Bethany Henry: Writing & Wellness

Books are a wonderful magic. Here are some beautiful quotes for book lovers to celebrate books, reading, and writing.  1. “Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” – Neil Gaiman 2. “There is no friend as loyal as a book.” –Ernest Hemingway 3. “There are many little ways to enlarge your child’s world. Love of books is the best of all.” –Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis 4. “I do believe something very magical can happen when you read a book.” – J.K. Rowling 5. “I love books. I adore everything about them. I love the feel of the pages on my fingertips. They are light enough to carry, yet so heavy with worlds and ideas. I love the sound of the pages flicking against my fingers. Print against fingerprints. Books make people quiet, yet they are so loud.” – Nnedi Okorafor 6. “So many books, so little time.”–Frank Zappa 7. “You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me.” – C.S...

I have a confession to make. Sometimes I try to do too many things at once. Confession number two- I do this a  lot  actually. I’m often pretty good at doing a lot of things at once… Which actually becomes a problem because then I think I can continue scheduling 10 appointments into an 8 hour work day or plan to cook dinner, clean the house, respond to emails, and keep my kids happy all at the same time and expect it to work. (Spoiler alert- it doesn’t.) Even if the tasks all get done, I end up burnt out and cranky. And more often than not, something gets forgotten or messed up. When we juggle too many things into our days we may be able to keep them going for a short while but it doesn’t leave any room for things to go wrong. Because this is life, people. We wake up sick. The car gets a flat tire. I live in New England and it’s practically a guarantee we’ll get a snowstorm whenever we have someplace important to be. When our deadlines and schedules are maxed out we don’t have...

Lately I’ve been on a reading kick and Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder is one of my recent finds. Today we’re going to look at 8 informative “laws” from Save the Cat! that will guide and enrich our writing. First a quick intro: Save the Cat! is by Blake Snyder and is subtitled “The Last Guide on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need.” “Now hold up,” you’re saying. “I thought we were talking about writing novels?” In this book, Snyder brings us years of experience and a comprehensive understanding of what makes stories work (and not work). Whether our stories take place on screen or in novels, the lessons remain true. Obviously there are some items in the book that aren’t relevant to novel writers. Feel free to check out the Novel Writing adaption of the book if you want a more directly applicable approach. And now, onward to our laws! These are taken from the end of the book after Snyder goes over pacing, structure, and other critical story info as well as stories of his own ...

Today we’re going to walk through how to set up a website. It doesn’t need to be stressful to create something that will be useful for you! I’ve gone through this process somewhat recently myself so I’ll be sharing what I’ve done (or wish I’d done haha) along with resources that may work for you. Last month we looked over goals for our website so if you haven’t checked that out, now would be a good time to do so. Having a general idea of what we want our website to be like will help as we get started. No pressure if you don’t have it all figured out yet though, there will be plenty of chances to change things up as we move along! Website Building Step by Step Prep Step: Decide the basics of what kind of website you want to build. What do you want your website to do for you? What are your goals? This will influence what type of website you build. Are you looking for a basic online calling card? You may want to build an extremely simple website with some information ab...