Sarah Ahiers Writes

Friday Fun!

2012-01-27T07:00:00.000-06:00

I'm back! Yvie here, the sassy frenchie with a heart of gold! And a mouth full of teeth. If you pet me, will you get the gold heart? Or the sharp teeth?

No one knows, and that's half the fun of moi!

teefers like daggers!

Can you believe the first month of 2012 is almost over? I can't. Mostly because I'm a dog and really have no sense of time.

Because time is a relative thing, ape-friends, and it doesn't actually exist. True Story.

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which We Host A Blogfest

2012-01-26T07:00:00.000-06:00

Yay! Surprise Thursday post!
Vic Caswell, Emily White and Moi are hosting a Blogfest!

What blogfest you ask? A super fun one!

The Teenage Heartthrob Blogfest!

Remember when you were teen (yes, it may have been a few or more years ago) and you saw that first person that made you think "hmmm, I think I like them in a way that's more than just thinking they're "cool""?

This blogfest is dedicated to those people.

We want a list of the 7 people that you crushed on as a teen. They could've been teens at the time, or adults, it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is that teenage you wished you could've been a bit closer to that person.

The deets:

Monday, March 5th we want to see your heartthrobbing list! Please sign up using Mr. Linky below.

I'm already planning my list. How about you? Who's going to be on your list?

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In Which I Write A Letter To Google Alerts

2012-01-25T07:00:00.000-06:00

Dear Google Alerts,

Remember when, over a year ago, I set up an alert for my name? So that way if someone mentioned me on their blog, I wouldn't miss it and would be able to thank them?
Remember how you worked for, like, 2 weeks the you stopped?

No?

Because I do. And though I felt scorned and irritated at you (and at me, for my inability to get such a simple technology to work correctly) I let it go. Because mostly I'm laid back and so I could just shrug my shoulders and move on with my life.

But you know what? Moving on with my life becomes difficult when, after a year of not getting a single damn alert even though I had proof my name had been mentioned on friend's blogs, you suddenly start working again.

Kind of.

Not really.

So I'm writing you this letter to let you know, dear Google Alerts, that I don't EFFING NEED YOU to alert me every time I post a new blog post.

This may be shocking to you, since you are only a digital program, and not even a good one at that, but you don't need to tell me when I update my blog. I was there when it happened. I KNOW.

Please go back to ignoring my alert. OR, if you're feeling magnanimous, start working for real. But right now, this isn't working for me.

Sincerely,

Sarah

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In Which I Promote A Blogfest

2012-01-23T07:00:00.000-06:00

In the month of February, there's an awesome blogfest hosted by:

1) Live to write...Edit when necessary.
2) Cassie Mae over at Reading, Writing, and Lovin' it.

Whats the dealio you ask? Characters! And a chance for AWESOME PRIZES! (I'm not even kidding about the prizes)

Here are the details:

Monday, February 6th--Characters on the couch:

Have one of your characters answer the following questions (to make this work to your benefit, choose a character who is the hardest for you to write :) Max 250 words (Not including the questions—only the answers).

What is your biggest vulnerability? Do others know this or is it a secret?
What do people believe about you that is false?
What would your best friend say is your fatal flaw? Why?
What would the same friend say is your one redeeming quality? Why?
What do you want most? What will you do to get it?

Wednesday, February 8th--Dialogue Introduction:

Have two characters introduce each other using only dialogue—no backstory, no internalization, just dialogue between the two. Max 250 words.

Friday, February 10th -- Emotion Flash Fiction:

Emotion is the engine of a story. Pick an emotion and in a flash fiction piece of 250 words MAKE us feel it! We want to connect with your character. This will be a challenge in 250 words.

Prizes include two books, two query critiques, and two FULL MANUSCRIPT critiques. Seriously.

So, I've signed up. What about you?

Friday Fun

2012-01-20T07:00:00.000-06:00

Yvie's back, ape-friends, becasue we all need some fun on our Fridays to launch us into the weekend. That and we just don't really care about doing our usual amount of work on Fridays, amiright?

It's been super cold here, finally. But it stinks when it's really really cold, but we have no snow. What is the point of winter without snow, I ask? Nothing, that's what.

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which I Read Books

2012-01-18T07:00:00.000-06:00

Well, I finished my goal of reading 55 books in 2011. For awhile there I thought for sure I wouldn’t make it, but I read like 10 books in November which helped a lot. Natch.

I actually finished out the year with 58 books read. Which is pretty awesome. And I thought I’d share my top picks from the year.

In no particular order, here are my top 5 books of the year (I could’ve easily spread this to 10, but I wanted to keep this list succinct)

Divergent

Have you read this book yet? No? Why not? Because it’s excellent. I’m pretty particular about the dystopian I like, but throw in a lot of action and badassery and I was hooked from page one. I was lucky enough to snag an arc of this and have passed it on to other members of the fam to read.

Soulless

Steampunk, Victorian paranormal? Yeah, sign me up. LOVE these books! It’s such a refreshing take on the same old Vampires and Werewolves paranormal we’re all used to. I mean, I love Sookie as much as the next person (though I’ve officially give up on Anita Blake) but these books made me fall in love with the idea all over again.

The Liar Society

I used to read mystery when I was in middle school. Then I moved onto horror, then SFF and the rest is history. If not for “knowing” L and L through the blogosphere, I don’t know that I would’ve picked this book up if I’d seen it in a bookstore. Just because it’s not my usual cup of tea. And that would’ve been a travesty. I LOVED this book. Could not put it down. Who knew YA mystery could entertain me so much? I cannot wait for the sequel(s)

A Companion to Wolves

Sometimes I read YA to the detriment of everything else. I forget that I love adult SFF. This book reminded me, hard, how much I love it. And I don’t know why. Lot’s of guy on guy action, giant wolves, Vikings, etc. Loved this book. I made Twin read it right away and she also loved it. Can’t wait to read the sequel (it’s in the mail, shipping from B and N as I write this)

Blood Red Road

I picked up this book at a Border’s closing sale. It was the last weekend and I though I’d pop in to see what they had for extra cheap. They had a whole stack of these books and though it sounded kinda meh, it was only a few dollars so I thought I’d give it a shot. Great decision. Completely different that the back cover made it seem and I loved it. Love the voice of the MC, loved the plot, loved everything about it. Will definitely be buying the sequel.

So, that’s the top 5. Many were close to making the list. What about you? Have you read any of these books? What did you think? What was your favorite book you read last year?
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Friday Fun

2012-01-13T07:00:00.000-06:00

Yvie's back, babies! Because it's Friday, natch, and I'm here to load you up with some good stuff. Good stuff.

Let's get this Friday STARTED!!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which I Make New Goals

2012-01-11T07:00:00.000-06:00

All right, time to get going with these 2012 goals! Time’s a wasting!

2012 Goals

Query Glimpse of Another Shore
Query Break Free
Finish another novel
Sell another short story
Attend a writer’s conference
Join a new crit group or find some more crit partners
Go on a date
Lose weight
Read 60 books

1. I stopped after two months last year to make some changes on the MS. But because I was in

the middle of writing Break Free, and then had NaNo, the revision got pushed back more than

expected. BUT I think it’ll be ready to give the agent waters another test starting in February.

Maybe a bit earlier.

Once I start querying Glimpse again, I’ll work on finishing this bad boy up. It needs line edits and beta readers, but I think it’s very strong. I’m hoping for a late spring/early summer query date, but we’ll see where we’re at with Glimpse. I don’t know if people query more than one novel at a time but I don’t know if I could handle the confusion and the double roller coaster.

I’ll probably tackle All That Remains, even though I still have rough feelings about it. I mean, I’m like 50K in. It shouldn’t take much just to push that baby through to the end. I also plan on writing my Shiny New Idea in 2012 as well, but whether I’ll do that for NaNo or not, I’m not sure. Time will tell

Again, like last year, I don’t have much control of this. The best I can do is submit some stories and see if I get any bites. I’ve got 3 in the wings that I plan to submit this year, hopefully. I’d also like to see if I can get into SFWA, though the horror markets that grant you membership are few and far between.

I’ve gone to Fourth Street Fantasy the last two years, but that’s not necessarily a writing conference. This year, I’m going to hit one with actual agents and junk. I’m aiming for Wiscon, so let me know if you’re planning to hit it up to. I WANT TO MEET UP WITH YOU if you do.

I’m part of my existing writing group with Hannah and Teebore, and I love it, but I’d also like to get to know other writers as well, especially locally, so I’m going to see what I can do. If I can’t get in one locally, through SCBWI, then I’ll probably be looking online for some more crit partners especially people who may be at the same stage as me (querying, etc) (hint hint, if you’re looking)

Yep. That’s just what it sounds like. Even if it’s just a single date, that’s fine by me.

Always a goal. We got new treadmills this year, which is awesome, but our poor elliptical died on us. We'll be tackling Couch to 5K in our hopes we can hit a Warrior Dash this year. Anyway, excercise is not really the problem, nor is eating healthy. It’s just portion control. Once more into the breach

Warrior Dash, here we come!

55 Books was touch and go, but I made it. So I have to raise the bar. Will I be able to hit 60 books read? I have no idea. Guess we’ll find out this time next year.

And that’s it! How about you? What are some of your goals for 2012?
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In Which I Met Goals

2012-01-09T07:00:00.000-06:00

Well here we are, 2012. Much easier to say than 2011. Man,the years go by fast, right?

You know what else happened with the passing of the year? My Blogoversary!That's right, I've been blogging for over 2 years. Yay! I blogged 148 times in2011, which is not too shabby, if I say so myself. I have no clue what I’vebeen talking about.

Also with the new year comes new resolutions!

I know some people are anti-resolutions. And I guess Iunderstand why. But for me, that’s not an issue. My resolutions areactually goals I aim for. I like lists and goals. Goals are cool. If I don’treach them, *shrug*, then I don’t reach them. It doesn’t upset me in the least.They’ll just be waiting for when I give it another shot.

Anyway, let's take a look at my resolutions from last year and see how I did:

2011 resolutions:

1. Query Glimpse of Another Shore (check. I only queried for 2 months before Ipaused, but it went much better than expected. No agent, yet, but that’s OK.I’ll keep working)

2. Finish another novel (check. Finished Break Free, which I utterly love. Like1000x more than Glimpse.)

3. Get Hole-Ridden published (Super check!!! Sold that baby to Dark Moon Digest#6 (now available here)

4. Lose Weight (uncheck. THOUGH, I didn’t gain any weight. Which is a plus)

5. Read 55 books (check! It was close, but I pulled it out at the end)

So, not too shabby. Not at all. Wednesday I’ll list my 2012goals, which are both the same and different. They’re at least more numerous.

Friday Fun

2012-01-06T07:00:00.000-06:00

All right ape-friends! Yvie's here so we can get this weekend started with some laughs! ZOOM!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which I'm Published

2012-01-04T07:00:00.000-06:00

Besides the awesomeness of Christmas and New Years over these last few weeks, something else exciting happened:

I'm officially published, yo.

My Horror short story Hole Ridden has been pubished. Dark Moon Digest #6 is available for purchase through Amazon or Barnes and Noble and will release as an ebook later in the year.

I'm not going to lie, I was pretty excited when it arrived in the mail. And my super cool parents bought 8 copies to pass out to members of the fam over Christmas.

Since it's also Insecure Writer's Support group today, I'd like to point out to anyone feeling the blues about their writing that I'd been sitting on this story for years. YEARS, before last year I made a goal to start submitting it. It only takes that one decisions, guys, to get you on the right path.

Sometimes you just have to take the plunge. What's the worst that can happen? What's the best?
And, seriously, you'll never experience the best if you don't take a chance and risk the worst.

So how's your writing going?
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No-Kiss Blogfest

2012-01-02T07:00:00.000-06:00

Yay! It's time for the 3rd annual No-Kiss blogfest!!

This is when you get to write a scene or post one from your favorite books, movies, or TV shows that show the almost kiss-- the rising, crushing, excruciating, longing, tension that comes when two characters get oh-so-close to kissing that you can just feel it, want it, NEED it....and then...they don't!

I've chosen a piece of a scene from my WIP novel Break Free (which I lurrrve, btw. Seriously in love with this novel, guys)

Setup:

Kiel (MC) has been tasked to lead Izzy (love interest) through a jungle of deadly wild magic. He wears a collar that's attuned to Izzy, so it forces him to intervene whenever she's in danger.
In this scene, they just escaped from a bounty hunter who was looking for Kiel.

As always, this is still a rough draft. I haven't even started line edits yet, so please overlook any rough spots.

Onto the fest!!

"This way,” I yelled, pulling her down another game path. We zigged and zagged until finally the pulse in the collar began to dissipate. Izzy took another left and I followed into a clearing with a large tree. The hot breeze shook the tree’s branches and moisture dripped off its leaves; a mini rain-storm brought on by the wind.

“We can hide beneath it,” Izzy said.

The ground surrounding the tree was scraped clear of any sort of vegetation, a circle of dirt. Moisture from the leaves sizzled in an oily sheen before it soaked into the earth. The drops had a strange golden glow to them, similar to the stone in Izzy’s chest. Something wasn’t right.

Izzy stepped to the edge of the dirt circle and the collar flared up again. It jerked me forward, faster than my own reaction time, until I was pulling Izzy away from the tree, yanking her so hard that we stumbled to the ground, landing away from the tree and its rain.

“What the hell, Kiel?” Izzy yelled, trying to pull herself out from under me.

I didn’t even notice, the pounding in my head from the collar was so loud. “It’s not safe,” I managed to get out. The pounding slowed, then stopped. Damn collar. I didn’t need it jerking me around. If it kept up, it would get us both killed. And then who would protect Izzy?

“That’s not water,” I said. “It’s something else. Acid, I think.”

She paused, then peered over my shoulder at the tree and the liquid which dripped off its branches. “How did you know?”

“The dirt surrounding it. Where are all the plants? A tree that big should have some stranglers or other undergrowth below it. There’s nothing but dirt.”

She watched the liquid drip onto the ground. “Huh. Well, that would’ve been bad, but do you think you could get off me now?”

Only then did I realize the collar had forced me to cover her in protection. Interesting. The collar controlling me pissed me off, but I had to say, I wasn’t too terribly upset at my current predicament.

I watched her for a moment, just enough time for her skin to start to flush. It was surprising how easy it was to get that color to spread across her cheeks and neck.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m pretty comfortable.”

“You’re also pretty heavy…”

I sighed and pushed myself off. I offered her a hand and pulled her up. She stumbled into me but I held her before she fell. I caught a whiff of her perfume, still exotic, still tantalizing. Did she taste as good?

She blushed again and dropped her gaze. “We should probably find Dayre…”

No. Screw Dayre. The heat her off her body rivaled the warmth of the jungle. I wanted to pull her closer, feel that heat pressed against my skin. I inhaled deeply, trying to imprint this moment on my memory. Then I breathed out. “Yeah. I guess so.”

She stepped away from me, her fingers still gripped in mine.

Bam!! There you have it! Now I'm off to read the other entries!
How about you, did you participate?
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Friday Fun

2011-12-30T07:00:00.000-06:00

Yvie's here! To write the final post of the year! (the rhyme was unintentional)

So I guess the best thing we can do is send 2011 off with a bang of funnies!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

some things only women can do

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

See you next year!

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In Which I Got Books

2011-12-28T07:00:00.000-06:00

How was your holiday? Was it fun? Did you spend time withyour fam? I hope it was rockin.

Mine was good, but too short, as always. It’s great gettingtime off from work, but it sucks when you then have to go back to work. Luckilythis week and next week is a short week for me because of New Year’s. Yay!

I got a lot of books for Christmas. Which is awesome. It wasespecially timely because I had pretty much read everything on my TBR pile andwas forced to scrounge around a bit to find something to read before Christmas.

Now, though, the TBR pile has been refreshed with 8 newbooks. And I LOVE it when you have brand new books and you want to read themall RIGHT NOW. Then you have to make a tough decision. Which great book shouldyou read first?

But, that’s the type of problem I like to have.

Also, besides the gifts from the fam, I was also gifted witha brand new shiny idea. And I already LUUUURVE it. Seriously. Cannot wait towrite it. But it’s get to sit and ferment for awhile while I’m working on editsfor both Glimpse AND Break Free. I also haven’t given up on All That Remainseither.

So, yay for good gifts from the fam and the muse!

What about you? Did you get any books you’re excited toread?

In Which I Announce Winners

2011-12-23T07:00:00.000-06:00

Not much to say today, since it's the Friday before Christmas and the blogosphere has really been dead this week.

So I'll make this quick:

The winners of copies of Catherine Stine's Fireseed One are:

Lindsay!

TL Conway!

Congrats! I'll send your information over to Catherine and she will be sending out the books.

Have a happy Holiday all!

Harriet Birthday Suit says remember to dress warm!

In Which I Guest Blog

2011-12-22T07:00:00.000-06:00

Hey all!

Today I'm over at Maria Zannini's blog, guest posting on crafts.

Please stop on by!

In Which We Launch Fireseed One!!

2011-12-20T07:00:00.000-06:00

You know, there are things you may not know about me. Wait, scratch that. Probably you at least suspect this about me if you've been reading this blog for any length of time, or are friends with me on FB.

I like food.

I like food like a lot.

Not only do I eat a lot of nummy food a lot of the time, but I also spend a good portion of my time cooking and baking and creating nummy food. If you've checked me out on pinterest, you would see that 5 of my 15 pinterest boards revolve around foodstuffs. That's almost as many as my writing boards.

So what would I do if there were, say, limited foodstuffs, due to climate change?

Well first, I'd freak out. But then, when I heard that maybe...maybe there were some cults, running around the hotzones of what used to be America... well. That would sound just fine. Just fine.

You'd better believe I'd join a food cult. Hell, I'd probably lead that mother effing food cult. TRY AND STOP ME.

BUT. But. If you like food as much as me, well. There's plenty of room in my food cult. As long as you bring me something good to eat.

Today we launch the book Fireseed One by Catherine Stine! It's a YA futuristic thriller, complete with illustrations. Actual pictures, guys.

Check out her blog here and you may find other bloggers celebrating with additional giveaways!

Buy Fireseed One on iBook for your iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch here

Buy Fireseed One for Kindle here

For Nook users Catherine is offering a special launch party discount! The Fireseed eBook is officially $2.99, but during this party, you can buy it for only $1.50, directly from Catherine! Email her at kitsy84557@gmail.com and she'll send you a link to Paypal, and then the eBook.

Here's a synopsis of the book:

What if the only person who could help you save the world was your very worst enemy?

The year is 2089. Temperate climate has replaced Arctic ice, and much of what is now the United States is a lethal Hotzone, cut off by an insurmountable border from its northern, luckier neighbors, Ocean and Land Dominion. It is rumored that roving Hotzone nomads will kill for a water pellet or a slice of insect loaf, and that the ZWC, a dangerous Hotzone activist group, has infiltrated the border to the northern Dominions.

Up in Ocean Dominion, all eighteen year-old Varik Teitur wants to do is party on Snowangel Island with his friend Audun and flirt with college girls he dreams of joining next year in his quest to become a doctor. Instead, he inherits a vast sea farm, following the death of his father, famous marine biologist Professor Teitur. Five weeks later, ZWC member Marisa Baron breaks into the farm’s secret seed vault and a fellow activist poisons the farm’s agar crops, the world’s food source. In order to save the last agar seedlings Varik is forced to journey to the Hotzone in search of Fireseed, a plant his father supposedly developed with magical hybridization properties.
Varik takes Marisa along. Aside from being a terrorist, she’s the beautiful, estranged daughter of Melvyn Baron, the biggest real estate mogul in Land Dominion, and the professor’s old rival. Oddly, she knows lots about Fireseed, and what Hotzone land Professor Teitur bought to test the crop, before becoming embittered and trashing the project. No one except Varik knows whether Fireseed ever existed off the drawing board. Might the refugees in Vegas-by-the-Sea have answers, or the bizarre Fireseed cult in the Chihuahua desert? Varik, the reluctant hero, must risk burning in the Hotzone, as his mother did, to save the ailing agar, and the world.

Sounds awesome, right?

You want a copy right? Yeah you do.

SO!!! Let's give away some free copies!!

That's right! You can win One of Two copies of Fireseed One today on my blog!

How do you enter? Easy! Fill out the form below!

Rules:
You must be a follower of my blog.

That's pretty much it. BUT!!! You will get extra entries if you help promote Fireseed One's launch today.

Blog. Tweet. FB. Whatever you choose. If you do one (or all) of those things, you will increase your chances to win a book.

Deadline is end of day Thursday (Dec 22nd) so spread the word and fill out this form! I will announce the winners on Friday Dec 23rd and Catherine will send your book out asap.

Sounds great, right?

Hells yeah it does. It sounds just fine.

CLICK HERE FOR THE ENTRY FORM!

Deja Vu Blogfest

2011-12-16T07:00:00.000-06:00

Today is the Deja Vu Blogfest! Where we dig up a favorite or important post that we feel needs a second look.

I've chosen what I felt was one of my funnier posts. It was written, I think, in the first two weeks of my blog being born, so it got some hits, but not that many.

So I blew the dust off for one more run.

Re-Introducing:

That's a Bitch Move, Jo March

I was eating lunch the other day and had nothing to watch on my DVR (in case you didn't know, my job lets me work at home, which is just as awesome as you think it is and also full of more sweatpants than you'd guess). Typically I have a swath of TV shows that I tape purely for watching during my lunch break, but Castle is on hiatus as with everything else. Therefore I had to channel surf and I found Little Women. It was half an hour in but I hadn't seen it in a long time so I started watching.

Barring the fact that I forgot Christian Bale was in it

I love you even with your dickery

I love you D'Artagnan. I mean Gabriel

Along with Gabriel Burns, Susan Sarandon AND Claire Danes, I'd also forgotten how awesome it is. I taped it after my lunch break so I could finish watching it in the evening (which is why I only got 300 words written that night on my WIP. Yes, it was definitely Little Women and not Zombie shooting. Not. At. All)

On a side note Brother apparently says he's never seen Little Women before, evidenced by the fact when he came in he said "What is this crap? It looks stupid." Even though BETH HAD JUST DIED and IT WAS NOT STUPID!

On a side note off the first side note, whenever I think of Little Women I'm reminded of the Friends episode where Monica finds Stephen King's IT in her refrigerator. She discovers that Joey put it in the fridge because it had frightened him, which is apparently his usual solution for books that upset him. So Monica suggests that he reads Little Women instead. He goes through almost the whole book thinking Jo is a man and Laurie is a girl. At the end of the episode Joey is all upset that Beth died and Monica's solution is for him to put Little Women in the fridge.

Back to the first side note - I do think Brother has seen Little Women, he just probably doesn't remember.

Back to the main point of the post. I was thinking about how Jo was writing, more or less, genre fiction and Friedrich is all "oh it's good but I know you can do better" and blah blah blah and I'm all like "Maybe Jo wants to write about zombies and steampunk and maybe you should just shut your mouth Friedrich" but not really because it's Gabriel Byrne and I lurve him.

So then Beth dies and it's sad (AND NOT STUPID) and Jo takes one night (HAH!) to write a new wonderful novel called *Gasp* Little Women (and I freak out because of the paradox of her writing the book that the movie is based on that I'm watching where she's writing a book and...well you get it. Mind Freak!)

And even with all of that other crap going through my head, the one thing I really come away thinking is that Jo is a piece of crap because apparently she can write both fiction AND non fiction.

I took a creative non fiction class in college. I was a senior and the next semester I would take my senior project class which involved Fiction writing and then a semester after that (because I needed 4.5 years to get enough credits to graduate so my last semester was filled with pure fun stuff including beginning fiction writing which I had skipped over originally when I went straight to intermediate fiction writing. Talk about an easy class. Beginning Fiction I mean) I would take an MFA fiction writing class even though I wasn't working on an MFA.

I'm totally losing myself in my own train of thoughts here. Anyway I took a single creative non fiction class. And I was HORRIBLE at it. Not only was I horrible at it, I didn't find it very fun. I didn't have anything worth writing about. And I didn't even want to write about me and my past - booooring - I wanted to write about made up crap.

The weird part is, I knew HOW to write good non fiction - I could recognize it when my classmates did it, and I could appreciate a good memoir. But for the life of me I just couldn't apply that to my own writing. I think a lot of the people in the class thought I was dumbish and couldn't believe my major emphasis was in creative writing (I know this is at least partially true because one of the girls in that class would also be in my senior project class which was fiction based and she flat out told me that my fiction was world's better than my non fiction.) My non-fiction work is the only writing that I've willfully destroyed.

I wonder if other writers have this trouble, or if it's just me? I'm not great at poetry, either, but I can pull some of it off. But not Jo March, ho no. Jo can write anything and everything and get it all published while simultaneously finding herself a man. Apparently she's like the Avatar of writers.

I would give much to be an airbender

So anyway, here's what all this rambling comes to: Little Women, I love you, but Jo March can suck it.

In Which I Stop Reading

2011-12-14T07:00:00.000-06:00

If you're reading the title of this post, no, I don't mean in general. I mean, stop reading a specific book.

No, I'm not going to say which book it is, though possibly you could figure it out with some clever googling. Also I never got around to putting it on my sidebar either, which ended up being a stroke of luck. I've met the author and she's super awesome and nice and smart and I've read another of her books and loved it, so it's not her or her writing, it's just this specific book.

I was reading the book, got 100 pages in, and just decided I didn't want to bother finishing the book. The book, which was urban fantasy, more or less, was filled with obscure historical and literary references I couldn't follow. It seemed like I needed to have an MFA in history AND literature to even follow the conversations the MCs were having with each other. It was like listening to inside jokes. You know it's supposed to be funny, but are missing some historical understanding - an "in" so to speak.

An example from the book:

"It was then I thought of Rudolph Rassendyll and shook free the shroud of emotions, of questions I could not ask. Shades of Prisoner Of Zenda!"

OK, I've never read Prisoner of Zenda, which is an adventure novel written in 1894, so I don't follow either of these references. Yes, this line fits with the MC and her experiences, but how can I understand the MC and her motivations if I can't even follow her references? And this is just one example in a book FULL of them.
Still, I'd wade through stuff like this if the plot was exciting or something, but I was 100 pages in and it was just barely hinting at excitement to come.

I think giving a novel 100 pages is plenty to decide if I want to keep going with it.

I never used to do this. There used to be a day, and it wasn't that long ago, where, if I started a book, I finished it no matter what.

Now, not so much. There are just so many great books out there that I want to read, I just can't really waste time on reading something I'm not enjoying. Also, because, if I'm not enjoying the book, I take a lot longer to read it, so it takes even MORE time away from reading something I might enjoy, or even love.

So what about you? Do you finish everything you start? Or do you ever stop? And how long do you give the book before you give up on it?
.

In Which I House-Keep

2011-12-12T07:00:00.000-06:00

Hey all, time for some quick blogosphere housekeeping.

In case you haven't heard, Maria Zannini is hosting a DIY Christmas series over at her blog. It's filled with guest posts of crafts and cooking and some of the posts even have free giveaways. I'll be a guest post later next week.

So stop on by, there's a lot of awesome crafts and recipes going on over there.

Also, next week I'll be blogging on a T, TH, F schedule instead of M, W, F, due to some book launches etc.

Are you participating in WRiTE CLUB? If not, you should. Or at least head over there and vote every Monday. It's a lot of fun.

Finally, are you participating in the Deja Vu and No-Kiss blogfest?

The first is on 12/16, the second in 01/02. I'll be participating in both and I hope you will too!

All right. Do you know of any fun things going on in the blogosphere?

Friday Fun

2011-12-09T07:00:00.000-06:00

Bam! Yvie's back!

I'm not even going to waste any time, Let's DO THIS!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Earth | Time Lapse View from Space, Fly Over | NASA, ISS from Michael König on Vimeo.

In Which I List My Favorites

2011-12-07T07:00:00.002-06:00

Anne McCaffrey, over her career, won both a Hugo award AND a Nebula award. She has been inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame, and she did more for women in sci-fi (both characters, AND writers) than almost anyone else. For all of us women who write genre fiction, a large part of our success is owed to Anne McCaffrey. Without her and her stories, there may not have been room for the strong female heroines we love, or for us, their writers.

The overall plot of the Pern series has to do with the dragons and Thread. Thread is a living organism that falls from space every 250 years. The fall lasts for four hours at a time over different parts of the planet and lasts for 50 years. Thread devours anything organic (except rock, and metal) and the only thing that kills it is fire or water.
The dragons were created to fight Thread in the sky before it can land on the ground and destroy crops, animals and people. The dragons can breathe fire and also possess the ability to teleport, so they can destroy Thread in the air and pop in and out before Thread manages to touch and devour them or their riders.
That's Pern in a nutshell.

All right. Let's talk about my favorite Pern books. For my list, I'm only considering books written purely by Anne McCaffrey. Of course, that still leaves 18 books to choose from. Not an easy task, but one I dove into.

Here we go, my top 5 Dragonriders of Pern books, in no particular order.

DRAGONSINGER (published 1977)

Plot: Menolly travels to the Harper Hall, a music conservatory for harpers (minstrels/educators). Menolly finds life in the Harper Hall challenging. She must at first live with a group of paying female students who are catty and mean and also finds herself torn between master musicians who want her to specialize in their techniques. The situation is complicated by her nine fire lizards, small dragon-like creatures recently rediscovered in Pern.

The Harper Hall trilogy is the YA part of Pern Saga. It's an easy starting place for anyone who wants to give Pern a try. It's certainly where both myself and Twin started. Of the three books, Dragonsigner, the middle one, is my favorite. I love Menolly as a character. She's both self-effacing and humble but also strong and not afraid to punch a boy in the face. The best part about this book is the life at the Harper Hall. I love books that center around schools. I could read about Menolly going to her music classes any day of the week. The only thing I don't like about this book is that it's too short. I wish there was more.

DRAGONSDAWN (1988)

Plot: The planet Pern seemed a paradise to its new colonists—seeking to return to an agrarian-based simpler way of life. Shortly after arriving on the planet, however, a new threat appeared – Thread, an organism that falls from the sky and devours anything organic. With time running out, the colonists set out to bio-engineer Pernese lifeforms that appear to instinctively react to the Thread – the dragonets that colonists have adopted as pets.

This book is firmly in the science-fiction category, with space travel and technology that is not present in most other pern books. It's also the first, chronologically, in the series (barring a short story or two). I love this book because it's the beginning of everything. We get to see the dragons genetically engineered. We get to see the tragic first threadfall when so many colonists were killed. I also love colonization stories, so that helps a lot with my love of this novel.

THE WHITE DRAGON (1987)

Plot: The White Dragon follows the coming of age story of Jaxom the young Lord of Ruatha, who had accidentally impressed the white dragon, Ruth. As Jaxom grows up, he has to deal with the difficulty of being both a Lord Holder and a dragonrider. While fighting Thread, Jaxom falls ill with a potentially deadly sickness. This leads him to recuperate in Cove Hold, where he discovers some of the mysteries that the Ancients, the ancestors of the Pernese, left behind.

Ruth, is, hands-down, my favorite dragon. He has more personality than a lot of the larger dragons, due to his runt-like nature. Jaxom is also a very likeable character and it's fun to watch both he and Ruth grow up to become leaders of Pern

DOLPHINS OF PERN (1994)

Plot: Readis, the Paradise River Lord Holder's son, is saved by talking dolphins ("shipfish") as a young boy after falling into the sea and subsequently develops a strong fascination with the dolphins. T'lion, dragonrider of Bronze Gadareth, also develops an interest after being involved in an early dolphin encounter. The two befriend each other due to their shared interest and, in their own ways, defy family, Hold and Weyr to maintain their friendships with dolphins and convince others of the dolphins' intelligence and ability to speak.

This book is just a lot of fun, because the dolphins are adorable. They're funny and entertaining and their interactions with the dragons is worth a book alone. I always feel like this book is too short, though. Right when it ends is when I want to read more, even if it's just boring technical stuff. I'd read it, because I want to know how all of Pern deals with the reintroduction of dolphins into their society.

ALL THE WYERS OF PERN (1991)

Plot: AIVIS, the AI machine left behind by the original colonists, is re-discovered and sets about on his original task, to discover a way to use the dragons to stop Thread once and for all. But not everyone trusts the talking machine and its new technology, and factions of people seek to destroy it, even if it means Threadfall and Pern's dependence on the dragons and their riders must continue forever.

This is, more or less, the final book in the overall plot of the pern series. The dragons were bred to fight thread in the sky, but they were only supposed to be a temporary solution. What I love about this book is all the characters learning about their history, especially the people and events that take place in Dragonsdawn. It's like a super crossover. But it's also sad for many different reasons, so I both love picking it up, and loathe it, because I know what happens at the end.

BONUS BOOK
THE MASTERHARPER OF PERN (1998)

Plot: The story of Robinton's life as he grows from a boy, choosing whether to be a harper or a dragonrider, and his subsequent position of Masterharper of Pern and the most important man on the planet.

Yes, I cheated a bit. This is a sixth book. I couldn't put it above any of my other favorites, but it felt wrong to leave it off. Robinton is the heart of most the Pern books. He is kind and funny and plays a main character is almost all the ninth-pass books. I love this book because we get to focus on Robinton and his life, even though it's a life full of sadness and tinged with regret.

So that's it! Those are my top Pern books. If you're a fan, do you agree or disagree with any of my choices? And if you've never read the Pern series before, I really hope you one day decide to take the plunge. You won't regret it, I promise.
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In Which I Remember Anne McCaffrey

2011-12-05T07:00:00.001-06:00

I've been a long time fan of Anne McCaffrey. I can honestly say she's one of the main authors who steered me towards my love of fantasy. I probably would've gotten there without her, but certainly not as quickly. It would have been a different path, and one not as happy, or exciting.

I knew she was old. Even as a kid I knew one day she would die, and there would be no more Pern books written by her. And though, yes, Todd McCaffrey has taken on the mantle, he's just not as good of a writer as his mom.

If you asked me if I'd rather be a jedi, go to school at Hogwarts and become a witch, or impress a dragon on Pern and be a dragonrider, I would pick dragonrider every time. There's seriously no competition.

my favorite picture of Ruth and Jaxom

When I'd heard that she died, it was extra sad because I had, quite literally, just finished a re-read of most the Pern series, something I used to do every winter, but had taken a long break from. I read 12 books in less than two months. That's how much I love the Pern series. I could not put them down, even though I had read them all countless times before. Even though I knew what would happen. That, to me, is firm evidence of her skill as a writer.

Lessa, bringing the oldtimers 400 years into the future

Anne McCaffrey offered this nugget of wisdom to inspiring writers:

“First — keep reading. Writers are readers. Writers are also people who can’t not write. Second, follow Heinlein’s rules for getting published: 1. Write it. 2. Finish it. 3. Send it out. 4. Keep sending it out until someone sends you a check. There are variations on that, but that’s basically what works.”

Wednesday I'll have a quick list of my favorite Pern books and why. Though it will be hard to choose.
I've read many of her other series, as well, but Pern's the only one I come back to, over and over again.

I know there was one final book planned for the ninth pass story arc, tentatively titled "After the Pass is Over". I wait for it eagerly, because I never felt like their story was done, even though the main plot had closed. I didn't care about that. I wanted more of Jaxom and Ruth, and F'nor and F'lar and Lessa. I could read about Menolly writing songs at the Harper Hall for the rest of my life and never be bored of it. I laugh out loud at the adorableness of the Pern dolphins and their intentional puns. Every time I read a dragon impression story I want to be there.

But now, that's all done.

Dear Anne McCaffrey. You changed my life for the better. Though the Red Star has passed and thread has gone, Pern seems emptier without you in it.

Thank you for the books you leave behind. I will always dream of dragons in the sky.

Friday Fun

2011-12-02T07:00:00.000-06:00

Wow. It's been, like, FOREVER since me, the wonderful and glorious Yvie, was here to grace the blog world with my presence and my fun.

Thanks for that, Mom. Thanks a lot.

Well, lucky enough for you, nothing too crazy has been going on with me, so it's not like you missed anything. It would suck for you if you did, amiright?

Onto the fun!!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

See all the CollegeHumor Original Videos here.

In Which I Forgot

2011-11-30T07:00:00.000-06:00

So I completely forgot to write a post on Monday. It was extra dumb because all day Sunday I kept reminding myself not to forget, and then Monday morning I was all "I'm a dumbass!"

I think the deal is that when Twin, who normally works on Sundays, has the day off, we just do a lot of fun and wacky things, so I get off my usual scheduled events of writing blog posts and junk.

Yesterday we decorated for x-mas, so I'm going to blame that for no blog post. But, the tree is up as are the garlands and wreaths. We also now have a spot for our Christmas village we inherited from our grandma and fixed up some fancy mason jars with cranberries in water and floating tea lights.

Like this, only I used smaller jars

All in all, it looks pretty nice.

How about you? Is your house decorated?

In Which We Launch Tangled Tides!!

2011-11-25T07:00:00.000-06:00

Yes, I know all us americans are doing either two things right now, recovering from our food comas, or shopping, but other important things are happening on this blackest of fridays...

Karen Amanda Hooper’s young adult novel, TANGLED TIDES, is officially being released into the world today. I’m joining the celebration by fighting in the war--the underwater web war between the sea creatures!

Karen’s story contains battling merfolk, selkies, sirens and gorgons. She says she loves all of them, but she wants everyone else to choose a side, so…

I CHOOSE SELKIES!!

Wanna learn more or join in on the fun? Go check out the details at Karen’s blog.

Karen is giving away a signed copy of her book and some other sea creature themed prizes. To enter, join the underwater web war on Twitter. Tweet which sea creatures you’re rooting for and why. Include the hashtag #TangledTides and you could win.

Karen will be on Twitter all day celebrating and answering questions, so stop by and say hello. @Karen_Hooper

Summary of the story:

Yara Jones doesn’t believe in sea monsters—until she becomes one.

When a hurricane hits her island home and she wakes up with fins, Yara finds herself tangled up in an underwater world of mysterious merfolk and secretive selkies. Both sides believe Yara can save them by fulfilling a broken promise and opening the sealed gateway to their realm, but they are battling over how it should be done. The selkies want to take her life. The merfolk want something far more precious.

Treygan, the stormy-eyed merman who turned Yara mer, will stop at nothing and sacrifice everything to protect his people—until he falls for Yara. The tides turn as Yara fights to save herself, hundreds of sea creatures, and the merman who has her heart. She could lose her soul in the process—or she might open the gateway to a love that’s deeper than the oceans.

Amazon
Rhemalda Books
Barnes & Noble
Goodreads

Bam! So support Karen! Because she's an awesome chick with an awesome book!

In Which I Share Good News

2011-11-23T07:00:00.000-06:00

Yay! You're back! I'm glad to see it.

Because I have some fun news to share today!

What is it, you ask? What could it be?

Simple.

I sold my short story Hole Ridden!

Woot!!! That's right! I'm going to officially be a published author!!

It will be appearing in Dark Moon Digest #6, which should be available for purchase in early December. It will be available as an ezine at a later release date.

I'm super excited guys. It's nice to know that when I actually put in the work to get something published (this was the first story I actually submitted anywhere) it can happen.

This is, hands down, my favorite short story I've written. It's also the short story that people who have read it tend to remember the most. People refer to it as "the hole story", which is a pretty accurate description.

I've mentioned it in posts here, here, here and here (where it was picked as editor's choice on OWW).

In that third post, which was mostly about how my wordle cloud for it ended up being a creepy, ominous cloud that was a perfect visual representation for the story itself, Twin had stated that when it was published she would make me a nice frame with the wordle cloud.

Well, she didn't forget:

Yay! Thanks to everyone who's ever beta read it for me or offered me advice on dealing with submissions. YOU ARE ALL AMAZE BALLS. Glitter in the air for all!

In Which I Return

2011-11-21T07:00:00.000-06:00

So, I'm back everyone. Last week I took a surprise hiatus. I didn't mean it to happen, it just kind of popped up. And once I was in it, I figured I'd just use the time off productively.

I've been having PC problems, which frustrate me to no end. My good laptop has a stupid virus or something, which makes using search engines almost impossible, and makes using FB and google reader very frustrating. And when I get frustrated I mostly just walk away. So my presence on the interwebs has been less than normal and will probably remain that way until I find the time to get the laptop fixed (mostly, it's just a pain in the butt to try and figure out when I want to go without my computer. Probably not until I at least catch up on NaNo)

Yes, I'm behind on NaNo. Yes I'm still confidant I will be able to catch up and still pull out as a winner. So far, the MS is kicking my ass. I've yet to reach that stage where I'm excited about it. Which makes me sad and also makes me not want ot write on it. Mostly I just want to go back to Break Free and work on that.

Oh well, nothing I can do about it now.

Anyway, while I was offline last week, I did get some SUPER AWESOME NEWS that I will be sharing on Wednesday. So, please stop by then.

Also on Friday I will have a post which may or may not tell you how you can win a book via twitter. And by may not, I definitely mean may.

So! Exciting things going on here the rest of the week. Have exciting things been happening to you? Fill me in! I feel a little lost, having limited internet access.

String Bridge Amazon Chart Rush!

2011-11-11T07:00:00.000-06:00

Today is THE day to help Jessica Bell's debut, STRING BRIDGE, hit the bestseller list on Amazon, and receive the all-original soundtrack, Melody Hill: On the Other Side, written and performed by the author herself, for free!

All you have to do is purchase the book today (paperback, or eBook), November 11th, and then email the receipt to:

jessica.carmen.bell(at)gmail(dot)com

She will then email you a link to download the album at no extra cost!

To purchase the paperback:

Amazon USA

To purchase the eBook:

Amazon USA

Amazon UK

To listen to samples of the soundtrack, visit iTunes.

If you are
not familiar with String Bridge,
check out the book trailer:

Rave Reviews for String Bridge:

“Jessica Bell’s STRING BRIDGE strummed the fret of my
veins, thrummed my blood into a mad rush, played me taut until the final page, yet with echoes still reverberating. A rhythmic debut with metrical tones of heavied dark, fleeting prisms of light, and finally, a burst of joy—just as with any good song, my hopeful heartbeat kept tempo with Bell’s narrative.” ~ Kathryn Magendie, author of Sweetie and Publishing Editor of Rose & Thorn Journal

“Poet and musician Jessica Bell's debut novel String Bridge is a rich exploration of desire, guilt, and the difficult balancing act of the modern woman. The writing is lyrical throughout, seamlessly integrating setting, character and plot in a musical structure that
allows the reader to identify with Melody's growing insecurity as her world begins to unravel … String Bridge is a powerful debut from a promising writer, full of music, metaphor, and just a hint of magic.” ~ Magdalena Ball, author of Repulsion Thrust and Sleep Before Evening

“Jessica Bell is a brilliant writer of great skill and depth. She doesn't pull back from the difficult scenes, from conflict, pain, intensity. She puts it all out there, no holds barred, no holding back. She knows how to craft a scene, how to develop character, how to create suspense. This is an absolutely brilliant debut novel. I look forward to reading her next novel, and next and next.” ~ Karen Jones Gowen, author of Farm Girl, Uncut Diamonds and House of Diamonds

Connect with Jessica:

String Bridge: http://www.stringbridge.com/

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/jessica_bell

Website: http://www.jessicacbell.com/

Blog: http://thealliterativeallomorph.blogspot.com/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/author.jessica.bell

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/MsBessieBell

Publisher: http://www.luckypress.com/

Please TWEET and/or FACEBOOK this post using #StringBridge!

In Which We Check In

2011-11-09T07:00:00.003-06:00

Well, we've officially made it through NaNo week 1, and I want to know how things are going for you.
Judging by your word counters on my buddy lists, most of you are doing amazeballs. Way better than me.

I've been hitting the word count each day, which is a bit of a disappointment. I really ~~want~~ need to get ahead, not just because of the approaching holiday (though that is definitely a reason) but also because I know this weekend is pretty shot for me.

Friday we're hosting a baby shower for a writer friend (Twin's Co-Worker) and her writer husband. So, judging by our party timeline (there's going to be a lot of baking and cooking) I really won't have time to squeeze in any writing on Friday.

Saturday is my Mom's birthday, so we'll be going out for breakfast. I may be able to sneak in some words here, but I'm not going to count on it. I rarely, if ever, write on Saturdays. It's just not my thing.

Normally Sunday would be my day to catch up since Twin works on Sundays, but she's got this one off, and we have cooking club in the evening, and the theme this week is yeast breads.
Which means Twin and I will be doing even more baking on Sunday (and kneading and folding and rolling etc)

So. This is why I want to get ahead. Hopefully I can get 3K in today and Thursday. If so, that should give me a good enough buffer that I'll be able to make anything else up over the next week.

Now, I want to hear all about you. How's the daily grind going?
And if you're not participating in NaNo, what are you up to?

In Which I Have Pet Peeves

2011-11-07T07:00:00.000-06:00

Let's take a moment to discuss the things that drive us a little bit cray cray. You know, those pet peeves that you wish you could correct across the board, so you'd no longer be confronted by them.

You know the things. And I want to know all about them too. Especially if it's something that I don't know about.

So here's a list of my top pet-peeves:

1. Poisonous vs Venomous

This one has to be my number one pet peeve. I go a bit ballistic every time it comes up. Which is all the time

Poisonous - something you eat that makes you ill

Venomous - something that makes you ill by some other means, usually a bite, but possibly also a sting.

So please don't say snakes are poisonous. They are venomous. As are scorpions, spiders and male platypuses.

2. Nauseous vs Nauseated

This a common one, and I actually only learned about this in the last 5-6 years or so.

Nauseous means causing nausea. When you say you are nauseous, what that means is, you are making everyone else sick. Example:

Jean and Jim are hanging out together. Jean says she's nauseous.

What that means is - Jean is making Jim feel sick.

If Jean actually wants to say that she's not feeling well, she should say she's nauseated.

3. Bison vs Buffalo

This is something that almost everyone knows, but must be too lazy to be accurate.

The giant hoofed mammals native to North America and parts of South America are Bison.

The giant hoofed mammals native to Africa and Asia are Buffalo.

4. Healthy vs Healthful

This one is pretty easy to remember.

Things are healthful (good for one's health) and People (or animals) are healthy (in a state of good health)

WRONG - eat a healthy breakfast
RIGHT - eat a healthful breakfast.
RIGHT - You look healthy today.

And that's it! I may make this an ongoing feature, because I'm sure I'll think up some of my other pet peeves.

Alright, now its your turn. What are some of your pet peeves? Let us know! I certainly don't want to the person driving you crazy.

Friday Fun

2011-11-04T07:00:00.000-05:00

Yvie's back, ape-friends, after a short lived hiatus for my stoopid dog brother's stoopid birthday.

Anyway, I have this amazing tale to tell. The other night, I was walking around looking for something to do. I was kind of in a mood and just really needed the right toy. So I was sauntering across the living room when I saw one of my most favorite toys of all, which is the armchair.

Well, decision made, I didn't want to waste any time. So I leaped for the chair from right where I was standing. True, I was maybe 5 feet away from it, but that didn't matter.

You know why?

Because I can fly.

Seriously. Mom and Anne lumpin FLIPPED OUT when they saw my amazing move. My legs were outstretched behind me as I zoomed across the room to land on the chair. Mom said was like Krypto. All I needed was my cape.

Krypto

Me. We could be twins!!

True story.

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Insecure Writer's Support Group

2011-11-02T07:00:00.001-05:00

Today is the Monthly Insecure Writer's Support Group.

Yay!

I've actually been feeling pretty good, lately. NaNo's a big reason why, since it's so much fun you just can't really get stressed out by it. But also some other good things are happening too.

But here's the thing. We can't always rely on things going well to keep us happy. Because we all know there are long stretches on the writing road where things don't go good. Where things actually *gulp* go bad....

Like rejections. Most of us have felt that sting once or twice. Or maybe hundreds of times. And I don't care how thick your skin is (mine's pretty thick) or how laid back you are about it (I'm so laid back, I'm practically sleep writing this...), rejections hurt. Even if it's just for that second where you're disappointed. Even if you're expecting them. Even when they're the best rejection ever, because they told you they love you and think you're amazingsuperawesomeballssmokeonthewater cool, but they're closing shop or some other sort of reason that totally has nothing to do with you. Even those ones, filled with compliments, hurt a little.

But you have to keep going. You know why? Because even the most painful, horrible, make you want to never write again, rejection feeling has nothing, nothing on the feeling you get when something is accepted. Or your MS gets a full request.

That feeling is amazing. And totally worth the pain.

You can do it! I know you can.

In Which It Starts...

2011-11-01T07:00:00.000-05:00

LET NANO 2011 BEGIN!!

In Which We Carve!

2011-10-31T07:00:00.000-05:00

Happy Halloween everyone!

Are you doing anything fun tonight? Did you do anything fun over the weekend?

We carved pumpkins, as usual. Two apiece, to get as many seeds as we could for roasting.

Sarah's Pumpkin #1

Sarah's Pumpkin #2

Brother's Pumpkin #1

Brother's Pumpkin #2

Twin's Pumpkin #1

Twin's Pumpkin #2

So how about you? Do you carve pumpkins?

Friday Fun

2011-10-28T07:00:00.000-05:00

Hey all!

I know Yvie usually does the Friday Fun, but not this week. This week it's George's time to shine!

Why is that you ask?

Because today is my birthday!

That's right, I'm 6 years old! So I thought it was only fair I got to be on the blog today and have some more fun!

Here we go!!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which I Guest Post

2011-10-27T07:00:00.000-05:00

Hey all! Today I'm guest posting over at TL Conway's NaNo Blog Party.

Come check it out!

In Which Pinterest Helps Me Prepare

2011-10-26T07:00:00.000-05:00

So, as mentioned before, I love me some Pinterest. I have a whole inspiration board, but then Twin was all "why don't you break out your NaNo 2011 stuff and make a separate board for it?".
And, after I told her to shut her face, I realized that was a pretty good idea.

So! Here is the link to my 2011 NaNo inspiration board!

I'm totally loving it. Especially since I don't have a NaNo soundtrack for this year (and probably won't have time (or really the energy) to make one)

Seriously, the NaNo pinbaord is possibly one of the best things ~~Twin~~ I have ever come up with.

What about you? Do you have a NaNo pinboard? Or, if you're not on Pinterest, do you have a folder or file where you keep inspiration for your current MS?

In Which I Shout Out

2011-10-24T07:00:00.002-05:00

Shout out time!

Maria Zannini's newest book Chain of Souls is now available for purchase!

Isn't this cover amazing?!

If you want to help give it a proper birthday launch, please check out either Amazon, Barnes and Noble or Smashwords to get yourself a copy.

Also, the amazing and cool TL Conway is hosting a NaNo extravaganza for the next two weeks on her blog. It will be filled with awesome guest posts (including one by moi) so check her out! (I believe my guest post will be on Thursday. I'll post a blog reminder on that day).

So, anyway, how are things? I'm OK. Not really ready for NaNo yet, but hoping to make a lot of headway this week. BUT, I also have some sort of crazy sore throat going on that I'll probably have to have a doctor check out here soon, cuz it's driving me CRAY CRAY!

Also, for some unknown reason, my Internet Explorer has stopped working. I wrote this whole post using safari (which I've never used before) which is fine, except that all my favorites are saved under IE so I'm super frustrated. Sigh.

How are things going for you?

Ready for NaNo yet? How about Halloween?

Update:
I've created a rage comic in relation to my sore throat experience:

Friday Fun

2011-10-21T07:00:00.000-05:00

Hiya Ape-Friends -

Today is a special edition of Friday Fun, presented by me, the lovely Yvie.
Why is it a special Edition, you ask?

Because IT'S MY BIRTHDAY TODAY!!!!

Yep! I'm 5 years old! And just as adorable as I was at 10 weeks. That's right, I'm like a fine wine, improving with age.

I'll be getting presents and canned food today for a birthday celebration. Normally Mom would've posted pics, but with working in the office this week, she just hasn't had time.

Anyway, onto the fun!!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which I Housekeep

2011-10-12T07:00:00.005-05:00

So, I'm going to be out of town for the rest of the week. Myself, Twin and our mom are flying down to Chicago to visit with Youngest Sister. Then, next week I actually have to go into the office for work for some huge-o project I'm involved in, which means around a 3 hour commute each day, which also means that I won't be online hardly at all.

So, this will be my last blog post for about a week.

Also, I realize I forgot to post my NaNo username for anyone who wants to be buddies. It's Falen1 (natch). The new website appears to be up and running, so I'll probably be messing around there at least once a day.

Also, if you're participating in NaNo, don't forget to also participate in 30 Covers in 30 Days. This is the contest where you can win a book cover done by a graphic artist. You can see the one I won last year on my sidebar. Needless to say, I Love it, and think everyone should participate for a chance.

A lot of people don't know how that part of NaNo works so I'll give you a quick breakdown.

Under the NaNo forums, there's a forum titled 30 Covers in 30 days (there's nothing in there yet because of the website change, but soon there will be some announcements and junk)

You only need 2 things to be eligible to win a cover - A novel title, and a novel synopsis. Make sure you've updated your author page with both these things and you are entered.

BUT! Usually in the forum, there's a place where you can nominate yourself or someone else, to draw attention to an awesome synopsis etc.

There's usually either a forum post where you can nominate yourself, or a form you can fill out . There will be an announcement in the forum once they've got this set up.

And that's it!

Definitely take advantage of it, I will be, because it takes very little effort on your part.

And that's pretty much all I had for today. I'm flying out early tomorrow morning, so I'll chat with you all when I'm back online.

Have a great weekend!

In Which I Make A Decision

2011-10-10T07:00:00.000-05:00

So, after a week or so of contemplation (and a lot of crazy amounts of work at the day job which doesn't look like it will be slowing at all for the rest of the month) I think I've come to the conclusion that I'm not going to participate in Authoress's Baker's Dozen auction. I just don't have time to get my MS where I want it to be.

I mean, what if I was selected as one of the people in the auction, and an agent requested a full or something and my MS just wasn't up to snuff? That would be a wasted opportunity. I'd rather just take my time and make sure the MS is as good as I can make it and just query normally. Cuz I like querying anyway, and there's no reason to rush things.

I thought briefly about entering Glimpse. But a few of the agents on the list of participants have already seen my query or the MS or still have the MS, so it would kind of stink if I took up a spot for only a few agents when I could just query them. Also, I haven't yet made the change to Glimpse that I want either.

This also means I can let Break Free sit a bit before I start on line edits. It also means I can give NaNo much more of my attention, since I haven't yet started my outline or query (or really even come up with a stable plot)

The new NaNo website is supposed to roll out today. I'm excited to check it out.

How about you? Are you doing NaNo this year?

Friday Fun

2011-10-07T07:00:00.000-05:00

Heya ape-friends! Yvie's back!

How was your week? Was it good? Did you get a lot of napping in?
I did. I'm not going to lie. Napping is awesome.

Onto the fun for the weekend!!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Make sure you watch to the end, the orchestra is the funniest then

Insecure Writer's Support Group

2011-10-05T07:00:00.000-05:00

Bam! Look who remembered to participate this month! Me!

Anyway, in case you missed the title, today is Insecure Writer's Support Group where we try and bolster each other up. Because writing is hard, and everyone, EVERYONE who writes occasionally needs help and support. Any professional writer who says they don't have moments of self-doubt are lying to either themselves or to you.

A comic: (language and partial nudity warning)

So, seriously, everyone has those moments when they're writing, or revising, or whenever, when you think you just suck at it. I do. At least once a MS. Sometimes I can point out other things going on in my life that triggers it, and sometimes it just shows up on its own.

BUT! Luckily for us there are two easy things to remember that help fight the self doubt.

1. As I mentioned above, it happens to everyone. Even Stephen King.
2. IT WILL PASS. This is the most important thing to remember. Even if you have to step away from the writing or revising or whatever for a few days or a week, that's fine. As long as you return once the self-doubt passes.

Don't let your self-doubt trick you into thinking you're no good. That's bullshit. You are effing brilliant. For reals. Go look in the mirror. What do you see besides great hair? Brilliance, that's what.

And even if you don't see it now, keep working. Keep working hard, and one day it'll be there. I'm not saying it's going to be easy. I'm just saying it will be worth it.

Promise.

In Which We Cook

2011-10-03T07:00:00.000-05:00

Here's a quick little photo essay of all the things Twin and I baked/cooked while on our vacay (Links provided when posible and actual photos used when possible (ie, when I didn't forget to take actual photos of the deliciousness))

Parmesan Knots

Cheddar Bay Biscuits

Honey Rolls

Pern Bubbly Pies

Crock Pot Potato Soup

Pumpkin Spice Cream Cheese Breakfast Rolls

Frosty

Spinach Pesto Grilled Cheese

Tomato Tortellini Soup

I'm not going to lie. It was delish.

So, how was the week? Did I miss anything awesome? Did you cook anything nummy?

Friday Fun

2011-09-23T07:00:00.000-05:00

Yay! Yvie's back, babies, because it's the weekend! And you know what's awesome about this weekend? Next week Mom and Anne have the whole week off from work, which means plenty of time for them to hang out with me (so I don't have to hang out with Tula. Who just won't. Leave. Me. Alone.)

Mom also wants me to mention that this means she won't be blogging next week, or really on the internet much at all since there will be yard work and stuff happening.

And by stuff, I mean, playing with me. Because I'm awesome.

Just like you ape-friends. Just like you.

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which I Won

2011-09-21T07:00:00.000-05:00

So, I'm super excited that I won one of the auction items in the Read for Relief Auction.

I spent waaay more money on my bid than I wanted to, but I justified it like this:

I got paid on Friday, so I wasn't quite as broke as I had been
I actually get paid 3 times this month, which means I have a whole extra paycheck that doesn't have to go to the mortgage or monthly bills
It was for a good cause
I had been outbid on everything else I had bid on
Both Brother and Twin offered to chip in some money if I needed it to win the bid (I didn't. But still, they're pretty awesome)
I both wanted and needed the auction item

Ahh, justification. Is there anything you can't do?

The item was:

The Sisters in Scribe are offering to each critique the first 30 pages of the manuscript of the winning bidder. That’s three thorough crits for one manuscript! Since we all write YA, this prize is for YA and upper MG manuscripts only, in any genre. (Contemporary, sci-fi, paranormal, dystopian, fantasy—you name it!)

Sisters in Scribe is made up of YA writers (and crit partners) Kristi Helvig, Valerie Kemp, and Lacey (L.J.) Boldyrev. They blog about all things writing. Learn more about the Sisters in Scribe on their blog.

So yeah, 3 crits is pretty awesome.

Also, I'm struggling a bit with my opening for Break Free. I think part of the issue is that the opening for Glimpse was pretty much perfect from the very beginning. I just needed some line edits to spruce it up a bit, but that was it. What's in the MS now were the first words I wrote for the MS and I still think they're pretty successful.

It's not that I think the beginning of Break Free is bad. I don't. I think it's just kind of mediocre. And if I'm going to enter the Baker's Dozen Auction (see Monday's post), and I will..., then I'd like an opening that's a bit zazzier than mediocre.

So, I'm really looking forward to the crits I won.

How about you? Written any great openings lately? Have any tried and true tricks you'd like to share?

In Which I Have Pitch Problems

2011-09-19T07:00:00.000-05:00

So, a few months ago, before I started writing Break Free, I set a goal for myself.
I wanted to participate in Authoress's Baker's Dozen Auction for this year. I missed it last year, since I didn't have anything ready at the time. But this year, I knew I could do it.

I mean, there's 300 YA entry spots and only 35 chosen to be part of the auction, so the odds are low for me to actually be in the auction, but I don't even care. I just want to be able to submit my first page and pitch for consideration.

This seems like a "do-able" goal, but I keep running up against some issues.

First issue, you need to submit a pitch along with your first page.

I don't typically write pitches. I'm not very good at it. Queries, no problem. Pitches? Bit of a problem.

She's having some pitch crit sessions next month, and I'm going to try hard to get into one of them, but they're run on a lottery, so it would be pure luck.

I've got my pitch down to 4 sentences, but I'd really like it to be 2-3 sentences. To be fair, last year the pitch had to be under 100 words, and mine is at about 75 right now, so it's not like I'd be disqualified or anything, but it's just the spirit of the idea of it. If that makes sense.

Does anyone have any good tricks or tips in regards to writing a good 2-3 sentence pitch?

Here's what I have so far...

Seventeen-year-old Kiel Reaux is two steps away from paying off a debt and earning his freedom from the Baron of Old Town when he is captured by slavers. Sold to Izzy, a foreign priestess, she promises to set him free if he leads her through a deadly jungle of wild magic. But when the Baron comes to collect, earning his freedom is the least of his problems. You can’t enjoy freedom when you’re dead.

I have issues with the length of the first sentence but am too close to it to decide what I can cut without messing up the rest of the pitch or losing the reader. Anyone have any thoughts?

Otherwise are you planning in participating in the Auction? Did you want me to look at your pitch or 250 words?

Friday Fun

2011-09-16T07:00:00.000-05:00

Yvie's back, ape-friends!
Why?
Why because it's the weekend of course!

And what a great weekend it will be! Up here, we've said goodby to hot summer weather and hello to cool fall weather. I'm just going to cross my paws it's here to stay.

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Click Here for HILARIOUS Captain Planet Video. Trust Me. (Language warning)

In Which Matt Needs Followers!

2011-09-15T07:00:00.003-05:00

Do you know Matthew MacNish?
Of course you do. Who the hell don't?

BUT! In case you don't know Matt, this is the post for you.

I'm not going to lie. Matt is amazeballs. He's also kinda badass, and pretty cool to boot. He hosts query workshops on his blog. He's a blog commenting fiend, and also he's funny and used to live pretty damn near close to where I live now (Minnesota represent!).

Matt has a goal. He would like to reach 1000 followers before he starts querying. Hopefully by the end of this year. If you aren't familiar with his blog, take some time and pop over. Maybe click on the "follow" button. You won't regret it.

In Which We Discuss NaNo (Again)

2011-09-14T07:00:00.000-05:00

I know, I know. Another NaNo Post? And not even yet October?
Yes. Yes it is.

So I know a month or so ago I was leaning towards not doing NaNo, just because I had so much other stuff I wanted to work on.

BUT, now I'm leaning towards doing it. Why? Multiple reasons. One is that after some fixes in Break Free, and a list of what I need to do for it going forward, it turns out it might not need as much work as I thought it did.

Another reason would be that NaNo would give me an excuse to take a break from it and let it rest before I dig into line edits. Which is always good.

Also, my NaNo story idea has been really developing over the last few weeks via day dreams and junk. Clearly my drunken muse is telling me to get on board for writing it in a few months. And I have to say, I don't really disagree with her.

(NaNo project has things in common with the below pictures:)

BUT, we'll still wait and see. It's not yet October, and October is the month I really spend time ramping up for NaNo, with the beginning of the snowflake method, a first draft query and a scene list. So there's a chance that, come October, I just won't have time to do all that. And if I don't have time, I'm not doing NaNo because I don't want to screw up my story just because I didn't have time to properly plan and nurture it first.

How about you? Are you going to participate in NaNo 2011?

In Which We Bid To Support

2011-09-13T07:00:00.000-05:00

Hey all, just wanted to quickly pop in to draw your attention to this awesome auction
Read For Relief

They’re auctioning off a bunch of industry-related items to raise funds for the Red Cross to help with the Hurricane Irene aftermath. The auction items include:

Query critiques
Manuscript critiques
Books (ARCs or published books, both signed and unsigned)
Book-related swag

Check it out, there's some awesome stuff!

In Which Blogger Switches Things Up

2011-09-12T07:00:00.001-05:00

Has anyone played around with the new blogger interface?

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, blogger rolled out a new interface for the dashboard about a week ago. You can try it out by clicking on the "Try the Updated Blogger Interface" Link. Don't worry you can switch back.

It looks something like this:

I haven't really given it a try beyond just a few looks. Mostly because just with those few glances I decided I'm not crazy about it. I'm also not crazy about trying to figure out where everything is again.

But, I realize I may be acting unfairly since I haven't actually used it. Has anyone else given it a test run? Do you like it? Not like it? Why or why not?

OK update: I've played around with it a bit. It's going to take some getting used to, especially regarding some weird format stuff but one of the things I absolutely LOVE is when you "preview" your post now, it actually opens it as a separate window and shows what it will look like on your actual blog. So it's a true preview.

Friday Fun

2011-09-09T07:00:00.005-05:00

Yvie's Back! To send you into the gloriousness that is the wiznat.

That's a nickname for the weekend, btw.

I have a crap load of nicknames. I think most dogs do. Here's a list of my more popular nicknames:

B
Miss B
Beaver
Beavie
Beep
Beep Beep
Beedibeep
Bee Bee

You can see there's a bit of a trend there.

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which I Went Shopping

2011-09-07T07:00:00.005-05:00

Hi all, sorry about yesterday's post, The link for the bread recipe was included, but I realized it was kind of hidden between the pictures.

So here's the link to the recipe again, for anyone who wanted it: Cinnamon Sugar Pull-Apart Bread.

Here's what mine ended up looking like. And I'm not going to lie. It was delicious.

So, last week I mentioned shopping therapy at the RenFest. I told myself I wasn't going to buy anything this year because, as mentioned, I am pretty broke (AND Doggy Tula has come down with a serious itching problem over the last few weeeks. She will be getting a second vet visit later this week. Sigh).

Anyway, so they we were, hanging out at Renfest, studiously NOT thinking about how Twin's car was stolen and how someone was in our house while we were sleeping, and THERE IT WAS...

Now, I know I've mentioned before how I'm jealous of Twin's ability to look good in hats. It doesn't come as easy for me. In fact, my steampunk writing hat in my blog pic is really the first awesome hat I've ever owned.

Until. I found. THIS!!!

That's right! A mothereffing steampunk Bowler/Derby Hat! Holy hell guys. I wanted it IMMEDIATELY.

So I bought it.

For reals. I would've totally regretted not getting it.

So, now I have another steampunk hat. This one, though, will be a steampunk EDITING/REVISION hat. I think I may change my blog picture to match the hat of whatever I'm doing at the time. So, for example, since I'm revising Break Free right now, I'll be changing the above picture to match.

So, there you have it. The Siren call of the steampunkery sucks me in again. Man, I would buy so much cool stuff if I had a lot of money.

How about you? Bought anything ~~frivilous~~ necessary lately?

In Which We Celebrate

2011-09-05T07:00:00.002-05:00

Happy Labor Day to all my friends in the states.

I'll be back to regular blog posts on Wednesday because I'm making this for breakfast today.

Cinnamon Sugar Pull Apart Bread

TTYL

In Which We Write Posts To Help Shelter Dogs

2011-09-03T15:01:00.004-05:00

Saw this post on Piedmont Writer and decided to jump on.

11 week old Yvie at the shelter

The face that launched a puppy adoption

Pedigree is resurrecting its insanely successful Write a Post, Help a Dog program. In 2010, 391 bloggers wrote about the program and with each post, Pedigree donated 20 pounds of its Healthy Longevity dog food to shelter animals. In all, 7,820 pounds of food was donated to two shelters renowned for their care of senior dogs: Muttville Senior Dog Rescue in San Francisco and Castaway Critters in Harrisburg, Pa.

How you can help in 2011

Simply spread the word about Write a Post, Help a Dog 2011 and once again Pedigree will donate 20 pounds of food for each blogger's post. Here's all you need to include in your post:

The Write a Post, Help a Dog program is aimed at raising awareness and food for the more than four million dogs that wind up in shelters and breed rescues each year.
For each blog post mentioning the Pedigree Foundation from now until midnight ET on September 3, Pedigree will donate 20 pounds of its new dry Pedigree recipe food for dogs -- its best recipe ever -- to a shelter, because every dog deserves leading nutrition.

The Pedigree Foundation -- a 501 (C)(3) nonprofit organization is committed to helping dogs by providing grants to shelters and rescues and encouraging dog adoption. This year the Foundation has already raised more than $376,570 against its goal of $1.5 million to carry out its work to fund grants that not only help shelters operate, but to further shelter innovations.
The Pedigree Foundation depends on charitable contributions from individuals to carry out its mission to help dogs find loving homes. In addition to writing a blog post, here's how you can help:

Donate online at http://pedigreefoundation.org/donate.aspx
Apply for a shelter grant from the Pedigree Foundation by completing a form at www.pedigreefoundation.org
Purchase Dogs Rule Gear at www.dogsrulegear.com where the proceeds go to the Pedigree Foundation to help loving dogs find a home. SPECIAL OFFER: Get 10 percent off Dogs Rule Gear by using the promo code BlogPaws10 from August 22 - September 30.

Now, the deadline for this is TONIGHT, and the link is at The Eagle's Aerial Perspective blog. So please go there, link up, copy and paste, or blog what you can to help this fabulous cause.

Friday Fun

2011-09-02T07:00:00.004-05:00

Yvie's back ape-friends! To start your weekend off right!

Even though it's supposedly been kinda crazy around here lately, not much has been happening in dog world. I mean, I guess I got to meet a policeman, but that's been about it.

That's why it's time for some fun to zazz this place up!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

In Which Not Great Things Happened

2011-08-31T07:00:00.020-05:00

We've had a bit of a rocky run in my house the last few weeks. It started with things and animals breaking, then it culminated with a Breaking and Entering. But, I'm getting ahead of myself.

So instead, here is a list of bad things that have happened in my life over the last month.

Miggory Sow Guinea Pig has injured eye.

Resolution: Trip to the vet and eye drops fixes her corneal ulcer after a few days

Harriet B Suit Guinea Pig has injured eye.

Resolution: 3 trips to the vet in two weeks. Eye drops, ointment and medication all finally get her eye back to normal before the vet is forced to remove it.

Yvie Crazy Cakes (yes, Crazy Cakes is her middle name. Which makes perfect sense if you get to know her) comes down with UTI.

Resolution: Trip to the vet for meds which fixes her up in a few days.

Ceiling in brother's bedroom starts to have water spots and mold.

Resolution: Problem caused by sweating AC ducts. Twin and I have bought duct insulation and will insulate ducts and replace ceiling tiles.

Mice in basement ceiling have become bolder, crawling on Brother's wall scrolls while he sleeps and making mice nests in workout room insulation.

a mouse was here ...

Resolution: Plan trip (once the finances recover and we actually find time) to nearby natural pest store

Kitchen faucet leak becomes so bad that cupboard below is flooded and warped.

Resolution: Twin and I once again use plumbing talents to replace kitchen faucet.

Dishwasher breaks.

Resolution: Plumbing skills only go so far. We're forced to buy a new dishwasher (and are able to get the above beauty only with financial help from our awesome parents)

AND, the most recent and worst bad thing:

House is entered by stranger while we are sleeping. My phone, Twin's purse and TWIN'S CAR are stolen. Burglar leaves all garage doors open and George escapes Saturday morning before I realize something bad has happened.

this is how he/they left the doors

George says there's nothing in the world that will convince him to stop once he escapes outside

Resolution: I managed to catch George after five minutes of panicked running around in my PJs. Police came and, like us, don't know how someone got into our keypad locked garage to then make it into our house. A few hours later a neighbor found Twin's Purse and my phone ditched under their apple tree, but so far Twin's car (named "Jeepers" because she's a Jeep Liberty. She even has a vanity tire cover with said vehicle name embroidered on it) has not shown up.
Locksmith has come and rekeyed house locks since burglar now has Twin's house keys.

So. Lots of crap. Still, I'm really hoping we get Twin's jeep back. After the police left and the insurance was called we went to Renfest, because we were dammed if we were going to sit around moping all day. Even though we're broke, I still spent some money at Renfest, because shopping therapy sometimes helps. But that will be a future post.

And, on the plus side, it was Brother's birthday yesterday. We plan on doing our usual family meal and gifts this weekend.

So, how have things been for you lately? Good? Bad? Just Mediocre? Share!

UPDATE: Police came to our house in the AM to tell us that a neighbor's garage had been broken into, a door handle on their car was busted and the burgler...how to put this politely...took a shit in their garage. BUT, while the officer was poking around he found a ticket issued for Jeepers two days after Jeepers was stolen. The ticket was for expired tabs (which is hilarious since Twin's been putting off paying for them due to said above expenses). The officer said he would link our case and their case.

UPDATE 2: The police recovered Jeepers!! They found Jeepers, but unfortunately the guy wasn't driving her at the time. BUT, after a bit of investigation, they found the guy with Jeeper's keys in his pocket. He was arrested for first degree burglary because he entered our home and will be going to jail. He was also linked to other burglaries in our neighborhood. So Yay! Everything turned out OK. And seriously, how dumb a thief can he be that he just drives the jeep around like it's his car and he hasn't stolen it. Especially after he already got one ticket.

In Which A Great Thing Happened

2011-08-29T07:00:00.002-05:00

That's right.

I FINISHED MY WIP!

Well, just the first draft. But let's get serious here, that's the first major step.

And what does finishing a first draft entail? Why it entails A MOTHEREFFING DANCE!

And maybe a fist bump

So. That was good. It ended up just shy of 80K which is awesome. Lots to play around with there. I was really pushing hard the last two weeks. I would just be exhausted in the evenings after writing so many words. Now I have to begin the revising and editing. I think it will need a fair amount of revisions, but nothing I'm not up to.

Mostly, I really really really want to be able to participate in Authoress's Baker's Dozen Auction this year, it was really the motivating factor on keeping me working at such a hectic pace. So, I've got a few months to get this MS in tip top shape, which means hectic revisions from here on out.

LET'S DO THIS!!

Friday Fun

2011-08-26T07:00:00.004-05:00

Yay it's Friday!! Finally.

Seriously, Mom's been so busy writing lately that she hasn't been giving me the attention I need, NAY, deserve

Good thing I've got George to hang out with.

Onto the fun!!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

80's Dating Video Montage

In Which Teenage Alien-Hybrids Don't Know How Good They Have It

2011-08-24T07:00:00.006-05:00

So I had a post planned for today, but then, when I went to write it, it kinda seemed like a bad idea. So I scrapped it. Instead you get a mishmash of a post which probably won't make any sense, though I could be wrong about that.

I'm so so close to being done with the WIP. If I'm super lucky, I may even finish the first draft today. That would be awesome. It's taking up so much of my time. I'd really like to be able to get back to doing some of my usual chores on Sundays instead of writing, especially since I prefer to do no writing in the evenings or the weekends. Not if I can help it.

Also, I'd love to free up some time to look through my collection of short stories, to see if anything is even close to being something I can work with. The magazine I submitted Hole Ridden to back in January personally asked to see more of my work. Which, I'm not going to lie, was SUPER EFFING AWESOME!

Or, at least it would've been if I A) had something else prepared for submission (I don't) or even B) had time to write something new (Ha! Yeah right...)

Ah lack of time, my oldest enemy.

THIS is why I want to the super power from Out of The World. You know, where she freezes time, but can unfreeze people by touching them?

example of her powers at 0.53 seconds. Feel free to stop watching after that. I did.

Do you know how much sleep you could get? Or the books you could read?

Not to mention people you could rob.

Just kidding. I'd only rob banks.

So. How's your WIP coming? Give me an update, and I'm serial. I actually/really want to know how it's going.
Don't make me stalk you...

In Which I Have A New Obsession

2011-08-22T07:00:00.001-05:00

"A new obsession?" you ask.

Yes. Yes I do.

What is it?

Why, it's PINTEREST!

"Pinterest is a Virtual Pinboard.
Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes.
Best of all, you can browse pinboards created by other people. Browsing pinboards is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests."

So let's say you're on a website and you see an awesome picture of, oh I dunno, a cat. Because, you know, the interwebs is bereft of cats. So you click your little "pin it" button, select which pinboard you want to add it to, add a caption, and voila! It's pinned, while linking back to the original source.

The best part about pinterest is, you can repin - so if someone pins something to their board and you love it, you can repin it to your board. The original pinner still gets credit AND the original source link is never lost, so you can repin to your heart's content, knowing you can always get back to the original pinner, or the original source.

Or, if you find another pin that you like, but you don't really want to repin it to one of your boards, you can "like it". Your account will keep track of your likes as well.

You can also comment on people's pins, and use @mentions to draw someone's attention to a specific pin.

Better yet, if you have an etsy shop (and I know a few of you do) you can install an easy "pin it" button next to your etsy items. So then if someone sees something on your shop they love, they can pin it on their board and it's like FREE ADVERTISING.

Seriously, guys. I. Am. Obsessed.

You can request an invite to get started, and once you do, you can make as many pinboards as you want. I currently have 6. Here's a list of mine, with examples of my pins.

Books, Writing and Stuff: Anything to do with the aforementioned title

Home, Garden and Cooking: OMG, guys. I have found THE MOST AWESOME recipes on pinterest - I find anywhere from 2-6 a day. I actually had to stop looking at pins of recipes because I found too many

I'm actually making these potatoes tonight!

Tattoos: A pinboard to highlight all the awesome tattoos out there

Themes I Love: A pinboard specifically for themes I love (for no specific reason), like paths, doors and doorways, eyes etc. Similar to the next board, but with more focus

Inspiration: I use this pinboard to pin things that creatively inspire me and make me want to write a scene or a story. Seriously, sometimes I look at this board or the Themes I Love board and they just hit me in the gut

Awesome Things: Which is kind of a potpourri of "awesome things" I find on the interwebs or on other people's pinboards. Honestly, it's probably my favorite pinboard because it makes me laugh a lot.

If you decide to sign up, you can follow me by clicking on any of my boards. If you do, I'll be sure to follow you back! I'd love to have more pinning friends. You can also find my whole pinterest account by clicking on the little red Pinterest banner on the right hand side of my blog.

Hope to see you there!

Friday Fun

2011-08-19T07:00:00.001-05:00

Hi All! Yvie's back after an extended vacay to once again start your weekend off right - with fun!

Vacation, though, was no big deal for me. It's not like there was a special "dog day" where everyone showered me with gifts and stuff. I mean, they SHOULD have, but they didn't.

Instead, I had to go to the vet because I was peeing so much and now I have to take some pills for a few days. Stoopid infections. Could've been worse, though, I guess. I could've been one of the TWO piggers that had scratches on their eyes and ALSO had to go to the vet. I've been there. No thanks.

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Watch this video. Trust me. It's amazing

In Which Summer Flies By

2011-08-17T07:00:00.004-05:00

So here we are, mid august already. Can you believe it? Where the hell did the summer go?

We're also in the midst of WriteOnCon. Are you participating? I had plans to go cray cray with it this year, but, just like last year, it's kind of poor timing for me. I reeeeeeally want to finish my draft asap (maybe this week) so it's kind of a "do I spend time at the writing conference, or do I like, you know, write?" conundrum for me.

Writing seems to be winning out. Good thing you can rewatch all the live events and stuff.

Writing has also interfered with both my QueryTracker Forum visits AND some of my blog visits. I recently switched up my schedule a bit. I used to read blogs in the morning and write in the afternoon. Now, though, I've flipped that. Writing needs to come first. So, while I get back into the groove of visiting all your blogs, you'll probably see comments from me later in the day. Hopefully the drafting will be done asap and then I can really get back into the interwebs groove of things

I always seem to forget how actually busy I get in the summer, especially once renfest starts. MMMMMM...renfest food...

This is probably a good note for me to remember - don't start a new WIP in the summer. If I need to write, to distract from queries or something, short stories are probably the way to go.

So, how's writing going for you?

In Which I Return

2011-08-15T07:00:00.003-05:00

Well, I'm back! The vacation was actually over last week, it just took me another week to get back to the Internet grind of things.

This post will just be an easing back in, with a list of what I did on vacay. Wednesday's post will be back to more writerly things (also, are we all ready for Write On Con?! I...am? I guess we'll find out later this week)

Anyway, here is a list of things accomplished on vacay (which was actually a staycay, meaning we hit up things to do locally instead of travelling anywhere)

1. Cousin's Wedding
2. Breakfast at Hell's Kitchen
3. Picnic with extended family with kneeboarding and tubing
4. Visit to the Mall of America - hit up Minnesota Sea Life Aquarium
6. Tour of Target Field and lawn bowling at Brit's Pub.
5. Sports Day: Disc Golf, Racquetball, Bowling (I bowled the worst three games OF MY LIFE)
6. Minnesota Zoo
7. Valley Fair (local amusement park)
8. More racquetball, board games.
9. Paintball

Coming up this weekend and next week is the beginning of RenFest and the MN State Fair! I'm going to be bu-sy.

Anything exciting happen over the last two weeks?

In Which I'm On Vacation

2011-07-29T07:00:00.000-05:00

See you in a couple weeks!

from my Pinterest boards

In Which Pepper Returns

2011-07-27T07:00:00.003-05:00

Last year around this time, I posted a a garden update Here and in the update I had a picture of snakeskin as proof of the garter snake living in our flower garden.

Here's the pic. We named him Pepper, because he spices up our lives.

Well, I was just thinking earlier this week about how I missed Pepper hiding in our yard, when, low and behold, what did Brother find mucnhing on a toad in the flower garden?

Pepper!!

His eyes are milky blue, which means if we keep out eyes open, we'll probably have another snake skin hanging out in the lawn before long.

He actually let me take quite a few pictures of him, once I sat down and stopped moving. I resisted the urge to pet him and instead just held the camera a few inches away to snap some photos.

I feel bad for the toady that Pepper scarffed up, especially since it could've been one of the toads we saved from the egress window a few days ago, but Pepper's welcome to stay as long as he wants.

Also, a reminder that I am officially on vacay, and probably won't be back to the blog for about two weeks. See you when I get back!

In Which I Heart Storypeople

2011-07-25T07:00:00.001-05:00

So, as briefly mentioned last Friday, I will be going on vacation beginning Friday for 10 days. And I am totally checked out. I'm still trying to get some writing in, but man, trying to come up with a blog post when you don't want to do ANYTHING is a bitch.

Anyway, are you guys familiar with Brian Andreas's Storypeople? No? Well you should definitely check it out. I've been a fan for years. YEARS and keep a list of my favorite ones.

It's hard to really explain storypeople, but they're little stories, each one a few sentences or less, and they're just awesome.

You can also get them as sculptures, furniture and prints (I have a print in my room of Bittersweet, listed below)

Some of my favorites are:

Bittersweet - "She said she usually cried at least once each day not because she was sad, but because the world was so beautiful & life was so short."

Raspberry Patch - "My great-grandmother sent us out to pick raspberries in her garden while she watched the first moon walk on TV. You'll have plenty of time to see things like that, she said, but those raspberries were carried overland by your great-great-grandfather. She was very wise. I see pictures of the moon walk all the time, but all I have left from him is the memory of those sun-warmed raspberries."

Enough Time - "Everything changed the day she figured out there was exactly enough time for the important things in her life."

Confusion - "It took me a long time, she said, to stop confusing safety with love."

Duty - "My great uncle shot & killed his own brother for disturbing the peace & I wonder if anyone ever tried to quiet his deep deep sorrow. Duty isn't consolation enough."

Mr. Right - "He loved her for almost everything she was & she decided that was enough to let him stay for a very long time."

No Difference - "There was a boy with skin as dark as the earth & a girl with eyes as blue as the deep & they loved each other so well that people could not tell them apart, for in their hearts, there was no difference between them."

Pillar of Flame - "One summer night, we took my parents' grill & we put in some sticks & paper & soaked the whole thing in lighter fluid & then my friend turned on his shortwave radio & we listened to some scientist in Houston who was saying where Apollo was at that moment & at the exact time it went over us, we lit the stuff in the grill so the astronauts would look out & see this light & they'd say 'What the hell is that?' & we danced around the pillar of flame & sparks laughing wildly because while the astronauts were out there unlocking the mysteries of the universe, we were back home in Chicago making more of them."

Untitled - "Reality is bigger than all of us, he said, but it still gets a lot smaller right before I go in to work"

Take a look when you have a chance!

.

Friday Fun

2011-07-22T07:00:00.009-05:00

Greetings ape-friends! Yvie's back to fire you burning hot into the weekend! Ka-pow!

Now, I know we've talked about the egress window of doom on this blog before and the things we find in it. Two examples Here and Here (the second link was my favorite thing)

Well, the other night, Mom crawled into the egress window again, with the bucket, and this is what she and Anne pulled out:

11 of them! And once again, Mom didn't let me eat any. Sigh. Since my Mom's no fun, I'll just have to spread some for you!

First though, a warning about the below video:

Now, I'm a dog so I don't get too scared about things. One time, though, I got super scared. At our old home I went outside one day and I found a little girl. Except she wasn't really a little girl. She was flat and fluttered in the wind. Mom tried to explain to me that it was "just a dora the explorer doll stroller" but I knew she was a liar. That thing was a monster.

I tell you this story only to prepare you for the frightening thing in the following video. YOU. HAVE. BEEN. WARNED.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Finally, just a heads up. Starting Next Friday, the blog will be on hiatus for a little over a week due to a family vacay. Mom will blog Monday and Wednesday next week, but I won't see you back here until three weeks. Have a great summer ape-friends!

In Which I Provide An Update

2011-07-20T07:00:00.001-05:00

So it's been awhile since I've given an update on my goals and junk and today seemed like a good day to do so.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

I'm still querying Glimpse, though I've decided to take a bit of a break to make a change in the MS, then get back on the query horse. I'm hoping things will be back on track by the end of august (assuming amazing things don't happen before then and I get an offer or something. ohmygodcouldyouimagine?!)

I'm in the midst of my first draft of Break Free, and I'm totally loving it. I had a bit of a rough time with it the last week and a half, a combination of a tough couple of scenes to organize and write combined with a ticking personal deadline and a busy dayjob, but I think I've managed to power through the worst of it. I hit 50k earlier this week and suspect I may have hit or passed the half way point of the story. I won't know for sure, though, until its done. Just because I'm a plotter, doesn't mean there's no mystery. There's tons of mystery!

My current goals are to try and finish the first draft of Break Free by August. I don't know if I'll hit this goal (part of the reason I was having troubles with the writing) but I'm still going to try. Once I do finish the first draft, I plan to put it aside and make the change on Glimpse. Once that's done I'll send Glimpse back into query waters and start to revise Break Free. I was really hoping to be able to finish revisions on Break Free before NaNo, but the clock is ticking and I don't think that will be possible. I still have plans to participate in NaNo, at least right now I do, but we'll see how things are going closer to November.

I'm behind on my goal to read 55 books this year. Not too far behind, (by the end of July I should have 32 read and I'm at about 28, 29) but still. It's no big deal if I don't make this goal. It's just for fun.

So how about you? I want to know where you're at with your writing goals? TELL ME!

In Which I Wrap Up

2011-07-18T07:00:00.002-05:00

This will be the last post regarding the 4th Street Fantasy Conference Hannah and I hit a few weeks ago. There's no real rhyme or reason to this post, I'm just going to list remaining quotes or comments I wrote down made by the authors at the conference. They're all interesting but weren't strong enough for a whole blog post (or I just got lazy. Probably both)

Patricia C Wrede - She suggested that as an author, you should really hire an accountant to help out with the taxes and junk. She doesn't have one, but that's only because she was an accountant until she could support herself with her writing

Elizabeth Bear - "Nobody with a clean house ever wrote a book"

Patricia C Wrede - "There's only 2 rules to writing. You have to write and what you write has to work"

Lois McMaster Bujold & Steve Brust - both touched on the term Burn Story, which meant writing through the story points as fast as possible, trusting you'll come up with more.

Steve Brust - in regards to Burn Story - "If you're saving something (a plot point, etc) for later, you won't come up with something new"

Elizabeth Bear - "Writing is too hard to do well, which is why we have to do it in stages with revision"

Sherwood Smith - In regards to derivativeness of Eragon and Christopher Paolini - It's possible the people who published Eragon did so purely for financial reasons and the money, but we mustn't forget that Christopher Paolini wrote Eragon out of joy, because he loved those aspects of the genre.

Emma Bull - in response to Sherwood Smith's above comment - Joy, though, doesn't necessarily = readable fiction. That's where craft comes in.

And to wrap it up, Elizabeth Bear shared a motto she and her CPs had in regards to getting that agent or book deal - "Right Day, Right Desk, Right Story, Write Better"

Friday Fun

2011-07-15T07:00:00.003-05:00

Yvie's back! Are you ready for the weekend? I know it's like harry potter weekend or something, but there's never enough screen time for fang.

Anyway, I’ve decided to change the name for a "Walk" again. Yes I know, previously I had changed it from a "Walk" to a "Run" and I taught all you how to jerk on your leashes etc. But to be honest, my Runs ended when Mom and Anne bought the Easy Walk Harness for me. Don’t get me wrong, I still dash about, but with less force than before, due to the harness.

But anyway, that was in the past. I have decided to rename the Walk again – it will now be known as the Buffet.

That’s right. Because, seriously, what do I spend most my time doing when I go on a Buffet? That’s right, eating stuff. I start off with the long grass by the driveway. I check out all the pebbles to make sure they’re not edible – I eat more grass across the street, then I start to scarf down worms. Form there I transition to bugs on the sidewalk, maybe some garbage (once there was melted ice cream) and of course, the ubiquitous goose poop.

Once in the woods I move on to sticks or leaves.

Honestly, pretty much anything can be eaten if you can put it in your mouth.
So next time you go on a Buffet, eat up! Who are we to turn down a free meal?

Onto the fun!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!