Posts Tagged ‘Writing Freaking Writing’

Carolyn Good Faker

Friday, March 28th, 2008

Yesterday was a very good day. And today, why, it’s Friday, so that’s 2 good days in a row. Yowza! Today, I worked and worked on Chapter 16 and at the end, I was only up 400 words. Rats. I’m doing the book trailer plunge with this release, and that revealed a wee problem unrelated to the money I’m spending on it.

Of course I had to write a synopsis in order to sell My Wicked Enemy but other than the protagonists’ first names, that synopsis bears no resemblance whatever to the book I actually turned in. I knew that would happen. The whole time during the sale process for this book I knew the synopsis I had to slave over like a dog was written in disappearing ink. I told my agent, when she asked about stupid stuff I put in it, I don’t know! I have to write the book first! None of that stuff is going to actually happen. And yet, I had to provide a synopsis anyway, of some other book from some other universe. They gave me money anyway. Carolyn good faker.

So the problem is the book trailer people want a synopsis. And I only have a fake one. And a book trailer based on a fake synopsis? Bad. Bad indeed. But the next book is due May 1. I did not have time to spend 3-4 days bleeding out my eyeballs to write a synopsis. I paid those dues already, Bub! I am not agonizing over this while I pay them. Oh, no never. That’s just sick and twisted. So I whipped something together, mostly resisted the urge to edit and sent if off with the last round of edits copy of the book.

Which is most of the reason I’m only up 400 words. That means 1600 words tomorrow.

off to bed.

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Still working…

Sunday, December 9th, 2007

I fell asleep this afternoon. I feel a lot better for the nap, but it kinda put a crimp in the reading. I went grocery shopping early today so as to get it out of the way and have my afternoon clear, but a bunch of stuff kept coming up. I washed hundreds (and I do mean hundreds) of box elder beetles off the outside of the sliding glass door in my room. After that murderous spree, I admitted I had a couple of rough patches to fix in Scandal and then went and fixed them. I hope. And no I was NOT procrastinating or anything like that. Sheesh! Like I’d ever do that. I just didn’t want to stare at all those bugs any more. I didn’t. Would you? I wish the peacocks were still here. They ate a lot of box elder beetles.

I had to make two batches of cookies tonight, one for the Darling Child and his lunches for the week, the other for the Cookie Parade at work. Not, as I was hoping, an event where you dress up as your favorite cookie, but one where you bring them to work for every one to enjoy. Can you say good bye diet? I can. Rats.

Anyway, I’m going to read more and hope I find out that I’ve fixed the problem chapters.

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Bad Poetry Day (no, there’s no meter)

Friday, November 16th, 2007

Panic, how do I love thee?
Let me count the ways.
You turn my stomach into a rock
When I’m cutting pages.
(Don’t worry, that clunk is just the sound of bad writing when it hits the worm hole to the bad writing universe behind my monitor)
You’re the ice that runs down my spine
When I play whack a chapter.
(Once yesterday, twice today!
Whack!
Whack! Whack!
At the gym!)
That squiffy feeling in my elbows?
That’s you, Panic.
All that writing that came from nowhere
And might even be halfway decent?1
That’s from you too.

But I still don’t love you.

1. If you’re not, you’re going into the same black hole you came out of. And yeah, that’s a threat and a promise. Try not to Panic about it.

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Some post title here

Sunday, September 16th, 2007

Yikes. Didn’t get much done today, word-wise. Soccer in the morning in a city about 45 minutes away, then back to town where I did the grocery shopping before heading home. Kidlet not happy about that, but pretty much, tough tootles for him. No way was I going to go back into town to shop later. Too much stuff is out or picked over. I gave him $5.00 and send him over to the yogurt place to wait for me while I shopped.

Came home from shopping and fell exhausted into bed and slept hard again. When I woke up, I fuzted around and thought about Scandal but didn’t actually do anything about it. Then I took the DC to the movies. We saw The Brave One which was better than I expected. I like moral ambiguity and that was present for sure. And, I’m embarrassed to admit that I totally missed a subtle yet key point of a pivotal scene that my son totally picked up on. He liked the movie, which I actually didn’t expect. I thought it might be too cerebral for his tastes, but no.

Came home, took down the garbage and recycling and I swear by the time I walked back up the hill, I was ready to fall down in a heap. I’m exhausted now, and this, obviously by now, isn’t normal. I wasn’t anemic when I gave blood, so that’s not the problem. So, we’ll see how things are tomorrow. I must be getting something. I did work on Scandal though, and ended up rearranging the chapters. But I need an unexhausted brain to think about where things are going.

To bed for me.

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Things Go Along

Tuesday, August 14th, 2007

Scandal is going reasonably well. I’m slowly working my way through scenes, just going with the flow as it turns up on the page and surprises me. Tired. Going to sleep. Am meeting my minimum so right now, even though it’s first draft time, I’m OK. Two months from now I’ll have a lot of crap to fix. Joy! True.

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Ah, my little dumpling . . . Yes!

Monday, April 9th, 2007

Tonight I tackled chicken and dumplings again and success! I pulled out the old Betty Crocker book, followed the dumpling instructions almost faithfully, and winged it on the chicken. (Good gosh, two puns in the same day!**) Ah, yes, I ended up with light yummy dumplings. And the dumpling lore is this: Do not cook them in the water. You set the dough on TOP of the meat which is in a frying pan with boiling whatever but has enough meat in it that the dumplings will not fall into the water. 10 minutes boiling no cover, then 10 more covered with a domed cover.

** See previous post.

67+ K for Magellan’s Witch.

I have an issue to deal with. I think I have too many characters right now and I’m going to have to do the authorial version of a Vulcan mind meld on somebody I know who!! — Shut up — and combine some characters. But I haven’t sussed out the exact roles those parts are playing, so I’m not sure how to most effectively combine them. The thing I don’t want to admit right now is that Mr. Zorro stripes may actually be taking the place of my hero in these last scenes I’ve been working on. That damn little voice is shouting at me so loud that I can’t think. Something isn’t right. Hero and heroine cannot be separated for this many pivotal scenes. Listen to me! Lookit, I’ll notebook it at the gym tomorrow and get some clarity OK? So will you just shut up, now? No. That’s not my job. I’m going to haunt you in your dreams and all those moments when you lose track of an important conversation or in the shower or whatever. Maybe the stairs. Right. Thanks. A writer must be eternally vigilant.

Or maybe just nuts.

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