Immortality and Mortality by Vivienne Ylang

Hello, hello, hello Scribey people!  Vivienne Ylang here.   Like J Monkeys, I’m a big hat wearer.  Not physical head coverings so much as the multiple-responsibilities kinds of hats.  It’s a constant struggle for me, and I have to admit, one that I have been losing.

One of the reasons I write (other than to flush these extra folks out of my head) is a quest for immortality.  I’m not seeking fame or fortune (although they’d be nice) so much as a place in history.  That’s what I’m working toward, even though I’m not there yet.  So when my other responsibilities (and as a wife and mother there are dozens of them!) take up my time and energy, my personal dreams of immortality get shoved to the way side.  I know this is a common problem for moms.  We put everyone else first and ourselves last.

So while I’m aware that I’m short-changing myself creatively, I’m also short-changing my self when it comes to my health.  My mortality is rearing it’s ugly head.  Not in any particular way, but over the last few years, I’ve taken a good look at myself in the mirror and been unhappy with the reflection.  I’m sedentary (I loathe exercise) and overweight (there’s a different “O” word that I should really be using, but I can’t manage to type it.)  Shudder. 

Weight isn’t a new struggle for me and over my lifetime, I’ve tried every diet out there.  I never manage to stick to them for very long.  Four years ago, I was quite successful with a very extreme diet (daily shots of HCG and 500 calories per day – under doctor supervision) and I kept the 40 pounds off for more than 2 years, but a change in stressors at home had me hitting Dairy Queen daily.  Ice cream is my heroin.  Well, sweets in general.  And pastries.  You get the idea

I know a lot of folks struggle in these same ways, and being writers we like to share our experiences, so I thought I’d share mine this past week.  I was watching Dr. Oz last week and I was really struck by a couple of folks he had on talking about various cleanses.  Three day cleanses as it turned out.  I may have trouble sticking to a diet program, but surely I can manage three days!  I convinced my long-suffering husband to do them with me.  God bless that man – he’s awesome!

We (ok, I) chose to do the Clean Gut cleanse designed by Dr. Alejandro Junger and the Juice Cleanse by Joe Cross.  At the same time, my long-time bestie had suggested the book Wheat Belly by Dr. William Davis.  So I’ve been reading these books and I’m now in the midst of these two cleanses.  My goal for this week is to start to get off sugar and junk food.  It’s terrible for me and I’m definitely addicted to it. 

So, the Clean Gut cleanse was pretty easy.  Just a smoothie for breakfast, a fistful of supplements meant to fix the problems in my dirty (?) gut and sensible meals the rest of the day.  It wasn’t too hard, except for the smoothie.  My son called it the salad-smoothie.  It shouldn’t have been too awful – a banana, blueberries, spinach, almond milk, some  protein powder and vinegar.  The vinegar gave it a definite tang.  But it was the protein powder that caused the problem.  You had to drink this thing fast.  Within 90 seconds of completion in the Magic Bullet it turned from something pourable into a pudding.  A green, lumpy, sandy, tangy pudding.  I was not a fan.

But I choked it down and at the end of 3 days, here are my results: I lost 4.5 pounds and 3.5 inches.  In three days!  Hubby was up a pound and didn’t lose any inches, but they are redistributed to muscly areas, like arms and legs.  His hips and waist were down.  All in all, not bad for so short a time.  The best part is that we both noticed an increase in energy – the 2pm sluggishness (or in my case, nap) was gone.  I’m usually plagued with wicked nasty acid reflux at night, hitting the pepto chewables three or more times a week.  Not the last few days.  

Yesterday we made juice.  I mean, for like four hours.  It took forever but now my fridge is full of 5 different juices for each of us over the next three days, vacuumed with my Foodsaver to preserve freshness.  Isn’t that pretty?  I particularly like the rainbow one.  So far, I’ve drank the breakfast juice – apple, carrot and ginger.  It was very gingery, but way better than the salad smoothie.  I’ll post the final results in the reply on Saturday am.

In addition to doing these cleanses to address the mortality issue, I’ve also worked hard this week to find 15 minutes each day to write.  I was successful on Monday, not so much Tuesday or Wednesday, but I’m signing off here and heading back the world of Sometimes right now. (It’s Thursday am.)

When it comes to secrets, what’s yours?  How do you stay in shape?  Is longevity important to you?

Your Journey Starts Here by Casey Wyatt

Happy Friday everyone. Casey here.

Now that I’ve done the final edits on Mystic Storm, I’m focusing on my next few books. And because I plot my novels before I write a single word, I always create a document with all the basics like premise, characters, setting, etc. The first thing I always ask myself – what is the initial premise?

It’s really a very simple question - what is this story about? It’s not meant to be used by anyone other than me. And it’s not supposed to be a tagline, elevator pitch or back cover copy. No. Nothing fancy or complicated at this stage.

Instead, the initial premise is a starting point to get the creative ball rolling. Generally, I aim for one or two sentences. The simpler, the better.

Here’s why. At this point in the process, I don’t want to be encumbered by a constricting idea. If the premise is too well-formed, it might make it harder for me later if I want to deviate from the chosen path. And, why give The Doubt Monster more fodder to work with at this stage in the game?

We all have to start someplace, for me, this is a great way to launch into my next book. Because I have three new book ideas in my brain, I have three different documents mapping them out. Since they aren’t written yet, sorry, you can’t see them. I’m kind of superstitious about my stories. No one but me gets to know the details until I’ve written them.

Now, I know I said the premise is for your eyes only, but, in this case I’ll make an exception for my fellow Scribblers. Here’s what I came up with for my published novels (and it’s funny to re-read them!).

Mystic Ink: A tattoo shop owner keeps finding dead bodies in the alley next to her shop.

The Undead Space Initiative: Vampire stripper Cherry Cordial spectacularly messes up her life with a single act of kindness that earns her the wrath of the entire vampire community.

Mystic Storm:The Fates have cursed Zephyr, God of the West Wind, for interfering in a Hero’s Journey. He tries to deal with the consequences while helping a Muse find her missing brother.

In the case of The Undead Space Initiative, I was able to use the premise to form the back cover copy. Just a lucky fluke, but again, in the early stages of writing, I would recommend not worrying about the tagline or back cover. But, hey, if you do have a flash of inspiration, by all means, write it down!

Now, my challenge for you. Can you summarize your story in one or two sentences? Remember, vague is good.

Rest in Peace, Duchess

Hi, Scribettes and Scribes. Suze here.

Jeanne Cooper 1928-2013

I was going to talk about my recent trip to St. Louis today, but yesterday’s news made me think about something else. Jeanne Cooper, the matriarch of my favorite soap opera, The Young and the Restless, has died. I don’t know if the part will be recast. On one hand, no one can replace her. Jeanne Cooper was Katherine Chancellor (on screen, anyway), and I for one would have trouble accepting anyone else in the role. On the other hand, the longest-running storyline is the feud between Kay Chancellor (her son Brock always called her Duchess) and the wonderful, scheming Jill Foster Abbot, and that’s always been the pivot point on which the whole show turns. Without Kay, we’re going to feel lost for a while until we get our bearings and see which new direction the show will take.

As writers, we can learn so much about plot and character from the soaps. One of the brilliant things the writers of Y&R did in the beginning was to give Kay some pretty big and scary demons. Her husband was in love with a much younger woman (the aforesaid Jill); Kay became alcoholic; she killed her husband in a deliberate car wreck where she intended to kill herself too, but instead survived. This formed the basis of the conflict between Kay and Jill, and although there have been times when they’ve reconciled (at one point, it looked like Jill was Kay’s daughter given up for adoption. This was later proven false), that underlying hatred of each other was always there. And when things got bad for Kay, the writers could always make it worse and send her back to the bottle so she’d have yet another internal/external struggle.

We hear so much about GMC–Goal, Motivation, Conflict. Well the Kay Chancellor storyline (click here for the Wiki article, if you want to read a synopsis) illustrates that beautifully. And as for plots, of course they’re outrageous. That’s why we love the soaps! But notice how every single episode ends on a hook, and there’s a bigger hook on Friday’s show to bring the viewer back on Monday. While your plots might not take the crazy twists and turns of a soap story, every chapter should end on a hook, big or small. Every book should end making the reader satisfied but wanting more (your next book). And if you ever need inspiration on how to throw rocks at your characters (remember the classic advice: Run your character up a tree. Throw rocks at her. Get her back down.), nobody throws rocks like the writers of soaps. Abducted by aliens? Secret babies? A long lost twin back in town and bent on revenge? Why not?!

So tell me. Do you love the soaps? What’s your favorite show (whether or not it’s still running)? What character keeps/kept you coming back for more and why?

Premonition of Terror by Kathryn Orzech

Hi All,

Happy Wednesday.  I was called out of town for the day job and am unable to be with you today. So, I put a call out for reinforcements to take my place and the lady who answered will freak you out!! (She probably already knew I needed a guest, if you catch my drift!)

Please give a big ole’ Scribes welcome to: Kathryn Orzech!!!

Paranormal. Fiction. Fact. While writing Premonition it was difficult to tell them apart. 

Hi everyone. Thanks for coming. And thanks to Seven Scribes for the invite. KO here.

Premonition of Terror began with a dream, shifted into paranormal, and I’m not sure it has ended with this book. Much of my writing explores what happens when ordinary people find themselves in extraordinary circumstances, when fate has another plan for them. I’m no more psychic than most, but I accept and trust my sixth sense and pay attention to signs.

Decades ago when I was lost, I asked higher powers for direction. I woke the next morning with the idea to create a website where ordinary people could share psychic dreams and premonitions. Okaaay! The supernatural curiosity of my twenties had long faded so this came from afar. The internet was new to my town and I’d heard of it, but I sure wasn’t on it, yet the site idea was so specific—and so clear. I’d follow the path until I hit a roadblock.

That day at work I looked over the shoulder of a young woman as she surfed websites and it was obvious I could use my graphics skills to design a site like those on her screen, so I took it as a sign. Same day, a co-worker asked if I’d be willing to trade services: a logo design for his son’s new software company in exchange for free website hosting. The second sign. I swear this is true.

He’d register my domain name (huh?) and get me online as soon as I wanted. He warned that .com names might be taken, but they were gold, so my list of alternates should be generous. Overnight, I listed thirty names in preferential order and he’d work down the list until he snagged one. Dreamwatch.com—my very first number one choice—was available. The third and flipping HUGE SIGN.

Seeing the signs. And we’re off … 

People actually wrote to the site and I posted their paranormal stories, submitted from at least 20 countries and 36 U.S. states. I’m no longer surprised that people wrote. They’re often frightened and seek validation. Family and friends called them crazy. They wrote about personal events, like knowing who’s calling, seeing an auto accident days ahead, or smelling a loved one’s perfume the moment they had died.

Like my protagonist Kate, I imagined Dreamwatch to be important and relevant, a warning system—before the bridge collapsed or the plane crashed or the mud slid—you get it.

But that’s not what people wrote about … until they did 

I just slipped into fiction because the site submission’s don’t predict world events (well, a few did and my stomach sank when I read them) but I had a solid story idea: What if similar premonitions from around the world predicted the same deadly event? Who would I tell? What would I do? If you were the only person who knew, what would you do?

The plot for Premonition of Terror was born and from the start I had my hook:

Dreamwatch.com, true paranormal experiences, began as a hobby. It was supposed to be fun—until premonitions from around the world predict the same catastrophic attack. 

Beyond coincidence? A true premonition? 

I wrote Premonition of Terror in less than six months, research and all. I couldn’t type as fast as my brain was working. The original title was Dreamwatch.com but Premonition of Terror seemed better for a “Premonition of …” series if that happens. But the title change (May 2011) seems even more important because of recent events and the whole idea of it chills me. My two terrorist characters—with a Russian connection—plan an attack in a major northeast city. You can guess which one. And though it’s taken a couple of years of revisions, conferences, professional editing, pitching and queries, agent then no agent; if I hadn’t asked BookBaby to make changes, Premonition would have been released on April 15, 2013. What are the chances? Seriously!!!

When coincidence stretches beyond belief I look elsewhere for answers. More often for me I don’t look for them, they knock me on my head. If the story was a true premonition of terror, I had only grasped its fringe with sloppy details, still, it makes me ask: How can we know of a future event unless it’s set and destined to unfold? Are some major events our inescapable fate? What do you think?

Premonition of Terror 

Premonition of Terror, a paranormal thriller with strong romantic elements, has just been released in ebook format at most major book retailers, softcover in summer 2013. View the trailer with no ads at Dreamwatch. Or on Facebook or YouTube.

Read what others wrote or tell your spooky story at Dreamwatch.com.
If a premonition warned you of a tragic event, what would you do? Who would you tell?

#amediting

Good morning Scribes and Scribettes. PJ Sharon here, writing from deep in the edit cave. I thought it might be useful to share an Indie’s perspective on the editing process. It’s about seven weeks until the launch of my next book and the pressure is on.

Coming June 24, 2013!

I received my final set of edits from Carol, my super-editor who looks at everything from plot holes, inconsistencies, and characterization, to misplaced modifiers, repetitive sentence structure and comma placement. She is very thorough and brutally honest. She gives me fantastic feedback that at first makes me grumble and sometimes even cry in frustration at my own lameness as a writer. But then I realize that her suggestions are right on the money and that I would do well to listen.

Her best advice in the end for WESTERN DESERT: “Paula, if you can learn to write sentences that do not rely on “this” and “that” but are specific and vivid, your writing will improve enormously!”

You’ve got to love English teachers!

Carol’s straightforward approach makes me continue to grow as a writer and I am eternally grateful for her as a resource and a friend. But everyone’s view point is limited so I am going through another round of edits on my own, employing her suggestions, layering in details that will enrich the story, and developing more deeply, the character arcs. By this point, I’ve also run the entire manuscript through an editing program called Auto-crit which gives me reports about overused words, repetitive phrases, clichés, and much more. I could make myself crazy with it, but I’ve learned to use it to catch those pesky bad habits we all have (55 occurrences of the word “that” in one chapter, please remove about 34 occurrences). Eeek! Using the program helps me to see where stronger verbs and more vivid language are needed.

Next–as in today–I’ll hand the book over to editor #2, Jane. I feel like this round of edits is what fine-tunes the story, bringing it to life on the page and cleaning house on all the picky details like grammar, punctuation, and overall flow. Don’t get me wrong; Jane will also catch me on plot points that need clarifying, missed opportunities to deepen character, and stilted dialogue. She, too, is extremely thorough and honest—two necessary traits for a great editor.

When Carol and Jane are done red-penning my baby to death, and I’ve done my level best to write a compelling and entertaining tale, I’ll send the manuscript to Createspace for print copies.This step takes a week to ten days (usually less), so I use this time to work on marketing and promo plans. Initially, I can only buy four copies since I haven’t approved the final at that point. I give two of these copies to Beta readers (avid readers with a keen eye for what works in a story and what doesn’t), and send the other two copies to reviewers. Most of the big review sites require copies several months in advance of release, but it won’t hurt to send one to Publisher’s Weekly and hope for the best. This is also the time I will send the e-version in PDF format to on-line review sites. I have a yearly subscription to Author EMS, a website that pre-filters a list of reviewers perfect for my book. It’s a lot of work querying and sending out requested material, but I think it’s worthwhile. (I’d love to find an assistant to do these types of tasks for me).

Once I receive all the feedback from my Beta readers, (I usually give them a week or so), I make one more pass, considering their suggestions as I go. I’m usually still adding layers, sharpening dialogue, and looking for ways to weave the underlying themes throughout the story—basically putting the fine brush strokes on the final picture. Then it goes back to Createspace and I get a few more copies. I give one to a Proof reader, and the others I use as review copies. After the final proof read and final corrections, it goes to my husband for formatting. Although I’ve gotten pretty good at it myself, he is much more patient than I am and is meticulous with all of that awful detail and computer savviness. I approve it on Createsapce and order print copies, 30-50 to start, and upload to Amazon, BN, and Smashwords.

Viola! We have a book. The hardest part of this entire process is all of the other work that is supposed to happen simultaneously, such as planning a launch party, marketing the other books, and preparing my social media strategy for getting the word out. Obviously, I need to get back to work!

Any questions? What’s your process like?

My First One Star Rating

This Wednesday as I signed on to Goodreads to add a friend’s book to my TBR pile. I noticed that somebody had rated Dangerous Curves Ahead. My first rating ever, I thought. Cool! But when I clicked on my author dashboard to see who left the rating I saw that it was only for one star. My heart sank a little. One star? One star! Really!? I knew I was going to have to let it go, part of being an author is getting reviewed and rated.

But then reality smacked me in the face. How could a person rate a book that they never read? The book isn’t out yet. The ARCs haven’t gone out and yet this person rated my book with one star. I thought maybe it was just an accidental mouse click. But when I clicked on his name I saw that this person, this man, had rated thousands of books, and when I looked more closely I noticed that the only books he rated with one star were romance novels. Authors like Julie James and Jennifer Ashley were rated with one star. While JD Salinger got five glowing stars. I’ll freely admit that romance novels are predictable, the plots can be a  little clichéd, their writers are a little wacky and can seem a little sex crazed by people who aren’t in the know. BUT we write books, great books, that make people happy and sell millions of copies.

So why all the hate? Why take the time to go through hundreds and hundreds of books just to rate them with one star? Who has the time for that? Who really cares that much? Maybe the guy had his heart broken by a romance novelist, maybe his wife spent more time reading our books than she did with him. Maybe the only way he can exact his revenge is to bring down all of our average ratings? I don’t know. I shouldn’t even care. I’ve got enough crap to think about without having this man’s motives on my mind.

What do you think? How would you have reacted to that? Why do you think romance writers don’t get no respect?

PS. My one star rating was taken down. I still have one rating by someone else who I know didn’t read my book but this time it’s five stars.

Tick Tock Goes the Clock – Are you Managing your Time?

One of the biggest reasons for not getting writing done is that we don’t have enough time. But time is one of the most democratic of commodities. Here’s The Unlocked Secret right up front today: Everyone gets the same number of hours a day. 24 hours for everyone! Yay! But it’s how we use them that make the difference.

Author Terri Main coordinates the Book in a Month group at the American Christian Fiction Writers site, and for the past two months I have enjoyed hearing all her wise words and inspiration. Today I thought I would pass along some of her tips for managing our time in order to get in more writing. 

 

1. Understand how you are already using your time. For one week, record what you did in every 15 minute time segment throughout your day. Some can be easily designated like 11 pm – 7 am sleep or 9 am – 5 pm work. But even there, you might put 9 am – 12 pm work, 12 pm – 1 pm lunch and 1 pm – 5 pm work. Others may change every 15 minutes or so. This will help you identify how you are using your time. 

 

2. Check your priorities. Looking at the time log you made, highlight in different colors different activities by priority. Use three priority levelsHigh – Must do for survival. Extremely important to family life. Something I’ve committed to as a moral, spiritual, physical, family priority. Something that I would sacrifice lower priority items to do. 

 

Medium – Of importance, but would sacrifice, if reluctantly for a high priority item, but would sacrifice a lower priority item to do. 

 

Low – Enjoyable, habitual or dragged into by others, but not personally important. Would not knowingly sacrifice anything else to do. 

 

Look at the colors. Is a lot of your time taken up low priority items like watching a TV show you were only moderately interested in seeing. Going to a Tupperware party for someone you don’t really know that well. Reading a tabloid story about some movie star who may or may not be seeing another movie star behind her movie star husband’s back who in turn is seeing another movie star. 

 

Those low priority squares are the first place to look for writing times. Then check the medium priority stuff. This is where things get serious. Giving up the low priority stuff is easy, but when it comes to something in the middle, you have to think a bit more. For instance, there is a sale on at the mall. There are some good deals. Not great, but you might save a bit. On the other hand, you are getting close to the end of your novel and an extra two or three hours would make a difference. There is no easy answer. You simply have to weigh the pros and cons of each and make a decision. But be sure you make the decision and don’t let the decision make itself. 

 

3. Beware of the Tyranny of the Urgent. I forget who coined that term, but I like it. Sometimes we do something because it must be done now and not because it is actually important. Don’t let a low priority item get in the way of your writing plans simply because something has to be done quickly or not at all. When faced with something urgent, ask yourself if it is also something important and if it is more important than anything else at that time. It might be a one day only sale, but is there anything at that sale which is actually a high priority thing you need to buy? 

 

4. If you can’t write an hour, write for what you can. This is sometimes a sticking point for people. Someone looks at the clock and says, “Oh, I have to leave for work in 20 minutes, I can’t write.” Sure you can. Writ for 15 minutes and then gather your stuff and head out the door. You may “only” get 300 words written, but that’s 300 words you would not have otherwise. Consider this. If you write 300 words a day five days a week that’s 1500 words a week or 78,000 words in a year. That’s a good sized novel from just 15 minutes a day and taking weekends off. 

 

5. Use the “in between times.” Sometimes, I think I spend half my life waiting for something. I may be waiting for a doctor’s appointment, a phone call, a business appointment, a train or dinner at a restaurant. With the various small computers like netbooks, ultrabooks, tablets and Chromebooks, you can spend that time writing, outlining, editing, researching or making notes. 

 

Consider writing during commercials on TV. Every hour of television has, on average, 20 minutes of commercial time. Just mute the TV and write during each commercial break which averages 3-5 minutes. 

 

6. Word sprints. A word sprint is a short time of concentrated writing. You set a timer and write for 15-30 minutes. You do nothing but write. You don’t have soda, coffee or snacks. You don’t listen to music. You turn off the phone. You just write and write as fast as possible. It’s amazing what you can do in 15 minutes of concentrated writing. 

 

A useful tool for this is Write or Die. It has both online and desktop versions. The program begins to flash and play screechy music if you don’t type something for a few seconds. Their motto is “It puts the prod in productivity.” 

 

Well, those are a few of Terri’s favorite tips. Hope they help you.