Hopefully, you’ll take my all-caps message to heart. ^_^

When I have finished reading Joe’s eBook, I will provide a more detailed review here, but for now, suffice to say he makes excellent points about the importance of short stories in a writer’s development.  I found myself nodding in agreement as he wrote that short stories provide great practice at completing a work you have started.  Rather than take months or years on your first novel, write something smaller that can actually be finished rather quickly.  Then work on getting it published and you’ll have a credit to lend some authenticity to your work.   Makes sense to me.  Now to go finish Joe’s eBook and then my first official short story.

Detroit handyman, Derrick Chance, has life just the way he wants it after recovering from period of excruciating loss and emotional turmoil brought on by the deaths of his grandparents and brother.  Safe, unexciting, normal. some would say routine even and they would be right.  Everything in its place, everything in order. and especially no unwelcome surprises lurking to throw up his hard won equanimity.  It has taken Derrick 10 years to get to this point in his life where he feels balanced and safe and he doesn’t want anything to change.  Just look at his home and furnishings.  The house is much the same as when his grandparents had lived there, nothing updated, even the appliances.  Heck, he didn’t even have texting on his phone.

Then Derrick gets a phone call from Gavin Hayes, an accountant who needs his home office outfitted with some shelves.  One look at Gavin, a quick handshake and all Derrick’s comfortable and predictable life is shaken up. Derrick gave up trying to date and all personal relationships when trying to recover from the loss of his family at a young age.  He just didn’t have anything left over to give so why bother? Now Derrick doesn’t know how to handle the emotions Gavin is bringing back to the surface after a long absence.

Gavin too is fighting the impulse to get to know his skittish handyman better.  Gavin has just removed himself from an abusive relationship and the thought of trusting another at this time leaves him uncertain and more than a little afraid, given a secret he is hiding.  It is going to take more than time and an attraction for Derrick and Gavin to decide to risk it all on a chance at love.

Inertia is the first book in the Impulse series that looks to follow the course of a relationship between two men, Derrick Chance and Gavin Hayes. The title of the book is an accurate description of the state of Derrick’s life.  Derrick has remained unchanged, and happily so since the trauma of his grandparents death. Then his brother died as well leaving him so emotionally empty that he was unable to do more than react as his life changed forever.  From that time on, Derrick froze himself into a lifestyle of emotional stasis that comes complete with a house full of relics from his grandparents time, a business based on fixing things from the past, and an isolation so complete that his only friends are his dog, his elderly neighbor and his friend, Devon.  When a work order leads to a meeting with Gavin Hayes, their mild flirting shakes him up, to the point of  Derrick reevaluating his choice of a solitary life.

Gormley does a really nice job of conveying Derrick’s uncertainty about the future and making changes to his life.  From Derrick’s perspective, the future has never held anything but heartache and pain causing him to withdraw from an active social life.  She paints the portrait of a man so hurt, so afraid of emotional pain that he does nothing to move himself forward for fear of being hurt once more.  Derrick has also frozen his sexuality as he has been abstinent for years, remaining a virgin into his thirties. This gives his character a certain innocence that plays off nicely against the character of Gavin Hayes.

The character of Gavin Hayes has also some interesting layers to him.  He is just come from an abusive relationship with a man whose ideas on HIV and AIDS are not only frighteningly self delusional but dangerous.  He too is full of fear for the future and hesitant to start a new relationship. So when the men find they are attracted to each other, each advances forward with all the hesitancy and indecisiveness of ants at a tap dance rehearsal.  For each uncertain foot forward, then is an almost immediate step back, sometimes several so that they find themselves back at the starting point.  But instead of this being a frustrating element, Gormley makes us understand these men and their actions.

Then there is the sex.  There are some very hot scenes here as Derrick discovers that his sexuality didn’t die along with his family but has just been dormant, awaiting a spark to come back to life.  Gavin is more than happy to be that spark.  But this is not a teacher/student relationship as Gavin’s former lover has left him with mental scars where their sex life was concerned.  There is a very realistic give and take here between the men as Derrick discovers he has a slight submissive kink and Gavin explores the idea of reciprocity in sex play.

There is no real angst here although from the sound of Gavin’s former lover, it might appear in the sequel Acceleration, Impulse #2. Inertia is simply the story of the beginnings of a relationship.  It may go on longer than necessary. In fact, the entire book could be tightened up with respect to editing errors and repetitive sections.  This is the second edition of this story after all. All of this might be due to the fact that Inertia is a self published book that could benefit from the efforts of a good editor.  That said, Gormley has done a wonderful job with her story and I look forward to the next installment in the relationship of Derrick and Gavin.

Cover:  Interesting cover by Kerry.  Compelling in its own way but also a little rustic in feel.

Maybe it’s not so much funny as it is aggravating. I perseverate on things. Sentence fragments. Run on sentences go on and on and on until I stop and deliberate on the uses of commas and periods only to find out that I’m either too trigger happy with the fucking things, or that I’m not savvy enough with them, and then it turns out that my friends are no better with commas and periods than I am, and don’t even get me started on the uses of semi colons and the like;

Whew.

In short, I am my own worst critic. You would think that this would make me an excellent editor for my work. You would think that I wouldn’t need the services of professionals.

But I won’t lie. I’m too biased, after a certain point, to know what I’ve missed.

Beta readers are important, in part, for this reason. I’ve got several loyal and wonderful writer friends who will help me in that department. YAY ME! And a big YAY should go to them all. You know who you are

Short stories are one thing to edit. After a certain point, I’ve done all that I can do. I’ve listened to the advice of my beta readers. I’ve even read the darn thing aloud to myself and to others just to ensure the smoothness of my narrative. I find it easiest to catch errors this way. If it sounds awkward as I read, it will read that way to my audience. At least, I think this is true.

But now that I’ve gone and written a book, I find that the editing process is very different. In my mind, it’s a bit like dropping a pebble into a still pond. That pebble creates ripples, and these ripples can spread forever. They can, in fact, bump into other ripples created by other dropped rocks, or they can be blown away; fragmented by an unexpected wind.

But I can only see the ripples if I am under the sunlight. My book feels like the pond underneath the heat and the light of the sun.

The magnitude of my accomplishment is beginning to settle on me.

Editing a book of mine also makes me feel as though I am in a time warp. When I can go back to the beginning chapters of my book and ask myself questions like “Who the hell wrote this?” and “What the hell was I thinking?” I have to feel good. I feel good because I am a better writer who can catch many of these mistakes. My style has evolved. I’ve altered my use of American English (hopefully for the better).

The editing of erotica adds another interesting layer to this exposed feeling.

I am bearing my soul with my writing. I won’t mince words. I knew that I was going to try to get this thing published. I knew that I was going to finish this book, make some noise, edit the shit out of it, celebrate my greatness, and then allow a professional editor the smack the shit out of it (and my ego) if needed. I am capable of doing the forward, backward and side rolls I need to figure this thing out. I’ll put in the sweat. I’ll work through the tears and the desire to put my fist through walls.

What else is a warrior writer supposed to do, especially when they are trying to break into the business?

Erotica exposes a part of soul that I rarely share with others. People don’t look at me and assume “this man has sex on the brain.” Well, some might, but I either laugh at them or get their numbers depending on who they are. But we can all be honest with each other, right? People are probably better off not making more than perfunctory assumptions about one another on first glance.

But if I  am damned lucky and I work hard, someday, this part of me will be exposed to the world. I want to make people squirm at work. I want the husband who reads my stuff to go home and fuck his wife until the roof comes crashing down around their ears. I crave the knowledge that I caused someone to break into a sweat on an otherwise uneventful bus ride back home from work.

Now, my characters really ARE on a stage. It feels like there are cameramen and boom mic’s with them in each scene as I scratch out one word and use another. As I relinquish my use of adverbs, I zoom in on someone’s bare ass. As I add a description of the glint in my leading lady’s eye, I actually see her breasts heaving up and down in the heat of passion. My leading man is beginning to understand what a fluffer is.

Again, I ask, “What the fuck is going on?”

Throw in the horror aspect of my book, and what we have here is a recipe for double the pressure. I’ve got to keep the tension going on multiple levels. Horror must be a visceral experience too! Fear must build. Gooseflesh, thrills and surprise must be felt when this is all said and read.

Horror and erotica are two of the hardest things to write, and perhaps two of the strangest genres to combine. The thing they both have in common other than being so difficult to do WELL is that both must be shown with such clarity. I want everyone who reads my work to feel what these characters experience. I want grab my readers by the hand and leap head first into a hell of a ride. I want them to break into a sweat for one reason or another.

I don’t know if I’m good enough to accomplish this. But I am not afraid to do the work to find out.

And damn is it fun!

I don’t know all the unwritten rules of writing a book or editing it. This is something that I can only learn by doing it over and over again. I can go to the drawing board as many times as it takes. I can pour my soul into every word that you will ever see. But I didn’t go to school to learn to write fiction. My hat is off to those who have. I may even take a class on creative writing someday when I’m not creating something else to scream about. What I’ve discovered lately is that there are so MANY good writers out there, I can only guess at what defines success for each one.

For me, the appeal for writing always was and always WILL be the ability to use my voice to add something original, fun and beautiful to the world.

Look for it. Listen for it.  It’s coming.

I may or may not record these words later for my amusement and your entertainment Fear not! my dulcet tones shall return later this week!

The best way to make sure you have all the right permissions is to contact www.emicmglicensing.com.  They’re a company that helps administer the copyrights for EMI, which includes songs by sixsteps artists.  To reprint the lyrics, you’ll need to obtain a Lyric Reprint License.  Check out their website and the INFO section for details on the different types of licenses.  You can actually call and talk to someone in their office if you need more information.

So I checked the website and it looks extremely easy to get the license and the fee is only $40.00.  Not too shabby.  As soon as I have the money I will get the permission.

Still working on editing and have a suggestion on who to contact for a review.  I will be working on that soon as well

More updates as they come in.

I receive emails from Pastor Kenny Luck periodically with inspirational stories and teachings.  In one recently he talked about not taking revenge and used David and Saul as examples.  A few days later I reached a part in my book that the main characters did just that, they took revenge.  Even though they were provoked, they took revenge.  Then they all were proud and slapped each other’s backs.  I looked at that again and decided that someone had to see it as an issue and realize that revenge was not the best course.  I left the revenge in, seeing as  the main characters are only 15 they would probably do that and think later.  So I put in the think later part and had a short discussion about whether they acted appropriately or not.  I referenced the same sections that Pastor Kenny did and I think it came out okay.  I tried to describe it to my wife and she is looking forward to seeing the actual writing and then decide on whether she likes it or not.

The next section I am struggling with is a short scene that takes about 15 pages or so.  It is not integral and might slow the plot down a bit.  I will be getting to that soon and may just cut it out completely.  Again my wife had a good suggestion.  Instead of deleting it I will cut and paste it into another word document so that if I decide to add it back, it is already completed.

I also am struggling with having an outside person read the book to give me feedback.  It was suggested that I use a certain person so I looked at her website and she did not list fees, but there were some examples and it was about $1500 for what I was looking for.  No way can I afford that.  Really, what I am looking for is someone that I trust to give me the truthful feedback on the big picture of the story, I can look at the commas and periods.  I need to know is it interesting?  Is it enjoyable?  Is it too easy for the group?  Is it something that they would buy?  So This has been about the tenth time I am mentioning this so I need to come to a resolution soon or just start looking for a publisher and see what happens.  Normally I am very decisive but I am struggling with this right now.  Prayer and talking it through with my wife will help though.

Have a blessed day.

It seems like that is a long time to start the process of planning book launches, the launch of the official Website, blog and merchandise, but time has flown by and we want to congratulate Ward of his success.

The most exciting thing we experienced as a team was when we received a phone call from Ward and could tell he had a great story for us by the tone of his voice. When Road to Rupp was first published, it was only available through Amazon.com. At first, we all thought the process of the book being available at other retailers was going to be a long process we had to worry about, but with that phone call we learned differently.

Ward had walked into a Barnes and Noble and asked, “Do you have Road to Rupp available?” The sales clerk looked it up for him and said they just had it placed in their inventory and could order it for him!

We can only imagine the immense pride Ward must have felt, as well as any other author who has gone through the process of writing and having their first book published, and congratulate him on this achievement!

Not only can Road to Rupp be found at Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble, it is also available at Books A Million. Make sure you get your copy today!

If you send us a picture of you holding up your copy of Road to Rupp, we will even post it on WardsFastBreak.com!

Congrats Again Ward!

The Team @ WardIrvin.com

Guess what. Fifteen minutes is a hell of a short time.  In that fifteen minutes I think I also completed my first draft of Tabitha and Dundee’s story. Fifteen Minutes. Of course it is still a long way from being done. I am sure it will take many more forms before I finish it. I am sure it will be a completely different book when I finally publish it. It is a draft though. A completed draft!

The subjects of my book. Tabitha and Dundee Boy.

Now comes the fun part of revisions, finding an illustrator and a publisher. That of course is getting ahead of myself. Tonight, I am just proud of my 15 minutes and completed draft. Small steps. One word at a time. Or to paraphrase Anne Lamott, cat by cat.

I should note, that this picture, which I stole from Dundee and Tabitha’s person, brings tears to my eyes and fuels my desire to tell their story.

First off, my computer died. Not so much my entire laptop, but my hard drive decided it’s time had come. Luckily, Ross predicted this, so he had a new one waiting. It is now replaced, and life can finally go on.

I could access the internet briefly with the kindness of strangers, but I couldn’t write except for longhand, and that gives me horrible cramps. It was madness, I tell you, madness. Several people told me to think of it as a vacation. Strangely, forced vacation = not fun. I’ve written two short stories since I got my dear laptop back, just because I missed writing that much.

More post-hard drive good news, I got to write the acknowledgments and dedication for The Pyramid Waltz. That was a lot of fun and a lot of trying to remember everyone to thank! I felt like those people at awards shows who just start shouting names and then have to end with, “If I forgot you, I’m sorry.” Luckily, no one was playing me off the stage.

Today I’m going to look at a book launch venue. Soooo exciting. I’ll give you a full report once I’ve finally FINALLY nailed down my location.

Is anyone else doing Nano summer camp this year? I’m gonna try to do it this June, though I have a lot of non-writing tasks to complete. Who’s with me?

Did you have any tragedies these past weeks? Any near misses?

I have not heard back from Chris Tomlin’s group so now I will attempt to go another route.  Of course I have to figure that route out still but that is the plan.  Try another route.  The next option is to use a song from a gifted songwriter friend of mine.  I plan to do that in a later book and have asked for a song from him, and he would be happy to let me use another I am sure.  God always provides what is necessary when it is necessary.  Usually not before and never too late.

So I will start working on the editing again.  My wife has provided some insight for some things when I think something is clear she has shown me that the way I worded it is clear to someone who pictures things the same way I do, yet I do not really make it understandable to those that do not think like I do.  That was probably as clear as the sentences she talks about.  I realize I am not painting the pictures as clear as I would like.  That was a little better

My friend that had agreed to editing for me has had a rough couple of months.  I was feeling sorry for myself at a point when I heard some of the things he was dealing with, I realized that no matter what happens to me, mine was an easy burden to bear.  I do not understand what God does most times, however He has His plan and we may understand it someday.  Or, my personal opinion is that when we reach heaven we will no longer care about what happened here on the training grounds of serving the Lord.  He has asked to be relieved of the responsibility of editing for me.  I agreed.  However he is still my first choice and I hope that he will someday heal enough to help me along this road.  My prayers are with him and his family.  I know I have not said anything specific but i would appreciate any healing prayers sent his way.

To counteract this and write a story that starred a woman instead of being about her, I moved my story to outer space.

Well, that’s not completely true. I wanted to write stories set in outer space anyway, or at least on other planets. Since one of my first college loves was anthropology, I created an anthropologist studying alien species in order to help her human colony survive.

You win this fabulous jungle background!

She felt tremendous pressure to do her duty, to do what was expected no matter what she might want for herself. Those pesky societal constraints sneaked in there again, like ticks, or gnats. Stupid societal constraints…

Crap.

On the same planet, years later, I wrote about a space marine. She followed her own path, walked to the beat of her own drummer. She knew about sacrifice, but she chose to do it; no one ever forced her. She was huge and muscular, and too tough to cry.

Barbie dolls can’t flex enough to truly bring the gun show to town.

I still like her, but she was a bit of an overreaction.

For my next female MC, I swung far the other way. I wrote about a dancer who could take care of herself but wasn’t afraid to cry or love or wear pretty dresses, you know, all that girl shit. She embraced what some might call the feminine things in life. (In real life, I think this is when I fell back in love with glitter.)

No matter what I did, she looked drunk, okay.

I discovered that female characters could cover all these ranges, could cover every range. They could be insecure, easily swayed anthropologists, tough-as-nails space marines and dress-wearing dancers. I realized there was no one role model everyone could look up to. Not everyone can be a superwoman, but all my characters had one thing in common, when the chips were down, they were all brave in their own ways. I think I mixed them all together to make to create the heroines of The Pyramid Waltz.

Prom 1996

Two women, each brave in a different way, each very different people. Starbride (on the left) is a thinker. Katya is a fighter. In different situations, each is cautious or impulsive. They both love jewelry and nice clothes, though they have very different styles. Katya takes sacrifice to extremes and needs Starbride’s level head. Starbride tries to do everything herself and needs Katya’s helping hand.

And it doesn’t hurt that I can easily make them into Barbies. (I do wish, though, that the Barbies of color were a little darker. I think the one I bought is supposed to be Hispanic, but her skin tone is even lighter than her blond counterpart.)

And now I have enough dolls to stage this:

Yes, that is a woman dancing with a panda in the background. That’s what you took from this?

Aaaahhh, so good. Yeah, I didn’t put the panda and the pear together. That would’ve been…weird.

But I can’t stop doing this.

I know, it looks like there’s some ass-cupping there. These dolls are hard to pose!

Or this.

The untold Disney story.

Or if I’m honest, this.

A love that will not be denied…

Who’s up for writing a ninja/pear romance with me?

And a super duper p.s.: My friend John Clark has started a Kickstarter for his novel, Red Chords! Let’s all go help him out. If you’re a fan of Laurel K. Hamilton or Patricia Briggs, I think you’ll really go for this.

p.s.s It’s not even my birthday yet, and I’ve already received some wonderful presents from my writer friends:

Soo……much…..glitter…..*drool*

What’s goin on with you guys? Writing news? Birthday news? Barbie news? What can I say, it’s all I think about.

In the meantime,

Edits are away to my publisher. Now to decide what the hell I’m gonna do until The Pyramid Waltz comes out in September!

Network: I’ve missed talking to my blog buddies as much as I want, and I haven’t been able to click any #FF links on twitter or to take any blog recommendations. Now I can! I’m looking forward to meeting more internet friends. I’m soooo much more awkward in person. I tend to smile really wide in overcompensation. ^_^

Book release party: I’ve got to plan one. Got to figure out how many people might come, book a venue, and then…no clue. Bake some cheese sticks?

Keep writing: Not only do I have to jot down some ideas for what I’m hoping will turn into a series from The Pyramid Waltz, I also want to write some new stuff, just to keep my brain elastic. Maybe something about giant sharks. Or pirates. Or giant shark pirates. Heh. I almost typed pilates. Giant shark pilates might be fun, too.

On a totally unrelated note and since in my day-to-day life I keep flipping from topic to topic here, I heard Huey Lewis and the News’s “Heart of Rock in Roll” in the car, and when he’s singing about LA, I know what he really says, but it sounds like:

“Neon signs and the pretty pretty girls
All dressed so skeptically.”

You’d need sensible walking shoes, in case you have to disprove something in the wilderness. You’d need heavy trousers for wading through weeds. You’d need all sorts of gear for your skeptical tasks, like cameras, meteorological sensors, tape measures and other tools, and an EMF detector in case you’re investigating ghosts. A girl dressed skeptically has to be prepared to disprove anything. ^_^ I didn’t know they were all Scullys in LA.

Everyone else got any news?

We’re all compared to other people for most of our lives. As soon as we develop our unique personalities, talents and appearance, it’s she looks like…, or he sounds just like…

Such comparisons are meant to flatter.

First time authors are no strangers to this process. If your first novel is a romance, chances are you’ll be compared to other established romance writers. If your book is based in a particular region, the comparison will be with other writers whose novels are based in that area. This is not a bad thing. The effort is to find a readership, and association with someone known and appreciated can be helpful to a prospective reader wondering if he or she might enjoy your work.

I’ve noted comparisons of my first novel with well-known authors and it’s quite flattering, actually somewhat embarrassing. John Grisham is the master of the legal thriller, and Greg Iles is an extraordinarily talented writer without regard to genre with most of his novels based in the South. Both are among my favorite writers. I can even appreciate how such comparisons might be made. My protagonist in Ice Fire, Jock Boucher, is a judge, hence the association with a legal thriller. It takes place mostly in New Orleans, thus the pairing with a southern regional writer.

But comparisons can only take one so far. For instance, Ice Fire begins with a courtroom drama—Judge Jock Boucher meets a scientist who’s been hiding from the law for twenty years. Grisham fans will warm up to this. Then we discover why the scientist has been in hiding and it involves his process for extracting a unique source of energy called methane hydrate from the sea bed at great depths. Next thing you know our judge is at the bottom of the ocean in a mini-submarine. Now this sounds more like Clive Cussler than John Grisham, so let’s make that analogy for the benefit of all the Cussler fans out there.

We learn that Jock Boucher is an attractive, strong, intelligent man who’s conflicted in his love life. Does he love his girlfriend? Is she being unfaithful to him? I think Oprah might find Jock an appealing character. Perhaps I could ask her.

Then Jock turns and takes the law into his own hands. He is vengeful. He is brutal. He kills bad guys; not exactly judicial demeanor. Lee Child fans may find similarities. Other writers have done well with anti-authoritarian protagonists as well.

Did I mention New Orleans? Readers have told me they loved the romp through the French Quarter and salivated reading about all the Cajun cuisine. Any of Emiril’s or Paul Prudhomme’s fans out there? I should put a warning on the cover jacket – ‘Reading Ice Fire may make you want to run out and buy a beignet.’

And finally there’s science. Ice Fire deals with methane hydrate. It is found at the bottom of the ocean and there is twice as much of it as all other fossil fuels combined. Several governments around the world have been conducting studies on its use as a fuel source this year. Methane hydrate is similar to natural gas, and Mad Money’s Jim Cramer is bullish on natural gas. It has the potential of eliminating our dependence on foreign oil. Mr. Cramer has a lot of fans out there too. I recommend my book to him and to them.

So I relish comparisons but would advise readers of Ice Fire not to limit expectations. There’s a lot to enjoy in my first novel, and you may find it does not fit narrow categorization.

And I think that’s a good thing.

Happy reading.

David Lyons

Let’s get one thing clear, my dream is not to be a best selling author of world renown, I simply want to pay my bills with my craft. I want to wake up in the morning and not have to go to an office building where I feel like I am selling my soul. Sure there are times when you must do that to make ends meet, and if that is what you must do to feed  your family and make your way in the world, more power to you. I don’t think I would survive a life like that though. Yet, I can hardly pay my bills as it is, the last thing I can afford to do is quit my job and bang away at the computer full time. Besides which, I don’t think I have ever earned more than $25 for anything I have ever written. It makes me fear that I am going to end up in a dead end job in some horrid office building slaving my life away. Which is soul crushing to think of.

For my final class of graduate school I am taking “The Creative Process,” a class about where ideas come from. I am alternatively horribly discouraged and tremendously inspired by this class.  I have found so many little snippets and tidbits that have helped me fuel my desire and passion to write. I have used these tidbits to help me generate ideas, in fact the past two weeks I have found myself coming up with more ideas than I had in ages, and it was glorious! Then there are times when I get so discouraged because I don’t think I am creative enough, or I don’t know how I will ever find the time to write. At least write “professionally.”

There was even one day when I came out of class determined to give up writing.  Now this class is geared towards public relations, advertising and overall communications professionals (graphic designers etc), I meaning there are writers, graphic designers and advertising artists in this class. One class the professor made a comment about how all of the writers were at a disadvantage because “everyone is a writer.”I know he was talking about the pr/advertising community, but my mind thought of the thousands of people who spend their days and their lives trying to earn a living as writers; all the people who self-publish, some of them publish truly amazing works while others, well I can see why they had to resort to self-publishing. I worry that I am in the later category. It made me terrified of ever putting pen to paper, or curser to computer screen again.

Yet, here I am. Blogging. Attempting to work on my children’s book. And feeling utterly discouraged. The past  three weeks I have wanted nothing more than quiet time to sit alone with my thoughts and churn out the stories in my head. Something inside me knew, just knew, this was what I was meant to do. I was so eager to write, so eager to fight the blank screen, if only I had time. Everything I was reading, such as this article,  seemed  to push me in the direction of writing, seemed to encourage me, if only I could clear away the distractions.

Which brings me back to today. I spent several hours fighting with a duck cake mold, only to lose in the final round. The weather is overcast, windy and completely gloomy which has set off my SAD and generally made me a gloomy gopher, a phrase which I may have just invented. I finally, finally, got to sit down and work on my story and it feels like crap to me. Absolute crap. It’s not working out at all. So instead of sitting there and slaving over it, I turned to a blog to complain about it.

Seriously though, what do you do when you are discouraged about your dreams? I am especially interested to hear what other writers have to say, but everyone has some dream they are looking to follow, some path they were meant to take and some setback along the way. I would love to hear how everyone deals with those setbacks. Leave a comment and this time I promise to respond to comments!

And breathe.

I’m going off on those OMG deadline tangents a lot lately. Luckily, I’ve got them pretty condensed and can go straight into the breathing much sooner than I could before.

And breathe a little more.

Before I pass out, I have some fabupendous news. (I thought about going for stupenabulous, but that’s more like stupid fabulous. Well…that could work.)

Okay, stupid fabulous, stupendous news. I’m on amazon again! But for my book this time which guarantees I will never ever go away.

NEVER.

The Pyramid Waltz!

Squeeee! It’s very exciting. Go ahead and hit that preorder button, don’t be shy! ^_^ I’m sure the cover art will be up as soon as publication time gets closer. (It’s not until September.)

So, who’s coming to my book launch party in Austin? You’re all invited!

I am not sure where to start,  I am trying to write a christian fantasy novel and I love Chris Tomlin’s songs.  I would like to have the lead character singing the song at the beginning of my first book and maybe some other songs during the series if I actually get published.  I am not sure where to start to look for permission to use the lyrics.  Of course he and the other writers would receive full recognition in the book and on my blog.

 You can read my blog at www.wadepgoodman.com and you will see that I am serious about this attempt and would appreciate any suggestions on the next steps for securing permission to use the lyrics.  The song is question is “Our God”.

 Thank you for your time and any information you can provide me.

I hope I will here from them soon, I was editing my book and thinking about how I will be using song later and realized that, as suggested by my friend, for character development I needed to add that element now so itw won’t seem so out of the blue.  Right now where I have a song it is out of the blue and just doesn’t fit.  And knowing that singing of worship songs is integral to worship as a whole I decided to start adding sooner rather than later.  The question is getting permissions.  So here goes attempt two at getting copyright permissions.  I was not so lucky with getting any answers with Wizards of the Coast so now try number two.

As far as my editing, the first book was 374 pages and the feed back I received really helped me see some weak areas.  One was an area that I took about a page and a half of dialogue, acted like it was important then promptly acted like it never happened.  I deleted the whole scene.  Gone, goodbye and fare thee well.  So I am up to about page 180 and am enjoying the process.  I took long enough time off and really like working on it again. 

Anothing thing I have come to realize is that my writing skills need improvement a bit.  Most of my training has been report writing for security and law enforcement, therefore it is cut and dried, facts only, no flourish.  Now I am trying to get the flourish in and it does not come naturally.  I have added some and deleted some parts that don’t make sense and I am trying to look at it from the readers perspective so that I can hopefully start seeing if something is believable or not.  Of course it is fantasy but there has to be some sort of realism and not totally out of the realm of it really working and happening.

One issue I am stuck with is race.  I am not sure how to address it.  There are seven characters and several support characters.  The main character, the focus of the series, is white.  I then had one other main character as black, but then within the group of friends he was the main antagonist of the lead character.  Not my intent.  So now it was suggested that I drop the race issue and just put in brief descriptions that reader can infer.  I have seen that used and may do that but at the same time it seems kind of like being lazy. 

So now I am faced with rearranging descriptions a bit.  I could make them a full mix, or have them be all white.  But the town is mixed racially so that to me means the friends should be mixed.  I look around and see so many fictional tales having mostly one race as the primary group.  Take TV shows for instance, they are usually all white with the occasional minority, or all one minority with the occasional white.  South Park handles it in a way that I think is hilarious by naming the black child “Token” highlighting how tv shows do that.  I don’t want a “Token” in my group.  So back to the beginning.

I am once again struggling with letting my extended family read the book after this edit or even posting parts of it here.  My wife protectively wants me to keep it off the blog in any way shape or form so that if I do find a publisher, it gets stolen by someone and marketed faster.  Then there would courts involved and so on and so forth.  I have tried explaining copyright laws and that once it a completed work it cannot be used without permission and I have all of my supporting material plus the original hand written account and the supporting books.  Besides the christian market for fantasy is rather small so I do not worry too much about that.  So back to my internal arguments. 

Have a blessed day.

A new book about the historic Devon port of Dartmouth is a ‘labour of love’ according to its author and publisher.

The Chronicles of Dartmouth: 1955-2010 was written by Phil Scoble and will be published in April by Richard Webb. Its 300 pages contain more than 600 illustrations and world-renowned artist Simon Drew has written the Foreword to the book.

The book is based on more than five decades of events covered by the town’s weekly newspaper the Dartmouth Chronicle, and features more than 30 special spreads on specific subjects.

The former Dartmouth Chronicle reporter Phil Scoble has been working on producing the book since September 2007. He has read more than 3,000 newspapers and spent more than 3,000 hours writing and editing this accessible and fun modern history.

The lavishly illustrated book uses stories from the town’s newspaper which results in a volume packed full of high drama (including murders and tragedy) and quirky stories and tales of everyday triumph by members of the local community.

“After four years it is amazing to finally be on the eve of publication,” said Phil. “I’ve spent so long writing and editing the book so it’s very exciting to be at the point where I can hold it in my hands. It has been a labour of love both for Richard and myself. I’ve come out of the writing process with a deep affection for the town and a respect for the people of Dartmouth. It really is the most wonderful place to be.”

World-record breaking Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady publisher Richard Webb has created his own publishing niche in his hometown of Dartmouth starting in 2000 when he published the first Chronicles of Dartmouth 1854-1954, written by Don Collinson.

Since then has brought out ten bestselling books about the town and area, covering its beauty, history and even its restaurants – the Chronicles of Dartmouth 1955 – 2010 is his eleventh local publication.

“My life and family will always be inexorably linked with Dartmouth,” he said. “This book covers almost the entire span of my adult life and I have personal

experience of many of the events in it. It has been a fantastic, nostalgic and interesting journey to come to this point and I hope that people will enjoy reading it as much as Phil and I have enjoyed preparing it for publication. We are very proud of it.”

The book will be launched at a special event at Dartmouth’s Flavel Centre that will include a free presentation on the period covered by the book called Dartmouth Down the Decades by Phil Scoble.

For more details or to reserve a seat, contact the Flavel Centre on 01803 839530, check out www.theflavel.org.uk, or go to www.dartmouthbooks.co.uk.

A lot of these are Catholics that are portrayed as self-serving and not following what God teaches but their own agenda.  Now I have some issues with Catholic Doctrine and I am not an ignorant child, but I believe a vast majority of leadership in any Christian religion follow what their heart and mind tell them God is saying to them.  Now I also know these are works of fiction and I am first to state that a work of fiction is not a statement as to who people really are.

However I do find it disturbing that there are so many anti-Christian authors out there.  The heroes are not Christians that are rooting out evil within the church, just “ordinary” people who then get involved within the machinations of a self-serving leader.

I have decided that I will not approach that point directly in my books.  I will not necessarily always show Christians as righteous and just as that would be a false portrayal.  Reality needs to be injected just enough that the book would be believable and human failure is the reality of life.  We as humans failed when Adam and Eve took the bites from the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.  Yes I listed Adam first as I believe as the leader of the family he should have stopped Eve.  Of course he just made it worse by blaming Eve.  And any married man knows, if it a failure of yours, do not blame your wife.

Back to my thoughts on writing, I think that some authors are just so anti-Christian that they cannot help but make the Christian the bad guy.  I also think that some people get stuck in a rut and read anything that attacks Muslims, or communists.  I also think that there is such pressure to get out the next big seller that authors start hitting a winning formula and follow it.  I know with Tom Clancy he has a great series with Jack Ryan.  But he keeps it moderately fresh by changing the dangers and who the players are.  Usually the problems lie within and without wherever Jack Ryan was currently placed.

I also think that I will have villains within the church as a whole because there are people within the various organizations that are more there for themselves than for God.  But I will present them that way, not as murdering thieving get it any way I can kind of people.  I think most within the church that are self-serving are more obvious than they think, they just get away with it because they come up with plausible reasons for limousine rides everywhere and exorbitant houses and such.  Then you have folks like Pastor Rick Warren who donates most his salary back to the church or to various other charities and yet he is vilified for making too much money on his books and such.  I think that my writing will focus on the individual that has lost their way and needs a nudge, or a shove to get back.  I like the way that the Kendrick brothers handled it in Courageous the movie, he still paid the price by going to jail, but his friends never gave up and visited him and he moved forward, or rather, backward to his faith.

I understand not all books will be from a Christian perspective and they shouldn’t be, the same story retold over and over gets boring.  However toning down the rhetoric would be nice.  And yes, I am aware that to follow Christ is to be persecuted.  I just would like my recreation to not be persecuted.  Although; I have to say it is not too big a burden putting up with that type of persecution with my Savior on the other side of the yolk doing a vast majority of the work.

Thanks for reading my rambling.

Did you know that there are several different types of editing?  Yep, yep, let’s take a look.

Personal Editing:

• Edit for Efficiency
  • Read your manuscript specifically for efficiency. Snip the loose threads that do not tie directly into the plot of your story.
• Edit for Motivation and Clarity
  • Revise the story to ensure a clear understanding of what is at stake, and what the main conflict of the story will be.
• Edit for Style Cleanup
  • Edit for wobbles in your writing style.
• Proofread for Tiny Errors
  • Your eyes get accustomed to your writing and tiny errors are missed.
• Beware of Jargon and Heavy-handed Writing 
  • Simple is almost always better.
• Fix Misused Words and Phrases
  • Double check the word you’re using means what you think it does.

Professional Editing:

• Developmental Manuscript Evaluation (DME)
  • Professional editors will read your manuscript and provide a thorough, helpful DME to address larger issues. Editors verify what’s important in your story: Indicate what writing needs to be compressed to help move the story forward: Make sure the reader gets the right material at the right time: Identify what characters are needed in your story: And ensure the villains pay off.

• Line Editing and Critiques
  • Line editing aims to correct punctuation details, and catch awkward word use.

With gusto, I recommend both DME and Line Editing. I learned so much from both techniques, which strengthened my writing and editing style. Below I’ve written out the timeline and editing schedule I used for my novel.

JANUARY 2010 – JANUARY 2011: Wrote the novel.

FEBRUARY 2011 – APRIL 2011: Edited the novel myself. Reading through each chapter, I re-wrote sentences and added scene details. Anywhere a scene lacked character depth, I added brushstrokes to character’s personalities.

APRIL 2011 – SEPTEMBER 2011: Mailed the novel to my first editor for a DME. Note: A six-month long evaluation period is not normal. The feedback I received was very helpful. The editor pointed out holes in character development. For example: One of my characters, a mother of two, has a vital role in the story, but was missing scenes to really illustrate her vulnerable human side. Without the evaluation, I wouldn’t have thought to add more of these scenes.

OCTOBER 2011 – DECEMBER 2011: Wrote more words! Approximately 10,000 more of them. I added sub-character brushstrokes who’d, up to that point, been a bit ignored.

DECEMBER 2011: Sent the new version of the manuscript to a different editor for another DME. The notes I received were invaluable. Not only did I receive detailed feedback on where my writing tended to get heavy-handed, but I also got details about which characters were vitally important and which I should consider cutting. I also received feedback to re-arrange the first five chapters to get to the heart of the story faster.

JANUARY 2012 – FEBRUARY 2012: Back to the drawing board: compressing scenes, adding scenes, cutting characters and finding more character depth. The feedback and perspectives gave me ideas on how to grow and evolve the novel. (Seeing the manuscript blossom into a polished literary piece has been very exciting.)

FEBRUARY 2012: Sent the first half of the manuscript to be line edited. Line editing will always be beneficial for the pure and simple reason that human error exists. Writers are going to make punctuation mistakes, and that’s okay! Hire a line editor to clean up your novel’s tiny errors.

MARCH 2012: Second half of the manuscript was line edited. Reviewed and implemented all final editor notes.

APRIL 2012: And here we are today! April 2012, and my manuscript has been through the ringer! Two years, and two editors later, my book is polished and ready to go, and I am actively seeking representation!

I hope you enjoyed the information I’ve learned through my novel writing process! What are your thoughts? Have you gotten anything edited? Any recommendations or buyer bewares? Comment below!

First I made it look too easy for the hero.  I will work on that.  I personally get tired of the hero who only succeeds in the last two pages of a book, so I will find a way to make it more balanced.

I read a blog by Piers Anthony, or more precisely a book review a while back and I liked the way he put it when he said that the author used too many” saidisms”.  I have read before that just using the said is good enough, but I still looked for alternatives.  I liked Mr. Anthony’s way of explaining it though.  When you use the word said, it just disappears.  It’s not that it is not there, but the reader just blows right past it because it fits.  I like when I read a book and find that I am turning pages without having to slow down due some sentence not making sense to me.  So “said” is the way to go!

Also I have a group of seven teenage boys.  I have put too much time in trying to make them all main characters.  I will look at reducing the main and increasing the secondary.

In addition I spent more time describing actions that are tedious and bogs the story down, when I should be working on character development.

Those are some of the things I will be working on.  Hopefully this round will show much improvement. 

Thanks.

Maybe, just maybe, I can keep the momentum going forward and finish writing this book. I keep questioning what type of book it should be though. My original plan was to make it a children’s picture book. Now I feel that there is too much story to tell and I wonder if it should be a beginning readers book or something like that. Not sure there is quite enough story to make it a full fledged chapter book. I suppose the best option, the only option, is to stop worrying about it and let the story show me what it wants to be. I must trust the story, I must stop worrying and trying to shape it into what I want it to be. I must write even when there are no ideas, but I must let the story write itself. It will shape itself, show me what it wants to be.  At least, I hope it

The writing bug bit and would not let go last week. Inspired in part by inspirational quotations posted on Facebook, I got the notion in my head that it would be lovely to beagle to quit my job and spend my days rescuing cats and writing. It is a dream I will hold on to. Before I can get there though, I need to be able to support myself with my writing. A great place to start with that would be to finish my current book. Ya know, the kids book I started in November. That one. I want to finish it.

I want so desperately to write, I feel it deep in my soul. Yet, I don’t write. I put other things first and ignore my dreams, prioritizing instead to focus on the mundane tasks of life and put everything ahead of my dreams. I need to fix that. I need to understand why I don’t give my dreams more precedence. Yes, there is truth to the refrain “I’m just so busy.” I am busy, but that shouldn’t mea. I can’t find time to write.

Since first starting this entry I have done a million other things including laundry, a dinner party and volunteer work. That just goes to show how hard I find it to it down and write. In that time one of my best friends gave me her second self-published book. It just made the need to write that much stronger. Writing also became a tool to beat. Myself up with, a pressing need I am not meeting that shows what a failure I am, why I should just give up my dreams. I will not do that though. I must not do that. I will join my friend in the self-published author ranks, and I will be happy.

I have a week off school, a quick break before all hell breaks loose in the form of my final quarter in grad school and comprehensive exams. I am going on “vacation” to visit my grandparents. I hope in that time I am able to write. I want progress on my story. I will have progress on my story. I will. I will not hope, I will not try, I simply will. After all I have a two four hour flights, I should have plenty of time to write.