Smooth riding, quiet, cool (literally, after coming from a car with A/C problems), and a unique, asymmetrical look. Definitely a fun car. We love it. We may have missed the Cash for Clunkers (by one day) but came out with a good deal. We couldn’t be happier.
EotF Status
# of queries out: 7
# of fulls out: 0
additional querying on hold
T.C. Status
word count: 9,034
FwM Status
word count: 5,751
Color Poems
complete: 14
min needed for chapbook: 20
Previous goals:
Goals for this week:
I wrote down the list of books we need to buy to fill out all our series: 104. That number may go down after we take another hard look at our collections. We have some where it’s only book 2, or we have a couple but the series is really long, and may decide to donate the books rather than buy the rest.
B will be in a full day kindergarten class. No more excuses not to write. It might be time to buy a watch again, since I’ll be walking B to and from school. At least my husband can pick up him some days, since work gets off before school. We met B’s teacher yesterday. She seems nice. B came away very excited about school. (Not that he hasn’t been excited prior to the visit…) Over the weekend we made a paper chain to represent how many days until school starts. Each morning after breakfast he cuts off a loop and we count how many are left. I’ve also been showing him on the calendar, so he can practice the days of the week.
B has been peeing his pants lately. Waiting until the very last second to run to the bathroom (and not always making it). Hopefully he’ll be back into good potty habits by Monday.
Nikki had twins on August 18. Both boys are doing well, but Nikki is not. She needs all the prayers and blessings you can send her way.
If you are at all familiar with MMO’s, you are likely to enjoy this highly entertaining music video. Much satire and humor. And an extremely catchy tune. I can’t stop watching and singing! The song is called “Do You Wanna Date My Avatar.”
And if you haven’t yet, check out The Guild: a web series about a group of online gamers (seen in music video).
Speaking of MMO’s, got two big ones coming out next month! Looking forward to Champions Online and Aion. Two very different games. Both a lot of fun.
EotF Status
# of queries out: 7
# of fulls out: 0
additional querying on hold
T.C. Status
word count: 9,034
FwM Status
word count: 5,751
Color Poems
complete: 14
min needed for chapbook: 20
Previous goals:
Goals for this week:
Got all of our books organized and listed in Excel. Hand is tired from all the writing, copying down author/title/series/shelf to input in computer. The last time we did a count was in 2005. At the time, we had over 700 books. Since then, we have bought more books, but have also donated duplicates and a lot of books we realized would never be read. Here are some new statistics:
Total books: 325
Fantasy: 211
Other: 114 (includes non-fiction, poetry, as well as other fiction genres)
Most from one author: R.A. Salvatore (18+ books)
The plus is because three of those books are complete series in one volume.
Going through these books makes me want to read some of them again, as I remember how much I enjoyed them. And there are quite a few books that my husband brought to the collection that I’m interested in. I don’t think I need to visit the library anytime soon…
Later, I’ll have to figure out and post the numbers for how many books it will take to complete the gaps in our series.
Now that I’m revisiting EotF, I’ve been wondering if there are other ways to make it stronger. I had a light bulb “what-if” moment, and shared it with my husband (my backboard to bounce ideas off of). My idea:
What if magic did have that chance to drive someone crazy if it remains untrained? (Not just a lie the Enchanter Council spreads.) The boys are trained when they are eight, so it prevents anyone from knowing the possibility for them is there. But females that escape the testing go mad: a self-fulfilling prophecy. What takes mental training/overcoming is the sensation of spiders crawling over the skin every time enchanter magic is cast.
I know I would go crazy if it felt like bugs crawling on me, but nothing was actually there.
My husband had a few suggestions to enhance the idea even more, and agrees that this will add more “incentive/motive/danger for various aspects of the story.” The other part of the idea is Marian getting her own moon spider. Currently, only the higher up enchanters have moon spiders. I need to figure out how Marian is going to acquire hers.
So, I need to work in some craziness and spiders with my description, and write an entire new chapter for Marian’s spider bonding, and a few more scenes. It’s not a lot, but I think it will improve it a lot. Querying is on hold until I finish these new revisions.
EotF Status
# of queries out: 7
# of fulls out: 0
T.C. Status
word count: 9,034
FwM Status
word count: 5,751
Color Poems
complete: 14
min needed for chapbook: 20
Previous goals:
Goals for this week:
I didn’t do any writing Saturday or Sunday (shouldn’t have even expected it), and my Thursday and Friday counts were low. But I wrote over 1000 words the other three days, which brought up my average considerably.
My husband had a light-bulb moment on a problem with EotF. Not enough descriptive details for my world to really come alive for him. He has a point. My early stories had a lot of description. But the complaint was always that I didn’t get into the character’s heads. Too omniscient. Now my strength is in the dialogue, the emotion. I don’t have a problem getting in their head, but when I do I’m not focused as much on the world around them. Often when I’m reading books, I get very attached to characters, but half the time I couldn’t tell you what they look like. I know my writing will be much richer if I can combine the internal with the external. They shouldn’t suffer from my own lack of observation. It means a lot of attention to my writing and rewriting. More awareness. And a lot of hard work if I plan to apply it to this book. I added some description in previous drafts, but apparently mostly generic, not unique enough.
The problem wasn’t one I could notice on my own. Obviously the world is alive to me. It took an outside source to point out where it’s lacking. I’ll see if I can add those details to the first three chapters before sending out more queries, or entering the War of the Words contest (deadline Aug 20!).
In other EotF news, I wrote a new query completely from scratch. I don’t know if it’s any better, but I tried to add more voice. I’ll give it a few days to sit before looking at it again and getting feedback.
I had a spectacular weekend. Cirque Du Soleil: Saltimbanco was absolutely amazing. Breathtaking. The singer was incredible, as was the live band. And the acts! The duo trapeze artists about gave me a heart attack when one caught her partner’s feet with her own. The biggest surprise, and the most fun, was Eddie. A jester, a clown, a master of sound effects. I laughed so hard! One of my favorite acts, though, had to be the boleadora duo. Very cool. The show was definitely worth the ticket price. If they come again with a different show, we will buying tickets without hesitation. And this is coming from two people who rarely go to events, not wanting to pay the high ticket prices. Cirque Du Soleil is worth every penny.
Olive Garden was a great follow up. I’d only been there for lunch, or had their soups. This was the first time I had one of their specialty dishes. I had the Chicken Scampi. Oh my gosh, was it good. Exquisite. I couldn’t finish it all, but not for lack of wanting. My husband had the Grilled Steak Crostada, which he enjoyed. I have finally seen the why Olive Garden gets the praise it does. It’s not worth it to go for the chicken parmesan, or spaghetti, or lasagna. Get something specialty rather than generic Italian. It’s worth the extra cost. My leftovers even heated well.
After such a filling dinner Friday, we decided not to eat out at Mimi’s on Saturday, saving our gift card for a future date. We still went to a movie. We saw The Perfect Getaway. Thoroughly enjoyed it. It wasn’t an action-packed horror, or gore fest. Yay! Lots of suspense, and wondering who was the killer. With a killer twist in the second act.
Sunday was nice, not having to pick up B until the afternoon. This was the first time he’d spent two nights away from us. He did just fine, and had a fun time with his grandparents. Saturday he got to play for five hours with one of his cousins. He loves playing with other kids. We’re both looking forward to school starting soon.
With B gone, we took advantage of uninterrupted game time and opened up one of our unplayed board games: A Touch of Evil. We had so much fun, we left it out and played it again the following morning. I have yet to be disappointed by a Flying Frog Productions game. Next time we need to play with the soundtrack.
Conclusion: Awesome weekend!
I’ve got a lot to do this morning, to get chores and preparations out of the way. After lunch, we’re dropping B off at my in-laws. He’s staying through Sunday. (Woot!) Husband and I will then go see an afternoon showing of Cirque Du Soleil: Saltimbanco. So excited!
After the show, we’ll be eating out, using a gift card to Olive Garden that was given to my husband by a friend.
Then tomorrow, extended date time! My husband’s five year anniversary for working at his job came up this week, and they gave him a gift certificate to Mimi’s, and a gift certificate to the movies. So we’ll be going out to dinner again, and seeing a movie.
So, I need to give B a bath, get laundry done, plan meals for shopping Saturday, get B’s weekend bag together, and hopefully fit in some writing.
What are your weekend plans?
| Your Travel Personality Is: The Adventurer |
 You truly have wanderlust. When you're not traveling, you're dreaming about where you'll go next. And your travels are truly legendary - they leave you with stories you'll be telling for the rest of your life! |
I guess that is the ideal traveler me. So far it’s all in my head! I so want to travel, see the world. Go backpacking in the Amazon, climb the pyramids, walk on the beach, explore a castle. *dreamy sigh*
Our vacations growing up were never big ones. Can’t afford to go far with a family of nine kids. I got to go to San Francisco my senior year in HS, for our choir tour. That was a lot of fun. But we weren’t allowed to go to the beach, and there’s only so much we could do outside the itinerary (though what we did do was awesome). I want to explore, though.
Even in video games I’m the explorer. I love discovering new areas, revealing the map from the fog. Whether it’s an MMO or Civilization game or RPG.
Maybe that’s why none of my stories take place near home. I’m exploring the world through my characters. And I’ve always been fascinated by the world’s wonders: Easter Island, Stonehenge, the Pyramids of Egypt and South America. My dream vacation would have to include a trip around the world. My very first novel attempt (I was eleven or so) was called The World Wide Contest, about a group of kids who won an educational/diplomacy trip around the world.
Anyway, a bit sidetracked? I came to write about my dream vacation. Though all out dream is unrealistic, so we’ll go with an uber-vacation that’s doable within the next five years.
Evil Liana for making me spend a big chunk of the day buried in cruise websites.
So today, for your workout, plan your dream vacation.
- Where are you going?
- Who will you take? - What time of year will you go?
- How much will it cost?
- How long will it take you to save an earn for your trip?
Going on a cruise. I will take my husband only. (Son can stay with his grandparents.) Most likely go in fall, just before school starts. Costs below. Will take a while to save up.
All out dream trip? World cruise. That’s a 106 day voyage though. Don’t think that’s happening until after my son graduates high school (aka 13 plus years from now). Oceanview room would be $63,189.88 for two, including fees. Heh. Anyone have a winning lottery ticket they’d be willing to give up? That’s more than two years salary… By the time we saved that much, prices would probably even higher. *sigh* Let’s see… if we round that up to $70k… saved up $200/month… that’s 350 months of saving… or 30 years. $250 a month would drop that to 23 years. Either way, not any time soon. There’s probably cheaper world cruises, but likely all equally out of my budget. Well, I just wasted a big chunk of my day drooling over that.
Okay, let’s settle for a much cheaper cruise. A 7-day Caribbean Cruise is more in the range of $2,000 for two. Plus money for the round trip flight to the port. Plus souvenir money. Plus passport money. Gosh, no wonder my husband doesn’t like the planning. Umm. We could probably save up, set aside some of our tax return money each year, and plan on a cruise for our 10 year anniversary in 2012. That’s not terribly far away, and would be a great event.
Okay, my head hurts. Time to play Sims 3 (and look forward to the newly announced expansion pack World Adventures, which comes out in November). Wow, that post got long… Lemonade, anyone?
EotF Status
# of queries out: 8
# of fulls out: 0
T.C. Status
word count: 9,034
FwM Status
word count: 5,751
Color Poems
complete: 14
min needed for chapbook: 20
Previous goals:
Goals for this week:
I may have to resign myself to working without an outline for Fly with Me, or wait until I have the story more fleshed out. I did make progress on the outline though. I now have general guidelines for the next four chapters. I’m not sure where to go after chapter six. Hopefully I’ll have a better idea once I get there.
Outlining Trinity Coven has been much easier. With FwM I only have a few sentences describing each chapter. Harder to tell how many scenes there will be when it’s all one point of view. With TC, I have my outline broken down to the scenes, with whose POV it will be and a paragraph of description. A lot more in depth. Maybe that should be a sign to focus on TC more. I’m up through chapter nine on my outline, and have a synopsis to draw from for the rest. I feel confident about finishing the outline over the next week or so.
Break Down
Fly with Me:
Trinity Coven:
I’ve thought about this some more. For Emergence of the Fey, I was a definite plotter. I made no progress until I knew exactly where I was going. That meant a play-by-scene outline, and extensive notes. With Trinity Coven, the same method has been working. But with Fly with Me, which I am very excited about, I keep coming to a brick wall when I try to visualize what will happen in more than very general terms. It's also in first person, which I've never done before. This book is defying all my usual expectations. I gave in to the first person, so I suppose I'll have to give in to its need to be a pantser* as well. Any pantser’s here? How do you do it? Not knowing where the story is taking me is scary!
* pantser: aka “writing by the seat of your pants”; writing with minimal outlining and plotting, letting the story take you where it will.
Winners have been announced for Authoress’s query contest. I really appreciated the feedback from Jodi Meadows, as well as other blog commenters. For the purpose of the contest, we submitted a query and first 250 words of the manuscript. Mine was number #38.
I got nine comments on my query. Four were hooked (though one normally didn’t read the genre). One liked it “with reserve”, and thought it could be tightened. Four were not hooked (including Jodi).
Overall, the concept didn’t seem to be the problem. Advice leans toward tightening/more focus, and dry/lack of voice. Hopefully in fixing the first issue, I can bring out my voice more. And fixing the query is easier than fixing the central concept and conflict.
It was also pretty universal to drop the three sentences about Jex and romance which felt tagged on; which is fair, as they were… It was my second version query, that I tried to spin to more romance oriented agents.
Jodi also commented that (judging from the opening page) the manuscript starts too soon. I disagree, but that’s harder for me to judge (being the author and all). But if enough agents aren’t hooked by my query and sample pages, then I may have to reconsider. For now, I’m going to revise my query and send it out again.
The query is still open for comments if you want to leave any, here or on the contest entry post. All feedback is welcome. :-)
