Life Changes

My life has gone through some abrupt and large changes lately. Unfortunately not the kind of changes I would prefer. (AKA Getting "The Call" and becoming a widely known author) but I am now forced to adjust.

Adjusting can be difficult. Even when it is adjusting to the changes that we DO prefer.

So then the question swarmed through my mind, "How will I adjust to the changes that come with publishing?"

Wow! Big question!

I'm used to being a writer. I'm used to writing my novels for me. I'm used to agonizing over query letters. I'm used to my heart breaking over rejection.

But...

How will I get used to having an agent? How will I get used to finding a publisher? How will I get used to finally fulfilling my dream!?!?

These are going to be some pretty big life changes. And don't get me wrong, I am SOOOOO ready for them. If they want to pile up on me tomorrow, it's all good!

But do you ever ask yourself these questions? Do you ever wonder HOW your life will changes when you finally reach success?

Are you ready?

Even I have Goals!!!

It looks to me like everyone is coming up with lists of goals as 2009 draws to an end. I simmered on this for a moment, considered whether or not I should do it myself. I mean I'm not much for following trends, BUT then I decided to go with the flow. It sounded fun enough!

So here we have it kids.

Poppins 2010 Goals

1. Consider giving up dairy. I feel that as long as I am giving it consideration I am making a large step forward. Maybe next year I'll actually do it. But I really like cheese!


2. Acquire more gnomes. I have come to the heart felt decision that 4 gnomes and 2 gnome pictures are not NEARLY enough for a Gnome Connoisseur like me. (That's right! I no longer feel that the term 'Gnome Lover' applies to me! I'm SO much more than that!)

OMG Someone PLEASE make me some of these!!!

3. Stay free and clear from #blogwars! While at the very same time making sure to enjoy every moment of them. (Now this is going to be more difficult than one might expect. I have to watch my P's and Q's and make sure to NOT AT ANY TIME let anything embarrassing about me slip. I'm really good at embarrassing myself on this blog so it's going to be quite the challenge!)

4. Finish editing my book, write a KILLER query, score a perfect agent and sign for an awesome book deal with a HUGE publishing house. It can happen...you just wait and see!

5. Go to the movies ... a lot ... this is going to be one of the best movie years EVER! Percy Jackson, Toy Story 3, Eclipse, The Deathly Hallows, Shrek 4 ... and seriously the list goes on. I'm stoked!


6. Get a second car. I'm hoping this can be accomplished after I complete number 4. I'd REALLY like a mini van with a DVD player and heated seats. Is that really too much to ask for?

7. Have fun with my blog and remember it's not about how many followers you have, it's about how many of those follower love you! (Luckily for me ALL of my followers love me ... right? Right! RIGHT?!?!)

8. Continue building awesome relationships with all you awesome bloggers and writers and mommies. You guys have truly made 2009 one of the best years ever! I'm in love with each and every one of you. But I'm sorry, I'm married. So I'm going to have to keep our love at bay.

9. Find new and innovative ways to waste time and/or keep up my obsessions with twitter and Facebook. (Easiest goal to obtain EVER!)


10. Be me .... um ... or figure out who me is. That might be a better start.

So what are your goals for 2010? Has 2009 been good to you?

Considering a Change

I've been exceeding my word goals on NaNo by large amounts and I am super excited. My book is coming along quite nicely, ok well ... it kinda sucks considering I'm just trying to push out words. But I am writing, and for the most part I am getting the story out and providing myself with something to work with in the editing process. All and all a very good start.

You may have noticed however that I was missing yesterday. All this writing has left my brain incapable of thinking of anything that does not directly include my story, thus I could not for the life of me come up with a blog topic yesterday.

BUT

Its ok.

Jody Hedlund wrote a great post today about building a platform and when you should start. I've been thinking about that a great deal lately. I've been so wrapped up in the blogging world and keeping my twitter going and trying to make my name known to anyone and everyone that I have thrown my writing into the back seat and it's just been sitting there quietly. (unlike my children while they are in the back seat!) I almost forgot what it felt like to write.

Now granted building a platform WILL help me in the long run, if I'm not writing and not progressing, what good is it going to do me.

I've noticed quite a few of my blogging friends only write 3 days a week. I am considering doing the same myself. I think I have just been afraid that if I stop writing everyone will forget me! At the same time I have noticed that I have been so busy plopping out blog posts about incredibly irrelevant crap that no one is really reading my posts anyway. That's not cool! I love my readers. I don't want to bore them!!! You guys are awesome!

So what do you think? Will you forget me if I move down to 3 days a week? Will you miss me?

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

On Publishing....

As many of you know I have been eluding to some news regarding my writing career...

WELLLLLL

You have to go HERE if you want more details ;)

There is Only One Thing Left to Do

It's finally that time kids ... I've written, I've edited, I've pruned, I've rewritten, I've moved chapters, I've edited some more, and edited again ... and now it's time. The only thing left to do...

...*Poppins pulls her hair out, breaks into a cold sweat and screams!* ...

The only thing left to do is write the query letter.

I have painfully realized through my first attempts at query letter writing, that I am indeed not very good at it. Well let's be honest, I'm horrible at it. My novel comes off as silly, superficial and uninteresting when I try to summarize it. The novel itself, not so silly, superficial and uninteresting. Does this make me a bad writer? Am I suffering from lack of oxygen to the brain? (No need to answer that one kids...) Why is it so hard to summarize 80,000 words into 250?

...*Poppins sighs (Loudly!) and places her wrinkled forehead in her tiny child sized hands*...

I've read ALL the blogs and articles I can find on it, yet I still can't seem to perfect it. And seeing as I AM Desperately Searching for my Inner Mary Poppins, you can guess that my Query Letter is not leaving my Inbox until it is PERFECT! I'm just not sure how to get it that way yet.

Can you help me? PLEASE SHARE WITH ME YOUR SECRETS! I like secrets! (No not the secret about your co-worker's husband's affair with the secretary's sister who was once a man, or the one about your brother's uncle's monkey that just got out of Banana Rehab, and I do NOT need to know that you pick your nose and pee in the shower... ) Tell me your secrets to Query Letter writing! I need all the help I can get!!!

... *Poppins gets down on her knees and begins to beg with her pathetic blue eyes turned into a puppy dog fashion*...

How Long is TOO Long? Why writing a Query Letter can be so Frustrating!

Where less is more and more is less, is there a middle ground? When writing a query letter, how much of the plot do you really need to expose? Will your synopsis measure up enough to get a request for a partial?

I can honestly say I do NOT find the actual writing of a novel to be the hardest part. Although it is difficult to sit down and come up with a beginning, middle and end to a well written book, it pales in comparison to the actual writing of the query letter. Imagine for a moment, taking an 80,000 word story, and being told that you are only allowed to use about 500 words to explain the entire work of literature. Does anyone else see how this appears to be almost virtually impossible!?!? And this is not the end to the insanity.

Not only do you need to figure out how to insanely condense your hard work into an email or letter, but now you must decide which portions of the story are relevant and important enough to capture your readers attention. Are you merely looking to dangle a tiny piece of steak in front of a starving dog, leaving them with just enough to want more? Or do you want to just throw them the bone, the major piece that holds the steak together and smells of what they want, but leaves off all the beef making them NEED that sustenance? And let's face it, we could always just throw them the whole dang steak and hope it tastes sufficient enough to want the entire cow?

Therein lies the question, how long is too long? Is more less or is less more? And if that wasn't enough to make you lose your mind and consider maybe this novel is not worth the hassle, the process only becomes increasingly complicated.

EACH individual Agent is different. Each has their own guidelines about formatting and grammar. Each has their own style, their own represented genre, and their own preferences about how many credentials you have. There is not going to be just ONE query letter you are writing for this ONE novel. Instead there will be ONE query letter specifically written for EACH agent. What? You had not even considered researching your agents? You were planning on just sending out a "generic form" query letter and hoping one bites? OH! Well I hope you are planning on getting ONE "generic form" rejection letter from EACH Agent as well.

This is the life of a writer my friends. Maybe after reading this you think I am insane and surely I should give up. But maybe, JUST MAYBE, I do believe my novel will capture the eyes of even ONE Agent. It is possible I believe that by writing NUMEROUS query letters, and exposing a different amount of my plot to each Agent, ONE will bite and be as excited about my story as I have become. I may not know the answer to "How long is too long?", but I can assure that I fully intend to find out!

Lesson of the day kids, don't give up because something sounds impossible. If you believe in it....it will become possible! Will MY synopsis measure up? Well I can assure I refuse to discontinue my efforts until it has.

Ok, enough with the speeches and back to the editing... Have I mentioned how frustrating editing is yet???

Red Wine is like a Prepositional Phrase....

"How?" you ask....well let me explain....

1. Sometimes it sounds good, at others it doesn't. Unless you are a member of my family, then most always it sounds wonderful! (The Red Wine, not the Proposition) But if you are not a member of the fabulous wine drinking family, the question lingers. Same goes for Prepositional Phrases. Sometimes the word THAT just sounds so damn good! What if I want to use it???

2. They are both my enemies! They creep up on me when I'm not expecting...throwing everything off. Especially balance. Confused? Prepositions have the tendency to throw off the balance of a wonderfully written sentence. Too many that's and had's and if's and of's! It's crazy THAT I think THAT after I just HAD a glass of wine THAT I just drank. Now tell me there is balance in the previous sentence! Red Wine...well let's not talk about how horrible my balances becomes after a few glasses.

3. There are times when I am not sure when to use either. It's 4:30 on a Thursday afternoon and the week has been long. Each day has been marked by either a sick child or a naughty son who has been sent home from school. The question is, do I wait until the clock strikes five? Or do I just uncork that seductive bottle of Shiraz and sip it down as though it were water and I had been stuck in the swealtering heat for days without even a drop of sweat to quench my thirst? It's a tough decision. Same goes for those tricky little propositions.

Example....
What did you step on? You can't say, "What did you step?" You need to say, "What did you step on?" to make a grammatical sentence.
Although to be true to gramatical form, should you really be saying, "On what did you step?'"

Seriously! This is going to take years to figure out! (The Prepositions, not the Red Wine...)

Do you have any advice? Any tips?

Showing vs. Telling

Now we are not talking about your Kindergarten version of Show and Tell here kids, BUT it is a great way to start explaining my struggle. Let us see if I have the concept straight. I'll let you be the judge! Throw on your imagination caps people. I'm about to make you think! (Oh stop moaning and groaning. Even grown ups need to use their imaginations once in awhile!)

Picture this! (Ok, now I have a Verve Pipe song in my head. At least it is a good one!)

Five year old Marybeth brings her favorite stuffed animal to school one day, Donkey. (Now there is nothing wrong with loving a jack ass kids. If you've met my husband you'd realize I'm quite fond of them! Just kidding husband, I love you!) Little Tommy is blind (UPDATE: His eyes were recently damaged by a large Magnext Roller Coaster piece. Thus he COULD see before the accident!) and can not see the pet Donkey visibly and feels a little left out. So sweet little Marybeth, with her curls bopping up and down in pig tails tied up by fuzzy blue ribbons, wants Tommy to see Donkey. Unfortunately all she has is her words.

She can do one of two things at this point. She can Show with her words or she can Tell. Up until VERY recently I was not aware that there was a difference. And here I sit, my soar back propped up on my wicker stool, wanting to verify that I understand the concept. This is the part where you swoop in with your knowledge and tell me. Have I succeeded, or do I need to do a bit more research?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Marybeth TELLS Tommy

"This is my favorite pet Donkey! He looks like a donkey decorated for Christmas."

Marybeth SHOWS Tommy

"This is Donkey! My Grammy gave him to me last Christmas as a gift. We do not get to see Grammy often, so I sleep with Donkey every night to remember her. He is grey with black hooves and a BIG nose. He also has large teeth and smiles at me. Sometimes I think he wants to talk to me. He even has a red fuzzy Santa Clause hat on top of his little floppy ears."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So how did I do? Was it enough? Was it too much?

Don't be shy now. I want to hear it all. After all, I am preparing myself for all the rejection that comes with sending out query letters!! So give it to me straight.