Story Leads

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about story leads and the advice everyone dishes out, "write what you know." Except, you might ask how someone could possibly know about space invasions and after death experiences since today's writer couldn't possibly have those experiences.

Here's the scoop: any story, whether it's set on earth or another planet, in the past or the present, or in your own home town has something that relates to the human experience. A good story pulls on the heart strings, tantalizes the senses, and pulls from core human emotion. Basically, if you can find something from your life that another person could relate to (whether he experienced it or not), you can use it to build the foundation for a story.

Great places to get ideas for stories:

1. the news
2. conversations you may overhear
3. life experiences
4. dreams

Now go plant a story seed and see what sprouts.

Sleepless in Rochester

Family Stuff
The kids are home and going a little stir crazy with all the wet weather we've been getting. In order to squeeze some editing in during the day, I've allowed them to have zombie time, watching TV and playing video games. But seriously, I did have bigger plans for the week.


Monday, we traveled out to Hope Farm to meet with a couple former classmates from the UofR. The kids loved meeting all the animals: the alpacas, horses, chickens, ducks, cats, and a very woolly dog. We planned a summer get together for fellow sci-fi enthusiasts from our college days. It should be fun.


Writing
I'm still on task to finish my current WIP before May. All three of my critique groups have been very encouraging.


Editing
Two of the books I've edited for Double Dragon Publications are now available as ebooks: YVEN by Jessica McHugh and UNFAMILIAR CHRONICLES by Patrick Welch.


In July, MuseItUp Publishing will be releasing another novel I'm currently editing a science fiction/thriller, SPECTRA by Joanne Elder. In memory of her father, a World War II veteran, Joanne is donating fifty percent of all her author royalties to Alzheimer's research. 


In August, MUIP will release a historical romance, REMY by Tricia McGill.

Woo hoo!

I've had several woo hoos in the past week.

Writing:
I've entered a pact with one of my local writing groups. We vowed to finish writing our current WIPs by April 2011. All three of us are working on YA novels. Two of us are writing dystopian futures and the other critique member is writing a fantasy.


Illustration:
I'm continuing to study children's illustration. My current effort: studying individual illustrators. I'll study their process and design.


I also found out that a local writer/illustrator, Sheila Jarkins, teaches a children's illustration course. I plan to take it.  http://tinyurl.com/2dhs8ky


Job Front:
I recently received an editing job (proofreading fiction manuscripts) for a company that publishes trade and e-books. The best thing about it is that I can: 1) work from home and 2) read (one of my favorite things to do). My first assignment is a fantasy novel. Wish me luck.


Family:
My read-a-holic 10 year old won the Barnes & Noble 39 Clues Summer Reading Program. 
On Wednesday, a representative from Barnes & Noble came to his classroom last Wednesday where she presented my son with a signed set of all of the 39 Clues books and a 39 Clues backpack. He was surprised and very excited about it, so he asked if he could hang onto the books so he could show them to the kids in his class. Unfortunately, one of  his classmates damaged book #10. He doesn't seem to mind as much as I do.

Summer Ho!

Everyone in the family is staying up later. The hubby is staying up till 1am each night, seriously eating into my writing time, and last night he actually let the kids stay up until 11pm. The kids are all out of school, and those of us fortunate to be home with them are scrambling to schedule in “me” time. But how do you do it if you don’t want to pay a babysitter while you write or draw?

Unfortunately, I’m not the kind of person who tolerates the average Joe watching over my shoulder when I draw or write. Believe me, I’ve tried to sketch during my kids' karate lessons, but someone always ends up watching over my shoulder. I’ve tried to read, but there are always one or two very loud parents that yap incessantly. Getting real work done at home while the kids are conscious… rare.

My plan was simple. The town I live in has this great summer play program. You drop the kids off at 8:30am and then pick them up again at 2:30pm. The program has three two-week sessions. I signed my kids up for one session, and I thought I’d sign them up for and additional week in a sports camp. The sports camps cost a little more, and the kids are busy for two to three hours.

Okay, so the hubby vetoed additional camps since we’re also going to Cub Scout Adventure Camp this summer (think lots of $ even though we sold popcorn to lessen the price). I have no hope of writing time then.

What plan to do? I’ll squeeze it in. I can revise with kid prattle as long as it’s not kid fighting, so if they’re occupied I try to steal some time for myself. I’ve started making the kids work on their writing skills. While they are working on their stories, I will be working on mine. We’ll work on the art skills together. 

I’ll let you know how it works.

Productivity or Random Stupidity

Holy Productiveness Batman
I lost most of the evening yesterday because I had fallen asleep before the kids' storytime, but at 11pm I woke up and started working on my never ending "to do" list.

So instead of going to bed like a normal person, I decided to get some stuff done. First, I worked on revising my resume since I'm applying for a professor position at a local community college. Yay me! I believe I have the resume the way I'd like it. I still need to do some more tweaking on the teaching philosophy statement, though.

I fought with my scanner for a couple of hours while it wheezed and protested. I think it's dying. Mid-scan it would freak out and make clicking and buzzing noises. After a while, I found out that it was much happier on a completely flat surface instead of a pile of papers. Who would have known?

I did a little shopping. It wasn't the fun fun type. My older son's class is behind, so I went online to buy one of his textbooks and a few workbooks. Since I was on the education kick, I looked online for more resources for boy #1 and emailed the links to another parent of a 4th grader in a class that is lagging.

Then, I realized boy #2 has a spelling test that he hasn't studied for and frantically searched the house for his word wall words. One hour later (with all the kids papers sorted), I've only found weeks one through ten. I can't imagine they're only on week ten, so I'm hoping this week's words are easy.


Here's the stupidity:
I stayed up all night. I'm more awake than if I had actually slept eight hours, but I'm going to pay for it later.

Oh well...
Since I'm up, I cleaned in the kitchen a bit, ran the dishwasher, and started making picky boy's lunch (that's boy #2). He's getting a burrito and a carrot. Boy #1 is buying (not a picky boy and basically a bottomless pit when it comes to food).

Writerly stuff...
I'm dissecting one of my finished novels... again. .

Blogmania

It seems like almost everyone has a blog, and a lot of people post regularly. I’ve been, um, posting something like once a month. I guess I’m not on the blogmania bandwagon.

I do like to read certain blogs though, but it's difficult to keep up with it all. Here are my favorites for certain topics:

Editor and Agent Advice
Nathan Bransford has lots of great information regarding the submission process, publication, and writing in general.

Jill Corcoran Books has submission advice in addition to industry news.

Tracy Marchini has a lot of great information on her blog too regarding submission and the writing process.

Cheryl Klein not only has great information on her blog, she also has a wealth of information on her website: Talking Books.

Writer Blogs
Writing for Kids While Raising Them

Haunting the Broken Tree

NaNo What?

Well NaNoWriMo was a bust, but there’s always next year, right? Seriously, I don’t work well that way. I still haven’t gotten last year’s NaNo novel in readable shape, though I do believe the story has promise.

What I want to know, is who thought November was a good novel writing month? You have Thanksgiving and other pre-winter holiday activities.