I enjoyed reading  Karen’s post about how we met.

Meeting Karen came at a time of writing changes for me. I had been writing fanfic for several years and decided to look into the epublishing industry, since that was the only place that was looking at much romance fantasy or paranormal. Karen was in the same type of mind set, and we were able to encourage each other to write and submit. Those first contracts–wow was that exciting!

I think we are both at another crossroads now. We’ve learned a little, had success and rejection, ridden some epub trainwrecks….plus had many life changes. Karen has a new relationship and in a way so do I because teenage girls are much different than gradeschool girls!

I suspect we are in the awkward adolescence stage of writing careers. But we are still alive and still growing.

I just spent a month working on an entry to the Harlequin Presents contest. It was a valuable experience because I saw how my mind would take a scene in the story, and run it into something totally not Harlequin Presents! A paranormal element, or the setting that was fun was a broken down mobile home… or I wanted to add a slew of characters, pets, weirdos…or, or, or!

So here is what I concluded:

1. I’m not likely to leave speculative fiction.

2. Romance all the way.

3. Secondary characters and plot lines are important to me.

4. I am very comfortable with the heat level of HP, which is sensual but not in the    romantica realm.

5. I like families and children in romance.

6. I like accidental pregnancy stories.

So, where do I go from here? ( Humming ‘Where do we go from here’ from Once More With Feeling, the Buffy Musical).

Anybody publishing the equivalent to a paranormal/fantasy/futuristic Harlequin American Romance or Silhouette Special Edition?

Becca

Well hello and welcome to my first post. I love the fact that both Becca and I are able to spread out across the world and hopefully pick up a few fellow authors in the process.

We love talking about writing, offer support and tips and most of all, a listening ear. Becca certainly has been a listening ear for me since we ‘met’ over four years ago. I wandered into a random chatroom looking to talk to others about a story I had milling around in my head. That’s where I met Becca and I’m so glad I did. I was destined to meet her. She has been a solid supporter of everyone who wants to be involved in writing and she makes damned sure she has her writing time set aside! Something that I have clearly not been able to do in the last year I must say – I’m feeling a little apprehensive as this is the first real piece of writing I have attempted in just over a year!

Now … that’s not to say I have been doing nothing through that year. I bought a house, renovated, sold a house, moved towns TWICE! I started a relationship with a wonderful and supportive man. The last year has been filled with many emotions and mindsets towards my writing – and those were mainly negative. For some reason, I’ve felt a fear of writing. More to the point, not being able to write any again, let alone it be decent. I’ve had the fear of -

• rejection – bound to happen in this industry though,
• distrust – one of my publishers left the authors of the company high and dry. Declaring bankruptcy for the authors who decided to stay with them for the long haul only ended up biting most of us in the ass. I think that had something to do with the confidence being beaten a tad.

• Others include, insecurity, no confidence, relief that I don’t have to go through those emotions again because I just won’t write. 

   

  But if I continue to have that mindset, I will never write anything again – and it pains me everyday that I don’t write. Writing is my meditation. It’s my release. It’s what feeds my soul. I love seeing characters develop. I love writing about the wildest things as if they were an everyday occurrence. I love developing a story line so real that when it’s time to end it, I feel like I’m saying goodbye to dear friends.  

   

  So why can’t I get back in the zone??? I have very supporting author friends from all over the globe who have been patient with me and have encouraged me to get back into the writing zone. Lately though, I find I will sit, some ideas run through my head but they are nothing tangible. It all seems so clichéd, so forced or just downright boring! Perhaps I don’t want to write the genres that I wrote before. A good writing and personal friend of mine suggested what about editing a story – just happened to be hers. So, at 6.30am yesterday, there I sit – feeling slightly apprehensive about doing her story justice with my feedback – I open the file and take a deep breath. “You can do this,” I tell myself. “Not like you are writing your own story – you are just reading and finding points that don’t gel.” (And there weren’t many). Within about five pages, my mind was racing. It was racing with all the things I loved about reading a story for the first time. The characters and getting to know them, picking which ones you think are the goodies and the baddies, and I can’t stop my mind from thinking about how the story is ultimately going to end.
  Having completed my friends edits, I braved myself to edit a story I’d written over a year ago as part of an Australian-themed anthology. And I might just say so myself, it wasn’t half bad!

  So my challenge today, after I come back from the library, is to sit down at the computer and work on a story I’d started a while ago. It’s a thriller, action, vampire story – and I know before you groan ‘not another vampire story’ – it might just changeI’ll let you know how I go.

  This is me – starting over.

  Hope to hear from any of you soon!!

  Karen M