Write What You Love

by Shannon Fay

The one piece of advice I would give new writers is to not just to write what you know but to write what you love. Maybe you love astronomy and have a head full of constellations, or you have a gift for languages, or you’re an expert in some field or hobby. These things that interest you, that take up your idle time, use these things in your stories. Your knowledge on the subject will give your story more credibility and your passion will give it life.

And the things you love don’t always have to be so specific. Maybe you love unconventional narratives and finding new ways to tell a story. Maybe you love rousing adventures that make the reader forget their troubles here on the ground. Or maybe you think often about how men and women relate to one another, or how parents and children relate to each other, or how people in general relate to each other. Figure out what interests you and cultivate it.

There have been times when I’ve grown stuck while writing, working myself deeper and deeper into a rut the like a wheel spinning in the mud. The most frustrating thing was that there was nothing technically wrong with the stories I was working on: the plotting was sound, the words at the very least in the right order, but there was something missing. I didn’t care. And why didn’t I care? Because I just didn’t care. There was nothing I loved in the story. Usually this happens because I’m so focused on writing something technically good that I stop writing about things I care about. Instead of following my passions I end up following trends, tapping into the popular consciousness rather than my own. And that’s when I get stuck.

There are stories only you can write. They might end up being very weird and/or personal stories, and they’ll probably be rejected a lot. But that just means that when they do connect with someone, the connection is all the stronger.

Write what you love sounds like obvious advice, and it is. In fact, new writers usually have a better handle on it than writers further along the path (in which case maybe this post should be about advice I’d give to ‘old writers’ instead of advice I’d give to new writers, not that I feel overly qualified giving advice to anyone). But it’s something that’s easy to lose sight of. So, even after you’ve written thousands upon ten thousands of words, remember what you love.

Shannon Fay is a freelance writer/assistant bookstore manager living in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She has recently won the James White Award and has had several short stories published in a variety of genres.

Learn more about Shannon Fay on her website.

How to use pearls, the Couture way

Armani Privè 2009 via Pearls and Chains

Above you can see what king Giorgio does best, amaze! This is an outstanding top made of strands of pearls. 
The single strand of pearls around your neck is perfect for almost any occasion and it's so chic, but what's beyond it? What can you do with pearls (lots of them) and what can they do for you (make you look unique)?

Pearls are really popular this spring thanks to Chanel's big, chunky bracelets and necklaces (see how to DIY yours here).
Discover below what couturiers do with millions of pearls and an army of seamstresses.
Don't be scared! If you want to obtain some of these look you can skip the exhausting sewing hours  with a simple trick.

Francesco Scognamiglio s/s 2011 via Theimportanceofclothes

Diane Von Furstenberg spring 2013 shoes via TheLuxurySpot

Acne ss 2011 via TheChicDepartment

High - low mix. Sporty proportions and delicate pearls.

Victor&Rolf a/w 2001 via gidgetbowden

Ok these are more beads than pearls but the effect is stunning and it can be done with pearls as well.

Alexander McQueen a/w 2009 via gidgetbowden

Baroque headpiece.

Chanel s/s 2012 via FashionTelegraph

Pearls to decorate a bag.

Balmain fall 2012 pic via babes in balenciaga

Balmain baroque dress. DIY your own Balmain inspired trousers here.

Chanel fall 2010 pic via moodboard

Jewels for the body. Pearls give their best effect when they can move. See the beautiful swinging pearls on this dress.

Chanel fall 2010 via moodboard

Chanel fall 2010 via moodboard

 Chanel fall 2010 via gidgetbowden

Pearls as sleeves.

Anna Sui spring 2013 via stylebistro

Chanel spring 2013 via parischerie

Alexander McQueen fall 2013 via Vogue

Pearls on tights.

McQueen spring 2012 via theimportanceofclothes

This effect could be obtained on a smaller scale with glue on flat back  pearls I think.

Bolts of Lightning

by Chris Pavesic

Speculative fiction has been a favorite genre of mine for years. I like the ideas in the fiction; I like the short story length. It gives a writer a chance to work on his/her craft; in essence, it gives a writer a chance to be a wordsmith.

Writing comes down to creating connections—making that momentary bridge between the writer and the readers—and those connections are made through words. In its basic sense, writing is a means of transmitting the thoughts and images that reside in a writer’s brain to a reader in the most effective and accurate fashion. In a letter to George Bainton in 1888, one of my favorite authors, Mark Twain, described the desire for this accuracy in the following way: “The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter--it's the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.”

This is what I look for in speculative fiction—words or phrases that can make that connection between the reader and the writer with the force of a bolt of lightning. This is what I search for as a reader and this is what I strive for as a writer—the amount of impact that will make a story memorable.

Recently I had that “lightning bolt” reaction when reading Ken Liu’s speculative fiction story, “The Paper Menagerie.” A friend of mine had a similar reaction when reading Brian Grigg’s “Wendell, Custodian of the Galaxy,” published in the March, 2013 issue of Penumbra (a story that I really enjoyed as well!). What causes that “lightning bolt” reaction with a reader? I know when it happens to me as a reader, but it is something I continue to work on each time I put a metaphoric pen to paper.

Many of my short stories start out a great deal longer than their finished versions. I pare them down, looking for those essential words or phrases that will connote as much meaning to a reader as an entire paragraph. This is not an easy task; changing one paragraph can alter the entire meaning of the story. This is where multiple drafts come in, and why I am grateful for the technology we have today. I can save one version of a story, make changes, and go back to the first version if I prefer it with a mere click of a mouse button. (I almost cannot imagine writing and revising with pen and paper the way that Twain did!)

If all this goes well, I will create a connection to my readers with my words. They will interiorize the thoughts and images from my writing. They will see the characters, experience the emotions, and wander in the storyscape I create. We will have that momentary bridge of understanding, complete with a lightning bolt or two.

Chris Pavesic lives in the Midwestern United States and loves Kona coffee, fairy tales, and all types of speculative fiction. Her story, “Going Home,” is the featured story in the June, 2013 issue of Penumbra. Between writing projects, Chris can most often be found reading, gaming, gardening, working on an endless list of DIY household projects, or hanging out with friends.

Stay in touch with Chris on her blog.

5 designers bring 5 manicure ideas

Chanel spring 2013 manicure by Miss Lady finger

This Chanel suit is perfect. The proportions are young, colours are fresh, the grid is modern. Its manicure version is also interesting.

4 more nail  ideas after the jump.

Diego Binetti triple tiered pearl manicure via Huffinton post

Ok, this is very unpratical, but it's really different. I mean, who would have thought about stacked fake nails?
I had to show you.

Prada japanese flowers manicure by  MichelleOhtman

Kate Spade spring 2013 via StyleBistro

There are a lot of stylish grid patterns this season but this one by Kate Spade is my favorite. It's simple and comes in bright colours, very picnic chic.

Libertine fall 2013 jewel mani via Huffingtonpost

Why not add studs to nails too? These nails decorated with rhinestuds on a gold base look like a byzantine jewel. Very precious!

P.M. GRIFFIN GOES LIVE!

Romance novelist Bernadette Walsh interviews science fiction and fantasy writer P.M. Griffin Sunday May 26 at 7:30 p.m. EST on Nice Girls Reading Naughty Books. Please stop in to cheer P.M. on.

To watch the interview live please click HERE or go to: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/bernadettewalsh/2013/05/26/nice-girls-reading-naughty-books--pm-griffin

Pauline (P.M.) Griffin's Irish love of story telling coupled with her passion for history, the natural world, and research have resulted in seventeen novels and ten short stories, two Muse Medallion Award winners among them, all in the challenging realms of science fiction and fantasy.

She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her cats Jinx, Katie, and Nickolette and three tropical fish aquariums and devotes just about every 'spare' moment to writing, research, and reading.

To read excerpts from P.M. Griffin's books released by Musa Publishing, please click HERE.

It's not the average sheer skirt, DIY it!

Sheer skirt DIY tutorial -DIY demanta bag - DIY walnut bracelet

You can renew any skirt from your wardrobe. I sewed mine from scratch and I added a curved edge at the waist.

Featured in almost every spring collection, sheer clothes are a season must have. You can choose how much skin to show according to the occasion and your personal style. Get into the season mood and DIY your unique sheer skirt with a pair of scissors and some sheer fabric. Why shouldn't it be called an average sheer skirt? Because with this technique, that I also used in this man shirt makeover , you can cut the skirt wherever you want and there's no need of any pattern, you're free to make the skirt that you want! I'll show you how. I was inspired by Stella McCartney for the curved hems and the color combination. The skirt I used is a knee-length one made it more interesting by the sheer panel that goes behind the skirt.  Ready to renew a skirt from your wardrobe?

Follow the step by step tutorial on Style.it

Liked this post?

See another DIY dress inspired by Stella McCartney 

See another sheer skirt DIY

See all the DIY skirts

Are You a Science Fiction Writer?

by John Deakins

Never mind what you write: what do you read? Scientists and technologists who never write SF themselves, read it continually. They may not always recognize bad writing, but they’ll immediately spot a scientific or logical blunder. Science fiction has a better educated readership than that of bodice ripper romances. Listen as your SF-reading friends rip into some recently released SF film. Want more readers? Your current readers can make your book by word of mouth, but those readers can kill your book the same way. The Ignore It approach to scientific road-blocks may not be enough.

Live With It

Science is cold, hard, and unyielding, but it won’t let you down on consistency. If you’re stymied by missing FTL drives, write a story with slower-than-light interstellar transport. If it’s too dangerous to land on an alien planet, create a way to make contact without landing. If you can’t use your time machine for time travel, use it for space travel. Real science happens all the time. Most of what happens within our solar system follows fairly simple Newtonian physics, never mind Einstein. That’s a huge canvas on which to paint your word pictures.

You have before you enormous possibilities within Science. Mars doesn’t have multiply armed green Martians, but what it does have is fascinating, even if it is hard, cold, and unyielding.

Unexplained Science.

You don’t have to explain how your SF technology works; you only have to name it. In fact, the more you explain it, the sillier your explanations will sound to anyone who actually knows science. Some stories need controlled time travel, faster-than-light speed, and the ability to smooze with aliens, but the smart author will tiptoe around hard-science details of exactly how those things are accomplished.

The biggest danger of unexplained science lies inside the writer. We know our science. “Unexplained” makes us itch. It’ll be hard not to yield to the pressure to throw in “subspace” devices or “tachyon pulses.” Hollywood pimps are eager for more “drama” in their SF. They know no science, but they’re full of hackneyed “science fiction” ideas. (Well . . . they’re full of something.) Their “science” explanations stink up the genre; flawed logic flows from mainstream media as from a ruptured sewer line. How easily unexplained science crosses over into partially explained fantasy! On the west coast, that’s a mighty thin line. Nevertheless, it’s a line that we shouldn’t cross.

It’s time now to take on the behemoths of science fiction. We’ll beat them into submission, and then harness them to pull our stories. The blogs that follow are full of story “hooks.” If one snags you, go with it If you get that literary gestalt, when a story leaps full-blown into your mind, quit reading this and write that story. When you do, you’ve made this work a success.

John Deakins, B.A., M.S.T. is a four-decade veteran of the science classroom and author of his own fantasy series Barrow.

To read an excerpt from Barrow book one, please click HERE.

On Writing Advice

by Michael Hodges

Writing advice all tends to blend into wallpaper. And soon it becomes like that old peeling stuff in your kitchen you pretend isn’t there as you glance back down at your coffee cup. I could write about using too many “ly” adverbs, or not to use “and” too often in one sentence (Mr. McCarthy would disagree), or even suggest copies of On Writing or The Elements of Style. I could say “find your voice”…something I think is more about writing a lot and consuming stimulants than performing Jedi mind tricks. These are all fine things. But you probably know them.

Discussing one aspect of writing will almost certainly segue to others. There’s an ecosystem here, an unavoidable connection. We void these connections at our own peril.

In our daily paths, we try to make that separation. We are closer to the plump raccoon that sneaks onto our porch at night than we like to think. There are things out there—living, breathing things that share our space in this world. The raccoons, the bats, the geese, the frogs, this frenetic symphony amongst the soggy parks and brown rivers that we pass on our way to Costco or whatever the next big box store is. If we are holding coffee, perhaps we can avert our gaze once more.

We are slaves to the sun. We are forced to wake and sleep, wake and sleep in the rhythms that have brushed this planet for billions of years. But today, and maybe just today, you are free. The world is more than credit and bills and our paths amongst the strip malls.

What is real? What is important?

Writing is one of them. You know this or you wouldn’t be here. And I guess this leads me to pluck a single focal point for this piece:

Awareness.

It’s the writer’s best friend. Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips, in their classic song “Do You Realize” asked, Do you realize, we’re floating in space?

No shit. We’re floating in space. Once you are aware of this truism, you are already ahead of the game. The writer, at his or her desk is at that moment, floating in space. Your mind is the sun, your hands the rain, your writing software the caked plains of Northern Africa.

What is important? What moves you? Can you feel all of this about you? The violence and the love and the dying and birthing? There are few things we have control over. Writing is one of them.

So go. Create your own universes within universes. Today, you are the creator, and the characters in your stories will wake and rest to the sun of your mind.

Michael Hodges resides in Chicagoland, but often dreams of the Northern Rockies. His work has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies. He is represented by FinePrint literary, and hard at work on a new novel. You can find out more on his website.

Gold shoes to die for

Zara shoes pic via Jamie Fashion

Sergio Rossi shoes

It's Monday again. You're at work with plenty of things to do, but with an eye outside the window. The weather is getting warmer and as the sun enlightens your workspace you're already picturing yourself on vacation. Big sunglasses and big smile, a floaty maxi dress and nothing to do but relax. Wait, what shoes are you planning to wear? If you've been too busy to check out some gorgeous spring shoes let me show you a few exciting pairs with something in common: gold details. I'm particularly taken by the designs with the metal plated heel. Sergio Rossi's shoes have a lot of things going on, colors, patterns and the gold plated heel, but all the elements work well together, they are an outstanding pair of shoes in my opinion. Zanotti never ceases to amaze and if you were tired of seeing studs everywhere (because they've been so popular for a couple of years now) well, you may change your mind watching Tom Ford's  "porcupine" studded wedges. They're awesome.


Di nuovo Lunedì. Siete a lavoro con mille cose da fare ma vi distraete guardando fuori dalla finestra. Basta un po' di sole che illumina la scrivania ed ecco che vi immaginate già in vacanza. Occhiali da sole, un vestito che vi accarezza le caviglie ad ogni passo e un bel sorriso di chi, senza pensieri può dedicarsi al relax. Aspettate un momento, che scarpe indosserete?  Ecco una selezione di scarpe estive con un comun denominatore: il dettaglio oro. Un particolare che, rispetto all'anno scorso è passato dalla punta al tacco. Stampa, colore e oro, le zeppe di Sergio Rossi sono un perfetto mix di trend estivi. Se non ne potete più delle borchie, perchè negli ultimi anni sono spuntate dappertutto, vi ricrederete guardando le zeppe firmate Tom Ford, un'irresistibile cascata di aculei dorati.

Zanotti shoes - Topshop senso metal shoes

Sergio Rossi metal plated heel shoes

Zanotti gold metallic shoes

Fred Butler spring 2013

Tom Ford Studded gold shoes

When designers use safety pins, get inspired!

McQ pic via my fashion connect

the making of safety pin heads pic via the x-stylez

Safety pins are a classical DIY material. They're easy to use, suitable for a lunch break diy and they istantly give an egdy look to a piece of clothing. Safety pins are not only a diy-er best friend. Designer have used them successfully to create incredible work of art. Sometimes they used an unbelievable number of pins or used giant ones to make a statement.
Get inspired by their work and take your crafts to a whole new level.

Le spille da balia sono molto usate nel fai da te. Sono facili da usare, veloci da appuntare e danno un tocco punk a qualunque capo. Ma non sono usate solo dagli appassionati dei lavori manuali. Famosi stilisti le hanno usate inserite ripetutamente in incredibili abiti di alta moda, a volte a migliaia in un solo capo oppure scegliendole enormi. Fatevi ispirare dalla loro creatività e vedrete che anche i vostri lavori raggiungeranno le vette dell'alta moda. 

randomly placed safety pin jumper by McQueen pic via the x-styles

McQueen safety pin dress 

Tom Binns necklace

Charlotte Olympia sefety pin shoes and clutch pic via telegraph

Moschino neckline decorated with pins pic via a pair and a spare

House of Sprouse safety pin top pic via imagist

Versace safety pin dress from Met Chaos to Couture exhibition pic via shop this

Moschino safety pin dress 1980 pic via 1stdbs

Kirkwood safety pin shoes pic via shoelust

McQueen safety pin belt pic via popscreen

Christopher Kane for Versus big safety pin shoes

Shabby Apple giveaway winner + discount for everyone

Thanks for joining the Shabby Apple giveaway. It's time to announce the winner. Congratulations to Heidi that won the $75 Shabby Apple gift card. The Shabby Apple team will send you the code of your gift card.







One prize and sadly just one winner,  BUT Shabby Apple just contacted me offering a special 10% off discount for every Matter of Style reader! 

Enjoy your 10% discount over Shabby Apple with the code: matterofstyle10off