Category: Writer

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Please Step Away From Mr. Lehane

When I was young and foolish, I was young and foolish.

Embarrassing Truth #1: When I was in grade school, I was CRAZY for David Cassidy. But that was 40 years ago so you have to give me a break on that. After him came Robby Benson, Ryan O’Neal, Robert Redford, George Clooney, Bono… the list goes on and on. If you’ll forgive me here: When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a writer, I put the ways of childhood behind me. Now that I’m a grown woman (in some senses of the word), I’ve learned to value talent and intelligence over a pretty face—though there’s nothing wrong with a pretty face.

Embarrassing Truth #2: When I was 49, I was CRAZY for both Ann Patchett and Dennis Lehane. (Wait, that’s right now. Oh, well.) I’ve even gone so far as to wish (out loud) that one day I hope to be known as the literary love child of these two great writers (never mind that I’m older than both of them; as a writer, I’m still an adolescent). For those of you who don’t know this already, Lehane wrote Mystic River, Gone Baby Gone, Shutter Island, and Live By Night, among others. His stories are intense and suspenseful, if a little grisly—that’s where a dose of the lyrical Ann Patchett might come in handy.

Embarrassing Truth #3: Sometimes I scare myself. More often, I scare others. Take this summer, for example. I went to the Jackson Hole Writers’ Conference for many reasons, but somewhere near the top was the opportunity to have Lisa Bankoff (Ms. Patchett’s literary agent) review my Work In Progress (WIP). That’s not a bad thing, but strangely, when I told that to Ms. Bankoff, she looked a little… nervous.

I promise, People, I’m harmless. I’m simply a dork, kind of like a puppy who’s just been let out of her kennel.

In a few weeks, I’m going to meet Dennis Lehane. I know this because I’m paying for the opportunity. That keeps me just outside the stalker category, right? I don’t have to tell you that I got front row tickets. Dennis Lehane (Let’s call him Dennis, shall we?) is coming to the great city of Des Moines for our first annual book fair. It’s fantastic for the book fair and our city, but it’s a little scary for me. I must NOT behave like a dork in front of Dennis. (Having my husband at my side will help; he’s wise and rational and he works out a lot.) I must somehow stress how much I admire his writing without creeping him out. This is going to take some practice.

I’m thinking of trying Mental Imagery, whereby I picture myself behaving like a normal person in Dennis’s presence. Not like someone who wants private writing lessons, or his personal review and opinion of my latest WIP. Not like someone who wants to observe his writing process, or to dissect his brain during the planning stages of his next novel.
How does he do it?

Did I mention that Dennis now has a publishing imprint, and is looking for young authors?

All right, wish me luck. I’ll be sure to let you know how it goes. And just in case the whole meditation thing doesn’t work, I think I’ll slip a Xanax in my pocket as a backup plan.

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I’m Much Obliged

oblige |əˈblīj|verb [ with obj. and infinitive ]make (someone) legally or morally bound to an action or course of action: 1) Karolyn feels obliged to take care of her family first. 2) Social media experts say writers are obliged to blog on a regular basis.

Where do a writer’s obligations lie? To WRITING!

Okay, so we can’t ignore our family and friends completely, nor personal hygiene, sleep, and the occasional meal, but treating one’s writing time (or personal time, like meditating or exercising) like an office job is vital for success. That might be easy for a writer who’s “made it,” one who has paychecks coming in with enough zeros to make a difference to her household. But what about the writer who has yet to be validated by a paycheck? Or one who has sold a few articles but still has trouble justifying her time away from friends and family? Does the issue lie with the writer? Or with her family and friends?

It’s an equal matter of respect: respecting one’s self, and demanding the same respect from others. If writing (or painting or volunteering) is important to you, you must think of it as a job (“The check’s in the mail.”), and tell your loved ones that they, too, need to treat it as such. It’s the “Fake it till you make it” concept.

My son-in-law is one of those techie brainiacs that makes the rest of us go glassy-eyed when he describes his latest project. He’s “made it.” Like me, he works from home in a dedicated office. Unlike me, he’s able and confident enough to say, “All right, good to see all of you, but I’m going back to work.” And he does. He shuts the door and works. I haven’t quite gotten to that point. Everyday I struggle against answering the phone, running household errands, planning events for my family. And blogging. I feel guilty when I blog, and guiltier when I don’t blog. Argh! 

Years ago, when I had an art gallery, I learned a lesson, that I need to remind myself of occasionally. If, when you’re working, you feel guilty for not being at home, and when you’re at home, your mind is at work, then you’re failing at both obligations. The best solution is to be fully engaged with your task at hand. “Efficient at work, efficient at home,” as I said in an essay I wrote a couple years ago.

So, as a reminder, here’s my pep talk to myself; you are welcome to eavesdrop.

You, yeah, you: Go get your dream! You deserve it! For all these years you’ve taken care of others, and now it’s your turn. Set your boundaries as if you had to clock in and work under the scrutiny of a demanding boss. Turn off your phone and email. Schedule appointments and run errands “after work.” You want to see your hardback novel on the front table at Barnes & Noble, so write. Rewrite. Get advice, then rewrite again. Do not stop. Do not give up. You will succeed. Everyone who loves you wants you to succeed, so they will understand. Trust that. Believe in yourself and others will believe in you, too. It’s okay to put yourself first!

Whew, thanks. I feel much better now, but hey, I really have to get back to writing. Drop me a line if you have any more suggestions on setting boundaries and goals.

 

 

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The Best Books on Writing

Ask any writer what books on writing they would recommend to others and you’re bound to get Stephen King’s On Writing and Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird.

Fair enough, those are both great books. But, hello? They are not the best books for craft.

Over the past five years, I’ve been teaching myself how to write. I call it a self-inflicted MFA. I’ve written nearly every day (just like King and Lamott told me to) for one to eight hours a day, plus I’ve read a few hundred books, many of them on the skill of writing well. It’s definitely harder than it looks.

One thing that seems obvious in our bottom-line, cash-is-king world, is that the story trumps the skills. If someone has a killer $tory, a publisher will buy it, and so will the public. We all know who I’m talking about (ahem, Stephenie Meyer and E.L. James). (And yes, I know, they’re laughing at my list on the way to their Swiss Chalets.)

For those of us who want to be proud of our writing, who truly care about lyrical phrases and sympathetic characters, here is my list of recommended books on writing. (I have no reason to endorse these books other than I found them to be the most helpful. I am not getting paid for recommending them.)

1. The Elements of Style, by Strunk and White: This is not just an old reference book. If a person wants to begin writing, or is trying to figure out why their writing is getting rejected, this is the book to read first. These are the basic rules of the craft.

2. Story Engineering, by Larry Brooks: This book might be a bit controversial; it’s certainly arguable. Ok, here’s my argument: This book teaches the structure of a novel. If a writer considers herself to be an “organic writer,” and likes to let the words flow, let the story tell itself thru her fingertips, she ain’t gonna like this book. I still say read it, and keep Brooks’s ideas in the back of your head as you formulate your book as a whole. Brooks delineates the nine milestones every successful novel must have, just as Blake Snyder did in Save the Cat, a similar book for writing screenplays. Unfortunately, Larry Brooks seems overly defensive about his theory/opinions which nearly undercuts his idea… but I still think the structure of a novel is vital.

3. How Fiction Works, by James Wood: You’re going to have to have your thinking cap on for this deceivingly simple little book. This is possibly the most dense, erudite, non-fiction book I’ve ever read, but it was well worth the effort. The book covers 123 separate instructions. Buy the book, and even if it takes years to get through it all, read Numbers 7 – 16 on Free Indirect Style, and Number 119 on Hypotyposis (yeah, now you get the part about your thinking cap.) Buy the book.

4. Hooked, by Les Edgerton: Ok, so if you are a writer, or you want to write, you probably have a rough draft of a novel, or maybe short story by now. If, after you’ve read the first three books on this list, you’re still not sure your book’s going to sing, read this one. Every writer loves her characters, cares deeply about them—otherwise how could she spend months if not years telling their story. But how does a writer make an agent care? An agent will never read more than one (maybe five) pages of a submission if he/she doesn’t love your characters immediately. Edgerton tells you how to hook the reader on page one, and two, and three… You get the picture, now buy the book.

5. Self-editing for Fiction Writers, by Renni Browne and Dave King: True story here: I bought this book several years ago, thumbed through it, then placed in on my shelves in perfect alphabetical order among my writing reference books. Recently, I attended the Jackson Hole Writers’ Conference in order to further hone my craft. It cost me nearly $2500, but it was a wonderful, valuable experience. And the most valuable thing I learned? Read this book, the one I’ve had on my shelf for years. (Doh!) This book finally explained how to separate third person POV from omniscient POV, something I’d been screwing up all these years. And that’s just for starters.

Now, anyone who knows anything about the publishing industry will tell you that it’s all a big crapshoot. An MFA grad from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop might never publish a book as successful as The Help. Heck, I doubt Stephenie Meyer has read any of the books on my list, yet her story idea was a goldmine.

So what’s the real secret? No one really knows, unless… Wait, maybe this list of books is the secret, and no one has ever written it before because they’re trying to cut down on the competition! Oops.

Have you read any of these books? Do you agree, disagree? What books would you add to the list? Maybe there’s one more book on writing out there that I should read.

A P.S.  from Yours Truly: When I originally posted this post, a lovely reader named Cynthia Robertson (see below) suggested Francine Prose’s Reading Like a Writer. I have since read that book and I would definitely include it in my list of Best Books on Writing. I don’t want to eliminate any of the above, so I now have six books in my top five! I can do that because it’s my blog. Read it and I think you’ll agree! Thanks, Cynthia!

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The Power of Networking

I’ve long been a proponent of the adage: It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.

When I was an art dealer, I represented about forty very talented artists, but some were much more successful than others. It wasn’t that they were more talented, it’s just that there’s more to success than talent. The three components to success, I believe, are talent, ambition and luck. It’s like a pie cut into three slices: the size of each slice may vary, but together they make up a whole. If someone is very talented, but they have no ambition, they probably won’t go anywhere, unless they get very lucky and happen to meet the one right person that will change their life. In the case of an artist, that person might be a wealthy and well-connected collector, or a museum director or curator, or an enthusiastic art dealer. Another artist might be very ambitious but need to work on his or her skills before s/he finds success. The third possibility is someone who is so naturally talented that with very little effort, they get incredibly lucky, and boom. Overnight success.

In light of this example, I feel lucky to have been found by Melani Ward. No, she’s not a lit agent nor does she own a publishing company, but she seems exactly like the kind of woman who is good to know. Melani is writing a book about making career changes after 40, and she found me by way of an essay I wrote that was published on More Magazine’s website titled “Opportunity is the Mother of Reinvention.”

A certified life coach with two Master’s degrees (and working on her third) who’s also writing a book, Melani interviewed me about my three markedly different careers (interior designer, art dealer, writer) and how I made those changes. (They’re not as random as one might think.) Most importantly, though, is Melani’s purpose in writing her book: She wants to help others succeed.

I think that’s fantastic, and I’m happy that I had a chance to talk with her.

Check out her blog post about our conversation!

 

 

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Like the Terminator, or the Exorcist

Forgive me, Followers; it’s been seven weeks since my last post. The last time we spoke, I was on my way to a writers’ conference in Jackson Hole.

So was it fantastic or horrible? Why did the trip silence you, Karolyn?

Ah, it was fantastic. The faculty, the guest writers, agents and editors, plus the other wanna-publish writers, everyone was friendly, helpful and extremely talented. I filled an entire legal pad with notes and quotes and ideas and more books to read. I got feedback on my work in progress (WIP) from four different people: three writers and an agent. Each weighed in with sage advice, some of it conflicting, but some comments were repeated by all. More than 100 writers attended the conference, and I made a few friends. I saw the dedication in their eyes that I see each morning in my bathroom mirror. From age 15 to 75, writers from across the country came to listen to the likes of Michael Perry, Anita Diamant, Dennis Palumbo, Lisa Bankoff, Robert Guinsler, Sarah Bowlin, Denise Scarfi, Katherine Sands, and many more.

In other words, it was intimidating.

The thing about being wanting to get published is this: nobody cares if you do. Seriously, nobody. Unless, I suppose, you have a family to support whom you’ve convinced that the only way you’ll ever be published is if you quit all other money making ventures to focus on your manuscript. They might care. But no one else will. Not agents, not publishers, not your friends. You know why? Because there are thousands upon thousands of other writers who will give them finished manuscripts.

But here’s the thing. The definition of a publishable novel varies as drastically as the definition of a good president. A newbie writer just has to find one person who thinks his/her book meets that definition. If that person’s not an agent or publisher, then the writer just puts it out as an ebook! Some writers have the confidence (or… stupi  naiveté) to put any work out into our glorious literary world with their name on it for eternity. Either I lack confidence, or I’m playing it smart. One day you will be able to judge.

So how does this explain my silence, and what does it mean for our future here?

Okay, I might have had a momentary (read: weeklong) lapse wherein I stopped writing, but then, like the storm that follows the calm, I woke one day with a screaming vengeance. I will not give up! (Winston Churchill taught me that.) But, I also learned that small publication credits will immeasurably boost my chances of having an agent take a second look at my query letter once it lands on his or her desk.

In other words, I’ve been cheating on my novel with a couple of non-fiction essays.

There, I said it.

I’ve also just returned from a weeklong plane/bus/automobile trip covering the northeast part of our beautiful country. Oh, the things we do for family.

But now, I’M BACK… and curious….

How do you recover from that overwhelming feeling of “Do I have what it takes to do this?” Whom do you call? What do you tell yourself? What is your motivation to follow your passion or simply fulfill your obligations? I look forward to reading your comments.

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Publication is the Goal

I haven’t been honest with you, dear readers. But take heart because I haven’t been completely honest with myself either. Until now.

My last post was a sweet, esoteric, zen-rific ditty about “The Path Is the Goal.”

Yeah, no.

I mean, yes of course, the path is the goal… BUT, my ultimate goal is publishing my novel. I want to sell my novel. Period.

I have learned over the years that it’s vital for a person’s sanity to enjoy and appreciate the trek it takes to reach one’s goal; my last post was as much to remind myself of that as well as the millions of you reading along. In my case, it’s a curlicue path toward a golden bookstore, where I will pick my hardbound book up off the New Fiction shelf, and hold said book in my shaking hands. For you, it might be hearing your song on the radio, or buying a house, or landing your dream job, or walking up the aisle with your soulmate…

How many of you out there aren’t yet where you want to ultimately be? (I cannot see you  nod your head or raise your hands) (unless my spy camera is set to your IP address today). (In other words, leave a comment below if you’d like to chime in.) Dreams are fantastic; goals have a deadline. Deadlines bring out the best and the worst in me. They make me productive and make me strive for brilliance. They also make me crazy, which brings us back to The Path Is the Goal.

Each of us, I am sure, has had moments of blood, sweat, and tears (if you get that reference, you’re either a music buff or you’re as old as I am) throughout our lifetime when things haven’t gone as planned, or at least haven’t gone as quickly as planned. That is where my previous post comes into play. Not to sound too preachy here, but it is essential that you ENJOY the route you take to reach a goal of which you may or may not even realize is waiting for you to find it. By not enjoying LIFE until you reach your pre-determined milestone/goal/net worth, you could waste years being miserable and missing out on the beauty that you will pass along the way, as well as the lessons you are meant to learn as you go.

In other words, life is a highway balance. Like a teeter-totter. Walk the walk with one eye on the ultimate goal, and the other eye on the path. But be careful because the path can bend, twist, make a 90 degree turn, possibly to a better goal, one you might never even have imagined. And that may be where you are supposed to end up. As my soul-sister/literary idol Ann Patchett said in State of Wonder, “Never be so focused on what you’re looking for that you overlook the thing you actually find.”

When I was a little girl, I used to write poems and short stories, but I never once dreamed that one day I would be a writer, writing novels. Today, that is my happy dream, with a deadline. Which means… hasta luega, amigos. I’ve gotta go write!

What about you? What have you learned on your path through life? And what (I love this question) would you tell your younger, naive self?

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The Path Is The Goal

What kind of person would take an hour to blog when she has her first professional deadline zooming toward her like the Japanese Bullet train?

One exactly like me.

I am signed up for the Jackson Hole Writers Conference in June. I am, in equal parts, eager, excited, and dreading it. Very soon I need to submit the first 40 pages of a manuscript for critique (yeah, I paid extra for this pressure privilege). But am I happy with them? Not even close. I’ve been writing and rewriting those first pages for the last month. Now, mind you, the novel is currently 300 pages long (75% written, 100% outlined), but it’s those first 40 pages that are kicking my butt. Oh, I’ve thought they were strong and ready about ten times. Just ask my husband about our nightly conversations. “How did your writing go today, honey?” “Fantastic!” I would reply. “Today I rewrote the opening to my novel, and it’s so much better!” Then the next day: “How did your writing go today, honey?” “Awful! I scrapped the new opening to my novel.” Then the next day: “Fantastic!” Then: “Awful!” Yeah, not kidding here.

Here’s my problem: I’m teaching myself to write by reading the best authors in the world. How do you compare to the experts in your field? See? It’s like that.

But a friend of mine, Sabine Friesicke, one of my favorite artists who is much wiser than I, recently told me what she reminds herself while she’s painting. It’s an old Chinese proverb (those guys were really smart): The path is the goal.

Yes, Sabine, the Chinese, and I are all minimalists.

I’ve been writing for five years, and have completed three novels plus my work in progress, A Reasonable Price. I started out slow, “just an hour a day,” and I’ve progressed to 4-6+ hours a day, plus reading everything I can get my hands on. As my bio says, I read the classics (for the education) and I read debut novels (for the comparison). What kills me is that until my work starts sounding more like—well, not Nabokov—but “Ann Patchett meets Dennis Lehane”, then I am not going to be happy with it. It’s very difficult to remember that they had to start somewhere, and their debut novels undoubtedly needed the help of a great editor too. It’s the same comparison I drew about Steve Jobs and Me.

But here’s the kicker: No matter what happens in my publishing career (ooh, I like the sound of that), I am a better, happier person because of the path I’m on to get there. When I look back on the last five years of my life, I can see that I am a much, much happier, wiser, more centered person than I was when I was an art dealer. The beauty of writing is that when you slow down enough to think about what makes people (i.e. characters) (including and most importantly yourself) tick, then the world starts to make so much more sense. I have learned more about myself through my hours and hours of pecking at my laptop about my characters than I did in the four decades before that.

The path is the goal.

So, today’s lesson, peeps: Relax. Today is probably not your last day on Earth, so enjoy it and stop putting so much pressure on yourself. Every day is a privilege.

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What’s The Opposite of Prescient?

I was at lunch recently with my dear friend Larassa Kabel, aka. my personal John Galt, and she asked my if I ever felt prescient. Didn’t see that question coming! Alas, I rarely see anything coming. In fact, today I had another shining example of “I’m always the last to know!”

Writers often hear the advice: Write the novel you want to read. That’s what I’m doing with A Reasonable Price, my current work in progress. I read a lot, but few books, even the great ones, really speak to me. I love a plot-driven, emotional roller coaster of a book with characters you love to hate, e.g. The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith. So I started poking around the internet in regards to antiheroes. Would you look at this list! This looks like the Mother List from where I’ve picked all my favorite books and movies (and a few I hated for the same reason (see American Psycho)). Who knew? I’m a sucker for an antihero. And indeed, I’ve got a terribly good one in A Reasonable Price.

I had a similar bonk on the head about a year ago when I was talking with New York Lit agent Jenny Bent about my last novel, and the same thing happened. She told me I write noir fiction. How did I not know that before she did?

In the art world, there is a category called Outsider Art. The term actually grew from the name art brut coined by French artist Jean Dubuffet to describe, among other things, art produced by insane asylum inmates, but I’m not going to touch that connection here. It does make me wonder though, if there’s an official category for Outsider Literature. (Wikipedia says no, but that I can ask for it to be created. Hmmm.) In essence, outsider art, and by extension, outsider literature is that which is created by untrained “artists.”

Yep, that’s me! And countless other authors who do not have Lit degrees or MFAs; I’m certainly not alone here.

All of this makes me wish, however, that I were Benjamin Button, living my life in reverse so that I could finally be prescient.

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How Badly Do You Want It?

I want you. I want you so bad. I want you. I want you so bad, it’s driving me mad, it’s driving me mad.

That’s how I feel right now about my Work In Progress.

Friends, family, work, TV, the internet, eating, sleeping, reading, blogging, cleaning out your closets… On any given day it’s easy to get distracted. Life holds not only Jungian hierarchies and obligations, but also the freedom to make poor choices, give in to poor time management skills, a million cracks in the sidewalks, and a few other things that can get in the way of our goals.

Generally speaking, everyone has time for what’s truly important to them, but some things are completely out of our control: Computer crashes, health problems, money problems, accidents, theft of one’s laptop… If you read my last post then you know that two weeks ago when my husband and I were in Costa Rica, we were robbed. They took not only our electronics, ALL of them, but also my eyeglasses and Rx sunglasses, four pair of shoes, jewelry, clothes, and most importantly, they stole two weeks of my life. That’s how long it has taken me to regroup, replace all my stuff (including my peace of mind), and get back to writing. The two most fortunate aspects of what we’ve been through are, one, we were not harmed physically, and, two, they did not steal my novel in progress.

My dear Twitter friend, Taylor Stevens—NYTBSA of The Informationist and The Innocent—and I agreed that a writer’s list of priorities are: 1) Life, 2) Work in progress, 3) Everything else. Los hombres malos did not get my novel because I was wise enough to back it up each day. (Note to others: since I was traveling, I actually emailed my novel to myself each night so that no matter what happened to my electronics, my novel would be safe. Google Docs would also work.)

What would have happened if I lost all 200 pages and all my notes and outlines and research? Would I have had it in me to start over, rewrite the entire work from memory, re-interview my experts? As much as I want this novel to be published (that would be more than anything in the world other than good health for me and my loved ones), I’m not sure if I could have garnered the strength and energy to recreate it. I would have been a pile of mush, I know that much. I would have been devastated. I would have tried, but I’m not sure if I would have felt capable of bringing it back to life, or if I would just have moved on. I do know I would not have given up writing all together.

This I know for sure: I am a writer; I will always write.

Fortunately, I am safe and I am back. I want this SO badly I must keep writing. So without further ado, please excuse me while I go apologize to my characters for abandoning them for the past two weeks, and see if I can’t write them in and out of a few more mini-dramas.

What about you? What’s the most important goal of your life? How badly do you want it? What would it take for you to be defeated? What are you willing to sacrifice to achieve your goal? Sure helps determine your priorities, doesn’t it?

Turns out orderly closets aren’t so important after all.

 

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Only The Dates Have Been Changed

Costa Rica, Year 3, Day 1: It’s like we never left, only more so.

I’ve been reading The Best American Travel Stories 2011, edited by one of my favorite authors, Sloane Crosley. In her introduction essay, she states that she never wants to go back to the same place twice because the world is so big and wonderful. I used to agree with her, and in many ways I still do. In a previous life (about 15 years ago, I suppose) I spent 10 days on the island of Mustique. Mystical, to be sure. Ah, Basil and his friends (rock stars, clothing designers, European royalty, entrepreneurs and trust fund babies). What’s not to like? The beaches, the views, the restaurants. Ok, there was only one restaurant, but it was fabulous—a lively lobster once scampered across the dining room floor trying to escape his devilishly hot fate—heaven on earth for us humans. And here is where Ms. Crosley’s point is valid: my return trip the following year had none of the awe and fascination. I went back hoping to repeat the wonderment. Alas, it was, “Oh, yeah, I remember this beach.”
But this spot in Costa Rica where we (my hubby and I) have found… We love it more each year. We’ve met people here, found the best places to eat and buy good meat (organic beef and pork from Nicaragua), my Spanish has greatly improved, and I am over the culture shock that overwhelmed me on my first visit. But I post this post as a marker, taking my emotional temperature, if you will, so I can compare how I feel about it at the end of our trip.
Here’s my Costa Rican recap:
First trip to CR: 1 Week in Tamarindo: Fabulous. Me, hubby, 4 sons. Great time, great food, great town, great house though it didn’t have an ocean view.
Second trip to CR: 1 month near Coco Beach: Not so fabulous. Hubby and I land after dark; by the time we got our rental car and found our house, I was depleted of all positive emotions. An afternoon wildfire had scorched the hilltop just below our house, but our host insisted they’d hosed everything down so we’d be fine. The house was in disrepair, though the ants and geckos didn’t seem to mind. The tarantulas loved our pool, but they can’t swim so it wasn’t that scary to scoop them out in the mornings. But by Week 3, when 5 (grown) kids arrived, I had adjusted and relearned to sleep at night out of pure exhaustion from all the local adventures we mastered. This is how I felt about it at the time!
Then we moved to another house for 1 month: Ah, much better. Clean, airtight, no bugs inside. Wonderful. Enjoyment! A writer’s dream. Lovely. Until our final night here. That night, sound asleep, pure bliss, and then BANG! Ouch! OMFingG! My husband was stung by a scorpion who had crawled into our bed! After we killed it, we wondered if it had a nest of friends nearby…
Year 2: Back to the Scorpion house. (yes, I agreed to this… hey, it wasn’t me who got stung!). (We did have 10 scorpions in the house during our stay, but no stings. They were mostly dead due to perimeter fumigation by the time they snuck into middle of the rooms.) This year, no kids, no adventures, only peace, quiet, calm, happiness, and writing: 45,000 words on my “third” novel, The King of Liars. I also did a lot of blogging about our time here (See January 2011 archives). Some of it’s worth reading. Most of the last 20 or so entries relay our adventures. (Note: This link is to my “old” blog via Apple. I have since moved my blog to where you are reading now.)
Year 3: Now here I sit, in the Scorpion house again, in my “writing studio over looking the Pacific Ocean.” I wonder what lies ahead for us over the next 11 weeks. We’ll have most of our kids visiting for parts of 3 separate weeks. With any luck, our children will outnumber the scorpions, although that still leaves room for too many scorpions! This year, I’m working on a new novel—my “breakout” novel? Yes, this is the one!—A Reasonable Price. I’m at 35,000 words now (125 pages), but no telling how many of those I’ll scrap in the next 11 weeks. My current friends—I mean, characters—have different names from last year, but my intensity persists.
So, friends, I hope to entertain and inform you in the coming months. I’d love questions or comments from you along the way so don’t be shy. Take care and I’ll write more soon! Hasta luega!