X comes before J which after N but before B

Do I have you completely confused? Because I am.

While I wait for the response to my first query, I have this other story that just won't shut up. No, I'm not going to make it--it makes writing so much easier when your mind continuously conjures the story and you can see it playing in your head like a movie. My problem is that it's giving me different clips at a time.

The first scene I wrote, I was certain was going to be the first chapter. I introduce the protagonist and her love interest. Then another scene continued to pop in my mind. I tried and tried and tried to write that first scene, but this one pushed it out of the way before I could get three pages written. So I gave in. And wrote a whole two pages before ANOTHER "beginning" scene played out in my mind. Writing out of sequence conflicts with the OCD writer in me...but this new story won't let me do it any other way. I know what happens. I know who the bad guys are. I know the trials their relationship will face. I know how it will end and what I want to happen in the sequel. I just don't know what order this blooming thing's going to get written in and if I'm going to know how to arrange it.

I've placed two calls to specialists so I can understand the disability the love interest has and write about it accurately and am waiting to be able to meet up with them. For now, those scenes are like pencil sketches, waiting for the paint from the supplier so it can be colored in.

In the meantime, I have the second book on the one I have out for submission writing itself in my head, too. This one's going chronologically...except for the beginning. There's the general premise, a bright shining light and what comes next is a path of sheer black with the next scene another bright shining light. I'm missing the lightbulbs I need to illuminate that dark part...but I'll find it.

What's your technique for writing? Do you force your story to conform chronologically? Or do you write what your imagination gives you and put it in order later?

Just in time...

Query Hiatus (9/1 to....TBD) | Confessions From Suite 500

This is the absolutely brilliant agent I queried--I have, to be quite honest, coveted her since I met her at the Emerald Coast Writer's Conference last April.

I've, naturally, been counting down the days since I submitted my query and first three chapters (today is 19 days). So, while this really sucks for anyone who can't query until after September 1, she'll be ready to catch up to my query and pages and send me an e-mail saying "I LOVE your pages, send me the whole thing!" (That's how it works in my mine, at least).

So, I sit, as patiently as I'm capable, and wait for her to fall in love with me...

P.S. She told me I could inquire on my status after 60 days--that'll be September 16...told ya I was countin'!

Let's take this seriously...

"It's writing, d-mn it, not washing the car or putting on eyeliner. If you can take it seriously, we can do business. If you can't or won't, it's time for you to close the book and do something else. Wash the car, maybe."--Stephen King On Writing

My thanks to Lisa W. for lending me Stephen King's memoir On Writing. If anyone needed a kick in the pants, it was me. I have over 70k words and I let myself stall out. Yes, life sucks. Yes, life's busy. Yes, I'd really rather be reading the next book in one of the dozens of series I'm reading...but I'm also writing a book. So maybe I need to remember why.

Why am I writing this book? What on earth could I possibly have to say that other people in this world would be interested in reading? Well, actually, that's half the fun. I, for one, enjoy re-reading what I've written. There are times when I go back to edit and think "OMG, that's brilliant." I'm completely surprised and impressed by the paths my imagination takes me.

And there are plenty of other times that this quote from Stephen King's On Writing fits perfectly: "Sometimes you have to go on when you don't feel like it, and sometimes you're doing good work when it feels like all you're managing is to shovel sh-t from a sitting position." I sat with my laptop on my lap for four hours and was only able to bang out a whopping page-and-a-half. My head ached, my eyes hurt and I felt as though I had battled for every last word. It was literally one word forward three words back--I'd write something and decide the whole lot of it was crap and delete it all. Once I finally forced it out, I went to bed mentally exhausted. When I re-read it the next day I was pleased with what I had accomplished and was almost more happy with that little bit I had to fight for than the eight pages that flowed out in a matter of two hours that next day.

So what is the purpose of this blog? To reinforce to myself that this is very serious to me. I want my book published, not sitting in a word document on my desktop of my laptop. And maybe have a few other people read it and enjoy it as much as I have.

The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round...

I found myself unable to sleep late last night, or early this morning, depending on how you look at it. My imagination siphoned itself onto my Word document until finally my mind was quiet. But there was peace because my mind wasn't empty (haha, yes, go ahead and insert your joke here). Instead, with the scenes that have been going round and round and round inside my head finally out and "on paper", its as though there's now this massive, blank canvas ready and waiting for more good stuff. Sleep made itself surprisingly more elusive as new plot points began to weave their way through my imagination.

Alas, though I near the end of my manuscript, I met with another writer-friend who just finished with my first three chapters. Holy macaroni do I still have work to do! But it's all good. December is the worst month for querying agents, so this gives me another month and a half (probably all the way through til February) to polish and get it as close to perfect for submission. Which then becomes extra exciting because I have an agent I met in April at the Emerald Coast Writer's Conference who wants the first three chapters when it's finished! (I stroke her business card every time I see it in my wallet!)

Not really off topic, but I just read "The Dead Tossed Waves" by Carrie Ryan (which I enjoyed). The first chapter shows the very exciting possibility of Gabry finally developing a romantic relationship with her long-time-crush, Catcher. Only to end up (sort of...there's a 3rd book still to come) with a completely different boy. Which gives me great hope that readers won't be turned off by my major plot twist 2/3 of the way through the book.

What do you do when your story won't let you sleep? Do you fight it and toss and turn (like I did for two nights)? Or do you throw off the covers, grab your pad and pen, laptop, whatever, and throw it up all over your canvas to finally expel it from your mind and find momentary peace?

Time Heals All Wounds...

...but most of the scars never fade.

It was quite an unfortunate coincidence that August was the month it came time to kill off someone very important in Kylie's (the main character in my story) life. Losing Bandit (the first boy we had to put down) became a very real life experience I had the misfortune of being able to use for my story. But it was so raw, so fresh, it took me over a week before I was able to even begin to think about writing it. Then we lost Ashton.

I hadn't been looking forward to killing this character to begin with- I even had some threats (*clears throat* Anna). The biggest loss I'd had in my life was my grandfather several years ago. I wasn't quite sure how I was suppose to write about this massive, life changing loss, but I knew I'd figure it out. Life offered me more assistance in that than I would ever wish on anybody.

Suddenly, I doubted my story. How could I do this to my fictional character? How could I do it to me-I had to write it and live it as I did. So I procrastinated and wrote a few pages then deleted them, knowing it wasn't enough and I wasn't doing it justice.

So today, two months after I lost my precious boys, we finally picked up their remains from the vet. What an awful word- remains. These two playful, active Italian Greyhounds who lived and breathed and cuddled and loved are reduced to ashes that fit into a wooden box smaller than what most people put their jewelry in. I will never hold them, smell them, play with them...they will never play with my children (when I have them) like I always envisioned they would.

Now, I'm stuck with this female character who has lost someone who was her future, someone she envisioned a whole life with. She's captured by the enemy, tortured, beaten, and is trying to stay strong and hold true to his memory. But how much a part of this new part of her life do I make him? How much is too much? Not enough?

I think about Bandit and Ashton daily. Miss them, not as much as I did a month ago, and my heart aches from their loss. At what point do I have Kylie's wounds begin to heal? That red tissue that shows blood is coming to the wound, beginning the healing process. The scab formation as the tissue knits itself together beneath. And eventually the scar.

Maiden Voyage

So here I am, having previously forsworn blogs and ever creating one, making my maiden voyage on the vast sea of the internet.

Kind of dipping my toes in the water, trying it out, I'm sure I'll be a spotty blogger for now. But for anyone who follows me (even those of you who do it out of kindness or strong arming!), be honest and open with your comments.


This might be my easiest blog ever- because I'm going to talk briefly about myself! I met my husband ten years ago when I proclaimed I didn't want a committed relationship, was tired of looking for love and never finding it, and God plopped him in my lap less than a month later! All five of my dogs (all Italian Greyhounds) are in my heart, but my three boys reside only there now. My two girls, the Queen and Princess (really Shadow and Sasha, but they know their places in our house!), command belly rubs and treats from my husband and me, their most faithful servants *bow*. 

I am currently a nurse and absolutely love it. The patients are the best, the skills I get to utilize fascinate me, and my coworkers...let's just say as I type this I'm being distracted by my iPhone and Words With Friends!

But the purpose of creating this blog is because of my writing. I wrote my first short story when I was eight years old. I've written hundreds of poems, half of them torn up and tossed as garbage, in true fickle poet form. And finished my first novel a year ago this month. Then I started working with a critique group (who are the best!) and realized how much work starts after you finished your sh-tty first draft! And now I'm almost finished with my second and could never have gotten this far without many people-most specifically Anna and Lisa. So, even if this comes to naught, which I don't expect it to, thank you both of you. And Anna, you'll be my first follower so you can tell me how wonderful my story is and how it would be nowhere without your guidance and critiques!

My girls are commanding attention-they feel I owe them for forcing a bath on them! So until later...

Heather Rebel