Inspiration

I Saw Three Ships

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This has nothing to do with the Christmas carol. What it does pertain to is the fine art of shipping, something common to romance fans, of the reading and/or writing persuasion, and I happen to be both. I write romance, I write about romance, and I have been reading romance since the age of eleven, when I stole a then-brand-new copy of The Kadin from my mother’s nightstand and inhaled it under the big brass bed in the guest bedroom. I’ve been a first round judge in several romance writing contests, write posts on romance novels and recap shippy TV moments for Heroes and Heartbreakers, so I think I know a little something about the smoochy stuff in stories.

For those who may still consider “shipping” to refer to the transportation of goods by water, I’ll clarify. I don’t mean that. I mean “shipping” as in “relationshipping” (yes, yes, not techinically a verb, I know, but still valid in the vernacular, so we roll with it) or following a work of media, in this case, a television program, primarily for the sake of a romantic relationship. That, I do mean, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. Even before I filched The Kadin, I was very strongly drawn to the happily ever part of fairy tales, and devoured them in endless variations. I preferred the darker, pre-Brothers Grimm versions, the ones where Cinderella’s stepsisters actually lopped off parts of their feet to fit into the glass slipper, Rapunzel gave birth to twins in the wilderness, Sleeping Beauty gave birth to –I am seeing a theme here– you get the drift. In short, I don’t want la-la-la perfect; I want my lovers to earn that HEA.

I can’t plan when I connect with a ship, but I know when it happens. I’m watching, I’m interested, and BAM, the chemistry hits me, and I’m a goner. Some ships are casual, and others, well, they get me thinking. I’ve been thinking a lot lately.

Fans (and former fans) of How I Met Your Mother know exactly what two-year anniversary recently passed, and may of may not have been part of the mini-kerfluffle that stemmed from Neil Patrick Harris’s tweet on the occasion of Cobie Smulders’ birthday. No, actors are not their characters, but there was a reference to their HIMYM characters’ relationship. There was the word “marry!” There was the word “divorce!” There was the word “love,” which came after, and therefore is the defining statement! Past references to NPH introducing CS as his HIMYM co-star and wife (present tense, no “ex”) though their characters did divorce in the finale…but the alternate finale suggested that may not be the end of the story.

Out of the two options, I’m an alternate girl, myself.There are enough holes in the out-of-the blue divorce plot to qualify it as a spaghetti strainer, but that’s not what we’re talking about here. Well, not entirely. Stick with me. I’m going somewhere.

Sleepy Hollow’s maybe-season/maybe-series finale similarly hit fans between the eyes with a two-by-four, killing off the Abbie half of the popular Ichabbie ship, and leaving the other half, Ichabod, vowing to find Abbie’s eternal soul in another body. Ummm…yeah, about that. The tweets, during the original airing, that had started as #RenewSleepyHollow turned to #CancelSleepyHollow, and the fandom (or former fandom) is split between defending the original Ichabbie bond and being done with the whole deal. Others are happy to see the show continue, if it does, but we’re dealing with shipping here, so that’s for someone else to discuss.

For me, the appeal of the show was the relationship between Abbie, a thoroughly modern law enforcement officer with a storied past, and Ichabod Crane (yes, that one, albeit a much more fanservicey version,) man out of time, fish out of water, devoted husband….wait, did she say “husband?” Oh, yes, she did. At the series start, Ichabod was married to and determined to return to his wife, Katrina, whom one might say was not worthy of him. Didn’t tell him she was a witch, didn’t tell him they had a child, buried him alive (but she had good intentions,) that kind of thing. The connection was palpable from the start, but he was married, there was the whole staving off the apocallypse thing, we never saw a single lip lock (closest we got was an impassioned hand kiss in their last moment together) and yet…the chemistry crackled. In the season two finale, Ichabod had to make an impossible choice, and kill Katrina to save Abbie. That should have gone somewhere. It didn’t. Even if there is a fourth season, even if Ichabod does find Abbie’s soul in another body, will fans be there to watch it? I’m not sure.

This comes straight on the heels of the sinking of another favorite ship, Derek Morgan and Penelope Garcia of Criminal Minds. Buff, alpha male FBI agent meets quirky, colorful, optimistic computer nerd, and it’s magic. He’s her Chocolate Thunder, she’s his Baby Girl, their in-office flirtation is the stuff of legend so much so that a seminar on proper conduct in the workplace quotes their specific exchanges. They’ve been there for each other in the other’s darkest moments, she’s been on the line with him when they both thought he wasn’t going to make it, and his most distraught moment during a near-death experience was not related to then-girlfiend, Savannah’s reaction to his death, but of Garcia letting go and walking away from his memorial photograph on a wall of agents killed in the line of duty.

I recapped Morgan’s farewell episode at Heroes and Heartbreakers, and while, on the surface, it was a good exit, Morgan choosing his now-wife and newborn son over the BAU, for Morcia fans, it didn’t sit right, because, dangit, what could have been. I’m not going to address the brother/sister argument here, except to say that I’ll skip those family barbecues, thanks, I know, I know, the actor wanted to move on to other projects, and Criminal Minds is a police procdural, not a romantic drama, but my shipper heart still aches over the loss. Maybe if we’d seen more of Derek and Savannah’s relationshp grow, come to know her, it would have been easier to accept, but it’s Morgan and Garcia that we saw, so that’s what’s going to stick.

So, where am I going with all this? Straight to my initial reaction after turning off the Sleepy Hollow finale: “I need to read a romance novel.” Granted, commercial fiction and TV writing are two different things, and I’m not about to tell a different kind of writer how to do their job, but when I’m there for the romance, I want…the romance. I want the two lovers who went through hell and back to be rewarded for all they’ve been through. I want to see that the charater arcs have taken the characters to a better place (and not in the “they’ve gone to a…” variety.) I want to see the couple become more than the sum of their parts. I want these characters, whom I’ve fallen in love with, individually and together, to have each other’s back, from this day forward. I want the you-and-no-other. I want them to know they’ve found the place where they won’t be judged, won’t be rejected, will be accepted and valued and cherished. I want to know these characters have found, in each other, the one who will walk through the darkness with them, as well as dance in the light. That, even though it may not be strictly puppies and lollipops and rainbows ever after, it’s going to be good enough, still, because they have each other, no matter what life throws at them.

That’s what I want from romance fiction, and that’s what I strive to put into mine. While a TV show may be about wacky hijinx, a supernatural take on history, or the dark corners of the human mind, and incorporate love stories that may end happily or otherwise, in romance fiction, both protagonists win. Always. That’s a promise, and one I am proud and happy to keep.

 

Draw Shapes

annabowling 2 Comments

We have snow. In April. I am going to have to go outside and shovel the sidewalk. In April. Even though snow is my favorite weather, it had the whole season of winter to show, and it didn’t. I live with two springophiles, and they’re sad at the loss of their favorite season, which makes it hard to enjoy this unexpected dose of mine, so this is an interesting conundrum. I may need to take a snow day.

 

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view from our balcony

 

 

For my fellow Sleepyheads, my recap of Sleepy Hollow‘s latest episode, “Delaware,” is up at Heroes and Heartbreakers. Man, this episode. Two particular Ichabbie scenes could count as love scenes -donuts and boat, for those who have seen- because the connection is that strong, and sure, and understated and all the more obvious for it. If this were a book, I would have sticky notes on those chapters, so I could see how they did it and learn to do it for myself. Still no word on whether the show will be renewed or not, so next week’s season (and hopefully not series) finale should be interesting, not to mention cause for great speculation. It is here, and it looks like this:

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New member of the (notebook) family came home this weekend, when I saw this gorgeous specimen at Barnes and Noble, in the red dot clearance section:

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new art journal – what can I do to it?

 

I’ve always wanted to try an unlined Picadilly, and one of their larger notebooks, so when I saw this, and it announced it was my new art journal, (because notebooks talk to me; don’t they do that to everybody?) I fell in love with the creamy pages, and spent a rather blissful chunk of time at the kitchen counter, slapping down seemingly random things that were within easy reach, and I’m rather pleased with the results.

Though I don’t remember who actually said this particular gem, I want to say it was in an issue of Art Journaling magazine. In every issue, multiple contributors are asked the same question about their creative process. That’s probably my favorite feature, as I love finding out how different people do the same thing. In one issue, I want to say the question was something like, how to get started when ideas aren’t coming.

One answer stuck with me.  “When you don’t know what to draw, draw shapes.” I am fairly certain I’m paraphrasing here, and probably need to go back and find the actual quote and artist’s name, because that had a big hand in getting me out of a creative funk. Draw shapes. Well, that’s easy. Anybody can draw shapes. So, today, when I sat down with a two page blank spread in front of me, that’s what came to mind. I stuck down a piece of scrapbook paper, tried out some long-neglected stamps, with a longer-neglected ink pad (that pad has earned all the RIPs in the image) and then…nothing. Which is where the shapes came into play.

I grabbed an old stencil that was, apparently, made by IBM, for…IBM-related something, I imagine; my dad probably bought it for art use, and now it’s mine…and started tracing shapes. Then I filled them in with an old #2 pencil, which I’d found in the same box of stuff. I didn’t think, didn’t plan, only let one shape flow into the next one, my mind drifting along with the music, picking out the stories from the songs, the snapshots of emotion captured in sound, and that told me where to go next. When I got to the point of “done” with shapes, I looked at the blank space for a while. It needed a figure. I grabbed a stack of pages torn from old magazines, cut out the first one I saw, glued it down, added some shade, then sat back.

Words. I needed words on that page, but didn’t want to overthink it. What ended up going on the page were the lyrics that played at that exact moment. It worked. Done. I liked the whole process a lot, and will probably do that again, because it gets my creative brain in gear. So, what does that have to do with writing? Other than inspiration, that is, because there was definitely that.

It’s the blank page. It’s the shapes. It’s knowing that I know how to  do this. Once there is a shape on the page, once there is a splash of color, or even a single mark, the page isn’t blank anymore. The first step will invite the next one, which will make the page an entirely different thing from that, and once I get in the groove, it’s easier to keep going than it is to stop. It’s trusting myself and knowing that  what works for me, works for me. It’s feeling the doubt and going ahead anyway, because otherwise, what else is there to do but stare at a bank page? Put something down. Anything. Fix it later. Add to it later. Cover it later. Rip it out later, if you want, but put it down there. Use a template if you need. Go freehand if you want, but start. Make your mark. Draw a shape. Write a word. I dare you.

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Typing With Wet Claws: Rainy Day Edition

annabowling 2 Comments

Hello, all. Skye here, for another Feline Friday. It is rainy here today, so Anty is very happy about that. Rain gives her energy that too-bright days take away, and she is looking forward to getting things done. That is why she wanted me to get my blog out nice and early. I do not mind, because I would not have sunbeam time anyway, because of the rain.

This week, Anty had to say goodbye to one of her favorite characters, Derek Morgan,  on one of her favorite shows, Criminal Minds. Then she got to write about it for Heroes and Heartbreakers. That is a little tricky, because this character was part of a shipped pair, and that ship is now in drydock because Morgan married somebody else and left the job, and the show. It is here, and it looks like this:

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goodbyes are never easy

 

Anty is not sure if she will keep watching the show, but she will give it a few episodes, at least, to find out. She is interested to see the shift in the group dynamics of the rest of the team, and what sort of character will come along to fill the vacant spot. Anty is very aware that Criminal Minds is a crime drama, so the relationships are not the focus of the show, but that is still one of the main reasons that she watches. (Uncle refers to this show as “Soothing Serial Killers,” because Anty finds the show calming. For the most part, that is. There is an older episode where bad things happen to kitties, and she will not watch that one. I fully support her in that regard.)

Besides the relationships, Anty likes the psychological aspect of the show. She likes to see the profilers figure out why the bad guys are doing what they do, and what is the best way to stop them. Getting inside the characters’ heads is one of the things Anty loves best about writing, and that works very well with figuring out how relationships work, because romance novels are all about relationships. Every couple is comprised of two people who have psychological and emotional baggage of their own, and that is not magically solved when they fall in love. If anything, falling in love makes it worse, because that brings a whole new set of problems.

This kind of thing makes Anty very happy. Anty loves solving these sorts of problems and getting her heroes and heroines through their difficulties and on the right road to their hhappy endings at the end of the book. That gets her about as excited as waking up and finding our that the day will be rainy (the only thing better than a rainy day is a snowy day. We did not really have any of those this year. That did not please Anty, but she is over that now and happy to have rain.) When both of those happen at the same time, then that is a perfect storm. Today, Anty  has to go out with Mama and get some things done, but she is taking along her story notebook (and her all purpose notebook, and probably another notebook, in case she needs that one. She may also buy a new notebook, because she is Anty and requires multiple notebooks to survive.) because she does not want to shut off the movie in her head while doing other things, like getting cat food.

When Anty is on the right track with a story, it plays in her head all the time, even when she is doing other things, and, sometimes, she will follow it off to wherever it goes. This is all right when it is writing time, but when it is grocery time, that can have some interesting results. Mama knows Anty’s story world face (I am not allowed to post a picture of it) and can tell when Anty’s body is in the regular world, but  her brain and her heart are somewhere else. That is either a time to let Anty do what she needs to do, or very gently steer her back to the mundane task at had. She will usually be crabby if that is done too quickly, so Mama has to be very careful about when and how to do that. If all else fails, gummi bears can usually do the trick.

Sometimes, though, the only thing to be done is to leave Anty to it and try to keep up if she decides she needs to talk. For Anty, talking and thinking sometimes happen at the same time, and she will not know she knows something until she can talk about it. Then the idea unlocks and she needs to put pen to paper. This is why she has this many notebooks. On rainy days, especially rainy days when Anty is out and around a lot of people, the likelihood of this is a lot higher. I think this is going to be one of those.

It is about time for the humans to leave the house, so that is about it for this week. Until next time, I remain, very truly yours,

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Until next week…

Skye O’Malley Hart-Bowling
(the kitty, not the book)

 

Typing With Wet Claws: New Notebook Edition

annabowling 1 Comment

 

Hello, all. Skye here, for another Feline Friday.  Today is a very special day for Anty. Not only did she finish her very first daily pages book, but is ready to start a new one. There will be a lot of pictures in this post, because the notebook is very pretty, and she wants to show her readers all of it. Here is the front cover:

 

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Another Paris book, but still no Paris stories. Interesting.

 

Anty is really not that surprised that she picked another Paris-themed book for her next daily pages book. In working with her last book, she learned that having a two page spread with a distinct design keeps her focused on filling only those pages and then getting on with work elsewhere, so that immediately told her what she needed to find in the next daily pages book. She still has some others that fit that category, but she will share those at another time, and stick to this one today.

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This is by a different maker. Anty has not had any of their books before.

 

One of the things that is different about this book is that it has six uniqe spreads, rather than four. That works very well, since Anty was thinking about adding another day to her daily pages, anyway. If she does that now, each week will fit nicely in there, with a break on Sundays. The spreads look like this:

 

The colors in this book are much quieter, and the designs more subtle. Anty thinks she might want to use fountain pens in this book, but she does not want to sacrifice a page for an ink test, so this may be a surprise when she starts the new book tomorrow. Ballpoints might be all right, but the fountain pens feel more elegant, and the ink Miss Jenna gave her would fit very well with the plum color that occurs throughout the book. Colors are important to Anty. She thinks part of that is her own natural inclination and part of it is growing up as an artist’s kid. Having colors that agree in depth and value help get her brain into its happy place.

Another thing that gets Anty into a happy place is interior pockets in a notebook. This one has a special shaped pocket. It is inside the front cover, not the back one, which Anty finds unusual and interesting. She does not know if there is something special that is meant to go in there. For now, she will call it an ephemera pocket and figure out what to put in there later. Normally, she puts some business cards in notebook pockets first thing, but her daily pages book won’t be leaving the apartment, so that will not be needed. Hm. Maybe a CD can fit in there, although Anty listens to most music digitally now.

 

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Inside front cover

 

 

Because Anty forgot to bring her lobster into the good light for these pictures, she had to have Mama help her hold the back cover open, so she could take a picture of that spread.

 

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This would have been a two-lobster job, anyway, from the look of things.

 

Since this book did not come with a ribbon marker, Anty will need to decide what sort of bookmark she wants to use. Right now, she is not sure, but will have to check her collection. Maybe something distinctly English, to keep things interesting. All Anty knows right now is that this book is super pretty, and she is looking forward to starting a brand new bunch of daily pages, since the habit has worked well for her so far.

This is not quite seven hundred words yet, so I need to keep going. Anty  will be watching Sleepy Hollow tonight, in case anything shippy happens. She will still watch it if it is a mostly monstery episode, but then there would not be much to write about, which would be okay. She is still in the middle of reading a lot of books for another post that will be on Heroes and Heartbreakers later, and there is still work on her own books.

Those who have been reading this blog for a long time know that Anty sometimes gets discouraged. Writing these daily pages, that are for her and her alone, have been a big help in dealing with that. They are a time to focus on her work and her voice, and help her remember she does not have to compare or compete with anybody. A little bit every day, and look, after  while, there is a whole book. I think that is pretty special, and it works for novels as well as daily pages. Anty will definitely be keeping with this habit.

If it is true that a picture speaks a thousand words, then I have been talking a very long time today.  That is about it for this week. Until next time, I remain very truly yours,

 

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Until next week…

 

Skye O’Malley Hart-Bowling
(the kitty, not the book)

Adieu, Daily Pages (Book)

annabowling 4 Comments

On October 26th this year, I decided to start writing my own version of daily pages. One two page spread, every weekday, no matter what. If I was late, or missed, I had to make it up. No skipping. No censoring. Whatever was in my head went on the page. Domestic tornadoes, family stuff, existential angst, my Hewig and Hamilton obsessions, books I’ve been reading, thoughts on books I’ve been writing. Sims. Tea. Random thoughts. Writer things. Domestic warrior queen things. Me things. Yesterday, I started on the last signature of this volume. It’s taken me seven months. So, what did I learn?

A few things. One, setting aside time to record my thoughts is essential for anchoring myself in the work of writing. Nobody is going to see this, except for whoever goes through my stuff when I have completed my life cycle (not planning on that anytime soon, so there will be many more of these volumes) so Hypercritical Gremlins are not allowed. This is for me, and me alone. This is putting on my own oxygen mask before tending others. I remember dragging my Martian-death-flu-riddled body into my office because I needed to fill pages, dagnabit. I’m not going to guess how much sense those pages made (probably not a lot) but getting the discipline in there was and is key.

When I realized I was on the last signature, I remembered that I hadn’t taken any pictures of the blank pages, in what is, hands down, my favorite notebook I’ve ever used for this purpose. I’ve attempted others, but this is the first one I’ve come this close to filling, and, as the habit is now entrenched, I don’t see anything coming between me and that.

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Since yesterday was a domestic tornado day, I didn’t get to my pages until after 5PM, but even with groceries to be put away, all family members arriving home at the same time, and Skye needing to collect on back food and scritches for the time we were away, my first priority was – pages. Also pictures, because I wanted to save some record of what the book looked like before I got my hands on it. My lobster friend, Dashing John, (thanks, Mary) wanted to help out, because this book does not open flat.

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I still don’t have any ideas for Paris-set stories, but as soon as I saw this gorgeous Punch Studio specimen, I knew this one was special. It became my morning pages book, and I’m going to miss it. I have candidates for its successor, and at least one of them is also Paris-themed, but it won’t be the same, and that has me feeling nostalgic.

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This particular book has seen me through a lot. New relationships come into my life, and old ones gone out of it. The ups and downs of Real Life Romance Hero’s health and his move to a new job. The aggravation of my Sims 3 installation going wonky, and ripping the whole thing out and putting basegame back in, because yes, I do need gaming. Physical things. Spiritual things. Writing things. It’s a time capsule, and now that Friday will mean it’s time to close that capsule, and put it on the shelf of completed notebooks, I don’t want to let it go. I work a lot of stuff out on these pages. Some of it, I’m still working.

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But back to things I’ve learned. The visuals on the page anchor me. Even when I don’t know what I’m going to write on a given morning, there’s an image right there. I can write about that. Do I like the colors? The art? Do I know what that landmark is? What ink do I want to use on this page? What kind of pen? The visual connection matters, and, since the designs cycle through the four shown, I’m not tempted to keep on going when I reach the end of my “assignment.” Different picture, different ideas, different day. Close the book, put it back on the shelf and get thee to some novel work.

Some days, novel things do find their way into my morning pages, and that’s okay, too.  Whatever is in my head is what goes down here, and I can move things to my novel books later and/or continue them there. There are days when Hero and/or Heroine poke their heads over my shoulder and want to talk, and there are days when I write a bullet point list of what’s in the refrigerator. Most days are somewhere in between.

I’ve loved watching the bookmark (a piece of paper from a Punch Studio notepad) move from the front of the book, to the back. I’ve loved the harmony of the art not being the same, but page and marker agreeing with each other, and I will probably tuck that notepad page into the back cover of this book when I’m done. They’ve bonded by now. The next book will have something else as its marker. I don’t know if any of the candidates have built in ribbon bookmarks, or I should say, I don’t remember. It doesn’t matter.

What does matter is that I’m excited about starting the new book, deciding what pen(s) I will use, what color(s) of ink, probably intuitively when it’s time to plunk myself down on Monday morning and begin the new adventure. This new book will know Her Last First Kiss as the current project, not a pile of angsty possibilities. This new book will know the me that I am now, evidence of the me who lived in the past seven months tucked away with the sheet from the notepad. Some months from this coming Monday, I will tuck that book away, too, and start on another. Circle of stationery? Maybe so, but what I do know is that I’ve found something that works for me, and isn’t that the whole reason we try new disciplines in the first place?

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Typing With Wet Claws: Reading Room Edition

annabowling 2 Comments

Hello, all. Skye here, for another Feline Friday. Right now, Anty is focused on getting the other humans settled in their tracks for the day so that she can get on with hers, so it is a good thing I am the one who is blogging.

Anty has a lot of reading to do this week, and I mean a lot.  Here are only three of the books on her TBR shortlist. You have seen them before, if you read Anty’s entries and not only mine. She needs to get them read so that she can write about them, and have time for the next three that come after them.

 

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so it begins..

That is not all Anty has to read, because there are still other library books, for pleasure (that she does not have to write about, but probably will, because she is Anty) and she has chapters from Critique Partner Vicki that have been sitting in her inbox for long enough that she is ashamed. For one of them, she is really ashamed, but she is very happy Critique Partner Vicki is making such good progress toward The End. That is a very good thing.

 

Anty also  has to read her own work, because she somehow managed to delete a whole section of her Scrivener file. That is okay, because that section was one she had originally written in longhand, in her Big Daddy Precious notebook. Anty says longhand has saved  her um, writing, more than a few times. Plus, writing with a fountain pen helps her feel more connected to her historical characters. I would mention that using a dip pen would be even more accurate, but that might give her ideas.  I have heard the words, “pen cull” around here recently, so I do not know if bringing new pens, and even a new kind of pen, into the house is a very good idea. We have seen what happens when Anty is trusted with bottles of ink. In case you missed it, this is what happens:

 

She will probably get one anyway, because once she gets an idea in her head, it usually stays there. Also, they sell them at the art store sometimes, and we are talking about the human who has been known to burn wine and fireplace scented candles at the same time, to make sure she knows what that smells like when it is important to a scene. Uh oh. I think I may have inadvertently given her an idea.

Living with a writer human has its occupational hazards. One would think that a writer human would be reading all the time that they are not writing. Anty says she only wishes it were so. Even with books on  her e-reader, tablet, phone and laptop, not to mention paper books from the library, Heroes and Heartbreakers, bookstores, and rereads and new reads of books she already owns, there are still other things to be done to help keep the household running, and, sometimes, reading gets pushed to the periphery. (Anty is very proud that I am a kitty who knows how to properly use words like “periphery.” That is one of the perks of being an author’s kitty.)

Besides reading novels and manuscripts, Anty also has to read for research. Here is where I can give you an interesting piece of trivia, in case it ever comes up: Anty does not use research books for the majority of her research. That is not how her brain works. Her favorite method is to talk to experts and pick their brains, and if she can get into a living history museum that is pertinent to her needs, that is the best. Yes, she will play along with the interpreters, and have a persona on hand. Mama knows that, when they find themselves in a living history museum together, Mama is Anty’s um, employee. Mama is fine with that, which is a good thing, but I think Anty would probably do it anyway, because Anty loves living in other times for a little while. (She likes living in our time, for things like the Internet, central heating/cooling and gummi bears.)

Sometimes, these worlds blur. Earlier this week, when Anty was on her way back from her meeting with N, she walked through the park, and found herself caught in the middle. Since Hero in Her Last First Kiss is an artist, Anty needed to know more about what it was like to be an artist in the late eighteenth century. She would get bored reading a big nonfiction book, and does not know any experts in that area right now, so she hit the Internet, to look up artists who actually lived then. Well. On her walk home, and on her next few walks through, it all looked like a Gainsborough painting. The trees, the water, the light, the colors, all of it.

Even when she saw a gentleman sitting on the grass by the lake, her  mind translated things back a few centuries. The pose would have been right at home in an eighteenth century portrait, the expression, and the power paunch was hot stuff back then. (Anty says do not worry, Hero does not have a power paunch.) All Anty’s brain had to do was translate the modern suit to a period-appropriate one, and imagine a powdered wig on the gentleman’s head. She had to remind herself to keep walking and not stare, because nonwriters (and to be fair, there is no way to know if said gentleman fit into that category or not; writers can be anywhere) usually do not understand that sort of thing. That also reminded Anty of an interesting tidbit that will be useful in Hero doing his job; portrait painters often bought premade backgrounds with figures already in them – except for the faces. Those, they had to put in themselves. I suppose that saved a lot of time, when they had to get portraits made quickly, because they did not  have cameras back then.

Anty says I have been very blabbery  and she needs the computer back, so that is about it for this week. Until next time, I remain very truly yours,

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Until next week…

Skye O’Malley Hart-Bowling
(the kitty, not the book)

Signs of (Writing) Life

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Right now, I am in my comfy chair, next to a soon to be opened window, cup of tea at the ready, headphones in, blog window open. I had a post typed out, but accidentally trashed it when I got up to take pictures to go with said entry, so I’m going to babble here, stick the pictures up anyway, and see where that takes me.

Today, our temperatures here in upstate NY should top 70. The waterfowl are back in the lake at the park. On my walk home from my meeting with N yesterday, one of the male Canada geese (should I be calling him a Canada gander?) rather pointedly strutted his stuff for the benefit of the Canada goose ladies. Waterfowl romance season, it would seem, has begun. It feels early for that, but if goose love is in the air, it must be spring.

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In less than two weeks’ time, I will have filled my morning pages book. I started this one on October 26th. I’m looking forward to writing the last word on the last page and starting a new notebook (I have a few candidates in my stash already) but I’ll miss the gorgeous pages inside this one. Pretty pages make me want to write more, and knowing there is a set place where I must stop helps me focus on what I want to say in that space.

 

 

Hacking my plain cardboard binder for Her Last First Kiss clicked like wildfire. I love when colors and textures suggest themselves, and it’s easy to see where one choice flows into the next. This is my story bible, with all pertinent information gathered in one place, easily accessible. Times and distances between locations (and noting when our historical people would need to change horses matters, people) and who went to school where, owns what, and employs whom. My best way into this sort of thing is to let myself blunder blindly ahead and, after I smack into a few (dozen) walls, I’ll find what works, and then get to it. Housemate has threatened me with bodily harm if I attempt to use a regular binder again, though there is still some hacking to do.

I need to Mod Podge the cover that slipped oh so easily into the plastic pocket of the old binder (but then I never wanted to use the old binder because the plain white bothered me, so tradeoff there) and there are no pockets to hold loose papers. I can buy those at the office supply store, though, stick some coordinating paper on them, and glue the kraft envelope on the inside of the back cover, to hold smaller ephemera. I blame Moleskine for giving me a need for back cover pockets on pretty much all notebooks, including binders.

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I’m working, I promise

 

These babies are all set to be my constant companions for this week, as I’m prepping for a post at Heroes and Heartbreakers. I did want to increase my reading for this year, and to write more book related posts for H&H, so I’d say I’m doing all right on that front. Who needs sleep when one has books? Seriously, if that could be worked out, I would be a very happy camper. In the meantime, blocking out reading time as though I were studying for a college class is the best way for me to make sure the work gets done. Family has been informed that, when my nose is in these books, I am working.

 

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Reading that is not related to any posts (as far as I know) also needs to happen, because that also fits under the umbrella of “study.” I’m very curious about Kerrigan Byrne’s The Highwayman, and have heard wonderful things about it, so can’t wait to start that. Elizabeth Hoyt’s latest Maiden Lane novel is an auto-read, so that’s going to happen, especially since it fits with my immersion in all things Georgian. I’m still determined to get back on the Bertrice Small horse (and the fact that the book I picked, The Border Lord’s Bride, is number two in its series means I will have to go back and read book one, A Dangerous Love, because that’s how I roll) and I’m still devouring  realistic YA like a starving hyena. Seeing notice of an upcoming David Levithan release in the current issue of Romantic Times Book Reviews magazine made me literally squeal (Skye is used to this kind of thing) when I read it in the upcoming releases section.

Okay, there’s the magic 700 word threshold to call this blog entry good enough and traipse off to century 18 with Hero and Heroine. See you later, Liebchens.

In a Bind(er)

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Sticking with your own style is incredibly important. It’s exactly what you should do. You should never allow someone to talk you out of your natural style or water down your writer’s voice.
— Nat Russo

 

Right now, I am in my comfy chair, duck blankey in my lap, cup of tea at the ready, disposable fountain pen now empty. Maybe I’ve been using it more than I thought I was, or maybe I hadn’t checked how full it was when I bought it, but there I was, this morning, in the Laundromat, furiously scribbling notes for a scene for Her Last First Kiss in my pocket sized Hero notebook, with a ballpoint pen. One scene I knew had to happen pushed itself to the front of my brain this morning, and “something has to happen here” turned into a heated exchange between two characters, which may end up getting physical, (I did not see that coming, but Hero’s berserk button gets pushed, and yeah, he might) and propels him into Heroine’s path at a critical moment.

This is what I’ve been going after with all those miscarried stories, all the methods that didn’t work, for the times when the story takes on a life of its own, talks to me, pushes through the whispers of Hypercritical Gremlins and tells me “this is how I go. This is what I look like. Here is what you do next.”

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Part of that is moving my binder materials into the right binder. They’re in a white binder right now, which may possibly bother Housemate more than it bothers me, and plain white anything usually does bother me, so that’s saying something. While I do hold with the old Japanese proverb that a poor workman blames his tools, there’s something about having the right visual setup that clicks with my brain.

Scrapbook paper is for covering the section dividers in my story binder. Pastel sticky notes match the paper that is color-coded for each section. Index cards are for listing scenes and shuffling them around. Sticky index cards? I’m not sure what I’m doing with those yet, but they are super cool and I will find a use for them at some point.

I love the visual component of writing. If I know what the story looks like, not only the faces of hero and heroine, their clothing and such, but the story itself, there’s a thrill that goes with that. While I’m putting together this new binder, Hero and Heroine are over my shoulder, giving advice (Hero is an artist and Heroine likes to manage things, so they have a lot to say) and the story itself simmers on the back burner of my brain. I love that.

Later, I’ll add pictures as needed, maybe song lyrics, maybe lines of poetry or favorite quotes. I’m not sure yet. The physical act of setting up the binder, moving from the plain white temporary binder (Housemate has informed me she is taking said plain white binder away from me once I do transfer everything, so I can’t use it again.) to its permanent binder that has never belonged to anything else. This  new binder, plain cardboard, is a blank canvas -the clean sweep I thought I would find in the white binder- ready to be personalized -more layers- and it feels right.

Last week, N asked me if I would write a second book about Hero and Heroine. That’s a tricky question. First, I write romance, so a direct sequel with Hero and Heroine would need to provide some new obstacle for the love relationship, by that time, the marriage. For the second, I’m so in love with this story right now that I don’t want to think about any others. That’s a good place to be. Then there’s also the question of what the market will bear. I don’t see a lot of direct sequels with the same couples, though there are some serial stories. This doesn’t feel like one of those. I naturally think in standalones anyway, and always have. Do I have ideas? Yes, but this book now. The date is on my calendar, June first as my target for my bullet point draft. Let me get there first and then we will see.

Right now, when I spend time with this story, my heart leaps. The papers and stickies and all the rest are part of the puzzle. I love touching them, moving them around, throwing everything down in haphazard fashion and then making order out of chaos.  I like structure, and I like intuition. This way, I get both. Onward.

 

 

 

 

Typing With Wet Claws: Plot Pants Puzzle Edition

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Hello, all. Skye here, for another Feline Friday. Anty is on a tight schedule today, with hunting for food (she hunts at a place called the “supermarket”) and writing things. She has some research to do for some upcoming articles, and then there is book work, which she thinks really ought to come first (I agree) but she also likes to be the strangest person in the Laundromat, so she likes to do the laundry early. Laundry time is very good time for Anty to sort through ideas in her head, and, if she has her headphone in, and keeps her head down and pen moving on the paper, people generally leave her alone to do exactly that. Well, sometimes, almost-grown-ups ask her how the machines work. If the owner is there (he was not there today, but the custodian was) she will chat with him some.

This week, Anty  has a lot of feelings about what happened to Morgan and Garcia on Wednesday’s Criminal Minds, (or what will apparently not be happening between them in the future, because the writers decided to…what? Oh, sorry. Anty says no spoilers, so I will stop there.) but she did not have to write an article about that, so I cannot give a link to an article that does not exist. What I can say is that she and Uncle had a grumbly conversation about it yesterday -they are both on the same side, so it was not an argument- which showed Uncle’s impressive grasp of romantic arcs and character dynamics, as well as genre expectations and creative choices that limit options once a path has been chosen. Spend enough time around Anty, and these things tend to rub off on a person. Or kitty.

As Anty’s mews, I spend a lot of time around her. Pretty much all of it, except when she leaves the house, since I am an indoor kitty and only leave the house when it is v-e-t time.  It is not v-e-t time now, so I have an up close and personal view of her creative process. When writers get to know each other, they will often ask if they are pantsers or plotters. That means, do they make things up as they go, with no firm plan (or a very loose one) or do they plan things out ahead of time? Anty has come to learn that she has to give a different sort of answer to that question: she is a puzzler. That does not mean she stares at  a blank screen or page and puzzles over what comes next. Well, not all of the time.

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these all fit together

What it does mean is that Anty does not always work from beginning to end. That may sound crazy to some -it did to Anty, at first- but that is how her brain works. Finding things that look like her story also help give Anty visual cues. Since Hero in Her Last First Kiss is an artist (she wanted him to be a musician, but he said no; Anty did not mind too much, because when characters tell her she got them wrong, that means that they are alive inside her head, which is  a good thing.) the visual cues are even more important. They are another piece of the puzzle, and working in notebooks that look like the story helps her feel connected. That is why she is going to hunt at the craft store for some toile patterned cardstock so she can make better dividers for the binder where she keeps important story information. I like that, because I get to play with the strips of paper from the bottom of the cardstock; they are really fun toys. Anty holds one end and wiggles it, then I bat the other end with my paw. Sometimes, I get so into it that I even go back on my hind legs. Since my balance is sometimes special, sometimes, I fall over, but I get right back up, because I like to play that game. Falling over is worth it.

Anty is like that with writing. At one point, she thought that being  punster was the ‘real’ creative path, and she tried that, but she soon felt like she was lost in the middle of the ocean, and did not know what was going on. Some of the stories during that time did not make it. Then, she tried plotting, and that worked better, but the stricter she tried to be with it, the more restrictive it became, and then she found that she could not move. Well, write, the same as when she tried to pay strict attention to word count. I think those actually happened around the same time.

This week, she played with index cards and listed scenes, then transferred that to her binder, color-coded, so she could see where she was missing things and what had to happen when. It literally can be a puzzle, when she sits on the floor with her index cards, or puts sticky notes all over her plotting board. When she can see what is missing, then finding out what goes there is a lot easier. That is probably why she has lots of sticky notes all over her notebook pages, because when the puzzle pieces start fitting together, they really start fitting together. Something that comes clear to her about the end of the book could fill in a hole about something she did not know near the beginning, so she can go back there, put down a sticky note and come back to it on the next pass.

I do not mind this at all, because it means more paper for Anty, which means more toys for me. Granted, I am in one of those learning how to play again phases, but Anty says that fits with her relearning how she works best. I guess that means we are in sync. That is about it for this week, so, until next time, I remain very truly yours,

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Until next week…

Skye O’Malley Hart-Bowling
(the kitty, not the book)

Flowing Into the Next

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Yesterday, I ran out of white index cards.   Yesterday, I saw two mallards swimming in the lake. when I walked home through the park after my weekly meeting with N. I’m not saying that ducks and index cards are related in any specific way, but that’s what came first to mind when I opened the window to write today’s blog.

Today, I danced in the Laundromat, listening to my Broadway selection playlist while I waited for the dryer cycle to complete. Today, I had a brief chat with the Laundromat’s other patron, because I always peek to see what book someone is reading, when caught doing so out in the wild. This time? Shanna, by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss. I gave Other Reader a thumbs up and told her that was a great book she had there.

Other Reader responded that she loved everything she’d read by Ms. Woodiwiss, but this wasn’t the whole book. Someone had thrown it out somewhere, and a chunk was missing out of the end. Readers who love particular books know how big the book is, and this did not look anywhere near thick enough to be all of Shanna. I loved the determination in Other Reader’s voice when she informed me her next step would be the library, to pick up or request a whole copy of the book.  I heartily approve of such actions.

Oddly enough, or maybe not, the book I was reading at the time, Angel in a Red Dress, by Judith Ivory (aka Starlit Surrender, by Judy Cuevas) is also falling apart. It was like that when I got it from the library, chunks of pages unglued from the spine (it’s a paperback) and part of me wants to ask the librarian if I can just have it if it’s going to be destroyed for said falling-apart-edness. Sign of a well loved book, to be sure, and I know, I could go buy my own copy, and probably will, but we’ve bonded, the two of us (but I’ll still do the right thing and return it; I’m not a savage, well, not in that respect.)

I got to page 338 of this particular edition, and I gasped out loud when certain information was revealed. This was one of those “I-did-n0t-see-that-coming” and “of course, how did I not know that all along” moments at the same time. This is a book that makes me gasp and choke and sniffle and want to bash heads and want to hug the pages back together and a number of other reactions non-readers would never understand, but readers and writers do understand. This. This is why I do what I do. This is why I write historical romance. This is what I’m aiming for when I open notebook and/or computer file, every day.

This is why I sat down yesterday, after passing the ducks on my way home after meeting with N, popped Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (okay, I had to watch the movie then, because it was my only chance before the library wanted the DVD back) into my old laptop and got out my stash of index cards, a black Sharpie, and wrote a short description of each scene I know is in Her Last First Kiss on each card. I ran out of cards before I ran out of scenes, which surprised me, but this does mean I get to buy more index cards. They look solid there, in their pile. Hefty, even. Substantial. Like a real book, because they are, encapsulated, the foundation of a real book.

It’s been a while since I had that feeling. The miscarried manuscripts never got to that stage, never put down that root. Maybe because I didn’t know that particular root needed to be there, but, once I started, there it was. One scene spilling into the next, into the next, into the next. Color coding the scenes, when I copied each one onto a sheet of graph paper, with felt-tipped pens, showed me where I have multiple chunks of Heroine scenes. What’s Hero doing through all of that? X, obviously. I’ll figure out the particulars of that later. I’ll know what I need to know, when I need to know it.

What I do know, right now, is that the focus, for me, doesn’t have to fit any prescribed shape, method, or form. Only what works for me. Life is going to happen (the alternative doesn’t make for a lot of writing, really, so good thing there) but  as long as I move from  Once Upon a Time to They Lived Happily Ever After, it’s all good. Ducky, even.

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