Excited about writing again.

Monday, November 17, 2008

I've mentioned that I've had trouble sticking with the writing, lately--that is, sticking with one book. I just couldn't get into either character or story for several wips. Then things finally clicked with a werewolf romance I had sitting around on the hard-drive for the past 5 yrs or so. So much so I'm kicking myself that I let it sit this long. It rough, so it needs cleaning up, plus my writing is a lot stronger now. And I have to flesh out the heroine, and add in a few more characters because there is slight mystery regarding a villian. And of course finish the damn book (novella), right now, in terms of structure, it's very close to the end of the second act.

A few things I found surprising:

1. This is the hero's book. All this time I thought the heroine was a cypher, but in reading the story, she actually has a very strong presence/character. But her backstory is weak and so is her goal/motivations (a part from surving. heh).

2. There's a high amount of sexual tension, and a few non-consumated scenes, but the way the story is going, the lovescenes are going to happen at/near the end of the book, and I don't think I can force them to happen sooner. (I was thinking of expanding one of those near-miss scenes to help with the word count, but I think they're exactly as they should be.

3. The gore. Dee and I were exchanging emails on the weekend, and she said she remembered who bloody this story was, which really surprised me. Sure there's a couple of dark scenes, but I would have said this is a lighter paranormal, that definitely has some humourous exchanges between the characters. But the villian is not nice and the scenes with him are pretty darn groseome. Not sure how that will play out with readers (if this one sells). On the other hand if I can pull off humor/horror/romance, it'll be pretty nifty.

But before I finish this story....

I found out on the week-end that I can participate in the Samhain (free-read) Christmas Anthology. I think it's only available to Samhain newletter subscribers, but not sure. Anyhow, I was dragging my feet on sending an email to say I wanted to participate, then Raine emailed me and said I should get a move on that because it seemed liked there was a limit to the number of authors they were going to accept stories from and the list might already be close.(!!)

Luckily, I got in. Now I have to write it. They're looking for approximately 3K, so that's one single-spaced page per day (the deadline to send it in is Nov. 28th and they're depending on self-editing so also have to get a writing buddy emough time to read/crit it).

I have never written a short story before. I've almost come to the conclusion I can't write short, I always want to add characters, subplots, etc. But I'm going to write short for this one damm it!
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6 comments:

azteclady said...

*innocent, earnest, sincere face*

If you need help, I'm always willing to sacrifice my free time to beta read...





*crickets*



Well, it *was* worth a try! :-P

Dee Tenorio said...

Hey, lol, I liked the gore. That's why it stuck in my memory. That villain was unique, remorseless and gross. I loved it. :)

Good try, AL. LOL! She might cave for chocolate!

vanessa jaye said...

lol, AL.

::tempted::

Srsly, though, my beta readers are crit partners who don't have the time to do an indepth crit, but will do a read for general feedback. ;)


Dee - I knew there were some creepy moments in the story, but once you made that comment and i went back to formating/revising the story I became really aware of how dark it got in places.

vanessa jaye said...

Oops! I should have said, thanks for offering to sacrifice your eyeballs on reading my first draft dribble, AL. *g* Like all writers, I get nervous getting my stuff read, even by long time crit partners like Deedle. I'd rather send you an ARC... if it sells. :-P

azteclady said...

Let's make a deal: just write it ;-)

vanessa jaye said...

Deal! :-D

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