Interviews, Tarot Readings, and Crazy Dreams...

Hey everyone!

As the first part of the title explains, my interview with The Pen & Muse Blog has been posted. Yay! Click here if you'd like to read it. It was so surreal sitting at my laptop, filling out an interview questionnaire. It kind of made me wonder if someday I'll be doing this regularly. Making the rounds online doing blog tours and other promotional stuff for my writing career...

All-in-all, this entire experience went completely differently than I had ever thought it actually would. Sure, I had those random, daydreaming moments where I could see myself winning... but then reality would kick in. It would remind me that no only am I an unpublished author (even though everyone in my category would be too...), but I had also never submitted anything before. Yup, this was the first writing contest that I had the nerve to enter.

To make this situation even more surreal, actual published authors have been congratulating me both on the interview site as well as on my blogs. Part of me is fully convinced that I'm going to wake up tomorrow and this will all have been a dream. I get up each morning and double check my email just to make sure that I wasn't dreaming this all up.

Hey! I have an overactive imagination. This situation would be nothing for me to dream up... but I guess that overactive imagination is the reason that I'm here...

I know why I'm here. I'm here to write. Not because I want to, but because I have to- not that I don't enjoy it, because I really do. Coming back to writing only made me realize that I was missing a very vital part of my life before. Writing is truly my passion and I can't imagine ever giving it up again. And if my tarot reading, given by the amazing Karen Mahoney, is any indication... I'd better not give it up! As part of her blogiversary, Karen performed 50 tarot readings (simple three card spreads) for people who left comments on her blog. I was able to get in before the cut off and asked for a reading having to do with my writing. Here's what the cards told her:

"So a general reading about your writing:

The Moon, Princess of Cups, 9 of Pentacles.

The Moon is an interesting and powerful card. It highlights creativity and imagination - you are filed with ideas right now and you are possibly confused about which roads to explore. The Moon says you need to explore as much as possible, because only by doing that will you find out for sure which is the right path for you. You might have some particularly vivid dreams (or just plain weird ones!) in the coming weeks - take note of those you remember, because even *they* might hold the seeds of more ideas you can write about. :) You might want to try writing something you've never tried before. Sometimes this card indicates mystery, so perhaps a story with a real mystery at its heart?

The Princess of Cups, in this context, backs up the rush of ideas you are already having - or will soon have. She also says that writing fiction for children could be a good thing to explore. Cups also = romance, so you should do well with romantic themes, whether in YA or not. The 9 of Pentacles confirms that writing is your calling - this is a wonderful, fertile card. You will one day make money from writing, so stick with it no matter what stage you're at right now. Work hard and you will be rewarded."

The really cool thing? I have been having amazingly, vivid dreams lately. Some have been really sweet and are ideal scenes for YA novels with a romance element to them, while others have been of the creepy, mystery sort. I've been bombarded with inspiration from everywhere the past few weeks and have, at times, struggled to outline it all and store it in my TBW (To Be Written) folder on the laptop. One dream in particular keeps me wondering what would've happened if I hadn't woke up when I did.

It was night and I was with a group of people wondering, lost through a gigantic mansion of sorts. There was an older gentleman with white hair, a woman in her mid thirties with red hair and wearing a lime green suit dress, two teenagers (a boy and a girl, both wearing punk-style clothes and hairstyles), and myself. It was dark in the hallway we were in and we were following tracks on the ceiling because, for some reason, we were certain that they would lead us where we needed to go.

At one point a glowing, red, crystal skull suspended from a metal rod appeared along the track and we followed it. The older gentleman tripped and we all stopped to help him. When we turned around not only was the skull gone, but we realized that we were at a T-intersection where the tracks went both straight ahead along the path we had been following, but also down a hallway to our right. I'm not sure why, but the teenaged girl had a piece of chalk, so we made a mark on the wall and turned right. We could've followed the path straight and stayed at the outer perimeter of the mansion, but the woman in the green suit said we should go right, so we did. We left the security of seeing the outside world through the large windows in the original hallway and ventured inward.

Looking out the windows before, we could tell that we were on an island of some sort and that the mansion was built on a cliff face, well, at least this side of it was. Looking down all we could see were crashing waves and jagged rocks in the moonlight. We ended up in a gigantic atrium (I'm talking professional football field sized, gigantic). The ceiling was rounded and towered stories and stories above us. We could just barely make out the stars and clouds in the night sky through a holographic image of the world that was projected on the ceiling. There were symbols on different countries that would occasionally blink or change color before disappearing. This room was full of people and everyone was certain that we were at the end of our journey, that this was our treasure. And, to be fair, it was a pretty amazing room. Food, music, well-dressed people there for an amazing party ... it was magnificent.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the glowing, red skull zipping along the perimeter of the room as it headed toward another small hallway that would normally have been overlooked. I stood there wondering if I should follow. If this room- this party was our reward, then the skull should've stayed here, right? Was there a greater reward if we kept following? Was it a trap, meant to punish those too greedy to appreciate what they have?...

Then I woke up... and unlike my normal dreams, this one didn't pick up where it left off the next night. I guess I'll never know what happened...

Oh well, maybe now that I've actually typed up the dream, it'll finish tonight? It's late and I'm tired, still getting over the flu, so I'm going to end my blog here for the night and head to bed.

Until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

Snoopy Dance Time!

Hey everyone!

First of all, if you don't know what the snoopy dance is... go out and rent a Peanuts movie. No one should go through life having not seen the beagle dance.

The picture to the left is my little way of celebrating. Celebrating what, you might ask? Celebrating the fact that I won the grand prize in the Pen and Muse Romantic Short Story Contest in the unpublished author category!!! So yes, that is the reason for the blog title, "Snoopy Dance Time!" When I read the email from Denisse last night, jumping up and doing the snoopy dance was the first thing that I wanted to do, sadly not the first thing I did do. I think it went something like this...

Slightly hyperventilating, Willow puts her hand to her agape mouth. "Honey!" she calls out to her husband.

"What is it?" he answers from his chair across the room.

"I... won... I won the short story contest," she says, re-reading the email, certain that she misread something.

"Awesome!" he says before pulling out the phone to call his mother and tell her the great news.

I then sent a Gmail chat to my beta reader, M, who happened to be on at that moment. I think she wanted to snoopy dance with me too. I really wish that I could've jumped up and celebrated, but sadly I'm getting sick again... ear ache, sore throat, the works. Getting the email about this contest was exactly what I needed to make me feel a little better after a day spent huddled under my blanket.

So today, once I finish this blog post, I'm going to be filling out a interview questionnaire and sending it off to Denisse. The awesome thing, she'll post it on the blog! How often do unpublished authors get interviewed about their writing? Answer: Rarely.

I still don't think I've fully processed the fact that I won. I mean, I believe in my writing and really enjoyed the story I submitted, but I really wasn't expecting to win, you know? I was just hoping to place, especially since this is the first writing contest that I've ever entered.

Hearing that someone else likes my story (other than family and friends who have to say they like it) has really re-energized me towards writing. I think I sort of hit that slump that I've read about where you feel like everything that you write is crap. I spent so much of my writing time second-guessing everything that I've written that I really wasn't getting anything accomplished. Once the shock wears off, I'm sure that I'll end up in another typing frenzy on Instinct, which will probably bring me to the end of the first draft.

So , I think I'll start on that interview questionnaire now. I'll post a link to it once it's up over at the Pen and Muse. I still can't get over the fact that I'm being interviewed for my writing... me... plain little, unpublished me... just wow... but anyway...

Until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

Catching up on the past few weeks...

Hello again!

I've finished my second round of antibiotics for this stupid sinus/ear infection now, so let's hope that it's cleared everything up so I can feel human again.

So, what have I been up to while living in medicine-head-land? Surprisingly quite a bit of writing. Sadly, most of it wasn't on Instinct, but it's still writing. I really wish that I had been able to work on Instinct these past few weeks though, I really miss the story and the characters. Unfortunately sinus medication + full length novel plots don't mesh up that well in my brain.

So, what did I write then?

Well, first off, the one thing I did write for Instinct was for a blog that I frequent regularly, Dear Author. Every Saturday, they post what is known as "First Page Saturday". Here's a blurb from their site that explains what it's all about:

"Welcome to First Page Saturday. Individual authors anonymously send a first page read and critiqued by the Dear Author community of authors, readers and industry others."

So, I spent a good amount of time polishing the first page of Instinct to send it off for this. Now, I'm pretty sure that this is a popular program, so I'm not certain how long it will take for my first page to be posted, but it's worth the wait. The advice and critiques that have been posted for previous entries are wonderfully helpful and insightful, not to mention brutally honest. So, I'll be checking back every Saturday, waiting to see if my page gets posted.

***

The other project that I've been working on is a short story for a contest held by The Pen & Muse blog.

"The Pen & Muse Blog proudly presents a Romance Short Story Contest! This contest is open to published/unpublished writers. There will be two categories/divisions for winners, published and unpublished.

Story length: 10,000 (no more than 10,000 for minimum)
Deadline: February 19, 2009"

(Click here for more details.)

Strangely enough, about a week before this contest was posted, I felt inspired to start writing a romance short story. I think I typed up about half of it and outlined the other half before sending it off to a friend to read. I was pretty doped up on sinus medication, so I wanted a healthy, outside opinion of it before I finished it.

I hadn't written a short story since high school, almost nine years ago... okay, feeling a little old saying that... I really didn't think that I could still write something so short and have it turn out well. Ever since I first sat down to outline Instinct, I've been hooked on writing novel length fiction.

But, anyway, this story came to me in a fever-induced dream one night and kept haunting me the entire next day. I figured that since I was having trouble remembering what I ate earlier in the day, that the fact that this story from the previous night was sticking around in my brain meant that it must be important. I really liked the characters and thought their story was cute, but was willing to discard it initially because I couldn't see how they could be used in a full-length novel. I can't believe that I almost threw out a story that I liked for a stupid reason like this... the medicine was really strong I guess. Glad to be writing anything though, I typed it up and put it aside, figuring that I'd find a use for it someday.

A little under a week later, that use appeared in the form of this contest. I knew that I'd be able to finish the story in well under 10,000 words and that my friend absolutely loved what I had so far, so I went for it. I've spent my free time since then writing, and re-writing, and editing, and re-editing this story. I have a couple of sentences highlighted that still sound wrong to me that need to be fixed, but I'm really liking what it's evolved into.

The goal for me is to straighten out those last few sentences that are being a nuisance before bed tonight. Then, I'll read it out loud... again, before going line by line doing spelling and grammar checks tomorrow since you can't trust MS Word to do this correctly 100% of the time. I'd like to send it off by the end of the week.

Giving myself 'til the end of the week should be plenty of time to have a couple of friends read over it for me. I have the friend, who read it in it's original format, who I'm sure will read it again for me. My husband has also volunteered to read it over, even though it's definitely not a genre he'd usually read. It's hard to imagine him reading a romance story in any format though, even a short story. Luckily for him, it's at just under 3300 words right now.

***

In other literary news...

I've won a couple more free books online. All of my research into the publishing industry is really paying off for my personal library. Thanks to various contests on publishing and review websites and blogs, I've won the following things:

• An iPod Shuffle - (Bitten By Books contest sponsored by The Pen & Muse)
• A signed copy of Eternal Seduction by Jen Turner as well as ARCs of her next two books when they're ready. - (Bitten By Books author interview contest)
• A signed copy of Unleashed by C.J. Barry - (Paranormality guest blogger contest)
• A copy of Kitty and the Dead Man's Hand by Carrie Vaughn - (Bitten By Books author interview contest)

In case you haven't noticed, Bitten By Books is an awesome website, not just for winning contests, but for amazing interviews with authors and book reviews. Someday, when I'm published, I'm definitely signing up to do an interview and contest with them.

I love my iPod and can't imagine not having it now. I've read Eternal Seduction and really enjoyed it, I even did a review of it on this blog. (Click here to read it.) I just received Unleashed in the mail today and am looking forward to reading and reviewing it as well. And I've received word that my information has been sent to the publisher so that I can receive my copy of Kitty and the Dead Man's Hand soon. I'm really looking forward to reading and reviewing it once it's here.

I plan on posting reviews of every book that I win in an online contest as a way to thank the author. I can't promise that I'll like every book that I read, but I'll be honest and explain what I did or did not like about each one.

***

I think that's about it for what's happened in my literary world since my last post. Of course, I could have missed something, those sinus pills were really strong... If I think of anything else cool that happened, I'll make a new post with it.

Oh, and I'll keep everyone up-to-date on the short story contest as well as any other cool contests that can be entered as I find out the information myself.

Until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

Bitten By Books Rocks!

All right, I know I've mentioned this before but... Bitten By Books Rocks!
( http://bittenbybooks.com ) This is the website that I won my iPod Shuffle from a little bit ago during a contest.

Well, I just found out today that I won another contest! They had a live interview with self-published author, Jennifer Turner.
( http://www.darknesswithinnovels.com/ )

To be honest, I didn't even realize there was a contest until after I had posted, asking her a question. I just got on for an opportunity to chat with another author, she was really cool by the way for all of you that didn't catch the interview. Well apparently by posting my questions/comments I earned an entry into a contest to win a copy of her current book and advanced copies of her next two about a month or two before they're released. I am so excited!

So, for any of you who haven't checked out Bitten By Books, ( http://bittenbybooks.com ) You really should consider it. They have contests all the time, sometimes several going on at once. The people are really cool and it's just a nice website. But, if for some reason you don't like winning free stuff for doing easy stuff... oh well, more goodies for me!

After the last couple of days, I really needed cheering up. I've been in a slight slump, writing-wise for a couple of days now. I had been writing so much that I started getting into a rhythm of writing every morning, always getting done around 1 p.m.

Well, the other morning, my husband was using the computer to look some stuff up online and I didn't have the heart to ask him to let me use it to get my work done, figuring that I could always start later. I've also been feeling pretty guilty for hogging it non-stop lately.

Now, I don't know if I broke my rhythm and have to work my way back up to it again or if my brain and Writing Gremlin just need a couple of days off to catch up, but I can hardly type up anything for this story right now. I had been typing 8-10 pages a day for several days in a row there, usually within 2-3 hours time. But now I'm stuck, it took me all day to write up part of one scene... and I only got as far as I did thanks to a pep talk from one of my reviewers via Gmail messenger.

She thinks that, knowing my writing style, that I just need to take a couple of days to recharge and I'll be writing like crazy again. I must be overworking my Writing Gremlin or something... She's probably right though, I don't see how missing one morning shift of writing could throw everything out of whack like this. Maybe it's "Chapter 2-itis" all over again... Maybe I've written all I'm supposed to for this scene right now and I'm just forcing myself now... Maybe... I can use more ellipsis in this sentence...

Oh yeah, did I mention, my reviewer tried to name my Writing Gremlin, saying he seems like a Jasper to her. I keep trying to picture him with the name, but my love of the Twilight series of books and the new movie keep holding me up... my Writing Gremlin looks nothing like Jasper... but, oh well... at least she didn't try to name him Edward, lol!

Well, until I Blog Again,
Thanks Bitten By Books!

~Willow

P.S. - I actually figured out what was up with my Writing Gremlin. I forgot I had sent him to find another gremlin to give to a friend of mine who's working on the proposal for his dissertation. Being as my gremlin is from the London area, he had to go back there to find a friend for the job. No wonder I couldn't type worth anything, I was going it alone!

But fear not, he returned last night, hopped onto my shoulder and excitedly said, "Let's get writing!" And we did, writing up a good 8 pages of text, keeping me up until... well too late, lol. Now that he's been home for a visit, I have a feeling that it'll take a bit for him to adjust back to this time zone again... oh well, who needs sleep?

Moral of the story: Never underestimate the power of your personal muses...