On Finishing the Book!!

This'll be a quick blog about finishing the manuscript, cuz I'm in the midst of finishing the manuscript and I can barely stop long enough to blog. It's weird how, at the end, it suddenly all comes rolling out of the brain. It's the characters talking and trying to get their roles wrapped up, I guess.

So, how am I feeling about it? Happy. Sad. Worried. The usual!

First, I'm very excited to be finishing. Then I'm sad to be ending my relationship with these characters. And finally, I'm worried that it won't be good enough.

It's always a great feeling to finish a manuscript. Its' like dancing on air. Writing a whole book, a full story centered around these people's lives is just such a huge undertaking for me. It took me a year to write this book. A year's worth of sitting on the sofa, thinking and typing, hoping what I created was the perfect little scene for each moment in the characters' lives.

I'm sad because Rafe was so hurt. Then he was so into Jolie. Then he was so set on leaving her. And *then* he was so wrong about it, and had to make amends in a big way. And it was sad leaving Jolie because she was fun-loving, gentle and looked at the world with a glass-half-full attitude. Though she'd been through some tough moments in her life, she recognized others' troubles and felt they were worse than hers. Both really cared about their families. I like family people.

And finally, I'm worried because even though I think this is the best story I've written, maybe I'm the only one who'll think that. I so want an editor to read this and go, "Wow. These seem like real people, and I'm rooting for them to get what they want."

Okay. Now I have to run because the *other* characters in my life are becoming loud and demanding attention. That would be my husband and kids.

I'll blog when I'm really totally finished! Then the fun part starts: the tightening. Actually, I love revisions because I've got more than a blank page to work with, as they say.

Talk atcha latah!

Mel

Why are Category Romances so Hard To Write?

Good question! And when I Googled it, I discovered I wasn't the first to ponder the dilemma. I hope it's okay to copy and paste from this website. I could put the url, but I really wanted this little discussion from the Barnes&Noble Romance Book Writing Club on here "live and in person." I don't know who started the discussion, but here it is. And they refer (in this part or another) about an article Jenny Crusie wrote on the topic, for which I *will* put the url: http://www.jennycrusie.com/essays/sobill.php

So anyway, I just round this author Jenny Haddon's reply about what makes category so difficult to write spot-on and wanted to share it with you.

So here is the discussion:

Unknown questioner writes: Thanks, Sophie. I found the article (of Jenny Crusie's.) It made me understand why a talented author wouldn't want to write category romance.

Author Jenny Haddon replies:
Hey, I DON'T think talented authors have an aversion to category romance. Some people who want Reviews in the New York Times or Credibility with the Sisterhood can get a bit sniffy about it but I think people who write for a living recognize quality writing. And you have one of the best here, in Leigh Michaels. I've loved her books for years and still think that 'With No Reservations' is an absolute model of the genre - pushes at the 'rules' but delivers the absolutely perfect and utterly believable happy ending.Also, don't forget that writing category romance for Harlequin Mills and Boon is one of the few ways that you can get to communicate round the world. I'm in 25 languages and more than "100 international outlets" - what bout you, Leigh?I DO think that some writers find category romance very difficult. I said I would think about why and the best I can come up with is this; Category Romance is what I call a single experience read. That means it has to be very tightly woven. The author has to give the reader all the usual elements of a novel - a sense that the characters lived before the book started and will go on when it finishes; a sense of their world; a sense that they have normal lives and work and relationships. BUT you have almost no room to spend any time on it. A category romance novel is 55,000 words tops. That means that, in order to get in all the usual layers, you have to make sure that every incident on comment carries the story forward AND tells you something about the character AND helps paint a picture of the life the characters normally live. And you've got to get all the passion and hope and fear and risks and humour of a serious love affair as well. That is very economical writing indeed. It's like playing three dimensional chess, if you like. You can only do it well, if that's how you think. Some lovely writers DON'T think like that and never feel comfortable trying to.Just a theory - what do you think, Leigh?

News on The Daddy Issue

Sadly, I've had to cut ties with my publiser, Premium Press America. Things did not pan out as promised. I'm very disappointed. But I'm also happy that I have my rights back and can now begin the marketing of the manuscript again.

Today I sent it out, and will see what I hear on it. I'll keep you posted. Please keep your fingers crossed for me.

What is the lesson to be learned here? Well, I guess I could say you can't trust people, but that's not true. You can't go through life not trusting that things will turn out right, or good. I was skeptical. But then, I'm always guarded, since I've seen so much happen in the romance publishing industry in the years I've been around. But I was also hopeful. You have to keep up your hopes, or you'll quit. It's that simple.

I'm a little off my game right now, but I hope to get a chapter completed on my work-in-progress while I'm at the beach next week. Some people go to the beach to vacation. I'm looking forward to working. See, the other people I live with don't get up 'til around 11 in the morning, so I have from 7 to 11 to write. I'll take advantage of that, and then still have plenty of time to bike, walk the beach, shop and eat. It's our family vacation, and we all just want to chill as much as possible.

I hope your writing is going well, all you other writers. I know you're busy, busy, with summer here and with all that you do, too. It's so easy not to write. But know that I'm here doing it, too. Let's keep each other motivated!!

Write on!

But it ain't that easy

I did it six years ago, with an epublishing company. I wrote and sold a romance. But that doesn’t count. It wasn’t a print book, which is my real goal. I sold about 200 copies, and that was cool. But now I have my rights back. Now I’m revising that manuscript, and I’m shuddering. Those poor readers. I owe them their money back. This book is terrible. What was the editor thinking?

I contacted an editor of a book publishing company. He says to send it. He’ll read it and consider putting it in their romance line. But UGH I have to make a lot of revisions first, because it’s truly awful. I’ve learned a few things from my wonderful critique group. I’ve grown. I know how to pace the story better, create tighter tension, paint the scenes with more succinctness.

But that doesn’t mean I’ll achieve my goal. The business is fickle. I may be writing stuff they no longer care about. I know erotic and paranormal are the hot market items. But I don’t care about people making love with ghosts or vampires. Not to diss anyone who loves them. That’s fine. They’re just not for me. And I don’t really want to read a book that’s all about gratuitous sex. But you can, if you want to. I don’t mind at all.

I have to fix this story, this little romantic suspense that drags often, that veers off the romance with too much 2ndary char interaction. At least when I’m finished, I’ll know I made it better. That’s some comfort, even if I don’t achieve my goal immediately.

It’s nice to state the goal in a public forum. Not that I need motivation. What I need is more talent, and a brain that clicks faster. Maybe I need to visit the wizard. Maybe he’d tell me, “You have a brain, but it’s an abusive one. It’s telling you you’re not good enough, you’re slow. Ignore it and listen to your heart. It’s saying you are good enough. You’ve learned. You’ve grown. You’ve got the courage others don’t. Who are you trying to prove yourself to? Those who matter already like you and think you’re talented.

Yeah, yeah. I can sit around and not write with a happy heart, a happy life. Or I can write and angst about all those other romance authors getting ahead, getting agents and contracts and being feted at the conferences.

Guess which one I choose, and have chosen for over a decade?

See more progress on: Write and Sell A Romance

Stuffing Square Characters into Round Actions/Reactions

Writing a book (in my case a romance) is sometimes fun and often hair-pulling-out frustrating. It's a wonder I didn't go completely bald years ago!

My current work-in-progress (WIP) is finally to the point where the characters want to tell their own story. And they want to be together and stay that way. I'm actually having trouble keeping them off each other. I think I finally realized that all that peripheral stuff is cool, but what Jolie and Rafe really want is to follow their animal instincts. Well, of course what they really want is love, but right now it's physical attraction they're fighting. The emotional stuff will come later, though they kick and scream to avoid it. And all that other stuff that they do from chapter to chapter and scene to scene, the part that isn't about love and sex, had better be leading them through an up and down, great romantic ride. Gosh, I hope I have enough of all that to occupy them so that I don't turn this into an erotic romance! This is supposed to be another Home and Family type story.

I wonder why it seems to take me about 90 pages, and one 90-page rewrite, before I understand that the romantic conflict (why these two characters can't be together) should always be obvious and up front in the story. Hopefully it got ingrained in my brain this time, so I won't work for so long on the next story.

I like it when the characters finally start to mold themselves (with my help, and my critique partners') into what they should be. That's the magic of writing. We writers manipulate and manipulate. Quite often, I catch myself trying to squeeze a square character into a round action or reaction, or so it seems, and they just won't fit. Someone reads it and goes, "What the heck? Why is he so mean?" or "When did she decide to be wimpy?" Then I know it's because I'm trying too hard to accomplish what doesn't need to be done. All that *needs* to be there are characters who love, who dream, who are passionate about their feelings, who are endearingly obstinate, and who are right for each other in ways they don't even know yet.

Sounds soooo easy. Trust me, it's much easier to synopsize the process than it is to work through it.

Well, that's it for now. Back to Rafe and Jolie. They're wanting me to hurry up and get to the fun stuff.

That 4 Things About Me Thing Going Around

Okay. I fell for it. So here it is:

Four jobs you may not have known I have had in my life:

1. department floater/fill-in at Federated department store
2. cocktail waitress (Victoria Station)
3. food service amusement park (Kings Island, OH)
4. credit card collections (as part of bank mgmt training)

Four movies I could watch over and over.

1. Breakfast at Tiffany's (just saw it the other day...again)
2. Pride & Prejudice
3. The Quiet Man
4. Groundhog Day

Four places I have lived.

I think I'll pass on this, in case I have a stalker (Eek!)

If you know me, you know where I've lived. Let's just say I haven't lived in the Dakotas, CA, Alaska, and a bunch of other states on the left side of the map.


Four TV shows I love to watch:

1. American Idol
2. Medium
3. Forensic Files or Snapped
4. Cash in The Attic

Four places I have been on vacation

1. Bermuda
2. Hawaii
3. The Caribbean
4. Europe

Four favorite foods

1. Sushi (cooked only)
2. seafood
3. Thai food
4. sugary food! Prefer homemade

Four places I would rather be right now:

1. With my parents or sisters
2. With Aunt Dot in Memphis
3. in Europe with Frank
4 . at our cabin

Four of my favorite candy

1. 3 Musketeers bar (I just ate one--yum!)
2. Bassetts Licorice All Sorts (I'm the only one in the world who likes these)
3. jelly beans
4. Peeps

New Print Date for The Daddy Issue

In case anyone is wondering when The Daddy Issue will be released, I'm being told it's now April. Sorry for the confusion. I'm told it has to do with distributor contracts and printing schedules.

I'm very excited about the book. I've been writing for fifteen years, and all I can say is, "It's about time." This is actually my second published romance, as I sold a manuscript to an ebook publisher in 2000. That book is now my option book with Premium Press. I'm hoping they'll be able to put it in the 20007 publishing schedule as well.

To everyone who has asked me when The Daddy Issue is coming out. Thanks so much for your interest and patience. Hopefully I'll get my author copies soon, and once I do, then the book will be in the stores shortly thereafter.

Family, friends, fellow writers and fans rock!!

What Inspires You? What Makes You Tick?

Thought maybe it would be nice to write about something for everyone for a change, and not just writers. So, what to write about? Hm. I'm not sure. I'm not so sure I don't wax redundant all the time on here, anyway. I know I think about motivation a lot, and along with that, inspiration.

Maybe inspiration could be the topic. Everyone is inspired in life. Everyone has goals.

What are your goals? I'd be interested to know. But I'd be even *more* interested to know what is behind them, what inspired them.

Today a nice lady from my exercise class, Lynn, was asking about how to sell greeting cards. At least, I think that's what she asked me. She started out by saying, "You've published a book, right? Well, I'm working on these greeting cards, and I had some questions about it."

That, of course, led to my diarrhea-of-the-mouth speech about the publishing industry. I think by the end of our 3o- or 40-minute discussion, I'd probably just succeeded in thoroughly confusing her! I'm still not sure what she expected from the conversation, but now that I've thought about it a while, I think I know what *I* meant by it!

There are so many aspects of "greeting card writing." She had had a successful salsa (and cookie and chips) business, where she had to do a great deal of marketing. She told me that she really didn't want to go that "full bore" into marketing the greeting cards. At that point, I must admit I wondered if she was driven enough to stick with her new dream. On the other hand, there are plenty of us who would rather write than market. That's what agents are for, we think. But just get a publishing contract and you'll find yourself doing a lot of marketing, anyway!

I guess what I was trying to get a feel for as we spoke was, what were Lynn's goals with the card business? Did she want to reach for the stars and knock on Hallmark's door? Or would she be happy soliciting to several contacts she had made in the gift store market while she sold her salsa?

She said she was enjoying her retirement. So if she is enjoying her retirement and she doesn't want to do that much marketing, then maybe placement of her wares in local stores is the way to go. And again, "enjoying my retirement" makes me wonder just how long she'll stick with her new goal of selling greeting cards. Gosh, I'm such a skeptic! But I've seen people come and go in the writing business. It can be grueling. You can feel at times very alone, and at times like a very bad writer. It's hard to get the positive vibes you need, to keep the creative juices flowing. Will Lynn be able to keep herself pumped up? I hope so. I like to see people follow their dreams. That's inspiring for me.

Then we talked a little about why I write, and why my buddy Marlean creates and sells her calligraphy (commissioned through a fine stationery store.) We both told our new creative friend that we pursue our goals mainly because we love doing what we're doing. We don't do it for the money. Marlean's calligraphy is a very slow process. I'm a slow writer. We couldn't ever be properly compensated for our time, unless maybe she was Donald Trump's personal calligrapher, and I was the next Nora Roberts.

Uh oh. I'm back on my favorite topic, writing. But I really think you can learn a lot about life just by comparison. In any job you do, if you don't love it, will you do your best? Will you do it for peanuts? Will you keep doing it day after day, hour after hour, and be contented?

What inspires you?

Some people are inspired by money, and there's nothing wrong with that. Some people are inspired by fame. That's cool, too. Others are inspired by learning, by a need to fill a hole in their lives, by the success of others, by the *greatness* of others, by music, by beauty, by good weather, by the need to prove to themselves they can do it, and the list goes on and on.

I probably confused the Lynn the greeting card writer by throwing out all the options to consider, like whether or not to join a critique group of her peers, or license her work before putting it on a website, or if she should send it out to editors before she gets too much feedback.But I think what I was trying to say was, "This is what the business is like. Now, what are YOU like? Can you handle criticism? Can you take rejection? Are you willing to be in it for the long haul? Would you do it for free, forever, if you never got paid? Do you love it? Are you doing it for your relatives and friends, or for Hallmark, and does *that* even matter?"

It all boils down to, what inspires you? What are your motives? What is the carrot that's dangling in front of you?

I love people. I love to try and figure out if I can answer those questions about them. It fascinates me to the extent that I spend a lot of time watching dippy reality shows, gorey murder tell-alls and reading People Magazine. I want to see reactions. I want the blurted feelings. I want to know the real you. Scary,right?

What makes you tick? Is it obvious? Could I figure it out right away? Probably not. We're layers and layers of feeling, memory, emotion, upbringing, opinion, hormones, chemical balances and imbalances, genes.

Fascinating stuff, eh?

Well, back to trying to at least figure out my characters. I'll work on *you* tomorrow!

Reworking a sweater and reknitting a scene

Just a quick blog about what I've been up to lately. The *really* quick version is, too much Goodwill-diving! I've developed a thing for running up to my new Goodwill store and bringing back "orphans." This is sometimes good and sometimes not. I recently found a wonderful vintage sweater, all furry with mohair, and so cute, with its little rows of bobbles up the front plackets. It had some slipped stitches that I figured I could easily pull back up with a crochet hook. I'm pretty good at fixing things like that. Unfortunately, once I got it fixed, I realized one sleeve was really threadbare. What a shame.

I just couldn't give up right away. I kept that sweater lying around in a basket while I contemplated how to fix it. I was thinking maybe if I took the sleeves out, I could somehow re-knit them with the good yarn and eliminate the threadbare part. But that would probably mean short sleeves. What good is a short-sleeved winter cardigan?

Still, I started taking out the sleeves. But see, you can't really do it just like that. Sweaters are assembled in parts that interlock like a jigsaw puzzle. Once I began taking the sleeve seams out, it messed up the collar and the front a little. Soon I'd *really* created a lot of work for myself.

I gave up. I threw it in the trash atop some gooey stuff, so I wouldn't be tempted to take it back out. I knew I had enough projects around here without having to worry over that pesky one. I would list them, but let's just list the really important one: finishing the manuscript I'm working on! The others are mostly needlework, which takes a back seat to writing.

I don't know what it is that makes me want to fix things like that sweater instead of going out and buying one, but I think the fix-the-orphan urge helps me a lot with my writing. It allows me to rewrite and rewrite until I get things straight. You can pull the stitches out of a sweater, or toss out the batter and start the cake over, or you can hit the delete button on a scene.

Maybe what drives me is the need to get things right. "Do your best," we're told. Maybe that's what it is.

Sometimes, just as you end up ripping out part of the neck edging as you try to rework that sleeve, changing a few paragraphs will change the direction of the written scene to such an extent that you're actually rewriting the whole scene. Or maybe the whole chapter. But that's a good thing, right? In my experience, it's a rare revision that isn't a *better* revision.

When would I toss out a whole chapter? Ha! Usually if it's the FIRST chapter, which always gives me a run for my money. Sometimes that thing gets morphed two or three times into something entirely different than what I first dreamed it would be like. But what's the most important chapter in a book? The first one, I do believe.

Lately, as I've worked on revisions on this partial that were recommended by a Harlequin editor, I keep reading other Superromances and trying to see what they're doing right. I think I need to cut out some of my hero/heroine's yammering about other people, places and situations, and cut to the meat: the romance. For some reason (my mainstream storytelling nature?) I like to layer and layer the story. And really, what is the reader picking the book up for? The *love story,* Melissa. The love story.

Sooo....back to cutting out what the grass looks like, and how the house needs paint! <>

Mel: "But, that was a *great* descriptive passage!"

Critique partner Jen: "Mel, what does the *reader* want?"

Thanks for getting me back on track, Jen!

Thoughts On Characterization

I'm trying to go deeper into my character's thoughts and feelings. So what I want to blog about is what makes people tick. There are so many factors to why we do what we do. Brings to mind Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs chart. You know the drill, how you start with your basic needs like food and shelter (at the bottom of the pyramid,) and then move on up to more emotional things like "need to be loved," "need to be accepted," etc,...

I'm thinking my heroine has a need to pull people together, to nurture, to "get things straight" for people. She really wants her family to be as "whole" as their rather disfunctional group can be. She wants Mayberry. Hey, it strikes me, suddenly, that even Andy had a sort of strange little family. He had Aunt Bea, his aunt, instead of his wife, who was dead or something. And wasn't Barney sort of like a family member? What about Otis? He lived with them in the jail, and Aunt Bea brought him lunch, and he was allowed to come and go with the jail key, as if he were the errant teenager in the family. So that begs the deeper question, "Are we striving for things that don't really even exist?" If Mayberry wasn't even utopia, what is? Is there really such a thing as a perfect family? Some might say, "Only in fiction." But shouldn't fiction reflect reality, if it is to be believed? Even in fantasy fiction, for us to love Luke Skywalker, we have to read or see him as someone like us.

My hero is an easier character to draw. He's the tortured soul, hurting from losing a child, his marriage, his home, his life as he knew it. Knocked down to his knees, he has to pull himself back up.The heroine can't do that for him. Isn't that strange how we have to help ourselves a lot of the time? We won't listen to others. We have to fall down and then pull ourselves back up. Reminds me of Dr. Phil's recent shows, where he had people on who wanted their spouses to lose weight, or be better parents this year, or be sexier, or whatever. Dr. Phil's very important advice? "You can't make someone else's resolutions for them."

AHA! Epiphany!! We have to grow ourselves. Characters have to grow themselves. And the more stubborn they are about it, I'm betting the better story is. Those are the ones where the reader goes, "Come on! Figure it out, you boob! She loves you! You love her! Get to that happily ever after."

"In due time," the characters say, glaring back at the reader. "Read on."

Ooh. I sure hope I can remember this as I go on with this manuscript. I really want these characters to pull my reader through the story.

I just got *another* reference book for my permanent shelves. Concerning beginnings of stories, the author says you must really pull the reader in in the first 100 pages. Give them something that makes it hard to put the book down. Keep them reading.

I'm keeping that in mind while I revise this beginning. The first chapter is the most important chapter, I think. It sets up the entire story. It's the hook, it's the intro of the characters and their goals, and it's the beginning of the plot. It's the taste for the writer's style, flare, voice. Will you like it? Will you want to read this author again? You decide that so quickly, it's scary.

I read M.C.Beaton over Christmas. The author lives in the Cotswalds in England and writes cozy mysteries. Her main character in this books I read is Hamish Macbeth, a likable, laid-back Scottish Highlands detective. I like her Agatha Raisin mystery series, too. Anyway, murders happen around Detective Macbeth. He solves them with an air of ease. The author has a way of making even the drawn-out parts (what writers refer to as the "sagging middle") interesting. I love the way you get to know quite a cast of characters rather well. I like to write that way, to play the people off each other so the interactions show glimpses of all of them.

To sum up my thoughts for the day on characters, I think the more complex they are, the more the author must work at laying out a simple story with clear goals. Things can get convoluted, which confuses the reader. What makes a good character? Well, what makes a good person? Someone who has goals and desires, is spiritual, kind, willing, trusting, a survivor, one who pitches in and rolls up his/her sleeves, and on and on. That's what makes a good character. Well-rounded, but definable.

Isn't that one of the most basic needs? Doesn't creating a character boil down to knowing who they are? Doesn't life boil down to knowing who *we* are? What kid hasn't said, "When I grow up, I want to be..." and what adult hasn't asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" We're all asking, "Who am I?" are we not?

Another epiphany!! In life, you may not know who your are until the end of your life, when someone (hopefully a good writer)pens your obituary, giving tender glimpses of your heart and soul, and you're still alive to read it. LOL But with characters, we HAVE TO show who they are, in a thousand words, or 80K or 100K.

Dang. Why didn't I take up dog grooming? I'm pretty good with scissors.

New Year, New Resolutions

No! I'm not making any resolutions this year. I usually make a few earnest ones and try to stick to them, and I'd actually thought of a few this year, before the ball fell. But I believe it was on New Year's Day that I heard someone say they were a bad idea. Why? Because most people can't keep them, or don't keep them. They say a better way to make resolutions is just to resolve, daily, to do certain things differently.

I guess there isn't really a big difference between that and the NY resolutions, except that with them, there's maybe a bigger letdown if you break them. Well, who wants to go around feeling bad? So here are my resolutions that really aren't resolutions at all. Hey, what do you call things you decide just about every day to do, and sometimes you do them and sometimes you don't? Are they mantras, or goals, or just to-do list things? Well, here they are:

1) Walk more. I'm trying for 10,000 steps each walk, which is 5 miles. I'm not there yet, but if that's my goal, it keeps me going longer.
2) Work on my writing and improve all the time. Create well-motivated characters, and don't come up with convoluted plots.
3) Be nicer and less demanding with the spouse. And don't allow spouse to over-schedule social activities or out-of-town fun. Too much play time makes Mel a frustrated woman.
4) Don't be so hard on myself.

That's it. I work on this all the time. What are your things you're always resolving to do?