Tag: amediting

The continuous road of writing…

I’ve now been sending queries for 25 days. I know this because one agent I emailed sent an auto-reply telling me after 30 days–it wasn’t me, it’s him or her.

Why is sending queries like getting dumped? Besides the obvious rejection. But seriously, that is what all auto-rejections feel like. And here I am–in my teens again, getting the, ‘It’s not you. It’s me,’ speech from some catholic school boy whose name I can’t remember.

The only difference is I’m not sixteen any more and I’ve matured enough to believe that the sender is correct. You can’t please everyone now can you? And why would you want to for that matter?

As the query wheels roll I’ve taken the time to look at what else I have in my writing armory. There is full history fiction novel, a half novel that still has potential not to suck a ton, and then the long queue of new ideas burning holes in my brain.

[They keep me up at night. Does this happen to you?]

Most ideas I let sit for a while. If they vanish I know I was right to wait. How great of a concept could it have been I can’t even remember it existed? Then there are the others… Over a dozen random characters in my head poking my frontal lobe just to see if I’m paying attention.

My brain needs a receptionist.

On top of that I have one other problem: two of these stories are promises–one is a first draft (a very, extremely, oh god help me! first draft,) that was a promise to a friend and the other is for my son.

I came here to write about it because seeing the problem on the computer screen helps me make decisions. I suppose that is another cure of being a writer–the transition from brain to page. My hazel green eyes need to rest firmly on the blackness of the text in order for my brain to calm down and make a decision. It also allows me to distract myself–because while I’m busying myself filling out beat sheets, typing up character breakdowns, and deciding where to put a big chunk of my energy for the next four weeks, I’m able to hold onto the notion that I won’t be sad on June 16th when I don’t hear from that agent…

Querying is such a roller coaster! (which is an amazing place to pick up emotional traits for the characters I write about. Damn it. Writing is like the song that never ends. It just keeps going and going and going and going…)

 

by Categories: Rejection Letter, WritingTags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Writing, querying, PitMad, & words

What is in a name? Shakespeare. He had Romeo ask  that very question as he looked over a thorny rose–trying to convince himself what he was doing was right.

A few nights ago I asked a writer friend of mine what inspired him. What made him want to write? For me it’s everything. Maybe I’ve heard a name that interests me in a way that I’m compelled to attache a fictitious body to it. Then, I collect these imaginary people in my head. I leave them there to stew. Some survive. Some are forgotten.

But maybe it’s not a name, but a situation. An overheard comment. A dream.

Writing is a salve that cools and heals the life around me. My WIPs are made up of all those words I didn’t say at the right moment.

I don’t know how long I’ve been working on my latest project, THE TRIALS OF IMOGEN GRACE. I wrote the first draft two years ago. I’ve change the POV three times, and done countless edits and rewrites. And now…now I’ve entered the Query pit. The endless bit of sending off letters, chapters, pages, fulls, halfs, synopsis, pitched–all ties to hopes and prayers.

If you write, you know what I’m talking about.

The last time I did this–sent queries–was much harder. This time I feel different. Not as hopeless. Yes, I’ve received more rejections than not–but still–I’m not sure why I’m so calm. It’s refreshing. haha…

If you’re out there writing–don’t give up. I wish you luck! The same goes to those sending endless queries and everything else writing related. Follow your dreams, my friends. Life is to short for, ‘I wish I had.’

For Shakespeare also said, ‘To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.’

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Day 5 – I’m alive!! (maybe)

I’m on day five. (It’s day five! I’m alive!!) Ha! Bad humor is mucha diversion!

So, moving on… This week–the week I decided to make this jump into life preservation, self discovery, truth, honesty, yoga, and writing–has been a royal pain in the ass.

I’m not kidding. Not even a little.

From insomnia, to sickness, to soreness, to the fact I bit my tongue SO HARD talking isn’t an option–it’s been a roller coaster ride. And by roller coaster ride, I mean I feel like I’ve been rolled up in a pile of snow and pushed down the side of a hill.

Have I mentioned it’s down right chilly in L.A.?! It’s hard for me to remember the days when I thought forty-degrees was warm. Evidently, back in the day, I was dealing with the side-effects of hypothermia. (Kidding. I lived in Cleveland. All you do in Cleveland when it’s cold is drink. I never would have noticed I had hypothermia.)

SO! Back to coming alive on day five.

I have no lessons for you, right now I’m still trying to hold on and not let myself quit. Maybe there’s a lesson in there… the whole, “quitters never win, winners never quit,” spiel. But… there has been an excellent battle of faith happening.

Not that I’m a religious person, because I’m not.  And I don’t care if you are–I’m not a fan of judging. I am, however, a fan of people following their heart and gut. For me, that has led me to a non-secular path.

Maybe you’re thinking, how can one question their faith, if they don’t worship in the traditional sense? Let me tell you, it’s simple. I just wake up and do it.

Lately I’ve been having this, “What if I’m wrong?!” argument dancing in my head. What if all this time and energy I’ve put into my personal (and maybe a little warped) belief system is a waste of time because it’s just a pile of nothingness?

Thoughts pop into my head that, two years ago, I wouldn’t have questions, but now… I can’t stop questioning them.

I question everything. Why this? Why that?

Then the doubt creeps in… what if I’m wrong?

Okay, here’s and example: What if I’m putting all this time and energy into writing, when–at the end of the day–I’m just not that good.

I don’t want to believe this, because I love writing so much–but how do you know?? [insert Whitney Houston song here]

And the most ridiculous part of this internal struggle/constant argument? The one thing I use as an example is one of the few things I won’t quit. I just can’t. Maybe I should have chosen my new desire to distance myself (physically) from humankind? That may have been a better example, but that ship sailed… and I’m left with my previous example.

As I’m sitting here writing this, now I’m thinking, “Is this a mid-life crisis? am I old enough to have a mid-life crisis? Don’t have to be in my 50s and 60s to have a mid-life crisis? WHEN IS MID-LIFE?!!”

It must be what it is, right? Because I don’t know where it’s all coming from. No, I may not always be the most over confident person, but I can hold my own when need be. And right now I can’t find the root of all this squabbling in my brain, and I fear that until I do it’s going to be months and months of me changing the lyrics of “Who Will I Know,” to fit my life…

BLURG!

I guess I’ll just keep “being alive” and also a little “confused” all the time.

This is what happens when you take time for yourself… you start to analyze things in order to make decisions to better yourself.

I just hope that, when I’m done, I am a better person, and not just the crazy woman on the internet who wishes there was a “jazz hands” icon on wordpress, so she can convey sarcasm with hand gestures other than the middle finger…

What will day six hold?!! What rhymes with six? (besides dicks.)

Now I have to go… ten pages left on this edit, so I’ll be back tomorrow!!! Hopefully with a better song to get stuck in your head…

by Categories: Writing, yogaTags: , , , , , , Leave a comment

Counting down = a fun way to add stress!!

I slept terribly last night. This is another trend in my life–and another reason for the yoga/writing/change–whatever I’m calling this. (I really need a better name…)

So, this is how this how my life is, almost daily these days. My child wakes early, so I try to go to bed early and to wake even earlier than him. This way I can suck down a couple cups of coffee, and write, before he wakes.

Some days it works, others, I’m not so lucky.

Last night, for example– I couldn’t sleep, or I should say, I couldn’t stay asleep. It’s always the same story. I’ve tried valerian root and melatonin and they help me fall asleep, but I’m twice as jittery when I wake up. So I stopped taking it.

On the good nights, who cares! Life is good on the good night–am I right?

On the bad nights, like last night, I’m a mess the next day. (depressed, crying, angry, unfocused… all the good stuff.)

I fall asleep and wake up several times. When I wake up, my brain ignites with the power of the sun, and my calm is constructed like Icarus’ wings. It melts away and I’m stuck with a ‘to-do’ list longer than the Mississippi, and if that isn’t what keeps me from drifting off again–it’s some random song (last night was, This is Halloween, from Nightmare Before Christmas) that plays on a continual loop in my brain.

Then the boy wakes up early, and here I am.

Getting on the mat was a wrestling match. I spent a lot of the morning telling myself how I wasn’t going to do it. Or, I should say, Doris spent a lot of time this morning telling me it was a waste of time.

I did it anyway.

Forty-minutes. It felt like ten. It was worth it. Oh, and I’m sore. Going from periodically practicing and mostly running, to practicing daily and concentrating on strengthening poses–well, it hurts.

That is how the anxiety crumbles! (Totally not a saying and should probably never be one.)

Three down and fifty-eight to go. (Not sure why I’m counting down… what happens at one, besides 2016? What I hope is that I keep going, but for now I need to make it that fifty-eight… baby steps.. baby-baby steps.)

…maybe counting isn’t such a good idea…

Anyway! Let’s see how this goes, shall we? In the mean time… I have thirty-five pages left to edit (in this edit) so I should be getting back to that.

Until I write again… 😉

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Honesty. Life. Yoga. Writing.

Honesty may be the best policy, but it’s also one of the hardest things we ever do as humans. From being honest to the people in our lives, to keeping the truth flowing with ourselves–sometimes honesty takes the back seat.

Writing a blog post is hard for me, because of honesty. There is the fear that if I’m honest, no one will read my posts, and then there’s the fear that if I’m honest, people will actually read my post–and comment on it.

If I’m honest, and put it all out there, its like dangling from the edge of a cliff…

waiting…

Obviously, this feeling passes. The fear of rejection and acceptance is over the second you know that you have been accepted or rejected. Then you can move on with life.

You can decided what to do next. Try again, or maybe give up this time–the choice is yours, no matter what other people want you to believe.

I’ve given up on a lot of things in my life. Given up on books I’m reading, books I’m writing, people I once called “friend,” and even myself. Giving up is comfortable. It’s that sweet spot where you don’t really have to be scared all the time. Because, simply put, when you’re not putting anything out there, you’ll never have to worry about that second of “will they or won’t they?”

Sometime over the past few months I’ve realized I’m tired of giving up. [insert shrug] I really don’t have a game plan, other than I need to stop it. Living like this–in this sweet spot–turns out it’s not so sweet after all.

The sweetness has morphed into something much more debilitating. It’s become a weird cocktail of depression, I could have been’s, and this has got to stop. Now, the logical side of my brain knows I’m being over dramatic.

Part of being a writer (or any sort of artist) will lead you to being over dramatic from time to time. You may not agree, but I’m fine with this. There is a lot of emotion and energy put into your work–a lot of your own soul–and that will tip the best of us over the edge from time to time.

Now, the not so logical side of my brain–my stupid ego that I’ve named Doris, so I can yell, “Shut up, Doris!” whenever I feel like this–is a complainer. She likes to tell me to stay in the sweet spot.

So, making the decision that I’m done with feeling like this is the first step at getting Doris to shut up on a more permanent bases. The second step is to actively change. Without actively working to change what I dislike–what’s the point?

Once upon a time, I used to practice yoga and mediate daily. Over the past few years, between my new isolated life in L.A. to the boom of the industry, I’ve pulled away from it. (Not a fan of trendy. Won’t buy lululemon pants. I’m not sorry.) But recently I started getting back into it. (Yoga, not trying to be trendy.) So this morning, as I was balancing on my arm in a side plank, I started thinking. Maybe it’s all true, this idea that yoga = happiness?

I mean, I remember being happy when I practiced a lot. So could it be that my answer has always been there, but I’ve been avoiding it because I can’t be honest with myself?

There is really only one way to find out, and yesterday I started my “yoga till then end of 2015” challenge. (I’m not inviting you along, or maybe I am–you choose.) I’m also implementing my “write every day” policy again. That one won’t be hard, because I do write/edit nearly every day. The actual challenge will be to tackle the weekends. Weekends are hard when it comes to exercising and writing for me, because I feel an obligation to sit around with my husband and son, instead of working.

Now, hers is another moment of “honest.” The reason I’m coming on here and sharing is… I need to hold myself accountable. I could easily go journal about it. Keeping this journey to myself and not sharing it with anyone, which would be completely fine. But I feel that if I force myself to write about it on here, and to be as brutally honest about it as I can manage,  maybe I can actually make it to December 31st and practice every day.

Maybe then Doris will be so quiet I can concentrate on things that are more important?

Like I said, there is only one way to find out. So here I am.

Please prepare yourself from some swearing. Swearing is very stress revealing, and it won’t get me arrested like random punching will. Because that’s where I’m at in this life–wanting to randomly punch people because I find them frustrating. <- that’s me being honest.

 

by Categories: meditation, Writing, yogaTags: , , , , , 3 Comments

edit/machine

There are so many catch phrases or one liners out there. The same words regurgitated repeatedly until they lose their meaning.

I find I use all of them. All.

Metaphor after metaphor. Line after line. Soliloquy on a page trapped in a vacuum known as the internet; a living thing called a blog.

We all need to have our own live action digital magazines.

Editing lost out the moment we claimed ourselves writers, artists, photographers, and independently published genius. The rooms are so crowded no one can get through–we all suffocated together.

I lost my breath years ago.

…somewhere shy of midnight…

I sit, leaning back in a worn and damaged swivel chair, palms resting on the equally frayed desk. Fingers cramped–because I know better, but still don’t care.

I sit, knees pressed together pulled up into my chest–because I’m sure that’s how Dickens’ did it, too.

I sit. I sit. I sit and I write. I write. I write, because that’s was the advice I received. My feedback. My life line.

And when I’m not sitting I pray my words capture more than the one-liners and worn out metaphors. That they are like, “a light in a sea of darkness.” (see, there’s one now.) And I hope I don’t shrivel up, but secretly I know I won’t.

I haven’t before.

I won’t now.

So I close my ears, squeeze my eyes shut, and tell myself tomorrow will be better. Because it has to be. Because I said so.

And then I write some more.

Delete is the greatest key designed. Backspace is a close sentence. And cntrl X has it’s moments, too. But never around worn out metaphors, and some times when a soliloquy when it runs to long. (and you forgot why you started in the first place.)

by Categories: WritingTags: , , , , , 2 Comments

Write Right

To my right is an old warped cork board covered in index cards with places and characters written on them. They belong to a story I began last summer with my son, but abandoned once he was in school.

It’s hard to plot out a story you’re writing with a child who isn’t home…

But there they are – staring at me with weird made up words on them, penned out in a variety of obnoxious colors like neon green and magenta.

My computer and this cork board are in my bedroom, so each night as I sit in bed, I stare at them. About a week ago it occurred to me I should take them down, seal them in an envelope and save them for next summer when my son and I can pick up where we left off. (We have a rather extraordinary world, but not much premise or story as of yet.) But then as I looked them over – our sea monster, flying men, dragons, etc., – I decided to let them stay.

This decision brought up other questions: How long is too long to write a story? How many stories should I be working on at once? When is it the “official” time to throw in the towel?

Staring at his board had become my late night meditation. At first I would think about this world we created, and now I think of answers to those questions.

When I ventured out on this writing path (many moons ago) it was all very linear. You wrote a story, you had people read the story, you adjusted the story, you sent it to agents who either ignored you completely or sent robo response rejection letters. But now (many moons later) the answers to those questions have changed dramatically and I know the path is more chaotic than ever.

#Q1 – How long is too long to write a story? A1 – There is no time line. When you set a time line is when you mess up the story. You begin to rush, you miss details, your characters are thinner than the paper you want your story published on.

#Q2 – How many stories should I be working on at once? Q2 – I used to think the only way to write was to write one story at a time. Now, I can’t speak for you, but on a good day I have 5+ stories in my head rattling around like marbles in a jar. Currently I’m working on a new novel I’m calling “Triangle”, I’m also reworking an old novel in a new format that I feel will work better for its multi-character storyline, I have another novel waiting in my writing queue ready for a good edit (because my last edit was impetuous and damaging), and then there is the one on the wall and another one that keeps invading my dreams. Oh, and then there is the novella that I want to self publish – so make that 6+. (…then there are the others made up of only characters or vague premise that aren’t worth mentioning yet…)

Once upon a time, working on one thing suited for me, but only because I convinced myself that was how “real authors” wrote. Now I write in a way that keeps me wanting to write.

#Q3 – When is it the “official” time to throw in the towel? A3 – Back then, I used to get tired so I would give up on manuscripts – these days its more like we “take a break” from each other. I’ll have Beta Readers email me and ask about old titles, “What happened to that book? I loved that one!” And I’ll tell them I’m working on something new. They fret I’ve given up, but in truth I have not. If you believe in your story, your characters, your world – you will never officially throw in the towel. Because when you love something so much, giving up on it isn’t an option.

These are the things I remind myself on the days I do want to give up. Lately, I have more of those than I’d like to admit, but at the same time this is the most consistent my writing has ever been. I write DAILY. I edit DAILY. I challenge myself DAILY. And I permit myself to take a step back when I know I need one, because some days the words flow, and others its like trying to pulled tar out of the bottom of a nail polish jar. But I do it anyway.

Why?

Because even though it feels like I’m not going anywhere, I know as long as I try I’m making better strides than giving up.

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Characters, aren’t we all.

the-fall-tv-showThere is this BBC show, it is called “The Fall” and it centers around two characters:

#1 – Stella Gibson, played by Gillian Anderson

#2 – Paul Spector, played by Jamie Dornan

It is the tale of two obsessive, compulsive people on two different sides of the law. One is a police detective and the other a murder, and yes – you’ve heard this premise a million times before.

But you’ve never met Stella Gibson.

I’m a fan of crime drama, not all but a lot of them. I’m a fan of female characters, not all but a few I really love. And then there is Stella Gibson.

In every recess of entertainment – television, movies, novels, plays – I would like to see more “Stella Gibson” type characters. I would love to see someone so self-possessed and contained even the lowest of the low (and I’m talking about people who are a fan of slut shaming) can’t touch her. Well, maybe they do. Maybe they get to her, because after all, we’re all human and words hurt – but still, there is something magnificent about her.

She is beautiful, smart, sexy, confident, contained, brilliant, and caring.

The underlining theme of Man V. Woman is strung throughout in more ways than one – from sex, to death, to daily life. It is examined, dissected, discussed and thrown in your face. Basically, The Fall makes you think. The tension keeps you on your wit’s end and then you have this truth handed to you – because it really is a truth, no matter what people say or how they try to spin it.

At the end of series 2 there is a discussion between Stella and one of her officers – a man – and she’s says something along these lines, “When ask why men felt threatened by women, they say they’re afraid women may laugh at them. When women are asked why they felt threatened by men, they say they’re afraid they might kill them.”

The Fall is an excellent example of non-stereotypical characterization and I’m talking all of these characters. They are layered, have debt, and make you connect to them – even if it’s by making you hate them.

What type of characters do you wish there were more of?

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The trials of writing a short story… who knew?! (That’s right, everyone did.)

wise-asteroid

 

Look up! It’s a giant rock headed right toward us!!

…or is it?…

That’s how all of this feels – and I mean “life” by “this.” Life feels like a giant rock falling out of the sky aimed directly for my forehead.

Things take longer than planned, even with all the organization I try to put in place and the schedules I create for my writing – life comes in and…

hd-wallpapers-bomb-explosion-wallpaper-mushroom-cloud-1680x1050-wallpaper

So there is a delay, but the story will happen. I WILL have a short story to post on this site, for you to read – if you like (which I hope you will because I’d love that. No pressure… seriously. Thank you either way…)

I have no date – but the plan is before the end of the year. Secretly (not really a secret if I post it online…) I hope it will be ready for everyone to read on Holiday break! It’s the least I can do for lovelies like yourself.

UNTIL THEN! Promise to stay positive and write more posts to keep you writing!!

xx

A

 

by Categories: Life, WritingTags: , , , , , 2 Comments