The Seven Page Novel

Latest Session, the first since November. Sad, says this lonely and rather preturbed blog. Very, very sad indeed.

Stop pestering, Blog. I know. I haven’t kept up with my part in the blogosphere. Or my writing in general. Laundry. Haven’t kept up with laundry either, but you don't see the dryer complaining. Actually, that's not true. It whined when I turned it on the other day and an odd smell spouted from its innards. I think it was trying to tell me something.

Well today, I have mustered some time, energy and inspiration to write...Beginning with my blog, inspired by my children...

On our way home from recent parent teacher interviews, report cards in hand, it seemed the Kid-Goobers were in need of practice in the subject of writing--spelling, grammar, editing, spacing, punctuation, indenting, you name it. Not an easy task, to assign "parent" homework on top of what the teacher already sends on a regular basis, so we conjured the idea of buying each of them a notebook to write over the weeks to follow, topic and format of their choice whether it be a diary entry, fiction story, or a retelling.

My daughter decided on a novel.

Our son has yet to pick up a pen. But the notebook is cool, the pen matches and it's a clicky one, so the important stuff is covered. Now, weeks since, he has been “forced” to write a story in practice for PATs and reluctantly formed a few pages that in turn melted my heart.

I won’t say that I am envisioning them as talented, famous, creative writers of the future, but in the last few weeks they’ve been dipping quills of their own into that proverbial ink and stories from the mouths of babes are flowing. I remember writing stories in school, assignments based on each kids’ version of a famous authors book or poem. They were fun, I am sure our mother’s were proud, and I have shared those moments as well from the other side. But this seemed to come from another place entirely, an idea that just seemed to flow from a need to come out. Much like my own inspirations, I saw that light in my daughter’s eyes, the frustration with moments of writer’s block in my son's. Even before the pencil touched paper.

They have begun and I can only imagine what the future holds. My writer's soul within has it's fingers crossed, that much is inevitable, but for now I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs with my face in the wind and share with the world how perfectly awesome they are. (Titanic not available, so I have resorted to this verbal gush of motherly pride.)

Of course, I asked for permission to publish the words of each author.

From the girlie, the rights to the first few lines were granted.

The little man, however…well, he is our strong willed boy who walks the line of his life as if it had been created the moment he was born; drawn by him, governed by him, and he simply said, “no” with a look that said, “not on your frickin' life, Mom.” I can’t deny a bit of pride in his strength of character alone. (Even though that same strength has tested this mother from his wee age of at least 18 months.)

Nonetheless, I am soaring.

I will leave you with a short excerpt entirely in her words from the “novel” (which includes prologue, character drawings and notes, and the first four chapters. Page count? Seven. That’s right. Seven. I can’t help but find this both endearing and amusing.)

The Crystal Of Shadow Island

Prologue

Eyes in the Dark

Firecry lay awake, unable to sleep. Two hours already had passed, but he felt as if someone was watching him. He looked at the entrance of the White Tail Forest and saw a huge, blazing pair of yellow eyes.

1

[picture of paw print here]

Scar

"I need to find that fool!" Scar yelled. “Koda! Bring me my rock. NOW!”

Koda, the River Otter, scurried across the rocky den. As he ran, he looked around. He saw old, wet vines hanging above him and moss and lichen growing on rocks and boulders.

I can only say that upon reading these first few lines, I was pulled into her world. And I can’t wait to read more. I hope to be granted permission from my son in future. For now, I will wait with baited breath, hoping in the least for better grades from the Goobers.

Procrastination and Dr. Suess

Latest Session

I was perusing my quotes again today. (Instead of writing.)

And rearranging and fixing the fonts. (Instead of writing.)

Because since getting a new-to-me computer, the fonts are far more updated, text boxes actually work and this process of "organizing" quotes, obviously, is completely necessary. (Instead of writing.) Or I risk laying awake in bed tonight while the morning hours creep in thinking to myself, "Is W. Somerset Maugham more of a green font sort of fella or maroon?" Or, "Is Veranda exciting enough to highlight a fine piece of Jane Austen's wisdom?"

Really.

I am so not joking about this.

I think I might need an actual psychiatrist, an actual therapy couch and an actual session on it.

Nonetheless, instead of writing, I decided to post a few of my favorites, though the fanciful fonts are not supported here, so I have had to make do.

Though think of me when I am not sleeping later tonight.

T

 _____________

“Hold on," Lula said, pulling a red flowered scarf from her coat pocket, tying the scarf on Harp's foot like a flag. "Don't want to get a ticket. I hear police are real picky about having things sticking out of your trunk."

–Janet Evanovich, "Three to Get Deadly"

The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't. ~Douglas Adams

from William Safire's "Great Rules of Writing":
Do not put statements in the negative form.

And don't start sentences with a conjunction.

If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing.

Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.

Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all.

De-accession euphemisms.

If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is.

Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.

Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague. 

“You said I killed you - haunt me, then! The murdered do haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts have wandered on earth. Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! it is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!” ~Emily Bronte (Heathcliff on Catherine’s death) "Wuthering Heights"

"We have read your manuscript with boundless delight. If we were to publish your paper, it would be impossible for us to publish any work of lower standard. And as it is unthinkable that in the next thousand years we shall see its equal, we are, to our regret, compelled to return your divine composition, and to beg you a thousand times to overlook our short sight and timidity."—a rejection from a Chinese economic journal

Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened. Dr. Seuss

Why Romance You Ask?

Therapy Session Two. This one also free.

I feel a need to revisit this issue again as I tend to find myself faced with the look so often. You know the one, writing community. The one that says, "Really, you're a writer, how exciting!!!" Then, "Oh? Oh [tone has fallen, nose is scrunching up] You write Romance? That's....great. Right? Wh...why did you choose romance, anyway? [all casual-like, added giggle for effect]."

My husband even gave me the look and still on occassion sighs with a grin until I nudge him into reality that his wife WRITES ROMANCE! AND THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT! 

Needless to say, here is a post I am revisiting, taken from my now 'Archived Blog'. Enjoy!

I have ventured beyond my own expectations, begun many journeys I never thought I could through my writing. It began when I plunked myself down in front of an old hand me down computer and started to write a few notes for a short story idea I had. I didn’t know where it would go, how many pages, who the characters really were beyond demographics and one single scene that had been running through my mind. It turned into a novel sized book. The romance writing began somewhere else, somewhere a couple of years later.

My cousin read my second completed mystery novel; my second novel period-—very raw and with an inexperinced voice-—and wondered why I didn’t try writing more romance. The mystery was good, she’d said, but the very small romance line in the story came much stronger, much more easily. I think I had found my niche without even knowing it, and wouldn’t realize this until over a year later when I actually tried to do it.

I thought she was insane. I laughed at the comment. Romance? Me? Really? I’d not written, much less read, many romances in the last ten years at that point. Who does, really?...Old women, lonely single mothers, our mothers and grandmothers...come on, we’ve all scene the old Harlequin’s sitting on the bookshelf and dared to open them up at age ten, laugh, turn red and wonder to ourselves, ‘why would someone read that crap?’

There is a world out there I never knew existed, I’ll tell you that. And my mind is forever changed.

So I picked a few up. Some were smut, some written purely to see a sex scene in print, I’m sure--porno for women, my hubby calls it--and I could barely get through them. I have to say I was embarrassed for women everywhere.

Other writers, other stories, have come miles beyond the days of near-rape style sex scenes so elicit they overpowered the guts of the story. Some of them-—I can’t honestly say all because there is a load of crap in every genre of writing whether fiction or non, romance or not—are good. Great even.

The writing has much improved, the storylines set in greater depth, sex on levels from barely mentionable to erotica. Take your pick. Fortunately for me, or so I think, I’ve always been a romantic at heart so I fit into the genre pretty well. (Just count me out of the erotica, or the religious for that matter, thank you very much).

But I didn’t stop there. I wrote two novels (‘throbbing manhoods’ and ‘heaving breasts’ gladly witheld) that were, for lack of a better expression, "romancy" and may dare to fit into the Harlequin section of the bookstore, though those have vastly expanded, too. I have written Chic-lit from a first person and witty perspective, and lingered a while on a darker side as influenced by my love for the Bronte's and classic gothic romance. I even set my head in the early 19th century for another.

When I look back to my first few books, I laugh. I laugh at the writing. But I love them. Ten novels and many short stories later, they still hold some of my favorite moments and characters. If nothing else, the feeling of finally getting down on paper some of my first thoughts and ideas, watching them develop, taking count of my growth as a writer in the meantime, drives me. I haven’t been at it long enough to call myself a "Jane Austen" or "Emily Bronte", perhaps never will, but I know I can make my way to a higher place eventually. And we get nowhere without dreaming.

All of my books say something about who I am as a person, a mother, a wife. A nurse, a writer, a woman. That’s where it counts. I love romance, am no longer afraid of it or the cliché’s and negative thoughts it brings in the eyes of many.

As Jane Austen once said, "Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery." Mine is dwelling with Jane’s.

"Far away in the sunshine are my highest inspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see the beauty, believe in them and try to follow where they may lead."

~Lousia May Alcott~

A quote from K8:

"So, did you write alllll the words in that book? Like on all those pages?"

A Whole New Me

So I've switched blog sites, this, my first entry or what I think of as a free therapy session.

And I can sit on my own sofa.

Why switch?

First: Layout. This one looks pretty. I'm all about pretty.

Second: Blogspot seems to be "the thing". And "the thing" means more access, more hits, and we, as inherently attention seeking humans, want as many people as possible to *tag* us, *friend* us, *poke* us or *follow* us, whichever the case may be.

As a writer, multiply that by a thousand because writers, even the otherwise introverted loner types, want to be noticed in the on-line world. Let's face it, in any world. When I write, I am screaming, pay attention to me, I have so much to say and the words just fall out all over the place. In person I am often saying, hey...so..., and wishing I was back at home within the walls of my comfortable, domain of solitude where only my computer knows my bold side. Well, not only. But close.

But here's the real reason for the switch: I was bored. Are you kidding? I can't stick to one thing for long before I find myself rummaging through websites in search of another excuse to write. So here I am...

Thanks Blogspot...

Until I get bored and start searching again which is inevitable. But by then, this writer will be on bookshelves all over the world, travelling for book tours and fighting off the publishers...

(This is the boldness I speak of.)

I will attach a link on my website to the old blog because tossing my thoughts to the recycle bin of internet-space is like sacrilidge. Every word is a treasure chest full of gold that only I can open or still care about. My first novel manuscript is proof of that; we'll just call it a "practice run" but it sits, 11 years, 2 complete 300 page re-types--from paper copy due to Dinosaur Computer's malfunction--later in the recesses of files.

So welcome. Keep posted. More to come...

T

A quote from K8 (after seeing my one page spread in the small community flyer advertising my book):

"Mama, like you said before, only one person needs to read it and buy a book, then it'll be a million."