Dream Vacation

Your Travel Personality Is: The Adventurer

For you, travel is how you learn about the world. And you like to learn the stuff that's not in guidebooks. 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!

What's Your Travel Personality?

 

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?

Tuesday Tally and the diff between my WIPs

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:

• write chapter outline for FwM – much progress
• write chapter outline for TC – little progress
• catch up on crits – still very behind on these

 

Goals for this week:

• catch up on crits
• revise query with recent feedback in mind
• write a min. of 250 words every day this week
• continue adding to TC outline

 

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: 

• 5,751 words written
• 2 chapters completed
• outline through chapter 6 (one paragraph per chapter)
• no synopsis

 

Trinity Coven:

• 9,034 words written
• 3.5 chapters completed
• outline through chapter 9 (one paragraph per scene)
• synopsis

 

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.

Query results

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. :-)

end of month Tuesday Tally

EotF Status

# of queries out: 8

# of fulls out: 0

 

T.C. Status

word count: 8,272

 

FwM Status

word count: 5,547

 

Color Poems

complete: 14

min needed for chapbook: 20

 

Previous goals:

• send out 2 more queries – sent one

 

Goals for this week:

• write chapter outline for FwM
• write chapter outline for TC
• catch up on crits

 

I’ve decided to continue with TC as is. Will save muses for future story. After some recent feedback, I’ve decided to turn my novelette The Blazing Princess into a novel. There are too many characters, and not enough room to really care about the love triangle. I’ve definitely done the world building for a novel length book, I just need to multiply the word count by ten. Not until I’m done with current two WIPs though.

 

I’ve entered Authoress’s query contest, which means a crit from Jodi Meadows, assistant to agent Jenny Rappaport. I’ll wait to send out more queries until after the contest.

Tuesday Tally

EotF Status

# of queries out: 8

# of fulls out: 0

 

T.C. Status

word count: 8,272

no change

 

FwM Status

word count: 4,302

 

Color Poems

complete: 14

min needed for chapbook: 20

 

Previous goals:

• send out 4 more queries
• submit more poetry

 

Goals for this week:

• send out 2 more queries

 

Any recommendations for first person contemporary fantasy? Particularly one with a male narrator? Trying to get away from the repetitive “I” syndrome. I may have to try writing a scene in third person, then switching it over.

Dreaming in Ink

I’m a member of the critique group Dreaming in Ink Writers Workshop.

 

Critiques are required to make sure everyone gives as well as receives. I’m enjoying the community, and the monthly challenges that push me to achieve. In reviewing other member’s writing, I have been enlightened to issues in my own. And I’ve received some great, well-balanced, helpful reviews.

 

As of the last count, there are 13 openings! The group has a limited size, to give a sense of community. You must be at least 18 to join. Basic guidelines can be found here: http://community.livejournal.com/diiww/632.html. Feel free to apply if you like what you see.

Muse Online Writers Conference 2009

Deadline is coming up for the Muse Online Writers Conference. Registration is free, everything takes place online in forums and chat rooms. You can participate in just the workshops or just chats, or both. There’s something for every type of writer, whatever you write, and whatever your experience. I learned a lot, had a lot of fun, made new friends, and got out of my poetry block.

 

Conference dates are October 12 – 18. Registration deadline is August 1. I hope to see some of you there.

 

One of the ongoing benefits from the conference is my poetry group. It was formed by participants of one of the poetry workshops last year. I also have a poetry chapbook complete, which is ready to shop around. I’ve been holding off on doing so in the effort to get some acknowledgements first, but it’s done.

 

Some previous posts relating to the Muse Conf:

http://marywjensen.blogspot.com/2008/10/end-of-october-tuesday-tally.html

http://marywjensen.blogspot.com/2008/10/tuesday-tally-muse-conf-time.html

 

Let me know if you have any questions about it, and if you plan on participating.