The Pain in the Heart

I've been pondering this post for a long time, trying to get the words right. 

Ironic, considering my chosen profession. Sometimes I think we become writers because we see great beauty and sorrow, and need to find words for it. Even if those words aren't always easy to come by.

This idea of mine is something I've long felt about writing, since I was a teenager and just starting to think about writing as a craft, and not just the stories I told myself at night, but not something I had words for.

A few weeks ago, I was reading DEAD SET by Richard Kadrey (so good!), and the feelings I've been trying to articulate came into sharper focus. The story is about a teenage girl dealing with the death of her father. She and her mother have to move into a shabby apartment, and she's struggling in a new school. She wanders into a record store one day, and finds a special room. The room is filled with records made from people's souls, her dad's among them. She travels to the Underworld, battles dying souls, and copes with the death of her father.

Kadrey has a light hand throughout the book--thank goodness. It would be easy to make Zoe mopey and depressed all the time. It would be easy to harp on how much she misses her father, and how she wishes she could be with him again. It would be easy, but the book would suffer for it.

Instead, Zoe's grief rises and falls like the tide. Sometimes, like when she discovers her father's soul at the record store, it rises. Other times, it's way underneath the surface. Not just as subtext, but as something hinted at in the spaces in between. In the words, and the scenes, and what's there, and what's not there. 

Kadrey is a good writer. So good, I'm going to assume he knows the chestnut about showing and not telling. He's very good at showing. Light on the telling. 

The obvious emotion running throughout the book is grief. Zoe's loss of her father. Her strained relationship with her mother. But in order for Kadrey to be able to sustain that sort of undercurrent all the time, he had to have been feeling grief himself. Not just emotion forced on the page, but a feeling that wells up inside you and pours out onto the page.

You feel sexy when writing a sex scene. You feel witty and clever when writing humor. These emotions are part of the larger book, but for me, the best books come from a place of pain. Of disquiet. Unrest. The main character needs something. Something desperately. Whether it's a sandwhich or true love, told well, we feel this yearning through the entire story, as something even deeper than subtext.

I believe that is where the words come from. The inspiration. The pain we feel in our hearts. The unrest. The easier we can tap into this feeling and just let it flow, let is simmer, the better our writing will be for it.

I'm not just talking about the subtext or surface emotions. I can think of a happy memory and feel happiness, but it doesn't last. For this other, more elusive feeling, it simply is. It just bubbles up from you--whether it's grief, or lust, or sadness, this is a state of being. Curiosity, a sense of justice. It's like a secret heart, beating inside the novel.

It then occurs to me that many writers were famous for being tortured. Hemingway. Fitzgerald. Plath. It's not that you can only be a good writer if you're borderline suicidal, but that these people have obviously had horrible things happen to them, and this infused their work. 

I think you can be perfectly well adjusted and still feel disquiet. Or curious. Or rail against the injustice you see. And these feelings will then lend themselves to words, because it burns inside you to tell it.

I still don't know if I'm explaining myself properly, but it's the best I can do for now. In the meantime, I hope you all mine your own emotions, if only to exorcise them on the page.

*I totally stole this title from the name of a Bones episode, because it fit so well.

The Silly, Completely Inconsequental Contest that Changed My Life

Source: wikimedia commons

If you listen closely, you can hear the frantic typing of thousands of writers gearing up for November, when they will embark on a month long trip into Insanity, Population: You. 

Some choose to outline their novel ahead of time (ahem). Some choose to completely wing it with notes, but have their novel premise and characters completely thought out. Others have put several ideas into a hat and when the clock strikes twelve on October 31st, they will choose the novel to write.

Yes, that's right: I'm talking about National Novel Writer's Month. Or NaNo for short.

In other parts of the Internet, writers are complaining about NaNoers, not because they're opposed to arbitrary goals with no consequences, but because they feel it makes the querying climate harsh for people who know not to polish their novel for two days before deciding it's good enough and sending it to unsuspecting agents everywhere. There's some truth to that, but honestly A) December was going to be a harsh month to query anyway and, B) these same inexperienced people are also your year round competition which really aren't competition because no agent is going to say yes to someone in the slush pile who clearly hasn't edited their novel.

Whatever your personal feelings for NaNo, I will always hold it in a special place in my heart, because the year I did NaNo for the first time was the year I really got "serious" about writing.

Let me explain. I was always serious about writing. I was always writing stories, and even attempting novels in high school. I started and stopped many novels since I was fourteen or so, with the notable mention going to the novel I wrote when I was 17 that was 15oK and still nowhere close to the middle. I honestly didn't know how long a book needed to be, because I'd never researched it before. This was before being a writer was ubiquitous with being on the Internet, blogging and maybe self publishing.

I read Stephan King's On Writing, and Orson Scott Card's Character and Viewpoint. I subscribed to Writer's Digest. I still didn't seem to be able to translate the pictures in my head to the page in front of me. Then I read an article in WD about NaNo and I thought it sounded fun. I still remember sitting in my old apartment and taking the magazine over to my computer so I could properly enter the website address into Google. Lately, I had been feeling depressed. Down. Like writing was just a dream I would always have, but never achieve. For the last few years my writing had taken a back seat to going to Massage Therapy school and working long hours. I was trying to build a business from scratch with other entrepreneurs, and it was grueling, heartbreaking work.

But I'd see my copy of On Writing, and feel a pang a sorrow. I'd get my issue of Writer's Digest in the mail, and devour all the articles like they would be my salvation.

And in a way, they were. Because when I went to the NaNo forums, I found a community of writers. Just like me. Beginners, completely new to everything about writing, and people who had been writing for years. Pros. Hobbyists. Amateurs. Amateurs to amateurs like I was that first year, who didn't know what my average daily word count was, or even what conflict was to a novel.

From there I furiously Googled things like creating characters and building conflict. I found Holly Lisle's website and promptly used half the free articles there to develop the idea I had for my book. Because I signed up for that year, and even though I had absolutely NO IDEA if I could even write 50K in a month, I knew I had to try. I knew time was passing, and if I was really serious about being a writer, of being the person who had books in a store instead of just being someone who talked about it, I knew that I needed to take writing more seriously. Instead of thinking "I'll write a book and then edit it" and letting that be this vague statement, I needed to figure out how one actually goes about doing that.

I started that first novel, called Seeing Red, about a modern day take on Little Red Riding Hood, and learned through the course of the month that I could type fast. Only having a day job to worry about, and my then boyfriend/future husband, I could ignore everyone for a month to work on my novel. And you know what? I wrote 150k words that month. 

More importantly? I finished that novel, something I had never done before. I'd written novels before, novels that long even, but I had never, ever managed to type "The End" without jumping from the middle straight to the end and writing one last scene.

It was invigorating. Exhilarating. I knew this was something I wanted to do the rest of my life, and I haven't looked back since. I wrote another book in February. I tried to edit the first book I wrote. Then I tried to edit the second. I bought and read LOTS of novels about writing. James Scott Bell's Plot and Structure was one of the first, recommended by just about everyone on the Internet, and it's still one of my favorites. 

I started this blog, to talk to other writers and blog about my thoughts on writing. You'll see those early posts, where I thought I had my process all figured out. I still cringe when I read them sometimes, but there's a lot of information there, and people still say they get some use out of them, so I leave them up.

Almost seven years later, and I feel like I know less in some ways than I did then. Writing is harder with all that knowledge in my head. All the dos and don'ts and rules and opinions and trends and what to write about and what not to write about and omg you're going to die in a broken heap if you put vampires in your novel. But you know what? I've written--and completed--at least seven novels (I think it's more, but I'm too tired to count right now). I've started countless more in those seven years, and I've lost count of how many books and articles on writing I've read. All but one of my best friends I found through the Internet, through our writing.

There's a dark voice inside me, one I think we all have, that wants to point out it's been seven years and I'm not published yet. That I still have issues starting and finishing novels. That I should be further along in my writing career by now. That I should at least be moaning about all the rejections I've stacked up over the years.

But right now, reflecting back on all the good that's happened to me, it's easy to push that voice aside. Cathy Yardly, in her phenomenal book Write Every Day: How to Write Faster and Write More talks about our fears, and points out that the things you fear are parts of yourself. Crushing your self doubt, smashing your internal editor to smithereens...these are all pieces of yourself. You doubt things because you're afraid. Of failure, of success, of mediocrity. This is a part of you. You can embrace and attempt to work through it, or let it consume you. I have not found another option; if you have, please tell me.

So in the spirit of celebration of how far I've come--how far we've all come, because every person that views my blog, that writes their own blog, that toils away at their novel when the whole world sometimes feels like it's against them--I'm going to do NaNo this year with the same bright eyed innocence and steely determination as I did that first year. I don't know what project I'm going to write yet--I keep jumping from project to project as one fear or another rears it's ugly head, but come October 31st at 11:59 my butt is going to be in front of the computer and I'll be ready to start a new book. I'm going to write it until I can type "The End". And then I'm going to celebrate.

I invite you to write along with me. I plan to post this month what I'm doing to prep myself (most of it will be of the "try not to freak out" variety since that's where my issues currently are), and then during November I'll blog about my progress. You can come and leave comments or links to your own update posts and we can cheer ourselves on.

What do you plan to do this November? Write a novel? Are you already in the middle of one? How do you shut out the voices about marketing and trends? 

  

Puerto Rico!

We landed in San Juan, Puerto Rico on Thursday. 

I can't say that I've been here long enough to really get an accurate picture of what my life is going to be like, especially since most of our worldly possessions are on a boat. It will be a couple more weeks before they arrive, but in the mean time we're making the best of the few things we have. 

I didn't think I would have as much culture shock as an "average" person, but I was wrong. I vacillate between terrified and elated. My husband and I will be out shopping for beach stuff with our son, and I'll fall back into my normal "out shopping with husband" mode, when something completely new and different strikes me, and it hits me all over again we're essentially living in a foreign country.

Because despite English being one of the two official languages of Puerto Rico, despite not needing a passport and everything being in dollars, this is still another culture. I've experienced culture shock before, in many small ways, moving from Upstate New York to Atlanta, Georgia. I thought I was ready; prepared. I was wrong.

All of the signs are in Spanish. The street signs, the Interstate exit signs, the signs at the Wal*mart. Everyone speaks mostly Spanish, although we haven't had issues checking out at stores and eating between the little Spanish I know, and the little English the person on the other side knows.

I feel bad for writing this. I feel like I'm complaining. All I thought about before we moved was what a fun adventure it was going to be. And it is. And will continue to be fun, and I'm far from miserable. I just didn't realize how emotionally draining it can be to constantly be assaulted with new things. It's not like we can hole up in our house until we feel ready to face the world either. 

The neighborhood we live in, known for it's dominance of people from the United States, is still 99% native Puerto Ricans. Despite the temperature staying around 80 degrees year round, most houses don't have central AC. The houses are older, and don't seal up properly, so if you choose to run the AC units in the wall, you're essentially cooling the outside. Not to mention electric is more expensive than in the States. There's Walgreens and CVS and Mcdonald's and Walmart, and Burger King, and even a Firehouse subs. But despite how familiar those places are, it is still very different experiencing it on the other side of the language barrier.

All in all, I've having fun. I like practicing my Spanish on unsuspecting people, and we live a block away from one of the most gorgeous beaches in the world. I can eat all the mangoes I want, and outside the Walmarts, they have a Frutera place you can get fresh fruit smoothies for super cheap. I haven't even begun to scratch the surface of all the cool food we can get here. 

I'm enjoying this part of my life, but change is always scary in a way. I think it's good for us to figure out why we feel what we do, and how to fix that. For me, I'm going to get better at Spanish and spend lots of time at the beach.

Traveling in Time (But Only 5 Days)

I just spent the last five days sick. Super sick. As chance would have it, my husband caught the same thing I had, so we laid on the couch watching my Criminal Minds DVDs while high on cold medicine.

As some of you may remember, I don't do well with medicine. I have no idea why, but basically anything stronger than Tylenol makes me loopy. The night time stuff makes me go right to sleep, and the day time stuff makes me groggy and spacey. We packed the kid off to the grandparents and laid around wishing we were dead.

Yesterday was the first day I felt like a human being, so I spent five hours straight cleaning the house. All the blankets got washed, all the surfaces disinfected, and all the floors scrubbed. I now feel confident that we will not reinfect ourselves with the plague.

It's always weird getting back to the world and social media after five days straight of not thinking about anything but how much phlegm your body is producing. I feel like a time traveler who's not very good at her job, as I've only jumped five days into the future.

I didn't mean to, but I know have distance on all the writing and personal stuff I'd been working. I think I am going to take advantage of this, and re-prioritize my projects. I'm also trying to not over do it and "catch up" on all the stuff I didn't do whilst coughing up a lung. Wish me luck!

How you do get back into the routine after spending a long time sick? Any disinfecting rituals you have that don't involve setting fire to everything and hoping for the best?

New Adult: My Thoughts

I've let this post compost in the Drafts section for awhile. I wanted to make sure my thoughts were well thought out, instead of just a reaction to the current articles.

As a result, these links are a few weeks old, but still relevant. You should check them out if you want to find out more about this new genre. 

http://dearauthor.com/features/letters-of-opinion/new-adult-its-not-about-the-sex-but-dont-be-afraid-of-the-sex-either/

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/22/books/young-adult-authors-add-steaminess-to-their-tales.html

http://bloggers-heart-books.blogspot.com/2012/12/new-adult-nuisance-or-necessary.html

http://jezebel.com/5970716/new-adult-fiction-has-tons-of-sexy-sex-for-the-millennial-reader-trapped-in-adolescence

As I tweeted to Sara Megibow, I am honestly a little disappointed that this new genre is being touted as YA with sex. I know that's not all this genre is about; I certainly am not trying to stereotype any of the books or authors coming out. I agree that we needs more YA books that handle sex in an adult manner. We need books about teens and young adults going through their first sexual experiences. I know people think sex in books will encourage kids to have sex, but I don't agree. If they want to read books with sex in them, all they have to do is pick up a romance novel. 

It would be better in the long run if they could read about a character's first experience with sex in a variety of different forms and out comes, and make their own personal decisions from there. I firmly believe we read books for a vicarious experience. I want a book to make me think and see an old topic from a new perspective, but it's also training wheels. I know from reading tons of horror, if there's a crazed serial killer on the loose who wants to kill me dead, I will not go into the darkened basement sans flashlight.

Some of my favorite books growing up were by Judy Blume, who tackled the topic of sex with realism and depth. I watched my friends and associates struggle through their first sexual experiences, and I can't help but think a little more preparation might have been nice. I knew girls who had sex to make a guy like them, because they were curious, because they wanted to get it over with, so they could be better in bed for when their real crush asked them out. Because they thought they were in love, and because they knew they weren't but they wanted to get back at an ex-boyfriend.

I know this would have happened regardless of the amount of sex in YA, but I think if we could have experienced these things through the lens of a character, it might have helped some of us work through our issues (for the record, none of these girls were me. I was terrified of the idea of a guy seeing me naked, so I waited until I was a) older and b) knew I was really in love. There's your TMI for the day.).

So yes, I am all for sex in New Adult. But is that all there is?

What about the entire experience of remaking yourself? What about going through being a responsible adult for the first time? Your entire life up to this point centered around school. Your friends, love interests, and associates were completely dependent upon geography. These days the Internet can fill in some of these gaps, but you can't tell me having three dozen friends on the Internet who like the same things you do will make up for eating lunch at school alone. 

I had friends in high school, but as you know, I am a nerd. I played Dungeons and Dragons. I read fantasy books. I watched a ton of anime. I went to high school during a time these things were not cool. Becoming an adult...I just can't explain the amount of freedom I felt getting out into the real world and no longer being judged (as much) by my reading preferences.

The things they tell you matter in high school (getting good grades, being a jock) no longer matter. The manager at your crappy minimum wage job gives not one single shite that you were a quarterback in high school.

Even if your parents made you pay for stuff, getting an apartment for the first time will not prepare you. It will not prepare you for prioritizing your bills, and realizing after you paid rent, your car note, insurance, and the utilities, you have fifty dollars left to buy food.

If you never went grocery shopping alone, taking that fifty dollars to the store will not prepare you for how little that will actually buy. Let's not even discuss junk food.

I wish there was more emphasis on EVERYTHING there is to learn and figure out about being an adult. Not just the sex part. 

New Adult looks like a promising genre, but I wish there was more focus on other things than just the sex. Because "YA with sexy parts" does not a genre make.

What do you think?

Done

So I am done with the first draft of Zombie Road Trip. 

I don't feel excited yet. Mostly, I feel like a fake. That's because my endings in the first draft suck. They suck big time. They suck so much they create tiny black holes stealing all my joy. When I say I am finished, I feel like I am anything but.

It's not until a few days later do I start to feel joy at being finished. I know people talk about post-novel ennui, and for me, it comes on quick wings of loathing. Of realizing how awful the ending is, how big the plot holes are, etc etc etc...

Yes, I am a perfectionist. Most people say that with a certain amount of pride. That they demand a high quality in themselves. That IS something to be proud of, and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it in small doses. But I'm not talking about spell checking something before you send it to your boss. 

I'm talking about never wanting to let anyone see something until it's "good enough". And since it will never be "good enough" in your eyes, no one ever sees anything. That's why I've written five novels and never queried one. That's why when I finish a first draft all I initially feel is despair at how awful it is.

And that why I am breaking the cycle with this book. I've let people read the first draft, warts and all, despite how much I want to crawl in a hole and die at the thought, and why after a break, I'm going to revise the crap out of this book, and then I am going to send out some queries. 

In the meantime, I am going to be celebrating and telling everyone who will listen that I am DONE with this draft.   

EDITED TO ADD: My friend Liz has advised me that I can improve my crappy ending by adding: AND THEN THEY ALL DIED. THE END.

Or if I was feeling optimistic: AND THEN THEY HAD SEX.

I think I am going with: AND THEN THEY SAVED THE WORLD AND EVERYONE WAS HAPPY AND GOT KICK BUTT AGENTS AND AWESOME BOOK DEALS.

THE END.

Question: Should You Rewrite Every Trunk Novel?

My friend Joe and I were talking about rewriting old trunk novels. He's in the middle of redoing several books he's already finished, and me...well, you know me. I've done several rewrites with various results.

It got me thinking. There's trunk novels I've written that I still love, despite how broken they are. Every book really does teach you something, and if I didn't love something about it, I wouldn't have written it in the first place. I look back on them fondly, but realize that no amount of revision would save those books. If I ever wanted to unearth the premises and characters, I would have to start from scratch.

But should you?

Is it really necessary to rewrite every good idea you've ever had? A certain amount of reusing old ideas is going to happen no matter what, so parts of those books will live on. But maybe at the end of the day, it's necessary to let go of an idea, a setting, a group of characters, no matter how awesome they are, and move on.

I don't think I'm going to redo every book I've ever written. Sometimes you just have to put them in a trunk and call them done. It's sort of freeing, when you let it go like that.

What do you think? Would you go back and redo every good idea you have, or just let them be training wheels?

Milestones and Setbacks of 2012, Goals for 2013

I'm going to go ahead and say that one of the biggest milestones of 2012 is that the Mayan Apocalypse didn't happen. As someone who has intricately thought through what it would be like in any apocalypse scenario, I can say most of us wouldn't do well. Not well at all. 

It's funny because it's true.

 Aside from that, it's been a very eventful year. Kameron Hurley has an awesome post where she talks about things she wanted to get done this year, and where she succeeded and failed.

Inspired to do the same, I present to you this post.

Milestones, Events, Accomplishments:

*Gave birth to my son
*Did not die of sleep deprivation (yet)
*Managed to not smother my husband in his sleep (placed on list at husband's request)
*Quit job to stay home with my son
*Started rewriting my book, Zombie Road Trip
*Moved into a bigger house
*Bought new computer 
*Organized most of music library and figured out how to fix the messed up songs that WMA messed up
*Went to Dragon*Con and got to spend time with Rena
*Started Pinterest boards to help mind map book ideas. You can see them here. 
*Made new friends via Twitter, Internet stalking, etc
*Read lots of book on the craft of writing, and regular fiction

Set Backs:

*Did not finish rewrite of Zombie Road Trip (I could have pushed through and wrote the last 15K(?) before the New Year, but I needed to stop and brainstorm the last act)
*Neglected this blog something fierce. Sitting at under 80 followers for a long time.
*Did not get website up and running 
*Certain family relationships have deteriorated with no fix for the foreseeable future
*Still beta reading too slow
*House work and other Real Life Stuff piles up to near breaking point, so I manically clean/work on things/run errands
*Barely exercising
*Not reading as much as I would like
*Still not cooking as much as I want to

Goals:

*Finish writing Zombie Road Trip before the end of January
*Edit the pants off Zombie Road Trip
*Query Zombie Road Trip
*Get website attached to blog soon
*Do more active things with blog--contests, give aways, guest posts etc
*Learn how to manage time better for everything--writing, life, friends and family
*Exercise regularly
*Attend James Scott Bell's Next Level fiction writing seminar
*Attend RWA that's being held in Atlanta next year (2013)
*Attend Dragon*Con and spend lots of time with Rena. 
*Make more time for reading
*Attend cousin's wedding in hometown of upstate New York
*Plan meals better, and experiment more
*Maybe start a bento blog? Or post on here about bento adventures?
*Finish ripping giant collection of cds into iTunes and finish music library once and for all

That's my accomplishments and set backs for this year, and my goals for the next.

What are you guys planning for 2013? Feel free to post in the comments section what you're doing!

Holidays, Writings, and Apocalypses

As I write this, I am holed up in a bunker hoping to escape detection from our machine overlords...

Okay, not really. I couldn't resist the urge to make a plug about the failed apocalypse. From someone who is writing about the zombie apocalypse, it would be irresponsible of me to NOT plug the apocalypse. Not that I was actually hoping the world would go down in flames. No, seriously. I know I write about apocalypses a lot but it doesn't mean I'm super crazy...

*awkward silence*

Anyway...

The book is coming along, but I'm slogging through. It feels like work, and that every word I type is drivel, but I am advancing ever onward to the end of the book anyway. I just hit 77K, and I should be almost done. It's hard to tell, since the beginning in no way shape or form matches the middle of the book.

When the book is a slog like this, when you're Internal Editor screams at you that the book is wrecked, you're doomed, and you should start over now, all you can do is take it word by word. Paragraph by paragraph. Scene by scene. 

I literally cannot remember how I finished the other books. I've written five full length books, and I know each time I hit this place, that everything is coming undone and it's too wrecked to continue and I should just give up. Start over.

I've listened to that voice before, for various reasons. I'm not saying NEVER listen to that voice, but there comes a time when you have to just finish the book and see what you have. You can't hit a moving a target (technically, if you're a good shot, you CAN, but for the purposes of this metaphor, you CAN'T) and you can't edit an incomplete book.

I know I've moved past this horrible, sucky feeling at least five times (more, actually, because I have more books that are technically finished, but I don't count for various reasons), but I can't remember how. It's weird. They say you forget the pain of labor, otherwise women would only ever have one kid, but that is so not true. I remember every hour of that 30+ labor, but I can't really remember moving from suck to finished. 

So I focus on my writing for today. I focus on the scene I am currently in, and what might happen directly afterwards. So far, it's working. I don't think I'll be finished writing before the New Year, which was my goal, but I am super close, so maybe in time for my birthday (January 3rd). 

In holiday news, Christmas is almost here and we're so excited. It's Connor's first Christmas, and he turns ten months old the day before Christmas. He already got to open his presents from my in laws because they've going to be out of town. He got some fun baby activity centers and a walker he's been driving around the living room for the past hour.  

My in laws got my husband and I a GRILL! I know, right??? We've wanted a grill so bad, but living in an apartment we were never allowed to have one. Something about a fire hazard or something.

I know I'll be doing a lot of grilling in the week to come, and not just my characters! Zing!
Wait, come on guys, that was funny...

So as the year comes to a close, what are your holiday plans?

 

Scheduling Your Time--a Better Way of Living

I've never been very good at balancing the stuff I have to do in a reasonable fashion. 

My entire life, I've usually just gotten stuff done in a manic frenzy. House dirty? Spend the entire day cleaning. Behind on the word count? Spend the next day writing. Missing your friends? Spend an entire day out with them.

This sounds exhausting, and it can be, but once I get into the zone I want to keep going until it's done. I have a hard time just cleaning the kitchen and stopping there. Yet, afterward I'm tired, and I don't feel like cleaning for a few days until it piles up and I have to spend another day cleaning again. Ditto with exercise.

I was somewhat more disciplined with my writing. I write just about every day, because it's what I love to do. Some people like to watch TV, or play sports, or I dunno, race dolphins for fun. Writing was always the thing I did for fun. I take it seriously in the sense that I care about the quality of my words and I want to write the best book I can, but it's still fun to me.

Now that I am staying home with my son, free time has gotten weird. On one hand I am home with him, and therefore have all day to do something, in theory. But between feeding, clothing, and playing with the baby are these weird gaps of time that I've learned to use for chores and writing. 

I can't spend all day cleaning anymore, so chores must be broken down into smaller tasks. Now tasks are accomplished like I imagine a normal person does, a little bit at a time. My word count doesn't fluctuate between 2-8K anymore, but it's consistent. I can't clean several rooms in a day anymore, but I can consistently take care of each chore.

In order to keep track of not only the obvious stuff, but also long term projects I need to do, I made a list. But this isn't just a list of things to do. After reading this post on Fiction Notes, I decided to try out her method of using a low tech solution.

I got a legal pad out of my giant box of office supplies, and turned it sideways. I then divided it up into sections: Writing, House, Family/Friends, and Life. I wrote out every thing I needed or wanted to do in each area of my life.

Here, I am going to be really transparent and show you what exactly I have on my legal pad:

Writing:
Write 3 blog posts for the week
Write Flash Fiction
Write daily word count

House:
Meal plan--bento boxes 
Organize: Tupperware, linen closet, desk
Sweep and mop floors
Vacuum
Dishes
Cook dinner
Grocery shopping

Family/Friends:
Take baby to the doctor on Thursday
Crit POC
Visit In Laws
Read "The Thirteenth Tale" for book club

Life
Exercise 3x/week
Read for pleasure
Read non fiction

There's a lot of stuff I want to do, but never get done. I am really tired of feeling like I have all this stuff I want to do with my life, but I am always running behind. 

I want to blog more! I want to exercise more! I want to read more for pleasure, and more for learning! I want to get better at making bento boxes, so I am not in the kitchen for two hours every night when my husband works mornings, and eating cereal for dinner when my husband works nights!

In addition to making sure the daily tasks happen, I also have long term stuff. We're moving in a few months, and all of that stuff under "Organize" is tedious and time consuming, but it needs to be taken care of before we move out. Plus, if the stacks of Tupperware in the cabinet gets any worse, it's going to crush me the next time I open the door.

There's not really a big difference between columns on a legal pads and a big list of things to do, but it matters to me. For one, it's not all lumped together. For another, it's not in any order. I have my columns, and when one thing is finished, I scan the columns for what might come next.

I added a week schedule to this column idea by again, taking a piece of paper and turning it sideways. I then marked out Sunday through Saturday, each day with it's own column. I filled in stuff that had to get done on a particular day. I chose not to go the personal calender route because a) I've done that before and it's never worked, and b) with the columns I have more room. A daily calender gets big and bulky if there's writing room, or too small to be useful if there isn't.

I also added a loose order of importance so I know tasks that have to get done in a certain amount of time don't fall through the cracks. I got my highlighters out, because any time I can use office supplies is a happy time, and highlighted the stuff that was time sensitive in pink. So "baby's doctor appointment" was on Thursday's column, highlighted in pink. Daily stuff is yellow, but I don't normally bother to highlight it. Long term projects like cleaning out a closet are green.

Most of the Stuff to Do remains on it's own piece of paper, and I don't bother to transfer it to my weekly schedule. I did write my word count goals down each day, as well as put the "write blog posts for the week" in Sunday's column, but that's more about trying to figure out when the best time to do something would be, and less about a hard and fast schedule.

I know this sounds like madness, but so far it's working. I am not only scheduling time for the stuff that must get done, but stuff I want to do but haven't gotten around to yet. 

For certain areas (Writing being one of them) I plan to break it down even further. Instead of "daily word count" reminders, I plan to eventually get to the point where it reads "Write flash fiction story about time travel", "plot next three scenes on note cards", "write a blog post on scheduling your time". Being specific, especially with writing, has always helped me. 

I'm not saying I won't fall off the wagon and stop doing this a time or two, but I've been at it for about two weeks now, and this system seems to be flexible enough to allow me some wiggle room but keeps me on task. I finally feel like I am making progress, and not just treading water.

What do you think? How do you make sure to accomplish everything you need to do?

Novelist Schizophrenia

Schizophrenia looks like it's spelled wrong, even though Google assures me it's correct. I for one am not going to question our Google overlords, so let's just go with it.

I'm in that weird place where I swing wildly back and forth between positive affirmations for my novel, to soul sucking despair. When you're doing any sort of serious editing, there's really no in between. You either sit down happy to put words to the page, or the minute you open Scrivener, you think of a million other things that have to be done right now.

I have the attention span of a hamster at the moment, so that just makes it worse. There are so many things I mean to do and forget to until I am in the middle of something else. These things range in importance from clipping a hang nail to paying a bill, so when I remember stuff while writing, the urge to take care of this other thing gets really strong. Unlike rocking my son to sleep, I can actually get up from the computer.

If I was a normal person, I could simply write this stuff down in a list and take care of it after I am finished writing. But depending on what I remembered, it turns into an itch that won't go away until I scratch it. Like that hang nail. I wish I was kidding, but it really bothers me when there's a catch on my nail. It bothers me so much that as I am writing, this is what is going through my mind:

"I really need to show how scary this zombie is...that hang nail won't go away."

*picks at the nail. It only makes the catch deeper*

"I really have to remember to cut it the next time I get up to pee. Back to the scene. But what if I forget? I keep forgetting to cut this darn thing and it's really starting to get on my nerves."

*bites nail. It only makes the nail ragged and gross looking*

"Damn, that's not any better. Now it's really going to bother me. Maybe I should just get up and cut it. No. The last time I did that, I got distracted and mopped the kitchen floor, made a sammich, and then remembered about the writing. Then I sat down and had to pee. No, I am just going to ignore the ragged nail and keep typing. Zombies. Think about the zombies."

So I think about the zombies for a little while, but the pressure to get up and cut the nail increases until it's like a klaxon in my brain...

"YOU HAVE A HANG NAIL IT WON'T GO AWAY OMG YOU NEED TO CUT IT THE HANG NAIL IT'S JAGGED AND GROSS AND YOU NEED TO CUT IT."

In the case of the hang nail, I gave in and cut it (I am sure there's a diagnosis and/or medication for people like me, but I prefer to just blame it on being really tired for about nine months now (But Liz, you say, your kid is only six months old, how can you be tired for longer than he's been alive? To which I say, thank you hypothetical person, for asking and noticing how old my kid is. Also, you don't sleep that last trimester of pregnancy. You're so big by that point that when you lay down, the baby sort of pushes up on your ribs and lungs, and mine decided that kicking was a fun way to past the time at night. So there's the other three months accounted for.)).

Now I've lost my train of thought, and I keep staring at the periods and parenthesis wondering if I have enough of them and they are properly placed. So we're moving on now.

For other stuff I just have to ignore it and keep writing. It's harder when the writing feels like crap, and it's pointless, and it's never going to get better and I am never going to amount to anything and everyone is going to be so disappointed I am going to have to physically move away even though this is the Internet and global warming is probably my fault too.

But seriously, you just have to buckle down and write. Even when you feel like it's crap, writing can be like a parachute. Writer's block? Write some words. Feel like it's all pointless? Keep writing, and eventually it will feel pointy again. Don't know what happens next? Write some words and make it up as you go along. Bored with the book in general?

THAT'S WHEN YOU MAKE THINGS GO BOOM.

You write some words, but man, add in something awesome. A nuclear-virus bomb explodes in Washington. Add a llama. Force feed a character with a nut allergy some peanut butter. Shake things up.  

Above all, when you have a million voices in your head chiming in about your novel, only listen to the nice ones.

The rest of them can take a hike.

So, what do you do to quell the voices? Besides medication, I mean. 

Return to Normalcy (Sort of)

Four days shy of my son turning six months old, and I finally feel like life is returning to something resembling what passes for normal in this house.

Of course, this is the new normal, the normal that includes having a baby doing barrel rolls across the living room floor.

I've gotten into a decent routine of picking up as I go along, and taking care of housework in short bursts. Writing comes in short bursts as well, but it's a little more of a stretch for me. I used to simply write for hours, and then go off and do other things. 

Now I might have fifteen minutes there, and ten minutes here. It's harder to keep track of what I was able to write, what the scene was about, and the general thread of the book. Writing's slowed down to a crawl and it feels like this book is Taking Forever to Write. The "this sucks, let's burn it and dance on the ashes" period is lasting longer as a result, and things are generally difficult. 

So, in addition to using nap times, I've decided to out source for help. My mom's going to watch the baby every Monday, and I am going to get some serious writing done. Today was the first day of this schedule, and it was glorious. I wrote for hours, got some plotting done, and had time to spare to make dinner and straighten up. 

You see, it's hard to justify spending money on a babysitter when I am staying home to be with the baby. I feel like it will be easier once I have an agent and a book contract, because I'll be bringing money into the house, but for now it just feels...weird.

It's just me; my husband and family aren't making me feel this way, but it's there just the same. My mom watching the baby seems to be the best solution, since she gets to spend time with her grandson and I get to spend time working on my book. 

This got me thinking about what people do to make their writing feel more legitimate. I think it's really important to not only tell yourself you're a writer, and act like a professional, but practice habits that reinforce that notion. At the moment my desk is in the living space, but when we move into a bigger house, I am going to have a separate room for an office. I've arranged to have the baby looked after so I have time to work. All of these things are scary in a way, but they feel necessary to ensure that I take myself seriously. 

But like anything else, this is a job, and I should act as such. It's easier, working from home, to feel like I am just playing around. There's no clear mark between when I am done working, and at home, so I have to make that mark myself. Part of that is finding a baby sitter, or once I am done with my word count for the day, walking away from the computer. 

Of course, this sense of routine is going to be short lived since we're moving in November. 

0_0 

But until then!

What do you do to make your writing feel legitimate?

Pictures of the Baby!

This is not a real post.

It's Saturday and I've been up since 7 and I actually slept really well, and this is a run on sentence but who cares because it's Saturday!


So here I am, posting pictures of the baby because he's starting to look like a little person!

Enjoy!

Tonight, we feast on parrot!

Why won't this leg come off?

Happy baby is happy!

Mush yon baby! Mush!

Really Mr. Mammoth? And then what happened?

My toes are my friends, my toes are my friends!

Seal baby!

This is Grade A sock right here.

The Kindness Project: The Kindness of Strangers

 About The Kindness Project

Too often kindness is relegated to a random act performed only when we’re feeling good.  But an even greater kindness (to ourselves and others) occurs when we reach out even when we aren't feeling entirely whole . It’s not easy, and no one is perfect. But we’ve decided it’s not impossible to brighten the world one smile, one kind word, one blog post at a time. To that end, a few of us writers have established The Kindness Project, starting with a series of inspirational posts.

The other day my friend Liz told me about the Kindness Project, and it seemed like the universe answering a question I hadn't yet asked out loud. I knew I had to join.

Because lately I've been thinking about how even small things make a big difference. On the Internet, it's really easy to forget how many people you come in contact with every day. I don't usually think about how my actions affect other people, but I've certainly noticed how other people's actions affect mine.

For example, I read The Bloggess's blog and bought her book. It's funny and sad and awesome. You should read it. I follow her on Twitter, and occasionally reply to her tweets. A few weeks ago, she started to follow me. I was blown away. One of my writing heroes was following little old me on Twitter.

Then just Sunday, I posted a comment on James Scott Bell's blog asking about writing a road trip novel. He very kindly replied within a few hours, despite his ridiculously busy schedule. I've been through Plot and Structure so many times I've had to buy a second copy, and my copy of Conflict and Suspense is already showing the love. It meant a lot to me, that another one of my personal heroes took the time to reply to my question.

These are just two very small examples of how a small thing can have a big impact. I am sure both The Bloggess and Mr. Bell see themselves as regular people going through their daily motions. I'm sure they didn't know how highly I think of them, considering I try to keep my Internet stalking to a bare minimum. But that small gesture completely made my day. 

I've got to be honest here. Most of the time I don't consider my Internet dealings as a big deal. I am just a tiny, tiny fish in a very big ocean. I send out my tweets and posts because I enjoy doing those things, but I assume that they're going to be largely unread. When I read a blog post, and see that fifteen people have already commented, I think my own comment isn't that important. 

But I'm wrong.

When people leave comments on my posts, it makes me inordinately happy, so why wouldn't the reciprocal be true? It does matter, and for me to assume that it doesn't...well, that's just sad when I really think about it. Words and actions have power, and mine are no different. In fact, part of the reason why I am a writer is because I believe words have power.

From now on I'm going to be more mindful of my actions, and I hope you will too. You never know what something might mean to another person, and after all, isn't that why we're on the Internet? To make a connection?

Please check out the other wonderful people in this blog chain and spread the word. 

Avatar: The Last Airbender vs. Legend of Korra

I am just going to come out and say it: Avatar the Last Airbender is one of the most tightly written TV shows I've ever seen. EVER. 

Quick explanation: Avatar is set in a world where people can "bend" the four elements (water, earth, fire, air)...

You know what? Just watch the opening intro. It explains everything. Plus, PICTURES!

Spoiler: the Avatar was reborn into the Air Nomads. He gets frozen in an iceberg for 100 years. He wakes up to discover the Fire Nation at war with the rest of the world, and all of the Air Nomads dead at the Fire Nation's hands. They were trying to find the Avatar.

Talk about a bad morning.

The series is about Aang trying to master all four elements and defeat the Fire Lord. Awesomeness ensues. 

Okay, so now you're with me. We can proceed.  

The show writers consistently produce high quality episodes. Even the so called "filler" episodes advanced the main plot or a subplot in some way. From the very first episode of The Last Airbender, you can tell they had their end game in sight. Prince Zuko's character arc is still my all time favorite in anything. Ever.

So when the show writers announced they would be doing a sequel of sorts, centered on the next Avatar called the Legend of Korra, I was elated yet frightened. I've been burned before, and I wondered how they could possibly write a sequel and still do the original show justice.

My husband and I have watched all the current episodes of the Legend of Korra.

Here are my thoughts:

*Recap:

Korra does an excellent job in the first episode of quickly establishing how this series is going to be the same, and how it's going to be different. The Order of the White Lotus, a callback from Airbender, find Korra in the southern water tribe. She's bending earth, fire, and water as a toddler, so there's no doubt she's the next avatar. From the opening intro we're told "Avatar Aang's time came to an end", but before that, he and Fire Lord Zuko brought the four nations together and founded the United Republic of Nations.

We also see Airbender Tenzin, Katara and Aang's son. He arrives on a sky bison (unnamed, so probably not Appa) with three kids who are all airbending, and his pregnant wife.

So, that answers some questions, mostly about the airbenders. 

See, an earth bender never gives birth to a water bender, so with Aang being the last airbender it is up to him to single-handedly repopulate the airbenders. Bending isn't directly genetic either, so it's a good thing Aang and Katara had an airbender, and that Tenzin is having lots of airbenders himself. I'd wondered after the Last Airbender ended what would happen if the last air bender died. The avatar cycle would be broken, because the next time the avatar was supposed to be an airbender, there would be no airbending TO be born into. 


*Setting:

This setting is very different from Last Airbender, and I at once love and dislike it. I love the setting in general. LOVE IT. It's very steampunk, and reminds me of the roaring 20's. There's radios and cars and a professional sport in bending. It's awesome. It's fantasy and urban and the art style is gorgeous. 


That said, I'd prefer it if they'd kept the setting a little more fantastical for Avatar. One of my favorite things about The Last Airbender was the setting. It wasn't pseudo-medieval Europe (or pseudo-feudal Japan), but there wasn't a bunch of high tec gadgets either. It was one of the best high fantasy settings I'd run across.

Legend of Korra goes the urban fantasy route. I know it sounds like hypocrisy, coming from the urban fantasy author. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the setting they've created. I just preferred the other setting for Avatar. But that's just my preference. The setting doesn't ruin the series, and in fact brings an interesting angle to the show.


*The demographic:


Legend of Korra is definitely for older viewers and I love it. They took some of their more adult concepts of The Last Airbender (*coughcough* blood bending anyone?) and ran with them. I love it.


*The Avatar State:

I am sort of disappointed Korra is having a hard time accessing the Avatar State. I think the writers have it this way because there's a secret with Aang that they don't want to reveal, but my favorite part of Avatar is Aang dealing with the spirits and the Avatar state. Seriously, every time there was something with the Avatar state in The Last Airbender I got goosebumps.

I also wish they would deal with the Avatar more during peacetime. See, the Last Airbender deals with Aang trying to bring peace to the world. I've always thought it would be cool to see an Avatar in action during peace time, acting as a bridge between the spirit world and their world. 

Korra both shows us what it might be like, and not. There's a lot of politics involved, and dealing with an anti-bending movement, which is pure genius. I love the politics and the vision of what it would be like to deal with bending of all sorts living together. 

There's not a lot of Avatar mediating yet, so I am waiting to see what's going to happen.

They've done an excellent job so far. I love how it's both it's own show as well as a sequel to the original show. 

What do you think?  

The Great Juggling Act

My friend Linda mentioned that she can't juggle more than a few things at once without feeling frantic, which got me thinking.

I can juggle several things at once. I used to pride myself on my abilities to multitask. But I looked at my daily practices, really looked at them, and now I wonder if we as a society should attempt to juggle a bajillion things at once.

Granted, in some cases it's necessary. I know that for a fact trying to juggle a baby with cooking and housework, and oh yeah, dinner, and let's not forget Elizabeth needs to write at least a few times a week if not every day to maintain basic sanity.

But when did we start feeling like not only we had to do it all, but all at once?

In some cases multitasking is a boon. Last night I loaded the dishwasher, cooked dinner, and cleaned out the fridge at the same time. With the time saved, I finished watching season four of Heroes with my husband (more on that train wreck later). 

In other cases, multitasking actually hurts. Imagine trying to write a novel at the same time as reading one. Or walking in the park. I'm not saying that people aren't capable of it (although walking and writing at the same time strikes me as hazardous to your health). But why would you want to? Shouldn't some tasks be awarded your complete attention? I don't know about you, but I want to get lost in a book. When writing, I want to be completely in the zone. When walking, I want to pay attention to the birds and the trees and the breeze on my face.

Some things deserve no less than your complete attention.

What about you? Do you prefer to try and get it all done at once, or one thing at a time?










 

 

Uppity Updates!

Just in case you were all wondering what's going on, here's some updates on life, the universe, and everything:

*I am overwhelmed by how awesome all of you are. You guys were nice and supportive about my last post, which only proves my point that you guys are awesome. Also, let's see how many times I can use the word "awesome". It's really awesome that you guys are so awesome. :D


*I wrote this sentence to prove that I have a larger vocabulary than a teenage girl. Actually, that's an unfair statement considering when I was a teenage girl I had a large vocabulary, as did most of the girls I knew. I apologize to teenage girls everywhere.

*I have finished the first draft of Zombie Road Trip. I did not celebrate this occurrence with a blog post, mostly because this draft wins the gold medal of crappiness. I seem to really embrace that whole "crappy first draft" rule. When I say crappy, I am not being modest or hard on myself. We're talking about plot holes the size of the moon, plot threads that went nowhere, a beginning that in no way shape or form matches the middle or the end, and that's just the major stuff. Last year I wrote several first drafts, all of which suck. It seems that this year will be the year of editing these drafts into some semblance of coherence. More on that later.

*I narrowly avoided death yesterday on my way to the OB. A woman was driving and putting make up on. Just, no. No ladies. You're beautiful. You don't have to apply make up while your vehicle is in motion. Really, you don't. At least wait until you get to the parking lot of your destination. And no, waiting at a red light doesn't count. 

*I am 36 1/2 weeks pregnant, and boy am I fat. I had my baby shower this past Saturday and I saw the pictures and wow. Just, wow. It looks like I am smuggling a watermelon under my shirt. Before you guys get all worried or mad at me for calling myself fat, I don't mean it in a "I must now starve myself to keep my girlish figure at 9 months pregnant" way. It's funny, especially since I've always been small. Just when I think my belly can't possibly get any bigger, it does. I am not starving myself; on the contrary, pass me another brownie. It's just that I've gained 30 pounds, and well...it's hilarious. I waddle when I walk. I have a hard time getting off the couch. I out grew my maternity pants and had to buy the next size up. You see? Hilarious.

Fun baby shower game--guess the pregnant woman's belly size! My friend Janice actually guessed it perfectly. Jennifer, the woman in the picture, obviously over shot it by a lot. Thanks Jennifer.

 *Something something something, something something goes here but I forgot what it was.


*I am critiquing two novels and failing miserably. My brain is slush right now, and I can't concentrate for very long, so it's taking forever. I feel horrible, but figured giving the book back with a gigantic smiley face on it wasn't exactly what my crit partners were looking for.

*Holy crap babies make a lot of laundry! I mean, sweet Georgia Brown, he's not even out yet and I've already done two loads of laundry and have about three more to do. Blankets, burp clothes, wash clothes, bibs, clothing, socks (LOTS of teeny baby socks), you name it, I've washed it. 


*No, I am not nesting yet, why do you ask?


*Editing! Yes, it's that time. Last year I wrote a bunch of really, really awful first drafts. This year will be the year I edit them. There's a lot of rewriting in my future. Grid your loins for posts about editing, that's all I've got to say.


*I've downloaded a ton of books on my Kindle. Right now I am reading James Scott Bell's Writing Fiction for All Your Worth and loving it. Reading books on writing puts me in an editing frame of mind, which is great because I am going to need it. Bell has this awesome (there's another one!) makes me want to work on WIP, right away. When I start whining about editing, you guys can remind me I was excited way back when. 

So what are you all up to?