Author: Kristin Wolden Nitz
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The Reading Bowl Rap
It was so fun to find SAVING THE GRIFFIN in the first verse of the Georgia Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl 2009-10 Rap. A clever person from the DeKalb County Schools managed to work the titles for of the various books into a few short stanzas. We’re Deep and Dark and Dangerous And you don’t need to mess with…
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Reading Every Word Out Loud
I still don’t know a better way to find mistakes in my writing than reading each word out loud. It keeps my eye from skimming over my all too familiar words. Of course working my way through 51,000 words takes awhile….
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Revising YA Mystery: Done?
It took a writing binge of epic proportions, but I completed a draft of the YA mystery very early on Saturday morning after putting in a marathon day on Friday. Deadlines can be a powerful thing. This one was self-imposed. I knew that my technical advisors–aka college-age daughters–would be able to read the book if…
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Something Brilliant Goes Here
I’m still working away at the revision to my YA mystery. I’ve reached page 100 out of about 175. For this revision, I have a new favorite tool that I picked up from Leslie Connor, author of WAITING FOR NORMAL, at a recent SCBWI Michigan retreat. When she get completely stuck on something, she’ll write…
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YA Mystery Revision: Halfway There!
With respect to numbers of pages, I’m halfway through the revision of my YA mystery. But in many other ways, I could very well be within a week of a semi-polished draft. I’ll have to draft a few other new scenes, but they won’t be anywhere near as hard as what I’ve already accomplished. At least I’m…
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The Origin of Prince Eduardo’s Tale
Three nights ago, Michael had asked for an extra bedtime story when she’d walked past his room. So Kate had leaned against thedoorway and started in on another one of her fantastic tales. “Remember how you and Mom decided not to climb all the way up to the monastery ruins with me and Stephen this…
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Holiday Reading
It’s fun to read books set during the various seasons of the year. This year I reread THE DARK IS RISING by Susan Cooper. It’s set during an unexpectedly rough twelve days of Christmas in England. If you had the bad fortune to see the film of the same name and haven’t read the book, read this…
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Uaou! Che bella!
My blog stats showed an unusual search for the Italian phrase in the post’s title. But it looked like a phrase straight from DEFENDING IRENE, so I’m going to give a short pronunciation guide. Uaou is like “Wow” with a bit more of the “oo” sound on each end. Che sounds quite a bit like…
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Research all Finished?
I had left open our last day in Egypt just in case I needed to go back and do any additional research, but it looked like it was complete. I had visited all the places that my characters had: Giza, Abusir, Ma’adi, the Metro, the Khan al-Khalili, and Al Ahzar park. My husband, the man…
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Forward Progress
Goals are good things. My editor established one goal when she gave me a due date for the mystery revision: February 15. But it was pretty clear that she’d like to have it sooner, so I have a private goal of getting it out the door by the end of the third week in January. I also have…
Kristin Wolden Nitz 