Adoption

I’m sure some of you have noticed that I’ve been a little bit less active than normal. There’s definitely a good reason for it.

Several months ago, my facility finally opened officially, and instead of sitting around, waiting for something to happen, we grew from two to seventeen in no time flat. During that time, it gave me a good chance to reevaluate my life’s goals, and the direction that I’m taking.

As my husband and I talked and pondered and prayed, we came to the decision that it’s time to expand our family. This decision wasn’t easy to make. Last year, we found out that chances of having kids is slim to almost none. We considered in-vitro, but even that doesn’t have the greatest projected outcome for us. Since I was young, I always said I would adopt, and now, we’re working on making that a reality.

We looked into both fostering and adoption. We would love to foster someday, but right now, we feel that adoption is the right path. So for the past 2-3 months, we’ve worked on all the preliminary papers: the home study, the reference forms, background checks, doctor’s physicals… and everything in between.

Earlier this month, we were finally approved to adopt. But that means that now we’re playing the waiting game. We’re waiting for someone to choose us to love their child. I can’t even imagine how difficult that decision would be.

We would love for you to spread the word for us. The more people who see our profile, the greater the chance we have of finding the right match, and the child who will make our family complete.

Here’s a link to our profile on adoption.com 

Thank you!

Halfway Through the Year!

Wow. At some point, June snuck in. I’m still signing everything with the date of May.

Halfway through, and time to double check how I’m doing with my goals.

1. Focus on publishing.

In January, I set up a query party, and it was amazing! There were six people from around the world that participated, and we roated queries every week so that we could have someone new critique it. I definitely learned a lot from all of them.

I actually just went through my query again this week, and after one or two more revisions, it’ll be ready to send out. (Though, that’s what I’ve been saying since January, so…)

2. Participate and win both Camp NaNoWriMos and the regular NaNoWriMo

April’s Camp NaNoWriMo was a little interesting. I made a completely different goal for myself to try and get pumped for November, and in a way it worked, in a way it didn’t. I did win, but halfway through the month, I decided to scrap that goal because it had started to frustrate me too much. I went back to revisions, and finished the month strong. I just signed on to the ML for this year’s NaNoWriMo, so I’ll be there cheering everyone on!

3. Read 52 books in the year of 2015

I’m on book number 13. Basically, I’m only about halfway to where I need to be. It’s been awesome though, to know that I need to be reading. Another amazing phenomenon is that I’m throwing books into my to-read shelf without paying as much attention as I might, and often, I’m very surprised by what I’m reading. Less research is actually making the process more interesting.

On the writing side, I’m halfway through my second revision of King’s Councilor. February and March, I took it and tore it apart, throwing in a new beginning, middle and end. Right now, I’m trying to make it a little cohesive before sending it to the betas to be torn apart again.

On a more personal note, my husband and I have been working toward a goal together, and today we made a major breakthrough! I still can’t talk about it yet, but I’m so excited I’ve got butterflies! I hope to tell you about it soon.

Book Review: Rosehead by Ksenia Anske

I don’t normally do this. I love reading books, but I’ve never actually written a true review. But this book blew my mind.

I met Ksenia online through Google +. When she first published Rosehead, I put it on my to-read list. I knew that she was a very dedicated and enthusiastic writer, and I was excited for her and her achievement. But as it always happens, things started to get busy. It took me way too long to get to it, but last week, I finally did.

Since I’ve put so many books on my to-read shelf, I usually forget what they’re about. When I started Rosehead, I had no idea what to expect. And of everything I thought this book could be, it wasn’t.

Let’s start with the main characters. Ksenia created a thirteen year old girl with a large vocabulary. She’s struggling to fit in, and in more ways than most kids. I won’t spoil the story, but let’s say, I had a hard time deciding whether or not her world was upside down, or if she was just a kid imagining it all. Part of it had to do with her talking dog, and the crazy rose garden.

I think what really amazed me about this book was that I never knew what to expect. Whatever I thought would be the logical next step, Ksenia threw it onto its head and did the opposite. Or not even the opposite. It’s like choosing between right and left and deciding on up. That’s how the story went.

And it was a fantastic ride. I’ve told everyone I’ve seen in the past three days about the book. My neighbors are sick of me talking about it.

It’s well worth the read.

Insignificant Scenes

My neighbors have recently introduced me to the Marvel Universe. We’ve been working through all of the movies one by one, and I’ve loved it. One of things that has really amazed me is the story telling. Joss really doesn’t have a single insignificant scene.

It may not seem that way, there are random scenes that seem to pull out of the story, or reduce the tension, but every single scene is absolutely important to the scene.

We were watching Thor: The Dark World the other night, and there’s a scene where they spend several minutes dropping bottles, shoes and cans down a vortex that takes them to a completely different world. At the end of the scene, the intern drops their car keys down. It’s a hilarious scene, and the first time I watched it, that’s all I thought it was. A way to diffuse the tension, build comedy. But the second time I watched it, I realized there was a very important purpose to this insignificant scene.

Near the end of the movie, two of the characters are stranded. They have no way out, and then they find a vortex. One of the characters automatically knows that this vortex leads into her world. How? She sees cans and bottles… then shoes… and finally her keys. It’s a way to clue the audience into the significance of this one particular vortex, and where it leads. Otherwise, the audience might cry foul when they magically appear exactly where they want to go.

This is just one of the many, many examples found in the new Marvel movies. Every single scene, no matter how insignificant has a very vital part of the story.

When writing, I like to use Scrivener so that I can separate my scenes and figure out where I am. After watching the Marvel Movies, I’ve decided to go back through each scene and write the purpose. How does it move the story forward, and is it vital to the story?

How do you make sure that your stories don’t have non-vital fluff?

Why I Love My Betas

Over the weekend, I read a book that I’d had on my to-read shelf for far too long. The writing was brilliant, the characters well rounded. The world drew me in and I couldn’t stop reading. When I finished, I couldn’t stop thinking about the story, and how good it was.

But as I continued to think about it, I realized that the author had forgotten to clear up one giant plot hole. The more I pondered on it, the more I realized that something like that could make or break a career. And that’s why I rely on my betas to catch things that I may miss.

I started writing at a young age. I finished my first novel in high school, and I edited that thing to death. Or, at least, that’s what I thought I did.

Despite all of my efforts, I felt like maybe there was something missing, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I took a huge leap of faith and exchanged crits with a complete stranger, and she changed my life in ways I never expected.

She tore it apart. She pointed out all of the flaws, all of the plot holes, the pointless scenes, the repetitive dialogue. Because of her, I was able to look at my writing from a completely different perspective, from different eyes, and in many ways, she was right.

As writers, we know our story forwards and backwards. We know where the characters are, what they’re doing, but sometimes, it doesn’t always translate to the page the way we want it to. When I finished the last draft of King’s Councilor, I sent it to my sister. Her response was mainly positive, but then she asked a question.

“What happened to (insert glaring plothole here)?”

It’s important to have other people look at your writing. They’re going to bring their own points of view and they’re going to see things that you don’t.

And that’s why I love my betas. They make me a better writer.

What’s In a Name?

I’ve been having a bit of a dilemma recently. At work, there’s a guy who’s been calling me Tiffany since we first met. Now, I would have corrected him, but at first, he would mumble “Hi Tiffany” while passing me in the hall, and usually, by the time I realize what he’s said, he’s already turned the corner. This went on for several weeks, and it’s not like I can correct him before he even greets me.

So basically, it’s been two or three months since he started calling me Tiffany, and by now, I just feel weird saying anything. Plus, I know he’s talking to me, so does it matter?

I’ve been thinking about it a lot recently, whether a name fits a person or not.

And as a writer, it’s even more important than in real life. Because when you have three characters named Andy, Andrea and Andre, it might get a little confusing. In fact, I had a beta tell me that all of my characters have two syllable names. Something I’ve never actually realized.

When I first started writing The Orphans of Jadox, I had three separate characters. I spent time and energy naming them, and I liked all of their names. When I started writing, when I finally got to a scene with all of them in it, I realized that their names are just too similar: Aydra, Emera, Emdra. It was the third one that really tied them together. So once I changed that, Aydra, Emera and Shara, it didn’t feel like I had Huey, Dewey, and Louie on the page.

Then when I was working on The King’s Councilor, I realized that all of my character’s names started with a C or a K: Cassie, Karvid, Kelso.

Now, when I’m planning a story, I write all my characters down next to each other so that I can double check what they look like together.

What kind of name traps do you find when you write?

Wait, what story is that?

Last night, I went to another group meeting for Camp NaNoWriMo. We meet above the local grocery store, and after we finished, I decided to get my sister and her roommates a dozen doughnuts. They just started a new semester this week, and I remember how that feels!

My sister and I started talking about my NaNoWriMo goals, and I told her about one of the stories that had evolved from my character bios.

As normal, I got very excited as I started talking about my story, and my writing, and my sister, having lived with me long enough, knew exactly what I was talking about. Her roommates on the other hand… they were thoroughly confused.

I guess it makes sense, once you start talking about characters in arranged marriages, sick queens and quests, it’s not exactly the normal, everyday conversation. Halfway through, one of her roommates asked, “Wait, what movie is this?”

That’s when I had to explain that it was just a story in my head. Probably my project for this November.

Once I finished explaining, all three of them got excited and told me that it was a story they would be happy to read.

That kind of enthusiasm and encouragement is often what a writer needs, especially when they’ve had a bit of a dry spell. I think changing projects also helped. I have enough character bios to form two or three stories. Now, it’s time to move onto another project. After deciding to switch last night, I was able to rewrite the first chapter of The Stone Mason.

So, as much fun as my first Camp NaNoWriMo project was, it’s time to work on bigger and better.

Wish me luck!