Winner!

Just validated my word count for Camp NaNoWriMo. Over 31k words edited and revised in April for my upcoming Young Adult novel, In the Middle.  
Can't wait to share it with you guys!  It's a cool, creepy story... but that's all I'm going to say right now. I don't want to give away too much.  :-)

The End of the Middle

7/31/13.  In the middle of the night, I typed the last sentence of my Young Adult novel "In the Middle".  I celebrated and felt free and easy for approximately half a day, then I flipped back open my laptop and fixed a section that didn't feel exactly right.  Because that's what writers do--they always feel like something could be fixed or rearranged for more impact.  It's a sickness.  A strange and wonderful sickness.

The beginning of August marks the end of July's Camp NaNoWriMo, 31 days of writers worldwide creating.  Campers are encouraged to pick their own word count goal (mine was 26,364 words, oddly specific because that magical number brought my novel to 50k words) and go for it.  I rounded out July with 38,406 words (62028 words in total), 12k above my goal.  I'll take it.

In March I began this journey with Lucy, an orphaned teenager burdened by the weight of her parents' deaths.  Lucy was angry and unpleasant, scarred and in pain.  She wasn't the only one in the little town of Mitte who struggled with loss and regret.  In the Middle forced me to look at death and remorse from a handful of angles, mourn with each person, and then offer a bit of hope.  Perhaps it will never be published, let alone read and understood by an audience, but recording their story took me on a journey I will always remember.

To Lucy, Oliver, Jasper, Perdita, Letty, Duke, Magnolia, Tessa, Johanna, Norman, Millie, Sadie, Angus, Sal, Bud, Vera--even Derek and Tanya...  Thank you for waking me up.

Full of Win

In the wee hours of the morning--3:14 a.m. if we're getting all technical and stuff--I finally brought my current manuscript to 50k words, the length of an average novel (or so the peeps at National Novel Writing Month tell me).  This story, best described as a young adult paranormal thriller, woke me up one chilly morning this past March.  I read a lot of paranormal fiction, but it's nothing I really had any desire to write until this story shook me by the shoulders and demanded I pay attention.

In April I tried to take this particular story (currently titled In the Middle) from about 13k to 50k by participating in Camp NaNoWriMo.  For those of you not familiar with the way NaNoWriMo works, allow me to explain.  The other NaNos want you to write a 50k-word novel in one month (typically November), with emphasis on daily word count goals. If you've got a a big enough stash of junk food and are good at disciplining yourself and/or know how to blacklist most of the Internet from your computer, you will sit down at a computer, write for a month and magically a book appears at the end of it.  You grin like a maniac and shake your aching fists in the air proclaiming your triumph over evil--I mean, words!  Words!  Then you quickly realize you haven't showered in a week (or three), clamp those armpits shut again, and wander off to tell your family they can call off the Search-and-Rescue mission.

If you're not so good at the whole NaNoWriMo thing, nothing happens.  You probably have a social life, a job, a family who still likes/recognizes you--all bonuses.  The most social we get during NaNoWriMo months is usually comparing word counts on our latest word battles.  On Twitter.  That's, like, not even a real website.  That's people simultaneously yelling their opinions into a crowded room.  #yesI'mtalkingtoyou.  Sometimes I write on my porch just to remember what the air feels like on my albino skin.

Why do I do this to myself, again?  Oh yeah, because I really, really love it.

All kidding aside, the lovely, caffeinated folks behind NaNoWriMo have inspired a staggering number of people to write books.  Most of the time, that's a good thing.  And, no, I'm not talking about you, E. L. James.  Stopit!

The beauty of Camp is the ability to pick a goal for your month of concentrated writing that fits in with your life instead of 50k, which used to be the only option (go big or go home!)  Optimistic, or possibly sadistic, I aimed high--That ended up too ambitious of a goal when it all boiled down to it.  I lost a horse to old age and arthritis and gained two more within the same month.  Historically, I'd say I'm pretty crappy with change, especially change involving the equine species.  Emotional upheaval doesn't usually lend itself to my creative process unless you consider my creative process eating a ton of chocolate and threatening to move away because, and I quote, "y'all are crazy!"

I managed six-thousand words that month.  That's, like, 1/8 of my goal.  Or something.  I'm bad at Math.  Numbers aside, it was no bueno.  My main character stuck in the middle of something big, something that changed the whole storyline... and I couldn't write myself out of it because I lost it all.  Poof!  The passion that woke me out of hibernation on a frigid Saturday morning fizzled away, even though I knew I had a story worthy of bleeding onto the page.  I began to feel anxiety that I would never rescue poor Lucy from her predicament.  I feared In the Middle would get buried in the old files on my laptop, never to see the light of day again.

A similar thing happened to me last July (and August.  And Septem--do you see where I'm going with this?) while working on the second draft of my first novel.  I'd lost my horse and best friend of 19 years to colic and the devastation wiped my mind completely clear of everything, including my creativity.  My main character, known for her sarcasm, couldn't think of anything funny to say.  For months, literally, I stared at my laptop screen all day, lucky to work out a couple sentences in all of that time.  The whole thing seemed pointless and discouraging.  I finished the redraft of that first novel only days before NaNoWriMo started up in November.  When NaNoWriMo began, I started the sequel to my first novel, which I eventually finished up on January 15th of this year.  Can't win 'em all, they say, but I won when I didn't give up.  The second book was just the icing on the cake.  (Did someone say cake?  It is NaNoWriMo again, which means JUNK FOOD!  It's for the books, I swear!)

Life, and death, runs in cycles--and I guess it is my Kryptonite, all this grief.  And I need to learn to deal with it like Superman does.  On second thought, no, probably not.  Kryptonite renders him a whiny cry-baby.  Dang it!  That's the only comic book analogy I have!

Thankfully Camp NaNoWriMo occurs each July, too, which doesn't make a lot of sense to me because it is the worst possible month for a mom of four to accomplish anything beyond brushing her teeth each morning (and often that is questionable).  But they didn't design their calendar around me, so I just have to deal.  Camp is the perfect excuse to push myself to get back into the habit of writing a lot, so I went for it.  This time, I set a goal of 26,394 words to bring "In the Middle" to 50k words.  At 3:14 this morning, and six days before my deadline, I hit my mark.  **

The novel's not completed, as much as I wish it was, but the finish line is so close I can almost taste it (have you ever noticed how much I talk about food?  I have.).  Now I'm pouring my focus into getting as close as possible to "The End" before July reaches its end.  This month's success is the total opposite of last year's July paralysis

Being trapped inside your own head trying to figure out how to heal is not pleasant.  Being able to look back and see how far you've come and realize you really CAN do anything is a feeling beyond words.  Three-fourteen this morning found me staring at a blinking cursor and the word count screen with my heart bursting full of allllllll the emotions.  No one can possibly know what it feels like unless it is your struggle and your triumph.  Today I feel very powerful, kinda like the opposite of Superman hugging a bar of Kryptonite.  I think the analogy worked that time!

Now back to the story...

~~~

**Special thanks goes out to my writing doula, Courtney, whose enthusiasm (or, at least facade of enthusiasm) keeps pushing me to press on even when my eyes are bursting into flames.  Thanks to the Camp NaNoWriMo crew, of course.  Also, a humungo shout out to the dude who wrote Write or Die!  I don't know what it is about that red computer screen that makes me want to type complete gibberish just to make it go away. And, as always, a big "whaddup!" to my muses, Ish and Moe.  Keep it up, boys.  Mama needs a new pair of riding boots!

Camp, Day 1

Here is a snippet from the novel I began earlier this year.  I'd hoped to finish it up in April, but April was a trainwreck.  Camp NaNoWriMo began today, and my goal is to add an additional 26k words to this novel to bring it to 50k and, hopefully, completion.  For those of you following along, here's my progress today.  Meet Lucy, the main character of "In the Middle".

~~~

Being slow as a turtle—even slower than that, it seemed—wasn’t my norm.  My body was aerodynamic, thin and sleek.  My legs used to reach outward with the grace of the gazelle, bounding me forward with ease.  They said I would go places, that I’d have my pick of colleges.  Coach lined up college recruiters for our biggest meets, all I had to do was show up and let go.  My heart would do the rest.

I missed the wind in my face and the teardrops that collected in the corners of my eyes as the world blurred behind me.  I missed the crunch of pebbles beneath my shoes.  I missed the tickle of my ponytail grazing the back of my neck with each swaying step.  I missed pushing through the burn in my lungs and deep within my legs.  Faster, faster, faster.  I missed every single shin splint and weeping blister.  I missed running so hard the world spun behind my eyes, struggling to catch up.  Heck, I even missed throwing up in the grass because I’d pushed myself to my limits.  Even the worst day on the track paled in comparison to what my life looked like now.  This was not life at all.

They said I would go places.  Somehow I doubted this is what they meant.

I bit my lip to keep from sobbing as I continued forward at my numbingly slow pace.  The forest around me fell silent except for the low crunch of the pine needles under my feet.  The sulfuric air grew thicker and so heavy that it pressed on my chest and I had to stop to draw in a really good breath.  My throat burned with the effort, and I coughed.   The fire was close, and so was my rescue. 

The pines crowded close together ahead with branches intertwined in protest.  Even the forest wanted to keep me stranded in this pit.  I knew following the trees until I could find a large enough opening to squeeze through would mean going to my right or left instead of forward.  Sideways was frustrating to me.  Sideways wouldn’t get me away from Oliver or Mitte, two things I wanted more than anything.  It was not one of my brightest ideas, but I gritted my teeth and pushed forward into the arms of the pines.  The needles welcomed me, sliding across my skin like feathers.  The tang of pine tar overtook the smell of soot and destruction.   Maybe this wasn’t so bad, after all.  Spreading the branches of the tangle before me, I smiled.  Yes, this plan would work.  Adios, Oliver!

Almost as soon as I’d thought it, the needles turned against me.  Pins made contact with my face, pricking my lips and drawing tiny beads of blood. 

“Ouch!”  I yelped, trying to bring my arm up to shield my face, which only made me more of a human pincushion.  No one came to help me, even though it was pretty obvious that I was stuck.

Oliver left.  He left.

He didn’t owe me anything, and I figure most of the messes I’d found myself in since fate dumped me in Mitte had been his fault.  Not even two minutes ago I wanted as far away from that boy as humanly possible.  Finally, something had gone my way.  From where I cowered, shrouded in flesh-eating vegetation, I couldn’t bring myself to feel happy he’d gotten around to taking a hint. 

If Dad was here he’d have torn himself in two to protect me.  There was no way he’d let me wander off alone into the wilderness, no matter how much I kicked and screamed.  Dad would have kicked and screamed right back at me, and then, when he’d had enough, thrown me over his shoulder and carried me back to safety.  I would have hated him every step of the way, as much as I loved him.  He knew never to give up on me, but it didn’t matter anymore.  Even Dad had abandoned me as the dragon drew near.

A flood of anger surged through me, and its intensity vibrated wildly across my skin like a bolt of lightning.  Feeling sorry for myself wouldn’t do a single thing except kill me faster.  I was no damsel in distress, and this was the furthest thing from a fairy tale.  Death would track me to this forest, one way or another.  A man couldn’t stop the inevitable.  I felt it as sure as the pulse pounding in my veins.  Wiping the blood from my mouth, I forced myself further into the green.  Goosebumps sprung on the back of my neck and rippled down my arms.  What in the--? The frantic rhythm slamming through my body crushed the breath from my lungs.  

My grandpa suffered his first heart attack right in front of me as I blew out the candles on my birthday cake on my tenth birthday.   I’ll never forget--his eyes bugged out of his head like he was a fish out of water, gulping for air and finding none.  Yeah, my life sucked. 

Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-changes!

I haven't blogged in weeks.  Maybe you noticed.  Maybe you didn't.  Maybe you never even knew I had a blog.  Maybe you never cared to know the random things that pass through my brain.  If you didn't care, then I guess you wouldn't be here reading this now, so nevermind that bit.

At any rate, I've not had a lot to say.  A lot happened in April, but the words kept to themselves, mostly.

I lost a sweet horse, Mariah, to a heart-breaking decision I didn't want to have to make.  Her weight was good through the winter, but her joints just seemed to give way.  We spent the afternoon before the vet's visit brushing her and stuffing her full of the treats she loved so much...  After I had to chase her back to my property when she turned tail and ran through the neighbor's hay field.  That burst of spunk caused me to second-guess myself up until the moment she walked away from the barn for good.  Really, there wasn't anything to second-guess.  Even with her halting gait, she nearly bowled me over to go through the gate for the last time, never to return.  My step-dad says I'm reading too much into it--she was just a horse, after all--but I think she knew her time had come.  She was ready to be whole again in some other place.

Two days after we said good-bye to Mariah I began what I assumed would be the long process of horse-hunting and test-rides.  That day we looked at two ponies and bought the second one, a grey draft pony named Ellie.  She reminds me a lot of the pony I had when I was a kid, another horse I loved and lost.  Thank goodness I can think of that pony and smile.  The wounds are still a bit too fresh from losing my Moe and Mariah nine months from each other.  Back to Ellie, though--she is talented and quick, so I've been working at slowing her down and getting her back in shape for the kids to ride.  I've been riding a lot, for me, at over two hours a day in the saddle.  I'm one tired muchacha, most days.

My step-dad decided the tack room in our barn was in need of a major overhaul, so they began that project around the time they purchased the grey pony.  Now instead of dust, cobwebs, and mouse droppings, we have wood paneling, fluorescent lighting, and linoleum.  There are cross-ties for three horses instead of only one.  It's super-fancy.  You know, I've been riding for the past 30+ years in squalor so I don't know how to behave in nice places.  I might have to let the mice and birds into the tack room to relieve themselves, for old time's sake.

Yesterday my sister also bought a horse, a bay Tennessee Walker gelding.  His name WAS Henry, but he has been renamed "Romeo".  Despite my mare's (Trinity) best attempts to scare the bejeebies out of him with her crazy front legs and ear-splitting squeal, he is not very concerned with the goings-on of our barn.

The reintroduction of my family to the barn has been difficult.  For decades it has been my safe haven, the place I go to escape everything.  One by one, the horses are being replaced.  Board by board, [beautiful] improvements erase the little bits that remain of my memories of horses past.  The air is laced with the conversations of others instead of the whisper of the breeze.  It is all changing.  The changes are not all unpleasant, but, to me, they are all related--directly or indirectly--to losing a loved one.  I'm still grieving.  Not with the intensity I did when I lost Moe, but it's still there.  I'm crying for all of them.  There's little emotional leeway for much else.

Things have been happening in my non-horsey life, too.  A while ago I entered a contest attempting to attract the interest of a literary agent.  My submission didn't make it past the slushpile readers whose job it was to wade through all of the entries for the agents.  At the conclusion of the contest we were given a second chance to submit a Twitter pitch so the agents could see what they'd missed.  My Twitter pitch received requests from one agent and a brand new publishing company.  The agent ended up passing once she read my query and first several pages, but the publishing company requested my full manuscript two weeks ago.  Last night as Mr. Ohboy and I walked back from feeding the horses, I checked my e-mail and found a message from the publisher saying they were interested in signing me.

This afternoon I talked with the woman who runs the company, firing off questions and concerns and sharing our mutual disdain for "50 Shades of Grey" for over an hour.  The premise of the company is promising:  Treating writers with respect, fostering community amongst the authors in this house, allowing authors as much control as possible, and a lot of other things that made me feel comfortable about possibly letting this company help me bring my stories to the world.  The biggest problem?  They are so new their first round of acquisitions isn't set to publish for another month or so.  They are a total unknown.  On one hand, it's flattering to be considered for this fledgling company, getting in on the ground floor, so to speak.  On the other hand, I worry that once things get moving they will discover that their nice ideals and flexibility aren't making them money and all of those "pros" will disappear.  What if they don't survive?  What if they take my reputation with them?  I'm not sure if any of that makes any sense, but I've been processing it all day long.

The next step is to lay my eyeballs on their contract and figure out if it makes any sense to me.  It won't.  It's completely written in legal-ese.  I barely speak redneck-tinged English.

And then I think of this publisher, someone who doesn't know me from anyone, who personally read my manuscript and saw something of value in it, and in me.  Enough that she'd be willing to take a chance by bringing me in to be part of the building effort for her company.  It's scary and humbling, all at the same time.

I've not signed anything or given a commitment of any kind because all I've had is a nice phone conversation with a stranger.  Maybe I will wake up tomorrow and this will all be a weird dream, but tonight I will smile remembering her compliments.  I don't get enough of those, do you?

Also on the writing front--In April, I participated in Camp NaNoWriMo.  My hopes had been to add 30k words to a project I've been working on, a Young Adult thriller tentatively named "In the Middle".  With everything else going on, I managed about 10k.  This big "miss" did give me time to think about the plot a little, so look for more happening with that story in the near future.

What else?  Oh, I have a new nephew!  He's adorable and I need to visit him.  Other than that, I haven't had time for much else.  What about you?  Anything big happening where you are?

Something New.

My skull wrenched into pieces.  A blistering flash of light pierced my vision, though I tried protecting myself by squeezing my eyelids shut.  And then, quiet.

***

My eyes popped open, startled awake by the sound of the taxi’s tire thudding in a pothole.  I could feel my heart galloping within my chest, and I took a deep breath to calm myself.  Of all the things that could go wrong in an automobile, a heart attack seemed the most ironic.  I mean, you’re driving along, all safe and proper one minute, and then your body quits on you... and CRASH!  Sayonara!  

Cars aren’t really my thing.

I distracted myself by leaning forward, towards the driver, a middle-aged guy wearing a faded baseball cap and a grey t-shirt that definitely had seen better days.     

“How much longer?”  I asked loudly enough so my voice carried over the annoying twang of the country song he’d been humming along to.  Talking out loud hurt my brain, and I pressed my palm onto my forehead to slow the vibration.  For the life of me, I couldn’t recall the last word I’d spoken out loud, and now I remembered why.  Everyone thought I kept silent because I wanted my space.  And, yes, I wanted people to leave me alone--but, most of all, I wanted this God-awful pain to disappear.  Keeping my mouth shut helped, or, at least, it drove others away so I didn’t have to perform like a circus animal.

“We should be to Mitte in ten minutes.  You okay?”  The driver asked, his concerned eyes peeking at me from the rearview mirror.  

I nodded in response even though he’d turned his focus back to the road.  Immediately, a stab of discomfort shot up my neck.  He didn’t seem too concerned at my lack of response, and completely ignored me when I sucked in a breath at the painful movement.  His lack of concern didn’t bother me, though.  I’d reached my limit of how many times I could lie about feeling good, especially when those asking couldn’t fix me even if I told the truth.