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Not just a sword a character of mine used anymore…
I’m going to take a quick break from writing to talk to you about those nights. You know the ones. You have a cold so you haven’t been sleeping well for a few days. When you get home from a long day of shopping and driving after a longer day at work and after relaxing for about an hour you curl up in bed beside your significant other? You both promise yourselves that this is only going to be a quick little nap or that one of you will stay awake? Then you don’t and you wake up at 10 pm 11pm and you can’t get back to sleep?
Yeah, that’s my life today.
My husband is still sleeping in our comfortable bed where I will be heading after I finish writing this blog post. I have to work this morning, waking up to go to work in about 3 hours. I’m hoping that after I get another hour or so (and perhaps an energy drink for work) that I’ll be fine for most of the day and #FNTWP on twitter tomorrow tonight.
Not that this is a wholly odd evening. I’m just usually the one sleeping while my husband sits up with insomnia half-asleep playing video games. I tend to get annoyed at him when he’s like I am tonight. I know that it’s very hypocritical of me, to tell him to wake me up when I won’t wake him up in the same situation.
That, honestly, is one of the things that make me love him all the more. Not many men would be willing to deal with all of my idiosyncrasies including the times when I’m hypocritical… not when the rest of those little odd things include me writing/talking about writing nearly 24/7.
Anyways, I think its time for me to head back into my warm bed so that I see if I can find some minor amount of sleep before I have to wake up and work at my tiring, annoying day job. Also, here’s hoping that you all got the sleep you need.
Posted in Blogs on February 17th, 2012 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
I apologize in advance; today’s post is a bit rambling because I didn’t really have a starting or ending place in mind when I started.
I am on Twitter daily, checking it out whenever I have time or I’m bored or when I really need something to distract me. I comment a few times a day which is why in just over a year I’ve tweeted over 6500 times (which is just over my total period). A very large chunk of those get posted on Fridays. Why on Fridays you may ask? Am I really one of those women that prefers my cats and fleece sweaters and glasses to drunkenly falling into peoples beds?
Well, the short answer is yes. I am just that dull a person. I admit that I did my clubbing about 5 years ago over one summer when I was 25. I didn’t like drinking, I’m not the sort of woman to take home men I just met and I generally prefer atmospheres where I hear what people are saying to me. Following the other train of thought, I think a night writing with friends is a great way to spend a night and willingly spend hours each month planning roleplaying games and hoping to eventually play in one. Years ago, my coworkers thought I was insane, playing roleplaying games which were thought of as Satanic.
Nowadays, times have changed. Roleplaying games aren’t considered a bad influence anymore. I’m now a respectable 30+ year old woman which means I only horrify my coworkers about once a week (usually with my beliefs on subjects better left unspoken). I have found many friends that actually have similar interests and my coworkers tend to be willing to believe that I am just the most boring person alive.
Let’s face it though, the life of a writer sounds pretty boring to anybody not also a writer. I stay home almost every night and work on my laptop churning out words and distracting myself from churning out words. Every two weeks I go see my fellow Bitches in my critique group (My critique group is called A Bitch of Writers, not to be confused with the great Wordbitches, whom I suggest you check out as they also have an awesome blog). On the off weeks, I run a penny poker game. On Sundays I destroy my self-confidence by finding out how little I know about story during Lani Diane Rich’s revision class.
So, yeah, all in all, I am that dull a person. Still, I am getting to be known (almost, kinda, slightly) on the Twitter front, mainly for my part in running the hash tag #FNTWP every week.
However, it finally occurred to me last week that #FNTWP is finally getting big enough that I better do it justice by explaining it here on my blog. Epic Robot Danni and I run FNTWP every Friday from 7 pm to Midnight (Mountain Time) though any who are there earlier or later are more than welcome to join in. Basically it’s a writer’s hang out. Writers stop by, chat and talk, discussing their plots, their trials, their tribulations, their celebrations and their triumphs.
Any of you who are looking for a place to meet writers I would suggest that you come by and join us.
Posted in Blogs on February 8th, 2012 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
Okay, today’s post was going to be a post on my editing/revision class and what I’m learning from it. Well, I’m learning a lot and that’s sorta the problem and why I won’t be talking about it today. I have to live the creeds I preach and today I didn’t. That regression, such a small thing, bothered me as soon as I’d realized I had done it. Not only that but it destroyed my entire good mood, which is actually a pretty hard thing to do.
My husband helped get me out of the funk by calling attention to it though in a way I really didn’t appreciate at the time.
What did I do, you ask?
I defended my work.
It was unintentional but it affected me just as badly as if I had done it knowingly. I know I can’t be there to defend my work but the person in question hadn’t read my work. I attempted to explain what I had obviously missed originally but what I ended up doing was defending my work. I had answers but I hadn’t shown this in the description.
Afterward, all I was able to take from it was that my story design was “pretzel-ly”. My story is a bit convoluted but I had made it partially that way deliberately. For some reason, being told so really got to me.
So, what am I going to do about this blow to my ego? Well, tomorrow or Tuesday, I will look over this again and with a slightly more rational eye. I will see all the good advice that she gave me and note what I think needs to be noted. The other suggestions I will look over and see if I can make them work.
Sometimes, it’s really hard to watch someone misunderstand what you were trying to say about your novel. And sometimes you have to remember that they may have not have misunderstood what you said.
And that’s all right, too
Posted in Blogs on January 29th, 2012 by B.A. Matthews | | 4 Comments »
Time for a much delayed blog post from me. I’ve been keeping myself so busy (either sick or editing) that I keep forgetting to post. However, I was reminded forcibly by a friend who recently wrote on her blog post about blogging is part of the “building a platform” job of being an author in today’s digital age. Plus, I actually have stuff to talk about.
Years ago, I heard about Lani Diane Rich, who also goes by the pen name of Lucy March. I first heard about her because she has published Nanowrimo novels and because nearly every year, she offers a spot in her revision class to one lucky Nano-er. Now, of course, I know a lot more about her, mostly because she and her husband, Alastair, have one of the best writing podcasts out there, Storywonk (Seriously, it’s on daily, monday – Friday. If you’re looking for a writing podcast, listen to theirs). I have been hoping for years to take her revision course though and this year, I am pleased to be able to say that I was able to enroll.
Lani is a great teacher and I will probably end up doing a full post on Sunday about what I have learned so far in this class, since that will place me squarely at the midpoint. As a quick explanation, I can say that I have learned more in the first two classes than I have been taught about structure and editing during my twelve years of Canadian schooling. Due to her class, I was able to go back over my manuscript and discover what my seven key scenes are. I also learned that at least one of my key scenes needed to be rewritten, since it wasn’t doing what it needed to. I’m also going to be spending a bit of time this week trying to reorganize about 25% of my manuscript. I have learned that Act II of my manuscript was about 15% longer than it needed to be. This means I either need to re-identify my key scene there or that I’ll need to play around with that particular scene and see if it can’t come earlier than it currently is. Once again, if you’re interested, come back on Sunday for the full write up on how I’m applying her class to my book. If you’re looking for a class yourself, keep an eye on her main site and sign up whenever she next offers it. Unless you’ve studied Structure and Editing individually, I can pretty much guarantee that you’ll learn something from this class, even if you don’t always agree with Lani’s personal opinion about how to fix up your novel.
One of the other things I’ve been looking at lately is rebooting my Dual Melodies. I put up a message saying that until I figured out where it was going that it was on a hiatus. It technically still is, but I’ve been looking at structure and how I’ll be applying it to this story. It will end up being just a novella and I’ll still be offering it here when I finish writing more of it. Then I’ll take it for a few runs of edits and perhaps sell it as an e-book if it is good enough. Like I said, it’s technically still on hiatus but I wanted to let you know that I haven’t forgotten about it. The main problem I ran into was that when I started fleshing out the novel and I wasn’t focusing on characters, the story changed signifigantly enough that I felt I couldn’t keep putting it up in its current form. Hindsight though is 20/20 and I’ve now realized that the story it became, isn’t the story it was and that those characters still wanted their story told. Now that I know I’m working on two different stories, I can promise that planning and writing on it will be starting up again.
And that is where my update stops. I’ll try to have a nice post about the class up for all of you on Sunday. Till then, keep writing and let me know how you’ve been, what you’ve been working on and if you have any tips on how to survive the editing/revision phase.
Posted in Blogs on January 25th, 2012 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
It’s 2012 and I must admit, I enjoy starting every year with making resolutions. I have a confession to make though. I don’t usually end up keeping them. No matter how well I have planned those resolutions or how easy those resolutions are or even how much I want to accomplish those resolutions, I seem to not do it if I phrase it in a resolution way.
So this year, I’m not going to make resolutions. This year I am simply going to have fluid goals and plans and keep myself on track with those.
My first goal is to compete in the Year of the Epic Query, otherwise (or more commonly) known as the Epic Year of Querying. Basically, my friends are I are challenging each other to finally get our work out there. My friend Danni is going to be score keeper and if you check out her blog you’ll see on the side of the page The Epic Year of Querying and all of our names with a number below them. Currently that number is 0 for all (I believe) but as we begin sending out our work, it will rise. I’m not sure if we’re going for the first to 100 queries or the first to 100 rejections, but either way, it’s going to get very heated towards the end of the year.
Personally, my first thing to query is going to be my Falling through the Threshold, a novel I have written about a woman who discovers she isn’t human when she is kidnapped by vampires. It is fully written and I am in the process of editing it right now. I just got back critique information on part one of Chapter six and I’m hoping to hand in the second half of this chapter as well as all of Chapter six next week.
My critique group, A Bitch of Writers, is going quite well. The group has gotten large enough that we separated them into two groups. We now have six members and while we didn’t have to separate the group, we all find it quicker to only have to keep track of two critiques instead of five. Four to a group is our maximum number for now. We found that four kept us very busy but any more tended to take too much time to do.
What about you? Do you make resolutions every year? What are they if you do?
Posted in Blogs on January 3rd, 2012 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
Okay, so I missed my post on my birthday. Sorry about that. It was an awesome birthday though! I hung out with my friends and watched the first two Underworld movies, in preparation for the next movie coming out in January. I also got the best gift ever from my husband. I am now the proud owner of the 2012 Writer’s Market, Deluxe Edition. It looks like it’s going to be insanely useful this upcoming year.
Otherwise, I’ve been cleaning, reading, exchanging gifts with my family and even getting some editing done. Basically, it’s been a darned good holiday season and I intend to keep it that way for all of you as well, by keeping this short and sweet.
Yule Blessings, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah or whatever blessings are most important to you, from my family to yours. Enjoy the holidays and I should be back with another post on Wednesday.
Until then, keep writing, keep learning and always make time to play with your favourite toys. (My new favourite toy that isn’t a book or DVD? This toy below, which I have ordered from ThinkGeek.Yep, I’m strictly a Windows/Blackberry/Android girl. Basically, Anti-Mac.)
Posted in Blogs on December 25th, 2011 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
Happy Holidays! This is my favourite time of year. Not only is my birthday in 4 days’ time but Solstice is also in 4 days’ time. This year will be particularly fun. I’m going to have dinner with friends and then we’re going to watch the first and second movies of Underworld, in preparation of seeing the third in January when it comes out.
I’ve also been cleaning my house (a little), preparing for Solstice, buying gifts for both Solstice and X-mas (I buy the gifts for what people celebrate, whether I follow the religion or not) and reading quite a bit more than I’ve been able to lately.
I have even managed to get in some writing work, though not too much since work was killing my hand this week. I did manage to finish my critiques for tomorrow… the last critique of the year.
Speaking of the last of anything of the year, I must admit that I always approach this time of year with just a hint of sadness. It is a case of out with the old and in with the new, but I feel like I’ve wasted chances and opportunities this year. The main one that is eating me up inside is the query letter.
I must admit that writing a synopsis and query have really been taxing my skills. It takes a completely different type of skill to write either of those and make them sound good.
That’s all I have to say for today though. What have you been working on since Nanowrimo ended? Also, what do you celebrate this time of year? Just as importantly, tell me how you celebrate.
Posted in Blogs on December 18th, 2011 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
…to get moving again in December.
Or at least, it seems that way every year to me. In prior years, I have ignored my writing, well into January in most cases. This year, I haven’t gotten a change to do much writing since Nanowrimo and, of course, this is the unofficial busy season at work (until late January when it dies). As much as I would like to discount my job as an issue, I can’t quite yet. I have gotten some editing done but little to nothing done on my query submission yet. I do have a short ½ chapter ready for submission and I’m going to see if I can do more editing tomorrow without compromising my hand further.
If I may be blunt, I am starting to worry about my hand more. I’m starting to think that it may be something a bit more serious than I’ve been considering it. I’ll be arranging a trip to the doctors to see if a specialist may be needed. It looks as though I may now have scar tissue up to my elbow if the areas of pain when my husband massages my arm are any indication. At any rate, I’m going to try to not get too worried until we see what the doctor says. All in all though, this means that I’ll be getting a bit more reading done this season than I was originally hoping to. My to-read list will thank me if nothing else does.
What have you been doing this December? Writing, editing or are you not paying any attention to writing at all?
Posted in Blogs on December 11th, 2011 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
Today is going to be the third or forth day in a row that I haven’t written, mainly because my hands have been killing me. Work has been really busy since the end of Nanowrimo and finishing, as always, has left my hand hurting. However, this doesn’t mean that I haven’t been doing writing work. I’ve had a meeting with my fellow A Bitch of Writers members, met up with new members and have worked a bit, starting a new scene in my Dual Melodies story. Since my Dual Melodies story seems to have evolved from one story into two, I have decided to write the original story of Dual Melodies, still posting it here.
It’ll be a little bit slow for me to get up stuff since I will be working on a few other stories as well, but I promise I will be posting them.
I am really excited about starting my editing again though. Our first critique needs to be turned in on Monday night. I can’t wait!
How have you been since Nanowrimo? Have you finished any writing in the last few days?
Posted in Blogs on December 8th, 2011 by B.A. Matthews | | No Comments »
It only took 4 days for the Nano-Squishy brains to recede; at least, enough to me to write a blog post. While I must admit I’m thankful that it’s over, I also have to admit that I’m already missing it. It’s really nice to stay within the house and know that all I have to do is write. My hand doesn’t hurt as much when I’m spending all my time writing, as strange as that may sound. It’s the monotonous typing at work that is the worst for it.
Now of course, it’s December and I have to split my time between family, commitments, shopping, work, writing and editing. Fortunately, as much as that all sounds like work, a lot of it is stuff I enjoy doing. Which is really what December is all about for me. We’re starting our critique group up again on Monday evening, I still have a query to send in, and a book to edit along with everything else. Fortunately, I love the idea of doing that work.
Yesterday was our city’s TGIO party. And, I must admit that of all the TGIO’s I’ve attended this one has been my favourite. Not only because I had great people to sit with or even because I won a brilliant prize of a hat with kitsune ears and a scarf that had a chainsaw on it; No, it was awesome because we had a visitor from Toronto join us.
He had apparently missed his own TGIO party and decided to join ours. It’s awesome and we encourage such. We are always willing to have other Nano’ers join us. In particular, I was ecstatic because though I’ve never met our guest, I’ve been a bit fan of his for years.
Our guest was Errol, of Nano-video fame. You may remember, I had a video of his that I put up for the last day of Nanowrimo.
Here’s a picture of us together, along with my awesome new hat and scarf that was donated by Paper Street Cosplay. Kitsune ears are my favourite.
What are you doing this December? Still writing?
Posted in Blogs on December 4th, 2011 by B.A. Matthews | | 2 Comments »
