Roll with it

Well, I'm finished Part Three of London Steam, my vampire / artificial heart / daughter of a demon menage story...

Pretty awesome. And it's already been contracted by Torquere Press, which is More Awesome.

I have a cowboy story, Pistols & Guns, out right now. Ripped is still out - I begin to think that project folded and vanished into nothingness. The story's been out for over a year now and I haven't heard a word... My middle-aged lesbian story is out... and that's it at the moment.

I may or may not write a Tristan & Isolde based BDSM story; I have one that's about halfway done, but I'm not really happy with it. I think I'd have to scrap what I've written and start over. The due date for that one is May 1st, so I still have time... ish.

And I may submit stories for both Sex Objects (due July 1st) and Delilah's Highlanders & Knights call... (due June 1st)...

I've also finished concept edits for my fantasy-romance novel, cut the word count down dramatically, and have it ready for pitching. More on that later.

I need to finish writing my vampire urban supernatural story - I pretty much ended the damn thing right after the climax (story climax, not sex climax!) without having any of the falling action, sum-up stuff that usually makes up the end of a romance novel.

And then there's what I want to be doing now... which is the coming of age, m/m story, Roll, that's somewhat loosely based on a short story that I never finished. The original short was about two lovers, one of the men firmly in the closet, especially with his family, who took his boyfriend out to the family farm on a day when no one else was supposed to be there (because it was the day before his brother's wedding, and really, everyone had something better to be doing...) and ends up getting caught... that scene is still going to be in the novel, but when I sat down to map out the characters, they both had more to tell me. And in the end, I decided to let them. Which means I have a novel length project in front of me....

Beau with his uptight, highly religious family, and Vin with his over-protective grandparents and the search for his birth-father...

So, I'm working on that. My outline gives me the thought that this'll be about a 50,000 - 75,000 word novel... which means if I write about 2,500 - 3,000 words a week, I should be ready for edits in September/October.

And I've still got my short-short project; we just passed 25,000 words yesterday... I think it's going well, and that should be complete by June. (Oh, and I could use some more prompts... 5 words, noun, verb, adjective, and two random...)

Busy writer is busy. I've already written 3,200 words on Roll this week, in addition to writing 1,800 words yesterday on my short-short (which I may steal, write another 2,000 words on, and turn in as my short for Sex Objects... we'll see....)

Snippet

Seriously, I have a problem.

I've mentioned, I'm sure, that Elizabeth L. Brooks (the fabulous editor of He Loves me for my Brainsss!) and I are working on a collection of short-short stories.

When we originally discussed the idea, we were thinking of maybe 40 stories in the sub 1,000 word length.

(You, over there in the third row? I hear you laughing. Shut up. Seriously. Shut it.)

Thus far, I've written nine stories for the project.

They are:

After the Party - 1,016
Two Tents* - 933
Mouse Games* - 1,355
Away Games - 370
Home Inspection - 1,064
On the Job Training - 1,679
Dinner Service* - 811
Steal Not a Moment - 1,466
Surrender - 1,108

The stories with * asterisks next to them mean that the story isn't really complete. At least with Two Tents, I've got another two parts of similar length to go before I consider the story complete. Dinner Service has another two parts, Drink Service and Kitchen Service, ditto on them being the same length. Ish. I really want to steal Home Inspection, write another 1,500 words or so, and submit it for a collection. Also, Surrender isn't quite done yet either. I dunno about that one, I think I need to go back and fix some of it.

Even though I've managed to cut down my writer's bloat a bit (did I mention that my first novel, which is currently in content edits) was over 190,000 words as a first draft? My second novel, which is currently being read/reviewed for publication, is only 80,000... ) I'm still fighting a LOT with the short-short.

That being said, I really like some of these stories a lot, and I think the exercise is good for me. I might not be the short-short queen or anything, but at least in the process of working on this collection, I will get better. And that's all anyone can ask, right?

Here's a sample from On the Job Training...

“I'm Noel,” she said. 

A thousand puns and jokes leapt immediately to mind, and he bit down on all of them. It was unlikely that he could make a fresh one, and no one ever appreciated those sorts of things anyway. “It's a pleasure to meet you.” That was safe enough.

Noel raised an eyebrow. “Very good. I admire your restraint. You said, earlier... it was 'mostly.' Now, adorable as my shoes are, I have to say that if you're after a cheap one-night stand, please go elsewhere. You seem interesting enough, and I'm certainly not adverse, but I have strict requirements, and I'd rather you not waste your money if you're not qualified for the position.”

“Lucid's not cheap,” Danny chipped in from over his shoulder. “So it would be an expensive one night stand.”

“Not helping me here, bro,” Chandler muttered.

Noel laughed. It wasn't a titter, a giggle, or one of those fake chortles that he was used to hearing from women in bars. It was an absolutely delighted guffaw, full on belly-laugh that shook her whole body in delightful ways and was infectious. He couldn't help answering it. He blushed, embarrassed, felt more embarrassed, having blushed, and still couldn't help laughing. 

“Oh, that was wonderful,” she said, blotting carefully at the corners of her eyes with a napkin, leaving small red smudges behind. “What do you think, Danny? Is he worthy?”

Oh, god. He finished the rest of his beer.

“He drinks good beer,” Danny said, “even when his friends aren't here, so he actually likes it. He's not just showing off his hefty paycheck or his fancy palate. He plays darts a few times a month. In fact, I was expecting his crew in tonight. Responsible, too. I've never had to take his keys. And he remembers to tip.”

Chandler stared at the bartender. Really? He'd noticed that much? Suddenly Chandler felt about eight years old, being scolded for forgetting to write a thank you note, or for licking the butter knife, or any of the dozens of faux pas he'd committed in front of his grandmother. He felt the urge, however briefly, to just say never mind, pay for his beer and leave. 

If he did that, though, it was doubtful he'd ever be back. Not after having such a personal witness. Oh, well. He took a deep breath, met her cool, curious gaze. If he was going down, it'd be spectacular, and in flames.

Marscon 2013

This weekend upcoming is the annual Marscon science fiction/fantasy convention.

If you've never been to a sci-fi convention, I can't really recommend them highly enough. If you're a sci-fi geek, of course, and if the idea of being stuck in an elevator with a Klingon doesn't bother you. Sci-fi geeks run the gamut of weirdos. (Altho, to be perfectly honest, I only know a few geeks who are actually Sheldon levels of intolerable assholes.) But a sci-fi con is a great excuse to let your geek flag fly...

I usually go for the music - as you all know, I'm a huge fan of filking and supernatural folk music. There will be several performers there - Jonah Knight, Mikey Mason, Poison Dwarf, the Blithering Humdingers... and the writing workshops. This year, my editor Kristina Wright, and my fellow writer and best friend Elizabeth Brooks will be sitting erotica panels... so that should be fun!

The husband brought home print-outs of the schedule yesterday. Three copies.

He gave one copy to me, one to the kiddo, and kept one. Over the week, we're going to look at the schedule (there's almost 30 damn pages!!) and figure out what we want to do, what we can do, and what we will do. Having to juggle the kiddo back and forth, since she really can't go to a writing panel for writing about alien sex... (No, really! There's a panel for that!! And yes, I'm planning to go.)

Marscon has the huge benefit of 1) assuming that geeks are also old 2) and that they've actually managed to carry on conversations and relationships long enough that 3) they've had babies. 4) those babies are likely also geeks

There's a HUGE amount of family friendly programming and stuff specifically aimed at the younger geeks in the crowd.

The husband is taking Friday off so that we can leave as soon as the kiddo gets home from school (driving up to the peninsula can be horridly time-consuming) and the kid's got Monday off for MLK-day. So I might not get a lot of work done.

That being said, this whole sitting down in front of my computer for several hours with the stated agenda of Getting Shit Done seems to be remarkably more productive than I might have imagined.

Captive of My Desires, Johanna Lindsey cover
Artist: Alan Ayers

Yesterday I wrote almost 2,000 words.

It's been quite a while since I've been that productive. I wasn't tracking my word count very carefully last year, but I don't think I've had a day like that in a while. I wrote 1,200 words on my steampunk-vampire story, took a break, then came back upstairs and wrote about 600 words on Full Frontal Neighbor.

While making dinner, I thought about how to move the story along, and I head-worked a pretty good conversation between my main character and her best friend... much like me and my best friend, they're both in the novel business, but Claire, the best friend, is an editor and publisher. Mallory, the main character, is an artist. She's the one who paints the cover art...

And I was so determined not to forget the line that after dinner, I went back upstairs and wrote another 400 words or so, just so I could get to that conversation.

Here, enjoy a small snippet...

“Well, I have three covers. How’s your time? Can you do three in a month?”

“I have a couple in the drawer, that I painted just for funsies. Maybe one of those would fit. Otherwise, I got time for two. I’m still knee deep in the moving-in process. Stupid movers lost half my stuff and I’m just now getting it back.”

“You said. Which reminds me, your ex was poking about. Asked the new girl where you were living. She didn’t know, so she didn’t tell him. That guy just does not take no for an answer.”

“Tell me about it,” I grumbled. “I had to move back east to get away from him.” That wasn’t entirely true, but I wasn’t above blaming David for just about everything. It was one of my less attractive traits, but at the moment, I wasn’t worried about it. Claire hated him almost as much as I did. Neighbor boy stretched magnificently, and I stood there, silent in the darkness, watching him in all his masculine glory. There was a delicate, not quite unpleasant, ache between my legs. At least David had been good for one thing.

“… and I’ve got one collection of short stories about shape-changers,” Claire said. I drew my attention back to the conversation.

“Werewolves?” Great. I hated painting werewolves. Readers all had their own ideas of what lycanthropes should be, and inevitably, anything I painted would be all wrong for two-thirds of them.

“No, just shape-changers. Some of them turn into cats, or foxes. I think one of the stories has a guy who turns into a weasel.”

“All men turn into weasels, eventually.”

--Full Frontal Neighbor

He Loves me...

So, you can get your e-copy of He Loves me for My Brainsss from Torquere...

Thought I'd give you a little sample today...

“Wish you didn’t have to go,” Avesy said, drawing a teasing line down his chest, finger tracing along the waistband of his trousers. Korin forced a half-smile, heart aching.

“I wish you wouldn’t talk about it,” Korin answered. He snatched at the teasing hand, jerked Avesy’s arm down, placed his palm firmly against Korin’s straining erection, ground his hips against his lover’s fingers. He groaned at the touch, then roughly pushed his lover onto his back. Korin tore the buttons free in his eagerness to get his pants off, much too eager, he was going to cream his pants right there if he didn’t get what he wanted, what he needed. There was nothing but hot desire in Avesy’s eyes and Korin let himself sink into those eyes, sink in and drown there, not looking away.

He’d tasted Avesy’s lips a hundred times and more, but tonight, this one night, was sweeter and more bitter than any flavor he could ever imagine. The last time, the very last. And even having memorized every line of his face, every soft nuzzle of his mouth, Korin was startled all over again at how intoxicating those sweet kisses were. How full and lush his mouth was, how heavy his breath, and how Korin’s entire body turned to fire with the simple touch. Like wine. 

Well, I had to move my work hours around immediately, since I discovered that on those days I need to take the husband to work, I don't get back to the house until almost 8:30. So... guess I'll start at 9am. No worries.

I did do some writing on the 1st, even though technically I was still on vacation. I decided to work on my story for a Valentine's Anthology. I was specifically asked to submit, if I could, and I admit that that's flattering.

I'm running a Shadowrun paper and dice game at the moment, and cyberpunk (and cyber sex!) are on my mind recently. What would it be like, to be able to jack into your partner's head, feel what they're feeling? Sometimes it could be really amazing, and sometimes, not so much. I'm exploring that, with the help of two characters, Adria Benn-Parker, a character who's been hanging about in my head for a while and needed something to do, and a new fellow who just showed up recently, Cyberius Jann. We'll see how that goes. It's a pretty tight deadline, so we'll see if I can get something put together by mid-month.

Hey, my first ultra-short story is due to my partner on the 9th (that's going to be the established pattern for the time being, we'll exchange our shorts on Wednesday...) So, I could use some prompts, please. One noun, one verb, one adjective, and two random words of your choice. Please, help a writer out, here?

Looking at my Progress

(Just as a note, there's still a bit more time to qualify for the absolute TON of smutty prizes for the Advent Calendar. Winner announced tomorrow.)

Last year, I thought it couldn't get any better... that 2011 was the best year of my life.

It's really nice to be proven wrong sometimes.

Now, admittedly, I went about everything upside down and backwards, barely accomplished a thing that I'd set out to do for myself in 2012... and yet, still... fan-freaking-tastic!

I wrote Blister Effect and saw it published. From my to-do list from the beginning of the year, that's all I said I was going to do that got done.

However, I also:

• wrote and published 8 short stories (two of which are in the 10,000 word range...)
• submitted 5 more stories that were either rejected or I haven't heard back yet... 
• Got asked to write something specific for a few different editors
• MOVED INTO A HOUSE
• edited about 8 chapters in my novel
• planned out and wrote the outline for a romance novel
• planned out and wrote an outline for a young adult novel
• saw my work featured in both Publisher's Weekly and Hustler Magazine
• wrote at least 85,000 words that I can conveniently count (somewhere along the way, I stopped tracking my word counts quite as religiously)
• wrote 53 blog entries
• wrote guest blog entries for a few well-known erotica writers
• worked out a rough idea for a project with fellow-writer and best friend, Elizabeth Brooks
• wrote a chapter in a collaborative novel project (more on that tomorrow, since it's finally "revealed" tonight)

So, while I accomplished almost nothing that I'd intended, I did a lot of good work on other stuff, and I am quite pleased.

2012 has been a good year.

Hippo Gnu Deer

I felt a bit alone this New Years, which is funny, since I think this year I was surrounded by more people on that occasion than usual. (Admittedly, I spent at least an hour and a half of it attempting - and failing - to keep an elderly Jewish woman from completely losing her shit, but hey...)

I felt alone because I was the only one mourning the passing of 2011.

2011 was the best year of my life, bar none.

I remember, way back in 5th grade, when the most interesting thing about me was that my name was longer than I was, I was introduced to a strange concept; People write books. Actual, real people. Someone I could talk to had written books. And other people read them. Hey, I was a kid. I suppose if you'd asked me before that, I would have acknowledged that people wrote books, but I hadn't really glommed onto the concept... that year, my teacher had us write short stories. Each student wrote a short story, mine was called Alona and the Blue Ribbon. After we wrote - and then revised - the story, we made bound copies by writing the words carefully on paper, sewing the pages together, and pasting them inside cloth-bound cardboard covers.

I still have mine. (It was bad. Terrible in fact. Fire drakes and fantasy, weirdly not-nice fairy godmothers... those fairies, always creep me out just a little bit... adventures and learning to deal with magic.)

From that day forward, I've wanted to be a writer.

And to some degree, more or less, I've been one. Or, at least, in the strictest sense. I was a writer in that I wrote. Along the way, I had one short story picked up by a Young Authors magazine (I was supposed to get 2 contributor copies, the magazine went out of business shortly after my acceptance, and if they ever printed my story, I never got a copy, and never saw it in print.) and one play picked up by an underground lesbian indie magazine. (I didn't submit that one, my professor did in college, and I suppose I should be grateful that she submitted it under my name instead of her own, since there's no way in hell I would have ever known about it otherwise. I don't count that, really, because that's not a piece of work I would have wanted to publish on my own.)

I don't actually have the "stack of rejection letters" that a lot of writers talk about having. Oh, I've received a few of them. About 10 years ago, I sent out a string of inquiry letters to agents, trying to sell my co-authored book, Circle in the Sand. I got back 3 "no thank yous" and never heard on the rest of them. Really, if I send out a SASE, is it that much trouble to say no thank you? I never kept any of them; or at least, I don't think I did. If I have any, I have no idea where they are, and that's about the same thing, right?

2011, things changed.

I finally found my groove for writing; and honestly, if I'd been paying attention, I'd have found it a lot earlier. I took Creative Writing in college twice which meant I wrote four short stories for critiques over the course of two semesters. I wrote two horror stories, one sci-fi and a modern-day romance about a woman who runs into her ex-husband while at a bar in the Bahamas. The one story that got any approval AT ALL from my classmates (now, don't mind me, but I will still say that 95% of my classmates were a bunch of snotty, stream of consciousness, look how stylistically I'm writing mom! assholes who were more interested in how obscure they could be rather than in learning how to tell a good STORY) was the one romance I wrote.

For decades now, I've been writing romance stories and trying to market them under a different genre. I've written horror romance, fantasy romance, and sci-fi romance. And when I was done writing, I'd go back and edit out all the sex, most of the romance, and end up with a bare-bones plot that just wasn't that interesting. What I'm most interested in is romance. My favorite sci-fi stories are the Liaden Universe novels, written by Steve Miller and Sharon Lee. (Start here and move forward.) I like Anne McCaffrey's Crystal Singer stuff best of all her work; if you look at them, they're very, very romantic. I read and re-read, obsessively, Clan of the Cave Bear, which was one of the first novels I was introduced to that had graphically described sex. I'm a huge Jane Austen fan (I even have a Jane Austen action figure that is pinned to the wall near my monitor).

So... eight short stories written and submitted in 2011. Three accepted.

34,356 words written that have been submitted (slightly more if the fact that I had to submit On the Fly twice!)

One novel written. 50,059 words.

And one semi-completed short story that will be done within the next 2 weeks, for a total of 91,415 words written this year. (That's not including the 20,000 words I've edited OUT of Marked Man... or blog posts. Or flash fiction, of which I have written a TON....)

2011 has been the best year of my life. Bar none.

Except that I want to raise the bar.

Yes, yes, eventually I'm getting to the point, hold onto your butts.

2012 (it's the end of the world as we know it....)

I would like to write over 150,000 words.
I would like to submit one short story per month (with the average word count of 4,000 words submitted, so if I submit a longer story, say 10,000 words, that counts as 2 stories...)
I would like to finish editing Marked Man and get it out the door.
I would like to plot out and begin re-writes for Circle in the Sand
I would like to finish Blood Sight and begin edits for that
I would like to start writing Hunter Moon (perhaps as my NaNoWriMo project)
I would like to start writing The Wormwood Trade

So... that's my broad plan for 2012...

More detailed plans:

Finish writing Blister Effect (a 10-15k short story) by Jan 15th, get to betas and get submitted by Jan 31st
Plot out and write Roll, a 3-5k short story and submit by Feb 29th
Plot out and write Alive and Kicking, a 3-5k short story and submit by March 15th
Plot out and write a tentacle sex story, 20 - 25k, due for submission March 25th 
Plot out and write Picking up the Pieces, a 15 - 20k short story, due for submission March 31st
Plot out and start writing Nocturnal Equations, a 10k short story, due April 30th

(I'm not committing myself to both of the March longer stories; I'm mulling them over and trying to decide which one I want to do more...)

Setting Myself Up

I might have bitten off more than I can chew.

To be honest with you, I didn't expect it to be the 29th of November and for me to have anywhere close to 50,000 words.

I rather expected that, much like I've done several times before, I'd start up the NaNoWriMo project with the best of intentions and sputter out somewhere around week 2. I've only once ever completed the project (and then I lost it all in a titanic hard drive failure), even though I've attempted it at least five times previous.

I don't know what happened this year. I have 2 more writing days in the month and I'm currently at 47,400. (I'm not done for today, mind you, just taking a break.)

However, I do have a project I want to do that's due to the editor by December 15th - a 3-6k short erotica with a fantasy theme. Which would probably be doable if (BIG if!) I wasn't going to Florida for a week, starting on Friday. However, I have the outline for Dragon Maiden written up and I'm going to take my laptop with me to Florida. Give my parents some grandchild time and I'll stay one or two mornings in the resort and get some work done. Ha. Ha ha ha. I foresee my writing like a fiend on the 11th and 12th when I get home and then badgering my beta to do a forced review. (Hi, Liz and Greg. You are warned!)

And this one? I'd love to do this project. I even have an idea. But to get it done in less than a month. Well, I might be able to. If I didn't have any other social engagements.

And I promised myself I'd finish Blood Sight, which is my NaNoWriMo project. I'm about 50K words in which will give me a technical "win" for the project, but I'm not actually done. I'm expecting the rough draft needs another 15,000 words to be actually finished.

And I have two old novel projects that I've told myself I will finish and get out the freaking door, A Marked Man is finished. I need to edit a few things in Chapters 9 - 11 and cut out about 50,000 words. (I even know where about 35,000 are going to come from!). Circle in the Sand - a VERY old project - could use some edits, have the sex scenes put back in, and then polished.

And I have the sequels/companion stories for Shadow of Kenfig to work on. I keep changing the titles, but at present they are Blister Effect (10k words estimated, 6k of which are done), Lunar Equations (10k estimated, outline drawn up), Umbral Theories (10k estimated, a one sentence hook written) and Wind Me Counterclockwise (20,000 words, outline drawn up). After Blister Effect, I think I may work on Wind Me Counterclockwise, since that premise has the most excitement for me, at the moment.

I also have a lesbian story in mind, Stealing Third, 3-5k words.

And a boylove story, Roll in the Hay, which will probably be about 10k.

And then there's the novel ideas: Blood Sight is the first of four stories that I have planned for that particular series; Blood Sight, Hunter Moon, Bad Intentions, and Grave Magic. (ish 80k words each!)

Also, I have a steampunk romance idea, The Wormwood Trade.

And that's not even including the fact that I haven't been looking for any more submission calls...

Busy writer is busy.

Just a Quickie

Yesterday I was reading through a marketplace for submissions; essentially a web site where you can go and see if any publishers are looking for a story like yours, or to get ideas for new stories to write. I've got a bit of a gap between now and when my current WIP is due. (October 1, to be precise, and I've already written more than half of it...)

I wasn't even really looking hard for "new work". Just kinda getting a feel for it. Window browsing.

I came across one CFS that looked good; specifically looking for new writers, not at all published, or only published since June 2010. As my story in Steamlust isn't coming out til October, I'm pretty much exactly meeting those requirements.

However, the story call was Very Open. Topic/genre/setting all open, except for a few basic no-nos (which she spelled out, because we are NEW! Hehe!) No underage sex, no animals (shape-shifters don't count), no dead things (ditto on vampires being excluded.)

I book-marked it and wandered away from keyboard to do the dishes.

Open-ended... hmmm. I have a mostly finished story about ghosts/zombies. (I haven't really decided what they are, except for being recently deceased...) Maybe I could do that... well, haven't I written a lot of supernatural stuff recently?

And then I got hit with the inspiration mallet.

Literally. Hit.

Felt like someone walked up to me and wopped me on the head. I staggered backwards.

I hadn't thought about that particular episode in a long, long time. And honestly, as far as sex went, it wasn't that wonderful. It was kinda scary and had the thrills of possibility of being caught, which added to my excitement, but as far as technique? No. I was back in college and sex back then was never more than wham! bam! Heh. I didn't know any better and neither did my myriad lovers.

However... could I take the situation... and have a run with it?

Yes, yes I could.

And I did.

Two thousand words yesterday.

Almost another two thousand today.

And it's already done.

I don't know that I've ever written that quickly before.

Awesome!

Sex is Hard

I have a little routine before, during, and after I write.

Usually.

First thing I do is organize my desk. I just can't seem to write if there are too many shiny things on my desk, and since my desk is the Flat Surface of the house right next to the front door (yes, I know, poor planning on my part, but my apartment is tiny, and three people live in it, so I'm doing the best I can), it is the repository for any number of shiny objects. I take all my jewelry back to my bedroom; bead necklaces, mismatched earrings, my squid ring; then any books that I'm not currently reading, move my keys out of reach (because yes, I will fiddle).

And then I open up my WIP and jot the current number of words down on a post-it note. Can I just mention I would die without post-it notes? They are essential to my life.

And then I work.

Theoretically.

Sometimes work is opening my email and spluttering out some half-assed "entertain me" note to a friend. I'll play a few games of Bejeweled Blitz. Check my dragons in another stupid Facebook game. In between, I'll write a few sentences, and if I'm lucky, I'll get sucked in and before I know it, I'm an hour later, with a few pages written. And I go about my day. (Cleaning, being mom, wife, cook, errand-runner, and all those mundane things that if I don't do, no one does.)

Other days... not so much. Like yesterday.

I've finally got my protagonists up to having sex. I write erotica and romantica, so the sex is often the payout for whatever terrible things I've had happen to the characters along the way... the end goal, so to speak.

So I open my WIP, re-read the last few pages to make sure I know where I am... and... wrote an email. And wrote another one. Got a sentence in. Cleaned the living room. Wrote a sentence. Watched some videos on YouPorn (hey, it's research... really. I promise.) Dicked around on Facebook. Wrote two or three sentences and some dialogue. Reminded myself that not everyone talks as much during sex as I do and took some of it back out.

I had my WIP open from 10am until 4:30.

And wrote about six hundred words.

Ug.

And I'm not even to the orgasm.

Good lord.

Sometimes my job is hard.