Author Archives: Peggy Jaeger

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About Peggy Jaeger

I've been many things in my life,but the most consistent is WRITER.
May 12, 2014 · 9:05 am

Motivation

The dictionary definition of motivation is the act or process of giving someone a reason for doing something (Merriam Webster).  Deb Dixon, in Goal, Motivation and Conflict, tells us “Motivation is the “why.” Why do characters want something? The motivation is what drives characters to achieve their goals.” She also tells us that motivation is both an internal and an external concept.

Your characters  must be motivated towards a goal. Otherwise, they will just be dancing around on the page, happy and carefree with no worries. How do you spell b-o-r-i-n-g? They need to be moving towards or working towards a goal and the reason for that goal is what is motivating them. I think this holds true in real life as well, not just simply in our fictional characters.

Some days, when the words are flowing through my mind faster than my typing fingers can keep up, I never question what motivates me to write. To me, writing is like breathing: I have to do it or I will surely die. My tag line for this blog is Writing is my oxygen. I mean that.

Then there are days where I can’t get my mind to tell my fingers what to type. My brain is clouded, cluttered, and non-cooperative. But even on those frustrating days when the words don’t come easily, I still never have to question my motivation to write. I just have to or I know I will die. Sounds melodramatic, doesn’t it? Yeah, that’s me:  Melodrama’s my middle name. You thought it was Mary, didn’t you? Na-uh! Margaret-Melodrama Jaeger.

If I were a character in a novel and Deb Dixon was analyzing my character motivation, it might go something like this: External motivation: needs to write in her blog everyday so she doesn’t die. Internal motivation: writing is the one thing that is mine and mine alone, that gives me unlimited pleasure, and makes me feel worthy of living. I need to write just like I need to breath.

I think I’ve got this one; no worries. Now, applying it my characters may be a tad more difficult. And it should be. Otherwise my characters will be – here’s that word again –  boring!

My quote from today is from ubersuccesful writer Barbara Kingsolver: “The very least you can do in your life is to figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is to live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance, but live right in it, under its roof.”

What I hope for is the ability and freedom to write until I take my last breath. Seems to me like my hope and my motivation are pretty much the same thing!

Any thoughts?

 

 

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May 11, 2014 · 3:16 pm

Goals

Goal, Motivation and Conflict was an excellent workshop yesterday, courtesy of Deb Dixon. I highly encourage any one who writes anything to get her book and follow its guidelines. It has helped me tremendously with my own fiction writing.

Starting today, I’m doing something new. I’ve found some quotes I think are excellent for my life and am gong to try and relate them to writing. The first one is, not surprising, about goals.

A goal, properly set, is half way reached — Zig Ziglar

I’m a plotter.

When I start a new novel I plan the whole thing out, bullet point by bullet point. I now where I’m going, who I’m going with, and the stops and starts along the way. Only when I feel ready and solid with my plot, do I begin the actual writing work. This quote from businessman and motivational speaker Zig Ziglar is a truism for me. I actually feel like I’ve done all the hard work when the plotting is set. The typing and putting the words down on paper doesn’t seem so hard after that because I know my way. Of course, there will always be little detours, sub plots I didn’t think of at the time but now feel right, characters I want to add or remove. Those things are easy to accomplish. The hard part for me has routinely been the road map. But once that is done, like Ziglar, I feel more than halfway there to my goal of completion.

Any thoughts?

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May 10, 2014 · 8:20 am

Deb Dixon Conference

On this lovely day before Mother’s Day, I’m privileged to be attending the Deb Dixon  Book In A Day Conference in Nashua with my New Hampshire RWA chapter. This was the perfect Mother’s day present  I gave to myself. Deb Dixon has an amazing CV and her landmark instructional book, Goal, Motivation and Conflict, helped me plot my last two books. I was able to pen them so easily, I wished I had known about her book when I was a neophyte writer.

After attending two writing conferences in two weeks ( last week was the NECRWA conference in Boston), I am uberinspired with my writing. I’ve updated my goals and I’m going to be starting something new tomorrow. Each day that I can – and hopefully that will be everyday – I plan on putting a quote up on this blog and will try to relate it to my writing journey. I hope you will join me in this new endeavor.

For now, I’m off to learn from the master, Deb Dixon.

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May 3, 2014 · 9:46 pm

Conference end

Days like today always remind me why I love being a writer and attending writing conferences. Shared experiences, instilled knowledge, networking. This is why you come to conferences and why you should.

Today’s schedule included a class on finding your voice as a writer and how to use humor in your writing. I’ve done a previous blog on finding your writer’s voice and this class reiterated to me why it’s so important to be true to yourself and your writing style. It is distinctly yours and the more your write, the better it gets.

For our luncheon speaker today we had Cara McKenna take us through her journey to published author and gave us some advice on how to navigate through the sometimes tortuous waters of the publishing industry. With some colorful phrases and through a few tears, she made every writer in the room feel as if their journey was a worthwhile endeavor.

I attended a very good workshop in  the afternoon by Megan Frampton titled, Angst and Affability: Using Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice to Craft New Adult and Contemporary Romance. She drew comparisons and contrasts between the older books and their contemporary usages and it was quite fascinating.

Oh, and I did my two pitches. And survived! Suffice it to say, I had a VERY GOOD outcome with them. More will follow  ( hopefully) on that in the future.

I encourage everyone who writes to attend a writing conference at least yearly. I go more often because I can and, let’s face it,  want to. Even if you learn one thing you never knew before about writing/publishing/editing, whatever, or meet one person who can help change your life, the expense is always worth it. I’m going home armed with a new energy and desire to write. I have new writing goals for myself and am determined to see them through.

One of the most important things I learned this weekend was to keep at it. Keep writing and reading what you love. Don’t be discouraged if it isn’t your time to be discovered – it will be one day! Just keep at it and keep loving it.

Good advice.

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May 3, 2014 · 1:10 am

Conference – again!

So,the first day of the NECRWA conference is done. What a day! So glad I came. Two perfect standouts for me today. One was the Angela James master class b4youhitsend. I learned more in two hours with her in this class then I did in four years of college english and writing courses. The second was the dinner’s key note speaker, Bella Andre. She detailed her remarkable journey to publication both traditionally and digitally, and she made us all remember “It’s all about the book,” and “keeping your promise to the reader.”

I consider myself an okay writer when it comes to the mechanics of the craft: punctuation, tense, word use, etc. I’m usually a pretty fair to good editor of my own work. But after hearing Angela James speak for two hours about how to make your manuscript as perfect as it can be, and all the mistakes she’s sees with submissions,  I will admit I am an absolute  novice when it comes to editing. Simple things, like knowing when to capitalize words or how to use adjectives and adverbs correctly, I thought were second nature to me. Noooooooo. Right after I publish this I am going straight back to my WIP (Work in progress) and use the handouts she gave the class to go over every line of my manuscript with a fine tooth  digital editing comb. The class was pared down from an 8 hour workshop to 2, and believe me, even in those two hours my head was spinning with knowledge. I fully intend to take the 8 hour course when it is given and will consider it some of the best money I’ve spent all year on my writing career.

Super Best-Selling novelist Bella Andre’s speech was an inspiration. I am significantly older than she is and just starting out on my writing/publishing journey, but she said so many wonderful things that just touched my writing heart, the most important of which is to always keep the promise you made to the reader. The book is the most important and vital thing – not checking your social media for sales numbers, or reviews. The book itself, the story. That’s what should be uppermost on the mind of the writer. I am going to print that out and keep it next to my laptop at home. Every time I write I will see those words and remember.

Day two promises to be another gem -even though I have my two pitches!! Oh well, what’s the worst that can happen?
Details to follow tomorrow.

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May 2, 2014 · 5:02 pm

Conference – Part 2

So it’s the first day of the NECRWA conference in Burlington. After checking in I received my “goodie bag” complete with program, name lanyard and my scheduled editor appointments for tomorrow morning. I get to “pitch”  my newest work in an 8 minute diatribe to two powerful editors at two distinct publishing houses. How do you define nervous? I’ve done this before at other conferences and that feeling of nervous anticipation coupled with sweat-producing dread never seems to go away. I know I have nothing to be nervous about – after all, I talk for a  living. But I think it’s that little nugget of self doubt that always permeates my soul when I talk about the stuff I write. Will the person like it? WIll they understand the story line I’m talking about? WIll they think I’m a complete illiterate moron? Will I stutter, falter, spit?  And God forbid – will I forget the story line I am pitching? All  these things run through my mind when I think about the pitch.

I’m a confident woman. Really. I know myself and I know my stuff. I can articulate – most of the time – well. I write fairly well, or so I’ve been told. But when it comes to talking about my writing with a complete stranger – who, by the way,  may be  my ticket to publication – I turn into an inarticulate, thread of thought losing toddler. That’s just dumb!

I’m not going to think about it for now. For today I’m going to attend the meetings I’ve chosen, learn from the masters, and just relax and enjoy the moment. I’ll think about the pitch later…probably all night long…and I won’t sleep, and I’ll be bone tired tomorrow and then then  I really will forget the story line, or falter, or stutter, or spit.

Oh god! What have I gotten myself into?

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May 1, 2014 · 9:08 am

Conferences

In my professional life – the one that pays me a salary – I have to attend several educational conferences every year in order to keep my licensing credentials up to date. These conferences are usually long winded, many times boring, and often soul draining because of the tedium involved with the materials. This weekend, I get to attend a conference I am eagerly looking forward to with joy and anticipation. The NECRWA Let your Imagination Take Flight Conference in Boston. The featured speakers list is a who’s who of amazing romance writers, editors and agents,  including Judith Arnold,  Bella Andre and Angela James. I can’t wait to hear all their pearls of wisdom.

Let’s face it: conferences can be expensive and time consuming. Most are usually never near where you live, so there’s always travel time and gas money involved, or in some cases, plane fare. With the travel goes the obligatory hotel stay. I usually stay in the hotel where the conference is being held just because I’m lazy and don’t want to shuffle from one hotel to the other. Then you’ve got to include the cost of meals if the conference doesn’t provide them. Even with all that, I am still an eager and willing conference attendee because I always learn something and the chance to interact and network with others who love writing as much as I do is very rewarding. I’ve always thought that if I learn one new thing and make at least one new writing friend at a conference, then the expense was more than worth it. I’ve never been let down with this thinking.

So I’m off to the conference today and will be live tweeting @peggy_jaeger and blogging here about all the fabulousness and info that I’ll be collecting.

Next weekend it’s off to Nashua for the Deb Dixon Book In  A Day conference – another great experience in writing. Deb Dixon is a writer/speaker who wrote the quintessential instruction book Goal Motivation  and Conflict, a must have for any writer. More about that conference at a later date.

 

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April 29, 2014 · 10:44 pm

The BUSINESS of living vs. The DESIRE to write.

I have a job that pays me a salary, affords me some health insurance, and gets me out of the house three days a week. This is the job the people in my social realm call “Peggy’s real job.”

I don’t refer to it that way. I call it “The place Peggy goes when she’s not writing.” My real job is the one that affords me the most enjoyment, the one I eagerly look forward to each day, and the one that occupies my mind during rest, sleep and all other periods in my day.

My real job is not a job at all, but a love; an avocation; a calling. For my real job I, simply, write.

I’ve loved turning words into sentences and then into stories on the page since I first knew how to spell. I was that kid everyone hated in school who actually liked writing THEME ESSAYS in class and usually broke the grading curve with my scores. All during my school career I dreamed of graduation and then being able to write all the time, every day,whenever and wherever I wanted.

Reality washed over me like an ice cold shower when I did graduate and was told to pursue a real career which would pay my way into the world, because no one was going to do it for me. Unfortunately, sitting in a garret, writing mystery novels was not to be that career.

At that time, anyway.

Being able to write fiction on a full time basis is a luxury when you are first starting out in a writing career. I didn’t know that when I was younger. If I had, I might have steered towards a more literary career pursuit, in publishing, agenting, or even editing, instead of nursing. If I had known that my desire to write would be interrupted numerous times during my adult years with marriage, motherhood, and the need for a consistant, dependable  salary, I would definitely have made different career choices when I was younger and more flexible. Let’s face it: when you’ve got a husband, a child, and a mortgage, not to mention a car, the need for groceries, and an occasional night out, starving in a garret penning the great american novel doesn’t look so easy to do. Writers need to live. They need to pay bills, put food on the table and provide for themselves and their families. I wish I could give every writer I know who is trying to make a name for themselves with their craft a fairy godmother who could provide for them. Centuries ago, writers, artists and musicians had Patrons, wealthy people who would pay the artists’s expenses so they could devote their time to their writing, art or music. This allowed the creative person ample time to simply create and not have to worry about mundane everyday living needs. Patrons of the Arts were usually nobleman or women who had a staked interest in the person using their creativity. I would have done very well during those times as a writer because I would have had no qualms about accepting help ( in the form of money) in order to afford me time to write.

Most of the people  I know personally who are writers, have another job – a paying job – as I do. One that takes care of the mortgage, the kid’s college tuition, groceries, health insurance and car payments. This is just a fact of their life as it is mine.  Some day, hopefully BEFORE offical retirement age, I will be able to forgo this necessary salary and be able to support myself and my family with the fruits ( read: money) of my writing endeavors.Until then I steal whatever time I can from things I should be doing – like laundry, vacuuming, grocery shopping and sometimes even cooking. I haven’t been to a mall in almost a year and my wardrobe is several seasons out of date.

I don’t care, though, because I’m writing.

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April 26, 2014 · 10:19 am

Why I write romantic fiction

Those who know me personally already know the answer to this one. Sometimes, though, it’s good to lay it all out so everyone knows the same thing.

For most of my life I’ve loved reading mysteries. As a kid I read Nancy Drew and the Trixie Beldon mysteries like they were sustenance for my starving body. As I got older I discovered Agatha Christie and by the time she died I had read every one of her novels and short stories at least twice. I never really read what was called “love stories” until after I had my daughter. I was browsing through the book store one day, looking for a new author – since most of the ones I liked had died! – and I spotted a Nora Roberts paperback. It was Irish Thoroughbred. I read the back jacket and it seemed like I’d like it, so I took it home and read it. In three hours. I was absolutely hooked by the way she wove a story. The same day I went back to the bookstore and bought the other three titles they had in her name. They were devoured within three days. For the past 25 years I have read everything published by Roberts, including her JDRobb works. By opening my reading world to romantic fiction, Roberts introduced me to a wealth of  other  romance novelists who have made my life so much sweeter and more exciting with their writings.

When I decided I wanted to try and write romance, I sat down and made a list – really! a list – of why I loved reading it so much. These were the highlights:

  • there is usually a happy, relationship-resolved ending. And who doesn’t like a happy ending?
  • the female characters are always independent, smart, many times funny and witty, go-getters, nurture-ers, thoughtful and someone I would like to be friends with.
  • the male leads are usually – but not always – alpha males, successful in almost everything but love ( hence the heroine!), smart, charming, family oriented ( usually) and someone I would like to have in my life. The beta males are pretty hot, too.
  • the secondary characters seem real to me, not walk on’s who come in and then go, usually just to deliver a message, like so many other kinds of novels I’ve read. You never see them again and they serve no purpose in the character’s life except to tell them one piece of info. In romance writing, the secondary characters are real people, just like you’d have in your own life. And they serve real purposes in the main character’s lives.
  • the sex is written from an emotional viewpoint, and not a clinical one. I’ve read enough “popular fiction” where the obligatory sex scene describes a going into b and then c happening. Boring. In romance, we get to hear and witness the character’s emotions, responses, desires and dreams. And a really good author will make you feel like the character’s emotions could be yours as well.
  • the stories told around the romance are fun, sad, exciting, mysterious, thrilling, though provoking and sometimes even just sweet.
  • who, after all, doesn’t love LOVE? Being in love, feeling loved, loving someone else. Even the Bible says “Love one another.”

Those are the main reasons I like reading – and now writing – romantic fiction. I’m sure if you ask ten different romance authors their reasons, you will get ten or more different answers than mine.

Some of my favorite Romance Novelists:

Nora Roberts, Tami Hoag, Julie Garwood, Linda Howard, Lisa Kleypas, Kasey Micheals,

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April 22, 2014 · 11:13 pm

You write WHAT?!?

For years I never told people my secret. I kept it between myself and my laptop. No one knew, suspected, or had any inkling what I did with my free time. Then one day, quite by accident,  I let it slip. The look I got from the person I told was comical and just this side of insulting.

“You write WHAT?!?” I was asked.

“Romance,” I replied.

“Why would you write that kind of book? You’re happily married and successful.”

I asked what that was supposed to mean and what connection it had to the kind of book I liked to write. The response floored me. “Romance books aren’t very interesting. I mean, the plot is always the same. Nothing new ever happens. They’re not very stimulating.”

Okay, did I say just this side of insulting? 

Romantic fiction has gotten a bum rap for a number of years, yet the sales statistics are staggering. Over 1.5 billion – that’s billion with a capital B – dollars in revenue in 2012. Compare that to its next highest competitor of mystery sales at just over 7 hundred million, and you can safely say romance sells. So why the bad rep? Why do people – professional writers included – feel that romance novels are the second class citizens of fiction?

You can probably get ten different reasons if you ask ten different people, but I’ll tell you the ones I’ve personally been told by friends and acquaintances.

“I don’t like books that have a lot of explicit sex in them.”

“The basic story line is always the same. The ending, predictable.”

“If I’m gonna buy a book,  I want to read about more than just  the two people in  the story.”

“I don’t like mushy writing.”

These are actually things that have been said to me when I asked. I’d like to address them individually.

“I don’t like books that have a lot of explicit sex in them.” This is so stereotypical that I’m pissed off I even have to address it. Romance novels come in all degrees of heat.  Everything from inspirational novels, where the two “love interests” don’t even kiss, to erotica, and everything in between. Some romance novelists are known for their heat level, jacking it up high and then cooling it down, just to fan it again. This is a normal romance roller coaster. The characters don’t hop into the sack on page one ( well, some authors in erotica do that). Their relationship grows in the novel until it reaches a point where the author either lets them act on their sexual attraction, or finds ways to keep them apart – interested – yet apart. It’s not all sesexsex on every page. That would be a boringly clinical book if it were, with nothing vested in the characters. You might as well read a sex manual.

“The basic story line is always the same. The ending predictable.”  Part of this statement has a smidge of truth – the last sentence. Almost all romance novels end the same way – with the heroine and hero discovering that they want to spend the rest of their days together. Marriage is usually the end product, but not always. The first part of the sentence is just flat out wrong. The basic story line of every romance novel is not the same. Sure, you have two main characters whom you’re rooting will fall in love, but how they get there, how they go on that journey, is different from book to book, character to character. Just like every person in real life is unique, every character in a novel is as well. Every person’s journey is unique, just like every character’s is. Nothing in life is predictable and neither are romance novels.

“If I’m gonna buy a book,  I want to read about more than just  the two people in  the story.”  This statement is surely made by a person who does not read romance. Yes, all romance books have two love interests. But just like in real life, there are people surrounding those main characters. Parents, siblings, friends, bosses, enemies and co-workers. Unless your story takes place on a deserted island and the main characters are shipwrecked, you’re gonna have more than two people in the story. Those secondary characters have their own story lines as well, again just like in real life. How they all intersect, intertwine and effect one another is the basis of sound story telling.

“I don’t like mushy writing.” Well, neither do I. Nor do I read it. What I read is dialogue that sounds natural, as if the two people were speaking in my own living room to one another. What I read is a plot that has a beginning, middle and resolution that satisfies me as the reader. I don’t read flowery sentences and purple prose, or any kind of drivel that makes no sense and makes my groan. I read well written, well plotted, superbly spoken works of talented writers. That these books have as their main premise a romance in them is frosting on the cake as far as I’m concerned.

Romance readers know what they want in a good story and romance writers strive to give them that with each and every book they pen. Numbers don’t lie and romance novels are here to stay.

Thank goodness for that.

 

 

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