Pernell Rogers – Writer

Archive for May, 2023

Hello all! Finally, my collection of six stories is with my editor for copy-editing, YAY! I’ve been adding and subtracting stories from the collection for almost 2 years, and I think it’s ready for publishing.

When I started writing back in 2011, I had no idea what I was doing, but over time, I learned. I had to find my voice, delve deeper inside my character’s heads to discover their strengths and faults, do massive research for each setting I chose, then come up with some type of plot where everything comes together. I was able to succeed, then I hit a wall.

I’ve mentioned this in past posts. My endings suck! That’s my oen opinion with many of my stories, and because I realized this, I had to pause writing. I’ve gone back over my unpublished stories, and added appropriate endings which I feel better about. All of this was due to a single speech.

While watching a rerun of a South Park episode, (Imaginationland Part 3), Kyle give a small speech on how imaginary characters changed his life (Luke Skywalker, Frodo, Harry Potter, Michael Corleone, etc.). I feel Kyle’s short speech opened up the real reason I should be writing.

In my stories, I try to practice escapism. I want my readers to leave their problems behind and enter the realm I created for them. However, I’ve never considered lessoned learned from reading my stories, and that’s become my focus now. I’m examining my themes and premises more. Why am I writing this story? What lesson should the reader’s take away?

In supernatural horror, the easiest lessons are to either get away from the supernatural occurrence or confront it. Whatever the decision, there’s a reason behind it.

Why did the character decide to skidadle? To save his/her life, and that of their significant others.

Why did they decide to stay? The had the courage to confront their fear and protect any significant others.

What can the character learn from either decision? That’s the key question I’ll continue to ask myself as I continue writing.

I’m so glad I started this journey. Take care!

It took less than 30 days for me to complete my first mystery! The hardest part was coming up with the crime. In my last post, I mentioned the setting, and it’s both perfect and relevant. I always walk around the house while I’m developing a story, or get stuck on a specific passage. During the week I developed JUST the crime for my first mystery story, I logged over 35 miles! The funny part was when I finished, I just needed the detectives to solve the crime. It was so much fun. The words and dialogue came so freely.

So that makes 15 stories. I’m going to stop writing fresh stories for a while.

I will spend most of my time editing these stories. I plan on sending my collection of six stories back to my editor for copy-editing in May. so that project continues to move forward. Take care!

Hi all. Don’t let the title fool you. I’m still writing, but once again, I discovered another symptom of my “show the monster and stop” syndrome I seem to suffer from. In my last post, I stated that I’d begin editing my 15 stories. I’ve done extensive edits on the 6 stories for my collection, but the others have had less than 3 revisions.

I pulled out a story that sat on Revision 2. I read through my story, adding and deleting, as necessary. The story held my attention until I got to the end. I’d set up a situation the family had to suffer through. Then the words ‘THE END’ popped up. I re-read the last chapter again, and the story simply ended. Over 23,000 words and the story just stops. I don’t know why I ended it, but I’d omitted the entire section about the family’s predicament.

I needed a satisfying ending, so I started walking while speaking into my recording app on my phone. After 15,000 steps, I had a real ending. So, I added another 12,000 words to tie up every loose end I’d left dangling. Now, in a couple of months, I’ll re-read it again, and see if it really is satisfying.

I’ve been focusing on the endings of all my stories because they’re so important. Take Care!