Establishing a Writing Routine: What Works for Me

My writing routine has evolved. Mostly, it centers around my kids' nap time. It also depends on what I'm working on. First drafts can be written between breaths. Whenever I get a free moment, I can sit down (butt-in-chair or BIC) and pull a couple hundred words from my muse. (Where'd you think I pulled them from?)

That doesn't work for revision, though.

Something about rewriting a scene drains me. You may recall, I'm writing by hand because, well, it works for me. The content is better (setting, conflict, voice) but it's EXHAUSTING! When my kids (finally) go to bed, I go back to my room, pull out my notebook, and pick up where I left off the day before.

Thirty minutes later, I'm resting my head on my arm with my eyes closed, trying to recover. It's physically draining.

I'm lucky to get more than four pages written.

Now, typing those pages up on the computer takes no time. It's not nearly as demanding, mentally. I usually type up the week's handwritten pages on Saturday. It comes out to about 1800 words a week.

For those of you who haven't done the math yet, that's 300 words a day. (I take off Sundays.)

Really? That's pathetic.

It's okay. You can say it. I used to write five times that. But the thing is: I'm going to save myself a whole draft. So I like to double that number. :)

Another thing I need: silence. Some people like to work with music. I've done that, and it works really well for me if I have music or dancing in the scene. Otherwise, I find it builds the world in my mind without it being on the page. (I'm not sure if that makes sense.)

But the kids have to be asleep and I can't write in the same room as my husband if he's listening to something on the computer. Sometimes I get really lucky and he'll take the kids to the park or the pool. That's prime writing time, right there. Pure quiet.

I love it.

AbsolutelyEvil: the voice that says: You Can't

As I get closer to finishing this draft of Roses and Mirrors, I start to hear that voice. You know the one. The voice that says, "You're going to fail." It's AbsolutelyEvil.

AbsolutelyEvil is picking at the back of my brain right now, telling me that there are so many mistakes in this draft. AE says I'll never catch all of them in the next pass.

Maybe I should freak out and stop what I'm doing RIGHT NOW and go back and make all the changes I can think of. Because I might forget to make those changes if I don't do it RIGHT NOW.

I'm leaving myself little notes while I write (AE says I'm not going to see them when the time comes to make those changes.) and I try not to worry about it until I'm ready to do the next draft, but (excuse my whining) it's hard. It's difficult to put something imperfect on the paper and move on.

But I must.

And AE can just deal with it.

Fairy Tales Gone Wrong: Riker's Fractured Fairy Tale

by Ivy Thorn

The last post I made on this blog, someone asked me for an example of something that can go wrong in a fairy tale if you don't follow my three rules. (Why is it always three?)

Well, I'm not the only one who gets trapped in fairy tales. Every now and then, I'll meet someone like me, someone who's been captured by one of those obnoxious pixies. I got sucked into the Twelve Dancing Princesses once, where I met this guy named Riker. I got his permission to tell you about one of his adventures. I think I mentioned him once. Riker survived The Clever Little Tailor.

Riker's a pretty awesome guy. Like me, he enjoys messing with people. I warned him about that. It can get you into trouble. He knew exactly what I meant.We were dancing at the time, so we had some time to talk.

"I had a little too much fun with that fairy tale," he said.

I stepped on his toe, but didn't apologize. He was used to it by that point. "What do you mean?"

He flashed a wicked grin. “I broke into the cheese shop.”


“You what? Why?”

“The tailor was supposed to trick the giant by squeezing some cheese. Says he’s squeezing moisture out of a rock.” He spun me around, slow enough that I didn't trip.

“So you stole all the cheese? That’s crazy.”

“Crazy delicious.” He grinned and patted his stomach. “But then the tailor had to scramble for a new plan. In the meantime, the giant tore up the entire village. Not pretty, when the whole community uses outhouses.”

I wrinkled my nose. “Tell me you’re kidding.”

“I’m kidding.” He dipped me really low, totally hamming it up. “But not really.”

When he pulled me back up, I tried giving him a look that said, “Oh, please.” but on the inside, I was cracking up. I just had this mental image of busted outhouses, all because this guy stole some cheese.

There you go. That's what can happen. So please, if you ever wake up in a fairy tale, follow the rules!

Writing Progress

I have about three scenes left in Roses and Mirrors! I'm really excited to be so close to The End.

The story still needs another draft and I'm going to try reading the manuscript out loud because it's supposed to be incredibly helpful. I'm hoping to query Roses and Mirrors by July 12. I can't wait!

(Yes, I look forward to querying. Rejections don't bring me down like they used to. I realize that must seem strange. Oh, well.)