Monday, January 30, 2006

Men look down at their nuts and this THIS???

Brenda, and Joyce,


Thank you for your encouraging comments.

A wanking scene!haahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!Any reference to used tea bags?


But I ask you, rhetorically, do you know of any men who look down at themselves and think:
By Golly, my nuts look like a used tea bag! :-) ?

I think the teabag simile is feminine POV.
I'm told that a male is so used to what he has down there that it doesn't occur to him to describe its looks any more than he would describe his forearm... unless there was something wrong/unusual about its appearance on a particular occasion.

What do the rest of you think?
Best
Rowena

Rowena Cherry www.rowenacherry.com

Saturday, January 28, 2006

Male Point of View Masturbation (scholarly thoughts)

BIAQers,

I have to share. I've written my male POV wanking scene.
First draft, reasonably polished, but not something I've ever attempted before, not --obviously-- having the necessary appendage. Anyway, my dh read it, snorted over a couple of lines, chortled over another, and passed it as being very "me" but realistic.

The only thing he questioned was that anyone would even think about having sex in a corset. He'd forgotten about what Madonna wore on stage at one point in her career.

Best to all.

Rowena Cherry www.rowenacherry.com

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

The Me I Do Not Want To Be

Somebody at work today asked me what I write. When I told them dark romance, they asked "Why dark?" I answered, "Because I'm a pacifist."

On the way home, a man driving a large pickup truck zoomed up behind me while I was passing a wide load transport. I was going 60 mph, but yet he felt it necessary to drive right up the ass of my Buick as I passed. And I thought, very distinctly, that the world would be a much better place if everyone on the planet were fitted with high-voltage-delivering electrodes in their brains, and I controlled the button that turned on the juice. I frequently have thoughts like this, and not just involving electrocution. Sometimes it's flamethrowers. Or, my eternal favorite, the application of Baseball Bat Justice. I often fear that I have these thoughts more than I should. Hence, my commitment to non-violence.

But I can't deny the part of me that wants to breathe firey wrath, wreak vengeance and cause pain. So in my villians, my plots, and many times in my heroines, I let out the Me I Do Not Want To Be.

So you know, somebody better publish me soon or I'll burn down the world. hehehehe.

Monday, January 23, 2006

WRITE FIRST

Recently someone asked how to get back into writing harness after taking some time off. I had some suggestions, and Joyce asked if I'd post it here. So here it is.

Write First.

I tend to give this advice a lot. Figure out when you have time that can be set aside for writing. If your kids are little, it may be naptime. If you have a full time dayjob, it may be after dinner. If you've finally sent your youngest off to school, it's going to be the minute they walk out the door. (I just sent my youngest off to college--and oh the peace and quiet--though he did leave the electric guitar behind...but it's quiet too when he's not here.)

Anyway, figure out when YOUR time is, and when it gets here, Write First.

Leave those toys in the middle of the floor. The kids can pick them up when they get home. (Okay, you may have to crack the whip a little, but it's good for them.) Leave the supper dishes in the sink till morning, or make the kids do them. If you have to wash clothes or go naked the next day, throw a load in the washer and sit down to write while it's washing. I've been lucky enough to be able to write full time the past 6 years (since before I sold), and I discovered very quickly that if I do not sit down to write shortly after I do my hair (I simply cannot do much of anything worthwhile if I don't fix my hair--bad (neglected) hair day = bad writing day), then I usually don't get any writing at all done that day. (I can put laundry in the washer, and dishes in the dishwasher, but that's it.) If I don't Write First, I generally don't write at all. (When I had a day job, I wrote after dinner. I didn't watch TV for years...)

Now, as for how to get back into the story. Go back and read it. From the very beginning, if you have to. If you don't have much written, read over your notes. Look back to discover what it was that excited you about it. I took a 3 week break from this !@#(*!&! book I'm trying to finish (In the next 2 weeks! and I (oh so foolishly) thought I was ahead of schedule) over the holidays, (The Cold from Heck that turned into The Cold That Wouldn't Go Away caused its own set of problems) and had to get my brain back into the story. I went back a couple of chapters' worth and read, so I could remember what had happened already and figure out where I was and where I needed to go next. I write from beginning to end, so I still have the end left. If that still doesn't get you where you want to be, you might try journaling about it, in longhand. Write down what bothers you about it. What you think you want to happen. What you like about the story. Somewhere in there, even if you don't find what excited you about the story to begin with, you might find something new that excites you, and you can fly with that.

Best of luck, and congratulations for making your laborious way through all that heavy verbiage. (And yes, I know I ought to be at least typing the silly book into the computer, if I'm not going to make new stuff up for it...)

I think I jinxed myself by naming it The Eternal Rose.

Gail (who wrote 31 pages last week, and STILL hasn't found the end)

Week #2 Check!

Okay, now we've finished Week #2 of our Book in a Quarter. Our group has quite a diverse list of goals, as the previous posts show. But some, like me, are In Revision.

I'd rather be In Hell, I think, than In Revision. First drafts are so fun, like eating the icing from a cake then finding out the cake underneath is just as good. Revision is like peeling the burned cheese off a ruined pizza and hoping the crust isn't so bad you have to start from scratch.

But I revised the first three chapters last week, and am going to start working on Chapter Four this afternoon.

So, to everyone: Keep Writing!

Thursday, January 19, 2006

Rowena Blogs

You know that Cyndi Lauper song: She Bops?

I'm mentally dancing to that tune, but substituting Blog for Bop, I am so glad to be here.... actually, I'm here, there and everywhere but where I ought to be, which is at my iMac writing about Insufficient Mating Material.

That's the title of my "Out, Damned Story" book for the Book In A Quarter.
However, I've also got an urgent problem with a poem about my alien djinn heroes, so I've put out a contest all over the internet.

As for my progress with my novel, it should be around 450 pages, and a few days ago it was 700. I love words to glorious excess! Nevertheless, I have trimmed down to around 600.

I wonder whether I could start Word Watchers for verbose authors?

Best wishes,
Rowena

Tuesday, January 17, 2006

Morning Inspiration . . .

As a writer, one of the things I tell myself is:


"if I don't write it, they can't buy it!"


Happy writing. :-)

~Ann JR

Monday, January 16, 2006

Today is our Report In Day

******* Today is The Day.*******
Every Monday, our merry band of dedicated authors report in with their progress. We've set goals for the quarter, January through March.

I have not progressed at all in my revision goals, which shames me as moderator. The neat thing about this group, though, is that reporting failure usually merits external encouragement, which cancels out the internal disparagement. So I was able to break the block and put in two hours of writing time this morning.

I'll be back next Monday, and I'm sure I'll have met my goal of three revised chapters for the week.

Joyce

Saturday, January 14, 2006

Promotion Fun

Singing nekkid wouldn't be bad if you held a poster of your book cover in front of you. People'd sure pay attention. ;-)

~Ann

Friday, January 13, 2006

Today is the first day ... blah, blah, blah

My first book is due out soon. Since it's an epub, it's soon after I wrote it, relatively speaking. What I've discovered, being a virgin and all, is that the editor can make or break you and that by the end, you wonder how any writer ever feels that they did it alone. Does anyone ever feel that? I know why so many books are dedicated to the writer's editor.

Now the fun part--promotions. For a confirmed introvert and hermit, this is the scary part. I think I'd rather strip naked and sing in front of my coworkers. Hmmm, maybe not. And maybe it won't be as bad as I think. I guess there are some things worse...


Raine

Lots of first

Hey, I thought the original version of MacArthur's Park was rap. Richard Harris didn't exactly sing it, right?.

Raine

The Universe Is Almost Complete

Hey, this works!

It's important that it does work, because on the drive home I thought that, in order to be complete, the world needs two things.

(1) A rap version of the immortal "MacArthur Park"

and

(2) A blog by a group of speculative romance authors gritty and determined to Meet Their Goals.

I have done my part to secure the universe.

P. Diddy, Usher, Lil' John....it is all up to you.

Joyce

Weekly Goal: Revise Three Chapters
Weekly Progress: Zero Chapters Revised. Hey, I still have till Monday!

PS . . .

Don'cha love Friday the 13th?

~Ann ;-)

Quiet eveyone, I'm hunting a story . . .

Well, here's my first post. The plan: finish what I start by March 31!

~Ann JR