Stepping Into Your Role

Good morning, everyone!  It’s been a while since I have gotten to my blog posting.  Dang this sickness.  But I’m about over the sinus pressure so I've crawled back on the blog horse today.  

Today we are on Day 22 with 38 days to go until March 1, 2014--publication day!  The numbers sound more than scary to me, but I can’t think about that.  I must get this book done.  That is my only choice.  When I think of my characters, Daisy and Dell (the nickname that has grown on me for my heroine’s best guy friend), they take me to another world where that scary type of pressure caused by time doesn't exist.

Two things I want to tell you today about my journey to my first book:  1.) I finally have the feeling back that I used to get when I would sneak off to a secluded spot to write when I was 12; thought I’d never get to have this feeling of excitement about writing again.  2.) I found great power in stepping into the role of who I’m meant to be in life.

Number one is self-explanatory, but let me talk about number two.  Most of my adult life I have followed people’s suggestions on how to live my life, even though their suggestions did not follow what I wanted to do with my life.  Part of it was due to me not seeing writing as a profession but rather a hobby, something to do on the side of real life.  But the older I got, the more I realized I hated everything I was doing in my life.  No job satisfied me.  I thought I was just a lazy bum who hated to work.  The truth was I was waiting for “some day” to get to my writing.  I didn’t think people would approve of my stepping into the writing profession, especially since it doesn’t make any immediate money, or so they tell me.  I listened to them for two years longer.  But something happened to me at the start of 2014.  I was saved by God’s view of my life.  He created me to be a writer.  How long was I going to keep playing around, investigating other people’s suggestions of what I should do with my time instead of pouring my energy into writing a novel?  I took control of my thoughts, told myself “I am a WRITER, a NOVELIST, and that’s what I want to do with my life.”  Ever since that point, the drive, the motivation, the energy, excitement, and inspiration I needed for a project as intimidating as publishing an entire novel, came to me.  

Every time I begin meditating on my characters, I start feeling excited.  My novel calls to me, pulls me toward itself, to write, to work, to find out what’s going to happen next in the story.  I never felt this way when I was half “noveling”, as my cousin George calls it, and half investigating other options of work for my life.  The drive I needed came only when I completely accepted who I was.

So I push forward with everything I have, on a time scale that’s far too short; excited, persistent, almost in tears at the relief I feel to finally be doing what I want, what I was made to do from the day I was born.

Follow my progress on Facebook and Twitter @EdinanRoman as I reach my goal day by day.

Holding Onto a Great Idea

Good morning everyone!  Finally able to get up and start writing again.  The sinus headaches were killing me, but those seem to be over for the most part.  Still gotta deal with this cough, but what better way than to write and immerse myself in some good movies for inspiration?

There’s not much progress to catch up on, since I have been lying ill and struggling merely to breathe, let alone write.  But let me fill you in on a little writer’s quirk that I experienced once again.  As you know, I have a book scheduled to publish March 1st this year, a mere 51 days away, and my mind is running off on new ideas and actually considering writing a completely different book than the one I had planned.  You may think I’m crazy to even have these thoughts, but I've heard of these things before.  Writer’s minds are very funny things and do many things on their own without the owner’s permission.

But common sense calls to me and tells me that would be a ridiculous stunt at this point in the game.  I know that, and the fact is in my mind as well.  I just don’t know why it would take off like that and cook up such a preposterous notion, throwing me off from the work I have already committed myself to doing, taking out the excitement of this book and throwing it into something new.  It’s exhausting trying to keep tabs on my mind.  But it’s this same mind that I appreciate and love for its wild ideas.  Without them my life would be dull and safe, doing something mundane from 9 to 5 every day until I went insane.  

So today, I call to the adventurous minds out there and invite you to let your ideas fly.  But when you latch onto one, make sure to hold him down good and keep your eye on him because there’s liable to be 50,000 other ideas more amazing than the one you’re holding.  That’s when you've got to get your focus on and see that tough bird through.  It’s not going to get done otherwise.  Just ask my file cabinet full of half-written stories collected over the twenty years I've been writing.

Together we will conquer the flying idea we have captured and see it through, no matter how many other sparkling ideas fly out of our heads.  Here’s to great ideas--and getting them done!

If you have not done so already, check out my Facebook page and click “like”, or follow me on Twitter @EdinanRoman.

See you tomorrow!

Scritch Scratch

So I woke up in the middle of the night with a throat so scratchy I could barely swallow.  I stumbled to the kitchen to get that tasty cherry-something-flavored medicated throat spray.  I turned the light on to make sure I had the nozzle pointed in the right direction.  Relief!  I was able to sleep until the morning light came in my window.

My robe and I are still best friends even though it is nearing noon.  But there is nothing like the comfort of a robe to draw the characters out of my head and onto the page, at least that’s what I tell myself.

Last night a new hero developed in my mind.  And I’m not talking about a hero in CastleVille (which, by the way is progressing very well; I have completed the second part of the Yuletide quest and now have a magical berry patch growing).  My new hero is a guy.  I’m withholding the name for now because I’m only 99% sure about it.  Maybe after today I’ll be 100%.  He will be a friend to Daisy Mosse, my heroine.  But that’s all you get to know for now.

No progress made on chapters, however, the development of said hero greatly progressed my story line.

Thanks for stopping in again.  This is Day 5 with 55 days to go until publish date March 1st.  Check out my Facebook page and click Like for the magical experience of becoming a fan.  Also, follow me on Twitter @EdinanRoman.

See you tomorrow!

Without a Robe

Kinda late going to press today folks.  All due to good reasons.  

This morning was spent cleaning the kitchen, doing laundry, going to an appointment and getting some quick shopping done.  Got back home for lunch, finished up the laundry, took care of some financial matters and now finally sitting down to write.  Oh, and checked on my CastleVille, of course!  I think I am progressing very well through the Yuletide Quest, a special holiday quest in which Kris Kringle can be used as a hero to explore while I help him rebuild the toys that got broken when his sleigh crashed into I kingdom.  It is silly games such as these that drive a writer to complete her goals, just so she can take that well-earned break to check her CastleVille.

So you can see, no robe day for me.  And I had a normal breakfast of pancakes, a banana and coffee.

Progress on my writing...ok, here goes.  I am still at only two chapters complete, but as soon as I publish this blog post and update my growing number of adoring/adorable (pick whichever fits) fans (and yes, I mean you!), I am off to the Pennsylvania hills to see what my main girl Daisy Mosse is up to.  Yep, it’s out.  She’s my girl, my protagonist, the heroine of my story.  At least I’m planning for her to close the last page of the book as a triumphant heroine.  However, I’ve heard these characters can be sneaky sometimes and change the story around on you.  So now you know my main character and setting.  But that’s all for now.  

I never thought I’d be one of those weird writers that refused to tell what her book was about while it was still in the rough draft stage, but I learned by trial and error, mainly error.  After sharing the story line with one too many people, it changed on me.  Hence, the story I’m writing now is completely different from what I was telling people last month.  So I am choosing to shut up and let it out bit by bit.  So you all will just have to wait.

Thanks for stopping in again.  Hope everyone had a happy New Year.  Writers, this is our year.  Let’s go for it and finish our novels or take the next step in our writing dreams.  Check back tomorrow on my progress and connect with me on Facebook, www.facebook.com/oneladyofshalott, and Twitter @EdinanRoman.