Self-employed with a wimp for a boss!

My boss sucks. She's too nice! She's too forgiving! She needs to start cracking the whip around here! Yes, I'm an employee who struggles with confidence. Look at me! I'm clearly a nervous wreck. I tend to forget what I've accomplished and doubt myself. And I have a lot of other responsibilities. But still! That's no excuse for her allowing me to be such a slacker! She needs to get tough!

I have some great plans for the company. There are two short stories related to Dreaming of Deliverance that are basically finished. I have some beta readers lined up to go over them. Them I'm going to produce them both in text and audio and release out into the wild. You'll be able to read and/or listen to more about Trae and Lindsay's background. I know there's an interest. But I'm having trouble getting myself to do what I need to do. And my boss does nothing. I just have to email them to the beta readers. Why can't she require/encourage me to do it?!

Then there's what my son refers to as "The Rat Book". It's a middle-grade novel thats 75% complete. I love this story. I can't wait to finish it. I think it will be excellent in audio and there really seems to be both a need for and lack of ebooks for younger readers. But my boss hasn't given me any direction on when I need to finish it. I'm floundering here, and she's no help at all!

And of course there's the sequel to Dreaming of Deliverance. I'm getting there with it, but I still have a long way to go. However, I'm ready to start sharing excerpts: post videos of myself reading them on Youtube. I'm excited to share them. Even my non-podcast listening readers know how to watch videos on Youtube. It's going to be awesome! But once again, my employer is giving me no guidance, no timeline, no help.

So I'm turning to this blog, as I often do when I need a kick in the rear. Something about stating here what I'm going to do, helps me to actually do it. And maybe the fact that I'm spilling corporate secrets by admitting that things aren't exactly hunky dory here at work, will finally force my boss to treat me how I need to be treated!

Either that or fire me.

Writing Lakeside

I’m up early. Sitting on the dock of a mountain lake, looking at the snowy peaks, and listening to the water lap against the shore and the occasional ski boat roar past. This morning I’m working on a short story I’ve been working on forever. My approach to writing is the opposite of a lot of what you’ll read from the writing gurus. I feel like an oddball compared to them. It’s one of the many reasons my confidence isn’t as strong as it could be when it comes to writing. I do things so differently from many other writers.

For lots of writers, word count is a big focus when they are writing their first drafts. Not for me. I understand the appeal. Word count is something trackable. You can measure your progress, mark how much you’ve written, and even share that with people in your social networks. I’ve tried to track words, but it doesn’t work for me. I’m too slow. It’s depressing.

One of the reasons I’m slow is because I don’t take the time to write as much as I should. In some ways that’s understandable. I’m a mom and it’s summer. The kids are around more, blah, blah, blah. But the main reason I’m slow is my writing process. I write and revise and write and revise. It’s difficult for me to keep churning  out first draft type writing for more than a couple of pages. I have to go back and rework it until I feel ready to move on. That can take awhile. And I get stuck, not only on the level of trying to polish the writing so that it says what I want it to say in a clear, effortless-to-the-reader way, but also on the story level. It takes time to come up with stories that are interesting, compelling, and different. I like being different. I like having characters that you haven’t seen before and situations and resolutions that aren’t what you expect. All of that takes time.

Does that mean I’m a hobbiest and not serious about being an author? I don't think so. I’m not going to have several books come out a year; they just take too darn long to do. But I refuse to crank out writing that doesn’t work for me so that I’ll have a high daily word count. Maybe I take it all too seriously. But my goal has never been to put out stories just for the sake of putting them out. I want to be able to stand behind them and know that I am satisfied with them. They might not work for everyone, but they work for me.  I make them the best that I can. And in order for me to do that, it takes time.

Time spent writing on the dock of a mountain lake isn't so bad, however. Now I'm going to get back to it!

Writing Mind Games, Cowry Catchers, Dunesteef, and Website Woes

I've been a blogging slacker lately. Sorry! But on a much more positive note, I've been writing like the wind! Unfortunately, I need to play mind games with myself to get myself to write and I've had to adjust those strategies over the years as my circumstances change. So when I first started writing fiction, I wrote during nap time. Then my kids stopped taking naps and I had to adapt. That's when the 4:30 AM approach began. Lately, however, it's been tougher to get up that early. My kids are staying up later making 4:30 seem even earlier than it used to seem. So instead, I'm not letting myself log onto the internet until I've met the day's writing goal. It's working out really well so far.

In other news, I'm going to redo my website. For some reason I can't update it and since I've never really liked the way it looks, I've decided to stop struggling with it as is, and redo it using WordPress. That could take a while, unfortunately.



However, I can still update you here about a couple of new voice work projects. First, six episodes of Book 3 of the Guild of the Cowry Catchers, by Abigail Hilton are now available. If you've read this blog post from November, you know how much I love this story. I am thrilled to be a part of its podcast! Listen to Books 1 and 2 first, so you'll be up to speed, but then you can start Book 3 and hear me play Dakar, a girl that Abbie describes as both creepy and sweet. Listen to Dakar hum in episode 4 and you'll see why!









Then I produced another Dunesteef story: "Sides", by Clay Dugger. I had a lot of fun with this one. My character is creepy and not so sweet, and there are zombies, a scary lab, and lots of humor.

So although I haven't been blogging much lately, I've been busy as usual. And remember, even if I haven't posted here in awhile, you can usually find me on Facebook and Twitter, but not before I've completed my writing for the day!

More on writing fear: at least I'm in good company!

Last entry I blogged about fear and writing. Craig wasn't sure what I was afraid of, so I decided to write a little more about it today. No I don't have a creepy guy in a black hat stalking me, like poor Johnny Depp's character in Secret Window. 

In my case, the fear is less tangible, but it is a part of my writing process. I've come to learn, however, that not all writers experience it. Like a lot of fears, it isn't rational but that doesn't make it less real to me. 

Almost every time I write I'm scared of trying to get what's in my head, down in words. It's not worrying I can't be good (although I've had those moments too). It's that I'm afraid of the monumental task of piecing the story together so that it works to my satisfaction. When I sit down to write, there is so much that is unknown, and I'm the one who has to face that unknown, alone. There are always a huge pile of problems to be solved, and most of the time, I worry that I won't be able to solve them. I want to solve them. I want to find the story and get it down in such a way that it resonates with other people. The fact that I've solved countless similar problems in past writing sessions rarely reassures me.

I've been writing fiction for the better part of a decade now, and it's clear to me that this fear is just part of my process. If I want to write and tell stories, I have to accept that I'm going to be afraid a lot of the time. I think it's worth it, but that doesn't make it easy.

And I'm not alone. Here are some quotes from that book I mentioned in my last entry The Courage to Write by Ralph Keyes, "Page Fright" section (p. 24).

All my life, I've been frightened at the moment I sit down to write.

—Gabriel Garcia Marquez

 

It's really scary just getting to the desk—we're talking now five hours. My mouth gets dry, my heart beats fast. I react psychologically the way other people react when the plane loses an engine.

—Fran Lebowitz

 

I suffer as always from the fear of putting down the first line. It is amazing the terror, the magics, the prayers, the straightening shyness that assails one.

—John Steinbeck

 

Blank pages inspire me with terror.

—Margaret Atwood

See? I'm not the only 'fraidy-cat writer in the world! Wouldn't it be great if Queen Latifa from Stranger than Fiction could come and give us all some moral support? Sadly, that's not something I can count on so I guess I'll just face my fears, and write anyway.

No, really! I'm still around!

It's July 10, already?! Didn't I just post a blog entry? No? Crud!

The time is getting away from me. I'm writing some, recording lots, and have plans of course, but I haven't been blogging about anything, because nothing is available yet.

Soon, I'm pretty sure.

Anyway, as for the writing, I'm working on DoD 2, which probably won't be called DoD 2, but I don't have a title yet. That's not unusual since I didn't come up with "Dreaming of Deliverance" until the book was over 2/3 written. I have a hard time with titles. I like them to have multiple meanings, which Dreaming of Deliverance does, if you think about it. Anyway, I'm doing a lot of brainstorming, outlining even for this second book, which is very different from my usual process. The story of DoD was discovered as it was written, which was a ton of fun and worked well, I think, because Lindsay didn't know what was going on. She learned things as she went and so did we.

This book is different, however, because it's where we learn answers to all of the questions that came up for Lindsay. The story is going to end with this book and I don't want to spin my wheels writing without knowing where it's going. I do have a big chunk written already, but before I continue, I need to solve some problems. So I'm doing a lot of thinking and questioning and answering. I'm learning some incredible things about the whole situation. It's really cool! So don't worry. Progress is being made, even if I'm not sharing much about it right now.

As for the voice work, I think the story I narrated for the Dunesteef Audio Fiction Magazine should be live before too long. I can't wait to share it with you!

I'm also doing some voice work for Craig Robertson's next podiobook and that has been so much fun! You wouldn't believe the variety of characters in this one. As soon as that becomes available, I'll point you in that direction. You won't want to miss it.

Then there are three other voice work projects that should be underway before the year is out, that I will be starting soon, and should be available to you in the next few months. I'll keep you posted!

And I'm going to have a story in the Farrago Anthology! Something else that I'm thrilled about, but again, isn't quite ready. If you're curious what the Farrago Anthology could possibly be, check out this blog post by author/podcaster/editor powerhouse, Jennifer Hudock: The Power of Community I love being a part of this effort!

That's all for now, I think.

I will blog more soon.

Really!

Making Connections

I have even less time this morning than usual, so I'm going to make this brief. We leave in 48 minutes for our last day on safari. We stayed near Lake Manyara last night and saw lots more great animals. My favorites were the black-faced monkeys. They are so cute and a group of them, including several babies, played, foraged, etc. so close to where we were parked watching them. Once again I probably took way too many pictures, but it's hard to stop photographing so many great moments!

But the highlight by far was the trip to the Maasai village. I'm not going to say much about it right now because I just don't have enough time to adequately describe what happened, but I ended up making a connection with some people with such a different life from the one I lead, and it was quite an incredible feeling. It didn't happen during the official tour, but afterward. Nice tease, huh? I will tell you all about it soon, I promise!

I think making connections is so important not only in real life, but in storytelling as well. I wrote something here about my experiences as a first-timer to Tanzania that all fit together really well. I don't mean to brag, other writers I know can relate--sometimes what you are doing all connects perfectly and it's so exciting when it does.
That's something else, however, that I'll have to tell you more about in a future entry, because we leave in 1/2 an hour for Tarangire National Park (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarangire_National_Park) and I still need to grab some breakfast.

More soon!