Procrastinating with Pinterest

I’ve discovered another great procrastination tool. It’s called Pinterest. I’m sure many of you have already discovered it, too. In fact, I’m probably already following your boards. It takes me back to my childhood, when I loved to collect pictures of things I liked or sayings that I wanted to remember. The days when I secretly wished that I could cover my walls with posters of my favourite singers, actors and bands like other teenagers were allowed to do. So I have my board of ‘favourite entertainers’, ‘favourite books’ and ‘favourite music’, I can add to my 3-D collection of owls with 2-D versions, I can save all the lovely illustrations I come across on the internet, photos of places I’ve been and places I want to go. It’s all there for me to go back to whenever I want.

While I do spend a modicum of time there, though (mark that as understatement of the year), I have to claim some writerly justification in using it. My favourite board by far is this one – ‘Inspiration’. I go to this board and immediately my head begins to fill with stories, scenes and descriptions. It’s magic! There are so many beautiful places, or weird and wonderful places; some of them real, some of them imaginary, all in this one place for me to go. It’s like walking into a new world.

I also have another board, to which I am going to add interesting faces that I might use for future characters. Here, I’ll let you into a little secret…I’ve already used some of the faces on my ‘favourite entertainers’ board as characters in my books – but I’m not going to tell you which! The future characters board doesn’t have many faces yet, but I’ll add to it as I find them.

There's another facet to the boards, too. By pinning my books, artwork, illustrations and book cover designs there, I'm able to advertise what I do. Whether it has worked to bring about any sales, I don't know, but it can't harm.

I’m sure I’ll find other ways to use Pinterest, for writing and for entertainment, but for now I’m happy with what I’m doing. I’d love to hear your ideas on how to use it, though. What do you like to pin?