Writing Mojo - Check!... Internet Access - not so much...

Well, I typed up this post on 5/24/09, but then our Internet went down as the cable company is still working on lines in the area from the storm. So, here it is... better late than never!

***

Okay, the yard and house are mostly cleaned up from the in-land hurricane… We’ve pretty much settled into a routine of sorts with our son and his autism therapists… Technically, we’re all still sick… but, I’m back! This time it’s going to stick gosh-darn’t!

I’ve found my writing mojo and realize that my brain never stopped working on the book, it just did it in the far corners of my mind where I wasn’t paying attention. Today, I skimmed my first draft and read over all of my notes and ideas for what to tweak in the second.

Somewhere around page 211, I think I figured out what to do about my first chapter. The scene that is currently chapter one is all right. I like it and plan on keeping it in the story, but it just didn’t seem right for the first chapter. The chapter that is supposed to draw everyone in and make them start asking questions and needing to read the book to figure them out... The current chapter is a fun way to introduce several of the characters while showing Casey’s personality, but it just doesn’t have that… that, you know… That thing that makes you curl a little more into a book that you’ve begun? Yeah. That.

But, as I said, around page 211 of my skim-fest, I had an epiphany. I really like my new concept, but am wondering exactly how I’ll pull it off. I’m thinking that I want to start the book with the death of one of my favorite characters, preferably within the first two pages. Currently this death occurs towards the end of the book, but I’m wondering… maybe I can start the story there and have it leave enough cryptic clues to really get the reader sucked into the story and then have it go back and start at the beginning. Maybe have the death be a type of prologue, even though I know that some people don’t like those.

Start with the death and have the next chapter start up with the scene that is set to start next on the timeline. This scene includes a phone call where Casey is told about the death. Now, what I’m thinking is that the shock of hearing that this character is dead will have Casey internally questioning what happened? Was there anything she could’ve done to stop this? Thus, leading into the story from the beginning.

This would make the bulk of the story in the past tense as it’s describing what’s already happened and would require a bit of extra rewrites to accommodate this. But! One concern that has been expressed with the story is that it’s in the present tense. This way, most of it would be past, until we catch up to that point in the story, where she is sitting in shock. Then it would pick up in present tense.

This would also explain why most of the story is from Casey’s POV. It’s all her memories at that point. Once we catch back up to the present time, the POV starts swapping around again, at least a couple times.

It would also give me more chances to lay cryptic clues about the men in Casey’s life and it lets the reader know what a large part the dead character actually plays in the story. What they do in those first couple of pages lays the groundwork for the entire series.

I wish that my husband was home from work or that my beta reader was online right now because I want to explain this idea in detail to someone who knows the entire story to see if it works for them. I think that vocalizing it and answering any questions that they might have will help me decide if this is really the way I want to organize my chapters.

There are a lot more tweaks that I plan on making to the story that will really change it for the better as well. But, I’d really like to start by reorganizing it if that’s the path that I choose to take. Otherwise, I might rewrite a chapter and then have it affected by the reorganization and need to be rewritten again.

But anyway, I guess I’ll spend the time until the hubby gets home reading the story and adding in more comments via the Track Changes feature on where I’d like to add in all my new ideas.

Oh yeah, I’ve also found a great new procrastinatory outlet other than Facebook. I enjoy watching TV shows on the Internet because I can never seem to remember to watch them when they’re actually on. (Yeah, no TiVo or DVR and I’m not about to try and find a blank VHS to use the VCR.) But anywho… somewhere along the lines, I discovered that the Highlander series is on Hulu! I loved that series and it’s been forever since I’ve watched it. So, now that most of my shows are on hiatus until the fall season, I’ve been watching Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod beheading people. Hopefully, my writing mojo is stronger than my need to watch Highlander… I can find a healthy balance, right?

Anywho, until I blog again…
Talk 2ya later…

~Willow

***

Additional Note: After talking with the hubby, I think I know how to make this new idea work in the story. I'm going to start the second draft with the new, reorganized story and if, in the end, I don't like it, I can go back to the first draft copy and start over.

Writer's A.D.D.

I have self-diagnosed myself with having Writer's A.D.D. It wasn't all that hard to do really, I have all of the symptoms...

• So many ideas spinning around in my head that I can't focus on anything
  
• Jumping from one part of the story to another because... "oooh, what if I did this, here?!" (very similar to SOS - Shiny Object Syndrom)
  
• etc...

(Oh yeah, disclaimer: I'm not a medical doctor, but I could write myself in a story where I am one... Oh, and there is no such disease as Writer's A.D.D., but it makes me feel better thinking that there's a medical term for what I'm suffering from, lol!)

I need to start meditating again or something. Anything to get my mind to calm down and let me work on one thing at a time. When this would happen during the first draft, I would just do a free write with all of my ideas and I'd be all set to start implementing them. That's not even working this time! Halfway through a note for one idea and my brain is already racing ahead to the next idea.

The excitement of getting this far in the process must have fried my brain. Well, that along with the burst of creativity that hit me once I started thinking about what needed to happen in the second draft. I'm sure my inability to make a decision regarding my main character's age isn't helping either though...

Today, I'm going to try organizing all of my notes for the story to see if that helps organize them in my brain as well. Maybe, having everything together in one document will convince my brain that we have it all down... no need to worry about forgetting something. I'd do just about anything to calm my thinking right now, my brain has more energy than my two-year old... and that's impressive!

Thanks for all of the amazing comments on my last post by the way. Your comments and advice on the situation really helped me realize that I have to stay true to my characters and do what is best for the story. Overall, I've decided that if I can't commit to a decision and support it 100%, then I'm not going to change anything, yet. Down the road, should I decide to change her age or if an editor or agent wants it changed, I know what needs to be done. So, thanks again! You guys are the best!

But, anywho... Off to round up my notebooks and documents so I can start my "second draft to-do list"...

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

~Willow

So many questions...

My poor little head is spinning. The rewrites on Instinct aren't confusing me, I pretty much know what needs to be done there... it's a new change I'm considering that has me unsure of what to do next.

First a little backstory (yay! the dreaded info dump!). I submitted part of my story to an online critique group anonymously and some of the comments have me thinking. There were a lot of stupid mistakes on my part that I'm not sure how I missed, but some of the other comments were deeper than just SPaG (Spelling, Punctuation, & Grammar) errors.

The first issue that got me thinking, people seemed to agree that my voice is very YA. That's pretty cool as most of my story ideas are definitely YA, except Instinct. To be honest, I'm not sure how to classify this story. Right now my main character, Casey, is 21 and attending the police academy. I know that due to her age, this would be a tough sale as a YA, even though I think that the story itself could go either way, YA or adult.

On the same note as the last comment, I've had several people ask if I couldn't just change Casey's age to maybe 18. Before, I would always say, "No, it wouldn't work with the story or the series..." but now, I'm not so sure. I originally chose Casey's age based off of the requirements for the real Boston Police Academy, minimum age of 21 and have lived in Boston for 1 year (I wanted the story to be as believable as possible).

But, I am writing fiction, aren't I? Would it be horrible if the academy in my story had a minimum age requirement of say... 18? I'm taking liberties on the timing and content of her classes and training, why shouldn't I fudge the admissions requirements while I'm at it? I'm taking liberties with the entire city of Boston since I've never actually been there. I don't want to pull people out of the story who have been a part of the police academy, but I need to do what's best for my story at the same time, you know?... [Head Spinning Moment]

The more I thought about changing her age, the more the story seemed to make sense. I had found a couple of plot holes and other problems and this change would fix most of them.

• Why would her father, all of a sudden, insist that she have a roommate if she's been living in Boston for 3 years? She couldn't have been living with Heather the whole time or their dynamics wouldn't be believable. Her having a different roommate before doesn't make much sense either though, it's very obvious that Heather is her first roommate.
• What actually released her gift? If her turning 18 triggered it, that would make sense.
• Why is she so anti-social to begin with and why, in her three years living in Boston, did she never try to change this on her own? Being 18 and fresh out of high school would work with her backstory as to why she's not over her past enough to make the changes on her own.
• Why is she so emotional and having other specific problems? Still a teenager, yet expected to act like an adult... that would definitely be believable.
• And a few others...

I always wanted Instinct to be YA, but didn't know how well it would work given what I knew about the story in the past. Now that the first draft is done and I know the entire story, I think that it would really work.

Well, I'd have to alter one of her love interests too... maybe make him a Ph.D. student instead of a young associate/assistant professor (can't remember which is the correct term off the top of my head, but it's in my notes). That would work well too, make him a TA... would explain why he doesn't really have his own office...

But anywho... If I can get past the whole, "I want my story to be as accurate as possible, except for the paranormal aspects" (which, you never know, they could be true...) then, I think it would really work well. I'm doing rewrites now anyway, so this would be the best time to implement these changes...

But my questions for you, my dear readers.

• Would an age change in this case be believable? Would you believe a story where an 18 year old was a police cadet?
• Is 18 still too old for a YA story? I can think of several YA books that had characters with similar ages, but they were still in high school and Casey has graduated.

Well, I'm off to write up notes on these potential changes and maybe skim through the chapters and see if there's any major issues with her being 18 that I'm forgetting.

So, until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

It's Back!

My writing mojo that is.

Image by kattebelletje via Flickr

I've been in such a funk lately, not sure why I haven't been inspired to write up my last few chapters on Instinct to finish the first draft... now I know why. The chapters I have left suck! I can see why I outlined them in the beginning, but over half of them aren't going to make the final cut in this story. Sure, the scenes actually happened to Casey, but the reader doesn't need to be bored with all of those details when they don't really further the plot.

I made a decision this morning. My first draft is DONE!

Sure, I have a couple of chapters that aren't "complete", but I have them fully outlined and the parts that aren't complete will most likely be changed anyway. I'm starting on my second draft and feel that unexplainable energy that I felt writing the story before. I started seeing the characters in my head again and envisioning scenes that need reworked. It's an amazing feeling let me tell you!

I'm going to re-read a section of chapters that are done today to get ready to work in the mythology information. In my head I can see how to make this work where it isn't an info dump now! Woot!

As for my other to-do list:

1. Layer in some scenes for a major character that kind of got pushed to the background in his scenes: I have so many ideas for how to do this now. This is going to be so much fun!

2. Add in some extra paranormal aspects to Casey's gift and their ramifications to the plot: Love, love, love this idea now! The best part is that I get to add in these same abilities on a couple other characters. And this helps explain what happens to one character at the end perfectly.

3. Rewrite 2-3 scenes from another character's POV: I know at least two chapters that I want for this, but need to see if the chapter after that can be reworked from his POV as well. It's a tricky situation because I need to let the reader get to know this character without giving too much away that would ruin the twist at the end.

4. Figure out what I'm going to do with my "boring" scenes: Well, this one is fairly easy. Most of them are going to be cut or completely re-outlined to the point where I might as well cut them and start from scratch.

I was really starting to wonder if I'm meant to be a writer or not. It's a bit disconcerting to have your writing mojo fizzle like mine did on this story. Now I realize that I was trying to force myself to finish my boring chapters instead of following my own "instincts" that said to start the rewrites. I am so happy to be back to this frame of mind and see things being written fairly quickly in the coming month.

You wanna know how giddy this change in attitude has me? Well, it's no secret that I am NOT a morning person, but I woke up early this morning (well, early for me... especially on a day that my husband is watching the toddler). But anywho, I woke up and realized what I needed to do and everything came together so wonderfully in my head. My favorite scenes started playing themselves in my head as I re-acquainted myself with the characters that have been so silent for the past weeks and months. I grabbed my bedside notebook and started scribbling down notes and ideas. The excitement is so intense that I'm not sure how I'll get through reading over a couple of chapters before I dig in and start writing.

I haven't drank alcohol in about three years because of the whole pregnancy and nursing thing, but I think I'm buzzing on this writing mojo feeling! Woo, riding the writing high!

For anyone else who feels like they've lost their writing mojo, I have some advice: re-evaluate what you are trying to do with the story. Are you trying to make yourself go against your instincts? Toss out your preconceived notions on how a writing process is supposed to go and just do things your own way. When you really think about it, every known writing process started off as someone's instinct that ended up working so wonderfully that people emulated it. Maybe someday people will be following your process!

But, I need to get to work organizing my notes and reading a few chapters that need rewrites.

So, until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

YA -vs- Adult... I wanna write both!

Image via Wikipedia

I'm drowning in ideas for YA novels... Every week it seems like I'm outlining another fun book or series with a YA vibe to it. The cool thing about this is that each new idea seems better developed than the last. The bad thing is that all the time I'm spending writing up these synopses is time away from my nearly completed first draft of Instinct. But, if I don't write up these stories now, they'll be lost forever because of my bad memory. *groan*

Technically, I guess this isn't a horrible time for me to be taking a break from the writing aspect of Instinct though. You see I've recently decided to make a few little tweaks to the plot and a couple of main characters. These tweaks will affect a good portion of the book, but will make it a lot better. It will involve rewriting some scenes and layering in a lot of new information in other places, but it will be worth it in the end. One night I just had this moment of inspiration that set off a whole row of dominoes in my head until I knew what I had to do. I'm so excited to think about how these little changes will add a new sense of drama to the characters' lives as well as fill in a few plot holes.

So, why isn't this a bad time to outline other stories if I have so much new work to do? Simple. I have to let all of this new information "cook" in my subconscious for a few days so I can add it in as seamlessly as possible. I have a separate document typed up and handwritten pages of notes that will help, but... I don't know... it feels like when I first started outlining Instinct. I needed time to let my subconscious work out the kinks and once that was done, I started writing like a maniac. Taking the time to let everything settle in my head for a few days seems to be part of my process when I make big changes. (And these are big changes, but will be so much fun to write!)

This Just In: And just like that, while editing this blog post one of the new scene ideas *dinged* in my head and started playing. I typed up the outline and know exactly where to put it. I expect moments like this to happen off and on over the next week or so until everything is "fixed" in my head. But now, back to the somewhat regularly-scheduled blog post...

There is one thing that I am nervous about with all of my new book ideas though. If I'm successful and am able to get Instinct and the subsequent novels in the series published, how hard would it be to write YA novels after that? Instinct is one of those books that would be hard to classify. My MC is 21 so technically the story is at the extreme high end of what is typically considered YA, but I can easily see a teenager enjoying the book. I wish that I could believably change her age to 18, but that wouldn't work on many levels so I'm pretty sure it would end up classified a sweet, paranormal romance should it get published. Would it pigeonhole me into just writing romances if I were to find success with this story?

The stories that I want to write next are all YA and I've really enjoy creating these characters and their worlds. There's something about writing dialogue for a teenager that is so much fun. Maybe I can relate to teenagers because I love reading YA books and listening to the teen and tween music groups. It's not that I don't have ideas for new romance novels or that I have a problem with the genre (I love it!), but I just feel that the YA stories are better ideas and would be more enjoyable to write.

I hate to even think this way because I believe in Instinct so much, but what if it's meant to be my practice novel? The one I write first, but for whatever reason never gets published. What if all of these YA inspirations that I've been bombarded with lately are the universe's way of telling me what I'm supposed to be writing? Maybe I'm just scared to finish Instinct and my mind is looking for any excuse to keep me from working on it... *sigh* Then again, maybe I'm just over thinking things AGAIN...

I have no intention of quitting my journey to finish and publish Instinct. I love Casey and can't imagine not finishing her story and trying to share it with the world. So fear not, Casey Parker will not disappear! I just need to work on my ability to focus and try to regain control of my muse... Hah! Like I've ever had any control over him, but I can dream right?

If I can successfully make my tweaks to Instinct, then I think I would have a decent shot of publishing it somewhere. Anyone I've told the premise to says that they haven't seen a paranormal romance with my particular paranormal element before and that it sounds awesome. Agents and editors want new ideas right? But, what if finding success with Instinct makes it where I can't tell the stories of Brooke, Lisa, Megan, or...? Arrrggghhh... I need chocolate...

The current plan is to finish Instinct and then start writing whichever one of these YA stories inspires me the most at the time while on submission. If Instinct should happen to sell while I'm working on my new project, great! If not, I'll start submitting the complete YA story as well and let the universe decide which should be published. And, if both sell... I'll wake up and blog, "I just had the best dream..."

But anyway, until I blog again,
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

D'oh! D'oh! D'oh!... *DING*

An glimpse into the mind of a writer working through a plot problem...

Have you ever had one of "those" days with your writing? I've spent a bit of today working on the motivations for one of my characters... Who would've thought that this simple task would lead to a major duh moment on my part?

I started my task by re-reading the scenes that this character is in so I could get a feel for his voice again, not that I could ever really forget it... he is one of my favorite characters after all. The more I read, the more in love with my new scene ideas I've become. I'm going to add in additional little mini scenes with this character to help build his character up with the reader. It will really add to the story in ways that I honestly didn't think of when I first outlined Instinct. I never realized how little this character was in my original draft when he plays such a major role in the story. I guess I took for granted that the reader would sympathize for him, without really knowing him. These new mini-scenes will help show more of his personality and add some drama for Casey to deal with. Drama + Casey = Fun!

So what's the problem then? Arrrgghh! Well, while re-reading the text, I noticed a specific point where my character gets upset over something he walks in on (and rightfully so, given his perspective of the situation). The problem... his reason for being upset is horribly, horribly wrong. Unless I can recreate the way the weekdays fall believably in my story (not likely...), his motivation just isn't going to work here. Here's a breakdown of my lapse in mental processing:

1. Character asks girl out for the weekend and she tells him that she's going home to visit family.
2. He's sad, but accepts it, he did wait until the last minute to ask her (It was Thursday afternoon).
3. The next Friday (not the next day, the next week) he sees her out with another man.

The problem? His reason for being hurt and mad is that she lied to him... basically in my head the days of that particular week went something like this: Thursday (ask out) > Friday/Saturday (she's with family) > Sunday (she meets other guy) > Friday (he sees her on a date with new guy). There are no other days between Sunday and Friday. It just doesn't make sense for him to be upset for the reasons I thought he was here.

So, now I have to find a better motivation for him to be upset about when he sees them out together. Maybe I can have him ask her out again for Friday sometime during that week and she tell him that she can't. Him asking her out for that night would work with their backstory, but she wouldn't not tell him why she couldn't and she wouldn't lie to him either, I think... I guess I could work that into the story, her lying about her real plans... Then he catches her in the lie and... well, the rest of the scene happens!

... \
... Brain processing this new info...
... /

*DING* (That's the sound of the buzzer in my head going off, saying this new idea is ready!)

OMG, I think I've got it! Yes, him asking her out again is DEFINITELY the way to go!

Thanks for listening to me working through this problem. For some reason working it out in my head wasn't cutting it, but blogging about it did the trick! I haven't figured out all of the specifics for this change, but I'm liking where they're headed. Fixing his motivation in this one scenario has even caused a domino effect to go off in my head and now I know his motivation (as well as a few other characters' motivations) in later scenes.

Well, I need to start sketching out these new scenes and motivations so I can add them in as notes in my main story file. This makes so much sense now! Maybe I was misinterpreting the scenes all along... it wouldn't be the first time... But anyway, Instinct calls!

So, until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

Sighing, Willow bangs her head against the wall...

Casey isn't speaking to me... Of course Casey would be the heroine from my current WIP, Instinct, not some random friend I've offended in some way. I'm pretty sure I haven't offended anyone in real life lately...

As you will remember from my last post, it was my last one right?... anywho... I had begun outlining a fun story about a pop/rock singer named Lisa. Not that I want to spend all of my free time working on yet another fun story that I'd like to write, I simply had no choice. I'm sure I'm not the only writer who's been hi-jacked mid-story, well I hope I'm not the only one, that would be weird and kind of lonely...

Well, Lisa has a very strong personality and wasn't about to let me ignore her. I would begin visualizing a scene from Instinct and she'd just walk right in and plop herself down on the couch, turning on the TV and saying something like, "Oh don't mind me, I just have a few things to settle with her," while pointing skyward, towards me. So, yeah... my cast of characters in Instinct got a bit fed up with this so I decided to take a few days and write up a synopsis of Lisa's tale to add to the TBW (To Be Written) pile.

So here I am, quiet house, husband at work, toddler napping... and what am I doing? Blogging. Oh, I tried to work on Instinct- I really did-, but as I mentioned before, Casey's mad at me. As she's the main character and everything is from her POV, this puts me in an awkward position. I understand that she's upset that I took a few days to write up some stuff for Lisa, I really do. Why can't she see that I did this for her. Now Lisa is happily sitting in her own file knowing full well that her story is spinning around in my subconscious, brewing up all sorts of misadventures for her to have. Now I'm free to work on Instinct without any more interruptions from a certain pop/rock princess.

I guess I didn't make things any better between Casey and myself when I pointed out that she is acting just like Heather towards the end of the book. Yeah, that didn't go over well... how could I forget the temper she has? I really should've remembered that, after all she can channel the instincts of Ares to help fuel her anger. I was quickly reminded of this fact once I uttered the stupid words, "You are so being Heather right now..." with a roll of my eyes. The way her eyes flashed bright red as her hands balled into tight fists at her sides before she turned and stormed out of the room... yeah big ol' reminder there. I'm just lucky that the Casey from the end of the book was the one I was talking to, at least she has some semblance of control over her gift. I shudder to think about what could've happened if I had encountered a Casey from an earlier chapter. But seriously, where were the gray eyes of Minerva with all of her wisdom when I needed them, huh?

But anyway... Last night I was able to write the beginning of a chapter that was otherwise done. Yeah, I'm horrible about skipping the beginnings of chapters. I know what I want to happen, just not the best way to start things off to hook the reader. So I use my "blue text" technique and write down a quick summary of what I need to include in the beginning and make it blue and italicized so I can tell what isn't done just by glancing at the page. So far this has worked really well for me.

I'm not really happy with what I wrote though. I think Casey was silently fuming while we were working things out and not cooperating very well. Something with the voice of the scene just sounds too... harsh? compared to everything else I've written. I hope that I'm not losing Casey's voice because of all of these other characters that are swimming around in my head. That would suck because I love Casey and her story. I'm just going to hope that I'm able to smooth out that section of the story in the second draft.

So what am I doing right now to try and locate Casey's voice amongst the ever-expanding crowd of characters in my head? I've tried listening to Edwin McCain singing I'll Be on my iTunes and looking at pictures of the celebrity cast of Instinct that my friend M and I compiled a while back. I'm really hoping that this helps pull me back into Casey's world. I'll Be is sort of the love theme for Casey and one of the men vying for her heart. If this doesn't work I'll have to loop the book's playlist all day while re-reading the entire manuscript, all 236 single-spaced pages of it. Not that I don't enjoy reading the book, I really do, I just wish I could be writing it today.

Maybe the secondary love theme, Why Don't You Kiss Her? by Jesse McCartney will help too... the scene it goes with is one of my favorites so far. Maybe Mina's themes, Do You Believe in Magic? or I'm Walking on Sunshine would do the trick... Man, I need another mad Casey scene to write... all I can hear is her angry voice right now.

Anyone else have characters revolt on them before? Any way to make them cooperate without threatening them? I'd try the whole, "Behave or I'll delete you," but she'd just laugh at me, knowing I couldn't do it. I'm actually tempted to say, "Fine. I'm sure Lisa would be happy to have her story worked on today..." but I'm pretty sure that wouldn't help my case any either. What do you think?

Well, I'm off to have an argument with the voices in my head... man that doesn't sound good...

So, until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

No news is good news...

Willow, reporting for blog duty!

Well, it's been a week since I sent off my short story, On Occasion... to the publishing house and no response yet. Part of me keeps reminding myself that in publishing, "No news is good news..." is a general rule. If the editor has read it and didn't immediately send me a form rejection, that's always a good start. Now, of course, my story could be one in a long list that he has to read and he simply hasn't gotten around to it. Either way, I'm just happy that I found the courage to send off my story for consideration.

I wouldn't even blame this editor if he hadn't gotten around to reading my story yet. In the past week this publishing house has made the news several times. Once reporting their financial situation and another announcing that they are doing away with a couple of their imprints. With all of that going on, I wouldn't blame anyone at the company for being behind. It doesn't appear as if they are going to scrap their short story project though, a new short story was posted on their website this week... so that's a good thing.

I'll just maintain my standpoint that no news is good news and even if I end up with a form letter. At least my story was read by a professional editor. If I hear anything, good or bad, expect a blog post about it. If it's bad news, I'll chalk it up to my first professional rejection and see it as an opportunity to develop the thick skin necessary for this business. If it's good news... well, I'll be freaking out again. I'll call my husband, if he's not home. I'll call my friend, M, who beta reads my writings. I'll have my husband start calling the family because at that point, I'll most likely be a quivering mass on the floor. Once I'm able to function normally, I'll email the editor back, thanking him profusely, but professionally, and then write up a blog post. Not that I've thought this through or anything...

Now for an update on Instinct...

I'm still having a blast writing this story and working with these characters. This past week I've continued my useless scene weeding. I found several places where I had outlined a scene that would be more powerful if I just mention it in passing.

For instance, at one point Casey is sent to a counselor about something that happens to her. I had the scene all outlined out with her and the therapist, but then realized that the entire scene was one big info dump. Not a good thing. The story will be much more powerful if I begin the scene with her walking out of the session and let all of the information she was going to spew out to the shrink reveal itself in small chunks throughout the rest of the story. I'm really excited with how the scene is outlined now and can't wait to write the short transition from the counselor's office into the next scene. I love writing Casey mad!

I've also been going back and finishing up scenes that I found myself stuck writing before. If I find myself stalled on part of a scene, I simply add a comment about what I want to add in and move on. I have these "incomplete scenes" scattered throughout several of my otherwise complete chapters so I'm going back through now and seeing if any of them are clearer now.

Once I'm done rechecking my incomplete scenes, I'll click through my document map and see which unwritten chapters want to be written. I have several of these chapters that are attempting to write themselves in the back of my head, but I don't think they're ready yet. It's like baking a cake. I take my characters and my outlines and mix them up and toss them in my subconscious to "bake". Every once in a while I'll check on them and see if they're done early for whatever reason, but if not, I leave them to do their thing. Right now I'm waiting on that mental "ding" to let me know they're done.

The scenes that are appealing to me right now are the more paranormal ones. I've written a few scenes where Casey has random episodes, but these scenes are different. The ones I'm cooking right now are where she is going through training, trying to learn how to control her gift before it controls her. Of course having her try to avoid getting back together with her ex the entire time will add some interesting internal drama for her. This point in the story is especially cool because this is when Casey starts coming into her own and accepting herself for who she is. She deals with making new friends and losing old ones... she's able to move past events from her childhood and recent past... she decides to give love another shot... In other words, it'll be a blast to write!

Here's an update on where I am right now:

• Pages (single spaced) - 232
• Words - 89,053

So I'm making pretty good progress considering how little time I've been able to devote to the story this past week. Even with cutting a lot of scenes, my word count at the end of the day keeps going up. My goal is to have the first draft done by April. I'm giving myself plenty of time because, if things go well, we could be moving in between now and then. My husband is applying for a pretty good job about 6 hours from where we are now, in the same area where his family lives. I really, really, really, really hope he gets this job. Not only would he be making more money, but we'll be so much closer to loved ones. All-in-all, we'd all be a lot happier if he gets this job, so fingers crossed!

Well, that's about it for today's update. I have to get some work done off of the computer... blech! So...

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

~Willow

I don't want to jinx anything, but...

Hi again!

Has it been an intense week for anyone else but me? Well, maybe not the entire week, but definitely the past couple of days.

Let me explain... Now I don't want to jinx myself, so I won't list specifics, but... yesterday something crazy happened. I stumbled across an open call for short stories. As it so happens, I have a completed short story that I'm pretty happy with. I'll go so far as to say that I down-right love the story. Loved the characters so much that I've even outlined a full novel for them to be written... sometime...

Finding a call for short stories isn't that impressive, but this call was put out by a MAJOR publishing house. I don't want to provide any names over the blog because I'm scared that I'll somehow jinx myself...

Anywho, there weren't any guidelines listed, just an email address. I copied over the address into my trusty Gmail account and sent off a quick email asking for specifics (formatting, length, genre, etc.) and waited, not expecting much because it was after what would normally be considered busines hours. Around an hour later, I had a response telling me how to submit and that they would gladly read my story.

Okay, at this point I was really excited. Not only is this a major publishing house but they don't usually take unagented work. And here I am -unpublished and unagented- given permission to submit my short story. I quickly make the required adjustments to my file and send it off, really excited that my story was going to be read by someone at...

Now, I do my best to stay on top of the publishing industry and know the major houses, but... as my novel isn't complete yet, I haven't done a lot of research on the actual editors at these houses. Sure, I know of a few, whose blogs I follow on my Google Reader but, for the most part, I'm clueless.

I pretty much assumed that the person I was emailing was a junior staff member or at most a junior editor, but still treated everything as if I were emailing a big wig in the company. Boy am I glad that I did! After sending off the email, I knew that doing anything else for my novel would be near impossible so I Googled the name of the person I had been corresponding with. While I was unable to find any company hierarchy or listing of agents with titles, I did find a news release from a couple of years ago. The news release listed him as being the editorial director for one of the publishing house's imprints...

*THUD* -- That was the sound of me passing out at the memory of what was going through my head when I first read that...

I also found a short summary of an article that was published maybe 6 months after the news release that I mentioned before. This summary mentioned something about this person being a VP at the publishing house... As I was unable to read the entire story in context, I don't want to assume that what I read means what I think it could mean... I don't want to draw conclusions based on a short blurb that was cut off mid-sentence when I can't find any other information to substantiate this.

But anyway... unless this publishing house has two people with the same name (and it's not a common name that you hear a lot...) it looks like I was emailing at the very least an editorial director at a major New York publishing house.

*THUD* -- There I go again...

Can you see why I'm alternating between mild and major freaking out episodes? If my story gets selected, it would be published on a website for this particular imprint of the publishing house alongside short stories written by other published and unpublished authors. Do you have any idea how hard it is to wrap my brain around what that could do for my writing?

To be perfectly honest, I'm just elated that someone at this house is even reading something that I've written. I'm too scared to even think about what would happen if they really like it. I keep having to repeat, out loud, that, "an editor at ... is going to read my short story. An editor at a publishing house that, for the most part, doesn't accept unagented work. One of the largest publishing houses in the country, if not the world..."

*grabs a paper bag to hyperventilate into*

I don't know anything about having short stories published, everything that I've researched thus far has been specific to novels. I'm not sure what the typical turn around time for getting a response to this type of submission should be. If it were a novel, I'd have a general idea of what to expect, but I never even considered having a short story published. Heck, I never expected to write a short story.

For now I think I'm just going to be excited that an actual New York editor is reading my story. Sure a part of my brain is shouting for me to finish Instinct so I can strike while the iron is hot should On Occasion... get accepted for publication... but the rest of my brain is numb from freaking out. At this point, I don't think that I'd be that upset if I'm not chosen. There are a limited number of slots available and I'm not sure how many are available for unpublished authors.

Is this what it always feels like when you have something out for submission? I feel like I'm checking my email every five minutes, even though I know that any sort of decision that I would like would take longer than it's been. What's sad is that I don't even have to "check" my email to check it... I found that if I keep my Gmail open in a tab in Firefox, it will update the tab name to show that I have an unread message. So now that tab never closes, lol. If I'm doing something away from the computer, I make random passes by it... just checking the tab title... How pathetic am I?

So, other than that... I've made a little bit of progress on Instinct, not as much as I had hoped... but I think I have a decent excuse this time... I've mostly been weeding out scenes that I had originally outlined, but now realize have no real value to the story. Nothing new is presented in them and they don't do anything to further the plot along. Nothing is lost by removing them, so they've been stuck in a file for ideas that just didn't cut it. This way, if I need to add something in in a later draft, I have pre-outlined scenes to consider. It feels so weird to see my word count going down and knowing that I'm actually making progress.

I have my "To Write..." list made up for tomorrow. It includes a couple of incomplete scenes that I'm really excited to finish up. So, hopefully I'll make some decent progress later tonight and into tomorrow.

Well, that's my vague, big news and a boring update on the novel. I'm sorry again for being so vague, but I'm still trying to convince myself that I'm not dreaming. I check to make sure that the emails are real a couple of times a day as it is... Maybe I'm overreacting to the situation, but this is pretty exciting considering that I've never submitted anything for publication before.

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

~Willow

Short Story DONE! and other news...

Here I am again! I've had a pretty good writing week, in my opinion at least.

First, I finished my short story for The Pen & Muse Romance Short Story Contest. As in, it's done! Written, edited, proofread... D.O.N.E. done! I was very fortunate to happen across a post on The Writer's Beat forum where someone volunteered to do free proofreading so that they could build their resume. As I had read and re-read my story so many times that I knew I was most likely missing a lot of little errors, I jumped on this opportunity. I'm so glad that I did!

I send my ~3300 word story off to Aspen and had it back the next day, well before the 72 hour wait period that I had been expecting. As expected, I had several little errors... comma/semi-colon issues and a couple of instances where I had used the same word multiple times in a paragraph, etc. I'm proud to say that I've learned where some of my punctuation weaknesses are and am working on improving them. I agreed with every suggestion that was offered, even though I was fully prepared to ignore anything that didn't feel right to me; it is my story after all. But that never happened, every suggestion was spot on.

Overall, I would say that this was an awesome experience for me and I would definitely recommend Aspen's services to anyone in need of a proofreader. I'm not sure how long the free proofreading services will continue, but I would definitely encourage anyone to email and inquire about it. It's a win-win situation, they get experience to put on their resume and you get a cleaner piece of writing along with an opportunity to learn your strengths and weaknesses. You can't get any better than that now, can you?

This shot story contest ends on February 19th and I'll definitely keep you updated on how my story fares. People who have read the story seem to like it and I love the characters, so I guess only time will tell. I'm doing my final read-through on it today and sending it off. I know... I should have sent it off yesterday like I originally planned to, but I guess I'm paranoid. I wasn't able to do my final read-through last night because my writing gremlin hi-jacked and forced me to outline something else (more info on that farther down in this blog). So, once I'm finished posting this blog, I'll be reading over the story one last time and emailing it off. Wish me luck!

Let's see... what else has happened?

Oh yeah! Speaking of my short story, titled On Occasion..., after hearing from two important people in my life who have read it, I wrote up a six page outline to further my new character's stories. I honestly had never considered that there might be more to these characters than what was created in my fever-induced brain when I dreamed them up, but I guess I was wrong. First my friend, M, after reading it, told me that she wanted to know what happened next... I was like, "um... nothing that I know of, I think..." Then, the other day, my husband read it and said that he agreed with M that the story could be expanded beyond what I had, not for the short story, but for another writing project. Hearing this from a man who I'd never imagine reading a romance short story really made me start thinking. If someone who normally wouldn't read this genre likes the story and characters and sees the potential, maybe I should consider it? No harm in asking the characters if they have anything more to share, right?

Wrong! This started several days of my writing gremlin creating, writing, and rewriting Megan and Joseph's story after On Occasion... ends. To be honest, the process is pretty cool to watch in my head... very Butterfly Effect. A scenario creates itself in my mind and plays out as if I'm watching a television show or a movie, then something won't seem right and the whole thing stops, rewinds, and starts again, changed to fix the error. Day and night I was plagued by these characters, just like when I started writing Instinct. At night, I would dream these looped scenes until my brain and the writing gremlin agreed that they were "just right". During the day, I would find myself daydreaming more scenes. Somewhere along the way, I created a playlist on my iTunes and started throwing songs that fit the scenes and characters into it. Then, while engaging in my worst time waster-checking celebrity gossip blogs (I know... but I can't help it...)- I started finding pictures of actresses that looked like a couple of my characters. This whole process is reminding me of the early days when I first dreamt up Instinct. Maybe this YA story will be added to my back burner projects for when I need a break from what I'm doing on Instinct.

Speaking of Instinct, I'm having a blast working on it again. The medications are fully out of my system and I can finally see and hear the characters clearly again. Don't ask me why I could write a short story while on them but not my novel... medicine head is a very complicated ailment apparently....

After reading a blog post from Murderati, I found myself really wanting to write all of the scenes with my villain. After reading a different blog post from Fangs, Fur, and Fey, I suddenly wanted to finish up everything with Casey's love interest. And now that I've started finishing up incomplete scenes and thinking about how I want to begin some of the chapters that I've yet to start.

I can't believe how happy I am to be back writing again. M even commented to me over a Gmail chat that I sound happier than I have been since I had to take my break from it. The funny thing is that I feel happier, more "myself" now that I'm back writing, ya know? It might sound weird, but part of me thinks that I was going through some sort of withdrawal/depression the past month because I couldn't write what I wanted or how often I wanted.

"Hello, I'm Willow and I'm addicted to writing..."
"Hi Willow!"

All right, now that that's taken care of... back to where my writing has taken me since my last post.

I'm actually almost done with the only part of the story that isn't in Casey's POV and I'm liking how it's turning out. I really like getting inside of this other character's head and it works really well to jump to his perspective towards the end of the book. Certain things happen at the end that Casey doesn't experience first-hand that are necessary to keep the plot going. I went back and forth on how I could get her this information when I realized that some of what happens can't be told to her. And since this book is part of a series in my head, I need to have a character experience things in order to subtly place clues to set up future books. Things that the characters don't think much of at the time and definitely not something that they would rush out to tell everyone about. Little subtle clues and hints that, on the surface, don't appear to be much... but when the truth is revealed make perfect sense.

So, what I'm saying is that I'm back writing Instinct and really excited to be back in that world. As confusing as it was, I was even writing on it while my brain was figuring out Megan and Joseph's story. The fact that I was able to go from writing a chapter of Instinct one minute to writing up the full outline of this new story (who's working title is being quite elusive...) makes me believe that I'll be able to work on both as needed.

My main focus is still going to be finishing Instinct- I'm so close to seeing the end of the rough draft that I can taste it! But, for those times when the scenes for it just aren't ready to be written, I now have a back up project to keep my occupied. Can't have me slipping back into writer's withdrawal/depression again. Now I have an alternate story to outline fully so I can get my writing fix when I'm stuck.

So everything is going really well with my WIPs and I can see the glimmer of a light at the end of the tunnel for my first draft of Instinct. It's so good to be back!

Let's see, what else? Oh yeah, before I forget again... I'm joining a writing guild. At the end of last year I found a website for a local writers guild and decided to check them out. I went to their first meeting of the year on January 15th (a horribly, horribly cold night where I found myself having to fill up the car before making the drive out because my husband forgot to...). Well, during the first meeting, I was able to meet several different writers from all different specialties. Writers of fiction, non-fiction, journalism, even a woman who is specializing in oral story telling. While at 26, I was the youngest person there, it still looks like it'll be a good group. Sadly, I wasn't able to officially join that night because I forgot the checkbook at home (d'oh!), but when I attend the next meeting on February 19th, I'll definitely become an official member.

This group has guest speakers at the meetings, be they published or unpublished authors, industry professionals, or even professors. The speaker at the first meeting was published author, Harry Spiller. He's a local author and retired teacher who has had several books and short stories published. He's even done work with a true crime television show on A&E, pretty cool. He told us about his struggles to find a publisher for his first book as well as the importance of knowing, and adhering to, submission guidelines. While I had already read pretty much everything he spoke of on the do's and don'ts of getting published during my extensive research of the publishing industry, it was still amazing to hear these truths repeated in person. It seemed to make them more real to actually hear someone speak them.

Another plus to group membership is that I'll be allowed 4 pages in their yearly anthology to have my work published. I'm not sure what I'll be able to find that is short enough to fit in the allotted space, but I'll definitely be looking out for something good to include.

They also produce a newsletter and allow members to submit writings to that as well. Maybe I can take some of the valuable information that I've learned through my favorite writing websites and blogs and write up an article for it? It'd be fun to try and I'm sure that someone would find the information useful.

They also have a yearly writing contest, but the fiction category is limited to 1500 words. I would be hard-pressed to write a piece of fiction that short. I still don't know how I wrote On Occasion... in under 3500 words, especially when the maximum word count allowed was 10,000 words. The deadline for this contest is May 1st, so maybe I'll feel inspired by then. If not, well... there's always next year if we're still living in this area then.

But anyway, this coming month I'll be joining the ranks of the Southern Illinois Writers Guild and I'm really looking forward to it. Not only will I be able to connect with other writer's in the area, but I'll be given the opportunity to network with published authors in person. As I've mentioned in other posts, I love the opportunity to ask questions and get advice from those who've been successful in this industry.

I think that's pretty much all that I've been up to in regards to my writing since my last post... If I think of anything else that I forgot, I'll definitely make a new post. So...

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

Day 1 Back on medication...

Yeah, you read the subject right, I'm back on the medication. I had started to feel better, finished up my prescription, and crossed my fingers that all would be well in my world... yeah, that didn't happen...

My ears are still killing me so the husband sent me back to the doctor today. The infection looks better, but there's still fluid in my ear. Luckily I only have five days worth of antibiotics this time and I wasn't instructed to stay on the antihistamines. Hopefully this new, stronger antibiotic won't affect my mental functioning too much, I'm finally getting back into the groove with my writing.

Since going off of the antihistamines, I've wrote up a synopsis for one story and written the rough draft for a short story contest I'm entering. I've also started reading my 200+ page, single-spaced manuscript of Instinct to help get myself back in the groove to finish it. Luckily, I still love my characters and their story and I'm not having any real problems getting back into that mind set. I guess part of me was afraid that all of this time away from it would somehow diminish my enjoyment of writing it, but it didn't so I'm happy.

As for what I've actually written... I'm liking the story synopsis that I came up with yesterday. It came to me in a dream during the few hours that I was able to sleep... the toddler has been a little sick and wanted to see 3 a.m. apparently... But anyway, it's sort of a middle school/young adult type story. I really like the main character, Kat, she's fun to write about. It's basically the story of how a 13 year old girl is chosen to tend a mystical tree that is the source of hope for the world. I think I wrote up around five pages, single-spaced, outlining the story and making notes of certain pieces of dialogue that I remembered from the dream. Right now, it's happily sitting in my "Incomplete Story Ideas" folder, waiting for me to get to it.

I also finished a rough draft for a short story contest that I'm entering. The maximum word count for the contest is 10,000 words and mine's just over 3000, so if I decide that I need to add something, I have plenty of wiggle room. Right now, that draft has been sent off to a friend of mine. She had enjoyed the characters when I originally wrote up a 1500 word scene with them, so now I'm waiting to see what she thinks of what I added to it to round out their backstories. Now, I have a couple of weeks to polish it up and make it presentable for the contest.

I'm not expecting too much though, I'm not a short story writer. Well, I used to only write short stories, but ever since I picked up writing again, I've fallen in love with novel-length fiction. This will also be the first contest that I've entered something I've written in. It'll be a good experience, getting used to sending off something that I've written and love for someone else to read and critique. Should be good practice for when I finish Instinct and start sending query letters out for it. And, if by some miracle, I was to place in the contest, it will be something to add to my accomplishments in the query letters.

So, I guess... wish me luck on the contest, wish me good health as I recover from my illnesses, and send me encouragement as I jump back into the world of Instinct to finish it up. Of course, I wish you all well, good health, and good luck in all that you do too!

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

~Willow

Day one off of the medication:

I'm feeling a bit better today. My ears don't hurt anymore so that's an improvement. My sinuses are still driving me batty, but I don't think I have the infection anymore. Sinus problems are just part of living in this part of the country I guess.

Today will be the first day that I'm going without my antihistamines and I'm hoping all goes well. Medications like these always seem to affect me really strongly. Even supposedly non-drowsy versions of medication make me groggy. Probably something wrong in my genetic make-up...

Anyway, I think that I'm going to take it easy the next couple of days and ease myself back into the writing process. As much as I'd like to just jump in and start writing again, I think it'll be better if I give it a couple of days to let the rest of the antihistamines get out of my system. I'm feeling more like myself today, having not taken the mental-fog-inducing pills, but I know that the fog isn't completely gone yet. I think that I'll take a couple of days to re-read my manuscript and notes to re-acquaint myself with what I have left to write. The iPod is loaded with several of my inspirational songs for the story, so I'll be playing those off and on too.

I've also decided to enter a short story contest on a blog that I frequent regularly. The Pen and Muse is currently holding a romance short story contest and I'm really excited about it. This is the blog that sponsored a prize that I won in a contest held by Bitten By Books. Feel free to click the above link for more information on this contest, the prizes, and the deadline.

From somewhere within my clouded mind, an idea for a short story came to me this past week. Well, one scene from it came to me. Happy to be able to write anything, I eagerly typed it up and shared it as a cute story with a friend of mine. She really liked it and kept asking me what happens next. I was shocked, I hadn't thought that far through it. It was just a cute little scene to me, not an idea for a novel. I can't even think of an interesting way to expand these characters into a full-blown novel right now.

My scene is currently around 1500 words and is almost done. I have a couple of paragraphs of background information that is necessary in order for the characters motivations to be clear, so that's what I'm going to have to work on before the deadline next month. I have an idea of how I want to let the reader see what led up to where the characters are now, I'll just have to see how well it comes out when I go to write it. Luckily the contest has a 10,000 word minimum and I'm sure I can easily flesh out the character's brief backstories in less than 8500 words.

Writing this short story should be a good way to ease myself back into my writing habit. I can practice getting into these character's heads for a few days while refreshing my memory on what my Instinct characters are thinking and feeling in my remaining scenes. And if I win, or even place in the contest, it will be something to add to my writing resume. Being able to say that I won, or placed in, any writing contest is better than having nothing to include in my query letters when I finish Instinct and start looking for agents. (This, of course, only matters if my short story does well enough to win or place...)

To be honest, I've been wondering about my writing abilities. Maybe it's just how the illnesses and medications are affecting my brain, but I wonder if I'm talented enough to make it as a professional writer. I know that my beta reader enjoys my writing and my stories, but what if she's the only one? I keep trying to find a good excerpt to include in my blog or an various websites that I peruse regularly, but am having a bit of trouble. So much of what I've written needs backstory to have it make sense so I never know which passages to include. Also, since I'm still on my first draft, a lot of the writing needs a bit of polishing that I'm trying to hold off on until the subsequent drafts. When people ask for snippets of my work, what should I do? Post something that people may not fully understand in a hope that it "hooks" them into wanting to read more? Take time to try and polish just that scene to make it as error-free as possible? Or should I just wait until at least the first rough draft is finished?

I'm by no means ready to give up writing, I enjoy it far too much to ever do something like that. Actually, I don't even know where these doubts came from... no one's actually told me that my writing is horrible, the opposite in fact. It's probably just the after-effects of being sick and on the medications... I'm sure that once I'm able to delve back into the world I've created in Instinct that I'll be back to myself...

Well, until I blog again...
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow

Illness and New Writing Projects

Anyone have a quick cure for a sinus/ear infection? I'm serious, this being on antihistamines and living in a constant fog is getting old. What's really annoying is that I can still write fairly decently. I just can't focus on how what I'm writing ties into the bigger picture of the story.

I wrote what I consider a fairly cute little scene the other day, while at the height of being sick and drugged up. My beta reader likes it at least. I just have no idea what I want to do with it as it has nothing to do with Instinct. I've considered putting it in this one book idea that I've been toying with, but I'm not sure if it really fits.

This other book idea is actually one that I came up with before I started writing Instinct. It's sort of a Princess Diaries (book, not movie) meets Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. I really like the concept behind it, but I'm not sure exactly how I want to execute it. I know pretty much everything that I want to include in it, but can't seem to come up with a good "voice" to use for it.

I've actually been able to do some work on this project because none of the chapters directly tie in to each other. Before you get all shocked, saying "How can a book's chapters not fit together?" Let me explain... It's a compilation of stories, letters, and blog posts from a small group of friends. Each chapter will be them sharing special moments with each other as they go through their lives starting the day before they graduate high school. Sure, several of the chapters will be by the same "author," but each chapter will be it's own self-contained story. There's no need to connect the ideas to each other. In an opening portion of it, I'll set it up to show that the girls also communicate with each other regularly on the phone to keep track of the day-to-day stuff, but write up the important moments for each other.

I've created a basic character for each of the girls and what their "moments" will be, but I'm considering adding to my original idea. I'm thinking that as each of them go about their lives apart from each other, they invite new friends to join in their moments sharing group.

I'm glad that I can work on these individual moments while I'm sick. I've been going crazy not being able to write this past week. I'm still dying to get back to Instinct because I'd say that it's about 80% written... I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and just want to get back to writing it. I think at last count, I'm at almost 86,000 words. Considering most novels are anywhere between 80,000 to 100,000 words, I'm pretty proud of myself.

I'm really looking forward to the editing and revision process once my first draft is done, strangely enough. I want to read through it and find where my mistakes are. Then, I get to decide what scenes that I've written really aren't that important and get to fight with myself on whether or not I want to cut them.

Thanks to hundreds of websites and blog posts that I've read through this whole writing process, I can't wait to finish this book and start polishing it up so I can start querying agents. I've learned so much in the last five months that I've been researching and writing. I want to learn what my strengths are and figure out how I can improve on my weaknesses.

Part of me also can't wait to start blogging about the whole querying process. Maybe reading what I go through will one day help another new writer learn from my mistakes. Maybe not? I'm not really sure who all reads this.

I really believe in my characters and their stories and really hope that I get my chance to share them with the world. Thanks to everyone to continually sends me encouragement as I travel this bumpy road that will lead to hopefully becoming a professional writer one day.

Well, today is my son's second birthday so I have some prep work to do before friends start showing up for yummy cake.

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

~Willow

Out Sick.

Well, it's official. I have to take a few days off from my writing... and I HATE it. I'm on two different medications right now and if either of them would do their job, then I could probably continue my daily writing regimen. But as modern medicine has yet to create an instant cure to sinus and ear infections, I'll have to be patient and wait it out in misery.

If the antihistamine would kick in and get rid of all of the pressure on my eardrums, then I could stop taking it. It's a good medicine and I feel pretty good while it's working, but I live my days as a zombie in medicine head-land. Normally, this wouldn't bother me and I'd just ride it out, but it's really annoying with how my writing process works.

You see, I'm a very visually stimulated writer in that I see all of my scenes playing in my head sort of like a movie before I write them. Thanks to the potent effects of this medication, it's almost as if I'm looking through a foggy window. I can make out the vague shapes of my characters and hear their muffled speech, but I can't see or hear anything clearly enough to write it out. No matter what I do, I can't seem to clear the glass, as if it's dirty on the inside... so I sit outside and wonder what mischief my characters are getting themselves into and what scenes I'm missing out on...

If the antibiotic would kick in and start fighting the infections, then maybe I would feel well enough to at least work on the chapters that I've already started. Do some editing or at least add in a few comments of what parts of scenes don't seem to work right in my medication clouded brain.

But, as it is, I have no choice, (and believe me I've tried fighting this for the past couple of days...) I have to force myself to take a couple of days off of trying to write anything good. Sitting and staring at my open work in progress (WIP) like a drooling idiot all day doesn't get anything done.

I know that I could write up a lot of short little scenes that could, possibly fit into the story, but without being able to keep the whole story in the back of my mind, this idea really wouldn't work all that well. These scenes would be too hard to tie in when I can't write them successfully in context with the rest of the book.

So, please pardon my whining... whining that I can't write the scenes and chapters that I want... whining that I let myself get so horribly sick before going to the doctor... just whining in general...

I think that I've decided what I'm going to do to remain somewhat productive during my recuperation. Recently, through Bitten By Books, I won a copy of Eternal Seduction by Jennifer Turner. Jen is a really nice woman that I was able to speak with via an open interview session where the readers would comment on her blog post, asking questions, and she would answer back. I've been dying to read this book since it came in the mail, but never had enough free time to dive into it. As, I seem to have quite a bit more free time, (all of the time that I would normally spending writing...) I figure that now's the perfect time to give it a read. This is actually pretty decent timing because as another part of my prize, I should be receiving an advanced copy of the second book in this series, Eternal Hearts, sometime next month when it doesn't actually release until May.

So please forgive me if, over the next week or so, I don't do much real writing as I recuperate. Who knows? Maybe I'll write up a review of Eternal Seduction when I'm finished and post it up. I'm an opinionated person who likes to write, I think I will write up a review of the book. I'll be sure to let you all know what I think of it as soon as I'm done.

Well, until I blog again... (hopefully with a clearer head...)
Talk 2ya later...

~Willow