I have a cold. Again. I had a cold one month ago today. This sucks. I really need to take better care of myself.

Anyway, Happy New Year everyone! I'll be hopped on champagne and cold medicine tonight.

I'm still stunned about the contract. And then when that feeling subsides - usually just for an instant - then panic sets in. What the hell have I done to myself? There is a lot of work involved in this process. I even developed a bout of (not-so-unusual) insomnia last night dwelling on it. I want to do this right, but am trying to be mindful of being too eager and jumping the gun. A lot of authors out there have websites where they promote themselves but for me, this blog and you are what I have, dear readers. I've always marched to the beat of my own drum and writing will probably be just another example of how much so....

I've picked up Flight of the Guardian (again) today and want to finish it by the 30th of January. I'm shooting for a 35,000 word story this time. I'll keep you posted of my progress.

Stay tuned regarding all of the above.

My printer is churning out the contract right now and it's a heck of a lot more complicated than I had ever anticipated. Cover art. Cover art?! I get to approve cover art? Yes, you would think that this is common sense, but I guess I never really thought about it. I'm supposed to sign up and link to certain blogs and web addresses and a million other tiny details I never thought of. I won't know a release date yet until I've been assigned an editor which could be up to a month from now. I'll keep you posted on how it happens. I've always been curious about the whole process and now I'm a part of it!

Thanks to my friends for seeing me through this. Apparently, I'm the only person who is surprised that someone other than me liked the story. I guess that's a good thing too.

Well, Merry Christmas to me! I received an email notification this morning that the first publisher I submitted it to wants to offer a contract for "Soldier"!!! Can you believe it? I still can't. Go me! Go me! :)

I'll be cheesing about this all day.

I don't know why I bother. I said that I was going to let "Trial" sit and then edit and then send it to a publisher. <Ennnhhh.> Nope. I re-edited on Friday night and sent it off that evening. No turn around time listed on their site, but I would be very, very surprised if it doesn't get published...at least somewhere. Not necessarily at the first place I try, but somewhere. I even mentioned to the editor that I think there's room for a part 2 to the story. In fact, I've spent a lot of last night and this morning musing over writing part 2. I really hope it does get published dear readers so that you can take a look at it. I really do think it's that good. (lol. see previous post if you don't believe me.)

And on another note, the new story is called "Flight of the Guardian". My MMC's name is Hiero (pronounced like "hero"). Isn't that sexy?

Anyway, writing here gave me a 30 second break from cleaning the house for the holiday visit by my folks. Since I probably won't get another chance to say it, Merry Christmas everyone!

Damn I'm good. I mean it. I'm really good.

I'll try not to break my arm patting myself on the back but I just finished "Trial" and it's 23 pages, 6400 words of *spice*. I mean, it's hot. I'm not certain that I'll keep the title since I veered away from what I had originally intended to happen in the story, but I am beyond satisfied with the results. I think Morgan Sierra definitely has a future. I'll let it sit for a few days and then go back and edit it before submitting to a publisher. The storyline is well, controversial and I can see people not wanting to publish it because of the subject matter. I absolutely cannot see them not wanting to publish it because of the writing. It's really that good.

(Now that I've said all that, how much money do you want to lay down that I come back in a few days and exclaim how horrible the story is? ha ha!)

I really shouldn't bother saying that I'm not going to do something. Nine times out of ten, I end up doing it anyway. I'm referring to The Voice. I said I wasn't going to edit it. Yeah, right. Not only did I review it once, I reviewed it three times. (And caught errors in it all three times, mind you.) Once done with that, I finally settled on my NaNo gift to myself: I'm having it printed in hard cover. It will be a 6x9 hard bound book, color cover and 291 pages long. (I've even got a dedication page! What it says is a secret for now.) I went to LuLu and ordered two copies. One copy will forever sit on my shelf in pristine condition. The other copy is for others to read. I'm still not 100% pleased with the story, but it does make me smile.

Oh yikes! Double yikes! Got an email today that half of November's submissions have been answered! The other half will be answered before the New Year! Yikes!

I haven't gotten an answer. Whether this is good or bad news....I just don't know.

On another note, despite my earlier resolution, I have started editing The Voice. It's not that bad, I suppose. Not great, but not that bad. I'll let you know if I decide to submit it.

I really, really need more discipline. I was perusing some publisher sites and came across a call for stories from Harlequin called Spice Briefs. They want stories between 5 and 15K words (totally up my alley) that are hard-core erotica. ::Hmmm:: Hard-core, you say? Instantly, I pulled my MC from the story I just started and put him into this new story because he would work better here than in the story I had planned for him. I also came up with a pen name for writing erotica, taking inspiration from my two doggies. If you find any stories published by Morgan Sierra, that's me! So, the new story is called "Trial". Because of its brevity and planned content, it might be hard to post an excerpt, but we'll see. In the meanwhile, the other story - no name now because I took away the MC - is on hold.

I finally did it. I started another story. And that should be good news, right? Well, the new story has hit some snags. I've started it exactly three times. What I mean to say is that after the first start, I realized it was missing some oomph, so I inserted a few lines. About half a dozen pages later, I realize "oh! this is a whole 'nother start!" No biggie, right? Wrong. Two days later I get a brainstorm about how it should really start. And yep, this should occur before I get to the pages I've already started. Oy.

I think I need to go back to a disciplined way of writing. This free-lance thing ain't doing it.

Is no news good news from a potential publisher? Anyone?

Wow. Perhaps there's a writer in me after all.

I am going absolutely nucking futz without a novel to write. I was going to give myself some time off, but after what? - seven whole days, I'm starting to lose my mind.

Did I mention that my laptop is working now? Yeah. After NaNo is over. Of course. But at least I'll have it for the next great piece I write. Whatever that might be.

And is it true that no news is good news when it comes to publishers? That's what I'm counting on for Soldier. I've read that people are using their rejection letters as a source of pride which says "Hey! At least I tried to get published. What did you do?!"

That's something to ponder too.

With all of the grumbling I did during November about how behind I was, you would think that I wouldn't miss NaNo. Well. You're wrong. I do miss NaNo. I can't believe that November is over! It's currently only the 5th of December and I'm supposed to be taking a break, but I find myself fidgeting - nay, itching for something to do. Did I mention that school is over this week too? Double whammy.

I don't think The Voice is salvageable, so perhaps I'll come up with a new story to write instead of trying to edit it. I'll let you know what I come up with.

On another note: The Voice ended up being 50,825 words....finished November 30th at 10:08pm.

OMG.

I did it.

I came. I saw. I conquered NaNoWriMo 2007's butt!!

Although I still have to finish the last chapter, I have surpassed the 50K word count that is required to be a NaNo winner! Go me! Go me! By my count, I have exactly 50,026 words at this moment. I cannot tell you how pleased as punch I am!! Looking back at the posts I've made for November, it seemed that I was always behind. Always trying to catch up. Well, no matter! 7 full hours ahead of time, I am a winner!

For those of you who see this blog and think that you don't have enough time to undertake something like this, get rid of those excuses. If I can do this while working full-time, working part time, going to school full-time, making a Thanksgiving dinner for my family, hosting a family sleep over, keeping a social life with friends and DH (and the list goes on) - all in the month of November - So. Can. You.

44,412.

I'm so tired I'm seeing double. I'm supposed to be at 45K by tonight, but 600 off is going to have to do. The good news is that I can see a light at the end of the tunnel. Two tunnels, if you insist. First, Friday is the last day of NaNo; 50K here I come. Second, I'm certain that when I cross the 50K finish line, my current novel will be complete.

Now, I personally think that it jumped the shark about two chapters back, but I have December to go back and edit with.

C'est la vie.

37,830. Sigh.

This four day weekend was not the writing adventure I had expected it to be. I spent Thursday afternoon cooking, after spending a little time playing catch up on the writing that morning. Then my parents announced that they were coming for a visit on Friday.

Uh oh.

So after dinner, I had to do some serious straightening up for them. And that also meant that I would do ZERO writing on Friday. By Saturday afternoon after they had left, I was drained and took a three hour nap. Fortunately, I did get up and spend a lot of time writing. Unfortunately, no where near what I needed to do. I'm at 37,830 at this moment and I should have had 40K yesterday.

I'm now starting to question whether or not I'll hit 50K by Friday. Type, D., type!

Creeping along. Creeping. Creeping. Creeping along.

Yesterday I was so full energy about my story really taking shape. Now I just want to stab the next person who says NaNo. Well. Not really. It's just that who decided NOVEMBER with turkey day as a major theme would be a good month?! There are a million things going on in my personal world and yet I labor and toil over this damn novel.

Could I be a little cranky because it's a little late? Yeah. Probably.

Come back tomorrow. Perhaps I'll be in a better mood by then.

Doubt it.

OMG! I've been forgetting to blog! :)

Wow. I can't believe a week has passed since I've been here. To give you a heads up, I've fallen woefully behind. Again. As of this moment, I have 26,211 words and I'm procrastinating catching up. I think I'm supposed to be around 30,000 words right now. Oh well. I still have another eight hours before I go to bed. Let's see what I can do in that time.

And guess what! I submitted "Soldier" to a publisher today! 60 day turn-around-time to find out if they absolutely hated it, think it's merely ok, or if they think its publish-worthy. Wish me well. So far, five of five friends who were supposed to be editors got caught up in the story and about halfway through forgot to edit. Or perhaps my writing just got so good by that point that they didn't need to? One can only hope.

21,779. Thank goodness for three day weekends.

I finally caught up to where I need to be after the hiatus in Atlanta. In fact, since I plan on doing some more later on tonight, I will probably be almost two days ahead of schedule. With Thanksgiving quickly approaching, I need to make certain that I am ahead or else have to suffer through another weekend of doing almost nothing except working on this novel.

The title for the novel appears to be "The Voice". In fact, I'm thinking now that the title to my other novella may just remain "Soldier" as I had originally called it for lack of another title.

Finally, after 12 days of writing, I'm really getting into the story. The bad guy - I have a thing for bad guys - sounds intriguing.

It's only fair that I post the same excerpt here that I posted on NaNo:

“You ok?” he said.

“Just really, really tired.” She stifled a yawn. “I don’t know about you, but the painkillers didn’t do much. I just want to lie down and hope I don’t ache this badly in the morning.”

“Can I help?”

“Anything in particular in mind?” she said. As the words came out of her mouth, she froze, hoping they didn’t sound as suggestive to him as they did to her.

“Actually,” he paused. “If it’s not too forward, I do give a pretty good massage. You’re probably going to hate life in the morning, but we can try working out some of the kinks now so that it won’t be too bad.”

“You don’t even seem fazed,” she commented. Mentally, the angel on her left shoulder and the devil on the right shoulder battled fiercely. Cherry had been watching his hands at dinner and they seemed so incredibly large and capable. The idea of a massage was deliciously tempting. Then again, their level of intimacy would raise another notch if she allowed him to run his hands over her body carte blanche. But boy did that sound good.

Really good.

***
12,185 as of right now. Type, fingers type!

Let the Marathon begin! I have fallen so behind with NaNo. I think I'm somewhere around 8800 words. The fact that I can only "think" what my word count is should tell you something. The trip to Atlanta was wonderful, but I just didn't get the writing in that I had expected to. Also had some hiccups with the Alphasmart and I may have to return it.

In any event, I'm planning on doing at least 20,000 words by Monday evening - today being Friday. It's a three day weekend; I'm not scheduled to work and my school assignments are caught up. I'll be back on Monday to tell you how I did!

4699. After three days of NaNo, I've fallen behind by about 400 words. I don't feel too badly about that seeing how I worked a twelve hour shift yesterday which was the cause for the delay. I am heading for Atlanta later today and between the time at the airport and being cooped up in a hotel room by myself tonight, I'll make up the 400 words and some. Unfortunately, this also probably means being out of touch with the Internet for a few days so you'll have to wait until Wednesday to see how far I've managed to come!

On another note, for the trip I bought an Alphasmart 2000 - yes, the really old version. Unfortunately, I failed to notice that the one I purchased didn't come with the cable, so now I'm trying to find a USB infrared adaptor to use. I'm going to take my chances on it working once I get the adaptor and take it on the trip with me. Please, please, please let it work! My hand is cramping from having to hand write my novel when I'm mobile. sigh.

You know what blows? Being sleepy at 9:12 pm...just under three hours away from NaNoWriMo 2007 officially starting. Ah. The tribulations of getting older. lol. I'm only 33. But some days...some days!

Before this recent bout of sleepiness, I had planned on staying up and writing at 12:01 am. I guess I'll just try to get up early tomorrow and start then. C'est la vie. I am excited to say that I've ordered an old version of Alphasmart on Ebay. I have a trip to Atlanta this weekend and I'm trying to convince the seller to send it to me by Friday so that I'm on my way to typing up a great story (instead of handwriting it and then typing it up). Hopefully, I can get it sometime soon!

Wish me well!

I attended the Jacksonville kick-off party for NaNo and met a group of people with some interesting story ideas! It was nice to put faces to the user names. I'm looking forward to seeing how we do as a group.


Can you believe it? I *still* don't have a name for my novella. DH read it on Saturday and said he spotted some holes in the plot that I need to plug. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I expected that. I didn't expect to have such a hard time with a title. If you go to Lulu, they have a "scientific" method for determining whether your title will help make the book a best seller. It's funny. The names I kind of like have a low chance of success (around 22%), whereas the ones I'm just fooling around with end up pretty good (44%). Go figure.

The drive to work can be so helpful. Although I had an idea for NaNo, I'm onto a - at least, I think - better one. What say you to this:

Professor/writer's boyfriend kills for pleasure. He's planning to kill her on their first trip together. On her way down to meet him, she runs into (literally) a former student (with a huge crush on her) who finds out about the boyfriend's plot. (I haven't figured out how yet!) They end up on the run. (and that's as far as I've gotten with the "details".)

And my 25K challenge needs a title. I've had two people read it so far and the only comments were reading level a little high (e.g. "fastidious") and more sex! lol. The latter comment from a single woman. I think I'll leave it as is though.

DONE!!!!!!! 86 pages; 25,070 words at 10:55pm EST on 10/24/2007.

Darned good story if I do say so myself. Unfortunately, now that I'm reading the story from start to finish, I recognize how stiff the conversations are in chapter one. Fortunately, as the novella progresses, the writing gets better. I'm going to modify and tweak a little and then have a few friends read for input. In the meanwhile I'll start outlining for NaNo!

I'm so proud of me! :)

82 pages & 23,775 words down. I have just my last chapter to go!! I anticipate another 7 pages of text - at least, 1750 words - in the next two days. I'm so excited and I just can't hide it. Yeah. Cheesy, I know. Face it, though. I'm about five days ahead of schedule! Wow. Actually saw this one through.

As for NaNo, I saw today that people are getting themselves goal presents. I think that at 50K words, I'm going to get myself an iPod Nano! (get it?) One of the other prizes will be a NaNo mug and possibly a NaNo 2007 tshirt. Any other suggestions?

Eureka! I'm almost done!! As of this moment, I have 21,490 words. Wow. I'm down to the last two chapters.

Writing this has made me realized how difficult NaNo is going to be. I mean Really. Difficult. I'm not usually one to fluff up my words, but I'm going to have to pull out every trick to make it to 50K words next month.

Along those lines, I came up with a storyline on the way to work Saturday. Steve - dear hubby - helped me with some of the plot twists later that same day over dinner. With my current novel - the one with no name yet - about to wrap up, I can spend some time developing my new story.

Can't hardly wait!!

My main characters are finally gonna do the deed! Writing the scene made me wonder if writers ever feel like they're repeating themselves when they write about sex. I've seen some very creative ways to change it up, but man, after a while you have to run out of words! Ha! I guess that is what distinguishes a good writer from a great one, huh? (Or would that be a good sex life from a great one?! ha ha!)

As of this moment, the word count is...15,924

As of this very moment, I have 11,937 words typed in my personal October challenge. That's almost halfway to my goal of 25,000 words by October 31. I'm right on target. Here's a small excerpt - note: up to this point, the hero doesn't know the heroine's real name:

She stopped short when he came into sight and let out a low whistle. “Anna you said he was gorgeous, but damn!”

His hand went under his chin and his head tilted to the side. “Anna? You said I was gorgeous?” he mocked.

“You can never keep your mouth shut. I told you he thought my name was Lisa.” Anna turned colors of pink previously undiscovered and Lucy hooted with laughter, holding her waist with both hands. The sound was beautiful and Nicholas chuckled in response.

***

If that isn't insane enough for you, I decided to not only do NaNoWriMo, I'm signing up for 70 Days of Sweat. Today is day #1 of that challenge. Wish me well!

I've decided to start this blog today to keep me accountable. Let's see how well it works.

The other day while cleaning out the garage, I came across at least a dozen stories I had started years ago - even pre-undergrad days - and never finished. Let's not forget the novel that is about two chapters away from being finished that I haven't touched in years. Pathetic, isn't it?

Well, for the month of October I have challenged myself to write three pages a day. This is in preparation for NaNoWriMo where I'll have to write about 7 pages a day for the month of November to make their 50,000 word challenge. So far, so good on the October challenge. I'll post my progress on it here.

Look for me on NaNo ID blkdawn.