Blog Award

May 8, 2012 at 1:00 am (Writing)
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My blog has been given a Versatile Blogger Award…twice.

The first blogger awarded me this well over a month ago, and because I have no organization skills and procrastinated for far too long sadly I have lost their blog address and contact info. So, if it was you, PLEASE let me know and I’ll post your name and a link to your blog ASAP.

The second blogger who gave me this award is Jay Elle Tee, or JLT, or otherwise known as Jay. Confused? Click HERE for the full lowdown on the name :) and who Jay is, and the fantastic blog he writes called Write Now.

The basics of the award are as follows…I have to tell you seven things about myself. Here goes!

1. I can’t stand salt and pepper shakers that are shaped like ANYTHING other than salt and pepper shakers. Seriously, I’m not looking to hoist a cutesy ceramic cat or chicken into the air, turn it upside down and wait for salt/pepper to fall out. Yes, it’s a pet peeve, but it’s all mine :)

2. I’ve donated my hair to Locks of Love three times, and one of the times I was featured on the local news for my donations. Recently, my daughter donated for the first time and she proudly displays the certificate on our fridge.

3. I am attending Willamette Writers Conference in Portland, Oregon this August. I could only afford to attend for one day, but I still plan on making the most of it.

4. I’m holding the 2nd annual “Worst First” contest next month, and yet again I found a published author silly enough to be involved in the nonsense I come up with to judge the contest. I’ll let you know more details soon, but for now just know that I’m looking at a STACK of prizes the author’s publisher mailed out to me to giveaway.

5. I am a long time watcher of the television show, Castle. So much so that I have the show’s poster on the back of the bedroom door. Yeah, cuz I’m all high school like that :)

6. I broke the blade on our lawn mower by running it over the metal lid that covers the water access turn on for the house. To this day, I’ve never told my husband the entire story, because as I tell him, “You don’t want to know why I did something so stupid.”

7. Because of this day, not only do I not get mad when my son sticks his tongue out at me, I highly encourage him to do so.

Here’s some more specifics about the Versatile Blogger award. If you are nominated you need to do the following…

  •  Thank the person who gave you this award.
  •  Include a link to their blog.
  •  Next, select blogs/bloggers that you’ve recently discovered or follow regularly.
  •  Nominate those bloggers for the Versatile Blogger Award
  •  Finally, tell the person who nominated you 7 things about yourself.

So, I nominate the following blogs for this award…

1. Diane Lynn Tibert

2. Florence Fois

3. Artemis Grey

4. Tori Mcrae

5. PDP (I won’t put up a link here, but he knows who he is :) )

9 Comments

Storyboard Teaser (Photo too!)

December 13, 2011 at 1:00 am (Writing)
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Have you ever heard the phrase, “Back to the drawing board”?

I’ve been standing in front of my storyboard for hours on end, trying to make sure I’ve tied up all my subplots/storylines and distributed them evenly throughout my WIP.

As a result, I’ve got no post today, so instead I’ll share a picture of said storyboard. (And my poster of one of my favorite shows, Castle.)

The notecards contain a brief summary and objective for each chapter. The sticky notes represent different subplots/storylines and I put them under each chapter. That way, I can see at a glance if I’m too heavy/light for certain storylines, and how they weave in and out of the entire manuscript.

I find it to be a thing of organizational beauty, but please note, I plowed through the first four drafts using the “pantster method before I created this monster :)

What about you? How do you track subplots and storylines throughout your writing?

25 Comments

Screensavers, Puppies, and Justified

May 26, 2010 at 1:00 am (Open Thread)
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I’ve got nothing to write about today so let’s do an open thread in the comments section. Here’s some possible topics to get the ball rolling…

What is on the screen saver of your computer? (Mine scrolls the following…”If you’re reading this it means you’re not writing!”)

Why would a puppy eat rose bushes and how do I get him to stop? (Yes, I know he needs daily excercise, but seriously?! A rose-bush?! With thorns?!)

What is your favorite television show right now? (Since Castle is currently on hold for the Bachelorette, mine is an AWESOME show on FX called Justified. It is a modern-day western, complete with a lead character who is a US Marshall. I highly recommend. Plus, the photo you see when you click on the above link is an exact vision of my male lead character in my book.)

On to the comments!

3 Comments

A Scalpel not a Hatchet

April 12, 2010 at 6:26 am (Writing)
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My story is done. I’m in the final leg of this marathon. But, before I finish I have a few more things to accomplish. Small things yes, but oh so important to the final product.

I’m talking about word choice, active voice, and passive sentence structure.

Over the weekend I found out just how many times my characters “decided” or “managed” to do something, how often they “jumped” from the wagon, and how they always ”quickly” slid from their saddles. 

At this point I no longer need the large hatchet to go through my manuscript, hacking away at entire pages or chapters. I’m down to carefully lifting away one or two words and replacing with stronger ones that convey an even better story.

Time consuming, yes. But in the end, when I cross that long-awaited finish line, it will be completely worth it!

Happy Monday everybody. Castle is all new tonight!

4 Comments

Finished!

February 1, 2010 at 7:41 am (Writing)
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After months of struggling, I have finally finished my rewrites!

Now I’ll be updating my site with links to my favorite agent, author, and publishing industry websites.

Also, a special thanks to Christina Berry for sending me an autographed copy of her debut novel, The Familiar Stranger. If you have a moment, check out her site. (www.authorchristinaberry.blogspot.com)

Happy Monday everyone!

PS. Castle is a rerun tonight, but still just as good!

4 Comments

If it Ain’t Broke…

January 18, 2010 at 1:00 am (Writing)
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The saying is…”If it ain’t broke, then don’t fix it.”

Last night, I had to disagree.

In reading over my revisions from the weekend (hey, I made 5500 words by the way!), two pages really began to bother me. I mean, they weren’t horrible per say, but they also didn’t match up to my other pages.

Yeeeeesssssss, I BRIEFLY considered the “Ah, well. It’s good enough” path. But, knowing it would bother me to the rest of my days, I went back and took a good hard look at WHY  it wasn’t working, figured out the problem, and now those pages SING with poignancy! (At least, to me.)

I really don’t think that makes me a perfectionist. I think it makes me a careful writer who doesn’t want her name attached to anything less than my absolute best effort.

Castle is on tonight. Everybody should start watching it so if we don’t want to talk about writing in the comments, we can at least talk about that :) . 

Happy Monday everybody!

8 Comments

MOMMY IS WORKING…

January 11, 2010 at 1:00 am (Writing)
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This weekend was amazing!

SATURDAY  My dear hubby took the family (new puppy included) for an all day visit to the grandparents house. I became one with my computer chair* and pulled off 5500 words.

*Well, to be fair I did stop to watch a movie–but hey, at least I cleaned up the house during the commercials AND at least it was a movie about writing a novel. It was called Alex and Emma, starring Luke Wilson and Goldie Hawn’s daughter (can’t quite remember her name–Kate Hudson I think?).*

SUNDAY.  I immediately noticed a difference in my word count an hour into working. On Saturday, I’d polished over 2000 words by 10:00am. Sunday, I was at maybe 150 by the same time due to a bunch of silly interuptions. Grrrr.

This is the moment I finally figured out that since my four-year olds (and dear hubby) can read, why don’t I post a note on the door?

So I did, and it worked. For any of you wondering exactly what brilliant words I strung together, I have included my words of wisdom below.

MOMMY

IS

WORKING.

DO  NOT

COME

INSIDE.

 

So, the sign (and the threat of “You’re in big trouble if you open the door”) stayed in place all day and I managed to pull off another 3000 words. 

Of course, this entire weekend’s success is partially due to my dear hubby, who held down the fort while I was working.

I may make my deadline yet! 

PS.  Happy Monday–Castle is on tonight!

7 Comments

Because…

December 14, 2009 at 5:00 am (Writing)
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Because I’m coming up on a milestone for posts (ok, it’s just 40, but seriously…how cool is that?)

Because I’m chugging right along on my rewrites, and at the same time coming up with the production side of my book trailer I plan to start producing in about a month (yep, I used to make commercials for a living. My favorite story is when a salesperson told us the golf course wasn’t even built yet, but could we make a commercial to run in three days? By the way…we rocked it)

And, because it’s my blog so I can if I want to…I’m going to “rerun” a previous post.

PS. Castle is on tonight. Don’t forget.

*UPDATE*

I recently entered, and won, a guest hosting contest over at “Pimp My Novel”. (http://pimpmynovel.blogspot.com)

The post I “reran” here is the one that will be featured on December 23rd, so I am removing it.

3 Comments

Time for Some Changes

November 30, 2009 at 4:00 am (Writing)
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Note to Self: When the manuscript’s own author can’t figure out the progress of the scene during a rewrite, it’s time to make some changes.

On a completly related note…WOW is my “Typical river crossing along the Oregon Trail turns high action and fraught with dangerous, unexpected obstacles” chapter turning out to be a good one!

To all you NaNo’s out there…you’ve got one more day. Totally enough time to get in a couple tens of thousands of words :)

PS. Castle is on tonight. For those of you who haven’t discovered this show with good writing, that happens to be ABOUT writing…check ABC at 10:00pm tonight.

2 Comments

Movin on Up

November 23, 2009 at 5:00 am (Writing)
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Step back people!

I’ve reached over 20,000 words for my rewrite.

It’s a monumental day.

Only 90,000 more to go. (Wow, those historicals sure are long huh?)

If you need me I’ll be writing.

For those of you doing NaNoWriMo…get busy! November’s almost over!

And for everyone else, Happy Monday.

(Of course it’s a Happy Monday–Castle is on tonight!)

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