Kristin Wolden Nitz

Author: Kristin Wolden Nitz

  • Judging Books by Their Covers

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    That Cover Girl is one blogger who’s willing to judge a book by its cover.  Or maybe it’s closer to say that she’s judging the covers of various YA books.   In any case, she recently interviewed Peachtree’s Mo Withee about her THIS GIRL IS DIFFERENT cover.  At a point later in the interview, Mo mentions…

  • Starting a New File

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    It’s been a long, long time since I started a new project.   But today, I created a  file with the name of ItalianChase and managed to produce just over 500 words.  It will be another young adult novel, but more in the vein of a suspense/thriller than a cozy mystery.  In fact, bad things are…

  • Kansas Reading Circle

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    Suspect turned up on the Kansas NEA’s Reading Circle Catalog!   The list appears to cover fiction and nonfiction for grades K-12.  Cool beans!

  • Rejection Cupcakes and Other Bits of Brilliance.

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    Now I confess that I have not yet read Penny Blubaugh’s BLOOD AND FLOWERS, but I’ve been wanting to every since the sale was announced by the agent we share. It sounded like a great concept, and here’s what Kirkus wrote about it: “..atmospheric language, arresting “culture mash-up,” unique characters, an alluring overlap of fantasy…

  • Done for Now

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    I spent a little time this evening clicking back through the Calyn category on this blog.  It’s been a long road.  One thing I noticed is that I reached “the end” of this story repeatedly.  At one point, I completed the rough draft. Later, I managed to get the story up to the level of a semi-polished…

  • The End

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    Several of my writer friends were kind enough to look over the product of last week’s writing binge.   It looks like I addressed a goodly chunk of the issues that they had with the book’s ending.  It had felt abrupt; there were too many questions unanswered.  I’m definitely sensitive to that charge since it was one of the…

  • A Writing Binge

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    I’m not usually a binge writer.  Instead, I tend to dedicate early mornings to my current project, the middle of the day to my students’ work and late afternoon to various household chores.  During the evenings, I’ll putter away at this and that depending on my student load and whether or not I like the current NCIS…

  • A Robin McKinley Rant

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    I am in the middle of going through what I hope are the last few tweaks of Calyn’s story.  Of course, the problem with tweaking one section is that I have to follow the thread all the way through the manuscript to make sure that everything still hangs together.  But I know that manuscript so well…

  • Endings

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    When I’m not sure what to do with a certain section of my novel, I frequently reach for my copy of the Newbery honor book, The Perilous Gard by Elizabeth Marie Pope.  I’ve done this with first chapters, last chapters, chapter openings, chapter endings and transitions in general.  So when I was struggling with an…

  • Writing Novels

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    Kristin Wolden Nitz
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    Some writers don’t know what’s going to happen next when they sit down at their computers.  Others follow their outlines religiously.  Sir Terry Pratchett, author of the Disc World books, compared his process of writing novels to wood carving on his website: You find the lump of tree (the big central theme that gets you…