I'm back.

I had been thinking of merging all my blogs into one, but seeing as each one deals with a different topic I have decided not to merge and to leave them all as they are. So I am back writing here. I have been working on Jumper. 3 chapters are done and 3 are left. I know that there will be more chapters than that as the plot unfolds and more things are revealed to me. So far the story has changed several times and I like the changes. But it just feels so weird rewriting Andrea's story. Her plot is getting thicker and I am back at the "hard" part of writing, getting her story started. And now I am doing it from her point of view. Ugh!!! Don't get me wrong, I love the story and it refuses to let me walk away from it, but it's so frustrating and I have several other ideas I want to entertain in other novels but I can't until Andrea tells me her story. So that is where I am write now. Rewriting history, at least where Andrea is concerned. Wish me luck.

Writing away,
M.

I think I need a do over.

So here lately I have been in this weird funk. There are so many things I need and want to do but I just can't stick with anything long enough to do it. I don't know why. I'm not really a lazy person. Once I start something I am dedicated to it until I finish it. So I don't know what this funk is. It might be related to things going on in my life that I can neither control or change and it's frustrating to me. This frustration is sucking the life out of me along with a few other things that I actually can control and change but for some reason I just don't have the dedication to do it. It's so weird. On some things I will do what I need to do until it's done. But on the one thing I need to do in order to change my life I just can't be dedicated enough to do it. Maybe I will be blog about it in my main blog later...if I can be motivated enough to do it.

So why am I writing about this in my writing journal? Well, this funk I am in has also affected my writing. I have not be dedicated to it in a long time even though writing is all I can think about. So for the past couple of days I've tried to get back to writing with little to no success until this morning. I got back to "Jumper" and tried revising chapter 6 when I just saw that the story was lacking something. I've let it sit so long that it's no long the story I want to write. Don't get me wrong, I still want to write Andrea and Maxwell's story, but there is honestly something missing as well as the story seems like a tango done by two people with either two left feet or they've only had one lesson. So I've been tinkering around in my head lately on what to do with it. Do I just keep going? Do I chuck it all together? What do I do? Well, it was two seconds ago that I finally decided what to do.

I'm going to rewrite "Jumper" and I'm going to do so in first person. I've been reading a lot of first person YAs lately and I think this story might be better told in first person. There are so many people in the story that it's easy to lose sight of who the story is about. It's about Andrea and what happens to her and Max. So instead of me telling her story, I will simply let her tell it herself. I think that's what she's been trying to tell me all along.

I will be starting on chapter one tonight to see how I like it. Fingers crossed tight that it will work. I want this novel done and ready for submitting by Fall. The way I wrote her story first time around it seemed to only warrant two books, but perhaps writing it in first person will warrant several books like I originally intended it to do. She was suppose to go through several time periods fixing certain events so that her life would go in a certain way that would better the world. To give you a better idea of what I mean, think the Terminator and how he went back in time to kill Sarah and John Connor to fix his time. So yeah, we will see how this works out. Wish me luck. :-) Off to write now.

Writing away,
M.

Chapter 4 is done.

Now that I've finished chapter 4 I am seeing where chapters after this are going to need some filler. I feel I should really be taking away from the story instead of adding to it, but I'll just do that in the 3rd go round I guess. Gotta get ready to take off for a bit, but I will work on chapter 5 when I get back. More later.

Writing away,
M.

Chapter 3, done.

I wonder if I am moving to fast through my chapters? I mean I don't know how this all really goes, but I am thinking I am ok for now. I don't really need to add anything in as of yet. I do see where I may need to add some more bulk to the story later but for now it's "ok". Going to chapter 4. Hoping to finish it and chapter 5 today. Ok, I'm off.

Writing away,
M.

Chapter 2, doing a little better.

So I just finished chapter 2 and it wasn't as painful as chapter 1. I know chapter 1 will have to be reworked, there is no getting around that, but chapter 2 was actually witty and funny and it didn't kill me to reread it. Now moving on to chapter 3, but I may need to take a break before getting to that. I'm not feeling well as of late and have been napping a lot. I think another nap is in my near future. I'll try to hit chapter 3 first. More later.

Writing away,
M.

My return to writing. About freaking time!

So today is my official return to writing. I've been thinking about it for months and I finally opened one of my stories today. I was working on a story a while back while I waited to return to "Jumper" and now I'm back to working on "Jumper". I just went through chapter 1 and honestly it I feel it didn't get good until the last page of it and it's 9 pages long. Ahhh!!! I mean I feel I am putting to much fluffy filler stuff in there when I just need to tell the story. And I am having problems with actions my characters could do in between talking. Do I even need to focus on that? I now see why writers need to be readers as well. I need to get back to that. I always take long lapses in between reading and I hate that. I actually love reading, all stories, good and bad. I have some book reviews coming to show you what I mean.

But back to "Jumper", it's just such a slow start, but then again I am worried that it's just my negative side speaking to me. Oh, for those who don't know, I am working on my second draft of the story. Taking it one chapter at a time. Chapter 1 is done, for now at least. I know I will be revisiting it again very soon. I so need to get to the library and check out some young adult novels. I used to buy them all the time when I was a little younger but now I haven't done it as much. But if I am going to write young adult I need to know what they are interested in reading. So it gives me an excuse to order some or buy some at the store. I have some in mind that I want to get actually, so perhaps I will look into that later on this week.

I have this nagging need to share parts of my story to get some advice on how I'm doing so far, but without showing the full story I don't think I will be giving myself a fair chance and my story is just not ready to be seen in full yet. So I guess I keep pressing onward and just give myself some slack so I don't delete the whole thing. I love writing but it's so hard on my confidence at the same time, I hate that. Oh well. I'm off to work on chapter 2 now before I do some exercise. I'll let you know how that goes, hopefully I'll feel better about the story by the time I reach the end. Bye for now.

Writing away,
M.

On Writing by Stephen King

So I finished reading reading a book that I had started a good while back and then stopped reading and had to reread due to that. So I finally finished it today and let me just say this book is amazing. It is so inspiring to anyone who wants to be a writer and its an interesting read to those who are just readers in general or fans of his work.

Now I'm not going to go into deep detail about the book since its been out since 2000 and there are many reviews of it, you can click the picture above to be taking to Amazon and read the review there.

What I will say about the book is that he really breaks it down for those who doubt if they are or could be a writer. He doesn't hold back on what he thinks constitutes what a writer is. I know everyone has their own opinions on that, but his I respect highly and agree with. Also this book was written around the time he had his near death experience in 1999 and was finished while he was on the mend and writing this book helped bring him back from a bad moment in his life. Reading the part about his accident and how he did come back from it, writing helping a good bit, just inspired me more and put me in awe of his talent.

Now let me tell you straight off, I'm NOT a Stephen King fan. I have never read any of his books all the way through. But that doesn't mean I don't know of his talent to write. He's very talented and I'm awe-struck by it, hoping to be as talented as he is. But this book he wrote on the craft of writing has reminded me that one should not write for money or fame, and most writers do not get much money or fame. One should write because they love writing and they have a story to tell. Both of which I do have. So I'm going to write for me. I'm going to write for my IR...read the book and you will understand that one. And I'm going to write for my characters, to tell their story to the world. And because of this book I can now because Stephen King gave me something I long thought I didn't have. He gave me permission to do so with guilt or doubt. So that's exactly what I'm going to do. Every single day. 2500 minimum. Starting today.

Writing away,
M.