September 1
Had to update my bio on the SCBWI website. Included on-the-fly invented one-liners for each of my novels (in v-a-r-i-o-u-s stages of development. #5 doesn’t even start growing till November).
“My novels are all on the speculative-fiction spectrum:
1. Lindorm King: A crippled shepherdess allies with a lindorm (dragon-sized snake) to escape from her abusive stepmother.
2. Lindorm Queen: The former shepherdess learns more about the magical knife left to her, and her role, with the lindorm, in thwarting the magical enemy that seeks to destroy their kingdom.
3. Shadow Swan: A 17-year-old honors student finds himself in another world over Christmas break, and ends up bringing home the princess he disenchanted, just in time for the spring semester.
4. The daughter of a successful cancer-researcher must try and heal a dying mob boss and decide what her relationship is to each of his three dynamic sons.
5. Stolen: A piano-scholarship university student finds herself in another world, needing to learn a new system of survival that works long enough to find her kidnapped infant and return home.”
I tried to make them intriguing and indicative of feel and content (e.g. #4 is a sort of romance, I think).
September 3
E, finishing up school: How do you say… B-i-t-c-h?
Me: What are you reading?
E: Oops. *P*-i-t-c-h.
Kim Eames: Oh, the heart attack that comes when kids ask something off-kilter like that.
Brooke Bonett: Lol.
~ ~ ~
New article up at Wyn: Is it Bad For Christians to feel Bad?
September 5
This is so SO great people! I wish everybody could learn this stuff!
September 6
E: This is the first time ever I cook for myself!
Wow. And yay. And yes.
Melody found a vole nest, Teena. Jay talked to the kids about leaving the grown ups (biters) alone and let them play with the kits.
In the house. Iris was *very* intrigued.
Totally me.
If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like in my head (a few brave souls have wondered that aloud), here’s a good example.
So Jay asked me to YouTube this and decide if it’s something I can do, so we can do the testing ourselves.
I’m already experienced at giving shots and sewing (gaping flesh) wounds closed, so I suppose this is a reasonable progression.
Sometimes I think we’re weird. Sometimes I think we’re kind-of amazing.
E, putting away clothes: Pants! Glorious pants!
I really need to teach him how to do his own laundry so he’s not waiting on me. :}
September 27
I think (as a writer) that perfectionism and writing go together better than most things.
That is, everything else you do, you just DO (or don’t because you know it won’t be perfect). With writing, everything you do is part of the process, and you can always remind yourself that “Now isn’t forever.” It is a fabulous step away from crippling perfectionism without surrendering that important part of you that desires excellence.
The familiar mantra, “real writing is re-writing” can remind us the great freedom we have as writers: we are not bound to what we first see. This trains us in the great freedom available in the rest of life as well, a freedom to explore and experiment and remember/realize that LIFE isn’t a finished product either!