Tag Archives: romance writer

January 1, 2015 · 12:53 pm

A non-resolution resolution…

I’m not one to make New Year’s Resolutions. I’ve always believed that if you want to change something at any time – just pull a Nike and DO IT! There’s no real reason to wait until a monday to start a diet, or until the kids are out of the house to write, or anything else. If the thought occurs, put action behind it right then and there.

Can you tell I hate to wait for things??

This year, I’m changing it up a bit. While I’m not making tried and true resolutions, I do intend to change a few things to make my life and the lives of those around me better this year. I call these things INTENTIONS, not Resolutions.

First and foremost, I INTEND to devote a lot more time to blogging. I was on fire last year when I started this blog, but with the passing of the year, I waned a bit. I intend to document here at least 3 times weekly ( sometimes, hopefully, more).

I fully INTEND  to have at least one more book ready for publication by my birthday in May. I’ve got two out to the publisher now, and another one in consideration. I want my current WIP ready to go to the publisher, done and completely perfect ( or as close as I can get) by my 55th birthday.

I INTEND to do two brand new, totally non-Peggylike things this year. One of them will be trapezing, The other is a secret for now. I’ll revel it at the end of February.

I have the fullest INTENTION of being a calmer, less stressed wife and mother this year. I know: this intention is really a challenge, but hey, I’m up for it! With my retirement date set for April 30, I think I will be better able to do this since I won’t have healthcare work issues to occupy most of my time anymore.

I INTEND to live a less cluttered life – physically, emotionally and spiritually. There are many things in my life and surrounding me that I need to let go, get rid of, and not replace. More on those things in later blogs, but suffice it to say I am having a helluva garage sale this spring!

So, my intentions are now written in laptop stone so I won’t forget them or shove them to the back burner. What are your intentions for 2015?

 

 

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December 11, 2014 · 12:04 pm

Call me…And I’m not talking about a Blondie song

For anyone who was raised Catholic, as I was, when you hear  someone has received The Call, you immediately know they have been “spiritually called” to join Holy Orders. Either enter a convent or go to seminary.

Now, even though my mother neonatally named me to enter a nunnery ( Margaret-Mary Bernadette, folks ) my Call did not come with an invitation to serve the Lord. No, my call was much different, but no less life changing.

At the 2014 RWA conference in San Antonio, Tx, I had made arrangements to briefly introduce myself to an editor at the Wild Rose Press who was currently evaluating a romance novel submission of mine. I had emailed her and found out she was going to be volunteering at the event and I wanted to meet with her face-to-face in order to thank her for being so gracious to me via all the email “chats” we’d had. When I introduced myself to her, I discovered one of the loveliest women I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet. She was not only as gracious as her emails had been, but sweet and kind as well. I thanked her, as I’d planned to do, for being so nice and patient, and she quite literally changed my life in that instant.

She told me that she had “good news for me.”

My heart stopped.

Literally.

I could feel my blood pooling in my feet, swelling them, because it wasn’t being shunted to any vital organs.

She told me that by the time I got home I should have a contract for publication waiting for me in my email. The Wild Rose Press wanted to publish my book.

Now, my brain stopped functioning from lack of blood. And shock.

I don’t know how long I stood there just staring at her. The poor woman probably thought I was having a stroke or some kind of medical emergency. All around us was the noise of the conference: people walking by, laughing and talking, heading to their next course; hotel workers moving about, delivering water jugs to the classrooms they were setting up; people checking into the conference.

After what seemed like a lifetime – but was probably just a few seconds – I found my tongue. I said, in a shaky voice, “there have been two times in my life I have been speechless. The first was when my boyfriend “told me” we were getting married, not asked. And the second is right now.”

I hugged her. I couldn’t help it. I was so overcome, I didn’t even realize I pulled her into my arms until she was there. And, as before, she was gracious and kind.

She had to get back to her volunteering and I had to get to my next course, so we parted, each saying we would be in touch.

I went to class. I can honestly tell you I have no idea what it was and have no memory of even being in it. After that I went up to my hotel room.

As I played the brief meeting out in my mind, I began to wonder if I had hallucinated it. I really did. I didn’t tell any of my RWA chapter mates who were at the conference as well, keeping my secret hidden – just in case I had imagined the entire two-minute event.

I didn’t want them to think I was suffering from delusions. It was bad enough I thought I was.

I got through the rest of the week and headed home. Sure enough, when I got there and checked my email there was a contract proposal waiting for me.

Third time in my life I’ve been speechless? When I opened and then read that email.

To say my life has changed since this is a totally inadequate way of conveying what has happened to me. My first romance novel SKATER’S WALTZ, book 1 in the MacQuire Women Series will be published in early 2015 and book 2, THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HOME, later in the year. I have officially given in my resignation to my day job, effective in April 2015 so that I can no pursue the lifelong passion I have always wanted to pursue.  I’ve begun learning valuable marketing tools to sell my books, and I now know the difference between an algorithm and branding. These days my head is not only full of plot lines and character profiles, but social media sites that promote authors and help with book sales.

In the Catholic faith, THE CALL is a life-changing, spiritual event. And although I didn’t immediately don a habit and enter a nunnery, my Call was no less  life-changing and spiritual.

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November 20, 2014 · 11:36 am

How do you “see” your characters?

My friend was sitting in my writing lair the other day and happened to see a bunch of index cards with color photographs of various head shots with written descriptions next to them. She asked me what they were. I admitted they were my cheater cards for characters. When she gave me that quizzical look we as writers can all describe: brown furrowed, a subtle squint in the corners of the eyes, I explained these were what I envisioned my characters in my current WIP looked like. I like having an actual picture to work from than simply a written description.

How do you see your characters? Are you like me and you need a visual prompt? Or can you simply see the person in your mind and bring them to life on the page?

Up until a few years ago I tried to paint the picture of what my peeps looked like in my head and then transfer it to the written word. The problem I encountered was I needed to keep going back to the original description if I mentioned eye or hair color again, because I would invariably forget how I described them. I got the idea to start using photographs of celebrities, or people I’d see in print ads, one day when the person I wanted to describe looked exactly like a very famous actor. I figured as long as I didn’t state he was dead ringer for my character, but describe his attributes instead, I would be okay.

And I was.

I printed out a picture from an on-line site and then went on to describe his features, including height, approximate weight and body type. From that moment on, whenever I needed to refer to a characteristic again, all I needed to do was look at my picture.

Then I had a divine inspiration: I not only printed the picture, I pasted it to an index card and then physically wrote down every description of the character I might need. Body type, weight, height, any physical ticks or quirks, eye color, hair color. For men, if they would typically sprout a five o’clock shadow by, say, 3 pm., I’d add it. If their chests were hairy, matted, or smooth got included so during the love scenes I wouldn’t have mistakenly “shaved” a guy with hair and made him smooth to the touch.

For the women, waist and bust size along with shapeliness or a lack of it was documented. Were their smiles full, sexy or sardonic?

You may ask isn’t this a bit much to fit all on an index card? No, it’s not.

This system has worked so well for me, I haven’t had a mistaken blue eye substituted for a brown one in years.

However you envision them, however you remember their attributes, whatever works for you is fine.

This is the easiest way for my rapidly deteriorating menopausal memory to deal with information that needs to be repeated.

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