Writing, then and now

October 26, 20134 Comments

My parents in our living room. Those lovely bookshelves went from floor to ceiling. 🙂

Well, once again, I didn’t get my post up on time. I’ve been spending a lot of time writing lately, although not on The Lokana Chronicles or Remnants. I’m taking a writing class online, and in our second class, we received a prompt. My homework was to work more on what I’d come up with for the prompt in class, and it’s been a challenge.

I got called into work yesterday afternoon and since I had to drive over there and drop the boys off anyway, I left in the morning like normal and spent three lovely hours at the library working on this new story. It reminded me of when I was younger, and I would take over the living room to write, or spread things out in my room.

There wasn’t really much to take over in the living room, since my sister lived with my grandparents and my dad lived at his desk in the dining room, but it was the space I wanted. Often a friend or two would join me and we would stay up till the wee hours of the morning writing and giving each other feedback. And also dancing to Gaelic Storm.

And now, an interview!

October 24, 201327 Comments

Will's Photograph As promised, I have an interview for you with the lovely Will Macmillan Jones, author of the hilarious Banned Underground books. It might have taken me a little longer than I first thought to get this posted, but what can I say? Writers are not necessarily the most organized lot. (Some may very well be, but I most certainly am not.)

KK: So, now that you’ve done it a couple of times, what’s it like to put out two books a year?

WMJ: What’s it like? Let me see…imagine being run over by a lawnmower, thrown in a washing machine, a tumble drier and finished off in an old fashioned mangle. It’s hard going. As you know, I don’t write especially long books, mainly for commercial reasons. But even so it is very hard work, both creatively and practically. But actually quite rewarding too. I can now look at my dressing table and see a line of my books. Yes, I’m really that sad as to have them on show in my bedroom, so that I can see them when I wake up.

KK: I see nothing wrong with that. In all honesty, I would likely do the same thing. 🙂 They say it takes three books to see success. Do you feel like that’s true? Why or why not?

The Banned Underground: The SatNav of Doom

October 14, 2013October 14, 20131 Comment

The latest installment in The Banned Underground series, The SatNav of Doom definitely holds up to the standard set by the first four novels (you can read my reviews of them here, here, here, and here). Chock full of humor as always, I laughed my way through The SatNav of Doom at an admittedly slower pace than the previous books, but that was due to my overwhelming open house (and moving) preparation and is in no way a reflection on this fine novel. Indeed, settling down with Fungus and the gang for a rockin’ gig was a welcome relief from my moving stress. 🙂

The discerning reader will find many gems along the way to the Edern’s enchanted Fairy Hill hideout. From wonderful musical jokes to brilliant pop culture references, there’s plenty here to make you giggle, grin, and even guffaw. For example:

Fruitful

October 11, 201320 Comments

In my post from Tuesday (that should have gone up Monday, but was delayed), I talked briefly about all the fruit we have at our new place and how it reminded me of summers at my grandparents’ farm. I’d intended to get back to that in my post from yesterday (again, delayed), but I ended up going a different direction. So today, let’s take that trip to Grandpa and Grandma’s house.

My grandparents lived on a farm about half an hour away from us. My grandmother lived all but six months of her life on that farm, as it had been passed down through the years from one generation to the next. It’s a century farm, and I’m proud to be part of that tradition, even though the acreage has been sold off and all that’s left now is crop ground. I’d like to someday buy the acreage back, but so far, no luck (the one time it was up for sale, the timing was just not right and we couldn’t do it *sigh*).

When I was little, the acreage included much more than it does now. When you turned in the driveway, the house was on the right and the old garage was on the left. The old garage has now been leveled, but the foundation remains, and the new owners put up a basketball hoop. Just west of the old garage was a corn crib, which I believe still stands, and to the west of that was a barn. It was lost in a fire several years ago – the new people had heating lamps in the barn for some animals, and somehow the place caught fire. If it hadn’t been for a passing fireman, of all people, the whole farm might have burned.

Moving memories

October 8, 2013October 10, 201321 Comments

1094527_10201786529601589_1779662465_o So, I didn’t get my post uploaded yesterday for the October Blog Challenge. I was a little bit busy yesterday, busier than I thought I would be, anyway. We closed on the purchase of the acreage we’re moving to, and it involved a lot of driving – to the boys’ daycare and back (an hour round trip), to the acreage for the final walk-through (forty minutes round trip), to the bank for the closing (an hour round trip), back to the acreage to drop off some things (another forty minutes round trip), then back to the boys’ daycare to pick them up much later than I had thought I would be (another hour round trip). In between all of that driving, the closing took about an hour, we had to eat, there were errands to run…By the time we ate supper, it was after 8:00 p.m. It was a very long day.

Seymour was planning to take another load out to the acreage today, in addition to buying some things to start working on the basement right away. Since we haven’t yet sold our house, we won’t be moving right away, which gives us time to do some remodeling and painting before we have all of our stuff in there (and it’s going to be a tight fit – we’re moving to a smaller house than what we currently have, and we have a lot of stuff). That’ll be nice. But I’ll be glad to be finished with remodeling.

So, how does this relate to memoirs and backstory, or even to relationships?

It’s October!

October 1, 201312 Comments

And that means it’s time for a blog challenge. Once again, I’m taking part in the October Memoir and Back Story Blog Challenge, run by Jane Ann McLachlan. I had a lot of fun with it last year, so I thought I’d try it again. It’s a little bit different this time around, but I don’t mind.

IMG_20130722_191349 The theme for the first week of October is childhood memories. I always feel like I don’t remember very much about my childhood; I think I blocked out a lot of it in a misguided attempt at coping with my mom’s illness (which you can read about in posts from last year’s challenge here and here). There are times, though, where I think I remember more than I realize, and that thought has worked its way into at least one of my stories.

Today, though, is an absolutely beautiful fall day…

Lotsa news!

September 12, 2013September 12, 20132 Comments

First up, The Lokana Chronicles is up on Miss Snark’s First Victim as part of this month’s Secret Agent Contest. Click here to check it out! And if you follow me on Twitter, I apologize for the pitch spam, but the After the Madness Twitter Pitch Party is today and I’ve – belatedly – been pitching my book in hopes of snagging an agent’s interest. I missed out on Pitch Madness this time around, and I haven’t been too addicted to the #pitmad thread today, either, but both things are always a lot of fun and I wish all the contestants good luck (and all the winners congratulations). 🙂

Next, I was super excited to see this in my email yesterday:

I adore the Banned Underground books and have been anxiously awaiting the release of The SatNav of Doom ever since I finished the last book in the series. My screencap cut off some of the links, so here they are again: Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, even a blog!

And last, but certainly not least…

A letter to my blog

September 10, 20133 Comments

Hello, pretty blog. How are you? Have you missed me? Been lonely without me to update you?

I’m sorry. Really, I am. It’s just that I’ve been revising. And writing. And chasing one kid after another – it’s like herding cats, I tell you.

Don’t believe me? Why not? Oh, you want pics or it didn’t happen? All right, fine. Here you go.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

There, are you happy? Proof I’ve been writing and drinking all the coffee. What more could you want?

Oh, you want something of substance? Well, I think I can help you out there. Here’s an excerpt from my new short story…

Change is falling all around me

September 3, 201317 Comments

Beautiful fall color (Photo credit: blmiers2)

Can you believe it’s September already? Overnight, it seems like fall has struck. The grass in the ditches is suddenly golden, the temperatures at night are nice and frosty, and football is now everywhere I look.

I love fall. The colors are breathtaking, the temperatures are perfect, and fresh apples abound (I’m a sucker for the smell of fresh apples – nothing beats it). Fall is a time of change, though, and I don’t always do well with change, so reconciling my love of fall with my strong dislike of change will be interesting this year.

Whether it was the beginning of a new school year or the start of a new job, fall for me means change.