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Tired of dropping hints about what you’d like for Winter Solstice, Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, or just “because it’s winter and I’m cute?” Print the following list. Highlight your favorites. Hand it to your significant other, your kids, your mother. And if you have any other suggestions for writer gifts please share them in comments.
Four lucky readers are getting Christmas gifts from Poe's Deadly daughters:
Auntie Knickers
Lucinda
Helen K
Penny T
are the book winners from Wednesday. Please contact Sandra Parshall with your mailing information: sandraparshall@yahoo.com.
(Special thanks to Debby Ridpath Ohi—Inky Girl and Lynn Viehl—Paperback Writer on whose blogs I first saw some of these items mentioned.)
1. Books. Writers like to read as much as we like to write. (Some days we like it more.) You’ll get brownie points if you know what books we’d like to get, but ask and we’ll be happy to give you a list.
2. An Alphasmart Keyboard. They’re tough. They’re portable. They’re lightweight. They run for ages on batteries or one charge.
3. Desktop Whiteboard. This will save your writer lots of paper which will save her lots of money and the planet lots of trees. The whiteboard is fun to play with and your writer can feel virtuous while she’s using it.
4. Magazine Subscription(s). The Writer, Romantic Times Book Review, Ellery Queens Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine are just a few the writer in your life might like.
5. Dragon Naturally Speaking. Give your writer a break at the keyboard with this voice recognition software which can be trained to recognize voice and speech patterns.
6. Books on w
riting. Give some inspiration: Bird by Bird from Anne Lamott, On Writing by Stephen King, How Not to Murder Your Mystery by Chris Roerden, The Artist’s Way from Julia Cameron, Write It Down, Make it Happen by Henriette Anne Klauser.7. A massage session. Some massage therapists have portable massage chairs or tables and will come to your writer. (Warning, a good massage can be addictive.)
8. Writing tools from Levenger include planners, organizers, pens, briefcases and more. How about a note card bleacher for organizing notes, a Thai book rest, or the Lapalot lap desk for working in bed or just about anywhere else?
9. Cafepress offers a great collection of t-shirts, mugs and other fun items, including Debbie Ridpath Ohi’s Will Write for Chocolate T-shirts and mugs.
10. McPhee's action figures include Poe, Shakespeare and (my favorite) The Crazy Cat Lady—complete with six cats.
11. Chocolate. (Enough said.)
12. Time. Take the kids or the dog for the afternoon and give your writer time to write. Cook dinner, do the laundry, clean the bathroom and give your writer time to write.
8 comments:
I'd add mechanical pencils and colored pens to the list.
Books on forensics and police procedure are always good for mystery writers. The giver has to be familiar with what the recipient already has, though.
I've always wanted a fountain pen. It feels very writerly.
Love the suggesttion of a message. After four or five hours sitting on your butt that is greatly appreciated.
How about a CD of murderous sound effects just to get in the mood.
# 30 #
#12 is the best one of all.
Did you know that if you count up all of the gifts named in that song ("On the first day of Christmas"), including all of the repeats, you come up to 364? That's nearly one year. The last gift is supposed to be the Christmas miracle itself (if you believe in that kind of thing). Apparently such numerology was quite respected in medieval times.
Murderous sound effects? That would be the sound of me trying to smash 24 green and white peppermints to make peppermint bark. There's a round mallet-sized dent in the workbench and the bark is the color of pea soup.
I love the list for writers and I especially love the T shirts.
Thanks.
Marilynne
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