All posts by NewEngland_Muse

I'm a traditionally and self published author. I write in the genre of children and YA at the moment but working my way up to adults. I'm a sports loving, photo taking gal who loves to sing/dance to my own enjoyment. I love to laugh even at myself. I am also owned by 8 birds and 2 hamsters, and yes they know it. :)
Books, Sharon C. Williams

Reviewing a children’s book

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2013-10-19 11.06.56

As a reviewer for Booksneeze, we are required to write a 300 word review. Easy peasy, right? The book I received on Monday was so short it took me under 30 seconds to read it. The material is geared at the young children who are learning to read on their own so it had short sentences and a heck of a lot of pictures.

My first thought was, “How in the hell was I going to come up with a 300 word review?” It didn’t help that my reviewer brain went into full gear as I picked it apart from a level of a book meant for an age much older. I didn’t like the concept, parts didn’t make sense and overall I was left flat in feeling.

Being the first reviewer for this book I did not want to leave such a remark on a book. I sat back in my chair and thought on how to write this. Then it hit me. It didn’t have to work for me, it had to work for the child reading it. Once I made the realization the review was easy. I commented on the short sentences, the easy words, the colorful illustrations that a child that young would enjoy. The book worked for it worked for the child that it was meant for.

By the time I was done writing I had 344 words. Not bad, huh? I see so many bad reviews. I wonder if people forget who the book is aimed at when placing the post up online. As a writer, we have to write for the audience that is in our target audience, why should the review be any different?

 

You can find me here at my blog that is strictly for reviews: Www.mainemuse.wordpress.com

 

Author, Freelance writing, Uncategorized, Writing review

Freelance writing review

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I had a person, who had read three of my articles in a local magazine, give me this compliment. He wrote:

@NewEngland_Muse Great articles you wrote. Hope they know the talent they have writing for them. Could you sell mag. a serial?

That made my day. It truly did. Do you tend to wonder what people think when they read a blog post you wrote, an article or a book? I know I surely do. If we are lucky we get some reviews stating what they liked about it but for the most part we don’t.

Writing is something I love to do. It is a passion that exploded a few years ago and the burning I felt then is still inside of me. I won’t make much money with my writing unless I get a lucky break, THE lucky break, that we might dream off.

So we need to look at other things that makes us continue to write. One of my reviews for Jasper, Amazon Parrot: A Rainforest Adventure made my heart sing. It mentioned how the book had been for the man’s third grade grandson. Upon receiving the book, the young boy placed down his electronic toy and sat down to read the book until bed time. Wow. That blew me away.

This is one of the reasons I write. For people to enjoy the content and learn if possible from it. If I can make a child read a book, then mission accomplished. I been an avid reader for as long as I can remember, it was my beset friend growing up the books I had with me. Yeah sure the money would be nice, it really would. But until that happens, if it happens, I will continue to write books of various topics for people to pick up and enjoy.

 

Author Sharon C. Williams, WIP, Writing

My WIPs

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As with most writers, we tend to have more than one writing project in the works. This didn’t use to me though. When I first started my writing journey I kept it to one project at a time. That evolved to me writing notes and ideas down of potential projects. Sadly and happily that notebook has exploded into pages and pages of thoughts for writing adventures. Added to that is a list of people who have expressed an interested in collaborating with me for potential projects. A few years has gone by since I first started and now I have projects out of my yang yang.

At the moment this is what I have: finishing Jasper 3 which is a children’s series based on my Amazon parrot, finishing Lost Faith, my NaNoWriMo book winner from 2013, which is a YA book based in the future, finishing A Woman of Color, my NaNoWriMo book winner from 2011, an adult true life story, finalizing the pictures for Squirrel Mafia which is a true comic relief story andmy latest interview for the magazine I now freelance for

Eventually I will get to Moe’s Cafe which is adult fiction and my first attempt at a crime story. This was my NaNoWriMo book winner for 2012. I have now lovingly labeled my notebook of ideas to “Whenever I have time to write these books” notebook.

When I went over the list in my head this past weekend I had realized I was interchanging from children to YA to adult and back and have been doing this for the last few weeks. I am surprised how easily I can transcend from different characters and plots. But maybe it is easy since the characters and their lives are so vivid in my head and have been for so long they are now part of my brain function.

Whatever the case, these are the projects I am working on to keep me busy and in some case sane from everyday life.