Definitely an introvert. I think all writers must be introverts, because writing is a very lonely occupation. At the same time, however, you must study people if you're going to make believable characters. In almost all of my characters, I can see elements of people I know.

Do you know the difference between an introverted math major and an extroverted math major? An introverted math major looks at his feet when he's talking to someone; an extroverted math major looks at the other person's feet when he's talking.

By contrast, however, in the same period of time, I have received 1,392 spam comments. So, only 7% of commenters have something worthwhile and/or relevant to say. Make me wonder if only 7% of my traffic is legitimate too.

His wife had divorced him and took the house and their daughter. He didn’t even have visitation rights (although you can be sure the state stuck him with child support payments).

He had lost his job as a mid-level manager at a car manufacturing facility in River Bottoms.

He would have killed himself, but he was undead, and apparently you can’t die twice.

(Doctors are currently working day and night to find a way to kill vampires. They have tried sunlight, but it only burns and temporarily incapacitates; the vampire recovers when removed from sunlight. Staking through the heart does little more than produce a vague feeling of indigestion. Even decapitation has no effect (although Hollywood has rushed to produce a slew of movies and TV shows set during the French Revolution, featuring real beheadings).

Medical colleges are setting up a new field of study: killology. Rather than the Hippocratic oath, doctors of killology promised to do everything within their power to kill their patients. There are patient waiting lists several months long, making it the most in-demand specialty after cosmetic surgery and dermatology.)

Stripped of everything but life, Scott eventually realized that when you’re on bottom, there’s nowhere to go but up. So he went to night school and, in just 18 months, he got his law degree, specializing in vampire rights.

With his newly-inked sheepskin in hand, he set up shop in the Grays Office Building on the Clarksboro square. The historic building housed a lawyer specializing in divorce and bankruptcy (Attorney Rutherford gave discounts if you combined both into a “total freedom” package), a tax accountant, and an acupuncturist/Reiki practitioner/holistic therapist named Astrid, who also performed weddings as a licensed religious practitioner—of what religion, Scott didn’t know. She gave him the willies, so he tried to avoid her.

Scott got a good deal on his office lease because Attorney Rutherford—who owned the building—said he could use the basement at no additional charge. So, as soon as it grew dark, Scott met with clients in his upstairs office, and when dawn approached, he went down the rickety wooden stairs in the back storage room to the basement to sleep for the day.

He had also lucked out when he hired his secretary. Josie was an attractive, intelligent young woman in her late twenties with experience in several branches of law and eager to learn vampire rights. Furthermore, she had been willing to work for the paltry salary he had offered, even though she could have easily commanded several dollars more an hour at a large firm. He wondered why she took it, but didn’t dare look a gift-horse in the mouth. Of the other resumes he had received, three had been from people whose current occupation was as a night-shift clerk at a convenience store, and one had been from a person who used commas instead of periods in sentences.

He had to take out a loan to furnish his office and cover Josie’s pay for the first few months until he built up a clientele; he didn’t have anything left for himself and he spent a few days sleeping on a tarp on the dirt floor in the basement. But Josie took pity on him and offered him some of her old furniture.

Together, they moved the furniture into the basement, and Scott was feeling rather proud of the modest, but comfortable corner they created. He had an old TV, a couch, a bookcase, and a bed—all sitting on a remnant of carpet he had rescued from a dumpster on a construction project. He had to hang his suits from nails in the floor joists overhead, but it was a start. Josie had even gotten him a book on transforming large warehouse spaces into studio apartments, and he had grand plans to eventually transform the basement into a classy, high-brow apartment where he could entertain his fellow attorneys, judges, and the local politicians.

So, all in all, things were looking up.

Read the entire series–The Bloodsuckers: Vampire Lawyers of Middle Tennessee

But while I was living in Ireland, I was inspired to write some Irish fairy tales, and originally planned to compile them into a book. One came out okay, one sort of “meh,” and one never got finished because I didn’t know how to end it.

But one story did get finished, and I thought it a very good story. The problem was I couldn’t do anything with it. At approximately 14,000 words (that’s about 50 book-size pages), it wasn’t long enough to be its own book, yet the rest of the book it was supposed to be in crapped out on me.

So it’s moved from hard drive to hard drive for eleven years, and I occasionally open it and read it for my own entertainment.

But looking at publishing free e-copies of short stories or novellas for the purposes of marketing made me remember it. I did a couple of edits on it, and now I have two friends proofing it for me. I also set up a Kindle publishing account at Amazon. If all goes as I think it will (after actually reading the terms and conditions of the account, I’m not entirely sure if I can publish something which remains perpetually free, but from my perusal of the free books on Kindle, it sort of looks like you can), then I will publish it on Amazon in the next couple of weeks. But even if it doesn’t go as I want, I’ll still convert it to e-reader formats and publish it here. (Although that’s not nearly as effective a marketing tool as having it on Amazon, where lots of people are searching for books and stories–especially free ones.)

(I have absolutely no idea who the artist is of this beautiful picture; I found it on a free wallpaper website and it did not have any artist credit. Leave a comment if you know who it belongs to.)

So, here is the description:

Aine is a willful young woman, determined to travel the world and become a bard of great renown. But first she has to have stories to tell. So one night she sneaks away from home and sets out on a journey to find the last golden dragon.

But, instead, she meets Eamonn—a solitary young man who is not quite what he seems. A lifelong companion of the dragon, he can give Aine the stories she’s looking for, but can she give him what he needs most in return?

“The Last Golden Dragon” is a romantic fairy tale of approximately 14,000 words. Although intended for an adult audience, its PG rating makes it acceptable for pre-teens and teens as well.

People are putting out short stories which serve as prequels to their romance novel (especially if said novel is a trilogy/saga). These short stories are free–in the hopes of enticing readers to buy the actual book.

I had already heard that sci-fi/fantasy writers with a trilogy or saga are tempting readers by making the first book free, then charging for the sequels.

It’s actually a very clever marketing campaign for the self-published author. It also means that if you want to make any money, you’re going to have to write something well enough to entice people to read it and/or follow you as an author. Speaking as a reader, there’s something appealing in that idea; you’re not out cash if a book turns out to be bad. If you like it, though, you’ll pay for more.

That’s capitalism, people.

While I am still holding out hope to go the traditional publishing route, I will not forswear self-publishing if this process drags out for a couple more years. Now that I’m not writing just one series in one genre, I feel like I have room to experiment. Also, I have not invested as much in my romance novel as I have my vampire series. While I think I did a good job with my historical romance and I’m proud of it, I wrote it in a month and edited it in a month (while working a full-time job). It took me a year (nearly full-time) to write and edit my first vampire book, and I’m still making typo corrections. I have invested a lot of time in it (true of most any fantasy novel; it takes a lot of work to create the background) and have really poured my heart and soul into it. My romance novel was written to sell.

I am going to check out a few of the short prequels and see how they work.

I have to show my appreciation to this writer just for bailing me out of this scenario.

“Which writer?” my readers might ask. Clearly the poster meant me, since it’s on my blog.

After looking through the world wide web and obtaining techniques that were not pleasant, I assumed my life was done.

I find that obtaining techniques in and of themselves–regardless of their specifics–are generally unpleasant, although I would never condone suicidal thoughts over such techniques; they’re just not worth it!

Living devoid of the strategies to the issues you’ve sorted out all through your good report is a serious case, as well as those that might have in a negative way affected my entire career if I hadn’t discovered your blog post.

Yes, I agree that it’s a serious business (a.k.a. “case”) living devoid of my strategies to the issues I’ve sorted out in my blog (a.k.a. my “good report”). For those readers who might not be familiar with the theme of my blog, my issues are writing and getting published, and my strategies are to write and to send out query letters to literary agents. If you follow my strategies, then you too will not have to worry about your career being affected in a negative way.

Your primary capability and kindness in dealing with all areas was valuable.

Thank you.

I’m not sure what I would’ve done if I hadn’t come across such a thing like this.

Again, for those of you unfamiliar with the subject of this comment, the poster means my blog.

I can now relish my future. Thanks so much for this reliable and results-oriented help.

I’m all about getting results.*

I won’t think twice to propose your web site to any person who needs and wants tips about this topic.

(Note: “This topic” refers to writing and getting published.) Thank you! Please propose my blog (a.k.a. my “web site”) to every person you know.

* Disclaimer: at the time of this writing, all of my results have been rejections, but considering that many people never get to even that point, I feel that I am getting a result, even if it’s not the result that I want.

While that comment was pleasant, I also received one that was not.

Hrm, Not the best post unfortunately. Sorry to be so blunt! You should try some Norwegian carrot cake ( gulrotkake ) to cheer you up instead.

So, after being insulted by you I should buy your cake and try to raise my self-esteem by stuffing my face? Way to cause an eating disorder!

Actually, this is a horrible way to advertise. I mean, spamming someone’s site is bad enough, but insulting them while doing so not only makes me NOT want to eat the damn cake, but it makes me want to blow up all the cakes in the shop. I now hate and loathe your cake and would not eat it even if you gave me some for free. (And I’d hate and loathe it even if it wasn’t carrot cake, which I don’t like in the first place.) I now actively recommend that no one ever eat cake out of Norway.

I kind of imagined the endeavor as a cooky, comic sitcom or, at the very least, an Adult Swim animated short cartoon in the style of Harvey Birdman, Attorney-at-Law. But instead I’ve decided to make it kind of like a graphic novel without the drawings. So, without further ado:

The Premise

Fallout

Two years ago, the Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant in Athens, Alabama exploded due to faulty construction materials.  The Local Union of Ironworkers (No. 477) would have gone on record saying that this would have never happened if TVA had used union labor—like they used to—but unfortunately that union was obliterated in the nuclear holocaust that invariably follows an explosion of a nuclear power plant.

(Ref. Chernobyl, Three Mile Island)

In fact, all of northern Alabama was laid waste, and nothing survived except kudzu and houses and mobile homes insulated with asbestos.  Which, surprisingly, was quite a large number.  (The asbestos industry—after consulting with the egg industry—is now remaking its image and extolling the virtues of having an asbestos-clad house if you live near a nuclear power plant ).  Unfortunately, though, the radiation fallout killed all of the survivors when they emerged from their homes to see “what the hell was that noise?”  Sadly, there was a lot of other news going on in the world that week—like the protesters at the G8 Summit staging a naked sit-in—so the tragedy got about as much national attention as Nashville did after the 2009 flood.

(No reference; no news articles to cite)

In Tennessee, however, the radioactive fallout did a strange thing.  In several rural counties in Middle Tennessee—between the Alabama border and just south of Nashville—the radiation caused random people to mutate into vampires.  This was quite shocking, of course; everyone stayed inside with their guns, waiting for the rioting to start.  Consequently no one rioted, but no one left their property unguarded either, and anyone brave enough to travel through that part of the state said it was as eerily lifeless as North Korea.  It was only after the Tennessee Lottery ran a commercial for a new scratch-off ticket that commerce again resumed.

Once people had their beer, cigarettes and lottery tickets, it became apparent that life was going to have to go on—even if some people were going on without life.  People were still driving drunk, abusing their families, wanting divorces, smoking pot, coveting their neighbor’s [wife’s] ass, getting into car wrecks, ad nauseam.  Only some of those people were now vampires, and court during the day just wasn’t working.  The notices for Failure to Appear were numerous enough to paper the men’s washroom on the third floor of the Deputee County Courthouse.  So a night court was established, with the Honorable Judge Peter Standiff presiding for eternity.

Oddly enough, most of the lawyers in Deputee County mutated into vampires.  Lawyer jokes doubled (making use of the obvious parallel between bloodsucking lawyers and… well, bloodsucking lawyers), overtaking blonde jokes as the most common form of joke-related entertainment.

Read the entire series–The Bloodsuckers: Vampire Lawyers of Middle Tennessee

My husband advocated fiscal responsibility by way of saving for a vacation in March. I, however, have used up all of my fiscal responsibility over the past couple of years of recession-living, and I instead went to Amazon and ordered myself a Kindle and a used copy of Zelda: Twilight Princess.

The game came in the mail first, and I instantly became addicted. By the time my Kindle arrived, I was in the middle of killing many things, and I gave it only a cursory glance. We have no wi-fi in our area, so there was nothing I could do with it. (Come on Amazon; you could have at least shipped it pre-loaded with one book–Dickens or Wizard of Oz or something.)

The next evening I went to McDonald’s for supper and connected it via wi-fi.

Oh. My. Sweet. Lord.

Blessed are you, God, Ruler of the Universe, who has allowed me to live to see the day when I may store thousands of books in something smaller than a breadbox. In fact, I can store all of my books AND a full loaf of bread in a breadbox.

The first thing I did, of course, was go through the free titles section. Title looks interesting? Download it. Who knows? I may one day get a hankering to read the unabridged version of Moby Dick. With unlimited internet cloud storage and the ability to d/l everything to my computer, I can, theoretically, own every book ever e-published. And, just like when DVDs began taking over video tapes, not only are newly published books coming out in e-format, but every year older books are being released in e-format.

11 classic books by the greatest Jewish sages in history for 95 cents? Sucker, I downloaded that shit three seconds ago. Let me preach on about Ethics of the Fathers.

I’ve always been a good girl. I’ve never smoked a cigarette. I’ve never been drunk. I’ve never tried drugs; I’ve not even gotten high by way of second-hand marijuana smoke.

But I have just discovered my crack cocaine–my instantaneous-addiction meth. I am going down a long road in which Kindle will consume my soul. There’s nothing to do now but consult the Jewish sages regarding the theological implications of the situation. That, and make myself a leather Kindle case so I can enshrine its holiness.

I have to get my query letter up to snuff between now and then. Given that I went through 4 versions of the first query letter I did, you’d think I’d be an old hand at making them, but the fact that Flames of Prague is set over a 20 year span and really has two separate plot lines in two sections (which tie together) really screws me up on the query letter. I have no idea how to approach it. Maybe I need to just write two separate query letters–one for each half of the book–then stick them together. That is how I wrote the book (although that makes it sound slapped together when it’s not; it’s about one family, only in two generations, so it flows together).

I began work on another historical romance yesterday. As my book on writing romance said, when you get done writing, write something else. Don’t sit around waiting to hear back from an agent or publisher. Always having something to work on is what keeps you going when the rejections come in.

I had a vague idea of a Hospitallar and a young woman having a brief romance, but didn’t know where to go with it from there. I also didn’t know where or when to set it. The era of the Crusader kingdoms is a bit earlier than I like, and while the Hospistallers were not limited to the Crusader period (they still exist under the name of the Knights of Malta), that was their heyday.

Bad make-believe costume!

Correct 13th century costume

This weekend my husband and I watched the movie Ironclad. It’s actually a very good depiction of medieval warfare and the men’s armor and clothing is accurate. Unfortunately they dressed the main woman up like a Renaissance Faire whore with some sort of off-the-shoulder metal-studded bodice.  Guess the costumer was tapping her inner Xena.

I hate when a movie is good right up to the point they turn all the women into strumpets. We will not speak of the maid servant running around with her hair constantly in disarray and a Frederick’s of Hollywood push-up bra popping her tatas up like only modern underwire and elastic can accomplish.

But, I digress. Said Xena-esque heroine really gets her strumpet on by seducing the resident Templar knight. Not that I blame her–I mean, he’s a man I’d like to seduce too–only I could have done a much better job because I’m a romance writer–unlike the person who wrote the terrible dialogue for the script.

And then, as I was trying to go to sleep that night, the idea for my new book came to me. Not a Hospitaller, but a Templar, and not the Crusades but the fall of the Order around 1308. And not in the Holy Land but in England. I started doing a little research on the Templars in England and I think I have a setting for my new knight.

Fleeing the arrests of the Templars, Sir Guy is going to go north, to the border country, where his foster brother has a residence. He gets there, only to find his foster brother is dead. The brother’s widow, however, gives Sir Guy shelter, disguising him as her new household priest. Some time passes, they become friends, and then, one night, the manor is raided by Scots (this is the period when Scotland was fighting for her freedom from England, so cross-border raids were a frequent part of life for people on both sides of the line). Brother Guy and the lady are taken… but not for long. He starts fighting bare-handed, then she pulls out her husband’s sword and tosses it to him, and shit gets really serious. They sneak out of the house and ride through the freezing night to the nearest lord with a proper garrison to raise the hue and cry. Did I mention, because they got raided at night, they’re in nothing but their underclothes for this long, cold journey on horseback? Yeah, that’ll be where things become romantic.

I’m not sure where things go after that–although I’m thinking an illegitimate child–but, then, I never know how a book is going to end when I start it. It just happens. I’m a big believer in characters–and even plot–developing naturally, as opposed to outlining everything in advance. However, there are many writers who are in favor of the later school of thought and wouldn’t be able to go anywhere with their stories if they didn’t have it planned in advance.

And you better believe all descriptions of clothes and armor in my books will be historically accurate!

Disgusted with myself, I vowed to get back on the wagon Thursday

Regardless of what wagon you’ve fallen off, the first thing you need to do is identify why you fell off; that’s the only way you have any hope to change yourself for the better.

The long weekend and messed-up sleep schedule is not what made me procrastinate when I came to work. Breaking my rhythm certainly contributed to my decline, but it’s not what kept me there.

The number one cause of my procrastination? Temptation. Presented with a pleasant distraction versus a tedious task, the distraction will always win out for the procrastinator. My worse distraction? Oddly enough, not the internet (although that’s up there). Actually, my writing is my biggest distraction. So the first thing I did was leave the USB key at home (I carry my writing around on my USB key). That eliminated the temptation of writing and editing instead of doing work.

Secondly, I fell into the fallacy that because nothing on my list was terribly important or time-consuming (back to filing and billing), I could wait until the last hour of the day and get it all done. Remember, I confessed to being a person who gets a high from rushing to complete tasks; I was setting myself up to get a high.

Only it never came, because by the last hour of the day, I was not saying, “Let me run around like a chicken with my head cut off and get this stuff done.” Instead I was saying, “Eh, it’ll wait until tomorrow.”

I know, from long experience, that I am most productive shortly after waking up (studies show that the vast, vast majority of people are this way, regardless of what time they wake up). As the day goes on, my output drops exponentially. This is why I can’t exercise or clean house in the evenings after I get home from work; my energy is used up for the day.

So, when I came to work Thursday, I knocked several things off my list first thing. Accomplishment is like a snowball rolling downhill: if I make a big enough snowball early, it will continue to gather momentum as the day goes on.

And before I even got to work Thursday, I drug my ass out of bed and did some exercise. It was lame exercise–sitting on the couch, reading a book, peddling a mini stationary bike–but it was better than laying in bed and not moving at all. (Not to mention I’m reading non-fiction, so I’m being edified in the process… theoretically.) I did that for 15 minutes, then I got up and spent 15 minutes picking up the living room (which is also a form of exercise, believe me).

Everything combined, I was able to get my list done yesterday, plus I picked up 1/3rd of the living room. I did the same thing this morning and my to-do list was more than halfway done before lunch. And this morning consisted of purging old files and making new ones for 2012–not high on the excitement list, you know.

My boss asked me today what my New Year’s resolution was. I said, “The List.” 2012 is going to be about getting more crap done. All hail The List.