Tag Archives: Videan Unlimited

Our Words, Music, and Village community

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Looking for details on faerie portals and Faeries’ Tales?
Visit our Absolutely Wild! web page.

The Latest…
(updated 6/7/2023)

The next roundtable gathering of the Alliance for Literary Writers, Authors, & Yabbering Scribes (ALWAYS) writers’ collective, will take place at: 11:30 a.m., Thurs., June 8, 2023, at Mimi’s restaurant in Chandler, AZ. Our established authors will meet in-person to discuss an ALWAYS nonfiction anthology revealing our author origin stories.

Avatar for Book Shepherd Ann Narcisian Videan

Come on in!
     I’m so glad you’ve found our little online community! Here, we share ideas to create and market better writing, music, and “village.”
     Throw in a few “Coffee CommuniTea” coffee and tea-shop reviews, and we’re golden, right? What better places for writing, enjoying music, and creating community?
     Our goal is to generate success together, using fresh tactics to get the ‘verse buzzing about cool creative endeavors. Come in and join us…
—Ann

………..

Write on!
Ann Narcisian Videan, Book Shepherd
Write • Edit • Publish

P.S. Learn more about my novels on my Amazon Author Central page.

Find me elsewhere online.

 

Ann Videan’s Phoenix-area writing events this spring:

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Ann with her books at the Tempe Public Library

You may benefit from these writing events…

Alliance for Literary Writers, Authors, and Yabbering Scribes (ALWAYS)

Meet in-person with the ALWAYS writers’ tribe of established authors to discuss writing and support one another. In March, we’re talking about the structure of the ALWAYS group and how to better interact with and support one another. I hope you can join us! (We meet the second Thursday of each month in Gilbert, except for the first Thursday of each quarter when we meet in Phoenix.)
Romeo’s Euro Cafe, downtown Gilbert, AZ
11:30 a.m., Thurs., March 14, 2019

My Words Jump Off The Page!
[A presentation at the Society of Southwestern Authors—Valley of the Sun Chapter.]

Authors, learn a handful of writing and editing techniques to help you discover ways to build visual imagery and emotion, and subconsciously compel readers into your story. I’ll share my thirty years of marketing experience to show you how to make your story “jump off the page” for readers and publishers. In this two-hour hands-on session, explore:

  • The edits I make most often as an editor
  •  What to look for when hiring an editor
  • Leveraging the scene question to develop a compelling plot line
  • Writing with active voice, and deep point-of-view
  • More effective editing tips using MS Word

Tempe Public Library
2:30–4:40 p.m., Sunday, April 28, 2019

Write on!
Ann Narcisian Videan, Book Shepherd
Write • Edit • Publish • Word-of-mouth strategy

P.S. Learn more about my novels on my Amazon Author Central page.

 

Prepare for perfect publishing — ALWAYS

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ID-10029251Join us for the September 2014 gathering of the Alliance for Literary Writers, Authors & Yabbering Scribes (ALWAYS).

Our discussion will center around everything you want to know about self-publishing your books and others’. Karen Mueller Bryson, multi-published author and publisher of Short On Time Books, will share her best practices at our gathering. She’ll  have back-up from other self-published authors and literary consultants in the group as well.

Buy your own lunch, share a tip, and reap the rewards of our informal get-together with other established authors.

Next gathering:
Thursday Sept. 11, 2014
11:30 a.m.–1 p.m.
(ALWAYS meets on the second Thursday of the month.)

Where:
Romeo’s Euro Café
(downtown GIlbert, AZ)
207 N. Gilbert Rd. #105
Gilbert, Arizona 85234
(480) 962-4224

Back-up location:
Joe’s BBQ
301 N. Gilbert Rd.
Gilbert, AZ 85234
(480) 503-3805

Cost:
A writing tip, and the price of your own lunch.

RSVP:
PLEASE show the consideration of reserving your spot at the table by:
• RSVPing through the “Join” link on our Facebook Event page
or
• Contacting Ann Videan, avidean@videanunlimited.com

If you’ve RSVP’d, please SHOW UP. If you run into a conflict, please let me know BEFORE the event so Ann can make the necessary adjustments for the group meeting. Cheers!
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ABOUT ALWAYS

• Need contacts to help your writing?
• Want advice about your writing?
• Like to hang with other cool writers?

If so, our tribe – the Alliance for Literary Writers, Authors & Yabbering Scribes (ALWAYS) – is the place for you. We’re an informal group of established writers looking for camaraderie, ideas, enlightenment and connection with writers, especially in the Phoenix metro area, to talk about our craft and businesses.

Any established writer can connect with us online through our ALWAYS Facebook page, get listed in our directory of writers on our ALWAYS LinkedIn page, or you can meet with us in person at a lunch meeting. We’d love to have any experienced writer join us at our next meeting … anyone who spends a significant part of his/her week writing, and wants to rub elbows with other writers.

#1 Writing tip: Passive vs. active voice

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Ann Videan at Souvia Tea

Passive:
For her Coffee CommuniTea (CCT) blog, Ann had visited the Souvia Tea Shop and had found this perfect tea-shirt.
Active:
Ann explored the Souvia Tea Shop for her Coffee CommuniTea blog and discovered this perfect tea-shirt.
(Visit Ann’s CCT watering hole reviews at https://anvidean.com/coffee-communitea/.)

My main pet peeve when editing involves the overuse of passive voice. I don’t mean past tense, where you’re describing things that happened before. But passive voice, which uses far too many “to be” verbs and far too few active verbs.

Passive verbs = is leaping, are creating, have experienced, was learning, were thinking, have been choosing.

Active verbs = leaps, create, experienced, learned, thought, chose.

Your goal? Communicate your message in the most compelling, concise manner to intrigue customers and get them talking, right? Here’s how…

Your message jumps off the page when you use active voice. Plus, you shorten the length of your writing by one-third. (This most valuable tip takes into consideration the on-screen scanning that people – myself included – use as an excuse  for reading these days.)

Active voice takes  practice, but simply watch for “to be” verbs followed by words ending in “-ed” or “-ing” and replace them with active verbs. Example:
Passive: The voice was mesmerizing to the student.
Active: The voice mesmerized the student.

Also, try to start your sentences with the subject and use an active verb to describe what the subject does. Example:
Passive: The young girl was overwhelmed by the depths of the woman’s presence.
Active: The woman’s deep presence overwhelmed the young girl.

Employ these two tips alone and just watch your writing become much more effective!

Tell me about your main editing pet peeve.