do when your book launches.

I don’t know. 

Seriously. Some writers get tattoos, a piece of jewelry, a new charm for a charm bracelet. Some hold book release parties. Some go out to dinner. 

As you’ll hear, Carrie did none of those things. Instead, she ran, made a whiny video from the campground shower stall, had a Taco Bell incident, bought Shaun a new outfit, tried to raise money for ShelterBox and finally got a copy of her own book.

Plus, rainbow-unicorn golf carts.

The point here is that you have to create your own life and your own celebrations. Do what feels right to you when you achieve a freaking amazing goal like releasing a book, graduating, sobriety, whatever it is that makes you realize you achieved something.

Writer Tip of the Pod 

Try to make it memorable for you. You did something pretty darn cool. You created something. 

Dog Tip for Life

Don’t forget to be happy. It isn’t all about stress and anxiety all the time. Let go. Wag your tail. 


SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.


WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, ORDER NOW!

My new book, IN THE WOODS, is out!

Gasp!

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 


Taco Bell Leaks, Rainbow Unicorn Golf Carts and How to Spend Your Book Release Day

 
 
00:00 / 00:21:55
 
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Poop Texting Fail

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So, two weeks ago the podcast featured poop texting and writing, but somehow only our random thought was uploaded and not the full broadcast.

Carrie feels this may have been her mother refusing to allow such things be out in the open. She raised Carrie better than this, honestly. No decent woman from New Hampshire talks openly about poop.

Shaun feels Carrie just messed up.

WE’VE BEEN MARRIED TOO LONG AND POOP TEXTS

Sometimes you get married and you’ve been married for a long time and you remember that the beginning of your marriage is like a poem and there’s white space and new discovery in every line. 

Sometimes you’ve been married a long time and it’s a routine, a science experiment that can be replicated. There can be beautiful comfort in a rut or a routine. 

Some people want life to be poems. 

Or not.

Some people want life to be expirments. 

Or not.

Some people like patterns to their lives and their books, but some people don’t.  

🙂

As writers and people, we have to decide if we want to be science experiments, or do we want poem moments again. Listen to the podcast to hear Shaun talk about poop texts, poop talks, Hallmark-quality texts and makes up brilliant poems and admits to excessive emoji use. Also, we haven’t really been married too long. 

WRITING TIP OF THE POD

Random things in your childhood come up in your poems and stories. It’s okay to not realize this until your siblings tell you.Also, poop is funny.  

DOG TIP FOR LIFE

Dogs smell their poop. They are proud of it until they kick grass on top of it. Dogs are not afraid of the poopy side of life. Embrace your dark side, but then know that the things you poop away should stay away.  

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.


WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, PREORDER NOW!

My next book, IN THE WOODS, appears TODAY!

TODAY!

Gasp!

It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site. 

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps). 

Check it out here. 

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 

Poop Texting Fail

 
 
00:00 / 00:25:02
 
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Being Extra

So, sometimes Carrie is a little extra.

Carrie: I was looking at people who liked me in college – all the ones that I didn’t like back – and they were all so stable and mellow even in college when it was all about putting dissected sharks on the floor and jello shots. Now they are all grown up and they are stable and mellow and have these beautiful upscale lives. They’re doctors, lawyers, engineers.

Shaun: But you have me.

Carrie: Exactly! And I love you. I love that you are unexpected and funny and occasionally dangerous.

What does this have to do with writing?

Carrie has a new book coming out. It’s called IN THE WOODS. She’s being a little extra about it. She is a little extra about everything.

What exactly is extra? Performingfartist says, “Doing the absolute damn most. For no reason.”

Writing is supposed to be extra. It’s supposed to be big and important even for the quiet books, even for the books nobody notices. It’s all about pouring your heart into it. It’s all about this damn quote right here:

Life is very short and what we have to do must be done in the now.

Audre Lorde

Also, we should add that “extra” like a lot of great words and terms originated in AAVE.

When people call you extra, it’s mocking a bit, but it’s also loving a bit. You’re living large. Extra was a super popular term in 2015 and inspired a lot of memes, but it hasn’t gone away yet.

Salt Bae is a perfect example of the beauty of being extra.

I hope the term never goes away. Because being extra means you’re all in. You aren’t mellow. You aren’t boring. You take risks. You embrace your loves and who you are and what you do.

Writing Tip of the Pod:

Be extra! Shouldn’t you want to be as big as possible, as enthusiastic as possible, as all-in as possible when you create.

Dog Tip for Life :

Go all in. Be authentic. Being extra might involve a fake limp to get some love? Whatever. Be authentic in your need if not your limp.


SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.


WRITING NEWS

IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, PREORDER NOW!

My next book, IN THE WOODS, appears in July with Steve Wedel. It’s scary. It’s a bit paranormal. It’s a bit romantic. And it’s one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019.

There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed! 

You can preorder this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?

In the Woods
In the Woods


ART NEWS

You can buy limited-edition prints and learn more about my art here on my site.

Carrie Jones Art for Sale

PATREON OF AWESOME

Paragraph

You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps).

Check it out here.

WHAT IS PATREON? 

A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you. 




Being Extra

 
 
00:00 / 00:24:47
 
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