Finished In 3 Months

The satisfaction of finishing a first draft is still exhilarating. Not like it used to be with me, so obviously I've become jaded in this way. But I've been writing for a very long time. I used to write non-stop works. That was in high school. I don't recall how long it might have been but I had one on-going "romance" that I wrote on Gregg tablets. I believe my stint in Newbie/Rookie status went for about 15-20 years after that. But I gradually learned how to plot a novel, but mostly how to end one. I once wrote a novel that was 800 pages. I think I might have mentioned this about a week ago. Yeah. It is housed in a large box in a bin. No one would touch it. Which only figures. I have other works in boxes too, and too busy to take them out to go through.

Anyway the fourth book of my Sabrina Strong Series is at a finished state which I can now work on with editing, adding details, etc.

But I'd like to go back to the third one and tweak it some more.

And I'm working on notes for a mystery series, wondering if it would be possible to present it to a different publisher.

At the moment I'm looking into Smashwords and going Indie. But I have slow dial up. Until I get a faster Internet, there would be no way. I'd like to either get a lap-top or find the money to get satellite. Our funds are rather tight. We're about to pay off one loan, but have another one to get out of our hair and that will take another few years to pay off. Meanwhile there are other things we need, and would like to have, but money is tight.

My writing had always been hinged on a simple need to write. To create. I'm a creative person, always have been. Writing seems to fulfill some deep, inner need in me that is inexplicable, yet I have no other outlet for it. And what writer doesn't want to see his or her work in print? And make money doing it?

I will never see the light of a large publishing house. I've gone through 30 years of trying to appease the Powers That Be. Now that the Industry is in flux, and we who write are beginning to get better control over publishing (which can be fraught with frustrations as well as success), I think the idea has become more appealing to me. I did self-publish a first light fantasy (Spell of the Black Unicorn), and it was good. Our mistake was buying more copies than we could sell. I might, someday, put it in ebook format and self-publish it (without paying for it, going with Smashwords, probably), but again, this isn't possible right now.

Thus I'm between a rock and an hard place, wanting to do something that is so readily available to everyone, and yet I can't. Frustrations kindle the fire of need and want and that only adds more frustration to the pyre. Seems I've always been at the disadvantage, at least in getting my work published.

At any rate, having finished a book gives me lots of time for other things...like washing floors, dusting, etc. Sounds so melodramatic, but not meant that way. I need a little break. I can prowl sites and learn some necessary things. I've joined Smashwords site so that I can get a handle on it. I'm following some mystery writing blogs. This one is really good and if you are into mysteries, you'll want to check out Mystery Writing is Murder. Today she had some excellent offers from Twitter that any writer can take advantage from, not just mystery writers.
Another one I might suggest for all writers is The Kill Zone, with several authors of suspense and mystery novels giving their weekly tips or write on other topics of interest. I highly recommend it for expert advice. My favorite author among them is James Scott Bell, who has written many books, and wrote/writes for Writer's Digest (a magazine I no longer get, mainly because it aggravated me by how they always made it sound like you could get published by following their advice, but it never worked for me. And because their articles had become repetitive, plus, I found I was already doing some of the things they suggested, and thought the rest of it was a bunch of horse hockey pucks.)

Okay, my husband and I will be putting a roast in the crock pot and while he is out lopping the grass for possibly the last time, I will wash my (new) kitchen floor.

Have a great Sunday, and rest of the week, everyone.

Visit my main blog Lorelei's Muse for some fun posts I'll be doing all October.

Lorelei signing autographs at Borders 2009
for Spell of the Black Unicorn, a light fantasy.