Beta Readers

I sent out the call for beta readers last Friday. Yes, it was a last minute SOS and I knew I would be pushing my luck getting anyone to respond to me by this AM.

--Remember: my deadline is tomorrow. I have only today and tomorrow morning to make the needed changes. The manuscript must be in the mail with tomorrow's time stamp on it!

Many people had stuff to do this weekend so I didn't expect a whole lot. So far I've only had 2.5 responses.

--#1 beta reader is my SIL and I talked to her last night. She journals and reads a tremendous amount of books. She's the only person, other than Deb Dixon, to read the entirety of The Leprechaun Connection. Oh, since I couldn't sell that story, I stole some of my characters and put them in this book.--HEY! It's my own stuff, I can recycle. Her input concerned the first two chapters. She felt as if I had changed POV. Well, I had. :-) From the mom's POV to the daughter's POV AND into first person. I need to rework the first two chapters, especially since the daughter thinks/speaks older than her age, BUT I have an answer for that and I hope this will fix the problem.

--#2 beta reader writes MG/YA stories. She had the same issues with the first few chapters and caught some stupid stuff (missing words, wrong word, wrong tense, missing -ed's, that sort of thing)

--#0.5 beta reader was only able to finish 1/2 the story. This reader is published by Harlequin American. Now, this reader was awesome! She found so many missing things that I'm in shock! Definitely, head-whacking stuff. It is amazing how the eye and brain supply the missing words.

--one friend, not counted as an official response, but still has a valid point, is published with Wild Rose Press, has critted for me in the past. She sent me a quick note questioning the main character's maturity for her age and offered a suggestion.

Two things stood out for me. Missing words and MC too mature. Both are fixable in my time frame.
1) I will offer a sound reason for my character's maturity in the first few pages. The scene is already in place, I just need to enhance it.
2) Find and fix missing words/tenses, etc. For me this will involve reading the story out loud. My jaw will get tired, but I'm game.

Heck, I've been reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone out loud to my kiddo before she goes to bed, I think I can do this.

Write on! . . . or should this be . . .
READ ON! . . .
. . . and edit!

A Berrying We Will Go . . .

It's berry picking time!

The kiddo and I went out blackberry picking yesterday! My plan was to leave the house about 8:30. The kiddo had a different idea and she was up and ready to go at 7:00. This should have given me a clue that my day wouldn't go as I had planned. It wasn't awful--well, yeah, it was--just not what I wanted or expected.

Together we picked 9.5 pounds. It took us about an hour, and we suffered only minor pokes and scrapes. I love modern berry farms. They provided buckets, gloves (too large and mismatched--didn't use--but they still provided them), they had the quart containers and boxes ready to go for the picked berries.

We got home and I edited for about an hour before she had her dental appointment, then lunch with Daddy, and a Sam's trip. We got home about 2. I wanted to finish my edits so I started back in on them, but the kiddo was doing her workbook stuff and interrupting me every three minute . . . plus she sings when she works. :-)

Oh, yeah and the cat barfed. Cleaned it up.

Then I made the crust for a blackberry pie--needed to refrigerate. Oh, and did I ever mention that I SUCK making pie crusts. I don't know what happens, but it always rips and I have to patch it. When I rolled out the top crust--I finally figured out the trick!!

Key word: PATIENCE. Yay! Top crust looked awesome. Popped pie into oven.

Oven has been doing scary things. Making HUGE pops when the pilot light ignites--too much gas escapes before it lights--it's so violent that the oven door pops open. S-C-A-R-Y

Oh, yeah, and the dog proceeded to barf. Cleaned it up.

Tried to edit. Story had something wrong with it. I didn't know what. ARGH!! Only 13 more pages and it SUCKS!!

Start dinner. Easy-peasy recipe, except I forgot to thaw hamburger meat.

Uh-oh, juice from pie bubbles over. Almost catches fire, but smokes like hell! I KNEW should have put a cookie sheet underneath it. Now we have scent of 'eau de burnt berry' wafting through the house instead of berry pie scent.

Fanning smoke out door, and invite the flies to join us for dinner. Oh, and did I mention that it's freakin' hot out there?! Over 100! Ick!!

Can't use oven to cook dinner, until burnt sugar juice is removed. Thank God for convection/microwave oven.

Start cleaning up messes. Everyone in kitchen, including animals. Proceed to snap everyone's head off. Hubby starts doing dishes. I walk away until dinner cooked. Hubby hands me a margarita.

Eat. Dinner good. Pie good. Sit to figure out what's wrong with story. Can't. It sucks raw eggs.

Hubby and daughter make quick escape to pool, leaving me alone with rest of kitchen mess to clean up. I don't care. I'm alone. *sigh*

We all tromp upstairs. I'm still cranky, but it's under control, until . . . kiddo tells me that I PROMISED to stitch her stuffed animals that have holes in them. I go ballistic.

Calmed down when child gets into shower and proceed to sew animals.

Hubby asks me what wrong. I start crying when I tell him it wasn't just one thing it was cumulative. I love my hubby, but sometimes he's so much guy. He says he's supportive of my writing, and he is in the technological sense, but he doesn't get how important it really is to me. And this Delacorte deadline is looming. Sometimes, I just need time alone to get through it.

Uhm, last time I got this emotional I was preggers.
Uhm, I'm almost 48 and I didn't have my period this month.
Uhm, is it menopause or something else????
Please say it's menopause!

Took two Tylenol PM's and went to bed.

Woke up at 5, staggered downstairs to work on edits. FIGURED OUT WHAT WAS WRONG!!!

Edits are now finished! YAY! Total word count: 46,876. I added roughly 7,000 words.
Now to prepare letter for Beta readers, and go through the spelling and grammar check one more time.

My Beta readers might not finish their read in time for me to make changes before I submit it to the Delacorte contest, but I'm going to sure try.

Write on!

Techno Crap

I've been having some issues with my phone syncing up with my computer recently--it hasn't been. I've connected and reconnected each end of the tether, but it doesn't see the phone. I've rebooted the phone and the computer, reconnected the tethers, and pounded the phone on the counter.

Clearly, something is amiss.

I don't actually enter my appointments on my phone--I hate the itty-bitty keyboard--which is also why I'm a text-o-phobe, but I do check to see if something is conflicting. Therefore this lack of technical meeting of minds is irritating.

Anyhoo, hubster (techno-geek that he is) took the phone to work (they use the same phones and have had issues with them) to wipe the memory and restart it with factory settings. Well, I had taken a few pictures on the phone, mainly when the kiddo had her hair cut and she donated it to Locks of Love. He pulled the pics and saved them for me. But they sucked. They were blurry, out of focus and just plain lousy.

I thought it was me. I thought I'd jiggled the camera, or rubbed my finger over the lens, etc. Turns out the little plastic protective thingy was still covering the camera lens.

Huh, talk about feeling stupid . . .

So, of course, he had to point it out, and took before and after shots at his office to show me the difference. Basically, made me feel horrible. I'd missed a milestone in my daughter's life by an oversight.

Until I remember that I didn't set up the phone--the hubster did. Not my fault!

And YES, I did point that out to him. HA!!

Techno-geek waves his hand over something and I'm given a computerized whatchamacallit that is up and running. I used to ask to read the manual, but he's always say 'why bother when I can take care of it for you'. I gave him the 'what if you get run over by a car' argument, but it falls on deaf ears. So I stopped asking and let him do his techno-geek thing.

So while he resynced my phone to my computer. He notices that I haven't had the auto updates in awhile.

I looked him in the eye and said as blandly as I could. "Couldn't have been me. Remember, I don't have a clue about this stuff." And walked away.

I now have an updated computer and phone. And since he hasn't bought a computer in awhile, he's going shopping to update mine.

Write on!

Life is cyclic

Ever notice how cyclic life is?

This is where it pays to have good karma. There's a reason for the trite saying 'what goes around comes around'. Life tends to bite you in the butt when you aren't looking, so try to exude good karma to those around you.

But this isn't a post about karma, it's about puking . . . animals, that is.

Almost nine years ago I had my daughter. I had zero morning sickness. So what type of child did I spawn? Yeah, we called her the puker. I knew the child would never choke to death because she puked everything up before it could get to that point. Over time, the puking slowed to a stop, she was probably around five or six at the time. YAY!

Or so we thought, then the geriatric fuzzy critters started. Yes, I now have puking cat, at least every few days or so, and a puking dog (age eleven) who projectile vomits monthly (the vet helped with Katie's problem and I feed her three small meals a day--so far, so good).

Kato Kitty is nineteen and pukes . . . a lot. At first it was when he would stuff himself with too much food. So I started feeding him less, in tiny coffee spoon increments, three times a day. Alrighty-then, but he began drinking copious amounts of water. Sometimes simply puking up the water or--joy, oh joy--puking up water AND food. At least it's dry food and usually still in chunk format.

He used to go to our closet and vomit on the floor. Though it was funny when hubster would walk in and step on a wet patch, it did wear on our relationship--okay, it still was funny--like the time hubster (I was at work, pre-kiddo) was home sick and he was watching cheats for a video game, and runs into the other room, plops down on his knees and lands right in a cold wet hairball. My stomach hurt so much from laughing so hard when he called to bitch about it!

Anyhoo, over a year ago we decided to recarpet the house. It needed it--cat/dog puke, you know--so we had to lock Kato in the laundry room to keep him safe. Food, water, litter box, and cat bed were put in the laundry room and he was a happy kitty. So we never moved him out. He's happy there. It gets toasty warm when the heater is on. Oh, when I toss clothes in the dryer, he thinks he's in a kitty spa with the dryer vibrating and warming his old bones. It's tiled, so when I feed him we lock him in for at least an hour--usually when he pukes--and it makes for easy cleanup.

Which brings me back to the topic. Life is cyclic. Don't crap on someone's parade, because when you want them in your corner--they'll just crap right back in spades.

Write on!

How Many Drafts does a Story Make?

It depends.


So many things factor into it. I know many writers who have the best first drafts: clean, consise, great pacing, lovely emotion, blah, blah, blah. Most of those authors are multi-published, so it could be that they've gotten their writing process down perfectly. I also know of writers who puke out their first drafts, send to their agents or editors who suggest revisions, they do said revisions and the 'second draft' is pretty much book ready.


Other writers puke out the first draft, layering the emotion, description, characterization during the subsequent X number of drafts. Blake Snyder had a blog about this.

So when is a story done?

When it is. It could take one draft or ninty-nine. It needs to be as perfect as possible before you start pimping it.


I had hoped to be finished with draft #2 by today. Uh, it ain't happin', people. I'm about half way through MOGG and will be the first to acknowledge this story will need to go through numerous drafts to get it to the point that I think it has the potential to become.

Will I make my Delacorte deadline at the end of the month. Probably, but without input from my beta readers--unless they are super duper fast readers and I wrote a damn good book that doesn't need input . . . ye-eah, ri-ight.

I may spout a lot of bull, but I really don't believe it no matter what I tend to say.

All I can ask is that my readers hang on. I'm working hard and I hope you'll help me when it becomes crunch time!

Write on!

Draft #2

Okay, this week I'm getting serious about my second draft of MOGG. So far I've made it to page 16. Not a good thing. The first 30 pages will be the roughest and take the longest as I have to change the mom's POV to the daughter's POV and then layer description/ emotion/ characterization/ etc. to the story.

Two things are in my favor this week:
1) Rachel is at all day soccer camp. I have to fight traffic and take her to Tulsa University for a drop off at 8:30 and pick her up at 4:30.
2) My cyber friend Barbara is holding her monthly BIAW this week.

Once I get home, the timer will be put to good use. When I was writing this story I didn't know what kind of word count I was going to get, but when I hit around the 3000-word mark on the first day, I knew I could do it again. And by this type of dedication, I managed to finish the story.

I think I'm going to try something similar with my edits. And I may or may not blog this week. If I can blog without it interrupting my editing time then I will post on Wednesday and Friday. The same thing goes for my blog hopping tendencies. So without further ado . . .

Write on!

Start with the Devil, End with the Star

As you all might or might not know, I started drawing a daily Tarot card. Originally it was to research a character in a romantic suspense, but then I used it to make certain I documented my writing progress as it forces me to pull up my computer calender and write my card down.

I also use this calender to document my monthly goals. Sometimes their big, other times small. During the summer, my goals are usually small: edit, write query letters, judge contests. In other words, stuff I can walk away from without it blowing my brain pan to smithereens.

So on Monday, I drew the Devil. Probably the worse card in the freakin' deck other than The Tower. The Devil represents negativity and hopelessness. And yes, I was feeling the green monster this week. One, it ticked me off that I felt that way about a friend's excitement and success. Two, I read through my MG novel and couldn't believe I thought such dreck could actually be my first published novel. I always have the same hope for each of my novels and I always have my hopes smashed to smithereens. So needless to say I still have low hopes right now, and all the cheerleading friends in the world won't help me get out of this funk.

I'll have to work it out on my own.

Today I drew The Star, hope and inspiration, and the complete opposite of the Devil. The Star doesn't offer practical help, but it does make you realize that life isn't so dark.

I must have been feeling a little more sure of myself yesterday, because I worked on my query for MOGG, my middle grade novel. Of course in true Margaret fashion, I put the cart before the horse and submitted my query to Query Shark. I don't know if it will make it onto the blog and if it does I fully expect it to be cut to shreds, because it is totally different from the normal query. I have a tough skin. I'm used to it.

If I'm opening up myself for public ridicule, I might as well give my friends first heckle. Here is my query:

My garden gnome went missing. It’s your basic pudgy gnome with a white beard and red pointy cap about twelve inches tall made out of some sort of hard stuff. Walking away was out of the question. Statues don’t walk. I can’t imagine someone stealing it, ‘cause who in their right mind would drive to Nowheresville, Oklahoma to steal a gnome?
So I decided to look for it.
What I didn’t expect to find was a real live gnome named Rory Leafhopper.
Go figure.
My name is Rhiannon Webber, just call me Rhee. It seems that the gnome wanted my help to figure out what happened to all the local mythical creatures. It was summer. School was out. We lived in the country. No cable and stinky TV reception. Add those four sentences together and you get one excruciatingly bored eleven year old girl. Plus the adventure would get me out of Mom’s hair for awhile. I’m game.
It wasn’t until I overheard my mom talking that I discovered I’m adopted and a half-blood, too. Half-blood what I didn’t have a clue. Maybe that was why I could see the gnome. Talk about a shock. I hoped Rory could tell me about being an adopted half-blood when old Mrs. Finch’s cat, Mr. Bickles snatched him.
Now, I have to rescue the gnome. What else could possibly go wrong?
MISSING: One Garden Gnome is a middle grade novel complete at 45,000 words. I would be happy to submit the manuscript and synopsis per your request. Thank you for taking the time to consider my story.
Sincerely,
Wannabe Author

Oh, for all the possible boo-boos in this query, it does one thing and it does it well.

It shows voice.

Write on!

Summer Fun!

I knew when Rachel got out of school I could say good-bye to any writing time other than little short spurts.

I hate it when I'm right. Sometimes it is better to be pessimistic and pleasantly surprised than too optimistic and disappointed.

This week I did manage to edit the same eleven pages that I edited last week. I deepened the scene a little, caught a couple of present tense boo-boos, caught an incorrect plural pronoun (they instead of we, since I changed point of view to first person). But it's slow progress. I hope once I progress into the story that it will speed up a little--but I have my doubts. See--there's that pessimistic side of me again.

The first couple of chapters are always the toughest: setting the stage, getting into the character without adding backstory that doesn't add to the story, plus I have to rewrite the first two chapters in a different POV. I had written the first two chapters in the mother's POV, while it can be done for a middle grade book, it really isn't acceptable since the story is about the kid and you are trying to get kids of the same age to relate. Bryn, the mom, is also privvy to certain circumstances that Rhee wouldn't be aware of--financial issues. Her emotions about the death of her husband are very different from the way an eleven year old would think about the death of her father.

So during the first two weeks of summer vacation, we did doctor's appointments, hair appointments (got mine cut yesterday and it's too cute--I NEED to update my photo!), dentist appointments. I planted three flats of impatiens, a flat of verbena, two hanging baskets, four pots for the front porch, swam and played in the pool, helped Rachel with her third grade workbook, etc.

Next week I will get down to the business of editing MOGG. Rachel is at an all day soccer camp so once I dump her off at Tulsa University, the day is mine until I have to fight traffic to pick her up. Until then, I'll plod along with my edits, tweak a query letter to send to Query Shark blog, and get my life tidied up for my writing stint next week.

Oh, and I need to start thinking about a plot for book #2 in my middle grade series.

Write on!

Gnomenclature

--:a system or set of terms or symbols esp. in a particular science, discipline, or art.
Definition #3a in Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, tenth edition.

Okay, MY spelling of nomenclature is slightly different, though it is pronounced the same way. :-)

This week I hope to get revved up on my MOGG edits, my gnome story. I revised eleven pathetic pages last week, but I have to do better this week. I must get a firmer foothold into my new world, which means research.

Not just any research, but fantastical research. I need to study gnomes and their behavior. *sigh* I know I can make up stuff, but I want my gnome to follow the 'gnorm' for gnomes. Why? Because it's my world and that's the way I see it.

I HATE reading stories with fantasy characters that are too human without a good reason. I'm currently reading an anthology of novellas involving fairies--human-sized fairies who fall in love with humans. I'm not buying into the concept. I think it is because the novellas are too short to pull me into the new world as it tells me the story. I have a pre-conceived notion about fairies, and these authors haven't done their job to make me think any differently.

I finished reading Nancy Haddock's Last Vampire Standing (LOVED IT!) last week. Her vampire is slightly different, but it was because of her back-story that explains how and why she can walk at sunset and survive without drinking blood while she was imprisoned. The Blade movies did a good job of this. Blade is a day-walker vamp because he's half-blood, but also receives injections of 'something' that prevents his cells from exploding in the sunlight. This allows the viewer to believe in the possibility.

If a writer does his/her job, the reader is sucked into the new world and believes.

This is my goal for MOGG. And I intend to do it well.

Write on!

Schedules

This was the first week out of school for my kiddo. We had one eye appointment. One rescheduled hair cut appointment (see results from previous blog). One visit to the zoo. One visit to the aquarium. One visit to the library to sign up for the summer reading program. One friend over to swim and who ultimately spent the night. R's friend is one of the 'quiet' ones, so I actually like having her around. When some of R's other friends hang out, the noise tends to escalate. . . and escalate or the bickering starts. Grrr! Anyhoo, this kid is pretty good to have around. She's one of the middle of five children, so she likes being only one of two kids, I think.

Needless to say, I'm not getting very much rewriting done on my story. I've reworked (changed from mom's POV to child's POV and added emotion) only eleven pages of MOGG. Uh, only 123 more to go! I really would like to get a little farther along than this. But it is what it is and THAT is summer vacation. *sigh* I'll get there. Next week should be a little more organized. I think it is the newness of no school that has the kiddo all freaky-deaky.

Today is another complete write off for the writing stuff. I might get to sit down, but I don't anticipate getting much done. When we take R's friend home I'll be picking up my BIL and his two kiddos from the tire store. They're all coming over to swim. Maybe I can get some gardening done while the play in the frigid pool. No, the new electronic board didn't fix the heater.

I may not be writing, but I HAVE been reading. I finished Smoke in Mirrors by Jayne Ann Krentz, Last Vampire Standing by Nancy Haddock, and middle grade book The Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan.

Maybe this afternoon I can,

Write on!

Yeah, Yeah, I'm Late

with this blog Nothing else. Trust me.


Today, Rachel got her hair cut. Big time cut. She wanted her hair short and it turned out we could cut off ten inches--enough to donate to Locks of Love. She was so excited throughout the process. Even though she is a self-admitted tomboy, she really enjoyed the whole pampering thing.

I had to change her appointment from next week to today because of a birthday party conflict. So, yesterday we were frantically looking at hair styles until we settled on a 'do' that Eva Longoria wore July 2008.

And this is the result:

We met Todd for lunch right afterward at Macaroni Grill, and he took this picture on his cell phone. Actually, she kind of looks like my niece, Cathryn with this cut. Cathryn just turned thirty but is still way cute. Rachel took it to be the compliment that it was. :-)

Now, I need to try to get some editing done.

Write on!

First 'Official' Day of Summer!

Today is the first official day of summer as Friday was the kiddo's last day of school and weekends don't count. So, of course, I wake up at four frickin' thirty in the morning, finally gave up on going back to sleep at around five-fifteen. True, I'm an early riser but six o'clock is my normal time. This was just too nuts.

Rachel has an eye appointment this morning, but so far we don't have anything else scheduled. I promised to take her to the zoo afterwards. We have a nice zoo, but it's a two hour jaunt, if that, not including drive time. I want to stop by our Air and Space Museum to check out their summer programs for kids since it's close to the zoo--one stop shopping my fave.

I did enroll her in two summer camps. She has a two week break before she starts the first one, which is a week long soccer camp at TU (Tulsa University) that features the University's soccer coaches and players teaching these kids. She did half-days last year and loved it. I'll let you know after they run her butt off during the all day camp this year whether or not she loves it.

Two weeks off and then zoo camp called Meet the Predators. Tulsa Zoo also changed their half-day camps to full day ones, which makes it easier on the parents, plus they are offering before and after camp care for the parents who need it. Last year, I took my computer and parked myself at one of the picnic tables with a handy dandy plug and wrote. It was nice overlooking the lake while I wrote about demons and evil critters.

I did look into another camp this year, it's at Phibrook Art Museum. They had a variety of topics, but the classes were half-day for two weeks and over $250--OUCH! And that was for members! The hassle and money factor might be more than the educational worth.

And during Rachel's free time when she's not at camp: dollar or free summer movies, the zoo or aquarium (both with season passes), swim lessons (we have a pool at home), 3rd grade curriculum exercises, summer reading program through the library, and I bought her a book and supplies on how to draw dragons :-). And, of course, inviting friends or her cousins over for an overnight or just a day in the pool.

I don't see us taking a big vacation this year, though we will do some weekend jaunts to Silver Dollar City and Branson. And Rach expressed an interest in fishing, so we might have to get out on the lake to hook some sunfish.

Some where in there I'll have to find time to edit my gnome story.

Write on!