SYTYCW Interviews

My pal Maria Buscher decided to interview entrants into 2012's So You Think You Can Write -- Harlequin's writing competition. So if you're curious how other entrants have been getting on, stop by her blog.

My interview kicks off the series, talking about Mountain Man:MD and what I've learned from revising him(so far). But I'm sure the others will have useful advice :D

New interviews will go up on Thursdays. Stop by!

Next few interviewees:

• Fiona Marsden (Feb 7)
• Janie Couch (Loveylove day! Feb 14)
• Heather Gardner (Feb 21)
• (There will be more, just stopping the list here.)

Betraying Your Voice Is Bad

I also speel gud

With an eye toward revision and submission, I picked up a novella I wrote last summer. It was written about two months before I wrote my SYTYCW entry, and I didn't think that there would be much difference in the writing style.

Wrong.

I remember now that I'd read something... some piece of writing advice(like I do) and I'd decided to Improve My Writing by incorporating this advice into my style.

The result? I completely lost my voice.

I read the first couple chapters and it was like someone else wrote it.

Someone slow.

With a limited vocabulary and stunted imagination!

Maybe someone in a coma, or perhaps this is what it would be like if a zombie tried to write a novella. A novella about zombies.

Bad. So bad.

I'm sure my skill set has changed, improved since last summer. With the revision letters, I'm getting an idea of my problem areas and learning what I need to do to address. All that is good, but I've come to the conclusion that in trying so hard to WRITE RIGHT, I sabotaged myself.

Gearing up to rewrite it now, and actually excited to do so, but so dismayed at this feat of ridiculousness I perpetrated like... six months ago.

Lesson learned. If it ain't broke, stop messing with it! Work on craft, not on voice. I've got my voice, and I'm comfortable with it. I like it. Now I need to concentrate on effective storytelling.

Revisions and Tatting

Sent my revisions off last night. No idea if they are in the ballpark of good, but I am feeling pretty pleased with the amount of work TrackChanges has allowed me to document. I took screenshots to show how much of it got changed from first submission. You know, so far.

The scene of the crime, where the word massacre occurred

Pink Tatted Top Hat Fascinator

And since I need a couple days to decompress and make stuff with my hands, and I'm exceedingly tired of scarves.... I'm making tatted top hat fascinators. Well, I've made two so far. The first version, the pink top hat, was a gift for my niece for Christmas.

Black Top Hat (Pattern)

Then I made another, in black for her mother(my SiL), who liked the pink one so well, I thought I'd surprise her. And I wanted to see if it was as cute. Of course it is. How can a tiny top hat not be adorable. The index card in the picture is shown for scale.

Have had a request for a friend of the family, something for her teenage granddaughter. So! Will whip that up before I dive into the writing again. Burgundy with a cream band and amber glass seed beads. Maybe feathers, we'll see on that count.

Wheee.... Scarves & Other Nonsense

From mid-August until December 25, I made 46 scarves. *crosses eyes*

Grandma Hair: Unchanged since the 80s

I got to witness half of them finding an owner at the family Christmas party. I thought I was gonna get to see an Angry Octogenarian Christmas Throw-down over the sparkly scarves. And they weren't even that sparkly. Imagine if they had more than a single thread of shiny silvery something-or-other woven through the polyester!

I'm sure my great-aunts would've been too polite to do any hair-pulling(or too smart to do any hair-pulling--when you get your hair set in a salon once a week and coated with enough hairspray to survive a nuclear blast, if anyone messes with it they might break a calcium-deficient finger). The little mental-trip I took to picture this granny-scuffle (as I huddled in the corner while they dug through the pile) was a nightmare of shiny shoes, broken hips and Christmas sweaters.

But the scarves went over well.
Even the non-sparkly ones.
And I may never make another scarf. Ever.

Got another round of revisions for Mountain Man: MD, and praying I can follow directions. And since I should be working, I'm taking a break to post about granny-fights and wondering how come pervy people reached my blog with the keywords: kids sleeping in their underwear, and teenagers fighting.

That's it, Google's off the scarf-list for 2013.

NaNo and SYTYCW Updates

So, I have been lax in posting here. I tend to do that when I'm dug into a project.

First, a confession: It wasn't my NaNoWriMo project. I was buzzing along with NaNo and the day after my last post I got a request for the full manuscript from Harlequin for Mountain Man:MD (which I'd entered into SYTYCW). I really didn't expect it. I still have a manuscript under consideration with HQN, and since I hadn't actually gotten to any medical situations in the first uploaded chapter, I'd already decided I should probably start thinking about reworking the story for Special Edition or SuperRomance. I stopped revising it when I didn't make it to round two of the competition, and shifted focus to my NaNo synopsis for Savvy's Bootcamp.

I sent off the first half(which had been revised) and have already gotten notes back on that and am working those notes into the revision process. But, I've had such a good reaction from everyone with this story that my husband says I'm no longer allowed to bemoan how much I suck as a writer.(So I'll stop doing that for, you know, a week or two *hah*)

So you can guess what else I have to report: I have once again sidelined eWife(my NaNo project). A bird in the hand, and all that. I have story guilt though, and I'm planning on digging back in December or January at the latest. Writing a book and revising another in one month was a little too much for my little brain.

Next year, I MUST resist the lure of NaNo. I always start with such good intentions. I can write a book in a month(Mountain Man was written in 16 days), just apparently not when it's in a NaNo month. But it's hard to feel too bad about that right now aside from letting down my Savvy team. That's why the frowny face. -->

NaNo week 1 report

NaNoWriMo bootcamp going well so far. It's really all about the public humiliation with me, getting my word count down everyday. Apparently, I'm crazy. Who knew? (Besides everyone . . .)

• I skipped writing on Sunday, but my word counts have been high enough to offset that day. 
• Haven't written yet today but I'm still ahead of that 1667*8 daily word goal total, so that's good!
• It's my birthday but I'm still going to write in a little bit. Aiming 2K+ (and for a whole load this weekend). Really want to get through this project and at least half-through another before November is up. Although since I'm fixin to buy tatting supplies... this goal may be canceled by my drive to tat.
• Random note: aside from the threat of public humiliation, writing my word count every day on my calender and seeing it leapfrog ahead keeps me motivated. Whatever works, eh?
• Regretting slightly that I didn't sneak in a second synopsis with the editors when I had their attention. I like knowing there's at least a line fit/story interest before I storm the castle, you know?

NaNo and General Update

So, my SYTYCW entry didn't make the top 28. Didn't expect it to--I just don't have a very big social media presence. Instead, I used the contest deadline as a motivator to crank out a first draft in 16 days! That's an all time best for me. I can't say I write well under pressure, but I can write without the infernal editor slowing me down. You know, so long as there's that threat of public humiliation. Now it's resting, along with my ZombieRapunzel, in the ToBeEdited pile.

I figured that if I can write 50K in 16 days, surely I can actually do NaNo... so long as there is a threat of public humiliation! Signed up with Savvy Authors for their NaNo Bootcamp with the Entangled Indulgence editors. This let us run our synopses past the editors to get feedback on the story we meant to write for NaNo. Very helpful! For the NaNo portion, we're all on teams and if you don't pull your weight you don't help your team. I did 7K words in 3 days, not too bad, guess it's working. Hope I can keep it up.

Meanwhile, I'm still trying to finish up my scarf project, learning needle tatting because it's awesome and after I get done with this Victorian Bride Home Study course I'm going to have a vast repertoire of things I can make at home(but that are much easier to buy): granulated sugar(yes you can make it at home), cheese, butter, jelly, ice cream, candles, yeast colonies, blankets, sweaters, scarves, and now lace for jewelry and flimsy underthings. None of that is particularly practical, but at least in a zombiepocalypse I'll be warm, have cheese, and feel pretty. Because nothing makes you feel pretty while running for your life like lacy underwear.