The Heartache of a Good Book

Merry Christmas, everyone! I love getting books as presents,so leave a comment for a chance to win a free ebook! (Your choice, Fairy Tale Trap or Cinderella & Zombies). Deadline is the end of the year.

Have you ever been in love? Have you ever cared so much about a person, be it a spouse, child, boyfriend/girlfriend, or dear friend that it physically hurts you to think about losing them?

Why is a good book like that? I sometimes call them magical books because of the effect they have on me. Magic is the only way to describe it.

You know what I mean (or at least, I hope you do so I don't feel crazy). While I'm reading a truly awesome book, I sometimes get a tightness in my chest. And that feeling that makes me keep reading. A good book demands that I give up sleep. It plagues my thoughts during the day. I make excuses to sneak of and spend time with that book. It's addicting.

Just like being in love.

But why to good things make us do crazy things? I think we can all agree that love is good. A good book is, by definition, good. Yet, we're talking about chest pain and sleep deprivation. It sounds like torture.

I'm sure there are a lot of really complicated, very different answers to this question, but here's my best guess:

That there's always a balance. High highs come with high risk, but we love it. We seek it. Because the height of emotion is the height of human experience.

What are your thoughts? Why have you chosen the life of a fiction junkie?

My NaNoWriMo and Future Books

I did Nanowrimo this year and it was a total blast!

I tend to write shorter books, so my first story didn't cut it. I finished the book, but hadn't reached 50k words. So, after some thought, I started work on Snow White and Zombies. I think this one is a keeper. It still needs some work (as in a few more drafts) but I'm going to get this book out as soon as I can. I still feel bad about putting Fairy Tale Twist on hold (Thank you SO much for being patient!) but I feel like this needs to be out there. Also, it doesn't take nearly as much time to produce a zombie fairy tale as it does to make Ivy happy.

That said, what happened this past November?

Word count goals
I like to take weekends off. So I write 2300 words a day, and if I need to use Saturday to catch up, I do. I do not write on Sunday. It's a rule I keep for myself. I think it's important to take a mental break to keep from burning out. Burnout = bad.

Did you ever get writers' block?
Sometimes, the words would fly off my fingers. Other times, I had to sit down and force myself to write one word at a time. I had writers' block a handful of times. The way I got through it was I sat in front of my computer screen, reread the last couple of paragraphs, then wrote a sentence. That sentence was usually pretty bad, but it led to another one, and another. Eventually, I got back to writing better stuff and it was easier to come up with the next idea.

Was my first draft bad?
YES! It's awful and you'll never be allowed to read it.

Will it be better?
If not, I'm not worth my weight in salt as a writer.

Will you ever publish that first story?
I'm not sure. I don't know if the root story is strong enough to support something better. But I'll take a look at it. You know, after Fairy Tale Twist.

FAIL and WIN: Writing a Male Character

I want to write a book where the POV character is a guy. Because guys think differently. They'll take the same situation, but make the story completely different.

Unfortunately, every time I start a book with a male POV, my brain shuts down. I lose interest. And eventually, I give up on the book. Even if the concept is cool, even if I think the character has a distinct voice, there's something about those stories that falls flat. So I have two or three unfinished stories that I have no desire to even look at any more. Sad, huh?

So basically, I can't write male characters. At least, not in-depth. Not characters that I have to get close to or fully fall in love with.

Until The Fairy Tale Twist.

Somehow, I managed to create a character I LOVE (Riker) who is going through the same thing Ivy is--he's trapped in a fairy tale. But he has a completely different attitude about it. And because of that, his experience is completely different, including his relationship with his pixie. He's smart, but he's also impulsive (kinda like Ivy) but he's impulsive in a different way. It's not a stubborn, I-do-it-because-I-can kind of impulse. It's more of I-do-what-pops-into-my-head-because-that's-how-I-do-things kind of thing.

Do you have trouble with characters of the opposite gender? Which are your favorite? Have you read a book recently where the author failed to capture that gender?

How to Write a Fairy Tale in 3 Steps

Step 1: Invent a character
This character needs to be pathetic on the outside, and relatively perfect on the inside. Honest, kind, and dirt poor.Also gorgeous.

Step 2: Put said character where she can demonstrate how obnoxiously selfless she is.
It helps if she's really hungry, dirty, or extra-poor at the time.

Step 3: Reward her for acting in a way you would never act yourself.
Then pretend like you actually would act that way and give yourself a pat on the back.