How many times have you been out and about at a social event, a bar, a party etc. and had to answer the question, "what do you do?" I must have answered it a hundred times or more. And what do I say? My Job? Or my writing? I've always, without exception, said my job; even though my job means nothing to me. It's a means to eat and stay off the street but other than that it doesn't matter. I don't have a passion for it. It's not my dream or my life goal. It really doesn't say anything about who I am or what I'm about. I enjoy it and it pays the bills but that's it. In contrast my writing is a part of who I am. I have stories in my head almost every waking moment. I plot while driving, I carry a notebook with me and jot down dialogue or title ideas or story ideas. I've written and edited and published a book, and a damn good one at that, and yet I don't feel entitled to tell a stranger that I'm a writer.

Why is that?

Because I don't make any money at it. It's that simple. And I think that's really shitty. I assume when people ask "what do you do?" It's because they want to get to know you better: to form a connection or find similarities, but no. All people really want to know is how much money you make and how prestigious/educated you are. God I sound cynical. But it's true. Humans are super judgy, in case you haven't noticed.

Well, I've decided I'm going tochange my answer to that question. The next time someone asks me "what do you do?" I'm going to smile and say, I'm a writer. Although, I bet 100 bucks the following conversation will go something like this:
'oh wow, do you write for a newspaper or something?"
"No, I write books"
"really? that's exciting. What are they called, maybe I've read one."
"probably not, it's only e published. Only about 30 people have read it. But it's called Amaranthine."
"Oooooooooh, no. I meant,  what do you do for a living?"

facepalm :-\

Today, I went to the funeral of a very special person. His name was George Bloor and he was our neighbour growing up here in Fruitvale. He lived across the street from my parents and he and his wife owned a very large piece of property with a barn, an indoor riding arena, and dozens of horses. Of course, to my young self the horses were the best part. I would feed the horses, watch the horses in their fields and dream wistfully about growing up to be a great rider one day.  It wasn't until years later when I was a teenager that I got to really know George. I started working there as an exercise rider for their many horses that needed to be ridden. Part of the deal was that they wanted the horses ridden properly and that was how I came to be one of their students. I spent years being coached by George and Fran.  He was a very kind, generous, patient man who was deeply involved with his community, his horses, his family and never in his 91 years did he stop teaching. Always teaching. There were many many stories from people who had been touched by George and Fran over the decades and as I sat there and listened to the mile long list of accomplishments I had a small moment of shame. Because I know I can do more. I can be kinder. I can work harder. I can do more. I can try harder.

The only limits on me are the ones I put on myself. Spending time on trivial things instead of focusing on the things I really care about truly is a waste. I've let a text message take the place of a real conversation with friends and let the computer or the TV replace being active in my own life and future.  I suppose I've had an epiphany. George lived his very best life, and in the end he is remembered by hundreds of people as being a truly good person. And that's what I want for myself. I want people to pore over the dozen books I've written, regale each other with stories about the million things I'd done in my life, and repeat each others sentiments of what a kind, hard working, enthusiastic and generous person I was. It's not too late.

Good-bye George, you'll be missed.

 A few months ago I joined a writing group. I was interested in meeting, hanging out with and talking to other like minded writers in my community. Bounce ideas, have a critique partner, and have the emotional support of people just like me who sometimes need encouragement to keep going and/or to sit down and actually write. Butt kickers if you will. It started out great. We all introduced ourselves, got very excited, discussed what days we would start meeting and then.......

Crickets. Well , one very lazy cricket who doesn't like to chirp at all. Nothing has happened since. Total silence in our little online writer's group. I even gave a big push to say hey what's up, when are we meeting, and no one even answered. Which leads me to the question: Why is writing so hard? Why don't we make time for it? We love it, it's in our blood, we think about it day and night, have plots spinning in every direction. It's free, and easy and we can do it anywhere anytime and yet it's so hard to just sit down and do. I personally hate showering. It's a thing. I find the whole process so tedious; getting wet, drying my hair, getting dressed and undressed. A total waste of 20 minutes every single day. But I still do it every single day. I do something I hate every day, but can't find 30 minutes a month to do something I love.  (Insert mind blown emoji here)

Are there psychologists who can explain to me what this phenomenon is?  Is there an adult coloring book that will help me get back on track? I've written, edited and published one book already so I know I'm capable, I just need to do it again.

So, Taylor Swift has been taking a lot of heat since forever for writing songs based on her relationships/boyfriends/ breakup drama and I feel this over whelming urge to jump up and down and flap my arms and say THAT'S LITERALLY WHAT EVERYBODY DOES, SO WHY HATE HER FOR IT?  phew, it feels good to get that off my chest.

Ok, look. Writing about what you know is the first rule of writing, and the biggest inspiration people get is from their own personal experiences, so ya if you have an interesting thing happen to you in real life and you can spin it into a song that makes you millions then why for all that's holy aren't you allowed to do it? Jeese Louise. I'm willing to bet that the vaaaast majority of music written is based in some way on a real event that the writer either experienced first hand or heard about and thought it was interesting. Taylor Swift is really really really not the only one who does it, so Please for the love of God, stop harping about it like some jealous twit with your knickers in a knot and just enjoy the catchy tunes and sing along to Never Ever Getting Back Together the next time you break up with your on again off again boyfriend.

And go buy AMARANTHINE on sale now. You'll thank me later.

Just posted the Prologue to Book 2, just after Chapter 3 of Amaranthine under the AMARANTHINE link above. Check it out.

Okay, not really. But Amaranthine was the word of the day on Dictionary.com Mar 18, 2016 and that's pretty fabulous. Definition 1: Unfading; everlasting. Just like my Davn, sigh.

It's such an uncommon word I'm a little surprised it was featured at all. It's so uncommon that sometimes I expect people to tell me it's not a real word. So uncommon my computer insists on telling me it's an error with an angry red squiggle. Stupid Windows, get a dictionary.

I checked my stats today for the first time in about 6 months and I'm at the pitiful, sad total of $30.10. What. The. Hell? Don't people realize they are missing out on what may be the best book ever written? I am looking into getting paper copies, for the people who have expressed an interest in a paper copy, but that shit ain't cheap. $30.10 won't go very far.

Some good news on the home front though I just finished renovating my bathroom. It was so incredibly hideous before I'm pretty sure it was causing me a mild depression and now it's so beautiful I could hang out in there. And since I'm so proud, I'll post before and afters here.

Isn't it gorgeous! I'm calling it Modern Victorian. Now I have no excuse not to have a nice long bath with candles and music and write write write. Which reminds me, Sound of Silence by Disturbed is a great Cover. I highly recommend checking it out on Youtube.

I did something the other day I haven't done in years and years. I went to the library. I'd forgotten how much I love the library. So many books. So free. My two favorite things. I'll have to get up my courage and go talk to the local libraries about maybe putting a copy of Amaranthine on the shelf. Not sure what their policy is, but hey a new book donated to them can't be bad.  But anyway, I was at the old romance rack and of course I picked up a couple of good historical romance. The broody Earl and the spirited, not so beautiful, kind of old, poor, and everyone thinks she's a shrew type of books. Not really my type. I'm more for the fantasy myself. Poor? ok. not the most beautiful in town? sure. Too smart for her own good and rubs everyone the wrong way? ya. But all three? yikes. Who wants to marry that person? You gotta give your hero and heroine something that's lovable. Flaws definitely. No one is perfect. Perfect is boring, But all around bad is boring too, and really hard to read for 400 pages because it's just not believable. Astral certainly isn't perfect. She's rash, overly emotional, naive and poor as dirt with no family. But she's pretty, and kind, and she laughs, and has an unshakable loyalty. I think one of the major flaws of historical romance novels is the heroine or the hero is either too perfect or too flawed, and both come away as unlikable.

There are two other major flaws that I'll talk about next time. See you soon.

Has anyone bought a book online recently? You search and search and find one that seems decent and you pay, download and start reading only to quickly find out it's just the first few chapters? Ya, me too. Crazy annoying, mostly because most of the time there is no indication that you aren't buying the whole book. It's just a hook. Here's a great book, only a dollar buy me buy me, oh ya wait if you actually want to see what happens you have buy 5 more installments at 2 dollars each. Grrrrr. Needless to say I did not do that. I put the whole damn book out there for sale, priced it fairly and let people read to the very end. Oh ya and it's a complete book. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end. It continues in book two but that is a complete book as well not just the second half of book one. God, what is happening to writers and publishing that people feel the need to parcel out their work a few pages at a time? 

I have never bought the second installment of any of these books. Even if I liked them I can't be bothered to try and find the next cluster of chapters, so, oh well, I guess I'll never know who Hannah chose or how Troy got himself out of trouble. If you had charged 5$ for your whole book I would have paid it, but I'm not paying 1$ five times for five different chunks. Sorry.

I subscribe to Bookbub, and every day I get an e-mail with a list of books on special for that day. Every day I peruse the list and read the short write-up on each book. Every day it's the same old crap. The plot lines I can't stand above all others is the special object/special destiny "hooks". Lisa finds a dark ruby in her grandmother's attic and now she's on an adventure to save the world... or, Hannah wakes up one morning with antlers on her head and now she must fulfill her destiny as the antelope enchantress before the evil magician enslaves the entire human race...blah blah blah. Boring as shit. I think too many writers have subscribed to the fallacy that big stakes equals an interesting read. That's not it at all. A good book that I can't put down is one that a) I can relate to, and b) has an emotional connection to something I care about. I can't relate to the concept that any one person is responsible for the safety of the whole world. Nope. Nor can I get on board with the magical item that will save the whole world, sorry all you Lord of the Rings fans. Give me a great story about a person who has to protect his or her family during a real crisis like a fire or a home invasion. Or a story of a girl who uses her brain to discover who her stalker is and put him in jail. Small scale stakes that hit home are far far more intriguing than a global apocalypse as far as I'm concerned.

Think about it. If 100 people were asked 'what's the most important thing in the world to you', what do you think their answers would be? The protection of the galaxy from radioactive space bugs? or to protect their kids from the bully at school? People care about their fully restored classic car in the garage, their spouse and kids, their dog, their stack of unpublished manuscripts under the bed. As important as the galaxy is it's not the first thing that comes to mind during a crisis. So why do so many writers write about such fantastical things?!!! gah, I don't get it.

And frankly, the hero of a book doesn't have to be a super hero. It can be a normal person with no powers or special artifacts or a prophecy foretelling their destiny. The sheer of mass of all that B.S makes it boring. Another cookie cutter over the top plot. Sorry but I'll pass. I'll save my money for something a little ...less.

The beginning of every idea starts in the strangest places. Amaranthine started with a chicken. Yep, a chicken. I had a little idea about what it would be like to have a pet chicken that someone else wanted to eat. The chicken quickly turned into a duck because I like ducks better and they are more charming. Then I came up with the story of how the duck appeared, the duck got a name. Who loved the duck? Astral. Why it was so important to protect the duck at all costs? Dead mother. It all kind of snowballed from there.  My original idea was that after fleeing her parents' farm with Sabie Astral meets and lives with Davn, which is the same, but in the original version she discovers his secret and, horrified, she flees and hides from him. She thinks he doesn't know where she is and she starts a new life. She has the 19th century equivalent of a boyfriend, she has a job, she's happy. Then one day she's in an accident, a carriage runs her over or something and as she's slowly bleeding to death Davn reappears and takes her away, changes her and slowly has to regain her trust and her love.

That story didn't have enough ooomph to it. It didn't have a clear villain. There was no climax at the end, it just sort of fizzled for the last 100 pages and there was no where to go for book 2. So it all got re-invented into the book you have before today. I like it a lot better. Saraid was born, Maksim came to life, Georgianna thumbed her nose on every other page and Helene cast her serenity and wisdom on everything. And now I have a clear path for book 2 and 3, so it all worked out for the best.

It's hard to believe a whole book can come from one little chicken.