Masochism with Shovel

So, according to my best calculations (i.e. a recounting of fingers and toes this morning), I have 30 days to write 43K words.

Doable? Certainly.

Realistic? Not so much.

But since reality and I have never really gelled, I don’t see a problem.

Therefore, ladies and gents, please join me in feeding my newest delusion… The Clockwise Heart will be done one month from today!

*gulps uncomfortably at the freshly dug pitfall at my feet*

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

I Am Not Job

After an evening of gruesome nightmares from which not one positive could be scraped from the steaming, stinky pile of negative, I pose this question… How can my writing benefit from this experience?

This is not a new question. In fact, it’s very old. I ask it all the time.

Panic, anxiety, OCD-stupidity are always addressed with this query once the daily battling is done. 

There must be some good to come from such experiences, some wisdom I can impart if not to myself than to my readers about these ridiculous struggles.

Fortitude and faith are the most common answers, but the question asked after particularly cruel, apocalyptic nightmares I wrestle to find an answer to.

Oh, well. I guess it’s just another failing to add to the lot. *smirks*

Travel day tomorrow, folks, so…

Until Monday…

Chloe

Tardy

Please, blame today’s tardiness on the following…

1.) Furniture shopping an hour’s drive away in a little, teeny, tiny town in Tennessee.

2.) Failure to find a darn thing furniture shopping in the little, teeny, tiny town in Tennessee.

3.) A much needed nap cocooning a headache born in a nightmare conceived the night before.

4.) Olympic Opening Ceremony food making.

5.) Olympic Opening Ceremony food eating.

Apologies all around.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

...And Make the Door Red

Well, the bloody thing finally has a beginning.

I am truly appalling at writing opening lines/scenes/chapters of a novel. Oh, I have no problem picturing the perfect entry for readers into my storyline but getting it down satisfactorily on paper is another thing entirely.

So, it is with great relief, and with 17k words of the tale in the rearview mirror, that I can announce that my newest romance has its stoop, its front door (red, of course) and its welcoming little foyer.

Somebody, pop me some champagne!

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Post-note: True, you have to squint to make this orange door appear truly red, but I adored the picture and just had to go for it. Apologies for my rose-colored glasses.

Knotting

As I have lamented several times, I tend to complicate things.

Give me an outline consisting of Jack, Jill, a hill and a pail of water and I’ll not write you a nursery rhyme, I’ll craft you a five-part saga with prequel and sequel possibilities.

Hence, I am trying very hard not to turn my simple romance The Clockwise Heart into something akin to a Gordian knot of love.

“Trying” being the key word here.

*sighs*

Somebody, please, lash my hands behind my back and shackle my toes. Perhaps if I can write only by pecking my nose against the keyboard things will take a simpler turn.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

Spine

One must have a spine.

Every major character I’ve ever written has had one. However flawed or crooked they may have been, however broken and life-weary, no matter the time or the place, each and every one of them has had a spine.

Even I have a spine. Oh, with my panic disorder it is remarkably feeble at times but it is always there. I may have to kneel, I may have to crawl, but I will never slither.

So my question is this… Are most politicians simply born without or do they pry their spines from their bodies the moment they take higher office?

Although it pains me to admit as a writer, sometimes words are not enough. Sometimes action is called for. Rebuking certain “demagogues” by vague inference does nothing. You must find your spine and stand up to them. Do more than talk from your bellies. Stand tall and take back your support.

Please.

Until tomorrow…

Chloe

The Tunnel's End

After seven hours on the road, I managed to throw a grand total of thirty words at the screen yesterday.

Thirty words.

At this current pace, my two in-progress novels will arrive in digital bookstores in approximately 2062,  just in time for some posthumous laughs at my ill-attended wake.

On a brighter note, my mind is no longer sludge. There is movement in the synapses. Sparks have occurred. I will take this as a positive and beam appropriately.

Perhaps Tuesday I’ll even manage something meaningful to say?

Until tomorrow…

Chloe