Writing Tips and Favourite Places

I'm doing a double-take again this week on the Romance Writers Weekly Blog. I am the Production Manager at a small market television station, and one of the programs we produce is called QuizMe. Think of it as Jeopardy for elementary school children. We shoot fifteen half hour episodes over three days, and those three days are this weekend, April 22 to 24. So I'll be a wee bit busy, and won't have time to join the usual hop. But the topic was so interesting I didn't want to miss it, so I'm giving you another two-fer this week!

This week's topic is posed by Leslie Hatchel:

What is the most valuable thing you’ve learned about writing? Who did you learn it from?

I have learned so much about writing in the last few years (and am still learning, of course) so this was a bit difficult for me to narrow down. One of the simplest tricks I learned was to watch out for sentences that start with "There was…"  For example:
"There was a house on the corner of the block, standing forlorn and neglected, hiding behind a ragged hedge."
I learned to get right to the meat of the sentence:
"On the corner of the block stood a forlorn and neglected house, hiding behind a ragged hedge."
So now when I'm editing I keep a wary eye out for "There was…" sentences and zap them where they stand!

Next week's topic was suggested by A.S. Fenichel:

Where is your favorite place in the world and why? Share some pictures if you can. Does this place wind up in your books? Feel free to share more than one.

See what I mean about it being fun and interesting? Mr. C and I love to travel, and we've been lucky enough to visit some amazing places. It would be hard to narrow down a single one, so I thought I'd share a few of my favourites in photos. Check them out below.

I do put locations I've been in my books. For one thing, all but one of my books have a tie to Prince George, my hometown. And the one that doesn't is set in Vancouver, a beautiful British Columbia city I lived in for a couple years and visit often. NO LIFE BUT THIS, my most recent release, is set mostly on the Portuguese Island of Sao Miguel, Azores. Mr. C's parents emigrated from there in the 1950's, and we visited in 2013. While it wasn't the best vacation (my mother-in-law fell and broke her hip our second day there and spent the two weeks in hospital) we did at least get a chance to explore the culture and island.

I'd love to hear about your favourite places to go. I may even find some to add to my bucket list! And once you've done that, be sure to hop over to Leslie Hachtel and see what writing advice she thought was the best.