12/8 Full of memories

The 7th, 8th, and 9th of December are the birthdays of three (out of five) of my brothers. Dad's birthday was on March 16th. You do the math.

Anyway, surrounded by their birthdays always makes me reminisce about my childhood and the happy memories of growing up the eldest in a big family.

I feel so lucky that I'm able to celebrate some of the memories by incorporating a few of them into my books. For example, the Darling family in the series use the word "shup" in place of "shut up." That's from real life, and we still use the word.

I don't know if it's just an abbreviation or if we'd get in trouble for saying "shut up." Either way, it's one of the small things from real life that made it into Sam Darling's fictional life.

11/20 NaNoWriMo continues...

I have almost 20,000 words finished during NaNoWriMo. Since this is the 20th, I actually should have written 33,340. So I'm not going to reach 50,000 words this year. That's okay. The important thing is that I'm writing.

And I'm having fun doing it. Now that I know who the killer is (or the killers are), and I know why the person(s) did it, I am in writer heaven. That's one of the hard parts.

So I know the ending, and I just have to follow the route to get there. Unfortunately, the route isn't charted, since I don't outline. However, writing the book is a lot easier once the characters tell me about the villain(s).

The book itself is almost 2/3 finished, so I'm feeling pretty darn good. Who's the Rogue? will be completed this year. My publisher will be happy!

11/1 NaNoWriMo

And so it begins. I've got about a thousand words done out of my 1667 needed for today. I'd like to hit 2,000 because I know there will be days when I won't or can't write. In order to hit the 50,000 I need to overachieve on a few days I think.

I'm about 1/3 of the way through Who's the Rogue? and I still am not sure who did it. There are a few people who look suspicious to me as the writer, but I'm getting caught up in wanting to write about Sam and George's relationship and not in solving the murder.

Dumb, I know.

It's not easy to weave both of them together--to want to write a mystery but to also have a love story in it, and hopefully a realistic one. Well, not a completely realistic one. George is pretty much the perfect guy, after all. :)

Okay. Back to work. Wish me luck.

10/31 Candy and kids

Munching on candy while I wait for my great-nieces and great-nephews to come to the house. Gus is waiting at the door, hoping kids will come soon.

Something unusual happened today. I didn't write.

It feels funny. I've been writing at least 1,000 words a day for a while, but haven't touched the keyboard until now. (My FB posts were done on my iPad. Now I'm typing on my Mac Air.)

But tomorrow NaNoWriMo starts. It's National Novel Writing Month and it comes around every November. The idea is to commit to write 50,000 words during the month of November, which averages 1667 words per day, a little more than I'm used to doing.

But I've exercised my fingers and am raring to go. During November I'll finish the first draft of Who's the Rogue? (Sam Darling Mystery #6) and will begin #7. Thinking about the concept of #7 now.

Hope you have a great Halloween and hope you are reading and enjoying my books. By the way, if you are, please write a review on Amazon. Writers live and die by their reviews. Thanks.

10/25/15 Faces

The older I get the more I believe there are only a certain number of faces in the world. Everywhere I go I see people I know. Unfortunately, sometimes they aren't people I know. Perhaps they're clones. That would explain it.

Or perhaps as one ages, the planes and lines on a person's face blur so that the things that make us look special are no longer so evident.

I mean, it really could be a high school chum I saw on the Eiffel Tower. I was there, so he could have been there too. Except he looked as he looked in high school. And I...didn't. Not fair.

I was with my sister on Oahu in the 70s when she saw a classmate from Illinois. It does happen.

I've seen others I recognize and then discover it's someone's child and not the person I know. Some day it might be a grandchild I mistake for a friend. Time hurries and hurries and pushes forward and we're swept up in the wave.

Much of the time I blame my imagination. The same thing that allows me to write books also helps me make things up when I'm trying to identify someone.

This is true--I saw the same woman twice in one day and they were different people. I even asked the second one if she had a sister or daughter that looked like her. She said she had no female relatives.

Clones.

It's the only answer.

Unless I'm making this all up.

10/6/15 Book news and book signing

Am taking a break from writing Who's the Rogue? in order to get all the other books ready to be printed. Then every single book will be available in both ebook and paperback. I'm going to be so happy when that's done. The only book (from 1 through 5) that needs to be checked is number four, Will You Marry Me? One and two are printed, and three and five are at the formatters.

This is a huge deal for me because I've wanted the ebook and print book to come out virtually simultaneously for a long time. Many of my readers prefer a book in their hands, so that's my goal.

Be on the lookout for the books to show up in print form.

In the meantime, I'm having a book signing for the first two books--Who Killed My Boss? and Any Meat in That Soup? It will take place at Panera Bread Company in Quincy, IL on Saturday October 10 at 10 AM. Hope to see you there!

The plot thickens...

In Who's the Rogue? I now know who gets murdered. I'm still not sure who the murderer is. I'm like a reader as I write; I have to get into the book before I know who killed the person(s). Right now I'm making educated guesses, just as readers do. It could be so-and-so because of a checkered history with the victim or it could be so-and-so because of a jealous rage or even...

You see. I don't know much at all yet. :) I do have ideas though, and have narrowed the field of potential murderers.

I've reached the 5,000 word mark which means I'm definitely in it! And I'm loving the premise. Hope you will too.

And Where Is Henderson? should be out soon. It's with my publisher and I expect to get her suggestions back at any time. Then some quick edits and off to the formatter. Getting excited.

Not much

I've been writing at least 500 words per day. It doesn't seem like much, but with the rehearsals for Mary Poppins, plus learning my lines, 500 words is plenty.

I do think there will be a day when all I do is write. As soon as the characters tell me who gets murdered, and who did the deed, the words will just flow. Until then, I write some "filler" scenes, waiting for the action to happen.

Some people think it's funny that I don't have an outline or don't know what really is going to happen in the book. I have the idea of where the book will take place and who the characters are, but that's about it. As the characters become more and more "real" to me, they let me know who is going to die and finally who the murderer is. I get quite excited when that happens.

I'll let you know when I know. Nope, won't tell you who, but will tell you that I have it figured out.

Writing and singing, a nice combination

Book #5, Where Is Henderson?, is with my publisher. I expect it back soon with some (many?) suggested edits. It should be published as an e-book by mid-June. I'm currently writing #6, Who's the Rogue?, which takes place entirely in Quincy, IL. Back to my roots, as suggested by some readers. See, I do pay attention!

My second book--Any Meat in That Soup?--has been printed in paperback form and is available at Amazon and I believe Barnes and Noble. Excited about this.

I'm rehearsing nightly for Mary Poppins, in which I play the Bird Woman and Miss Andres. I love that I get to play both a hero and a villain. Because of my renewed love for local theater, via Quincy Community Theatre, WTR? takes place at a community theatre. In the book it's Gem City Community Theatre. For the uninitiated, Quincy's nickname is the Gem City, given to us by none other than Mark Twain. I believe his exact words were, "Quincy is a gem of a city." No, I'm not quite old enough to have heard his words myself.

I'm hopeful that my fellow castmates won't mind that I stare at them and occasionally take notes. I'm still deciding who's going to die in the book and who's going to do the murdering, so everyone better be nice to me.

Fair warning.