Category Archives: Writing

Love It or List It?

Motivation, Writing, ,

I am an unapologetic HGTV-slut.  I. Love. That. Channel.

It doesn’t matter what is on – I’ll watch anything – but my favorites are House Hunters and Property Virgins.  But, a new program has caught my eye and I’ll definitely be tuning in when it premieres later this month – Love It or Leave It.

The premise is that when homeowners live in a house long enough and they lose the lovin’ feeling the question pops up as to whether they renovate or move.  In this show, two real estate professionals take opposite viewpoints and try to convince the homeowner to either stay in their home or list it for sale.  I think it looks fabulous!

It also reminds me of a recent writing dilemma I had about an old, unfinished manuscript. Now, I’m a little type A (don’t snicker, those of you who know me well) and I just can’t leave things unfinished – it drives me crazy.  But, this ms started out so strong and then, like a literary barracuda, I was distracted by a bright shiny object and put it aside.

Now, here’s my confession: It was easy to put it to the side because I’d hit a snag in the ms, wasn’t feeling the love for it anymore and . . . well, the other story was SO shiny!

So, I recently pulled it out and took a look at it to see what I wanted to do with my poor little orphaned baby. It still has the problems I hated before and shockingly the little writing elf did not finish it for me as it languished on my hard drive.  Sigh.

So, what do I do?  I’m working on my NaNo project right now and that takes immediate priority. But November will end and I’ll finish my WIP and the orphan will still be sitting there.

I need to decide if it’s worth picking up or if I should just shelve it for a different time – which might be never. Do I love it?  Do I list it?

I honestly don’t have a clue.

Do you have any advice? Have you faced the same question about one of your babies? When is it time to let a book go?

Robin

Colors of Fall

Dana Rodgers, mermaids, Motivation, Writing

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?”

Dana Rodgers, mermaids, Writing,

“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

Dana Rodgers, mermaids, Writing

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!

Dana Rodgers, mermaids, Motivation, Writing,


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?

No Room for Doubt

Dana Rodgers, mermaids, Motivation, Writing,

Do you ever spend hours, days, weeks pouring your heart and soul into your writing only to go back, read it and think, “Oh my God, what was I thinking? This is crap. I have no talent. No one will ever want to read this.”

Well, guess what? You’re not the only one!

I love to write. I love the creative process and making the story come alive on the page. For me it is not just the destination (the finished story), but also the journey getting there (developing characters, and hammering all of those twists and turns into place). But I often find, especially during my editing process that doubt creeps in. I start wondering what the heck I’m doing. Wondering why I ever thought that I could write a book.

Recently, while going through one of these moments, a friend introduced me to a new type of encouragement in the form of John Steinbeck.

John Steinbeck? Maybe, the Pulitzer Prize winning The Grapes of Wrath will ring a bell… or Of Mice and Men or East of Eden or The Winter of Our Discontent or Cannery Row…

John Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1962, and even he harbored doubts concerning his ability to effectively bring the written word to the page. While working on The Grapes of Wrath, he composed letters and wrote in a journal. Some of this material was later published in Working Days: The Journals of the Grapes of Wrath 1938-1941. Throughout this journal John Steinbeck writes about his struggles, worries and self-doubt.

The following are a few quotes from Working Days: The Journals of the Grapes of Wrath 1938-1941:

June 14, 1938–“Yesterday was a bust. I could have forced the work out but I’d lost the flow of the book and it would have been a weak spot.”

June 18, 1938–“If only I could do this book properly it would be one of the really fine books and a truly American book. But I am assailed with my own ignorance and inability.”

August 1, 1938–“I didn’t work then [July 25] or all week. …Hope to lose some of the frantic quality in my mind now. It’s just like slipping behind at Stanford. Panic sets in. Can’t organize. … I’m jumpy. …Don’t know who will publish my book. Don’t know at all. No reason to let it slide though. Must keep at it. … Wish I could control the jumping jitters though.”

August 30, 1938–“I’m having a hell of a time concentrating with so many things going on. … I hope this book is some good, but I have less and less hope for it.”

September 26,1938–“This book has become a misery to me because of my inadequacy.”

So the next time you doubt yourself, remember, there are other incredibly accomplished authors out there who have also acknowledged uncertainty when it comes to submitting their work. When you start to question yourself just remember:

1. Don’t worry about what anyone else thinks. Your voice is your own and it is unique. Why do we have so many different types of writers? So many different genres? Because there are so many different types of readers!

2. In the words of Nora Roberts, “Write the damn book!” Forget about everything else and just get your ideas down on the page because you can’t edit what doesn’t exist. You can always cast off what doesn’t work later.

3. Trust you instincts. Everyone worries about breaking the rules. Ignore the rules because they are intimidating, and that can lead to insecurity. Instead focus on telling a great story. Once the story is on the page you can obsess over comma usage and dangling participles.

4. Make time for yourself. I know it sounds difficult, and it is, because life gets in the way, but consistently setting time aside for yourself and scheduling around that time will help you to put words on the page.

5. You are not alone. Believe in yourself. Everyone has experienced moments of self-doubt or insecurity, even someone as accomplished as John Steinbeck. If he can do it, so can you… So keep writing!

 

 

Who Are You Meant To Be?

Dana Rodgers, Kerri Carpenter, mermaids, Motivation, Writing

You know how some things are a secret? Like the chocolate stash behind the canned vegetables at the back of the pantry. Yep, no danger of anyone finding the mini candy bars hidden there in my house.

Writing was one of those things for me.

I grew up in a less than ideal home and I used writing as my outlet. Over time the journal entries and poems of my youth evolved into short stories. Not very good ones at first, but it was still satisfying to see the story in my mind come to life on the page. And yes, for those of you wondering…I do in fact carry on conversations with my characters. In what other profession is it possible to get paid for talking to your imaginary friends? Yeah, in most places they medicate you and introduce you to a little thing called a straitjacket!

But I kept my writing a secret. No one knew. Not my friends, not my family, not even my husband, a wonderful man I have been married to for almost 18 years! I never set out for it to be a secret. It’s not like I lead a double life as a secret agent or anything. I just never felt good enough, talented enough to make my deep, dark, crazy dream of being able to walk into a bookstore and one day see my name on the shelf a reality. So, I didn’t say anything.

Then about three years ago a friend asked me to be a beta reader for her manuscript. She knew I was an avid reader and I jumped at the opportunity to give her feedback. Boy, did she get more than she bargained for! Fortunately, she was so happy to get constructive feedback that she called me again and again to ask questions and get opinions. In return, I was thrilled to be involved with a real author; after all she had an agent. We worked well together and I quickly became her critique partner.

Since that fateful day, Anita Clenney has encouraged and cajoled me into coming out of the writer’s closet and embracing the insanity that is the publishing industry. I have written my first full-length manuscript and pitched it at the WRW Retreat. Although, I have been fortunate enough to receive multiple submission requests I now realize that it doesn’t matter. The true gift that my friend has given me is confidence in my own abilities. She has opened a door to an entire community of incredibly talented nut jobs that talk to their characters too.

My friends and family have been very supportive since my coming out. The first time my husband read an excerpt of my work he said, “Holy crap! I had no idea you could write like this!” and “Oh yeah, now that I know, can you edit my master’s thesis on water management in Europe?” For the record, I would rather edit an entire manuscript than his incredibly dry academic thesis again.

And by the way, my dream of seeing my name on the bookstore shelf came true April 29, 2011. My friend and critique partner, Anita Clenney, published Awaken the Highland Warrior (the first in a trilogy) and bless her heart, she dedicated it to me.

The point is we all come from different places and have taken different journeys to get where we are today. For some of us the path has been relatively easy, tripping over wonderful opportunities at every turn. For others, the road may have been wrought with challenge and constant reminders of past failures. But the question I ask is this–Have you ever looked back at your life and thought… Wow, that was so not worth it. I really wish I hadn’t tried. Or, do you more often look back and think… That was such a great opportunity. I wish I had learned to _____________. Or, I should have _____________.

At the end of the day, no matter what your journey is, put it all out on the line and see what happens. Because you miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take and along the way you short change yourself out of being who you’re meant to be.