Writing Meme

Your genre(s): I write mostly adult Urban Fantasies but I've been experimenting in YA books the past couple of months. I still like UF the best but I'm slowly getting better with YA.

How many books are you working on now: Right now my main book is my NaNo novel, The Freshman Affair. And if I ever have any extra time after working on that, Gwen and Jay demand my attention. Constantly. Seriously, they won't shut up.
I still haven't finish my last year's novel, College for Witches, but it needs a total make over before it will ever be finished. So far now, it's on the back burner.

Are you a linear or chunk writer: Mostly a linear writer, but when I get stuck or I'm in a particular mood, I'll skip ahead to a scene that fits that mood or is thrilling enough to get me unstuck.

The POV you’re partial to: First person, first person, first person. It's been a really long time since I've used any other. When I realized that, I decided to try third person limited for my NaNo. There's the occasional miss use of pronouns but other than that I'm liking it. I still think I do better with first though.

The Tense you use: Past. Hands down.

The theme that keeps cropping up in your books: Sex.

Okay not just sex. Also violence, love, pain, and lots of death. What can I say? I like to put my characters through hell.

How many days a week do you write: I try to write at least five days a week. With NaNo it's all seven. Before NaNo, it was probably closer to three, but I'm working on it,

What time of day do you get your best writing done: Latish. Like midnight or later.Or right away in the morning if I actually manage to walk up.

Who are your mentors: Err... I don't really have any. I just try to listen to people who have been writing longer and have had some success with it. I'll take all the help and advice I can get.

My favorite authors to read: Well there's Laurell K Hamiliton, who really turned me on to Urban Fantasy. Katie MacAlister, Kim Harrison, and Madelyn Alt have also helped there. Annette Blair has help nurture my love for paranormal romances.

Then there's the more serious works, like Doyle and Austen. Chuck Palahniuk and Ian McEwan are new favorites. And, of course, I love me some Shakespeare.

This Meme was shamefully stolen from Lori. Thanks for giving me something to post about. =]

Houston, we have a problem.

I don't even know if I can call it a problem. If it was any month but November, I would consider this problem a blessing. And yet...

Because it's NaNo, I had to start a completely new story. I didn't think that it would be a big of deal. I figured I could just temporarily move Gwen and Jay's story to the back burner and give TFA my full attention. But something is happening to me that I've only ever heard of from other authors.

Gwen and Jay won't. shut. up.

Their story keeps me up at night. I even had a dream about them when I finally manged to get to sleep (Jay was even hotter than I thought. It was a really good dream ;-]). Gwen's voice is whispering to me constantly. And her and Grace (TFA's female MC) are two completely different people and their stories have very little in common. Gwen keeps showing up, her mannerisms and attitude keep creeping in where they don't belong.

Some of you would think there was a simple solution, just work on them both. Well, with school, trying to find a job, and dealing with my father, it's hard enough to find time to do nearly 2k a day.

Gwen. I'm beggging you, just for November, please keep your mouth shut.



I really have no reason for putting Gerard Butler in here. I just like to look at him.

Besides, some people *cough* Scarlett *cough* only read this for the hot men. Got to keep them coming back. ;-]

Oh NaNo.

It's that time of year again. NaNo is just around the corner. And I'm just as, if not more, nervous for this year as I was last year.

Some of you may remember that I didn't win my first year. I'm still okay with that because I still wrote more that month than I ever had before. But this year, I feel even more pressure to win. Now that I've gone through it once, I feel like I should be more prepare.

I think it's safe to say that's not how I feel. At all.

Since NaNo last year, I have learned a few things about myself as a writer. One, I'm not a wing it kind of girl. I always thought I was, but after the fail that CFW turned into and the success that VDGP is turning into, I've been proven wrong. So I've been outlining The Freshman Affair, but there is something missing. The "Magic Feather" as Lori (Between Brothers out now. Read it.((Unless you're like me and are still waiting for the paperback to come out))) and Scarlett have deemed it.

I've got a little more than a week to discover that magic. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

On a side note- My birthday was two days ago. Which still hasn't really hit me. I feel like I just hit 18. What happened to 2009?

To apologize for my absent, I present to you:


Men who could murder your cat and you'd forgive them without hesitation.

Forget about my blatant neglection yet? Not quite? Well this should do it then....
Enjoy. =]

Not to toot my own horn...

But I'm awesome. Seriously.

Okay not really, but I am having a really good night. Writing wise that is. (You thought I actually went out and got myself a life didn't ya? Sucker) Here is the list of writing accomplishments so far today.

• I finished the outline for my urban fantasy story.
• I finally thought of at least a working title for said story. Since I'm not sure I'm going to keep it, I'm not going to post it here. For now, let's just call it VDGP
  
• I started on VDGP. It's very small start but still a start
  
• I came up with a NaNo idea.
• I came up with a NaNo title- The Freshman Affair. (Don't laugh. I'm horrible at titles)
• I started an outline on The Freshman Affair.

Toot toot!

Meh.

Well. I didn't reach the goal for NaNo. I kinda sorta lost all drive to do anything in the middle of the month (that's something that happens every year round this time). I was lucky if I got out of bed and showered, much less wrote 1,600+ words.

Don't worry though. I'm not too discouraged though. I'm still proud of the 18,000+ words I did manage to crank out. And I'm going to finish the rest of the story as soon as I can. At least the rough draft part. I'm excited to see how it turns out.



Next year NaNo,
You're mine.

Life.

So far this month, I wish I could just hide in my room with coffee, my laptop, and music and that's it. It's been really hard trying to juggle real life with writing. My friends and family have been far from helpful when it comes to writing. I've wanted to do nothing but writing since I was a little girl, but all anyone talks about is needing to have a fall back plan. I don't think they realize how much it hurts to hear that. It them basically saying, "Well you don't have a chance at making it so you better have another plan."

Things haven't been great for me lately. I'm still trying to get the hang of living on my owe. I can't seem to get the hang of budgeting and saving money. There's so much I want to do that I just can't afford. Like, join a gym and actually get in good shape again. That's probably the number one thing on the list. But I can't even afford to buy cleaning supplies for my place, much less something like a gym membership.

I guess a plus is I actually like the stuff that I wrote on my NaNo the last two days. It's still not good, but it's less crap than what I've been prone to writing so far.

Another random thing I'm going to throw into this blog is I've been reading Paperback's blog and she had the idea of doing a photo a day for the year 2009. I think that is a really great idea and that I might try and give it a shot as well. I think my camera bit the dust awhile back though, so I might need to get a new one. But if I can get one in time I think I'll defiantly take a swing at it.

That's all.

Halfway Through...

Well, the month is halfway done. My NaNo, not so much. I'm sitting at 13,563 words and I'm supposed to be at 25,000. Life has been really kicking me in the face. I got my wisdom teeth out two days ago, so I've been spending most of that time asleep. My work hours have also picked back up, which I would have killed for last month. But this month, not so much. It's making me wish I was out of a job. On the bright side, this is probably the longest story I've ever written. I just have to push myself harder so I give up.
As for the actual story itself, I'm not a huge fan of where it's going. My MC is falling for the lead male way to fast and she just won't listen to me when I tell her that she needs to tone it down so she doesn't get hurt. I guess though I've known I was going to hurt her from day one. Most of the story I don't like at all. I'm guessing that's because it's so unedited. Usually, I crazy rewrite everything as I go. Not doing that is making me hate my WIP. But I'm trying to keep my inner editor sedated and I'm doing a fairly good job. I think I just need a little push to get myself going again.
Something I'm hoping to do today, at least for an hour or so, is go to the write in at a local cafe, but the problem is I made plans with some people. The last write in I went to, the one that I basically organized, was fun and did help to see that other people were having as much trobule as I was.
Anyways... Here's a little tidbit for my story, probably the only part I actually like right now,


He thumbed my cheek, coming away with fresh tears.
“Just tell me. It will not chang…” I hastily slapped my hand to his mouth. I think I hurt him, but I did not say sorry.
“Please, do not finish that sentence. I can not bear to hear it. Not again,” tears were streaming down my cheeks once more, but for a different reason. All the people who had promised me that what ever dark secret I was hiding they would be there, they would accept it, flashed trough my mind. “I’ll tell you. But do not make promises you can not keep,” I was reminder of our first date, how he promised he would never hurt me, not if he could help it. I took a shaky breath, and made my self ready to make him a liar. “My parents raised me as… as a Wicca. I am a witch.” I was not ashamed of who I was raised, I was proud and comfortable with my religion. The only reason I kept it to myself this long was because of how quickly fear and prejudice could turn to hate. Hate that could turn violent, hate that had in the past had turned violent.
His hand dropped from my face, “You are a what?” The look on his face would have been comical if it wasn’t so heart breaking.

Remember, totally unedited. And so far form perfect. And with that, I say goodbye.

Good luck to my fellow NaNoers out there =]

Panic has set in.

As NaNoWriMo draws closer and closer, the more it hits me; this is a huge commitment. One that I really want to do. But I am so afraid that I am so far from ready. Plus I have to finish all my school stuff by November 18th. Well, Shit. And then there's the getting my wisdom teeth removed. Aka. Amanda writing while she's high on painkillers. Should be an interesting few days.

I've been reading more and more about NaNo in hopes of reassuring myself, but I think it's making the panic worse. Most people have 2,000 word outlines and know exactly what they are doing. I'm going into this basically blind and praying for the best. Hopefully next year will be better. Don't get me wrong, I'm gonna work my ass off to finish this one. But next year I'll know what to expect. And maybe be able to help out with organizing events in my town. There is no way I am going to be able to get through this by myself

Thankfully, I'll have plenty of cigarettes and caffeine and music. Maybe that will be enough

NaNoWriMo

So I'm doing National Novel Writing Month this year. Basically, all November, I have to write a novel from scratch. 50,000 words. Since I've been working on a different story for a very long time now, I think it is going to be really hard to just let that one go for awhile and write a brand new story. It's now two days until it starts, and I just wrote my ideas in my daybook. I think I'm going to write about a witch girl who is just starting college. Do all the things a normal college girl goes through; love, keeping up in class, juggling relationships, then trying throw in some supernatural stuffs; keeping up with her coven, learning new spells, and dealing with this new witch boy that seems to be interested in more than just being friends. I'm hoping it plays out the way it is in my mind, not the way it sounds on paper so far.

Wish me luck.

I really hope I can finish this. It opens me up to being able to be involved next year. I really want to be the liasion for my area but young newbies aren't allowed to. So for now I'm hoping someone will step up and take the job. Next year I'm also going to try to get sponsered and go to the writing dangerously event in San Fransico. I would like to go this year but I didn't learn about this soon enough to plan everything out. I'm getting my wisdom teeth removed. Not great timing. Next year though. Man I hope that works out.

Support through this would be amazing. I know I'm going to need a lot of it. And understanding. I'm probably not going to be too social in the month to come.