Chapter One ............. Eventually

Firstly I would like to thank both Lacey and Suzanne for their lovely comments - yes I should be replying to them in the comments section of the previous post but for some reason Blogger won't let me!  You may have not forgotten me Suzanne but I think Blogger has!

So the first chapter............

Cue the Pointer Sisters and all together now everyone:  "I'm so excited!  And I just can't hide it!  I'm about to lose control and I think I like it!"

Then cue me:

Sitting down in front of the computer.

Forgetting my coffee.

Justifying surfing the internet because I can't really be expected to sip super hot coffee and write at the same time.

Finding inane videos on YouTube to watch, snorting in contempt at what people are willing to screen to the entire world but then scanning the suggested videos for more.

Realising that it is now lunch time and I can't possible write on an empty stomach.

Stuffing myself Eating lots of healthy salad and falling asleep on the couch while trying to tell myself that I am  working through the "conflict issues" in my head.  With my eyes closed.  With a pillow and blankie.

Waking up and being shocked to find it's almost dinner time.

Preparing dinner all the while scolding myself for sleeping when I should have been plotting or conflicting or characterising or something.

Eating dinner in front of a blank page, doing my best to ignore the fact a semi-but-not-really interesting show is on tv.

Eating dessert (ahem of course it's fruit - strawberry ice cream counts doesn't it) in front of the tv looking for conflict ideas within the New York cop show that started after the semi-but-not-really interesting show that was on during dinner finished.

Realising that despite the nap I had this afternoon that I am actually stonkered* and that an early night means an early start and tomorrow I will really start writing.

Just as soon as I have breakfast........


Actually I did manage to get a first draft done - correction:  I got three first drafts done.  Two false starts where the beginning just didn't feel right so third time lucky and now I have a starting point for editing.

*stonkered = an Aussie term for really super dooper rooper tired.

Lazarus Calling

Bonjour! Je suis de retour.

I heard a voice crying in the wilderness...........well not the wilderness - more like cyberspace.......and it wasn't exactly crying - more like just making a statement.............and it wasn't just any old voice - it was Maisey Yates..........Okay enough! This is what she said:

"Due to the upcoming New Voices contest..."

And then everything went all fuzzy and I think I must have passed out with my eyes open and without actually losing consciousness because the next thing I remember is googling New Voices and seeing that they were running another competition.

So it's been like 19 weeks or something ridiculous since I last blogged.  Probably in blogging terms that's the equivalent to writing something hideous enough to offend every single last person on the planet and then expecting to have people waiting to read your next post - so if there's no one out there listening anymore, well that's cool, but I needed some time.

Okay so the quick story is my sister died.  We had time to prepare and we laid down some lovely memories with her but her death was still an awful shock.  I don't like to talk about it so if anyone is out there reading this, say a prayer for my family if you feel comfortable doing that or send some positive vibes my way but I'd prefer not to discuss it.  Instead I'd love to hear some encouragement regarding my writing.

See I thought that writing would be the one thing that I would be able to use as a viable distraction but it didn't turn out that way - I found it really hard to work up enough motivation to sit in front of the computer and when I managed that, what I did write was disjointed and I couldn't sustain one project for very long.

So I gave up.

I knitted and I cooked and I watched and read Jane Austen (my goto gal for literary comfort) and because of the cooking I sorta plumped out a bit a lot.  Cue the sit-down-and-have-a-serious-talk-with-yourself-about-your-diet-and-lifestyle chat.  Which was pretty awesome even if I do say so myself and now that I'm eating better and exercising fairly regularly I felt ready to start lurking around some of the sites that inspired me to start writing again in the first place (Maisey, Jackie, Megan Crane et al).

So I click on Maisey's site first and voila! I find that New Voices is running again and my first reaction is: omigodomigodomigodomigod squeeeeeeaaaaaallllllll.  Which surprised me really - in a nice way.

And now here I am, blogging again, writing again, wondering if people will remember me if I comment on their blogs, getting all psyched up to hear what the changes they made to the comp, getting all antsy about which idea I'm going to use...............

but most importantly:  I'm here.

:)

Un Au Revoir Petits

I won't be blogging for a little while.

A tragedy that was looming finally descended and I'm going to take a bit of personal time to deal with it.

I doubt I'll be able to go cold turkey so don't be surprised if I comment on your blog but I won't be writing so I won't be posting here.

Talk to y'all soon.

Day Five and Six

You don't have to say it - I know there was no cheating in the Bible.  But God wasn't running behind because he had to share a computer so I'm catching up the best way I can!

Day Five and Six in Eden saw the creation of all the animals and finally man.

I made a man too.  Not in my image of course but one that I wouldn't mind finding hanging out in my garden sans loincloth.  An extremely alpha French chef.  I took Gordon's Ramsay's talent and quite a bit of his arrogance, added Gilles Marini's accent and those dark brown eyes *le sigh* and then some of Eric Christian Olsen's hair (all dark blonde and unruly-ish) slapped it together and threw it on a Harley (yes I created them on the sixth day too)! 

And while it's easy to 'make' a man physically, fleshing him out is quite another feat altogether.  That old saying that a man is more than just the sum of his parts is very true.  I'm getting to know him via my heroine and by writing through the story (aka writing lots of guff that will be pared back to the bone or hardly used at all) I'm working out how to introduce and resolve their individual and combined conflicts in 50k words.

I was a tad blocked today but I wrote through it and I think I'm back on track.

Oh and just a side note - Eve didn't make an appearance until after Day Seven when God had rested. 

No, no pictures of a half-naked Gilles - something much sexier: a tall man with a french accent, dancing.  Oh be still my beating heart *swoon*.

Day Four

On the fourth day there was a great light.  And Elissa did call it an "aha moment". 

The Good Book tells us on the fourth day God created the sun and the moon and the stars to separate day from night and to mark seasons and the passage of time.

So more washing up and more thinking and I decided to totally re-write from about chapter four onwards.  I mapped it out and ......it sucked.  I had a very busy day yesterday: appointments, errands and meetings and the fact my deadline is only days away and I'm having all theses revelations about the characters and the plot line and the conflict issues being resolved (or not) means that I really am no where near ready to finish this baby.

That doesn't mean I'm giving up - just realising that what everyone has been saying about how hard editing can be is true.  But the fact it's hard and that I'm finding all these issues with my work shows me something else - that I know more than I did a year ago.  Back then I would have probably already sent this ms off, thinking it was a pretty hot dish with an outstanding chance of being published.  Now?  Well now I'm applying all my research and I hope that my end product will be much better for it.

Day Three

Yes I know - technically this is Day Four but hey the Big Man upstairs took some time to get his achievements down on paper so I don't think a 24 hour time lag is such a big deal!

Ok.

On the third day Elissa did realise that she had completely messed up the middle and if she wanted her Hero to be a three dimensional character and actually have his conflict all sorted out by the end of the book then she was going to have to do some serious cutting.  So Elissa did call for the good stuff to be separated from the bad stuff.  And Elissa said let the bits happen at the end of the manuscript come forward and let the bits that come after be cut and removed from sight.  And she called the good bits The Right Part and the other bits some words that can't be repeated.  And Elissa saw that it was better.  Not great.  Maybe good.  But definitely better.  And the good bits did yield new ideas for a better ending.

According to the Good Book on the Third Day God separated the land from the seas and gave them names and then called forth the first plants into being.  Me?  I did lots of writing and then whilst doing the washing up last night (primetime for thinking folks) I realised that if I kept going the way I was, this book was going to be WAY too long. So then I started thinking about why it was so long and of course I realised that it was because I was writing 'filler'.  The stuff that pads out that saggy middle.  Rambling.  Nice enough but not good enough.  I needed to change things and the Hero was bothering me - the heroine is torturing him nicely, making him rethink his life and decisions but there's this deeper issue and it just wasn't going to get resolved if I kept going the way I was.  So..........back to the creationist blackboard so to speak.

More detergent, a couple of stubbornly stained pots later and voila!  I needed to bring events forward so he has the last third of the book to address that issue (with the heroine's 'assistance' aka interference of course).

Day Two

On the second day Elissa separated the sucky sort of ending she had written from the rest of the manuscript.  And Elissa made another document into which she pasted the thousands of words she had written in error.  And she called it Cut Material and it was truly sucky (with some not so sucky bits that she will probably use later).  And even though it was exceedingly difficult to click on 'cut' she did it and then saw that it was good.

Biblically God separated the waters on Day Two and I cleft my manuscript in twain.  It was not easy clefting but it was a much needed cleft and it is liberating to now have all that white space begging me to fill it up with scribble erudite composition!

Photo courtesy of RGBStock.com