For real, I swear. Until my next blogging hiatus. But with four works in progress, a volunteer non-profit charity biz, a new jewelry biz (very new), a new job for the first time in 3 years, continued chronic pain, exercises to keep up on, chronic migraines, two cats to try and get to stop killing each other, and a sick/dying parent, it's hard to keep up on the blogging. But I want to blog. I want to do all the things.
As is tradition for when I've taken a blogging hiatus, I will discuss my current writing projects. Because that's how it's done. More about all that other stuff later. And it's a lot.
Four works in progress.
My first priority: "Pieces" A contemporary mystery with light paranormal elements. It's in the final stages. I've gotten good feedback from drafts 2 and 3 from different sets of beta readers and am working on the 4th draft, which is more editing than rewriting. Finally! When you've moved from constant rewrites into actual edits, you've gotten somewhere. Because I said so. I think it may be done by mid-year, maybe sooner. It's hard to say. But I'm super excited. I plan to enter it into some contests and try to attend some writing conferences this year to meet with agents in person. I think this one is the most commercially-marketable of all my stories, so I'm definitely going to try the traditional route with it. I think I will be in fully querying-swing by Fall, definitely winter.
Priority 2 is "New Year's Revolution" (Formerly Bloody New Year and Vampiric Vanguard. Still thinking of using Vampiric Vanguard as a series title.) This is an urban fantasy/paranormal/post-apocalyptic novel. It's my first baby, and has therefore seen many rewrites/edits. Somewhere between 7 and 10. But I've discovered the solution: it's not a three book series, as originally planned. It's four. The first book needs to be cut in half. I feel confident about these changes. My goal is to have this ready to be queried (again) by the end of the year. It's doable. I've queried agents for this in the past and gotten roughly 30 rejections (go me!). I'm aiming for the 3 digits. When your number of rejections hit the hundreds, you know you've made it. I plan to query some agents, but mostly small/indie publishers.
These two books will keep me busy most of the year, but I have not forgotten my other two children. I began my fourth novel "Eternal" in November (NaNoWriMo 2017). While I got it past 50k, I did not complete the rough draft, but that's okay. I know where the story is going and felt like continued work on the sloppy rough draft wasn't productive. I don't know when I'll be ready to work on it again, but I feel like I'll be ready to write a solid draft two when the time comes. Oh yeah, it's a speculative romance. I know, I'm writing a romance. Who would've thought? While I won't be writing on it for a while, I will be reading in preparation: lesbian romance novels, stories that take place in the 80s, and stories that feature mixed race characters.
Last but not least is "Caribou Canyon" later called "City of Secrets". This is my second baby. I love it, but don't know where to go from here. It's a YA paranormal, and the story is too big. There are 3 MCs, and I fell in love with all of them and gave each character many subplots. The polished first draft rounded out at 250k words. Yes, you read that correctly. I started releasing it as a serial on Jukepop, but that didn't pan out. Then I started releasing it on my blog, but I'm not sure that's what I want to do with it. I think I'm going to remove it from my blog and set it aside in my mind, but I definitely want to continue it. At this point, I would likely polish it up and self-publish it, maybe in installments.
Okay, so those are my writing projects. I'm having a busy 2018, and that's just about the writing. So many other things are happening, many of them painful and trying and sometimes I just want to curl up and sleep, and keep sleeping, and keep on sleeping. But writing is my passion, my art, my life. I will take all of this crap and funnel it into my stories.
Get ready world. They are coming.
Wednesday, March 14, 2018
Sunday, March 11, 2018
March 11th
I used to get depressed around February and March. Well, to be truthful, I get depressed on and off all year round, it's called dysthymia, or persistent depressive disorder. But that isn't the point. Before 2007, Daylight Saving Time didn't start till after Easter. I got really restless in early March for the time change, because it always made me feel better to have that little bit of of extra sunlight. It helped.
In 2007, I was really excited that we were going to be changing the clocks forward about a month early. I remember March 11th 2007 very clearly. It was the perfect day for Spring Forward. It was nearly seventy degrees out. I was bored, but it wasn't really a bad kind of bored. I was feeling hopeful for the future, which was a big deal because the past few months had been shit-tastic and that is not an exaggeration.
I was trying to decide what to do regarding the fiance I was separated from due to lots shit-tastic fucking shit. I hadn't spoken to him since early December, before the bleeding shit hit the flaming fan and flung its shit-covered entrails all over my life. Despite those months of separation, I didn't consider us over. I didn't know what I considered us. I needed time to myself, time to focus on Becky because for so many years Becky hadn't existed. Josh existed. Josh and Becky existed. Every now and then Becky and Josh existed, but mostly it was Josh. So it was nice to focus on Becky. I thought he understood that. I thought he knew I loved him and just needed time. Now I know he didn't, because in his world, Becky still didn't exist. Josh and Becky existed. Becky existed as a prize for Josh, as something to covet and keep and hold onto and to worry would leave. Becky existed as someone who could make everything right, except that wasn't a fair thing to put on a person.
It was the morning of March 12th when Mom came home from work less than thirty minutes after having arrived and woke me up to tell me Josh had died of a heroin overdose. I remember those moments more clearly than anything. My Mom heard the news because her mother-in-law reads the newspaper regularly. Mom rushed around to find out it if was true before she told me. Josh's mom wanted to tell me herself, but my mom wouldn't let her. I appreciate that. Hearing the news from my mom, someone who wanted to comfort me instead of be comforted by me, helped.
March 11th was a Sunday, just like today. Because of that, the memories are more potent. It's been eleven years but it will never go away. To add to this pain, my mom, the person who's been there for me through everything, is in the final stages of COPD and not going to make it much longer. So now I just have to remember the strength she gave me and save it for the future. It's a gift. And I guess the sunshine is too, though it hurts, like antiseptic in a wound.
Sometimes I want to remind myself that pain is what makes me real, pain is what makes me feel love and appreciate beauty. Sometimes that's true, and other times it's a giant load of flaming horse shit.
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The darker the night, the brighter the stars,
In 2007, I was really excited that we were going to be changing the clocks forward about a month early. I remember March 11th 2007 very clearly. It was the perfect day for Spring Forward. It was nearly seventy degrees out. I was bored, but it wasn't really a bad kind of bored. I was feeling hopeful for the future, which was a big deal because the past few months had been shit-tastic and that is not an exaggeration.
I was trying to decide what to do regarding the fiance I was separated from due to lots shit-tastic fucking shit. I hadn't spoken to him since early December, before the bleeding shit hit the flaming fan and flung its shit-covered entrails all over my life. Despite those months of separation, I didn't consider us over. I didn't know what I considered us. I needed time to myself, time to focus on Becky because for so many years Becky hadn't existed. Josh existed. Josh and Becky existed. Every now and then Becky and Josh existed, but mostly it was Josh. So it was nice to focus on Becky. I thought he understood that. I thought he knew I loved him and just needed time. Now I know he didn't, because in his world, Becky still didn't exist. Josh and Becky existed. Becky existed as a prize for Josh, as something to covet and keep and hold onto and to worry would leave. Becky existed as someone who could make everything right, except that wasn't a fair thing to put on a person.
It was the morning of March 12th when Mom came home from work less than thirty minutes after having arrived and woke me up to tell me Josh had died of a heroin overdose. I remember those moments more clearly than anything. My Mom heard the news because her mother-in-law reads the newspaper regularly. Mom rushed around to find out it if was true before she told me. Josh's mom wanted to tell me herself, but my mom wouldn't let her. I appreciate that. Hearing the news from my mom, someone who wanted to comfort me instead of be comforted by me, helped.
March 11th was a Sunday, just like today. Because of that, the memories are more potent. It's been eleven years but it will never go away. To add to this pain, my mom, the person who's been there for me through everything, is in the final stages of COPD and not going to make it much longer. So now I just have to remember the strength she gave me and save it for the future. It's a gift. And I guess the sunshine is too, though it hurts, like antiseptic in a wound.
Sometimes I want to remind myself that pain is what makes me real, pain is what makes me feel love and appreciate beauty. Sometimes that's true, and other times it's a giant load of flaming horse shit.
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The darker the night, the brighter the stars,
The deeper the grief, the closer is God!”
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
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