New cover for Feda's Anchor

Since I'm getting ready to release the first novel in a new series, I decided up update Feda's Anchor's cover.

I've learned a lot about Photoshop since I created the original. Back then I was disappointed that I couldn't show the vision rattling around in my head.

Now the background reflects the island of Feda more accurately.


What do you think about the cover overall? I'd love to read your suggestions.



The cemetery and the rose hedge photos are courtesy of
     http://www.morguefile.com

Cloaked skeleton photo is courtesy of Dawn Mueller,
    http://www.etsy.com/shop/PhotosByDollymae
    Check out more of her wonderful photography!

The cat, the anchor, and the Australian jungle are from my personal photos.

Formal Education and Writing

Here’s Churchill in my writing corner, wondering what the heck I think I’m doing. Need I admit I’m playing with the camera when I should be working? LOL!

Lydia’s question for the Sisterhood of the Traveling Blog:

“What formal writing experience do you have? (classes, degrees, major/minors). Did it shape your writing? Have you ever considered getting an MFA?”

I have a BA in English, earned mumble years ago.  Did my education shape my writing?

Maybe.  I read many brilliant books for those classes, and a few clunkers, which might not have been so awful if I’d understood them.  I’ve always been a painfully literal person, and sarcasm and satire often go right over my head.  Novels like Babbitt were excruciatingly boring because I missed the point altogether.

The “bad” novels were painful, but in many ways the great novels were worse.  How could I write to that standard?  How could I make my characters live and breath?  How could I entice readers to see and hear and smell my settings?  I knew it would take practice.  A lot of practice.

Yet the MFA programs have never tempted me, probably because I’m a genre reader and writer.  Literary and mainstream don’t interest me, and all the MFA programs I’ve noticed emphasize literary writing.  The extra years of effort didn’t seem worth the possible results.

How do you feel about MFA programs?  What formal writing training have you had?

I hope y’all had a happy holiday week, and I’m wishing you a prosperous New Year!

Animals and writing

It was my turn to pick the topic this month. My question for the Sisterhood of the Traveling Blog was:

How do your pets/kids/plants (something you take care of) influence your writing?  Do they help you, or distract you?  Do you include them in your stories?

People rarely inspire my fiction, but the animals in my life often have.  I’ve even named a kitten after one of my characters, then used his personality to guide the character’s behavior.

I’ve asked what my darling, long deceased Mystic would have done if she’d been human and in such a situation.  Her ghost informed me she’d never act as silly as humans do and would never have gotten into such a situation.  When I reminded her of some of the stunts she pulled in life, she just stared at me with that cool cat stare that says “You’re thinking of someone else, but I’m too polite to correct you.” LOL!  She was good at that.

My family had horses when I was a teen, and horses are often supporting characters in my stories.  Occasionally they have more personality than my humans.  Horses are more than a mode of transportation. They have feelings and reactions and quirks, and they most certainly are not cars that can run forever without tiring.  Horses are fairly fragile, and die from misuse or accident, in real life and in my fiction.

Churchill, my current owner cat, is purely a distraction. He insists he needs to lie upon my keyboard.  No way, my lad.  That’s one of the few battles I’ve won.

How do animals affect your writing? Do you like stories with animals as significant characters?

The Query and the Muse

I’m happy to announce my muse is back at work.  He’s not interested in querying, thank goodness, since I’m only a quarter of the way through the first pass of this rewrite, but he’s wild to write new chapters, and a hard slogger in editing standing chapters.  And in my opinion, he has a great voice.

He’d better still be around when I start writing my query!

Speaking of queries, Laura - of the Sisterhood of the Traveling Blog - asked a hard question this month:

 

If you're querying now, or have in the past, how do you develop patience to wait for responses?

I’m not sure patience even enters the question for me.  Dread, terror, and occasional despair, maybe.  ;-)  But not patience.  I need to push querying out of my mind or I can’t carry on – or at least, not sensibly.

Like Lydia, I try to keep busy.  If my fiction won’t flow, I work on non-fiction.  Cleaning, on the other hand, is a desperation measure.  Lydia, you’re a stronger woman than I am!

One thing I believe writers need to learn in order to survive the query journey is compartmentalization.  (Sheesh, do think I could have found a longer word?)  But compartmenting helps me function.  If I dwell on something I can’t change, I only make myself miserable.

I already have a tendency to keep the different parts of my life separate.  Prioritizing can be a problem (it’s waaaaaaay too easy to go play on the web – I really need to read all those agent blogs!), but knowing the internet is a time suck actually helps because I go offline to work.  If I’m offline I can’t check my email every five minutes for agent responses.

So I schedule times to check my email.  I write, or edit, whenever I can.  And I spend a lot of time rubbing Churchill’s tummy – a guaranteed soothing activity.

How do you deal with waiting for agent responses?

Inner Inspiration

I chose this month’s topic, and in a sense I cheated.  I asked the Sisterhood of the Traveling Blog: How would you personify your muse?

For many years, I couldn’t visualize my muse.  I couldn’t define it, or even think of it as separate from myself.  But since my fiction dried up, I can see my muse clearly:

Many of you have met Churchill, who I rescued from the Animal Shelter, mostly by accident.  After my ancient, long-blind cat died, I heard on the news that blind cats were euthanized at the Pound automatically, because they couldn’t find homes.  What an awful thought!  Blind cats are quite easy to care for.  Off I went to the Shelter, to sign up for the next blind cat who came in.

Churchill isn’t blind (though he has the normal Persian eye problems), but he came home with me anyway.

BUT, as you can see, he’s not exactly inspiring.  Sweet-tempered, laid-back, and sleepy, he reflects the state of my fiction writing lately.  I can power down on my non-fiction for hours, but when I try to write creatively, my eyes cross, the screen blurs, and I fall flat on my back. ZZZZZZZZZZZ.

This state is more frustrating because two years ago I wrote a book in three months, and revised over the next six months.  Since then, I’ve started two other books, only to get stuck halfway through.  I’m bored to tears with one, and the other has turned into a sequel to a trilogy that desperately needs a total rewrite.  I’m threatening to cut the trilogy down to a single novel …

As you can tell, I’m thinking with my fingertips.  I’m so frustrated with my lack of creativity, I don’t even want to go near my fiction.

What do you do when inspiration – and your muse – fails you?

Critiquing isn’t easy

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Blog’s question for the month is: How do you approach critiquing someone's manuscript? For instance, do you focus on one thing at a time, or do you "let 'em have it" all at once? And once it's out there, do you ever regret sending off a critique because it moved the person in a direction you didn't intend or anticipate?

My goodness, Laura. You don’t ask easy questions. ;-)

I approach all crits with caution, and each novel differently. If the manuscript needs a LOT of work, I might do a line crit, pointing out spelling and grammar errors. The less help I feel I can be to the writer, the more detail-oriented my response is. There may be nothing overall “wrong” with the work, but if I can’t connect to it in some way, all I can offer is proofreading.

Ideally, though, I prefer to give overarching critiques. I like to point out when something worked brilliantly, or when limped along. I like to note good foreshadowing, or when an element popped out of the blue – and not in a good surprise way. I’m particularly fussy about endings that rush by too quickly, or that leave me scratching my head.

My goal is to help the novelist in a positive way. To make him or her say, “Ah-ha, that’s what was bothering me.” And best of all to say, “I can fix that!”

So far, I haven’t regretted a novel crit, though I cringe at my early attempts to crit short stories. I always worry that I’ve depressed the writer, which is the last thing I want to do. All stories have merit. They just might not be marketable in their current form.

Today I’d like to introduce Churchill, my new Muse, to all my bloggy friends. I think he looks like a cross between a stuffy Prime Minister and a thug in fancy dress, but he’s a sweet gentleman. He loves to sit in my lap when I’m writing. And rest his chin on the space bar. Yikes! When I’ve been writing too long he gets up on the desk and sits in front of the monitor. Talk about a hint. LOL!

All in a day's work

I found this video on Janet Reid's blog, and just had to share!

Do you try to write with the assistance of your cat?