Results of P&E Poll

I forgot to mention, the results of the P&E poll are in!

• The Heat of the Moment tied for 6th place in the anthology category
• Devil's Breath tied for 14th place in the mainstream short story category
• Hear the Wind Blow tied for 5th place in the fantasy short story category

Thank you to everyone who voted, and congratulations to all the winners! You can see the complete list at http://critters.org/predpoll/tally.html

Confessions of a writer-in-progress

I have all these writerly thoughts swimming around my head. Character development. Story arc. Character goals. And every night I go to bed with one particular thought on my mind: Who killed Humbert Watson?

I've written this story once. It didn't work. I'm writing it again and I still don't know who killed Humbert Watson and why.

But I'm okay with that.

This story has evolved. The characters have evolved because I've let them evolve. That doesn't mean that what I'm writing now will end up in the final draft: it means I can explore the possibilities and let the characters lead the way. Sometimes that means I write a scene that has to be tossed. I've got plenty of those! But sometimes I stumble upon the direction the story needs to go, and that's exciting.

It's why I started writing, and why I love the craft.

Judge a Book by the Cover

My, it's been a while since I last updated my blog. I've been busy with L-I-F-E and whining about not getting enough writing time. I get a few hours here and there but not enough to keep me happy. I sense a day-long writing session coming up. You know, one of those days where I don't even get dressed all day, I just sit at the computer and get lost in my fictional world.

Great news! The cover for my e-book, Hear the Wind Blow, is being featured on Nikki Leigh's blog. http://judgebookbycover.blogspot.com/2008/01/hear-wind-blow-by-janelle-dakota.html Check out Nikki's blog to learn more about her and her book promotion ideas. Thank you, Nikki!

Preditors and Editors: Last time I checked, Hear the Wind Blow was tied for 5th place; Devil's Breath was tied for 14th. The official results will be posted in February. Thank you to everyone who voted! You can see the tally at http://critters.org/predpoll/tally.html and the final results will be posted at http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/perpoll.htm

Blog goals, life goals

Things I'd like to do with my blog:

1. Learn how to post book covers on my blog like I can on MySpace so I can have a stack of "tiles" that represents my reading pile or what I've read so far this year.
2. Learn how to make an active link with html. For instance, have a line that says, "If you want to buy my book, click here" and the words click here are the underlined link. That's cool.
3. Try having a guest blogger. Preferably one of my favorite authors.
4. Settle on a bio that reveals my goofy, obsessive, lovable self. I find bios as difficult to write as cover letters. Hopefully, I'll get over that someday soon.
5. Occasionally post a scene from one of my WIPs. I'm hesitant to do so because of publishing rights. Publishers want the work to be unpublished and to not have been read by more than X amount of people. If portions of it are on the Internet, any number of people could have read it already. I think excerpts must be okay, though, because I see a lot of them on writer blogs. But it feels odd to always talk about my writing on my blog and never share any of it.

This time of year, my thoughts gravitate toward orderliness and organization. Perhaps it's from spending so much time indoors? This year I've taken the orderliness and organization to heart and decided to eliminate activities that drain my energy or rob me of my writing time.

I'll let you know how that works.

Vote for my stories on Predators & Editors!

My short story, Hear the Wind Blow, has been nominated on Predators and Editors. It only takes a minute to vote. Will you please cast yours?
http://www.critters.org/predpoll/shortstorysf.shtml


And...The Heat of the Moment, the Echelon Press LLC anthology that contains my short story, Devil's Breath.
http://www.critters.org/predpoll/antho.shtml

And finally... my short story, Devil's Breath.
http://www.critters.org/predpoll/shortstory.shtml

All you have to do is follow the links, scroll down (to Hear the Wind Blow, The Heat of the Moment, and Devil's Breath, respectively), enter your name and email address, and click submit. You'll receive a confirmation email and your vote will count once you confirm it. Voting goes from January 1 to midnight, January 15th (GMT).

Your vote is greatly appreciated! Thank you!

Conference update

I'm officially registered! I'll be going to Massachusetts in April. I'm so excited!!! I've never been to the northeastern states, and I get to meet one of my long-time online writing buddies for the first time. Way cool!

Deception is coming along very well. I have over 8,000 words on this draft so far. But I'm anxious to get back to Falling as soon as possible. I feel guilty, like I'm cheating on my characters. At the very least, I'm neglecting them. How rude of me, especially considering that those particular characters were productive in December, even though I was not :-)

I've really, really enjoyed the break from routine that the holidays provided. So much so that I'm not ready to go back to the normal routine. I thought about kicking and screaming, but I've never been good at tantrums. My daughter has a science class tomorrow and basketball on Saturday, my son goes back to school on Monday, and my daughter's homeschool classes resume on Monday. Our busy week includes a play at the Seattle Children's Theatre (The Neverending Story), piano lessons, orthodontist appointments, and evening meetings. So it wouldn't matter if I had a tantrum, I'd still be thrust back into Life As Usual.

What that last paragraph leads me to believe (she says with dawning realization) is that I need to take a look at how I spend my time and why I dislike my usual routine so much. Duh.

First blog post of 2008

In between making merry with my friends and family over the past two days, I took down the Christmas decorations, cleaned house, and got busy on The Art of Deception. I also made a few notes on Falling Short which resulted in a minor change that will have a big impact. It's funny how a small change in one character can effect so much. Like looking through binoculars and shifting the view just slightly - a little closer, a little farther away - and suddenly so much more comes into focus. I am excited to be having some "yes!" moments in my writing.

Those of you who are near and dear to me know that I need fistfuls of Starbucks and loads of patience in order to partake in the Great American Pastime known as shopping. I loathe shopping. For myself (when and only when I must do so) I go in with a purpose, grab what I need, and get out. Unless we're talking about a bookstore; then, I can spend hours perusing and it takes superhero-willpower to keep from spending my mortgage payment on the latest releases. My daughter, by some fluke in the gene pool, is a true shopper: she needs to explore every possibility before making a decision. My idea of hell. So yesterday, I had a plan: daughter had a gift card to spend at a store within walking distance of my house. Solution: send her with teenage girl next door, follow along a few minutes later to check on them, and spend the time browsing the aisles of Barnes & Noble! I thanked said teenage girl for having the patience to wait while daughter tried on every article of clothing at Old Navy. It was a win-win situation, especially since I had B&N gift cards to spend.

She spent her gift card, snagging bargains and coming away with a cool sweater, two hip new shirts, and a cozy pair of slippers. I bought only one book: The 2007 Best American Short Stories, edited by Stephen King. And a venti-decaf-nonfat-one pump chocolate-mocha :)