A Point On Accents

"Well I've been thinkin' about this fer a while and I kept noticing writers who would try t' give their characters accents. They'd wanna go fer Irish 'r Pirate 'r Southern 'r Cowboy 'r Rough-City-Type-Thug, so they'd start leavin' off Gs and Os and Ts and tryin' t' git their character t' look like they had 'n accent. But that did'n' work. I j'st couldn't figure out what kinda accent they were s'posed to be goin' for. The character's voice in my head kept switchin' from one accent t' another."
It's just become a tiny peeve of mine lately. If your character has an accent, decide what that accent is, and then listen to people talking in that accent. Write down every word they say. Try to do it phonetically and be honest to what you hear. But please don't overdo it. I' c'n be very 'noyin' when yer tryin' t' read an' the char'cter's not sayin' English words. Bear this in mind; How do your readers talk?
My reader base is primarily Americans. Most of them will read my words in an American accent. Because of the way Americans often talk they will already read 'going over to the store' as 'goin' over t' the store.' If American English is your native language you'll say it quickly enough to slur some words. So there is no need to slur such words in your writing. If your character is Irish and your readers are American, there is no need to say 'goin' t' the store.' In both languages it's granted that Gs and Os and little in-between letters are often left off.
Instead, only change words insofar as it differs from your readers' native accent. So if your readers are primarily British, pick a narrative accent and let your readers assume that all words are said in that accent unless otherwise specified. If your narrative voice and head voice and out-loud-reading voice are all Westshire, there's no need to make your characters say, 'I fought y' towd me the' wos noi wai t' ge' oiver tha' bridge.' (And furthermore;don't make your characters say things like that if most of your characters speak with a Westshire accent. Just let the reader figure out -through setting, narration, or hints - that the main accent is Westshire. Can you imagine how annoying it would be if you had to read a whole book where the four main characters 'tol' li' this?' It's almost impossible to read.)
So keep changes in dialogue to a minimum.
And finally, know your accents. A great example of an author who did it right is Brian Jacques (Redwall). His characters have a diversity of accents and he presents their dialogue in a way that's fun to read and informs the reader of just what they sound like, without stating the obvious or getting annoying. He's very familiar with the accents in his books so his characters use expressions native to their accents that add a very convincing sense of reality to his characters.

Brown and Grey and Black

I saw him sit against a wall

He never ever moved at all.

His eyes were closed, his breath was slow.

Was he awake? I never know.

His feet are narrow and are tall.

The color of the sand in fall

When it is stained, more dark than light.

His soles are tan, his skin is white.

He sat with legs extended out

In front of him, which brought about

The strangest sense of jealousy;

He was more pliable than me.

Against the wall his back was straight

His slender legs - he never ate -

Seemed unattached to his body

Stretched out in flexibility.

His clothes were simple, brown and grey

And black, like night, but unlike day.

His hat, however, was in blue.

A streak of orange, a lighter hue.

Beneath the brim - well worn and frayed -

Dark bangs, left-sweeping, were displayed.

And tufts of black swept up behind

His ears and neck, and brought to mind

Dark eyelashes against his cheeks

In silent thought - he never speaks -

And eyebrows, darker, thicker still,

Like frost upon a window sill.

Behind those lids are pools of brown,

A broken heart, a soul cast down.

He sits, unable to disclose,

And hurts, and hurts, and no one knows.

NaNoWriMo WINNER

Wow. After 30 days of crazy writing I can't believe I did it. I was typing my last words at 11:57pm on the last day, cramming to get them in and literally bouncing up and down as I raced the clock to validate my novel at 11:59pm. It's been hard pushing past insecurity and writer's block, but you know what? It 's been worth it. I knew it would be. I've gotten to know these characters like never before, laughed and cried, loved every second I've spent in their presence, and I can't wait to do it again next year.

But don't think for a moment that I'm going to stop writing. Oh no. Last year I tried NaNo and failed. I made only 20,000 words. It was so hard, I thought I'd never do it again. But failure is only a minor step to success. Hard things make us stronger. This year was comparatively easy. I wrote 30,000 words this year, and somehow didn't feel half as crammed. Part of it is due to giving my schedule over to God, which changes everything and takes away the stress. But part of it is just that he gave me the inspiration and especially the will to get up again.

Guys, I'm so in love with my characters. The more I write them, the more I love them. If you are writing a story, I beg you not to give up. Those characters are amazing people. You just haven't gotten to know them yet. Write even when you don't have inspiration. Write when you feel like every word you put down is stupid. Write when your entire body is screaming 'ANYTHING BUT WRITE'. Write when your brain is begging you to go outside or eat or get on Pinterest or text your friends or doodle. Just write.

Because it's worth it.

It's worth it, I promise. Just write. Writing comes first, then inspiration. Don't wait for inspiration till you feel inspired.

Last year I worked so hard at NaNo that I felt I deserved a break. A month's break turned into two months, and two months into several, until I found it was November again and I'd written almost nothing over the course of the year.
Well that's not happening this year. If God allows it, I'm going to write every blooming day (except Sundays XD). Raising a story is like raising children. There is no break until it's done. If you step away from your characters, you start to drift from them, and it takes an awful lot of work and healing to get them back.

This has been a pretty disorganized blogpost. Sorry. It's 12:19am. I'm going to go to bed and sleep in, and treat myself to a cup of eggnog and relax.
Just kidding. Because a writer's work is never done. If it was, they would no longer be a writer.
I'm going to get up early and fight to(day)morrow's battles with all my strength, because I know who I'm fighting for. And I'm not going to live the aforementioned lazy kind of day. (Well, except for the eggnog part. That... actually was true.)