ASPIRING ROMANCE WRITER

2008-05-30T03:31:00.003-05:00

I'm disillusioned with blogging. Its not fun to me anymore. If I haven't stopped by your blog lately it has nothing to do with you. I have made blogging work for me, free work sadly, by starting several other link exchange sites. Don't think I don't like the sites, I do.

But they require hours and hours of my time. And now there is just no time for playing on other blogs or even posting here.

I am writing though. I'm in a short story phase right now. I'm aching for another great novel idea to come my way but none of my ideas seem to have legs right now.

This blog probably won't become active again. Thanks for your support. Best of luck with your writing.

Sara

2008-03-28T00:44:00.001-05:00

If you are a fiction writer and have a blog, stop on by this link exchange site
Writers Who Blog.

2008-03-25T17:00:00.001-05:00

For anyone who is interested an online collaborative novel is being written at End of This World.com

Switchback

2008-03-20T14:10:00.002-05:00

My own moans echo in my ears before I even open my eyes. A dull thumping at the back of my skull reminds me that I got bashed in the head before I passed out.

Down at Niko’s Pizzeria my boss calls me “our tough chick.” Most woman don’t deliver pizzas in the slums of Chi-town. It ain’t worth the risk if you got kids or even a halfway decent man waiting at home.

But it never bothered me. In fact, until about a minute ago, I thought I was born without the fear gene. Turns out I have it and it kicks in just about the time I realize my wrists have been handcuffed behind my back while I’m strapped into a chair in the middle of an abandoned house.

I spit out a curse word. From the next room I hear wood scraping wood ( a chair being pushed back, maybe) and then feet shuffling closer, lazily, like this guy is in no real rush to torture, maim, rape or whatever else he has in mind, me. I get the slacker serial killer. Figures.

There are many times I do things without knowing why, especially in the last year and a half. It’s a part of my brain that just snaps on and knows how to roundhouse kick a mugger in the head, load a semi-automatic weapon, scale a ten foot high brick wall, and slip out of handcuffs. I have my right wrist nearly disjointed and slipped out of the cuff when she steps into the doorway.

My lungs clutch up. I’m breathing so shallow it sounds like puff, puff, puff. It’s the only noise in the room, except her smile. That smile is talking to me. Its my own smile, on my own face, and matches my own eyes that stare back at me.

I’m looking at me.

“Slip out of them and I’ll put double cuffs on you next time.”

He must have drugged me. A man answered the door to get the pizza. He looked about ninety years old and when he said he forgot where he put his cash, I bought it. I remember trying to break the hold he had on my neck. I flipped him over onto his back. I should have been able to get away but my world went black. Somehow he injected me with a drug. What else could explain this hallucination that leaned casually on the wall, arms crossed over her chest- my chest- while wearing a pissed off glint in her eyes- my blue eyes. “What....is this about?”

“We have a job to do.”

She stalked closer to me, then behind me, smelling like jasmine- a scent that flashed images in my mind of two identical blonde haired girls learning tae kwon do. Into my ear she whispered “Enjoy your vacation?”

Blink. Blink. Blink. Shake my head. Try to clear my foggy mind- wipe out those two girls, who are training, always training.

Life is war. Never forget that, girls.

Where did that thought come from?

I need to see the man again. See his eyes and judge what he wants out of me. But all I see is myself. She grabs my shoulders. “I’m severely disappointed in you, Cheyenne. We were made not to break.”

“I’m not Cheyenne. I’m Rebecca, sir.”

“Sir?” In a second she is crouched in front of me, grabbing my face and digging her nails into my skin. “Snap out of it! I have plenty of ways to jog your memory but you won’t like any of them. Look at me. LOOK AT ME! Do you SEE me?”

Whispering I choke out “Yeah.”

She snaps back “What do you see?”

“Myself.”

Sighing she gets on her feet, her hand runs into my hair, and forces my eyes to look into hers. “You playing me, sister?”

I’m not seeing her. I can’t be. I’m an only child. I’m Rebecca.

You’re name is Rebecca Lynn Adams. You remember right, honey?

“ANSWER ME. Are you playing me? You think you can fool me? You can’t. We are identical. There is not a thought you ever came up with I didn’t think five seconds before. You don’t think I wanted to fake my death? Make a run for it. You know we can’t run. They knew where you were every second from the crash to your recovery to this brand spanking new life you got for yourself. I thought at first you hired that team to play Becky’s mama and Pops, but you didn’t, did you? The Unit sent them in....because....” she let go of me and took a step back “ you actually did lose your memory. You let yourself forget.”

The way she said it is what convinced me I was not looking at any figment of my imagination. Disgusts rolls over her face. In her view, I’m weak for getting amnesia.

Good soldiers choose death over dishonor, girls.

“I’m Rebecca Lynn Adams. I grew up in South Bend. I was valedictorian of my graduating class before attending Purdue to study education...”

“Shut up!” She pulls a gun out from the back of her pants.

Glock 17Pro. Vertically titling barrel.Front rail mounted lights with lasers.

Rebecca the ex-school teacher turned pizza delivery girl shouldn’t know such a detailed knowledge of guns. She shouldn’t know half the stuff swimming around in my head. But eighteen months of being her is hard to let go. Rebecca is easy. She lives alone, works nights and sleeps days. She minds her own damn business and keeps her head low. Cheyenne-as this double of mine called me-well I don’t know who the hell she is and I don’t want to.

The gun is shoved toward me. “This was yours. A favorite. This is who you are. Born Cheyenne Leyton. Agent number 22-498-3365. Inducted June 2001 at sixteen. We didn’t go to any high school. You know that. Somewhere in that messed up memory of yours you know who you are.....and you are gonna remember tonight.”

Do it again, Cheyenne. I want a perfect score from both you girls. Imperfection leads to weakness and weakness leads to death.

Crouching in front of me, for the first time her voice becomes gentle. “Don’t you get it? They are letting you live this fantasy life only because it keeps me in line. They can make me do....anything....by dangling you in front of me. They have Johnny now. He went rogue. He’s in interrogation. He’ll be dead within 22 hours.”

Did you want to join The Unit, Johnny?

Did I join? I don’t remember agreeing to this when I started training at 8. I didn’t join anything. I was born an agent, just like you.

My eyes sting with unshed tears. For what? For who? Him? Her? Me? Who am I? What am I?

“I don’t know how I can help you. Let me out of these handcuffs and....I’ll do what you want.”

Our eyes connect. Cold, calculating blue stares me down. “You would be better off dead then Rebecca Lynn. I’d be doing you a favor. You’ll remember or...” She looks down at the gun in her hand. “I’ll do the kind thing for you. Cheyenne would thank me.”

You are a gift to this country, my girls. Twin elite genetically perfect machines. When you are born to save the world it is not a question of if you will do it, it is only a question of how many times you will do it.

She walks out of the room, leaving me to try and wrench my wrist free of the handcuff again. It pops out just as she comes back in with a black bag. Its big enough to carry a body and bulging with something that is packed tightly inside. She tosses in on the floor. “In here is everything The Unit uses to induce truth telling and memory retrieval. We go until you start getting the answers right or until there is no more chance you ever will. You ready?”

Without a word I spring from my seat and pounce on her. Every move I use, she counters. Blood flies from her mouth. Two of my fingers break when she bends them back. With each move I execute a memory shoots through my mind, till Rebecca burns away and only Cheyenne remains.

She’s got her arm around my throat when she says “This is why I need you to help me break him out. You’re still damn good.”

Though her choke hold makes it hard for me to breath I manage to get out “You need me cause only your twin would follow you into a near certain death, Celine.”

She tosses me to the ground. I look up at her. Pain shoots through every part of my body but I block it out.

Soldiers don’t feel pain.

Celine smiles. “About damn time.”

“You could have came for me sooner.”

“Figured you were working your own play. Leaving me to do the job for both of us.”

“That is something you would do, not me.” I shake my broken hand but don’t grimace.

“You gonna sit there and bitch about why I did both our jobs for a year and a half,” she asks me “or help me get Johnny out?”

Getting on my feet, with the gun in my hand, I tell her “Unless its happened since my car accident, no one has ever broken out of lockdown in The Unit.”

“Until tomorrow when Johnny does.”

It’s a suicide mission. My mind calculates the odds, running numbers faster than a computer, and comes up with no scenario where we could take on The Unit and walk out breathing.

Still I know I’m going to be one step behind Celine in whatever she attempts in order to gain Johnny’s freedom. I also know that none of it will probably work. We were born to be fighters, conceived in a lab in a quest to grow a generation of perfect agents, ready to lay down their lives for the interests of the United States of America.

The only thing our parents, all scientists and doctors and cops, didn’t count on was that some of us wouldn’t want to die in the name of truth, justice, and freedom for all.

Dying in a futile attempt to save the only man you’ve ever been in love with....well that is an entirely different story.

Rebecca Lynn, the tough chick, had a nice easy life. Cheyenne, the genetic marvel, will have a brutal, ugly death.

I tell my twin. “Lets get started working on a game plan. Sunrise is only six hours away.”

March Prompt

2008-03-20T14:07:00.001-05:00

Brand New Aspiring Writers, the yahoo group I run, had this for their March prompt:

Posted on 10/23/2007 at Writer's Digest.com

You're a pizza delivery driver and it's your last stop of the night. The house is on an unlit, unfamiliar street. As you ring the doorbell, you're greeted by an unusual character who invites you in while he (or she) gets cash--and abruptly knocks you out cold. When you wake up, you're tied to a chair.

What happens next?

Send those entries in!

2008-03-11T23:27:00.002-05:00

Award winning short story author DBA Lehane is holding a short story competition that he invites all writers to take part in.

The Like What We Did Last Summer short story competition will be hosted at RedBubble.com

Head here to read more details.

To check out some of DBA Lehane's fantastic work, visit Short Short Fiction.

New prompt

2008-02-15T14:51:00.001-06:00

Each month my writer's group has a prompt to inspire a short story. For this month it is:

I ask you to pick one of the following character sketches and write a short story based on this person meeting their future spouse.

Mateo Sanchez - former professional baseball player who was thrown out of the league when it was discovered he intentionally caused errors in games because he was betting against his own team.

Savannah Marjorie Patterson- this southern belle was beautiful enough to be in pageants but she never had the money to compete. That doesn't stop her from pretending she comes from the upper crust or looking for a man who can make her dreams of being a socialite come true.

Walter Lukinski- this senior citizen knows the days on his life clock are ticking down. Still he isn't done living yet. He yearns for one more big adventure or love affair, something to feel like he is alive.

Emily Keats- she never expected to become a single mom, to sleep alone every night, to miss the feeling of a man's arms around her. Life took her down a road that has left her feeling nothing but lost.

Chandra Roberts- it's the night before she is shipped out to Iraq and her friends take her to a bar to get drunk.

Jonah Knight- he has a newborn baby to care for but no wife or girlfriend.

2008-01-11T05:18:00.000-06:00

This is After

Timestamp: 12 March 2067

The worst part is the lack of light. Though your eyes adjust to the stony blackness quick enough, there are always things you can’t see. Like the hinge on the door at the top of the concrete stairs. When it jerks open, it whines, creaking its discontent at being forced into action. When you hear that sound, you have three point five seconds to grab a weapon- not four, never four. You wait four and you’re dead.

In this six by ten foot space, a storm cellar on what- during a time that no one likes to talk about anymore- was once idyllic farm country in Iowa, I wait to hear that screech. Sometimes I eat, just enough beans to keep my energy up. Sometimes I search the room for what I need to survive. But most of the time I just stand still and wait.

Three generations ago, no one huddled in these little caverns. Terror alerts were still a novelty. Everyone knew something could happen, would probably happen, had happened before and they should be ready. The news said: Stockpile water. Horde supplies. Having a gas mask handy wouldn’t be a bad idea. You will be on your own. Don’t expect FEMA. FEMA isn’t coming.

Still, no one was ready. When they invasion came, few had places like this to hide in. Most did what was common in those days during a crisis, what made sense to them. They got in their gas guzzling SUVs and hit the highway. Everyone there died first.

Time started to tick slowly in that new reality. The sky looked different. The air tasted bitter. The lights didn’t come back on for over seventeen months. I thought the world had ended and I was left behind.

But it didn’t end. Maybe it can’t end. Maybe the human spirit is too resilient to allow it. Or maybe Earth is God’s favorite, and so like any hopeful father would, he just can’t give up on it. Maybe we were just lucky. Or just fought hard enough. Whatever the reason, we were not, as a people, wiped out during the winter of 2007.

We lived on. And learned how to hide underground. And what to do when the storm door opens.

Creak.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.

My hand is on the weapon but its too late. This time I moved too slow. The sound I hear as it swoops down the stairs is inhuman, and not quite any animal I ever would have imagined either, until the invasion, that is.

Light floods the room. My eyes pop open. I am in my bedroom, controller in hand.

My son tells me “You went too slow again.”

“I know.”

The virtual training game has improved my speed, as I train in a variety of different scenarios, pretending I am at home, or the office, or the local park when the sky goes dark and they come again. Everyone does these drills. Old people like me, the only ones who saw the first attack, do them the most often, knowing what it means to once again be caught unprepared.

“You’ll get them next time,” he assures me. His hand rests on my knee. There is sympathy in his eyes.

His is middle aged and has his own children. None of them have ever seen what can come out of the air, come for you and your family and your neighbors. It is almost not real for them- something out of a school book.

“Next time,” I agree.

I hate the darkness of that storm cellar. Though it isn’t real, it feels it. I smell the dirt beneath my feet. Feel the cold beans slide down my throat. I hear their voices beyond the door, never able to understand what they are saying but knowing they understand each other and are plotting how to find me. The computer monitors their condition- giving them various injuries and ailments- and mine, recreating what was once all too real, what I lived through without anyway to pop out, like I can now.

“Ready for lunch? I cooked while you were under.”

FEMA isn’t coming.

“I better go one more time first,” I tell him.

He thinks I am a silly old man. I think its only a matter of time before the sun goes dark once more.

As I pick back up the controller, my son reaches out to press the button to start the game again. Over his shoulder, the light streaming in the window disappears, like a lampshade turned out. Its midday.

The sun is gone. They’re here.

He’s in shock. Staring at the darkened view with his mouth gaping.

I’m the one who has to grab his shoulder, pulling him to his feet, and then we run to get underground. An alarm shrills through town. Pretty little Iowa, once upon a time. The siren wails and wails, the only sound for miles. All children have been warned: do not scream, just run.

This is not a drill.

By Sara

Written for Brand New Aspiring Writers
Prompt: Find a song and write a story inspired by it.
Song chosen: Virtual Insanity by jamiroquai
You can read the lyrics here

By the way, this was my first attempt at science fiction.

Short Story?

2008-01-10T02:48:00.000-06:00

Right now I am trying to tackle a prompt from Brand New Aspiring Writers.

Pick a song. Write a story inspired by it. It can stick closely to the song or veer as far left field as you want.

Some suggestions for song choices:

Last Dance with Mary Jane by Tom Petty.
Jack and Diane by John Melloncamp.
It's the End of the World as We Know It ( And I Feel Fine) by R.E.M
Country Boy Can Survive by Hank Williams Jr.
Fancy by Reba McEntire
If I Could Turn Back Time by Cher
Brenda's Got a Baby by Tupac
Runaway, Love by Ludicris
Citizen Solider by Three Doors Down

Or find a song of your own choosing.

2008-01-02T17:24:00.000-06:00

The new year is kicking off with a bang already for me. I will be starting this month by attending our First Annual Anniversary Celebration and ending the month at a progressive dinner party, The Soup to Nuts Gonzo Carnival on January 30th, 2008.

Kilroy, from Fear and Loathing, will kick off the night with a virtual cocktail hour in the form of blog enteries submitted to him at his blog. Then my writing group will host the first course at Brand New Aspiring Writers.

Other bloggers will jump in to host the main course and the dessert. It should be a fantastic time, jumping all around the blogosphere, finding new sites to explore.

To submit a post to me for this event, email me with a link at IlovetowriteSMP@yahoo.com. You must put Progessive Dinnerin the subject line. The post can be about anything you like, from a poem to a personal story to photos or advice.

You could also submit different posts to:
Kilroy, who will serve hors d'oeuvrers and drinks.

Isabella Mori will serve up the appitezers.

Anja who hosts the main course.

Fiction Scribe dishes up dessert

Only one post per course is allowed to be submitted by you. You can submit to just one course, if you want.

If you send a link to IlovetowriteSMP@yahoo.com, I will make sure you are part of the first course. But make sure you mark the subject line with Progessive Dinner, or you risk your mail being confused with a Nigerian Lottery scam or some other kind of spam.

2008-01-01T21:23:00.000-06:00

An online writing friend has started a fic blog you might want to check out, if you enjoy chick lit.

A fic blog is a fictional account of the life of a character as told in first person POV blog entries.

Wavelengths by A. Writer

2007-12-15T09:07:00.000-06:00

This is the time of year when I always seem to suffer a writer's drought. It takes me well into the new year to get back on track. I don't try to fight it though because with all the stress of the holidays I can't add another thing to worry about.

NaNo really didn't work at for me this year and that National Blog Posting Month thing I tried- yeah, that was so not for me! As you probably noticed, I ran out of things to blog about halfway through the month.

Anyway, hope you all are writing more than me.

All my writing friends, you can join this blogroll

Author Blogs

Song Lyrics of the Day

I'm so hard to handle;
I'm selfish and I'm sad.

Now I've gone and lost the best baby that I ever had.

Oh I wish I had a river I could skate away on.
I wish I had a river so long
I would teach my feet to fly.
Oh I wish I had
a river.

I made my baby say goodbye.

It's coming on Christmas.
They're cutting down trees .
They're putting up reindeer
and singing songs of joy and peace.

I wish I had a river I could skate away on.

Sarah Mclachlan lyrics

2007-11-16T23:02:00.000-06:00

I encouraged several writer friends to do NaNo this year, from the soap opera fan site I visit. I'm thrilled they are taking part. Its fun to see others jump in and ride this crazy train.

Hope your writing is going well for you,

Sara

2007-11-14T14:39:00.001-06:00

Yesterday, I was reading the novel The Wednesday Letters by Jason F. Wright . It is about about a couple that writer letters to each other each week. The thing that makes this book noteworthy is that the epilogue is done in the coolest way. In the very back of the book, an envelope is attached and inside is the last letter.

I've never seen something like that in a novel. It made it a stand out, something I won't forget anytime soon.

History Before Your Eyes

2007-11-12T09:04:00.000-06:00

I'm excited to let all of you know that today a new poetry community launched. Not only will this bring new poets together to share their work but it will share many varied poetic visions with the blogosphere at large.

Head on over to Read Write Poem., sign up and meet the contributors.

I don't know about you but I think its a good day when more poetry enters the world. Best of luck to our friends at

Excerpt of Intersection

2007-11-11T01:26:00.000-06:00

From my NaNo Novel, viewpoint of Kenny,-

He walked from driveway to driveway, jogging right through the middle of the yards, not even trying to hide himself because at 5 am no one was awake to notice the guy in prison orange outside their house, and finally found a car with the door unlocked.

In two minutes flat he had the dark green Saturn hot wired. He drove slowly off that block, headed east toward Rt. 30, and pulled into the first gas station he found. There was not a minute when he thought Maybe I shouldn’t do this.

His mind did not work that way. He needed cash. This place has cash. He would take the cash, meet up with Cadillac and then they would cruise up out to Los Angeles and lay low. Get lost among the chicanos and glitterati. Everyone was nuts out in California, no one would notice a couple more crazy men among the masses

Update on Nano Novel

2007-11-10T11:34:00.000-06:00

There are twenty-plus characters in my NaNo novel. I actually went ahead and worked up a plot outline, which I never do but desperate times call for desperate measures. There will be seventeen chapters and the name of each chapter is based on the character it is about.

Here are the first five characters:

Criminal- Kenny Delucca
Witness- Marissa Montez
Hostage- Bianca Stein
Cop - Tom White
Neighbor of hostage- Lionel Hughes

2007-11-09T12:45:00.000-06:00

Since, for reasons I still have not figured out, I thought it would be fun to do National Blog Posting month this year, you will find me here everyday this month with a new post.

I'm thrilled to see so many friends I know online doing NaNoWriMo this year. I always encourage any writer I know to give it a chance. I think it is amazingly empowering to be able to turn off your internal editor and write freely, without agonizing over each and every word during the first draft. Being desperate to reach that daily word count is a good thing!

I did not win NaNo on my first try in 2005, but I did in 2006. I now wonder if winning last year has made it so I don't feel the same intensity to win this year. I am still trying but not pushing as hard as I did last year.

Then again, I loved my story last year. Nikolas and Simone was very close to my heart. Intersection doesn't grab me in the same way.

Maybe this weekend I can go all out during my writing sessions and catch up. Stranger things have happened, right? Its not like my brain will explode if I write 10,000 words in a day....at least I wouldn't think so. Maybe I should google that and make sure.

Check out my favorite NaNo related post by me from last year:
How to survive NaNoWriMo

Song Lyrics of the Day

Don't know much about your life.
Don't know much about your world, but
Don't want to be alone tonight,
On this planet they call earth.

You don't know about my past, and
I don't have a future figured out.
And maybe this is going too fast.
And maybe it's not meant to last,

But what do you say to taking chances,
What do you say to jumping off the edge?
Never knowing if there's solid ground below
Or hand to hold, or hell to pay,
What do you say,
What do you say?

Celine Dion

3WW

2007-11-08T10:53:00.000-06:00

Compensate
Modern
Radio

Hello everyone. Here is the latest installment of my 3WW
continuing story. If you want to catch up, read:

part one
part two

Rock Bottom Part Three

Note to self: Never again make a death bed promise to anyone.

Of course, when that person is your mother, it is kinda hard to refuse. Still, Eric wouldn’t be out in my living room, in his grungy street person clothes, if I hadn’t promised to always look out for him. But I am the younger brother, so what do I really owe him?

I mean I was supposed to look up to him, and I did. He played baseball in high school, so I worked hard to make the team myself. Though I was always in his shadow, having to hustle twice as hard for half the glory. Then he was off to college and, when I graduated, no one but the trade schools would let me in unless I took a full year’s worth of courses without credit to compensate for my lack of academic achievement in high school. I didn’t have Eric’s brains or looks or charm. No one called me a modern day Jimmy Stewart. Eric hit the gene pool jackpot and still managed to waste it all away.

While, here I am, working freaking overtime to keep my head above water and the loan sharks off my ass. The gambling used to be just for fun- a few hours on the boats or the computer, make a couple thousand and get out. Being good and lucky at poker- about the only thing I ever did excel at- made me just cocky enough to think I could run the tables in Vegas, make enough to start my own business, and never work for anyone else ever again.

One crazy weekend about three years ago, Gina and I headed out there to make it happen. I went there with only five thousand in my pocket, borrowed mostly from friends and family, but managed to leave Sin City with six figures. The pizza parlor opened six months later. And if I had kept my word and given up gambling altogether, went straight like Gina begged, I wouldn’t be in this mess I am now.

I couldn’t stay away from the tables, though. It was like a temptress calling to me. Easy money, Tommy, easy money. So easy.

For a while it had been, till my hot streak went ice cold. The restaurant needed money, I needed to make it a success so I could finally give Gina all she deserved: the huge diamond ring, the big wedding, the house behind gates in the suburbs. She deserved it all and more. So I found a way to stay in the game, past when I should have known to get out.

First I borrowed from the wrong loan shark, then I started working for him. I know, real smart, right?

I take bets for Mickey ‘the Mountain’ Panazzo. People call me up and put twenty on The Bears, or one hundred on the Cubbies. Then I got to make sure the winners get paid and the losers pay up. I get two grand a week for this, while the Mountain makes ten times that, at least. I would never skim from him though. I’m not the only bookie he has and I’ve seen what happens when someone loses their job with him- they also lose their ability to breath.

If I can do this side job with him for a few more months, I’ve have enough to get out, sell my pizza joint, move out to Indiana where all the mini-mansions are popping up, and start over, just me and my girl. Gina can give up her job at the radio station and be a stay at home mom like she dreams. I can be the hero she thought I was.

I might not even tell Eric where I live once we move. I can’t have him showing up, all high and wasted, smelling like the sewer, when I have kids running around the house.

Or maybe he will straighten out before then. Maybe I should help him. Get him in rehab finally. I did tell Ma I would never turn my back on him.

Ring. Ring.

I stop typing on the computer, where I was filing out invoices for work, and reach for the portable phone I usually keep on the desk next to me when I am in my study. But it’s not there. I realize I put it back on its charger in the kitchen. Jogging out into the living room I never make it to the phone, because I spot a hundred dollar bill laying on the ground.

My eyes dart back to my bedroom. The door is open. My heart jumps into my throat. I only shoved the money under my bed because someone knocked on the door and I didn’t have time to put it back in the safe in the closet. Then my mind got consumed with my older brother and his idea that he should squat in my home for who the hell knows how long- a weekend, he said, yeah right.

My feet nearly slide out from under me as I race into my bedroom.

He didn’t, I think frantically, He couldn’t have.....

I throw myself on the floor, to look under my bed, and then I have my answer: he did. My brother has screwed me over big time, the duffle bag of money is gone. Damn you, Eric.

2007-11-07T10:21:00.000-06:00

NaNo is kicking my butt. This year is taking my sanity away bit by bit. The truly ironic thing is that last year at this time I have never written 50,000 words on any one story before but now I have, several times over.

In November 2006, I didn't know I could reach 50,000 words. This year I know I can and yet I am stymied at every turn.

Over this last year I really got into writing fanfiction and I wonder if that is the crux of my problem. Maybe I am so used to writing within another writer's universe that I can no longer create my own.

I keep thinking that I am going to hit my stride and start cranking out word after word but it has not happened yet.

Don't think I am giving up though. It's not November 30th yet. I hate math but I have run the numbers and I think I could still make it to 50,000 words by the end of this month.

Or go crazy trying.

NaNaWriMo Participant for the third year
NaBloPoMo Participant for the first year

2007-11-06T09:12:00.000-06:00

I have a favorite blog. I have gushed in the past about Fiction Scribe.

This post is inspired by one I saw there.

Thirteen First Sentences to Start Your NaNo

13. I knew I shouldn't have married a werewolf.
12. It was the most awesomest of times, it was the most baddest of times.
11. This is a story about a story within a story about a story I once heard.
10. Chickens need love too.
9. In a galaxy far, far away....
8. You will not like this novel but read it anyway.
7. He loved licking toes- the smellier the better.
6. It was not easy to kill the gaint blob living in the sewers in New York City but somebody had to do it.
5. I need to pee.
4. The butler did it and now I will tell you how.
3. This is a memoir about the time I was abducted by aliens.
2. "The first thing you need to understand, Officer, is that this all started when I decided to try and write a 50,000 word novel in a month."

and the number one way to start your nanowrimo novel is....

1. He was a wizard named Scary Trotter.

* Use these suggestions at your own peril.

Now that's how you play Poetry Tag

2007-11-04T11:36:00.000-06:00

The sound shook his bones
like a cymbal
crashing fast against his soul,

a soul detached from mind and body,
shivering in the dark
and fearing the coming light.

He fled to a dingy back alley
and waited. A wind rushed
to meet him at the end
with that terrible sound wound through it,

and all he could do was wonder if he remembered to lock his front door,
or if his memories would be taken away with his sanity.

He crouched down, curling into his grief,
and all he could do was fight for water memories and gas-lit stoves still on,
and a cardboard castle, while insensitive queen
did battle for the pawn of man, within his fragile mind.

3 MORE LINES ARE NEEDED FOR THIS POEM BEFORE IT CAN RETURN HOME TO Poets Who Blog. The last site this poem was on was A (de)finite problem with an in(de)finite solutions

If you want to add the next line, then comment tag and take the whole poem to your blog. Tell your readers that you found it here and that if they want to play here are the rules:

Comment TAG
Paste poem on your blog and add a line
mention what site the poem was on last

After the 19th line the poem should be returned to PWB by leaving the entire poem in the comments section there.

Thanks for helping our poem travel the blogosphere.

Day Three

2007-11-03T00:07:00.000-05:00

I am happy to report that I have actually managed to come up with a story idea.

Intersection- there is a price to pay for every sin, but who is to say when and how that price is paid?

Caleb wants justice for an injustice perpetrated against him in his past, so he hunts down high powered divorce attorney Franklin Gorman with the aim to end his life.

But when three other people get trapped in the office where Caleb has taken Franklin hostage will they become victums or heros? Is Caleb justified or just out of his mind?

Song Lyrics of the Day

Head under water
and you tell me to
breathe easy for awhile.

The breathing gets harder- even
I know that.

Made room for me.
It's too soon to see if
I'm happy in your hands.

I'm unusually hard to hold on to.

Blank stares at blank pages.
No easy way to say this.
You mean well but you make this hard on me.

I'm not gonna write you a love song.
Cause you ask for it.
Cause you need one, you see.

I'm not gonna write you a love song.
Cause you tell me it's make or break in this.

If you're on your way,
I'm not gonna write you to stay.

If all you have is leaving,
I'm gonna need a better reason
to write you a
love song
today
today..

Sara Bereiles lyrics

Day One

2007-11-01T09:01:00.000-05:00

NaNo has started. I still find myself idealess. The writer within is getting very whiny. Thoughts in my mind over the last few days:

How can every other NaNo person-from 8th graders who type in text speak to trekkies who are living in Star Wars World- have a damn plot for their novel and I still don't?

Maybe if I just start typing Once upon a time, it was a dark and stormy night, when...the rest will just flow out of me like water.

Hey, that was twelve words. Only 49,988 to go. It doesn't matter if that would be the worst start to the worst novel ever, does it? Yeah, it does. Back to the drawing board.

Maybe I can write about trolls.No research needed.

Is thinking about writing about trolls a sign of mental illness? Should I start medication before I write this novel this month?

Because I am writing this novel this month, I am.

Just as soon as I figure out what in the world I will be writing about.

Song Lyrics of the Day

Like a gift from the heavens,
it was easy to tell,
it was love from above that could save me from hell.

She had fire in her soul.
It was easy to see
how the devil himself could be pulled out of me.

There were drums in the air
as she started to dance.

Every soul in the room keeping time with their hands.

And we sang…

Ay oh ay oh ay oh ay,
and the voices bang like the angels
sing.

Santana feat. Chad Kreoger

NaBloPoMo participant for the first time
NaNoWriMo participant for the thrid year in a row

3WW

2007-10-31T10:20:00.001-05:00

Well this is the last post before NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo ( both of which I have no idea how I am going to handle keeping up with!).

Three Word Wednesday words-

Phone
Stumbled
Windy

Rock Bottom- Part Two by Sara

After spending the last few nights sleeping on the streets of the Windy city, it feels like all the dirt in Chicago got together and took up residence on my skin. When you are curled up, wearing all the clothes you own, and keeping warm by a trash can fire, it don’t matter if you used to be a junior level executive at one of the cities premier financial institutions- you are a bum, plain and simple, like the one sleeping on the right and left of you.

I told Thomas I would only crash at his place for the weekend but, after being here five minutes, I already am starting to feel more human and less savage, and I can't imagine leaving in two days. He can't send me back out there again.

He’s my brother. He owes me.

So I start to take from him- like a vulture- a shower, a shave, my clothes get washed, my stomach filled with all the bread and lunch meat in the fridge. Thomas is still holed up in his spare room, where he said he’s on the net. Probably gambling. He’s always had a problem with that. My mother used to tell him to shape up and “Act more like, Eric.” We buried her a few years back. I don’t think I could stand to look her in the eyes if she was alive today.

While my clothes are in the dryer, I head into the bedroom to see if Thomas has a robe I can borrow. But, like everything else in my life since Angie threw me out, that plan don’t quite work out like I expected.

I trip over his size twelve Nikes, stumble for a few steps while I try to stay upright, and then take a header into the corner of his wooden bed frame. I land on the floor with a thud, my forehead bleeding, and stars dancing before my eyes. The phone and three books from his night stand managed to fall on top of me. Pushing them off, I start to haul myself upright, when, out of the corner of my eyes I see green. Money green.

Jerking my whole head to the side so I can look under the bed I see a black bag that’s zipper is slightly open. It is filled to the brim with cash. My hands are on it before I can complete a thought.

If I took just a handful of this, I could get a place to stay, some suits, new copies of my resume. I could be back on my feet again.

If I take it all.......

He’s my brother. He owes me.

END OF PART TWO

Note- I am thinking about keeping this going. Maybe writing from Thomas POV next.

Poetry Tag

2007-10-25T01:41:00.000-05:00

I was at The Shores of My Dreams when I saw this post:

It's a game of poetry tag. Be the first to post TAG in the comments. Then take these lines and add one, in a post on your own blog, along with these instructions. Whoever adds the nineteenth line then takes the poem to Poets Who Blog at http://poetswhoblog.blogspot.com/ and puts the whole poem in the comment section there. Each person who plays need to also mention what site you were at when you found the poem so that other bloggers can follow the breadcrumbs back to this poem. You can play more than once but not twice in a row.

Poetry Tag Poem

The sound shook his bones
like a cymbal
crashing fast against his soul

My line is the third one. Tag me and you can be the person who writes the next line. Post it at your own blog.

2007-10-24T13:08:00.000-05:00

Three Word Wednesday prompt this week is:

care
unexpected
weekend

ROCK BOTTOM

This was the last thing I wanted to do. The last place I wanted to be. But it wasn't like I had any choices left. They say that your family has to take you in when you go back home, but like a lot of things people say, that is not strictly true.

“Can I stay, man, just a few days?”

Thomas immediately tensed, and moved to block the doorway to his apartment.

I beg “Let me stay just for the weekend. Monday I’ll be off your couch and you won’t hear from me again till Christmas - like usual. Come on, man, I need to get off the streets for a couple nights...”

I know I sound pathetic, look pathetic, smell like a dead body that was left at the dump for a month and then got up and walked down the street. I reeked of desperation.

The second Angie kicked me out, throwing my duffle bag at me on the stairs, I’ve been steadily sliding down to this place till I finally landed right on rock bottom. It took a little over three months of crashing on friend’s couches till the last friend on my list stopped returning my phone calls and didn’t answer when I pounded on his door- though I know I heard someone moving around in his place.

Who can blame him really though? If I saw me coming- this man with ratty hair and clothes, and eyes that looked a little too angry and defiant to trust- I would not merely look the other way, I would run the other way.

But Thomas is my brother. He don’t have that option. I shove my foot in between the door and the frame, so he can’t close it. After a moment, where his dark eyes meet mine in a silent warning, he sighs and motions me inside. “What the hell happened to you, Eric?”

I tell him, “I hit an unexpected run of bad luck, is all.”

What am I supposed to say?

I wasn’t always a screw up. I graduated college- unlike Thomas- and had a decent entry level job with room for advancement. But the waiting to get there, up that ladder, was like a rest stop in Hell. No man with a fully functioning brain stem and my sense of ambition could have put up with it for long without relief.

So I let loose every now and again- just a few drugs, a few pills, staying up a little too late once too often- but it was enough to get me canned. Angie didn’t like a lay about boyfriend and soon me, the duffle bag, and my ever growing addictions were tossed out the door.

Thomas doesn’t know about any of that. We don’t keep in touch and I wouldn’t be here right now if I had anywhere else in the world to go. He knows that and seems to resent that I have fallen so far that I am now forced to burden him with my situation. Maybe he wants to be concerned, thinks he should, but it is obvious to both of us that he just can’t work up the energy to care.

“I was online,” Thomas says, with a wave of his hand toward his office.

“Sure. Go back to it. Don’t let me keep you.”

“There’s not much in the fridge. I eat at Gina’s a lot. But I’m sure there’s something you could make a sandwich out of.” Thomas walks off, closing the door to his office, while I am still standing just a foot inside the apartment.

He doesn’t want to deal with me. I can’t blame him. I am now at the last place I have to turn and he wants me gone as soon as possible. All I can think as I stand here is This is what being completely alone in this world feels like.

THE END

Note- I am thinking of continuing this next week with the Three Word Wednesday prompt, because I have an idea for how to change Eric’s luck.

Pre-NaNo Pain

2007-10-22T12:52:00.000-05:00

I still don't have an idea for my novel. The clock is ticking louder and louder as each day passes. I don't usually do much planning before I start a novel but this year I would love to spend some time doing character sketches and rounding out some background for them. But to do that....you sort of need characters.

At least I am pretty sure that is how it works.

In Worst Case Scenerio

2007-10-22T12:46:00.000-05:00

Do not panic. This post is just a test. Should this be a real NaNoWriMo Emergency, you would hear screams and see smoke coming out of the ears of the fried brain of the writer before you. In that instance, do not attempt to engage subject. Simply turn off computer and wait for brain synapses to start firing again. If this does not happen by December 1st, seek medical care.

Smile and the world smiles with you

2007-10-15T09:31:00.000-05:00

I was pleasantly surprised to learn that Marie, who blogs about her novel writing pursuits at Deep Thinker, has nominated me for the

It's heartwarming to think my blog does that for her. I started this blog to help me focus on my writing, to make me work harder toward my goal, and to find others who were working toward publication to share the highs and lows of this ride with so it is a bonus that I also managed to make a few good online friends.

I thank Marie for thinking of me and urge you to check out her blog. I'm looking forward to one day being able to buy a copy of her tale about vampires.

Now it is up to me to nominate five bloggers who make me smile. Whenever I visit these sites I think that I have been lucky enough to stumble on another person with the true soul of an artist:

Saoirse Redgrave from Hollow Hearts and Hollow Hills

JM from Fiction Scribe

Adrain Swift from Chronicling the Novel

Shakir from The Crimsonflaw Lived to Tell the Tale

And, of course, Marie from Deep Thinker. I nominate her not because she nominated me but because she has been kind and understanding to me, and supported this blog and others of mine, for months. She is an unexpected blessing to me.

There are other bloggers who make me smile, too. If you hit on any name in my blogroll under the section Writers I Read you will find the work of those I respect, admire and love.

Happy writing, my friends, and remember that if you enjoy reading someone's words online that its a gift to leave them a comment saying so. Who knows you just might make someone :)

In Case of Emergency

2007-10-12T12:30:00.000-05:00

The Three Word Wednesday words look deceptively easy this week.

Initial
Knock
Weather

At first I was relived because they really seem to go together well and surely an obvious story would leap into my mind from them but....not so much.

Just as it holds true that love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant...the muse is fickle, the muse asks not what you want but gives what she deems, the muse is stingy and moody and stubborn.

The muse is within me and I am within her. Sometimes the words flow easily between us and sometimes it is akin to caged deathmatch with me fighting for my creative sanity. But the muse always wins. She’s a badass that way.

This is the story the muse wants to tell this week:

In Case of Emergency

There is one sound a pilot never wants to hear. It’s a hard knock of metal on metal and always immediately proceeds the most silent silence known to man. Tyler knows that if he ever hears that sound there will only be minutes left in his life.

He thinks it won’t ever come. But one sunny, cloudless afternoon-perfect flying weather- it does.

The initial thought that floats through his mind is: Maggie.

She’s not his wife. He put off the wedding five times and after the sixth she had asked him “Why don’t we admit we’ve gone as far as we are going to go together?”

He reached out to pull her close, that day, to soothe away her fears and make all the promises he had a million times before but she didn’t want to be touched then, or comforted, or lied to anymore.

She found herself a school teacher and eight months later they were husband and wife. Tyler went to the ceremony and danced with the bride. He felt relived to not have to be someone’s husband and only now, as he plunged toward Lake Michigan in his single engine cessna, did he see how damn foolish he had been.

Maggie had a blonde haired two year old son now. A child he could have fathered, but didn’t.

Tyler didn’t see his whole life flash before his eyes. The bungee cord jumping, the motorcycle racing, the climbing to the top of every mountain in this hemisphere was wiped from his mind. All his big triumphs in corporate America, the wild days of being a frat boy, the time he took his first sip of beer, and kissing Kelly Winters at the roller rink in seventh grade - all those things he swore he would never forget- might as well have not happened at all because to Tyler, in these last seconds of his life, they did not exist anymore.

All he could see in his mind eye’s was Maggie. His hands gripped the wheel as he tried to pull out of the freefall, knowing it was too late now but having to try anyway. He wanted to get back to her. To slip out of this place and time and back to when she still believed in him. He had always been so selfish with professing his feelings for her. She had to drag it out of him. He wanted to scream his love for her now.

The water rushed up at him, sucking him into its depths, flooding the cabin with its icy life stopping force. he squeezed his eyes tightly close and did not see the blue-green coffin around him, instead Tyler took his last breath seeing the woman who had loved him better than he loved her. And his last thoughts were not of himself, his goals unfulfilled, of the old age he would never see. Instead it was all about her:

You were more than my love, Maggie, you were my best friend. I don’t want you to cry for me but I know you will...I should have said yes....I should have kept you mine...I should have...oh.

I'm it

2007-10-10T22:24:00.000-05:00

I have been tagged by the blogger who runs the awesome writing site Fiction Scribe.

Check out the rules of this unique meme:

* 1. After your intro, copy/paste this line and the rules below it: The originator wants to see how far it goes so please keep his link intact: http://rileycentral.net

* 2. Encourage people to post with the incentive of a link by including those who have passed it along here: Audrey, Celtic Angel, JM

* 3. Visit at least 3 on the list who’ve written and passed this meme. Leave them a comment.

And then you are supposed to, “pick three things that enrapture, consume, fascinate, or otherwise enliven you more than blogging. Then write a few lines about each to explain what the nonblog activity does for you, why and how.”

—

1. Soap operas- after about fifeteen years of watching them everyday I would say I'm pretty hooked. I know the history of the characters lives on the ABC soaps as well as I do my own history.

2.Family- I would say I spend more time thinking about, planning for, and caring for my immediate family than I do myself.

3. Writing fiction- two years ago I started working toward being able to write a 100,000 word novel that would one day be able to be purchased at your local Border's book shop. Suffice to say, it has turned out to be harder than I ever thought. But, also, more rewarding than I even could comprehend when I first started scribbling away in my notebooks years ago back in my days of hop scotch and barbie days. It's the driving force in my life. Each day I type away, trying to figure out this mysterious craft, and each day I move one microstep closer to reaching my goal. It's a hell of a way to spend a life, I recommend it whole heartedly.

I tag the talented writer Deep Thinker.

Inside the mind of me

2007-10-09T10:42:00.001-05:00

If you were able to get a computer printout of my mind right now this is what you would read:

I'm so jealous of anyone who has an idea for their NaNoWriMo novel. I wish I outlined. Maybe I will outline my next novel? What the hell am I talking about? I've never outlined and never will. I'm as allergic to outlining as I am to dogs.

God, I am itching just thinking about dogs.

Maybe I could write a novel about dogs....oh my hell, am I desperate for an idea.

Think, think....I wonder what is going to happen on GH today? That show so needs to fire Guza. He can't write worth a....focus, no soap opera ranting allowed right now.

NaNoWriMo ideas so far:

Titles?

This is a girl becoming
Girl-in-Progress

Story Ideas?

Something like the movie Crash with different independant storylines of many different characters that are somehow all connected.

Connected how? Somehow.

Hello, muse, you there? Hello? HELLO!

Sigh.

I really need an idea for my NaNoWriMo novel.......

National Blog Posting Month

2007-10-09T09:44:00.000-05:00

Fiction Scribe just clued me in on the fact that November will be the second annual National Blog Posting Month event. The idea is to post a new post on your blog everyday in the month of November. I don't think I heard about this event last year. Or, if I did, my brain was so addled by NaNoWriMo that it didn't sink in, because I have no memory of knowing about it.

I am not sure if I will take part in NaBloPoMo. It could be fun but I could also be insane over National Novel Writing Month and all my posts would read like gibberish.

Let me know if you take part in NaBloPoMo.

Elmore Leonard Knows Best

2007-10-07T09:42:00.001-05:00

I found a quote today that embodies my writing philosophy.

"I try to leave out the parts that people skip." --Elmore Leonard

Mr. Leonard is one of the writers I love to read and any advice coming out of his mouth carries great weight with me, but this particular piece of advice is the credo I write by.

I don't spend time in my writing describing every lamp in a room, or every speck of gray hair in someone's head. I jump into the story and let my reader's imagination do what God intended for it to do: fill in the blanks.

Goodbye, Mr. Understanding

2007-10-05T10:46:00.000-05:00

I found myself struggling to write something with the words offered this week. Unlike a few weeks ago, though, I did not drive myself batty spending hours writing the start of 20 different stories I hated. Instead I waited until this character, this frustrated man with a need to scream, came to me. Meet Martin Langley on the day he comes undone......

Goodbye, Mr. Understanding

A crime of passion. That is what the newspaper would say about this tomorrow, Martin Langley was sure.

Wouldn’t the people who knew him- all those nosy neighbors who peeked out their windows when Tanya moved out, and all the bloodsuckers down at his office- find it ironic that he was the one who snapped? For if there was one quote he was sure would be in the article about this incident, it would be “Martin was not the type to lose it that way.”

Maybe he hadn’t been, but he was now. Walking the line had proved less than useless. Crossing it felt like his first breath of freedom after twenty-eight years and eleven months of being the perfect, unappreciated, good guy.

Hell with the laws, with what people would whisper, with what it would feel like to have a rap sheet. He needed this and he would have it.

Wearing a self satisfied grin, he went from room to room collecting every item that Tanya left behind. An errant shoe tossed under the couch. The painting she picked out in Tuscan that he silently despised ever moment it had hung on their wall. Her copy of The Secret that was left on the bedside table. And the wall calendar- all marked up with her handwriting, telling him about birthdays and parties and holidays they wouldn’t be sharing now. Because of her, because of what she did.

He could still smell her all over this house. That wouldn’t do. He grabbed the used towel still hanging on the back on of the bathroom door. Next he whipped the comforter off the bed- she insisted on goose down feathers even though he was allergic- and all the pillows, too.

Everything went into a pile on the floor of the living room. Tanya had loved this house. She just had to have four bedrooms- saying it was for the children they would have but knowing all along it was just to have one more than her sister in Cleveland.

There were no children here. There will never be any children here.

With that thought in his head, he struck the match and watched her things start to burn. But it wasn’t enough. Tanya was still here, everywhere, still lying to him and sneaking off into the other room to take a call from Hank, who Martin had been assured, ad nasueam, was just a friend.

A damn good friend, it turned out. The type you walk out of your marriage over.

Needing Tanya- and everything that she had loved once- gone from this house, Martin’s eyes darted around for more kindling. He spotted the picture on the bookshelf. A smiling, in love pair on their wedding day. Grabbing it he cursed her face as he flung the frame into the fire.

The smoke alarm went off, piercing the air with a ear shattering beep, just as the door rang out a high then low, ding dong.

Martin pulled it open to find Emily Grabowski, the gaurd dog of Lincoln Street. At seventy-two years old, she had spent fifty of them looking out her window at all of them, noting and judging their small little existences.

“Dear,” she started in her condescending way “I thought I smelled smoke.”

“Very astute of you to notice. But then nothing gets past you, does it? Well, come in, come in, I’m having a barbecue.”

She hesitantly stepped one foot inside, turning just enough to look into the adjoining living room, and gasped at the flames that now had burned not only the pile of belongings but also the carpet and couch.

“Hot dog or hamburger, Mrs. Grabowski?”

She gave him a look reserved for very small, unaware children or very large insane men. Martin thought himself neither but then she wouldn’t understand him so how could he expect her to see this wasn’t the act of a crazed, cheated on, abandoned spouse but instead of a rational man who knew the only way to begin anew was to destroy the old. He had not misplaced his good sense, no quite the opposite. He had found the guts to do the only sane option Tanya had left for him now.

Smoke started to cloud the room.

“I’m going to call the fire department,” she said, then fled back out the door, leaving it standing open.

Martin reached in his pocket and pulled out the last thing he wanted to toss into the flames- a band of gold, now tarnished and not worthy of hanging onto.

He wound up, like a pitcher trying to strike out the last player in a baseball game, and with a whoop of joy tossed the ring onto the top of the blackened pile. Then he picked up his briefcase, full of the only documents he needed to start his life over, and walked out the door.

Mrs. Grabowski was whispering to her old cohort in snooping, Mr. Lee, “The way I heard it was she just up and left in the middle of the day while he was at work....oh, Martin, dear,” she called out after seeing him walking down the sidewalk toward his car “the fire department will be here any minute.”

“No rush,” Martin said as he climbed into his car. “Tell them to not waste the water. There’s a drought going on, you know. Remember you are the one who told me just last week- no using the sprinklers on Tuesdays, right?”

He smiled at her. The front window of the house exploded outward. The neighbors on the lawn scurried toward the street.

Martin drove away, passing the speeding fire engine that was barreling toward his house. He flipped on his CD player. The song playing was one he used to listen to in high school. Before he was a banker, before he owned a four bedroom house with two mortgages, before Bush was in office, before Martin had a low sperm count, before he ever met Tanya.....before.

Martin decided he would ditch the car but take the CD with him. Wherever he ended up, whoever he ended up, he would still need good music in his life. It was one thing he was sure of. That, he figured, was enough to know for now.

THE END

Thanks to Bone at
Three Word Wednesday for the words this week:

useless
feather
misplaced

Yippe Kay Yay!

2007-09-27T08:44:00.000-05:00

It's Blog Rodeo time, fellow bloggers and friends!

This edition focuses on different posts about blogging. We starts our ride through the blogosphere at Great Circle. Pete Aldin offers a link to his last blog carnival about the way each of us overcome personal obstacles and battles. Read many interesting and varied posts on How the War was Won.

For a more personal insight into Pete Aldin read the first blog post that ever went up at his blog, Freaked Out Fathers. Slip back to December 2006 and see how he reacted In the beginning.

This next stop will be a real treat if you adore the beauty that is a found in the creation called a woman's body. This blog run by Aloha_50 is adult in some of its content and called In Praise of the Female Form. The post offered for the rodeo is of an array of gorgeous famous faces, artistically photographed and fully clothed. There is a particulary striking one of Kim Bassinger.

We've seen bueaty in the physical form at the last site, now lets cast our eyes upon beauty of the written variety. Jonas Lamb shares his poetic vision with this short sample of his work:

a baby's heart
a hummingbird's wings
my ear drum on her belly
listening
__

Now read all about this talented and thoughful poet who blogs.

Our wagon train is heading to to the heartland of my country as we stop by a site titled Alabama Kitchen Sink.Shelia Norbit lives in Springfield, Missouri now and opens up her world to us when she answers Why I Blog.

Time for a little fun. Play Tag at The Lives and Times of....Anthony McCune.

Draw your eyes to the center ring of this Rodeo and see me take the bull by the horns with the first blog post I ever put online. Its February 2005, its cold here in Chicago, and I am entering a brave new world See what started it all for me.

Some of us, like me with that very first post of mine, are not born brillant. But some of us are. This poet and friend from Doktor Lapse Eternus never fails to entertain and enlight me with his work. Shakir takes a moment to tell us why he blogs.

Our wagon train through the blogosphere zooms over to England to visit Naomi now. She's someone I can relate well to- an aspiring writer working hard to finish her novel. She's been blogging since January of 2006 and recently hit her 500th blog post. Read about that milestone and the blog carnival she is running by stopping by herDiary from England

We end the this time at our Rodeo by hopping on over to the see the man who inspired this whole event, the hardworking Kilroy of The Gonzo Papers. His post is dedicated to a cause that touches the heart of every American I know. If you pray, say a prayer for lost souls and then read about the life of Joseph Vincent Vigiano, who lived and died as a hero on September 11, 2001.

Thanks for taking the time to read this post and stop by all the sites that participated. Leave a comment at each one and let them know you had a ball at our Blog Rodeo! Till next time, cowboys, cowgirls and all you crazy blogging buddies of mine. Yee Haw.

Sing us out, Tim McGraw.

I got a life that most would love to have
But sometimes I still wake up fightin' mad
At where this road I'm heading down might lead
I guess that's just the cowboy in me

The urge to run, the restlessness
The heart of stone I sometimes get
The things I've done for foolish pride
The me that's never satisfied
The face that's in the mirror when I don't like what I see
I guess that's just the cowboy in me....

We ride and never worry about the fall
I guess that's just the cowboy in us all.

Cowboy in Me Lyrics

An Accidental Life

2007-09-26T16:09:00.000-05:00

Its time for Three Word Wednesday again. The three words offered are

Caught
Eager
Perfume

To me the first thing that comes to mind is a tale of two lovers having an illicit tryst. But I didn’t want to go with the obvious route so here is what I came up with instead. I am trying to change up my tone each week. I have done violent, obsessive, and romantic already.

An Accidental Life

Jared sat at the kitchen table, smoking a cigarette. It was about time to go out and water the flowers.

No one expected a guy like him- with spiky black hair, cold eyes, and a rap sheet that stretched over two tables back before they had all the records on computers- to enjoy gardening. He was supposed to like riding motorcycles and bar fights. And he did. But raising hell would never ease the heavy weight of loss that had settled into his bones.

Though he could not call himself a good man, he had a desire to leave something good on this earth once his time ran out.

The way Jared figured it, he had done one right thing in his life. Though his Ma would say one thing don’t make up for all the shit he pulled, all the lives he drug down, all the times the cops banged down the door or the phone rang at three a.m. Jared thought- for a time- that this one thing had made the fact he was born worth it.

He had been a good father.

His daughter was christened Camille Amelia Tennyson . Her skin was pale as translucent paper. Her hair a deep ruby red, her smile heaven. She woke up eager each day- for life, for hugs, for seeing the sunrise and watching cartoons. She was alive for three years, thirty-nine days and ten hours.

They made quite a sight around town, after her mom split with that roadie from a rock band no one had ever heard of. Strained. Spliced. The name was something like that. Jared had known it once but now it was more than irrelevant. Kim didn’t make it to her daughter’s funeral. Her cell was cut off and by the time she got the message Camille was laying beneath a stone that read Daddy’s Little Angel Girl.

People who would have never spoken to him before- who were turned off by the tattoo’s that decorated his neck, knuckles, and both arms- left flowers and teddy bears on his front lawn, right over the dark patch of grass where the truck had barreled over his child.

The driver lost control. That was the answer he got. Four words.

To keep from going crazy- from diving into pills and booze, from killing someone or himself- Jared started to plant flowers. It started when he had to cover the spot on the lawn. Then he added a bed of flowers near the back door. Gardenias.Camille had loved when he brought home bouquets of those for her. They smelled like the perfume Kim used to wear. A visceral reminder of a mother lost. She would suck in the scent and light up, as if her mother might walk in the door at any second. He thought of not bringing them home but she would beg, “Flowies!” and he didn’t know how to tell her she couldn’t have her mother or her flowers.

Now all he had was flowers, too.

Jared needed to keep moving, planting, watering, pulling the weeds, because then he wouldn’t be able to think as much. He planted flowers all along the perimeter of home, and then his mother’s and then his best buddy’s yard got a makeover.

It was a small thing to do. But it kept him planning and tending and honoring his baby girl.

The driver was caught. He didn’t flee the scene. A kid. Seventeen and stupid, not stoned or drunk.
He was never charged. The prosecutor broke it to Jared by saying “I understand your grief. But it was tragic accident...”

Jared didn’t think he understood anything. Camille would be seven now. Did he understand what four years, fifty days and three hours without being able to kiss the head of his child felt like?

No one should understand that.

Ring. Ring.

He stubbed out the cigarette and crossed the kitchen to grab the phone.

“Yeah.....Kim. I’ll be over to plant those roses you wanted put in this weekend.”

THE END

Note-

Did you know that DBA Lahane has added a new story to his blog? I mention this because I'm impressed by his work each and every time I read it. He's a published writer that weaves unique, engaging fiction everytime he puts fingers to keys. I'm a hug fan and hope to write like him when I "grow up". :)

Check out his latest story

Panacea by DBA Lahane.

OMG,is it THAT time again?

2007-09-23T17:35:00.001-05:00

I got an email from Chris Baty ( okay, I personally didn't just get an email from him. Thousands of other crazy people- I mean NaNoWriMo participants- did too.)

The site will go live on October first in preparation of the November first start of the challenge. For anyone who hasn't heard of National Novel Writing Month, the goal is to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days.

I took part in 2005 by writing 42,800 words or so. That unfinished work was called Tripping Over Myself. It was about the misadventures of a slacker twenty year old guy named Jasper Patterson.

Last year I jumped in again. That time I made it to 51,000 words. The novel I worked on was Nikolas and Simone. Anyone who reads this blog has probably already heard me bitch and moan about this story ad naseuam. I do love that novel though( except for the days I hate it). It is, to date, my favorite piece of fiction written by me.

Will I do NaNoWriMo this year?

That is the plan. Except I have zero plot ideas. I'm dry. Even though it is only September and by all rights I should not enter full fledged panic mode till, oh say, around November 5th or 6th I would still prefer to have at least a germ of an idea right now.

Hmmm. Will have to muse on it.

I'm crazy about NaNoWriMo. It's insanity but its a bueatiful sort of madness that only a frustrated writer could enjoy.

Are you doing NaNoWriMo?

Dancing Backwards in High Heels

2007-09-19T11:55:00.000-05:00

After two weeks of spinning dark tales of men gone mad I offer a woman’s perspective.

The three words offered this week are:

Ambiguous
Nine
Slept

Dancing Backwards in High Heels by Sara

Vanessa Hartgrove had been rushing for the last eighteen years. This was one of the parts about being a feminist no one mentioned to her in college. You had to run- always, everywhere.

If you wanted it all you had to be at the gym early ( looks matter), the office late ( face time counts), and not forget to squeeze in meeting a life partner so you could raise two point nine happy, well adjusted children that you would lie to everyday when you swore “You can do it all.”

Doing it all took its toll. But all things in life did, she knew now.

She was forty three years old, and tired. Exhausted down to her bones, would be a more apt description. In her loss column was a failed marriage (Jerry liked them young) and a kid who smoked weed (rehab had taken care of the Oxycotin problem). It was far from the picture she had painted in her imagination for herself when she left Yale two decades before.

Still she didn’t look like a failure. No one would guess, upon first glance, that the world had beaten her down, that all her days as the competent employee, mother, wife had made her a bitter, restless woman.

As she hurried from her office building toward a cab, with rain splicing down over the city street making it so she could barely see more that the flash of familiar yellow and headlights, Vanessa knew she looked damn good. The fact that she slept only four hours a night did not show on her face, how she gave up on ever being happy didn’t reflect out of her eyes. Her disillusionment was her best kept secret.

“Share a cab?” the man asked as he slid into the backseat next to her.

A quick, offended retort sprang to her lips before he turned and met her eyes. A smile curved his lips as recognition darted into his eyes. “Nessa?”

Harold Ratson. She hadn’t seen him since they kissed goodbye before he headed off to Chicago, the summer after graduation. They had both been so eager to start their “Real Lives”-she laughed now thinking about that. They hadn’t even cried as they stood in the airport. No big teary good bye for them. They had been too full of themselves to imagine they wouldn’t be moving on to bigger, better things.

Her life had gotten bigger, that was for sure. But better? Vanessa seemed to remember thinking the way his lips felt when they kissed the pulse point on her neck was the best single sensation she ever experienced back then. Nothing had been ambiguous when they were young. Everything was now.

She smiled at him, her life started to slow down. “Harry.”

Spinning an original racket? No, no, that is not right. A racket spinning orginally? No, that is not it either. Oh, hell.

2007-09-14T10:12:00.000-05:00

After spending a few hours trying to create a story using the three words

Spinning
Orginal
racket

I started to realize I was defeating the purpose of Three Word Wednesday. It is to spark creativity and to get the words flowing. But all I was doing was slowly driving myself mad. A good, compelling story could surely be born from this week's prompt but I won't be the one to write it. Blame it on The Muse. What a bitch. :)

Anyway, I went back and did an old prompt from August 22, 2007. Since I didn't write anything that week here is my first attempt to incorporate

Subtle
Linger
Corridor

into a short story. The title of this story comes from Pat Monahan's latest song, Her Eyes.

Blue Skies Meet the Sunrise by Sara

Manny felt like telling the judge “Don’t blame me, it was her eyes. Those eyes, man. How could I resist?”

To say they were blue is like saying Jordan was merely good at basketball. Her eyes were such a shocking bright, sky at dawn, shade of blue that the first time she looked directly at him Manny forgot everything he ever knew.

His name- gone. Telephone number- disappeared. Address? At that moment he couldn’t have told you if he lived in a hut or mansion. All he saw was those eyes.

Then- and this was another part of his defense he would have liked the judge to know-she smiled at him.

See? If she didn’t like him back, then why did she smile? It wasn’t the type of smile other women gave him, Manny could tell the difference. Her smile had lingered flirtatiously. Lana knew what she was doing when she smiled at him- what she was starting.

So he chased her. Men had been chasing woman since the beginning of time. Since when had that become a crime with a sinister name like stalking? Wooing, that is what it was. He sent her love notes, promised her things, offered her chance after chance to admit her feelings for him. But Lannie- his nickname for her- she was young still, just a few months into college, and she didn’t know how to be in an adult relationship. Manny didn’t blame her for her misjudgements about him. He should have been more subtle. Sitting outside her apartment all night might have been a tad bit overprotective, he could admit that much in retrospective.

But Lana had to take her blame in all this mess too. Fair was fair. That was another lesson she needed to learn. So many he still had to teach that girl.

“You are sentenced to 36 months to be served in an minimum security facility under the direction of the California Correctional System,” that damn misguided judge pronounced as Manny shook his head vigorously in protest.

Could no one see the injustice? Sent to prison for loving Lana too much? Being too good to her? His eyes jerked over to where she sat behind the prosecutor. And that is when Manny lost it. He really did flip then- not like the times before when Lana was merely confused. Because at that moment, when he was just about to have to leave her side for three long years, Lana did it again, what got them in this whole mess.

She smiled at him. Sweet blue eyes from Heaven met his nearly black ones before she stood and, with a flip of her honey blonde hair, left the courtroom, slipping into the corridor without even saying good-bye to him.

“You cold hearted bitch!” Manny shouted. “I’ll slit you like a fish. Teach you some respect, nasty whore. You better wait for me. Don’ t go cheating on me, Lannie. Don’t you dare.”

Guards rushed him. They were all crazed with power and eager to take any excuse to use it. They insinuated he was causing a disturbance which Manny found to be utterly ridiculous.

He couldn’t even tell the woman he loved good-bye now? What was this world coming to? It was getting to the point where you couldn’t breath without getting arrested. Manny blamed that on The Patriot Act. He would have to write Lana a letter and tell her to be very careful while he was away. She would surely appreciate the advice.

2007-09-07T12:54:00.001-05:00

Hi everyone

In an effort to post more often on this blog between now and November ( when if I do NaNoWriMo again I should be posting all the time about how crazed I am) I have decided to start doing the prompts found at Three Word Wednesday.

The latest one asks for each person to write something using these words:

Pound
Sunglasses
Wild.

Pay it Forward

He stood on the balcony of the overpriced, but still somehow trashy, hotel and gazed down on all the smiling, happy people. Hurly hated smiling, happy people. And beaches. And sunshine. And life. Hurly particularly hated life these days, ever since he became a walking cliche on the night he walked in on his wife and his best friend.

They had never even liked each other, Shiela and Tom, or so they had lied to him. Hurly hated liars.

It wasn’t like Hurly has ever been a upbeat guy to begin with but that day something changed, something broke. Something that could not be soothed over no matter how much alcohol he poured down his throat, no matter how many blondes spread open their thighs for him, no matter how good it felt to go to Shiela’s funeral and hear that there were still no suspects in her murder. Maybe it was just an accident, after all, was what people whispered.

There was a young woman, not over twenty and still full of promise, on the beach beneath him. She reminded Hurly of Sheila. She looked like she would take a man and break him but good.

Wave after wave pounded the shore, as the perky bright eyed beauty laughed at something the man at her side said. Then she stole his sunglasses right off his face, taking what wasn’t hers, taking without permission, not caring how the man felt about it at all. Hurly longed to scream at her clueless boyfriend “Don’t you see what she is?”

But only Hurly could see. Ever since Sheila slept with Tom, Hurly had a certain kind of second sight. He used it viciously. Some women weren’t human, Hurly now believed. He wondered why it had taken him so long to see that. 39 years and only now did he know the truth. So many men never figured it out. Some women were just wild things- animals, greedy and never satisfied.

Hurly titled his head to the side as a smile curved up the corners of his lips. The young woman on the beach was walking back to the hotel- his hotel- right now. He could catch her in the lobby if he hurried.

Self absorbed little twits like her didn’t ever notice when someone was watching them.

By Sara Pufahl

Okay that was extremely dark. Whoa.
Let me know what you think.

Three Word Wednesday

Blog Rodeo

2007-09-06T16:28:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone.

I will be hosting a Blog Rodeo this month, in conjection with Fear and Loathing- The Gonzo Papers.

Submit your entry to: IlovetowriteSMP@yahoo.com with Blog Rodeo the Subject of the email by September 26th.

The entry should be the URL to a post on your blog that is about

We want to round up the best posts on bloggers, blogs and blogging. The types of posts were looking for are these:

LOOK FOR THE POST ON THE 27th.

Do you write for yourself or the market?

2007-08-15T23:22:00.001-05:00

Will Write for Chocolate, the fantastic comic based on the crazy times of an often frustrated writer, asks this week "Who do you write for yourself or the market?"

For me, I write to entertain. I don't feel like there is any choice in if I am or am not a writer. But I could ignore all the impulses ( and go slowly mad) and not write. I do write with the intent that others will read and enjoy my work. But if there was not one person on earth willing to read my work I bet I would still be off scribbling something.

What about you?

What is most important in a good book?

2007-07-13T10:36:00.000-05:00

Saoirse posed that question at her blog. Click here to take her one question poll at the bottom of the page

For me I chose tension as the most important part of a novel. What I need when I read a novel is to first be engaged by the writer's voice. That is the main thing that will drag me in and keep me in a story. I honestly think that is why editors and readers alike know if a story works for them after one page of a novel, sometimes after only one line even. If the voice doesn't speak to you it is like trying to wade through cement to read it.

Once the writer has me hooked, as they say, I need a reason to stay in the game. I need to know the stakes, the goal, the conflict on every page after that. I don't want to lose the thrill and wonder "When does this story get good again? When does something happen?"

I get invested because of the tension.

If you have time take the poll
and let me know what answer you picked.

2007-07-13T09:53:00.001-05:00

I feel like I haven't posted here in ages. The novel, Nikolas and Simone, is still plodding along. I'm starting to think of the whole process as a relationship. I fell in love with the idea in November. It was a crazy time. Everything moved quickly. We spent morning, noon and night togther. No one else mattered.

Then came the holidays. The stress of the New Year. The frigid air that engulfs the Windy City. Things cooled off. We were on a break.

Sping ushered in a fresh wave of excitement. We found each other again. We dabbled around together, seeing if we were still a good fit.

By June we were having doubts. It's July now and I just about hate my novel. Nikolas and Simone are houseguests that stayed way too long. I want to move and not tell them my new address. LOL.

But we are in this together. I am taking them to the end of the line. I will be thrilled to have this novel done because I want to start dating again. I want a little fling before NaNoWriMo. Maybe a short story series or a novella. Something lighter, something I don't invest so much into.

But before I can run off with the poolboy I have to finish things up with the current relationship- Nikolas and Simone.

Carnival Time

2007-06-26T22:55:00.001-05:00

Want to find my readers for your blog?

Submit a post to Queen_of_Pentacles@sbcglobal.net

with this information

(1) Your Name as you'd like it to appear
(2) The Name of Your Blog
(3) The Title of Your Post
(4) A BRIEF Description of your blog (Three lines only)
(5) The URL to Link To Your Post.

Deadline June 30th, one minute before midnight. More details here

Exchanging Links

2007-06-15T12:00:00.000-05:00

If you have linked here and I haven't linked back leave me a comment and I will.

Thanks for reading and all your support.

Song of the Day

It's time to move on, baby doll,
and walk away just like you did before – when you wanted more.

When you close your eyes
you hear the music playing.

You can see her dancing underneath the spotlight.

And when she sleeps she dreams she's back in Hollywood
when she was a younger girl.

A pretty heart in a tainted world,
not sure who you wanna be,
your daddy's little drama queen.

I hope that when you find yourself
you're more than just a baby doll.

By Pat Green

2007-06-14T15:09:00.000-05:00

I am overwhelmed by the thought of completely finishing the writing of my novel Nikolas and Simone. I feel like I have ADD ( but I don't) because I can't focus on it for very long, my mind is scattered, it seems too much to break it down and perfect each part of it. The whole is something I can not, at this time, work with so I am trying to just deal with it piece by piece.

The most horrible habit I have is diverting my attention to other projects and story ideas. Of course they look more appealing. They are new, like the blueprints for some dazzling mansion only Donald Trump could afford to build. The new story idea could be magnificent and so my mind wants to pursue it.

But I've been in this game long enough now to know that there will always be a new idea begging for attention. The trick is to stay faithful to your old, tired, losts it luster and new car smell original idea.

Novel writing is not for wimps, I will tell you that. It takes the ability to harness all the creativity, willpower, and determination you have and, at the same time, wrestle down all your demons, doubts and fears while typing till your fingers bleed and your butt takes on a new shape from sitting at the computer one too many hours.

I was watching a reality show the other day called The Lot. It was about wannabe directors. One said "The difference between brain surgery and directing is brain surgery is easy."

Insert writing for directing and I could not agree more.

Well that is where I am at right now, plugging along. Where are you?

You got to laugh

2007-05-30T13:21:00.000-05:00

Check out Inkygirl's comic about being obsessed with blogging

I first learned of her site, Will Write For Chocolate, during the crazy, wondrous time period of NaNoWriMo a.k.a November for those not signed up to write like a mad monkey on speed for 30 days.

Her comics constantly crack me up because they focus on humor derived from the experience of being one of those unique creatures called a writer.

Confessions of a Fraud

2007-05-22T10:02:00.000-05:00

Last week I watched an episode of Inside the Actor's Studio. The actress being interviewed spoke about how she felt like a fraud every time she started a new movie role. She wondered if this would be the time that everyone figured out she didn't know how to act. I have heard these same sentiments echoed by other performers.

I think I suffer from something similar to this. I constantly think I don't know what I am doing when it comes to writing a novel, no matter how much I have learned in the last two years.

After hearing this actress say the same thoughts that run around in my mind all the time, I realized its just part of the process. Doubting yourself, not understanding this mysterious craft, wondering if your work will be laughed at, its all normal.

From now on I am going to try and embrace that uncertainy. Its just another thing that puts me in the same category as all the other writers ( who feared they were hacks) who came before me.

So the next time my self doubts scream "You don't know what you are doing!"

I will answer back "Of course, I don't. So what?"

The Eight Things Meme

2007-05-21T11:40:00.000-05:00

I’ve been tagged. Canterbury Soul asked me share 8 random facts of myself.

Here are the rules for the meme:

1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.

2. People who are tagged write their own blog post about their 8 things and post these rules.

3. At the end choose 8 people to get tagged and list their names.

4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged and to read your blog.

I decided to do all mine about my tastes in music.

1. My favorite type of songs are the ones that are filled with a certain amount of sadness and ache in the lyrics. My favorite is Feels Like Home to Me by Chantal Krevizuk. Some of the lyrics are

If you knew how lonely my life has been
And how long I've been so alone
And if you knew how I wanted someone to come along
And change my life the way you've done

2. Until I graduated high school I hated country music. I headed off to college in a rural town and found not much but that on the radio. I fell in love with the story song. Garth Brooks is now on the top of my list for artists who just can't have a bad song ( forget the little Chris Gaines episode.) Favorite song by Mr. Garth Brooks is The Dance.

Holding you I held everything
For a moment wasn't I a king
But if I'd only known how the king would fall
Hey who's to say?

You know I might have chanced it all

And now I'm glad I didn't know
The way it all would end the way it all would go
Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain
But I'd of had to miss the dance

Yes my life is better left to chance
I could have missed the pain but I'd of had to miss the dance

3.The first song I ever got hooked on was by GrandMaster Flash and is called The Message.

Don't push me, cause I'm close to the edge
I'm trying not to loose my head
It's like a jungle sometimes, it makes me wonder
How I keep from going under?

4.The first record I owned was, I think, the soundtrack from the musical Annie. I love musicals till this day just as much as I did at seven years old. My favorite one is A Chorus Line. Favorite song from that one is What I did for Love.

Kiss today goodbye,
The sweetness and the sorrow.

Wish me luck, the same to you.

But I can't regret
What I did for love, what I did for love.

Look my eyes are dry.
The gift was ours to borrow.

It's as if we always knew.

And I won't forget what I did for love,
what I did for love.

5. Another song that touches my heart is Desperado by The Eagles. I think some fnd it cheesy but this section cuts me deep

You better let somebody love you ( let somebody love you)
You better let somebody love you.....before its too late.

6. The latest song I keep playing over and over is Rock Star by Nickelback.

'Cause we all just wanna be big rockstars
and live in hilltop houses driving fifteen cars.

The girls come easy and the drugs come cheap.
We'll all stay skinny 'cause we just won't eat.

And we'll hang out in the coolest bars
in the VIP with the movie stars.

Every good gold digger's
gonna wind up there,
every Playboy bunny
with her bleach blond hair.

And we'll hide out in the private rooms
with the latest dictionary and
today's who's who.

They'll get you anything
with that evil smile.

Everybody's got a drug dealer on speed dial.

Hey hey I wanna be a rockstar
Hey hey I wanna be a rockstar

7. My mother used to sing this to me as a baby, by Debbie Boone.

You light up my life
You give me hope
To carry on
You light up my days
and fill my nights with song

8. The groups I love most are Matchbox Twenty, Goo Goo Dolls, and Counting Crows. One song that I could listen to, and have, over and over is Round Here by Counting Crows

Mama's little baby better get herself in
out of the lightning

She says "It's only in my head."
She says "Shhh, I know it's only in my head."

But the girl in car in the parking lot says
"Man you should try to take a shot.
Can't you see my walls are crumbling?"

Then she looks up at the building
and says she's thinking of jumping.

She says she's tired of life.
She must be tired of something

Round here.

I am not tagging people, cause I don't like to. If you want to do this meme go ahead, and if mine inspired you, drop me a note.

Sara

Thinking Blogger Award

2007-05-15T11:10:00.000-05:00

Read this site for details on what this meme is all about
Thinking Blogger Award

The Top Five Blogs That Make Me Think

1. Fiction Scribe-

If you are like me and have a half finished novel that you are trying to sculpt into something decent that might even make sense one day, then you need to read her column. For every writer and hopeful, she has down-to-earth advice that you can take to the bank, or typewriter as the case may be. Just read her! You will not be sorry.

2. Wandering Author- Recently this blogger began a project of putting together an anthology of short stories where all the proceeds raised from the sale of the book would go to charity. He wanted to help the life of one small boy who needed access to doctors and therapists. When I read about that it awed me. It's an amazing task to take on and, also, quite possible if all the bloggers who are writers pitch in and help. We could make a difference in the world by making the difference in one child's life.

3.DBA Lehane- No one does short, short fiction better than this man. The first time I read one of his stories he inspired the best compliment I can give another writer, "Damn, I wish I wrote that."

4.Susan Abraham- this blog has a real international vibe in it to me. The writer is a traveler and when you read her you feel like your world is opening and you are seeing other countries and other cultures through her eyes. She gives a wealth of information and support, plus shares her own struggles and her personal journey which inspires me to keep pressing forward for my dream.

5.Operation Poem- this blog opened my eyes to the power of my words, and to what one small website can accomplish. The goal of the blog is to write a poem for each American service person killed in the war. Can you imagine your words being used for something so remarkable?

Our words can open and close doors and hearts. These bloggers know that and they have made my life only the richer for having found their blogs.

A big thanks to Wandering Author for naming me to his list. Check out the rest of his choices here

Still Plugging Away

2007-05-10T11:17:00.000-05:00

I've set a goal of September 1st to be done with the second draft of Nikolas and Simone. I want it completely cleared from my to-do list by the time next NaNoWriMo rolls around.

I am still struggling with my fear of completing it. It's bizarre but very real for me. It's as if I like being able to say "I am working on my first novel." That's hopeful and almost hints at the fact that my novel could be amazing. But when I finally say "I finished my first novel," I think the rest of the sentence with probably be "and it is pure crud!"

But I have to sludge through the crud on the way to being able to produce something superior. There are no shortcuts in this craft so I will just forge forward, inch by agonizingly slow inch.

Anyway, I was tagged by Kilroy_60 :

1. What do you hope to accomplish with your blog?

I want to spur myself into action to complete my novel.

2. Are you a spiritual person?

Very much so. I haven't ever questioned if God exists. I feel like I was born knowing He does and that there is no reason to doubt that.

3. If you were stranded on a deserted island, what three things would you want to have with you?

Well, I think the obvious answer is a satellite phone to call for help. While I wait for rescue I would want to have the novel The Broke Diaries by Angela Nissel to read. It never fails to crack me up. The last thing I would like is water so I could survive long enough to be saved.

4. What's your favorite childhood memory?

Taking dance lessons.

5. Is this your first meme?

Nope.

33 lines so far

2007-04-22T19:38:00.001-05:00

The Writers Game
The 101 lines story.

Add a line to this story. Once it reaches 100 lines, which may take months, I will add the last line. I may add lines in the middle if the muse strikes me. I will take your line from the comment area and put in the end of the story.

Her legs were on fire but she couldn't stop running.Her toes bled but she kept on, knowing the danger that hounded her.

Not too far behind, her pursuers seemed to be gaining on her. It was their silence as they followed her that bothered her the most. She'd always thought wolves howled as they hunted, so what was wrong with these animals?

Cate Samson didn't want to die tonight, torn to pieces by these hungry beasts that stalked her. She saw the yellow light streaming from the window of the cottage few paces ahead of her. Torn between the fear of the wolves and the uncertainty of the unknown cottage, Cate quickly chose the less immediate peril.

The cottage window bared a peep into a wild teenage party,Cate slipped in through the backdoor. Unaware of what fate lay ahead, she ventured into the unknown enveloped by darkness; yet in the distance there shone a dim light.

Cate gasped for air, while locking the door behind her, and then rested against it as her eyes swept over the darkened kitchen. She could hear laughter and music coming from the living room.

A party?

Without warning, she heard voices calling out in farewell, a door opening, then sudden screams. Cate ran toward the commotion and came upon a bloody scene of carnage where wolves were attacking teenagers, but as soon as she moved into the room the image disappeared again.

Cate froze, fingers twitching, eyes darting about the eerily empty room. She whirled around, suddenly sure she must be standing in the beam of a hologram projector.

"It's happening again, isn't it?" her boyfriend asked

She opened her mouth, but her voice had vanished - stolen away with the horrific scene. Bewilderment surged over Cate much as water closes over a shipwrecked sailor who cannot swim, and she struggled to keep her mind afloat, her sanity alive.

Daniel moved across the room and placed his hand on her arm, then said "It's getting worse, Catie."

Suddenly there's a flash of lightning, a booming, rolling thunder that sounds like it will never end and silence in pitch darkness after the electricity has gone off. Daniel stumbled forward, his hands reaching but connecting with nothing.

Daniel turned and saw Cate step out of the shadows as she whispered defiantly, "I want to try it again. I think I know how I can change it next time. You have to let me--I know I'll be able control it. I don't want to lose you."

He said the word that even in her bravest moments she didn't dare dwell on-- "Again."

Cate walked over and flipped off the projector. The images fell away, leaving them in a gray walled room in the sub-basement of a nameless- to the masses- government agency. Since those scientists who knew of it could not agree on the precise significance of the effect a team of theoretical physicists had stumbled upon while investigating the possibility of time travel, the Department for Understanding Special Technologies had stepped in.

"Let it go for tonight," Daniel said as he walked over and rubbed her shoulders. "You're tired."

Never would she imagine that she had to arrive at this stage and yet fail. What was wrong? Was it the quark that went awry? Was it the application that was at best a procedure?

Cate sighed, as Daniel rubbed her shoulders. She started to purr, as she turned around and kissed him greedily on the lips.

Daniel said, "Let me take you home."

Cate allowed herself to be led from the room, but her mind stayed there, working and reworking the problem that was threatening to take over her life, if not end it altogether.

Suddenly, a black cat appeared in the window.

"Schrodinger!" Cate whispered, plucking the sleek feline from the windowsill and stroking his perfectly groomed fur.

Writers taking part :

Sara, Susan, Friend of Jaime,Sylver, Wandering Author,Sara, Nothingman,Sam, Usha, Blu Jewel, Sara twice,Syler, Wandering Author, Sara, Saoirse Redgrave, Wandering Author, Sara, Cesalie Chase, Wandering Author, Sara, Kilroy, Sara, Stargazer, Saoirse, Sara twice, Ray, Sara twice, Canterbury Soul three lines, Markbnj 2 lines, Sara 2 lines, Kilroy, Saoirse,

Thank you to these writers. The story is really shaping into something different than I would write on my own. Loving it so far!

Will you add the next line? One line per writer per day. Play often!

Don't be shy to twist the plot. You control where this goes....

Peeking through the fingers that covered my eyes

2007-04-03T11:32:00.000-05:00

When I first decided to write a novel I thought that was all there was to it. You sit. You write. Time passes. (How much I never really pinned down though I remember doing mad calculations. If I write 1,000 words a day then in 100 days I will have a novel. If I write 2,379 words a day then in... I was never very good at math and completely useless at keeping to schedule so those Words- Per- Day schemes never did much good in the end.) Anyway, you write and then re-write and then you have a novel.

But as Robert Frost wrote in my favorite poem,

knowing how way leads onto way,

it was not such a straight path from blank page to finished first novel.

The most terrifying moment on that journey,so far, was the second before I clicked open the e-mail that contained my first critique of my writing.

I belonged to a different writing group then, New Writers Chat at yahoo groups. I hadn’t started the group and I hadn’t been there at its inception. I was the new girl on the block, in writing and status at the group. I had no idea what to expect to hear about my work.

In that period, I was trying hard to craft a Harlequin Intrigue style romance. I would read them and try to match my writing to what was in the book. I was so green I could of been grass.

Biting my lip, I let my mouse move toward the email and then away. I said a prayer to God. My stomach knotted, my brain was yelling “Why did you ever do this? This is a disaster!”

With a muttered, “Here goes,” I opened the email.

My eyes skimmed over it quickly, looking for some line that equated “You suck! Do you call this writing?”

It wasn’t there.

In fact, the person had been encouraging. Sweet joyous relief flooded through me. The words in her critique didn’t make me a writer. But that was the start of me developing my thick skin that all writers need to face rejection.

It was not in the words of her critique that I found my new tool in my writer’s arsenal. It was in the act of facing a possible rejection that I learned I could survive it, and that I felt the pride that came with taking my place in a long line of scribes who had done the exact same thing on their way to publication.

Note- This post was written for Fiction Scribe's Blog Carnival. Head on over and show her your support by taking part. She has one of the most informative blogs online for aspiring writers.

Lend Your Words

2007-03-27T11:15:00.000-05:00

There is power in the written word. There have been a few projects in the blogging world that have aimed at harnessing that power for a good cause:

2996
Operation Poem
A Poet's Rag

Now a talented writer and fellow blogger has come up with a new idea that gives all of us the chance to put our words to good use.

If you are a short story writer I ask you to consider lending your talents to
A Child Without A Voice Anthology

Wandering Author has concieved this remarkable idea as a way to raise funds for a child in need. If there is any way you can help, I urge you to jump in and take part.

Lets ban together and make a difference!

What I needed to hear once

2007-03-16T12:24:00.000-05:00

I wrote an article for my writing group blog. It is meant for people who aren't actively working toward writing a novel, but who dream of doing that one day. It's the words I needed to hear two years ago.

Check it out at
I was going to write a book, but Oprah was on.

An Economy of Words

2007-03-08T13:31:00.000-06:00

Could you write a story using only six sentences?

I tried to write one using six words and it was a killer assignment. It made me think though and stretch my writing muscles.

I may try to craft a six sentence one and send it into this blog. Let me know if you decide to play along.

Guidelines

Six Sentences Blog

Also, here is another question for you all. Are all writer's crazy? Let Saoirse know what you think at the link below.

"Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia." E. L. Doctrow

Writing Blues

2007-03-03T11:41:00.000-06:00

Recently I read the advice column of Cary Tennis at Salon.com

The Feb. 26th entry was titled

I don't feel like writing. Does that mean I am not a writer?

In it a 31 year old writer describes his frustations over not being able to complete his second novel. He goes as far as wondering if he should give up on writing. The part that really made me laugh, though I sympathisize with this writer's struggle, is that he said he could be happy not writing.

To that I say:
Give it a try then. I see only misery in your future. Because if writing makes you feel like hell, not writing will be like sharing a bunk bed with the Devil.

Over twenty blog writers,so far, have referenced his story and written their own thoughts on it. After reading it I was left thinking that this man could walk away from his craft but if he does he should immediately book an appointment at a therapist's office. Not because it is crazy to stop writing but because if writing is in your blood than not writing will drive you to insanity, I truly believe.

What do you think? Could you turn your back on writing and still die with a smile on your face? Or would you always miss your love and lose yourself because you were separated from it?

The Craft

2007-02-27T10:25:00.001-06:00

Read Ten Tips for Strengthening Your Novel By Wandering Author at

http://brandnewaspiringwriters.blogspot.com/

Because long after you know you are a writer, you still have to figure out how to write. My current goal is to keep improving my writing, growing my knowledge, and reveling in the fact that I get to spend my life a servent of this art I love.

Hope you enjoy the article. Stop by this blog if you want to read more from the author
http://the-wandering-author.blogspot.com/

Time Marches On

2007-02-22T10:28:00.001-06:00

In four days this blog will be two years old. I thought of doing a post on that day but with my scattered mind there is a good chance I would blank on it and forget until the day had passed by.

Having this little spot on the net to claim as my own is the first time the fact that I am a writer went from being something only my friends and family heard about to something that was real to the world. Anyone could stumble here and see who I am. That amazes me. It motivates me. It makes my path as a writer seem like it is being laid brick by brick and is not just an undiscovered trail through the woods.

Everyone who comments here keeps me going. You have done me a great kindness to remember to check in on me from time to time. Alone I could never be as strong as I am with you pushing me along.

I am inspired daily by the work I read on other writer's blog. I am not a jealous person when it comes to most things but I love being jealous of what another writer has written. When I think "Damn, I wish I wrote that!" that is the biggest compliment I could give.

So keep writing and going for you dreams, my writing friends. And here I shall be, too, going for mine.

Sara

P.S.

A new poem

Cell Memory

For Your Success

2007-02-12T10:22:00.000-06:00

Check out five hints to
Beat Back Writer's Block written by me.

And on Billy the Blogging poet's site there is a poem I wrote

She Will Still Stand

Also, if you write poetry and post it online think about taking part in this

Poetry Slam Carnival

Weird is as weird does

2007-02-11T01:22:00.000-06:00

My friend, Wandering Author, tagged me to post about six weird things about myself. Only six, huh? This list is endless. Not that I'd want to tell the world all the details about how profoundly weird I am.

So here are six ways I would label myself as weird:

1. A foodie thing- Ever heard of dipping french fries in a chocolate shake? It's good! Especially if you can get your hands on a Wendy's Frosty.

2. A boob tube thing- Do you have a favorite commercial? At most times in the year I have no clue what commercials are funny or cute because I can not stand to watch them. The only, and I mean only, ones I will willing watch these days are the Geico caveman commercials.

3. A mane thing- I have a fear of hairdressers. After some nightmare inducing experiences as a teen I started to hate to step inside the doors of a salon. Now I don't freak out or have panic attacks or anything over it, and I have found stylists I like, but I still have this fear of walking out of there looking ridiculous and worst of all I paid them to do that to me.

4. A queasy thing- I close my eyes during surgery scenes on TV and movies. I can deal with blood just fine in real life. But when I see doctors sticking their hands inside a person on screen I about lose my lunch. And hospitals over all give me the willies. I would rather go inside a cemetery or funeral home, there is nothing creepy for me at either place, than go to a hospital.

5. A fandom thing- For the last six months I have spent time each day reading fanfic about General Hospital. You have to be a soap opera nut like me to not think that is weird.

6. A writer thing- This is completely normal, imo. But I suspect that people who are not book lovers will find it weird. I could spend an hour in the library just smelling books. They smell like history and hope to me.

I don't like tagging people so if anyone wants to play along feel free. Then mention that you did in the comments and I will add a link to you in this post.

Check out Saoirse Redgrave's list of weird things about her at http://writethatromance.blogspot.com/

And don't forget to play The Writer's Game

Fallen Words

2007-02-03T09:22:00.000-06:00

In the mood to read a short story filled with suspensful twists and turns? Then check out the first story by the members of my writing group.

http://brandnewaspiringwriters.blogspot.com/

The Wake is a tale about friends who reunite to honor the wishes of one of their own. But when the secrets start to spill from their drunken lips no one can escape the grip the past still has on all their lives.

The Writer's Game

2007-01-24T10:04:00.000-06:00

The 101 lines story.

Add a line to this story. Once it reaches 100 lines, which may take months, I will add the last line. I may add lines in the middle if the muse strikes me. I will take your line from the comment area and put in the end of the story.

Look for new posts underneath this story.

Her legs were on fire but she couldn't stop running.Her toes bled but she kept on, knowing the danger that hounded her.

Not too far behind, her pursuers seemed to be gaining on her. It was their silence as they followed her that bothered her the most. She'd always thought wolves howled as they hunted, so what was wrong with these animals?

Cate Samson didn't want to die tonight, torn to pieces by these hungry beasts that stalked her. She saw the yellow light streaming from the window of the cottage few paces ahead of her. Torn between the fear of the wolves and the uncertainty of the unknown cottage, Cate quickly chose the less immediate peril.

The cottage window bared a peep into a wild teenage party,Cate slipped in through the backdoor. Unaware of what fate lay ahead, she ventured into the unknown enveloped by darkness; yet in the distance there shone a dim light.

Cate gasped for air, while locking the door behind her, and then rested against it as her eyes swept over the darkened kitchen. She could hear laughter and music coming from the living room.

A party?

Without warning, she heard voices calling out in farewell, a door opening, then sudden screams. Cate ran toward the commotion and came upon a bloody scene of carnage where wolves were attacking teenagers, but as soon as she moved into the room the image disappeared again.

Cate froze, fingers twitching, eyes darting about the eerily empty room. She whirled around, suddenly sure she must be standing in the beam of a hologram projector.

"It's happening again, isn't it?" her boyfriend asked

She opened her mouth, but her voice had vanished - stolen away with the horrific scene. Bewilderment surged over Cate much as water closes over a shipwrecked sailor who cannot swim, and she struggled to keep her mind afloat, her sanity alive.

Daniel moved across the room and placed his hand on her arm, then said "It's getting worse, Catie."

Suddenly there's a flash of lightning, a booming, rolling thunder that sounds like it will never end and silence in pitch darkness after the electricity has gone off. Daniel stumbled forward, his hands reaching but connecting with nothing.

Daniel turned and saw Cate step out of the shadows as she whispered defiantly, "I want to try it again. I think I know how I can change it next time. You have to let me--I know I'll be able control it. I don't want to lose you."

He said the word that even in her bravest moments she didn't dare dwell on-- "Again."

Cate walked over and flipped off the projector. The images fell away, leaving them in a gray walled room in the sub-basement of a nameless- to the masses- government agency. Since those scientists who knew of it could not agree on the precise significance of the effect a team of theoretical physicists had stumbled upon while investigating the possibility of time travel, the Department for Understanding Special Technologies had stepped in.

Writers taking part :

Sara, Susan, Friend of Jaime,Sylver, Wandering Author,Sara again, Nothingman,Sam, Usha, Blu Jewel, Sara twice,Syler, Wandering Author, Sara, Saoirse Redgrave, Wandering Author, Sara, Cesalie Chase, Wandering Author, Sara, Kilroy, Sara, Stargazer, Saoirse. Sara twice, Ray

Thank you to these writers. The story is really shaping into something different than I would write on my own. Loving it so far!

Will you add the next line? One line per writer per day. Play often!

Don't be shy to twist the plot. You control where this goes....

Wandering Author

2007-01-11T10:55:00.000-06:00

My friend and fellow writer has written an amazingly heartfelt post about the serious subject of International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Read it here

http://the-wandering-author.blogspot.com/2007/01/never-again.html#links

This subject is especially close to my heart today because at my church we spent the service praying for Israel. All people should be able to live in peace and safety, and I will continue to pray that one day that will come to be.

Word Count Journal

A member of my writing group let me know about an exciting new blogging format. Read about it here

http://wordcountjournal.com/about

The idea is to write one word on the first day of the year, two on the second, and so on, then write 365 on the 365th day of the year.

I started a novel to post in that format. It is just a lark for me but so far it's been fun.

The name of my new novel and the blog is Crazy as She Goes.

The premise of that novel will be

Four people hook up on Craigslist and agree to share expenses during a trip from Chicago to LA on Route 66.

Nikolas and Simone remains my first priority. What is your top writing project these days?

Back on Track

2007-01-03T10:51:00.000-06:00

During December I slacked off on working on my writing. Each year I let that month be reserved for holiday stresses and celebrations.

Now that a new year has begun I am planning to recommit myself to finishing Nikolas and Simone. Later this spring, I may even attempt a Personal NoWriMo. Because The thrill of working so fast and desperately opens up all my creative pathways.

Also this year I want to, for the first time, submit something to a publisher. I have not yet decided if I will focus on a short story or a poem. But I think it is appoarching the time when I enter that realm of trying to become published.

Anyone who has suggestions about publications to submit to, or stories about the first piece of yours that was ever published, can leave me a note in the comments section.

The support of the readers of this blog makes all the difference in the life of this aspiring writer.
I wish all of you luck in pursing your writing dreams in the coming year.

A Slice of Fiction

2006-12-30T18:53:00.000-06:00

A meme from Susan, a talented writer and friend. Check out her blog at http://www.susanabraham2006.blogspot.com/

Grab the book closest to you.
Open to page 123 and go down to the fifth sentence.
Post the text of the next 3 sentences on your blog.
Name the book and the author.

"I was just teasing you." He smiled.
I looked around.

That is from A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley.

Anyone else you wants to play along let me know and I will make sure to check out your post on your blog.

Fic Blog

2006-12-28T00:39:00.000-06:00

Ever heard of a fictional blog?

A member of my writing group has started one. It is a blog from the viewpoint of one of her characters.

Check it out at
http://claudiawalker.blogspot.com/

My new favorite song

It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
and singing songs of joy and peace

Oh I wish I had a river I could skate away on

But it don't snow here
It stays pretty green
I'm going to make a lot of money
Then i'm going to quit this crazy scene

I wish I had a river I could skate away on....

I'm so hard to handle
I'm selfish and I'm sad

Now I've gone and lost the best baby
That I ever had

Oh I wish i had a river I could skate away on
I wish I had a river so long...

I wish i had a river I could skate away on

Joni Mitchell, latest version by Sarah McLachlan

Meet Kelley Vitollo

2006-12-20T10:56:00.000-06:00

Longing for a little spice during this sweet holiday season?

Then check out Studs R Us, a short story anthology available for free download at

http://www.kelleyvitollo.com/

Kelley Vitollo is an up and coming romance writer.

She wowed fans with her first published piece, Dream Man (available at Forbidden Publications.com). In it she brought her characters fantasies to life and made a few new ones for her readers, I'm sure.

Now she's back with a new tale called Stargazer Lillies. It will be part of the Studs R Us anthology.

Kelley joined together with 10 other authors to create an e-book full of erotic short stories that sizzle with enough heat to keep you warm, even when the temperature dips way below freezing.

So click on over to her official author website http://www.kelleyvitollo.com/

or for a more intimate peek into the mind of this talented woman visit her blog

Heartfelt

Read all the stories in the Studs R Us anthology and you won't have to ask Santa to bring you an electric blanket this year. You'll already be steaming hot.

Happy Reading,

Sara.

A Game of Tag- Holiday Style.

2006-12-16T10:13:00.000-06:00

Kilroy from the blog Fear and Loathing tagged me to fill out this meme.

...'Tis The Season
Favorite seasonal movie? Jingle All the way. Though it is not a classic by any means it cracks me up everytime.

Song you most enjoy this time of year? My top three favorites are
Please Come Home for Christmas, the Bon Jovi version.
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
Mary, Did You Know?

"Holiday Greeting"? Merry Christmas.

Decorate, inside? outside? Inside, but I haven't done much so far this year.

Do you make a list? If so, how many people are on it? No list. I have over twenty people I have to but for. I have only bought for one so far.

How up to the last minute do you shop? Every year I am in the stores on Christmas Eve. Then I vow not to do that next year. Then the next year I am back there on Christmas Eve again.

When do you open your gifts? Christmas Morning.

Holiday food you most savor? Christmas cookies. I am a sucker for chocolate anything.

Favorite holiday book? For kids, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. For adults, The Christmas Box by Richard Paul Evans.

New Year Resolutions? The same ones as always: go on a diet and finish a novel. Another one I have is to make my yahoo writers group even more fabulous next year than it was this year.

I will tag Kelly from the blog Heartfelt, Jaime from Fiction Scribe, and Book Worm Addict from Too Many Books, So Little Time.

Your Version of the Famous Six Word Story

2006-12-15T13:03:00.000-06:00

Have you heard that Hemingway once wrote a six word story? It was-

For sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Well, here is your chance to try and top him. Or, at least, impressive a fellow blogger. There is a contest accepting entries for a six word story. The competetion ends at the end of this year so create fast if you want to get in on it.

Details here

http://shortshortfiction.blogspot.com/2006/11/short-short-short-short-short-short.html

Skinny Bones

2006-12-07T10:14:00.000-06:00

My NaNoWriMo novel has a beginning, middle and end but the scenes are anorexic, they all need fattening up.

Some characters have complex emotions and full backgrounds, like Simone, but others, like her fiancee Thomas, are still two demensional. He walks in, says his lines, feels nothing most of the time, and exits left. LOL.

So I need to overhaul him, make him real and not just a stooge in the Nikolas and Simone love story.

I introduce all the ideas I want to incorporate ( infertility, obligations, sacrifice, religion) but have not expanded on them to the level I feel I need to yet.

Hopefully once I do all that I can turn my 50,000 words into 90,000 and then I will be ready to start draft two.

Last years NaNo novel I did not touch after November 30th. The story had no hope of making it to a publisher's desk but I'm not through with Nikolas and Simone yet. For now, we are in this together, me and them, trudging along and creating a world, a love, a long awaited dream come to life, one page at a time.

Song Lyrics of the Day

let mercy fall me...

take me as You find me

all my fears and failures

fill my life again....

shine your light and

let the whole world see!

we're singing

for the glory

of the risen King

Lines from He is Mighty to Save by HillSong

An excerpt from Nikolas and Simone

2006-12-07T10:08:00.000-06:00

Simone fled from the waiting room after an hour. Hospitals drove her crazy. They were like fun houses in the twilight zone, every where you look another person twisted into an unnatural shape: grief, fear, pain, loss.

And time moved at a different pace, agonizingly slow when you didn’t know if yourself or your loved one would survive and then like a lightening bolt when the answer came. Thomas didn’t try to stop her when she said she needed coffee. He didn’t say anything, just gave her a blank eyed stared, nodding.

She sat in the cafeteria, staring at the black liquid swirling in her cup, and tried not to think. The paramedics had jolted Edna, once, twice, finally getting her pulse back, then losing it again. Another jolt and then they were up and running, with her on the stretcher, toward their rig.

Death had been there, lingering above them like a thunder cloud, threatening to wash away the future they had, like foolish mortals often do, planned out so carefully. The one they thought they were entitled to.

Finish Line

2006-11-29T16:56:00.000-06:00

There have been highs and lows while working on my NaNoWriMo novel. The novel has three different types of scenes: Nikolas and Simone scenes, flashback scenes, and Simone and Thomas scenes.

The hardest ones to write were the Simone and Thomas scenes. He is her current boyfriend and I wanted to make him seem like a viable option to Nik. I wanted Thomas to be sensitive, attentive, and almost too good to be true. But every time I tried to write him he bored the hell out of me.

What can I say? I was rooting for Nik from the get go!

The modern day Nik and Simone scenes in the early part of the novel were a snap to write. But, far and away, the most fun I had were writing the flashback scenes. Nik and Simone dated in the late eighties. So I got to have them wear acid washed jeans, be huge fans of the song Boderline by Madonna, and sport Member Only jackets. They could say “Totally rad!” and “Like awesome!” The whole thing cracked me up!

The best part about NaNoWriMo is the freedom. I would never write

And then pirates flew out of the butt of the giant green ape sitting in the middle of Times Square.

But I could have if I wanted to! Because NaNo is about quantity and not quality.

And the freedom did give me the chance to throw in scenes of them being overly emotional, cryptic, rude, criminal and whatever else I could dream up without wondering if an editor would approve. I want to write all my novels like I do my NaNoWriMo novels but the internal editor shrieks at me so I end up second guessing myself.

Today I crossed the 50,000 word finish line. It felt amazing. I made my goal and gave myself added faith in my abilities.

If you did not do NaNoWriMo this year I suggest you become a participant in 2007. Like Simone circa 1987 would say, “It is like, oh my god, so totally awe-some!”

Running just as fast as I can

2006-11-22T17:00:00.000-06:00

I'm in the weeds!

Do you know that expression? I think it comes from golfing.

Anyway, what I mean is that I am getting behind in my daily words counts and feel like I need to race to catch up to where I should be. I have 34,000 words. At midnight tonight I need to have 35,007. But the gap feels bigger than that. Because I think of how little time I will have to write on Turkey Day and then over the holiday weekend.

I could imagine this convo tommorow at the dinner table:

I say, "Well, if you will excuse me, I must rush off. It's National Novel writing month, you know how it is."

Blank stares.

I add, "I have to write 2,000 more words today to reach my goal."

A well meaning but clueless member of my family asks, "So that should take how long? Half an hour? Go jot down your words and come back for pie."

"It might take a while longer. I have to wait for my characters to speak to me. They're being difficult these days. Simone doesn't want to hurt Thomas but she doesn't love him the way she loves Nik. And Thomas is still in love with Miranda, who is dead. So that poses a different problem altogether. Plus they still haven't told me if Simone chooses Nik or Thomas."

Blank stares.

I hurry from the room mumbling, "Nanowrimo."

They discuss what size straight jacket to order for me.

I will try and explain to my family my need to carve sometime to spend with Nikolas and Simone but I fear it may be a losing battle.

Home stretch

2006-11-20T10:06:00.000-06:00

Well I am entering the homestretch of NaNoWriMo and panic is setting in. I need nearly 20,000 more words. Three days this week I will be doing the family thing for the holidays. But I want to finish this time! To cross the 50,000 word goal line. So in the moments I can spare I will be stealing away into corners to write, write, write.

Each year I do NaNoWriMo I learn more about myself as a writer. It forces me to buckle down and figure out how to keep my novel going in the moment. I can’t waste months, like I usually do, mulling it over.

At the end of Week Two I finally indulged in the NaNoWriMo forums. What a paradise on the net for me. I feed off all the energy of other writers musing on the craft. But the more I play on there the less time there is to actually write my novel.

Overall I am happy with what I have written. But it is time for me to buckle down and get serious about meeting my November 30th deadline.

One off shoot of procrastinating on my NaNoWriMo novel is that I was thinking about my other story more, the one with an aspiring writer who is at a writer’s conference. And I figured out, I think, how to fix that novel. I like the beginning but the tale stalls at one point. I think it needs another POV character, not just the one I have now. It is to limiting to writer the whole novel from only his POV.

Song Lyrics of the Day

Now I'm stuck inside
a memory

You forgot about our
destiny

You buried me,
didn't you ?

Didn't you
love me faster than the devil?

Run me
straight into the ground?

Drowning
deep inside your water.

Drowning
deep inside your sound.

O.A.R. lyrics

What I did for Love, What I did for NaNoWriMo

2006-11-14T22:36:00.000-06:00

(Title of this post is inspired by the song What I did for Love from my favorite movie, A Chorus Line.)

While working on my NaNoWriMo novel I realized just how much information on widely varying topics a writer must know. Thank God for the internet or else my novel would be full of more holes that a crocheted blanket. Here are some of the terms I entered into the search engine:

down, down baby. children’s song
candle lit restaurant south side of Chicago chocolate
eighties phrases
pink tights Cindy Lauper
top 100 songs of 1987
hair band
study on imprinting

Sometimes in order to write 50,000 words in a month you must cut some corners and add some filler.
Sins I committed to try and reach my goal:
Never used any contractions.
Wrote run on sentences galore.
Had hero make up a story ( about soul mates) and tell it to heroine.
Mentioned a lot of different songs that were playing on radios in the car, at parties, or dance clubs.
Lots of flashbacks!!! ( These were my favorite to write. I loved going back in time and trying to recapture that flavor.)

Overall I am having a blast with NaNoWriMo. Knowing thousands of writers around the world are slaving away at the same feverish pace I am gives me a sense of community that warms my soul and infuses new energy into my spirit.

I see myself tackling National Novel Writing Month for the third time next year. Will you join in? Hope to see you there!

Word Count update- I am at nearly 24,000 words now. Still nervous I won’t make it but I will type, type, type and push it till midnight November 30th.

Song Lyrics of the Day

She grew up in an Indiana town,
Had a good looking momma
who never was around,

But she grew up tall
and she grew up right
With them Indiana boys on an Indiana night...

Last dance with Mary Jane.
One more time to kill the pain.

I feel summer creeping in and I'm
tired of this town again...

Oh my, my, oh hell yes
Honey put on that party dress

Buy me a drink, sing me a song,
Take me as I come 'cause
I can't stay long...
Last dance with Mary Jane
One more time to kill the pain

Tom Petty

NaNoWriMo Blurb

2006-11-10T10:52:00.000-06:00

The trick to getting your heart’s desire is to be able to force your heart to resist desiring what it can not ever hope to obtain.

For Simone DuPont that's rapidly becoming an impossible proposition. On her hand she wears an engagement ring from Thomas. Yet, her heart never relinquished it’s craving for a different man. To purge her soul she writes a novel about her love for Nikolas but when he reads her words he can’t stay away.

With one look Nikolas may ruin her plans to marry Thomas unless Simone can manage to curve her lips into the hardest word of all to say when looking in the face of the one you desire: No.

To read the first page of this story go here
http://www.nanowrimo.org/simpleinfo.php?uid=127560

UPDATE- I hit 20,000 words on November 13th!

Tagged- Collecting People

2006-11-05T00:19:00.000-06:00

My writing friend Kelley, from the blog http://kelleyv.blogspot.com/ , tagged me to participate in project that aims to tells other writers about your background so that they can turn to you if they need expert information for their stories. Check out Kelley's October 31 entry to read about her 5 areas of expertise.

This is supposed to be posted by each person that participates

Message from Sharon: "PLEASE LEAVE THE FOLLOWING IN ALL 'PEOPLE COLLECTION' POSTS:Remember that it isn't always the sensational stuff that writers are looking for, it can just as easily be something that you take for granted like having raised twins or knowing how to grow beetroot. Mind you, if you know how to fly a helicopter or have worked as a film extra, do feel free to let the rest of us know about it :-)"

1. I live near Chicago. So if you set a story there I can tell you all about the streets, Lake Michigan, the Taste of Chicago, the pizza, the way we eat hot dogs, the proper way to pronounce words if you live here, and everything that makes that big city seem like a small town.

2. I am a huge soap opera fan. You need to know anything about the ABC soaps I can fill you in for the last 10 years or more. Your soap obsessed character will be very authentic if you turn to me for the low down.

3. I grew up in a big family that lived in the slums and the burbs. If you are an only child or grew up privilaged one thing you need to keep in mind if you write a character that is like I was as a kid- broke in a close knit family- is that people like that are, first and foremeost, loyal to each other. When there is nothing else there is still the desire to fight to the death to stay together and stand as a force against the outside world.

4. Have you heard of the new trend toward mega churches? I go to one. So I can tell you what makes it different from the church you grew up attending.

5. My life is boring but I will bug the people I know if you need questions answered about: living in Africa, sercurity procedures in national corporations, having fibromyagia, PCOS, living in a trailer park, living in a mansion, living on a farm, car repair, NASCAR, and alcoholism.

I will tag

Brandi Ashland http://brandiashland.blogspot.com/
Raven http://dkraven.blogspot.com//
and Novelist in Training http://wordplay.lastpromise.com/

Avon FanLit Conclusion

2006-11-04T22:59:00.000-06:00

For anyone who wondered how the Avon FanLit competetion turned out here are the names of the winners

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/061031/nytu168.html?.v=66

I didn't ever submit a chapter to the project. I was not interested in writing that genre.

Anyway, for all you NaNoWriMo participants I hope you are keeping up with you word counts. So far I am doing great with it. Last year the first week was the hardest for me. It took days to figure out a story idea and then I ditched it and went with a different one. Now I am happy with my Nikolas and Simone concept and hopeful I can keep up this pace.

My word count now is just over 9,000 words. Check out my author page here

http://www.nanowrimo.org/simpleinfo.php?uid=127560

Survive NaNoWriMo

2006-10-31T16:52:00.000-06:00

A little joke to kick off our month of madness.

10 Things to Know to Survive NaNoWriMo By Sara

10. Coffee. Drink lots of it even if you hate the stuff.

9. Friends. Forget you have any. Ignore them. Beg forgiveness in December.

8.Write everyday. If your fingers feel like they are about to fall off take some aspirin and suck it up.

7. Tell your family you can only be bothered in the event of life and death situations. Give them slightly more expensive presents than usual this Christmas.

6. If your muse refuses to cooperate steal someone else's. Desperate times calls for desperate measures.

5. Make your characters suffer. The more suffering you can dream up the more words you can get down.

4. If you get stuck kill a character, have aliens invade or a bomb go off. That should be good for 1,000 words. Okay now you only need 49,000 more.

3. I don't care if you have to cry and type but cry while you type.

There are no breaks for emotional breakdowns, put it in your work. (If you watch Project Runway you will recognize this piece of advice.One fashion designer told this to the other one a few seasons ago.She said, "I don't care if you have to cry and cut but cry and cut.We are on a deadline." or something similar to that.)

2. Know that 50,000 words is all that is required to win. Not 50,000 pieces of perfection that add up to a masterpiece. If they end up in the right place- cool. If not, that works too.

And the number one thing you need to know to survive National Novel Writing Month....

1. Remember you can always burn this manuscript later.

The Day Before

2006-10-31T11:09:00.000-06:00

I am using my last day before NaNoWriMo kicks off to do line by line editing of Come Back to Me. It is the first short story I ever finished, a 10, 000 word romantic suspense tale.

Come Back To Me Blurb

Alexa Evans had walked out of five lives so far. Whenever The Hunter got too close she fled from whatever small town or big city she was hiding in and changed her hair, her eye color, and even her name.

She settled in Chicago and became Allie Cook. Months passed and she started to feel safe. So safe she took the biggest risk of her life and, ignoring the stalker that had nipped at her heels for years, she fell in love with Spencer Roark.

But The Hunter always comes back for more. And when he did she lost her love, her identity and her memory.

Now she must run for her life one last time and this round the stakes are higher than ever before because Spencer is right by her side, in love and in danger, with The Hunter closing in.

Months have passed since I finished this story so I hope my fresh eyes will be able to make the prose a little tighter. I am trying to cut out every word that is not necessary. Already I have completed my edits on the Prologue and most of Chapter One.

Then tomorrow starts my journey to write 50,000 words in a month. It seems insane. Yet It was quite a rush last year, the scribbling away scratching out words that to this day no one else has seen. The story I wrote, Tripping Over Myself, is gritty. The main character, Jasper Patterson, is a pot smoking teenage boy on the verge of manhood who moves out of his mother's home and tries to make something of himself despite his tendency to sabotage his own life. And there is a love triangle in it. He meets a young girl who comes from an abusive home and falls for her. While an old friend of his is pining for Jasper to notice her.

But I never quite made it to 50,000 words so hopefully this years story, Nikolas and Simone, will be my first successful NaNoWriMo.

So if you are participating drop me a comment and we can commiserate. It should be a crazy wonderful ride.

Song Lyrics
I never made promises lightly and there have been some that I've broken
But I swear in the days still left we'll walk in the fields of gold
We'll walk in the fields of gold

Many years have passed since those summer days among the fields of barley
See the children run as the sun goes down among the fields of gold

You'll remember me when the west wind moves upon the fields of barley
You can tell the sun in his jealous sky when we walked in the fields of gold
When we walked in the fields of gold
When we walked in the fields of gold

Sting

Brand New Aspiring Writers

2006-10-24T01:26:00.000-05:00

If anyone stumbles along this blog who is just starting out on their own personal writing journey I hope you read this entry.

Writing for me has been like chipping a face into the side of a mountain. The only problem is that I don't know what the face will end up looking like when I am done. Yet the daily chipping away that was once painful, but neccesary for me all the same, has now become soothing as I learn a little more every day how to mold this art to my whim.

This is all to say, "Do not give up before you start to see the payoff."

I wrote weekly entries on this blog for months and no one knew I was here. I was screaming into the dark. I started a MSN Group for Aspiring Writers that three other people joined. Three. And I was responsible for 90 percent of the posts there. I would laugh now if it didn't frustrate me so much at the time.

But now I have online writing friends and a thriving Yahoo writers group. But the best part so far has been I am starting to control my writing and to see the inner workings of this mystical art form.

So if you are just starting out write, write, write and reach out for help. Who knows? Maybe in a few years you will have own own face on the side of the mountain and what all this struggle was for will be revealed in what you have created.

And if you are a brand new aspiring writer make sure you check out, and consider joining, my yahoo group. The link is in the sidebar. All new writers who are friendly are welcome.

Song Lyrics

When you think happiness,
I hope you think: That little black dress,

think of my head on your chest,
and my old
faded blue jeans.

When you think Tim McGraw, I hope you think of me.

oh, think of me.

You said the way my blue eyes shined
put those Georgia stars to shame
that night.

I said, "That's a lie."

Taylor Swift

National Novel Writing Month 2006

2006-10-15T00:29:00.000-05:00

Well it happened. The first flakes of snow fell for this season. Some were happy about it. Others were grumpy as hell. I was the latter.

Anyway, back to why we are all gathered here, I plan to participate in NaNoWriMo this year. And I am currently gathering ideas to possibly use. I do not use plot outlines so all I will have to go in is a vague sense of where I hope the story will go.

My first idea has the working title Nikolas and Simone. Since you can only write your NaNoWriMo novel in the month of November I can not use an idea I have already been working on.

Nikolas and Simone would be a love story. They would be two people who are soulmates but don't realize it until they are broken up. I want the story to have a magical once in a lifetime feel to the love affair set against real life everyday circumstances that stand in their way. Basically they will mess up a lot of lives if they choose to be together but they will carry the scars forever if they choose to walk away from love a second time.

Will I end up writing that story next month?

Don't ask me I just live in this body. The muse makes the writing decisions.

October Goals

2006-10-09T13:31:00.000-05:00

This month I hope to

1. decide on a a couple of story ideas for NaNoWriMo. I need at least one strong idea and a back-up. Because an idea can be vivid in my mind and when I try to write it... nada. So if the first falls flat I need a quick replacement. I didn't quite reach 50,000 words last year so this one might be my first successful completetion of NaNoWriMo.

2. help to organise a group story writing challenge at my yahoo group. Any member can participate. When the story is done I will post it here.

3. complete more of my short stories.

So do you have any writing goals for this month?

Song Lyrics of the Day

essential and appealed,
carry all your thoughts across an open field,

when flowers gaze at you
they're not the only ones
who cry
when they see you

You said "You don't know me,
you don't even care,
you don't know me,
you don't wear my chains...."

By augustana

October Poems

2006-10-05T09:54:00.000-05:00

I put two poems about October on my poetry blog. One is called A Midwest October and one is called The Season of Atonement.

I only wrote them because I was inspired by the kind responses to my October Comes Quietly post.

Oh no, another blog. LOL

2006-10-02T10:34:00.000-05:00

I started a blog to showcase my poetry. So stop on in if you get the chance.

It's peices of me spilled on the screen for the world to see.

http://shewritespoetry.blogspot.com/

October Comes Quietly

2006-10-01T18:59:00.000-05:00

I think for me October will be filled with planning. I need to finish as many as my writing projects as I can before November first. Once NaNoWriMo starts I will be consumed with that for all of next month. Then comes the holidays. I won't be able to think straight until Feb. and any writing I get done in winter will surely be a miricle.

I love the holidays as much as anyone but the older I get the more stressful they become. I moved from being the kid who gets to watch the cooking, cleaning, and spending of money to the adult who must do all those things and the fun gets sucked out of the season a little more with each added responsibilty.

Anyway, I am trying to make October last. Back in August I was praying to just make it to September because the end of summer rush in my home was testing my sanity.

Now I want time to slow and ease gently into winter.

Where I live we, or at least me and the other sane people, like for it to snow the first time on Christmas Eve. A white Christmas is a lovely thing but beyond that the piles of snow can stay up in the sky as far as I am concerned.

It can snow in October here or not at all untill January. Then it may snow as late as March. The saying is There are only two seasons in Chicago- winter and construction.

Maybe that saying appiles to many places but it is true of where I live. So everyday without a drop in tempeture or a snowflake falling down on my head will be a joy for me.

And while the leaves are still hanging on for dear life to the trees I will be holding tight to this slow paced time of year, between summer and the holidays, and hope I can accomplish enough now to hold me till the winter rush is over.

Like the squirrels do it is time for this writer to start storing up nuts for winter.

Song Lyrics of the Day

Oh I swear this town gets smaller everyday...

most folks here
they don't dig too deep.

They can't dream too big
cause they've got fields to keep.

I could walk away and leave my family.

Or get buried alive in this legacy.

Angel carry me, oh so far away.
May my body never... touch the ground.

And If I promise you that I'll be back someday,
will you set me free so I can

fly away?

Sugarland lyrics

Avon FanLit update 1

2006-09-24T00:28:00.000-05:00

Well the Avon FanLit Project is well underway. On last Friday the winner of the first chapter was announced. Anyone who wanted to participate could submit a chapter and anyone who wanted could read these chapters, over 5oo chapters were submitted, and vote on them. The top ten made the final where another round of voting and the judges chose the winner. Now writing and submitting for Chapter two is underway.

Check it out if you are an aspiring romance writer-

http://avon.fanlit.com/home.htm

The chapters I enjoyed the most were the slighty different ones. Since I don't read Regencies I think I seeking something more than the typical set up to rate the story 5 stars. There were a few stories that piqued my interest. One where the hero was a vampire I found intriging. One where the heroine was a spy seemed like it could be fun to expand on. There was one that had a murder in it. I would have loved to write for that storyline since I do like suspense.

The chapter that won was a fun read though not my first choice.

If I can get into the story enough I may even submit a chapter. But I have to study up on the era because I am not going to do it if my facts are half assed.

Anyway, it's been fun to read the blog and follow the progress so far.

I hope all my writing friends are having a productive writing weekend. Things are still going well for me. Here is a prompt I used recently

My family was great at

If you feel like playing along add a few sentences of your own after the prompt and post your version in my comments section.

My off the top of my head paragragh was

My family was great at not seeing things. No, that's lie. We were damn geniuses at it. We didn't see father lying. We didn't see mother's mind decomposing. No one saw my sister shrinking away. 78 pounds the death certificate said. And no one saw a thing.

Song Lyrics of the Day

Now if we had the power
to bring our neighbors home from war

They would have never missed a Christmas
no more ribbons on their door

and when you trust your television
what you get is what you got
cause when they own the information,
oh they can bend it all they want

that's why we're waiting
waiting on the world to change!
we keep on waiting
waiting on the world to change!

it's not that we don't care, we just know that the fight ain't fair

John Mayer Lyrics

Smooth Sailing

2006-09-18T12:08:00.000-05:00

Right now things are going well in my writing world. I am happily lost in some short stories I am working on. I hope to finish them soon so I can get back to working on my novel. But I think these stories are helping me to learn to craft a complete story arc.

Because I have never finished a novel I am much more adept at crafting beginnings and less so at middles and ends. But now these short stories are allowing me to work on constructing conflict to fuel the middle of the story and bringing all the ends together for a satisfying conclusion.

My writing is taking its own sweet time to grow into itself, to become something I can rely on to produce when I start working with publishers. Each day I learn a little more how to navigate this mysterious craft.

Nine Eleven

2006-09-10T00:55:00.000-05:00

This blog usually exclusively discusses my creative writing pursuits. But I would like to take one post and dedicate it to something else.

September, 11 2006 will mark the five year anniversary of the terrorist attack on America.

That day was an earth shifting focus rearranging moment for me. The shape of the world around me and my viewpoint on it was forever changed. But nothing I felt or feel to this day is unique to me. It's a feeling that runs through millions of hearts. I don't even feel worthy to write about such a momentous event.

Beyond the national and global ramifications of that day was the individual
earthquakes felt in all the lives of anyone who knew someone lost. And that is where the heart of the story lays, with the families and friends who waited for someone to come home who never made it back.

I have no doubt that each person lost was someone's whole world. So to all those who left us that day I wanted to use my little piece of the net to say

I still remember your sacrifice.

Nine Eleven

An echo lingers in this land
and in every heart.

A screaming, bleeding oneness that
made us all a part of
each other,
countymen turned to sisters,
found brothers.

And down to the last
of us
left
we vow to never forget.

Every moment stained in time .

Every loss one
on our minds,
still.

And this knowlegde of who they were
we shall carry forever.

We shall remember.
we shall remember.

Song Lyrics of the Day

Free

Only want to be free

We huddle close, hang on to a dream...

In the eye of the storm
In the eye of the storm

Home,
to a new and a shiny place

Make our bed, and we'll say our grace

Freedom's light burning warm
Freedom's light burning warm

Some lines from the song America by Neil Daimond

Fighting back the negative thoughts

2006-09-07T13:24:00.001-05:00

I stare at a page in my latest WIP, the one about the writer's conference. I am only a few chapters in and I am already hitting the rough spot in this would-be novel. It is threatening to become another one of the many I start and don't finish. But I love this idea too much to walk away now.

The other stories were affiars. This is a marriage. This is the one I really want to take all the way. Still it will be written in its own time. I can not force it.

So the negative thoughts begin

"Why is writing so hard?" the inner suffering writer whines.

"Because it is," says my logical side.

"Why does it feel like I'll never finish my first novel?"

"You'll finish one when you finish one."

The inner suffering writer moans. "This is painful."

"Yes, but you love it."

Oh yeah, I do. Guess I better get back to it and bleed out a few more words toward THE END.

This cracks me up

2006-09-07T00:17:00.000-05:00

I saw this on another blog months ago and saved it to my computer. If I can remember where I saw it I will link to it. If not, thanks to whoever made it. It really made me laugh the first time I saw it.

Some advice to check out

2006-09-07T00:09:00.000-05:00

Any writer who loves to hear hints from published writers should check this blog entry outhttp://avonforum.fanlit.com/blogs/the_fanlit_blog/articles/3302.aspx

at the AvonFanLit blog.

For Other Romance Writers

2006-08-28T13:00:00.000-05:00

Avon is starting a online forum that will create a e-book one chapter at a time. By participating you could win prizes and have the chance to have your work viewed by publishers.

Find details here

http://avon.fanlit.com/

Right now there is voting going on to see if the book will be in the genre of

Suspense
Contemporary
Medieval
Paranormal
or
Victorian

I signed up but think I will only take part if the genre is suspense or contemporary. I have no idea how to write the other three. But the whole idea sounds interesting and a free version of this-

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=8430426057

http://www.noveltwists.com/page1.htm

Song Lyrics of the Day

Her face is a map of the world
is a map of the world

You can see
she's a beautiful girl

She's a beautiful girl.....

Suddenly I see
this is what I wanna be

Suddenly I see
why the hell it means so much to me ...

I feel like walking the world
like walking the world

You can hear she's a beautiful girl
she's a beautiful girl

She fills up every corner
like she's born in black and white

Makes you feel warmer
when you're trying to remember what you heard

She likes to leave you hanging on a word

Suddenly I see
this is what I want to be

KT Tunstall

Where did I leave my flashlight?

2006-08-23T11:41:00.000-05:00

I'm in the dark again about where to go next in my latest WIP. I hate when I hit walls like this. I write in a linear fashion. Only once have I gone against that method ( it did work but felt extremely odd to me).

Anyway, I wrote Eric into a boring corner in the story. I think the part I am writing now needs to be told to set up the rest of the tale. Yet something is off with what I have written. I have to fix it before I can concentrate on moving forward.
This WIP has me alternating between feeling thrilled because I think it is unique and will be a great showcase for my voice and feeling extreme frustrated because it is unlike anything I have written before.

But I am not giving up on Eric yet. If it takes me and him in a wrestling match to get him to tell him my story then so be it. I want to get this one out on paper.

Andre, the main character from another story, is still with me. Right now he is playing mute but I feel like one day I will find a way to tell his story.

So is your writing going well this week or not so much?

The Rules

2006-08-18T13:06:00.000-05:00

I just finished reading two books. Ever After and, the sequel to it, Neva Hafta by Edwardo Jackson. Putting aside the things I liked or didn't about the books I did notice the author broke some of the Rules I try so hard to follow. For example, he had the main character growl a kiss at his date. And he used everything but said or asked on most of his dialouge tags.

For him it worked. For me I can't afford to do those kinds of things. So I am off to try and write not just as well as published writers but better. The idea that it takes being that good to succeed frustrates me but I am willing to give it my all to try and get to that point.

Off to write..........

Song Lyrics of the Day

So I'll stand
with arms high
and heart abandoned
In awe
of the One
who gave it all

So I'll stand
My soul Lord
to You surrendered

All I am is Yours

Hillsong lyrics

Speak it into existence

2006-08-14T16:57:00.000-05:00

There is a theory that goes What You Speak You Make Your Reality. I think this can be true. Because if you say, " I am a loser. I'll never succeed." Then other people see you as what you have told the world you are.
When it comes to my writing, in the past, I had to overcome my own self doubts. I had this pesky self defeating voice in my head yelling " You are dreaming if you actually think you will ever publish anything! What a waste of time. Give up now while you still have time to do something else." and the worse thing it ever said was "People will laugh at you."
Thankfully, I have mostly silenced that internal critic. I consider that one more step I had to take on this writing journey. I had to believe it was possible to become a published writer.
Now I am taking a step in faith and saying, "My novel will one day be in bookstores. I will be proud of my published story. I will never stop writing."
If I can commit one hundred percent to those statements I don't think anything can stop me from seeing that become my reality.
But I can not whisper my intention. I must speak it loud. I must fight my own doubts and anyone in the world who tries to discourage me. I must scream for this dream.
This is a fight to the death and I intend to win.

Song Lyrics of the Day

Digging deep,
I feel my conscience burn.

I need to know who or what I am.

This hunger jolts me from complacency.

It rocks me
and makes me
meet myself.......

I've been everybody else

now I want to be something

closer to myself.

Kendall Payne