Forget the New Year–Carpe Bibliotheca!
It never bodes well when you disrobe in the kitchen—while making breakfast—because there’s an ant in your pants. Yes, I literally had ant(s) in my pants. It was a fire ant, but the kind that hurts just enough to make you angry for about an hour, not one of the horrible ones. But really, it’s been that kind of week. That’s why this week’s blog post will be light, because of the [cue scary music] Holiday Convergence. I’m sure you’ve all experienced those times, when things come together in your life to make a perfect storm of high stress and low Read more…
Channeling My Inner Blue-Slapper and Making the Decision to Decide
I’m not counting on many Americans reading this post the day it goes live. Most of you are probably either lying in a dark corner in a food coma, still reeling from overeating, or jacked up on adrenaline from elbowing little old ladies out of the way to grab the last [insert most popular item of the 2015 holiday season that will be forgotten by January 4, 2016]. Yes, boys and girls, it’s Black Friday, according to the History Channel not the day retailers traditionally finally go into the black, but the day lamented by Philadelphia cops in the 1950s Read more…
Why Writers Are Like Old People, Especially During a First Draft
A while back, a friend shared a popular meme on Facebook that went something like this. You know you’re old when you’re constantly asking the following three questions: Where are my glasses? Why does my back hurt? Why am I so tired? I was reflecting on this recently, perhaps when <ahem> helping my husband find his glasses, and I had a realization. Writers are like old people. Let’s take the questions in reverse order. Why am I so tired? I wake up tired every day. I had contented myself with blaming our pack of dogs (or the cat–it’s always the cat) Read more…
Progress Report, and the Dangers of a Dingbat Dog
Hello, happy readers! Or should I say, antsy readers? (Not to be confused with anty readers; if one tenth of the stupid little ants in our house owned mini ereaders and downloaded my books, Sydney would rocket to the top of the ‘Zon charts.) Well, good news—today I hit the 70,000 word mark on the rough draft of the fifth Sydney Brennan book. I’m anticipating 100,000 words, so while I’m not in the home stretch yet, with one of those satellite level views, I can at least see the end in sight (even if my book is roundish like our Read more…
Just When You Think You Have It All Figured Out (In Life and In Writing)
A couple of weeks ago, I was driving toward downtown Hilo, glancing at Hilo Bay. After checking the traffic, I merged automatically into the right lane as I’ve done during months (years?) of road work. Only to feel like a doofus. There was no merge. Holy crap! The road suddenly felt so expansive, minus the cones and construction detritus in the middle two lanes, that I felt like meandering from lane to lane just because I could. I didn’t, because—most of the time—I’m not actually a doofus. On a slightly grander scale, two weeks ago we were a one-dog, one-cat household. Now Read more…
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