#Bloggers , you can Still sign up for the #atozchallenge !

Blogging from A to Z April Challenge

I’m hosting the A to Z April Blogging Challenge again this year, on Amlokiblogs. Daily (w)rite had participated in 2011 and I’ve entered it back again in 2013, and for the first time ever, I’ll be AZing on two blogs! Wish me luck.

The brainchild of Arlee Bird, at Tossing it Out, the A to Z Challenge basically requires 26 posts in 26 days based on 26 letters of the alphabet, one post beginning with each letter during the month of April, with Sundays off for good behavior.

If you haven’t signed up yet, you have till April 1 to join in the challenge, and then the epic journey would begin!

On April 1, blog about a topic that begins with the letter “A.” April 2 is “B,” April 3 is “C,” and so on. No posts on Sundays and we finish with Z on April 30.

You can use a theme for the month or go random – just as long as it matches the letter of the alphabet for the day. We recommend short posts – participants will be trying to visit as many as possible during the Challenge and will likely skip long posts.

Please turn off Word Verification! You won’t receive many comments or return visitors if it’s on. Check your settings, as it may be on without your knowledge. If you are really concerned about spam, set comments to no anonymous or blog owner approval.

Make it easy for people to follow you. Use Google Friends Connect, Feedburner or other RSS Feed, Linky Followers, Networked Blogs, etc., and be sure those widgets are located near the top of your sidebar. Time your posts well, so as to get a maximum audience.

Start with the blog after yours on list. We suggest visiting five blogs a day and you are welcome to visit more!

Make new friends. Visit those who visit you. Return the follows of blogs you enjoy.

Each host has a section of the list and will visit you several times during the month.

We also have minions (assistants) who will help us. It is our goal to make sure all blogs on the list are participating. Ad sites, non-participants, and bad links will be removed as we find them.

Visit the A to Z Blog for updates and daily words of encouragement.

Bottom line – have fun!

If you have any questions, please ask. You can still sign up, so if you’re not on the A to Z Blogging Challenge list, add your name on there, NOW!

Do You Give Comment Love?

Recently, while doing the rounds of A to Z April Blogging Challenge it has come to my notice that some bloggers don’t get any comments at all, despite well-written posts, and others get dozens, despite a post which has nothing special to recommend it. This isn’t great for the blogging community.

With the Challenge in another 15 days or so, as a co-host I wanted to discuss this situation, and to help me do this, I’ve invited DL Hammons, another co-host, to Daily (w)rite.

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First off, I want to thank Damyanti for allowing me to hijack her blog for the day.  I wanted to take this opportunity to discuss the importance of community, cross promotion, and at the same time talk about a brand new way to share comment love.

Blogging from A to Z April Challenge

Being a co-host of the A to Z April Blogging Challenge has given me a chance to broaden my exposure to the outpouring of support the blogosphere has to offer.  Hands down, there is no better resource for aspiring writers. Information and experience is shared openly by multi-published authors, agents, editors, other industry professionals, even newbie writers attending their first conference.  The trick is learning how to shake off the insecurities that accompany being new, and just dive in.

I’m constantly reading how new bloggers are intimidated by this seemingly tight-knit community, taking a long time before they work up the courage to comment.  That’s funny, because comments are the life blood of blogging.  It’s the positive feedback received from these snippets of sunshine that motivates all of us to continue to churn out helpful material.  It’s also the Yin-Yang philosophy of the blogosphere that adds a different significance to commenting.  If you want to be noticed, then the best way is to do that is to comment, and comment often.

Insecure Writers!

 There have been many vehicles developed to help bloggers make connections with others just like them.  Blog hops, Blogfests, IWSG, and the A to Z Challenge are just a few examples.  But recently a worrisome trend has crept up where people feel they don’t get nearly as many comments as they make when participating in these events.  Whether this is true or not, a good rule of thumb is to treat every comment you leave as both a digital HUG…and an investment in your own imprint.  People tend to gravitate towards bloggers who comment frequently…and have something to say beyond “Nice Post.”

Blog Blitz

I recently invented something new, and it squarely revolves around commenting.  I call it the BLOG BLITZ.

Here’s how it works — after you sign up on the linky list (click on the badge), you’ll become a member of the Blog Blitz Team.  Then from time to time, I select a deserving blog (that must be part of the Blitz Team) and a specific date.  I then email the team members the information and on that date we all go out of our way to visit that blog and leave an encouraging comment on their most recent post.  I’m talking about hopefully a 100+ comments appearing out of the blue in one day!

At first I’ll pick who gets blitzed, but then I’ll start taking recommendations from other members for deserving targets. My only restriction about who joins the Blog Blitz Team is that your blog cannot be primarily for commercial gain.

Thanks again to Damyanti for sharing her space with me. If you take anything from my words today, let it be this…spread the comment love!

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DL Hammons

D.L. Hammons  enjoys taking a break from writing technical journals and procedure manuals for his day job and dabbling with novel writing or an occasional short story.  Son of a military family, he grew up across the southeast and ultimately graduated with a Business degree from Louisiana State University.  After a stint working in the big city (Atlanta), he packed up his family and settled in central Arkansas to be closer to family.  His love for writing was seeded in high school where he wrote both news and feature articles for the school paper, but it wasn’t until his children began heading off to college that he found the time to resurrect his passion for prose.  Although his first love falls into the Mystery/Suspense realm, he has recently discovered an interest in YA.  His short story Itinerary is scheduled to be published in AN HONEST LIE this spring.

What I Saw in Siem Reap

Daily (W)rite has been silent the past week. I’ve been in Siem Reap, Cambodia, mostly offline– climbing temple steps, tinkering with my camera, sampling local cuisine, listening to myths and legends, generally taking part in the tourism circus.

Back to regular programming in a while. In the meanwhile, here are some of the images from my camera:

Siem Reap Snapshots

A Social Media Hiatus This December

On Vacation til the New Year

I’ve been under the weather for the past weeks, which has slowed down the blog. I had planned a social media hiatus starting this December, but it came somewhat early.

So this blog, Amlokiblogs, my Twitter, Triberr, Facebook, Goodreads and G+ will all hibernate through December, and come alive on the 1st of January.

This is to give myself a much-needed break from online life, so I can focus on my health, family, and my writing.

In the meanwhile, wish you all the joys and blessings of the festive season, and see you in the New Year!

Have You Kissed a Mountaintop Without Trudging Up Its Slopes? #IWSG

Trudging Up the Mountain

The following post is for Insecure Writers Support Group hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh.

This is a picture taken by my dad, somewhere upwards of Nepal, on some off-the-map stretch of Tibet during his trek in the Himalayas, where the hourglass turns at a different pace, and the air is rare and thin. The Yaks make those bundles look small, but I’m sure they feel the weight just the same. Just as I do, writing chapter after chapter of my WIP. A lot of writers I meet online and off say that they enjoy writing. For me, I enjoy having written. And right now I feel the weight of all those unwritten chapters, and the air around me seems thin.

Prayer flags in the Himalayas

What I need, is to let go. Not of the writing, no; but of my ingrained instinct for perfection. I’ve been studying rewrites and editing for fiction classes I do with kids, and that seems to have rubbed off on me. I can let my inner perfectionist loose when I do rewrites. Not now, during the first draft.

Right now is the time to let my soul take flight, like these prayer flags from my Dad’s camera on that same trip. They seem to reach for that obscured peak, losing none of their colorful exuberance in the process. There is more than one way to climb a mountain, they seem to whisper to the winds. On some days,  you can kiss a mountain’s top without trudging up its slopes. Let the breeze bear you up, all you have to do is let yourself float.

Have You Kissed a Mountaintop Without Trudging Up Its Slopes?

Blogs I’ll NEVER Visit Again

Blogs I shall Never visit again

I’ll start with a confession: I’m not a model blog visitor in terms of the number of blogs I visit. I do 10-15 blogs a day at the max, other than in April, when I do more than 100 a day while hosting the A to Z Challenge. (If you don’t know about this challenge, I suggest you check it out.)

So for the 15 or so blogs I visit, I expect to be reading and commenting on all without a headache, and preferably within the hour. Not very ambitious, is it?

BUT. But.

I find some blogs that won’t let me do this. Not that anyone should care, but I have a headache from visiting my fair share of *such* blogs today, and I feel like listing out the sort of blogs I’ll never visit again:

1. Blogs with black backgrounds: You know the ones with an inky background, and light grey font? (I know you love Paranormal, but that doesn’t mean you have to torture your readers.) Or the ones with shiny pink or other neon colored fonts and icons on black? Flashy things in the sidebar? Not only would I never follow you, I would blacklist you if I could. I Love My Eyes, and won’t subject them to your blog.

2. Blogs that make me jump through hoops: If I like your post, I want to comment on it. If you make me cross-eyed with word verifications, or with the effort to find how to comment, or sign on to some vague service for the privilege, I’ll Pass. Thank You Very Much. Not following you either.

3. Blogs that do not believe in paragraphing: You might be the biggest Sherlock, Einstein or Dickens, but if you write in a dense chunk of 2000 words, my eyes would glide away after the first few lines. There’s a reason that Return key is there. Use it. I wouldn’t rush to the follow button on this.

4. Blogs written in terrible English: If you don’t have the time to learn the language you want to communicate with the world in, much less to proofread your posts, I don’t have time for you either. A few typos are acceptable (we’re all human), but not an entire glob of gobbledygook I have to try and make sense of. Next.

5. Blogs that thrive on controversy alone: I hate flame wars. Life is too short to indulge in negativity, to get attention or otherwise. Enough said.

Now that I’ve got it off my chest, I have to say that the sort of blogs I list above are in the minority. Or I’ve probably managed to weed them out of my blog circle. Mostly, I’m a happy camper, and I LURVE my blog buddies.  Sometimes, they are the only reason I blog.

Are there any blogs you would NEVER visit again? Is there anything on this blog that drives you crazy? Fire away in the comments!

Conventional Critics vs Book Bloggers: Whose Side Are YOU on?

Peter Stothard

Here’s an article I read on one of the conventional critics’ opinions on book bloggers:

“Sir Peter Stothard has edited the Times Literary Supplement (TLS) for almost a decade and spent the past seven months reading an “unnatural” 145 books on the search for this year’s Man Booker Prize. He has been left hugely critical over the decline in current standards of literary criticism, and says the rise of bloggers will leave the industry “worse off”.”Criticism needs confidence in the face of extraordinary external competition,” the former editor of The Times says. “It is wonderful that there are so many blogs and websites devoted to books, but to be a critic is to be importantly different than those sharing their own taste… Not everyone’s opinion is worth the same. Eventually that will be to the detriment of literature. It will be bad for readers; as much as one would like to think that many bloggers opinions are as good as others. It just ain’t so. People will be encouraged to buy and read books that are no good, the good will be overwhelmed, and we’ll be worse off. There are some important issues here.”

I totally disagree, and was happy to read Why book bloggers are critical to literary criticism.

What blogs can give readers is a sense of trust that, in professional circles, only the biggest lit-crit names – such as James Wood or Michiko Kakutani – can attain: a “criticism with personality”. They are expressing opinions about books in particular, and literature in general, based on a particular life of reading, written in a critical but non-technical language.

Do you think book bloggers help or harm?

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As an aside, I’d request you to go check out the chat I had with Zukiswa Wanner (Commonwealth Prize shortlister) and Rohini Chowdhury (multi-published, acclaimed author) on the A to Z Blog.

Positive Thoughts on a Sunday Morning

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

“Keep your thoughts positive because your thoughts become your words.

Keep your words positive because your words become your behavior.

Keep your behavior positive because your behavior becomes your habits.

Keep your habits positive because your habits become your values.

Keep your values positive because your values become your destiny.”

~Mahatma Gandhi

What Do You Do When You Feel a Rant Coming?

I’ve come across quite a few blogs where the owners tell us a story from a day in their life. Most of the time, it is about how miserable they are, how life sucks, how folks upset them.
I understand the need to vent, but something tells me that venting in public, and often, may just be detrimental– we’re sending out angst and negativity to the world in general– is that the sort of energy we would like to receive?

Yes, the ranters get sympathy, ‘get well soon’, and ‘feel better’, ‘hope it works out’ — and that helps soothe ruffled feathers. But for how long?

I myself have ranted, a rare once in a while, but nowadays, even when I feel like ranting, I tend to think twice.

What am I ranting about? Is there something I can do to mend the situation? If it is out of my control, will ranting help? Most of the times, I find that my rant dissipates if I give it time.I find I’d rather watch my aquarium fish instead.

Here’s a video of my old aquarium:

Reminds me I have to make videos of my new ones.

Long story short, that’s all it takes to distract the moneky-brain. Find something that soothes you and your rant need not appear in print at all.

What do you do when you feel a rant coming?

Procrastination is a Recipe for Happiness and Success

This blog has been on a long hiatus, I have procrastinated its coming back online– and today I found the perfect answer why.

This video I came across, talks about everything I want to say to myself and others after my hiatus. It is a long one, but I promise you, it is worth the 15 minutes it lasts.

All the time I haven’t written here, I’ve spent gathering my energies, working at my writing and at my life– and today, I feel strong enough to come and join this blog again as an active participant. Procrastination well-used, methinks–I used to hate this habit but I can now see it in a new perspective.

What about you? Do you Procrastinate? Are you frustrated with it?