Authors Dish: Viviana MacKade’s Writing Advice

August 2018: Writing Advice
~ Viviana MacKade ~

CTR asked:
QUESTION: What is the one piece of writing advice that has stuck with you and why? (Something other than ‘write what you know.’)

Viviana MacKade said:
“Don’t get bogged down.”

Best advice ever, coming from a great author and friend I had the pleasure to work with, Daryl Devoré. I wasn’t born into English, English didn’t come to me (I swear this is what a guy I was teaching Italian to once told me) (also, as you read that, cue in magical glitter twirling around as English came to him the day he was born).

See, the thing is, ten years ago, I could barely utter a hello. Thank god pizza is an international word because it allowed me to survive and yes, once I ordered kidney liver because kidney and kid sounded the same and I thought I had ordered a children menu. It was not good.

English is my cross and delight. I love everything about it–its patchwork-like origins, where so many different cultures came together, the sounds, the easy grammar, the sheer amount of words that allows endless shades within a single concept. But it’s not mine. I have to work for it, every single day, for every single sentence. I have grammar books, favorite grammar websites, I banned any book, article, song, even any recipe, in any language but English.

I stress over it, a lot. I’m terrified about re-reading something I wrote (and edited, and re-edited) and find a mistake. Which means, often I get stuck into corrections: is this word right enough? Precise enough? Is simple past or past perfect? Will or would? Dangling modifiers. Wrong or weird syntax.

Ah, hell, I got bogged down again and wrote 30 words in an hour.

In my quest for decent English, I tend to forget the sheer joy of simply writing, putting words down and turn something that existed only in my mind into something real.

So now, before I start writing, I chant a minute or two of her advice: don’t get bogged down.

The time for stressing about a verb form will come, but it has no room in the first draft, where it’s all passion and mindless creative rush. Which I can’t, I must not, (or learn not to, anyway) bog down.

– Website – https://viviana-mackade.blog
– Twitter – @ViviMackade

All Those Miles I Walked

[Contemporary Romantic Suspense]

At eighteen, DJ had to make a choice–her heart or her dreams. Neither was wrong, yet either would break her heart. She chose the world. Over a decade later, she returns to Crescent Creek and to the one regret she’s ever had–Scott.

Scott’s always been steady as a rocky reef. He’d loved once and when she’d left, his strong heart had crumbled like a sandcastle. Now DJ is back, and Scott wants nothing to do with her. The problem? They share Eva, a close friend of both, and now Eva needs their help. Because of her, he’s stuck with DJ and he’d be damned, the woman still gets under his skin.

DJ is a free spirit who needs the road under her feet. Scott is a family man who wants to groom his roots. With danger on their doorstep and a baby to keep safe, how much are they willing to compromise for love?

Available in Ebook:

– Kindle – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BDMYSTP
– Smashwords – https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/805644

More Authors Dish about their writing advice.

Day One: https://coffeethoughts.coffeetimeromance.com/ad2018-aug1-advice/
Day Two: https://coffeethoughts.coffeetimeromance.com/ad2018-aug2-advice/