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As the holiday season begins in earnest next week, many a writer will begin to wonder how on earth they’re going maintain their writing schedule. Wait, did I say wonder? I meant panic – especially if you have a looming deadline in the first part of the new year. I mean, let’s take a look at that word – Deadline – as in dead, final, unchangable, done. You editor wants it when she wants it, and doesn’t want to hear excuses....

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I'm not actually talking about children, I'm talking about manuscripts. Most writers consider each one their baby, and while each one being different seems an obvious statement, I'm not talking about plot or characters, I'm talking about the HOW of each book I've written.

I know a lot of authors who say they have a system that goes pretty much like this: premise, characterization, research, world-building, plot outline...and then on to the actual writing. They use tools such as storyboards, charts, notebooks, post-its, folders filled with pictures of people and places, etc.

I agree that planning is key to getting a book completed, and most importantly, completed by your due date. However I do very little of the above. I do keep a notebook for my research so I've got a handy guide to refer back to. This has been particularly helpful with the current WIP, OUTRAGEOUSLY YOURS, where both the hero and heroine are dabbling in the Victorian sciences (not my forte, but fun!). I also always have a notebook for scribbling scene details and characters traits. But my physical "props" pretty much end there. A good thing? Not for everybody, but I've always felt that setting up charts, etc. would take so much time, when would I write?

So where does the variable come in? As I mentioned above, the how. DARK OBSESSION, actually written years ago and majorly revised before it sold, was written on my desktop because at the time that's all I had. DARK TEMPTATION emerged almost entirely from my laptop. My March 2010 book, MOST EAGERLY YOURS, was tapped into being very roughly and quickly on my AlphaSmart, then rewritten primarily on the desktop. OUTRAGEOUSLY YOURS so far is a product of my desktop only. I've tried using the laptop - especially last week when my power went on the fritz for over an hour. But the results just weren't the same.

I'm not sure why I jump around like this. It's not that I haven't figured out which method works best for me. It's that each method has worked best for its respective project, whereas I felt in my gut that doing it any other way simply wouldn't. Does that make sense?

I'm not sure if it's a concentration thing, or a discipline thing (as in I sometimes need the discipline of sitting at a desk, sometimes I don't, and sometimes I need the stream of consciousness method that naturally arises with an AlphaSmart). Looking back, I wonder if it isn't the tool per se, but what might have been going on in my life and my state of mind at the time.

Last year at this time, when I was banging away at the AlphaSmart for MOST EAGERLY YOURS, the country was flipping on its side financially and things were kind of topsy turvy for me personally as well. I guess my mind couldn't wrap itself around fine details until much later, when I did my rewrites in the spring. This fall has been much more tranquil for me, and this book seems to be coming along swimmingly, and hopefully without a lot of rewrites later (fingers crossed!). I'm presently a much happier writer, but I haven't figured out why the desktop and not the laptop. The bigger screen?

Do you have a tried and true method, or do your moods affect the manner in which you write?

Oh, and while we're at it, seeing John Hodgman over the weekend prompts me to also ask, PC or Mac?

Note: I'm in the process of moving my blog to a new address and cross posting for a while. So you can read this hear, or click here to read it at my new site. Comments either here or there will be entered in my next drawing.

Some of you may already know this about me, but I always grumble at the thought of going down to Miami. In my mind, it's a huge, jumbled, bewildering maze from which I might never emerge, and besides, what's Miami got that Broward County doesn't?

A LOT. Which I realize anew each time I venture southward. Living in Broward's western suburbs seems to have a numbing effect on my mind, and I forget how alive a city is, and how alive being in one makes me feel. Seriously, few things exhilarate me more than setting off into a diverse crowd that's gathered for the sole purpose of having a good time. So thank you to my good friend for dragging me down there yesterday, for not asking me if I wanted to go, but for saying, "Clear your calendar for the 14th, we're going to the Miami Book Fair."

Oh, I grumbled as I got ready yesterday morning. I dragged my feet and changed my shoes several times, figuring I'd end up with blisters no matter what I wore. But as soon as I set foot inside the fair gates, my spirits soared. I became positively buoyant. I mean, here was a crowd representing countless diverse cultures and backgrounds, brought together on a cloudless, spectacular Florida day to share their love of books. We meandered, browsed, ate interesting ethnic street food, listened to live music, even ran into friends, including fellow authors Traci Hall and Lyn Armstrong...

What could be better?

I'll tell you. In between poring through the endless booths offering volumes on every subject of fact and fiction imaginable (Oh the temptation!!), we saw Gwen Ifill - whom I absolutely adore for her intelligent, straightforward approach to journalism (and you know what? She's really funny!) - and later, John Hodgman and Larry Wilmore of the Daily Show, whom I also adore for their...well...not so straightforward approach to journalism, lol, and who are really, REALLY funny. They all focused mainly on politics and the media (of course), and while I realize they were basically preaching to the choir, I still found it incredibly heartening to see how many people packed that auditorium for both talks.

My buoyant mood saw me all the way home. I felt refreshed, renewed, and inspired, too. Because I realized that, no matter how down the tubes culture seems to be these days, there ARE still wonderfully creative people in the world and plenty more who appreciate the fact. The crowds, smiles laughter and enthusiastic applause were all proof of that.

Oh and guess what? No blisters!

Sincere thanks today to all those who have fought to keep us safe.

 Your sacrifices should not go unnoticed or unrewarded, and every day you serve your country should be a day the rest of us remember to honor you.

Yes, consistency does pay off. When I first started writing, I met with some heartening successes - contest wins, acquiring an agent, a couple of near sales - but there were years of rejections nonetheless. Enough, in fact, that many a less determined writer might have given up. I didn't, and in the end my persistence paid off with my first sale and a three book contract.

Well, I'm not offering anything quite as exciting as that, but this month's winner of my drawing WILL have a visit to the bookstore on me. Hey, in my little world, that's exciting! She's a second time winner, and that's where persistence pays off. She visits often and leaves lots of comments, and I always appreciate her ability to make me grin. The winner is:

Having lived in New England, I can't help but love Halloween. After all, with it's Puritan history and Salem witch trials, all those haunted colonial houses and taverns and such, and of course the amazing fall colors to dazzle the eye, the entire region was tailor made for this holiday. There's no pretending needed - Halloween is everywhere you look.

A few months after my husband and I were married, a friend of ours hosted a Halloween party in the house where he lived and worked as an assistant caretaker. It was one of the historical estates around Newport, RI, a grand old Victorian house with wide verandas overlooking sloping lawns and Narragansett Bay. Now, the party was confined to my friend's apartment "below stairs," but (Newport Historical Society, please don't freak out) at the end of the night, in glaring breach of all the rules, he offered to let my husband and me spend the night in the main house. Or rather, he dared us to stay - in the very room where the last of the family, after exactly 100 years of ownership, had died.

Shocking! On any other night we'd have said thanks, but no thanks! But it was Halloween, and we were young and adventurous and, yeah, probably more than slightly tipsy. And since you should never drink and drive, we made our way up the shadowy, creaky old staircase...

The room was as cold as...you guessed it...death.  I think we could see our breath, although it was hard to tell because the electricity to this part of the house had been turned off.  So it was also as dark as...you guessed it...a grave.  

Waving our flashlight around in search of spooks, we laughed at our nervousness.  Did we really dare?  Our trepidation only intensified when we saw we'd be laying our heads on pillowcases monogrammed with the last owner's initials. Talk about audacity! I will mention, for those of you experiencing an ick factor right about now, that the linens were periodically cleaned, and were very likely NOT the ones in use on that unhappy day long ago...

Still. After seriously considering leaving, we steeled ourselves, snuggled under the down comforter, closed our eyes...and didn't open them again until morning. We were too scared too!  Too afraid we'd see the ghost of owner-past hovering at the footboard, one skeletal finger outthrust in accusation: "How daaaaaare youuuuuu???" 

I still wonder that myself! Then again, maybe she'd had a sense of humor, or soft spot for young love. Maybe our tremulous foray into her haunted chamber warmed her ghostly heart. I like to think so.

Do you have a special Halloween memory? Share it here and be entered for my drawing. I'll be picking a new winner on Monday!

Happy Halloween!

If you love Regency romance and read a lot of them, you've got to check this out - I'm still giggling.

Regency Satire

Then come back and we'll talk about cliches and why, despite the fact that writers are repeatedly told to avoid using cliches at all costs, they ARE used and they DO continue to sell books in great numbers. So go on, have a read...I'l wait...

Ok. Let's face it, cliches exist for a reason: they strike a chord in readers. Another way of looking at them is as universal identifiers. The evil stepmom, the greedy business partner, the curmudgeonly grandfather, the dashing rogue, the clever vixen. We know these people the moment we see/read about them. The trick, of course, is to give them new and surprising angles that keep them from feeling stale. But why? Why don't we constantly just come up with completely new character types?

Well, for one thing, at this point no matter what you come up with, it's been pretty much been done before, somewhere in the world's body of literature since the beginning of time. Sorry, but it's true. 

But so what? Robert McKee (writing guru and author of STORY) explained it best in speaking about the James Bond franchise. Over and over for decades now, fans of the series have enjoyed watching Bond do pretty much the same exact thing - defeat the bad guys, save the world, do the bad girl, win the good girl, without ever mussing his clothes or spilling his vodka martini. Bond has become his own cliche, yet we love him...we love watching the game unfold each time because he's so impossibly good at what he does. With each movie, his limits are pushed a little further and the plot becomes a little more fanastic and high tech. But it's still basically the same and has been ever since Sean Connery first swaggered into camera range.

 Classic features, dangerous eyes - cliche? Who cares!!!

Classic features, dangerous eyes...

Are we getting tired of this? I think not.

Is it cliche? Like I said, who cares!

The same satire also could be applied to romance series based around navy seals, or big Texas families where the men are all alpha cowboy executive millionaires, or semi-reformed soul gathering vampires. Watching angsty, alpha guys fall for sassy women is just good fun, and no, we don't tire of it.

Me, I love a man's man in breeches and boots, whose billowy linen shirt hangs off his tight, tapering body, who isn't afraid to gallop his horse across a foggy moor, whose dashing presence commands attention in any drawing room, and who knows when and exactly how to kiss his lady breathless.

Do you have a favorite, sinfully secret romance cliche?  Do tell!

Is it possible to write an emotionally satisfying sex scene without consummation?  I think I did today.  Taking in all the dynamics of my WIP and characters, it's way too soon for them to be knowing each other in the biblical sense. But it's certainly not too soon for them to be chomping at the bit to do the deed and to find it impossible to keep their hands off each other.  

They both have baggage (or it wouldn't be a romance, or fiction for that matter), and both have compelling reasons not to jump into anything permanent. In Victorian times nothing screamed "PERMANENT" louder and with more vehemence than consummation, unless of course the hero was a cad and the heroine rather less than a lady, which he isn't and she isn't. They REALLY need a ton of motivation and irresistible urges to ignore every moral standard by which they were raised and throw caution and silk drawers to the wind.

Hence a lot of intense but prolonged foreplay. And of course by "emotionally satisfying" I mean about five seconds of sheer bliss immediately followed by an onslaught of brand new angst and conflict certain to drive my poor characters crazy as they resolve to resist each other from now on.  Uh huh.  Of course they will.

Anyway, this was pretty much my challenge today: have them do it, without really doing it.  My hero, being the gentleman that he is, helped me out quite a bit by taking the high road and adhering to the honorable standard of "Ladies First." But of course now I owe him.  Or rather, my heroine does. Can't wait to see how she handles that - or should I say how she handles him.