the 7, 70, 170 meme...a.k.a. more Black Heart

the other day, Christine Hardy tagged me on facebook with this meme. today, Donna Hole tagged me on blogger. The rules are to go to page 7, 70 or 170 of your current WIP or new release and post the first complete paragraph or 7 lines of dialogue then tag 7 other authors. oddly enough, i already posted this meme a few days ago.  (and didn't really follow the rules). to play along today, i'll post a continuation of the same scene (and won't follow the rules again).

He smiled himself at the memory of the winged jewels landing on them before his proposal. One of his many efforts at winning her heart. Seven years of marriage and sometimes he still couldn’t believe she’d agreed to be his wife. He was blessed beyond measure. He pulled her closer, and for a few moments, they just lay there, enjoying the quiet and each other’s company. Despite being connected to her mind and heart, Kieran always felt better when Jessa was near.       

“What did the farmers want?” she finally asked.

“They’ve been losing stock to gurithents.”

“Gurithents? They never attack anything larger than a deer.”

“I know. And they’ve never come near settlements before.”

He put his hand on her growing belly. The baby kicked and Jessa sucked in a breath. He loved his girls, but a boy would be nice. Whether boy or girl, another child meant someone else who needed his attention. Spending time with the two he had was a challenge. How would he ever manage the half dozen they wanted?   

“If it were a drought,” she said, “we could bring rain. But gurithents…”

“Except for the occasional unfortunate encounter with one, they aren’t a threat.” He let out a long breath. “I’ll send word by messenger pigeons for other villages to watch for them, but other than that…” 

“I’m sure you’ll figure something out. You always do.”

as for tagging 7 other writers, i'm getting ready to do a big IWSG post in a couple of weeks, and need to devote my time to putting that together, so if you want to play along, go for it. just let me know so i can read your post.

another exerpt from Black Heart

this is from the first chapter, and takes place right after the exerpt i posted here... another first scene from Black Heart

Once inside his apartments, Kieran closed the door and inhaled. The room smelled like Jessa, just a hint of roses, his favorite smell. The candles were all snuffed, but a fire crackled in the large fireplace. He rested one hand on the mantle and stared into the flames.

“Still fascinated with fire?” He turned to see his wife curled up on their bed. She gave him a lazy smile.

“Life was simpler when I was a blacksmith.”

“Forging iron is certainly easier than forging a country.”

“Speaking of forging…I made a rose for the girls today.” “Playing again?”

“Working in the smithy helps me think.” He dressed for bed and joined her. Flour covered the end of her nose. He wiped it away with his thumb. “Seems I’m not the only one who’s been playing.”

“Halda needed help with the bread today.”

“For a queen, you spend a lot of time in the kitchen.” He tugged on the end of her braid. “You should rest more.”

“Baking helps me think. Besides, most of the kitchen staff were recovering from Riordan and Shula’s wedding last night.”

“It was quite the celebration.” After conducting a short ceremony, Kieran hadn’t stayed for more than an hour, but he’d heard that the drinking and dancing had lasted well into the morning.

“I’m surprised anyone was working today,” Jessa said, yawning.

“I was surprised my bodyguard would marry your Baraca handmaid. As far as I know, he still holds a grudge against the Baraca gang that killed his parents.”

“I think he’s still a little shocked himself. While he was saying his vows, he looked like he didn’t quite know how he’d ended up marrying her.”

“Love can overcome all kinds of obstacles.”

“Yes, it can.” She gave him a knowing look, then cuddled into his chest. He put his arm around her. “I’m glad love helped me decide to marry you.”

“So am I.” He kissed the top of her head. “I don’t know what I’d have done if you hadn’t said ‘yes.’”

“Well, without those butterflies, I wasn’t sure.”

another first scene for Black Heart...

and i think i finally got it right this time. or at least i'm much more pleased with this version than with any other. i have to warn you, though, it does give a couple of spoilers for Eldala.

“Once upon a time, there was a little princess. Every day she ran away from her home to climb the oldest tree in the forest. Every day she wished for someone to be her friend.”

Lydia groaned and rolled her eyes. “You always tell this story,” she said. “You met Mama in the forest and you both lived happily ever after. Blah, blah, blah. It’s boooring.”

Mikayla pulled her thumb out of her mouth. “Tell ‘bout Grampa Thor.”

“I like the one where he found you in Samuel’s shop and carried you away,” Lydia added.

“How do you know that one?” Kieran asked.

“Grampa Thor likes to tell it.”

Kieran was going to have to talk to Grampa Thor about the kinds of stories he told the girls. At six and four, Kieran hardly thought it was appropriate for them to hear the details of his death.

Lydia stood on the bed and brandished a pretend sword. “And then you came back to life and cut off of the evil queen’s head.”

Mikayla clapped. Kieran groaned.

He was definitely going to have to talk to Arathor.

“Cut off her head.” Mikayla added a maniacal laugh.

Lydia smiled and waved her “sword” around. “Ciara melted into the floor and—”

“She never melt—no!”

“But Grampa Thor said—”

“Enough! Time for bed.”

Mikayla stuck her thumb back in her mouth. “Not sleepy.”  

“And I want to stay up to read.”

“It’s late,” Kieran said. “And you both need your rest.”

“Grampa Thor lets us stay up late,” Lydia said.

Grampa Thor was going to get a stern talking to. “I’m your papa. It’s time for bed.”

Lydia pressed her lips together. Please Papa?

No, Lydia. No arguments tonight.

Lydia put on her best princess pout before lying down next to Mikayla. Kieran pulled the quilt up to their chins and gave them each a kiss on the cheek. Telling the girls a story and tucking them in at night helped him forget for a few minutes that he was a king—though at least the new city magistrates didn’t argue with him half as much as his daughters did.  

a "Look" meme, just for fun

as i was perusing blogs this morning, i came across this post from Annalisa Crawford's blog. in this meme, you have to find the first incident of the word "look" in your WIP and post the surrounding paragraph. the closest i could get was "looked" and it's from the prologue of Black Heart (my seemingly never-ending WIP sequel to Eldala). and i've included more than a paragraph.

if you want to read the entire prologue, which i think i wrote a couple of years ago, you can read it on my Eldala blog.

Hamal took a few ragged breaths of his own and tried to still his mind. If this was the end, he had to warn her. She was one of the last.

He tried to make me restore it. I refused. Now he is going to kill me as well.

There was no answer, but he knew she had heard him. She was the most powerful seer among them. Surely she would be able to evade the threat.

He darted to the next tree and slammed into something hard. The impact knocked him onto his back. Though it was pitch black, he looked up. A momentary flash of violet came from the man’s eyes.

Hamal remembered the cold malice in them.

“Last chance.” The voice was human and yet not.

“I serve the Baraca.” His heart beat frantically in his chest, but his voice was steady and strong. “I will never help you.”

“A shame,” the man said as he pressed a cold dagger to Hamal’s throat.

Black Heart snapshot

my friend Christine Hardy does a recurring post called Sunday Snapshot where we're supposed to post the last bit of dialogue we wrote. i cheated just a bit because i'm going to cut the last thing i wrote since it wasn't how i wanted the scene to go. so i backed up to the previous "last thing" i'd written.

this is from Eldala's sequel Black Heart. to explain, Kieran has told his 6 year old daughter Lydia that she can't attend a celebration (that i can't elaborate on without giving away part of Eldala's storyline). She's not happy about it because she loves to see the entertainers. He's trying to soften the blow. This is from Tiana's (one of Lydia's grandmothers) point of view and it's still first draft stuff.

“What if I send the magicians to you?” Kieran asked, his face softening.

Lydia pouted. “It wouldn’t be the same.”

“It will have to do.”

Lydia’s mouth twisted back and forth. “Can you send the jugglers too? And the acrobats and the fire eaters?”

Kieran smiled. “Yes, the jugglers and acrobats. But not the fire eaters.” He ruffled her head. “We don’t want to burn down the keep.”

Lydia put her arms around Kieran’s neck and laughed. He swung her around a few times, laughing with her. When he put her down, he kissed her cheek and ruffled her hair again. “Be good for Gramma Tee today. And stay in the nursery.”

“I will, Papa. I promise.”

He glanced at Tiana. She nodded.

“I won’t let her out of my sight, Kieran.”

a snippet from Black Heart

in this scene, Tiana (female MC, and mother to Jessa from Eldala) is having a heated discussion in her kitchen with Kieran (MC from Eldala and her son-in-law) and Arathor (male MC and Kieran's father). and yes, there's tea.

Arathor’s impatience rolled off of him like the steam from the whistling teapot. Let him steam. Tiana wasn’t going to change her mind.

She put the tea ball into her cup and poured the boiling water over the mint. Once the tea had steeped, she removed the ball and picked up the cup, hoping the pungent aroma would calm her growing anxiety.

“I know this is hard,” Kieran said. “For reasons we still don’t understand, Dorinda didn’t give us the answers. But she did say you would have them.” He gave her a sad smile. “We need your help.”

As desperate as Kieran and Arathor were for answers, some part of her—a very small part—wanted to help. The other part wanted nothing to do with this problem, especially if it meant looking at the purple stone again

With as much conviction as she could muster, she said, “I can’t help you.”

“Of all the damned things…” A muscle in Arathor’s jaw twitched. The dangerous look in his eyes made her flinch, but no matter how angry he was with her, she couldn’t do what he’d asked. After what seemed like an eternity, he stormed out of the kitchen. She flinched again when he slammed the front door shut, hard enough to rattle the windows in the sitting room. 

None of it seemed to bother Kieran. “Will you at least translate the book for us?” he asked.

Her hands started to shake. She set the cup down and put both hands to her knotting stomach. There wasn’t enough mint tea in Teleria to settle it now.

lucky 7 meme - a piece of Black Heart

Lisa Yarde, aka The Brooklyn Scribbler, has tagged me in a Lucky 7 meme. the rules:

*go to page 77 of your current WIP
*go to line 7
*copy down the next 7 lines/sentences as written and post them on your blog or website
*tag 7 other authors
*let them know they've been tagged

it just so happens that page 77 contains an important revelation that i don't want to reveal here since it would ruin the suspense i've tried to work into the story. but, i'll post the part you can read.

this is part of a scene with Tiana (my female MC). she's just learned something about herself that she didn't think could be possible and she's now reading a journal entry (that i can't reveal the author of-- sorry) that confirms it.

 “This is the only course I can take. My hope is that she does not squander my sacrifice. If the truth does not come out, the consequences will be catastrophic.”


This time Tiana couldn’t stop her shriek.


Seconds later, Arathor burst through her door. “What happened?”


The explanation stuck in Tiana’s throat. He sat on the edge of her bed and picked up the book. She felt his shock and then a strange calm. “So," Arathor said, "she did..."

 sorry, but that's where i have to leave you hanging.

 now, to tag 7 writer friends...

 Kristie Cook
Christine Danek
Alex J. Cavanaugh
Jeffrey Beelser
Christine Hardy
Annalisa Crawford (interesting - i have a character named Annalisa in my books)
Margo Berendsen 

a scene from Black Heart

This is a scene with Kieran and Jessa, from the first chapter of Black Heart. The story takes place seven years after the end of Eldala. 

Kieran nodded to the night guards who kept vigil outside the girls’ room and made his way down the spiral stairs to the bottom floor of the tower. The keep was older and draftier than the main castle. The new windows let in scant light, and the heavy tapestries did little to keep away the chill. He wouldn’t have had it any other way. Living here made it easier to feel like a normal family instead of the royal family.

 

Once inside his apartments, he closed the door and inhaled. The room smelled like Jessa, just a hint of cinnamon and cascabel, two of his favorite smells. The candles were all snuffed, but a fire crackled in the large fireplace. He rested one hand on the mantle and stared into the flames. They still fascinated him. He’d worked with fire most of his life, using it to shape lumps of metal into works of art. Life had been simpler when he was blacksmith. He’d learned over the last few years that forging iron was far easier than reforging a country.


to read the rest, go to my Eldala blog: A Tidbit From Black Heart

finally, a one-liner

just as i was falling asleep, i came up with a one-liner for Black Heart.

"A secret older than Teleria threatens to destroy everything Arathor holds dear."

maybe i'll tweak it. maybe i won't. now i just have to come up with a back cover blurb. oh. and finish the book. yeah. that would be good.

something to tide you over (or make you crazy)

as part of nanowrimo (which i keep vascillating on), i posted an exerpt, some stuff i wrote last month. i thought i'd post it here too.

Once upon a time there was a good king. He dearly loved his wife and his kingdom. The people loved him and the land prospered. But this king made one fatal mistake. He hadn't heeded his father’s warnings. The man he thought he could trust took over the kingdom. To protect his wife and unborn child, he had to flee the castle and go into hiding. His wife gave birth to a son, but to keep him safe, the king gave him to a simple blacksmith to raise as his own.

When the king returned to his island, his wife was dying. Giving up her only son was more than her heart could bear. The king did all he could to save her, but it wasn’t enough. He held her in his arms and watched her die..

He buried her on the island, and as he stood over her grave, he vowed he would never let his pride keep him from doing the right thing. He would do all he could to keep his family and country safe. Even if it meant dying himself, he would do all he could to protect those he loved.

“Papa, is that a true story?”

Kieran tucked the covers around four-year old Mikayla’s chin. “Yes, it’s a true story.”

“Did you know the king?”

“Of course he did,” Lydia said. She put her hands on her hips and gave Mikayla a matter of fact look. “Grandpa Thor was the king.”

“It’s a sad story,” Mikayla said.

“It is,” Kieran said, “but it has a happy ending.”

Mikayla frowned.

“Papa died and made everything right.” Lydia climbed into bed next to Mikayla.

Kieran gave them each a kiss on the cheek. “Your mama and I brought the blessing back to Teleria.”

“That’s why the Baraca and Telerians started to get along again,” Lydia said. It still amazed him that his six year old daughter never tired of learning Telerian history. “And why we can get strawberries in winter.”

Kieran chuckled and blew out the candles. “Strawberries in winter and so many other things that make life easier.”

“Will it ever change?” Mikayla asked in the dark.

“You never know what can happen, sweetheart, but no, I don’t think the blessing will ever leave now.”

Lydia yawned. “How do you know?” she asked.

How did he know? The blessing was something that was always there, something they could always depend on.

Instead of answering, he kissed them both before saying goodnight. 

snapshot Sunday, on using capital letters, why my dialogue looks British, and how hard your little finger works

-- Christine at The Writer's Hole sometimes has us post a snapshot of our work in progress, the last thing we wrote, either one paragraph or 5 lines of dialogue. i think this is a fun way to give teasers without giving away everything.

here's mine from the middle of chapter 6, not corrected for no-caps or punctuation. This is in Tiana's POV (Tiana is my female main character in Black Heart) and Trysta is Tiana's older sister.

‘I am glad you put away your childish fancies and married Devan,’ Trysta said. ‘being married to a king would have made you miserable.’


‘but now that I’m not a king, maybe she wouldn’t be.’


Arathor’s timing was horrible. And why would he tease her about marrying him, especially in front of Trysta? certainly he wasn’t considering it.


‘barging in uninvited,’ Trysta said. ‘boorish as ever.”


‘my apologies,’ Arathor said, ‘but I need Tiana’s help.’

-- for those of you who worried that i'd stopped being a rebel in my last post because i used caps at the beginnings of my sentences, don't worry. i wrote that post in Word and i use auto caps to save my little finger. it would have been a pain to go back and un-cap everything. unfortunately, as you can see from my snapshot of dialogue, it won't auto cap after a quotation mark. if someone knows how to fix this, please let me know.

-- and if you're wondering why my dialogue looks British with the single quotation marks and not a double, it's because not capitalizing my quotation marks is another way to save my little fingers.

-- do you realize how much work your little fingers do when you write? you use them for capitalizing, quotation marks, apostrophes, question marks, semi-colons, colons, dashes, backspacing, deleting, tabbing, starting a new line with the enter key... and in my case, using the letter A a lot - there is no letter A on my laptop keyboard. it's just a blank key, along with the N and D keys. i must write "and" a lot. i also noticed the S is almost gone. that has to be because i write "said" a lot.

when you can't write...

...because of illness in my case (the creative side of my brain has difficulty functioning when my head is full of... well, let's not get into that...), it's just easier to blog. even better is when other bloggers provide the subject matter.

the first blogger -- N. R. Williams, Fantasy Author -- gifted me with this cute award:

there weren't any specific rules that went with this one that i know of, so i'll just pass it on to a few people. 

two bloggers who make me smile--

Alex J. Cavanaugh (what a great blogging friend)

Cruella Collett (you should read her post about Japan. it's priceless.)

two authors who make me smile --

Mary Connealy (romantic comedy with cowboys, inspirational style)

Kaki Warner (romance with tough, gritty cowboys)

some blogging/writing friends who make me smile --

Kristal Shaff (who's currently snowed under)

Christine Hardy (don't forget to enter her blogfrest)

Lisa J. Yarde (check out her beautiful new cover art)

Kristie Cook (wish her good health - she's sick too)

and then on another note, a blogger i just started to follow -- Sniffly Kitty (i think that's what i am today) -- has this:

i'm supposed to take the third sentence of the book i'm currently reading and review it. well, the only "book" i'm reading right now is Black Heart (i have a third draft to write, so hey, no time for other books right now), and technically the third sentence is from the prologue (which i've already posted) so i'll grab the third sentence from the first chapter (that i finally re-wrote and like).

i've included the sentences around it because it really won't make sense without those, and my brain is too stuffy or sniffly or whatever to review anything, so i apologize to Sniffly Kitty for not following the rules to the letter. we'll call it part of my therapy to be less of a rule-follower and more of a rebel.

“We had it better under the last king.”

The farmer’s voice carried over the din of laughter and off-key singing. With each round of drinks, the man’s complaints had grown louder.

Arathor ignored him and concentrated on the dice he’d just rolled.

teaser Tuesday

while reading another blog, i realized i haven't posted anything from my work in progress, Black Heart. and posting this is so much easier than actually working on it, so here goes.

warning 1 -- there's one spoiler here, but it's a spoiler for Eldala, so if you haven't read that one yet and don't want to know how things go, don't read this.

warning 2 -- i'd rate this PG because it's suggestive, but not overly.

warning 3 -- this is from my 2nd draft, so this isn't my best writing, but i still like it. i'm pretty sure this scene will make it into the final novel.

to set up the scene, it's about halfway through Black Heart. Kieran and Jessa (my two main characters from Eldala) have been married now for seven years. as passionate as they are for each other, life with kids and the responsibility of running a country can get in the way of marital actvities. this is the first chance they've had to be together in quite some time.

(don't these two look good together?)

Just as Jessa had instructed, a servant had set a tub of steaming water next to the hearth. She set about lighting candles to give the room a golden glow. When she heard the door open and close, a shimmer of heat went through her. She turned around and watched Kieran walk towards her. He lifted his shirt over his head and she drew in a breath. Her husband was the most handsome man in Teleria.

When he reached her, there was a predatory gleam in his eye. She swallowed, suddenly feeling as shy as she had on her wedding night. He took her hand and kissed her fingers one by one, slowly moving over her palm and then across her wrist. His simple touch was enough to make her nearly collapse in a heap.

He pushed her sleeve up and let his lips travel across her unexpectedly sensitive arm. She took in a quick breath when he moved her bodice off her shoulder and kissed his way across her collarbone. As he pulled her closer, she splayed her hands across his chest, loving the way his hardened muscles moved under her fingers.

“I love you, Jess,” he whispered. His lips and beard nuzzled behind her ear, while his hands unfastened her braid. He threaded his fingers through her loose hair and let out a long breath. “You’re so beautiful.”

“And I love you, but you need a bath.”

His quirked one eyebrow. “And you’ll be the one to give it to me?”

“Unless you want one of the servants…”

“No, but I think you should join me.”

“I will.” She gave him a teasing smile. “Eventually.”

when nothing seems to matter

it's not really depression or even apathy, not this time. it's more like this feeling that there are so many other things going on in people's lives and i wonder, why does it matter that my book is on Kindle or Nook? or that my cover didn't turn out the way the designer and i hoped it would and i have to upload it again? why is finishing a novel so important when there are so many tragedies in life? why does any of that matter?

i don't know. or i thought i didn't know. i just sat there after reading about a stranger's pain and loss and i was crying and thinking the problems in my life are so small compared to that.

now i know that i shouldn't minimize my own troubles because my stuff is hard for me. and i know that people who experience more pain or trouble than i do wouldn't want me to mimimize the stuff that happens in my life out of guilt or whatever. but it's tempting.

and then i thought about the impact my first novel had on people... like a friend who asked God for a sign that he was listening and he used a passage in my book-- just the briefest mention of a cardinal of all things-- and she knew God was talking. or the mom who said her son hadn't read anything all the way through and when he started Eldala, he couldn't put it down. or the teen girl who can find courage because my female lead found the courage to be queen.

yeah, stuff like that. the stuff that keeps me going.

and all that flashed through my brain in a few seconds and i knew why it matters that i finish this one.

even if there's just one person who reads Black Heart and finds something in it that helps, or lets them know that someone else--even a fictional someone else-- went through it and survived or even became stronger in the end, then it's worth it to finish. there might be one scene or one piece of dialogue or one sentence that resonates with them and that makes it worth it too.

or maybe it's just important for *me* and my son that i finish it because i'm not great at finishing and i need another completed story to remind me that finishing is possible--hard but possible, something to fight for even when the world around me is falling apart.

post script -- on why it does matter.

expectations

warning: the following thoughts are so random even my head is shaking. that's just the way this day has been.

it started with a post on facebook: "why are first lines so hard? is it because i'm a perfectionist?" a friend posted this link in response: Famous First Words on NPR. i read through them. they were all great. and they all said to me, "your first line will suck."

i can think of about ten different openings for my first chapter. each of them could be good. how will i figure out which one to use? which one will be great? i already have a gripping prologue (in my opinion), so the first chapter's first scene doesn't have to be gripping. maybe i should roll a die or draw a scene number out of a hat and just live with it. thank goodness i have crit partners who can tell me if i made a good choice.

there's a problem with having learned how to write: i've let the "shoulds" and rules, etc. dictate how to tell my story when i already know how to write a story. can i trust myself to write another one? or will i worry about keeping my readers happy?

honestly, even though writing Eldala was about the hardest project i ever undertook, it was a whole lot easier because i wasn't consciously trying to keep people happy or live up to imagined expectations. i will try to ignore them now but i know it won't be easy. nor will it be easy to ignore the expectations i have for myself.

heaven help me...literally.

Black Heart 2nd draft news

after more than a year of working on it, as of 5:30 p.m. last night, the 2nd draft is DONE! (feels like a weight has been lifted. i really don't like 2nd drafts.)

now i have to make myself wait a day or two before i start the third draft. why? you may ask.

well... i have to read thru the whole thing because i don't remember what i wrote. i need to get my story changes for this draft in a list i can refer to with each scene i write. i need to write interview questions for Kristie Cook's Purpose Release Party. i need to clean house. and do some filing. and a few house projects for moving.

but then, i'm going to tear into it because i've been eager to get started on it for quite some time now.

Black Heart's prologue

yes, i've posted numerous prologues for Black Heart, and according to my CP, an author should write numerous beginnings. i have to say this is my favorite, and since i'm including it in the back of my Eldala re-release, i don't think it will change now.

you can read it at my Eldala blog: Black Heart's Prologue

Black Heart update

i just reached 17,000 words out of the 20,000 i needed to finish. weird thing was, i wrote "The End" yesterday, but only because my son and i had written the last scene. but i still have some scenes to fill in before the end.

ok, back to writing.

just a snippet

Christine at The Writer's Hole is asking nano-ers and non-nano-ers to share the last thing they wrote.

here's mine, but if i share too much, it could give the story away. i'll give you just a little. this is from just a few minutes ago, writing with my son on Black Heart.

Just before Dar'vosh released, Kieran found the strength to ram his shoulder into Dar'vosh’s legs. Dar'vosh threw the knife but it missed Lydia by a few feet. Dar'vosh spun around and clawed at Kieran, knocking him to the ground again.

Dar'vosh drew another knife. Kieran tried, but couldn’t find the strength to rise again. He couldn’t protect his daughter now. Dar'vosh released the knife, but it was a clumsy effort as he seemed to clutch at his eye right as he threw it. He staggered back and pulled a knife from his gored eye.

The bridge started to shake. Dar'vosh drew back his arm again, this time holding the dagger that he’d just extracted. Before he could launch the weapon, an ear-splitting crack made Kieran grit his teeth.

where the two halves of my brain argue with each other

not an unusual occurrence, but in this case, it's about whether or not to regret revising Eldala for re-release sometime in the near future. in case you wanted a peak inside my brain, here are the arguments.

Why I'm Sorry I'm Revising Eldala

do you know how many freaking writing mistakes i've made in it? no. don't answer that. i've seen them all. too much telling here, whole sections that could be deleted, too many dashes for emphasis, too much food, too many conversations over tea, and too many people "looking around" to set up a description. and the romance scenes, don't even get me started.

there's this huge part of me that wants to change all those things, but it would take away from the flavor of the writing, the story, etc. it's also good to leave things in place so i can see how i've improved, and frankly, no one's ever complained about them, except me, of course, but then they say a book is never finished; it's just abandoned.

on the flipside...

Why I'm Glad I'm Revising Eldala:

there were so many typos i'd missed on the last go-around that i was almost embarrassed to show it to anyone and i certainly wouldn't have been able to send it out to reviewers. now it's more polished formatting-wise, fewer typos, etc. and yes, surprise of all surprises, i'm finally getting up the courage to send it to reviewers. (any volunteers?)

i can see how my writing has improved over time. being part of a great blogger/writing community and having a fantastic crit partner have been a huge part of that. i've learned more than i could have imagined over the last five years since i published it.

going over it again has also shown me story things that i'd forgotten that will affect Blackheart. as each thing arises, i write it down to help me with the next draft.

And in Conclusion...

i'd say that the benefits of revising have outweighed the negatives. it's certainly been an enlightening journey. through it all, i've discovered that i still like my story. it's a good thing because i think i've had to read through it, either in part or in whole, about a gazillion times... ok, maybe only five? whatever. my head's too tired to argue with myself anymore.

And Before I Forget...

thank you to the people who've read through my revisions to make sure i didn't add more mistakes to the manuscript....
Lisa Yarde
Kristie Cook
Anne M.
and my fantastic CP, Kristal Shaff

wait...

i almost forgot my two oral readers.... Natural Reader's cheap demo voice, Microsoft Sam, whom my entire family has dubbed "The easiest way to make my story as boring as possible," and my daughter Anna who took over when Sam got to be too much for me to listen to. i love the way she's taken lines like, "What's that?!" and made them as sarcastic as possible, and the way she's changed names to make it funny -- A-rat for Arathor, He-ran for Kieran, Delirious for Delaine and Jail-bird for Galen.