Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘writing life’ Category

Thanksgiving Update/American Horror Story

Posted in horror movies, paranormal romances, Television, writing, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , on November 25, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

It seems that I pour all of my writing energy into books now. And instead of social networking, I’m socializing. I miss blogging, though. I used to love it. I can’t believe that the whole Dating Amy project will be ten in 2012. Do you know some of those guys I dated still call? Mind-blowing.

I sent my first novel, a young adult paranormal romance (not about vampires), out into the wild a week ago. I had bragged that it only took me two months to write, but then it took me eight months to revise so I shut up.

Writing my first novel was incredibly difficult and one of the hardest things I’ve ever done creatively. I keep pestering more prolific writers (aka ALL of them) to assure me that the first book is by far the hardest and the response seems to be that they’re ALL hard, but I guess I went deaf in that ear.

Having said that, I love my book. It’s sweet and funny and rock and roll, and it rubs up against being almost literary, so yeah.

Speaking of young adults and paranormal stuff I love: Have you been watching American Horror Story?

Anyone who knows me knows I love horror movies. I see pretty much everything. So of course I checked out FX’s fall offering American Horror Story. I watched like two episodes but even the credits had me lying awake at night, so I declared a ban on it, ’cause I don’t need that shiz.

But my writer friends protested, saying I needed to push through because it’s the best new show out there right now. I asked if I could skip to a recent episode because I knew there was a huge event caused by the teenage character I like, Tate, and my writer friends vetoed that. They said I had to watch the whole thing. So I forced myself to get though it and now it’s my favorite show.

It’s incredibly good. It borrows from so many horror movies that it’s an original. Francis Conroy from Six Feet Under is the older version of the housekeeper that is also played by the gorgeous Alexandra Breckenridge–whether you see her as sexy or geriatric depends on the character’s mindset at the time. This is also Jessica Lange’s first-ever television role and it’s perfect for her. Most surprising is the troubled teenager Tate Langdon, her son. Somehow the writers have made him a sympathetic heartthrob, even though he’s a crazy murderer.

I told Mark, one of my author friends, AHS makes the characters so sympathetic and real that it’s tough for me to watch.

His answer: It’s the New Horror!

Read Full Post »

Zen and The Killing on AMC

Posted in books, reading, Television, The Killing, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , , , on April 24, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

Tragically behind on posting here. Don’t think it means I don’t love you, because I do, I really do.

I’ve been revising the young adult paranormal manuscript I wrote in two months.

Also have snuck in a little reading, socializing and chardonnay.

And TV viewing.

God, are you all watching The Killing on AMC, because if you’re not you should be.

It’s the first show I’ve been excited about since Mad Men premiered in 2007. It’s a completely gripping story about the murder investigation of a teenage girl in Seattle. The characters are as gray as the weather and the acting is fantastic.

Mostly I’ve been working–revising this manuscript at a bakery/restaurant downtown. I love this cafe because there is a huge enclosed courtyard with tons of tables so I don’t have to feel guilty about sitting there for hours; there’s always room for everyone.

This place is so good that even though some of my friends think there’s an identity thief who works there–someone has taken their credit card numbers and used them and all signs point to this place–they still go there and just pay in cash. The croissant-like caramel pecan rolls and Cobb salads are that delicious.

On my way home from the bakery I pass a thrift store that gives proceeds to the homeless. All the books there are $2 each.

I picked up one called Zen and the Art of Falling in Love. A review on Amazon hilariously complained that it didn’t tell you how to hook up with the hot guy at work, but this book is so not about that.

More significantly, it got me, the most restless woman in the universe, to sit down and meditate.

I’ve had meditation recommended to me a lot, especially since I used to live in L.A., but I never got it before.

Now I do.

You experience being in the moment. It’s very heady when you’re done. I never realized how much I was living in the future or dwelling on the past.

This stuff is pretty amazing.

Happy Easter and good vibes to all of you! Also, The Killing is on tonight. You can also watch it at amctv.com.

Read Full Post »

Bucket List Update: Write a Novel in Two Months

Posted in books, bucket list, paranormal romances, writing, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , , , on March 11, 2011 | 2 Comments »

My mini bucket list is silly because 1) I am not including anything personal on it since I don’t roll that way on the Internet anymore. 2) It doesn’t have an end date and 3) It does have an end date, which is the nebulous “whenever Mad Men comes back on.”

Anyway, I checked a big one off today: Write young adult paranormal romance novel in two months.

Done.

I started writing this book (not announcing the title yet), my first novel, on January 10 of this year. It still needs a lot of work, but I did finish it yesterday. It’s currently 270 pages.

The most important thing I learned is that I can write like a fast mofo when I have to and that it’s really not that hard.

At first I was proud of myself for writing maybe 800 words a day, but now I see that 3000-4000 is not unreasonable at all, especially if you’re not doing other writing work.

I relied heavily on Write or Die and also having a writing buddy, Michelle. We met on twitter and wrote together mostly every Tuesday and Wednesday, with other check-ins throughout the week.

Twitter is great for this kind of thing. It is filled with writers who have nothing but time on their hands. Kidding, but it is a great hangout for writers.

Stephen King recommends that you don’t spend more than three months on your first draft because you lose the energy and enthusiasm for the story. Now I get what he’s saying. I felt really immersed in my novel’s world since I cranked it out so fast.

Not gonna lie, though. I couldn’t have done it if I had been working on other things. Writing a book is freakin’ hard.

Read Full Post »

Tormented Teens! True Crime! IFC! Kevin Smith!

Posted in Cinemas, Los Angeles Memoir, Seattle Cinemas, writing, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , , , on February 25, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

Good God. I’m coming into the home stretch with my young adult paranormal romance.

I’ve written 175 pages in the past six weeks. That is lightning-fast for me, because I am not a speedy writer. I really wanted to get to 300 pages and finish by March 1, but sadly it looks like that is not to be. Damn February and its short number of days. It would have been so excellent for me psychologically to be done before I flip the calendar over, but there’s no way.

Oh, but I love my characters and their swooning and their problems and their magic! Good times. I cannot wait to start editing. I haven’t let myself read anything I’ve written so far, so it will all be (sort of) new to me when I read it–the second week of March, I guess.

After the YA PR is written, I will attempt to get on the Stephen King-recommended schedule of writing in the morning and editing in the afternoon.

The next project I want to write will either be the L.A. memoir (which I think I’ve written 200 pages of?) or my self-publishing experiment, which I’m thinking may be part of a true-crime book I wrote from 2008-2010. No one knows what to do with it, including me. I tried to integrate a relationship memoir with this ripped-from-the-headlines story and… it hasn’t worked yet. Although everyone who’s seen it has said it’s an intriguing idea.

Also, I’m getting a lot of love from the independent film community and I’m not quite sure why that is. Big sloppy love right back at ya, though, guys. I’m a great believer in the cosmic flow or whatevs, so there must be a reason that in the past couple months I’ve 1) Broken a news story about a classic Seattle theater closing, 2) Been mentioned by the Independent Film Channel and 3) Been given a pep talk by one of my favorite filmmakers, indie upstart Kevin Smith.

I don’t know what it means, but it means something and I’m gonna figure it out after this teen novel is done.

Until we meet again, I’ll be off surfing the universal waves and typing ’til my arms fall off.

Read Full Post »

Kevin Smith Smonologue #9

Posted in books, celebrities, Dating Amy, movies, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 22, 2011 | 1 Comment »

I really like Kevin Smith. I like his attitude, I like his sense of humor, I like his rants. I sort of named Dating Amy, the blog that launched my career as an author, after one of his films (even though my name is Amy). I love his films.

He had me with Clerks, of course, but it wasn’t until Ben Affleck’s Chasing Amy speech about the painting of birds bought in a diner that I realized there was no turning back.

And now I am in Smonologue #9?

So excited.

Read Full Post »

Kevin Smith’s Writing Pep Talk

Posted in celebrities, movies, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on February 17, 2011 | 1 Comment »

I was feeling discouraged about writing today, so I randomly wished that director Kevin Smith (Clerks, Chasing Amy, the upcoming Red State) would give me a locker-room style pep talk about my writing.

Damned if he didn’t do it.














And then, because it’s Kevin Smith:

Read Full Post »

Using Mad Men’s Return as a Deadline

Posted in bucket list, mad men, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 12, 2011 | 1 Comment »

Don Draper writing his own bucket list -- it's all women's names

Writers are a slippery, distracted breed. That’s why we function best with deadlines. Writing is never perfect or “done” so we need an arbitrary drop-dead date. Very rarely does a deadline correspond to something in the real world.

I mean, I think last year one of my girl friends had to finish a novel and have it to her editor on Christmas Eve, which weirdly makes sense because then she got to enjoy the holidays without tearing her hair out over her book. But I assure you that kind of deadline was just a coincidence.

So I wanted to do like a bucket list (I hated that movie and only made it through part of it, by the way) but a short-term one that goes until the summer. To me a big event that I look forward to is the return of Mad Men, the best show in the history of television, so I thought I would have the items on my mini bucket list completed by the time that Mad Men returns. It usually premieres in July, so I was just looking to see if they had set a date yet and I came across some disturbing news from Variety.

It looks like they haven’t locked the show down yet. Is that right? I don’t speak Hollywood negotiation talk fluently, but it appears that some contracts have been extended and others haven’t? No!

Hopefully it will all work out. Anyway, the news that my favorite show may be in a precarious state completely distracted me from my bucket list (that I have to come up with a better name for, especially because it is milder than Things I Want To Do Before I Die).

The list may mostly be arts-related, but here are the first two:

1. See a Russ Meyer Film. I’m thinking Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! because it gets referenced so much and because I saw that the star of it, Tura Satana, died last week.

2. Read To Kill a Mockingbird. I was talking to some author friends on twitter and there were actually quite a few of us who haven’t read it. Totally disgraceful and embarrassing. It also gets referenced constantly. Just like there’s a band called Faster Pussycat, there is one called The Boo Radleys–named for a character in the book, not that I’d know since I haven’t read it.

3. I should also probably reluctantly put The Matrix on my list because people are always talking about it.

Of course if Mad Men isn’t coming back I have a lot more time to complete this project.

Read Full Post »

Writing life update

Posted in paranormal romances, personal life, writing, writing life, tagged , , , on February 10, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

So I’ve been laser-focused on writing this young adult paranormal book. I started on January 10 and I have about ten of the twenty-four chapters done. I see that I’ve written in my calendar under February 16: “Have YA novel done.”

That’s cute.

I am planning on having the first draft done by the end of this month at least, though.

I can tell I’m serious about this book because I’m not hanging around on the Internet all day and not watching any TV at night. I’ve also quit drinking wine–at home anyway. I’ve been hanging out at a really nice bar where I can write and have a glass, but it is not the same, believe me. I’m more productive when I’m out.

Weird.

Read Full Post »

Is it better to self-publish your novel?

Posted in author-ity figures, books, Internet shenanigans, paranormal romances, publishing news, writing, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on February 5, 2011 | 3 Comments »

My author friends are up in arms over the whole ebook thing and the decline of traditional publishing. No one knows what’s going on, including The People in New York–the publishing houses, editors, agents–and they’re the people we rely on to guide us.

No one knows what the publishing landscape is going to look like in the future, even the very near future, and it’s scary. Libraries are reducing hours or closing, independent book stores are like endangered species, Borders is in big trouble.

Authors rightly see it as a threat to their livelihood. And I agree. It’s really scary. The economy in general is terrifying. Even in my little neighborhood, it seems like anything having to do with the arts–the used CD store, the classic cinema, one of the two used book stores–is going under.

I don’t like it either. It’s the end of an era. Worse, it seems like the the impersonal (Amazon, Starbucks, WalMart) and the unprincipled (banks and their bonus-receiving executives) are thriving.

But other than supporting the small businesses with my money, I don’t know what else I can really do. It seems like being fearful and bitter about the future just doesn’t help.

And I do feel ridiculously optimistic about the future of publishing. I think the whole ebook thing is exciting and I think self-publishing (which does best with ebook format) seems really cool.

My traditionally published friends look like they’re going to throw up when I say this, but I really want to try self-publishing.

Not sure which of my darlings I’d be willing to send off into the wilds of Amazon.com to see if they could survive, but it’s definitely an experiment I want to try this year.

This Minnesota author Amanda Hocking couldn’t get published, so she did it herself and has sold 500,000 paranormal books for teens in less than a year.

I read her first book Switched, which is a fairytale-ish book about (not-ugly) trolls. I liked it a lot. I’m not positive I’d have the courage to self-publish, though. I’m not sure if my theoretical optimism has caught up with actions quite yet. We’ll see!

Read Full Post »

Things Change Once You’re Published, Stacia Kane

Posted in author-ity figures, writing, writing life, tagged , , , , , , , on January 26, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

I love this blog post by urban fantasy writer Stacia Kane about how people react differently to you once you’re published.

Honestly, I thought I was just being paranoid. I’ve never heard it put so clearly before. The context is how it’s hard for a writer to publicly review other author’s books once they themselves get published, but the experience she describes applies to most authors from the big six NY publishing houses, I reckon. Although let me say that I am so glad that I am published by a major New York house. It has changed my life for the better in many ways. But…

You have no idea how lonely writing is until you’ve done it. Especially not after you’re published. Especially not after you’re NY published, and most especially after people seem to think you’re actually successful, when everything you say is scrutinized and people don’t know how to respond to you or simply don’t understand where you’re coming from. Suddenly enemies pop out of the woodwork; people you’ve somehow upset or offended without knowing how, people who think you’re a crazed egotist.

I know that I was completely blindsided by any sort of reaction to me, especially since I had no warm-up period. I was just a blogger who suddenly had a book deal before I had written an actual book. I don’t think at that time I had ever even met a published author before, much less thought of myself as one.

I have the following happen all the time. Note to all aspiring writers: If I’m giving you advice, it’s because I like you. Really, really.

You offer someone advice and they snap and get defensive. Someone else says the exact same thing and they’re thanked.

This too:

You ask an innocent question and it’s taken as berating. You answer someone’s question, thinking maybe you can help, and suddenly everyone thinks you’re totally full of yourself and are swanning around like you know everything. They resent you for it. They go out of their way to slam you for it.

This is why we published writers cling to each other like Grim Death:

You talk to your husband or your best friend or whatever, and they help. But you know who actually understands? The only people who actually fully understand, the people who can confirm for you that you actually haven’t changed and aren’t being an egotistical shithead? That it’s not you, it happens to everyone? Other writers.

Read Full Post »

Older Posts »

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.