Social networking is good

Okay, the title of this post is a bit of a misnomer. I consider most social networking to be a huge time-suck. One that I enjoy, but a time-suck none the less. Sometimes good things can come of it. Like story ideas. Even if that wasn't the topic on hand. Long story coming up. I hope you have time.

When I was in college in the fine arts program at the University of Nebraska at Omaha we were talking about where we wanted our writing careers to go. What direction did we want to take. Most of the people in the class were literary writers or poets. They had aspirations of being published in the finest literary magazines in the land or landing a sweet teaching position at a prestigious university. One girl in my class was working on her musical career and by most standards she has done quite nicely with that having a couple of top 40 hits. She can also boast that she is huge in Japan.

I told the class I would like to write for children. The teacher looked at me like I had the plague or something worse. "Why is that?" she asked.
"Because I really enjoy the current books that are out for children right now," I said. (This was the mid-90's and the current crop of children's books included The Stinky Cheese Man as well as I Lost My Bear.) They were witty books and I truly did enjoy reading them. For the rest of my time in her class whenever I turned a story in (about every other week) she would ask me in front of the class if it was written for children. I always told her no. my class was not full of children and I was writing for them.  Secretly I think she thought I was wasting my time.

Flash forward fifteen years. I still would like to write for children, despite my short stories. I am subbing a middle grade literary adventure book and I have gotten some encouraging responses so far. I was talking with Chris Fletcher (of M-Brane SF) about dreams and remembered something from a nightmare I had when I was a child. I believe I was five at the time. It was about a witch with a patchwork cape. It scared me half to death. I had the dream several more times throughout my childhood and even as an adult once or twice. K.C. mentioned it would make an excellent story (part of an ABC book I believe she said) and it was seconded by a couple of other folks. I thought about it most of the weekend.

Darn you social networking sites. Don't you know I am working on a YA book right now and can't be bothered.

Ups and Downs

It is odd how making a shortlist can make you feel great and horrible at the same time. I feel privileged that I made it that far and like crap that I didn't make the final cut. Such is life. It seems that many of the stories they were looking at followed a theme and my story wasn't a part of that. Still, I feel really good because they say they almost never think about stories in the first person, but mine was different in a good way.  I really don't know why I like writing int he first person. I think I can slip into the skin of the character easier that way. Also, when you are reading it is like you are participating somehow. I don't know, maybe it is just me.

Also I have running water in my house (running through the pipes, not on the basement floor) for the first time in two weeks. I felt like a caveman during that time.  A caveman with electricity, internet and telephone. Now that that dilemma is over I can find more time to write. Right after I clean the house. It really needs it, because there is remarkably little cleaning you can do without water.

Happy Friday.

you make me feel super happy

Natalie Sin has given me something to blog about today.

 

Because of this I must now choose two supporters to share this with. They must be strong and able and willing to pass it on. They must have stuck with me through the thick and the thin (and some of my posts are very thin, translucent sometimes). So I will do this through scientific analogy and careful rendering of statistical information- Ink a bink, a bottle of ink, the cap flew off and I choose: 

Cate Gardener and Danielle Ferries. 

I want to thank everyone who reads this blog, because, I know, you really don't have to. 

Now, on to other points of interest. The dam seems to have broken. At least it did yesterday. I had the house to myself for a couple of hours while they started to dig my new well yesterday. I took the opportunity to put on my second pot of coffee for the day, move the computer into my writing desk and pound out 1500 words in Moonbow. I feel so freaking accomplished. I don't know how good those 1500 words are but they sure felt good to get out of the system. I hope I can continue with an 800 word day today. Speaking of that- I had better get started. The house is quiet for now. Have a great day.

One down, eleven to go

January was, if you have read any of my posts through the month you know this already- slow. I managed nothing spectacular.

Writing accomplishments (or lack thereof) in January:
Words written in story form: between 2,000 and 2,500.
Stories written: 1 flash piece posted on my blog.
Stories rejected: 2
Stories accepted: 0

That pretty much covers it. February is going to be much better, if I can get past the weather related problems that seemed to plague me and every other Iowan that I know of. And my little water problem. And that whole, brain and fingers don't want to cooperate thing as well. I just know that things are going to get better. They have to.

Have a great day. :)

Speed reading for the impaired

I will be the first to admit that, while I read everyone's guidelines I submit to, I read them quickly. I take brief, illegible notes and submit based on my chicken scratches. This doesn't always work out for me. I am sure I have messed up formatting, especially those clearly outside of the norm. With agents it is worse. I have been subbing to agents looking for a taker on my MG book. It has a couple of things going against it. It is short (although just right for the standard MG book at 26K) and it contains no supernatural elements. My characters aren't witches or vampires. They don't go hunting zombies or try to save the world. They are kids who have an adventure. Just like any kid could. It is the kind of book I read when I was ten. Just before I found my dad's copy of Robert Bloch's Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper.

My query has gotten some responses. A partial, quite a few flat out rejections and some very nice personal rejections. Yesterday I found out that my speed reading of guidelines got me in a bit of trouble. If I had been the agent I would have given me a Rejection on the spot. I didn't follow the guidelines. I sent my query and I, even after re-reading the guidelines, missed the part about the first ten pages. I was lucky enough that she invited me to re-submit (with emphasis on ACCORDING TO OUR GUIDELINES). I don't know if my query caught her eye or she is a nice agent who believes in second chances. Either way I am thankful for the second chance.

That is all. Have a nice weekend.

Good News

We found out last night that our well will (hopefully, if the weather holds) be dug next week. At least it is not the month without running water they gave us as a possibility. Oh, the joys of living in the country. Still, while we have changed how we do many things we are getting used to it. Still I look forward to being able to turn on a faucet again.

I was working on my supernatural YA that I have slowly been putting together over the last month and a half. (I still cling to it despite its slow go and tell myself I am choosing my words carefully as opposed to ramrodding it just to finish.) I like the fact that it is told from two different times, one when the character is a child and one when she has just gone out into the world. This way when I get stuck on one part I can work on the other. That was what I did today. I have been working on the child's part of the story since shortly after I started. Today I went back to her turn to adulthood. It was a welcome change. Things had been getting a little weird and I needed to show how she was adjusting to her new found freedom and the recent death of her grandmother. It all ties together. I am just glad I am writing.

Also, my wife and I went on our first date 15 years ago tonight. It was a vivid night of drinking beer (I still remember the brand) and watching Iowa State hockey (we kicked ass). One of the best nights of my life.

Good fight action about a minute in.

Have a great Thursday.

This is getting old in a hurry

I am sorry but this post will have little to do with writing and a lot of gripes involved. Here we go: I have to say this is possibly the worst winter I have ever remembered. The weather has been one miserable storm after another with no breaks in sight. Even our "thaw" we were supposed to have this weekend only caused flooding and when it re-froze caused slick streets. Last night while coming home from my mother-in-laws (where we spent the previous night because, while we finally got power back after several days of staring at candles for entertainment our well has gone bad so we have no water) I saw several people in their cars slide off the road because of black ice. Black ice is ice that just looks like wet road. It is very dangerous because it looks so unsuspecting.

So my daughter doesn't have school again today. I have lost track of how many days they have called it this year on account of the weather. We don't have running water in our house (I am drinking my orange juice this morning from a throw-away cup and would do the same with my cereal if I had paper bowls to put it in.)

the only good news is that I have caught up on some of my reading. I read Sideshow P.I.-The Devil's Garden by Nathanial Lambert and Kevin Sweeney (which was awesome, more about that later) and I am halfway through Gary Pool's recollections of his Vietnam experience as an EOD (explosive ordnance disposal) Xuc May (Never Happen). It is a self-published book and has the grammatical errors of one but it is an interesting book that reads like he is sitting there telling you the stories in person (which he has, because he installed a central air conditioning unit in my last house). (I am going to give him a plug for it now, www.xucmay.com (no one will ever try to take that address from him) If you ever interested in reading a soldiers recollection of the military life (and maybe some ideas for your own writing, I have come up with several nightmare scenarios I could form a story around) I would recommend looking it up.

It amazes me how much reading you can get done when you have nothing else to do. I can't clean without water, I can't do dishes, wash laundry. Without power there was no internet, no television, no movies, no building things in the shop. I did get a little bit of writing done in my hopefully YA book I am calling Moonbow, at least until the battery died on my laptop. It makes one thankful for all of the modern conveniences that we take for granted every day. It also makes me wish that the sun put in more than half a day a week this year.