bookmark_borderHow Gloriously Odd

I am still editing To Sleep. No big surprise there.

What is the surprise is the word count. I ended it at 100,858. That gave me a lot of room for deleting the unnecessary. A few days ago, it dipped down to just over 98K which was fine. Still plenty of room.

I just saved it and happened to glance at the word count. 100,419.

Are the shoemaker’s elves coming in here in the mornings and adding stuff while I sleep?? I am beginning to think so.

Granted, I am adding a lot. Clarifying a few things. But none of it is unnecessary. Still, I am deleting sentences and paragraphs. I cut a huge chunk earlier. Yet, I am again over 100K.

How gloriously odd indeed.

I just checked the submissions guidelines for my publisher and their cut-off is 120K so I don’t have to hack and slash to make it fit. Or make an immediate sequel.

bookmark_borderSnippet of Humor

First off, as I type this, it is 43 minutes into one of my most hated days of the year. I hate April 1st. I plan on doing a lot of nothing tomorrow. Today. Whatever. Luckily I have a partner who is not into practical jokes either so I don’t have to keep watching over my shoulder or doubting the truth of every statement she makes.

As much as I like humor, and I do like good practical jokes as long as no one is hurt or made to feel little, I’m just not good at setting them up. I don’t see far enough ahead to make it work. I admire the good ones that I have heard about over the years. Have me tell you the joke of the tomato aliens. Or the Volkswagon fuel mileage.

Anyway, I am doing some arranging of my current project. I realized I had the characters on different days doing the wrong thing. Like, Harri has three days pass while Liz only has one. Not good for the reader who would be wondering if they camped out up there or what?

As I fix the time line, I am reading over the story, laying out the plot, setting the characters up. I’m taking too long for the two of them to meet. Thing is, I need Liz to see something at Harri’s garage the first time she goes there but that something can’t be there until something else happens. See? Writing is hard. I actually have to THINK!

So, here, have fun with this whilst I pour water in my ear to cool off the seldom used gears.

“This weekend. Nikki’s going to help with her truck. I don’t have much stuff.” Harri shrugged. “But there’s the weights down in the basement. Kelly’s coming to help with that on Saturday. Once it is empty, we’ll finish putting up the drywall and she’ll paint this week as it fits in her schedule.” She rubbed her head. “I feel like my days are like that game in Cracker Barrel. Where you move one peg over another? Trying to get it all done.”

“Let Annette see any paperwork from the realtor before you sign. We want to make sure you aren’t getting screwed. She handles all our properties. Anyway, I need to get going. Call my office and let me know what time on Wednesday. After noon works best. Then you’ll come to Wednesday Dinner, right?”

“Yep. With bells on.”

Kaye groaned. “Not again. They’re so loud and it makes the dog bark.”

bookmark_borderWriting Humor

I am trying to write a funny book (Harri’s, for those of you invisible people who want to know). Not roll in the aisles funny, yet more than just a feel good funny. I want folks to laugh. Chuckle.

Yet I am finding it difficult. Me. The Joker. You’d think writing humor stuff would come naturally. Well, so does walking and y’all know how great I am at that.

I wish I could write like Fay Jacobs. Now, that woman can write funny. That didn’t come out right. She can write humorous tales. Better?

She lives in Rehoboth Beach (Delaware, right?) and writes good books. Like As I Lay Frying and For Frying Out Loud and Fried and True. I’ve not had the pleasure of reading an entire book yet. I’ve read snippets and had the pleasure of hearing her read from one. She’s good.

As I write, I find that my humor is more subtle, more day-to-day life kind of funny. Puns. Love puns. Any word games or play on words.

Anyway, back to writing. Funny. I need to be funny.

bookmark_borderIn Which She Says: The End

That’s right. My SF piece tentatively called To Sleep is done. 100371 words. I aimed for over 100K to try and give the edits some room to hack and slash. I like this story. There’s some bits here and there that ramble and some details to fine tune but overall, this is a good story.

I will let it simmer for a month or so then do the edits. Part of me says to just clean it up, finish the loose ends, and send it off. Errors can be fixed with the official RCE editor (going on the assumption RCE will want it). But another part of me wants to fine tune it a lot, to make it a solid plot with no holes or problems. Then submit it.

I think I will go with the second, of course. I will not let myself fall into the perpetual cat-licking I am doing with Simple Sarah.

bookmark_borderScience Fiction Is Hard!

The problem with writing science fiction is that what was once fiction is rapidly becoming reality. Writers have to stay ahead of the actual science. In Bradbury’s time, the concept of space ships and aliens were so very fictional. Now? Not so much. Oh, sure, we’ve not found aliens yet but we’re finding more and more planets and several that are within that “Goldilocks zone”.

There’s actually two kinds of science fiction. There’s the ‘soft’, which is the science in the book may or may not be actually, physically possible. And there’s ‘hard’ where the science is actually quite possible or is provable. I’m no where smart enough to write hard fiction.

Which brings me to my point. I’m writing a science fiction novel. I have tried this one before but it didn’t feel right and I ended it on this really out-of-nowhere over-the-top ending just to put it and myself out of my misery. I have another one, too, but it is in perpetual research and I sincerely doubt it will ever be written. But I love the research part! Anyway, back to the story at hand. I decided one of the problems with the original story is that it was too far removed from the emotional impact I felt it needed. Some big stuff was happening, emotional stuff, and I just never got the reader close enough. So I put on my Big Girl Pants and am rewriting it in first person.

Gasp! Say it ain’t so! However will you limit yourself to just one viewpoint? Are you even capable of it?

It is so. I do indeed feel very limited. There are some behind-the-scenes stuff that I cannot show and it irks me. And yes, I am very capable of writing in first person. It ain’t easy but I’m doing it. And I feel like I am doing a darn good job. And, by george that emotion is right there. Raw and available for the reader to soak up. In my humble opinion, that is.

And I watched the one that gave a far too brief introduction into the Universe As I Now Know It. In a span of a few hours, I’d gone from a pre-med student who kinda sorta knew SETI existed to being able to tell SETI where to aim their radio telescopes. Except those telescopes no longer existed. Nothing on Earth existed anymore. My apartment. My bike. The very expensive stacks of textbooks. My parents’ graves. All of it, gone.

I was in the kitchen, pacing. I even picked up the chair and considered throwing it. I guess I got myself all worked up. I felt a kind of pinch on my shoulder. My vision narrowed and I felt myself falling.

And then I woke up again.

#

I had hoped that when I opened my eyes, I’d see the white ceiling in my apartment. Or maybe the brown ceiling in Jose’s. I’d hoped that perhaps maybe wouldn’t it be great if I had been dreaming. But, no, it was that sickly, institutional gray-green instead. It was not a dream. I was back in the infirmary.

It was a small room. Just a toilet, a small counter and a tiny sink. In the toilet was a bluish water like in port a-potties. But it sure didn’t smell like one. There wasn’t much smell at all. I sat down to do my business and opened the small box. Inside was a simple bar of soap that smelled like lavender. I sniffed that soap like I was huffing spray paint. That smell, a very familiar smell, was real. The soap felt slick. That was real. My pee was warm and the sound of it hitting the toilet was real. I liked real things with real sensations.

I finished my business, flushed the toilet and washed my hands. I must have washed them about five times. I marveled at the lather, at how much just a few rubs of the soap on my palm could produce. Very real lather and very real water that washed it away.

It felt good to move at a fast pace. It felt good to sweat. It felt real like the water and the soap. My breasts were not comfortable flopping about as I jogged but I accepted the discomfort as another sign I was alive and real and whole. Tears wet my cheeks as I thought of jogging through Fairmount Park. Of how the sounds of the kids yelling, of the softball game, of the wind in the trees, the roar of the river. I thought of jogging along the river and watching the scullers. Gone. All of it gone.

The floor came up to meet me and I rolled off the treadmill. The alien wall on the alien ship in outer space was a far cry from jogging in a park. Crying, however, no matter where you do it, hurts just as much. At some point I felt someone come in and leave. Shortly after, or hours later, I couldn’t tell, someone picked me up but I fought them. I didn’t want to be comforted. I didn’t want to be consoled. I wanted to cry, dammit. I wanted to be miserable. I wanted to scream. When I felt something on my shoulder, I jerked away from it. I must not have gotten the full dose because even though I was dizzy as hell, I still was able to move away from…I didn’t know who it was. My vision was blurred by the tears and the swelling of my eyelids.

Up ahead near a large empty space where this aisle and an equally wide one sideways one met stood a crowd of women. Human women. I started smiling. I looked over at Julie and she, too, was grinning big. Humans. Awake humans.

We were mobbed by smiling, laughing, crying, hugging humans. Soft flesh, naturally warm. Bare skin, featherless and smooth. Light skin, brown skin, skin so black it reflected light. Hair. Brown hair, black hair, blonde, red, colors in between. Curly, straight, short, long, bouncy, flat, wonderful hair. Lovely women. Everyone of us a lesbian. It was better than any Indigo Girls concert could have ever been. It was orgasmic without the mess but just as wet. We all were crying. Happy, joyous tears of recognition in people I’d never met.

How long we all absorbed each other, I have no clue.

I have managed to bang out over 36K words so far. I did my usual stumbling at about mile marker 25K but Precious and I did a brainstorming session at Blue Mountain Pizza and I worked out some of the plot holes.

I know several folk would wish I would finish another Butch Girl book. Hell, I wish I could, too! But for some reason, they just don’t feel right. And no, I’m not even going to contemplate doing them in first person. I ain’t that stoopid.

bookmark_borderWriting Stuff

Hey, had a short story get published in Muscadine Lines: A Southern Journal. I’ve had two other pieces published by them. This story, “White Trash, Dirty Laundry, and the Southern Mafia” is an interesting piece, quite different from most stuff I do. Very different indeed.

What else? Oh, NaNoWriMo is about to start again. And, again, I have no freakin’ clue what to write. I’ll come up with something (I have 5 days). Butch Girls Can Fix Anything was written in my first NaNo, waaaay back in ’04 and since then, I have “won” every year but two. No bets on how I will do this year.

That’s about it for today.

bookmark_borderStep(s) Forward

The problem with being a writer, well, one of the many, is that you have to write something that makes sense to someone somewhere and hope that special someone finds your work and admires it. The more someones that it makes sense to, the better. There’s things to do to ensure that number is high. Editing, understanding grammar, plot, character development, etcetera. Then there’s marketing and promotion (which I stink at).

I got this story. It’s huge. I have mentioned it a lot since I’ve been working on it since 2004. I’ve finished it three times now. Maybe four depending on how I look at it. Each version is slightly different and, with each, it makes more sense to more people. I’ve had some people read it and they’ve all enjoyed it. Sure, there’s problems. But for the most part, they’ve liked it.

Problem is, I don’t. Yeah, yeah, I am so addicted to this novel I dream of it. But there’s parts of it I just can’t seem to get right.

The book is Simple Sarah (I can hear the groans from here). The problem I have with it is the Bad Guys and Evil and All That Bad Guy Evil Stuff. Where’d they come from? Where have they been? Why are some religious nuts allowed to kill them? Why doesn’t the gov’t step in and say, “Um, you are killing a lot of people.” It just never really felt right. I’ve danced around the issue in several different ways and I’ve discussed it with Lorna (spouses of writers discuss the oddest things at the dinner table).

Gods and Goddesses are odd beings. Where’d they come from? Are they static? Do they never change? Do the peoples that worship them change them in any way? How do those peoples even start worshiping them to begin with?

I realized the deities within Simple Sarah are like the Greek/Roman gods. They walk among the people at times, although they are not all that accessible on the whole. Which means perhaps that they have faults, just like the Greek/Roman gods did. And perhaps they were also influenced by the who and how of the worship directed toward them.

Many times in the Christian Bible we read of how someone sweet talked God into Plan B. Was that God’s intention to begin with or did He/She really get swayed?

Which led Lorna and I to develop a new religion base for the Simple Sarah novels. It actually feels better now. I feel as if I understand it now and feel more comfortable with the entire story arc. One of the things E. said about it when she read it was that while it was a good story (she finished the whole thing), she didn’t feel that anything actually happens. And she is right. Sure, lots happen but really, it was the WHY, not the WHAT that was missing. At least to me.

Evil plays a huge role in fantasy novels. People, things, places, abstract thoughts. Mean dragons or evil wizards or unholy trinkets wreak havoc on the world and someone has to fix it. But why did that dragon eat that village? Why did the evil wizard become evil and why did he stay that way? How did that unholy trinket come to exist? And, if it is oh so powerful, why does a simple blow from just the right hammer or a toss into just the right fire kill it?

I really feel that this is it for Simple Sarah. I really feel that in a few weeks, it will be done. For real. But I am not recommending you hold your breath. Unless you are underwater, then, yeah, go ahead.

bookmark_borderRamble of Thoughts

I write. Sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. I waver between intense explosions of ideas and directions and utter desolation of any kind of spark. I open a document, stare at it, re-read bits. Then close it down. Sometimes I don’t even read, just open then close.

Am I a one book kinda sorta wonder? Am I a literary fluke?

But then I think of the characters and their imaginary lives and where they are going. Some of them feel so very real to me. Their stories demand to be told but…nothing happens. Perhaps the clamor of the words in my head are too loud and I can’t see the plot for the pages. Their stories may eventually fade, I don’t know. Part of me wants them to go away. Another part wants to make them real. Today, I float in the air above two sinking ships, trying to decide which one to board.

bookmark_borderNow, For the Title…

Now I need to come up with a good title for the book.

It started out as Simple Sarah and has maintained that all along. The first version was this huge honkin’ thing and I knew it would have to be broken down into parts.

At that point, when I was sure there would be three books, they were called The Blessed, The Graced, and The Divine. It fit because the first book was about Sarah (the Blessed), the second was to be about Lea (the Graced) and the third was a culmination of the other two and some other stuff tossed in (the Divine). But I am thinking that Lea’s book (which chronologically takes place before the others) would be best saved for after the others are done. But I have another idea that may still fit the title.

If I keep Simple Sarah, I need to come up with something similar for the second book and I can’t, not if Lea’s book is put off (it would have been named Long Lea). Then there’s the naming of the third, which I am drawing a complete blank on in terms of this theme.

Another problem is I know I have enough written and in my head for the second book, but I’m not sure I have enough for a third.

I could go with Simple Sarah and just figure out the other titles as I go. When they are all done, be that two or three, I can update the sub-titles then. I’ve already decided the first book will not say “Book One of the Something Cool Here Series” ’cause that means I’m expected to write more than one more ’cause you don’t have a series with just two books in it. I had considered “Book One of the Castanea Chronicles” but, again, that’s assuming there’s more than two books.

Did I just ramble on enough? Wander about in the thickets of my mind a little too much?

Summary:
Simple Sarah – with the other(s) getting non-themed titles
The Blessed – with the others getting the other two mentioned above (which would mean Lea’s prequel getting an odd title)
Castanea Chronicles: The Story of Simple Sarah – would make the other books fit I guess. Even Lea’s book would fit. Hmm….

bookmark_borderCliffhanger

Cliffhanger, n. – An episode that ends in suspense

Since I know that Simple Sarah is Book One, and as I near The End, I am wondering where is the best place to end it. I can end it with a big cliffhanger, leaving the reader clawing my email box with demands for the next book. Or I can end it on a good note, leaving the reader satisfied yet calmly wanting to know happens next.

Personally, I hate it when a book ends with a huge bang and there be tough questions left unanswered. I say bad things about the author. Really bad things about their parents, too.

But now, as an author, I understand why sometimes it is a good thing. In terms of sequels, you want something (called a hook) that will make the reader want the next book. Some say that a good cliffhanger leaves some questions unanswered as applies to that book/episode, not a preview to the next. Others say cliffhangers in books are not good because, unlike the old radio shows or regular films in the movies, the next book will be at least 6 months away.

Most agree that a cliffhanger can be good (they were talking mostly about television series’ end of season) but most fail miserably in the first episode of the next season. Three sites that I looked at all mention the season ending in Star Trek: Next Generation when Riker tells Worf to fire at the Borg ship that has Picard as Lucotus. The season ended with that word: fire. Then the first episode is a total dud. Nothing happens with that shot, literally. All that mentioned this were rather pissed about it. And I agree.

It isn’t just the cliffhanger itself that can be bad, but the strength of it and its follow through. Riker saying Fire was heavy. He was ordering the crew to attack a vessel on which their own Captain was aboard. We watch Eureka on the Sci-Fi channel (I refuse to spell it the “new” way). One season ended with Sheriff Carter being fired. Big ending and he kinda deserved it. We spent the off season wondering how they would get him back. The cliffhanger was enough for us to look forward to the next season, yes, but it wasn’t OMG!! worthy. And when the season started again, they didn’t resolve his employment status that first episode. I think it wasn’t until the second one. The follow through was great. Kept the suspense.

Perhaps that is how I will end Simple Sarah. On a tense note but with few questions left unanswered. And that means that I must get to writing the next book! Oy.