I Have Been Dreaming

Good Morning. As I clicked the "schedule" for this post, I saw that I only have TWO weeks left to vacation, instead of THREE! OMG, where does the time go. And, as I watched the morning news, the weather lady said Tropical Storm Bertha will be on our doorstep within the next couple of days. I do not want to tell Monster that she may not get in any beach time until later in the week.

45 ft. down -- at the Coast Guard Station
Point Judith, Rhode Island

Anyway, I have been dreaming. During the night, as it were, not day - of which I am generally most fond. My dreams at night have been mind-blowing to say the least. I have not had such "real" dreams in a very long time. You know, the kind where you do NOT want to wake up from. The kind you wish you could live in forever. The kind, when you do finally wake up you roll over once more to see if you can get back into it, but to no avail, and then you feel like crying because the life you had in your dream was sooo muchhhhh betterrrrr than the one you are currently living in.

Yeah, those kind of dreams.

The first dream was in answer to a question I had asked myself before trying to sleep. I had just finished reading a book (contemporary romance) where the male protagonist was hot. Soooo hot. I liked the book very much, I liked the writing very much, I liked the male character (and the female MC, but this is not about her). Anyway, as I drifted off to sleep that night, I asked myself the questions -- Why can't I write a character like him? What is the secret? How do I get my writing to THAT place?

Ellis -- love him

So, I slept. And in my dream I was with my character Ellis Smith, Marquess of Haverlane from THE LADY'S FATE. Yeah, I know kind of wacked, but go with me. This book was the first novel in the series that I had published. It is, however, not the FIRST book in the series it is in actuality, the THIRD.

However, it has always been my best seller. Even when I have published other novels THE LADY'S FATE has always managed to outsell anything else. And I have always wondered why.

In my dream that night, the answer finally came to me. I was in love with Ellis when I wrote the book. Totally, irrevocably smitten. I had his image so clearly in my mind during every single scene that I wrote, I couldn't help it.
(Mind you, I had only ever seen the actor from this picture once, in a British drama about a zillion years ago, and even though he's quite famous now, I still can't tell you his name.) He's always been Ellis to me.

I also loved Violet as I wrote it, not in that way, but as a writer who's dug deep from the recesses of her own memory and imprinted her feelings onto the page through her character. (wow, that was kind of deep for me.) Anyway, as I was BEING Violet, and falling IN LOVE with Ellis as I was WRITING, I guess it made an impression on the pages. Hence, the obvious outselling other of my novels.

When I awoke from this rather bizarre dream, and as the answer clicked into place, that made me think about my other stories -- why they sell, or don't, and how I felt about the characters as I wrote each of them. Was I in love with them as well? I can honestly say, yes. And no, some not so much.

However, what's really weird, is -- each of the leading male characters from my other novels is based on a man I have known and loved at some point during my life. In each of the stories, each of them has the flaw that broke us up in real life to one extent or another. (I'm a writer who draws from her experiences) EXCEPT FOR ELLIS. He is totally and without reservation, completely made up.

Mind blowing isn't it? Well, maybe not to you, but it certainly was to me.

Perhaps I need to go on vacation more often? Or just eat pistachio ice cream before going to bed.

Tell me -- Do you ever dream about your characters? Do they speak to you? Give you the answers to questions you didn't even know you wanted? Or do they generally leave you alone?

Anne Gallagher (c) 1014

Reading vs Television

Good Morning. The last few months I've not been writing, I thought that would give me more time for reading. When I was living at the beach, long before Monster, even though I worked three or more jobs at the same time, I always had a book in my hand. I could probably get through  4 or 5 a week.

You would think because I stopped writing, I would have more time to read. You would think with real life finally under control I would have time to relax on the couch with a good book. And I'd recently bought a book by a favorite author that I've been dying to sink my teeth into.

Usually when I find myself with free time, there's always something else to do, you know what I mean... clean the clutter off the sideboard. Put the things that have been sitting on the stairs away. Straighten out Monster's bedroom -- again.

But one day I found that all that was done. I had even started the dishwasher. I actually had TRUE free time.

And I turned on the tv. And I sat and watched Castle reruns for two hours.

Why didn't I read the book? I asked myself that a million times since. Because you know I haven't found a spare moment since.

It was just too hard.

What? Since when is reading hard? I've been reading books since I was 4. It wasn't as if the book I wanted to read was a comparative dissertation on Charles Dickens and Jane Austen. It was a quick women's fiction, only 235 pages. And I liked her first book, so I was sure I'd like this one.

Then why did I sit on the couch and waste two hours watching Nathan Fillion? (Well, yeah, because hey, it's Nathan Fillion). But more importantly, it was mindless. I didn't have to pay attention. I'd seen it before.

In reading that book, I would have had to engage my brain. Fire the synapses to make connections with my inner self -- memory, vocabulary, imagination. First, I would have to THINK. Second, I would probably have inner edited. Putting that aside for the moment, third, I would have felt incredibly guilty that I wasn't writing. Inner deadlines, you know.

I miss reading. I really do. I miss letting myself go into another world, miss meeting new people (characters) who are different from me. I miss spending time in other places. Places I might never go. That I don't have to research.

Which I guess is the reason why I watch television. It's easy. You just have to sit and watch. You don't have to think. In the seconds you SEE something, your brain registers it. There's really no thinking involved.

When you read, you have to figure out what the author meant when she describes the wind whispering in between the window casing. Or the color between turquoise and teal. When you watch tv, it's right there in front of you. Your imagination is not engaged. There's nothing hard about watching television. Just plop your butt in the chair and turn it on.

Tell me -- Do you read more or less than you used to?

Anne Gallagher (c) 2013

Complacency in Our Reading

On Monday I talked about how some New York authors have become complacent in their writing. Today, I'd like to discuss when we become complacent in our reading. Or rather, how I became complacent in my reading.

When I was a kid, we had 3 television stations. No cable, no DVD, no VCR. No cell phones, no game-boys or Wii. When my parents bought the beach house, they decided they weren't even going to allow us a tv. So what was there for us kids to do?

Well, my brothers had friends in the village (there were no girls my age) so there was nothing for me to do BUT read. And read I did. Anything I could get my hands on. In the beginning it was always about horses. Misty of Chincoteague, Black Beauty, National Velvet. Then one of my mother's friends left a Harlequin romance behind The Honey is Bitter by Violet Winspear, and I was hooked on romance.

Soon after that I found what is now known as a bodice-ripper, about a Scottish Highlander and his lass. And thus began my love affair with historical romance. For over twenty years, that was all I read. Okay, that was MAINLY what I read. I delved into poetry for a bit because I am a classic romanticist, but for the most part I was totally into historical romance. Transported in time and place, I was all in.

After I graduated high school and began living at the beach house all year round, I worked two, sometimes, three jobs, but I always managed to have some time in the afternoons off -- to lay on the beach, get a great tan, and read my lurid love stories.

So from 1976 until about 2004 (28 years for those who don't do math) New York pubbed romance writers of the historical genre were all I read. Pretty sad, huh? Over those decades, I would say I accumulated about 10,000 books under my belt.

When I started writing, agents, bloggers, big names in the biz, would say "Familiarize yourself with your genre -- Read what's out there -- Get a feel for what's publishing now" Okay, but I already did that. So much so, I felt I was drowning in it. And I also knew, that when I began writing, I didn't want to be like all those other writers. I wanted to write what I wanted to read and no one was writing it, so I decided to do that instead.

In the last couple of years, I've branched out of my genre and started reading things that wouldn't have ever been on my radar when I was younger -- literary fiction, mystery, thriller, women's fiction. This summer I want to dive into some classics.

These days, I don't read nearly even one tenth of what I used to. (Back at the beach house, I could get through a book a day.) I think now if I get through a book a month I'm doing something. But that, in turn, has made me very selective about what I reach for.

Tell me -- What do you read? Do you stay strictly in your genre? Or do you branch out? Do you not read anything in your genre because you're afraid of finding out your plot has already been done? (Truthfully, this is one of the reasons I don't read in my genre very much anymore.)

I've been working in the yard this week trying to get most everything done before it gets too hot. By the time I get home, I'm on the couch. I do read your comments and your posts, but sorry to say, I just don't have the energy to comment.


Anne Gallagher (c) 2013

Great Lines

Rick Daley (of My Daley Rant) posted the Letter C last week on his A-Z Challenge and it was about Eric Clapton. (For those of you too young to know who Eric Clapton is, he is one of the best guitarists in the world.)

Anyway, for the rest of that day after I read his post, I couldn't help hear the song Bell Bottom Blues in my head. (One of my most favorite songs. Recorded in 1971 - shows you how old I am.) There is a line in that song --

Do you want to see me crawl across the floor to you
Do you want to hear me beg you to take me back

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_Bottom_Blues_(Derek_and_the_Dominos_song)

That everytime I hear it, I think, "That is the best line EVAH!" Sends goosebumps up my spine. Listen to him sing it. Sheer heartbreak. Anguish. All that fun stuff a romance writer loves.

This in turn, brought me to thinking about great lines in books. Every so often, I'll run across one that just blows me away. And they may not seem like anything to you (it's all very subjective) but each of these lines invokes something in me that makes me want to remember it.

There is something about trains, drinking, and being an Indian with nothing to lose.
-- Sherman Alexie

What reason weaves, by passion is undone.
--Alexander Pope

Family ain't what you inherit, girl, it's what you make with those you love who love you back.
--Olivia Goldsmith

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly: what is essential is invisible to the eye.
--Antoine Saint-Exupery

But Cash had been thinking how sad it was there was not even a plant on the windowsill in here. Not one green thing that can sit in the sun and be quiet.
--Barbara Kingsolver

That was enough for the both of us because those kisses came from the same place where pain and hunger live.
-- Robert Olmstead

One cannot live rightly when one lives without love.
-- Anne Gallagher (The Lady's Fate)

As you can see, I posted my own "great line" up there as well, because I feel it deserved a mention. Of everything I've ever written, that's the only line I ever remember faithfully.

How about you? When you pen your stories do you ever sit back and say, "Hoo-doggie, that was a GREAT line!" If so, what is it?

For your listening pleasure Derek and the Dominoes Bell Bottom Blues

Anne Gallagher (c) 2013

My Weekend with James Taylor

Ha! I bet that title got your attention, huh? Well, I've been waiting to hear back from my last crit partner on The Earl's Engagement and I bet you know what I've been doing for the last week. Yeah, cleaning my house. When I write, the house kind of gets...you know...messy. This time it was, well, a little bit more than messy. I think this time, my dust bunnies were going to call the housecleaning ladies up the street. I don't really blame them. With all the Christmas goo-ga hanging around, pine needles, tinsel. Yeah, a little overwhelming. 

So, amidst all the madness, I found my big dog had secretly peed on the carpet in the front hall. Yeah, we don't use it at all, so it was a surprise when I went to the hall closet and my feet squished. eewwee. Please don't judge me. I know I'm not the best housekeeper, but the dog pee is not mine. She was soundly yelled at and put outside. She promised never to do it again. (Of course, my telling her she was going to live outside for the rest of her life was probably what made her promise.)

Anyway, I dug out my old James Taylor albums (yes vinyl) and threw them on the turntable. Yup, record player.  The carpet was old so I decided to rip it up. Eewwee. Nothing like soggy dog pee carpet. Once I got the carpet up, I had to take up the foam underneath.  Oh, by the way it's 40 years old, so it was falling apart.  And then under all that, there were the staples and the carpet nail runners. Fun stuff. And I didn't hurt myself. Not once. Yay me.

But, during all the hard work, it was me and James. Singing off key with the front door wide open. I think my across-the-street neighbor was laughing at me. I didn't care. Nothing like old Jimmy boy. Did you know he was from North Carolina? I didn't until about 10 years ago.

I'm not sure what the point of this post is, but I do know that when I was singing with James, it brought about a lot of old memories. And it got me thinking about old books I'd read, back when I used to listen to James at my childhood home on Hendricks Street. L-O-N-G time ago.

I read my first Harlequin romance THE HONEY IS BITTER by Violet Winspear (Still have it too, believe it or not). I read Rod McKuen (ALL of his poetry -- still have all those books too, and a few albums he made.)  National Velvet. Trixie Belden. Louisa May Allcott. Little Women, Little Men, Jo's Boys. I think I even started Thoreau back then but didn't finish it until 20 years later.

While sweeping and vaccumming up the remainder of the mess in the front hall, I made a promise to myself, that this summer I was going to read all the books I haven't read. The classics. Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Stein, Dickens, Vonnegut. Perhaps they'll help me to be a better writer. lol

Tell me --  Are there books you haven't read, but think you should? What are they? Have you ever ripped up carpet without having anything to put in its place? (Yeah, I probably should have planned that a little better.)

A MUST READ BOOK!

Good Morning. I was recently given a gift by the lovely Anne R. Allen of the book INDIE CHICKS an anthology of personal stories from Indie women writers.





If you are woman

A writer

A Mom

A survivor

If you are overwhelmed, prone to anxiety, unsure, or just have no clue how to manage writing and the stress of real life at the same time

This book is for you.

Twenty-five personal essays from women Indie Writers that will leave you laughing, crying, shaking your head, and saying, "Oh my God, that is so MY life."

Not only are there the personal essays, but sneak peeks into the latest books of the writers and where to find them on the interwebs. I put so many books on my TBR list just compiled from this anthology, my reading list will take me into 2014 I'm sure.

This book is ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC and I can't rave about it enough.

Also, all proceeds go to the Susan G. Komen foundation for cancer research, so it's a win-win all the way around.

You can buy it here on Amazon.

****

In other news, I'm posting tomorrow on a special cause that won't cost you anything but a click of your mouse, so please, please, please stop by. Here's a hint... and with that face, you won't be able to say no.




****

And I'll be at Nicki's on Wednesday for another interview, and she found my favorite song in the whole world on You Tube, so I hope you'll swing by for that.

Brunch at the Piedmont Grille

On Today's Menu -- Eggs Benedict, Fresh Fruit, Fresh Squeezed Orange Juice, and Potato Pancakes.

I haven't had Potato Pancakes in awhile. With warm chunky home-made apple sauce. Yum!

Having never done a brunch before, I'm not sure what I'm doing today other than sharing my random thoughts about things that have happened to me lately in the writing world.

******

On October 9, I recieved a rejection letter from an agent I had sent a query to on April 11 for THE LADY'S FATE. It read in its entirety -- "Nope. Not for me."

Yes, that was all it said. AND, it wasn't even signed. I had to look again at the sender name in my inbox to find out who had been so rude. I've had better form rejections. For two seconds I wanted to write her back and ask her why did she even bother sending me a rejection. Within the six months I waited, the book went through 3 more revisions, two more beta readers, was published and is now making money. Yeah, I wanted to write her and say, "No, thank YOU for rejecting me." Glad I wasn't waiting with baited breath for her reply.


******

Recieved another rejections of sorts last week in my inbox. I've tried to keep up with old friends in other parts of the country, so I sent out a letter informing them of my latest news in the publishing world, gave them the links to my new website, sent off pictures of the covers, and one of The Monster from first grade.

I have recieved one reply. It read -- "Great to hear from you. Good luck." That was all. Haven't heard back from the other four yet. Now I realize I've not been the best correspondant, but I expected to get at least an acknowledgement. And "good luck" is, well, what is that? Sounds like "glad you finally got what you wanted but never want to hear from you again" to me.

******

Monster and I were in the car the other day when she asked why I had so many books in the box on the front seat. I explained that I had just bought them all from the library book sale (saving books, helping libraries).

"Are you going to read them all?" she asked.

"Of course," I said.

"Which one are you reading now?"

I picked up THE REMAINS OF THE DAY. "This one today. This one yesterday." I showed her WOMEN IN LOVE (D.H. Laurence). Then I picked up DANCING IN THE SHADOWS OF LOVE (Judy Croome)(Which had already been in the car). "This one two days ago." Then reached for THE BEND IN THE ROAD (Nicloas Sparks) "This one I just started, and this one is from last week." I picked up STRANGER IN MY ARMS (Lisa Kleypas)

I watched her face in the rearview mirror take it all in. Then she said,

"Doesn't your brain hurt?"

Gotta love The Monster.

Have a great weekend!

On Reading

Before we begin today's post I just have to tell you about the contest Chuck Sambuchino is running on his blog to win not one but three, count 'em three books.

His latest

HOW TO SURVIVE A GARDEN GNOME ATTACK

The must-have

2011 GUIDE TO LITERARY AGENTS

and the fantastic

FORMATTING AND SUBMITTING YOUR MANUSCRIPT

All you have to do is go HERE to put your name in. We all need to be prepared when gnomes attack.

Now, onto my regularly scheduled post.

I read a blog post last weekend that's been sticking in my craw.

How do you read now?

I used to read for pleasure, I'd get so engrossed I could forget about the world around me and often did. I would sit for hours, totally enthralled.

Now, when I try and read for pleasure, I find my inner editor kicking in and I keep putting the book down, something I never, ever did before. I would read straight through the day or night, sometimes both. I'd put off going to the potty, feeding the dogs, taking a shower. Now, I find I can actually do the dishes instead of finishing chapter 10.

How about you? Do any of you do that now? Edit instead of read?

Genre - Romance/ Sub-genre - Regency

Most of you may be wondering (especially after reading my Valentine's Day post) what in the hell I am doing writing romance. All of my real romances (for the most part) have been bad. Not to say there weren't a few good times in each of them, but in the end, they ended. Badly.

I have also maintained I am a pessimist. So no wonder, you may be thinking to yourself, does she have bad romances. That is the funny part...I am not a pessimist when it comes to love.

I love love. I love being in love. I love reading about love. I love sappy movies. I love Hallmark commercials. I love hearing that love has conquered all. Hence my proclivity to write romance. I love the way the characters meet, the way their eyes light up, the way they get stupid and tongue-tied and nervous when that special someone walks into a scene.

I started reading Historicals when I was in high school. Sweet Savage Love by Rosemary Rogers. Hey, who hasn't read that. And from there it just never ended. Anyway, as I read more historicals, it was plain I didn't like the longer ones, the medieval, the Scottish, Edwardian or anything that wasn't Regency.
Every once in awhile, I'd be able to get into a Victorian, if the plot was okay, but when I find something I like (from ketchup to toilet paper) I stick with it.

There's something about the class system in Regency England that I really enjoy. Perhaps it had to do with my upbringing in the 70's, the city where we lived, the religious ramifications my parents placed on me that I couldn't date a non-catholic boy. Yeah, hey, I know, but they're my parents.

I lost myself in those books. I became the heroine. I loved the hero. Back then they were all rakes and blackguards, but every one of them was redeemed by love. That thought has never left me. Music calms the savage beast, blackguards can be reformed by virgins.

Nowadays, the hero is called an alpha male, the heroines, although still technically virgins are much more savvy than they used to be. They're not simpering and scared, most of them are pretty smart, and have minds of their own. In the Regency, they still have the strict moral code, the strict socal class system, the strict adherence to social custom and forms of address. How cool is it that people get to address you as 'My Lady'? (Even if she is a peasant you know by the end of the book she's going to be a duchess.)

I love the Regency for all that and more. There was no greater architectural, artistic, musical or gardening movement in Britain, before or since. King George, before he went mad, was a patron of the arts, his Queen, of horticulture, and their son, Prince George, everything in between. (But more on the Prince next week.) It was a time of building, rebuilding, forging new ideas, and creating art in all its forms. You gotta' love that.

So tell me -- What kind of romance do you like to read? Contemporary, Erotic, Historical, Vampirey, Paranormal, Sappy? Did I forget anything?

On Reading

As some of you may know, we had a lot of snow last week and here in NC that means no school. All week. But I have survived and so has the Small One. That being said, I could not write. I need to be silent to write. NO music, tv, phones, and especially no "mommy, mommy, mommy."

I decided to read instead. Study up, polish a voice or two, take a stab at the pile in the crate. And so, I read the three books you find in my sidebar. (I know, I read really fast, I finished those in 4 days.) One was literary, one 'chick lit'**, and the other genre - historical romance. (**the author says in the back of the book she queried this out as women's fiction but the publisher printed it as chick lit.)

I made some really interesting discoveries, about writing and about myself. Last week while I was blogging around, there were several posts on POV; head-hopping, deep 3rd person POV, 'narrator' POV, second person POV, (which some say is really hard to do) first person, first person omniscient -- all this stuff I didn't quite grasp. (Sometimes I'm smaht, other times not so much.) I read through the blogs and wondered what the hell they were talking about. And that's all I did. Just wondered. For the longest time, I haven't paid attention to the "rules" of writing I just write. If it sounds funny, I change it. As my brother would say, "Not anymore." (Think Steve Martin with a French accent.)

(As a side note, I will not identify any of the books by name, only by genre. I don't want the google police after me, or the authors if I say something bad.)

Okay, Book One - Literary. This was written in second person POV, and it was a little tough to read. I couldn't seem to get into it easily. Don't get me wrong, it was a great story, sort of, (the ending confused and bewildered me) and the descriptive prose was beautiful but the writing was heavy, like Hemingway's. If I hadn't known who the author was I would have sworn it was written by a man. This book taught me, again, why I don't read literary fiction. It didn't have a happy ending. And it made the beginning unbelievable, well, actually it made the whole thing kind of unbelievable (and not like sci-fi fantasy unbelievable either.) This book taught me a lot, especially about 2nd person POV and descriptive narrative.

Book Two - Genre, Historical Romance. I love this stuff. Hence, why I write it. However, this time I read it from a student's eye and boy howdy, did I learn something. For one, the copyright was 1987, so that says something in itself. The story was great and kept me engaged but now I know why word counts have gone down since then. It dragged and dragged and dragged through the same plot points over and over and over again. It was written in 3rd person POV but talk about head-hopping, which to me, in a romance, you can't really get away from, but I did notice a few scenes where there was a sort of 'Narrator' POV that shouldn't have really been there, I'm sure would have been cut from my manuscript. It was interesting for me to read this and say, "Oh look at this, look at that, that's wrong, no move this." At least I can see what I'm doing in my own MSs now.

Book Three - Chick lit. This was written in first person POV which was okay. I could follow it. The writing was light and airy, sometimes funny, sometimes quite engaging. And then it wasn't. I read through it and thought, well, where's the transistion scene for this. Where's the plot point for that? And then toward the end she kind of segues into this really important moment, and I wondered, why did she bother with the segue, she should have written a BAM! And of course the ending was NOT HEA, but sort of, which is why she wanted it to be women't fiction. I would have personally liked it if I knew definitely the MC was going to stay home, but the author only hinted at it, and that really kind of rubs me the wrong way. I'm a Happily Ever After girl. You know.

And so, there you have it. My wonderful walk through POV's. It has taught me I like and can write in 1st and 3rd, and I should probably stay away from 2nd, or at least wait until I get a few books published under my belt before I start to tackle that kind of thing. And as for the 'was's' and the 'that's', well, guess what, the literary book had a boat load of 'em in there. So they can't be all bad. Now if I can only figure out where my dangling particples are, I'll be all set. LOL

What POV is your favorite to write in?

And read down through the Welcome post -- there's a contest announcement over at Chuck's blog. And I linked to it. Honest.