I write because I need to. I write because if I don't, I get cranky and my head gets too jammed up with words and characters and events. But as anyone who writes novels can tell you, there comes a point when writing a few minutes here and a few minutes there doesn't cut it. Eventually you need a steady stream of blocks of time. Rather than not write at all, I am committing myself to 15 days of writing something, anything. Perhaps the posts will be excerpts or character developments or scenes from a yet unwritten novel or even something like below. I do not profess to be poetic despite the poem essence in my below words. They are thoughts strewn together in a rhythm I found soothing to write. I will not be editing or critiquing - just writing.
Into the dusky eve, I steer and write.
No sense of time or the lack of light.
Pull me down deeper, into that gorge,
So it is written - my allegiance is forged.
Trading my soul
For an inspired spark.
Professing my unawares,
Of the complete and utter dark.
The course I have taken,
Playing with the dead,
Enlightened for a moment,
Till' my hands are stained red.
There are no more words
Flowing from my pen.
As I wait for my judgment,
My life - it is condemned.
I'd pray for forgiveness,
But forgot how to kneel.
These crimson wounds,
Never will heal.
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Monday, September 3, 2012
My Web Presence
I Googled C.L.LeMay to check my Web presence and was rather surprised by what I found. Goodreads.com has ratings for me. Cool, right? Not so much. Why? Because my rating is low - not that I disagree with the comment "Needs a good editor." The e-book versions of THREE CROSSES are not representative of the actual manuscript. There are 2 problems - 1st is THREE CROSSES has been professionally edited since it was published in e-form and 2nd is my MS Word is outdated and when I upload to an e-publishing format or the paperback publishing format, the translation is jumbled, making the published versions of THREE CROSSES a mess.
Suffice it to say, I have unpublished the e-books. I greatly appreciate everyone who purchased a copy and once again apologize for the mistakes. Anyone who has read THREE CROSSES since I have edited it, please join Goodreads.com and make a case for the improved manuscript and provide your honest rating of the book. Please and thank you.
As many of you know, writing novels is a great love of mine. It is very difficult at times to keep up the momentum to pursue publication for THREE CROSSES as the process is very mentally & time-consuming. I want to make a good impression on a prospective agent but find the task of writing a kick-ass query letter more difficult than writing a 400-page novel!
So if my Fairy Godmother is listening, I will do all the writing and editing if you would be so kind as to research agents and submit an incredibly terrific packet! Sounds good, doesn't it? But alas, if I just want to be an author, an author I am. If I want to be a published author, I best get a little more aggressive about the business of submission. I need to decide if being an author is enough for me. Just how badly do I want to be published?
As I write the last sentence, I realize I had great fun publishing A MIRACLE FOR MACKENZIE on my blog, albeit I stopped working on it after 7 or 8 submissions, but I still think about that book and look forward to getting back to it one day. I am toying with the idea of publishing through my blog. Hmmm? Not a money-maker, but heck, I get to keep doing what I love and my readers get to read my work. Of course I will have to decide which of the five novels I am actively working on will be the published novel. I guess the first step is to focus on one book. So hard to do when they each are pulling and tugging and clawing for my attention.
God, I love writing!
Suffice it to say, I have unpublished the e-books. I greatly appreciate everyone who purchased a copy and once again apologize for the mistakes. Anyone who has read THREE CROSSES since I have edited it, please join Goodreads.com and make a case for the improved manuscript and provide your honest rating of the book. Please and thank you.
As many of you know, writing novels is a great love of mine. It is very difficult at times to keep up the momentum to pursue publication for THREE CROSSES as the process is very mentally & time-consuming. I want to make a good impression on a prospective agent but find the task of writing a kick-ass query letter more difficult than writing a 400-page novel!
So if my Fairy Godmother is listening, I will do all the writing and editing if you would be so kind as to research agents and submit an incredibly terrific packet! Sounds good, doesn't it? But alas, if I just want to be an author, an author I am. If I want to be a published author, I best get a little more aggressive about the business of submission. I need to decide if being an author is enough for me. Just how badly do I want to be published?
As I write the last sentence, I realize I had great fun publishing A MIRACLE FOR MACKENZIE on my blog, albeit I stopped working on it after 7 or 8 submissions, but I still think about that book and look forward to getting back to it one day. I am toying with the idea of publishing through my blog. Hmmm? Not a money-maker, but heck, I get to keep doing what I love and my readers get to read my work. Of course I will have to decide which of the five novels I am actively working on will be the published novel. I guess the first step is to focus on one book. So hard to do when they each are pulling and tugging and clawing for my attention.
God, I love writing!
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Lunchbreak Lowdown
In true WIZARD OF OZ fashion, I acted like Glenda the Good Witch and had myself a whole bunch of munchkins this morning which means I am not hungry for lunch. So...I am blogging instead.
"Why munchkins?" You ask. We have a grandmother-to-be (as in hours away of becoming a grandmother) in the office and she is waiting patiently by the phone to get the news. She's on the east coast - the new baby is coming into the world on the west coast. Being up all night, she was in need of sustenance...thus the reason I have "We represent the Lollipop Guild...the Lollipop Guild...the Lollipop Guild" jingling in my head. By the way, is it lollipop or lollypop? Or is it one of those words that can be spelled either way? I personally prefer the "i" over the "y".
OK, enough with the flipping munchkins. Here's what is going on with my writing life - I have heard from a couple of agents who rejected THREE CROSSES; however, they actually contacted me to reject me vs. not acknowleging the rejection. This is a big deal. AND they rejected me by stating that it was a very difficult decision. They also said I was publish-worthy and had market appeal. So, despite being rejected, I feel pretty darn good. Besides, like I said, they didn't even have to bother responding at all. Oh yeah, they invited me to submit other manuscripts. Not bad, huh?
This summer is about writing short stories for competitions through Writer's Digest. I have submitted two thus far and have plans to complete two more. It's a great change of pace and who knows...maybe I will place in one of the competitions and will then have something wicked cool to put on my resume. Once the summer rolls on by, I will return to COVET (I just heard a small chorus of "Yippees") for editing and submission.
Ciao for now:)
"Why munchkins?" You ask. We have a grandmother-to-be (as in hours away of becoming a grandmother) in the office and she is waiting patiently by the phone to get the news. She's on the east coast - the new baby is coming into the world on the west coast. Being up all night, she was in need of sustenance...thus the reason I have "We represent the Lollipop Guild...the Lollipop Guild...the Lollipop Guild" jingling in my head. By the way, is it lollipop or lollypop? Or is it one of those words that can be spelled either way? I personally prefer the "i" over the "y".
OK, enough with the flipping munchkins. Here's what is going on with my writing life - I have heard from a couple of agents who rejected THREE CROSSES; however, they actually contacted me to reject me vs. not acknowleging the rejection. This is a big deal. AND they rejected me by stating that it was a very difficult decision. They also said I was publish-worthy and had market appeal. So, despite being rejected, I feel pretty darn good. Besides, like I said, they didn't even have to bother responding at all. Oh yeah, they invited me to submit other manuscripts. Not bad, huh?
This summer is about writing short stories for competitions through Writer's Digest. I have submitted two thus far and have plans to complete two more. It's a great change of pace and who knows...maybe I will place in one of the competitions and will then have something wicked cool to put on my resume. Once the summer rolls on by, I will return to COVET (I just heard a small chorus of "Yippees") for editing and submission.
Ciao for now:)
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Bay Harvest
Who'll dig for clams with me and who will bring the wine?
Whose toes will play in the sand with mine, now that Jenny's gone?
Whose toes will play in the sand with mine, now that Jenny's gone?
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Writing 101: Character Development
Pardon my lack of humbleness as I pat myself on the back. As Three Crosses continues to make its way through the hands of readers, I am randomly approached with compliments and typically some variation of any of these 3 questions:
1. Where do you get your ideas?
2. Do you base your characters on people you know?
3. How long does it take you to write a book?
I'll start with #3 as its the easiest to answer. 1st draft - about 5 weeks. However, and this is a big HOWEVER, some novels have been brewing in my head for years and even decades before they make their way to 1st draft. Others, like A Miracle for Mackenzie, had absolutely no brewing time and Mackenzie book was never completed so its a bad example.
#1 - I get my ideas from a myriad of places. As most of what I write is character-driven, answer to Q2 will explain some of this a bit. But my ideas come from my own imagination asking the age-old question, What If? I don't do writing exercises per se where I deliberately ask the question; I just go through life asking that question about everything. Makes for a busy brain so I have to do something with all those thoughts. I get curious about certain things - like ghost encounters, so I create characters who deal with my curiousity because lets face it, I don't have the time to do all the research for everything that piques my interest. I also am quite interested in why people do the things they do. It can be something as extreme as "why do psychopaths do the most horrible things to other humans?" to something not as extreme like "why did Michael choose not to marry the woman he had dated for seven years?" If I get curious enough to want to know more, well then Q2 kicks in...
Q2 - Sometimes, like in the above paragraph, a situation will prompt me to develop a character, but other times a character finds his or her way into my head where they start to have experiences that may or may not blossom into a story. But are my characters based on people I know or have known? Simply put, no. And again I say, BUT sometimes characters are borne from traits of people I have seen, or met, or have known.
For instance, I have a potential character brewing in my head this very moment. She was borne from a real live human being I observed last night. I started a narrative in my head this morning about what I observed.
It was hard to be aware of her pretty facial features when I was so distracted by the gauntness of her body. She was a walking, living, breathing ad for osteoporosis. She had no descernible butt but she had muscle tone in her arms. How odd. Her attire of ratty, wrinkled, and holey cargo slacks matched with her canvas sneakers that looked as if they had been pulled from a dumpster gave me a picture of someone with little to no money. Her bleached-out blond and cropped hair looked like it was shellac to her skull in a rubber band and it screamed to me that she couldn't be bothered with primping. But the fact that she was present with girlfriends who were well groomed and quite obviously concerned about their appearance told me there was more to her story.
The questions in my head start. Is she a past drug addict? Was she intentionally making a fashion statement? Did she just get out of rehab? Is she anorexic? If she is, why? Don't her freinds care enough about her to help her? Help her what? Maybe they do care. Maybe they are the ones getting her to the gym. Maybe she would look even less put together if it weren't for her freinds. Maybe she is a rich young woman with lots and lots of money that her friends want so they keep her around despite her drug habits. Maybe they started her on drugs? Maybe she saw something when she was a kid that made her want to disappear.
And on and on it goes, well at least as long as I am interested. Let's say I am interested in developing this real woman into a character. The woman I observed may be the start of a character who ends up looking and acting nothing like the real version of herself.
Both Simon and Amanda in Three Crosses are shadows of people I have known. As a matter of fact, Simon is a shadow of a combination of people I have known. He exhibits traits that I found interesting in real people.
The point is, there are no characters in any of my books who are mirror images or even closely mirror images of people I know. People I know/meet/observe may be the jumping-off point for a character to come to life, but each of my characters are just as unique as every single child that was ever born or will be born. As a matter of fact, there could be a whole other world where all my characters live out their lives...but that thought process will only get me labeled crazy. Delusional, primary diagnosis, God-complex, secondary diagnosis. Oh...I think I just started a new story. Ha! Have a great day! Thanks for reading:)
1. Where do you get your ideas?
2. Do you base your characters on people you know?
3. How long does it take you to write a book?
I'll start with #3 as its the easiest to answer. 1st draft - about 5 weeks. However, and this is a big HOWEVER, some novels have been brewing in my head for years and even decades before they make their way to 1st draft. Others, like A Miracle for Mackenzie, had absolutely no brewing time and Mackenzie book was never completed so its a bad example.
#1 - I get my ideas from a myriad of places. As most of what I write is character-driven, answer to Q2 will explain some of this a bit. But my ideas come from my own imagination asking the age-old question, What If? I don't do writing exercises per se where I deliberately ask the question; I just go through life asking that question about everything. Makes for a busy brain so I have to do something with all those thoughts. I get curious about certain things - like ghost encounters, so I create characters who deal with my curiousity because lets face it, I don't have the time to do all the research for everything that piques my interest. I also am quite interested in why people do the things they do. It can be something as extreme as "why do psychopaths do the most horrible things to other humans?" to something not as extreme like "why did Michael choose not to marry the woman he had dated for seven years?" If I get curious enough to want to know more, well then Q2 kicks in...
Q2 - Sometimes, like in the above paragraph, a situation will prompt me to develop a character, but other times a character finds his or her way into my head where they start to have experiences that may or may not blossom into a story. But are my characters based on people I know or have known? Simply put, no. And again I say, BUT sometimes characters are borne from traits of people I have seen, or met, or have known.
For instance, I have a potential character brewing in my head this very moment. She was borne from a real live human being I observed last night. I started a narrative in my head this morning about what I observed.
It was hard to be aware of her pretty facial features when I was so distracted by the gauntness of her body. She was a walking, living, breathing ad for osteoporosis. She had no descernible butt but she had muscle tone in her arms. How odd. Her attire of ratty, wrinkled, and holey cargo slacks matched with her canvas sneakers that looked as if they had been pulled from a dumpster gave me a picture of someone with little to no money. Her bleached-out blond and cropped hair looked like it was shellac to her skull in a rubber band and it screamed to me that she couldn't be bothered with primping. But the fact that she was present with girlfriends who were well groomed and quite obviously concerned about their appearance told me there was more to her story.
The questions in my head start. Is she a past drug addict? Was she intentionally making a fashion statement? Did she just get out of rehab? Is she anorexic? If she is, why? Don't her freinds care enough about her to help her? Help her what? Maybe they do care. Maybe they are the ones getting her to the gym. Maybe she would look even less put together if it weren't for her freinds. Maybe she is a rich young woman with lots and lots of money that her friends want so they keep her around despite her drug habits. Maybe they started her on drugs? Maybe she saw something when she was a kid that made her want to disappear.
And on and on it goes, well at least as long as I am interested. Let's say I am interested in developing this real woman into a character. The woman I observed may be the start of a character who ends up looking and acting nothing like the real version of herself.
Both Simon and Amanda in Three Crosses are shadows of people I have known. As a matter of fact, Simon is a shadow of a combination of people I have known. He exhibits traits that I found interesting in real people.
The point is, there are no characters in any of my books who are mirror images or even closely mirror images of people I know. People I know/meet/observe may be the jumping-off point for a character to come to life, but each of my characters are just as unique as every single child that was ever born or will be born. As a matter of fact, there could be a whole other world where all my characters live out their lives...but that thought process will only get me labeled crazy. Delusional, primary diagnosis, God-complex, secondary diagnosis. Oh...I think I just started a new story. Ha! Have a great day! Thanks for reading:)
Friday, February 24, 2012
Update
Wow! It has been a while since I have said hi. Sorry folks, but I have been busy...writing! editing! Hah! You thought I was going to say busy with life! That too, but also writing, creating, editing.
Just wanted to say hi and that I will update you in more detail over the weekend. All fun stuff!
Just wanted to say hi and that I will update you in more detail over the weekend. All fun stuff!
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Check out this site
www.shootandpaint.blogspot.com/
For all you artists and art admirers...join the fun and the challenge. Or be like me and just check out the artwork without actually participating. But if you enjoy painting/drawing, give it a try. I would love to see your work.
For all you artists and art admirers...join the fun and the challenge. Or be like me and just check out the artwork without actually participating. But if you enjoy painting/drawing, give it a try. I would love to see your work.
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