Counting Our Blessings and Joys

FRIDAY FREE-FOR-ALL
It's been a busy week.  It's been a crazy week.  It began with waking to snow on Monday morning, after a weekend of beautiful, but windy, Spring weather.  Temps in the low 80s were a blessed relief from the colder temps.  I was finally thawing!

Because my youngest granddaughter would soon be arriving for me to take her to Pre-K, but I couldn't find the ice scraper (the snow had obviously started as freezing rain), I used my fingers and fingernails to clear the snow and ice from my windshield.  Not a smart move.  Ten minutes later, my fingertips were so cold that I couldn't feel anything except the burning.  A bit of frostbite?  Maybe, and it took until the next day before they felt close to normal.  Lesson learned?  Yes.

Tuesday was Tax Day, and my focus all day was on that.  My taxes were filed and the first of quarterlies were sent.  But before I knew it, the day was over, and I went to sleep exhausted.  Mental work is exhausting!  Add my tendency to be math-challenged, and...  You get the picture.

Wednesday was spent catching up on what didn't get done on Tuesday.  It also brought a bright spot I nearly missed, if it hadn't been for an email.  My critique group met, and three of us shared our writing, and our thoughts (and complaints and woes) on writing.  To help one of our group, who hasn't been writing as much as she should, we decided that meeting every two weeks wasn't enough, and we'd be meeting weekly, at least for a while.  To be honest, it's as much for us as it is for her.  We all often need a push to do the things we've been putting off.  I'm certainly guilty of that.  The bonus of this is seeing friends more often.  Aha!  A blessing!

Then along came Thursday, and another day was gone before I knew it, and now Friday is here.  I ask myself what I've accomplished this week.  On the surface, it doesn't seem like much--except for those taxes finally getting done.  But looking back, I've been reading more than usual.  More non-fiction than fiction.  I've been learning...about myself, who I am, and how to make life better.  By better, I mean more positive than negative.

It seems that too many days go by without memory of what happened.  Nose to the grindstone sometimes means not seeing or experiencing the small joys in life.  And once that happens, we lose ourselves, seeing only the negative things or simply being relieved that we made it through another day without disaster striking in one form or another.

We all struggle with something.  I've been allowing myself the pleasure of reading, done while waiting for grandkids to be released from school and less than an hour before my go-to-sleep ritual.  I'm learning how to deal with things I struggle with.  I'm learning that I'm important.  I'm learning to focus on the good things and expect those struggles to right themselves, if only by turning some of them to blessings.

There are many joys in life.  Sometimes we forget to notice them.  The opportunity to read is one of mine.  Like the little girl in the image above, I've been a reader all my life.  As an adult, it's been my go-to reward, many times. It's also a gentle reminder that time spent reading is a blessing for my soul.  It lifts me up, takes me to places I've never known, and expands my understanding.

If you haven't given yourself the gift of reading lately, pick up a book and start reading.  Even if it's only for a few minutes, it's a blessing.  Blessings are our Joy.

What blessings have appeared in your life lately?  What has brought you joy?

Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself, and know that everything in life has purpose. There are no mistakes, no coincidences, all events are blessings given to us to learn from. ~ Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Another Step Back

1915 Library

I honestly can't remember a time when I didn't read.  I don't necessarily mean literally read.  My much younger days, even before learning the alphabet, included a large stack of Little Golden Books.  Although I only have a couple of them left, I remember the drawings in them, if not the words.

But it wasn't only those cardboard and colorful children's books I read.  There were trips to the library.

The other evening, a friend and I were talking about the big library downtown.  She never went as a child.  I went quite often.  I loved going to the library.  Not only for the books, but because of the atmosphere.  Walking up the stone steps to the door always gave me a flash of excitement.  Stepping through the door, the scent of books, the sound of footsteps on the marble floor, and the sight of the John Brown mural would come together to remind me that, once again, I'd be finding a story that would take me into another world or make me live as another person.

Library reference desk

In 1876, local business owners funded the establishment of the library. It became a Carnegie library in 1912.

Inside the doors and ahead was the main section of the library, with its hexagonal reference desk.  To the right, marble slab steps led up to my destination, the children's room.  As I climbed them,  my footsteps echoed in my ears.  "Whisper," my mother would remind me, as we reached the top.

Children's room

I don't remember all the tables and chairs in the children's room.  What I remember were the rows and rows of bookshelves that filled the room.  I knew exactly where to find the books I wanted to read.

My favorites.

In first grade, I read both of them, while sitting at home with the mumps at Christmas. 

 And let's not forget the Bookmobile that brought new books to our schools and offered us more to read than what our small, school libraries could contain.

To move the thousands and thousands of books from the original library, students formed a brigade, passing the books to the new library across the street..  Novel idea, isn't it?

In the summer, we take my grandkids to one of the branch libraries and participate in the summer reading program.  It's nice there and has a fairly large children's area. If only we could teach the four of them what QUIET means, we'd have it made!

I miss the old library.  It sat empty for several years, but is now occupied by a financial group.  I don't think I'll miss the current library nearly as much, if at all, when an even newer library is built on the river bank.  Although the opening date for that was in 2012, I'm not even sure ground has been broken.  That library promises to be even bigger and better.  For me, it own't have the memories the old one still does.  Isn't that the way it always is?

Take care of all your memories. For you cannot relive them. ~ Bob Dylan

Old Man Winter Brings a Hodgepodge of Thoughts

The weather yesterday was beautiful!  62 degrees.  Not bad at all for late January.  And then evening came and so did the cold front, sending 60 mph winds through the area.  Today's high?  24, and I'd bet that lasted the few minutes it took for the weather guys to chart it, then dropped again.

It's been a weird winter for everyone, what with polar vortexes and snow in places that rarely see snow.  Last year, we were hit with a snowstorm that dumped 20 inches in our area.  A record, for sure.  I've seen a foot or a little more a few times, but 20 inches?  That's crazy!

With two more months of winter--we have our biggest snows in March--I shudder to think what else we'll get to deal with.  Then I shudder with the cold from what we have in the present.

I spent most of the weekend writing, trying to catch up on days I wasn't able to write during the weeks before.  My total for our first BIAW this month was 82 pages.  I chart that, and even my mouth dropped open when I saw my word total for so far this month.  Last January my total word count amounted to zero.  With a goal of 200,000 words for the year in 2013, I wondered if my expectations might have been too high.  But things have a way of pushing us, and I finished with more than my goal.  Some of that was need, some of that was determination, and the rest is just plain being stubborn.

Today brought line edits for the next to last Desperation book.  With a February 24th deadline, I don't get to lay around and watch TV.  In fact, what little TV I usually watch has dwindled to very little.  I like to watch TV.  I used to do a lot of it.  I was once a soap opera junkie.  General Hospital was my drug of choice.  I'd watched it for so long, I could remember the original characters from the early days.  Not necessarily by choice.  My mother was a soap opera junkie, too.  But one day I realized what a waste of time it was and I quit.  Cold turkey.  I set a date.  Felicia and Frisco's wedding.  I'd watch that, then no more.  Amazing, even to me, I stuck to it.  I haven't gotten hooked yet.  Strange, but I've never missed it.

We all have our passions.  Reading has always been mine.  Sad to say, but time for reading has shrunk to very little over the past couple of years.  I pat myself on the back for reading Stephen King's 11/22/63 last fall.  With over 800 pages, it took a while, and most of it I read in bits and pieces.  Considering the length, should I count that as at least two books?  I think so!  I'm currently reading, although it's slow going.  I work until midnight, sometimes later, then read a little before turning out the light.  When I realize I've just read the same sentence or paragraph more times than I can remember, I put it away.  I'm currently reading a book I'd wanted for some time, found it discounted on Amazon last week, and grabbed it.  It's slow going.  Not because it's not a good book, but because of the lack of time to read.  No doubt I'll finish.  I have to know if the main character's son is the murderer.

But tonight is Castle, so I'll enjoy an hour of it, then go back to the keyboard and see if my characters will behave or at least talk to me.  Yes, those voices in my head are real. ;)  At least I'm never alone.

Winter is nature's way of saying, 'Up yours.' ~ Robert Byrne

The Power of Turning Points

WRITING WEDNESDAYS

Recently I blogged about how to cure sagging middles (the writing kind!) by using main turning points.  From experience, I know that the words "turning points" can strike fear in the heart of many writers.  I've been there.  I overcame the fear.  And I'm going to share how anyone can, too.

The first thing to learning how to use a turning point is to understand what it is.  Simply put, a turning point is a place/point in a story (often an event) where the plot takes a new (sometimes unexpected) direction.  

Besides the main turning point that usually occurs in the middle of the story, there are others, and they are just as important in keeping the story moving along and interesting to the reader as the main turning point is.

Back in July, I blogged about Growing the Story.  That blog post included the 8 Plot Points of a story and the storyboard I use to keep me on track during pre-writing (plotting or just thinking ahead) and writing.  Let's take another look.

1. Opening
2. Inciting Incident
3. Turning Points (1 or 2)
4. Main Turning Point
5. Black Moment
6. Sacrifice
7. Resolution
8. HEA

In a romance, a turning point will be something that happens (external) that brings about a new emotional (internal) direction.  Sometimes it's something that will push the hero and heroine together, when one or neither wants it to happen.

FAMILY BY DESIGN

Christmas is looking bleak for Becca Tyler and her three young children. Money is tight for this single mom, and the house where they live has been sold to a new owner, meaning they must move. Throw in an encounter with the guy Becca heartlessly dumped in high school, and not only Christmas but life seems to be handing out lemons.

First Turning Point
 Nick, the new owner and the guy Becca dumped in high school, learns he's the cause of her predicament and offers her a job.

Why?  Nick's secretary quits, and although Nick might be able to ignore that Becca may not have a home to live in, her three children make the difference.  They'll be working together on a daily basis, not exactly what a man wants to do with the woman who spurned him in the past.


THE MAVERICK'S REWARD

It's been almost twenty years since Tucker O'Brien left the Rocking O Ranch at the age of fifteen, and the only reason he's returned, physically and emotionally scarred, is to get to know the son he never knew he had. But once Shawn graduates from high school, Tucker plans to leave...until he meets Paige Miles, Desperation's new doctor, who forces him to take an honest look at himself and makes him want to risk becoming the man he's always wanted to be.

First Turning Point
Tucker relents and tells Paige he'll do Physical Therapy, but only if she's his therapist.

Why?  Tucker recognizes that he doesn't have a choice about doing the PT, and there's no one close who can oversee it but Paige. They may be seeing each other often because of it, but he's sure she's as much against getting involved in any other way than she is.


Two of the best places to watch for turning points are TV shows and movies.  I can almost set my watch to Criminal Minds.  The main turning point--where information learned makes a big change in who the unsub (unknown subject) might be, and they're off in a new direction of finding him--comes at the half hour, just before the commercial.  There's another turning point near the 3/4 of an hour mark, when they know who the unsub is and they go after him.  They were in a rut during last season when quite often this TP is a rush to a house with their guns drawn and vests on, only to find that the house is empty.  A good reminder to vary your turning points!  Author Elizabeth Sinclair loves the movie The American President and uses it to help teach plotting.  One of these days, I'm going to watch it! ☺

Whether you use television, movies or books, try to watch for those moments when something happens that changes the direction of the story or even changes the way a character sees things in a different way (an AHA! moment).

Using turning points throughout your story will strengthen it, earn the attention of editors, and cause readers to never want to put down the book.

Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way. - E. L. Doctorow

Accepting the Subjective Truth

MOTIVATION MONDAYS

What does a picture of shelves and shelves of books have to do with accepting the truth?  The answer is: A lot.  Or even more specifically:  A lot of books.

A fellow writer in our local writers group replied to another writer's email about contest scores with a legitimate statement.  "So much of this business is personal taste."

Let me first say that the second writer's scores were very good.  All four of the scores were in the top 25% of the total.  That's nothing to feel bad about, and she should feel very proud.

Now look at that photo on the left and imagine a huge room filled with those shelves.  Some of those books are newer than others, but they're all books.  At some point in time, they're all read by someone.  Some are read more than others.

Which brings us back to the comment about so much of this business being personal taste.  That sentence, that statement, begs the question of how much of any business--or product--is personal taste.  My answer to the question (and it's subjective aka personal opinion aka personal taste) is probably about 99.something%.

Instead of diving into this strange percentage and reason for it, let's take a look at some current publishing stats.  (This information and much, much more on publishing and books can be found at http://parapublishing.com/sites/para/resources/statistics.cfm.  It's definitely worth reading through it all.)

What genres/categories are people buying?

55% Popular fiction
10% Religious nonfiction
9% Cooking/Crafts
--2001 Consumer Research Study on Book Purchasing by the Book Industry Study Group, http://www.bisg.org

It's obvious that popular fiction is currently, well, the most popular.  Don't stop there, though.  Break that down into genres, and things get a little more into popularity, who likes what, and...wait for it...personal taste.

In romance alone, there are enough genres and subgenres to make a readers head spin.  For instance, Romance Writers of America (RWA) lists nine (9) subgenres.  They are:

• Contemporary Series Romance
• Contemporary Single Title Romance
• Historical Romance
• Inspirational Romance
• Novels with Strong Romantic Elements
• Paranormal Romance
• Regency Romance
• Romantic Suspense
• Young Adult Romance

If you're a romance reader or writer, you know that the above is only the tip of the iceberg.  There are mixes of subgenres, such as Young Adult Historical Romance, Inspirational Suspense Romance, and Paranormal Romance, all of which include many sub-subgenres.  There are Time-Travel Romances, Futuristic, Fantasy, Western Historical, Western Contemporary, Medieval, Scottish Historical, English Historical, Chick-Lit, Romantic Comedy...  Yeah, you get the picture.

So why all the genres, subgenres and sub-subgenres?  Personal Taste.  And that personal taste thing goes for writers and readers.

While I've read quite a few of those sub and sub-subs, and considering the fact that I cut my (romance reading) teeth on Regency Romance (Georgette Heyer, to be specific), I wouldn't even begin to try to write it or all of those subs and sub-subs.  Or even half of them.  Anyone who might try to write so many would probably be wasting his/her time, not to mention going slowly insane with all the research and details.  We each have our strengths and our weaknesses.  It's wisest, especially when first starting out, to choose the two that feel the most comfortable.

Apples and oranges and broccoli and cauliflower

Back to accepting the subjective truth.  Fact is, most things in life are subjective.  In other words, most things in life are affected and chosen by personal taste.  We choose the books we read by which genres and subgenres we like, by the authors who write them, and other individual likes and dislikes.  A particular cover might catch our fancy.  Or the blurb on the back.  Or something a friend mentioned about a book.  Or even the fact that it's on sale or free. ;)

Not only do are the books we read chosen by our individual and personal taste, but so are the TV shows we watch, the movies we go to, the music we listen to, the clothes we wear, the things we do in our spare time, and...the food we eat.

I like black.  Two of my daughters like purple.  One likes pink.  Someone out there likes orange.  Or green. Or yellow.

Except for math and most of science, everything is personal taste.  Everything is SUBJECTIVE.  For me, even math and science are subjective, because since sixth grade, I've hated math and science. ☺  And to think that when I was in fifth grade, I wanted to be a research scientist when I grew up.  I even had my own microscope.


SUBJECTIVITY AND MOTIVATION

There are genres of fiction that I would probably never choose to read, much less write.  That doesn't mean they aren't good.  It means they aren't among my personal tastes.

Not everyone who reads or even everyone who reads fiction or this genre or that genre will choose to write.  But if you do choose to write, begin with the old adage of write what you know and especially what you like.  If you're not writing what you enjoy, you're losing out on two things:  (1)The prime motivation for writing aka the reason we all dipped our toe in this crazy business and (2) the joy of doing it.

When it comes to personal taste, a writer chooses what kind of story to write.  In other words, a writer is as subjective as the people who will or won't read that writer's books.

There's more to this subjective thing, such as contest judges, agents, editors, readers and more, so next week we'll focus on those and how they do and don't affect our motivation and what we choose to write.  Stop back next Monday for More Subjective Truth. :)

Most beginning writers (and I was the same) are like chefs trying to cook great dishes that they've never tasted themselves. How can you make a great (or even an adequate) bouillabaisse if you've never had any? If you don't really understand why people read mysteries (or romances or literary novels or thrillers or whatever), then there's no way in the world you're going to write one that anyone wants to publish. (This is the meaning of the well-known expression "Write what you know.") - Daniel Quinn

The End of an Era

Although I've only read the first book, my youngest daughter has read them all--at least once.  She's also made sure I went to see the movies.  And we certainly wouldn't miss having all of the DVDs, except this last one. Of course it will join the other seven on our DVD shelf as soon as it's released.

Thinking we were going to see HP 7.2 on the nation's largest IMAX screen in 2D last week (3D gives me a headache), we discovered we'd read the online theater schedule wrong and had to see it in a regular, non-IMAX theater.  Even so, I still forked over $17 for tickets.  (Lucky me.  I got a discount.)   No popcorn, drinks or goodies.  Yes, I'm cheap.  I go to the theater to see a movie twice in a good year, and usually after it's played out at the more expensive theaters.  Being the first in town (or even my family) to see a movie is not my main goal in life.

After sitting through the trailers of the coming soons and the first fifteen mnutes of HP, I was eternally grateful we weren't able to see it in IMAX in any kind of D.  It was by far real enough on a regular screen.

Was it good?  Oh, my, yes!!  Even for someone who has only read that first book.  Although I have to mention that Brits tend to mumble, so I have to listen extra closely.  Or maybe my hearing is going with the rest of me...downhill.

Anyway, I won't give any spoilers, but for someone who didn't know how it was going to turn out, as readers of the books did, it had me in tears more than once.  I'm waiting to see it again in the cheap seats theater ($3 tickets) with my oldest granddaughter, who was disappointed we didn't take her along with us.  And we'll have the DVD later, so we can look forward to haveing a complete Harry Potter marathon.  I can't wait!

J.K. Rowland did a super job of storytelling!  My only question to her would be to know if what showed on the screen in the movies--the cinematography and special effects--were what she saw in her mind as she wrote.

In one word:  FANTASTIC

Defining Romance

"There wasn't enough romance."

Romance is all about love.  But what is it that shows or represents the romance?  Do each of us as writers or readers have our own expectations, completely different than those of others?  Are there general things that characters do or say that tells us there is a romantic link between these two people or are those things specific to each of us?


As romance writers and readers, we should be able to easily define romance or give examples.  So speak up and share your thoughts on romance.

As a reader, what, for you, shows romance in the making between two characters?

As a writer, how do you show romance between two characters who are in conflict with each other?