Jumping Off the Cliff

That's what my boss calls it, anyway.

The time has come, since I haven't made the announcement official yet in the blogosphere (though, if you're my friend on FB, this may not be news to you).

I'm pregnant, having a boy, due March 16th.

While I'm super excited (and not at all ready, so I'm glad I still have three months), I'm also trying to be practical. This involves wanting to finish reading work by my author friends before then, finish some heavy editing on my own work, and even possibly start querying before March. I think *fingers-crossed* if I can get my novel in good shape by March, querying can happen at, um, SOME point while the baby's super tiny. Then, if an agent actually picks me up, I'd be willing to bet it wouldn't be while the baby's still so little and I'm so exhausted that I can't open my computer.

Right? *whimper*

So in the next few months, I'll be slashing and burning a minimum of 5K (hopefully closer to 8K), critiquing, blogging, and fitting in as much as (if not more than) physically possible before I jump.

Any suggestions on how to juggle babies/small children and writing and jobs would be both helpful and gratefully accepted.

Temptations Involved in Self-Publishing

If you saw my semi-ranting book review on Tuesday, you may remember that the book in question was self-published.

Now, don't go jumping to conclusions. I've read plenty of self-published books in my time, and several of them are quite good. Sure, perhaps they shouldn't be judged the same way as one would evaluate a traditionally-published book (although some indeed can, e.g., Michelle Davidson Argyle's Cinders), but they tend to be good...

...if the author puts in the proper amount of time, energy, and possibly money.

I think there's a strong temptation these days to hop too quickly into the self-publishing route. I know I've thought about it, and I'm sure I'm not alone. There can be several factors involved in not having a book accepted by an agent or an editor that have nothing to do with the quality of the work: it's not the right time; the market's already flooded with similar stories; there's no market for similar stories; the agent/editor was in a bad mood that day; it got lost in the slush pile; etc. But, we all know that sometimes it IS the quality of the work that's the problem.

For many of us, we go back to the drawing board, edit, slash, burn, revise, repeat.

Some, though, may go the self-publishing route.

Again, I'm not saying this is a bad option. It's hard to get a break in this industry, we all know. But with self-publishing comes heavy responsibility to make sure that your book can attempt to stand among the more traditionally-published books.

Taking that book that never sold and publishing it as-is on CreateSpace is not the way to go. And just because you're best friend/spouse/neighbor/mother/sibling/cat think it's the best story ever written doesn't mean the general public—a.k.a. those people who don't know you from the annoying neighbor who doesn't clean up after his/her dog—will agree.

So, what needs to happen in the route of self-publishing? Here are my top three recommendations.

First, good critique partners. I suggest people you don't know in the real world, i.e., people who won't be afraid to tell you the truth. All of my critique partners, I've met online through blogging, and with most of them I don't even discuss my personal life. It's all about the words. Keep the relationship professional and potentially brutal. It's the best way to get honest opinions. They should spot technical and factual errors, comment on awkward phrasing, and tell you when the pace slows, when they're bored, or when you've strayed too much from your original story. Take those opinions and edit, slash, burn, revise, repeat.

Second, after you've ripped and shredded—which you might think you did before querying, but, hell, do it again! what could it hurt—hire a professional editor. You may think you know grammar, but this professional, if properly doing his/her job, will make you question how you managed to pass elementary English. This editor should have strong opinions on the Oxford comma (either pro or con, doesn't matter, as long as it's a strong opinion—and here's mine) and a sharp eye. S/he should not only cover your manuscript in so much red ink that it makes your HS English teacher blush, but this person should also once again be reading for factual and technical errors in the content. An editor that only edits for commas and typos isn't worth the money, unless you specify (and, dear God, why would you?) that that's all you want. A good professional editor is worth his/her weight in gold nuggets, so be prepared to shell out accordingly. In the end, it's worth it.

Finally, don't let your 12 year old design your cover. You may firmly believe in his/her talent, as do your spouse and the 7th grade art teacher, but, again, the rest of the world is full of brutal cynics like me who will take one look at the cover and decide never to read the book. Paying for a professional artist who has experience in cover design is worth the money. Don't think you can cut costs on this just because your brother's best friend's ex-girlfriend's roommate had a minor in art in college ten years ago. Just pay the cost.

Do you have any experiences in self-publishing? What do you think of the self-publishing option these days? Have you ever considered it? Would you?

Back from the Brink

Oh, boy, folks, have I had a crazy few weeks. Grab a cuppa coffee/tea/wine/beverage of your choice and let me tell you all about it.

So I needed a mini break of blogging because I hadn't quite figured out how to manage my writing, my "new" job, family, life, and blogging all at the same time. I think I've figured it out now, so we're gonna try a trial of me blogging on Tuesdays and Saturdays for a while, and see how it works. Please bear with me as I reintegrate myself into the blogosphere.

This is your brain on editing.
Any questions?

Then there was the writing. In late October not only was I trying to manage some pretty intense revision on my novel (currently listed on my WIPs page as FIGHTING FATE, though I plan to change the title to IN FLAMES). I wanted to get a full round of revision finished before NaNoWriMo started, while also juggling my NaNo prep. That took a LOT out of me, and I edited until my brains turned into liquid goo. Seriously. It was messy.

My own personal NaNo shield

On November first, having finished that round of editing, I was happy to accept my NaNo fate. I greeted it with a warm, strong handshake. And on the fateful afternoon of November 1st, I had an extra meeting with my boss, wherein he asked me to work overtime in preparation for our display at an upcoming conference (I work for a small, specialty academic publisher). And in my inner ear, I heard my NaNo plans go *squish*. My boss and I negotiated trading the days in early November for days around Thanksgiving, so not all was lost, but it put some stress on my NaNo plans nonetheless.

As of November 12th, one-third of the way through the month, I had only written about 14K over the course of 4 authentic writing days. Ouch.

On the morning on November 13th, as I'm leaving my house to pick up a friend, I grab my phone to let her know I'm coming, and see that I have a missed text message from my boss--who, I might add, never sends me text messages. It said, more or less, that he was in the hospital, post-surgery after having had a heart attack. Everything okay. Call to talk about conference prep. SERIOUSLY. My boss is in the intensive care unit on a Sunday morning and wants to talk about conference prep. Now, granted, the conference started on the 17th. My boss isn't really all that Type-A, but we did still have a lot of work to do, and that essentially took the editorial side of our house from 3 to 2 employees doing the bulk of the work (we have a few work-study students, but regular employees, we are three). So now add more overtime work to my schedule over the next three days, making the first day of the conference (Nov 17th) day 5 for writing. Not a good sign.

See how the Jell-O powder gets all goopy with a little water?

Not to mention that on the 17th and the 18th I was about as worthless a writer as an uncooked box of Jell-O, from working 10hour days three days in a row, and the emotional turmoil of talking to my boss on the phone while he was doped on morphine and falling asleep. Yup, powdery Jell-O.

Somehow, though, I managed to pull a few days writing between 5-6K. Don't ask me how. Perhaps some superhuman feats of strength that even kryptonite couldn't squelch. Who knows? But I have to attribute at least a little of my success to Hart Johnson and her stupendous idea for hour-long sprint-writing sessions. I think those were ultimately my saving grace. Coordinated over Facebook, I would periodically join Hart, among others, on these sprints, and both the time and the community support helped a ton.

And, imagine, through all of that, I actually won!

Granted, according to my word verification, I only have 50,002 words, but I don't care! I'm 2 words over what they need (although, according to my Scrivener file, I have 50,019), and that's what matters.

Anyway, now it's December. A little over two weeks until the holiday break comes, which will entail lots of time with family, friends, and fruitcake. I'm already celebrating by eating too many sweets and listening to Christmas music while I cook and bake. And, dangit all, I am MAKING these cookies if it kills me. I just have to find some sweet rice flour first...

Be seeing you around the blogosphere!

Welcome to my first post for the Insecure Writer's Support Group. And, if you're new, welcome to my blog.

This is something I've written about a lot lately because, well, it's apparently something that's been bothering me.

Recently, we moved. For the record, we did it all ourselves, with no packers or movers. Several weeks of packing, days of moving, a week of homelessness, a day of moving, and weeks of unpacking. To say the least, it was difficult to find the mojo to write during all of this.

Now I'm back to work, writing every day in the morning and working part-time in the afternoon. I started with major editing of my WIP. And I found that editing wasn't helping get my mojo back.

So, this is my concern. Once I actually regain my mojo, will editing and revision still kill my writing mojo? Does anyone else have this problem? I know that some people really enjoy the editing and revising. But if not, how do people manage their writing thrill and the revision process?

Struggle and Persistence

I have a relatively new crit partner, and in addition to trading work and brainstorming with each other, we've also been trying to keep each other accountable on weekly goals. Last Sunday when I sent her my goals for the week, I was horrified to see that I had 15 rather serious goals to achieve. She challenged me to completely mark 5 off my list. I'm happy to say that I crossed off 10 (which included writing this blog post).

One of my goals was to write for at least an hour per day on my new project. This proved to be harder than it seems.

My permanent desk muses:
one of my cats and the PowerPuff Girls

Saturday in particular was a day of writer's block. I struggled, staring out my window, messing with my cat, hoping that the PowerPuff Girls would save my from my strife. I stared at the words I had already written and though, "Eh. Who cares?" It was a rough day.

Then I came across this blog post from one of the fellow Campaigners. It helped me remember that my first draft doesn't need to be perfect. No one else has to see it. As long as I keep at it and keep working, it will come together in the end. And then I can come back and cut out that superfluous scene where they're watching a movie, right? :)

As long as I remember to edit the life out of it before I start sending it out to my poor crit partners. *innocent whistling*

We all have those days when it's hard to get the words out. But on a first draft, it helps to turn off the perfectionist inside. Let's just hope I can keep it up.


What do you do when you run into writer's block? How hard do you try to polish the first draft? Do you edit while you write? Or revise everything later?

Thanks and Welcome

Image Credit

First, I want to say thanks to everyone who had great ideas and encouragement last week on how to get through my writing funk. I've been able to get my butt in the chair and work a few times since then. In addition to my editing on Fighting Fate, I've also gone back to an old, shelved project and dusted it off. The combination of writing something "new" and editing/revision something has been extremely good for me. I feel revitalized. I'm even excited to get to work in the morning, and not as interested in procrastinating.

The encouragement from all of you, old friends and new, has been amazing. I love the blogosphere! You're all great. Thank you again.

And a warm welcome to any more Campaign group cohorts. I'm very happy to meet you. Glad you could stop by :)

Visionary (#atozchallenge)

Welcome to today's post on the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge. My challenge, as I have chosen to accept it, is thus: I have asked on my Facebook and Twitter accounts for people to contribute random words beginning with today's letter. From Random.org, I have selected one of these words, and will below challenge myself to connect said word to writing.

For the letter V, I received 54 suggestions. Random.org selected number 9: visionary.


Visionary

When I first started writing again, I had a vision. No, literally, a vision. Well, okay, it wasn't one of those show-my-destiny-through-mental-images vision, but it was a message my brain wanted to tell me. A repeated scene in my head over and over. My psyche whispering to me in my dreams. Too bad my psyche really wanted to scare the pants off of me... and succeeded, to be sure.

But this vision turned into something. It's the climax in my first (hefty) manuscript, something that no one will ever see but me, one supportive friend, and my super-supportive sister-in-law. But that's not the point.

The point is that we're all visionaries in our own worlds. We create from nothing but the synapses in that gray matter under our skull and some personal experiences. We have visions.

Yeah, yeah, are you bored with my "we're the awesomest" speech yet?

I bring this up because sometimes the original vision isn't the best. My writing instructor once told us that revision and re-vision aren't the same thing, and I believe her. I've seen it in action. Sometimes moving scenes around and editing the syntax aren't enough to provide the best story within us. Sometimes you have to delete a third of a novel and rewrite it, re-visioning how it should play out. Sometimes you have to rethink a character's actions. If, upon further inspection, that character wouldn't do that huge action that creates the tension for the rest of the novel, then something needs to be re-visioned.

I'm currently rewriting the first, oh, third (the number above was either arbitrary or subconsciously apt) of my novel Fighting Fate. The original was poor. The tension lagged. People did some stuff, but, eh, people do stuff all the time. This time around, though, I'm rethinking everything, including the backstory, to get them where they need to go. And, if I do say so myself (*dusting off shoulders*), it's not too bad.

Ever had to re-vision your work? How far are you willing to go to rewrite your fiction/poetry? Are you willing to scrap everything but your basic characters and start over? How much re-visioning is too much?

Send (#atozchallenge)

Welcome to today's post on the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge. My challenge, as I have chosen to accept it, is thus: I have asked on my Facebook and Twitter accounts for people to contribute random words beginning with today's letter. From Random.org, I have selected one of these words, and will below challenge myself to connect said word to writing.

For the letter S, I received 58 suggestions. Random.org selected number 46: send.


Send

For me, the "Send" button on my email can be intimidating. Does anyone else feel this way? I'm not talking about just to send an email to my friend, or respond to a blog comment, but when I have added that oh so gentle Word or PDF attachment to that email and am sending it to someone for critique or just general comments. Honestly, I can feel the tip of my finger sweating as I reach for the mouse button.

Click.

And let the nail-biting begin.

Really, this is just the beginning, because I haven't started querying yet. How am I going to feel once I start sending the blurb for my baby out into the wilderness, waiting for some helpful woodland critter (agent?) to help it on its way to maturity and its reemergence into the world? I'm worried it will feel akin to an outright fever, with the shakes and sweat and nausea.

So, folks, I ask you: What's your way of handling the anticipation and waiting during the query process?


Also, today I'm taking suggestions for the letter Y. Have any? Leave them below. Thanks!

Kind (#atozchallenge)

Welcome to today's post on the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge. My challenge, as I have chosen to accept it, is thus: I have asked on my Facebook and Twitter accounts for people to contribute random words beginning with today's letter. From Random.org, I have selected one of these words, and will below challenge myself to connect said word to writing.

For the letter K, I received 39 suggestions. Random.org selected number 7: kind.

PS--My Mondays and Wednesdays have me running around without good internet access all day until 9pm EST (US). I'll get back to you, but it might be late tonight.


Kind

What kind of kind shall I kind of discuss? The kind in which we discuss a sort of thing, or the kind in which I discuss the value quality of someone's personality?

GAH! I'm such a geek :)
Image courtesy of Wiki Commons

Is your head spinning? Mine is.

English is full of homonyms (e.g., kind the noun and kind the adjective), homographs (lead the ore and lead the verb), and homophones (two, too, and to; your and you're).

What's a writer to do with all this nonsense?

When it comes to homonyms like kind and kind, usually the context will make it clear to our readers what we're talking about. Not so bad.

Homographs get a little trickier. In the above examples, I mention lead (as in "Alchemists claim turning lead into gold") and lead (as in "The duck leads her babies to the pond"). This is usually okay, too, until we throw past tense in the mix. Have you ever written something like "The duck lead her babies to the pond" when you MEANT "The duck LED her babies to the pond"?

You don't have to admit it. We all know we do this, at least in that first draft when we're too excited to self-edit.

But Homophones are the worst. They're sneakier than those gnomes that hide in your drier waiting to steal your socks and use them for their little gnomy purposes. Your writing along, and their you have this horrible mistake where you meant to write "you're", but "your" just jumped in they're.

Yes, I know what I did in that paragraph.
If you send a manuscript to an editor with those mistakes rampant across the page, s/he's not going to read it. Talk about fodder for the slush pile!

So what to do? Fret away? Lose sleep wondering over what words are wrong? Chew your nails down to tiny stubs? (Wait, with all the typing we do, does anybody have long nails to begin with?)

No, my friends. There is a solution. Learn to self-edit.

Now, if you're reading this, I've probably read your blog, too, and, frankly, I haven't read many blogs out there where I would consider the author in dire need of a self-editing intervention. BUT, if you are in need of some suggestions, here's a place to start:

Revision and Self-Editing by James Scott Bell.

Want more suggestions? Check out this resource.

Still think there might be a problem? Save your nails, folks. You can always hire an editor. Some are cheaper than others, but if you can't edit your own work, make sure SOMEONE does before you send it in.

Or else the slush pile is waiting.


Do you self-edit? How did you learn your grammar tricks? Or are you just a grammar genius? (if you are, don't rub it in much :)


Today I'm taking suggestions for the letter R. Have any? Leave them below! Thanks :)

Clean (#atozchallenge)

Welcome to my 3rd post on the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge. My challenge, as I have chosen to accept it, is thus: I have asked on my Facebook and Twitter accounts for people to contribute random words beginning with today's letter. From Random.org, I have selected one of these words, and will below challenge myself to connect said word to writing.



For the letter C, I received 68 suggestions. Random.org selected number 8: clean.

PS--My Mondays and Wednesdays have me running around without good internet access all day until 9pm EST (US). I'll get back to you, but it might be late tonight.


Clean

So, I thought about taking the easy route with this, talking about cleaning up and polishing your work, making sure you've got a good editor, etc., etc., but we've heard that all before, haven't we? And, well, we need something to help us get over the Monday blues, right? Who wants to talk about cleaning up after yourself when you've spent a weekend Spring cleaning (or Fall cleaning, maybe, for our dear friends south of the Equator), or cleaning up after kids, or after dinner, or cleaning up the yard...

You get the idea.

Instead, I want to talk about you. Now, before I do, please don't take what I'm about to say the wrong way. I am in NO WAY implying that any of my readers (or myself) are unclean. But if you have one of those skin conditions that comes from not bathing, I'm not judging. I just don't need to know about it :)

Thus, exhibit A:

Image courtesy of Wiki Commons

Poor Pig-Pen. All he wants is to have fun with his friends, but he always ends up dirty and smelly. Why is that?

Enthusiasm!

Pig-Pen loves everything he does. He gets deep down in the dirty while he's playing, and loves every minute of it. The boy's not afraid to get a little messy.

When it comes to writing, we need to get messy before we can dust off our hands and call the creation "done". That's one reason, in my opinion, events like NaNoWriMo are so successful. It's like an entire month of rolling around in the mud and never taking a shower. By the end, you stink, and BOY OH BOY do you want a good, long, hot shower or bath, but look at the prize that's waiting for you. The diamond of your enthusiasm awaits. Yeah, maybe you got muckier than you wanted, and you can't stand to look at that gem again for a while. I haven't looked at my 2010 NaNo yet, that's for sure, and I have no intention of doing so before June. BUT, I know it's decent... deep, deep, Deep, DEEP down. I just need to clean it up.

My bottom line is: Clean isn't always good, nor is it always what's best for us. Let the words flow, get the ides down. Later you can find your diamond in the rough. It's there, no matter what. Sometimes the mud just makes it a little easier to see.

How do you write? Do you polish as you go? Or do you spew words and tidy up after yourself later? 

Have you tried challenges like NaNo? What others have you participated in?

Want to play along with my A-to-Z Challenge? Today I'm taking suggestions for the letter G. I'll take as many or as few as you'd like to contribute. :)