July 27th, 2011 by Theresa

Photo by Jef Bettens www.iamjef.be

“I’m proud of you for doing this.” Those were my Dear Husband’s words to me the other day. Stunned and confused I scratched my head wondering what was there to be proud of.
I’d just finished “The Captain’s Man.” I had locked myself in the Writing Wroom and worked until I typed “The End.” Exhausted but proud I moved on to edits for my first completed novella “Azrael.” I picked up the manuscript to discover the words I had lovingly put on the page were all crap. I have to rewrite the whole darn thing.
Downtrodden and crushed, I trudged on to fill out my schedule for rewrites, edits and work on new ideas as well as blog posts. I just kept on going. You know what? It just kind of hit me. That was it. That is why the DH was proud of me. I didn’t and haven’t given up.
Now as we all know. Being a writer isn’t easy. First of all, self-discipline is king. If you can’t depend on yourself to write a certain number of words a day or week, you can kiss those dreams of writing for big bucks goodbye. There are target dates to meet, deadlines to overcome and lots and lots of unspoken rules and regulations to learn. Commit a faux-pas in an elevator pitch to the wrong agent and you’re screwed. But you have to do it, learn it, live it and breathe it to succeed.
Next, you have to have skin thicker than the earth’s crust. Forget critique partners, I’m harder on myself than my English teacher father. You’ve got to dig through your own mistakes and not only correct them, but teach yourself new ways of writing. Then you realize that it doesn’t end. You are constantly learning through critiques, reading other novels, classes and the like.
Even then, there is no guarantee that you’ll sell that giant manuscript. It could languish for months or years before it’s ever picked up. Sometimes it isn’t picked up and you’re faced with either letting it go or self publishing. You just have to keep going. You have to keep writing. You have to keep your dream alive knowing that the creation of a story is what really makes you happy.

And that’s what I’m doing. I’m keeping on keeping on. That is truly something to be proud of, for me.

DH, goals, pressure, working, writing

June 20th, 2011 by Theresa

The End.

Never in my life was I so glad to type those words.

So I failed the “challenge.” It was friendly competition, but the lesson still stings. It took me 11 weeks to finish my short story.  I pushed myself through fatigue and sickness. At the very end I got just plain mad – dropped some “f” bombs and typed until my fingers jerked by themselves in spasms. But it’s over, all done.

To be clear, the story that I burned to write, that kept me up at night, I wish to never ever see again. I lost my plot halfway through, I think. Sub plots that I didn’t notice appeared. And the ending? It’s so  lame even I don’t think it can be fixed. But it’s over, all done.

All that’s left now is to send it off to be critiqued (to be read as ripped to shreds, set on fire and put out with Kool-Aid ) and put it in the rewrite pile. My plan was to get it done and sent off to a publisher now. Fat chance of that. I wouldn’t show this manuscript to my dog – and she can’t read ( that I know of ). But it’s over, all done.

The moral of this story is a life lesson – nothing so grand as how to plot, or what to do to fix a broken manuscript. This one is pretty simple – know thyself.  I know now how I work even with what I believe to be the simplest of tasks. Yeah.. I won’t be promising any editor or publisher anything in less than 12 weeks from this point on. Even then that will be pushing it for editing, critiques and rewrites.

space adventure, WIP, writing

April 4th, 2011 by Theresa

April starts a new month a new goals. I’ve finished a major rewrite for my pet romance project and got the darn thing plotted. I’ve also made some serious changes in the way I write and how I approach new ideas for novels. I know that as writers we have to adapt. I don’t think any editor or critique partner will be harder on my than I am to myself.  Change is hard but it’s for the better!

To your left you’ll see the AWESOME hat made by Josianne Blanchett!  It was my reward for getting through March! Check out her shop for more!

adapt, BMW, change, goals, hat, New Orleans, steampunk, witch, writing

March 27th, 2011 by Theresa

I may not finish my MarNo but I’m happy with the results. Most of the expansion is done. Just one or two big pushes left to add the big finish. I’m a lot farther on it than I would have been a month ago!  Taking it one page of edits at a time.

MarNo, WIP, writing