I’m writing the first draft of my latest novel, second in a trilogy. It’s been a while since I wrote the initial draft of the first book. I’d forgotten the annoying little quirks of this stage, things like overusing specific words, dropping a plot thread and having to go back and reinsert it in chapters…
Author: DremaDeoraich
Life After Life
By Kate Atkinson Back Bay Books, ISBN: 978-0316176491 Paperback, ©2013, 560 pages On February 11, 2010, a young girl is born to a wealthy English family. Due to a snowstorm and blocked roads, the doctor cannot arrive in time, and the child dies. On February 11, 2010, a young girl named Ursula is born to…
Living Our Stories
In writing workshops, teachers and advisers (and agents/publishers) all say that regardless of genre, a book’s word count is limited. In science fiction, for example, the standard acceptable word count ranges between 90K and 120K. Given this restriction, it’s important for the writer to confine herself to those words that move the story along toward…
The Girl on the Train
By Paula Hawkins The Penguin Group, ISBN: 9780698185395 Paperback, ©2015, 416 pages Rachel’s teetering on the edge. Alcoholism and bitterness over her failed marriage nudges her closer every day to total loss of what little she has left. Her only bright spot is the daily commute to London where her train stops at a faulty…
Smudging My Words
Southeastern Virginia got hit with a bad snowstorm last week, one we locals are calling “Snowpocalypse 2018.” While I personally did not go outside with a ruler or anything, friends posted photos on Facebook where their yards were more than 12” deep in places. Those of you in more northern states may laugh and call…
Learning to Fly
Since I posted last week, my schedule has focused mostly on writing, so much so that my fingers were flying on the keyboard and I busted my target word count almost every day. During a break, I perused old e-mail and came across a message from the middle of December from iFly, saying “Don’t forget…
Greetings from Slumpy Hollow, Slumptavia
So it’s been several weeks since I’ve touched my novel to any significant degree. Weeks. Maybe more than a month. I’m beside myself. I’ve tweaked and revised several short stories, spent time researching markets where I might submit them, attended several classes, re-sent book 1 of my novel series to the publisher I’ve wanted all…
Red Moon
by Benjamin Percy Grand Central Publishing, ISBN: 978-1455501670 Mass Market Paperback, © 2013, 668 pages They live among us. They might be our neighbor, our pastor, our doctor, our teacher, our spouse, our child. Most of the time, they look like us—except when they don’t. Except when stress or anger or fear incites the prion…
Swimming with the Snarks
A couple of months ago, I joined a FaceBook writers group with thousands of members. I hoped to find helpful input, guidance and handy tips from others in the biz. What I got instead was drama. Every post I saw, no matter how innocuous or innocent the question, drew dozens of trolls whose main purpose…
A Picture vs. A Thousand Words
This past weekend, Bobby and I visited the Chrysler Museum in Norfolk to see a glass exhibit, and while there we discovered Giovanni Battista Langetti’s “Prometheus,” which had been in the museum’s storage vault for some time awaiting restoration. Now that it’s back to full splendor, the painting hangs alone in the upstairs foyer, a…