Valor Publishing Group LLC Opens its Doors.

I am excited to announce that Valor Publishing has opened its doors. After months of work and planning Candace Salima has announced that Valor is open and accepting submissions. I am so excited! Candace has very innovative ideas and I believe that she will take this company far. She has allready signed Mark Shurtlef, and Karen E. Hoover. Check it out here.

When God closes a door. . . revisited.

I am at the end of my writing journey for Emergence. I sent my baby out to readers and worked diligently on every editing aspect I could do on my own. I pulled my hair at the whole grammar thing even though I am ten times better than I was five years ago. I was thrilled with some amazing comments and suffered through a really emotionally squashing crit. But I worked and fixed and found and replaced and cut thousands of words only to replace them with new words.

Then I sent my baby off to the big wide world out there.

I was rejected, and for a few days that REJECTION was all I saw in that email. I cried and said I was going to quit, and dealt with the emotions of that rejection. Then when things calmed down and I decided that maybe I wasnt really going to quit and re-read the rejection letter. The letter offered a second chance based on changes that they wanted me to make.

Of course I am going to make those changes,I want to be a writer, I want to touch someone with what I write. I have a mesage and its a good one.

In the quiet of a early Sunday morning I realized that this was exactly where I wanted to be. I have wanted to work with this editor like an addict wants a fix. I admire this person so much and have never been able to aford an edit on my own now they are offering it to me out of the graciousness of thier heart. This is what I wanted, and actually asked for the last time I went to contemplate and serve at the temple. That I be sent in the direction I needed to go with my writing. My prayer although I initially recieved it the wrong way was answered in the way I needed it not the way I wanted.

So . . . When God closes a door. . . he opens a window.

Comparison and disapointed

I know from drought to flood, I can't get my voice to cooperate.

After I finish writing. I usually take a few days weeks to read some books this time is no diferent. I didn't, however, expect the disapointment I recieved at about one last night.

I picked up two "romances" for reading enjoyment at the library.

One was a campy paranormal romance which I loved and literally laughed through the whole book. I can't wait to find the sequel and read it too. The characters were great, the setting unique, and the plot really good. I would read lines from the book to my teenage daughter and we would laugh together. I finished that book with a sense of satisfaction and went happily on my way.

The second one I picked up and read just yesterday, I loved the begining of the book although there were parts that were so predictable. I was actually asking myself why I hadn't read something of this authors before, they were that good. I loved how the author played on the stereotypes and made it work I also liked that the narrator talked to me as a reader intermittently. I was sucked into the book and stayed up after DH went to bed (A BIG NO NO IN MY HOUSE) to finish it. Then I get to the end and the two characters in the book who have had all this romantic tension and SHOULD get together in the end don't. I sat there in my kitchen at the table with a blank stare and felt SO BETRAYED! It felt bitter on my tongue and I have vowed never to read this author again because the betrayal was so huge in my eyes. I laid in bed for nearly an hour after that and wondered about the end of this book. I am sorely disapointed.

Now granted there are those of you who will probably pick this book up and love it. Either the story WITH the ending will grab you, or you will love it solely because of who wrote it.

I am begining to think about it this morning and I am realizing a few things.

First, is that this book was marketed wrong, if this is literary fiction/chic lit it was not billed that way. The jacket blurb does not tell you this is not a romance, it lied to me and I feel that sting.

Second, this author in my opinion made certain plot promises at the begining of the book. The author didn't fulfill them and the reader, ME, is feeling riped off. So much so that I will not read anything they write without a million glowing reports of the book.

I've learned this the hard way this year. You make your reader plot promises in that first chapter and you stick to them. Even if you as a writer half to decide what those plot promises are, write them down, and hang them above your desk so you see them everyday. The reader does not like to feel ripped off, or go to bed and hate what they just read.

You have a message to tell your readers? Great, decide what it is and stick with it. Your tale has a moral? Make sure you stay consistent with it. Granted characters have a mind of their own. I know, mine do too. Infact, that is why I am writing a nine book series instead of two books like I origonally planned. But there is this thing called revising and editing to reign in what your characters have done. If your characters change the book completely? Fine go back and change that plot promise in the begining so your not turning you reader on thier ear at the end.

As a writer you owe it to your reader to not leave a bitter taste in thier mouths as they close that back cover.

Writing Progress

I promised you I would blog three times a week, and I dropped the ball, but it's for a good reason I assure you. Last week was preparation for the paegent the time was full of meetings and practices. I also taught two writing classes at the local library. One for 3-10 year-olds and one for 10 +. This week I finished my three chapters for Kirk Shaw for the Grand Prize three chapter review and sent it and a summary of the book to him. I also submitted my MS Emergence to Valor Publishing Group with all of the things I needed to send with it.

So no, I didn't fall off the edge of the earth and I am still here treading water like usual. But it's all good.

I am so proud. . .

This is my daughter Laurel. She competed in the Miss Castle Dale Pageant and was crowned Jr. Miss Castle Dale this evening. She is an amazing young woman. She is talented and loving. I am amazed at her life, loves, friends, talents and charity.

The very serious (and funny) case for readers.

As I am finishing up my MS for submission I have sent it out to many readers. I have had many serious line and content editors. With each edit I have made the changes that people suggest and then wait for another one to come back.

Well,I am working on that last edit and had to laugh. This Is what I wrote:

Antony’s black hair slapped against the back of his neck as he ran. It still smelled of chlorine, he never showered in between his legs of exercise. He had only paused a moment as he pulled his pants and shoes on then took off from the community Olympic sized pool into the cool air. Before his laps at the pool, he rode his bike for 10 miles.

Okay, after many edits I missed something serious. Look again. :)

Antony’s black hair slapped against the back of his neck as he ran. It still smelled of chlorine, he never showered in between his legs of exercise. He had only paused a moment as he pulled his pants and shoes on then took off from the community Olympic sized pool into the cool air. Before his laps at the pool, he rode his bike for 10 miles.

It's a good thing that someone saw it. I'm glad that THAT didnt go to the editors. Who knew?

Readers are your best friend in thie business, and I am thankful for all of them.

How I Became a Writer Part: 4

Okay, I was diverted a little but such is life.

So when I left off I was talking about my work becoming better. So fast forward a few years to last year. After a few drafts of that MS and a few submissions I recieved a really great personalized rejection from Jodi Meadows from what is now the Rappaport Agency. She asked some questions that really made me think.

After talking about the rejection and my MS with my friend She suggested that I take the story back about five years and answer the questions that my readers wer seeming to ask all the time.

This was not an easy decision. Even if I knew that it was the right decision to make I was literally sick to my stomach. I had written hundreds of thousands of words and edited and revised this piece of work untill my eyes crossed. To take it back and change it to deepen the character and answer questions it meant that Antony/Nobles world was turned completely upside down. Noble was no longer an agent, and that changed evrything!

After a few weeks of worry and plotting on my and my friends part I sat down and wrote out the first chapter and Emergence was born. It was so diferent I was amazed. It was so good my readers were begging for more. With the fire lit under my butt I cranked out the rough draft in about 4-5 months. Then began to send it out to readers and revise.

An interesting thing happened in the process of writing this draft. I gave Antony a first wife and his second wife walked out of my head in protest. She didn't come back for weeks.

Fast forward to a few months ago, the adversary has been working on me and trying to discourage me from ever completing the MS and from being a writer at all. At the same time I have heard from all sorts of people that the ability to write is a God given talent. Knowing this I have told the Lord that If I am to further and hone this craft I needed his help.

That's when things started to happen, like getting asked for the full MS and winning the three chapter review. Having the awesome reaction from the class about my book blurb. I will go to the library and pick up a book and while reading it I will have inspiration as to how to better my book. I know this is an answer to my request.

So now I sit, waiting for that LAST EDIT before I send the complete MS to the #1 publisher on my list. As soon as the edit is finished I will send it to the publisher.

I guess that's it for now.