Operatic Tail-Wagging

With the tail end of August suddenly stuck up in the air and wiggling itself at me, I suppose it’s time to throw together the monthly list of what-nots and what-is-its.

Enjoy or simply muddle through, whichever keeps your tail wagging.

1.) Chapters 2, 3, 4 and 5 of The Hushing Days are safely ensconced in Final Edits. Chapter 6 is currently on the first editing block. Then I’ll only 15 more chapters to go… Thinking positive at this point is hard, my friends.

2.) Jake Arrieta of my Cubs threw a no-hitter in L.A. last night! After 33 years of following the Cubbies, it is the first no-hitter I’ve had the pleasure of watching. Zambrano’s effort years ago (2008, maybe?) was cruelly pitched while I was out of town and without cable… Maybe by the time they throw the next no-hitter, The Hushing Days will be done? Again, thinking positive at this point is hard.

3.) I’d like to play the role of Despina in Mozart’s opera Cosi fan tutte. Talk about a fun ride! Of course, this would mean I’d have to suddenly develop operatic singing and acting skill…. Need I repeat? Thinking positive at this point is hard.

4.) As this list has degraded into something rather sad, discouraging and definitely not tail-wagging-worthy. I will end this debacle here… This, my friends, is a positive thing.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Command Decisions

Command decisions must be made on the literary battlefield.

And while the resulting blood and gore, angst and mayhem are limited to screen or paper, their impact is no less agonizing for the story’s author.

Case in point: Thackary.

The skewed homage to my off-kilter life in my novel The Hushing Days has become an albatross around my editing neck. He’s not only weighing the story down in needless tangents, he’s sucking up all my creative time.

If I’m ever going to get this novel to my agent, I have got to keep pushing the chapters from first to final edits in a somewhat orderly fashion.

So, my command decision is this…

Dawdling is out.

Thackary, of course, will remain.

He’s too entrenched in a number of storylines to extricate from the plot tangle at this point. However, his motivations and his inner struggles will remain a backstory to which the readers only see glimpses.

From here on out, Thackary will be a tantalizing mystery whose oddities the audience is never quite able to figure out.

Publishing wisdom states: “always leave your readers begging for more.”

Time to put that axiom to the test.

Until Monday…

Chloe

Post Note: Visiting family will preclude me from gracing your lives with a post tomorrow. Chin up! Your blogger will be back Monday.

An Economy of Brain -or- A Prickly Dithering

“Economy of brain” is a concept I’m trying very hard to embrace. Unfortunately, the efforts have been prickly, at best.

Let me explain.

I am a perfectionist. I don’t want to be. I rather abhor it. But there it is.

Hence, every scene I edit in The Hushing Days I give my all to getting, well, perfect.

Yet the problem is, you see, there is no such thing as perfection. It doesn’t exist, at least not where we mere mortals can reach.

Realizing this, I have to restrain my efforts in the editing process. I could literally dither over a sentence forever. (Yes, when I die at the ripe old age of 92, please be sure to put The Hushing Days manuscript in the coffin with me. The second scene in Chapter Two still needs some tweaking. Seriously. That’s my thought.)

So, I must economize the use of my brain. Spending decades on a throwaway thought is not viable. (There lies the path to madness and all that rot.)

It’s been a struggle, but I’m drawing the concept ever nearer…

Of course I haven’t got my arms quite around the bugger yet, so excuse me while I go dither around with Chapter Two, Scene Two again.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Avoidance of Self

Avoid directing yourself.

Really.

Unless you’re tangling with an autobiography (in which all your actions should be past actions and therefore inarguable… Revisionist history? Ha! Never.), don’t cast yourself in your novel.

Really.

It’s not a matter of you not being interesting or colorful enough to thrive in your fictional wherever-land. No, it’s a matter of distance, or lack thereof, to be exact.

An author must have some distance from his/her characters. Objectivity is key in keeping a storyline moving and grooving. Plopping yourself in the middle of the dance floor and boogying down with the whole gang leads not only to stark embarrassment but writerly headaches. Big ones.

Really.

Thackary in The Hushing Days is more me than any character I’ve ever written. And while he’s only a supporting actor, keeping him in line with the rest of the cast has been, um, difficult. (Apparently, I’m a very head strong personality. No wonder I’m not married.)

In short: putting yourself in your story is not worth the time nor the aggravation.

Really.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Quantity Over Quality

It was a frustrating day in the old literary workshop yesterday.

Grand plans of progress were snuffed out by a decided lack of writing skill. Whatever talent I have milked from authoring 17 novels went POOF! and was gone. I imagine a pitiful little trail of smoke followed this incineration but I was frankly too busy gnashing my teeth to notice.

Thankfully the whole 17 book bit has taught me how to get some work done despite the POOF! Admittedly, my greatest storytelling was not on display yesterday, but I managed to fake it passably well.

At least I think I did.

We’ll see when I take a wary peek at it today. If there is no accompanying wailing on my part or laughing up a lung on the part of the muse, I’m perfectly willing to call yesterday a minor success.

Work was done.

Sometimes quantity must dwarf quality…

But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

When Simplicity Calls, Answer

Flannel slippers on an icy January morn.

A white cotton nightie on a sweltering August eve.

A sun-baked towel after a cool dip in the pool.

In other words… sweet Willoughby.

I’d truly forgotten how much I enjoy writing the character of Willoughby Fawkes. A minor major player (yes, there can be such a thing) in The Hushing Days, it has been a while since I slipped into the young woman’s skin.

I’ve missed her.

Yesterday, Chapter Two came into my editing sights, and in it I found the dear miss tapping her foot impatiently for her due attention. With all the attention my more “complicated” characters have required of me in Edits, I realized that I had been neglecting the “simple” girl who only wants someone to love.

Remember: there is never harm in crawling into simplicity.

Seek it out from time to time and smile.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Complicity Denied

In a book of 100k words, is there room enough for a single word?

Emily Dickinson (yes, her again… blame Harvard) delighted in the power, the mystery, the beauty of a solitary word. She would often go as far to isolate these single creatures within a set of her infamous dashes. In essence, cutting off the word entirely from the rest of the line, she forced the reader to go one-on-one with the lone accomplice.

Can today’s romance writer afford such luxuries of a single word? That is the question… and I’m saddened by its answer.

In a publishing world that too often emphasizes speed and bulk over quality, the romance novel is left out of this love affair with the single word.

How ironic is that?

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

"As Is" Love

Well, there’s no danger of anorexia here. The Hushing Days is quite full of itself and plans to keep it that way.

And while I applaud my manuscript’s cheerful acceptance of its bulk, and while I would never, ever curse it with an eating disorder that is both terrifying and oftentimes deadly, I wouldn’t mind a teensy bit of weight-management.

No, no, not a diet! Banish that dastardly word from your thoughts. I want my novel to eat as much as it wants. Digest the whole world for all I care. Go ahead: munch, crunch and brunch.

But...

When that inevitable flab is put on, my book really needs to learn how to distribute it a little more evenly.

For example: Chapter Four is lean, mean and runway material. Chapter Five is a real bruiser requiring “Wide Load” warnings. So, as Chapter Three reaches its final stage of growth, I’m beginning to fear its following in Sibling Five’s deep footsteps. It grows, and grows and grows.

*sighs*

What is a poor author to do but keep a chipper thought and love the stuffing out of all of them?

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Menage a Trois, Literally

Flirting with Emily Dickinson while going hot and heavy with my own The Hushing Days should be awkward. It should be weird. Hinky, even.

Instead the innocent little dalliance is turning out to be rather marvelous.

As I’ve told you before, I am taking an online course from Harvard about the elusive 19^th century poet while I’m trudging my way through the edits of my first mainstream romance novel. Surprisingly this has not shorted out my brain or even strummed one string of my not-so latent School/Panic/”Get me out of this classroom or I am going to seriously die” issues. Remarkable, that.

Equally entertaining to “literary psychiatrists” (Hmm…is there such a vocation, I wonder?) worldwide is the fact that my writing is flourishing in the shadow of this affair.

Even though I’m still struggling with speed issues (current forecast states I’ll be 94 when The Hushing Days reaches print), the work I’m doing is frankly freaking good.

Freaking really good, if I may bluster.

So, bottom line: Don’t be afraid to invite a third party into your relationship with your manuscript. It could spark something grand.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Astronomical, I Dare Say

Fifty years is a bloody long time.

Half a century, that.

I haven’t even had the pleasure of existing (i.e. breathing, panicking, popping Prozac, breathing again) that long yet. But there go my parents, celebrating the grand 5-0 of anniversaries today.

Yeah, well, I guess that’s what love and stubbornness, patience and faith will get two rather remarkable souls.

A hearty congrats to them both!

*the four-legged, furry muse scowls, and promises swift, messy retribution, as a bag of confetti is dropped ceremoniously on her head*

Party on, dear parents!

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

The Pinocchio Thing

Admittedly, Pinocchio and I have never been tight.

I mean, there are a whole host of Disney films/books/etc. I’d put way above the nose-growing kid. The whole thing just didn’t resonate with me. Geppetto was cool. Jiminy Cricket was, of course, alright. I even liked the big scary whale (my first horror movie viewing, I might claim). However, there were no real feels with the story.

Sad, I know.

But yesterday as I worked on The Hushing Days’ first edits, I finally found an affinity for the little tinder box.

You might remember that the character of Brone in my novel has been a problem child since the beginning. I just didn’t like him. Had no fondness for him, whatsoever. Relegated him from major to minor character with unmitigated glee.

Well, yesterday, I finally discovered Brone’s soul. WHAM! There it was! And the character was no longer just a wooden puppet I knew how to maneuver about with strings. Brone was suddenly a real little boy! (Ok, grown man, but you get the picture.)

So, Pinocchio and I have a thing going now. Who knows how long it’s going to last, but I’m going to ride it to the end… just as long as nobody morphs into a donkey along the way.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

If You Please...

A call for normalcy, if you will.

Not a big one, nothing grand or even particularly memorable.

Just a spot of one, about yeah high (5’8”) and ever so wide (16 inches should do it).

Room enough for me to slip into and make a Target run.

That’s all.

I need dog treats. Particular dog treats because the muse is very, well, particular.

It should be an easy stop-and-go.

It will be an easy stop-and-go… if I ever get going.

A panic-riddled mind is a terribly tiresome thing.

I bore of it.

Yes, a spot of normalcy, if you please.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Writer, Please Prepare to Taxi

I like to call them the Taxiing Chapters.

And depending on my authorly mood, I either love them or hate them. And I mean really hate them (i.e. tossing them out a plate glass window and running them gleefully over with a John Deere lawnmower a couple dozen times.)

Perhaps, I should explain.

What I’m talking about are those chapters every successful novel needs to set up the action and the angst. Like a plane needs to taxi down a runway either before taking off with a squeal of delight or after landing with a squeal of terror, every story needs that sturdy, no-frills flatness of sun-baked concrete.

Chapter Three in The Hushing Days is one of such taxiing.

It’s a frustrating stretch for a writer to work through who wants nothing more than to get the story over and done with already.

Editing these chapters requires the same patience and skill as managing the guts and glory sections.

I know this.

I do.

But…

ARRGH!!

Somebody needs to hide my John Deere.

Seriously.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

 

Small Victories

Despite Chapter Five shooting up steroids whenever my back is turned, the bruiser of a chapter will officially be done today!

Yep, Final Edits will be welcoming a second guest from The Hushing Days manuscript this afternoon, and there will be cupcakes with sprinkles.

And stiff drinks.

Possibly, a psychiatrist or two.

Come one, come all!

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Riding the Swell

Swelling has occurred. Both of my confidence (see yesterday’s blog for that cringe-worthy pity fest) and of The Hushing Days itself.

Yep, swelling.

I’d go as far to call it bloating, but, no. Let’s just call it a healthy swell.

Trying to follow my mind through its circuitous twists and turns would only make one cross-eyed and dizzy, so neither of us will venture into that recounting. Bottom line as to the confidence thing is: I’m good.

As to The Hushing Days… if Chapter Five portends anything whatsoever as to the remaining chapters in the Final Edits queue, the length of my novel will crest the 100k stage easily.

Whether this is good, bad, or ugly, I refuse to contemplate. At this point, it is what it is.

I’m just going to ride the swell and see where this behemoth lands.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Life Lag

My confidence is lagging.

Oh, it’s a temporary lag, I know. I would have given up this whole lark of “financial independence through writing” years and years and years ago if there weren’t some bloated veins of confidence somewhere deep within my core.

And just because I have lost sight of these bright and glittering streaks doesn’t mean they’re gone.

I know this.

I do.

But…

There’s still a lag.

*sighs*

While the rest of my small world seems to be progressing quite timely through life’s checkpoints, me and my blown-tire of a mind are just limping along on life’s shoulder…

Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m mixing metaphors here. I had a really nice mining analogy going on and then “Whammo!” let’s throw in a freaking highway.

I blame the lag.

Temporary though it may be, it really does suck.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe on the Shoulder

Epistle Envy

Do you remember those old Magic Fingers beds? Throw in a quarter and you’re moving and grooving without the aid of lover or hand. At a loss for some coin? The bed, the mattress and all its polyester fluff would just lie there and offer you a decent night’s sleep but no pleasant “hitch” to your “get-along.”

Yeah, well, my brain is a lot like that. The writing zip code, at least.

One example coming up…

In The Hushing Days, one character writes a letter to another character, a complete stranger at that point of the tale.

Should be easy-peasy, right? No interactions to doll up. No banter. No flirting. No fire to keep stoked and sizzling...

Please. If there’s ever been anything easy or peasy about this book, someone tell me.

Anyhow, for months, my brain would just simply lie there dormant at the task of writing the very important letter. If forced, it would have offered a real sleeper of an epistle, but that’s not what I was after.

Unbeknownst to me, the coinage my old gray matter requires to get humping is coursework. You know, school work. Lectures, homework assignment, required reading, etc.

Yesterday, I started an online course from Harvard about Emily Dickenson.

Yesterday, a shiny quarter dropped and before I could even appreciate the grind, that letter was fini and grand!

???

Don’t worry. Sometimes, my weirdness even leaves me at a loss for words.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Three in One

As my unwieldy wrestling with The Hushing Days continue, I’ve come to the stark realization that the Romance Writer in me is schizophrenic.

Yep. Three distinct personalities trapped in one Chloe.

Let me introduce you…

1.) “Katie”: She’s the hopeless romantic who wants every word, every visual, every supporting character’s inconsequential sigh to be consequentially sentimental. Everything is for the good of the love story. Love conquers all. End of story.

2.) “Pepper”: She’s my munitions expert. Anything that could go BOOM!, should go BOOM! A walk down a country lane is not an opportunity for a stolen kiss; it is an opportunity for a runaway wagon (18^th century time period, remember) to come barreling through and leave behind nothing but angst. No love is safe with Pepper around.

3.) “Blythe”: The scholastic wunderkind of the group, she desires nothing more than literary grandness from the story. Every sentence, every thought, every location shot should be Dickens-like or Faulkner-esque or Hemingway-ish. She’s a pretentious little witch who demands intellectual perfection. Love is a tool. Nothing more.

While I am of course exaggerating things a bit, these three writing personalities are tackling each other over every sentence. It is, shall we say, chaotic.

No wonder my edits resemble a warzone.

*sighs*

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Manuscript vs. Author

Negotiations with The Hushing Days’ Chapter Five went well yesterday. Neither side suffered brutal injury. While there were a few skinned knees and one ego was trampled on considerably, both writer and manuscript have agreed to return to the table today.

Hammering out of the dreaded First Edits is scheduled to continue, with a break for cupcakes and First Aid penciled down for the noon hour.

The overseeing muse, furry and four-legged, will continue to lord her opinion over the proceedings.

As per custom, all doors and windows will remain locked until the entirety of one scene is completed to the satisfaction of all parties (excluding the muse whose bullying orneriness is now accepted and ignored.)

Further updates as they become available.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

The Sequoia Strategy

If caught in a fiery round of First Edits with your completed novel, I advise two things…

1.) Distance

2.) A big conference table (the more ungodly long, the better)

Let me explain.

First Edits with your manuscript can sometimes dissolve into little more than a bare knuckle fistfight. Blood and gore, tears and grief are the only things you’re going to get out of these kind of negotiations.

Yes, I did say “negotiations.” That’s exactly what First Edits are. You with your red marker of death and comma-happy attitude facing off against the richly bloated storyline you’ve spent months and months feeding.

It can get, well, messy.

Here’s where Distance comes in. Take a break. Both sides take a few days off away from each other. No communication. No emails. No tweets. No scheming strategies on the back side of a napkin. Sever all ties for a bit.

Next comes the conference table. When both parties walk back into the negotiations make sure to keep a sturdy, wide-load of a table between you. Physical violence (i.e. bloodied noses, broken pinkies, etc.) is a lot less likely to occur when a sequoia must be scrambled for flesh to meet flesh.

After that, I can only wish you godspeed, my friends.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

An Opening Agenda

Well, hello there.

*offers hand politely…*

*reconsiders professional restraint and goes for a big, messy hug instead* 

Hope you all have been both well-read and well-written this past week. I have accomplished neither as I threw myself wholeheartedly into the family thing. (Despite the latent guilt, it was loads of fun not being a writer for a wee itty bit.)

Playtime is over, however. It is back to work. Back to blogging. Back to Chapter Five. Back to 18^th century romance. Back to muskets and petticoats and “Pray pardon”s and “Fare thee well”s. Back to…

*four-legged, furry muse bops me unkindly on the head; the “Really?” is unspoken*

Well, you get the picture.

Game plan of the day is simple… Write.

When I’m done writing a little, write a lot.

When I’m done writing a lot, write one paragraph more.

Simple, right?

*four-legged, furry muse laughs hysterically, rolls off the couch and laughs some more*

I’m leaving now.

There’s a too-full-of-herself dog who needs a stern talking-to.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Gone Fishing

Fear not, faithful followers. The world has not swallowed me whole. I am indeed alive, well and sincerely apologetic for not posting a single word yesterday.

Visiting family, including a 4 year old charmer of a nephew, captured all of my attention Monday. This may be a common occurrence the rest of this week so I can’t honestly guarantee a daily blog every, well, day.

I trust you all will be able to muddle through without my sparkling wit and dour outlook creeping in through the cracks of your day.

Rest assured that while I’m neglecting this blog, I am neglecting The Hushing Days as well. So, you won’t be missing a single struggle or triumph as I shove the behemoth of a novel over that finish line… You’re welcome, by the way.

Enjoy your potentially Chloe-less time this week, everyone!

Until tomorrow… or the next day… or for sure next Monday…

Chloe

Loiter Not

I simply refuse to dwell. There will be no lingering, either. No dragging of one’s feet, no circling in place, no loitering around the failure as if that would change any bloody thing.

It is August 1, and The Hushing Days is still not complete.

It’s almost there, but it’s not there.

Another internal deadline not only missed but blown by with a peel of tires and a jaunty honk of the horn. I’ve still got 19 chapters to push across Final Edits and it is freaking August 1…

*stops, catches breath and sighs*

I’m dwelling, aren’t I?

Dang it.

Oh well. Failure is simply another step toward success, right?

Yeah, we’ll go with that and move hurriedly on.

Until Monday…

Chloe

POST NOTE: There will be no blog on Sunday. Family duties call and I will be answering.