RTW- Best book of September

Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered.

This Week's Topic is: What was the best book you read in September?

The best book I read this month was The Princesses of Iowa by M. Molly Backes.

Even though I have lived in Minnesota for 13 years I grew up in Iowa. I went to high school in Iowa, I went to college in Iowa.

Reading this book was a little like visiting home for me and I seriously had to keep myself from getting in my car and taking a road trip to Iowa.

I felt like some of the characters in the book could have been people I knew. 

It was more than just Iowa me who liked this book Writer me like this book too. The main character, Paige, ends up in a creative writing class. Watching Paige find her voice and become a writer is something writers can relate to.

What was your favorite book of September?

Writing Dreams

Last month this post on Nova Ren Suma's blog got me thinking about one my particular dreams as a writer.

It took me a while to think about but then I realized a specific thing that is part of my writing dream.

My college has an alumni magazine. It contains the typical updates on lives of alumni- jobs, marriages, births, awards, deaths.

In the front of the alumni magazine is a section called "Pusha Da Pen" where books written by alumni are highlighted. A particular part of my writing dream is opening the Courier and seeing a book I've written highlighted in the pages of the alumni magazine.

Fortunately the alumni magazine arrives in my mailbox every quarter so I get to be reminded to this part of my dream every three months.

Have you read the post on Nova Ren Suma's blog? When you dream about writing what is a specific thing you dream about doing or seeing?

RTW- Writing in the digital age

Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered.

What word processing program do you use to write you manuscript, and can you share one handy trick you've learned in that program that has helped you while you write?

I've been a Mac owner for the last five years so I use Word for Mac. 

Currently my favorite thing is the "find" feature. Of course I keep adding to the list of things I need to find- I just added the word felt to my list of things to search and find.

My dad, a lifelong PC user who became an Apple product user a couple years ago when he bought an iPhone, gave me his iPad when he upgraded. This has been a great tool for writing on the go. On the iPad I use Pages, which I'm still learning, but I love that I can open my Word documents in Pages on the iPad. So far I've been successful in using the iPad as a writing tool instead of a thing to watch Netflix on.

The Kindle- Did you know your Kindle has an email address? It does. When it's time to read a draft I usually send it to my Kindle. I make notes in a notebook as I read through but this really allows me to read it on the go and keep returning to the draft through the revision process because I can take it anywhere to read it. I know there are people who print out each draft but I find this way much more efficient, for me. 

What program do you use to write in? Any tips?