I Swear…

/in , ,

The title of today’s blog is not facetious.  I do swear.  Kind of a lot.

fbombI try not to in public.  Much like public displays of affection, I find it inelegant to be assaulted by profanity that I’m not participating in.  I think keeping a lid on my foul mouthed habit is only polite and try to reserve it for private situations and friends who have known me long enough to not take offense.  As a result, a few of my acquaintances have been surprised to find themselves on the receiving end of a periodic f-bomb.  (Yes, I’m the person who should receive this paperweight as a gift.) In the past curbing my tongue has not particularly onerous, but since my child has moved into speaking and comprehending, you know, actual words, life as a purveyor of profanity has become more difficult.  Now I can’t even swear in my own home?!  Word swaps and humming the Star Spangled Banner do not really help.  (Son of a goat monkey, keeping my swearing on the inside is hard!)

In most of my books, I’ve minimized the swearing to a solid “hell” or “damn” because well, my grandmother likes to read my books.   But recently, I’ve begun working on a story that moves my swearing habit to the forefront.  Rather than really “messing some stuff up”, I am straight  “f***ing some s*** up” for a change.  And ooooh, does it feel good.  Ah profanity, how dost though trip lightly off my off my keyboard and onto the page?  Very lightly indeed.

fuckingladyMany comments on profanity seem to insist that profanity is the crutch of mind unable to think of something else to say.  I completely disagree.  To correctly use profanity one must have an understanding of language that allows you to use the f-word as a verb, a noun, and an adjective. (Yes, it really can – see examples here).

Will my completed manuscript stay chock full of profane goodness?  I don’t know, but I’m sure as **** interested to find out.

Dystopian Games

/in , , ,

You’re stuck in a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean with 8 strangers and no food or water, who do you eat first?

Dystopian novels have held a prominent place on our national reading lists for the last few years and while I occasionally enjoy a jaunt into the horrific futures that we could create for ourselves they don’t really speak to me.  To me they frequently seem like the ultimate lifeboat game. While occasionally it’s fun to work through the logic of how to survive in a treacherous situation, the real answer to any lifeboat game is to not get stuck in the lifeboat in the first place.

zombie-id

I was reminded of this principle recently when I visited a conference for my day job (graphic design). The conference was for public works personnel (AKA everyone who keeps your city functioning) and their lunch speaker spoke on how their department had handled an earthquake.  From personnel rotation, calling in reinforcements, clearing roadways, reviewing housing safety, clean up – this department moved swiftly with the goal of maintaining safety and returning their town to normal in the shortest amount of time possible (and they did a great job).  But having just read a dystopian novel I was struck by the realization that not one person in the room was thinking… “Bob, I’d eat Bob.”  They weren’t playing the game – they were strategizing about how to not get stuck on the lifeboat.

All of this led to four thoughts.  One – I’m incredibly grateful for our public works personnel.  From sewer maintenance, to bridge engineers, to water management, they deserve more recognition than they get.  Two – All of you great public employees are screwing up a perfectly good dystopian plot line RIGHT NOW.   We’re not supposed to be coming together to overcome a natural disaster and working for the common good!  Come on, people.  Where is the divisive hatred and the reaching for the shotguns? That’s it; I’m breaking out the zombies.  Bob is going to be dinner if I have to have three plot contrivances before breakfast.  Three – We as society need to invest more in infrastructure.  And four – Because we don’t invest more in infrastructure we all need to have 3 days to 2 weeks of supplies on hand depending on where you live.  Be prepared. Don’t let a dystopian novel happen to you.

zombie-e1305310249480

Market Research

/in , ,

As I have been exploring the question “Who are you like?” this month, I’ve also been exploring what other books in my genres look like.  This is sometimes gratifying on the base level of my fonts are so much better than yours and also sometimes mystifying on the level 51rIIiVsAeLof why are there so many bared midriffs in contemporary fantasy?  On the topic of midriffs, and purely for example’s sake, I’ll put the cover of Shifting Jock in Love here.  The cover is obviously… uh… fully functional, because I can’t stop staring at the uh… weight lifting bar.  Now that we’ve covered that topic (no, we haven’t covered anything?), let me move on to my point.

Market research, which is what I call shopping and (gently) making fun of book covers over a glass of wine, is important.  It’s hard to review my own book cover submissions if I don’t know what the trends are.  Not that trends should inform every decision, but I like to know how far out of the current I’m swimming. In addition to finding the occasional good idea that I could be copying, I also find really interesting authors.  Research shows that most people buy books based on word of mouth, but in this online age, that can’t ALWAYS be true.  From Facebook to google ads, to the wonders of Amazon, we get a lot of recommendations about authors and books online.  And without a person to ask, readers are stuck trying to answer “so who are they like” question based on the marketing surrounding the book.  But as we all learned in grade school, you can’t always judge a book by it’s cover.

One great resource I’ve found in my wading around the internet is a great website – www.literature-map.com  Simply type in an author you like and it will produce of an animated cloud of similar authors aka a handy new To Be Read list.  And you can click on the question mark in the corner if you want to add authors to the database to improve results.  And now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go enjoy a little more market research and a Riesling.

 

Originally published on 8/24/16 at the Stiletto Gang

Who are you like?

/in , , , ,

One of the most common questions a writer hears is: Who are you like?  In other words, what (famous, more talented, richer, that I would have heard of) author are you like?  Of course, as authors we would always like to respond – I am like no one! I am a unique snowflake of infinite genius!  Bow down before my staggering work of novelistic achievement!  Possibly at this point is where we also start investing in a parrot, flowing robes, and a pencil thin moustache to twirl.  I’m not saying all authors would go full Disney villain. Clearly, the eyebrows and make-up require a more high-maintenance lifestyle than most of us are cut out for.  I’m just saying, nobody likes to think of themselves, as “just like” somebody else.

However, temper-tantrums and eyeliner aside, it is a useful question.  It does let people know where they should look for you in the library and where you fall on their reader spectrum.  For the record, I usually answer this question with – Janet Evanovich.  My series Carrie Mae Mysteries is female centered spy series, with plenty of hunks, humor, and huge action scenes.  However, I also write in another genre – contemporary fantasy.  I write modern day fairy tales about fairies, vampires, and what happens when a mermaid meets a SEAL.

Writing in multiple genres used to be very “not done” because the publishing houses found it hard to market.  The prevailing wisdom was that readers don’t read multiple genres (uh… say what?), Self-publishing has opened the door for authors to write whatever their unique snowflake heart’s desire, but it’s still a risk, and a challenge for those doing the marketing, to figure out what to say to the question – who do you write like?

I guess for now, I’ll have to go with this answer – I write like my fingers are fire with sheer greatness and my mascara is totally, totally on point.

***

Originally posted on 8.10.16 at The Stilettog Gang

 

Cranking (Toddler) Tunes

/in , ,

Many things change after having a baby.  And I have to say that one of the things that I’m the most sad to see change is the amount of music I listen to.  Baby nap times seem to encompass the whole dang day! I used to have iTunes running almost constantly.  Not that it wasn’t a battle with my husband over what to listen to.  No, I don’t want more Phish.  And there’s only so much hip-hop and Grateful Dead I can listen to before going insane. (Yes, my husband is a hippy with a secret love of 90’s R&B.  He compensates for this deficiency by being ruggedly handsome and having the miraculous ability to open jars and kill countless spiders.)

The interesting thing is that, aside from the specific bands, where my husband I deviate in our musical tastes is an actual love of music.  He loves music.  Phish, Dave Matthews, the Allman Brothers, and the Grateful Dead all have one thing common.  OK, take a toke and make that two things – they’re jam bands.  I hate jam bands.  It’s just giant swaths of useless music that take away from the important thing – the lyrics.  I love the words. (Surprised?  Probably not.)  For me, music is like poetry with half the pretentiousness and way more shake-your-bootiliciousness.  And I like to play it ALL the time particularly when I’m working.  I find that music helps put me in the zone for writing and for design.

But with an in-home office and a baby, it’s become a lot more difficult to crank the tunes through the work day.  I was excited when the baby hit two and it became easier to send her to daycare/babysitting and there’s only one nap to contend with, but it has also meant that she’s tons more verbal.  With a toddler in the house, I don’t feel quite so comfortable cranking up a few of the songs I love, like Don’t Shoot Me Santa by The Killers.  I am perfectly prepared to explain that boys have a penis and some people are in wheelchairs and sometimes boys marry boys and girls marry girls.  But… I am not at all prepared to explain why Santa is shooting that guy in the song.  I’m pretty sure I see headphones in my future.

 

***

Originally posted on 7.27.16 at The Stiletto Gang

The Red String of My Mind

/in , ,

In the cop shows, whenever the intrepid detective (Watching the Detectives, Elvis Costello) is working on the massive conspiracy that killed her mother/lover/those six girls we never met, but who really give our character a reason to act, the case is always shown as pictures (Pictures of You, The Cure) tacked up and connected by red string. I don’t know what set designer came up with the red string, but they ought to get royalties. It’s so common that if I worked at a craft store and someone bought red string I’d think they were a serial killer, a cop thrown off the force for refusing to quit the case, or a grandmother of toddlers stocking up for Christmas. I bring this up for the reason that it is a fitting visual for the song lyric littered wasteland (Teenage Wasteland, The Who) that is my brain.

Whenever I have a story noodling around in my head, but haven’t moved it to the level of having an outline, my natural writing style is to pick out scenes that I want to write, type them up, and save each scene to it’s own word document. As you can imagine, this creates a number of random word documents that might be hard to keep track of. But I have a system, most often I’ll name the document the song lyric associated with it. As a book grows, frequently these scenes become chapters, and those document names become chapter titles. Which is why the original table of contents for Bulletproof Mascara, the first of my Carrie Mae Mystery novels, read more like a playlist than serious literary subtitles. Sadly, editor made me change most of them – now they simply hint at the songs they reference. Apparently, the only people more uptight that literary rights lawyers or music rights lawyers. But you can still rock out to the Bulletproof Mascara playlist simply by visiting my youtube page (youtube.com/CarrieMaeMysteries) – please enjoy the musical stylings of David Bowie, James Brown, Simon & Garfunkel, Tech9, Morcheeba, and (of course) more.

Originally posted on 7/13/16 at The Stiletto Gang

My Toddler Works for James Patterson

/in , , , ,

My dad says he invented the skateboard.

He says that he had never before seen or heard of a skateboard when he put a plank on skate wheels. Of course, his invention went no further than a backyard of summer fun, but he still likes to claim his invention when some youth sails by on a long board.

Well, now I feel his pain.  James Patterson, Mr. Prolific himself, is in the process of releasing what he’s calling “Book Shots” — novella length works, penned with co-authors, that cost less than five dollars.

You have no idea how annoyed this makes me.

Because it was MY idea.  This month I’m releasing Wild Waters, a novella length paranormal romance (sex scenes!) story.  The genre is outside of my usual brand, but I thought the structure and topic were interesting (reporters, SEALs, Vietnam!). I also thought my readers might enjoy something at a lower price point, but in my style of writing.  I examined the options.  I had the thoughts.  I came up with the plan.

And then James Patterson stole it out of my brain!  How dare he use his larger amounts of money, time and fame to launch my idea!  It makes me want to march right over to his house and give him a toddler.  Let’s see how fast he can type then.  Toddlers should be like weights for jockeys.  If Vegas gambled on writer’s turning in manuscripts on time, I’m sure that they would have developed some sort of toddler distribution system by now.  Fortunately, for Mr. Patterson and for me, there’s plenty of room in this world for novella’s and writers of all kinds, with or without toddlers. Good luck to both of us with our tiny books.

 

Originally Published at the Stiletto Gang on 06.08.16

Now is the time…

/in , ,

Late in the month, it seems like almost everyone suddenly wakes up and realizes that the deadlines that seemed so very far away are now, like, almost here, man.  Cue panic.  Cue sudden uptick in workload for yours truly.  The problem is that I’m exactly like everyone else.  I’ve been noodling over several pieces of writing and now the deadline is like, almost here, man!

Now is when the marathon of writing becomes a sprint. Just how fast can fingers type?  We’re about to find out.

Now is also about the time when back pain and carpal tunnel set in.  Time to start juicing writers!  No, I mean literal juicing.  It’s important to stay hydrated – prevents muscle spasms.  Although, I personally prefer copious amounts of tea, liberally applied, at regular intervals.

Now is the time when the tiny proto-human you’ve been carefully nurturing like a hot house bloom looks up from a coloring book and says, “Sorry mom, work. Four more minutes.”  Gee, wonder where she got that?

Now is the time that my face looks like this:

stressed face

So wish me luck as I sprint to the end of the month.  And wish my family luck as they get abandoned for fake people that I made up.

 

 

Originally published on the Stiletto Gang 05.25.16

Personal Fitness

/in , ,

Originally published at the Stiletto Gang on 05.11.16

I’m going to let you in on a secret – writing is not for wussies. It’s for old people.

Or at least it makes you feel old. Carpal tunnel. Eye twitches and strains. Aching neck, sore back. The human body was not designed to spend hours sitting at a computer, and the hours compound into stiff muscles that have forgotten how to move. Walking into the kitchen after a prolonged bout of editing, I look like I’ve escaped from the neighborhood old-person jail… er… assisted living facility. I imagine that back when writers were churning out novels by quill and candlelight that it wasn’t any better. But at least back then we were likely to die by forty anyway and probably needed to worry more about childbirth and dental hygiene than whether or not our wrists were a tad achy.

I could trot out some line about suffering for my art, but the truth is, I do many things to combat the muscular stress of sitting and writing. First of all, I got married and had a kid. Although, maybe that wasn’t quite my intended outcome when I started down the aisle, it has to be said that nothing curtails long hours at a computer like a toddler. However, the things I intentionally do to keep myself from becoming Quasimodo include walking / jogging, stretching and keeping up on my martial arts training. And then I whine and complain until my husband gives me a neck rub. And then when all else fails I break down and pay for a massage.

Below are the most common stretches I do for my wrists. These drawings were actually produced by one of my former employers – Visual Health Information. They produce drawings for physical therapists and others to give to patients. I have found all of these to be very helpful for my extended typing lifestyle.

wristhand1

Organizing My World(s)

/in , ,

An author’s job is not just to tell a story, but to decide how a story should be told. Is it better in first or third person? Is it told in one long march of words or are their chapters? We have to decide genre, tone and feeling. And once those decisions have been made an author must create and track the main plot of the story – the one that we struggle to capture in the blurb text on the back cover – as well as the sub-plots, underlying themes, and finally, the characters themselves.  All of those pieces require not just the ability to write, but also the ability to track information. Because, as any serious reader will tell you (sometimes at great length), consistency and details matter greatly to a well written book, and while we can rely on an editor for some items, they are only human and can only catch so much.  It is in an author’s best interest to provide the cleanest manuscript possible.

I’m currently working on two vastly different stories: the fourth Carrie Mae Mystery Glossed Cause and a Romance Horror novella Wild Waters.  Each story comes with an array of characters, research and plot twists that to be perfectly honest I can’t hold in my brain.  Possibly pre-production of a toddler I could have kept hold of all the details, but no longer. Now, to keep all my worlds organized, I must rely on a system of notes, plot outlines and spreadsheets.

CM-characterlistFor the Carrie Mae books I track characters with a spread sheet that notes who they are (name, basic role, job or company) and also what book they have appeared in or if they have been deleted or omitted from a book.  I also have a rather extensive style sheet that helps me keep track of how certain things, such as chapter headings are formatted and whether or not I’m consistently formatting things like “AK-47” and “INTERPOL” the same way over multiple books.

plot graphFor Wild Waters I’m writing in two different time periods – WWII and Vietnam ­– and they each use distinctive slang that I organize in a couple of basic lists.  There are also multiple character points of view and it is important to keep track of what characters know and when they know it, so that each plot point is revealed at the correct time. Tracking character arcs are more difficult and sometimes require multiple ways of visualizing.  I will frequently write out the plot from each characters point of view or I will graph it out on a virtual whiteboard, utilizing the main plot points.

There is no perfect system of course, and each author must work the way that works for them. But when examining a well-written book, I am frequently in awe, not just of the beautifully constructed words or strong turn of phrase, but the underlying construction of a book.  Sometimes, I find it amazing that any books get written at all.