Tag: novel

Odd Things Non-Writers Say

I know, not everyone writes fiction or non-fiction. Not everyone writes in general. Typing up a comment, an opinion or adding their prospective on a topic of dicussion online, is writing, but…

I’m talking about people who never read or those who do read, but never wrote a collection of short stories or a novel or two for fun. I’m pointing out those who have never written a single document past school years growing up. And after school years, never picked up a book after.

The things these types of people have said to me personally or in public, it blows my mind. (Names are taken out to protect them for obvious reasons)

“Why do you always want books for Christmas? You’re writing one of your own?” – …This one really blows my mind. This statement, spoken in person close to the holidays a few years ago, tells me they don’t read books for pleasure or for learning to expand their mind. All writer types must read diffrent forms of style and process in order to write better. Writers must study the craft. This means, we want more books on the exact craft stubject or books on a genre we are writing ourselves. I want books for Christmas, a gift card from Barns & Noble cause it makes it easier for the gift giver since they don’t know me well enough of the subjects and genre I like, I need books to study from on the craft from those before me. Yes, I can easily borrow books at the library, but a direct book that is not at the library, and if it’s particular to what I need, I can buy at the store. I keep a lot of the books on the craft of writing. I go back to the material over and over for years of study.

“All you need to do is sit down and write.” – …Oh, sweet summer child, you know nothing. It takes far more to place ass in chair, roll up to desk and start typing to pump out a book. I have a few articles I’ve already written on my author blog, that explains the common processes and my own method for myself. But to put it into simple terms here: 1) It takes planning, months or years worth for a novel. …2) It takes problem solving during the planning stages, sometimes months or years on a section to get right. Even a first draft can take some problem solving. …3) Drafts 2 and 3, to go through to flesh out the full form of the story before major edits. This process can take a year or more. …4) 6 to 8 months of major edits with critique partners. Different minds and eyes on the project itself. …5) In between each process, important breaks are needed for the mind to relax in seeing the work with fresh eyes. (These breaks include: cleaning house, grocery shopping, cooking, laundry, paying bills, reading, etc) I’ve created nearly 500+ pages worth of notes, character files, diagrams, family trees, world histories and timelines that took me years to gather in the developmental stages. It takes years to finalize a screenplay way before it ever gets looked at by a production company to become a full length movie. To create anything, it takes time and hard work. (Not to mention, the stress of Impostor Syndrome is something all writers who want to be professionally published face. Fighting the demons in her minds, the stresses of it all, lag the process down. So, again it takes time to write a 120,000 words size book.)

“What’s a novelist?” – …There are words I’ve never come across either. That’s how we learn. I use the word ‘novelist’ when I hand someone my business card or when I’m addressed diectly when asked what my job is. This person had said about my thin metal case mistaking it for a wallet, even though I use it as such. The metal container is for business cards, I told him. He then asked what my job was and I said, “I’m a novelist.” I don’t refer to the use of author, since I’m not currently published. So, this person didn’t know what a novelist was. I explained, “It’s another word for author. Someone who writes fiction.” I was abselutely taken a back by his question on the word though. He was obviously in his early 20s, but since he didn’t know the word, I blame the eduational system of the US. When I learned of the word, ‘novel’, in third grade in 1988, the English teacher saying, “We’re going to read a novel today. Novel means ‘new idea’.” I was entranced by the word. I fed off this new fact for decades. It still gives me happy chills when I use it.

I think that’s all of them. There maybe one more, but at this time, it’s slipped my mind. Oh well. To close, if you as a writer of any form come across similiar examples, remember, your book may strike their interest in reading for the first time in decades. Don’t let people who don’t read or don’t write fictions stop you from making your dreams come true. Keep writing and don’t stop.

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Cleaning Up The Stage

Cleaning up the store before opening the doors to customers. Preparing the canvas before placing the first paint filled brush stroke. Sweeping the stage before rehearsal begins. Prepping your work space before you type at the typewriter for that important article or first draft of a new novel.

Not all writers do this process, but it does help…at least that’s how I noticed a shift in my work whenever I cleaned up the stage.

I was always a tidy child and teenager. I did as I was ordered and told to do in keeping my room clean or maintaining some form of space to keep organized. Even if it meant that my mother with her bipolar with residual schizophrenia on top of that which the littlest thing would upset her of whatever I did ‘wrong’ to her whims. I grew accustom to maintaining my room as perfect as possible. Reason being for the most part, I danced in my bedroom all the time. I understood early on my own observations while taking ballet class in 1985, that the cleanliness of the studio and stage was important. It kept accidents from happening. There is nothing worse in the world than tripping over the smallest object when dancing.

I took that basic training of cleaning up the stage to heart and still do it today, but with a twist.

I discovered in my early 20s that I had a niche in recognizing a pattern of thought whenever I finished cleaning dishes, laundry and sweeping the floors or cleaning anything else in one day. Once the chores were done for that day, my mind was free to focus on my writing for the rest of the week. I would have 5 or 6 days devoted to writing even if it was only note taking and study of my works. I would finish one to three chapters in that week span. Then the cycle of come Sunday or Monday I would clean house once more to prep for the next work week of writing.

Why would I go to such lengths to clean house in one day, even if all I needed to do was 2 to 3 loads of laundry? Imagine for a moment you want to write a whole chapter. The story is flowing out of you, but your mind is bogged down at the forefront of – ‘There is a load of dishes in the sink’ – ‘there is a load of laundry that needs to be washed’ – As you notice there is something keeping you from your work, you stop and go finish that other thing, for my case chores. If I find that this is happening inside my mind and I know physically there are chores to be done, and I continue to ignore those chores, I get depressed for the next few days cause I’m being lazy to myself and neglectful to my writing.

Writing is the reward for when I’m done with basic household needs. I look at this way, if you can not maintain your household of the basic clutter around you (basic chores as I described before) then how can your mind be calm and at peace to help you focus on your creative work in front of you? As much as a cluttered mind can not focus, neither can a cluttered house, stage, etc. When you have not kept to a basic once a week schedule of maintaining the house needs (your needs, mind you) then the creative work before you will and can suffer as a result.

On a Sunday or Monday I’ll see the dishes need to be done. I’ll see if one or two loads of laundry to be done. I’ll notice there are dust bunnies on the floor and sweep all the floors and clean the cat box. Then come Tuesday onward I’ll have nothing better to do than write a new chapter(s) until the next Sunday or Monday rolls around. Then the cycle starts all over again.

Don’t get me wrong here. There are authors out there of all kinds that just focus on the writing and keep going all the while neglecting the household needs to keep them sane, healthy and happy. Especially the healthy part. If you have a partner in your life that can help with the chores to keep you on task at writing, then ask them to help you with the house chores from time to time. It will help you lessen the load.

These are all crucial processes before you begin any body of creative work, before setting a dinner party or office meeting or before you fill your car with vacation essentials for that road trip adventure. If the stage is not cleaned and ready, how can you focus on the task at hand that will then keep you mentally fit and healthy?

Muse Has Changed

A common muse to some would be something you see in the world may it be a painting, a flower, a song or an event that you see or that is happening. A muse is to spur you onward to a new experience that may and should enlighten you to something positive for the world and your existence alone. Here’s an in depth look into my muse.

A common muse to some would be something you see in the world may it be a painting, a flower,  a song or an event that you see or that is happening. A muse is to spur you onward to a new experience that may and should enlighten you to something positive for the world and your existence alone. Below is the basic definition of muse:
noun

1. Classical Mythology.

  1. any of a number of sister goddesses, originally given as Aoede (song), Melete (meditation), and Mneme (memory), but latterly and more commonly as the nine daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne who presided over various arts: Calliope (epic poetry), Clio (history), Erato (lyric poetry), Euterpe (music), Melpomene (tragedy), Polyhymnia (religious music), Terpsichore (dance), Thalia (comedy), and Urania (astronomy); identified by the Romans with the Camenae.
  2. any goddess presiding over a particular art.

2.(sometimes lowercase) the goddess or the power regarded as inspiring a poet, artist, thinker, or the like.

3.(lowercase) the genius or powers characteristic of a poet.

Origin
1350-1400; Middle English Muse < Middle French < Latin Mūsa < Greek Moûsa
My muse, whom I met when I was ten years old in my dreams who took on the form of a wise elder man with long white beard and mustache and small circular glasses. He would appear when I was alone in my room or at times when I was at school. He hardly ever spoke, but when he would it would be to the stance of: being careful of what I was doing and keep observant. I learned early to listen to him, but over time I grew less to listen, this of course frustrated him.
From age ten to fourteen, I found myself dreaming of a tropical island. A place for me to hide from the abuses, turmoils and angry; hurt-filled words of my mother. A place for me to hide and recoup from family and school stresses. I found that my muse, the one elder man that would follow me at school and hang around in my bedroom, who always walked on my left, was on the island, too. When I had first arrived on the island, in my dreams and meditations, I was afraid feeling I was alone, which I was for a few years, but gradually this man appeared. We would take walks around the island and into the woods and find waterfalls. I even found ruins of three stone towers in the near center of the island. (Later I would learn what these Three Towers were for and place them in my first manuscript)
It was not until June 22, 1995 that I had astral projected in my dreams to a new exciting world. I saw all its people, places, markets, shoreline, harbors, country side, animals and strange plant life, one being a pear shaped dark purple with pink spotted fruit. I found myself being filled with as much information about this world as I could carry in my mind on my journey back. I awoke back in my body that morning with refreshed vigor as though I was born and cleanly washed. For the next few days I set out to write the first few pages of the first manuscript which went through three different titles before settling on – Mythia.
It was not until a few months had past and I had written three new chapters at the beginning of the new school year of 1995, that I learned my muse’s name – Ynycornus. (Originally spelled Unicornus in some of my early writing class projects in between writing the first manuscript) Ynycornus by this time, was becoming someone I could depend on. He was full of wisdom and compassion toward what I was going through. I loved him dearly for being who he was, even though I became frightened in thinking I was hallucinating him due to the abuses of my mother.
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Continue reading “Muse Has Changed”

Manuscripts breath life for themselves

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I apologize for not updating my blog since late October or November. I had gone through a few things emotionally with my mother’s death and cleaning up my mental state and having to let go of a few things.

As you can see in the photo above, I have been working on book 3. As you can see, I breezed through to chapter five faster than I thought it would happen even with all the notes I have. But, yeah know, being sick with a cold twice really is the pits. Your brain doesn’t want to work and yet you yearn to writing the next chapter. If there’s one thing writers/authors can’t afford is sick days. We need our minds to push out our manuscripts at any cost.

Book 3 Soul’s Little Lie: Echos of the Lost is going to be quite a lot larger than the first two I think, however, I’m starting to think that I’ll have to take book 1 and 2 and put them into book 3 in chronological order of the story. Book 1 would be in the middle and book 2 would be right after that or so and kinda close to the end of it all. In other words, ‘book 1’ isn’t finish after all.

It’s not a bad thing. It just means that this novel(s) was wanting to be written differently. There’s no harm in that, I’ll just have to make sure I arrange the manuscripts correctly in a more constructive way with a few added paragraphs to connect a few areas. If all else fails, I’ll just have the professional editors take care of this rearrangement of the story. At least I have a very good idea how this will all be constructed. This form of editing won’t take too long I don’t think.

In other news, my three beta readers have read the 2nd book. They couldn’t put it down, but they also gave me a great amount of notes to fix up a few areas. This manuscript wasn’t that bad in lack of errors. A lot less than the first one by far. And they told me that the ending was a bit short, rushed and airy. This is what made me think that I should connect the first 2 manuscripts closer together for the 3rd one. I’m willing to do it if I must.

For those who might want to read an excerpt of the second manuscript, I’m sorry I can’t afford to do that right now as it hasn’t been fully edited and I’m more interested in wanting to send the first manuscript out, but if it comes to it, which it looks like it must, I’ll just have to rearrange manuscript 1 and 2 into the 3rd and then send it off. No, I’m not confused, this first time novel is a complete learning experience and never ever are any two manuscripts ever written the same.

Oh, more last thing, as for fan art of book 4, I haven’t touched those five art pieces in a year at least. I have three left and I fear I may have messed up the third one a bit and may have to start over. And, I’ve gotten down a fair amount of notes for book 4 and I can’t wait to get started on that one out of all the others. Been wanting to work on book 4 for nearly five years now. It’s driving me crazy, but I’m being very patient about it. I can’t jump from one book to the next haphazardly like some authors can do. I’m still learning and I don’t want to screw this up.

As always, you can find me on Facebook and Twitter if you ever want to talk to me about writing. Takes for tuning into my blog tonight. I’ll try to keep to a once a month blog as much as I can. Thanks and take care.

Changing of the Guard

Monday, November 21, 2016 was the last day to purchase a paperback copy of my first novel. In some small book stores online, through Amazon, you can still buy a copy if you’d like, but the price from those smaller stores has gone way up ($50 or more) cause of the rarity of them now. If you were lucky to buy a copy, any one of the 3 different mistake copies, those are collector items now. If you were lucky to get one signed, you’re one of my #1 fans of my works. Congratulations.

Come December 5, 2016 my contact with my publisher will end. I really can’t wait for that to happen. It can’t get here any sooner. I really hope a newer publisher will show better business practices and integrity than the other publisher did. This experience has been just that, loads of experience for what to look out for when things go wrong. At least it shows I can get published cause I love writing unique stories that come from my real life and imagination. Without writing, I’d be a shell of my former self, that’s for sure.

In other book news, the continuation to Soul’s Little Lie, the first draft, is done. I’ll be working on the third piece early next year. The third one won’t take long to hash out. I’ve made loads of notes and put them all in order. I’ll have to go through them again just to make sure everything is correct.

The fourth book, I’ve got the ending down. You know how some authors write the ending of the last book first so they know where the end goal is when they start the beginning? I’m kinda doing that, but not quite. I really can’t wait to get started on book 4 though. It will be so much more details and moving than the first three. Not to mention all the history, back story, culture, magic, etc that I have to put together. It will be a labor of love. This whole book series has been a labor of love since I was a kid. I can’t get enough of this and there is much more to cover.

 

Coming To The Home Stretch

I’m nearly done with writing my second manuscript for book 2 Soul’s Little Lie: Whispers in the Hall. I figure I have 5 more chapters to go. I could be done by late October or sooner. We shall see.

My goodness, I haven’t posted anything on my blog in a month or more. This time I want to showcase my progress from my dry erase board of the past few months. On each photo, about four of them, it will show my regular life schedule that also mingled with my writing.

You’ll probably notice a great gap in mouths and gaps in between weeks. Writing is hard at times, especially when that pesky writer’s block kicks in. The story is all there, it’s just life stresses keep you from writing. The darkness inside you of the doubt you have in your craft tries to weight you down with that massive or even small writer’s block. It’s no joke when people say: writing is hard.

What they mean by ‘writing is hard’ isn’t the writing part of typing up and hand writing words on a page, it’s getting the words out from your mind to your fingers to the blank page. That blank page can be intimidating at times. You just don’t quite know how to put the words together in telling the story of what scene or situation or conversation comes up next from where you left off.

Now that I’ve broken free of this nasty writer’s block that lingered for a collective total of six months or more, I’m almost done with the story. This second book has been the hardest cause you ‘feel’ as though the story is done with just that one first book, but oh know, it’s far from over.

At NorWesCon 2016 author Jennifer Brozek gave me some well needed words of encouragement that I will never forget:

“The hardest part in writing a book series is that second book. Most beginning writers have the hardest time writing a second book cause inside they believe that first book is the finished story. If you can show that you produced a second book in a series, that will help you get noticed by publishers. Until then, just keep writing and finish that second novel.”

I may have not repeated exactly her words, but it’s damn close to my ability in remembering them.

Now, onto what my work load looks like. Mind, I write on the board what I have produced and what happened in the day later in the evening. I don’t write a deadline to myself. It psychs me out and upsets me.

I gave up on the original idea of making a deadline, with posting a timeline of each week of which chapters to write, as seen in the first image on the left for the month of February.

In the second image, June 23-July 20, 2016 I began showcasing my real home life of what an author goes through in between ‘writer’s block’ and real life and then finally the writing that flows. Same thing for the third image of July 21-August 17, 2016.

What I used to do back when I wrote the first Soul’s Little Lie manuscript was, I kept all of this in my head of how I was producing chapters. Writing 1 chapter a week or more which spanned a total of 9 months. This time for the second book, it’s been a fussy child to me. I’ve been working on the second novel since late fall 2014. What really bogged me down in my writing for the first year or two was the constant interruptions of my elderly parents. They could not respect what I was trying to achieve. Now, you can see I’m more focused far, far away from them.

To add, I’ll do this little ‘writer’s tag’ questionnaire that I found on Jenna Moreci YouTube channel.

#1 What do you eat or drink while writing? – Maxwell House Coffee w/ International Delights Creamer of a flavor I’m in the mood for, usually it’s Almoretto Cafe and sometimes tea, but in between each cup of coffee, usually 2 cups one in the morning and one at night, I’ll drink a few 8oz water bottles of water. Oh, I don’t eat while I’m writing. I’ll take my food into the living room or watch videos on YouTube while I have my snack or lunch or dinner. Never, ever while I’m writing will I eat.

#2 What do you listen to while writing? – I have a large eclectic collection and it all depends on my mood in the scene I’m working with. I have a few soundtracks strictly for Soul’s Little Lie series. I arrange them in order of the story and use that song that comes up next as a ‘tuned in’ marker for my mind.
#3 What is your biggest distraction while you’re writing? – The negative hurtful words of my mother telling me I’m no good at anything. That then turns into a few days to a few weeks of depression and fear about my work. That emotional manipulative bs of my mother’s voice really hurts my time in the hours I could be writing.
#4 What is the worst thing that has happened to you while writing? – My first manuscript that I wrote by hand, that then I typed onto a Mac computer back in 1996 in computer class, decades later the hard floppy discs became corrupted and I lost all the files of all 200+ pages. Thankfully I printed the file out way before the corruption occurred and I have only one copy left. Recently though, 1 out of 3 hand written notebooks of said first original manuscript, along with 3 hard bound notebooks, artwork sketches, other odd notes and 2 hand written poetry books are in limbo at the USPS Distribution center in Federal Way, WA. The mailing location address was ripped off somehow and I’ve been waiting ever since, for nearly a year, for the box to return to me. I’ll have to just drive down to Federal Way location to get it that way even though I LOST the tracking number in the process of my move back to WA. Yeah, I’m on edge about that and that’s part of my writer’s block. I want my novel materials to come home to me so badly.

#5 What is the best thing that has ever happened to you while writing? – Currently getting Soul’s Little Lie book one published. Gotta consider each publication is a stepping stone to something bigger for my main goal.
#6 Who do you communicate with while you’re writing? – I don’t talk to anyone while writing. No one really should talk while they are writing cause you have to focus your whole energy onto your craft. If you must talk to someone, make sure it’s during a break so you can write down the notes during your talk. Or, just talk to yourself, since that’s where your writing is coming from – your inner soul.

#7 What is your secret to success and your biggest writing flaw? – I don’t have any ‘success’ to speak of yet. I just have one book published and have many more to write that will get published when they are ready. My biggest flaw would have to be – doubting myself and ‘listening’ to my mother’s harsh words. I have to break that habit if I am to ever succeed to my main goal.
#8 What is your inspiration? What makes you productive? – Music, my mind and my dreams that I remember when I wake up in the morning. Seeing that massive goal at the end of all of this. Can’t tell you what that final goal is, it’s a secret.
#9 What is one thing that you do or that other writers do that is super annoying? – There is this one author, I won’t say her name, that I met at NorWesCon2016. She kept on boasting this at the panel and in public at her booth – “I just want the fuck it all money!” Let’s just say, putting the cart before the horse and boasting that the cart can move, when it can’t, is a bad bad thing to do in one’s writing career. I don’t care how many books you’ve published or who your publisher is or how many you’ve sold. You don’t boast about wanting the ‘fuck it all money’ cause there is no guarantee of that ever happening. She was also very rude in how she spoke to me and other fledgling authors as though she was the ‘bell of the ball’, the ‘I’m better than you, cause I have this publisher’.
#10 Are you willing to share something you’ve written? – Since book 2 isn’t finished yet, I don’t want to share that just yet. I’m really not too keen on sharing book 1 either cause I need to clean it up for republication. I’m so sorry, but not at this time. I want to make sure both books are finely polished before sharing them in small bits.

Well, that’s all for today. A fairly long blog post as of late. Hope you enjoyed reading it and got a visual in how I do my work. If you’d like to see more my writing in what I’m up to, follow me on Facebook and Twitter.

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