Wednesday links: Brackets, categories and horror caching

I love regularly reading tips and advice articles in certain subjects — particularly writing and publishing. I don’t always need the information right then, but I know that it’ll eventually come in handy. Or at least, I hope it will.

I know there are a lot of other people out there who feel the same way I do, but sometimes it can be difficult to find every useful advice article that’s out there. So I thought I’d bring you a few. Since I took advantage of the holiday and didn’t post last Wednesday, here are the tips and advice articles that jumped out at me the most this week.

1. The Saving Grace of Brackets, from QueryTracker Blog: We’ve all gotten stuck when we’re writing. And there are a lot of different ways we could handle that. Using brackets is something I’ve dabbled with before, but I think I may utilize them a little more often. Excerpt: “So when I got close to the ending for the manuscript I just completed, I decided to do something different: I didn’t write it. I knew I was going to get stuck writing the conclusion, and that whatever I came up with would suck, so I got 2/3 through the story, wrote a terrible ending that was way too fast-paced for the story, and started revising.”
2. Query Question: YA or Adult?, from Janet Reid: Some categories (and genres, too, of course) have quite a bit of crossover. And that means that sometimes, it can be a bit difficult to figure out which category your work belongs in. If you’re worried about what that means when it comes time to query, this post may set your mind at ease. Excerpt: “I know that I’m probably trying to seek out a definitive answer when there isn’t one, but the blurred lines between YA and Adult have me so confused as to who I should be targeting for my queries, especially if there’s the possibility of crossover later down the road. My concern is that I might be limiting myself when it comes to querying by choosing agents who rep one or the other.”

And a bonus: Fredericton writer invites readers to go horror caching, from CBC: This one isn’t advice so much as a cool story. A horror writer has hidden three scary stories in glass cylinders and is encouraging readers to find them using YouTube video clues and GPS coordinates. Excerpt: “The stories are about three witches who haunt the areas. He laminated them, put them in glass cylinders, and hid them. The YouTube video gives glimpses of the spots where the stories can be found. It also has coordinates that can be plugged into a GPS for further help.”