It’s been quite a while since I’ve written a blog post that wasn’t a quick cover reveal or book review. My only excuse is…life. Life happens and frankly, I feel as though I’ve been treading water. Don’t get me wrong. Things are good…mostly. In the past eighteen months, I’ve sold a house. Bought a new house. Moved. Been honored to have been nominated for some prestigious awards. Sold a few sub rights (more to come on that soon). And, oh, yeah. I wrote books. I am still working the day job. I am also mentoring in the Seton Hill University Writing Popular Fiction Program. And, taking care of two quite demanding poodles. Through everything, I’ve continued to write. Yet, while I’ve been writing and things have gotten done, something has been slightly askew. What? I have no idea. How do I know somethings off if I don’t know what IT is? Well, there are signs.
The main sign that something wasn’t right was that a task that used to be done quickly was more of a struggle. Which task? Writing. I’m not one of those writers who has to be visited by my muse in order to write. If that’s you, congrats! Frankly, my muse is exceptionally fickle and has a wicked sense of humor. One of her favorite tricks is to drop an idea and then disappear for months at a time. When she does reappear, she likes to stir things up. How? “Oh, you only thought X was the killer. It’s really Miss Y, whom you liked and planned to include in the next two books in the series.” Then, Poof! Off she goes leaving me to sit in a dazed fog trying to rewrite what I’ve written. Yeah, NOT FUNNY! If my writing depended on visits from my muse, I’d still be writing (rewriting) my first book. Instead, I’m currently writing book #20. For me, writing involves putting my butt in a chair and getting the words on the page. Sadly, the last few months, instead of the words flowing onto the page like a raging river, I’ve had to scrape them out of my head with a dull spoon. Sound painful? Yep! You got it. But, one way or another, those words have to come out.
Thankfully, in the the last few weeks, I’ve started to feel more like my old self. I’d describe my word flow as more of a babbling brook than a raging river, but I’ll take what I can get. In the meantime, the poodles have needs and I have a book to write.