Freelancer's Life

Wow! It feels great to post again. A special thanks to cj for keeping the home fires burning these last months.

What have I been doing? Writing and editing and writing and editing…. You get the idea.

Mammatus Clouds

The life of a freelancer is akin to a rainstorm—rainstorm being a good thing. Sometimes the wind blows and shrieks. Sometimes the wind quietens but rain continues to pour. And sometimes the wind whips itself into a frenzy and whirls until a tornado sweeps away everything in its path. I’ve been in the frenzy stages with - thankfully - so many wonderful projects and clients that the storm took on a life of its own. So, I took a step backwards when I realized that my writing was being woefully shortchanged.

What to do?

I am an inveterate list maker, so……………….

•  Making a living is definitely high on the list.

•  Spending time with family and friends is high on the list.

•  Finishing my books is on high on the list.

 What I wanted to do was flip the list upside down, but my checkbook would be aghast. I had two exciting non-fiction editing jobs that were going well, so my clients would be aghast.Not finishing my books when I'm so close would send me into a state of aghastness. If Shakespeare could make up words, why not the Church Lady?

Hard decisions had to be made if my writing was ever to see the light of delighted readers. Yes, I did intend to say that.

So, dear teacher, this is How I spent my summer.

Wrote my own work every single day - 7 days a week. Some days for an hour. Some days for hours.  The result? One book 80% complete. One book refurbished and on its way. One short story won the Alabama Writers’ Conclave 2014 Competition for my short story, “Yellowed Picture.” One piece accepted for publication in an anthology. I came together with five talented writers to form a new critique group that meets every other week, which helps keep me focused. All in all a win win.

Worked every single day for my clients. The result, first draft of one book completed and the development and writing of a second book 90% completed. Joined a new marketing team approach to help an entrepreneur grow a new business. I'm counting that a win win.

Spent time with my family and had fun doing what we do best - laughing! A total win win.

Downside of all of this, my contributions to our blog took a dive, but now I’m back with a new perspective, exciting ideas, and writing information to share.

I’ve missed all of you!               Mahala

Michelle Ladner Interview, Part 2

Welcome back, Michelle Ladner.

Lyrical Pens is happy to have Michelle Ladner back with us today. Michelle is a wonderful writer who lives in Ocean Springs, MS, with her husband, Bryan, and a lapful of purr-fect cats.

So, tell us, Michelle, who inspires / motivates you to keep on keeping on.

My husband is an incredible support and inspiration. Not only have I gotten to watch him work at a job he loves, which has taught me the importance of doing something in life that you enjoy, but he’s incredibly supportive: financially, emotionally, and motivationally. I’m lucky that way. Writing can feel very selfish at times, especially when you aren’t pulling in a paycheck or you can’t cull together a list of “respectable” writing credentials when someone asks the dreaded, “what do you do” question. The pursuit of traditional publishing is brimming with opportunities for rejection. That can take a toll on confidence and self-esteem. Having someone in my life that understands the scope of the highs and lows is invaluable.

When you’re creating novels, are you a pantser, plotter, or the newest descriptive, pathfinder (a hybrid who creates a very loose outline then ad libs the plot from that)?

I used to think I was a pantser. That process hasn’t generated a lot of completed first drafts for me, certainly not any marketable ones. My draft shelf is littered with first drafts that are missing good structure. That said, I’m not a meticulous outliner. I think the best way to surprise the reader with unexpected turns and twists is to surprise myself while writing. I lose that ability when the outlining is too detailed—I begin to feel married to my plotting decisions once they are fully formed on paper. Pathfinding is the way I’m finding success. I think now that I’ve discovered that I can do both—plot and write organically—I’m finding my feet in the long form. Pathfinding is instilling more confidence in my ability to tell a good story. I hate that I came so late to the hybrid game, but that’s why I never stop being a student of writing. What you hear and the way you hear it can shake something loose in your process that you need to lose or develop.

What has been your biggest writing challenge?

My biggest challenge has always been (and continues to be) getting too far ahead of myself. All the not-actually-sitting-my-butt–in-the-chair-to-write things are many and ever-changing. I tend to worry about the business and the marketability and the agent and the publisher and the eBook and everything else before I finish the story. My focus on that multitude can, and has, paralyzed my ability to write. I have to force myself to remember that it has to be about the writing. The thing that counts the most is to write the best story I can. If I focus on that, the rest will follow.

Do you have a favorite genre? Do you write in more than one and why/why not? What do you read for pleasure?

I like to read a good fiction story. I do read memoir, biographies, poetry, and short fiction, but I tend toward speculative fiction novels. That said, good writing is good writing. And good fiction is good fiction. So I do venture outside the fantasy sub-genres while reading and writing. I love coming of age stories, and YA is a market I tend toward. I like the pacing and structure of a thriller. I like the big ideas and themes in listed and awarded literary fiction. I get a lot of enjoyment reading a racy romance. JANE EYRE is my favorite book. When I write I tend to weave together all the sub-genre elements that inform me. The largest percentage of what I’ve written to date is urban or alternate reality fantasy. I guess that makes me a fantasy writer at heart. I’ve always had an affinity for the fantastical. I was a kid with a lot of imaginary friends, none of which were human—always talking animals or mystical creatures. The human imagination is a wondrous thing. I love that we have the ability to formulate images and ideas that do not exist in our world or personal experience and put it on the page to tell compelling stories. I like to wallow in that experience.

If you were to host a dinner for your favorite authors, who are the six writers you would include? They don’t have to be living.

Charlotte Bronte, Brent Weeks, Rebecca Cantrell, Neil Gaiman, Neal Shusterman, and J K Rowling—and I’d probably insist that we have Thai food.

Thai food could certainly warm up the evening. What’s next for you and where can readers find out more about you and your work?

What’s next? More manuscripts, more rewrites, and more queries and pitches. I hope to get back into the conference circuit in 2015 after buckling down and doing good strong work on a promising rewrite and a couple first draft projects. It’s become important to me that I only solicit them when I am confident they are written well. I do have a published personal essay up on my website so it’s easy to locate.  You can find me at: www.michelleladner.com, www.courtstreetliterary.com and www.ninjapeas.blogspot.com

Thank you so much, Michelle, for visiting Lyrical Pens. Best wishes from our pens to yours for great writing successes in the future.

cj's week

TGIF. When I was “gainfully” employed, that was a favorite expression of people at work. I guess I was a bit of a Friday freak because TGIF was not my favorite expression.

Don’t get me wrong. I was happy to be out of the office, but my weekends passed like whirlwinds. As a single mother, my weekends were filled to capacity with things that needed to be done around the house or with family or kids’ ballgames or grocery shopping, ad infinitum. I had to race to complete my to-do list in two days because my weekday evenings were tied up with college classes and homework.

I’m no longer in a company environment, yet I find that the habit has stayed with me. Instead of college classes and homework, I fill my weekdays and nights with gardening and writing. I can spend hours pulling weeds or working on the dialogue of a single paragraph. I can spend days and days on Internet research (of course, that “might’ include a game or two of Solitaire while I conjure a plot point or character flaw). It seems I am still racing through whirlwind weekends to get a to-do list completed. (Sigh) Maybe I’ll see you at the grocery store tomorrow.

I think I need a refresher class in time management.

Here’s hoping you’re doing better than I am.

Okay, you-all guys keep on keeping on, and I’ll try to do the same.

cj