Taking the Plunge

After much thoughtful deliberation, unproductive querying and well-intentioned nudging from my parents, I’ve decided to give e-publishing a try.  I’ve been writing stories for what seems like eons now and I’ve reached the point where I’d like to share them with more than just my critique partners.  It used to be self-publishing meant spending a ton of one’s own money to print the books and then driving all over the countryside promoting those books, selling them yourself, one by one -a really tough, daunting row to hoe.  Now, with the creation of the tablet, a manuscript can easily become an eBook, which can be distributed with a few clicks all over the world.  A self-publisher can reach markets never dreamed of before.

So, with this in mind, I’ve decided to take the plunge and e-publish the first book in my middle grade, fantasy series STORYTELLER.  I’m not sure just how many kids are out there reading books on iPads, but if my daughter is any indication, they’re out there and their numbers are growing by the day.

I’ve done my research on smashwords.com (an eBook distributor) and I know that marketing will be the key.  Without a traditional publisher to help market my work, it’s all up to me (and you) to get the word out.  In e-publishing, that means twitter, facebook and blogs.  (Oh, how I cringe at the idea of facebook!)  In the coming weeks, the look and content of this blog may change.  I’m even working on a book trailer with a friend - youtube-style – very exciting!  I’ll post it here when it’s done.

Right now, the manuscript is undergoing the last round of edits and being formatted for smashwords, which takes a bit of work to get it right.  I’ll let you know when it goes live.  Wish me luck!

February is Picture Book Marathon Month

There's a month for everything.  This month, I'm taking part in a Picture Book Marathon.  You try to write a picture book every day of the month, but since we aren't over achievers,  you only need to produce 26 for the whole month.  Guess they figured you need a couple days off.  So I'm plugging away, writing a little something every day.  Most of mine are awful (the rhyming ones don't rhyme), but some may just turn out to be something one day, after many, many revisions.

I've also been submitting my middle grade fantasy manuscript to agents, without getting much interest.  I'm starting to think it's just not that original, or marketable in the minds of agents, who I'm sure have to think about the bottom line.  I may try submitting to some small presses instead, but I'm still mulling it over.  I've been following the blogs of other writers who've decided to go the self-publishing route with great interest.  If I could publish it as an e-book myself without the expense of printing, well...I must say its tempting.  Any thoughts?

I just finished the first draft of another work in progress that's been sent off to an editor friend for working over.   It's, what else?  A paranormal romance.  Maybe once I get that out of my system, I can write this dystopia I've been outlining....;)

Short Rant...I promise

I just want to express for a moment how frustrating it is for a writer who's tried to hone their craft, follow every rule, only to find the rules continually broken in published books.  And then I promise I'll stop because I don't want to be a downer.

I've been attending writing conferences, talking one on one to editors, visiting some very insightful agent blogs, reading/studying about writing, etc. etc. for a very long time.  The advice is all about having a distinctive voice, an alluring first line, conflict throughout.  And read all the time they tell you; read everything.  So I do that too.  I picked up a book, got it at a recent writer's conference no less, and started to read.  I've read probably four chapters now and have yet to figure out just what the conflict will be/is.  How did that author get away with that???  This is the same conference at which a highly respected editor told me she wants to know who the main character is and what their issue is on the very first page!

All right then, that's enough of that.  Just wanted to get it off my chest!  On the bright side,  we just got our first real snow of the season so the kids are preoccupied and I have a shiny, bright new idea for a novel I'm working on....much to be Thankful for.  Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

“8 Year Old: Professional Cliché Finder” or “My own personal nail in the coffin”

I’ve been polishing my latest draft of Storyteller (a middle grade fantasy I wrote) and decided it was time to read it, out loud, to my daughter, who is now eight years old.  She’s a bit young for middle grade reading (12-18 yrs), but I figure she can easily handle the story if it’s read to her.  She’s been wanting to read it for some time and been very patient with my brush offs, like “Leave me alone!  It’s not done!” She’s even suggested some of the plot points I ended up using, so I obviously owe her big time for all her love and support.

            So, she’s in bed (where we usually read) and I’m reading a chapter to her, trying my hardest not to start editing the thing, when I read a line that says something to the effect of “Lily knew it was probably the nail in her coffin, but she didn’t care”. 

“Huh?” says my daughter.  “What’s that?”  Now you try explaining this figure of speech to someone who lives in a world where coffins only appear around Halloween time and they rarely have nails in them anymore anyway.  It was a wakeup call for me and the phrase was immediately erased from the manuscript.  Now, if my daughter says “huh?” there’s a big circle around it for closer inspection later.

            The whole episode led me on a wonderful “find and replace” adventure with my manuscript.  I had no idea I had so many glances over the shoulder and so many occurrences of the word “suddenly”.  Thank goodness for word processors!  Reading out loud to a human being other than myself has helped tremendously and I resolve to do it with everything I write from now on.  Well, almost everything. ;)

The Gardening Blues Part Dos

Holy cats!  If I wasn't sure before, now I know that gardening in Idaho has to be something akin to Sisyphus trying to roll that stone up hill.  This year, we've had frosts into late June, wind like you wouldn't believe, a population explosion of voles, which resemble large mice with chopped off tails, and now a plague of grasshoppers.  I've just about had it!  My bee balm is starting to look like a collection of sticks, my rose bushes like swiss cheese.  I can live with a few bugs here and there, but when the grasshoppers toppled my tallest hollyhock stalk that was just about to bloom by chewing through the base of it, I lost it.  I broke down and bought a can of "spray".  Tonight I went out to the flower bed and, even though the wind was blowing about 15 mph, I unloaded my frustrations on the bee balm, the catmint, the roses and the hollyhocks.  Then I stood around and gloated at the writhing bodies of my foes in their last gasps on my patio.  I suppose the sprinklers will wash off the spray later tonight, but at least I'll have the satisfaction of knowing at least some of them feel my pain.

Elias

“Drink up!” he said. “Salude!” My temple was aching slightly from the two glasses of tangy, red Spanish wine I had drank prior to this one. I took one small swallow, but not all of it.
     “Salude! Finish it,” Elias encouraged me. Not wanting to disappoint him, I swigged the last of it finally. Elias smiled as he took my glass.
“You just became Basque!”
     That’s how I’ll always remember Elias Corbitarte. I only met him a few times, but he treated me like a long lost friend. Maybe it was because he was Basque or maybe it was because he was a special person; I think it was both. I regret that I didn’t get to know him better. I am thankful I had the opportunity to meet him. Our brief friendship reminds me to appreciate each person I know. So often, we take each other for granted. I guess we have to operate that way. If we truly tried to live each day as if it were our last, we’d drive ourselves and everyone around us nuts. Perhaps the lesson is to live your best life, every day you can. I’m pretty sure Elias did that.

Forgiveness

When I was a gangly, awkward junior high kid, I had a teacher whom I’ll never forget. She taught me so much more than history, probably without even knowing it. Mrs. Robertson was easily the smallest person I’ve ever met. A bird-like woman with ebony skin and long plaited hair, she teetered around the classroom on four inch heels no ordinary person could have maneuvered. She would shout our last names like a tiny drill sergeant, as if sounding big would make her bigger. We hated her from the beginning.

My friend and I entertained ourselves by passing notes in class. One day I wrote some very cruel things about Mrs. Robertson in a note and my friend accidentally dropped it on the floor as we were leaving class. Mrs. Robertson stalked the class on her clicking heels the next day, shouting my last name and the last name of another Lisa. (There were two Lisas in the class, so she didn’t know for sure which one of us had written the note.) She challenged “If you have something to say about me, say it to my face.” She demanded the guilty Lisa come retrieve the note from her desk in front of everyone. I looked at the other Lisa. She looked at me. My horror froze me to my seat. Neither one of us moved.

Mrs. Robertson must have known. How could she not see it all over my face? But she let it go. I never wrote notes in her class again and she never spoke of it again. As the school year went by, I actually came to think of her as a friend. When I think how she must have felt when she read my hateful slurs, I still cringe inside. If I could go back and ask the forgiveness of just one person I’ve wronged in my life, it would be her. And I feel quite certain her answer would be “I already did.”