Something Fun

Thanks to T.Z. Wallace, I have something fun to do while my feet recover. Well, something fun other than work on my writing... which I swear I'm getting to soon. I got my ice cream, the house is quiet (other than the tv) since Lulu is at a friend's for the night, and I swore I would get writing tonight. It will happen, just as soon as I fulfill my obligations here.

I'm not sure I follow seven blogs that haven't already participated in this award, but if you follow me and you haven't already done this, feel free to take the mantle upon yourselves with my blessing.

The first duty of the Versatile Blogger is to list seven things about themselves you might not have known before. This will be difficult, because I basically spew everything that comes into my head out on to paper or pixels somewhere or another. I'll take a stab at it anyway... here goes.

1. I'm hopelessly addicted to Dr. Pepper.

2. I'm also hopelessly addicted to any tv show about crime and the solving of said crime.

3. I tend to go on book buying binges, downloading or otherwise ordering about ten books at a time. Then it takes me six months to read them all before I repeat the craziness.

4. I love to cook, but between Helper Monkey and Lulu, I'm limited to about three things that everyone in the house actually likes, so I end up making a lot of spaghetti.

5. There is a bear on the loose in my neighborhood over the last day or two. I hope they don't shoot it, but this is not a normal occurrence. It's been freaking me out.

6. I tend to say whatever comes into my head. And I have a strange, snarky sense of humor that I've recently discovered is not appreciated as widely as I thought it was.

7. I'm not good at holding my tongue. It regularly gets me into trouble.

So there you have it. My second duty was to forward this on to seven other bloggers, but as I've said, I'm not sure anyone I follow hasn't already participated. If you want to participate, please leave a link in the comments below to your post of seven fabulous facts about yourself! Enjoy!

Sigh...but amazing nonetheless.

Well, Janet Reid announced the winner of the Liz Norris Pay It Forward Debut Novel Contest today, and it wasn't me. But I could have told you that days ago. In fact, I had the winner picked since the day before I announced my finalist status. She was finalist #3, and was revealed the day before I was. When I read her entry, I basically knew I didn't have a chance to win. Congrats to Cassie Marshall on winning, and getting to go to New York for the Backspace conference! My personal seething jealousy aside, I'm confident her novel, "The Stars Fell Sideways" will be on bookstore shelves in the very near future!

So, what am I doing now that I don't have to pack and plan for a trip to New York? Querying. When I took a break to revise my first novel back in early March, I stopped querying. I resumed for a few days around the time I entered the Liz Norris contest, but stopped again when I was (miraculously!) chosen a finalist. I figured, what the heck, I've got a 1 in 9 shot of winning now, so I'll wait and polish that query again before I head back into the land of writer torture (a.k.a. querying agents).

I spent the entire day today dusting off my agent research, finalizing my query, and compiling emails to half a dozen agents. Knock on wood one of them works! It really is a time drag, but I needed a day off from my WIP. I'm entering the Great Boggy Middle of the novel now, and it's perilous trying to navigate my way through those treacherous swamps. False plot lines threaten to lure me off the trail, while here and there I see a glimmer of light through the trees and hope to dog I'm still walking in the right direction.

The Helper Monkey is about a third of the way through Devil May Care, and so far he likes it even better than Dragon Hunter. And I planned to change the name of Dragon Hunter to Running Down the Dragon, but since I'm claiming "Finalist" status in the Liz Norris contest on my queries, I thought it best to hold on to the original title for a while. At least until an agent requests more material. At that point, I think I will let them know I changed the working title. Just in case any of them ask Janet Reid about my entry in her contest, it would be bad if they used the new title, and Janet told them she never heard of it, and I must be some crackpot. :) So, for now, sticking with the old title, even though I've lost all my love for it.

And I finally found an image that remotely looks like my dragons. Although all the dragons in my novel are black. Whatever. These are the closest things I've been able to find that fit my mental picture of my imaginary friends. Hopefully this helps anyone who read my query clarify what I mean by dragons. Minus the weird otherworldly backdrop. My main dragon lives in Boston, for crying out loud! :)

Thanks again, everyone. Especially Janet Reid, Liz Norris, and everyone involved in the contest. It was a fantastic trip, and I'm grateful to have been introduced to so many wonderful people along the way, even if we're only friends online for now. Someday we'll all be published, and meet regularly at events and conferences, and have yet another great story to tell.

The Progress-o-Meter is kind of stuck lately, but here it is, anyway. I plan to write some tonight. Hopefully. We'll see. Still recovering from the craziness.

Words: 31,473
Pages: 103

How odd, an award!

I was tagged by T.Z. Wallace for a happy little blog award. Since no one has ever bestowed such a thing upon me before, I thought it might be fun to answer the questions she posed, and repeat the process for anyone who stumbles across this post and wants to continue the happy randomness.

For anyone who wants to play along, here are the rules:

The Tag rules:

You must post the rules.
Answer the questions and then create eleven new questions to ask the people you’ve tagged.
Tag your award winners and link to them.
Let them know you’ve tagged them.

I'm just going to answer the eleven questions T.Z. posted, and create eleven new questions. Anyone who wants to answer my questions, please feel free, and let me know what your answers are, too!

1. What book character do you had a crush on?  Harry Dresden. The poor guy, he's always in trouble, but he handles it the best he can.
2. What was the last book that made you cry? I reread Lord of the Rings every winter, and it ALWAYS makes me cry. How sad is that?
3. What scenes are the hardest for you to write? Anything sexy. I always feel like it comes across as awkward and uncomfortable. Plus, my mom might read that! Ick!
4. Are you superstitious about your writing methods, or do you have any rituals regarding your writing? No, not really.
5. Do you listen to music when writing, or do you have to have silence? Often, I prefer to have the TV on with the volume turned down low in the background. I can listen to music, but it has to be consistent (not my daughter's chorus practice, but actual recorded music). I just like to not feel "alone" when I write.
6. What book antagonist do you love to hate?  That's too hard! So many deserve our righteous hatred! :)
7. What is the last  book that you stayed up ridiculously late to finish reading? Hit List, by L.K. Hamilton
8. When was the last time that you waited in line for a book release? I don't think I ever have. I have a Kindle, so I get things downloaded automatically on release day. The last author I stood in line to meet was Clive Barker. What a nice man! ;)
9. What book(s) is/are currently on your bedside table? Timeless, by Gail Carriger (no matter what I do, I can't seem to find the time to get started on it. Tim goes back to work tonight, so maybe I'll actually get it read now!)
10. What is your "guilty pleasure" book that you read and re-read? Guilty Pleasures (and the whole Anita Blake series). I thought that was an appropriate answer.
11. How comfortable are you calling yourself "a writer/" I write, so I'm a writer. I write things more involved than grocery lists and memos to my daughter's teachers. I still haven't figured out when I'll feel like an "Author" as opposed to a "writer."

Questions I will pose to the world (feel free to answer if you wish, either in the comments or linked back here):

1. What fictional character's special abilities would you like to have, and what would you do with them?
2. What author would you like to have a one-on-one chat with, and what would you ask them?
3. If you could become any animal at will, what would it be and why? 
4. If you were offered an all-expenses paid trip anywhere in the world, where would you go and why?
5. What do you do when you're stuck on a plot line? Do you have some specific activity to get yourself back on track or clear your head?
6. How do you reconnect with the story after a day or two away from writing?
7. What is the last book you read that made you run out and tell everyone you know about it?
8. If told you could only eat one food item for this entire week, what would it be?
9. What TV show are you embarrassed to admit you love, but you wouldn't miss it for the world?
10. Do you have any tattoos? If yes, why? If no, why not?
11. What's the first thing you do when you sit down at the computer to write?

Well, that was fun! I hope someone wants to answer my questions.


As far as my writing goes, I didn't get a lot done yesterday, because we were out selling Girl Scout cookies. We did great, with 102 boxes sold in three hours, and an additional $40 in donations! Wow! Thanks people, that was remarkably generous of you all! You're helping girls and the USO all at the same time! Good on you!

I think I need to lay off the exclamations!

Words: 11,457
Pages:  40

And we have sun outside, so I'm probably going to waste another day trying to get the deck finished. I can always write after dark, which seems to work better for me on the current book anyway. So far it's daytime in the story, but it's kind of a dark, dreary day for my poor characters, and it's hard to get into that when it's lovely and sunny outside here. Especially when I'm pressed to get the stupid deck painted.