Writing Process Blog Hop

Many years ago, I crossed paths with fellow blogger Kimberly Vanderhorst, who turned out to be a fellow writer outside her awesome blog, and who has since become a dear friend. She's one of those rare people who cheers and celebrates for friends' achievements because she's genuinely thrilled on your behalf, and she's willing to help you out any way she can.

Kim tagged me on a fun and different blog hop that's going around. I'm egregiously late on following through, but better late than never!

Before I get to the meat of the post, be sure to check out her writing blog HERE.


Here's the gist of the hop: 

"We writers share these things, but informally during workshops and at conferences (and, for a handful of established writers, in printed interviews), but not so much through our open-forum blogs. With the hash tag #MyWritingProcess, you can learn how writers all over the world answer the same four questions. How long it takes one to write a novel, why romance is a fitting genre for another, how one’s play list grows as the draft grows, why one’s poems are often sparked by distress over news headlines or oddball facts learned on Facebook…"


Below are my answers to the same questions other writers who are participating get to answer. I'm excited to see theirs; every person and writers is different, and we can all learn from each other!


What am I currently working on? 
As always, I have a gazillion pots in the fire, but the biggest thing going on right now is continued revisions on Winter's Crucible, my Winter War novel, which is historical women's fiction about a little-known part of World War II. It's also part that factors heavily into my ancestry, so I'm passionate about it. See THIS POST for more about one of the main characters.

The book is fully drafted and pretty shiny, especially certain parts, but a few chapters are sort of yelling at me to come back and fix them again. Every scene deserves to be as shiny as I can get it. I hope to have it all polished very, very soon.


How does my work differ from others of its genre?
Interesting question in light of the fact that over the years, I've genre hopped to some extent. Not entirely, though; even my romance novels have a solid women's fiction component to them.

At this point, my women's fiction typically has no romantic thread, which seems to not be the norm in the genre. Winter's Crucible breaks that mold a bit, but even it is heavy on the WF and very light on the romantic element. And romance readers can't expect a typical romance arc in it, either.

My women's fiction is definitely driven by flawed characters put into hard circumstances. Sometimes that means external events (like the Winter War), and other times it means looking at hard issues (relationships, addiction, mental disorders, and so on).


Why do I write what I do?
Long-time readers will remember that I went through not all that long ago before finally feeling at home in women's fiction. And that's really the best answer I can give: this is where my heart is. The books that have had the greatest impact on me as a person and as a writer have all been women's fiction. And as much as I enjoy reading other genres, the fact that those books aren't the ones that stay with me, that they aren't the ones inspiring me to write my own stories, is telling.

The vast majority of my colleagues, especially in the very rich Utah writing community, write for Young Adult or Middle Grade audiences, or they write fun, lighthearted romance. I love reading all of that, but somehow, I write darker stuff. And a result, I feel a bit like an oddball at times.

They get to share agents and editors and publishers, and I'm out in the wings doing something totally different. But emotionally intense women's fiction is where my heart is.



How does my writing process work?
It's hard to describe, especially as it's evolved a lot over the years. (That's what happens when you're a mom; you adapt to your kids' ever-changing ages and schedules!)

I do a lot of brainstorming while doing brainless tasks like sorting laundry and putting myself together in the morning. I'll often jot down plot and character ideas in a notebook to refer to later so I won't forget them (or I will forget them; I've learned that the hard way). Often before a writing session, I'll jot down a few bullet points listing the gist of what I want to happen in the scene I'm about to write.

When I'm working on historical fiction, I have to do plenty of research before writing a word, because the plot and characters come from learning about the era, the events, etc. If I ever feel stuck, reading up on research will often slip me right back into the story world.

I often reread what I last wrote, revising and tweaking along the way, to get myself back into the world. I used to be able to write faster than I do now. Today, if I can eke out 1,000-2,000 words in a day, I consider it a success.

That doesn't happen every day, though; I have a ton of hats to wear besides "drafter." Revision takes a lot longer, and I often have to stop working on a project in favor of another one, as deadlines overlap and interrupt. And then I still do a little bit of freelance editing on the side.

(Don't ask to hire me, though; the answer will almost certainly be no. I've backed off a ton because my own work wasn't getting written.)


Now for my tags!

Luisa Perkins is my well-known accountability partner. We first connected online (as I did with Kim), and have since become close friends both in person and long distance. She's a fantastic writer, an excellent editor and critique partner, and one of the best friends a girl could hope for. Find her blog HERE. She's published several books, but my personal favorite (not counting her WIPs) is Dispirited. (Okay, truthfully, I also rely on several recipes from her cookbook.)

Krista Jensen is a pure delight. She began her publishing career with the same regional publisher I did, and she's become not only a good friend but a critique partner as well. She's published several fun contemporary romances, including Of Grace and Chocolate, which I loved because: chocolate and romance. Find her blog HERE.

Jordan McCollum and I first connected when she came to one of my book signings, and we ended up chatting about all kinds of things that would appear random to other people but are near and dear to my heart (like linguistics and the Kalevala. I mean seriously, how awesome?!). She's since published several books, including her Spy Another Day series.

16 Months: My Transformation

While I usually talk about writing and books and word nerdiness here, this post is going to be a bit different. I'm hoping it will be of some benefit to others in their journeys.

A photo that amazing photographer Erin Summerill took of me at the recent LDStorymakers annual conference inspired me to put this post together. Even with my goofy facial expression and hand waving (I can't teach without using my hands), I've got great before and after pictures.

The really short version: 
For some unknown (then) reason, I got fat, sank into a horrid depression, and otherwise was miserable. Now I'm, well, not all that. The end. Oh, and this is what I looked like. The picture was taken at the 2010 UVU Book Academy conference. I may have gained a few pounds more in the following three months.








The longer version:
For most of my adult life, not counting pregnancies, my has weight stayed in about a seven-pound range. Ideally, I would have liked to have been around 10 lbs lighter and at my marriage weight, but I was at a healthy weight and felt decent about myself.

Then, a few years ago, the pounds began creeping on. I wasn't doing anything different in my life, as far as I could tell. Okay, I could have exercised more than I was (although I didn't stop altogether). And sure, I ate chocolate here and there. But that wasn't a change. Nothing significant had changed in my lifestyle.

But hey, I knew how to lose weight, right? I began watching my diet carefully, cutting here and there and eating much healthier. I exercised more.

Result: More weight gain. The scale just crept up and up. I'll clarify here that my weight gain wasn't in the realm of anything you'd see on The Biggest Loser, but it was still way more than was healthy, and I hated feeling like a beached whale. I hated not fitting into my biggest clothes and having to go to the thrift store to find stuff to wear. I rarely wore anything that didn't stretch.

At first I was in denial. Sure, the scale was up, but I didn't look that bad . . . right? I inherited my mother's frame, so I really can carry a little extra weight without it showing up. When my chocolate cookbook first came out, I had people asking how I could write it and stay so thin. That was before the weight gain. So when those comments stopped altogether, I had a clue what it meant. I was fat. I cringed at every photo of me. My usable wardrobe shrank and shrank.

I started to suspect I had a thyroid problem, but I didn't want to be one of those people making excuses for being fat. ("Oh, it's glandular . . .") I brought it up to my doctor, who ran a blood panel. My TSH and T4 were normal, so I was told not to worry about it; I wasn't hypothyroid.

But the results didn't sit right with me. I had plenty of symptoms of hypothyroid beyond unexplained weight gain, including a low body temperature (97.1), brain "fog," fatigue, depression, headaches, brittle nails, and a bunch of other things.

After doing a bit more research, including talking with a good friend who has a thyroid condition, I was convinced that something wasn't right. My original doctor, while a great guy, was a GP and likely didn't know how complex hypothyroid issues are and which panels to run, or how to read them. Finding a doctor to take me seriously and who knew enough to run the right tests took awhile, but eventually I did, thanks to the referral of a friend.

And waddaya know, but my T3 (the one that really matters) was in the toilet. So was my progesterone (which helps with stress, sleep, and mood), and a few other things, including Vitamin D, which was also contributing to my depression. I was indeed hypothyroid, among other things. My body was whacked out.

Almost as soon as I began taking the supplements I needed, my life, and my body, began to change. While the weight didn't come off in a flash, it did come off, slowly and steadily.

Here's a key point: I still had to do the work. 

I had to exercise, stay hydrated, and watch what I ate. But at least losing weight became possible, where before, it wasn't.

Something to note here: It's a horrid myth that to exercise you have to find something you like to do. I hate exercising, but I love having exercised. If you're waiting to like huffing and puffing and sweating like a pig, and you're using your dislike of exercise for not doing it, then you'll never have success. I often go running even when I hurt all over and I feel like someone's taking an ice pick to the back of my head. I go because it's something I have to do. I force myself to do it. I don't go to the gym when I feel good. I go to the gym and work my tail off so I'll feel good.

Another aspect in my success was that I started reading blogs of people who'd managed to lose weight and keep it off to learn more about how to fuel my body properly for weight loss (which takes more than cutting calories, of course). I grew up in a nutritious home, but there was still a lot to learn.

I'm now within (count 'em!) 9 pounds of my marriage weight. I'm solidly in the healthy range for what my weight should be, and on the low end of my old range. (I think I can actually hit that old marriage weight yet!) I sleep better (didn't even know how messed up my sleep was until it was fixed). I can exercise more. My chronic headaches are still around, but they're more manageable. My depression isn't the dark sink hole it once was.

No, life isn't all unicorns and rainbows. I still have chronic headaches. Depression of some kind just runs in my family. But things are so much better.

Losing the weight hasn't been an easy road. Like I said, it's still work. But now I can fit back into my skinny clothes, and my fat clothes are a thing of the past.

In my before picture up there, I hated myself.

But now? Well, this next picture was taken just over a week ago, at the LDStorymakers conference. I feel and look like myself again. Huzzah!

Top 5 Ways to Stay Sane as a Writer

Top 5 posts HERE.

Writing is a lifestyle where it feels as if you sit on the brink of sanity. Sometimes that's because you hear voices and see "movies" in your head. Other times it's the see-saw of emotions that goes from "Yay! I can really write!" to "I'm the lamest person to ever string two words together. Wah!" and back again.

And that's not counting the crazy stuff involved in getting or staying published.

When I'm losing my mind, here are my top 5 ways of staying SANE:

1. Read.

I always have a book (or two or three or four or . . .) that I'm reading, but I tend to read piecemeal. When I'm in the crazy zone, I find that sitting back and actually reading for an afternoon or an evening is a great way to de-pressurize and get back into the literary groove.

2. Take a Walk.

I walk as long as it takes for my mind to "unkink." No iPod or anything else. Just me and the sidewalk. The first several blocks, my brain chatters about this and that and the other. Eventually, the even pace of my steps and being outside calms the chatter, and my mind relaxes. I've found story ideas and plot solutions when I'm not even trying . . . but when I'm walking.

3. Have an Artist's Date

You know, ala Julia Cameron and The Artist's Way. For me, it can mean walking through the library, taking a jaunt through a thrift store, checking out a local museum, or even the dollar store. Just getting OUT. Sometimes this can be taking my writing with me and writing in a different location, like the picnic table at a park. I have a dream of going to a movie alone some afternoon. Haven't done it yet, but I will.

4. Knit.

Another way to unkink my brain. Provided I'm not doing a pattern that requires a lot of thinking, I can knit, still creating but in a different way. It always provides me with relaxation as well as a way for my mind to drift.

5. Each chocolate.

I don't think this needs much commentary. My downfall is often Mrs. Callender's French Silk Pie with the cookie crumb crust (because when I'm in the crazy, I'm in no mood to make my own chocolate, even though I have plenty of chocolate recipes!).

Chocolate Recipes & More

I got my author copies of Chocolate Never Faileth yesterday!!!

My children literally danced around the house, sang, and then personalized their copies with Sharpies.

(My son asked if they seriously all got copies, and I had to respond with, "Um, yeah. Actually, I've put aside copies of ALL my books for each of you kids." Apparently chocolate is the first one he particularly cared about.)

(Not that I blame him.)

Within minutes, my youngest begged to make something out of the book. Her first request (Easy Chocolate Pudding, page 87) was met with, "Sorry, we don't have whipping cream." She would not be deterred. She had to make something from the book. Right. Now.

So I helped her make my Sinful Chocolate Cupcakes (page 21) and Classic Chocolate Buttercream Icing (page 170) to go on them.

We used her copy of the book, so it's been officially "christened" in the kitchen, complete with a dusting of flour and a splatter of milk.

The kids enjoyed reading the anecdotes and quotes, looking at the pictures and recipes and remembering how we tested this one and how we came up with that one. My daughters were so tickled with their copies that they shoved the books into their backpacks to show off at school.

It was a fun trip down memory lane . . . especially when I thought about how it's been just under a year since I turned in the manuscript on October 6, 2009.

In honor of the release and my children's enthusiasm, below are the recipes for the cupcakes and the icing. (You'll have more icing than you need for a dozen cupcakes. Like that's a problem, right?)

I'm getting word of a bunch of fun promotional things coming down the pike (one of which I'll let you know about just as soon as it's official!). For starters, watch for TV ads on KSL 5 this weekend between general conference sessions. (I KNOW!!! How cool is THAT?!!!)

This week's book signings:

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 1, 5-8 pm, BYU Bookstore

Signing books and giving away samples.

And the next day:

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 2, flagship Deseret Book store in Salt Lake

Also giving out samples and signing books. BUT THE TIME HAS CHANGED. I'll be there immediately following the afternoon session of general conference: 4:00 - 5:30. (So NOT during Ladies Night. BEFORE it.)

With housekeeping business out of the way, it's recipe time!

Sinful Chocolate Cupcakes

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

2 tsp baking soda

1 cup sour cream

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup sugar

1 tsp baking powder

2 cups flour

1/4 cup cocoa

Preheat the oven to 400. Put paper baking cups into a cupcake pan. Melt the butter; cool in the freezer for about 5 minutes. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, combine the soda and sour cream. Stir well and set aside. The mixture will puff up as it sits. In a large bowl, beat the eggs and vanilla. Add the cooled butter and puffed-up sour cream mixture. Add the sugar and mix well. Add the baking powder, flour, and cocoa; beat for a minute or two until the batter is fully mixed. Spoon the batter into the cupcake liners and bake for about 18 minutes. Cool and ice with your favorite icing. Makes 1 dozen.

Classic Chocolate Buttercream Icing

Ingredients:

1 stick butter, softened

1 tsp vanilla extract

dash of salt (about 1/8 tsp)

half of a 32-oz bag of powdered sugar (about 4 1/4 cups)

2/3 cup cocoa

5-8 TB milk, as needed

Beat together butter and vanilla. In a separate bowl, sift together powdered sugar, cocoa, and salt. Add a generous 1/2 cup to 1 cup of the powdered sugar mixture to the butter mixture, followed by 1 TB milk. Continue alternating between the two until you reach the desired consistency.

Chocolate Quotes

We're less than TWO WEEKS OUT from the release!!!

Last week we celebrated the upcoming release with fun anecdotes and trivia that are in the book. Today, it's time for chocolate quotes!

But first, a housekeeping item:

I have TWO cookbook signings scheduled for next week:

FRIDAY, October 1, 5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

BYU Bookstore

SATURDAY, October 2, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Ladies Night at the Salt Lake Deseret Book

Important: I will be bringing samples to both signings.

I also have another EIGHT signings scheduled at area Costcos throughout October. I'll post the schedule for those soon.

Now for a few of the fun CHOCOLATE QUOTES found in Chocolate Never Faileth:

-I have this theory that chocolate slows down the aging process. It might not be true, but why take the risk?

-Man cannot live on chocolate alone. Woman can.

-Chocolate: Here today . . . gone today.

-For my birthday and Christmas, I’ll take anything in a size chocolate.

-Readers Digest, in one of their weight-loss articles, wrote that the average craving only lasts ten minutes. I find that mine last much shorter than that. I mean, really, how long does it take to get the wrapper off an Almond Joy? (From my good friend and hugely successful YA author, Janette Rallison)

-Ugh! They insulted chocolate! (My oldest daughter at the age of 9, on seeing a Verizon commercial about their new “Chocolate” cell phone, which [the nerve!] wasn’t even brown.)

-Many young girls make their first batch of fudge around the same time they kiss their first boy. They will remember the fudge.

In Honor of Chocolate and a Certain Cookbook

As we're only a few weeks out from the release Chocolate Never Faileth (squeee!) I decided to give a sneak peek into part of the book.

No, not into the recipes themselves (although maybe I'll post one or two in the next couple weeks, just for kicks).

I thought that showing some of the other elements of the book, the in-between stuff, would be fun. The book has lots of trivia, facts, and anecdotes I dug up, all centered on, of course, chocolate.

Below are four of many from the book. (Remember that you can now PRE-ORDER Chocolate Never Faileth through Deseret Book!)


True Story #1, about Lynn:
After being admitted at 18 weeks of pregnancy and spending over one hundred days in the hospital, Lynn broke the record for the longest stay at that hospital’s neonatal unit in hopes of saving the life of her unborn baby. Her daughter was finally born, nine weeks early—young but alive and with a good prognosis, weighing in at 3 lbs, 2 oz. Exhausted, Lynn returned home, craving a giant bag of peanut M&Ms. She ate the whole thing in a day . . . then picked up the empty bag and realized with a tad of horror that it had contained . . . 3 lbs, 2 oz. The exact weight of her baby.


Anecdote from Delyana:
A good piece of chocolate has about 200 calories. As I enjoy two servings per night, and a few more on weekends, I consume 3,500 calories of chocolate in a week, which equals one pound of weight per week. Therefore . . . In the last 3 ½ years, I have had a chocolate caloric intake of about 180 pounds. I weigh 165 pounds. Without chocolate, I would have wasted away to nothing about three months ago!

I owe my life to chocolate.


A Bit of Trivia:
A few years ago, Mars. Inc. stopped marketing the Mars Bar candy bar—but they didn’t stop making it. In its place, the company now sells the exact same bar with a new name. It’s now Snickers Almond. Did you realize it’s the exact same candy bar?

But in Europe and elsewhere, the same candy bar is sold as Mars Almond.

Confused yet? Let’s make it worse.

A candy bar marketed to Europeans and others outside the U.S. as the Mars Bar is called the Milky Way here in the U.S.

Wait. What?

And finally, a gem from my dear friend Luisa:

Elga called it a dessert when she gave me the little handwritten index card [with the recipe], but I know she must have been kidding, because, um, see, Elga, it doesn't have any chocolate in it.

IMPORTANT NOTE:

I get to be part of Ladies Night at Deseret Book's flagship store in Salt Lake City on Saturday, October 2! (Woohoo!)

I'll be there signing cookbooks . . . and giving out samples. Please come!

4-Year Extravaganza!!!

Yippee! Today marks FOUR YEARS since my very first post here at The Lyon' s Tale, wherein I celebrated my writerly weirdness.

IT'S PARTY TIME!!!

(PRIZES BELOW!)

But first . . .

A lot much has happened in four years. A smattering:

• Four of my seven novels were published.
• I got two teenagers. (And an ulcer. Connected? You decide.)
• I got my own gorgeous office with built-in bookcases made by my husband.
• I won Utah's Best of State medal for fiction.
• The Whitney Awards were created. My suggestion for naming the award was picked. ("Whitney" in honor of apostle Orson F. Whitney, who envisioned an amazing future for LDS literature).
• I was a Whitney finalist, then a member of the committee, and this year got to present a Lifetime Achievement Award to Gerald Lund.
• (Speaking of which, be sure to nominate your favorite books by LDS writers . . . and that includes national books. A title needs five nominations to be official. Get nominating!)
• The Teen Writers Conference was born, which I've been part of since its inception.
• I broke my nose.
• I used elements from that experience in my next two books.
• Two daughters hurt their wrists w/in about 48 hours of one another: one sprained, the other broken. With their red hair, I was immediately identified by the Urgent Care NP. "Weren't you just here with another daughter with a similar injury?"(I am a fit mother. I SWEAR.)
• Husband and I took a trip to visit my parents in my other homeland, Finland, where they were presiding over the temple. You can read all about the trip HERE.
• I was asked to write a COOKBOOK, of all things. Lesson: You never know where writing opportunities will come from. Keep doors open. (And watch shelves in October!)
• I joined Facebook (with both a personal page and an author page).
• I joined Twitter (@Lyonstale).
• At the pestering request of many, many people, I created my grammar book.
• Most recently, I got my very first book available for readers once again, currently on the Kindle. (Can I hear a woot, woot?!)

Now for the celebration, in THREE parts (each part will have MULTIPLE winners!):

1) A random drawing for prizes.

2) An easy trivia contest. (I give obvious hints, so there's no excuse to NOT find the answers.)

3) A mini writing contest.

THE PRIZES, THE PRIZES!!!

1) CHOCOLATE!

Kim is generously donating a delicious Canadian chocolate pack to one winner. (That alone is worth entering, no? Oh, yeah.)

2) Eyes Like Mine

A signed copy of Julie Wright's latest novel, a recent Whitney Award finalist.

3) All the Stars in Heaven

A signed copy of Michele Paige Holmes's latest, also a Whitney finalist this year. (Her previous book won the Whitney for Best Romance. She has yet to publish a book that isn't at least a

finalist.)

4) Alma the Younger

A signed copy of the newest release by 2-time Whitney winner H. B. Moore.

5) A Spiral-bound Notebook and a Pen

The notebook has a totally cool cover (a blueish/grayish door with a brass doorknob and lock). Quote on the front says: Unlock your mind: read. Winner also gets a pen to go with the notebook. It has cute polka dots and the words: Don't bug me; I'm writing.

6) A Mouse Pad

Features a stack of books and the famous Groucho Marx quote: "Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read."

7) A T-shirt

White, with a row of cute houses on it and a quote below them: "A house without books is like a room without windows."

8) A custom piece of jewelry from Bangles, Beads, N' Bobbles.

Visit their Facebook page or Etsy shop to get an idea of the fun stuff to choose from. Since the winner's prize will be created custom-made, they'll have to plan on about 2 weeks so Sandra, the brain behind the magic, can make the piece and ship it.

9) Finding Rose

A signed copy of Stephanie Humphrey's debut romance novel from Walnut Springs.

Enter THREE ways:

1) Comment, then spread the word, if you want to. (THREE RANDOM WINNERS.)

One comment will enter you. Get additional entries by spreading the word. (You know the drill: tweet it, blog about it, put it in your FB status, yada yada. Then let me know what you've done, and you'll get extra entries for each item. Blog posts linking back to this one are worth two entries, all the other fun stuff is worth one extra each.)

2) Answer the five trivia questions below. (THREE RANDOM WINNERS.)

Send your answers to ANNETTE at ANNETTELYON dot COM. DO NOT put your answers in the comments. I promise, they're EASY:

Five Trivia Questions (all answers can be found here on my blog):

1) What month of the year did I begin Word Nerd Wednesday? (Hint: Look for the "Word Nerdiversary" post.)

2) When (month and year) was Lost Without You first published? (Hint: Look at a recent post.)

3) What was the title of the first book I began to write (but never finished)? (Hint: The VERY FIRST post with from the Writing Journey series. They're labeled.)

4) What cosmetic do I almost never leave the house without? (Hint: #76.)

5) List the other SIX members of my critique group There are seven of us, but don't list me. (Hint: Sidebar)

AGAIN: DO NOT put the answers into the comments. E-mail them to me.

3) Enter my mini writing contest. THREE winners will be awarded from the entries, which will be judged by a super-secret but totally awesome panel.

The rules: write a short-short story of 250 words or fewer (word count will be enforced), with either the opening or closing sentence being:

In hindsight, it wasn't such a good idea.

Send your story (fiction or non-fiction) via e-mail: ANNETTE at ANNETTELYON dot com with the story IN THE BODY OF THE MESSAGE. (No attachments. Maximum of two stories per person.)

Winning stories will be posted here, so by entering, you're granting The Lyon's Tale that right.

DEADLINE for stories: Wednesday, July 28.

(That's a week from the date of this post.)

TO SUM UP:

-THREE PRIZES for comments and spreading the love.

-THREE PRIZES for those who correctly answer ridiculously easy trivia questions.

-THREE PRIZES for mini story winners.

That's NINE awesome prizes you have a shot at winning!

Winners will be announced Friday, July 30.

Ready, set, go!

I DID IT!!!

It took a lot more work than I expected. I kept running into parts I thought I'd already fixed, plot holes I forgot I hadn't figured a solution for, and then plain old things like inconsistencies and the like.

But I did it. And with 1 hour, 58 minutes to spare. (But who's counting, right? :-D)

The murder mystery I've tentatively titled Trigger Point is officially submitted to Covenant!

This means that one commenter from THIS POST gets to celebrate with chocolate, and that person, according to Random dot org, is my good friend LARA from OVERSTUFFED!

Thanks again to everyone who inspired me and kept me positive so I could reach my goal.

I have the best readers anywhere.

Up next: Sleep.

So Subjective

What makes a good book? What makes for good writing?

You'd think those questions would have pretty straight-forward answers.

Mmmm . . . not so much.

This is my second year serving as a Whitney Awards judge, and we're rounding the bend on finishing up the reading of the nominees so we can cast our ballots for who we think should be the finalists in our category or categories. I'm judging two of the six categories, and there are five judges per category.

I know every judge has their own way of looking at quality. Every judge is qualified to serve as one. Yet we all rank different elements as higher importance or lower importance. (Is the plot arc more important than character? Is the writing on a sentence and paragraph level more important than plot? And so on. The list is endless.) Whatever we use as our personal guidelines, we are to apply the same ones to every book we judge.

I'm not going to discuss specific categories or titles (although since my own book is eligible in Historical, I'm obviously not judging that one). What I'll do instead is offer some general observations.

In one category, I thought there were three clear front-runners. While I still had a couple of books to read in the category, I would have been very surprised to see any of those three knocked off my list of predicted finalists. The last two slots would be fought over by the others. Actually, not all the others, because there are always a handful of nominees that just don't hold a candle to the others. But there were several that could have filled those last two slots.

Then lo and behold, I find out that one of the judges absolutely detested one of my top 3. Um, what? Every other person I've talked to who has read this book has love, love, loved it. Except this judge. I'm dying to know what the other three judges think, and now I'm wondering whether this book will be a finalist after all. I think it absolutely deserves to be. But I'm sure this judge has their reasons.

It's so subjective.

In my other category, something similar happened, only I was on the other side. I read a title I thought without a doubt was on the "um, yeah right, this has no chance" pile. And then I heard another judge in the same category lauding it. I had to do a double-take. I had half a mind to shake the judge and say, "But no human being acts like that! The characters were cardboard, the plot was contrived, and the writer was trying too hard to have a specific tone and missed the target by a mile. Can't you see that?"

Or maybe I'm the one with no clue. So maybe that book will be a finalist even though I couldn't stand it.

In a little less than a month, the finalists will be announced. I'm sure there will be plenty of excited people. Others will be sad they didn't make the list. There will be lots of buzz about why certain titles are there while others are not, and whether LDS fiction has improved or not over the years and what were certain judges thinking, and whether the Whitney system is accurate and all kinds of stuff.

But the bottom line is this: everyone likes different things. Even "quality" is, largely, subjective. And as frustrating as that can be at times, it's the reality. It's why I have a daughter who loves brownies but hates chocolate ice cream. They're both chocolate. As far as I'm concerned, they're both delicious. But she has a different taste.

And that's okay.

On the other hand, I really hope that one title is a finalist and one isn't.

And since I'm being honest, I kinda wouldn't complain if Tower of Strength ends up on the list too.

Writing Journey: Sliding into Chocolate Homebase

It was the second week of August, and I knew without any doubt that I simply could not get a full manuscript of the chocolate cookbook to Covenant by the end of the month like I'd promised.

The thought was devastating. I'd never, ever missed a deadline, self-imposed or otherwise. I knew they'd be understanding, but I hated to disappoint them. I was disappointed in myself, even though I'd done everything short of moving mountains to get the book done in four months.

I sent an e-mail to Kathy, the managing editor, and to Kirk, my personal editor, explaining the situation and apologizing profusely. I said I could almost certainly have the book done in another six weeks, the first part of October.

Once again, Kirk proved to me that he's the best editor a writer could hope to have. His reply was something along the lines of, "We'd much rather have a quality product than a rushed one. Take the time you need."

(Have I mentioned that Kirk rocks?)

They hadn't decided on a firm release date, but they'd been toying with a possible Valentines Day release. The delay pretty much nixed that. So they penciled in a tentative fall 2010 release.

As soon as school started for the kids, I buckled down harder than ever, baking and cooking and otherwise chocolating (yes, it became a verb) all day long, every day. I'd plan out a strategy each day: which recipes I'd make and in which order, depending on what temperature the oven needed to be at and how long they took to bake, or if I needed to swing by the store for a certain ingredient.

While one recipe baked or cooled, I'd be at the computer typing up the results of a success.

Most of the time, the house looked like a flour, sugar, and cocoa factory had exploded inside. The counters and floor were scary. I did more hand washing and ran the dishwasher more times every day than ever before and still never caught up.

I don't have much memory of what we ate for dinner. My husband would walk in the door from work, see me bustling around in an apron, and asked if I was working on a recipe or actually making dinner. Usually, it wasn't dinner.

Life was utter madness. But I was going to get the thing done if it killed me. (I think it almost did.)

When I finished the actual recipes, I spent a week or so finishing up the other content I'd been working on periodically throughout the process: an introduction, explanations of ingredients, specific information on chocolate, a glossary, fun chocolate anecdotes and trivia, and so on.

That part, I must admit, was some of the most fun I had. (Possibly because it was, oh, writing.)

As the days went on, I gave Kirk a firmer date. I promised him that he'd have the manuscript by Monday, October 5th.

I thought that on that date, I'd be simply giving it a couple of final touches in the morning before e-mailing it off.

Instead, I was up late finishing the manuscript, working until I was happy with it.

But I made that deadline. I'm sure Kirk was long gone from the office by the time I submitted the manuscript around ten o'clock that night, but what I am tentatively calling The Chocoholic's Easy Guide to Bliss landed in his inbox on October 5th, as promised.

I celebrated not with chocolate, but with wonderfully salty chips and salsa.

WNW: Best Word Ever--Theobroma

Today's WNW is a brief vocabulary lesson . . . with a point.

The word: theobroma

Let's break it down.

Theo comes from the Greek root for "god"

broma means "food"

So basically, theobroma means "food of the gods."

Can you guess what it means? No, not ambrosia. Something even better. Oh, yeah. You know.

Theobroma is the genus name for the cacao plant.

(Here's a picture of cacao pods I took myself at the NY Chocolate Show back in 2003.)

In short, theobroma refers to CHOCOLATE, and one of the main chemicals found in chocolate is called theobromine.

So why did I use WNW to share a chocolate vocabulary lesson today?

Because I have a special announcement:

My chocolate cookbook has been officially accepted for publication!

The original thought was the it might be out next fall (Oct 2010) just in time for Christmas shopping. The official release date is still up in the air, but there's a slight possibility it might come out a little earlier.

I'll keep readers updated!

In the meantime, I'm going to go celebrate with some of the Finnish chocolate my parents brought home with them.

(You haven't tasted milk chocolate unless you've had a Fazer Blue. Go ahead and feel jealous.)

Writing Journey: Part XXIV

I frantically sat down to work on a grammar, usage, and punctuation book. Fortunately, I'd already compiled my syllabus for the upcoming conference, which was essentially a list of the most common questions I get asked and the most common errors I see in my editing work.

That was my launching point. I printed out my syllabus, added a few more topics, and began writing on one issue at a time, crossing each off as I went. I'd already blogged about a few of the issues, whether here on a Word Nerd Wednesday or on the Writing on the Wall blog, but most of them I had to write from scratch.

I began with punctuation, went on to grammar, and ended with usage issues (mostly commonly mistakes with usage pairs and the like, such as affect/effect, imply/infer, and so on).

I knew I'd be doing the book with print-on-demand (POD) technology, and I knew there were several different companies that provided such services, but I had no clue which one I'd go with. At that point, I was just frantically trying to get a manuscript ready.

My husband, however (who I've mentioned as Mr. Techno-Dude but who is also Mr. Consumer-Reports Dude), unbeknownst to me began researching POD companies, their pros and cons, and which might be the best fit for our particular situation.

One day, out of the blue, he came to me and announced that through his research, he figured that CreateSpace (a sub-company of Amazon) might be the best way to go. I had no idea he'd even been researching. I poked around at the CreateSpace site and saw plenty to know that it really was a good fit. I didn't bother looking elsewhere, because I knew that my husband already had. It was a good fit for what we were doing.

(Big caveat here: every POD company has its own pros and cons. Before doing your own self-publishing venture, know what you're doing, why and what you expect to get out of it. We knew my goals and what I was trying to accomplish very clearly. I won't recommend CreateSpace blanketly for all writers, but it was a great fit for ME and my project.)

I had no clue what to call the book, so I threw out the problem out to my blog readers and asked for ideas, promising a free copy to anyone whose idea I used. Lara was the first person to suggest I use "Word Nerd" in the title, since that's a nickname I'm known as thanks to my Word Nerd Wednesday posts (and, let's face it, elsewhere). I knew right away that was a good idea.

My oldest sister, who's very creative, got on a title kick and started e-mailing me literally dozens of title ideas. I used one of hers and paired it with Lara's Word Nerd idea, with the resulting attempt at a pun and comforting title:

There, Their, They're: A No-Tears Guide to Grammar from the Word Nerd

I liked it!

Next up: A cover.

One thing I knew is that a lot of self-published books have, to put it mildly, rather pathetic covers, because they don't have a team of professionals designing them. I really didn't want mine to look bad, so I hired a friend who is a professional graphic designer (as well as a writer), Crystal Leichty.

The poor girl had little to go by other my really vague ideas, but she came up with several awesome mock-ups, and after I saw them, I had a better idea of what I wanted. By the end, we had a final version I just fell in love with. (It's right there in the sidebar, of course. Doesn't it totally rock?)

With CreateSpace, you have to upload the typeset file (which was done by, of course, my techno-hubs), and then we had to wait for the interior and cover files to be approved, which would take 24 - 48 hours.

After the files would be approved, I'd order a hard proof, they'd ship it to me, and when I saw it and then approved the proof, I could order copies, have them shipped, and they'd be available for sale at the conference.

If we didn't hit a single snag, it would work. If we ran into a slight delay and they arrived a day late, my husband offered to drive them down for the second day of the conference. It would work, I was sure of it.

But . . . the files weren't approved.

Both the interior and the cover files both had minor problems we'd overlooked.

GREAT.