25 Days in the Hole

         Yikes! It's been 25 days since my last post. For those two people who are so desperate for entertainment that you read my blog, here's what happened in the past 25 days:

1. My son went to Norway and came back--safely. (That's him on top of that rock.)  

2. I created a synopsis for my manuscript, and then sent it off (along with the first ten pages) for a critique. On time.

3. I am almost finished with the above-mentioned WIP. Within the next couple of days it will be a WIF (work is finished) instead of a WIP.

4. I've spent the last month with 15 amazing writers-teachers. Sadly, that is about to come to an end.

5. I found a job. A language arts/reading job. A dream job. A job that is sure to make me glad I retired from the public school.

          For those who forgot me over the last 25 days, I understand. But for my two followers, I only have two words:

                     I'm back.

Back... But Just Momentarily

       Yes, I've been gone for a while, and I'm still not ready to return. I've heard tales that I've been off on some tropical island--with cabana boys making sure the margaritas keep comin'--but alas, that is not the reason behind my absence in the blogosphere. (However, if Viggo Mortenesen was willing to wear shorts, go shirtless, and sip blended drinks next to me, I'd move anywhere... even to Jefferson City, Missouri, which is where he used to live when he had already become a movie star. Jefferson City--less than an hour-and-a-half away from me.)

Here is an old photo of my granddaughter.
With her eye peering through the viewfinder,
she's reminding me:  I need to focus on things
and get things accomplished.

      I've been gone for the following reasons:

• Throwing away and giving away and boxing away 16 years worth of teaching stuff took a week. I added to the landfill (I'm sorry) and heaped piles of materials onto several long tables at the school where I left--for good--just a couple of days ago. Hopefully some of my trash will become other teachers' treasures. 
• Retirement has resulted in some emotional vacillations that I wasn't prepared for.
• I'm busy preparing to teach the writing class I've taught for the last two summers which begins soon. It's an intense, four week, five days a week (all day) 6-credit graduate class. I'll be teaching teachers how to get back in touch with themselves as writers--if they've gotten out of touch--along with teaching them how to teach writing more effectively. (It's work, but it's work I love doing.)
• I'm in the process of preparing a resume' (something I haven't done in over 17 years). If anyone knows of a wonderful teaching job in a private school in St. Louis or a public/private school in Illinois and can drop it right into my lap, I'd appreciate it. Seriously.
• My freelancing work (not really freelancing--I'm talkin' 'bout Chicken Soup stories) has been occupying my spare time
• along with my bigger, more important WIP, which I've fretted over but have not worked on
• and a wonderful book, The Fireman by Joe, has keep me intoxicated. (Joe Hill! He's got a new book out. This one is not as creepy as NOS4A2, but the plot is keeping me flying through the 700+ pages.)
• And I'm still feeling high over the film festival my students created. Their digital stories about Ferguson and their home were incredibly powerful. If I can get permission to share a couple of them, I will. They were that good.

     So, for Lisa Ricard Claro and the other two people who occasionally read this blog, I will return (much to your future dismay). It might be sooner or later... but I won't be gone forever.

Things Are Not Always As They Seem

          This post was inspired by a comment made by Donna Volkenannt and button. And both Donna and the button are wrong.

           Donna said something like, "A third draft! How impressive," when I posted about my WIP that might never get finished. She probably--and understandably so--is thinking I wrote a complete first draft, let it sit, gave it some thought, and then wrote a second draft.  After that, I let friends read it, let it sit even longer, and wrote a third one. Here's how it really went down:

• I wrote a 1st draft for a NaNoWriMo several years ago. Just like a dog will poop and then run away from the spot where they left the stinky pile, I ran away from that draft as fast as I could. It smelled horribly.

• I wrote a 2nd draft... almost. It's not quite finished, but it's getting close.

• Now I toggle back and forth between finishing the beast and revising. When I finish it, I'll have to print it up (I can't revise by looking at the monitor) and do some methodical checking. 

       So no, Donna. It's not a 3rd draft. It's more like 1.75 draft right now.  Things are not always as they seem.

         It's like the button my husband has from work. It says, "I'm cool. Are you?" When I first spied this button, I wanted to snag it for my own. Bu then I remembered what "cool" means:  country of origin label.

          Now, I'm not quite so rabid about the button.

          To finish up, a bit of La Petite Prince. 

Here is a hat.

Or is it?

When you look a bit more carefully, you can see it's not
a hat. It's a picture of a snake that's swallowed an elephant.

What have you been surprised about lately... something that was not what you originally thought...

Back-of-the-Book Blurb # 14

      Perhaps you're not one of the hundreds of three people who've participated in this book blurb stuff. Maybe you're wondering what I'm talking about... If that's the case, read about how you join in the fun and find out exactly what it is:

• Every Friday a pic is posted. The pic is meant to be the front cover of a book. Your book. You choose what kind of book it is. You choose the title. And you write the blurb.
• What kind of book could it be? Chick lit? A historical novel? A mystery? You choose the genre.
• The blurb? A blurb is that text on the book cover (often on the back) that is crafted to lure the reader, making it impossible for them to resist buying the book. It's engaging... and short, so being brief is key. For this challenge, your blurb should be 150 words or less.
• After you write your blurb, post it, along with the photo, on your blog, and link it to this post via Mr. Linky (which is quite simple to do--even my not-very-bright golden retriever can do it). You can also check out the other blurbs--there will hopefully be at least one other one besides mine that you can check out. 

       If you enjoy reading them/writing them, you should check out Lisa Ricard Claro's website. She's the writer who first had this idea several years ago but got too busy with a 3-novel publishing deal, and had to give up the book blurb activity. You could write a gushing email, thanking her for inspiring someone else to take up where she left off but if you do, you won't 

get a response. * Right at this moment, Lisa's cooling her heels in a jail cell, awaiting trial. What crime is she accused of? The authorities claim she did something horrendous... but something that every true writer has dreamed of doing. 

      Witnesses say that almost two months ago, Lisa assaulted James Patterson. Oh, she attempted to reason with him, during a book signing of all things, before she went completely over the edge. Hundreds of audience members heard Lisa shriek things like, "You aren't a writer," "What kind of writer just writes the outlines and lets dozens of other people actually write the book?" and "You ain't no writer! You're a fraud!" When Patterson just smiled at her and continued signing books (while one of his lackeys sat under the table, using Patterson's one paragraph "outline" to churn out yet another Patterson best-seller), Lisa took a book bag--full of all the drafts of her novels Love Built to Last, Love to Believe and Love to Win (with all the drafts together, the bag weighed 57 pounds) and she started swinging it at his head, as if she were a human windmill. 

      Patterson was taken by ambulance to an unnamed hospital. He was later released after getting stitched up. Thankfully for his fans, his check-signing hand sustained no injuries. 

      Enough. On with the blurb, that goes with this photo:

Fishin' For Love

      Hector used to be a construction worker. But when the construction business went bust, Hector had to humiliate himself and collect unemployment checks. His wife left. His pride disappeared. Hector was a broken man.

        Having nothing else to do with his days, he started fishing. The act of casting out his line and sitting patiently, waiting... well, it calmed Hector down.

        And then one day, a woman and her little girl came walking by. The little girl rushed over and started asking Hector a string of questions. He smiled as the young mother tried to apologize for the intrusion, as she tried to distract her curious daughter and get her to leave this nice man alone.

        Fishin' For Love tells the story of how many times he cast his line, how many times Celeste avoided the bait, and if in the end, they both became hooked... (147 words)

    Here is the photo for next week, if you'd like to try and work ahead:

*Lisa is unfailingly kind and generous, so she wouldn't not respond because she's rude. However, people in jail cells don't get an overabundance of paper or access to computers, so her hands are tied--almost literally. 

Bring Along Your Best Weapons...Plus a Giveaway

        On Saturday I went to the St. Louis Listen to Your Mother show. Two writer friends were performing. Little did I know that a breathy, unknown-to-me storyteller would make me cry.

         She brought to the stage her best ammunition:  her story. It was told honestly and simply, and chronicled getting a lung transplant from a young man named Kyle.

         On Sunday I found a copy of one of my favorite books, George R. R. Martin's Fevre Dream. I found it at my favorite bookstore, Half Price Books (the Delmar one, baby--the fifth-largest one in the country!). It made me think of the battle that takes place in this novel (which is soooo much shorter than his G o T books).

        If I tell you there are vampires  in this book, don't be instantly dismissive. I don't read Anne Rice's novels (although perhaps I should). I definitely never did the Twilight books. Fevre Dream does have a vampire as a main character, but the story is so much more than thirsting after blood. It's the riverboat trade, indigo plantations, and a friendship between a riverboat captain and vampire.

        I'm currently working (yes, still) on my WIP that's affectionately called my NIP (nightmare in progress). I hope I'm bringing my best ammo when I sit in front of my laptop. There's a part in Pat Conroy's South of Broad that brought my first-of-several epiphanies while working on this female-dog of a project. I thought I knew exactly where it was in Conroy's novel, I thought I noted the page number somewhere, I thought I remembered it clearly enough to mirror one single Conroy-crafted remark in my manuscript...

       But apparently not, because now I've resigned myself to rereading the book and putting the page number on a billboard--'cause I don't want to prove true the "third time's a charm" phrase.

       I began this piece of writing with several for-sures. I knew for sure who the main characters were--the WWWPs. I knew for sure how it would end. And in the writing, things have changed. The characters have become fictionalized, and the ending is not what I was planning on.

       It seems the characters are in the driver's seat, not me. 

        If you tell me what is your best weapon as a writer (you can interpret that any way you want), your name will be put into a hat (a literal one; I don't know how to do those random-whatevers) for a copy of Fevre Dream. I'll draw names at the end of the month.

Back-of-the-Book Blurb Friday # 13

photo by morguefile.org

        What is this book blurb stuff? Well, I'm glad you asked...

• Every Friday a pic is posted. The pic is meant to be the front cover of a book. Your book. You choose what kind of book it is. You choose the title. And you write the blurb.
• What kind of book could it be? Chick lit? Lit-tra-chure? A Harlequin romance (shudder)?
• The blurb? A blurb is that text on the book cover (often on the back) that is crafted to lure the reader, making it impossible for them to resist buying the book. It's engaging... and short, so being brief is key. For this challenge, your blurb should be 150 words or less.
• After you write your blurb, post it, along with the photo, on your blog, and link it to this post via Mr. Linky (which is quite simple to do--even my not-very-bright golden retriever can do it). You can also check out the other blurbs--there will be hundreds dozens a few hopefully at least one--and comment on them it.
•  If you enjoy reading them/writing them, you should check out Lisa Ricard Claro's website. She was the writer who first had this idea several years ago. Unfortunately (for us, but fortunately for her) she got too busy and had to leave it by the wayside. You could thank her but when you don't hear from her, don't think she's rude or snobby. Lisa's swamped right now. She has the third romance in her series coming out in July (she got a three-book publishing deal), and her current WIP is a children's book. For this book, she's researching the work of ballet dancers. When word got out about her research, Lisa got a call from Misty Copeland which eventually led to Lisa meeting Mikhail Baryshnikov (Misha to Lisa). Now, Lisa is part of a crazy love triangle. Her Georgian husband and this Russian dancer are going to have a dance-off to win a permanent place in her heart. Who will win? * Who knows, but Lisa did find out an important tidbit about ballet dancers--they do it on their toes... 

       Enough. On with the blurb, that goes with the picture at the top...

The Circus Kids

      Yes, the children were left unattended in the park. They spent all afternoon terrorizing and aggravating every single person there. As they tore across the field, hell-bent on knocking over a dog-walker, the brother and sister devilsh duo were grabbed by a woman wearing a khaki uniform.

        "Can't you read the sign?"

         She then took the battery-powered tattoo gun she never went without, quickly inked 666 on each child's forehead, and dragged them into a Ringling Brothers' van.

         Since there are no more elephant acts in the circus, there are bull hooks gathering dust. Whips that need to be used occasionally to keep them supple. What kind of embarrassing costumes will these two cherubs-turned-demons be forced to wear? And can they be taught proper behavior... so they can eventually leave the big top?

          Only time will tell... (142 words)



        And here is the photo for next week so that if you're not a by-the-seat-of-your-pants-er, you have some time to think.

photo by Sioux Roslawski

*  Lisa's husband, when interviewed about the upcoming dance-off, was quoted as saying, "Well, there's going to be a type of dance chosen. If ballet is the one that's drawn out of a hat, certainly, that Russian so-and-so will win. However, if they pull clogging or The Bump out of the hat... let's just say I've got a chance of winning."