WHATEVER: Even More Long-Winded (But Practical) Writing Advice Elbow deep in editing Demon (it's going great!). So not much blogging going on here. The strawberries were a big hit, by the way... Check out this link. It's an utter hoot!
 

Sweet Berry Farms We're taking C to pick strawberries tomorrow. Should be a blast! (And, yes, I plan to be finished by the book by then ... and, no, I'm not finished yet. About five scenes to go, though. I'm burning up the keyboard. ... And, yes, I do intend to take a break for American Idol.)
 

I'm at that magic place in this book. That place where the end is right there. Where you can see the whole landscape of the last scenes laid out for you. Where if you just had the stamina (or didn't procrastinate by blogging) you'd stay up until 6 a.m. and finish the dang thing.

Alas, I'm no longer 17. (Of course I'm still *close* to 17, cough cough). And I require sleep.

Still, it's exciting, and I'm going for broke. (I'll no doubt finish tomorrow night, but even that tiny possibility that I'll type "the end" sometime before daybreak is a secret thrill. Well, not so secret anymore, having just announced it to some unknown number of people.)

This book (Carpe Demon, for those keeping score) has been such a blast to write. It's entirely from one point of view -- Kate Connor, retired demon hunter and mother of two. Kate is great. She's totally come alive for me, and in a lot of ways that's going to make it sad when I do type "the end." (Of course, her book is the first in a series, so I'm hoping -- knock wood -- to be spending much more time with Kate and her family and those pesky, pesky demons).

Okay, so that's my magic place. (In case you hadn't noticed, today's blog is of the rambling variety...) All writers are different, but for me the words flow so fast at this point that I literally can't keep up. I have to write ahead and then fill in the gaps. I've done that on every book and, while I think it's a bit bizarre, I've learned not to question process.

This is the first book I've written entirely from one person's point of view, and it's been a great experience. Educational, too, from a plotting standpoint. The book has both a mystery and a thriller component, and there was one issue that I'd been moving toward that hit in about Chapter 15. As I was moving toward it, I realized that while it all made sense, you had to accept certain premises or else you had a "why would she do *that*?" moment). It all *worked* but I wanted it to work better. So I sat down and did some serious plotting with my husband, D, who is an amazing plotter, if I do say so myself. We got it all worked out in about an hour, and it all fits together great now. Here's the interesting part: not that much changed. I went back to tweak the story from page one before I wrote the last couple of chapters, and essentially everything that was there was still right. I added maybe one paragraph and changed a few words. In other words, a lot of backstory stuff had changed, but since everything is filtered through one character (who comes in knowing nothing about what's going on) she only sees the tip of the iceberg. There's an iceberg theory about building characters and story -- that readers only see the tip. And this instance -- pure first person pov -- is the most remarkable example of that that I've come across in my own work.

OK, enough procrastination. It's almost 1 a.m., and I'm almost finished with this chapter. Want to get at least ½ through the next before I sleep, so ..... signing off.

 

Just flew in from Santa Fe (and boy are my arms tired ... ha ha). Seriously, it's great to be home! Will post for real tomorrow. At the moment (and for the last 57 minutes) my computer has been diligently downloading email in what I'm certain will prove to be a ratio of 1:85 in favor of spam. Ugh.
 

Big stuff!

Ah, alas, I've been away from bloggidom ... but I had good reason! I'm in the homestretch of finishing Carpe Demon (yay!!!). I'll be typing "the end" early next week. Would be sooner, but I’m leaving for a writers' retreat in a day (thus, more blog absence, but will report back after). Also, I'll confess to being a teensy, weensy bit distracted this last week, thus rendering my work product considerably less voluminous than I'd hoped. What could be distracting me, you ask? Me, who can write a love scene with Blue's Clues playing in the background (that's not easy, btw)? Well, I'll tell you ... (drum roll)... we're buying a new house!!! Whee! Yahoo! Bells! Whistles! (Okay, you can stop now. Really. You're embarrassing me ... :)

OK, time is getting away from me. More to come next Thursday!