This weekend, as you can read at mom-blog, was NOT what I expected, but something really neat happened.  My husband caught up with a former colleague of his.  It was really nice, Sean was an a great guy and so it was nice to find that he’d been naturalized (he’s a Brit, love those Brits!), and married, and expecting, and promoted.

The last time I hung out with him, I believe Amelia was already born and a baby, so maybe 4 years ago?  Maybe she hadn’t been born yet, though, I’m not sure.  That night, Chris, Sean and I went out for dinner and drinks and after a few rounds, I told him the plot of my novel.   I believe this was the first time I told Chris the story as well.  It was VERY well received by both of them.

On Thursday night, Sean asked Chris how my novel was going, was I pursuing it, etc.  WOW.  I’m totally jazzed that someone would remember the plot and ask about it AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, especially when these 2 guys apparently had a LOT to catch up on (they hung out for SEVEN hours). This gave me confidence about this story.

Maybe it’s not my preferred genre, but it is one I like (although I’m the fussiest reader EVER), the plot has action, romance, sacrifice, hot hero, flawed woman, and lots of other good stuff, like war and politics.  In fact, to be honest, I’m rather happy with it, and I’m happy with my sequel concepts as well.  So 3 cheers for ME, and my little story 

Augh.  The voices in my head, they say, “you can’t do this.  you can’t make a living doing this.  you have too much on your plate, too much to do, there’s work, kids, you need to potty train and read this, read that, pray, what about church?, husband needs you, your BLEEP-BLEEP house is a BLEEPING mess, how can you raise kids like that?, worry about that low valued home, and all your debt, and school again? how’s that gonna work, and why bother, and you’re sick again, and isn’t web design more appealing, and you haven’t downloaded the kid’s photos, or made up with every one you’ve lost touch with, or emailed so and so, or saved your kids, your husband, THE WORLD….”

So, voices, stop it NOW.  What YOU don’t know is this:  My writing?  It’s not a hobby.  It’s not a phase.  It’s not a pleasure-moment, a task, a chore, a “thing”, a fling.

It’s my calling.  That means, it’s a God thing.  Way back when, when he knitted me together, he put this talent-gift-fever in my gut, and built my body around it.   I’m done burying it deep, because it’s only taken root like a seed within me.  It’s not WHO I am, it’s just my Purpose.

Which means it can’t fail, even if the mountain before me looks like Everest in the winter.  Even if time is fleeting and hard to catch, even if duty and charity and loved ones and devotion come first in moments, even if my sinuses ache, my strength is gone, and my heart is pounding, this is what I will be doing, permanently, at least in this life.  Every other work is mere distraction.

I’m turning my back on other stuff, at least for a little while each day, 15 minutes at least, more if I can manage it.  It FEELS good to work magic with my pen.  It LOOKS like diamonds glittering in the dark when I read back what I wrote.

I can regret my past, but maybe I needed to wait these 30 years to get to this place, to live through the stroke and Mom’s Alzheimer’s and my husband’s heart attack and my kid’s disabilities and the debt and 9/11 and Pres Bush.  To get through all that crap and still fill like I’ve touched base, like I’m “safe”, because it gives me a place to work and a deep well of tears and laughter to draw from.

Or maybe I’m just bored of the mundane life and being a writer is so much cooler…lol..

I’ve been learning a lot since I’ve been hooked up with an accountability partner (hi Katrina!) and not only THAT, but I’ve been CREATING a lot, which is astounding to me.

Lessons I learned this last week:

1.  Outlines take many forms.  In reading some old notes, I decided to try an out outline for my novel.  I had taken a stab before a long time ago and failed miserably.  The directions in the writing class were that they were NOT to be extensive and that was my problem.  I googled about and learned about netlining or mind-mapping (Google or Wiki it for yourself).   It’s decidely NON-linear, which put my schoolish butt ill at ease, but funny thing, after just “doing it”, my split personality kicked in, and the funky ginabad part of my brain took over.  My bookworm side screwed up its face at the messiness, but I read it all through.

Then, I pulled out a sheet of paper and literally ZIPPED through my novel’s outline, which came EXACTLY to my projected 3 page, double spaced requirement on my task list.  Better than that, it helped me make some critical decisions, such as the groundwork for the civil war in my story is the coup the book begins with, rather than there is already one going on.  The king is warring with neighboring regions, while tensions are growing at home.  This way it makes more sense when he gets assassinated.  (That’s no reveal, it’s in the first page of the book.)

2. Sitting in the passenger seat on long trips with no “aids” (ipod, notebook, book) really DOES allow you to create.  I started a nice little vampire story (not something I’ll really write, just for my own pleasure…I do this from time to time), and finished a concept in my head for an awesome short story.  Kicker ending too, now I just have to write it.  Must earn some gas money and plan long trips with Chris driving

3. Writing generates writing.  I had a task list, and I was working on one task (do one assignment from old class, which was “just start writing”) and - without even realizing - finished another (start writing that short story).  Cool.  Since I finished the concept on the trip, I now have some nice beginning bones to work with, and a promising plot that I can send to contests or lit mags.  Wow.

4.  Having an accountability partner works.  Really!  See Above!!  cool beans…

Ilana has tagged me, so here we go:

Here are the rules:
1. Pick up the nearest fiction book. (Following Ilana’s lead here.)
2. Open to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people and post a comment to the person who tagged you once you’ve posted your three sentences.

My laptop is near my bookshelf, so this took some measuring. The nearest fiction book is Coraline by Neil Gaiman. (Yes it is a youth book, but I like Gaiman, Ok?)

Beside the decapitated rat, a smug expression on his face, was the black cat. It rested one paw on the gray glass marble.

‘I think I once mentioned,’ said the cat, ‘that I don’t like rats at the best of times.’

ROFL!! I love it.

OK, then, whom am I going to tag? gina b from mom-blog tags Katrina, WonderMom, Lynn, Jenny, and Feener.  (Not sure who knows about this blog, lol!!

I want to thank everyone who posted last time - Ilana, Katrina and Pam -you guys really helped me clear my head.  So I have decided to:

1. continue on with part 2 of my online course, which has so far generated about 6 or 7 pieces for short stories.  So in my daydreaming time I will build those ideas.

2. continue on my seed of an idea for a novel that has a long way to go, also for daydreaming time.  This is nice because I’ve had some WONDERFUL ideas, but it’s all under wraps for now. Shhhh!  Code  name is “Reprieve”, but I am notorious for picking titles that absolutely suck. Note: Last week I heard that it’s critical that you write a good title, which contradics what I heard earlier, that editors write the title.  AUGH!

3. since I’m not really WRITING, I can still work through the editing and worldbuilding process for my little sf novel.  I’ve already taught myself how to generate a decent outline, which already let me ditch some things.  I might as well see it through for the learning process.  Can’t hurt, as long as there’s time.

4. am zooming along in marketing my mom blog, which will generate an audience or, if not, at least some adsense revenue, right?  I mean, I hope…

And that’s it.  Life is EXCELLENT.  I love being a writer, don’t you?

Ladies, you will all get REAL links on my high ranking blog…this one is like rank 1  billion, lol, so it won’t help…

Ok, I must confess: I DO like SF/F, a little, but I’m not sure - even though that’s the genre of my novel that is completed - how much I should do on it.

Here’s why:

This is not really the genre I want to write.  I WANT to write literary fiction.

OK, now stop laughing.  I am 100% aware of the odds of making a living as a literary fiction author.

And my little story, which needs massive amounts of work, is good and deep and has lovely conflict, true growth and sacrifice in the protagonist, sequels which I like, and is possibly marketable.  It’s a story I like, and today a SF/F writer at a group I’m attending offered to help me with it.

Thanks to working full time and the commitment with my kids and also my own furthering of my education, the novel probably needs 10-12 months to get into shape, before I can start sending it out in this genre that I’m not too interested in.

This week, I subscribed to Holly Lisle’s newsletter, and her advice was  basically:
“Know thyself” (with regard to your genre)  Do the work of the genre you’re writing (world building), don’t skimp, don’t use stock medieval footage, and so on.  Write a genre you WANT to write.

A few paragraphs down she wrote:

Any book you write is going to be the first book of yours some reader picks up.

So what if I write a genre and then it’s the WRONG ONE?  What if I start publishing the short stories I’m considering writing (not even remotely fantastical) and then come out with fantasy novel and everyone’s like “huh?”.  Or will I be typecast and doomed to never publish in the genre I love?

FWIW, though my little novel in NO WAY resembles the greatness of these two books, two of my favorite SF/F books are by authors NOT in that genre:

“The Time Travellers Wife” and
“The Sparrow”

It’s a lot to think about, because THEN it means I don’t even have a novel together…well, ok, not completely true, I do have another thing I’ve been working on, but it’s no where NEAR complete, nor can it remotely compete with my latest ideas.

AUGH.   I guess no One ever said this would be easy…

So, as mentioned, I’m taking this fabulous WriterStudio.com class and we get this assignment I found very difficult.  We switched, after 5 weeks, from writing in the 1st person, where  I’m comfortable, to third person.  I had a scenario picked that the teacher thought would work well but I just didn’t FEEL it.

I was really busy last week, so the actual writing of the assignment was done in the few hours I had available on Sunday, the day the assignment was due.  However, I was so lost that I mulled over the scenario over and OVER again, and reviewed the sample piece several times.

I didn’t have time for revisions, which I should have, but I submitted it, knowing that even if the piece failed, we have a chance for do-over on the last week of the class.

It didn’t.  It was by no means my strongest assignment, there were some issues, but because I mulled over it so much, I think it had a chance on the page even without  strong revisioning.

My lesson learned this week:

See your scene, see it live.  Smell it, feel it, hear it, be there in person.

Also, this was another scene based on write what you know:  Kew Gardens, NY during the blackout of 76(77??), in a dark lobby with the super (my dad was the super of a large building that night).  The details were from my memory, but the characters were all purely invented, so that is one interpretation of write what you know.

peace out readers!