Why Am I So Bad At Goals Whyyy

So this post was originally intended to be a halfway-into-the-year check in on my writing goals. Due to some scheduling issues, we’re a bit past the midpoint, but I’m doing it anyway. Because deadlines are for mortals, which is a response that probably will give you a lot of insight into the way my goals are going so far this year.

The short answer is that I’m doing awfully. At everything.

My reading goals were progressing beautifully until summer struck and then all bets were off. I didn’t read a single book over the entire summer that wasn’t for work, and it was difficult to squeeze even that much in. *claws at own face* I can’t live like this.

Giving myself more leeway on short story writing maaaay have been a mistake because I took that leeway as an excuse to do next to nothing. I have written two short stories so far this year. Two.

Editing is likewise a giant sinkhole so far this year. I just started editing Blood and Ebony about a week ago and have made it about halfway through the first chapter. And… that is all. Yikes. Zero down and three to go.

And I guess I started my one new draft of a novel, but realized about halfway in that it’s terrible and has some plot holes you could fly an Airbus A380 through and I have no interest in finishing it before the year is out. So… back to square one on that, I suppose.

My rejections goal for the year is currently sitting at fifteen of my forty-eight rejections, which is terrible in and of itself, but made exponentially more terrible by the fact that that is all. I have nothing more currently on submission right now that counts toward this goal. So unless I get my rear into gear, that number is going to stay at fifteen. At the beginning of the year, I had intended to have all the subs out that I needed for the entire year (plus a little extra under the assumption that some will be accepted) by the end of September, giving those rejections time to trickle in over the rest of the year. Yeah. Not happening. This goal is so far sitting at flaming-airplane-wreck-two-minutes-before-takeoff level of fail.

Soooo… yeah. That’s where I’m at.

But I have excuses. Do you wanna hear my excuses? Please?

My biggest excuse is that a few of those probable rejections turned out to be acceptances—and on pretty big projects, too. On top of my having normal day jobs, I’ve been working on these projects, steadily, daily, for about three months now and it’ll be at least another month before they’re all completed. It’s taking up nearly all of my free time.

Other excuses have been of the much less fun family emergency variety. Just this summer we had a string of chicken tragedies and three unique medical emergencies. (Unless we want to count each of my son’s complications as their own thing. Ah, dog bites. The emergency that keeps on emerging.) These things take time, and they also take brain power. I can’t work very effectively if I’m worried that my husband might need surgery (still a possibility) or that my son might lose an eye (off the table—whew!).

So, yeah. I’m still going to get myself as close to those goals as possible before the end of the year. I think I can catch up on the reading goal without too much fuss. Just two more short stories would put me above what I managed for last year, so that will have to be good enough. Editing might get trimmed back to just one book; if I really turn this thing around, maybe two. I’ll get about half of a first draft in November and try to finish the rest of it in December, so that one is still in the realm of possibility. But the rejections goal will definitely have to come down; I just won’t know exactly how much until I finish up these other projects. We’ll see.

All in all, I’m trying not to beat myself up too badly. I’m doing my best and I’m not just being lazy, so that’s a definite win in this game.

How about you fine readers? How are your literary endeavors going so far this year? Any wins to report? Any fails that could use some cheerleading? Let me know in the comments! And until next week, happy writing!

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Living in Alaska

Downtown Fairbanks. This is downtown, guys. SO CHILL.

I get to live in the best place in the world. Having grown up in the military, I got to experience a pretty significant chunk of the country and I can say with absolute certainty that Fairbanks Alaska is my all-time, no-runner-up-necessary, hands-down favorite. I will live here the rest of my life and scatter my ashes in its wind.

Alaska is glorious. It’s the biggest state by far, nearly a fifth of the US’ total area, but is home to about one five-hundredth of the US population (over half of which is concentrated in one town). Most of that area is wilderness and we’re fiercely proud of it. Alaska is home to seventeen of the country’s twenty tallest mountain peaks. We have over a hundred thousand glaciers. This place is giant, gorgeous, and you don’t have to deal with nearly as many pesky humans here. People are chill. Schedules are relaxed. Traffic is practically nonexistent. (Unless you live in Anchorage. Anchorage is basically a suburb of some Lower 48 town and doesn’t particularly count as Alaskan. *sticks tongue out at Mary*)

I got an interesting email last year from an ex-relative’s mother asking for some setting notes on living in Fairbanks Alaska. She was writing a story but hadn’t been able to visit, and wanted to make sure she got the light/dark thing right. I sent her an email and made a note to myself to do some setting notes on Alaska for the blog. So if you ever write an Alaskan story, here you go! (Free tip: come visit if you can manage it! You won’t be sorry!)

Population: Fairbanks Alaska is the largest town in the Interior, and the second largest in the state, with a population of a little over 30,000. This is a great, huge metropolis by Alaska standards, where most settlements have fewer than a thousand people. Fairbanks has most of the amenities you would expect in any American town, just less of them. There is one movie theater and three McDonalds’. We got a Walmart a few years ago and that was a pretty big deal. There’s at least one Taco Bell. So you can expect most of the same stuff you would see in a bigger town in the Lower 48, just less of it.

Light and dark: Fairbanks exists at an extreme latitude, and so the seasonal shifting of the earth’s orientation toward the sun is much more pronounced here. Therefore, the sun stays up nearly all summer, tapers down to equinox in the spring, and then wanes to hardly any presence in the winter. (Less so down in the southern parts of the state, but bonkers up on the north coast. In summer, the sun doesn’t set at all for over two months in Utqiaġvik, the northernmost town in the US.) Winter is dark nearly all the time. If you have a job or attend school during the day, odds are you will go weeks or months without ever seeing daylight. The converse is true of summer. Since most of us sleep at night, we can go most of summer without seeing the sun go down.

Cold: Yeah, it gets pretty cold here. Fairbanks is in the state’s interior so it can actually get pretty toasty in the summers too- sometimes into the 90’s, which is utterly miserable since nobody has air conditioning. Winters are extreme by Lower 48 standards, but have actually gotten a lot milder over the last few years. (Global warming is real, y’all. And it sucks. Ride your bikes and curb your plastic use. My glaciers thank you. *climbs off soapbox*) While years ago, it was very typical to spend most of winter at -20°F /-30°C with a cold snap or two of -40°F/°C, we’ve lately seen winters of -10°F/-25°C with two or three weeks at -20°F /-30°C. I haven’t seen it reach -50°F/-45°C in a decade. And while that sounds like a good thing on the surface, it’s not because of reasons I don’t have the space to get into here. Feel free to hit me up in the comments if you have questions. I love to rant.

Wildlife: I cannot tell you how many times I’ve been unable to get my kids to school because we have moose hanging around in our yard. Critters are everywhere in Alaska. I constantly have foxes and ravens trying to get at my chickens and we get the occasional neighborhood warning of bears or, more rarely, wolves. Animals here are large, scrappy, and they go wherever the heck they want. It’s not as big a deal as it sounds like, though. Like more southerly people who have to deal with the small and venomous crawling into their shoes (*shudders*), you just get used to a set of precautions while living alongside wildlife. Fairbanks, especially where I live on the hills outside of town, lives in close quarters with nature. I wouldn’t have it any other way. I just have to accept that animals that would happily stomp me flat or eat me get right of way during the stroll to school.

Tourists: I know this might not be true of everyone, but I can’t recall ever being annoyed with the tourists here. Honestly, I kind of adore them. They’re always so happy to be here and want to talk with locals and have loads of questions. Tourists are fun and nice, and I enjoy chatting with them about where they’re from and what they’ve seen so far. I regularly invite them to my house for dinner. (Just had another one last night!) My kids and I always wave at passing tour buses, which have never tried to run me over on my bike. (High praise–I cannot say that for any other kind of vehicle on the road.) Sometimes you playfully mess with tourists. (Naw, if my car freezes up, I just saddle up the family caribou to go to work. Oh, but you have to be careful because if you take a deep breath when it’s really cold, your lungs will freeze.) But you usually let them know you’re kidding before they leave. And you do occasionally find yourself in the weird position of protecting tourists from themselves. (No, no, no, ma’am, you do not want to get close to the bear cub for a picture. Yes, sir, that thousand pound moose is an herbivore, but it will certainly still kill you.) But all in all, I like the tourists just fine. Even if they do ask about the currency exchange rate between Alaskan money and American money. ❤

PS- Did you enjoy this? Then go read CM Schofield’s brilliant Living By the Sea. And watch out for the seagulls!

NaNo Recap: Fiction v. Nonfiction

Okay, I know that I whine about how hard it was basically every session of NaNoWriMo, but for reals, guys, this one was hard. I was really worried I wasn’t going to make it there toward the end. I spent a significant chunk of the month feeling supremely uninspired and had to start counting words that maaaaaybe really shouldn’t count, but they counted enough and I was scared. But this month’s scrappy desperation felt a little different because, for the most part, I was writing nonfiction. I’ve never tried that before. And let me tell you, it was hard.

I went into this maybe a little underinformed. The closest I’ve come to writing nonfiction before was a creative nonfiction short story of which I ended up having to completely rewrite the ending—the ending where the guy is executed for that murder he was found guilty of—because it turns out the guy’s execution was stayed at the last minute and he was released and spent his final days as a barber in upstate New York or something. Truth is stranger than fiction, I guess. The point is, I didn’t really know what I was getting into. And that never ends well for me. (Except for in marriage. Happy anniversary, babe!)

As it turns out, writing nonfiction is a totally different beast than writing fiction. Here are just a few of the differences that made my life difficult last month:

Nonfiction requires citations and stuff. You can’t just claim that the magic crystal pumps out thirty kilosparkles per minute under a full moon. You gotta annotate that junk.

Nonfiction sticks to the facts. Can I prove it? No? Then get that corn outta my face. It doesn’t matter that I like to make things up when I have no idea what’s going on. I have to figure out what’s going on. Even if it takes forever. That said…

Nonfiction is way slower to write. Yeah, that not making things up thing? That means that I have to look up anything I don’t know. Not just look it up, but find it (preferably in two or three places), weigh the merit of the publication, reference it, and add it to my bibliography. Every ten words takes about thirty minutes. It burns us.

Nonfiction requires research. Again related to the above point, but seriously, if I don’t know it, I have to figure it out. And if someone hasn’t already done that research, then I have to. Doing the research takes even more time than compiling the research, which takes even more time than writing about the research. And a thirty-one day writing sprint is definitely not the time to be conducting research. Ain’t nobody got time for that.

And I’m sure there are way more issues out there. This is just what I managed to uncover in a month of dabbling. (Did you know there are people who write nonfiction all the time? For a living? Willingly? It’s true!)

That said, there are advantages to writing nonfiction as well (and probably way more than I’m listing because augh, it hurt so badlyyy).

Fiction is more elaborate than nonfiction. There is something very straightforward and clean about writing nonfiction. Is it a verifiable fact? Then yes, that can go in. If not, save it for the alternate history fanfic. Probably nobody wants to know what the butter’s thinking as it melts in the fry pan anyway. (Probably.)

Nonfiction takes less concentration. For me, at least. When writing fiction, I need absolute silence, stillness, twenty minutes of meditation, and a sacrificial unicorn heart. Since nonfiction only deals with what really exists, though, and I don’t have to go into that zen creative brain space reserved for crafting universes out of what ifs and bat farts.

Nonfiction teaches. You could argue that fiction can do that, too, but mostly fiction is for entertainment. Nonfiction imparts knowledge, and that’s really cool to think about. Rare is the situation in which more facts and truth is a bad thing. Knowledge is power, y’all.

All that said, I’d like to keep dabbling in nonfiction, but I don’t think I’ll try it again during a NaNo month. Most of my difficulty can probably be attributed to trying to rush a project that would have benefitted from more thought. Despite the grind, I still want to finish both of the nonfiction projects I was working on last month. But I’m enjoying the work more now that I’m not tallying every word that I write as I nervously watch the clock winding down. (I really wouldn’t have won at all if I hadn’t paused in my nonfiction to draft out a fictional short story and notes, which ended up being nearly a quarter of my total wordcount for the month. I justified it because I was already working on multiple projects during the month, so what’s one more? Yeah, rules get a little bendy when you’re thirty percent behind schedule and things are looking grim.)

How about you guys? Any of my fine readers work in nonfiction? What are some of the pros and cons I may have missed in my quick splash in the shallow end? Let me know in the comments and, until next week, happy writing!

Incomplete Sketch: Intercession

Boy, I thought I was sooooo clever when I realized that the cord that connects my wacom tablet to my laptop could also allow me to charge my phone in the car. I was feeling a little less clever when the cord disappeared completely and I realized no other cord in the world was going to fit my tablet. Yep.

So I found it eventually, but I spent all that time in panicky desperate searching instead of finishing the sketch. So have an incomplete sketch! It is a bird. I love birds. Pick up your litter, y’all.

I cannot guarantee the anatomical correctness of my little sparrow friend here.
That leg. That leg needs work.

Reblog: 21 Tips for Successful Collaboration

Howdy! I am really really terrifyingly far behind on Camp NaNo this year. Like “not sure I’m gonna be able to pull this off” behind. I have eight days left to write and just under fifty-percent of the ground left to cover. I am scared.

I’ve never tried to do nonfiction like this before and it is hard. Not that fiction is all that easy either, but I seriously miss being able to just make things up as I go. I’m aaaaalmost desperate enough to start counting words from work emails and texts to my mom, because, yes, I typed them, didn’t I? IT COUNTS. (Gosh I hope it doesn’t come to that.)

Next week is the last week that you’ll have to deal with my terror-weeping and then it will all be over, one way or the other. Maybe I’ll hit my stride by then and start making good progress? We’ll see!

Until then, enjoy this break from my whining reblog from The Book Designer’s Helen Sedwick titled “21 Tips for Creating a Successful Writing Collaboration”.

21 Tips for Creating a Successful Writing Collaboration

By Helen Sedwick

When a writing collaboration works, partners inspire and complement one other. The creative process is less lonely. But when collaborations fail, the drama may be as ugly as a Hollywood divorce.

For every successful writing partnership, there are dozens of failed ones despite the best of intentions. Not everyone is a team player, and not every team is a winner.

To improve the odds of a successful writing partnership take the time to put the collaboration agreement in writing. Most people resist this idea. Like a prenuptial agreement, it kills the romance. They don’t realize the process of preparing an agreement may be more valuable than the result. If writers do a good job discussing issues at the start, they are less likely to have misunderstandings later.

Making Decisions

So before you jump into a co-writing project, discuss and write out the following…

Ready to read the rest? Head on over to The Book Designer for the full article!

Cooking with Strange Ingredients of Questionable Origin

Ugh, I do not feel like I am winning this camp session so far. I don’t think I’m going to not win (yet) but it’s been a slog and I’m quite a bit behind. This nonfiction writing business is kind of a drag. I mean, it’s interesting and stuff, but I feel like I need to do about twenty or thirty minutes of research for every ten words that I write. I knew I would be writing few words this time around and that it would take more research and fact checking, but sheesh. I could really go for just a quick and stupid blitz through draftyville right now, you know?

That said, it hasn’t all been rainclouds and misery these last couple weeks. One of the two nonfiction projects I’m working on is a cookbook, and that means cooking! Furthermore, it means experimental cooking, which is probably the best kind of cooking that there is.

In the interest of keeping the cookbook accessible to normal humans, I can’t do anything too crazy-go-nuts, and that’s kept me reigned in reasonably well. After all the ingredient I’m showcasing here is a little wacky itself- birch syrup. (Who here has heard of birch syrup? Tried it? Let me know in the comments! I’d love to know what you think about it!)

Birch syrup is like the half-sibling between unrelated maple syrup and molasses. It’s got that maple treeishness, and molasses’ kind of minerally tang to it, but has a flavor profile all its own that varies quite a bit from batch to batch. I’ve been working on a series of recipes that bring out its uniqueness, but within the kinds of comfort foods that people already know and love.

Some of the recipes I’m working on are things like birch vinaigrette, birch baked black beans, and birch-infused profiteroles. There are birch caramel popcorn balls, and boreal bliss ice cream, and birch brined moose jerky. (These are my comfort foods, okay?)

My kids’ favorite so far, though, has to be the birch bacon mac and cheese. Sweet and salty and gooey and hot, that double batch I made didn’t stand a chance.

1/2 pound of bacon

1 lb chopped vegetables of choice (broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, etc)

1 lb dry pasta

1/4 c unsalted butter

1/4 c all-purpose flour

2 c whole milk

1/4 c dark birch syrup

1 1/4 c mozzarella cheese

3/4 c cheddar cheese

1.  Boil pasta according to directions, cooking just slightly less than al dente. (I usually find the directions for al dente and then subtract one minute for every five. Bite a piece and if it feel just a bit undercooked, it’s ready.) Drain the pasta and set aside.

2.  Cook bacon in a frying pan over high heat until crisp, about eight minutes. While bacon is cooking, steam vegetables. I typically chop vegetables into chunks about the size of my curled forefinger and steam for five minutes, until they are just a tiny bit crunchier than al dente, like the pasta. Set aside vegetables. Drain bacon, and then chop into bite-sized chunks and set aside.

3.  Melt butter over medium-high heat in a large heavy-bottomed saucepan. When the butter begins to boil, add flour and whisk until the mixture becomes fragrant and turns a light brown, about three minutes. (It’s better to undercook than overcook at this stage. Overcooking with make for a slightly lumpy cheese sauce while little brown flecks, while undercooking is easy to correct with a little extra cooking later. Either way, it will still taste fine.) Slowly whisk in the milk. It may be a little lumpy at first, but keep whisking as the milk comes up to heat and it will smooth out. Whisk constantly as the sauce thickens, taking care that the bottom does not scorch. Turn off heat, but keep pot over burner, and whisk in the birch syrup. The sauce should be a uniform light caramel color.

4.  Add cheese a half cup at a time, allowing it to melt completely and then whisking it in before adding more cheese. Sauce should be thick and gooey; if it is too thick, add two tablespoons of additional milk at a time until desire consistency. (I usually end up adding about an extra half cup of milk at this point, but my family likes a slightly thinner mac.)

5.  Pour the noodles, bacon, and vegetables into the cheese sauce, stirring gently until well coated. Cook over low heat until cheese sauce just begins to bubble and all ingredients are heated through, about five minutes. Serve hot.

Looking for a slightly lighter side dish? Omit the bacon and vegetables, instead adding one teaspoon of salt to the cheese sauce.

Note: While any pasta would taste good with this sauce, different pastas hold sauces differently. When choosing a good mac-and-cheese pasta, pick a “short” pasta, rather than a strand or ribbon pasta, that would cup the sauce and transfer little reservoirs of it into your mouth. Medium-to-large sized tubes or shells (such as penne, conchiglie, or rotini) about the same size as your vegetable and bacon chunks would be about right for this recipe. Alternatively, if omitting the bacon and veggies, you can go for a smaller pasta such as macaroni or campanelle.

PS- If you can’t get your hands on birch syrup (like most of the world outside of extreme northern latitudes), don’t sweat it. This recipe will still be tasty if you use maple syrup or molasses instead. Just, while you’re eating it, you are legally required to think of how much nummier it would be if you had the real deal. Legal truth. *nods*

Until next week, happy writing cooking!

Reblog: How to Become a Successful Writer and Work-Full Time

Hi friends! As you well know, it’s a NaNo month, and that means reblogging my way to a murky victory by reserving every iota of brain power for spitting out garbage first drafts! Hooray!

One of those distracting brain power sinks is my job. I work two or three part time jobs in the winter, but in the summer, I work one part time and one full time, leaving me little time or thought for writing. This summer has had the added complication of doing freelance writing work for three different operations all at the same time. So while I don’t have the time to do any fiction work right now, I am still writing, with a bonus of contractually obligated deadlines (which for me is a very good thing).

That said, this week, I’ll be reblogging a guest article from The Creative Penn, Ron Vitale’s How to Become a Successful Writer and Work Full-Time at a Day Job, which is a really long title. Later in the month, I’ll probably post a snippet from one of my projects, which I’ll tell you more about then. Until then, happy writing, and enjoy the article!

How to Become a Successful Writer and Work Full-Time at a Day Job

Back in 2008, I made a decision that changed my life. I decided to write a novel.

Yes, I worked full-time at a day job and had two small children, but realized that if I wanted my life to change, I needed to either make a move, or let go of my dream. Having my big “four-oh” birthday on the horizon proved to be the kick in the pants that pushed me to act. I thought long and hard, but decided to take a leap of faith and try. I now have 7 novels on sale on various platforms and am working on my next.

I went from “wanting to be a novelist” to “being one.”

How? I did the following:

• Made a public commitment to my family and friends, holding myself accountable.
• Created a schedule that worked for my busy career.
• Chunked the work into bite-sized pieces.

Believe in Yourself

All my life I had waited for someone to validate me as an author. To change that unhealthy behavior, I started doing. I wrote in the morning before work, read “how to” articles and started listening to podcasts on writing and publishing. I reframed my goals by choosing to invest in myself and my dream.

No longer would I wait for someone to discover me, I would discover myself. 

Ready to read some more? Find the full article here!