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Here, I'll let Grace ask her own question:
I was wondering how you stick with writing on one topic for a whole book let alone 3 books. I have a slue of journals with stories that never quite passed the 50 page mark. I just lose interest because it is not quite time for the climax and back ground knowledge and thickening the plot can only go so far. How do you keep your self interested until the end of the book?
Here's my answer:
Before I wrote Prom Dates From Hell, I also had a whole mess of projects/books that I'd started but never finished, for exactly the same reason. I would lose interest and abandon one project for the next shiny thing. A couple of things helped me: I wrote a bunch of shorter pieces so that I got used to finishing things. A short story can be 4 pages, or it can be 40 pages. But it's good practice being able to get a beginning, middle and end into a short space. There's not space for the boring stuff.
For a book, I don't just plan one climax at the end. I have several turning points that are like mini-climaxes over the course of the book. This seems obvious, I know, but it's not just about plotting an exciting book. It's about giving myself goals that don't seem so waaaaaaaay far away and unattainable. If you think about the book as a series of successively higher hills rather than one long, tedious climb up a mountain, it really helps. And since those parts are usually fun to write, it's both a goal and a reward. (I love to write the Maggie/Justin scenes, so I tell myself stuff like: well, I have to get through this scene where they explain how magic works, but then Maggie and Justin get to fight then make out... er, I mean make up.)
But whatever you do, NEVER throw away those journals! One of my abandoned projects turned into the idea for my September book (The Splendor Falls). Way back when, I had an idea for a story about a ballerina who breaks her leg and goes to stay in an old house with a ghost. The setting and whole rest of the plot ended up being completely different, but it all started from about 50 pages of story I began (then abandoned) in high school.
So to all you budding writers out there, good luck! And if you have any other writing related questions, post them in the comments or e-mail me. We can make this a regular feature.
"Wowzers. I was enthralled from the very first page. I ate it up. It was mysterious, funny, original, detailed, romantic, thrilling, and expertly written." --Addicted to Books
(Squee!)
The reviewer is an actual teen, and mentioned the exact things I've been a little anxious about: the likability of the main character*, and the chemistry with the romantic interest. And Gigi, of course.
I'll be giving away a couple of ARCs soon. Watch this space.
*I love Sylvie, but I'm biased. Also, she's not Maggie, so I hope MQ fans will be open-minded.
It started this way. I actually keep up with the kitchen and bathrooms, because... well, that should be obvious, right? (It should to anyone who knows me, anyway.) But I'm not great about the dusting. But I'm going to "Just" do a quick swiffering of the flat surfaces, and the floor (which had gotten a little embarrassing with the dust bunnies).
Only I have a hard time doing "just" part of something. I mean, once you clean one thing, it makes the rest seem dirtier by contrast. Plus, once you start looking for it, you actually SEE it. Like the dust on the blinds. I couldn't just LEAVE it. And once I did that, I had to do the ceiling fans, too. And that all drifts down, so you notice that the floorboards are not so much white as gray, and they all have to be gotten systematically... And then its six hours later. (It's a big house, which is how we avoid matricide with Mom living here and all.)
So, anyway. I've decided dusting is one of my least favorite job, because it settles so fast. It's like Prometheus's liver growing back every day. You know those vultures were all like: "Zeus damn it! We just ate this yesterday, and now it's back! Our work is never done!"
What's your least favorite housecleaning job? Should I even ask if you have a favorite?
- 10:09 Mom is listening to Cheetah Girls while she dusts her room(s). I am countering with Talking Heads while I Swiffer my bookshelves. #
- 11:40 @ReadingToMyself yes, Cheetah Girls. Sort of Disneyfied hip hop? My mom cracks me up. #
- 17:48 Ugh. Bathrooms cleaned: 3. Kitchens cleaned: 2. Wasps nests eradicated: 4 (!!). Pages written... erg. Shower, then have to hit the laptop. #
- 18:37 Well, one and a half, to be honest. Kitchenette upstairs--- Mom has her own M.I.L. "suite". That's how we manage avoid matricide. @hilly_wa #
- 19:01 @hilly_wa Cause I'm a nice daughter. :-) #
- 19:10 @VictoriaDahl Ha! And you teased me for being my own fan on facebook. *snort* #
- 16:15 Home from Houston. Yay! Going to veg out and pet the dog for awhile. #
- 07:01 Boy do I have a headache. Ordering room service so I can eat and take aspirin before appearing in public. #
- 09:17 Having ridiculous trouble deciding between cute white shirt that makes cute outfit or purple shirt that makes me look less dead. #
- 09:52 Promptly spilled coffee on white shirt. The universe has spoken. #
- 14:29 Very cool listening to astronaut talk about space shuttle mission to space station! twitpic.com/8lg1b #
- 10:43 Packing for Houston. Have a headache. Related? Possibly. Looking forward to ApolloCon, tho. #
- 11:04 @NancyHightower Yes, I will! I'll see you there. #
- 11:05 @Kristen_Painter Well, thanks. That song is now stuck in MY head. #
- 11:08 Today's blog: The crap on my desk. It's a meme, so consider yourself all tagged: tinyurl.com/nctze6 #
- 17:45 It is hotter than Satan's armpit in Houston. #
On your desk/workspace:
List at least 5 bookish things:
1) Stack of ARCS for The Splendor Falls
2) My favorite Baby Name book (for characters, not babies)
3) Writer’s Guide to Poisons
4) Word Menu
5) My Kindle, which counts for a LOT of books.
List at least 5 NON BOOK THINGS:
1) 3 empty coffee mugs
2) Tube of sunscreen
3) Jane Austen action figure
4) Tangle of ipod earphones (I count 7 earbuds, so that’s at least 4 sets, right?)
5) Assorted 10 sided dice
(Seriously, I could sum up this list with: paper, more paper, and assorted tokens and totems.)
Now I must finish packing for Houston. If you're going to ApolloCon, I'll see you there!
- 16:29 Have I mentioned how much I despise DFW traffic? Cause I do. #
- 19:39 I'm not where I'm supposed to be, but I'm very happy. :-D #
- 22:08 @briaquinlan Let's just say that if @candacehavens and I had been in high school together, we would have had a really bad skip record. #
I get to panel on one of my favorite subjects: Soundtracks! I love a good movie soundtrack; I'm not sure I'm a connoisseur, but I like what I like. Actually, I know enough to parse out the technical craft of a piece, but that's actually of lesser importance to me than the emotional effectiveness of a score. Yes, this means I occasionally love a good, schmaltzy love theme, or a rousing, bass heavy, over-synthesized battle theme.
Like how I don't particularly care that many of Hans Zimmer's scores sound exactly alike, with too much synthesizer and the base jacked up to 13, and it doesn't matter because it's awesome monster-fighting, ass-kicking, demon-vanquishing music, and frankly I like the way it makes my speakers buzz. It's also a great cue for the family: Don't open the office door when the floor is vibrating; it means there's some serious slaying going on.
I don't even have to particularly like the movie, either. There are a couple of movies I didn't care for at all, but the soundtracks are on my regular rotation. Planet of the Apes, for example. (Actually, lots of Danny Elfman scores fall into this category, because I'm not a Tim Burton fan, but I love the music for his movies.)
Not everything has to be bombastic. I'm currently enamoured of the soundtrack to "Up" which has some delightfully engaging, sort of swinging and approrpiately retro melodies. It's a complete contrast to Star Trek (by the same composer) which is by turns dark and spacy and heroic. (Michael Giacchino is my current darling.)
So I guess for me, what works in a soundtrack is the story it tells, and the emotional journey it takes you on. In this way, a well crafted score is a lot like a tone poem of a classical composer, or a ballet score. I've heard John Williams' Star Wars scores arranged as a concert peice, and a good CD of a score does the same thing--arranges the music cues into a symphonic story.
Care to give me any material for my panel? What makes a good soundtrack for you? Do you like some good smchaltzy stuff? Lots of bombastic? Can you enjoy a soundtrack without having seen the movie?
ApolloCon Schedule
Fri 8:00PM - 9:00PM Raiders of the Lost Maguffin
Rosemary Clement-Moore, Gail Dayton, Tim Frayser, Joe McKinney
Discuss the appeal of action adventure novels.
Fri 10:00PM - 11:00PM Building the Perfect Soundtrack
Rie Sheridan, Rosemary Clement-Moore, Stina Leicht, Amy McNally (M)
Discuss the use of music in television and movies.
Sat 10:00AM - 11:00AM Readings
Martha Wells, Rosemary Clement-Moore
Sat 4:00PM - 5:00PM Southern Goth: Bayous, Mint Juleps, and the Grotesque
K. Hutson Price, Mel. White, Alexis Glynn Latner (M), Caroline Spector, Rosemary Clement-Moore
Panelists discuss why the South is such a ripe playground for the fantastic.
Sun 10:00AM - 11:00AM West Sidhe Story: Fairies in Urban Fantasy
Patrice Sarath, Rosemary Clement-Moore, Kimberly Frost, Rie Sheridan, Stina Leicht
ETA: It occurs to me, I'm repeating myself. I did a post about writing music not long ago. *sigh* I fail at the bloggernet.
- 11:01 @VictoriaDahl I'm such a bad speller, I sometimes have to use the thesaurus instead of dict. to find the word I already know I want to use. #
- 11:02 @TexasPixie Hope your day gets better. Your picture looks happy, at least. :-) #
- 20:28 @VictoriaDahl I can't wait. I just love your books so much. #
- 00:58 OMG. I have not twittered almost at all in TWO DAYS! But I did blog. Twice! What is wrong with me? #
- 12:58 I am having withdrawals, @DeniseMcClain! My fingers are twitching... but only 140 twitches at a time. #
- 12:59 Yes, A. Lee Martinez's booksigning IS today, 2-4 pm at the Hurst Barnes and Noble. :-) @PaulRedshirt #
I finally spent my Christmas/Birthday money. This is also sad, I realize, but I've been supplementing my stash until I had enough to buy a Kindle. So I did. And I freaking love it. I can read much faster and I don't have to wear my computer glasses to use it. Of course, I'm going through the Kindle store, looking at what they have, and I keep coming across things that I already own in hard copy and having read yet. *guilt* The only thing is, there's not a huge saving off the paperback price, though there's a substantial difference if something's in hardcover. (FYI, you can buy my books in both Kindle format, and for other e-readers, like the Sony.) I'm all for saving trees, though, so price wasn't my main consideration. Being able to carry a library around in my purse was, though.
Discovered the new Mediterranean restaurant around the corner from me makes a scrumptious falafel. I'm ridiculously excited about this.
I watched Valkyrie. I'd wanted to see it in the movie theater, but I missed it. I was leery, because (a) I know it doesn't exactly have a happy ending and (b) I'm not a huge Tom Cruise. Both were non-issues, though. The movie did a great job of keeping the tension really high, even though I knew how it ended, I was all in knots. And Cruise disappeared into his character in a way I haven't seen him do since... Since he became Tom Cruise, I think.
(Okay, I just have to get this off my chest. I don't know what to think of the guy personally, but he's just damned handsome. I didn't used to think so, because I don't love that cheeky Risky Business grin. And if anyone mentions Tropic Thunder to me I will smack you. Possibly it was the uniform (why are the ranking minions of evil empires always such snappy dressers?), or his doomed but noble enterprise, but SeriousActor!Tom made me forget Crazy!Tom in this movie.)
Anyway. Valkyrie gets a recommend from me. It was taut, moved a a nice clip, and really fascinating.
That's my week. How was yours?
- 10:29 Away from Twitterverse for one day, and feel so out of the loop. There's something wrong with that picture. #
- 11:59 Crud. Instead of grabbing a stack of Priority Mail envelopes, I grabbed a whole mess of Express Mail envelopes. NOT the same thing. #
- 15:54 Catch up blog post: Ye Olde Fried Brains Shoppe. (Not Zombie Related). tinyurl.com/lfa5ad #
see more Fail Blog
Is there something wrong with me that I find this hysterically funny. (Though possibly not in the way it was intended by the wearer.)
Also, I live in Texas, and I have never been to a Renn Faire that wasn't blistering hot and/or humid. There ARE days, I'm told, but Ye Olde Weather Gods must conspire to make it Hot as Ye Olde Helle when I venture to one. When I saw this, my first thought wasn't: what a moron. It was what a moron for wearing WOOL on top of a costume that involves a black helmet that will soak in the sun's rays and fry your brains.
Or, you know. Fry them more.
- 10:59 If anyone knows how to send personal files (like a manuscript) to the Kindle 2, could you message me. I'm pulling out my hair. #
- 13:26 Interview with yours truly at Beside The Norm. I blather about books a lot. Click here: tinyurl.com/nf8srd #
- 20:45 RT @mashable TweetDeck for iPhone Launches at 9pm PT Tonight bit.ly/UqnW1 (via @tweetmeme) #
- 20:46 @teralynnchilds Athena. As much as it pains me to go with a popular choice. I always dug the grey-eyed goddess. #
- 22:42 I need to consult a forensic anthropologist. Do you think Kathy Reichs would take my call? #
- 08:02 Sat down to write blog. Discovered breakfast cereal in teeth. Must go floss. (File this under: My Glamorous Literary Life.) #
- 08:30 @CandaceHavens Oh, I love that title! They did good! #
- 10:50 Went to pilates class. I am now dead from crunches. If life were like fiction, I could just write myself toned abs and tight glutes. #
1) The YMCA is packed! Packed with kids, packed with soccer moms, packed to the rafters.
2) The yahoos across the street are doing a booming business all day, instead of just after 3 PM. Which is not to say they don't have people stopping by during the day normally, since I guess if you're buying pot, truancy isn't really high on your concerns. But the coming and going has... gone up.
3) The Leaf Blower of Doom is now making weekly appearances. Unfortunately, the neighbor's lawn service hasn't picked a day and stuck with it this year. Usually I plan for their visits, and take that afternoon off, or do something that's not writing. Hopefully they'll get with the program soon.
4) I had to clean melted lip balm out of the cup holder in the Jeep because I left a stick of Burt's Bees in the car yesterday afternoon and it liquified.
5) My office is five hundred degrees until 1 pm, when the sun moves to the other side of the house, at which time...
6) I singed my hand on the handle of the back door. Youch.
But here's something cool:
Beside the Norm Paranormal book reviews has posted an interview with moi on their blog. You can also see their review of Prom Dates From Hell. The reviewer gave it 5 Ghosties! Check it out and leave some comments.
In the interview, I mention that you can follow and/or friend me on GoodReads. This is my new favorite networking site because it's built around books! Yay!
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