A Midsummer Night's Influence

I actually meant to mention this in an earlier blog, but, alas, I was distracted.

You know Patricia Puckett, correct? No? Seriously? Well, as she's a best friend and all, you'll be seeing her name on this blog quite often. Other than being a fantastic friend and human being, she's also a great writer. She's also probably one of the main reasons I stayed with writing all through high school and college. So, if this all goes bottoms-up, we know who to blame, don't we?

This isn't just a mindless promotion of a good buddy, though.

The Pedestal Magazine has a great July issue still out, free to view. Their theme involves Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. It features Patricia's "The Captured Queens Go to Tea" as one of its fiction pieces.

Pedestal is a great zine with new monthly issues. And, for writers, they do indeed pay. Let's face it, it's hard for poets and literary writers to get a check, so we must applaud them.

So, if you have a bit of free time and you enjoy your Shakespeare, stop in and read this month's issue: http://www.thepedestalmagazine.com/gallery.php?item=18300

Or, for more on Patricia's publications, visit her Yola site: http://patriciapuckett.yolasite.com/

Novellas Own Me

I must really enjoy pain. Or else I certainly wouldn't have taken on so many projects at once.

Novellas. They are an under-appreciated breed of story, don't you think? However, with e-publishing, they seem to be a little easier to sell in e-book format. Recently, novellas have taken over my life. I'm currently working on a novella collection with a few of my fellow Guild of the Fantastic Quill members. I'm also desperately trying to complete two other novellas for upcoming contests. Then, there is, of course, the Wicked Bag challenge.

So, last year, I signed up to take part in a writing challenge with Wicked East Press and the result of the challenge was a great anthology called Wicked Bag of Horror Tales edited by Jessica A. Weiss and M.S. Gardner. My short story "Muerte in a Small Town" was included in the book. Basically, the challenge was to give a writing prompt and take one in return.

Well, the creative madness returned, and, yes, I signed up. The challenge this time around? Use a Suspense Prompt to write a novella. Despite the pile-up of novella projects, I'm actually pretty excited about this last one.

Now, I must say, this is going to be a dream come true for my mother. She has been dying for me to get more involved in the thriller/suspense/mystery genres. Here's to you, Mom.

Ahh, Writing, My Old Friend

So, yes, I'm behind.

On what? Why, just about everything. And what am I currently doing? Trying to get the CW website to play last week's episode of Vampire Diaries (don't judge me). Anyhow, my point is, I actually have plans for "after" this horrid site finishes with me.

After chatting with Trish, I've decided that one of my YA stories, the one to be written in 1st person, might not require the full on outlining that I usually do for my stories. Though it's speculative fiction, it's raw and character driven. So in order to get more into the story itself, I'm going to focus on writing scenes with my FMC. Hopefully, once I get to know her, I'll get to know the world she lives in.

YA Woes

When the real world becomes, in Marty McFly wisdom, too "heavy," I zone. I zone often, as you might imagine. And sometimes, zoning even gets in the way of my passion, writing. Why? Well, zoning leads to second guessing.

Currently, I'm working on several different projects. I'm making my first full out attempt to get a novel written for publication purposes. In fact, I've quite the goal in mind (inspired by my writing buddy, Trish, of course). I want a novel agent-ready by December. Sure, not an impossible task, but... We're talking about me here. I'm the girl who rewrote a first chapter nearly a dozen times because of my "second guessing."

So, here I am, formally announcing this little goal. And hoping that, by doing so, I'm not making a fool of myself.

As for the projects themselves, several of them are Young Adult. Which leads me to the subject of this fair blog entry: YA woes. I have moments, really dorktastic moments, where I stop thinking about these project entirely because I'm worried my stories have too much gore, too many curse words... Then I remember my favorite young adult novels. Almost all of them have deep, resounding themes, deal with death, deal with the monsters of both the real world and the fantasy one. And I realize that having a Young Adult audience doesn't necessarily mean that I need to take a step away from my story.

I started out as a young adult writing for myself. I was writing YA stories, whether I knew it or not. Writing YA isn't about toning down the volume. It's about cranking it up.

So, yeah, about those "woes"? Who needs them.

Hopefully, next time I blog, I'll be well into one of my projects, be it for an adult, child, or young adult audience. I try to keep you updated.