Author: Maya

My oldest turns 12 today. Which means I only have one more year reprieve until he hits the teenage years. :faint:

He’s so funny though, and as of yet, hasn’t turned into a frothing at the mouth, head rotating, mouthy, obnoxious junior high kiddo. Can you tell Im not overly fond of the junior high years? So anyway, the other day, on the way home from picking the kids up from school, oldest child is telling me about his day and how some girl tried to get another girl in trouble by lying about something she did blah blah and he went on to say that he HATES the girl. (The one who tried to get the other one in trouble) So I say why? He gets this repulsed look on his face.

“She’s a girly girl.” (as if that explains the mysteries of the universe)

My six year old girl pipes up from the back seat.

“I HATE girly girls!” :purplelaugh::hysterical:

So I look in the rearview mirror and ask, “WHy do YOU hate girly girls?”

She scowls and says, “Because they won’t do really cool stuff like pick up bugs or frogs or lizards.”

I probably shouldn’t mention at this point that my middle child, my 8 year old son, wouldn’t touch a bug, lizard or frog to save his LIFE. :purplelaugh:

Over at Writeminded, we’re kicking off the 12 Days of Christmas with daily giveaways. Lots of books, gift certificates and yummy, fattening stuff.

Also, the free short story follow up to Colters’ Woman is now available for download on my website. It’s in PDF format. Just click over to download.

The trailer for my January historical adventure release, Her Majesty, My Love is now up at my Sharon Long site. Go have a look. It’s gorgeous!

Yeah, if you look at the time stamp, you’ll see I’m up at two freaking o’clock in the morning. Blogging. :beam: For those who know me, well, you know I like my sleep. I have to have my sleep. I am not a nice person when I don’t get at least 8 hours. :passedout: Since I have to get up at 6, uhm that’s in about 4 hours, to get the kids ready for school, we can safely say, 8 hours ain’t happening tonight, er uh this morning that is.

So why am I up at this ungodly hour of the morning? One word. Deadline. :fainting:

Now, also, for those who know me, you know I am an anal freak about never being late. It’s one of my buttons. If I have to be somewhere at nine, you can bet your ass I’ll be there no later than 8:30. I turned in my last book over two months AHEAD of deadline. I function much better when I’m not worried about being late.

So uhm, my deadline is Friday. And this isn’t a normal situation. Extenuating circumstances led to this cluster fuck. I can only hope it doesn’t happen again because I won’t survive it. I AM finished. Well, I should ammend that. It’s written. Finished is such a subjective term. I’ve emailed it to Amy, who I’ve harassed into giving me a one day turn around so that I can email it to my agent no later than Thursday. Because I have to be in Houston on Friday. How’s that for timing. Have to be out of town on the last day of my deadline. :huh:

Personally I think it’s the worst piece of shit ever. But then in my current state of mind, it wouldn’t matter WHAT I was writing, it would still be SHIT. So clearly, I have no perspective. It’s Amy’s job to tell me if it really is shit. And believe me, she’ll tell me. We’re hurtful to each other that way :lol2:

I do so love my Samhain editor. She’s been keeping me company into the wee hours of this morning while I slowly LOSE MY MIND. No, this project isn’t for her. It’s for my Berkley editor, which makes her willingness to poke fun at me at 1am even more endearing. We’re SO going to tie one on at RT. :drunk:

So goodnight, Jess, and whoever else is unfortunate enough to be up at this obscene hour. I’ll be a raving bitch tomorrow, but at least I’ll be a bitch who finished her piece of shit proposal on time.

I’m giving away an ARC of Understood over at Writeminded today. Also be sure and tune in next week when we begin our 12 Days of Christmas giveaway :elephant:

Pressies are wrapped (what I have so far anyway) Christmas music is playing and now I’m just waiting on the cold front due in on Thursday :dunno:

Thanksgiving was fun. Spent it with my dad, stepmom, sister and brother in law and of course my new baby niece, Ella. I actually worked some over the holiday, but not as much as I should have. I actually didn’t open my computer for two of those days. I did most of my work on the trip up and back.

I’m down to the wire on my proposal that I need to turn in. But my problem was, I had a story, I had characters, and I had a plot, but I had no conflict. Thank goodness I had a eureka moment earlier today and so I’ve been furiously hacking my synopsis to bits and reworking it. I’ll be hiding in my writing cave this week. If I don’t come out by Friday, someone send somebody in after me. :beam:

(at least as they pertain to writing)

1. A loyal and supportive, not to mention very honest and harsh writing kick butter bestest friend. (say that five times fast)

2. An agent who loves my writing and believes in it.

3. My Samhain editor who gives me a lot of freedom to write what I love.

4. Selling to NY and an editor who loves my stories.

5. Other author buddies who provide an invaluable support/venting system.

6. 16 writing contracts in 2006.

7. Fans who write me the lovliest emails saying how much they enjoyed my stories.

It’s actually cold here today. Was even colder last night. A cold front moved through and we had hurricane force winds all freaking day yesterday. I love it when it gets chilly. Nothing better than curling up in my living room in front of the fire with a good book. Even better, add a Christmas tree. Which we will be getting the day after Thanksgiving. :whoo:

My middle child is home sick. Second day and I think he’s feeling marginally better this morning. Yesterday he just wanted hugs and snuggles and didn’t move off the couch. This is USUALLY the time of year when I come down with my mono/strep throat combination. However, I already went through that misery a month ago. I’m hoping that means I get to skip my annual Thanksgiving tradition of turkey and antibiotics.

And in work related stuff, I wrote four godawful pages to the synopsis for my proposal that’s uh due like in two weeks. I have a lot more to do on it, but once I get some of the details hammered out, I know I’ll feel better about the project. After I send off the proposal I’ve got to do a marathon writing session and get Undenied hammered out. It’s going to be a fun write. Understood was more angsty and emotional and Overheard was a bit more light hearted but still tinged with emotion (ok so I cannot write a book without lots of emotion lol) But Undenied is Wes’s story and he’s a laid back, fun kinda guy, so it’s going to be a nice change of pace. :woot:

I recently posted a comment about where the hell October had gone, but geesh, it’s already halfway through NOVEMBER for Pete’s sake and Thanksgiving is just around the corner. I’m gonna blink and it’s going to be Christmas, I swear.

Jaci usually does a Monday to do list and today I’m going to join the ranks because I have a shitload of crap to try and get done this week. It’s one of those overwhelming lists that might take the better part of this year to finish :kap:

1. Figure out my proposal
2. Finish up my free short story due to go up on website in December
3. Figure out my proposal
4. Flesh out the details for Undenied
5. START writing the proposal (provided 1 and 3 ever get accomplished)

Things that WERE going to go on the to do list that I managed to finish over the weekend. :sweating:

1. Galleys for Caught by Cupid print anthology (releasing Jan 23)
2. Edits on Understood (releasing Dec 19)
3. Galleys for Colters’ Woman print (releasing Jan 23)

Yeah, you know you want to be my friend this week.

I always thought that writing would get easier the more I did it. I was wrong. In the beginning, you’re full of newbie glow and bubble and every word you write is golden. G.O.L.D.E.N.

Writing is hard. I didn’t say I didn’t like it, just that it’s not easy. I used to could sit down and write without regard to WHAT I was writing. I just wrote and went back and fixed it later. Now I spend more time crafting each nuance of the scene, the paragraph, making sure each piece of dialogue is written to show the right inflection. It’s slowed me down a lot, but the trade off is I spend a lot less time editing the finished product. I’m not sure which is better, because each method has its own set of frustrations.

I also didn’t used to have “let down” when I finished a project. I’d literally finish one book one day and dive into the new one the next. These days when I finish a big project I usually spend one to two weeks in a post production funk. I think it’s because I expend a lot more mental energy in the writing process than I used to.

This week is week two of “the slump.” I started writing again today. Not what I NEED to be writing, but it’s writing nonetheless. I’m hoping by the end of the week I’ll be ready to begin “Undenied.”