Why I'm Not Querying Agents This Time

November would mark the fifth time I'd be putting together literary agent queries for a novel. It would, but it won't, because I have decided to go straight to self-publishing.

For each of my previous four novels, I followed the same path, the traditional one, in seeking publication:

1. I wrote the best book I could. I edited and polished and asked for (and used) feedback and agonized and fine-tuned until I knew I couldn't make the book any better.
2. I researched literary agents in general, hunting for those who seemed most likely to be interested in my work. (I did this for each book, since agents enter and leave the profession all the time.)
3. For each agent, I researched likes and dislikes, query requirements (letter only, letter plus first X pages, letter plus pages plus one-page synopsis, letter with no pages but with a five-page synopsis, letter plus pages plus new car... okay, maybe not the last one. But sometimes it feels that way.), ways to personalize my letters, and how other writers felt about the person.
4. I assembled my queries and sent them out.
5. I did the typical "writer triathlon": hope, pray, cross fingers.

Step six, of course, would be signing with a wonderful agent who would then pitch my work to publishers, who would buy it in step seven. Unfortunately, I am stuck in Five Land. I've been achingly close with several agents, but close doesn't count. (As Weird Al Yankovic sings, "Are we playing horseshoes, honey? No, I don't think we are." No hand grenades either.)

Agent research and query assembly take an immense amount of time. I've been shocked with each book just how long it takes to do it right. And doing it wrong is pointless: why query someone who has never sold a book even close to mine? It's not wasted time, but it's definitely time I could instead use to create new books.

But time management concerns aren't why I'm going query-free for the book code-named Blueberry. (No title yet. Soon, I hope!)

I am not querying because I am increasingly unsure I want an agent.

Sour grapes, right? I can't get an agent so of course I claim not to want one.

No. It's much more than that. I have always been an independent beast and the freedom of self-publishing is working well for me. Yes, I'm responsible for absolutely everything: cover, layout, title, back cover blurb, editing, promotion… but the good news is…

I'm responsible for everything. I like that. I succeed or fail, by my own efforts. And I am succeeding. My sales are steadily rising, I have readers now and they email to ask me to continue their favorite stories, and the books I love are out in the world.

Some time soon, probably January 2011, Blueberry will be too.

I am still torn, I must admit. I dream of seeing my books on the shelf at a bookstore (I even took a picture of my spot back in April 2009), and having an agent and a big New York publisher is the best route to that. Self-published novels are rarely if ever carried by bookstores, and if they are it happens because the author pushes to make it happen and that kind of hard-driving selling is so not my forte.

Agents do more than get you a deal that gets your books in stores, of course, and I also wish I could have one's professional advice and guidance. I'm not convinced anyone has all the answers in publishing but I know that good agents have lots more answers than I do. I have online writing buddies, of course, but I feel like we're all thrashing around together trying to figure out how to proceed. I'd love a good guide.

But for Blueberry, I'm choosing not to try for one. While I am thrilled to have my first four books out there via self-publishing and delighted beyond measure when I get email from readers (hint: if you love a book, let the author know… you can't imagine how much it makes my day to get a "hey, read your book and love it" note) self-publishing wasn't my first choice for any of them.

Now it is.

And it feels different. I believed in my books even after the agents said no (or didn't say anything… I queried ninety-five agents with "Planning to Live" and only seventy either responded or had guidelines indicating they'd only respond if interested), but the process did leave an "am I wrong in thinking readers will like this book?" taste in my mouth. I don't have that this time. I am going directly to the readers, and I'll let them tell me what they think.

Will I query again in the future? I can't say yet.

Blueberry is something of a special case: it brings back characters from my first two books, which are self-published, so self-publishing it directly makes sense. (If you like Kegan, Candice and Ian, and Forrest and Tess, watch for Blueberry! If you don't know these people, check them out. $2.97 will get you all four ebooks.)

My two post-Blueberry books (codenamed Cookie and Dinosaur despite my husband's lobbying for Dodecahedron) have what I think will be more agent-grabbing concepts than Blueberry's "a divorced woman chooses between the career she's longed for and the sexy but impossible boss she's fallen for", so I might end up querying for them.

But do you want to know a secret? I doubt it. I feel so free to write what I want to write, what I want to read, what the readers are telling me they like, and I can't imagine trading that for an agent and a shot at shelf space at Chapters.

I'd love to know what you think. Would you keep querying? Why or why not?

Three Thousand Blueberries

Well, three thousand words on Blueberry.

I used to do daily "here's what I was going to do and what I actually did" posts here, and I eventually stopped because... well, I'm not sure why. But I miss it.

2010 is my year of NOT doing all my time tracking and word count analysis and all that stuff that made me even more deranged than usual. (When you spend time, serious time, trying to decide whether driving to Starbucks to write counts as writing time, you need to stop tracking.) But I want to document my progress, and where better than here?

SO...

Writing
- wrote exactly three thousand words on the new book. (It always amuses me when I get round numbers without even trying.)
- updated my character description lists for what I've written so far (so I don't later have to look through everything to figure out, say, whether Crystal wears makeup or not) (she does, in case you were wondering :)

Fitness
- ran outside, fortunately before it started snowing. I haven't been outside much and it was surprisingly nice.

Housework
- laundry. Lots, but not nearly enough. How Mr. W and I manage to generate so much laundry is a mystery to me. How people with children EVER have clean laundry is an even bigger mystery.


I'm making this up as I go along, but I think on Mondays I will include a "what I plan to get done this week" and then on Fridays I'll see what happened. I need a bit of accountability, I think!

This week
- two days on Blueberry
- three days doing the very final re-read of Aardvark and assembling its queries, which are going out on the weekend! (Ah, the query process. How I have NOT missed you.)
- dentist appointment for cleaning. (Boo. I want to cancel SO much but I will behave.)
- two more runs and at least two non-runs (swimming, Wii boxing, or whatever I feel like)

I want to revamp the whole blog, and I will, but not at any time where it can take me off Blueberry. My problem (if I may pretend I have only one) is that I actually dislike writing the first draft. Weird, huh? I LOVE the planning stages and editing, but I find the first draft exhausting. Not hard to do - the words seem to fall from me sometimes - but really tiring, and so it's hard to make myself sit down and do it. But I did it today, and I will do it tomorrow, and when I keep that up for 6 weeks or so, I'll have a book!

And then I'll get to edit it. :)

Oh, and remember I said I was going to blog daily in February? I didn't. :)

A writing update

I don't think of this blog as being exclusively about my writing, because I myself am not exclusively about my writing. But I do like to occasionally make it clear that I am still writing.

So here's where we're at.

The book code-named "Aardvark" is finished in its second draft. I, frankly, adore it. It was uncooperative at times, but that's because it resonates with me in a way nothing else has so far. In it, a woman's car slides off a deserted icy road leaving her trapped and bleeding, and between escape attempts she comes to realize she's focused her life on everything except what really matters. I love the character and the realizations she finds, and so far the people who've read it (my sister, my friend TS and Mr. W) seem to agree.

I will be beginning the final revisions on Aardvark next week. I am both excited and nervous: I have some fears that I'll mess this up because I really care about it, but I think that my care for it will also make sure I don't go too far afield.

I have also been looking for the next book, Blueberry. (In case you want to keep track, the next one will be codenamed Cookie, and the next Dragonfly. Mr. W gets to choose the codenames... he was gunning for Dodecahedron for the D name but I refused on the grounds that I have to think too hard when I type it.)

I had a great story coming together for Blueberry, deep and interesting and moral and all that. Unfortunately, it's not MY story. Dean Koontz or Stephen King could do it justice (and if they want it they're welcome to email me :) but it just isn't the kind of thing I want to tell. And I have recognized that and set it aside, which was nervewracking because I'd spent well over a month on it and what if I didn't find another one?

Well, I did. The new Blueberry involves Kegan from my free book "Life, Love, and a Polar Bear Tattoo" (go download it if you haven't already :), but it's not really a follow-up to "Polar Bear". It's just singing for me now and I love it. So I'll be editing Aardvark and working on Blueberry's outline and I'll be busier than the proverbial one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest (which saying always makes me wonder a) why'd he want to enter the contest and b) why would ANYONE enter the contest??) and I think I will be loving the whole thing.

I'm lucky enough to have a job I love. I even love the parts that make me twitchy and insane. (More insane.) Very lucky.

And now, off to bed to let my mind wander through Blueberry and see what happens. (I only track "writing time" when I'm actually at the desk, but all the good stuff arrives when I'm half asleep. Yet another of the mysteries of this job!)

Spring cleaning my life

This has been rather a strange week, filled with both creative success and sadness/frustration.

On the happy side, I finished Aardvark on Thursday. Now, it's only 32,000 words, which is nowhere close to being a novel, but it covers the essentials of what I wanted to say and I am pleased with that. I'm going to let it rest for a few weeks and then decide what, if anything, to do with it.

I've been trying to convince myself to start the next book's planning on Monday, but I just feel so gray these days. Do you get that feeling? Nothing's wrong but nothing feels hugely right either.

I did some free writing this morning to try to get at the source of the dull feeling that's lying over me, and I think it's coming 90% from doing the same old things over and over and 10% from obsessing over things I can't change and can't do anything about.

I'm bad with the "same old same old". I often won't even watch a new movie (even at home for free) because I haven't seen it before. Well, DUH, that's the point of watching a new movie. I know, but I just get these blocks about not enjoying it and then I don't watch. Same with books, although I am doing much better there since I switched almost exclusively to eBooks on my Palm.

So this week, I will spring clean the house AND spring clean my mind and creativity by doing something new every day. A movie I haven't watched before, a new author, coffee at a place I've never been (yes, I am one of those tedious people who doesn't like to try new restaurants :)... every single day! And I will blog about it.

That should at least help with the 90% part. It's so hard to get out of a rut, I find, but to be able to write with excitement and joy I need to be living those things, right?

Which takes me to the 10%. I love writing. At the moment, I don't love the industry side of it too much. I'm worrying far too much about things I can't control and obsessing over hidden meaning in rejection letters and all that sort of foolishness.

Therefore, I've gone through my blog roll and made some serious cuts. I will now read only one agent blog (Janet Reid's, because I find her both hilarious and informative) instead of the vast collection I had before, and I'm simply not going to worry about Raoul as it goes through the submission process. I have my procedures in place to send out queries as they're needed, and that's all I need to do.

I have an affirmation that I got from Carolyn See's "Making a Literary Life" (fantastic book, by the way): "Everything always works out for me, more exquisitely than I ever planned." I do believe that I'm meant to be writing, and I further believe I'm meant to be published eventually. The timing of it is not up to me. What is up to me is how hard I work and how much life I bring to my writing.

Next week my "work" is getting the life back in my life. The following week we can worry about the writing. :)

Spring is (finally!) coming. What are you going to do this week to enjoy it?

Short and sweet, and someday a reality

I'm off to the in-laws today and I need to get ready to go, but I wanted to post something.

And here it is.


I know it's not the best picture (my Palm Treo's camera is fairly crappy), but do you see what it is?

It's the space on the bookstore shelf where my books will go someday.

Top shelf, baby. :)

Guest blogger: JA Konrath/Jack Kilborn

A quick glance at the books I've read makes it clear I'm not much of a horror reader. Why, then, was I so interested in having JA Konrath (and his alter ego Jack Kilborn) post here as part of his month-long blog tour to promote his newest book?

I read JA Konrath's blog and adore it. It's called "A Newbie's Guide to Publishing", but he posts so much that any writer can learn from. I have several of his posts pinned to my bulletin board for daily inspiration, and he's kick-started my writing more times than I can count.

For today's post, I asked him to list a few of his favourite books and why he likes them. And here he is!

--
My name is JA Konrath. It's also Jack Kilborn.

Kilborn, my pen name, has a book coming out in April. It's called Afraid, and I tried my damnedest to write the scariest book of all time.

I love horror novels. Heather kindly aked my to write about my three favorites, so here are my top picks:

LEGION by William Peter Blatty. This is the sequel to his huge bestseller, THE EXORCIST. While I enjoyed that novel, this one surpasses it on the creepy meter. The villain kills in horrible, possibly supernatural ways. The subplot involving talking to people who have died is positively chilling. Plus the finale brings back Father Karras, the priest who exorcised the demon from the previous book. Great scares, a compelling story, and a terrific finish make this one of the best horror novels of all time.

MASTER OF LIES by Graham Masterton. This is also known as BLACK ANGEL in the UK. The first chapter is the most page-turning, horrifying, nightmarish opening to any book, ever. The rest of the novel is terrific, but I defy anyone to read the first chapter and not be shocked. It will stay with you for the rest of your life. How many books can boast that?

PRESSURE by Jeff Strand. This already came out in a limited edition, and is getting a large paperback release in July. It starts out as a friendship between two classmates, one of whom is a bit, well, off. Then it escalates into the bromance from hell. Seriously, this thing packs a punch. But it also really moves you, because you care some much about the hero. This book isn't for the faint-hearted, but if you think you're tough enough, this may be the greatest serial killer novel ever written.

Of course, I encourage all fans of horror to check out the paperback release of Afraid, which comes out in both the US and the UK in just a few weeks. You can read the first fifty pages at www.JackKilborn.com. But only do it if you're feeling really brave....
--

Am I feeling brave? Well, since I usually can't watch an entire episode of CSI without having to hide my face at least once, I'd say maybe not. But maybe YOU are! :)

Heather

Gimme oxygen!

There's a bad cold going around. It's bad. It's a hoodlum cold.

I haven't been sick for a long time, and I only realize that now that I AM sick and it feels so unusual. I will spare you the details, but let's just say my head hurts and my planned running workout isn't going to happen!

I am progressing well on Raoul's revision despite my stuffed-up head: passed the 50% mark yesterday!

Aardvark, on the other hand, is not going so well. I know what happens and why, and I can hear her voice. What's causing me trouble, then?

a) I'm afraid it'll be too short b) I'm afraid it won't sell.

I KNOW I shouldn't be worrying about either of those things at this stage, but I am. I love the concept of this book and the issues I am exploring, and I guess I'm almost wanting to keep it as a "sideline project" that I write entirely for me with no intent of selling. Once it's done, I could of course try to sell it, but in my head there's a difference between "book I'll sell when it's done" and "book I'm writing because it's exploring stuff I need answers to, and when it's done we'll see what we have".

The problem is that this has all come up this week, and my head is not in 100% working order. (Relative to usual, I mean. :) So I'm not sure whether I'm just feeling the "it's stinkin' hard to write a first draft" blues or whether I'm on to something.

I have an idea for a different book instead of the current Aardvark, and I might start exploring that a bit, but I don't want to ditch Aardvark and I really don't want to be writing/editing three books at once.

It's times like this I wish I had an agent. I'd love to have someone in the business take an objective look at what I have and what I'm planning and say, "I think you should do X". Maybe someday!

Until that happens, though, I have to do what feels right to me. And I think that might just be making Aardvark a "secret project" and beginning to explore the new idea.

But not until next week when my head clears. :)

Heather

Aardvarks aweigh!

(I want to say 'away' but it's spelled properly in the title. :)

I sent out the first wave of query letters for Raoul (which I should get used to calling "Go Small or Go Home", I suppose) on Saturday, and today was the first day in a while on Aardvark. I know what the main character needs to learn and I have a few significant plot points.

But I don't know how it ends.

It's weird. I have 31 pages of single-spaced typed notes, just my ramblings about the story and the characters and what could happen and what could not happen, but I don't know how it ends.

The wonderful thing, at this point, is that I'm not bothered by that. I had a dreadful time coming up with Raoul's plot, as I think I've mentioned here before, because I was so obsessed with "must have a plot right now, right this second, don't take any time to think about it, the schedule says it'll be done tomorrow so get on it hurryhurryhurry". I did eventually find what became Raoul, but I broke at least two good ideas by fighting too hard to make them something.

You can't take a seed and drag the plant out of it. The plant has to grow in its own time. And Aardvark is growing. I'll give it the time it needs, by being with it every work day and working through my various plot exercises and developing its characters, and I know it'll reward me with a book at the end.

And I can't wait to read it. :)

Editing the BOOK is the easy part

It's editing my thoughts that's tough.

No, there's no guarantee this book will sell. Yes, Heather, it'd be lovely if there were, but there isn't. No, we will not use that as an excuse to mess around on the Internet instead of editing. No. No, we won't.

Well, so what if it doesn't sell? Are you giving up?

Damn straight you're not. If you write the stories you love, then they're worth writing even if it's only you and your friends who ever read them. Hell, they might be are worth it even if you're the only one. Because you're learning all sorts of interesting things while writing them, aren't you? About yourself and how hard you can work, about how to keep moving when it doesn't feel good, about how to refuse to let 'it might not sell' into your mind.

Yep, those are good things. And I'm getting better at them all the time.

Today is the first real day of "Raoul"'s editing. (I should get used to calling it "Go Small and Go Home" but I still like Raoul. :) Yesterday I went through the list of changes I'd received from my great freelance editor and made the "comma here, no comma there" type changes. Today I started in on the big stuff. Top to bottom, making sure everything links up and the book is the best I've got.

Then it goes out to agents and I go back to work on the next one, keeping my thoughts focused in the right direction.

I love what I'm doing. I've never loved any job or career like I love writing.

"Success is loving life and daring to live it." (Maya Angelou, from a notecard pinned to my bulletin board)

I dare.

I am knot a knitter

(I crack myself up. :)

But I'm really not. I have spent this year trying to knit. I did in fact manage to teach myself, and can knit/purl/cast on/bind off. But you know what?

I hate doin' it.

I really do. I don't like having a needle in both hands, I don't like all the loops on the needles, I don't like the "oh, geez, the stitches nearly fell off" moments... I am not a knitter. I am a crocheter.

So why am I so determined to put time I don't enjoy into knitting a sweater I almost certainly won't wear? I think it's because I feel like I started it and I should finish it.

Well, I'm finishing it right now. I will be frogging the sweater of doom and turning it into a nice crocheted sweater instead. Something by Doris Chan, I'm sure, for those of you who'll know what that means.

Without getting ridiculously over-philosophical, this is the same kind of thing I struggle with in my writing. The lighter tone is a hard sell these days, but it's what I have. It's how I talk, how I email, how I write. And I love it. So I need to do that, and not worry about what other people think about how it sounds. Or how I make my sweaters.

Heather

The lords of the lace lounges

We're watching the hockey game (apparently 'vacation' doesn't include 'vacation from endless hockey games') and one of the announcers just referred to the goalies as "the lords of the lace lounges". As a writer, I'm sort of jealous and appalled all at once. :) (Apparently the last game included the phrase "masters of the mesh mansions", but while I was physically present I was mentally elsewhere and so don't remember that one.)

I feel like I should do some sort of deep and meaningful blog post, but I think my brain has left the building. It's out (hopefully in its snowsuit and mittens) cruising around in the snow, exploring the ski hills behind us and no doubt having a wonderful time. I'm happy it's gone, because I'm sure it'll come back ready to work. (It will come back, right? :) In the meantime, it's left me with enough mental capacity to read, watch TV, and vegetate, but not to be deep and meaningful.

So instead, a picture of Sapphire! Annette commented on the last post and said something about black cats. In that picture, she did indeed look black, but she's a gorgeous tortoiseshell. This picture shows her on the table in my writing area. I'd wanted to describe said area, so I'll use this picture to do that. (The Leafs are now down two goals to none, so I'm better off occupied so as not to have to talk to poor Mr. W who's now in mourning. :)


We have a two-bedroom condo. The second bedroom is our office (full of assorted computers and filing cabinets), and I took over what's officially supposed to be the dining room since we always eat on the couch.

I have several small bookshelves, which hold only books and objects I love. One bookshelf has doors to hold my pens, the laptop's spare charger, my notebooks (I write all my first drafts long-hand), and so on.

Atop the bookshelves, I have a small bulletin board which holds a few planning documents (one listing what I want to get done in the next few months and another listing what I have already done so when I feel like I'm getting nothing done I can look and see how much I have done) and an inspirational post. As you can see, there are also some polar bears. Obsession. I has it.

And finally, I have a crocheted shawl on the back of my chair (made of Moda Dea Dream - love that stuff!) that I wear nearly every time I write. It's cozy and comforting.

I feel certain Sapphire knows she's not to be on the table, and equally certain she couldn't care less if I paid her a million cans of cat food. :)

Well, the Leafs are now only down by 1, which has improved the mood here at Club Snow considerably, so I'm off.

But I'd love to know: what's the weirdest thing you've ever heard said by a sports commentator? I think 'lords of the lace lounges' is way up there. :)

Showing up

I didn't want to show up this morning. I'm SO close to finishing Raoul, and while I love that, a part of me doesn't want it done. I had to force myself into my writing chair and I didn't want to stay once I got there.

I usually go off to Starbucks when I feel this way, but I decided to prove to myself that I can work at home even when the mood doesn't strike (and in fact when the mood is dancing away from me rather than striking). So I gave myself a little pep talk, remembering that I'm writing Raoul exactly as I want to and that I love it, and that even if nobody else on the planet likes it, I do and that's good enough.

It's hard as a trying-to-get-published writer to remember that sometimes. Rejection is everywhere, and while it's not supposed to be personal, when you've put your heart and soul (and six months or more of your life and constant attention) into a book and someone says no, it sure feels personal.

Today, I was able to let it feel personal and still work, and I'm proud of that. I revised the final scene today, and it still makes me cry even though I know what's coming, because I love how it turned out. A billion rejections couldn't take that away from me.

I think I'll do the epilogue tomorrow, and then next week I'll re-read it and send it to my sisters, good friend, and freelance editor (who's fabulous - Bev Katz Rosenbaum) for comments.

And then maybe I'll go to Starbucks, just to relax. :)

Reading every day

Those of you who know me well will be shocked by this: I haven't been reading much lately. In fact, I've had to force myself to read.

As a child, I once (once!) told my parents I didn't feel like reading. They took me to the hospital. I had to have my tonsils out. I have always been a voracious reader.

But as a writer, I've been finding it increasingly hard to read. I see things that don't make sense, badly written passages and so on, in a different way than I used to, and I miss my old style of just tearing through books.

I've been trying to fix this by telling myself to read a book a week, but it hasn't worked. It's made reading a chore, and that's even worse.

So, I've made a resolution. I read a new novel for 15 minutes a day. I can read longer, of course, but 15 is all that's required. It can be an author I've read before, but only books I haven't read before count. I started the day after my birthday, and I will continue until my next birthday.

In those two weeks, I've read three novels and am partway through the fourth. True, some days I got the 15 minutes in right before bed (and I set an alarm on the Palm to make sure I truly did the full 15!) but I haven't missed a day.

Related, I'm also planning a 'three strikes' policy. I've always been one to finish books even when I hate them, but now that just doesn't seem to make sense. So, a book gets three strikes. If there are three separate instances of ridiculous characters or insane interpretations of situations or "too stupid to live" behaviour, the book is no longer worth my time.

My current book is at two strikes (one for a character, in one paragraph, going from "OMG they're demons you can't even be friends with one" to "you're pregnant by one? congrats" and being genuinely happy. urgh) and based on how it's going I anticipate the next one coming later today. :) SO then I'll just admit that this woman's best-seller status makes no sense and move on with my life.

I know I'm not the only one who'd like to read more than I do. Perhaps this resolution would work for you too? 15 minutes isn't that hard to find, but if it is make it 10, or even 5.

But do read.

June 27, 2008: Heather needs help (seriously)

Just read a blog post from Lauren McLaughlin (written back in April) in which she talks about needing time off, needing a six-week vacation.

I commented to Mr. W this morning that, while I am still loving Raoul, I'm finding it harder and harder to drop myself into that chair and make it happen. Once I'm there, it's great (really... I love the writing process) but getting there is tough. I HAVE been getting there, haven't missed a session, but the crowbar required to get me there is getting larger and larger.

I expect Raoul to be done by the end of July, and then I'd planned to spend August working on finding the next book. But what if I took a break instead?

I have been writing full-time since 2005. I finally dealt with a crippling fear of success/failure (not entirely sure it wasn't both) in early 2006, and since then there's been no time off. Since 2006, I have:
- completed the two half novels I had been stuck on (Polar Bear and a children's book I wrote for the volleyball team at the last school I worked)
- written four full first draft novels (Seven, Seven's ancestor, one that's never seen the light of day codenamed Gillian, and "The House of Her Dreams", a moderately creepy suspense I wrote for my sister). All of these also had a planning phase of 1-2 months beforehand.
- revised Polar Bear at least ten times (possibly more like 15)
- revised Seven's ancestor twice
- revised Seven twice
- spent a month fighting for Raoul's concept
- written half of Raoul's first draft

That's basically 1.5 years. I feel a wide variety of emotions re-reading this list: a little pride, mixed with awe, sprinkled with shock. HOW can I still not feel like I'm getting enough done?

Because I haven't sold yet? I don't think that's why. I've come to terms with the fact that the selling part isn't under my control and I accept that I'm writing the books first for me because I love them, and second for however many readers I can get. That's how I fixed the 2005 fears, and it's been working.

I do need a vacation. But I genuinely don't know what I'd do with myself for all that time. Taking a trip someplace for the month is not an option for a variety of reasons, so I'd be here. And how would I be here and not working?

Would reading and re-reading writing books, and taking courses, be a vacation?

How can I possibly not know what would constitute a vacation?

But I don't.

If you do, especially if you're another crazy-driven type like myself, let me know. Because I need one. Badly. Or at some point, the brain and creativity will give out and then I'll have nothing.

I get the rest concept on the exercise front. Training for marathon running makes it painfully clear - you can't just keep building. But here it feels different.

Here, I feel afraid. Afraid of what, I don't know. But deeply afraid.

Feedback, please. Here or on facebook or via email or via carrier pigeon or even by phone if you must. But I needs the helps.

June 5, 2008: Over-analysis

I was about eight hand-written pages into today's writing session when I got that sinking feeling that tells me, "You're writing, but this stuff isn't a book." Sure enough, I'd somehow managed to miss the fact that the scene's description didn't contain conflict. More precisely, it DID, but that conflict ended up being subsumed into the previous scene, leaving this one as the "I got up, had some toast, went for a walk" sort of scene.

Which we do not write, no, we do not.

So, fine, it's just over an hour out of my life. Start again. I moved on to the next scene, which crackled along quite nicely for the rest of the two-hour writing session. But then I had a problem.

I have a tracking spreadsheet for this book, as I've had for every book, for my running, and for probably lots of other things that didn't need one. In Raoul's spreadsheet, I track how many hand-written pages I finish in the two hours, and then track how many typed words they turn into.

So what do you do when half the pages you wrote aren't going to be turned into typed words?

If you're not ridiculously obsessed with statistics, you move on with your life. If you are me, you get all weirded out and try to figure out how to fix it. "Write another hour and take those words instead!" "Figure out the stats without that hour!" (Sure, but then today's total looks ridiculously low.) "Okay, then do the first one."

So I did. Went to Starbucks and wrote... for nearly two hours. Seeing the scene clearly, struggling to find the right words to describe it so others would see it too, crossing stuff out and re-writing it and moving forward and backward, but moving.

Back home, it was time to type it in, but the issue of the first "lost" hour still bothered me. I'd done the work and I wanted the credit.

And that's where I said, "Hold up, missy. Credit?" Putting numbers into the spreadsheet doesn't matter a fig. Not even half a fig. Word count in the first draft file counts. And that's about it. As long as I know I've worked, that should be good enough.

And I did work. I worked damned hard, as a matter of fact. This was a crucial scene, the first time Tess really shows her skills, and I think I nailed it. So what does it matter how many words got written on the page and how much time I spent?

What matters is that scene. And, even more than just that scene, what matters is that I paid attention. I got to a better place, by far, than I would have if I hadn't recognized I'd wandered off to a no-conflict scene and fixed it. I recognized it, and I kept working until it was fixed.

That's all the credit I need.

So I took the "hand-written to typed words" page out of the spreadsheet. I will keep track of how much time I spend each day, and how many words I have at the end, and the rest just doesn't matter.

I'm harder on myself than anyone else would ever be, and to some degree that's good. At the same time, though, I need to honour and appreciate how much I DID do, even when I think I could have/should have done more.

So... I worked hard today. I put in about five hours, and came out with 2900 words. The scene binds Tess into her new job more tightly than anything else could have, which is what I needed to have happen, and also reveals her character and Forrest's as well.

You done good, kid. :)

Writing Project: Raoul's first draft
Time Planned: 2 hours plus type-in
Time Spent: 3.25 hours plus type-in of 2 hours
Favourite Part: that I didn't quit

Exercise: 40 minute interval run
One Fun Thing I Did Today: not much yet, but I'm off to see the SATC movie tonight with my lovely friend L.J. Can't wait!

May 12, 2008: Running and writing

So I ran a half marathon yesterday. And it hurt quite a lot in the latter stages. I didn't want to stop, but I certainly didn't want to keep going either. But I kept telling myself I wanted to do this, that pushing through and giving it everything I had would be worthwhile. I'm never going to win a marathon, or half marathon, never going to have that kind of speed, but I can get better. And every time I try and don't quit, I do get better.

Writing's much the same. Sometimes it's hard. Sometimes it hurts a lot. In running, you get medals. (Everyone in the distance events gets a finisher's medal, which is part of the appeal for me. :) I've printed cover pages for the novels I've finished. Three are finished first drafts and I have left them behind, and two are polished. But looking up at them pinned to the wall above my desk reminds me of how hard I worked to get there and how good a marathon can feel.

Afterwards.

Writing Project: Raoul's planning
Time Planned: 2 hours
Time Spent: 2 hours
Favourite Part: incorporating a few "wouldn't it be cool if" thoughts into the plot in an integrated and useful fashion

Exercise: Walked to Tim Horton's for an iced cappuccino
One Fun Thing I Did Today: see above. :)

April 21, 2008: what a difference planning makes!

I built myself a seriously detailed schedule for today. And I stuck to it! I often make schedules, but they're usually full of stuff like "do two hour task" in a time slot of one hour. Today, I did not do this. I was rational about it. And I spent four hours on Raoul (and am starting to really see where it'll be going), cleaned out a bookshelf, knit two rows on the sweater of doom, called Rogers' tech support to find out about getting my Palm online (talk about your two-hour task... only took 45 minutes to find someone who could tell me what it would cost), made a dentist appointment, and did a bit of a few other 101 tasks.

Now, the real proof of the pudding (mmm... pudding...) is whether I can do it again tomorrow. Sometimes when I have a fabulous day the next day is... lacklustre, shall we say. Tomorrow will be just as good as today, I know it. :)

Writing Project: Raoul
Time Planned: 4 hours
Time Spent: like 3:55 (I was done and didn't want to start a new section)
Favourite Part: getting chills recognizing how the male and female main characters are linked together

Exercise: 45 minute tempo run
One Fun Thing I Did Today: wore Wes's phone headset while talking to Rogers - I felt like a tech support person myself

I'm so lucky

Wes just left for work, and I am here. I have the day, as I have every day Monday to Friday, to work on my novels and move forward. He never says anything about, "Make sure you work today" or "How's about doing a bit of housecleaning as well?" - he just heads off to work knowing that I am staying home to work.

Very few writers have the opportunity that I've been given. I need to take full advantage of it. I have the time and the energy to make my novels sing, and I will do it.

Starting right now.

"Seven" is complete in its ??? draft

Hard to say, really, but this version is finished! It is now resting for a month and then I'll polish 'er up and send it to my wonderful writing group for comments.

I'm now trying to come up with the concept for my next book. Why does it always seem that whatever stage of the process I'm in is the hardest stage?? :)

Books I've Read and Reviewed in 2008

The links from the book titles go to the "The Book Book" blog, where I am now posting my book reviews. Great site - tons of people contributing reviews and well worth checking out!

September

• Lisa Gardner, "The Killing Hour"
  
• Kelly Kirch, "More than Words".
  
• Vanessa Jaye, "Felicity Stripped Bare".
  
• Iain M. Banks, "Look to Windward". I'm not going to write a full review of this one because I don't think it's fair. It's a hard sci-fi book, and that's not my style. I did find it hard to follow, and until very close to the end I wasn't actually sure what was going on. There were some seriously hilarious sections, but they didn't seem to fit into the plot.
  

August

I got my Palm involved with tracking my reading, and now I actually KNOW what I've read. :) At this point, I've read 14 new authors since the end of March. Not bad!

• "The Age of Innocence" by Edith Wharton. Flowery language and yet clear and easy to read as well. Interesting story, both for what it shows and for how much of the relationships it doesn't show - no sex, no courtship details. (eBook via Fictionwise.com)
  
• "I'm with Stupid" by Elaine Szewczyk. Strongly chick lit in tone. The plot, frankly, didn't make all that much sense, but it was funny in a lot of parts. I did wish for some sort of character change/resolution but I didn't get it, and the few spots where some WAS added felt forced and fake. (eBook via Fictionwise.com)
• "The Farseer: Assassin's Apprentice" by Robin Hobb. I didn't expect to like this as much as I did. The cruelty of people to Fitz, the prince's bastard son, was so clearly portrayed, and yet the people felt it was justified. Fitz was always a strong character, to my mind, clear and well-written. I will read more of this author! (eBook via Fictionwise.com)
  
• "The Blood Books, Vol. 1" by Tanya Huff. A fair bit of headhopping, but an interesting take on werewolves and vampires, set in Toronto and London, ON. It's actually a compendium of two of her books. (library)
• "Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said" by Phillip K. Dick. Set in the ""future"" of 1988, it's neat to see how Dick envisioned the future. The destruction and rebuilding of Jason Taverner made great sense to me and I found the style, while a little stiff, easy to read and follow. (eBook via Fictionwise.com)
• "Currant Events" by Piers Anthony. I used to adore his books, but then I started to feel they were all exactly the same. After years away, I picked this one up. Typical Xanth, all puns, but better and more entertaining than I remember some of the others being. (Kibrary)
• "K-PAX" by Gene Brewer. I hadn't seen the movie before reading this (I have now) and I really enjoyed it. The tale of a man who is either an alien or deeply delusional. There appears to be a sequel; I will look for it. (Library)
• "Banewreaker" by Jacqueline Carey. I have read and enjoyed her Kushiel books, but I found this one VERY hard to get into. I think, for me, it's at least partly because the Kushiel books are in first-person and this was in third with multiple points of view. I never quite knew the narrators as well as I did Phedre and Imriel in the Kushiel series. (Library)

July

• "Remember Me?" by Sophie Kinsella. I loved the first Shopoholic book, but my interest wore off when the main character kept making the same stupid mistakes. THIS book, I loved. I think there are a few plot holes, but I CARED about the protagonist in a way I haven't cared for a character for quite a while. (read in July (22-23rd?), hardcover via library)
  
• "The Department of Lost and Found" by Allison Winn Scotch. I wanted to love this. I did like it. A main character dealing with cancer should have been someone for whom I felt sympathy, and I couldn't muster it up much. (read in July, dates lost to the mists of my memory, ebook via Fictionwise.com)
  
• "You Suck" by Christopher Moore. My first book of his, but not the last. I love his writing, although I realized when I'd finished that plot-wise this book is rather weak. Didn't notice until I'd finished, though, which tells you something. (started July 19, finished July 21, hardcover via Chapters' discount section)
  
• "Atlantic Shift" by Emily Barr. Apparently also released as "Solo". Odd.
  

June

Again, I am reading but not tracking. Come on, kid, you can do better than this!

• "Guilty Pleasures" by Laurell K. Hamilton. I've never been much into vampires, and this book didn't change that, but it had its moments. I generally liked the main character although there were times I didn't understand why she did what she did, and it was never explained to me. Still, kept me entertained on the elliptical machine! (started sometime around June 24th, finished June 30th, eBook via Fictionwise.com)
  
• "Mindless Eating" by Brian Wansink. SO interesting to see how we can be tricked by size of bowl/plate, amount of food presented, even perceived variety (people eat considerably more M&M candies when there are 10 colours in the bowl, for example, than when there are only 7). I've read it all the way through and am partway through my second read just to soak up more details! (bought June 18 through fictionwise.com, finished June 18, re-reading, eBook)
  

May

Doing Good by Pamela Morsi. Inconsistent at times, but better than most of what I've read lately. (began reading May 8 or 9, 2008, finished May 10, 2008, library book)

The Paper Marriage by Susan Kay Law. Disappointing to me - the main character's apparent personality transplant made the developing romance unbelievable. (began reading May 1, 2008, finished May 4, 2008, eBook)

April

Again, not so good with the tracking. Oh well. Onward!

"Diary of a Blues Goddess" by Erica Orloff.

"Cranberry Queen" by Kathleen DeMarco. It started out really well, I thought, with a woman freaking out about going to her ex-boyfriend's wedding suddenly blindsided by the car-accident deaths of her parents and brother, but then degenerated into a chance meeting I didn't believe and a bunch of people hanging out together that didn't make sense to me. I was disappointed, I must say.

Yesterday I re-read "Organizing from the Inside Out" by Julie Morgenstern. Good book. I think I've internalized quite a bit of it, which is great, but clutter and organization are issues for me, no doubt. We shall continue to overcome!

In March/April I read/re-read all seven books of Stephen King's "Dark Tower" series. (I hadn't read 5-7 before.) It's a true pleasure to read books and NOT get tripped up by strange word choices or awkwardness. Stephen King's in utter control of his writing toolbox, as he calls it in his "On Writing", and it shows. And it makes reading a delight.

March

What happened? I've read, of course, but I've been bad on the listing!! I will get back into it for April, and will try to catch up if I can figure out what I've missed.

Definitely read "Unpredictable" by Eileen Cook, which was unfortunately a little more predictable than I'd hoped. Still a solid chick lit book, but there's been so much hype about it I was expecting more.

February

• Nearlyweds by Beth Kendrick (three women who all got married the same weekend but the pastor died before filing their paperwork so their marriages aren't legal; amusing but so light as to be nearly non-existent)
  
• Shagpile by Imogen Edward-Jones (a novel of life in the seventies; funny, but probably funnier if I hadn't been a kid in the seventies)
  
• La Vie en Rose by Dominique Glocheux (a "things to do" book to help me with my 101 in 1001 list)
  

January

• Three knitting-related books, which have gone back to the library so cannot be listed
  
• My own 'Life, Love, and a Polar Bear Tattoo' - rereading and polishing
  
• I feel like there was at least one novel in here as well, so I'll check the shelves and see what I can recognize!