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I would like to thank Signe Olynyk of The Great American Pitchfest, www.pitchfest.com  for forwarding the following secrets to writing success by Pen Densham.

Secrets to Writing Success 

Pen Densham, co-founder of Trilogy Entertainment Group, considers himself a triple-hyphenate: a writer-producer-  director. He and his partner John Watson have been Oscar Nominated twice, have produced 15 features and over 300 hours of television. He writes for both TV and feature films and is personally responsible for reviving 'The Outer Limits' and 'The Twilight Zone' series to television, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, and many more. This year he is one of the Producers on Phantom – written and directed by Todd Robinson, starring David Duchovny and Ed Harris. His personal favorite is Moll Flanders, which he wrote and directed, starring Robin Wright and Morgan Freeman. Pen also teaches as an adjunct professor at USC Film School. His book on screenplay writing for publisher Michael Wiese is - "Riding the Alligator: Strategies for a Career in Screenplay Writing ...And Not Getting Eaten”
 
1. Write from your heart! As a writer, trust your instinctual creativity and write from your passion. When you don't value what you create, why should anybody else? When you chase a fad or a fashion that is not from your heart in an effort to sell something, there is a danger that when obstacles come, you will quickly abandon your efforts. When you love what you are working on, it feels less like work and more like a personal discovery. It brings your original and unique voice to the front. Even when you are hired to write, bring your authenticity to the game. Passion is a great way to help immunize yourself from the pain and uncertainty of the artistic process. And sometimes it can be enrapturing.

Things are beautiful if you love them.
Jean Anouilh

2. Don’t worry about rules. Collect ideas any way they come. Write the way things feel to you. Have fun! A well laid-out script with no feeling is crap no matter what. I often break the supposed “cardinal” rules. I write my scripts partly as poetry, I write my characters’ thoughts in the descriptions, I write in BLOCK LETTERS to make points. I call it “fusion writing.” Write from your voice. Imagine there is a roof inside your head that limits your upward thinking. Now reach in and toss it away. Your personal creative universe is up there! A fresh, inventive, and passionate script is more likely to sell. More likely to attract major actors. More likely to satisfy and grow you as an artist. 

Rules and models destroy genius and art.
William Hazlitt

3. Don’t overwhelm yourself. Scripts are not as complex as they seem. Movies are really short stories. If you took all the white space out of a feature script and looked at it just as prose, there are probably only 40 to 60 pages’ worth of words. Features usually break down into three acts:  beginning, middle, and end. (Maybe in a shuffled order if you use flashbacks).
 
Act 1 - The characters get into gear.
Act 2 - They explore but fail to reach their goals.
Act 3 - They recover and develop as people as they struggle to reach their ultimate resolution.
 
Scripts are often not as complicated or as overwhelming when you look at them like this. 

I don't think there's any artist of any value who doesn't doubt what they're doing.
Francis Ford Coppola

4. Ignore your inner nagging thoughts. They are seldom accurate perceptions of what you are actually achieving. It is deeply unfair to criticize your navigation skills when taking a journey into unknown territory. Try not to demoralize yourself. I call my first draft the “Lewis & Clark.” Any freaking way that gets you to the coast is the correct way! Do not criticize yourself for the odd wrong turn, the weather slowing you down, having to stop for supplies. There is no bad route when you are on a voyage of discovery. Just keep going! Look at your early script drafts as explorative, until you find solidly what you like. When you get to the Pacific Ocean -- your script’s ending -- celebrate! Next, put the freeway through with a polish, knowing what you have discovered and which signposts are needed to bring your readers on the journey with you.
 

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.
Scott Adams

 
5. Give your main characters a major flaw in his/her back story. I struggle to find my
character’s inner demon. Usually one, defining horrific incident in their lives that they have not recovered from or invested their courage in changing. I call these back story incidents “Nuggets.” Like the seed in a fruit, my story is really servicing the character overcoming this damage and becoming who they should be. The character is defined by the effect of his or her demon. When the character struggles to change, we see the conflict in his soul and root for him to become the fulfilled person that is crumpled inside. Even villains are heroes in their own mind and can have a potent back story issue, a nugget that drives them. I firmly believe we are creatures who are evolutionarily conditioned to pay deep attention to the behaviors of others as a survival and success strategy. It makes the writer’s task much easier when you realize you are exploring a nugget, a single very simple, but compelling, internal human story. 

And by the way, everything in life is writeable about if you have the outgoing guts to
do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self doubt.
Sylvia Plath

6. Don’t judge your progress by other finished movies. Evaluating your fledgling work in comparison to the successes of others can be demoralizing. You don’t know how they got made. Maybe their journeys were more perilous than you think. Regard your first draft as a pencil sketch. When museums x-ray the paintings of great masters like da Vinci, they find many false starts, sometimes total compositions that have been erased or painted over. Does that mean that Leonardo was an indecisive idiot? Being perfect is impossible! Expect some speed bumps on your creative journey. Writing is naturally a series of discoveries, growing your vision is a normal part of the artistic process. 

Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.
Pablo Picasso

7. You are never too overwhelmed to write! Here is the best way to fight procrastination. WRITE A SINGLE LINE A DAY. This is the most undemanding and easiest way to overcome resistance and writer’s block. Make a point to open your files and write the least threatening amount of work. One line! It keeps your mind primed. Even on a day filled with the clutter and debris of modern life, you will have assigned a portion of your personal processor to the task of your creative passion. It will be working away in the unconscious.
 
Truthfully, we don’t write, we get out of the way and let our inner mind free. And some days when you are only going to write “just one line,” you will find a treasure of new thoughts pouring forth.

If you hear a voice within you say 'you can not paint,' then by all means paint,
and that voice will be silenced.
Vincent Van Gogh

8. Choose carefully who you share your early work with. I never show a first draft to
the outside world. I share it with trusted people who I call Story Midwives: Empathetic kin, who understand the artistic process. Sensitive people who want to help you push through the pain of creative birth without making demands about what the child should be. Midwives help my child grow with supportive comments. Eventually my writing gets strong enough to face the less caring and dogmatic business world it will eventually have to succeed in.

Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others.
Jonathan Swift

9. Trust your brain to solve your problems. It is normal not to have all the solutions at once. Take a break when you run into a block. Sleeping on it works! Tell yourself you are just playing. Don’t make the stakes gigantic. I find I get some of my best ideas in the shower. Using my muscles seems to free my mind. All art is built on the foundation of the discoveries of others. Sometimes I watch other movies that feel like they might inform me. Ideas often ricochet from the screen into my head and come out as entirely different but powerful contributions.

Lesser artists borrow, great artists steal.
Igor Stravinsky

10. Treat your work with the respect it deserves. You have invested a lot of time and effort. First impressions are important. You need that financier, star, director, etc. to see the best version of your work. To sell a script that is the foundation for a large investment, it must make sense to the widest audience. Before your script goes into the wild: Proof the spelling. Make the layout as eye-friendly as possible. Make sure that your story points are really clear; I call this “A-hole Proofing.” Every obstacle you remove to a good read is one less reason for a pass. Use trusted readers to give you feedback to make sure you have achieved your goals with clarity. Then share it with the rest of the world.

True art is characterized by an irresistible urge in the creative artist.
Albert Einstein

11... Huh? I said no rules!
 
Find an emotionally powerful title. A great title is like the wrapping on a gift. It makes you want to open it – Did the word SECRETS and SUCCESS in this email’s Subject line get you to read this?
 
I love to share my observations, philosophy and hopes with fellow artists. I consider it a great honor to be a literary Story Midwife to others. But, I also have a rule: “Ignore everything I say that goes against your natural creative instincts.” Your process is sacred to me.
 
If you would like to see videos on selling and creating, and to download a free chapter designed
to fire up your creativity, please visit the website for my book, RIDING THE ALLIGATOR (ridingthealligator.com). Good hunting!

My soon to be published novel "The Chamber of Curiosities" explores the star-crossed love story of Darney Veska, a charismatic circus "freak" and the beautiful young trapeze artist, Clare Dupuis.  Set against the back drop of a carnival in an ancient bastion perched above a vibrant seaport, it is a tale of obsessive, possessive, forbidden love.

More about the book, scheduled for publication in 2013 at:

http://firestar68.wix.com/chamber-of-curiosities

 I was recently interviewed about my inspiration to write "The House on Black Lake".  This is my story:

It all began one sultry night in the venerable bar, James' Beach in Venice, California. The roofless space fused cigarette smoke, the salty stench of the sea, and the cologne masked sweat of three men surrounding me. To the left and right, perched on their stools, like cocks on the roost of a hen house, two gorgeous men competed for my attention. To my back was a wizened old man with a girlish muse on his arm. Somehow his sagely words kept sneaking between the hunks and worse yet the encroachment of his emaciated frame.

Attached is a link to a new website for my new novel. "The Chamber of Curiosities" is a tale of obsessive, forbidden love between  charismatic  circus freak, Darney Veska and beautiful trapeze artist, Clare Dupuis. Set against the backdrop of a carnival perched on an ancient bastion overlooking a vibrant seaport, it explores how a single act of faith can change the course of destiny.

I'm currently meeting with publishers and the book is scheduled to be published in 2015, with a screenplay soon to follow.  The website will be undergoing changes as the novel goes through the final draft editing process.

Here's a peak into the decadent world of "The Chamber of Curiosities":

http://firestar68.wix.com/chamber-of-curiosities

The Chamber of Curiosities

From PRWeb:  Scenes from the Erotic Suspense, The House on Black Lake, by Anastasia Blackwell, will be read at Beyond Baroque Theater, Venice Beach, on Sunday, February 10, 2013, at 7:00PM.

Anastasia Blackwell’s screenplay, based on her novel, will be presented along with other notable screenwriters at Venice Beach’s oldest and most venerated literary center. The evening’s presentation will include two scenes from The House on Black Lake with shades of Fifty Shades of Grey, as control, domination, and power are explored.

The screenplay is set in an enclave of summer homes for the wealthy of Montreal. It illuminates the tale of a world-weary American AlexandraBrighton, whose vow at a shrine leads her on a transformational journey in the French Canadian underground, where she is drawn into a web of dark secrets and deadly intentions by her charismatic host, Ramey Sandeley and his unstable wife, Ruth.

The novel was published in 2010 and was visionary and unique in its use of a cinematic trailer and multimedia videos, including the first documented music video based on a scene from a novel.  A screenplay was completed by the author in 2012.

Beyond Baroque is one of the United States' leading independent literary/arts centers and public spaces dedicated to literary and cultural production, contact, interaction, and community building. Founded in 1968, it is based in the old City Hall inVenice,California, near thePacific Ocean. It offers a program of readings, new music, free workshops, publishing, bookstore, archiving, and education. The Center launched its own imprint, Beyond Baroque Books, in 1998, dedicated to emerging, overlooked, out of print, and experimental writing, as well as the history and legacy of experimental and alternative writing, poetry, and the arts in Los Angeles.

Some of the most famous artists and poets of the last century have performed and read their works at Beyond Baroque.

A reception follows for audience members to mingle and talk with screenwriters.

        Most writer's say they have suffered from "writer's block".  However, in reality, the malady does not exist. There is nothing actually blocking them from writing. There is no paralysis of the hand, or amnesia of the mind. What they are actually referring to is their stubborn conscious mind attempting to edit and control their subconscious impulses. Most writers who have written extensively will attest to the fact that the story and the characters take on a life of their own once the tale gets going. The subconscious and the collective consciousness have powerful drives and impulses, and once the creative juices unleash the raw animal passion lurking beneath the cerebral control, their needs come fully alive. Whether we like the results, or not.  There may even be greater forces at work here, but that's for the metaphysics experts to figure out.

        So, the problem is not that the author is blocked, the issue is that the writer is blocking himself.

        The Cure:  Throw up and Clean up.   First, you throw up.  Write whatever comes to mind, anything, everything, no matter how crazy, wild, or unrelated to the scene at hand. If you wish to remain firmly inside your scene, then write an outrageous turn of events, bring in a new character, turn everyone's motives upside down, be dirty, nasty, and/or cruel. Turn on some inspiring music and write.Write, write, write. There is no "perfect" in the world of creativity. Describing the minute details of a landscape, or other such boring details, will drive the subconscious mad, and like a stubborn child, it will refuse to cooperate, resulting in a very bad case of the dreaded malady.

        Once you have thrown up, clean it up. I guarantee you will find some very useful material, lyrical passages, insights into the needs of the characters, and the landscape will come to life in a way it never could have in the controlled, sterile vacuum of your mind. In fact, it is likely you will find a jewel in the remains, priceless and fresh. It could be that the key element to the scene is clarified, a hidden secret of a character in illuminated, an intriguing new characteor has come to life, or fresh themes and insights are revealed that your logical brain could never have imagined.

       Get drunk on tequila if you must, but do it now.  Shut off your mind and let your inner spirit take the reins. That is the only cure for "writer's block".

Anastasia Blackwell

The Artists’s Duty

By Kenneth Patchen

So it is the duty of the artist to

    Discourage all traces of shame

To extend all boundaries

To fog them in right over the plate

To kill only what is ridiculous

To establish problem

To ignore solutions

To listen to no one

To omit nothing

To contradict everything

To generate the free brain

To bear no cross

To take part in no crucifixion

To tinkle a warning when mankind

    Strays

To explode upon all parties

To wound deeper than the soldier

To heal this poor obstinate monkey

     Once and for all

To verify the irrational

To exaggerate all things

To inhibit everyone

To lubricate each proportion

To experience only experience

To set a flame in the high air

To exclaim at the commonplace

     Alone

To cause the unseen eyes to open

To admire only the absurd

To be concerned with every profess

      sion save his own

To raise a fortuitous stink on the

     Boulevards of truth and beauty

To desire an electrifiable inter-

     Course with a female alligator

To lift the flesh above the suffering

To forgive the  beautiful its disconso-

     Late deceit

To flash his vengeful badge at every abyss

To HAPPEN

It is the artist’s duty to be alive

To drag people into glittering occu-

     Pations

To blush perpetually in gaping inno-

     Cence

To drift happily through the ruined

      Race-intelligence

To burrow beneath the subcon-

     Scious

To defend the unreal at the cost of

      His reason

To obey each outrageous impulse

To commit his company to all

      Enchantments.

Six years ago,  I attended a seminar in Phoenix, Arizona while doing research for "The House on Black Lake".  I planned to explore secret societies in my novel and felt that in order to write about them I needed to educate myself.  During the course of the week-end I heard numerous experts talk about the Mayan calendar and purported apocalypic event that would happen. A reknowned expert spoke assuring us that the world would not end, but rather would be transformed into a new spiritual awakening. 

It is my greatest hope that today, 12-21-2012, the end of the Mayan Calender, on this Winter Solstice, there will be an apocalyptic change and our world will be transformed by this horrific event, and evolve from acts of violence against innocent citizens to peace and good will to all.

On this fateful day 12-12-2012 this website will go silent as a pledge to honor the dead and to oppose the forces that gave rise to the loss of our innocent.

Anastasia Blackwell.

The stilted language of Christian Grey, of Fifty Shades of Grey, has me wondering if he is, in fact, a vehicle for the spirit of Lord Byron. 

 E.L. James,the author of FSG, a West London housewife and former TV exec, married to an academician and screenwriter (who edited her books), lives and was educated in the land of Byron. Ms. James has admitted that the story of obsessive love and dominance and submission is her own fantasy. However, it is highly doubtful she has spent time in the company of twentysomething Seattle billionaires (if there are any). Rather, her sexual fantasies would have been forged by likes of such romantic figures as Lord Byron, and his contemporaries Percy Shelley, and Keats.

I am a native of America's Pacific Northwest, Christian Grey's fictional stomping grounds, and know well how those guys walk, talk, think,and act - and Christain Grey would be laughed out of the states of Washington and Oregon, had he ever existed. And, let's be honest, most women would prefer to be held captive in Byron's gothic castle than in a sterile Seattle penthouse.

Clearly, Christian is of a different breed, land, and era. Perhaps the time of Lord Byron, who was a brilliant poet, war hero, and notorious naughty boy whose aristocratic excesses included incest, and the seduction at age nine by his nurse, Mary Gray.  A descendant of  "the wicked Lord Byron", who was known to be eccentric and violent, Byron gave over his beloved ancentral home, Newstead Abbey, in 1803 due to financial problems, and stayed there as a tenant of Lord Grey.

E.L. James began writing "Fifty Shades of Grey" as fan fiction of Twilight, so the character of Christian was based on a the character of Edward, who (as written) is well over a century old. Byron was a highly popular poet, and leader of the English romantic movement, in the early 1800s, and was said to have fallen into an abyss of sensuality before departing for Greece to redeem himself and fall to a greater cause.

She walks in Beauty is one of his most famous poems - note the reference to "a heart whose love is innocent","all that's best in dark and bright", and "one the more shade".

The  first edition of The House on Black Lake is sold out. The story and cover design are undergoing revisions and the second edition release date will be announced by Creative Revolution Media, likely at the time a production date is set for the film.

The Chamber of Curiosities, a mythical romance, featuring a charismatic circus freak and a beautifuly young trapeze artist, that explores how an act of faith can transform society, will be published in 2014.

Thank-you all for your interest and support for The House on Black Lake. Publication of the first edition was a personal triumph. I look forward to the second phase of this great journey.

Anastasia Blackwell