It’s going….kind of.

It’s been slow.  Darklight is just shy of 5k, after rewriting the opening scene 3 times.  I also discovered a better way to bring out the creepy so things have changed a bit plot-wise and Ellya might have a brother who becomes very important later.  I think.  The muse and I are still working on that.

I had oral surgery one week ago to remove a wire from my jaw surgery 20 years ago (!) that my body decided to reject.  I’d been feeling like utter crap, dizzy as hell, and a bit spacey, and that is why.  So no writing occurred because I couldn’t fathom it.  So I took a bit of a break, but spent most of my time either reading or thinking about writing, which was actually quite productive.  So now I’m back at it, but slowly, because my muse is still a bit gun-shy.  My quota is 100 words a day and I’m aiming low.  I have the time, and pushing myself or pressuring myself isn’t gonna work this time.  So going slow and building up to more.

I’ve approached Darklight very differently than I’ve approached other novels.  I’ve never tried to write a straight-up horror novel, and I suspect this one will end up with psychological horrors as well.  I can’t help it.  It’s my inner psychologist working on me.  But I am trying for more horror too, so we’ll see.

I’m also telling this story differently.  First person present, a first for me.  Also there will be some journal entries by Ellya, the main character, in this novel and they will take place in a different location than the main action (her relationship with her love interest I think will be told in the journal entries, at least for part of it).  And finally, the chapters have names.  They will all use the format “[something] and the [something].”  And I’m letting my muse come up with them ahead of time and I will try to pull out what I think should go in that chapter based on the limited “plotting” (if you could call it that) I did.  Totally random, totally muse-directed, and I think it’ll be good. This is thanks to Holly Lisle, who has a class (How to Think Sideways) which I took and graduated from where she demo’d a plotting technique.  I sort of adapted it for my chapters.

So I’m living the muse for now, and it’s been enlightening.

I’ve also decided that once I get the comments back on Pirouette, I’ll make a ruling on whether or not I want to pursue getting an agent with it.  And after that is decided, I’ve also decided to tackle Alpha Female again.  Going with my goal of submitting something this year, I think AF is the logical choice as it needs a bit of work and then it might be ready for critique.  We shall see.

On the back burner (can you tell I’ve been thinking a lot about this?) are Darkweaver, which was supposed to be my Nano novel for this year, and my Fae-war romance inspired by my grandparents that suddenly bopped me over the head about a week ago.  Tentatively titled Pixie Queen, but that’s subject to change.

Ugh.  Want to move forward.  And I am, just slowly.

Without Wings is now available!

Without Wings, my second chapbook with Turtleduck Press, released yesterday!  It explores the dark side of love.

My friend and fellow indie author SM Reine wrote an awesome review!

Here’s an excerpt:

“Her poetry has a way of painting pictures with negative space– that is to say, the things she withholds from the poems, rather than what she puts in them.  She dives right into the depths of emotion without hesitancy, and she has arranged the poems within to create a rhythm throughout the chapbook that flows as well as her poetry itself. ” 

You can read the review, as well as a short interview I did with SM Reine, here: http://www.smreine.com/2011/04/review-and-interview-without-wings-by.html  .

And to buy or for more information, visit us at http://www.turtleduckpress.com . I will be doing a giveaway very soon!

In other news, the Free-For-All ended up becoming Pirouette month. Which is just fine.  I’m on page 32.  It sounds like not a lot, but I’ve made some fantastic progress on the worldbuilding and the characterization.  I also have some ideas for the story as a whole.

Which leads me to my next point.  I realized that, while writing and rewriting novels may at times seem slow and inefficient, it also helps bring the entire thing into better focus.  For an example, in draft 2, I had Alisia totally unwilling to do something.  She fought with the people forcing her into it, but eventually figured she was overruled and went along with it.  That to me seemed rather shaky and Alisia is not one to go along with something she doesn’t want to do.  So, instead, in this draft, she’s going along with it, yeah, but to prove everyone wrong.  I think this is keeping with her personality more than in draft 2.

I also added some neat little touches to the world that will become important later on.

Alisia is more snarky now, if that’s even possible.  I’d wondered if I’d forgotten how to write her.  Nope, just took a little sabbatical.  She’s alive and kicking again!

So you see, I had to write 3 drafts to get to that destination.  I believe that nothing is ever wasted, even if I scrap something and start over.  It’s still there, in my head, and it can be revisited or refigured.  But I wouldn’t have gotten here without the original scene in draft 2.

Now my task is to keep the characterization consistant throughout the book.  Alisia and Lucien have to work for their happiness, and there needs to be obstacles.  And there are many.  So, that’s what’s next.

As for Alpha Female, I have a few changes I want to make, and the things I added to Pirouette will affect a few things in Alpha Female, so I think it would be best if I put it on the back burner for now.

I also was considering trying to write more poetry this month.  We’ll see how that goes.

Free-for-All month!

That’s right, ladies and gentlemen!  Since I can’t decide on one project to focus on and the muse is complaining, I’ve decided to do a free-for-all.  Whatever I feel like working on (besides the chapbook – that has to be done), I will work on.  As long as it’s a current unfinished project.  So basically Alpha Female and Pirouette are in the running.  Today I rewrote the first scene of Pirouette and got 606 words I didn’t hate.  That is progress.  😀

I’m not sure if this will work, and what the result will be, but I’ve got to get whatever I can get out of my muse.  Because that’s better than taking a month off, which I considered, but dang.  With just over 14k for the entire year so far, I didn’t want to do that.

But why torture myself?  If I want to work on Pirouette, then good.  Alpha Female?  Fine.  Something else?  Sure, as long as it’s unfinished (I highly doubt that, but gotta give myself room to move here).  It’s an experiment.  We’ll see how it goes.

The running tally:

Pirouette – 1 day, 606 words
Alpha Female – 0 days, 0 words

I’m crazy, I know.

God help me…

Been trying to get into some kind of rhythm and groove after my surgery.  Well, it hasn’t really happened.  Sure, I’ve written stuff.  I’ve spent a lot of time brainstorming and figuring out things.  But I’ve been feeling off kilter. I think part of it was my forced time off writing and part of it is my grandfather’s death.  He was my last living grandparent, 97 years old. His funeral was last week.  I’ve cried only once, but I’ve felt his absence.  I wrote a blog about him on the Turtleduck Press blog.  http://www.turtleduckpress.com . Scroll down a bit.  It’s called “Honoring My Grandfather.”

I have my 2nd chapbook, Without Wings, releasing April 1st.  So this month for me will be getting everything finalized.  We’re down to less than 30 days!

Alpha Female has continued to be my problem child.  I had to cut 5k because, as usual, it wasn’t working.  Started poking at it again tonight, and that didn’t go very well.  I’m thinking of setting it aside and working on it here and there. I’ve only got 5 parts to finish and the draft will be done.

Annnnnd I started the Pirouette revision.  Just 210 words, but hey – gotta start somewhere!  It’s daunting, knowing that this is the last revision (so I’m telling myself) and I’ve got to nail it.  So I’ve been putting it off.  Well, I decided today that I’m going to work on it.  Sentence by sentence if need be.  A lot of it is fine.  It just needs to be tweaked and cleaned up.  There are some things I’m changing too, but nothing major.

It feels good and it feels scary.

Lastly, I got clobbered by a plot bunny recently.  It’s a psychological horror, which I hear has no market, so I’m in no hurry to write it, but dang.  It speaks to the twisted, kinda crazy side of me and it’s drawing me in.  Relentlessly.  It’s about a girl who has erotomania – that is, she believes that someone is in love with her, a famous person, and he’s not.  It’s all a delusion.  And this is a real condition.  And it’s fascinating because, well…imagine what someone in love would go through for the one he or she loves…when the love is reciprocated.  Now imagine that intensity but without it being reciprocated but the girl believing that it is.  Can you imagine some crazy things?  Yeah.  That’s what I’m talking about.  It’s tentatively called Eros in Chains.  Another one to add to the pile.

So….this is going to be an interesting month.  I’m hoping to finish Alpha Female but who knows if that’s going to happen.  I need….something, and I’m not even sure what it is.  Just feel so lost right now.  Hopefully, I’ll find my way again.

Epiphany.

Today I was ready to throw in the towel on Alpha Female — not for good, but for awhile.  I’ve been working on it for about 7 months, pretty much straight through with no real breaks except the week of my surgery.  I was just tired, and the last two days have been rough for me production-wise.  But I’m not a quitter and I realized: I want to finish this.  Sure, I could put it off or wallow in being stuck, but the fact remains: the novella won’t write itself.  The farther I go from it, the harder it will be to get back into and on track.

I realized this because I considered switching back to either Flamebound or Pirouette.  Flamebound especially — when I read over the HTRYN lesson I was currently working on (naturally, I couldn’t have yanno, finished it up) I felt like I was reading Greek.  I read a few of my notes on some changes and again, I’m like, whaaaat?!  And it seemed impossible at this time, so I decided to wait a bit longer.  With Pirouette, this is more of a planned wait because the plan is to come back to it refreshed and I’m almost there, but not quite. Sooooo that left Alpha Female.

And after my recent discoveries, I’m actually excited about it again.  Sure, I’m not sure what rabbit I’m going to pull out of my arse this time (moar questions, how I love thee!) but hey, slow progress is better than none.  One sentence at a time if I have to.  I’m doing this.  I won’t accept anything less.

So poor Natasha is going to have to fight Delia with a magic she doesn’t know and doesn’t understand, and she’s going to have to kill Delia, somehow, even though Delia has a witch on her side.  Obviously, Delia has to die.  There’s no other option there.  Going to think on that one.

But other than that, it’s been a pretty good day.  About 780 new words on Alpha Female after ripping the scene apart.  I’m moving the stuff I ripped out closer to the climax.  Will have more impact that way.

Stay tuned.

Talking to myself yet again – Ilene and her Alpha “ability”

Sooooo I had my surgery on Feb 2nd and I am finally out of the splint and somewhat mobile after a week of being laid up.  Hated it and thought a lot about my writing, although I wasn’t really coherent enough to do anything about it (vicodin, yanno) and the #1 decision I made is to finish up Alpha Female.  So I had today off from work as well as tomorrow and I decided that since I’m supposed to be resting and bearing some weight on my ankle, might as well get some writing stuffs done.

Opened the AF document and tweaked a few sentences.  Reread the last scene and read my last “talking to myself” post.  And…went completely numb yet again.

I love the idea of there being an ability that’s the flipside of the Alpha Male madness — the “manipulation” aspect as I’ve been calling it.  I also like the two bonds going on.  But then I threw myself a curve ball, and I am still puzzling it out.  The idea that the Alpha Female can use the ability as Alpha Female but once she ceases being that, she loses the ability/memory of how to use it.  Okaaaay.  Easiest thing?  Change it.  Remove it altogether.

But I’ve never been one to go the easy route, or one to ignore something potentially cool that came from the Muse.  So let’s run with it, shall we?

And since I haven’t done a character convo in like forever, I think it’s time to do another one.  The character in question is Ilene, the former Alpha Female of the Pack and Luke, the male lead’s mother.  Natasha, Luke’s Alpha Female and the main character, has shown evidence that she’s possibly gained this ability, whatever it is, and needs to learn how to use it because otherwise her nemesis Delia could destroy her through a mental bond.

With me so far?

Okay, so Ilene doesn’t remember a whole lot about this ability for the aforementioned reason.  But I need to know what it is she does remember, and what she’s forgotten, and if this is a viable solution to Natasha’s problem.  Kind of big for a single line of text, but it might turn out to be cool.  Or not.  But I’m gonna figure this out.

*takes a deep breath*  *cracks knuckles*

ME: So, tell me about being the Alpha Female of the Pack.
Ilene: It’s an important job.  The Alpha pair sets the example and tone of how the Pack will function.
ME: That’s good.  I take it you were a good leader.  And you’re now the Pack healer.
Ilene: Correct.
ME: So what do you remember of this ability to manipulate your wolves?
Ilene:I know what it is.  It comes from the same place the Madness comes from.  It’s dark.  It’s not for evil Alpha Females, Alpha Females who want to completely control their wolves.  Tyrants.  Dictators.  It’s to keep the wolves in line, but with love and respect and goodness.  It just seems  like manipulation to some.  And then there’s keeping the ones in line that need it, like Delia.
ME: What is with this chick? She really has it out for Natasha.
Ilene: *nods* Oh yes.  She was sure she was going to be Luke’s Alpha Female.  It’s eating her alive.
ME: Truly.  So do you recall how it works?
Ilene: Through the bond.  Somehow.
ME: But you don’t recall how.
Ilene: It’s foggy.  I don’t believe it was harmful to the wolf it’s used on.  It can be if warranted, and that would need to be discussed, but an Alpha Female’s purpose is never to harm her wolves.
ME: What about the golden threads Natasha sees in her head?  Do those have anything to do with it?
Ilene: *nods* Possible.
ME: But not for sure.
Ilene: No.
ME: Any other stuff you remember, no matter how insignificant it might seem?
Ilene: Yes.  When Tasha saw Deliain her head, it pinged my brain a bit.
ME: Explain?
Ilene: It seemed familiar, as if maybe I’d had that happen to me as Alpha Female.  That might be a direction to investigate.
ME: But Tasha was hurt by that, horrifically (and SPOILER ALERT! there’s more coming! END SPOILER ALERT).  She can’t possibly have to use that to “manipulate” Delia.
Ilene: It’s a distinct possibility.
ME: What about psychic stuff?  Delia’s got something psychic going on.  Could this ability be psychic in nature?
Ilene: We as a race aren’t actully psychic, although we do use a basic form of telepathy when in wolf form.
ME: And the healing.
Ilene: Yes. 
ME: Could Luke healing Tasha have anything to do with this?  Would it give her more ..power, for lack of a better word, in this ability?
Ilene: It’s part of it, but it’s actually because she almost died once and actually died once.  It gave her an expanded awareness of her wolves on a totally different level. 
ME: Could her dying tie into the ability?  Kind of like necromancy?
Ilene: *looks baffled* I don’t think so.
ME: Necromancers don’t just raise the dead.  They communicate with the dead and can control the dead.  Could Tasha’s ability be a form of necromancy, except…it’s with living wolves?

NOTE: Now we’re on to something.

Ilene: I suppose that could be.  Don’t necromancers have an expanded awareness of the dead?
ME: Bingo.  So if we could treat this as a form of necromancy (Lupi-mancy?), maybe we could figure out how it works.
Ilene: I believe I might remember something.
ME: Tell me.
Ilene: Well…it’s the mind.  Tasha needs to connect with the mind.  Delia’s in wolf form, so it’s going to be harder since she’s not.  But that connection is key.
ME: I’m still thinking psychic.  Perhaps it’s sort of like a separate plane of existence?
Ilene: I’m not sure.  Just that it’s the mind.  Delia attacked Tasha there, and Tasha can attack or manipulate back using the same channels.  I’m almost sure of it.
ME: *smiles*  Well, I think we have a good chance of nailing this down.  Thank you so much.

So….in summary:

~It’s like necromancy except with wolves who are alive b/c of Tash’s brushes with death.  May allow her to communicate with/control/sense her wolves (“expanded sense of her wolves”)
~It’s connected to the mind.  That Natasha might be able to use the same channel, for lack of a better word, that Delia used to attack her.
~It might have something to do with the “golden threads” in Natasha’s head.
~It’s not meant to harm any wolves, but it is used to keep wolves in line.
~It’s not for “evil” Alpha Females who want to rule.

Soooooo lots to ponder, huh?

ETA: Notes: The life force or inner wolf could be the conduit for this manipulation.  Or something.

Status update.

I’m still alive.  The holidays just about ate me, and I’ve had a few things come up that kept me from making any noticable progress.  But I persevere!

The first thing is Alpha Female.  I’m almost done with the current pass.  I have a few new scenes to write, and do another overall edit for things I might have missed, and after that, I’m calling it done.  Going to see if I can get it beta’ed.  It’s been slow going for the most part.  I haven’t really been focused as of late.  I don’t really know why, just that I’m getting tired of looking at this story.  But I promised myself I wouldn’t set it aside to languish after spending all these months hammering away at it.  So I gotta hang in there, and get it done.

Without Wings, my 2nd chapbook for Turtleduck Press, is almost ready for the approval process.  It’s due on Feb 1st.  I’ve done a few edits and it looks good, so I’ll need another pass to make doubly sure — and to add the acknowledgements and such.  Very exciting.  I was hoping to have some new poems written for it, but that just hasn’t happened.  I just haven’t been in the poetry mindset.  I’m hoping I can write more in the future, though, because I want to get back into it.

And finally, my surgery is happening Feb. 2nd and I anticipate being laid up and doped up for a week, so I have no idea if I’ll be able to get any serious writing done.  We’ll have to see how I’m feeling.  I want to use this time wisely, but if I’m not feeling it, it’s okay.  I remember when I had surgery to remove some hardware from my jaw — the pain meds made me so dizzy that I couldn’t sit at the computer to save my life, so I dictated a scene to a microcassette (this was in 2004).  It was weird, but it worked (and it pre-dated my first serious foray into voice recognition software).  That’s how desperate I was to get something done.  Dunno.  We’ll have to see.

Future projects are Pirouette and Darkweaver, in that order.  That’s another reason to get Alpha Female done and gone.  So I can move on.  I want to move on.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to start Pirouette sometime after my surgery.

So that’s what’s going on.  I had a recent career development that I can’t get into at the moment, but it is a good one, so cross your fingers that it comes through.

Talking to myself again

SPOILERS FOR ALPHA FEMALE AHEAD – Do not read if you want to read AF and want to be surprised.

Okay, here’s the deal.  In the current version of this pain in the ass novella that demands to be written Alpha Female, Natasha is attacked by Delia (her direct competition for Luke) and Delia poisons her.  Also, she was about to leave Luke and go home when she’s attacked.

I’ve had a few niggling issues with this.  At first I thought, ‘well…Natasha’s not good at relationships so her bailing makes sense’ but after rewriting a key scene which made it so Natasha doesn’t leave, I’m not sure how to bring in her getting poisoned.  First off, Luke wouldn’t let anyone but especially Delia near Natasha as he’s so protective of her.  I thought, ‘hey, what about that hunt scene you wanted to add?’ and then I got derailed because hello, it wouldn’t be safe for Natasha to be the only non-wolf amongst wolves, right?  She’d be vulnerable.  And she hasn’t been changed yet, so she can’t shift.  Although having her have the pain of a possible shift would be interesting.  Cuz yanno, the Pack would bring it on if she’s truly part Lupi.

So how could Natasha get attacked without it being made of fail?  Let’s see…brainstorm, godammit….

Party.  Someone lures Natasha away and Delia swipes her quickly with her claws.
Natasha tries to leave, and boom! Delia attacks her (the original plan, duh)
Hey.  Could Natasha leave the area (not to go home) — she needs some time alone or something.  Crap, I could even have er make contact with the other Covenant peeps and Alisia (her Queen) at the same time.  If Natasha snuck out, really stealthy-like (she is an assassin, after all), and Luke’s distracted by something or someone, and her bodyguard is also distracteed (too easy?) and it takes a few seconds tops for Delia to fly by in wolf form and swipe her and promptly disappear….

Hmmm.  I has problems.  Luke wouldn’t let himself get distracted.  What could take him (and the bodyguard) out of the picture?  Something else, a Pack fight, something to mediate, something that needs doing right now and he just has to leave.  But he’d have someone watch Natasha.

It’s to damn bad that Natasha can’t be invisible.  Unfortunately, I can’t bring that in because, hello, her people don’t have that ability.  I could play it like the assassins have mastered their glamour ability and appear to be invisible, but it’s actually camoflage.  But that begs the question — why hasn’t she used this ability before?  You’d think she’d use it to get away from Luke.  Then again, she prolly couldn’t in the Between, and then after that she was among everyone and there was no way to escape…could that work?  Yeah, but wanting to leave and escaping would be so much easier if she’s invisible.  Right?

But wait.  Aren’t glamour abilities lessened in our world?  Because of the truce?  Maybe she doesn’t think it would work, and then she tries, and then she’s standing there, seemingly safe, and she’s talking to her people, and bam! Delia attacks her.  This assumes that she decides to go visible again, and wouldn’t she want to stay invisible?

Maybe it stops working once she’s touched by anyone or anything.  Maybe that’s a limitation.  But Delia would need to suspect that she’s there to actually know where to start running.  Unless she sees Natasha leave, then seemingly disappear, and is really curious and sort of deduces that she’s somewhere nearby.

Ugh, I don’t effin know.

2010 in Review and 2011 goals

This year just flew by.  I don’t even know what happened to it.  It felt as if I were making no progess anywhere, but I did accomplish a few key things.  I also had to adjust my goals to accomodate Alpha Female, which wasn’t planned.  All in all, this was a pretty productive year.

What I accomplished:

~I finished the 3rd draft of Pirouette in May and am gearing up for the final revision (which is my #1 goal for 2011)
~I started the Flamebound revision using HTRYN.  Got to lesson 8 of 22.  Yeah, that was one of the things that got adjusted. 
~I wrote and rewrote and completed Alpha Female.  My original goal was to submit it to an anthology by the November 1st deadline.  After getting it back from a wonderful beta, I realized that it wasn’t going to work for the antho.  I decided to expand it, as most of the issues were due to trying to keep the wordcount within the limits (25k) and then decided to try to finish it up by the end of the year.  Which I pretty much did, if you don’t count the tweaks I’m currently working on.
~I started Broken and got it up to 12k.  Broken was a personal challenge to myself, as it’s got a bit of BDSM in it and I’d never written that before. It’s also a different genre for me. I am very pleased with how it’s going.
~I critiqued 3 novels for writer friends.  While this isn’t a huge thing, I made my deadlines for the most part and got the honor of reading some really good books.
~I joined up with a few writer friends and started Turtleduck Press, which is our publishing endeavor which will hopefully change the world, muhaaaa.
~I self-pubbed Life as a Moving Target through them, which has been a dream of mine since December 2002 when I wrote the very first poem in that collection.  After trying traditional publishing, I decided to go ahead and self-publish it.  I’ve gotten some great feedback so far.  And it’s so dear to my heart.
~I wrote approximately 100k this year.  Not bad considering I did mostly revising and editing.  Some writing, too.  I’m glad to have hit 100k.  It certainly didn’t feel like 100k.
~I wrote and rewrote my query letter for Pirouette.  I think I have it nailed.  We’ll see.

So, yep, not a bad year at all.

Goals for 2011:

~SUBMIT something.  This is HUGE.  This year was supposed to be the year for that, but I got a bit derailed.  I will submit something if it kills me.  Most likely either Alpha Female or Pirouette.
~Finish up Alpha Female and get it critted
~Do the final revision on Pirouette and get it to critters.
~Submit something!
~Continue Flamebound revision, hopefully finish (I see a rewrite in my future…)
~Finish Without Wings, my second poetry chapbook with Turtleduck Press, and get it to approvals by Feb. 1st.  This is a biggie because it still needs some work and time is ticking.
~Write (hopefully) Darkweaver.
~Work on Don’t Close Your Eyes, chapbook #3.
~Do not get derailed this time.  Stay to the goals.
~Get an agent

Will I accomplish all of that?  Perhaps.  But I will try for sure.  It feels like 2011 will be a good year.

Alpha Female is done!

Yep, just finished it a few minutes ago.  It needs a final tweak, but it’s basically finished!  It’s at 38k, 2k less than the projected 40k.  Once I do my tweaks, it’ll probably end up around 40k.

This one gave me fits to the very end.  I’m so glad to be done.  Another year-end goal accomplished.

Next is the tweaks, and back to the Pirouette revision.