17 Comments
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Abby Alten Schwartz's avatar

What a great roundup of inspiring advice and resources!

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Anna Rollins's avatar

Thank you so much, Abby!

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Heidi Fiedler's avatar

Thank you for sharing The Making Magic Workbook! And I love seeing the follow up to your sunflower story. 🌷

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Anna Rollins's avatar

Heidi, your workbook is so incredible. You do such a great job de-mystifying the process, and I'm slowly incorporating it into my creative activities. I'm so grateful for you!

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Heidi Fiedler's avatar

You are the best hype woman! I can't wait to read your PB when you're ready 💛

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Amy Suto's avatar

Thanks for sharing my Substack, Anna! Love your roundup of resources here.

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Anna Rollins's avatar

Thank you so much for always sharing such excellent resources, too!

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Jocelyn Jane Cox's avatar

Love all of this and love that Courtney Maum perspective.

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Anna Rollins's avatar

Courtney Maum was my Query Doula, and she’s the best!

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Michael Roy's avatar

At the West Edge Literary Fest, one of the panelists was speaking to an audience member who had never written a screenplay. The audience member had written a book that she wanted to turn into a screenplay, but she said, "I've never written a screenplay before". The panelist said, "You had never written a book before you wrote the first one."

I thought that was a very inspiring answer. Everything is a learning process.

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Anna Rollins's avatar

Oh, I love that! I feel like I can hear that person giving that feedback, too (was it Ian Nolte who said it?).

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Michael Roy's avatar

It was! I was having trouble remembering his name. Thank you!

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Anna Rollins's avatar

That's so funny! It sounds like him :)

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Joy V.'s avatar

The “once upon a time” link went to a list of newsletters…I’m so curious so would love to see the challenge.

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Anna Rollins's avatar

Ah! Well, I think they have all the activities paywalled. Here's another resource that describes the activity pretty well: https://www.storyprompt.com/blog/the-story-spine-also-known-as-pixars-story-structure

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Jen Shepherd's avatar

Good morning Anna. I wanted to say thank you for your beautiful essay and also for sharing tips on Tiny Love Stories. I've submitted several essays and have not heard back so far. I'm also a photographer and I love the idea of beginning with an image. SO smart. I've shared your substack with my writing group. :-) Have a fabulous week and thanks again.

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Anna Rollins's avatar

This is so kind! I hope you keep submitting. I'm so glad that the idea of starting with a strong image resonated with you! I appreciate you sharing my Substack very much -- thank you!

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