Never Have I Ever

....been SO excited to finish writing/revising a novel before my latest one: Tattoo Love.

I got the idea for Tattoo Love last August. I was up late because I couldn't sleep, and I came across my uncle's Facebook page and I checked out his profile pics. He had a picture edited with two pics within it. Both were dragon tattoos, similar ones, on his wife and him. The dragons were around a Yin Yang symbol. I immediately thought up of making Joe from Call Me Robin Hood have a tattoo of a Yin Yang symbol since it's mentioned in the book.

Anyway, I started wondering about tattoos. And if it can be associated with love. That's when I got the SNI for Tattoo Love!

My girl MC gets tattoos of qualities in her dream guy.

I fleshed out the idea, and I figured out that she got a tattoo after each one of her jerk exes. And each quality would be something an ex lacked that she hoped to find in her dream guy. The title came to me soon after. Tattoo Love. Because she loves tattoos and she's basing it on her ideas of love.

At first, I had her brother be the tattoo artist. BUT THEN I wondered...what if the LI was her tattoo artist? And he had a crush on her but he was so not the right guy for her as being so far away from her dream guy. That was the conflict.

Then, because the LI was too interesting of a character, I decided to add his POV, too.

I'd worked on the idea here and there before, but just last Monday, I decided to take a break from revising CMRH. I was starting to get bored/tired of the plot/characters. But I knew I wanted to work on something else. I figured I should work on Tattoo Love.

The cool thing about Tattoo Love is that the girl and guy MCs (Maira and Kieran) mirror my boyfriend and me. And I created the characters before I met him. Pretty cool! Well, also last Monday, I had issues with him. Our relationship was super rocky, and we might really break up. So living vicariously through Maira and Kieran helped out loads. Then, my boyfriend and I, Zack, agreed to stay together, and suddenly I didn't want to work on TL that much.

BUT by last Thursday night, I knew I wanted to finish this baby up. I ended up writing 17K within 24 hours (Thursday at 11:04 p.m. - Friday at 10:34 o.m.). It was such a crazy all-nighter! By 9, I had 1.5K left and I honestly thought I wouldn't make it. But I did. YAY!

I didn't write much from Saturday-Monday, but yesterday/early this morning I made some progress for revisions. Yeah, I decided to revise as I go.

So yeah! I'm totally excited to finish TL. I'm really hoping this will be the novel I query and then publish first!

YAY!

:D

My reading goal for this year

I've hardly been reading ever since I became a writer. Reading was totally my thing growing up. I could never put a book down. But ever since I began writing seriously when I was 16/17, I tend to only start reading books but never finish them.

This has gone on for far too long.

So I made a plan.

Every month, I'll read at least 1 book. That's 12 books a year, and still more books than I managed to read last year. I think I only read 10 and maybe 3 or 4 of those were for novels for school.

That's totally doable. And here are the books I'm planning to read every month. Note, I chose things with gradually increasing pages!

1. I Heart You, You Haunt Me by Lisa Shroeder
2. Living Dead Girl by Elizabeth Scott
3. Love Story be Jennifer Echols
4. Something Like Fate by Susane Colasanti
5. Two-Way Street by Lauren Barnholdt
6. Rules of Attraction by Simone Elkeles
7. The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen
8. Matched by Ally Condie
9. Original Sin by Lisa Desrochers
10. City of Bones by Cassandra Claire
11. The Time Traveler's Wife by Audren Niffenegger
12. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

If I have time before the end of the month, I will read another book that I think I can finish before the start of the next month.

But yeah! Hopefully I can get through this list of 12 books at least! I really want to start reading more and more!

2011 Reflections and 2012 Hopes and Dreams

I usually do this post on New Year's Eve, but I completely forgot. I was too busy with a certain crisis I won't mention on here. So yes! Here's what I was up to in 2011 and my 2012 resolutions!

These were last year's resolutions found in this post:

1. Lose 10 pounds. A nice number that should be doable.

This one was a success! I actually lost possibly 20 pounds or so! Without really trying lol. I just hardly ate lol





2. Finish writing/polishing Love Square and at least one other book (possibly Always With Me).

Sadly, this did not happen. BUT I finished Call Me Robin Hood's first draft during the summer! Current;y working on revisions. Have been doing that on/off while I attempt other WIPs. I also got a new idea which is really exciting to me!



3. Read 100 books.

This didn't happen either. I think I read 10. Yeah....so bad. I bought loads of books this year, so I'm planning to do A LOT of reading!

4. Land an agent! :D (Maybe the agent I mentioned above, yeah? ;) )

The agent I mentioned in my last post was an agent who first requested CMRH back in December 2009. I still have yet to submit anything to her. And yeah, this did not happen either. BOO!

5. Meet a nice boy and fall madly deeply in love. Yeah, because I cannot be in love with love and NOT wish for a boyfriend :P

THIS HAPPENED! YAYAYAY!

Though, things are a bit shaky at the moment, but I hope things fix themselves for the new year!


2.5 done is great! That' 50% which is really good for me considering I hardly reached my NYR the years before.







Anyway, now here are the 2011 highlights:

• I turned 20
• I finally finished a first draft of something!
• I started my junior year at DePaul (though technically sophomore since I took 3 quarters off) and 3 quarters is a year 
• At DePaul, I had a new major - Environmental Studies instead of Creative Writing. Though, I still had CW as a minor
• I quit DePaul
• I went to a psychiatric hospital after a suicide attempt and learned so much about myself
• I asked a guy out for the first time :D
• I met the love of my life!
• I had more indecisiveness with what to work on writing-wise lol
• I traveled long-distance alone for the first time
• I got engaged! (though not sure at the moment if it's still on :( )
• I met some great new friends
• Bought lots of books!
• Lost loads of weight and I'm pretty sure I'm back to my old weight in HS lol
• On my way to conquering my depression for good!

 And yeah, that's all I can think of for this year. There's probably more, but whatever lol. A little bit more eventful than last year at least! :D

So my NYR for 2012!

1. Gain 5 pounds. I bought lots of pants that are too loose now lol

2. Polish CMRH and/or another novel or two!

3. Query CMRH or a different novel

4. Land an agent!

5. Conquer my depression FOR GOOD!

6. Read 50 books.

Yeah, I've got 6 this year lol. Though, 2-4 can count as 1 lol so I have 4 :P

Here's to hoping I can reach all my NYR this year! I hope you all have a great 2012!! :D

Being happy with your writing

So every writer's got their own writing style.

I've always been not-so-happy with mine. Simple and minimalistic and just plain. I didn't like it at all.

I hate admitting this sometimes, but...I don't have the strongest vocabulary. It's definitely not at the college level. I'm not very proud of that at all. I'd read published and unpublished works of fiction and tend to feel so negative about my writing.

I'll say things like... "I wish I had prose like this." "I wish I could describe this well." "Why can't I write like this?" "Why does my writing suck?"

It's hard to get out of that train of thought sometimes. And then I'll talk to some writer friends and they'll tell me that simple and minimalistic is perfectly fine. Everyone is different. Yet I'll still go back to thinking my writing is not stellar at all.

So how does one feel comfortable in their "writer shoes"?

Here are the responses I've received from fellow writers:

• Try to avoid comparing your writing to others. Everyone's got their own style, and it's your very own "voice" that sets you apart from other writers.
• Focus on positive beta comments (if you've ever had something beta-read before). If not, try posting a snippet of your novel in a writing forum where other writers can comment on it.
• Don't write to trends. Write what YOU want to write.
• A Publishers Marketplace subscription may not be helpful if you know  you will freak out seeing what's selling
• Take a break and then new ideas will pop up.
• Shut yourself off of any distractions, shut off your fear, and your doubts will work themselves out.
• Ask yourself why you write. Most often than not, it's because you LOVE it. Find that passion deep inside when you're in doubt, and let the words flow.

So there you have it. I hope any of you can use something on this list to help you when you're in doubt!

If you have any suggestions to add to the list, please add it in your comment and I'll add it to this list!

When you really want your hard work to pay off

I really want my hard work to pay off. I've been doing so much research for The Perfect Crime lately. So much important research that I feel like really makes the story come even more alive.

And I've gotten a couple signs that this was the novel I am meant to work on. That includes a Simpsons episode I watched called The Book Job. It was about Homer, Bart, and others writing a YA novel hoping to get it published. Well, the phrase, "the perfect crime" was in it and that's my title! And then there was a song that popped up on shuffle when I asked the cosmos for a sign on what on. "Damn Girl" by The All-American rejects. The lyrics, "all you need is an alibi" and "you stole my heart" were in it, and those are major components to TPC.

But yeah. I really, really, really want this novel to work out. I'm thinking it'll even be the first novel I query.

It's also a regular YA contemporary rather than the YA romance I'm used to writing, and it's a nice change.

I haven't felt this strongly about a book ever. I'm so, so excited. I will keep striving to finish writing the first draft and second draft and subsequent drafts until I get it polished enough for agents' eyes. And boy am I excited to finally query! I feel like I'm so behind my fellow writer friends lol.

I hope my dreams come true!

Writing by hand

I attempted to write my latest novel, my newest idea, The Perfect Crime, by hand. I wrote maybe 6K worth of words (Though, 3.6K was words I actually kept - I counted words by hand) before I finally decided that writing by hand wasn't for me. I was afraid my hand would cramp up too badly. It started to tighten the other day and yesterday too.

The cool thing that I found out is that I write ~2x slower by hand than I do on the computer at my best time. I can write 500 words in 15 minutes as a best on the computer. And 550 words in 30 minutes as my best by hand.

And I didn't consider writing by hand a waste of time if I was slower. I was more able to think about what I wanted to write instead of flashing through that 500 words in 15 minutes with hardly thinking.  That helped me focus better.

But yeah, my main motivation for writing by hand was that I knew I expanded in second drafts, so I figured I'd expand as I typed up my handwritten words. And this actually worked, too, because I started typing up the first 700 words I wrote by hand that turned into 1200 words. Not bad! 

I'll miss writing by hand though because the internet isn't a distraction! LOL

So yes, I'm back to writing on the computer, which might be better anyway since I'm striving to finish TPC by the end of December (but most likely it'll be mid-January). That's 4K/day for the rest of the 11 days to hit 50K, so here's to hoping I make it to my goal! :D

Ressurecting this blog

Hey guys!

So I'm resurrecting my blog. I think I'm going to be posting about my journey to publication. Creative Blossoms seems to be a great blog name for the process of growing as a writer. So I'll try to post regularly. I won't have a blog schedule, and will, instead, write about whatever comes to mind.

So yes!

I'M BACK!!!

I love plot breakthroughs!

I LOVE a good breakthrough whenever I'm blocked from writing. Whether the block is from laziness, a laziness, a lack of motivation/inspiration, something feeling off in the writing and my inability to figure out what's wrong yet, not knowing what happens next, and so on; breakthroughs are AWESOME.

And just having a breakthrough with Call Me Robin Hood moments ago finally gave me a blog idea after nearly 2 months off. I can't believe it's been nearly 2 months since I last finished CMRH's first draft. And revising has proved very difficult since my last blog post. Although I dropped the idea of revising within 13 days, and instead, I'm trying to finish the second draft by the end of September.

The problem was that within the last month or so, I'd been completely stuck with my Act 1, which I had to restructure and cut a lot of scenes and add extra ones. The first 4 chapters were fine, but after that, I had no direction with what the extra scenes would be.

So in that last month, I'd been going back between CMRH and other WIPs since then -To Find Love, and, as of 2 weeks ago, a SNI called Tattoo Love. (Tattoo Love I'm really excited about, by the way. I'll talk about it a different blog post. The way I got the idea was pretty cool, I think.) But the only thing I'd do on CMRH was tweak various parts. I did nothing major to it.

It was only until recently (last week) that I decided to buckle down and try to figure out what was the deal with CMRH. I realized my main problem was that after I was missing scenes about the actual premise (matchmaking Robin Hood). How I didn't realize that sooner, I'll never know. So last week, I brainstormed some ideas for scenes that had to deal with my MC's matchmaking Robin Hood idea. But then I didn't do anything with it. Until last Friday when I started to hand-write an outline for Chapter 1 and hardly got past those 4 good chapters (I ended it at Chapter 5). And only today did I try to finally figure out the entire Act 1.

So after some cutting/pasting some scenes around and expanding my outline which I'd typed up, I finally figured out the logical order of events in Act 1! And now I finally, finally, can continue revising again!

I'm so freaking excited. CMRH is my baby :D And this, by far, is my best plot breakthrough I ever got based on how long it took hahaha

Ahh that story was longer than I'd expected, but I'll take the focus to my blog readers now!

Have any of you had a major plot breakthrough?

You don't have to go into as much detail as I did about it though. I swear, anyone who gets me talking about my novels better watch out because I can ramble on and on haha

So yeah, I'll talk about Tattoo Love probably on Friday. I think I'll try to blog at least 2x a week.

Tomorrow I start school! Eek. I actually switched my major from Creative Writing to Environmental Studies, which is now my fallback if the writing doesn't work out.

Sorry for the tangent, I swear I should rename my blog back to Ramblings of a Writer, which the title was before lol

Ta ta for now!

Sorry I haven't been around...but I've got an announcement!

All right. I have no excuse for avoiding my blog. I wasn't always busy.

BUT something awesome happened 4 days ago. I know I announced it on Facebook, Twitter, and my writing forums, but I figured I needed to do an announcement on my blog to really seal the deal. :D

I FINISHED CALL ME ROBIN HOOD!!!

Last time I finished a novel was Dec. 22, 2009. That was also CMRH, but it was an old version with a bad plot. V2 has the same matchmaking-Robin Hood premise BUT it's got a new plot. I've said that before, but I figured to say it again in case you missed it.

And I was super excited to finish it! I did a lot of jumping and grinning and fist-pumping lol. And that's basically because I had serious trouble the last year and a half from lack of motivation, constant WIP-changing and wanting to give up again and again. But ever since Nov. '10, I've been a single-WIP gal. That was Love Square for a couple months, and then I switched to CMRH on Feb. 10  (I know this because of my Liquid Story Binder writing program). I actually did switch back to LS for a month because CMRH was a bit difficult to write - I felt like since my male MC is kinda a male version of me, the authentic male voice was sounding girly (like me, obviously). But I came back to CMRH, almost changed novels again, but stuck through one of my fave plots I've ever come up with. And yeah! After a lot of blood, sweat, and tears, I've finally finished the first draft from start to finish! :D


The blurb/query is on the Call Me Robin Hood tab if you want to check it out.

I'm currently trying to revise by August 1. That's 13 days away. So I'm afraid I have to disappear from blogging yet again. :( But I will be back with a teaser from it! I've also got a couple ideas for future blog topics, so I'll be around at least twice a week.

So yeah!

All I have to say :D

I hope you all had a great day!

"Why can't I finish a damn novel?!" A Theory

The I-Start-Things-But-Never-Finish-Them Syndrome

Symptoms:

• Moving from one novel to another quickly
• Making up silly excuses to avoid accomplishing it
• Desire to give up
• Feeling like nothing good will come out of finishing it anyway
• Feeling like the magic is gone
• And others

Probable Causes:

• You have a Shiny New Idea
• Exhaustion of creative energy
• Loss of passion/desire/interest/patience/drive
• Distractions keeping you away from working on it
• Lack of routine/organization
• And others

Suggested Remedies:

• Speed writing: If you're letting the words flow without stopping every day (but in manageable chunks so you won't exhaust yourself), sooner or later, you'll finish an entire novel. You can use things like Write or Die or the #wordmongering hashtag on Twitter)
• Locking away SNIs/other WIPs in the back of your mind to focus on a single WIP. BUT if you're really struggling, working on a scene or two of the SNI to quiet down your needs should do the trick (Make sure it's ONLY a scene or two!)
• Rewarding yourself when you reach your word count/time goal or word count in general, when you finish a chapter, and so on
• Getting a writing buddy to urge you on and exchange small chunks of your novel with - that can be very motivating.
• Setting up a routine that helps get you in the mood to write, maybe always at a certain time with a cup of coffee or always wearing a favorite pair of pjs even. 
• Sometimes, not always, but sometimes if you're in a rut, it can help to just go back over what you've written, especially parts that you really enjoy so that you become engaged in the story again and feel motivated to press on
• Self imposed deadlines
• Making lists like of little things you want to work on (character development or making some scene more visual) and then as you finish them you can check them off and see the red checks grow
• Close the browser on your computer when you write - major distraction. 
• Taking a break to read a book helps get you back in the mood to write again

Thanks to Angie and Erin for a bunch of the remedies!