Category: Writing

I’ve been doing some soul-searching recently, thinking about my life and where I’ve been and where I’m going.  Thinking about goals.  Thinking about challenges.

It seems to me that the rarest commodity in the world today is not oil or gold or silver.  The rarest commodity of all is Time. And the rarest of all Time is time to think.  Time to think is rarer than the rarest of gemstones, my friends. But if you are going to be a writer, then you are going to need to cultivate it.

It’s hard to push away the demands of life to clear out some thinking time. It’s especially hard if you have a full-time job, or a full-time family, or both. But it must be done if you want to be a writer.  It’s been my observation that writing is 75% thinking and 25% actually putting the words on paper in the right order. It’s probably more like a 90/10 ratio.  Plus, whether you want to be a writer or not, thinking time just plain makes you a better person.

Here are a few suggestions I’m trying to put into practice in my own life to “clear away the thickets in the deadwood of my mind,” as Elizabeth Peters’s character Amelia Peabody puts it.

1. Turn off the television and radio.  In my opinion, this is one of the most important things you can do to create some thinking time.  Thinking is listening inside yourself. You can’t do that if somebody else’s words and images are constantly filling your mind. You need the silence to hear what you are thinking, and to think about what you are thinking about. Plus, if you’re like me, when the television is on you’re just sitting staring at it with a dumb look on your face. And how many ads can they have in a half-hour anyway?

Just a side note on this one – sometimes I find myself with thought patterns that are not healthy. When this happens, I do play music to pull my thoughts into a different place. For me, I find that Baroque music works wonderfully well.  One of my teachers many years ago told me that because Baroque is very symmetrical  and almost mathematical in style, it helps your brain calm down. I find that this is true in my case, so I just thought I’d throw it out there. You guys might calm down to Def Leopard, and that’s fine (although I do question your taste).

2.  Step away from the internet and video games.  Surfing the net, staring at social media sites, and/or playing addictive video games pulls you outside yourself.  But thinking time is all about being internal, not external. Plus, these are just distractions and they waste the time you’ve gone to so much trouble to set aside.

3.  Meditation in motion.  There’s no way I can say “Okay I’m going to think now” and just sit and thiiiiiinnnnnkkkkk.  I’d fall asleep. On the occaisions when I’ve tried to do it, I just end up thinking about everything I have to do that day.

For me, most of my thinking time happens while I’m doing other things. I’ve done some primetime quality thinking when I’m doing household chores, or yard-work, or when I take a walk.  I try to have pads of paper and pens stashed strategically around the house in case I get an inspiration in the middle of, say, folding laundry. And I’ve been known to leave the lawn mower and rush in to type up something I thought about while sweating over my yard.

Your mind is a marvel and your only resource as a writer. Give it some time to breathe. Take a break and stop trying to shove things into it. Give it some time to tell you what it’s been up to all day. Who knows what wonderful things are crammed up in there just waiting to spew out?

Last Sunday, I returned the art fact sheet for my book to the publisher. This is the information Carina Press will use to come up with a cover, among other things.  (Yes, digital books DO have covers, smartypants. In fact, Carina Press covers are beautiful, and I suggest that you go look at them sometime.)

Anyway, when I was working on HOLD ME, I had photographs I thought pretty much nailed the looks or attitude of some of the characters, including the lead characters – Luc and Katie. They weren’t exact, but they were close. And so when I thought about celebrating the return of the art fact sheet, I thought it would be fitting to share these photographs with you.

Then I went into my computer and realized I had deleted them.

All of them.

I spent a lot of time trying to find them again. I was not successful.

At first, this upset me. It would be nice to have photographs showing different aspects of the characters I’ve come to know and love. On the other hand, the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was a good thing too.

A photograph, after all, is static. Everyone looking at a photograph will see basically the same thing. But if I tell you that Luc is tough and built and has dark hair and brown eyes, all of you will see something different in your mind’s eye. Some of you will see Antonio Bandaras. Some of you will see Al Pacino. Some of you will see the accountant down the hall. Or your brother. Or no one you even know. But all of you will see someone who is tough and built and has dark hair and brown eyes.

And I think that’s the beauty of reading, don’t you? We all can see things basically the same way, and yet totally differently. In the end, it doesn’t matter exactly who I saw when I wrote Luc and Katie. What matters is who you see when you read about them. That you see Luc’s brown eyes and Katie’s wild red hair, yes, but that you see them in your mind. That you know them. That you can identify them.

With all of that magic happening, why would I try to tie either of us down by making us stick with a photograph?

I work. I write. I work at working. I work at writing. Sometimes I try to work on both of them in the same day.

I’ve worked at working a long time. I’ve worked at writing even longer. And even though I’m not a best-selling author (yet), I have a few thoughts about trying to fit the two of them together. Not that I actually DO these things all the time, mind you. But at least I’m starting to recognize the important issues, at least for my own life.

1.  You have to be committed.
Writing is hard, and writing while you hold down a full-time job is even harder. If you’re not committed to making it happen, all you’re going to do is walk around saying that you’re an writer. And never actually writing anything. Trust me.

2.  You have to be disciplined.
You don’t have as much time to write as a full-time writer, so you have to use the time you do have effectively. If you don’t get in the habit of using the 15 minutes you have now, you’ll fritter away a whole day if one becomes available. Trust me on this one too.

3.  You have to make time to read.
Reading is a writer’s joy and life blood. You learn the most about writing by reading what other people have written-the good and the bad stuff. The more you read, the more you understand how writing works. Plus, we love it, right? Why else would we want to be writers?

4.  You have to make time to write.
Duh. Writer’s write. They don’t just talk about writing. Writers write consistently, hopefully every day. This is another one I’m still having trouble with. I write, but not consistently. I let life get in the way.

5.  You have to write new stuff, not just revise.
Take it from me, when you only have a short time you can devote to writing, it’s very easy to get stuck on revisions. Revising something already written is easier than writing something new. But you have to write new things, even if it’s just a new sentence, because otherwise you get stuck in what was and never move on to the new.

6.  You have to have a support network.
Whether you’re single, like me, or married to a devoted spouse, you need people who will cheer you on – and won’t let you stop when that’s what you think you want to do. Remember – writing is hard. Writing while you work a full time (or even part time) job is harder. Writing with kids is probably the hardest of all. You need people who care that you’re doing it.

And last but not least, you have to remember that, no matter what other demands you have on your time, you can do it if you want it badly enough. You can finish. You can write.

  

 

As of the writing of this post, what I believe are the final changes for my book, HOLD ME, have been returned to my editor.  In celebration, I thought I’d share some relatively amusing behind-the-scenes factoids about HOLD ME in case anyone was even remotely interested. So, here we go:

• The heroine’s name is Katie. She was named after Kate Jackson, of Scarecrow and Mrs. King fame.  Katie doesn’t look anything like Katie Jackson – I just liked the show.

• The hero’s name is Lucas Vasco. Luc has a picture of Katie taken when she was a young girl. The inspiration for that came from a calendar of Ireland I had hanging in my office a few years ago.  One of the photos was of a young girl with a mass of red, curly hair backlit by the sun. I looked at it and thought – “that’s Katie.”  One of my stupider moves was not saving that picture.

• Katie drives an ancient dark green Chevy Nova.  Ah, the Nova.  It was my beloved first car, and was not nearly so ancient then as it would be now.  Besides, that old boy could move! Eight cylinders, baby. Crank up the tunes and put the pedal to the metal.

• Luc has a Newfoundland dog named Spot. Spot is based on Newfoundland dog my friends used to own named Ned. Well, except that Spot is a girl and Ned was a boy. And Spot is young, but Ned, when I met him, was a trifle elderly. But Ned was indeed a Newfoundland dog.

• If you were sitting down in a chair and Ned sat in front of you, he was right at your eye level. It was a little intimidating. Spot’s not quite that big, but she’s big enough!

And there you have it. Just a few fun facts about my baby. Stay tuned for more information about covers and release dates as soon as I get them.

HOLD ME – coming soon to a digital bookseller near you.