Character Pics

Here are some pictures that I said I would share.  I’ll just make this quick since I’m writing this kinda late.  This first one is how I imagine 16-year-old Mint to look, the hair and the style of clothing especially.

 

This second one is a look I could imagine on Mint’s face when she’s just irritated with the general immaturity of the people around her (mainly her mom!).  Side note:  Wait till you meet her mom, Trixie.  She is a piece of work and does everything to make Mint’s life miserable, but she is one of my favorite characters.  She’s so...noticeable...as a character.  Definitely not a boring woman.

Aside from the expression, nothing else resembles Mint, though.  Lol.

This pic makes me think of Ben, a guy Mint will eventually meet in her high school--a-a-actually a bit sooner than her first day of school.  But I can’t tell you the particulars.  You’ll have to wait till that chapter is released.  Don’t worry, it’s near the beginning of the book.  I will hint that this guy’s half-hidden face is a clue as to what their first glimpse of each other is like.

In finding these pictures I just looked up random images.  Some writers use celebrity pics, but those always seem like I’m looking at Barbies or something and not real people.  So I like anonymous pictures.  Funny enough, I didn’t realize until later that the pic for Ben is actually some character on the CW (a local TV channel around here).  Some of you probably recognized him right away.  Oh well, he serves my purpose with the half-hidden face.  That’s all I wanted him for.

Well, that’s it for now.  Chapter 1 of Innocence will be released tomorrow on Wattpad, a website where you can read my work for free!.  I’m trying to have a purchase link available for next Friday so you can download the entire book immediately instead of waiting to read it one chapter per week.  So stay tuned for that.

If you want to get updates on the story to your inbox, follow my blog via email in the right hand panel.  I will post an update tomorrow once I have uploaded the chapter tomorrow.

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Good News and Bad News

One week ago I wrote a blog post that you’ll never get to read because it is eternally frozen on my phone’s Blogger app.  I can’t even click on it to read what I wrote so that I can retype it on my PC.  It was brilliant, of course, something about having finished my newspaper articles (that I write every three weeks for a local paper) and being free to work on my edit for Innocence.  But only my obstinate Blogger app will ever know now what exactly it was.

That’s not even the bad news.  That was only to let you know the great loss I suffered exactly a week ago, to the day.

Good News
Now, here is the good news.  The first chapter of Innocence (updated and in your face) is prepped and ready to upload on Friday, the big NEW LAUNCH of this first book of the Gold Dragon series.

Bad News
The bad news is that the updated version of the entire book will not be available for sale this Friday.  (Awwwwww!)  I know.  I hear you.  There is nobody to blame but me.  I am doing my utmost to get it ready for week 2 (September 11, 2015 MARK YO’ CALENDA’S)...now that I think of it, I could try blaming my friend-editor who is being THE BOMBE...THE BOMB (with an e or without an e?) and editing my chapters for me.  But if I did that, she might bail at my lack of appreciation, then you wouldn’t get to see ANY of the update or book 2 or book 3 or book 4...you know what I mean?

What Does This Mean for You?
Well, if you are a patient person, all that means nothing because you’re planning on reading the free version of Innocence that I’m uploading to Wattpad each week.  If you are An Impatient One, you will have to suffer until week 2 when the book is (hopefully! *hand to mouth with raised eyebrows*) available for purchase.  Barring a third World War, an early winter cold or an obsessive desire to do nothing but drink coffee and read every day, I will have it ready by then.

What You’ve Been Waiting For--Pricing!
For The Impatient Ones who must know IMMEDIATELY what happens at the end of Innocence, you can download the book for ONLY $2.99 as an Amazon Kindle ebook or an iBook.

For the Caver who can only hold out until Chapter 3 is released before the suspense kills you, you can download the book for only $.99 on Etsy!  (I know!  This is a much better deal, but if you’ve gotta have it right away, then there’s a price to pay!)

For those who are Stronger Than Rocks and can withstand the suspense, the entire book will be released on Wattpad for free, one chapter per week.

Innocence, along with book 2, Awakened, and the others to follow are, on average, 10 chapters long.  They’re made to be read quickly (in one sitting for you speedy readers out there) and to hopefully appeal to people who dislike reading long books.  In these short but captivating episodes, you get the story in manageable bursts of action, emotion and suspense (with a sprinkle of romance and appropriate downtime to balance it all out, of course).

Now, a word about the pricing:  The $.99 version of the book, available after the release of Chapter 3, will only be available as a PDF download via Etsy.com (I will give you more info on that website when the download is available).  This download is awesomely formatted (I know, bad adverb there...just ignore it) and reads beautifully on phones or tablets.  The font has been sized to read well on smaller screens so you wouldn’t want to read this on your PC.  Who does that anyways??  The file will download to a PC, though, if you really want to read it that way.  The might just look kinda big.

The website I publish the ebook version with will not allow me to price a book at $.99, so just consider yourself lucky that I found a way to do that for you!

I think that’s everything for now.  If you have any questions, leave them in the comments or email me at authorrebeccayoder@gmail.com

Remember to subscribe to my blog via email in the right hand panel to get each blog update to your inbox.  Come on over to Wattpad, create your free account and follow me there so you can know the second Innocence: Chapter 1 is uploaded this Friday!  For Tablo users, you can find and follow me here.  I will be posting the chapters for free there as well.

Also check me out on…

Facebook:  Rebecca Yoder, One Lady of Shalott

Twitter: @EdinanRoman

Goodreads:  Rebecca Yoder

...and on this awesome pic of me this morning getting ready to edit (never mind that the chair in the background completely takes center stage--just pretend it’s not there).

Two Things

You know how everyone was putting a picture of a giraffe on their Facebook profiles a while back?  Well, I have an even better idea.  Let’s all put a picture of a teapot as our profile pictures in honor of all those how drink tea.  Tea drinkers are highly overlooked (at least in America, with the exception of Boulder, Colorado where Celestial Seasonings teas are bagged).  We need to be more attentive to these people.  Quiet, peaceful, comtemplative people.  They understand the importance of that break in the day called “afternoon tea.”  We can all learn something from this culture of drinking tea.  So, hail to the TEA DRINKERS!  Today I will change my profile pic to a teapot!

The second thing I have to say today is that I finished a novel called Wildalone by Krassi Zourkova and it left me in a rage.  My view of men is quite different than the main character’s opinion of the two main men in the book.  Has anyone else read this book?  Does anyone else share my rage?  I wrote a brief review on Goodreads.  I tried to be nice.  Some say if you are a writer reviewing someone else’s book, you must give a pleasant review (because it’s unkind to say bad things about theirs when you want a good review on your own book).  But it’s not right to lie.  So I just said what I thought but in a nice way.  Because, although it may not be the perfect book for me, there are plenty of people who would give it five stars and those are the people who need to find it.

You can find me on Goodreads here.  I’m curious on your opinion of the book.  I thought it was very poetically written, but the rights and wrongs of the love triangle are a completely different story.  None of this is from a literary standpoint, more from a realistic (and dare I say, moral) standpoint.  The attraction people have to immorality escapes me.  How a woman could be attracted to a man that wants her for her body alone is beyond me.  Does she not know that that kind must have many women and that he will not give up those many women at the drop of a hat (like a certain character did in the book)?  Anyways, if you want to talk more of that nonsense, come read my review and let me know what you thought of the book.

If you liked this post, be sure to follow my blog or subscribe via email in the right hand panel to get these tasty tidbits delivered directly to your inbox.  You can also follow me on Wattpad and Tablo to read my stories for free!

Come on over to my Facebook page and give it a like and check out my new teapot profile pic! (It's different than the one on here.)

Continuing the Enthusiasm

I have to report something cool, even though I don't really understand the stats of Facebook or even Blogger for that matter.  But I get the general drift that big numbers are good.

Yesterday I posted a link to the blog I wrote (yep yesterday's blog) where I included the cover photo, a summary and excerpt of the novel I'm doing for NaNo and that will be out this month.  Usually my FB posts reach an average of 20 people.  Well, that particular post reached 159.  Wow, did you see that?  One hundred fifty-nine.  That's huge for me.  So if you have a huge following or whatever, don't laugh at me.  I'm coming to where you are.  And you started out with only 159 at one time.  Lol.  Not trying to hate.  Just some good-natured ribbing.

Anyways, I'm excited.  I've had a really rough day and I feel that was my little bit of encouragement from the writing world.

In case you missed it from yesterday, I will include the cover photo and the link to yesterday's blog for you.  I am so excited about this book.  It has one of those characters that you think, "Shit, I really hope I don't mess her up."

I have added another 1,153 words to my NaNo count as of right now.  I plan to finish the third chapter today.

Link to yesterday's blog

You can also check out a sneak peek of the first chapter here.  It's a "raw" draft copy so there may be some inconsistencies here and there.  But let me know your feedback and comments.  You can find me on Facebook or Twitter to stay in touch for updates.

My Writing Process and the Next Three Chapters

Very busy day yesterday, but still worked on my book.  I have been watching a YouTube channel called #Katytastic.  Right now I'm watching Katy's video on outlining with Scrivner.  Although this is not my favorite channel to watch, I have found some very useful information about outlining and organizing a book.  I take what I need instead of trying to do my work exactly as someone else does.

Yesterday I completed untangling my first five chapter ideas.  When I first began this book, I did not start with an outline, a plan or even the germ of an idea.  I just grabbed a stack of paper and began writing.  I wanted to feel like I was doing something, making progress on a book.  And as I wrote, the idea began developing before I had completed the first page.  Several pages down the road I knew I wanted to develop my idea into a full book.  So I began my outlining process.  (My process so far is no more complex than taking a piece of paper and numbering 1-10 to begin writing down my plot points.  Along with that I keep a running list of notes, ideas and plot progress as the story unfolds to me.)  I planned out the first three chapters or so as I was writing them.

Then, a week and a half ago I set a deadline to finish the book.  So my first step was to finish outlining the book to make sure my chapters would head in the right direction (at this point they were going a bit here and there, uncertain at times which way to go next because I didn't yet have a clear conclusion to the book).  So in about 2 or 3 days of work, I made a detailed outline/plan for the rest of the book.  Wow!  Hard work I tell you.  I think that's the first time I ever felt exhausted from working on fiction.  But at the same time it was fun and I felt so great that I KNEW I was making progress.  I had pages of notes I could show for my efforts.

After the planning was complete, my first four chapters proved to be a bit of a jungle gym, having to climb all over to follow the story, so I literally cut and pasted (everything is written out longhand so far) the different bits into the chapters they were supposed to go according to my outline.

So that's what I achieved yesterday.  I am all organized and ready to start on today's work.  I am not revealing the deadline at this time because the work for this book keeps growing and I have to move the date to accommodate.  My book almost doubled in length after I completed the outlining process, so that's obviously going to require more days than I originally scheduled.

With my updated work plan for the book, I will be completing chapters 5-7 today.  Thanks for stopping in.  Check back tomorrow to see how I did on my three chapters for the day.  And good luck with your own writing.  If you would like to share your current work in progress, whether it's writing or some other art, or just progress on where you want to get in life, please leave a comment below or on my Facebook page.  I would love to hear from you. 

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.

Not in the Mood

I am not in the mood to write today or to work on anything that’s serious.  I just want to relax in my robe and play CastleVille Legends.  Whoever created that game was genius.  A role playing game with interactive buildings, heros, knights and animals instead of just stupid lists of options to click on.  I just opened the app and the music alone makes me feel like I’m doing great things.  It’s the type of music that never gets old even though you play the game for hours at a time.  Someone should make a CD like this.

Yesterday I accomplished started a Facebook page for all my authorly and writerly accomplishments.  I also updated one of my blogs, so I think I’m doing pretty good.  This is Day 2 with 58 days to go to complete final draft and format my book for e-publishing.  And the music on CastleVille Legends tells me I CAN do this!

Since I love this game so much I think it only fair I post a link so you can enjoy it too.  Remember our purpose is to have fun so we stay sane during the grueling hours of writing.  You certainly cannot use this game for procrastination purposes.  https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.zynga.castlevillelegends  For you iPhone people, look it up.

Well, I’m off to check on my kingdom and see what treasures my heros have brought back from their explorations.  But I will be taking breaks to work on my great American novel as well.

Check back tomorrow on my progress or connect with me on Facebook www.facebook.com/oneladyofshalott or Twitter @EdinanRoman.  Cheerio everyone!  Until tomorrow.

Afraid of Commitment?

I began my morning with two slices of fried liver pudding and a wedge of Laughing Cow spreadable garlic and herb cheese along with my daily cup of coffee.  Not the most unusual breakfast I’ve ever eaten, but right up there with my other writer’s quirks.

My deadline looms before me.  March 1, 2014.  My self-chosen e-publish date for my debut novel.  Day 1 with 59 days to go to achieve the impossible.  Always one wary of commitment, proclaiming to the world, promising to complete a certain task by a certain day, I must have lost my mind to give an end date to such an ominously large project as a novel.  And yet the decision is made.  The clock is already ticking, and I have no choice but to proceed and find my way in the unpredictable maze of writing.

My progress stands at two very rough drafty chapters, completed and sent to my reading buddy Teresa.  I took last week off for Christmas.  And now I’m back to the drawing board (or is it more appropriate to say writing board?) for the next two chapters.  Logic tells me I need to produce more than two chapters a week to meet my goal, but my common sense tells me to shoot for two chapters and my overachiever ability will pump out the rest.  I’m trying a different approach to reaching this goal (not my first time in setting it) and setting small, easy-to-reach checkpoints along the way.  Thus, I will be encouraged and be able to work harder by removing the stress that normally accompanies large projects for me.

So here I go.  Check back tomorrow to see how I’ve fared on my journey to writing my first novel.  Sometimes the only way to overcome your fears is to face them and beat them down.  I’ve stopped running and started fighting, word by word, until this novel is on the page.  Follow me on Twitter @EdinanRoman or connect with me on Google + by clicking the follow button below.  Join the adventure and share your own writing journey as we inspire millions on the path behind us.