How Do I Know What I Think Until I See What I Say?

I've been working on the project I'm focused on right now for about a year and a half (which includes time taken out for my job(s), a relationship, walking my dog, sleeping, all that good stuff). It's an old idea that was born when I was in high school (someday I'll tell you that story), but never really came to much until I started working on this draft. Anyway, I've always loved all the characters, and the setting, and I've always thought that there should be a sequel to the story, although I've always been hazy on what, exactly, that sequel would look like. I think I've a got a little case of that Author Crush on her characters, so I didn't want this to be the end. So, from time to time, I've had ideas for scenes that I liked, but they never really hung together because I never had a plot to hang them on. Then, this weekend, while I was proctoring an LSAT practice test for my students, it hit me. I was working out a problem relating to my ...

When I was in high school, some friends and I would often go to the underage clubs in Milwaukee. I don't remember any of the names specifically, but there were two or three of them. We would get dressed up in old black clothes (I remember with particular fondness a black velvet jacket I had, and a number of white shirts with lace ruffles) and put on dark eye makeup and dance until we could hardly stand. I suppose we were proto-goths, although we called ourselves New Romantics, after the British bands we listened to. It was at this club that I met Myke and his friends. They were older, edgier, cooler than we were, and they were city kids, unlike me and my friends. It didn't occur to me at the time to ask why Myke, who was 22, would be interested in a 16 year old girl like me, although, in hindsight, Myke wasn't the most mature guy I've ever dated. Perhaps we were evenly matched. Anyway, Myke and I started dating and one night, I went out with him and his friends,...

I went to a Morrissey concert a few nights ago and had, in the middle of the concert, an idea for a new book! Obviously, I can't talk too much about it because it's (a) super new and (b) it's not a good idea to talk about your ideas in a public forum like this, but I'm very excited about it! I've been wondering, now that I'm in the later revisions of my current book, what I will work on while I'm querying that one, and now I know! Okay, sorry. I normally don't use that many exclamation points. ::deep breath:: Of course, the temptation is to abandon the first project and leap right into the second, but I'm pretty disciplined about not doing that sort of thing. I'm writing down the flashes of insight I have about the new project when I have them, but other than that, I'm just letting it simmer in the back of my mind and not forcing it. That's how I handle new projects or projects that are stalled. I just put them in the back of my m...

In line with my previous post about disaster movies , I am also a huge fan of things about zombies. It started when I first saw Night of the Living Dead, the original black and white one, on television when I was a kid and it scared the living crap out of me. It was so ... real and bleak and terrifying. I immediately fell in love with it. You see, zombies are my version of Mexican food. You know how some people can't eat Mexican food because it gives them gas and heartburn and generally makes them miserable? And you know how those people still eat Mexican food anyway, because Mexican food is delicious and cannot be resisted? That's me and zombie movies (except for the gas - although that would be an interesting effect). I mean that zombie movies give me nightmares, actual terrifying nightmares, and make me scared to go into the dark basement, and, after reading World War Z , a book about the (fictional) Zombie War, I had to go out and buy a crowbar, because I didn't...

The pages of the authors that made it into the second round at Fangs, Fur & Fey have started going up. It's interesting to see what people are responding to and what they aren't. It's interesting to see what I'm responding to and what I'm not. It's also interesting to see what asses authors can be. There are a couple of people who, in response to their critiques (either of the hook or the first pages), have decided to get indignant. They've decided to explain to the judges that, if the reader got to see more of the story, of course they would love it. Or that the judge didn't get what they were trying to do. Or that the writing errors are found in other books so why should they worry about them? It's not too many people, just a few, but let me tell you that I am writing down the names of these people in my book notebook to make sure I never accidentally pick up one of their books, because I don't like giving money to jerks. Here...

Unfortunately, I didn't make it past the first round of the hook contest on Fangs, Fur & Fey. The long and the short of the criticism is that the judge didn't like my main character. That's a bit of a risk I have with this project because the book starts with the main character in a rough place. Her parents have yanked her out of her home and moved her to the suburbs and she hates it, and them, and the whole fucking world. Of course, she starts lightening up by chapter two, because unremittting anger and sarcasm gets tired after a (very short) while, but apparently I put too much of that into my hook and the judge basically thought my main character was a bitch and didn't care about her. The judge also said that the hook should focus on the relationship the main character has with her parents, which clued me in to the fact that the judge probably wasn't a YA writer. Generally, in YA, the less parents the better. Kids don't like to read about adults, th...

As I mentioned, I entered the Fangs, Fur & Fey contest over on their blog (there's a link in the sidebar). And the results are supposed to be posted on Monday, which when all the hook writers would find out whether they should send in pages or not. Cool, cool. But, as it turns out, some of the judges are really on their game, and have been turning in entries earlier. Which have been being posted earlier. Which means that for the last two days I've been checking the website obsessively in the hope of seeing my magic number - 121 - up there. Which it has NOT been. 122 has gone up, but not 121. I'm trying to take this as a good sign. ::fingers crossed:: The contest itself has been real eye-opener. Good hooks, bad hooks, good hooks for books I would never read in a million years, bad hooks for books that I think I would love ... it's really cool. I also love the comments that the judges are making, which are usually right, but which also point out just how mu...