writing process

Typing With Wet Claws: Cheaty Cheaty Cheat Cheat Edition

annabowling 2 Comments

Hello, all. Skye here, for another Feline Friday. I have mostly recovered from the Festival of Explosives (the humans call it Fourth of July) but I do not know if I can say the same things about the humans. Having a weekend, then a Monday, then a holiday, then Wednesday acting like a Monday, followed by Thursday where Tuesday usually goes, has Anty off balance. Some might argue she is already off balance, but I mean more than usual. I will talk more about that in a minute, but first I have to talk about where you can find Anty’s writing on the interwebs this week, apart from here. I will give you a hint: it is an unusual week when I get right to that stuff in the first paragraph, but more on that kind of thing later.

First, as always, Anty was at Buried Under Romance this week, and this time, she talked about how romance novels can be fluffy or gritty or any point in between. This is not, to my disappointment, about the amount of cats found in books. I think she should write about that, one of these days. This is not that. This is about the tone of books. That post can be found here, and its link on the main page looks like this:

BURwhynothaveboth

Warning: does not contain actual fluff. 

Since this is the start of a whole new month, it is time to check in and see how Anty is doing on the historical romance challenge. Let’s have a look at that, shall we?

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We are burning daylight here, if we want to get this blog up before Anty has to go out of the house again, so I will not search for the historical romance challenge graphic. Cat’s prerogative.  So far, in 2017, Anty has read almost 44 books (she is within 25 pages of finishing her current read, so I will give it to her) and 21 of those have been historical romance. 22 and 1/3, if we add in historical fiction with romantic elements. I am feeling generous today, because Uncle is home today and that makes me happy. So, basically, 50% of Anty’s reading this year has been historical romance, which is the goal, so well done, Anty. Keep at it. She is still three books behind schedule, soon to be two, because, again, fewer than 25 pages to the end of the book counts. This is acceptable. Toss in a couple of novellas or graphic novels, and boom, back on track. Make it happen.

Here are the books Anty read this past week. Click on the link below the pictures if you want to learn more about them.

 

The book Anty will be finished reading in literally minutes after this entry is posted is Ripe For Seduction, by Isobel Carr.  It is a historical romance, set in Georgian England, which is very relevant to Anty’s interests, and it looks like all the heroes are second, or at least younger, sons, which is also relevant to Anty’s interests, because Hero in Her Last First Kiss is himself a second son, in Georgian England. Anty thought this was the second book in the series, when she got it out of the library, and figured she would be fine, because she had already read the first book, but then she went on Goodreads to add it, and found out she was wrong. It is really the third, and now she has to go get the second, because reading out of order bothers her. As Uncle says, that really frosts her cookies.

Anty has been doing a lot of writing on both Her Last First Kiss and Chasing Prince Charming, so she does need to refill her well at the end of the day. This blog entry is coming later than usual, because Anty had a Skype meeting with Anty Melva, to talk about Chasing Prince Charming, and then had lunch with Anty SueAnn, where they talked about writing and blogging, and, thankfully, pets. Funny story, but Anty SueAnn’s doggie, Bailey, and I are on opposite sides of the smooth vs not smooth floor issue. He prefers carpets to tile/wood/linoleum, whereas I am the exact opposite. Must be a dog thing. I will not pretend I understand, but I accept that is the way he feels.

To be able to talk with Anty Melva, Anty had to do a bit of fancy footwork, to raise her laptop to the right level for video chat. Anty’s laptop works fine, but the screen will go black if opened at a 90 degree angle, so here is what Anty had to do:

LaptopTower

Laptop supported by: makeup case, three novels, binder, and reference book under the writing surface.

Anty noticed that this is the same height as her desktop monitor, so she will be looking into getting an external webcam, so she does not have to do that again. That also means that she can get back to making video blogs again, like this one:

If you would like to know when Anty has a new video blog up, you can subscribe to her YouTube channel here. She hopes to get at least one video blog per week, so please stay tuned.  She did make a very short film starring me, this morning, which you can find on her Instagram. If there is anything you would like to ask Anty, that she can answer in a video blog, please let her know in the comments, or send her an email, using the handy form below:

← Back

Thank you for your response. ✨

That is about it for this week, so, until next time, I remain very truly yours,

skyebanner01

skyebyefancy

Until next week…

Inside-out Week

annabowling Leave a comment

Today is my marathon day. On a Wednesday. That basically never happens, but here it is, smushed together with #1linewed on Twitter, for which I have precisely one instance of the word of the week, “loyal,” from which to pull a quote. I made up for the lack of multiple quotes by whingeing. If this were not my marathon day, I would be sorely tempted to dig through files on my old laptop and ancient USB drives to see if I could find any of the notes for the Redcoat romance I noodled with some years ago, because “loyal” (and “loyalist”) would be all over that thing. Today is my marathon day, however, and that means I am going to mainline caffeine and cram a whole week’s worth of work into one day. One of these weeks, I will not have the need for marathon days, but this is not that week.  I am okay with that.

First thing on these marathon days is to get everything that is not related to creating a second draft of these pages out of the way. There. Done. Off my back, unable to whisper in my ear about how I really should answer that email or do that household chore, because they are already done. Once this blog entry is posted and publicized, I get to diver headfirst back into century eighteen, and play with my imaginary friends. Planner and cookie are sure signs that this is going to be Serious Business, and, while the chances that I am going to find my bed in the wee small hours are high, I’m also excited. This is only partially due to the fact that mainlining of caffeine has already begun.

Most of it is because Ruby and her Hero really do feel like friends (though I would like to think I am nicer to my real life friends than the fictional ones) and I actually do like spending time with them. Time away from them makes me edgy. The whole tracking system I’m trying out right now is, at present, a huge belly flop, but I’m going to stay the course and see how it goes for a full three weeks. That’s what experimenting is for, after all. For today, it’s get this entry up, do some longhand freewriting, reread the first draft of this next chapter, and then jump in and make it better.  As my mom used to say, the more I do, the more I’ll want to do.

This holds true even when life doesn’t want to keep to a schedule. This week, we had a weekend, with lots to do, Housemate out of town, a Monday that wasn’t really a Monday, but not really a holiday, either, and an actual holiday. Toss in there a holiday for another country, which is a special day for certain friends, and has a connection to Her Last First Kiss, and it’s no wonder I spent a good deal of that time getting the day of the week wrong. For a marathon day to happen on a Wednesday, when there’s already a blog entry and #1linewednesday, and plans for the evening, makes part of me want to ask Skye to shove over from her hunker spot under the bed (Skye did not like last night’s fireworks, especially since our neighbors were astonishingly well stocked for the holiday. To their credit, they did have a lovely display, but could have stopped a few hours before they actually did call it a night…which was actually early morning.)

Pressure to crank out a bunch of pages in one day is kind of scary, but the scariest part is the anticipation. Once I get in there, I’ll fall into my characters’ heads, and the minutes and hours of 2017 fall away, replaced by the world of 1784, which is “now” for Ruby and her Hero. They don’t know they’re in a historical. They think they’re in a contemporary.  The sights, sounds, smells, tastes, etc, of 1784 are different from what we have in the modern day, but it’s their modern day. This is their world, and their reality. This is their day-to-day, and they couldn’t care less about what some random person hundreds of years in the future is doing in that tiny green room all day.

Well, Hero would, because I have new art pens, and he would want them. His affinity for my pens is what got us into this mess in the first place, so I may take said pens out for a spin on one of my breaks. The breaks, I have found, are essential. Get some of the work done, get up, move around, get some water, do something to refill the well, and then back to it.

The farther I get into this second draft, the better I know Ruby and her Hero, and the better I know their story. I want to get it right, for them. It’s not always pretty. It’s the stripping away of images they try to present, the defenses they’ve erected around themselves, and letting the other in, to see the real them. That’s scary, because showing their true selves has garnered only rejection in the past, or put them in situations where there are no good choices. Even so, there’s that pull that tells them things might be different this time, that there is someone who actually does understand, that they aren’t the only person who’s ever felt the way they feel. It’s not the story I set out to tell when I went looking for a new story to tell, but it’s the one that found me, and, when I have a marathon day, I’m not running it alone. The characters and the story run with me, all of us, even when a Wednesday is actually Monday. I’m calling that good company.

Habit Tracking, in Theory and Practice

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Happy belated Canada Day to all who celebrate(d.) For those of us south of the US/Canada border, the big summer holiday is tomorrow, July fourth. I, personally, will observe the holiday by changing my desktop wallpaper to something more appropriate (but the maple leaf flag is pretty, and there is a Canadian connection in Her Last First Kiss, so it really is work related,) listening to selections from Hamilton, and getting a flame grilled burger in my stomach by whatever means necessary. Some things are non-negotiable, and that is one of them.

I am not a summer person. I never have been. When I got heat stroke at 22, that sealed it. This fair-skinned, heat-sensitive body does not do summer.  Give me some ice water, a nearby fan, and an ice pack when needed, and wake me in September.  I’ll be fine, really. I have books and notebooks and pen and paper.  Depending on what day it is, I am actually in March of 1784, (okay, verging on April by this point, because I am now thisclose to the halfway mark on draft two of Her Last First Kiss) or in, well, spring again, in the eternal now, in Chasing Prince Charming. Kind of easy to forget what’s going on outside the office when I am elbow deep in one book or another.

Because I did not write “take picture of writing tracker” on my daily task list, I did not get a picture of my writing tracker in my daily carry notebook, but Banastre Lobster did help me get a better shot of my reading tracker.  I’m kind of proud of this one.

 

ReadingTrackerBanastre

reading tracker, with lobster

 

Three days into July, and how am I doing on the reading front, now that I have a tracker? Let’s take a look:

July1st3days
on track so far

 

Knowing that I get to color a teeny tiny square if I read 25 more pages actually does seem to be working.  I always think I can draw a straight line on graph paper without a ruler, but then I try actually doing it, and remember I can’t, so that is why I have multiple rulers on my desk. The other months look a lot neater, and I look forward to turning them into colorful checkerboards, when their turn comes. For right now, though, I’m keeping my eyes on the day at hand. If, okay, when, I read more, that can carry over into tomorrow’s tally, because there are going to be days when I don’t get even 25 pages read, and I want to color all of those squares. Do not ask me why this is the motivation that works; it is, and that’s enough.

Since I now have a reading tracker, it made sense to make a writing tracker, but I can’t do it exactly the same way.  Story time:  one of the RWA chapters proposed having members report their monthly word count on the chapter loop. Many members thought this was a great idea. One other member and I, however, sat there, consumed by immediate panic. Cue Hypercritical Gremlins. Our then-president was quick to assure us that participation was voluntary, not mandatory, but it took a while for pulses to stop racing and the walls to stop closing in around us two unicorns. Word count doesn’t work for every writer. The key to tracking my writing, then, lies in finding out what does.

So far, the plan is to proceed as normal for the next three weeks, and then look back at what I did, then figure out how I did it.  How much did I produce, and what were the conditions around that? What prep work did I do on the days when I produced more, and what were mitigating factors on the days I produced less? I will probably count pages instead of words, because that’s how my brain works, and, by the end of the three weeks, I will probably have something that looks neater (and probably prettier) than this, but it’s a good place to start:

 

WritingTracker1stTry

1st try at writing tracker, with lobster

 

 

Is this going to have any effect on my productivity? I have no idea, but if all this experiment does is rule out this method of tracking, it’s still time more spent. Here’s the deal: I want to get more books written and out there, in the hands of readers. That means I have to produce more books, and get them out there, into the hands of readers. After far too long a time without a new release, and having two second drafts going at one time, (a third waiting sometimes patiently, sometimes not, if I count the medieval novella, which I usually do) this means that, theoretically, I could have three new titles on their way to readers next year. That’s pretty exciting.

Although six-year-old me would undoubtedly scream and kick the back of the Rambler my mom drove my protesting self to first grade in, on a day when I’d tried my best to convince her to let me stay home, her voice remains clear in my head: the more you do, the more you’ll want to do. If that means I get to uncap a brush pen and fill in another tiny square on a piece of graph paper, I am there, baby.

This also has a connection to Her Last First Kiss.  Ruby also keeps meticulous records that relate to her work and her interests, so I think she’d approve of me charting her and her Hero’s progress this way. Dominic, the hero of Chasing Prince Charming, also keeps a notebook close at hand, and makes use of it a few times during the course of the book, and his heroine, Meg, is a writer with a goal of restarting her own career, so I feel close to them when I’m planning and tracking, too.  If this method of tracking doesn’t work, then I’ll try something else, but the destination remains the same: get both books to The End of draft two, and embark on the next great adventure.

 

Monday Off the Map

annabowling 2 Comments

Today is the first Monday in a while that is not going to be my now-traditional marathon of getting a revised Her Last First Kiss chapter ready for a Tuesday morning meeting with N. Not that I’m not going to be spending time with  Ruby and her Hero, because I definitely am. Those guys are my happy place, and I’ll be logging some time on revisions for Chasing Prince Charming (and remembering it’s Prince now, and not Prints.) as well. Domestic tornadoes swept through for both N and me this week, hence the break from routine. I like my routine.

Blogging three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (okay, Friday is Skye day, but it’s still a post) here, with Monday and Wednesday always a shot of my desk for the day, is a part of that. Usually, that means I’m working on my desktop, but not always. I do sometimes miss the pink laptop photos, though I may want to figure out why I have to keep the screen at a funky angle if I want to actually see what I’m writing. If I open the laptop at the normal ninety degree angle, the screen goes blank. I have to nudge it forward a bit, and do some adjusting with my lap desk. That’s why my laptop’s travels have been curtailed as of late. Good thing writing can happen anywhere.

:brief interlude of scrolling mindlessly through Facebook, then trying to remember what I was talking about here, because Mondays are always marathon days and not having one is weird.:

So. Routine. Let’s get back to that. I like routine. I like planning. I like my morning pages, daily tasks, and having a set concept for my blog post pictures means I have to make a new cup of tea, because the old one is empty. More tea is almost always a good thing. Today, one of my variations from the norm will be to dig through the archives for Chasing Prince Charming, back when Melva and I had tagged the then-unnamed WIP with the name of one of the characters, because that’s how we naturally referred to it. Which was probably the story’s cue to take a couple of turs, but that all worked out.

Right now, I am in second draft mode on two different projects, which is a heck of a lot farther along than I was last year, and I am more than okay with that. At the same time, I want to be on to the next phase already. I want to have these drafts done (and probably one more pass after) and making the rounds, no, scrap that, out in the world. That’s where I want them to be. That’s where I want to be. I want to be out there on social media, splashing the “hey, look at my awesome new books” posts with cover reveals and all that other good stuff, all over social media, and that will happen. It won’t, however, happen today, because I am in the middle of that particular journey, not at the end. I’m impatient that way.

As much as I would like for there to be a fast forward button on the whole writing/editing process, there isn’t one. What it takes is butt in chair, fingers on keyboard, pen on paper, day after day after day after day after day, until, uh, wow, okay, looks like we got us a draft there. A first draft, a second draft, a third one, a hey, look, somebody wants to see the whole thing, and, after that, hey, they liked it. They really liked it. Can they please publish it and give us money? Okay. Or, because we are living in the age of indie publishing, there’s the moment of y’know what, I can do this thing myself. Then the moment where we do, learning about formatting and platforms and covers and blog tours and all that other good stuff.

None of that can happen, though, until there is actually a marketable draft, so it’s left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot, day after day. Not glamorous, not exciting, but there is a part of me that actually likes the marathon. I like the dedication, the sweeping clean of everything else besides the work at hand, the staying at the keyboard until the Job Is Done, even if that happens in the wee small hours, and I might possibly be mistaken for a Walking Dead extra on my way to meet with N. That’s not going to happen this week, and part of me misses it. Not sure what that says, but, right now, that’s where that section of my brain is camped.

I do have a plan for the day, and a good portion of the out-of-sorts-ness can be calmed by that. Look at the list. Do the thing. Do the next thing. Repeat until done. Not that different after all. What sorts of writing routines are musts for the rest of you?

Typing With Wet Claws: Do The Work Edition

annabowling 2 Comments

Hello, all. Skye here, for another Feline Friday. Anty is a little loopy this week, because it is summertime, there have been some domestic tornadoes, and she is on the second draft of two different books at the same time, and I have caught her eyeing that postapocalyptic medieval novella again, because she saw a premade cover that reminds her very much of her heroine, and the book is already finished, and sitting there in the hard drive, with the edits halfway done already. I am not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but Anty is happiest when writing/editing, so I guess we will see.

Anyway, before I can talk about anything else, I have to talk about where to find Anty’s writing this week on the interwebs. This week, it is easy, because her weekly post at Buried Under Romance is basically it, unless you count Facebook. This week, her post is about tropes, and she would like to hear all about your favorites. I like stories with cats in them, as long as those cats are still okay at the end of the book. Those are the best.  Her post is here, and its link on the main page looks like this:

 

BURtrope

Image editing program is still giving Anty guff, so excuse lack of frame.

 

Now comes the part where I have to talk about Anty’s Goodreads challenge. If you would like to follow Anty’s reading progress this year, you can do that here.  This week, Anty is holding steady at two books behind schedule, but she has moved her count up to forty books, as you can see in this week’s image:

BURreadingchallenge062317

Go, Anty, go. Her new addition is a historical romance, The Wild One, by Danelle Harmon, and her current reads are all historical romances, so I will call that good progress and discipline. Anty does plan to write a review later, as soon as she is current with other things. Those other things being mostly domestic tornado management and writing/editing books.

Some weeks, Anty does not have a lot to say on the interwebs, but that does not mean she is not working. Most writers are usually doing story stuff inside their heads, even when they are not making the clickety-clack sound on the keys, or pen squiggles on some paper.  I am very proud of Anty for getting all those pages done on Monday, and ahead of schedule. That is a good thing, and she certainly plans to do it again.

Earlier today, Anty met on Skype (I was not called upon to provide Skye Pee, but I am always good for that. Did I ever tell you that my previous vet said that he had never seen so much pee come out of one cat at one time, as he did when I hiked my fuzzy butt over the edge of his exam table, and let loose? It was not my fault. He had been feeling around my tummy area, and a kitty’s got to do what a kitty’s got to do. I kind of had a reputation at that vet, but that is all behind me now. Hah. Behind. I see what I did there.) to talk about edits to Chasing Prince Charming. Regular readers will note that they changed the spelling, because they did not want to be thought of as bad spellers, or have to explain that the non-traditional spelling is because the heroine is an author who wants to get back into print. So that happened.

What also happened was that Anty and Anty Melva have to figure out how to edit a whole book that they wrote together, because they have never written together before. Thankfully, it has been a pretty easy process, and most of their notes for this first section have been basically the same. They  have not yet had any major disagreements, which they count as a very good thing. Anty Melva is not too keen on this part of the writing process, but Anty actually loves it.

For Anty, the editing/revision/rewriting process is fun, because the hard work of writing the first draft is already done. The book exists, hurrah. Now it is only a matter of making it better. Sometimes this involves checking things like verb tense, making sure somebody’s outfit does not change in the middle of a scene (this is apparently more likely when there are two writers telling one story) and that kind of thing. I should take a moment to mention that the clothes problem would not be a problem if they wrote about cats. We wear the same fur all the time. Well, apart from shedding, that is. Anty and Uncle and Mama have a theory that all of my fur migrates to my neck before it sheds. Anty thinks that the same thing holds true for fur from other cats. I cannot tell her if that is right or wrong, because it is a cat trade secret.

Hm. It would appear I have digressed. My apologies. The point is, there are a lot of steps involved in getting a book from the writer’s (or writers’) head(s) to the readers, but each one of them is important. Life happens to everybody, even writers (that is why they have things that they can write about, after all) and “write a book” or “resume a career” can seem a very tall order, but “write this scene,” or “edit these pages,” well, that’s doable. Do enough of those, in the right order, on the same story (or stories) and, before you know it, there is a whole book there, where the big fuzzy mess of ideas used to be.

That is about it for now. Until next time, I remain very truly yours,

skyebanner01

skyebyefancy

Until next week…

 

Reverse Engineered Writing Goals

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So, it’s summer. I’m sitting here at my desk, ice water at hand, and absolutely no idea of what to write for today’s entry. These are my least favorite entries. I like to be prepared.  I like to know, in advance, what I’m going to write, how I’m going to write it, and even about how long it’s going to take. That last one can be fuzzy, from “get it done in time for lunch” to “okay, it’s Monday, let’s cram a week’s worth of writing into one marathon session that ends at 3AM and involves me snapping at family members who get too near my lair,” but I like structure. I like goals. Okay, theme there. I can go with that.

This Monday, I was fully prepared for one of my marathon sessions (which I do not exactly like, as a rule, but, sometimes, a writer does what a writer does, and my thirst for an unbroken record of always having pages to bring to critique session knows no bounds) but that’s not exactly what happened. I have no idea how this whole thing worked, but, by the time 3AM rolled around, I was sound asleep, because A) I had finished at midnight, and B) not only had I gone over my targeted page count, but eh, I’d finished “early,” so why not poke at the next chapter? Which was when I told myself that was a good time to save, print, pack it in and get some sleep.

Critique session went great, and I headed back home, even more pumped to get this second draft done and introduce Ruby and her Hero to the world at large. I also had another goal in mind: how can I do that again, next week? Hence, the reverse engineering.  Instead of looking at the goal (in this case, chapter twelve revised/expanded, and me getting a good night’s sleep) and figuring out how to get there (which, from a certain point of view -which would be crabby, often, when one is still figuring out this whole getting back on the horse thing) maybe try a different tactic. Take a look at a goal already met, and figure out how that happened.

First thing I looked at was, what did I do differently this Monday, that I did not do on all those collapse like a zombie at 3AM Mondays? This wasn’t plopping myself in the chair the second I got up and consistently pounding keys until my brain refused to go any farther. I took a lunch break, as in away from the desk, read for pleasure (another goal that might benefit from reverse engineering) and even took an (extremely brief) nap.

Hm. Breaks, you say? Interesting. When it was time to Skype with an online friend, who does know Mondays are my marathon days, I didn’t try to work while she wanted to share about her current playthrough of her favorite computer game, but the enthusiasm (and seriously pretty screenshots) was a boost that allowed me to go back to the work afterward, with an extra spring in my metaphorical step.

Granted, this is a second draft, but there were still scenes to expand and revise, and I am not going to put a time stamp on how long it took me to research guild signs, or figure out how much Hero could see, hanging out of a carriage window, with a tricorne hat pulled low over his eyes (spoiler: it is hard for a tall ginger dude in a bespoke suit to remain inconspicuous in public, especially when he’s trying to be sneaky) and the scene is one I especially like, because it’s when Hero’s world shifts, which forces him to make a leap, even if he doesn’t realize he’s making that leap until he’s already airborne. Metaphorically airborne, that is.

The chapter that comes next, I’m even more looking forward to, maybe because it means that I am now officially into the middle of the second draft. This past chapter was where Hero hit his point of no return. He can’t squiggle around in midair like a cat and land on his feet, back in his comfortable world, like it’s no big deal, and pick up life where it was before he made the choice he can’t take back. Maybe he and I have something in common on that one. Time will tell.

In the best of all possible worlds, I won’t have to have Monday marathons at all, but domestic tornadoes come through, and the book still needs to get done. Today, my focus is on Chasing Prints Charming, and I know that Ruby and her Hero are going to be doing their thing on the back burner, so they’ll be ready for our next round.

So, what have I learned for that next round?

  1. stay hydrated
  2. sprints, not marathons
  3. take breaks that are actually breaks
  4. know what I’m going to write before I write it, or what the goal of that particular revision will be (i.e. always take a road map)

That’s the hypothesis, anyway. We’ll test that theory next week, and I’ll let you know how it goes. Writer friends, what have you learned about the way you work, by reverse engineering a successful session/chapter/insert own goal here?

 

Title Goes Here

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You must do the thing you cannot do.
          – Eleanor Roosevelt

Rain started to fall as soon as I opened the document to start writing this blog entry. I will take that as a sign. It’s been oppressively humid here in New York’s Capitol Region, which is not that great for the creative brain, especially when that brain is going on roughly two hours of sleep. Nevertheless, it is Monday, which usually means a marathon writing session on Her Last First Kiss. Right now, I am dripping in sweat, and having wild fantasies about throwing the workday to the nonexistent wind and collapsing in front of the box fan with a tall glass of ice water and making some headway in rereading Shanna. I am also rethinking my decision to have hot tea with my breakfast, but my new pink skull and crossbones mug was too perfect not to take out on its maiden voyage this morning. I will always love my dearly departed Union Jack mug, but I think it would want me to find love again, and not mourn it forever, drinking out of mugs that are only okay, but don’t stir my heart. There’s a better look at the new baby on my Instagram, here: https://www.instagram.com/p/BVhS7arBVCj/

Absolutely no way I could leave that baby to languish in the cupboard without at least one cup of tea under its belt. I have no regrets. even if I do have an ice pack at the base of my spine. I was not built for summer. I’m fair skinned and light eyed, sun and heat sensitive. This would be perfectly suited for the British Isles, from which my biological ancestors most likely hailed, but somebody did something, and they got a trip across the Atlantic Ocean, voluntarily or otherwise. A couple of centuries later, here I am, but my imaginary friends, by and large, generally lean toward those British Isles, though Ruby, the heroine (aka Heroine) of Her Last First Kiss, is half Russian. Not that she’s ever actually been to Russia, but that’s where one of her parents was born, and where they went back to, after life took a turn they didn’t like.

I didn’t plan for Ruby to be half Russian, but that showed up all on its own, and, as these things are wont to do, did so in the very first line. Well, okay, then. Those kinds of things tell me that the story is real and alive, and has a mind of its own, which generally tells me we are going to work well together. Same thing when Ruby turned up her nose at the harpsichord I tried to give her in the initial draft, and informed me she liked pistols instead. Same thing with Hero refusing to accept my wishes that he be blond and play the violin. He was a ginger, thankyouverymuch (still is, and now I can’t imagine him any other way) and didn’t even want to look at the violin, but took a very keen interest in my pen collection. I let him (metaphorically) play with them, and he took to those pens like a duck to water. To write letters, yes, but mostly to draw with, because he would very happily spend his entire life drawing with pen and ink, but his painting skills were not up to the same standard, which led to his, ah, secondary career. That all spilled out of him while he doodled on scrap paper. I didn’t want to disturb him, so I let him ramble.

I also took notes. A lot of notes. This is the reason I have a lot of notebooks. Also because “notebook” may be my favorite genre, because I can put literally anything in them, but that’s another story for another day. Why was it that Hero never felt more himself than when he had pen and in in hand, but felt so lost with paint and brush that he lost all faith in himself? Of course that meant that, to get to his Happily Ever After, to be the man Ruby needs, the man worthy of her, he has to face that fear and actually paint a portrait. Actually, two, because painting two portraits is the only thing that terrifies him more than painting one.  Sure, he can probably paint the one, because it’ s a debt of honor, but then to do it again? There’s the real test.

Since Ruby and her Hero live in the eighteenth century, they’d have no idea who Eleanor Roosevelt is, but, by the end of the book, they get the drift of her message. Ruby and her Hero, and their entire story, came to me, almost all of a piece, when I was busy bashing my head against a brick wall, trying to come up with another sort of story entirely. Actually, a few of them, all of which now languish in folders in my old laptop, the one with the external keyboard and fuzzy internet connection. These characters, and this story, they found me. This wasn’t the sort of book I was looking to write, but it’s the right one for the writer I am right now, and there isn’t so much a question of “how do I handle X?” but “well, X works like this in this book.”

All of that makes these marathon days, when they come, not something to dread, but to treat as maybe a marathon of a favorite TV show; get comfy, stay hydrated, keep snacks on hand, and settle in for the long haul. That, I can most definitely do.

 

 

 

From Back Burner to Front

annabowling 6 Comments

Right now, it is eighty-nine degrees. I am at my desk, having lunch (chicken sandwich, for those keeping track of these things) and food is helping my mood somewhat. There is an overhead fan in my office but I haven’t turned it on yet, because it’s also connected to the light, and I haven’t figured out yet if I want the moving air more than I want the extra heat from the lightbulb. Probably negligible heat, but still a factor.

I don’t do well in heat.  I had heat stroke when I was twenty-two, and, ever since, I’ve had to take precautions when the temperatures soar. Normally, my Mondays are the days to tuck in and make sure everything is ready for critique meeting with N. I love those mornings, enough that, if I need to make Monday a marathon writing/revising day, I will do that. I can always nap on Tuesday afternoon, and there will be enough of a caffeine buzz from the endless cups of tea (hot in cold weather, iced in hot) to carry me through the meeting, and the feeling from a really good critique is enough to put an extra perk in my steps. That’s all normally.  This week isn’t normal.

Early last week, I made note of the weather forecast. Three days in a row, ninety degrees or above? Definitely worthy of notice. Since the weekend, tightly scheduled, overlapped with the first of those days, I knew, even last week, that Monday was not going to be a good day to get a lot of work done. I’d be tired (yep) and stressed (yep) and walking through the park in over-ninety degree temperatures would not be in my best interests. I asked N if we could meet on Thursday, and she agreed. Okay. That’s some breathing room. Not an excuse to slack off, but breathing room, to take into account that I’m going to have the brains of a bowl of butterscotch pudding during the heat of the day for Monday and Tuesday. Much better to use that time for taking in, rather than putting out.

Today, I have Season Two of Poldark. I have my travel mug full of ice water, a fully charged Kindle, and a hardcover book club edition of Shanna, by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss. There’s a box fan in the living room, next to my comfy chair (and the window seat) and another in the bedroom. Skye will hang with me, wherever I am, and, if I need some white space in my brain, I can play in an art journal, which might play nicely with Poldark or other viewing.  I have my first draft pages and notebook at hand as well, and it’s more likely than not that I will pick them up at some point in all of this, my brain moving things from back burner to front. Not that I’m turning the stove on in this weather. I’m not a masochist.

Yesterday, when I walked home from Panera (after four hours of quality time with a friend I need to see more often) the sun had begun to dip below the horizon, and the temperatures had fallen to a brisk eighty-five degrees. Condensation from my cold drink seeped through the napkin I had wrapped around it. My friend and I walked together as far as the park, where our paths diverged. Her apartment was in one direction, mine in the other, and we each headed home. My path took me along the lake. A female mallard paddled out from the shore, followed by six fuzzy baby ducks. There are few things more peaceful than a bunch of baby ducks paddling after their mama, on a summer night.

I did not get a picture. Mama duck headed back for her hideyhole, and the babies followed. I’m okay with that. Now I know where they like to hang out at that time of day, when the sun goes down and is no longer trying to kill me with its fiery blaze. It’s like that with taking a rest day. Even if I don’t get to Hero and Heroine today (though I suspect I will, even if not at a Marathon Monday level) they’ll be there. I know where they hang out, and they know where to find me. We can’t quit each other, and I am more than okay with that.

 

Do What You Love

annabowling 1 Comment

I’m going to thankblame Rose Grey for this one. I first met Rose a few years back, when we ended up at the same table for one of the meals at NECRWA’s annual conference. The entire table clicked, and we became the Last Call Girls, after the time we shut down the dining room at another meal, because we’d been so involved in our conversation that we did not notice that A) the meal was over, and B) we were literally the only people in the room not employed by the hotel. The staff hadn’t wanted to disturb us because they thought we were having an important business meeting, which we totally were. I’m not going to say what kind of business, but that’s the story we’re sticking to on this one.

Anyway, Rose is delightful in person, and I jump on her new blog entries like a starving hyena  would chow down on an unattended plate of Kobe beef.  Besides blogging and providing fascinating dinner conversation, Rose writes contemporary romance, and she does it at a desk that sounds a lot like mine.  Before I read Rose’s  blog entry on writing rituals, I hadn’t thought much about not having my secretary desk all the way open, all the time. That way, I could always be ready, wouldn’t have to set up anything, but then there were those words about adding a sense of ritual to the writing process, and hmm.

If I closed my desk at the end of a session, I’d be free to do other things. Leave the office, go home, as it were even though my office is already in my home. If the desk were closed, then I could open it at the start of the day. This wasn’t possible with the monitor in front of the cubbyholes,. and I do love my cubbyholes. Combine that with my other friend, H, getting used to her contacts and our resulting discussion on being nice to eyes and how it is a good thing for writers, and double hmm.

Because this desk predates my time on this earth, it has developed a few idiosyncracies over the years. One of which is that the chains which had always held the work surface open finally gave their all, about the time we moved back to New York, and, if I wanted to have a work surface, period, I had to find some other way of supporting it. The answer was close at hand; the drawers beneath it. Open one. Boom, support. You’re welcome. I am not proud that it took me until Monday (as in the Monday that is two days ago) to figure out that, if I opened the left drawer instead of the right one, I would have somewhere to put my legs. Hopefully, I will be quicker on the uptake next time.

Having somewhere to put my legs makes both computer work and handwriting a lot easier, which makes the whole process of writing my morning pages that much easier. Since I’m still early pages into my current morning pages book, I boost the writing surface on the facing page with another notebook, so it’s at the same level as the pages with hundreds of others to support them. This morning, as I put said notebooks away, I noticed I had a theme going on, that I had not intended:

DoWhatYouLoveNotebooks

Do we see a theme here?

Okay, okay, I get it. Message received. This does not surprise me. Since today is #1lineWed on Twitter (I love #1lineWed) I had that on my daily task list, and figured that was as good a time as any to pop the pages from my Monday marathon session into the master document, and then search for my lines that fit this week’s theme. Figured as well, that it was probably a good time to make sure the font is uniform (writers are excellent at finding plausible reasons to procrastinate) and so did a select all so that I could do exactly that. Normally, I don’t count words at this stage of the game, because that is a guarantee that my focus will shift to playing a numbers game, sweating over every keystroke, and, if left unchecked, end up in creative paralysis, which totally sucks, and I do not recommend it. This time, however, the count was there, and…well, the actual word I said was, shall we say, colorful, so I won’t use it here, but the result did surprise me. I’m further along than I thought. A lot farther.

So, how did I get there? It wasn’t that long ago that the bulk of my novel-related writing was me  filling an endless stream of Moleskine Cahiers with some variation of “I can’t do this, why can’t I do this?” My writing soundtrack was my Hypercritical Gremlins singing me the song of their people. While I’m not saying the Hypercritical Gremlins will never find their way back to my office closet, they have been quiet in recent days.

The difference, I think, is in forgetting the shoulds, and doing what I love.  If that means reading decades-old books rather than the new, hot thing, okay. If that means futzing around with my desk, if that means taking the time to pick out pretty paper and the right pens to write with on it,  while my imaginary friends perform their own rituals so they’re ready to meet me when I open desk and notebook, I am fine with that.  I can close the desk at the end of the day, tuck my imaginary friends into bed (often with each other, because, hey, romance writer here) and know we’ll both be in the right place when it’s time to open for business once again.

In the meantime, the ducks in the park probably have babies by now.  I could maybe go look for them, once today’s work is done.

TheWriterIsOut

 

White Space and Cubbyholes

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New setup for the desk this week, and I’m not sure what to make of it at the moment. My body, my back, and especially my eyes, are used to the old way, which is also the way that forced me to constantly be hunched over, which carried over to my normal posture, and nope, not having any of that. With the monitor on the tippity top of the desk, this means I can now sit upright and look at the screen head on, which my neck greatly appreciates. My eyes, however, are not convinced that shaking things up is such a great idea, but my brain believes in them and thinks they’ll get used to it in a few days.

Which does not mean the change is very helpful on a Monday, which is get those pages done for critique meeting day. Can’t we keep things the way they’ve always been for one more day, pretty, pretty please? Pretty, pretty no. Things may go back to the way they were if this experiment doesn’t work out, and it is entirely possible (and likely) that the ideal desk configuration lies somewhere in between the two monitor placements. Personal computers did not exist when this desk was created. Then again, neither did I, so we’ve got that in common, desk and I. We’ll get through this together.

One of the things I’ve always loved about this desk, which I have drooled over since I was two years old (and before then, I am fairly certain I drooled on it, but there’s nobody left to confirm that, so take my word on this one) was the cubbyholes. This thing is full of them. Multiple family members have informed me that I have always loved putting things into other things.  This may or may not play into my penchant for organization, which has, of late, roared to life. The decision to move my monitor to the higher shelf comes partly from ergonomics, and partly from a deeper desire – to get at those cubbyholes. I know myself.

Right now, most of them are filled with paper. Sticky notes, my pocket sized planner, notepads from conferences (yes, I need them all) and address labels.  Pause here for a happy sigh. I love having stuff I love around me, and, when it’s organized, that is pure bliss, which has to be good for the creative process. Clutter, which I have also had a lot of, both the mental and physical sort, hampers it.

I don’t remember where I first read about white space, but enough ideas sort themselves out when I’m doing something brainless, that I looked into the idea. At its most basic, it’s mental breathing room.  Visual breathing room helps, too. Now that I have the monitor moved, and I can get at those cubbyholes, there’s no more searching for a piece of notepaper or a sticky note. They’re right there, always in the same place. I don’t have to figure out where they are, because I already know.

Moving the monitor has presented a few other challenges. For one thing, the monitor now takes up a good deal of the space I used to use for storing notebooks in current use. With this placement, they don’t all fit…or do they? Which ones am I actually using, hm?

Ulp.

My gut reaction is to protest that I am using all of them, and there was not a single book on that shelf that did not have a specific purpose, a specific project, and slicing their number like the decimation scene in Karavans, by Jennifer Roberson gives me similar chills, but in a far less entertaining fashion, because these are my babies. Which is fine, but let’s look at them as babies of different ages, maybe.

My daily pages book, yes, and task list book, yes. Butterfly book for personal style related things, okay, that hasn’t had as much use as I would like, but I’m still not ready to put it away, because that’s something fun I can do that’s not related to writing or romance fiction, and that counts as white space. It stays. Black book (it has gray pages inside, super cool) for revisions of my postapocalyptic medieval? That one’s resting, but I don’t want to put it away-away. It stays, too.  Peacock book could use some more love, and it gets it sporadically, but the characters who belong to that book have been occupying my head for the past, hmm, let’s say twenty-five years, so they are probably not leaving, period, and keeping their notebook on hand is probably wise. Overflow book, with its gorgeous gothic cover, for when I still have brain to dump and my morning pages are full, that has to stay.  Pastel retro photo themed book for some just for fun stuff, that has to stay. The others? They can nap. They’re not going away-away, but let’s focus on the awake kids for a while. That feels more efficient, and I feel less guilty.

The only problem with the new bookshelf arrangement was that my daily pages book kept slipping into the infinitesimal gap between end of desk and start of wall. Solution? Park Big Daddy Precious book there, which also happens to be my big notebook for Her Last First Kiss. Handy, that.  Problem solved.

Well, at least that one. My eyes are still in the what the sam hill are you doing to us stage of getting used to things, and my plans to spread out all the work I do on one frantic Monday marathon, over the week, did not pan out as well as I had hoped, but I think I could get used to this.  There’s room to move, and endless cubbyholes to explore.

AnnaSelfie020417