Wednesday, 29 September 2010

Signed, Sealed, and...Crap, Gotta Get Stamps

Holy crap, it's hot today!

Whoever said that living in the tropics is an idyllic life, never had to endure September heat, pre-tropical depression, in the middle of the freaking afternoon.  Guhhhh, I feel slightly dizzy from this sweltering heat.  Even the cat hasn't moved from the window sill, hogging all my fan air.

I really need to get AC in my office.

Well, now that I've talked about the weather (doesn't everybody?) I can meander along to other things.

My contract for book two, The Master Key, arrived yesterday and after scouring it over, I signed off on it this morning.  Tomorrow, I'll try to get to the post office and send it off.

Then I await my instructions from my editor.  Eeeee!  And the process of editing begins all over again.  You gotta love being a writer.  I'm still getting used to it.  Speaking of editing, I'm self-editing my third book and groaned.  Three chapters need some serious work so I have to sit down, get the head into gear and work out how best to tackle it.

Yesterday, I also finished a short story I've been working on.  After a few changes and semi-rewrites, I think I've got it.  But now I can't decide whether to keep it as a continuing short story series, or a full length novel.  Oh, the decisions!

Okay, the heat's got me kerfuffled.  Going to shut shop for a few, then retreat into the cool bedroom where I do have AC.  Edit time again...

Thursday, 9 September 2010

Taking A Detour

Dark and ominous clouds loom,
Thunder and lightening go boom.
Behind the microwave hides the cat,
As rain starts, pitter-pat.

Okay, that's about as much I got in me for poetry...guess I'd better stick to fiction-writing or greeting card verses.

Taking detours are just some of lifes pleasant little pleasures.  I'm very good at taking detours, although, most people might call it procrastination.  It's a very fine line...

As September came zooming in (like the sudden downpour of rain beating down on the roof this very moment), I didn't want to catch myself napping and taking said detours.  After all, I'd given myself a so-called personal deadline in which to complete my self-edits to Book 3, The Eternal Knot.  Not to mention, many other marketing tactics that I wanted to tackle, one of which was posting another ad on Facebook to help promote my page.  I'm pleased to say that I've gained a number of new "Likes" to my page.  Guess advertising does help!  Let's hope I gain more sales as well.

While plugging away at self-edits, I suddenly felt the urge to write a completely new story.  For some time now, a character that I had introduced in Book 2, The Master Key, had been nagging me.  She indeed is an interesting character and I wanted to do more for her in the book.  Of course, the book wasn't about her, so I had to restrain myself.  (Did I mention The Master Key has been accepted by the publishers? Yay!).  Anyways...

Short story popped into my mind...like a sort of chronicle of her life.  After all, she is a captain of a space ship, she'd encounter all number of interesting things that beg story-time.  So, while ambling through detours in my mind, The Grosjean Chronicles were created.  I have to say, Captain Grosjean is starting to get out of hand as she takes control of my storytelling time reserved for edits.  I find that I'm now juggling between writing about Grosjean and doing my edits.  The distraction is getting out of control.  But then, like all detours, especially if you take the scenic route, it can be extremely interesting.

The rain has petered out some, but it's still dark and grim and the cat is still cowering behind the microwave.  Something tells me he'll be there for the rest of the day.  This thundering and rain doesn't look like it's about to take a detour...