Have New Headphones, Will Write!

Now that the kids are finally getting better, I have been able to start enjoying the new headphones that my husband bought for me. Right now I'm listening to the sounds of the Amazon rainforest while I type this entry. So technically, I'm also researching while I write this. I started writing a short story for the shared world that I am participating in with a group of other writers, and it takes place in the rainforest, which is why I need to familiarize myself with its natural sounds. Of course, trying to describe some of them might be a different matter altogether...

Eh, I'll muddle my way through that when I edit. For now, it's all about the crappy rough draft with lots of bracketing.

What's that, you say? Bracketing?

Bracketing is something I started doing in college, when I was writing a lot of theology papers. I didn't always have the precise words for the thoughts I wanted to formulate while I was working on the rough draft, so I would write some approximation of it in a little set of brackets, so I knew to go back and fix it later, and that way I could keep going before I lost my train of thought.

Bracketing served me especially well when transitioning into the madness that is NaNoWriMo. It satisfied my inner editor enough to keep going instead of getting bogged down in searching for the precise words I wanted to use, and thus making it much easier to make word count. I get to be compulsive, but not so anally compulsive that my brain shuts down and doesn't get much accomplished.

(Dang, this is a long Youtube clip!)

Speaking of getting things accomplished, it's time to work on that short story and then see if I can write any more of that article I alluded to in my last post. Especially since my husband keeps looking back at me and the laptop from the PS3 game he is playing. I have quickly learned that this means he is thinking about stealing the computer from me to look up a gaming hint. *sigh* Need to fix the other computer!

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Stop the Madness!

So I made the mistake of signing onto Twitter this morning. Normally this wouldn't be a problem. This morning, however, I was greeted by a couple of tweets by one of my friends, regarding Camp NaNoWriMo.

Gaaah!

Now I'm tempted to join in the madness all over again. But I need to be editing my book, Anemone's Song. And even more important than that, I need to finish the short story I promised my friend I'd provide for the publication she is editing at, The Forge. I really just do not need this distraction again. I have plenty of my own, thank you.

Willpower! Must...have...willpower. Must...have...

... ... ...

Maybe I could sort of join in by editing along instead of writing? That breaks the rules, but--

*slaps self*

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5 Short Story Tips

Short Story Writing Tips - tips for writing short stories

Today I found a site with excellent tips on writing short stories. I often have trouble writing short stories because I find it difficult to condense a story into such a short length. Looking at the tips on this page, I think this is due to a couple of factors--characters and theme. Too many characters invariably complicates the plot and turns it into a novel-length story. Then, without thinking of the theme I want my short story to embrace, I find that my plot loses focus and falls apart.

I will definitely be keeping these tips in mind as I write my newest short story, The Barefoot Prince. I think it may help tremendously in both writing and editing the piece.

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Taking Shape...

Today I managed to type out some notes for the new short story I'm writing. I think I've fleshed out the storyline in enough detail that I can begin writing it. I have a few details for the initial setting in mind, but I'm trying to do a little research on period appropriate poverty, first. I really want to capture the essence of what life is like for my character when the story begins, so I can show what a contrast his life is by the end of the story--at least externally.

Internally is quite a different matter. Or so I've planned.

Things don't always turn out quite the way we plan, when we write. But the thing about being surprised by characters--at least, I've found this in my experience--is that my story always turns out better when they deviate from the initial plan or outline.

Kind of like life, sometimes.

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Perhaps My Brain Is Finally Waking Up...

After scrapping several ideas, I have finally settled on a plot for my short story, The Barefoot Prince. Now it's a matter of fleshing out the details and sitting down to write it. Of course, with a 3 month old and a 3 year old, that is easier said than done.

Well, suck it up, Buttercup, right? I will get this story done, somehow. Eleanor is counting on me.

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Camp Nanowrimo and Writing Chaos

I can't believe I haven't written in this blog since January. Er...scratch that. Yes, I can. My little boy arrived three weeks early, back in February. He was due in March. The good news is that I finished typing up my book shortly before he decided to arrive. Needless to say, I wasn't doing a lot of writing after he came.

Now that he is 3 months old, however, things are getting a little easier. Or enough easier that I've started potty training my daughter and editing my book.

But alas, the editing must be put on hold. For Camp Nanowrimo, perhaps? No. Although it's tempting. Quite tempting. But I've made my husband promise to slap me silly if I try to take that on; I'm supposed to be concentrating on my editing, after all. I'd like to have this book ready to send out by sometime next year.

So what, then, has forced me to turn my attention away from editing?

A short story.

I'm trying to write a short story at the request of a guest editor, for a publication called The Forge.

So, it's back to writing I go. Hopefully, since I only have about a month to write it, my submission won't totally stink. I had a vague idea for a short story (and I say vague, because, really, it was only a title) recently, so now I'm trying to spin a plot that I think is compelling enough to submit.

Well, we shall see. The worst that can happen is that the editor takes back her offer, right?

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Pure Masochism

Submitted my short story about the vampire cows to a magazine called Weird Tales, on Sunday. Unfortunately, they are almost filled up for 2009, so my chances aren't that great. The move to our new place kind of threw everything out of whack for a while, and I didn't get to submit it even close to as soon as I orignally wanted to.

Still working at my temporary job. No idea how much longer they'll need me. Hopefully for a while yet.

I'm going to see if I can find where I put my Writer's Market after I unpacked my writing books, and start compiling a list of other publications to reject my story.

No, I'm not depressed. In a very masochistic way, I find it amusing, even while I'd rather just have someone stomp all over me repeatedly. I need to get all of my rejection letters out and hang them on the wall again, so I can laugh maniacally until someone comes at me with a straight-jacket.

Writing is a love-hate relationship with the voices in your head.

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Ending an Ending?

I've almost finished my newest short story. Or perhaps I have finished it, depending on how you look at it. See, the ending that I intended to write isn't yet written, and the end of the scene I wrote last night would make a great ending, if somewhat more depressing (but powerful). So I have to decide whether to end it there or not. I'm very tempted to, based on my instincts. And yet, I almost hate to leave it ended without some snippet of hope.

But maybe if I end it the way I orignally intended, it wouldn't be half as good, you know?

I have a lot to mull over.

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Not Dead Yet...

It's been way too long since I last posted. Do I have an excuse? Eh, not really. I lost my job a few weeks ago, and I just haven't had the heart or the willpower to bother posting on my blog, even though I've been accomplishing a decent amount of writing.

I started a new short story, which I'm almost finished with already. I'd guess that I'm 2/3 of the way through, if not more. And I have some other short story ideas that I've been jotting down for later use. I bought a new short story compendium the other day; it's called Many Bloody Returns, and it features one of my favorite authors, Charlaine Harris, but it also includes Jim Butcher, another author that I've recently started to like a lot, thanks to my husband lending me his Dresden Files books after he finishes them.

Anyway, between that compendium, which I'm still reading, and a couple of other short story collections I have, I find that coming up with workable ideas for short stories is getting easier--but not yet what I would call easy, by any means. I've found myself analyzing them as I read, and I think that it helps. It's nice to know that even though I've never met these authors, they're teaching me and helping me with their writing and they don't even know it. I hope that I can do the same for other writers one day.

But first I have to get published.

I'm working on it, believe me. More to come on that at a later date. My daughter is getting restless and wants to eat.

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Happy Easter!

For all of those who celebrate Easter, I hope that today was a very peaceful and joyous occasion for you. For my own family, we had a good Easter, if a rather uneventful one. And yet, that does not bother me too much. My days are so hectic since I started working again that I can use some peaceful, uneventful weekends. There's time enough for the craziness of easter egg hunts and the like next year, when our daughter is old enough for them.

My daughter is one year old now. She had her birthday last weekend, just before Easter. It is hard to believe that a whole year has gone by already. She's growing up so fast.

In terms of my writing, I haven't been able to do as much as I'd like since my evenings are so hectic after work, but my daughter is starting to sleep until mornings now, and so I'm able to get a little writing in again on some nights. I'm trying really hard to finish up my novel, Anemone's Song, and I'm looking at markets for my short story about the vampire cows. I'm really hoping to get published this year, whether it's a short story or a novel (looking doubtful on this front, given the current pace of my writing), or poetry. I just hope it's soon.

You see, I have really been wanting to re-dye my hair red. I have this obsession with red hair since I think it's so beautiful, and I used to dye it back in college. Long story short, I went back to brown, my natural color, before I got married, and so I've been a brunette for a couple of years or so now. But I really want to dye my hair red again. Only I decided that I won't allow myself to dye my hair again until I get published.

I'm hoping it will serve as extra motivation to get more writing done and to keep plugging away at trying to get published. I'm just afraid that now that I've promised myself that, I'll never have red hair again...

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To Market, To Market...

As I sat down to update this blog and pondered what to write about, my daughter decided that she wanted to climb into my lap and volunteer her services. Being that most people are not fluent in reading baby gibberish, however, the backspace key came quite in handy.

I have been perusing markets to submit my short story to, seeing as it didn't win the contest. I have found some promising leads; one in particular seems like it would be a perfect match. They are not open to new submissions until March 31st, however, so in the meantime, I'm going to go back over my story and see if there's anything I want to change. I felt like I pared my story down so much, cutting out a lot of good description and dialogue, just to meet the word limit for the contest. This particular publication, however, has larger word limits, and so I might add some things back in.

I don't want to add things just for the sake of adding, though. I think I will have to get some outside opinions on this.

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Sour Grapes, Or Honest Assessment?

I started my new job on Monday. The first day was quite rough. Long story...don't ask. But suffice it to say that I felt overwhelmed, and I second-guessed myself about going back to work. Luckily, the week got better, and I am getting the hang of things at the office. My boss told me on Thursday that he was very pleased at how quickly I am learning things. Boy, did I need to hear that! Especially since I felt like I wasn't learning fast enough. I guess it just goes to show that we are our own worst critics sometimes.

The good news is that my writing hasn't fallen completely by the wayside. Despite the dishes, the cooking, and getting the baby fed and put to bed at a decent hour after work, I still manage to do a little writing most nights. Of course, it's usually only a paragraph or a few sentences, but anything helps. It's better than not writing anything at all.

And besides, I've been doing more writing today, now that it's the weekend anyway. Things are looking up for me.

Mostly.

I still have never received any word about my short story that I submitted. So, I went online to the website, and the early results were posted. I did not win either the grand prize or the first place in the category I submitted to. I'm disappointed and frustrated. Especially since I skimmed through the story that won the category I submitted to, and I don't think it is nearly as good as mine. It's certainly not half as creative...and on the risk of sounding snotty, it's well...cliched.

Blah. How do you know when your work is honestly better than someone else's, or when it's just a case of sour grapes?

Well, fine. If they don't want my story, I'll submit it elsewhere. THEIR LOSS!

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The Closer It Gets...

...the more nervous I become.

That's right. I still haven't heard about the short story I submitted to that contest back in November (actually, the end of October, because I wanted it out of the way before NaNoWriMo). I have until March 16th, however...I'm supposed to hear about it by then. I check the mail anxiously every now and then, and I have my husband on alert for anything from them, but nothing so far. And honestly, sometimes it's so far from my mind that I forget for a while.

They say no news is good news, but it will really stink if I wait all this time just to get a rejection. Oh well. There's nothing tangible I can do about it, right, so I'm better off turning my attention to other things.

I finally got out of my writing stasis the other night. I hadn't written much in a week or so because I was a bit stuck on the specifics of a detail in the story, but it wasn't a detail I could really skip over and figure out later. Finally, my husband helped spark an idea, and I wrote a few pages last night. I was having such a good night writing after that, I didn't want to stop. But, I finally did, and I think I left off at a good spot. Hopefully it will be very easy to pick up from that and resume my writing.

I could use a little cheer in my life, something to go well. Had a job interview the other week, thought it went well, and didn't get it. There's just a lot going wrong lately; I need something to change for the better. Like a job or a published story. *sigh*

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Goodbye NaNoWriMo, Hello NaNoFiMo!

So I finished up the month of November with 65,115 words for my 2008 Nanowrimo novel. The novel is not yet finished by any stretch of the imagination, but as I'm rather worn out in writing it, I am switching to my Nano novel from 2007 and participating in NaNoFiMo, or National Novel Finishing Month now. I have been working on that story in bits and pieces, but it rather took the back burner to that short story about the vampire cows for a while, and before that I was quite busy for some months with a newborn baby.

But, now that my daughter is older and (somewhat) more cooperative about my time to write (ha ha ha! That's a riot, right?), I have decided to enter Nanofimo for the first time as a challenge to myself to finish up my 2007 Nano novel. Especially since I would like to try to publish this one within the next year. That will be one of my 2009 writing goals, I think.

But, I digress.

The two main goals of Nanofimo are: 1) to add at least 30,000 more words to your story, and 2) to finish the novel. You have to complete these two goals in some form to win. There are some variations on them, but I leave it to anyone interested to read about it on the Nanofimo website, which is , and read about it under the Nanofimo FAQ.

I am looking forward to the change of pace, especially story wise, this month. By the end of November, after working at such a grueling pace on one novel, and only one novel, I get rather tired of that story by the end of the month. So it will be nice to switch back to my 2007 story and work on that. I am a much better fantasy writer than a science fiction writer, anyway. By far. But, I gave it a good shot, and things went much better than I anticipated. Plus, I did not give up.

So maybe someday I can turn that sci-fi of mine into something publishable. For now, I am going to take a break from it and try my hardest to finish Anemone's Song, this month. Wish me luck!

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Off to a Darn Good Start...

Nanowrimo has been going really well for me so far. *knocks on wood* This is going much easier than last year. The story is just flowing from me, for the most part. I don't know if it's because I'm just more experienced at Nano, or if I'm not letting myself get as hung up with fixing mistakes and just moving on instead, but something seems to be working.

As of right now, I have 11, 864 words. I am just over a day ahead of schedule. I hope to write even more soon, to give myself a large cushion to fall upon, in case something happens and Eileen doesn't let me do much writing for a day or so. But so far it has been working pretty well. I let her play in the room with me while I type, and it works much better than I thought it would.

The election really got me down, but I'm trying to just move on from that. I may not have wanted Obama for president, but I really hope he does as good a job as people think he will. I hope that at least after all the hype, he can do some good for the economy--at the minimum. But I won't hold my breath.

For now, I'm pushing on with Nanowrimo and pouring even more of myself into my writing. Writing has gotten me through many things, and it will get me through this as well.

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Submitted!

I sent my vampire cows story in to the Writer's Digest Popular Fiction contest, under the fantasy category. It's entitled Put a Stake in It! It was somewhat inspired by my friend Morgan, who suggested similar titles that didn't quite fit. So that's what I finally came up with one morning while watching my daughter. My husband doesn't like it, and informed me so today. He was then subjected to a short rant about how I didn't care if he didn't like it, it's my story and my title and I like it, which is all that matters.

Then he said, "Boy, once you make up your mind, you really don't budge, do you?"

Usually, no. Especially when I didn't ask for your input to begin with. Ahem.

Figured out some new stuff for my nanowrimo story. I have a small, brief character profile for my main character, and I have a sketchy idea for the ending of my book, which is (as always) subject to change.

Now I just need to figure out my other characters before the contest starts...

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Warm Up Those Presses!

I sent the final draft out to some of my editing buddies for feedback and opinions before I turn it in for the contest. As soon as I get some replies, I'll make any necessary changes and enter my final version in the contest. I'm really hoping I at least place in the contest, because I think my idea is really creative, but I won't hold my breath.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to turn my attention to Nanowrimo. I've finally decided what type of story to write. I'm writing my first ever science fiction. But it has a bit of a horror twist to it. So it's kind of a science fiction-horror, or maybe a science fiction-thriller. I'm nervous and excited. I've never written a science fiction before. Most of what I write is fantasy. Still, this is a wonderful opportunity to stretch myself as a writer, and I'm looking forward to seeing what results from this experiment.

Oh, and I've started job hunting! Yay, me! I'm hoping to be employed by Christmas. Prayers and good wishes for that are appreciated!

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That's One Thing Out of the Way! Now on to Nano!

I did it! Yayness (as my friend Echo would say)! It is 4000 words exactly. Now I just have to call my sister and double-check my cow facts. Then I can send it in for the contest. This is about the best birthday present I could get right now, I think.

Speaking of birthdays, I have to go. My husband is taking me out to dinner to celebrate my birthday tonight, since he can't be with me on my actual birthday tomorrow. He got called in on a DJing job, so he called off of his regular job today to be with me, using a vacation day. Is that nice or what?

Here's to hoping I win!

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Nearing the Finish Line!

I am almost done with my short story, thank heavens! It seems like I've been writing it for eons. I managed to edit it down to 82 words over word count, but I had to change the lackluster ending. It didn't feel right. I wanted something that was quintessentially Wintra. It took me a while to come up with something, but I did.

So now I'm only 144 words over my count for the contest. I can whittle that down easily! Yay! I was honestly beginning to think I could never do it.

Meanwhile, I'm feeling nervous about Nanowrimo. Why? I haven't picked a story idea yet. At first, the problem was that I couldn't come up with one. Now, I have a LOT of ideas...and I can't seem to pick one. *sigh* Will the madness never end?

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NaNoWriMo On My Mind...

I have already begun trying to generate some novel ideas for Nanowrimo in November. I don't feel that I yet have a project that I am enthusiastic about. I have some nice ideas, but none of them are coming together into an actual working plot yet. I'm trying to decide whether to write a science fiction, which I've never done before, another fantasy, which I tend to write the most, a modern day vampire story, or a general fiction story.

I don't have a solid idea for my science fiction story. I'm toying with the idea of time travel, wherein people can travel into the future, but not into the past (as current scientific theory holds). This would mean that, once in the future, my characters wouldn't be able to leave and go back to their time, which would be the past, by that point. But I'm not sold on this yet. My other idea is a sci-fi about some kind of war over a planet's natural resources. The warring factions think it's uninhabited and ripe for the taking, but there's actually intelligent life on the planet, and that later complicates things.

For my modern day vampire story, I intend to re-vamp (pun intended) vampires in a way. I found some interesting things during all my research for the vampire cows story, and I think it would make an interesting story, if I wrote about psychic vampires, who feed off of people's energy, not necessarily their blood.

My general fiction idea isn't developed enough for me to feel comfortable talking about it yet. The other alternative I've thought about is to combine my modern day vampire ideas with some of my sci-fi ideas. Maybe a genetic experiment goes wrong, and scientists accidentally create human vampires, and the story chronicles the effects of that. I don't know.

I think my preparations for Nanowrimo were easier last year, when I already had a solid story idea and notes for November far ahead of time.

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