Today, I went to Starbucks with my husband, who was definitely going to hold me to being there for at least two hours. I actually got 1000 words done, which is more than I’ve written for a couple months. I’ll have to force myself to write now that the fall semester is about to start!
I haven’t written in a while, having spent some time querying and some time prepping for classes and some time traveling the past two weeks. But I’m here at Starbucks, waiting for my husband to show up for lunch. It’s only 10:45 and I expect him here at 11:30. Or noon. And I have to do something.
So I’m forced to write, starting with this blog. The words are flowing out after feeling blocked for the longest time. From here, I’m going to look at Maker’s Seeds and see what might have inspired me in the hiatus and tweak, then find new purchase in the story.
Maybe I should trap myself into writing more often. That should be a good way of forcing me to write.
I’m once again querying, sending out a manuscript and all the trimmings to agents looking to see if any of them want to represent my book.
It’s a nerve-wracking proposition, especially as I have had no luck so far with getting agents to look. It’s difficult putting one’s best work out there, not knowing if this time it will get some traction. Face it, rejection is difficult to face, and no, I am not used to it.
I’ve sent ten queries out today and I don’t expect to hear from any of them today, as it’s Sunday. Tomorrow, the early rejectors will reply, and I will wait on the others as I send out more queries. I’ve done this before.
I have made some important changes to this version, some having to do with grammar throughout and the more important ones having to do with something I should never have attempted with the story.
Wish me luck!
I can feel the end of the summer. The County Fair is over, the weather is boiling, and I’ve done all my digital setup for the fall semester. I always do it early, according to my Facebook posts from years past, mostly to prepare myself for the fact that my days will be fuller and more carefree, and there will not be nearly as much free time to write.
School starts August 17, less than a month from now. Meetings start a week before that, and there will (hopefully) be a beginning-of-semester cookout for faculty and staff which represents the beginning of the semester more than any ritual could.
What have I accomplished? I’m a quarter of the way through one book, an eighth of the way through another, and I don’t know which one to write. I have finalized It Takes Two to Kringle, which is waiting only for some last minute putting together before I submit it to Kindle. I have edited an old but (in my opinion) outstanding book called Prodigies, which I hope to send off to agents soon. I neglected my garden again. I relaxed.
Life is good and I passed through the summer doldrums without much damage. Soon I will go through the beginning of semester highs (If this sounds like bipolar, it is, sort of). But it’s my cycle of the year and I will do my best to meet it.
I have a tendency to feel rejections keenly, thinking that they are a personal judgment of me. But what if they’re blessings? What if they’re there to keep me from really embarrassing myself with a mediocre (or worse) submission?
I’ve been going over old works I have written. I’ve written so many half-developed character sketches that aren’t stories, so many poems of the same, with no hook. Novels with plot twists that became deal-breakers.
I’m not a poor writer, but I want to be a better one. I want to be accepted for publication more often. Someday I want to have a novel professionally published. This won’t start happening unless I see these rejections as blessings in disguise. (Or even if I do, I suppose, but I’d like to be optimistic.)
Now, finally, as the summer winds down, I’m feeling motivated! The book and cover for It Takes Two to Kringle are almost done. I have brushed up my query letter and synopsis of Apocalypse in case I get motivated to query it. I have done little with Avatar of the Maker, but I have reconciled myself with the fact that Leah is going to be a pregnant eighteen-year-old.
I think I’ve said this before — my mind needs to be split between two things for me to be productive in writing. I’ve proven this every summer, when the first half of the summer is free, while the second half sends me chasing down interns and expecting the beginning of fall semester.
It’s possible that this is what it takes to be distracted from my perfectionism. Maybe it’s inertia taking over during free times. Perhaps I just need the dichotomy of work and writing to turn my mind toward writing. The best use of my time is all or nothing. But at least I’m making progress.
The good news is that I have been writing more on my latest novel, which makes me very happy.
The bad news is that I’m dissatisfied with what I have written. Such is the lot of writers.
Why am I dissatisfied? (This should be cathartic!):
The bones of the story seem sound, but some of the surrounding structures (the muscles?) aren’t holding up the promise of the story.
Many writers at this point would tell one to keep plowing through and wait to revise until one has completed the first draft. I am ignoring this advice.
I am distracted by what is missing in my characters. I am bummed out with a story without laughter in-between the heavy stuff (and there’s plenty of heavy stuff in this one). If one’s feelings about the content impede the writing, I think rewriting those so many chapters is not only wise but necessary.
This means my progress will not be going forward, but rippling outward. I can accept this.
In the meantime, I’m trying to promote my work. It’s hard for me because I’m not the sort of person who feels comfortable with self-promotion. But here is my author’s website, which has a blog post about all the writing I have out there. Here’s the page.
Happy reading!
“I don’t write THAT stuff.”
I could hear the inflection in the writer’s voice, even though she had typed and not spoken the words.
What stuff was she talking about? Sweet (as opposed to sexual) romance books. This attitude is not uncommon with the romance writers I have encountered, to where I have left a group of writers because of words dripping with disdain.
I don’t write the opposite extreme — Christian romance — either. I want sexuality to be important to my characters, just not necessarily on the page.
I obviously haven’t found my tribe.
Here’s my confession: I don’t write sex scenes. No steam, no lemon, no insertion, no moaning, no dirty talk, no bodily fluids, no humping.
If you have preconceived notions about me, these might contradict your thoughts:
Some data which might explain things but I doubt will:
Why I write fade to black, closed-door, no explicit sex romance/romantic fantasy:
My dilemma about writing explicit sex scenes may go back to a distinction I ran into a couple weeks ago between escapist romance and literary romance. I want to write compelling fantasy-romances/romantic fantasies about complex people in a world not quite like the one they entered. To do that, I have to write the way I write and hope it catches on.
Apparently, according to some reading about ADHD I stumbled across, people with ADHD have trouble with non-verbal working memory (referred to in one article as visuospatial working memory). I probably have ADHD given my family history. In addition, I struggle with visual and spatial stuff. I can’t remember what someone looks like very well. Maybe after 50 times. This includes my husband — I didn’t know for a couple of years if I could recognize him in a crowd. I let him walk toward me before I approached him.
Apparently, people with non-verbal memory problems have trouble visualizing, including visualizing what a successful result looks like. Does this relate to my writing crisis, where I’m not sure if I’m doing “well enough”?
I segued from analyzing my mind to planting herbs. We have a hill of rip-rap, upon which the past residents laid a bare layer of dirt on top of. I planted herbs there; the mint loved the bottom of the hill but the top killed off whatever was planted there. So my husband and I laid soil at the top and planted herbs. I love to cook, and I like fresh herbs.
I’m a little tired now, but closer to the completion of the planting season. Looking forward to lovage in my soup and mint in my namya (Thai noodle dish).
Listening to a new singer-songwriter playlist as I type this. It’s a good day. All I have to do is sort out the writing thing and try to figure out how to visualize success to motivate myself. Any ideas?
Out the window of the cabin, I watch the barn swallows preen themselves. Blue-black shoulders and rusty chests. They soar and flutter to catch their daily quota of bugs, and then they preen.
A big guy has arrived to weed whack in the backyard, startling the swallows. He’s wearing a Bearcats Football t-shirt. He’s probably a football player. Football players don’t get cushy jobs here in Bearcat Nation. That’s part of why we have the best Division II football program in the US —
Richard is not here — he’s at work. I’m at work, too, if you count the emails I have been answering. It’s hardly a job; I’m down to about 3-5 per day from the 40-some during the school year. Hence the mini-vacation.
Hence the writing retreat.
I will only be here a day or so; I relish a mini-vacation, a writing retreat, a hope that I will reclaim myself as a writer. Small steps, this blog first. A cognitive exercise if I need to dissipate my feelings of mediocrity. And at least a few words of writing.
Inertia is the supreme force of human nature. Remain still, and one will find the couch incredibly tempting. Force oneself off the couch, and movement and industry flow. I am not a vegetative sort; I enjoy making things happen.
Right now, I am facing my nightmare of inertia: I am away from my other time demanding activities, the gardening and the researching thereof, and I don’t know if I want to get off the couch. It’s like being tired of the thing that gives one identity.
I will now trick myself into writing. Richard says I only need to write a little, so I will promise myself 15 minutes. If I can’t write more than that, I’ve done my bit of writing. If I can write longer than that, then I’m breaking the barrier of inertia.
Words Like Me 