2015 Week 2.

Posted: January 12, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Odds and Ends | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

I know, I have such creative titles.

I finished the first rewrite of my current project a couple weeks ago, now I’m working on the second go-round and I’m eyeball deep. It’s going well, but it’s absorbing.

The kids went back to school today after the weekend. I thought the weekend was gonna make me crazy. Not sure why this one seemed so long… It’s gonna be an even longer one next week with the holiday *sigh*

I did make a special stop at the dollar store today to get some candles.. It’s really odd, I know, but I’ve discovered I work better when I have a candle burning in my line of view while I work. I don’t know why but if it works why argue with it?

Do you have any odd things that help you work?

Updates from the growing fires of the third circle of hell.

Posted: April 20, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Escape, Hunt, Secret Project, White Mountain Chanat, writing, | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

It’s getting to be that time of year here, when the weather’s hot and dry and stepping outside feels like you’re climbing into a convection oven. The heat shocks the breath out of you and the wind sucks all the moisture out of your skin. This means I spend a great deal of time inside hiding from said heat when I can, having three kids playing baseball this spring means I have practices and games I have to ferry them to and attend, despite the heat.

Since I’ve had the time, I got a lot of work done on HUNT and it is now available. I’ve also got another story ready to go, it will be released near the end of the summer, I’ll share more about it soon, and I’ve started working on a sequel to ESCAPE. If what I have in mind works out, it will be another series, this one a little different, as each story will center around a different couple. That should be done about the end of this year, or very early next year, depending on how it goes. I’ll let you know more when I can.

A long spring break leads to a tired writer.

Posted: April 6, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Escape, Odds and Ends, White Mountain Chanat | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

To start with, we were supposed to leave last Friday to go camping. I had been watching what the weather would be like, cool, but nice. However, I’d forgotten to check road conditions. So I spent three days working and working to get things ready to go, only to discover within an hour or two of leaving, that the roads are still snowed in and we can’t get there.

Hubster insists nowhere else will do, we can only go to this one lake. So we’ll wait. We knew when we scheduled this early that there was a chance we wouldn’t be able to make it. We planned for the possibility of delaying. So Hubster canceled his vacation and the kids stayed home with me for spring break (which was how we’d planned to do it if we couldn’t go this early.)

On the upside, this meant I got to finish the revisions on my latest project (more on that soon) in the comfort of my home, with conveniences like electricity! On the downside..it’s hot here. Mid-90’s already, and I think one day, we actually hit 100, though, not officially.

Things went along fine, until I went to the grocery store on Wednesday. There, I discovered the card I use for all my purchases has expired without the bank sending me a new one. Talk about embarrassing. I apologized to the clerk, told her I was going to have to cancel the order, and we came home. I got a hold of the bank, there’s a new card on the way, in the mean time, I’ve pulled a different card out to get me by.

Then there was Thursday. I was doing laundry like normal, everything was fine, until I noticed water pooling in the laundry room floor. I looked up my washer model online and did everything I could find or think of to find/stop the leak… no go. I had to call a service person. They’ll be here Monday, no clue how bad the damages will be.

Today, Kidlet 1 and I made a trip to Tucson. It’s a 4 hr drive each way. We went, picked up a truck load of furniture, a party pack of Eegees and came home. It was a long day and I’m exhausted but it was a good day. 

The other really great part of the week was finishing the revisions on my latest project. No, I’m not ready to tell you all about it yet, but I will say it won’t be another nearly year before you get another book from me. It’s a great feeling. It also means I can go back to work on the next White Mountain Chanat book. Yes, a sequel to Escape is in the works, and going well so far. No, I don’t have a title yet, but I’ll let you know when I know more.

A really good day.

Posted: January 6, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Odds and Ends, writing, | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

Yesterday I spent most of the afternoon on a road trip, I ended up with more than five hours behind the wheel, with two kids in the car, both absorbed in the games they were playing on their individual devices. The radio was on, my favorite station, XM’s Octane, but I drove across a lot of empty desert, there wasn’t much to see. This lead, as it always does, to my mind wandering, I think over plot lines, I consider characters and their stories, I review things I’ve already written and come up with some new material.

It was after 9pm when I got home last night, but I had several things I had to get down, directions that current stories will need to go, details that my characters had let slip during that long drive. So, once I got the kids in bed, I took my laptop and set up camp in the recliner, turning on an old movie to keep me company. Once I got my side notes down I started on the new project that had haunted me for the last two hours of my trip. I couldn’t wait to get started, I had to get at least some of it down.

So I opened a new Scrivener file and got to work. My movie ended and I started another, not really registering the passage of time. The story was unfolding at my fingertips and that was what mattered, the people talking in my head, not the ones on the screen or the hands of a clock moving on their own.  I was startled when the low battery alert popped up in front of me. I had been working for almost six hours (yes, my laptop battery lasts that long.)

I saved my work (not for the first time) and stretched and went to plug in the computer. I had gotten a lot done. I was happy, though, more than a little sleepy.

This morning I sat back down to it, the same project flowing as easily as it had last night. I’ve been up and down today, dealing with kids, feeding them, caring for them, getting them ready to go back to school in the morning. Even with all the distractions during the day I’ve managed to make thirty-six pages in the last twenty four hours. It’s been a really good day. I’m happy with it.

Now I’m going to go unwind a little in front of the TV, maybe knit a little, I would really like to finish my hood, though I know that won’t happen tonight.

I hope you had as good of day as I did.