Category Archives: All Things Writing

What Are You Writing Right Now? Blog Hop

Something to keep you busy while I work on the final proofing of Widow Woman‘s print version:

If you’re an author, it’s quite common to be asked at a reading what’s your next project. You always need to be working on something, or you might as well hang up your pen! The question, “What are you writing right now?” inspired this blog hop, where a number of writers from all over the U.S. are writing  on “My Next Big Thing,” answering the same 10 questions  you see here.

I’m honored to be tagged by Alice Osborn, author of three books of poetry, After the Steaming Stops (Main Street Rag, 2012), Unfinished Projects (Main Street Rag, 2010) and Right Lane Ends. In the blog hop, Alice wrote about her current project, Heroes Without Capes, her first full-length poetry collection, as well as a few of her favorite things. Please check it out!

Now on to the Blog Hop!

 spriteWhat is the working title of your next book? The working title of my next book is The Water Bearers. The title I’d really like to use would be Sprite or some such variation, but because it’s a product name, I’m not sure about the copyright issues and haven’t had time to research them yet. One fellow writer suggested I might be able to get away with Sprite: A Novel; maybe I’ll have to go with something closer to Sprite: A Novel and Not Remotely Associated with the Sparkling Beverage of the Same Name.
SinkholesWhere did the idea come from for the book? The idea came from several different places. First, I saw a story about sinkholes a few years ago and wanted to learn more about what caused them. I checked out a children’s book, Sinkholes, by Sandra Friend, and learned about the relationship between water tables and their formation. It started me thinking about how careless we are in this country about protecting our water supply and about our stewardship of natural resources in general. Mix that in with a love of fantasy and a viewing of the movie The Abyss, add in a little rumination about the possible existence of previously unknown sentient species, and everything just started to click. It’s all tied together.
What genre does your book fall under? It’s youth fantasy. Although my daughter read Widow Woman, I didn’t feel it was appropriate fare yet for my two younger sons; I wanted to write something for them, and they are huge readers of youth fantasy. This is a labor of love for them and for all other kids out there—it’s so important for them to read.
Treasure PlanetWhat actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition? Since we’re dealing in fantasy with that question, I’ll deal equally fantastically with the answer: A 40-something Harrison Ford as Richard Barnes, the father; he’s so good at playing smart but hapless, much like Richard’s character. A 13-year-old Chloë Grace Moretz as Bibi; she just radiates smart and tough, which is how I envision Bibi. For her twin brothers, I’d go with Corey Feldman, circa The Goonies, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, circa Treasure Planet; these two boys need to be good kids at heart, but clever and “full of piss and vinegar,” as my mom used to say. Gordon-Levitt would be Nibble—I think he’s historically been better at playing characters with a softer side to them; Feldman would definitely be Lex. For Sabrina—I’d love to have Jennifer Lawrence play her. She’s very good at playing “flouts authority” in a way you can root for—that’s Sabrina all over.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book? “Scientists estimate there are 8.7 million species on Planet Earth; what if the one species we haven’t yet identified is the one that holds the key to destroying us all—or to saving us?”
Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? 
I don’t know the answer to that question. It’d be nice to be picked up by an agency, but my first book is self-published, and that’s been a positive experience. The total control over content, marketing, layout and design, combined with the increase in royalties, would be hard to find with any conventional publisher.
ArthurHow long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript? I’m still working on it. I hope to complete it by fall of 2013.
What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? There are elements from so many different youth works here, it’s kind of hard to choose just one, but I think the one that comes the closest may well be Arthur and the Minimoys by Luc Besson.

Who or what inspired you to write this book? Our children are all voracious readers, but my middle child’s love of reading didn’t take off right away. We had to search diligently to find books that would hook him. We had trouble at first, until we stumbled on R.L. Stine’s Rotten School series. He whipped through the first book in a single night and devoured the rest of the series in short order. That experience opened his eyes to what reading could be, what it could do; and that series became a gateway for him to others. While the idea for my new book was not directly “inspired” by him, as I’m writing it I think a lot about his early reading experiences, similar to so many other kids out there, and I’m consciously trying to craft a book that will really grab hold of them. I know if my kids tell me it’s working, I’m on the right track.

cliff diveHow did you find the courage to let people see your personal inner thoughts? That’s a good question: I’m still looking for it, I think! Revealing your inner thoughts is terrifying—like jumping off a cliff without a parachute and hoping that someone will catch you at the bottom. It’s a huge leap of faith, every single time. But if you want people to read you, you have to do it. Find someone you trust, take a deep breath, close your eyes, and jump. What’s the worst that will happen? Someone won’t like it. So you go back to work and make the next draft better. It’s the hardest part of being a writer!

 

NEXT! I’ve tagged 2 fabulous authors who (are also so beautiful) to follow me in the Blog Hop!

taiYou don’t have to quit your day job!” that’s the bold message Tai Goodwin delivers as a speaker, coach, and author of the upcoming book bearing that title. With a weekly podcasts that reaches thousands of listeners each month, clients and audiences sing her praises for her ability to insightfully deliver both inspiration and instruction – exactly what they need to go from stuck to started and create the life and work they really want. You can find her online at http://www.taigoodwin.com/, where she offers a complimentary Jump Start session. Look for Tai’s post on March 19th!

 

 

Kathi - PortraitIn November 2011 Kathryn Holmes published her first book entitled, I Stand With Courage: One Woman’s Journey to Conquer Paralysis. This inspirational book reveals Kathi’s life beginning when she was told she would be paralyzed from the waist down for the remainder of her life. In her book you will travel through her intense struggle to regain strength, to her ability to now stand, walk and drive. Kathi retired from a career in marketing, advertising and magazine publishing. She has written for both business and pleasure and currently writes a monthly blog educating and inspiring readers about people with courage, determination, and faith. Kathi lives with her husband and is the proud grandmother to two adorable little granddaughters who keep her motivated and mobile. She is working on her next book – a novel taking her fictional characters from real life people and experiences. You can find her online at http://istandwithcourage.com/. Look for Kathi’s post on March 22nd!

Absence

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I’m back! Did you miss me?

Wait–you didn’t even notice I was gone? Well, that’s depressing.

For those of you who did notice, I didn’t actually go anywhere, except to work at my new full-time job (hence the gap between posts). I am now officially working at XXXXX, XXXXX-ing a number of XXXXX’s for several large XXXXX’s–it’s all very top-secret. Yeah. That sounds pretty exciting, doesn’t it? I’ll just let you fill in those blanks yourself (feel free to insert your own ideas here; they’re probably far more titillating than what I’m really doing).

But it’s a job, it’s flexible, and it’s close to home, so no horrendous commute this time around.  The only real downside (other than the fact that XXXXX-ing is about as stimulating as watching paint dry) is that I’ve returned to work just at the time that I need to be busting on getting the print edition of Widow Woman ready to go and I don’t have a lot of extra time to spend on it now. I should, in fact, be working on the proofing now, but I worry that if I go too long between posts, you  might forget about me and move on to some other crazy writer’s blog.

So where am I now? I’ve seen the first draft of the cover from my wonder of a designer, I’m at about Chapter 6 of the proofing, and still need to purchase my ISBN (but at least I finished my research into which one to get–is there any good reason for those things to be so complicated?). Why am I reproofing, you might ask? Well, if you read some of my earlier posts, you know that the e-book version turned up a number of “little darlings” that need to be fixed and I’m anxious to put out a cleaner 2nd edition (but don’t forget: those 1st edition bloopers will make for a valuable item, someday. Yes, that’s what I’m telling myself–it helps manage my anxiety).

Well, that’s where things stand now–still plugging away at it, though in fits and starts during lunch and coffee breaks instead of in 8-hour stretches. Nobody said it’d be easy–because if it were, fewer people would be crazy enough to do it, I guess.

I’ll keep you posted! In the meantime, feel free to check in with me on Twitter or Facebook–shorter posts and tweets may be all I can manage for the immediate future.   

 

 

Another Fork in the Road?

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Classy SporkMaybe this is another fork in the road, maybe it’ll be something else. Like chopsticks. Or a spork–I really like sporks.

Bottom line is, I’m starting a full-time editing job tomorrow: the Clark Kent to my Superman; the Peter Parker to my Spiderman; the Diana Prince to my Wonder Woman. I think it’s a good move, but as with any change, it comes with some nerves and maybe some weird tingling–that could just mean my foot’s asleep.

What it does mean, certainly, is less time to blog, so I’m going to resort to a rerun (sorry, folks, even Emmy winners do it) of my post from the week I started my last full-time position. The position may have changed, but the new-job angst remains the same.

Enjoy, and hopefully, I’ll have a real update later this week. Wish me luck!

[Originally posted April 19, 2012]

What? There’s a fork in the road? Better pick it up before someone gets hurt [rimshot].

Sorry, I couldn’t resist—I seriously hope bad puns are not an uncontrollable side effect of all the impending changes ahead this week. What changes, you ask? Patience, my friends, patience. Submission updates first:

I haven’t sent out any additional submissions since my last post—why will shortly become clear—but I did receive 1 ½ rejection letters. No, that’s not a typo. If you want to be perfectly literal about things, then it was really 2 rejections, but I’m a fiction writer—I don’t do literal very well.

The first rejection was pretty standard—“We don’t normally write form rejection letters because we want to give you a personal touch when we reject you and your sorry piece of work, but in your case, we’re making an exception. Thanks, but this is not for us.” Meh. I’ve read worse.

The second rejection, however, thrilled me right down to the ragged toes of my fuzzy fuschia slippers (that’s why I’m only counting it as half a rejection: no crying). First, it was from my “dream agent.” Second, my dream agent clearly has the patience of a saint, because she is still corresponding with me even after I queried her three times for this book. And third—and this is huge—one line after informing me that she still didn’t feel she was the right agent for this manuscript, she wrote that she would “happily read” other material I sent to her. “Happily read!” Woohoo! That’s a door left ajar if I ever saw one. On the other hand, maybe delusions are another side effect of change? Nah. I’m sticking with huge.

Never has a rejection letter left me feeling so euphoric—and then, immediately, so panicked. Yes, panicked, because clearly, now I really need to get crackin’. But…that’s not going to be as easy tomorrow as it was yesterday.

Remember those changes I mentioned before?  Well, in addition to working on my manuscript for the last few months, I’ve also been doing some Other Writing. Writing that included, among other things, resumes, job applications, and cover letters. And that writing, as it turns out, was the more successful of the bunch, because…

I’ve got a new job.

Yay!!!!

But…I’ve got a new job.

Waaaaa!

To say I have some mixed feelings is a classic understatement: I am so thrilled about my new position (associate editor for a trade magazine) that I haven’t been able to sleep since accepting the offer. It’s exactly the job I’ve been hoping to land during all these years of freelancing. But unlike my freelancing gigs, this new one is a full-time position, which means the hours I’ve been able to while away on my own writing will now be consumed by writing for someone else.

Don’t get me wrong, this is a good thing, really. It is. (And I’m not just saying that to avoid hate mail from desperate job seekers out there). It is a good thing (ew: first puns and now I’m channeling Martha Stewart) for me to enter the corporate world. After all, it’s been more than eleven years that I’ve been at home taking care of my family and freelancing. Eleven years—has it really been that long? Of course I’ve got some mixed feelings—it’s the end of an era.

And while we’re on the subject, oy, you want to talk mixed feelings? How about this response from my youngest child: “Mom, I don’t want you to work over the summer—I’ll miss you.” Ouch. A moment of silence, please, for the author to take a deep breath and compose herself.

Thank you. I think I can type again now.

So that’s my Fork in the Road: it’s big and it’s shiny, but it’s some got really sharp tines. And there it looms, smack dab in the middle of my road, turning me away from the path I was on and nudging me onto a strange new one, whispering smugly “You always knew this day would come, didn’t you?” Okay, that turned out a little more mixed than I intended. Ugh.

I’m happy! I’m happy! I’m happy! There—balance restored.

Well, we all know what they say about two roads diverging, don’t we. So–Here’s to my new, unexplored road—wish me luck!

Keepin’ It Real

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Someone recently asked me to name some of my favorite moments as a writer. One that immediately sprang to mind was my phone conversation with a local fire chief about the feasibility of murdering someone by combining ammonia and bleach.

It took several minutes of fast talking on my part to convince him I was, indeed, doing research for a book. I don’t know that I ever fully convinced him, but we did wind up having a delightfully surreal conversation on the different ways that one might accomplish such a murder and avoid being implicated.

Hee hee. Bet you didn’t see that one coming, did you?

That moment remains one of my favorites, I think, because first, I love surprising people, and second, it was the true beginning of my love affair with research.

Uhh…come again?

You heard me. I love to research. Maybe it comes from my family’s teaching gene (my mother and I were both teachers) or maybe I’m just weird (guilty as charged, but that’s another phone conversation entirely), but I love conducting research almost as much as I love writing.

Research is important for all writing, not just for nonfiction. Research brings realism: it helps readers relate to characters and facilitates their willful suspension of disbelief.

When I wrote my first draft of Widow Woman, I initially set it in the present, but from a dramatic standpoint, that just wasn’t working. When my editor suggested a change of era, I knew that was the right thing to do, but doing so entailed a complete rewrite—and a great deal of research.

From small details—Did peanut M&Ms exist in 1962? How were they packaged?—to critical plot points—Was ambulance service available to that small town in 1962? What life support technology existed?—I needed to make sure that the integration of plot and era happened smoothly, without any irritating anachronisms to break the spell (like the first draft of my rewrite, when Audrey, the main character, threw her cell phone across the room. In 1962. I’m pretty sure cell phones did not exist for personal use at that time and that if they did, Audrey would’ve needed a crane just to lift one). Good research keeps those types of breakdowns from happening (and I honestly loved learning all about Minnesota in the early 1960s).

Some of the most treasured feedback I’ve received from Widow Woman readers has been about how realistic it is, particularly the hospital scenes (No spoiler am I—you’ll have to read them for yourself, if you haven’t already). Readers have been expressing a general sense of disbelief that I’ve never personally experienced those particular events. Sometimes the questions are pointed:

“Is this really your mom?”

“How do you know so much about marital infidelity?”

“Were you craving cigarettes the whole time you were writing this?” (Answer: yes.)

Sorry to continue to disappoint everyone, but while this book was inspired by some real people, the characters and events therein are complete and total works of fiction, brought to more vivid life because of my bizarre affection for conducting hours of research.

Freaking out unsuspecting fire chiefs is just a bonus.

 

 

Signed, Sealed, Delivered

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authorgraph logoMaybe it’s because I’m actually signing some autographs now, but I’ve been thinking a lot about signatures lately.

Your signature is a pretty important part of your identity, wouldn’t you say? I mean, we all make jokes about people with illegible handwriting going on to become doctors or pharmacists (or the U.S. Treasury Secretary), but some people really believe that your signature tells a great deal more about you than just how many times Sister Mary Frances rapped on your knuckles with a ruler during cursive practice.

There’s even a whole field of study dedicated to handwriting, called graphology (although when Wikipedia calls a field of study “pseudoscientific,” it’s wise to take any findings with a grain of salt).

Still, it is amusing, at least, to imagine what people can read from your signature. I even went online and took a signature analysis quiz (fair warning: it was a lame one), just for fun. My results focused entirely on the way I dot my I’s. Apparently, although I’m restless and always in a hurry, the fact that I actually take time to dot them means I am attentive to even minute details. Hmm. Freakily accurate.

One other reason I’m looking at my signature is my involvement with Authorgraph.com (just another thing I have in common with E.L. James). It connects readers wanting autographs with writers and allows them to receive personalized digital autographs for their e-books from their favorite authors. For authors, it’s a great tool to connect with readers who can’t attend their events in person.

When I first joined the Authorgraph stable, I didn’t yet own a tablet, so I had to use a mouse (and apparently an angry one at that) to create my digital signature. Haha, if I’d taken the signature analysis quiz with that, my results would’ve shown me to be restless, in a hurry, and wearing a large, heavy cast on my hand. Plus someone you wouldn’t want to sit next to on any form of public transportation.

Happily, now I’ve got tablet access, so I spent a little time this morning playing around with the stylus and tablet to try to improve my Authorgraph. I think it’s better now (although maybe I should take another quiz to make sure my signature doesn’t scream “demented photo bomber in training.”)

Let me know what you think.