Camp NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month - is the month for writers, where they set a challenge of 50,000 words for themselves and write furiously alongside thousands of other writers.

The Office of Light and Letters, the mother organization of NaNoWriMo, is putting together another challenge this year. In light of funding, they had to cut this year's Script Frenzy - but they redesigned Camp NaNoWriMo, an offshoot of their Young Writers' Program, to allow for another time period of fervent writing.

In April and in July, writers across the world are banding together to create their own word goals, for whatever they wish to write. Join Camp NaNoWriMo today to be a part of this great community. For an added bonus, let Palm Harbor Library know that you are joining Camp NaNoWriMo. By providing your username for the competition, you will be signed up for an exclusive Camp PHL newsletter every week and the opportunity for feedback, more immediate word count competitions, and prizes!

I'll be writing as Samma Lynne. I'm still deciding just what to write! ;) So many choices, only two months!

YALSA Reading Challenge

A good challenge can be just the fire needed to get moving on a great goal - like reading more. YALSA is presenting a challenge that has some great bragging rights and the chance to win a bookworm's dream prize - a tote full of 2012 and 2013 YA Lit titles! Follow this link to learn more:

http://www.yalsa.ala.org/thehub/2013/02/03/yalsas-2013-hub-reading-challenge-begins/

Speaking of reading challenges, this is a great challenge to combine with the reading challenge presented by Goodreads!

http://www.goodreads.com/challenges/940-2013-reading-challenge

There is no physical prize at the end of this rainbow, but the satisfaction of setting and attaining a reading goal. And, hey, it might coincide nicely with the summer reading program coming up soon (which will feature a contest with prizes)!

Secret Lives Of

For children and teens, interest in a TV show or a video game usually denotes a limited reading resource. Sometimes the same holds true for a book series - hype may interest someone into reading one series, but that interest may not carry over into branching out to read other books. Fanfiction creates a bridge between the non-literary and an impossibly vast world of literature.

While “fanfiction” may not be considered by all to be literature, it is words on a page - words that may be more interesting to a reluctant reader than a published writing. Fanfiction brings characters to life in a whole new way that is more understandable to struggling readers because they might have been written by that reader’s peers.

Fanfiction not only encourages reading, but it can inspire writing as well. Fans of a series will often want to know more about characters and events- and fanfiction gives them a chance to decide what that “more” is for themselves.

The Palm Harbor Library will be offering Fanfiction workshops, exercises, discussions, contests, and more through the website Figment. We are running a private group called The Secret Lives Of, in which we will promote reading, writing, and sharing. You can find it here: http://figment.com/groups/12684-The-Secret-Lives-Of Please feel free to sign up today and get ready to start the new year off with a bit of magic and wonder.

Figment

Social media has become the way to share ideas. Facebook keeps us in touch with the daily lives of our friends, Pinterest gives us a place to collect bookmarks in a fun new way, Tumblr shows off all the great things we find the moment we find them - no more forgetting to share a picture later!

Social media websites to share writing have existed, but never in so bright and fun a way as Figment.com currently offers. In the past websites, like sister sites FictionPress.com and FanFiction.net, have provided a place for anyone to share what they have written in a very efficient manner, but websites that provided a place to share and a cozy and fun atmosphere have been lacking. Figment.com, however, is changing that, one young writer at a time.

Figment.com looks like how one might imagine a teen-based coffee lounge would appear. Many writers on the site are tweens, teens, and young adults, and reading works by your peers and sharing your own work with your peers seems to have made a boom in the writing world.

Encouraging writing in any form - be it nonfictional essays for school or fantastical fiction on the side - improves language skills at any age, and Figment definitely knows how to make it fun. Add to that their daily offerings of inspiration and idea springboards and a multitude of writing contests, and there's little that Figment can't do to encourage people of all ages to write every day.

There's a Samma Lynne on Figment.com! I'll slowly be sharing writing from all stages of my writing career under that username, if you would like to explore my little worlds, or share with me any of your own stories!