Nearly One Year On!

I can't believe that with just one month to go, I will have been a student of WB for one year, and yet I have  completed just two assignments! 

I can only apologise to myself for the dwindling enthusiasm of the course, and I have no excuse. I could, of course, say that 'life is taking over'- but at the end of the day, I am just not motivated enough to finish assignment three and start number four.

I did, however, receive good comments from my tutor on my first two assignments, although to be honest, I wasn't too enamoured at my tutor's, 'see this post for advice on dialogue punctuation' with an html link to their blog/website, comment on my second assignment.

Don't get me wrong, I don't mind having errors pointed out to me, I expect that and I am all for people advertising their websites, blogs and books  at every opportunity. But I do take exception at having blatant adverts linked to advice comments on my course work, especially when the comments referred to two, (yes, just two) 'dialogue punctuation' errors, in a 1,180 word short (mostly dialogue) story. My 'errors' were typographical ones, where I'd missed a comma before, 'he said' in one place and I used a capital letter instead of a lower case letter in another.

Nevertheless, I decided, what the heck, as my tutor is a published writer, I'll have a look at the article. Who knows, there may be something on punctuation that I don't know, or something new and I clicked on the link. The article was good, for someone who knew absolutely nothing about dialogue punctuation and was new to writing.  As I said, my two errors were typographical. There was, however, a link in the article referring to the tutor's  'checklist for writers' book and thinking there would be a more detailed resume of the book, and other tips and advice that I would find useful, I clicked on that link. I was taken directly to Ebay with a view to purchasing the book.

There were mixed reviews from other buyers and even though I didn't really need another advice book on punctuation, dialogue or otherwise, as the book (rrp £9.99 which I think is reasonable for a good writing instruction book) was being sold brand new for £5.82 with free delivery, and my tutor had written it, I bought it. At least I can add it to my rather extensive library. :-)

Was it a good buy? Well, to be honest, it's not the best resource book on writing, but it was easy to read and will be helpful for anyone who is just starting out. There are some good tips on sending in articles to magazines, and I will keep it in my collection simply because my tutor co-authored it.


Think I ought to get back to my assignments.

Keep smiling, keep laughing and keep writing.