All posts by Dana Rodgers

Rachel Aaron — How I Went From Writing 2,000 Words a Day to 10,000 Words a Day

Back in December, when I was sick and not feeling very productive, I stumbled across this wonderful blog post by Rachel Aaron, author of The Legend of Eli Monpress novels. Rachel has found a way to manage her writing goals and increase her productivity dramatically. I was so wowed by Rachel’s no-nonsense approach I asked if I could share it here. She has graciously agreed, so join us as she discusses her process of discovery and path to success.

This is a long read, but if you haven’t seen it before you’ll be glad you took the time. If you don’t have time now, please stop back when you can or go to Rachel’s blog for the original post.

And don’t forget to join us here tomorrow, when I will have the honor of interviewing the very talented Rachel Aaron.

 

How I Went From Writing 2,000 Words a Day to 10,000 Words a Day

When I started writing The Spirit War (Eli novel #4), I had a bit of a problem. I had a brand new baby and my life (like every new mother’s life) was constantly on the verge of shambles. I paid for a sitter four times a week so I could get some writing time, and I guarded these hours like a mama bear guards her cubs – with ferocity and hiker-mauling violence. To keep my schedule and make my deadlines, I needed to write 4000 words during each of these carefully arranged sessions. I thought this would be simple. After all, before I quit my job to write full time I’d been writing 2k a day in the three hours before work. Surely with 6 hours of baby free writing time, 4k a day would be nothing….

I guarded these hours like a mama bear guards her cubs – with ferocity and hiker-mauling violence. To keep my schedule and make my deadlines, I needed to write 4000 words during each of these carefully arranged sessions. I thought this would be simple. After all, before I quit my job to write full time I’d been writing 2k a day in the three hours before work. Surely with 6 hours of baby free writing time, 4k a day would be nothing….

But (of course), things didn’t work out like that. Every day I’d sit down to add 4000 words to my new manuscript. I was determined, I was experienced, I knew my world. There was no reason I couldn’t get 4k down. But every night when I hauled myself away, my word count had only increased by 2k, the same number of words I’d been getting before I quit my day job.

Needless to say, I felt like a failure. Here I was, a professional writer with three books about to come out, and I couldn’t even beat the writing I’d done before I went pro. At first I made excuses, this novel was the most complicated of all the Eli books I’d written, I was tired because my son thinks 4am is an awesome time to play, etc. etc. But the truth was there was no excuse. I had to find a way to boost my word count, and with months of 2k a day dragging me down, I had to do it fast. So I got scientific. I gathered data and tried experiments, and ultimately ended up boosting my word count to heights far beyond what I’d thought was possible, and I did it while making my writing better than ever before.

When I told people at ConCarolinas that I’d gone from writing 2k to 10k per day, I got a huge response. Everyone wanted to know how I’d done it, and I finally got so sick of telling the same story over and over again that I decided to write it down here.

So, once and for all, here’s the story of how I went from writing 500 words an hour to over 1500, and (hopefully) how you can too:

A quick note: There are many fine, successful writers out there who equate writing quickly with being a hack. I firmly disagree. My methods remove the dross, the time spent tooling around lost in your daily writing, not the time spent making plot decisions or word choices. This is not a choice between ruminating on art or churning out the novels for gross commercialism (though I happen to like commercial novels), it’s about not wasting your time for whatever sort of novels you want to write.

Drastically increasing your words per day is actually pretty easy, all it takes is a shift in perspective and the ability to be honest with yourself (which is the hardest part). Because I’m a giant nerd, I ended up creating a metric, a triangle with three core requirements: Knowledge, Time, and Enthusiasm. Any one of these can noticeably boost your daily output, but all three together can turn you into a word machine. I never start writing these days unless I can hit all three.

Update! The talented Vicky Teinaki made a graphic of this metric and let me use it! She is awesome!

Side 1: Knowledge, or Know What You’re Writing Before You Write It

The first big boost to my daily wordcount happened almost by accident. Used to be I would just pop open the laptop and start writing. Now, I wasn’t a total make-it-up-as-you-go writer. I had a general plot outline, but my scene notes were things like “Miranda and Banage argue” or “Eli steals the king.” Not very useful, but I knew generally what direction I was writing in, and I liked to let the characters decide how the scene would go. Unfortunately, this meant I wasted a lot of time rewriting and backtracking when the scene veered off course.

This was how I had always written, it felt natural to me. But then one day I got mired in a real mess. I had spent three days knee deep in the same horrible scene. I was drastically behind on my wordcount, and I was facing the real possibility of missing my deadline… again. It was the perfect storm of all my insecurities, the thought of letting people down mixed with the fear that I really didn’t know what I was doing, that I wasn’t a real writer at all, just an amateur pretending to be one. But as I got angrier and angrier with myself, I looked down at my novel and suddenly realized that I was being an absolute idiot. Here I was, desperate for time, floundering in a scene, and yet I was doing the hardest work of writing (figuring out exactly what needs to happen to move the scene forward in the most dramatic and exciting way) in the most time consuming way possible (ie, in the middle of the writing itself).

As soon as I realized this, I stopped. I closed my laptop and got out my pad of paper. Then, instead of trying to write the scene in the novel as I had been, I started scribbling a very short hand, truncated version the scene on the paper. I didn’t describe anything, I didn’t do transitions. I wasn’t writing, I was simply noting down what I would write when the time came. It took me about five minutes and three pages of notebook paper to untangle my seemingly unfixable scene, the one that had just eaten three days of my life before I tried this new approach. Better still, after I’d worked everything out in shorthand I was able to dive back into the scene and finish it in record time. The words flew onto the screen, and at the end of that session I’d written 3000 words rather than 2000, most of them in that last hour and a half.

Looking back, it was so simple I feel stupid for not thinking of it sooner. If you want to write faster, the first step is to know what you’re writing before you write it. I’m not even talking about macro plot stuff, I mean working out the back and forth exchanges of an argument between characters, blocking out fights, writing up fast descriptions. Writing this stuff out in words you actually want other people to read, especially if you’re making everything up as you go along, takes FOREVER. It’s horribly inefficient and when you get yourself in a dead end, you end up trashing hundreds, sometimes thousands of words to get out. But jotting it down on a pad? Takes no time at all. If the scene you’re sketching out starts to go the wrong way, you see it immedeatly, and all you have to do is cross out the parts that went sour and start again at the beginning. That’s it. No words lost, no time wasted. It was god damn beautiful.

Every writing session after this realization, I dedicated five minutes (sometimes more, never less) and wrote out a quick description of what I was going to write. Sometimes it wasn’t even a paragraph, just a list of this happens then this then this. This simple change, these five stupid minutes, boosted my wordcount enormously. I went from writing 2k a day to writing 5k a day within a week without increasing my 5 hour writing block. Some days I even finished early.

Of the three sides of the triangle, I consider knowledge to be the most important. This step alone more than doubled my word count. If you only want to try one change at a time, this is the one I recommend the most.

Side 2: Time

Now that I’d had such a huge boost from one minor change, I started to wonder what else I could do to jack my numbers up even higher. But as I looked for other things I could tweak, I quickly realized that I knew embarrassingly little about how I actually wrote my novels. I’d kept no records of my progress, I couldn’t even tell you how long it took me to write any of my last three novels beyond broad guesstimations, celebratory blog posts, and vague memories of past word counts. It was like I started every book by throwing myself at the keyboard and praying for a novel to shoot out of my fingers before the deadline. And keep in mind this is my business. Can you imagine a bakery or a freelance designer working this way? Never tracking hours or keeping a record of how long it took me to actually produce the thing I was selling? Yeah, pretty stupid way to work.

If I was going to boost my output (or know how long it took me to actually write a freaking novel), I had to know what I was outputting in the first place. So, I started keeping records. Every day I had a writing session I would note the time I started, the time I stopped, how many words I wrote, and where I was writing on a spreadsheet. I did this for two months, and then I looked for patterns.

Several things were immediately clear. First, my productivity was at its highest when I was in a place other than my home. That is to say, a place without internet. The afternoons I wrote at the coffee shop with no wireless were twice as productive as the mornings I wrote at home. I also saw that, while butt in chair time is the root of all writing, not all butt in chair time is equal. For example, those days where I only got one hour to write I never managed more than five hundred words in that hour. By contrast, those days I got five hours of solid writing I was clearing close to 1500 words an hour. The numbers were clear: the longer I wrote, the faster I wrote (and I believe the better I wrote, certainly the writing got easier the longer I went). This corresponding rise of wordcount and writing hours only worked up to a point, though. There was a definite words per hour drop off around hour 7 when I was simply too brain fried to go on.

But these numbers are very personal, the point I’m trying to make is that by recording my progress every day I had the data I needed to start optimizing my daily writing. Once I had my data in hand, I rearranged my schedule to make sure my writing time was always in the afternoon (my most prolific time according to my sheet, which was a real discovery. I would have bet money I was better in the morning.), always at my coffee shop with no internet, and always at least 4 hours long. Once I set my time, I guarded it viciously, and low and behold my words per day shot up again. This time to an average of 6k-7k per writing day, and all without adding any extra hours. All I had to do was discover what made good writing time for me and then make sure the good writing time was the time I fought hardest to get.

Even if you don’t have the luxury of 4 uninterrupted hours at your prime time of day, I highly suggest measuring your writing in the times you do have to write. Even if you only have 1 free hour a day, trying that hour in the morning some days and the evening on others and tracking the results can make sure you aren’t wasting your precious writing time on avoidable inefficiencies. Time really does matter.

Side 3: Enthusiasm

I was flying high on my new discoveries. Over the course of two months I’d jacked my daily writing from 2k per day to 7k with just a few simple changes and was now actually running ahead of schedule for the first time in my writing career. But I wasn’t done yet. I was absolutely determined I was going to break the 10k a day barrier.

I’d actually broken it before. Using Knowledge and Time, I’d already managed a few 10k+ days, including one where I wrote 12,689 words, or two chapters, in 7 hours. To be fair, I had been writing outside of my usual writing window in addition to my normal writing on those days, so it wasn’t a total words-per-hour efficiency jump. But that’s the great thing about going this fast, the novel starts to eat you and you find yourself writing any time you can just for the pure joy of it. Even better, on the days where I broke 10k, I was also pulling fantastic words-per-hour numbers, 1600 – 2000 words per hour as opposed to my usual 1500. It was clear these days were special, but I didn’t know how. I did know that I wanted those days to become the norm rather than the exception, so I went back to my records (which I now kept meticulously) to find out what made the 10k days different.

The answer was head-slappingly obvious. Those days I broke 10k were the days I was writing scenes I’d been dying to write since I planned the book. They were the candy bar scenes, the scenes I wrote all that other stuff to get to. By contrast, my slow days (days where I was struggling to break 5k) corresponded to the scenes I wasn’t that crazy about.

This was a duh moment for me, but it also brought up a troubling new problem. If I had scenes that were boring enough that I didn’t want to write them, then there was no way in hell anyone would want to read them. This was my novel, after all. If I didn’t love it, no one would.

Fortunately, the solution turned out to be, yet again, stupidly simple. Every day, while I was writing out my little description of what I was going to write for the knowledge component of the triangle, I would play the scene through in my mind and try to get excited about it. I’d look for all the cool little hooks, the parts that interested me most, and focus on those since they were obviously what made the scene cool. If I couldn’t find anything to get excited over, then I would change the scene, or get rid of it entirely. I decided then and there that, no matter how useful a scene might be for my plot, boring scenes had no place in my novels.

This discovery turned out to be a fantastic one for my writing. I trashed and rewrote several otherwise perfectly good scenes, and the effect on the novel was amazing. Plus, my daily wordcount numbers shot up again because I was always excited about my work. Double bonus!

Life On 10k A Day

With all three sides of my triangle now in place, I was routinely pulling 10-12k per day by the time I finished Spirits’ End, the fifth Eli novel. I was almost 2 months ahead of where I’d thought I’d be, and the novel had only taken me 3 months to write rather than the 7 months I’d burned on the Spirit War (facts I knew now that I was keeping records). I was ahead of schedule with plenty of time to do revisions before I needed to hand the novel in to my editor, and I was happier with my writing than ever before. There were several days toward the end when I’d close my laptop and stumble out of the coffee shop feeling almost drunk on writing. I felt like I was on top of the world, utterly invincible and happier than I’ve ever been. Writing that much that quickly was like taking some kind of weird success opiate, and I was thoroughly addicted. Once you’ve hit 10k a day for a week straight, anything less feels like your story is crawling.

Now, again, 10k a day is my high point as a professional author whose child is now in daycare (PRICELESS). I write 6 – 7 hours a day, usually 2 in the morning and 4-5 in the afternoon, five days a week. Honestly, I don’t see how anyone other than a full time novelist could pull those kind of hours, but that doesn’t mean you have to be a pro to drastically increase your daily word count.

So 10k might be the high end of the spectrum, but of the people I’ve told about this (a lot) who’ve gotten back to me (not nearly as many), most have doubled their word counts by striving to hit all three sides of the triangle every time they write. This means some have gone from 1k a day to 2k, or 2k to 4k. Some of my great success with increasing my wordcount is undoubtedly a product of experience, as I also hit my million word mark somewhere in the fifth Eli novel. Even so, I believe most of the big leaps in efficiency came from changing the way I approached my writing. Just as changing your lifestyle can help you lose a hundred pounds, changing they way you sit down to write can boost your words per hour in astonishing ways.

If you’re looking to get more out of your writing time, I really hope you try my triangle. If you do, please write me (or comment below) and let me know. Even if it doesn’t work (especially if it doesn’t work) I’d love to hear about it. Also, if you find another efficiency hack for writing, let me know about that too! There’s no reason our triangle can’t be a square, and I’m always looking for a way to hit 15k a day :D.

Again, I really hope this helps you hit your goals. Good luck with your writing!

– Rachel Aaron

 

Thanks again, Rachel. I’m more encouraged than ever to keep up with the goals I’ve set and, thanks to you, I think I can achieve even more. Join us here tomorrow to find out more about Rachel Aaron and her new release.

In the meantime, you should check out Rachel Aaron’s website and here are a couple of places you can purchase her The Legend of Eli Monpress novels.

http://www.amazon.com/Spirit-Thief-Legend-Eli-Monpress/dp/0316069051/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1281028971&sr=8-1

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/legend-of-eli-monpress-rachel-aaron/1100737227?ean=9780316193573&itm=1&usri=the+legend+of+eli+monpress

 

 

Season of Change

I’m an overachiever. Yep, I’m admitting it. And if you don’t believe me just ask my husband—it drives him crazy. I tend to organize and make lists, heck even my extensive movie collection is alphabetized and categorized by genre. Not kidding. My books would be too if I could talk my husband into building me more bookshelves. Maybe when the basement is finished?

Every year for the holidays I wind up making a giant list of what needs to get done, then when I accomplish it… I celebrate for about thirty-seven seconds before making another list, and then another. So in truth I probably got the important stuff done way back with the first list but then I spend my holidays killing myself to achieve more and more, and only wind up making myself crazy.

But this year was a little different, I got sick right after Thanksgiving and I’m still recovering. I’ll just say that bronchitis sucks and I found out the hard way that you can actually tear muscles in your chest wall from coughing. Not fun! But being sick has taught me several valuable lessons and helped shape my New Year’s resolutions this year as well.

1. Priorities

What’s important and what’s not. Spending time with family and friends is important; having everything “perfect” is not. I mean really, is the house going to fall down if it doesn’t get vacuumed? Apparently not. And besides, there is no such thing as “perfect”, and even if there were, “perfect” would look different to everyone. Writing is also a priority I have been denying myself. Don’t get me wrong I write but it is usually in fits and surges where I write for like ten hours a day for a week and then not at all for a few days, then pull a couple of all-nighters. By the way, I don’t recommend this writing style to anyone. I have to stop scooting writing down on the old priority list and make time for it everyday. You know the drill, sit down and write a good story, the rest will take care of itself. To be successful you have to show up everyday and you have to work hard, but I know it’s worth it because nothing worthwhile ever comes easily. Come on, if it were easy to climb Mount Everest, everyone would do it.

2.  Friends And Family

Friends and family have always been important to me but since my dad’s sudden death last December this point has really been driven home. Once the people you love are gone there is no going back so it is important to love the people in your life well NOW. Not tomorrow. Not next week. It is important to forgive perceived wrongs, to send a card or pick up the phone to tell someone you are thinking of them, to look up that old friend you were thinking about, and above all treasure today.

3.  Unclutter

Not just getting rid of the clutter in the attic or the basement (Lord knows mine currently need attention) but also throwing out what is not working in life and incorporating more of what is. I think it is always important to reassess, figure out what is important to you and go after it. Like writing for example, I have to stop putting obstacles in my path, sabotaging my own success. I need to stop being afraid to go after what I want and just do it. No more excuses. I have to stop running the other way by switching which story I’m currently working on when I hit “the wall.” It’s time to pick one story and finish the damn manuscript come what may.

4. Live Healthier

Hi, I’m Dana and I’m a diet coke addict. I could also stand to cut back on the junk food and move more. I love writing, but it’s kind of a fat girl sport. When I’m writing, I’m sitting on my butt behind a computer and let’s be honest, that does not lend itself to exercise. I need to force myself to get back to a regular exercise routine and eat the salad not the cookie currently calling my name from the pantry, and take the walk instead of sitting down with a book when I’m not writing.

Now you’ve heard some of my New Year’s resolutions–my promises to myself. Me, yelling at me to get it in gear and make better choices. I would love to hear some of yours.

I wish you all a 2012 full of health, happiness and writing inspiration.

Just Show Up

It takes a brave man to swim in the mermaid pond but I think today’s guest is up to the task. Derek Dodson has a Master of Education in professional counseling, and was a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist for a number of years working with at risk kids and families. He is an accomplished musician (guitar/bass), has a number of black belts in martial arts and is knowledgeable in Chinese, Okinawan and Japanese weapons. Derek has been a college athlete, a rodeo rider, fought as a semi pro kick boxer, and even worked as a bouncer in some really bad bars when he was working his way through grad school. This has probably come in very handy as Derek is also married with four—yes, you heard me right—FOUR beautiful daughters.

And did I mention he also writes romance?

Derek has published several “forgettable articles and lots of academic crap” in his areas of interest, as well as written music and poetry. He began writing fiction a wee bit more than a year ago and is taking that on like he does everything else—full steam ahead. Today he’s here talking about the long road to mastering any skill. Take it away Derek…

The past 30 or so years I have had two great loves in my life beyond family, martial arts and music. During these three decades, I somehow managed to complete a couple of college degrees, get married, raise 4 kids, and change careers three times. All through the demands of job, school and family, I found time for the two pursuits I love the most. Martial arts and music. Certainly there were breaks during times of illness, births, etc., but for the most part, I continued to show up.

Teaching has always been a favorite activity, and with the many years I’ve invested in my two hobbies, I am now viewed as a bit of an authority by some. I think maybe it is just because I am getting old. Over this span of time I can’t tell you how often I have heard people say they wished they could do martial arts or play guitar, but they don’t have the time, talent, money, etc. They often go on to opine about how gifted/talented/blessed/unique I am. BS.

In Geoff Colvin’s excellent book, Talent Is Overrated He lays out all the research done thus far around the topic of talent as it relates to things like business, science, music and other arts. What he so convincingly shows is there is NO evidence for what we call talent when it comes to these interests. What the research does show is those who are considered “talented” in their field are individuals who have a single-minded focus on their one activity to the exclusion of others.

One of the books Colvin cites is Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. Gladwell takes a close look at the habits of those who are highly successful in their field. He is most often quoted for coining the 10,000 hour rule. That is, mastery of most subjects require approximately 10,000 hours of focused practice.

As a novice writer, I am swimming in a sea of amazingly talented people for whom writing seems to flow as effortlessly as breathing. Since I have chosen romance, most of these uniquely gifted people are women. Being active in two local and two online RWA chapters, attending over a dozen online workshops, and reading several of the “must have” books on the topic, I have come to a conclusion. Writing is no different than anything else.

The reason I am surrounded by this chorus of amazingly talented writers is because you ladies put in the time and work your butts off. Jobs, kids, spouses, PTA, etc., all pull you in different directions. Still you find the time to write. The 10,000 hours is no guarantee of success, as there are other factors involved when it comes to publication. However, the self pub world has exposed us to wonderful writers and to those who haven’t reached the 10k mark yet.

Perhaps there is some hope for me as a writer, as I spent 500 words to basically say “just show up”. I would love to hear what others think.

 

 

 

Anita Clenney Splashes in the Mermaid Pond


Today we are joined by NY Times and USA Today bestselling author Anita Clenney. She grew up an avid reader, devouring Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books before moving on to mysteries and romance. After working as a secretary, a Realtor, teacher’s assistant, booking agent for Aztec Fire Dancers, and a brief stint in a pickle factory (picture Lucy and Ethel–lasted half a day)…she realized she’d missed the fork in the road that led to her destiny. Now she spends her days writing mysteries and paranormal romantic suspense about Secret Warriors, Ancient Evil and Destined Love. Anita lives in suburban Virginia, outside Washington DC, with her husband and two kids. Anita has agreed to share with us a recent chat she had with Cody MacBain, hero of her second book, Embrace the Highland Warrior.

Anita: I’m sure you have better things to do, Cody, but thanks for joining me.

Cody: We’ll have to make it quick. I have an appointment with a demon.

Anita: Does the demon know that?

Cody: ‘Course not. It’s all about stealth. That’s how the clan has survived this long.

Anita: Can’t you get one of the other warriors to handle him?

Cody: <Crosses his arms> You know bloody well, the powerful demons have to be assigned. You want me to send Faelan or Ronan and have them killed.

Anita: Uh, sorry. I’m sure the ladies wouldn’t appreciate having Ronan killed.

Cody: <Frowns, narrowing his hazel eyes> You saying the ladies like Ronan better than me?

Anita: No. That wasn’t what I meant at all, although he does seem to have a pull for the female sex. You’re just fine. Better than fine, actually, with all that dark hair, strong jaw, and intense eyes. Can I get a drink please? No, don’t let Brodie get it. He likes to play tricks. So can you tell us about these demons, or does that violate some kind of warrior code?

Cody: There is a warrior code. Centuries ago, they would have eliminated anyone who found out about the warriors, for the good of humanity, you understand. I’m making an exception here, since it’s Halloween. I want to warn people that there are real monsters hiding out there, creatures that make Lord of the Rings look like a fairy tale.

Anita: Sounds…unpleasant.

Cody: Life’s unpleasant.

Anita: Not all of it. You and Shay used to have a lot of fun.

Cody: Aye. Back then.

Anita: Shay didn’t know then what was going on? She thought all that training was just a game?

Cody: <Shifts in his seat> But I couldn’t tell her who she really was. It wasn’t my place.

Anita: But you were her best friend…do you regret not telling her now?

Cody: <Stares at a little tattoo on his wrist that looks like a sword> Aye. I regret lots of things.

Anita: Care to elaborate?

Cody: No.

Anita: Okay then. So tell me about your brothers.

Cody: <Shrugs> What’s to know? They’re like all brothers, make you crazy one minute, saving your backside the next.

Anita: Lachlan’s your younger brother. He reminds me of Ronan.

Cody: Aye, he’s a handful, and he’s usually got his hands full…if you know what I mean.

Anita: I think I do. I saw him eyeing Anna earlier.

Cody: <Snorts> Anna will put him in his place. She wants nothing to do with men. Unless she’s sparring with one.

Anita: You seem close to the other warriors, but they live in Scotland. You and your family spent most of your lives in America.

Cody: It was our mission. We had to protect Shay. But we had other missions as well. The world is a warrior’s battlefield. We travel wherever our assigned demons go. We don’t spend much time at home.

Anita: That explains the lack of accent. There’s just a hint of brogue.

Cody: That’s part of our disguise. We have to blend in with our surroundings. And we don’t want the demons to know where we’re from.

Anita: Doesn’t the kilt ruin that plan? <Looks at Cody’s kilt>

Cody: We only wear them at home, not in battle. Except Faelan. We’re having a hard time getting him out of his. <sexy grin> Though he takes it off a lot for Bree.

Anita: <Clears throat>Well, he is from the 19th century. Kilts were more common then. Should I ask if it’s true…what you wear, or don’t wear, underneath?

Cody: <Another grin, drops open his knees> I could show you.

Anita: Please don’t. <If he wasn’t careful, she’d find out regardless…Fanning>Water, I didn’t get my water. Tell me more about Shay. You seem uncomfortable when I mention her. I know you were close growing up. How close?

Cody: <Grin fades> What do you mean?

Anita: I mean, were you best friends?

Cody: <Rubs the tattoo on his neck> You could say that. We knew everything about each other.

Anita: Everything? Are you sure about that? I hear there were secrets.

Cody: <shifting in seat, again> Let’s talk about something else besides Shay.

Anita: You know your voice sounds different when you say her name.

Cody: <Scowls, and a racket sounds outside door. A horrible screeching sound as the door splinters. Bloody hell! I think the demon’s found me.

Anita: <jumps up> Maybe the kilt gave you away.

Cody: <Pulls a dirk from his boot, hits a button extending it to a sword> You’d better hide. You might be able to write books, but you can’t fight worth crap.

Anita: Okay, looks like the chat is over. Oh my God. Did you see that thing? It looked like an Orc.

Cody: He’s one of the prettier ones.  

Anita: <Jumps up, runs toward a closet, glancing over shoulder> Are you opening your talisman? Good grief, you’re opening it. You’ll kill me.

Cody: I told you to hide. Close the door and cover your eyes or this’ll be your last book.

Anita: <Hides in closet and covers eyes as a blinding flash penetrates the darkness> If you want to know more about Cody and Shay, here’s a blurb for Embrace the Highland Warrior, available now.

They were driven apart by a timeless secret…

Cody MacBain let the woman of his destiny slip away. A member of an ancient clan of Scottish warriors, he grew up beside Shay Logan as her secret protector, but his heart compelled him to become more. Until Shay’s true identity was revealed, and the fated pair’s chance was gone…

But danger will drive them back into each other’s arms…

Shay fell for the boy next door, suspecting nothing of the ancient secrets he guarded. After a stinging betrayal, she’s determined to banish the memories of her first love forever. But the past can’t let go, and the boy she once loved has returned to her a warrior determined to protect her from the unspeakable evil fate has planned…

You can find out more about Anita and her books at:

http://www.anitaclenney.com

http://www.facebook.com/anitaclenneyAUTHOR

http://www.twitter.com/anitaclenney

http://www.mysteriesandmargaritasblogspot.com

http://www.goodreads.com/anitaclenney

http://www.redroom.com/anitaclenney

Some of the places Embrace can be purchased:

http://www.amazon.com/Embrace-Highland-Warrior-Anita-Clenney/dp/1402251262

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/embrace-the-highland-warrior-anita-clenney/1100076266

http://www.booksamillion.com/p/Embrace-Highland-Warrior/Anita-Clenney/9781402251269

http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/embrace-the-highland-warrior/id468777516?mt=11

 

We’ll leave you with an excerpt from Embrace:

Cody sighed. Might as well get it over with. He removed the shackles, returned them, and bent over her. “Shay, wake up.”

Her eyes flew open. She planted both hands against his chest and shoved, knocking him on his back, then sprang on top of him. “How dare you handcuff me to a bed?” she yelled, punctuating each word with a shake that rattled his brain. He didn’t fight back. She had to get it out of her system, and he didn’t blame her. He’d be more than pissed if someone shackled him.

She landed a fist into his stomach, and the breath rushed out of him. Okay, enough was enough. He captured her hands and rolled, trapping her under him.

“Get off me, you oaf.”

“I’ll get off when you stop beating the snot out of me.”

She let out a war cry and lunged for his throat, teeth bared. Intrigued, he hesitated a second too long, and she sank her teeth into his neck. A jolt of desire shot straight to his groin. He’d never been one for the rough stuff, but damn! He pulled back before she could do more than leave a bruise. He trapped her legs with his and held her hands above her head, letting his full weight press her into the soft mattress. She still struggled but could move only enough to get him excited.

“I’m sorry, Shay. I had to do it. It was too dangerous to let you go traipsing through the woods. I had to keep you safe.”

“What if he was hiding in one of the other bedrooms and sneaked in here while I was handcuffed to the bed? You left me so I couldn’t even protect myself.”

“Lach heard him out in the woods, but that’s why I locked the door, just in case. If this guy had broken it down to get to you, you would’ve screamed, and I would’ve come running. I was never far from the house.” He’d heard every name she called him.

Her eyes still flashed fire, but her breath was steadier, and she kept glancing at his mouth. He thought that was a good thing. He wondered if she’d calmed enough not to hit him, because he should move. She had to notice the effect all the wiggling around was having on him. He felt her hips push against his, and he groaned. He relaxed his grip and lowered his head, letting his lips touch her chin. He kissed his way to her mouth, and she head butted him in the nose.

While the stars exploded in his head, she shoved him aside and bolted out the door. He jumped up and went after her as she pounded down the stairs. He caught up with her outside. She was swinging her purse like a whip, headed for the car.

“Where are you going?” he demanded.

“Get away from me.”

“You can’t leave.”

“Watch me.” She opened the door. “I’m tired of people hiding things from me. I thought you were going to stop. Now you’re handcuffing me to the bed.”

“I explained it to you.”

“Don’t touch me,” she said, jerking away when he grabbed her arm.

“You’re not leaving.”

Shay straightened her shoulders. “You can’t stop me.”

He grabbed her, tossed her over his shoulder, kicked the car door shut, and stomped up the steps.

“Put me down!” Shay kicked and twisted, cursing at him. He dumped her on her feet inside the door.

She blew her hair out of her face, and as soon as she could see, she threw a punch at his chin. He deflected it and grabbed her arm. “Stop hitting me.”

“How dare you throw me over your shoulder like some kind of caveman,” she spat, trying to wrench her arm free. It didn’t work, so she used her knee.

“Ah, not there.” Cody trapped her knee. “I made the mistake of letting you leave here nine years ago without listening to me. By God, I won’t do it again. You’ll listen if I have to sit on you,” he growled.

She drew back her other arm, and before she could throw the punch, he had her on the floor and was sitting astride her, pinning her wrists to the floor. She bucked and twisted, but he held her down. “We can do this all night if you want, but you’re going to listen to me this time.”

“Listen to more lies? You’re still hiding things from me. Like the fact that you have Nina’s entire house under surveillance. Like the fact that you’ve got a Bat Cave in your basement. Like the fact that you were in Scotland when the stalking started.”

“You think I’m your stalker?” he yelled. “Me! I’m trying to keep you alive. We’re all trying to keep you alive. That’s what the clan’s been doing your whole damned life, trying to keep you alive! And just like always, you’re making it hard as hell. Your father wasn’t a bloody spy, and that thing in your living room wasn’t a man!”

 

My publisher will give away a copy of Embrace the Highland Warrior to one commenter, US and Canada only please. My question is, if you could interview anyone, past or present, who would it be?

 

 

 

 

 

Garden of Knight (Part Two) by Dana Rodgers

(Mermaid Note: If you haven’t already, please read Garden of Knight (Part One) first.)

The train rocked gently as Gemma flipped through a stack of photos from their last visit, pausing at a shot of her, Gran and Aunt Margaret. Gran and Margaret looked almost the same as they always had; the same dark eyes, olive skin and stubborn chins, but Gran’s hair was grayer, and they each carried a few more wrinkles. Studying the photo carefully Gemma saw strained lines around Gran’s mouth. She’d been so preoccupied  she hadn’t noticed before.

Gran and Aunt Margaret had kept their word and visited her every month. They’d planned special vacations for her holidays and breaks from school, and been there for all of the important moments of her life. But Gemma had let her resentment of being sent away build into frustration, anger and then open rebellion. By the time she was seventeen she’d refused to go home at all, even for the annual family reunion. She remembered Gran begging her to come, and stressing the importance of knowing her family, but Gemma hadn’t listened. She hadn’t even bothered to return Gran and Aunt Margaret’s recent barrage of phone calls.

It had been more than three years since she’d seen them in person, and now she’d give anything for just one chance to go back, to say she was sorry. She wiped a stray tear from her cheek and stuffed the photos back in her red striped tote.

According to the authorities, they had been attacked by some kind of animal.

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Garden of Knight (Part One) by Dana Rodgers

It was like someone had picked her up and dropped her on another planet. This planet smelled like cookies and came with a house so big she could get lost.  She dodged Grandma Emily’s favorite chair, a big fancy one with flowers on it, and passed the curio that held Great Aunt Margaret’s spoon collection. Floor to ceiling bookshelves flanked a stone fireplace so big she could stand inside it if she’d wanted to, and she was almost the tallest six year old in her class. She decided Grandma Emily might not like that and moved on, her attention drawn by the gold framed portrait of her mother above it. In the painting Mama looked younger, her black hair longer and dark eyes shining with mischief. She looked like a movie star with her red dress and olive skin. Daddy had called her his gypsy queen. She was as beautiful as a queen, Gemma thought, wishing she looked more like her. She had Mama’s eyes, but Daddy’s blond hair and pale skin. Mama always said Gran didn’t care about them, but why did she have so many pictures of Mama if she didn’t love her?

Still lost in her thoughts, Gemma wandered outside into a huge garden full of trees, flowers and statues. The air was chilly, not as stuffy as in the house. Red, yellow and orange leaves decorated the trees as if they were preparing for a party. It would be Halloween soon. Was Gran too old to celebrate Halloween? Stretching out her hand, Gemma plucked a leaf from a nearby bush. She traced the veins softly but the leaf crumbled at her touch. Just like her parents had in the accident. She swallowed hard as the familiar ache filled her chest. She let everyone think that she didn’t remember, but she did. Every time she closed her eyes she was back in the car. She could hear Daddy’s deep resonating laugh, see Mama’s dark hair blowing in the wind, and then the deer sprang from the woods and into the road a split second before Mama screamed.

Being sad won’t bring them back.

Gemma whipped around. “Gran?” But it was a man’s voice. “Who said that?” Her head swiveled in every direction, but the only one here was a statue of a man with sad eyes wearing strange clothes. He knelt on one knee, holding a giant sword, like a knight. She felt weird, reaching out and touching his cold hand, like someone was watching her. Rather than being creepy, it was kind of nice not being sad all alone.

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Colors of Fall

For some fall is about buying a new backpack or lunchbox, sharpening those pencils and sending your children back to school. For others fall is symbolized with tailgating and crowding into stands to cheer on your favorite football team.

While the pools have closed, fall sports have begun and school has been back in session for a few weeks now, fall did not in fact officially begin until yesterday, September 23rd.

So what does it mean the first official day of fall? Well it’s more than the beginning of a new season. It is the autumnal equinox. Equinox derives from Latin’s aquaeus meaning equal and nox meaning night, and is appropriate since this is the time of year when night and day are almost equal in length. This happens twice a year, once in the spring (March 21-22) and again in the fall (September 22-23), when the earth’s tilt is neither toward nor away from the sun.

The autumnal equinox has always been a time to mark change as we move from summer’s bounty to the colder, darker days ahead. Throughout the world and throughout history festivals have been held to celebrate the bounty of the harvest.While many people mourn summer’s passing, I always look forward to fall. It is probably my favorite time of year. I plant pansies and chrysanthemums, put out my scarecrow and some pumpkins. My family picks apples and enjoys exploring a local farm’s wagon rides and Maize Maze. We take walks in the woods, soaking up the reds, yellows and oranges that blaze festively from every tree, and go kayaking. I love the low hanging fog over the river in my backyard, the honk of geese and nothing says fall to me like the smell of a fire.

With the cooler temperatures I also feel revitalized, ready to get back into a more regimented routine and undertake those tough projects that may have been set aside while my kids were out of school. This year I’m tackling a historical that I set aside back in May.

So what about you? Is there a special way you and your family mark the changing of the seasons? And do you find you are more productive during the cooler months or the warmer part of the year?

“To Be Or Not To Be?”

“To be or not to be?” Okay, maybe that’s not exactly the question. The real question is whether to write under your own name or under a pen name?  Well, there seem to be a lot of differing opinions to that ever-important question.

First, let’s start with why someone might write under a different name. Well, why would a super hero have an alias? For privacy of course. A lot of people choose to write under a pen name for the same reason. I mean think about what would happen if everyone knew you were a super hero? Fans hassling you all the time to sign autographs, take pictures with them, begging you to make public appearances so you can rescue their cat out of a tree. I’ll be honest, I suck at getting cats out of trees but it might be nice if someone, someday thought I was fabulous enough to ask for my autograph. 🙂

Or maybe you work in a position where you would rather people not know that you are also a superhero book writer by night. If, for example, you were a kindergarten teacher and you write erotica you may not want the parents of the kids in your class to know that. We all know that writing erotica does not a pervert make, but there are those small-minded individuals out there who might think that it makes you less qualified to teach their little angels. Those same people seem to forget that those little angels wouldn’t be here if they weren’t occasionally turning up the heat in their own lives.

For someone else it might be because they write in different genres. If you have built a reputation for writing in a specific genre, like say historical romance, under one name, and you want to branch out and write in a different genre, YA for example, you might want to do it under a different superhero name. Readers tend to develop certain expectations when they pick up a certain author, so if you are going to be giving them something completely different you may want to do it under a different name.

Another reason to write under a superhero name may be in an attempt to appeal to a more diverse audience. Joanne Rowling for example, was asked by her publisher to pick a more androgynous pen name in hopes of appealing to a wider audience. She does not have a middle name so she borrowed her grandmother’s name, Kathleen, and writes under J. K. Rowling.

I considered using a pen name but ultimately chose to write under my own name, as do most of the writers that I know. Why you ask? Because I think your name is unique to you and brings with it a certain amount of your heritage. I don’t work in an overly judgmental career, so I didn’t see any reason to hide my identity. I am fortunate to be surrounded by so many supportive friends and family, and honestly most of them don’t care that I’m a writer, unless it means I can get them an autographed copy of a book. 🙂 And basically, I want to take credit for my work under my own name. I think it would be wonderful to have someone think enough of my writing to travel to an event to get my autograph or have their picture taken with me. I mean really, how cool would that be? There may come a time when a pen name might be beneficial if I decide to take my writing in an entirely new direction, but for now I will write as Dana Rodgers.

Now it’s your turn. Do you write under your own name or a pen name, and why?

 #amwriting

Project: Untitled

Deadline: None

New words written: Not nearly enough, but it’s early

Present total word count: 7,987 words


 


Bump, Bump, Bump

My family is on vacation this week at Massanutten Ski Resort. This morning I took one for the team taking my children on a summer tubing ride. So I buy the tickets and up, up we go. We get to the top of the slope and I bravely climb into the giant inner tube. When I’m ready and give the nod the burly blonde college age guy slings me down the giant funnel…where I squeal like a little girl. Fortunately they were shrieks of delight, not horror. At least until I reached the first real bump. I think it should be mandatory for the ride attendant to mention using those glorious abdominal muscles to keep your behind off of the ground! Let’s just say I’m still recovering from my afternoon of fun. 🙂

But bumps are all part of the experience, even in writing.

You start a new story and everything is going along so well. Your characters are telling you their tale. Your dialogue is almost writing itself. And then BAM! You hit a bump. Sometimes it’s a little bump, other times it’s more like a wall. It might be working out a kink in your plot line or deciding how to add more conflict to your story. Or it might be one of those horrible turning points. You know the ones I’m talking about, a decision point in your story where you can turn right or left. Neither decision is wrong, either direction will lead to a great story, but your writing comes to a screeching halt until you decide which way to go. Or your bumps may come at the end, during your editing process. Or writing the dreaded synopsis or query letter.

What kinds of bumps do you deal with in your writing and how do you overcome them?

Wizards, Witches and Muggles, Oh My!


I woke up at four-thirty in the morning the other day with an idea for a scene and instead of rolling over and going back to sleep like any sane person, I instead rushed out of bed and down to my computer to spend the next two hours writing. Why you ask? Because I’m a writer and that’s what writers do. We take our thoughts, ideas, dreams and musings and transfer them to the page, hopefully, creating dynamic characters, witty dialog and conflict along the way.

But why lose sleep? How important could one idea be anyway? I mean really, people have hundreds of ideas everyday. Is one idea really so important that you should stop every thing? Roll out of bed to get it down before it evaporates into the floating mists of dreamland? Can one idea for a book or a scene or a character really change the world? Heck yeah! Some people would disagree with me, but for those people I have only two words: Harry Potter.

Think of how many millions of fans on continents around the world have been affected by the Harry Potter books and movies. None of that would have been possible without J.K. Rowling taking the time to get her ideas down on paper.

Joanne Rowling first conceived Harry Potter in 1990, while on a crowded train from Manchester to King’s Cross station in London. She began writing the first story longhand in 1991 while teaching English as a foreign language in Portugal. Fighting depression after a failed marriage, she returned to her native Scotland in 1993 with suitcases half full of different versions of Harry Potter stories. Struggling to support herself and her daughter, she continued to write the books in Edinburgh cafes during her daughter’s nap times when she wasn’t working. In 1995 she finished the first book, typing it out on an old typewriter and submitting it.  It took six years for Joanne Rowling to bring that first glimmer of an idea to the published page, but she didn’t give up, even after being rejected by several publishers. Can you believe it? I bet those other publishers feel pretty silly now!

Her first manuscript, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, was released by Bloombury in June of 1997 winning several prestigious awards. When Bloomsbury released the second book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, in July of 1998 it went straight to the number one slot on the BookTrack bestseller list. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets was released in the United States in October of 1998 and Warner Brothers, recognizing a huge opportunity, paid a seven-digit sum to secure film rights for the first two books. With the wild success of the first two books and movies, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was released in July of 1999 and became the fastest selling book, topping book lists and selling 64,000 copies in the first 3 days.

Beginning with the 2000 release of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, booksellers around the world began holding midnight release events with games and live entertainment to coincide with the release of Rowling’s books. Anxious fans would line up around the block, some dressing up like characters from the books, to be the first to get their copies. This was the first time in history where people would line up around the block to get a copy of a book! To bittersweet fanfare the final book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was finally released on July 21, 2007. It had taken 17 years to bring her original idea, thought up on a crowded train, to fruition and get the whole story on the page and into bookstores around the world. And a record number of fans lined up for it…Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows sold 11 million copies in the first twenty-four hours. As of June of 2011, the book series had been translated into 67 languages and sold over 450 million copies. The world built throughout the Harry Potter book series has even been turned into a theme park in Orlando, Florida.
And all of this stemmed from one woman’s idea. So let me ask again—how important is an idea?