Fast Updates:
Wishing you all a safe and happy February!
We met some amazing creative folks at the convention we participated in during the month of January and we are really looking forward to the upcoming events!
Added Event: Oz Extravaganza
Resist Updates have been added to the novel page! The fourth and final book in the Blood Inheritance Quartet is coming later this month! Thank you for your patience and continued support!
“With the end at hand, Amanda seeks redemption. But the myths of Sumir are only half-truths, and the layers of deception go deeper than she ever imagined. As old enemies return and unexpected allies appear, the half-bloods only have one chance to right the wrongs of the past before the world they know unravels around them.“
readersfavorite.com will have two of my available books listed as prizes in the monthly book giveaway. If you are interested in winning some amazing books by great authors you can check out the monthly giveaway here: book giveaway /Rise or/and here for The Warning Signs: giveaway/the-warning-signs
Also:
*During the month of February there will be a limited time sale on The Blood Inheritance Novels Series Two-Book set!(For Kindle) *This countdown deal will be available through Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com. It is set to begin on the 5th and end on the 12th.
Upcoming Event Reminders:
2023
Concealed Realms plans to participate at the Ceder Rapids QuadCon on February 5th. This event takes place at the Cedar Rapids Convention Center.
We are scheduled to return to the NWI Comic Con on February 11th! This event will be held at the Lake County Fairgrounds in Crown Point, IN.
We are scheduled to participate at the Hall of Heroes Comic Con on March 4th and 5th. This event takes place at the Northern Indiana Event Center, located in Elkhart, IN.
We will be participating at the Madison, WI East Towne Mall Quad Con on Saturday April 8th! Keep in mind that this event is open on both the 8th and the 9th.
Concealed Realms will be at the Quad Cities Comic Con. This even takes place April 15th and 16th, at the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds in Davenport Iowa.
We are scheduled to participate at SalukiCon! This event takes place April 22nd and 23rd at the SIU Student Center in Carbondale, IL.
Concealed Realms with be at the Oz-Stravaganza! This event takes place June 2nd, 3rd, and 4th in Chittenango, NY.
On June 11th we plan to participate at the Springfield, IL QuadCon! This event is set to take place in the Crowne Plaza Convention Center.
Concealed Realms plans to participate at Midwest Monster Fest on September 23rd and 24th . This event is scheduled to take place in East Moline, IL at The Rust Belt.
Quotes about writing:
“The difference between the almost right word
and the right word is really a large matter.
’tis the difference between the lightning bug
and the lightning.” – Mark Twain
“You fail only if you stop writing.” – Ray Bradbury
“Writing, to me, is simply thinking through my fingers.” – Issac Asimov
“Start writing, no matter what.
The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.” – Louis L’Amour
“One day I will find the right words,
and they will be simple.” – Jack Kerouac
“Don’t tell me the moon is shining;
show me the glint of light on broken glass.” – Anton Chekhov
“Everybody walks past a thousand story ideas every day.
The good writers are the ones who see five or six of them.
Most people don’t see any. ” – Orson Scott Card
“Write what disturbs you, what you fear,
what you have not been willing to speak about.
Be willing to be split open.” – Natalie Goldberg
“Writing is the only thing that when I do it,
I don’t feel I should be doing something else.” – Gloria Steinem
“We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.” – Anais Nin
Definition of Rabbit Hole:
Cambridge Dictionary.org
Noun
1: “a hole in the ground dug by a rabbit.“
2: “a complicated or difficult situation, especially one that is difficult to get out of”
3: “a situation in which you become so interested in a subject or an activity that you cannot stop trying to find out about it or doing it” -dictionary.cambridge.org
Merriam Webster.com
Noun
1: “a complexly bizarre or difficult state or situation conceived of as a hole into which one falls or descends.
especially: one in which the pursuit of something (such as an answer or solution) leads to other questions, problems, or pursuits” – merriamwebster.com
The Research Rabbit Hole
Do you ever feel that you have fallen down a rabbit hole while doing research? I have!
I rather enjoy research, however, it’s easy to lose sight of our intended purpose and become derailed by offshoots of interesting information and related connections. This metaphorical rabbit hole, is a long and winding path of exploration, which the seeker travels by navigating from topic to topic as they browse.
Today this term is commonly used in reference to online activities due to the fact that when on the internet it is particularly easy to find yourself caught in route along a never ending tunnel that tends to have a multitude of offshoots as you seek your information, causing the course to veer or you to spend too much time on a task. As such, in this creativity post I will address what the phrase going down the rabbit hole means, where it come from, how to see the signs its happening, and offer a few tips for avoiding it.
Rabbit hole?
An actual rabbit hole or rabbit burrow has a main entrance surrounded by a mound of dirt that leads into a complex series of chambers and tunnels that interconnect. This underground system usually leads in a multitude of directions and contain nesting areas, runs, and emergency exits.
Rabbits dig these maze-like shelters for safety. They spend most of their time there when they are not grazing and even when they are outside, you can be sure that they haven’t strayed far from an entrance into their hideaway.
Who coined the phrase?
The phrase originally used to mean stumbling into a bizarre, disorienting alternate reality. It is now also used to mean a person who becomes interested in something to the point of distraction or obsession.
The earliest written record of the phrase dates back to the 17th century. But the figurative rabbit hole is said to be credited to the 19th century novel called Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland. This novel was written by Lewis Carroll and published in the year 1865.
Near the beginning of this fantastical tale, a girl named Alice follows a rabbit into his burrow. Shortly after, she literally falls down a rabbit hole and is transported to a strange world called Wonderland.
The metaphorical term has many applications, all united by a common sense of passing into some maze that after being entered, is difficult to escape from. More recently, in regards to the internet, the term rabbit hole has become commonly used in reference to extremely engrossing and time consuming topics.
The good and the bad
Since the World Wide Web, is sort of designed to function like a rabbit hole because of the way hyperlinks work, some may consider using it for research, a voluntary trip down the rabbit hole… This trip can have both positive and negative effects.
On one side these unplanned adventures into information mining may dredge up inspiration for future stories or articles. On the other, they may halt your actual research goals and place you behind schedule.
I am interested in everything. I like research, and I do everything I can to be as thorough as possible when it comes to accurate fact gathering for nonfiction articles, as well as for my fictional work. As is mentioned before, I enjoy the hunt. I can spend endless hours tracking down information on my chosen subject, and I don’t think that I am a rarity. So, what may help us stay on task and what are some red flags that indicate we may be starting to veer off course?
Suggestions To help Avoid Falling Down The Rabbit Hole
If you are planning a fact-based article, do some preliminary research to get an overview of the topic. This will help you draft a short outline of the main topics you would like to cover and help focus your research time.
With experience you will come to know an estimate for how much time you really need for research on each topic. Once you have a good idea, when planning your schedule, make yourself a promise to stick to the limits you set.
If you are particularly easy to sidetrack, one way to enforce this could be to set a timer. Each time it goes off, check back on the progress you have made before continuing. This pause could also be beneficial in other ways, such as giving you quick breaks to create a back log.
A back log reserve will come in handy if you research similar or interconnected topics and can help cut down time spent of future research. I prefer to use a simple filing structure with folders and sub-folders, but some authors use tools such as Evernote or spreadsheets to keep track of the information they have gathered.
Signs that you may be getting off track
Boredom may be one of the first signs it’s time to stop researching and take a break or start writing, because if your initial interest is waning due to repetitious information or overwork, you will be more apt to chase unrelated hyperlinks.
That said, online research generally includes hyperlinks to other sources, then each link leads to more. If you notice that you have followed more than three or four of these sub links, it may be time to move on.
When you find yourself saying, just one more it very well could be a clue that you’ve become hooked on the research and want to keep investigating, but each click can eat up unnecessary hours of you rereading the same information or worse yet, rambling about as you are lured off on side research. For instance, let’s say you’re working on an article about building snowmen when you come across an intriguing fact about photographing snow that sends you off on a photography history track.
Once engaged, it can be hard to pull away, but you need to decide that enough is enough, or the spiral down this new curiosity path may never end. This is another example of when the aforementioned timer may come in handy, because if you do find yourself getting pulled into a new subject that really peeks your interest as I often do, you may find it easier to refrain from investigating the article’s, if you take time to save the link information elsewhere for a future reading.
Final thoughts
It was a lot of fun looking in the information about on this topic. Given the understanding of what a rabbit burrow or hole is actually like coupled with the terms history helps to show how the phrase came bout and then developed over time.
I hope that you find some of the suggestions in the creativity article above useful for keeping you from getting swallowed up by the research rabbit hole or/and aids you in digging your way back out! Stay safe and keep being awesome.
Want to find some interesting rabbit holes to fall into?
Check out these other sites:
tvtropes.org, Wayback Machine, GeographyNow,rotten library,notpron.com (Riddle)
Check out these sites:
MidwestMonsterFest
wegiveyouthecreeps.com
QuadCon
oddmall
MightyCon
kingdomcomicsonline
iowa-icon.com
danegeorges
Penelopeloveprints
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