The Lily Cafe Digest #21

A couple of weeks ago, I was thinking of changing my blog theme for, um, the (pick a number)th time. Which doesn’t really impact much anyways since I think at least half of my views are through the Reader, but, just in case someone is actually at the site, things would have looked different. But, as always happens when I look at the themes, nothing was jumping out at me and I realized I still don’t know what I want my blog to look like. It’s kind of sad; I’m now into my 5th year of doing this and I still have no idea what I want it to look like, much less what I want to do with it or what it’s purpose is. Well, stumbling through seems to be working, so I’ll keep tripping over my feet over here.

So, I did not decide to change my theme. Yet. But I did find a new way to shake things up a bit! Scroll on down to see the new way I’ve decided to do my Digests. In theory, if you click on the image, you should be taken to the post. I’m a little tech-challenged, so it might not actually be true. If I’ve completely goofed and it takes you to not the blog post, please let me know and I’ll frantically try to figure out where I went wrong.

Anyways, enough with the blog chatter. I’m now off for my week-long blogging break. I’m somehow already completely exhausted and my family hasn’t even started the point where it gets really busy and we start juggling ten balls at once (I’m not even coordinated enough to catch a single ball, so this ought to be interesting). But I’m hoping to get a bunch of posts at least written over the next week so, when I do have to disappear from March-May or longer, there will still be posts up here and there.

Oh, and I can’t forget about Sisters. I can see the end! It’ll continue to post well after I’m actually done writing it (in theory), but I’ve planned out the rest of the story chapter by chapter. I’ll write more on that at the beginning of March because I’m somehow organized enough to actually plan through part of April. It’s been so helpful that my kids have finally grown old enough to play independently with each other now and then. Of course, it means I have to defuse more arguments and sit them down and explain their age difference more often (3 years is just so oceanically huge right now), but I get more stretches of time to blog, write, and read.

Well, I’ll leave you here. I hope this Digest works the way I intended and I’ll see you next Monday!

Guest Posts

The Bookshelf

Book Reviews:

Fantasy and Sci-Fi

Women’s Fiction/Romance

Mystery and Thriller

Life Between the Pages:

Catch up on Sisters of String and Glass

Part 107 | Part 108 | Part 109 | Part 110 | Part 111 | Part 112 | Part 113 | Part 114 | Part 1115 | Part 116 | Part 117 | Part 118

Writing Files

Blog Posts I’ve Enjoyed from the Blogging Community

This is embarrassingly short because, as both my kids are doing school from home (one homeschooled and one doing online school), I have been insanely short on time. I tried to read as many blogs as I could, but have definitely had a hard time keeping up. I’m so sorry I’m not sharing more because there are so many incredible posts out there that I loved!

Culture from the little blog of everything – I love everything Brooke has to share and this one is no exception. I feel this one particularly hard, and I wonder how many people would be leading different lives if they had lived in the world she imagines.

Announcing Path2pub! Why I Founded It from Lucia’s Fiction – I love everything Lucia has been doing for the writing community. On her blog, she shares writing tips and advice, and now she’s created a new community for writers to share their advice, tips, and journeys. Right now, Path2pub is doing a whole month devoted to querying.

10 of the Most Romantic Books in Classic Literature from Pages Unbound – As Valentine’s Day is approaching, this one is entirely relevant, whether you enjoy classics or not.

Faithfully Thinking: The need for society to show more grace and less judgment from Boondock Ramblings – Lisa’s blog post title references faith, but her post is so much more than that. It speaks to the judgment people choose to pass on others and how we, as people, should be better and have more compassion instead of just jumping to judge without understanding.

How to START Writing A Book – Unwarranted Advice from Nopoodles – Since I’m planning on doing more writing this year, I can’t not share this post. I actually have the opposite problem where I can’t stop starting stories, but there might be someone out there who wants to write and might just need this advice.

Channeling Your Inner Writer from Joan Wiley – Another writing post, and it goes so well with the one above from Nopoodles. So, jump from some advice on how to get started to this one on how to start getting into that writing groove. Joan also talks about what to try when you’ve hit that dreaded writer’s block.

Top Five Adult Thrillers Pt. 1 from Writer Girls Book Reviews – After a series of disappointing thrillers last year, I’m feeling a little hesitant about them this year, but this list looks like a good one! They sound like just the reads to rekindle that love for thrillers.

Most Sincerely, kat

You can find a list of all the Digests plus some bloggers I adore over here