Les Femmes d'Ecriture

It's off!

2012-02-17T06:51:00.000-08:00

After way more time than originally planned editing the ms, it's finally headed back to the editor. It started at 103,000 words and ended up at 76,000 words, so much red ink was spilled.

I miss the characters already. Am I mad? I guess when you've watched them do everything--and I mean EVERYTHING--it can be hard to let go.

I worry about the book: will it sell; will readers like the setting of southern Spain, which I consider very romantic but is considered an 'unusual' setting; will I be able to re-focus on the current book without too much difficulty. . . .

But for now, I'm going to celebrate the fact that my 'baby' is as good as I can make it right now and hope and pray that the editor will like the revisions.

What do you do to distract yourself while waiting for an editor's reply?

Final polishing

2012-02-13T06:40:00.000-08:00

I'm in the final polishing stage, examining each word, each phrase, each paragraph. This is where the self-doubt creeps in for me. Should I change it or not? What if I change it and the publisher wants something different? What's the point of it all? What's the meaning of life?

Ugh. Just need to muscle through this and make sure the conflict shines in each scene.

How do you make that final (hopefully) pass through your manuscripts? What are your techniques?

Karen Harbaugh on American-set historicals

2012-02-01T06:16:00.000-08:00

Karen Harbaugh is a Regency author who follows market trends and has been incredibly accurate in predicting where the next "turn" in the market will be, and why things are operating (or not) as they are. With a lovely re-issue of "The Marriage Scheme" available at Regency Reads, I thought it would be a good time to ask her about the State of the Market, and how that relates to my last blog post regarding the difficulty of selling American-set historical romances.

So here, without further ado, is Karen Harbaugh:

Well, IMHO, what's curtailing the move into American-set romances is the fear of traditional publishers to take risks. That's always been the case, and it's even more so now. Even though they're moving into the "risky" ebook market (at last), this does not mean they're going to take risks with subject matter. They're going to take baby steps, because they have assets to protect and right now, their assets are under a tremendous amount of threat.

Indie authors, on the other hand, have very little to lose. You have a few hundred bucks for a really nice cover and copyright registration, you do your own scanning and coding, and you're good. If you're really short on money, you can try creating the cover yourself and you're out maybe $50-$75.

When I look at what should sell if there weren't these constraints, I'd say American Revolution, Civil War, and WWII eras. Why is this?

1. We are at the same point in the approximately 80-year cycle that gave rise to the American Revolution, Civil War, and WWII. There is and has been rising interest in these eras.

2. We have already seen interest in these eras in the bestseller lists (McCullough's books comes to mind: 1776 and John Adams, the latter of which not only was on the best seller lists, but won the Pulitzer Prize AND was made into a mini-series. The media doesn't plunk that kind of recognition and money down on something like that without knowing it's worth the risk. Interest in the Civil War is suppressed at this time because of continuing racial tensions concerning slavery--it's very difficult to walk the line between historical accuracy and offending someone.

World War II gets special mention. In the 1980's the U.S. released 17 WWII-themed movies. In the 1990's, the same number. From 2000 to 2009, it released twice that many--34. That is a significant jump in not only audience interest, but business investment. In other words, it's considered a relative "sure thing."

3. Controversy sells. In addition, we live in one of the most divisive of times, and when we do, we ALWAYS hearken back to periods of history that might possibly give us the answers we need to get us through. Controversy + desire for answers = big sales.

Mainstream publishing hasn't jumped on these romance trends. I think this is typical--they tend to lag about 5 to 10 years. Case in point: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which developed a cult following from 1997 to 2003. The ratings were modest, but the significance here is in "cult following." That represents extremely loyal viewers who "evangelize" the show and get others to watch it, far beyond the lifetime of the series. This is the epitome of word-of-mouth. You get that kind of loyal readership for books, and you can guarantee bestsellerdom. But, as many of us know, in the mid to late 1990's, the publishers were saying that paranormal romances and vampires were dead (if you will excuse the expression) :-D

The consumer demand for paranormal romances was very heavy even back in 1995. I went to a Romantic Times convention around about that time, and it was significant to me that when the readers (and this was a reader--rather than writer--convention) that when readers were asked what kind of romances they wanted, there was a loud cry for paranormal romances, and a great deal of frustration that they couldn't find them. Keep in mind that these readers--like the Buffy fans--were readers so dedicated that they would not only go to a convention for romance novels, but they were the romance novel evangelists. The kind you want to spread word of mouth.

Yet, publishers at that time kept insisting that such romances were not popular. However, we all know how that subgenre has been doing since that time.

If I were to go on historical circumstances and similarity to our own era, I'd say that the order of relevance would be American Revolution, WWII, and then the Civil War.

However, our memories are short, and what we are currently told about the American Revolution is highly politicized. So the most accurate accounts we have of an era that is similar to ours is for WWII, because we still have some eyewitnesses.

If we were to write stories in older eras, we REALLY have to do our research. We can't go on the stereotypes of those eras. We have to look at those eras with fresh eyes and present a fresh, and very accurate perspective. So far, I don't think that's been done. The research may be good, but the fresh perspective may not be there.

If you want some historical parallells or have other questions, feel free to ask.

And since she's asked for questions. . . . ask away!!

American-set historicals

2012-01-30T05:31:00.000-08:00

What is the state of the romance genre when it comes to American-set historicals? Regencies and Scotland, of course, sell well. And vampires. I'm being told that American-set historicals are a hard sell, especially in the romance genre. Why would that be?

Digital publishers ARE publishing these, yet traditional publishers seem to shy away from them. Why the gap? And are they selling well? I don't know how to get numbers on digital publishing--will have to ask my friend Karen Harbaugh, who's an absolute genius at divining trends from the market. If they're selling well digitally, then why wouldn't print publishers be interested?

Is it because Americans think they already know their history? Is it because American history is somehow seen as 'unromantic', and therefore not worthy? We obviously didn't have kings and queens strutting around doing odd things, throwing lavish parties or building pleasure palaces. And Americans are a practical lot. Even in colonial times, education and reading material was almost exclusively based on useful information; growing crops, staying warm. . . .staying alive. Things that were "fun" were frowned upon because they took time away from the important business of living.

Or is it a lack of authors willing to take a risk and write in this area? Geralyn Dawson, Sharon Ihle and Alexis Harrington all have e-books or even a traditional book (in the case of Alexis Harrington) out right now that are American-set historicals. Westerns have had their rise and fall in popularity, but haven't hit the sustained sales figures of Regencies and Scottish-set historicals. If it's because people like to read about other places and times, then American-set historicals should be selling well in the U.K. and elsewhere.

Thoughts? Am I missing something here?

What to cut?

2012-01-18T18:11:00.000-08:00

Since I've been in editing mode for a while now, I'm finding in some parts it's darned difficult to tell what needs to be cut versus kept versus re-written. Kept some scenes, but did a POV switch. I **think** it's better, but crap, when you're in the middle of it all, it's really hard to be objective.

Of course, since it's my book and by definition I love it, I can justify keeping just about anything. That's what happened the first time I came at this. I cut it from about 103,000 words to about 102,500. Not exactly an effective job. It's kind of like getting a run at Queen Anne Hill in the snow, getting halfway up and then sliding back down to the bottom (Snow reference since we're in the middle of Snowmageddon here).

This time I'm trying to focus with a laser beam on the primary internal conflict between the h/h and also what their own internal conflicts are. As much as possible, anything that deviates from that gets extra scrutiny. Or at least I hope it does.

Do you have a technique for the first pass, second pass, subsequent passes? Or do you look for specific things each time? My "technique" is pretty darned hit-and-miss right now, but I'd probably be a lot more effective if I could refine this a bit.

So what are your tips for editing?

Really??

2012-01-04T05:33:00.000-08:00

Here's something I found on a to-be-unnamed freelance site:

Job: Ghostwriter for historical romance novel
Budget: $500 to $1,000
Description: I am looking for a writer to write a novel with a historical romance theme. I have no specifics for the story, so you would need to come up with title, plot, characters, etc. It must be original, engaging, sexy, fast moving, short chapters, and grab the reader from the first page. I am not looking for a long, drawn out romance. We will own all rights including resell and rights. You will not be permitted to use the content for any other purpose.The novel must be 120 pages minimum, 300 pages maximum. I also need you to include:- 3 Recommendations for a title (must be original and unique)- A basic 1-2 paragraph summary/report description that simply explains what the novel is about and what it covers. - table of contents. Delivery within 60 days of author selection. I'd like to see a detailed outline with full character descriptions within 10 days. Daily updates (short emails) are required. This is a very easy job for the right person. Suggested payment schedule: $25 for plot development and delivery with character descriptions (2-3 pages) $50 for first 10 pages. $50 for next 10 pages $100 when first 100 pages are delivered $100 on first draft delivery of full novel. Balance on final delivery of proofread document.

Is the person posting this job naive, crazy, or out to insult writers? The sad part is, people with no idea how to write a good work of fiction will bid on this, and someone around the $500 amount will win, and another work of bad romance will be pushed out there for readers, editors and reviewers to point to. Does the person posting this job think they'll make tons of money off the work, once it's "published"? (I put that in quotes because I doubt the end result will be publishable by any reputable house, so it will have to go self-publishing, which will once again dilute the quality for all those good romance authors self-publishing out there). Or would someone with an old manuscript that's been rejected hundreds of times decide to utilize this as a way to get some quick money?

Would you take a job like this?

Revising and editing

2012-01-01T20:26:00.000-08:00

Okay, I'm going to get this book edited/ revised by the end of January or die trying. Anyone else in revision mode? Anyone have suggestions? This is not my favorite part of the process, so I'm looking for any and all help I can find.

What's all the shouting about?

2011-12-04T18:56:00.001-08:00

As I read the news and watch an admittedly small portion of television, I'm left somewhat dismayed at the level of sensationalism that seems to pervade anything media-related. And I wonder: must we shout to be heard above the din? Must authors write books that "tell all" or let the reader in on some alleged "secrets"? Whatever happened to shows like Seinfeld, where we could just take a humorous and ironic view of daily life? What about books? The top 5 NYT non-fiction titles for this week include one each from Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck, two men who make a living off of inciting dissension. Will it get to the point where we, as fiction authors, need to insert something controversial just to make a sale? It used to be that controversy would kill a sale; now I wonder if we're headed down a path where, even in fiction, controversy might be required to MAKE a sale. I think that would be a very sad day for fiction writers.

Author Meg Mims!

2011-11-28T06:00:00.000-08:00

I'd like to welcome author Meg Mims to the blog. Meg has published a historical romance titled "Double Cross" that is a twist on one of my favorite western movies of all time, "True Grit". She uses a technique that I really like, character interviews. So without further ado, let me introduce Lily and Ace!

What do you get when you pair up a wealthy, well-bred heiress – shelteredand educated with an impulsive streak – and a gambling, mercenary Texan cowboy?

DoubleCrossing is a twist on “True Grit” that takes place on the 1869 Iron Horse –months after the Union and Central Pacific railroad lines joined at PromontoryPoint. Nineteen-year-old Lily Granville is stunned with her father is murderedand vows to track the killer – her father’s lawyer, who also stole a valuabledeed to a gold mine – across the country to California. Afterconvincing a good friend to escort her, Lily arrives in Omaha and discoversthat someone is now tracking her. Could it be the killer? And why? Lily decidesto enlist “Ace” Diamond, who agrees to protect her – for a price.

Qfor Lily – how did you first meet Ace?

A – He literallycrashed his way into my life. I was stunned. He’d been brawling in the street andI felt my Christian duty was to help him when he landed at my feet. But then Icaught sight of his Confederate belt buckle with the Texas Lone Star. Guiltoverwhelmed me. My father would never have approved of such a man, and I wassuspicious of the story he told me about my aunt’s husband. However, I soonrealized I had no choice but to hire someone like Ace Diamond, who had far moreexperience with his fists and weapons than the friend who’d escorted me toOmaha. Ace seemed the most unlikely “angel of mercy” as an answer to prayer! ButI suppose beggars can’t be choosers.

Qfor Ace – what was your first impression of Lily?

A – The moment Iset eyes on that pretty filly, all golden-haired and sweet, with the mostkissable mouth, I was bushwhacked. Couldn’t remember my own name.

Qfor Lily – were you surprised that Ace bargained with you over his fee?

A – The nerve ofthat man! He claimed he wanted to go to California, and then he wouldn’t acceptthe fair wage I offered. He even demanded an expensive Pullman ticket! And thenI found out he’d been bragging about the bonus I promised once we arrived safe inCalifornia. Really, Mr. Diamond was presumptuous and forward, given histendency to—well, I will only say that he’s no gentleman. I shouldn’t have beensurprised at all. He was a mercenary, plain and simple, and I was too naïve tosee it.

Qfor Ace – why did you accept Lily’s offer?

A – Riding shotgun on a train, and gettin’ paid? Easier thanwinning a hand of poker. But don’t youbelieve that I didn’t earn my fee. And then some.

Q for Lily – before the railroad trip, whatwas your dream for a happy future?

A – I wanted… well, I hadn’t decided. Charles wanted to marryme and serve as missionaries in China. We both heard the same lecture inChicago. My father wanted me to marry a decent man, a good provider and givehim grandchildren. He did not approve of the idea of me living half a worldaway. And while I did want adventure and independence, I wanted to be somewheresafe and to enjoy long talks with Father, sketch my pet lizard in the lovelygarden or watch the leaves change in fall and the snow fall in winter. Father’sdeath changed everything. I blamed Emil Todaro for his greed and betrayal. Heruined my life and I wanted to see him hang.

Q for Ace – what about you, same question?

A – A good woman in a nice, cozy bed. Now I’m aiming for thatwoman to be Lily.

If you haven’t read Double Crossing yet,here’s where you can find it!

AstraeaPress

Amazon

Barnes& Noble

Thankful accomplishments

2011-11-23T19:29:00.001-08:00

I want to wish everyone a hearty Happy Thanksgiving! My kids are home and I'll be heading to California with the youngest to get her car down to L.A.

In the meantime, I'll have a guest blogger here on Monday. Meg Mims, author of "Double Crossing", has penned a twist on the classic "True Grit" movie, one of my favorites (the original, with John Wayne).

So tell me, what are you thankful you've accomplished during the past year? Have you finished a book? Entered a contest? It doesn't have to be a big thing, but I think sometimes we forget to pause and pat ourselves on the back for what we've done. I know it's human nature to focus on the stuff we DIDN'T get done, but put that aside for a few days and give yourself credit.

Me? I've finally resurrected the bullfighting book and it's getting closer to being sent in again. And I've been studying writing books and learning the craft ever better.

How Dark is Too Dark?

2011-11-07T20:05:00.000-08:00

I have several ideas floating around in my head, but the one that keeps coming back is dark, dark, dark. Post-Civil War, and the heroine would basically be dealing with PTSD, even though it certainly hadn't been identified as a specific condition back then.

How dark is too dark a book for you? The Harry Potter series was dark, especially for something aimed at kids and young teens. How far can you go in the historical romance genre? Stephen King can get away with pretty much anything, but he's an outstanding writer and writes in the horror genre. His stuff is SUPPOSED to be dark.

Meagan Chance writes dark, and a lot of people consider Anne Stuart's stuff to be dark, although I just find it. . . intense, I guess is the best way. Not overly dark, at least for me.

What makes a book 'dark' for you, and at what point does it become so dark that you put the book down? What great books have you read that were dark? Any great, dark romances?

The Inside Story

2011-10-30T13:12:00.000-07:00

I'm reading a FANTASTIC book on writing. INSIDE STORY: The Power of the Transformational Arc by Dara Marks is written primarily for screenwriters, but everything in it applies to fiction. Absolutely fanstastic book that's bringing a lot of good information to me in a way my little pea brain can handle.

She breaks a story--any story--down into bite-sized pieces, explains each piece, and then demonstrates through famous movies exactly how they can be pieced back together. Even though there's structure, those of us who break out in hives at the very thought of being 'told' how their book 'should' flow can get through this because the structure, as she explains it, is no more than a general frame on which you can hang anything. Action/adventure, romance, romp, mystery, thriller. . . so long as whatever you're writing has guts, or an inside story, you can go anywhere with the exterior.

I'm seeing so many ways this book can apply to my writing and make it better.

Anyone else read this book? Have you applied the concepts? What do you think of it?

What Drives You Nuts?

2011-10-28T19:04:00.000-07:00

A lively discussion with some writing friends got me to thinking about what makes us love or hate a book, or drives us nutty about the story. For me, head-hopping will turn the book into a wall-banger very quickly. If you can't figure out how to tell the story without constantly jumping from head to head, I don't want to invest the effort into trying to follow the storyline. But for other people, that doesn't bother them.

Weak characterization is another thing that drives me nuts. Characters who are TSTL (too stupid to live), or who do things with no motivation whatsoever are another bugaboo for me. But my critique partners and other writing friends have lists of other things like historical mistakes, occasional flaws in the story logic, and other items that they can't forgive while I can.

On the other hand, strong storylines and characters with deep motivation and strong goals will bring me in every time.

So the writer in me wants to know. . . what drives you batty when reading fiction?

Contests--what's in them for you?

2011-10-14T21:24:00.000-07:00

I used to be a contest junkie, but haven't entered any writing contest in years. Now I'm considering the Golden Heart because, well, because I have a completed manuscript that I'm working on. I think it would give me another reason to keep forging ahead with these edits. But I'm wondering if it's worth the effort and cost. It's a non-traditional book, and I'm not sure how much contests have changed over the past several years. It used to be that non-traditional books not entered in the Fantasy category rarely did well. However, the rise of e-publishing and a wider variety of stories could bode well--or not.

Should I throw my $50 into the fray? What do you look to get out of a contest entry? Fame? Glory? An editor's eye?

Did computers change our content?

2011-10-05T20:11:00.000-07:00

Bummed about the fact that Steve Jobs died, but that got me thinking. The personal computer re-defined the way we write. No more pen to paper for most of us; instead, we sat before an empty screen and blinking cursor. But since the computer revolution, it seems to me that fiction has changed. Books are shorter, as are chapters. I remember when a 20-page chapter was the norm. I don't think that's the case any more. The books I'm reading today have shorter chapters, and most open in media reas, in the middle of the action.

I'm not saying this is better or worse than the way things used to be; just different. Or am I imagining things? I think back to the Brontes and even Pat Conroy and the beautiful, lyrical phrases and descriptions they could weave, and I don't think that style of writing is as prevalent today. Did the computer have anything to do with it? Are we losing our ability to live in the moment? For the moment? Must everything be rapid-fire, goal-oriented, make-every-second-count? Just because we can do things faster with a computer, must we?

Wine, Women, and Creativity

2011-10-02T07:28:00.000-07:00

Having just returned from a lovely dinner out with most of my critique group, I have to say that a) they're the best group around, and b)we got some awesome brainstorming done.

I do need to finish revising the current book.
I do need to finish writing the next book.

But wow, got some awesome plot ideas for the one after that. Perhaps it was the wine (both at the restaurant and then after we got back to the house) but the ideas were really being generated.

What sparks your creativity? A walk in the woods or through an art museum? Wine? <g> A critique session? Observing humans in their natural environment?

I'm wondering how people can get good results from this when they're sober!

Viewpoint

2011-09-18T19:11:00.000-07:00

Viewpoint--how important is it to you? As a reader, does it bother you if the author "head hops"? Or do you notice it? If you're an author, how often do you switch viewpoints? Not that there's any fast rule, but do you tend to move between vps often? Stay in one vp for an entire scene? Entire chapter? Some authors tend to switch fairly quickly, others less so.

Story may dictate this to some extent, but my argument is this is more of a stylistic choice by the author. However, I want to see a REASON for it. While I love Nora Roberts' storytelling, I can't read her books because of the vp switches that happen so often I feel like I have mental whiplash. Yet her storytelling is strong enough that most people don't seem bothered by it.

Stylistically, books written 75-100 years ago are slower, more deliberate, and tend to be 1st person, which doesn't lend itself to vp switches. Today's books are much faster paced. Has the vp switching happened as a result of the demand for "faster" plotlines?

If you're a vp purist, how much does it bother you when an author head hops? If you don't particularly care, do you even notice when the vp switches to another character? Do you think that adds or detracts from the story?

The problem with problems

2011-08-24T06:09:00.000-07:00

I'm still storyboarding, and still discovering problems with the book. Who'd a thunk, eh?

This is the heroine's book, yet I'm finding that the POV is tilted toward the hero. There are also more sequels than I would like in a book that's supposedly pretty action-oriented (it involves bullfighting, after all). And the problem with all of these is, well, the day job.

How does one balance a need to spend hours on the ms to fix all this, when one must work and pay the mortgage? Add to that the fact that it's finally decided to be nice, weather-wise, here in the Pacific NW, and I'm not motivated in the least to work on this thing.

So, gentle readers, I need your motivation tips to get my butt inside, out of the garden, and working on the ms. But only after I eat a few of these green beans. . . .

Storyboarding--the good, bad, and ugly

2011-08-16T21:10:00.000-07:00

My next Grand Experiment is to storyboard VALENTINA and see (hopefully) where I can trim this baby.

I'm hoping a storyboard will allow me to see the whole book as more of a 'picture', rather than a linear bunch of typing. I plan to do pink Post-its for the heroine's POV and blue for the hero's.

But I'm a newbie at this, so I'm wondering if anyone out there has any suggestions or hints for using this technique. When I get the whole thing done I'll post a picture of it. If it helps someone, that's great. I'm hoping it'll help me.

Carol

Guest Blogger Brinda Berry!

2011-07-25T18:24:00.000-07:00

Please join me in welcoming the delightful as well as informative author Brinda Berry to the blog. The first five people to leave a comment here will win a romance trading card! There's also a chance to win a copy of the e-book or a chance at an Amazon gift certificate. Take it away, Brinda!

Using Podcasts for Research

In writing my debut novel, The Waiting Booth, I used what some may consider an unorthodox method of research. Instead of using the many online resources or visiting an actual library, I relied on information that I could obtain at my convenience while commuting to my full-time job two hours daily. I listened to podcasts.

If you aren't familiar with the world of podcasts, you are really missing out on a very enjoyable form of information that suits our social natures. The podcast is a digital audio or video file that a user can access by using a web feed or checking it manually for updates to download. I used the iTunes software to manage my podcasts and subscribe to some of my favorites. Episodes are available for me on my laptop, iPad, and iPhone. I have an auxiliary cable that I plug into my car radio to connect the device (iPhone), and I can listen on the go. There are a variety of mobile devices which support the storing of podcasts.
I listened to The Scientific American Podcast, Stuff You Should Know, The Coolest Stuff on the Planet, NPR: Science Friday Podcast and others for inspiration and research while writing The Waiting Booth. I don't have a degree in science and won't pretend to be versed in some of the more scientific topics. The great thing about podcasts is the social format of the information. There are interviews with questions that I might ask. These are experts in the field as well as ordinary people with limited expertise. Conversations occur that break down the issues to the most basic elements. Also, these brief talk shows that usually lasts between thirty minutes to one hour are highly entertaining and frequently humorous.

Even if you aren't researching a topic, you have other great resources in the world of podcasting. There are enlightening author interviews on BTR: Authors on Air, Blog Talk Radio. Other podcasts focus on topics like technology, language instruction, news, humor, and sports. I'm afraid to look at the selection because I keep finding more podcasts to add to my listening queue.

Have I sold you on listening to a podcast yet? It may not be for everyone. I have a long commute daily, so this format fits nicely in my schedule. Instead of a commute, you may exercise with a daily walk while listening to your iPod. Or you could play it from your computer while you are cooking a meal. The possibilities are endless. Writers all lament about the lack of time for writing related tasks. Podcasts are terrific resources for the time-challenged author. I hope you'll try a podcast if you haven't, but I must warn you. They are addictive!

Brinda has her own blog at http://www.brindaberry.com/blog.html .

Her new book is THE WAITING BOOTH:

A missing boy, government agents, an interdimensional portal...

Mia has one goal for her senior year at Whispering Woods High—find her missing older brother. But when her science project reveals a portal into another dimension, she learns that travelers are moving in and out of her woods in the most alarming way and government agents Regulus and Arizona are policing their immigration. Mia’s drawn to the mysterious, aloof Regulus, but it’s no time for a crush. She needs to find out what they know about her brother, while the agents fight to save the world from viral contamination. But when Regulus reveals that he knows Mia’s secrets, she begins to wonder if there’s more going on than she thought...and if she was wrong to trust him...

CONTEST RULES: http://www.brindaberry.com/summer-2011-blog-tour.html

The Great Scrivener Experiment

2011-07-17T10:46:00.000-07:00

I'm a 'big picture' gal. I like to be able to see the whole story, the arc, the conflicts and disaster, and see if I've got 27 scenes in the hero's POV and only 3 in the heroine's. And it's damned difficult to do that in Word.

I'm also a sucker for office products, software, anything that even sniffs politely of technology. I see advertisements for things like that and I start drooling, which isn't always for the best if it's an online ad.

So now my friend Shannon McKelden makes a post on Facebook about how she just loooooves Scrivener, and it does everything except bake the bread for you. (Okay, I'm interested) THEN she sweetens the pot by talking about the 'corkboard' view in Scrivener (I'm getting hot flashes) and how you can color-code scenes or POV or whatever (I'm practically fainting at this point) and then move things around AT WILL to see how they fit together in a new way--or not. (I'm fumbling for my credit card at this point).

This morning I downloaded the program and copied in my manuscript VALENTINA, the one that was requested from Wild Rose Publishing. Maybe it was Scrivener, or just looking at the book in a different format, but I suddenly realized that the book opens with a frikking SEQUEL, not a SCENE--in other words, no action. Of course, that's fiction-writer's death, and I need to fix that.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to figure out how to break the monster manuscript (103,000 words) into the various chapters and scenes and color-code them, and I hope it'll stop raining sometime today so I can get out in the garden.

And--oh, yeah--GO U.S. WOMEN'S SOCCER!!!!

Why Children Are Like Books

2011-07-04T21:17:00.000-07:00

My daughter's been home for a week now from L.A., and is heading back tomorrow. And I got to thinking this week that kids are a bit like the books we write.

We do all kinds of prep work before they get here, and finishing that d@*& book has gotta be right up there with the birthing process. It takes a lot of work, a lot of time, and there are a whole bunch of people involved.

Revision is like raising the kid. Wondering if you're doing the right thing, if you should say this or that, and when someone gives you advice, wondering if you should take it or stick to your guns and do what **you** think is right, consequences be damned. In the end you know you missed a few things, but you hope you got it right most of the time.

Then you send your little work of art, be it a child or a book, out into the cold, cruel world. All you can do at that point is pray that yes, you did get at least some of it right, and that someone, somewhere out there will stop and look and say 'Hey, you didn't completely screw that up. This is actually pretty good.'

Because with books and kids, you generally don't get a second chance to fix things.

My daughter, bless her heart, has actually told me (now that she's past the age-18-I-know-everything-in-the-world stage) that some of the stuff I told her has turned out to be TRUE!! Yes, the landlord wants the rent at the first of the month. No, you cannot show up late to work on a continuing basis and expect to keep your job. And your older brother may have seemed like a turd-breath (her term, not mine) when you were younger, but he's actually a pretty cool guy as an adult.

And that, my friends, is like getting a five-star review.

Discovery of Witches and Maass

2011-06-26T08:27:00.000-07:00

My first Kindle book, A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness, is one recommended in a class I took on descriptions of setting in novels, Setting as Character. Very interesting class, and the instructor, Devon Ellington, recommended this book as one with great descriptions of the setting. She's right. The descriptions are brief--they don't slow down the story--and very evocative. It's also quite obvious that either a lot of research or experience went into this book. I've never been to Oxford (though I'd give my eye teeth to go) but I think I'd feel at home there via Harkness's descriptions.

I'm not done with the book yet, so I'm not giving out any spoilers because I can't, though thanks to my handy new Kindle I can probably polish it off today. Harkness also uses quite a few of Maass's techniques, with several unexpected twists in the novel. The heroine ( a witch) just went to a yoga class with the vampire/hero. Never in a hundred years would I have imagined a vampire in a yoga class, but she made it seem, if a bit unusual, highly logical. Loved that scene, even though I know less than nothing about yoga.

Anyone else read this book? What are your thoughts? What techniques of Maass did you see in there?

The Kindle Plunge

2011-06-16T09:25:00.000-07:00

Okay, I did it. This morning I ordered a new Kindle DX from Amazon.com. While I still lust after an iPad, the fact that it doesn't handle text as well as a Kindle and that they haven't come out with the e-ink/LCD version that can handle both types of content--and the fact that the rec room remodel will soon be done--forced me to take action.

When the rec room is finally finished, it will not have nearly the bookcase capacity that it did pre-remodel. All those books have to fit into much less space than they did before. Hence, the Kindle.

Of course, for the next few gift-giving occasions, I'll be putting Amazon gift cards on my wish list. What are your suggestions for content for my new device? Free books? Research books? Anne Stuart has a new book out. So does Maggie Shayne.

Make me a list of your favorites and I'll start the hunt!

Too Much of a Good Thing?

2011-06-12T19:58:00.000-07:00

Thanks to a Facebook conversation with my friend and critque partner DeeAnna Galbraith, I'm going to ask today's question: Can you have too much of a good thing?

We've tossed ideas about conflict around here--external, internal, and various permutations of All Of The Above. But DeeAnna is reading a book where pretty much everything that can happen does--yet from her description, not a lot of it relates to a conflict between the hero and heroine. Which, I would argue, should be the crux of any good romance novel. Oh, sure, people have physical disabilities. And they lose their job. Then someone in the family gets sick or dies. And their car dies. . . You get the idea. It's a whole huge bunch of bad luck, but to me, that doesn't necessarily equate to conflict. It's something that could be fixed with an oil change and a good counseling session.

To me, conflict that's big enough to sustain an entire book doesn't have to be anything with guns blazing or cars dying or even people dying. It does, however, have to be a conflict that speaks to a fundamental difference between two characters who maybe WANT to like/love each other, but because of that fundamental difference, can't. At least, not at the beginning of the book. He thinks people should make their own end-of-life decisions; she thinks that's morally reprehensible. There's your conflict, and not a bit of shouting or exploding cars is involved.

OR, there has to be something each of them wants that's mutually exclusive. In VALENTINA, it was the hero desperately needing to make a business deal with the Bad Guy, whom Valentina wanted to kill. In the end, neither of them got their original goal, but they got something bigger and better.

So have you read books like this, where the author threw everything but the kitchen sink at the characters? Did it work? Pick it apart for us.

Raising the Stakes in the Middle

2011-06-09T06:27:00.000-07:00

In Chapter 3 of the book and 7 of the workbook, we're dealing all about the personal stakes for the protagonist. What are they, and how do you raise them? How do you get the reader to care about what is happening to your characters, and how do you make it matter more?

His idea is raising the stakes--BUT--these new plot twists must be organic. Something that comes seemingly out of nowhere is not going to pull the reader deeper into the story. It has to come from the story, and from the characters.

I think the key is tiny little hints layered very early on in the story, so small that they lie unnoticed by the reader until the background of the character, the reason why someting matters to that character, is revealed or partially revealed. A character's reaction to something as noteworthy as a mother spanking her child in the grocery store parking lot, or as innocuous as passing by a stand at the farmer's market can ultimately reveal something about the character, and that then raises the stakes later on in the book. The trick, I think, is doing it so that it doesn't seem like deus ex machina or flying aliens or something that doesn't fit. It needs to be seamless.

Anyone have any good examples of this? I'm struggling with this as I near the halfway point in my ms, but this may be more a function of editing than first draft creation. Thoughts?

Back to Maass--Raising the Stakes

2011-05-26T05:21:00.001-07:00

In last week's Maass class we were reversing motives; finding different ways to motivate the characters into what they do in the story. Now we're working on raising the stakes. But as Maass says on page 60 of the book, the reason we care about the character when the stakes get high is that we care about the character, period.

And therein lies the rub, eh?

We've all read books where we really connected with the characters, and books where they seemed, well, flat. Maass has already covered a few techniques that he says will help you connect with your reader through words: open with the character in action, show him/her with heroic qualities, have them demonstrate larger-than-life qualities, etc.

But on page 61 he says that by clothing your protagonist(s) in a cloak of "high principles and codes of personal conduct" you'll create a character who has value, who is worth saving in the readers' eyes. A book must have, he says, "high public stakes and deep personal stakes" to have breakout potential.

This, of course, is work that's done well before Word One gets set down. You have to know and understand your character at a very deep level to know what he or she stands for, what matters to him or her.

So how do you do that? I've taken a wonderful class with Alicia Rasley that forced me to go deeper, and it was a great help. I've used Meyers-Briggs personality tests. I've interviewed my characters. I've read about their occupations, their time periods, and a zillion other things. What do you do to dig deeper, to really understand the heart and soul of your characters so you know what matters to them, and thus what you can put at risk?

e-books vs. print books

2011-05-22T19:49:00.000-07:00

Well, for the first time ever, Amazon announced last week that e-books had outsold traditionally-bound books. Here's one of many articles published on it:

http://www.kippreport.com/2011/05/ebooks-outsell-booky-books-so-what/

And of course, we've got to slam them, right? What's this 'books of questionable quality' crap? Like no bound book was ever a wall-banger? Yes, I understand this is the Wild West of publishing right now, but there are still good books and icky books and books that have a narrow market. But that's not really different than it's ever been. Books are still selling largely by word of mouth--which is why some e-authors are selling gajillions and other are selling nil.

So here we are, apparently, at the Tipping Point.

I really, really, REALLY want an e-book reader. But I only want one. And I don't know what that one is. I like the e-ink, but I also like a color display. If and when old copies of Godey's Ladies Book or other such items become available, I'd like the ability to examine the illustrations in color, to see the detail in the drawings and the different colored layers in the clothing or what have you. Right now I want a Kindle for the ability to read easily, and an iPad for the lovely color display and the ability to read Time Magazine and Scientific American on it and get the full effect.

I've become an iPad rumor whore, dashing from website to website looking to see when they might come up with the magic instrument of my desires. So far the fairy godmother hasn't landed. So I wait.

But back to the subject at hand. Admittedly, Amazon's customers are already computer-savvy. They're not afraid to try something new, given the fact that they're shopping online for everything from groceries to platform shoes. I see this as the tip of the iceburg. I think there will always be some paper/hardback books printed, but I can see in 10 years that it could very well be a print-on-demand service. Those who insist on paper will have to order it in advance, have it printed and (::gasp!::) shipped to them.

Either that, or shop at the Boy Scout Rummage Sale, Goodwill, and the Salvation Army Thrift Store, as those will be the only places left with paper books.

Am I being too pessimistic? Was the Rapture really about our books, and we just misunderstood? Tell me your predictions for the literary world for the next. . . . let's say 5 years.

Loving the (Un)saleable story?

2011-05-18T17:18:00.000-07:00

Reading through VALENTINA over the past couple of days, I realize that I'm just as much in love with it now as I was 7 years ago when I finished it. Yes, my writing has improved and I can tighten and strengthen, but the basic bones of the story are strong. My hero and heroine both want--no, NEED--something desperately, and are willing to do just about anything to get it. Their motivations make sense, and falling in love is a complication neither of them needs. But the story was really not saleable material, at least not to the NY romance-publishing houses.

The story is set in Spain, not England. It's set in 1880, which is neither a contemporary story nor the Georgian or Regency periods. When the book opens the heroine is planning on murdering someone--the bad guy, it turns out, but she's still bent on killing him. And although being disguised as a male isn't all that unusual, being disguised as a male bullfighter and actually getting in the ring to fight bulls most definitely is. Not sure I've ever read that before, at least not in historical romance.

Completely unsaleable.

Or is it? I have cautious optimism now that the complete has been requested. What does it say about this brave new publishing world if it now beats the odds and gets published? Is it because the market has widened? Is it because standards have been lowered? Is it because readers have always wanted more variety and now can have their demands answered? Is it because there's less of a cash outlay demanded from an e-publisher who will only print the paperback version in limited quantity?

I've seen all sorts of theories bandied about, but I'm not sure anyone really knows the answer right now. Would I like it to be published by Avon or Dell or St. Martin's? You betcha. Is that going to happen? Probably not, at least not with this book. I tried most of them (I think) after finishing the story, and they weren't interested in taking a risk on a book like this from an unknown author. But now that I've emerged from school lo these many years later, I'm looking at a publishing landscape that bears absolutely no resemblance to the one that existed when I returned to school.

Because over the past seven years the story really hasn't changed much, I have to think the primary reason that someone's looking at it now is because of the tectonic shift in publishing. True, I spent my time looking at a host of e-publishers and finding one that has published books in non-traditional locations and with non-traditional characters (The Wild Rose Press requested it), but I tried that the first time as well.

So what do you see ahead in publishing? Further diversification? Some consolidation at some point? If that happens, will we still have the variety of genres and stories that we currently enjoy? Will authors be able to love (and sell) their 'unsaleable' books?

Wax on, Wax off

2011-05-15T13:18:00.000-07:00

Or, how do you polish?

I have 5 days to go through one of my old manuscripts and get it ready for submission. Very excited that I got a request for the full manuscript, but now panic is setting in. I polished up the first three chapters when I sumitted the partial, but I wrote this historical novel. . . at least 7 years ago, because that's when I went back to school. My writing has improved since then. But I only have a week.

Do you work on the little things, or do you look at the overall story arc? I'm tempted to do the latter, but what if I find a big hole? 5 days isn't much time to fix it, especially when the bulk of that day is taken up with the day job, and this isn't a week I can take off much in the way of extra time.

I know there are many people out there smarter than me, so I'm appealing to that collective wisdom. What's my best choice, given just a few days' time?

Maass--Reversing Motives

2011-05-13T18:54:00.000-07:00

Now we're on Page 38 of the Workbook, and Maass says to pick any scene with your protagonist in it, and write down what the character is trying to accomplish, obtain or avoid. Then write all the reasons WHY the character is trying to do that--as many as you can come up with. (Do that now)

Circle the very last reason you came up with, and re-write the scene using that very last reason.

Maass's reasoning is that we often use the first reason (I do--it's most logical, right?) and that makes the scene predictable. But no one likes reading about predictable people. Or as Maass puts it, "Safe choices make a scene predictable". So by choosing another reason, you're straying from the 'safe' path and making the book more interesting.

The thing I particularly like about this method is that you haven't changed your charater's GMC. Okay, you changed the M--motivation--but only for that one scene. Overall, though, the character is still the same person: you haven't changed the overarching reasoning why this character is on his or her story arc. You're just changing one little thing beneath that arc to add some zing to the story.

I'm trying this using Debbie Macomber's infamous "List of 20": come up with 20 things for whatever you're stuck with. The first five or so will be safe; predictable. Around the middle I always get stuck and have alien abductions or some such nonsense. But listing the aliens or wizards gets me past that hump and then the good stuff usually starts to come out. My little pea brain has been working on it while I was busy adding zombies or rock stars to the list.

And while we all like routine to a certain extent, we're all unique and we surprise even ourselves from time to time. So what do you do to keep your characters interesting? Have you tried this exercise? What happened?

. . . . or smaller

2011-05-08T06:48:00.000-07:00

In "Adjudting the Volume", Maass says that larger OR smaller reactions than the reader expects can increase tension and make your book better. He uses an example from The Da Vinci Code, where Langdon and Sophie have just escaped the Louvre where it seems all of Paris had run after them. As they're racing away in her Mini Cooper, he doesn't yell or scream or whoop for joy. He says, "That was interesting", which, of course, makes the whole series of events from which they just escaped a little bit larger.

Then he asks you to go through your manuscript and find 24 places to heighten or diminish something your protagonist says, does or thinks. Wow!

If you're writing about someone who's naturally quiet, is there a danger of making this person a caricature? Then again, even 24 instances in a 300-page manuscript isn't that much. Plus it's a mix of increased reaction and understated reactions. This shall be very interesting.

Even BIGGER than life

2011-04-30T22:33:00.000-07:00

I have to confess: I'm not sure where Maass is going with this. Page 32 of the Workbook asks me to find TWELVE places the protragonist can break through boundaries and do something s/he wouldn't have done at the beginning of the book. While this is all great and good for character growth, with too much of itthe character traits you outline at the beginning of the book don't seem so much like traits if the character is just busting through that way of thinking or acting right away.

For example, if I have a female character who's quiet and shy in her speech, I can't have her shouting too much. The soft-spoken trait then looks like an affectation rather than a true trait, and the reader is going to see my character differently.

On Page 35 (still in Chapter 4) Maass says to practice taking a thought, action or piece of dialogue and first make it bigger, then make the same action smaller. And THEN come up with 24 points in the story (in mine, it would be 24 per character) where you can heighten or diminish something the character does, says or thinks.

Um. . .. wow. 48 times? Really? I'm going to work on this tomorrow, but I'm wondering if this level of intensity might get tiring after a while, or make the characters seem caricatures.

Larger than Life Characters

2011-04-27T06:24:00.000-07:00

Now we're on to Chapter 4. Here, Maass says that one of the things that makes a memorable, larger-than-life protagonist is that they will do what the rest of us would never do. They say things out loud that we only think. And of course, they come up with witty repartee in an instant, where we always have the perfect comeback an hour after the discussion.

Part of the exercises (Page 31 of the Workbook if you're following along) is to outline the things that your character would never, EVER, under any circumstances, say. What s/he wouldn't do. And what s/he wouldn't think. Then, find places in your story for your character to think, say and do those things.

What type of situations might cause that? What would be the consequences of the thought or action?

My thoughts at this point (having not done the exercise yet) are that it would have to be fairly well into the book to write this. Because a reader isn't going to know it's against the character's traits to think/say/do something until they know the character. But then I can see the shock value of starting with something big and dramatic, like killing someone, and then revealing how out of character that is. The repercussions of whatever opened the book would have to be felt throughout it, I'm thinking.

Has anyone done this exercise already? Thoughts?

Growing Conflicted

2011-04-24T09:43:00.000-07:00

Still working on Maass's chapter on Inner Conflict (Chapter 3), and in looking back at the work I did for Chapter 2 (Multidimensional Characters) I see now that identifying those extra character dimensions is a good chunk of the work toward creating (but not, darn it, solving) internal struggles for the characters. For example, in the wip, the hero's primary trait is that he's a rescuer. He sees himself as the person who swoops in and takes care of things for those who can't. He's a doctor, as well, which plays right into that. Rescuer types often become EMTs, doctors, etc.

The opposite of that would be to throw someone to the wolves, a very villainous trait and one I don't think that my hero has. Still, I wrote a scene with him doing something like that just to see what would happen. Very interesting.

But what would happen if someone came along who he could not save? Someone with cancer, or (in this instance) a mental illness that was simply beyond the medicine of the times to treat? How would that challenge him as a person? As a doctor?

So let's hear it. Pick one of your characters and tell me his or her defining quality, as Maass puts it. What's the one trait someone would use to describe your character, as in "he's honest" or "she's very direct". Now, what's the opposite of that, and how would you show some growth from one toward the other, even if not all the way there? Your honest hero might not have to become a pathological liar, but what would test his honesty? And would there be a time when he could actually tell a lie to achieve some greater goal?

Internal Conflict

2011-04-21T18:12:00.000-07:00

So you've created characters who are heroic and likeable. Maybe still flawed at the opening of the book, but that's okay. They can be flawed but still likeable, so long as their flaw isn't something like being a serial murderer or a pedophile. The flaw has to be redeemable, something the character can overcome--which brings me to the subject of this week's (I promise to do better about posting regularly) post.

Internal conflict. Growth of the character, WITHIN the character. This chapter of the Maass book deals with the internal conflict, something I love but I always seem to give my characters a Mt. Everest to climb. But I want them to work for their happiness. So how do you identify what that internal conflict is, make it large enough to be a rewarding read, but manageable enough that the character has a realistic chance of growing and changing enough to overcome it? How do you keep everything in balance?

Breakout Novel--Heroes

2011-03-13T14:46:00.000-07:00

I'm working my way through Donald Maass's 'Breakout Novel', and the beginning section is on heroes and heroines. I'm just going to call them heroes or protagonists, because we all know that women can be and are heroic, as well.

One of the things Maass says is that we identify with a protagonist not because we like them, but because we see in that character ourselves as we would like to be. That in the outset of the book we should see at least some 'small show of gumption, a glimmer of humor, a dab of ironic self-regard' or some other heroic trait, even if the character is in the middle of wallowing in self-pity or doing something un-heroic at the story's outset.

Another thing he asks is that we take out our favorite three works of fiction, the three we would most re-read now or have read the most. Laura Kinsale's 'Flowers from the Storm' and the Lord of the Rings trilogy are definitely on there. I'm trying to think of another. LaVyrle's 'Morning Glory' would probably be the other, though I doubt I have a copy of it any more.

The rich characterization is what brings me back to those books. Though LOTR has an intense, intricate plot, it also has well-drawn characters. The two romances have very intense internal conflicts and plots, but they're not 'we're gonna die' intensity in the external plot at all. So internal plot and characterization. And actually, LOTR has quite an involved internal journey for Frodo and everyone else. The external plot points tend to overshadow it, though.

So what are YOUR three favorite works of fiction, and why?

Conflict--why is it so hard??

2011-01-30T16:17:00.000-08:00

Spent this past weekend with the Olympia RWA Chapter at Manresa Castle in Port Townsend with some of the most fabulous people on the planet. Had a wonderful time, and took up the current MFH (manuscript from hell) to work on. Writing it has just turned into such a struggle. And I discovered with their help that the reason is. . . . there's no conflict. The hero and heroine both wanted, basically, the same thing.

This makes for a very short book.

In my head, they had opposite goals, but once people with a clearer vision looked at my plot (or lack thereof), they said, "Hey! There's no conflict here, and no place for your characters to grow."

On the flip side, I think I helped a couple of people with the same problem with their manuscripts.

So why is it so easy to see these ginormous plot holes in other peoples' books and not in our own? Is it because we're too close to the characters? Is it because we don't spend enough time before sitting down to write to get this figured out? Or do we not go deep enough? I mean, this is something like book #7. I should have this figured out by now. And I **thought** they were at odds. But they're really not.

I have a whole notebook full of 'deep insights' into this book that clearly meant squat. I'm going to start fresh because I still like the characters, but I was heading them in the completely wrong direction.

So today's question is, How do you ensure you have enough conflict? How do you recognize when there's not enough? And where do you draw the line between revising what you've got, and throwing it out and starting all over?

Adrianne Lee told me that you need Goal, and Opposition to that goal. And that both of those should either be heroic, or someone doing something unheroic, but for a very good reason, a heroic reason. Part of my problem was that my heroine wanted freedom and/or self-determination, which is heroic, but the OPPOSITE of that, which would have to be the hero's goal, would be to deny her her freedom. Bad juju there, at least for a hero. One of the many reasons the book wasn't working.

In my bullfighter book, the heroine wants to kill the story's villain. Now, murder is generally not considered heroic, BUT she's going to avenge the murder of her family by the villain years earlier. And of course, the villain does die in the end, but not at her hand, so she's still left being heroine-like. Heroic. Whatever.

Thoughts? How do we test our conflicts to ensure they'll be sustainable for an entire book?

What Jane Austen Saw

2011-01-09T14:35:00.000-08:00

Research ain't everything. It certainly helps, and I've read books with outstanding research, so-so research, and no research. While researching an article I'm writing, just today I came across "The Boston Tea Party was a defining moment in America's Civil War". Now, maybe it's just me, but I thought the Tea Party (NOT the current one) and the Civil War were in different centuries. That right there is what you call a "Research Fail".

We've all heard "write what you know". But how is that possible if you're writing a historical novel, or a futuristic? How about a novel that involves some scuba diving if you're deathly afraid of the water?

Jane Austen, however, did write what she knew, and we're certainly the richer for it. She was a keen observer of the world around her, and could hone her words to a razor's edge--the better to cut you with, if you were her quarry.

So this week I pose some questions:

Do you "research" or "observe"?
Do you get what you need before, during or after the story is written?
With the focus in most women's fiction being on the characters, rather than the explosions, murders or other selected mayhem of general fiction, is perfect research a necessity?
And what do agents and editors think about this? Will they take on a manuscript with great characters, but holes in the research?

Let's talk

Last day in London

2010-10-10T14:14:00.000-07:00

We walked all over London today: The millenium bridge,

then to the Globe Theatre,

then back across the Millenium Bridge to the Monument to the Great Fire. 331 steps to the top, and I climbed all the way up. (And back down, of course). Got the certificate to prove it.

From there we took the tube to Leadenhall Market, which still looks pretty much as it did in Victorian Days, when it began. Everything was closed because it's Sunday, but it was still fun to see.

Then we went to the Museum of London, which is built on one part of the original Roman wall. A section of the wall is still outside the museum. Very interesting place. From there we went to the Liberty Department Store, which had a lot of very expensive, uber-trendy stuff that I wasn't interested in. But it was fun to gawk at all the weird stuff.

Took the tube back to the hotel, ate a most lovely dinner (I had Caesar salad with grilled prawns), packed and re-packed, and are now ready to exit stage left.

See everyone when we get back home!

the Bodacia statue,

then to

London

2010-10-09T13:33:00.000-07:00

Well, we left Scotland and have arrived in London. The scenery is definitely different, much flatter and, of course, way more people. On our way from Edinburgh to Dumfries to return the rental car we were on "B" roads much of the time, and we encountered the proverbial "Scottish traffic jam": sheep standing and/or walking in the road, looking at you like you need to get out of THEIR way.

But eventually we got to Dumfries, returned the rental car, and took the train to London.

Today we went to the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Natural History Museum, which are conveniently next door to each other. Of course, each one is about 3 city blocks in size plus several stories high, but they are close to each other. Here's the V&A:

After museum-ing it we went to Harrods where we ate a late lunch and did some shopping. Didn't buy much (much of it is way too expensive for us) but had some fun.

Tomorrow evening it's time to try to fit everything into our bags for the trip home. Luckily I brought a nifty duffel bag that my daughter Jessica gave to me. It zips into a little square about 2" thick and 14" square. Unzip it and it's a medium-sized duffel bag. viola! Instant baggage happiness.

Ready to wind up this trip and head back home.

Borthwick Castle, south of Edinburgh

2010-10-08T13:58:00.000-07:00

Wow, this place is magnificent. We wanted to stay one night in a real castle, and mom decided Borthwick was the place. Here's how it looks upon driving up:

Here's part of the information we got upon arrival:

“Sir William de Borthwick built Borthwick Castle in 1430. He was granted a Royal Charter by King James I of Scotland to build it. . . . but it was noted that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would pay for its construction. This was because Sir William had been a hostage in the release of King James I in 1424, he (King James) having been abducted by Henry IV of England when he was just two years old and kept more or less prisoner in the French Court. One of Sir William’s ancestors was one of the knights who carried Robert the Bruce’s heart to Jerusalem. (A) feature of strength is the extreme thickness of the walls tapering from 14 feet in the dungeon area to 9 feet thick in the garrison. There are some 30,000 tons of masonry in the building, of which 12,000 tons was quarried locally. (Another ) feature of the Castle which makes it so unusual and so strong is the vaulted ceilings. The Great Hall has a pointed vault some 30 feet high. Above this there is a second chamber almost the same height with a rounded vault, which is currently divided into two levels.”

We toured everything from the top (our room, the Sinclair room) to the dungeons. Originally the castle has only ONE door in, and it was about 4 feet high. That was on purpose. You had to duck down to enter, exposing your head and neck. To defend the castle against invaders, all Lord Borthwick had to do was station a knight at that door with a sword and. . . .off with your head if he didn't like you. There's also a trap door that drops to the dungeon about 27 feet below. We went to the dungeon, but we went down some narrow, winding stairs like this to get there, rather than the more abrupt trap-door route:

Note the direction of the stairs. This was on purpose. If you're coming UP the stairs, you'll run into the central pillar if you're a right-handed swordsman, as most of them were, making it more difficult for you to make an effective attack. But if you're heading DOWN the stairs, as a defender would be (guards slept in the upper reaches), you can use your right hand with impunity because there's no central pillar in your way. Very ingenious.

Here's a picture of the Great Hall, where dinner and breakfast are served. The walls of the castle are 14 feet thick here! Originally colorful tapestries were hung on the walls (the holes to support them are still there) and there are faint, faint traces of sayings that had been painted on the walls back in the 1400's. The fireplace is immense at the other end. This is the reconstructed minstrel's gallery. The ceiling is a pointed vault, over 30 feet high.

Our room, being at the top, required 37 + 78 steps to reach: 37 steps from the parking lot to the entry door, and then another 78 steps from the main floor to our room. I carried mom's bag for her a couple of times, and finally got some exercise! the walls at the top are a mere 9 feet thick. I felt so unprotected!

Just up the road from the castle is the Borthwick Parish Church. The original was built in the 1430's like the castle, but has burned down a couple of times and been re-built. However, the stone effigies of (they're pretty sure) the original Lord and Lady Borthwick from the 1430's have survived, and are currently lying in state inside the church. Apparently they're planning to create a vault or something and put them there in the future. For now they're gazing up at the church ceiling.

So that was our trip to a castle. More on that later, including pictures of our room. For now, we've made it safely to London, and it's time to SHOP!

No luck today

2010-10-06T10:38:00.000-07:00

Went to the General Register Office for Scotland where all the old records are kept. One young lady there was very helpful. . . the rest completely ignored us. I couldn't believe it. The most unhelpful bunch of people I've ever met. It should be evident when I speak that I'm not from Edinburgh, but was any offer of assistance forthcoming? nope. I ordered some records, told I had done it wrong, and asked to find something more specific. Well, if I don't know what I'm looking for, how can I find it? While there are a lot of records there, finding them is beyond a first-timer's capability without some help. We spent the whole day there and found nothing, which wasn't totally unexpected, but I think we could have made a lot better progress with some assistance.
The guys in the research room just kept pointing us out the door to where the ladies worked, and after a while I got tired of bugging them.
Get with it, GROS!

Stirling to Edinburgh

2010-10-05T13:06:00.000-07:00

Stayed last night at a lovely B&B, the Roslin Cottage in Callander. No overly scented sheets, thank God. I could sleep through the night without itching and was able to breathe in the morning. Amen to that. Ate breakfast and headed out, stopping first at Stirling Castle. As with many medieval fortresses, it was built high on a hill. Easy to defend, not so easy to get water. But wait--you're the king! You can just send people to FETCH the water for you! Such a deal. The view from the castle is amazing.

Took a tour of the castle, learned that each of the statues on the side of the castle has a meaning. You can also see quite clearly how many times the castle has been altered and/or rebuilt. There are headings and doorways from earlier windows, etc. all around, but they've been filled in. The castle isn't nearly as tall as it was in medieval times, either. Apparently after the invention of the trebuchet (see earlier post with pictures) someone decided that a really tall castle made a really good target, and took things down a notch or two.

It's still a very impressive structure, no matter how you slice it. Hmmm, my husband made me promise not to buy any furniture on this trip, but what about property? THAT doesn't have to clear Customs. "Hi, honey? Yeah, I didn't buy furniture. But guess what I found?"

After Stirling we drove south to Bannockburn, where a decisive Scots victory was had in 1314 by Robert the Bruce, King of Scots, over Edward II, King of England. This led to the poem by Robbie Burns (an ancestor of ours, we found out recently) titled "Scots Wha Hay" and the "Flower of Scotland" song--one of my favorites.

And here's a tribute to the man himself, King Robert the Bruce who, we found out today, undoubtedly had leprosy. He clearly hid it well.

After Bannockburn we drove the M8/M9 into Edinburgh (THAT was quite an adventure) and found our way to our hotel (the Best Western Bruntsfield Hotel) where we parked the car and will take the bus to the Family History Centre tomorrow.

Who knows what we'll uncover there?

Down the Great Glen

2010-10-04T11:44:00.000-07:00

Today was another long day of driving, south from Culloden to Ft. William all the way down along the Great Glen, then east from there to a little town called Callander, where we're staying at the lovely Roslin Cottage B&B. The Great Glen was AMAZING. Beautiful scenery. Self-evident why this is "the" place for walkers and bicyclists to come. Even just driving is an amazing experience, and we had driven north along part of the Great Glen on our way up here.

We stopped at Urquhart Castle, which is now in ruins (those damned Jacobites!) but still a very interesting place to see.

Lots of history here, of course. Toured the castle, then headed on down the Glen.
Tomorrow is Stirling Castle and Bannockburn, and then on into Edinburgh. We may stop at the woolen mills here in Callander as well and see what they have to offer. Found some nice woolen products in a tiny little hole-in-the-wall shop in Stornoway (Harris island) and they were all hand made. Probably won't find that here, but we'll see.

If you're looking for weapons, though, Urquhart is the place. Trebuchet, anyone?

Oh. My. God.

2010-10-02T14:13:00.000-07:00

It is 10pm, and we have been driving around, trying to find a place to stay, since shortly after 6:30.

All I wanted was to go to Culloden Moor. See the battlefield. Stay the night. But nooooooo, there's a big marathon in Inverness, and EVERYTHING, and I mean EVERYTHING, is booked solid. We are about 40 miles away in a 4-star (!!$$!!) hotel that had the only room left for probably a hundred miles. We're down in the servant's quarters of an old manor house. I think--I hope--we have the cheapest room in the place.

Tomorrow morning first thing the job is to find a less expensive B&B closer to the battlefield. But for right now I have a splitting headache, and am downing a Tylenol with a glass of white wine (yeah, yeah, I know it's wrong. Sue me) and I'm going to hit the sack pretty soon. Will have to download pictures later. Too tired tonight.

the first marathon runner I see out on the roads tomorrow morning is toast.

The Outer Hebrides

2010-10-01T10:45:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we drove north on the A82 from Ft. William to Spean Bridge, then continued on the A82 north to Invergarry. Here we turned west and crossed the Great Glen on the A87 toward Shiel Bridge. At Shiel Bridge we took a left and headed due west toward Glenelg. The road from Shiel Bridge to Glenelg was one lane most of the way with “Passing Areas” every ¼ to ½ mile or so. Steep, sharp climb as we neared Ben Achacinich (but didn’t summit it, just drove around it). Still, we got some glorious pictures from up that high, looking down to sea level. Continued on down the other side of the mountain to Glenelg. On the picture below, the pinkish line is where we went just today! My butt is flat. this was way more driving than I care to do, but we got where we wanted to go.

Drove up to the ferry landing and they were just rotating the platform to take off. They stopped upon seeing us, then motioned us on the ferry. We drove on. It SAYS this ferry can take up to 6 cars, but I can’t see that unless every car is a motorcycle. 4 at most from my estimate. But they collected the fee at mid-stream, which I guess is the best incentive to pay, since you could get rolled off the back side if you don’t pay, I suppose! At the other side (Kylerhea) they rotated the platform to meet the ramp and we and the couple from Worcester, Mass drove off.

We took another one-lane road from Kylerhea on the Skye side to meet the main road, the A850. We followed the A80 through Portree, the main town, and on up north to the A856 until we came to Uig. Here are a couple of pictures from part of that journey:

There we bought ferry tickets for the Uig-Tarbert ferry, and waited about 90 minutes to board. Once on board, I was glad to see that there were no naked lights allowed aboard with us decent folks.

We bought return tickets for Stornaway-Ulapool, so today we've visited a Harris Tweed weaver's croft in Carlaway, then drove to Stornoway, where we are now. We shopped in Stornoway and bought some actual Harris tweed, and now we're at the Cabarfeidh Hotel, which, thankfully, has a good Internet connection. Tomorrow afternoon we take the ferry back to the “mainland” and Ulapool, where we’ll head for Inverness.

This is incredible country. Amazing, amazing scenery and people.

Harry Potter!

2010-09-29T10:21:00.000-07:00

Today we rode the Jacobite Express coal-fired steam train from Ft. William to Mallaig and back again. this is the same train used in the Harry Potter films. it was great fun--but very rainy and cool in the morning, so the only way you could get any decent photos is by opening the sliding window atop the big picture window. However (we discovered) when the train goes through a tunnel, steam and coal soot comes flying back inside the coach through said open sliding window. it was quite an adventure. But the scenery was breathtaking. Here are just a couple of the over 100 photos I took today.

The B&B we stumbled on yesterday is a real gem, set on the side of a hill overlooking the harbor at Ft. William. Absolutely lovely place and we've enjoyed chatting with several of the other guests.

Tomorrow it's off to the Isle of Skye on a tiny little ferry boat operated by hand that only takes about 3 cars.

Lost in Scotland. . . for a while

2010-09-28T14:13:00.000-07:00

Well, the other night we couldn't find out B&B. The address was "Gartmore, near Aberfoyle". That's it. It got dark, it was raining, I was in unknown territory driving on the left side of the road. We finally gave up and just stayed at the first B&B we could find. But YESTERDAY we found out that the old Neilson Parish Church (dating from the 1500's) was an outgrowth of Paisley Abbey nearby, which dates from the 1100's. We drove up to Paisley Abbey and. . . .Oh. My. There's not much more I can say. The place is fabulous! And the organ is stunning. Bringing pictures back for our church organist. Some attached here. It's late, and we're taking the Harry Potter steam train (the Jacobite Express) out to the coast and back tomorrow. Will attach pictures after we return tomorrow night. Should be fun!

Many travels today

2010-09-25T11:17:00.000-07:00

Well, we started in Stranraer, where we're currently staying, and went to many litle hamlets and fields that still carry the names they were given back in the 1700's: Lochan's Moor, Crailloch, High Salchrie, and Low Salchrie. Also investigated the TINY town of Kirkcolm, and found the old Kirkcolm church. Visited the area where the Inch church used to be: The original one was built in the 1100's on an island near the old Castle Kennedy, where the Earl of Stair used to keep his residence. At some point it was abandoned, and a new church was built, looks like around the 1600's. this is now in ruins, with no roof, however the current Earls and Countesses of Stair and their children are still being buried within the walls of the old church. Very interesting. One half has the parish ministers, the other half of the old curch holds the gentry who own or owned the land. We did find a couple of Gibsons buried there, but if they're 'our' Gibsons, they're only distantly related. Also, these fields are COVERED with stinging nettles, and my ankles are on fire right now because I didn't wear thick enough or high enough socks. Yowza!

We visited the 'new' Inch Church and churchyard which is exceptionally well maintained. Looks to have been built in the 1800s sometime. Driving in these tiny, mediaeval burghs is quite an experience. Glad I got the additional cover (insurance) on the car, because a branch came back and thwapped the driver's side mirror and broke it. Don't know if I should call and get it fixed or just let them deal with it when I return the car. I'm only out 60 pounds (about $100) since I have the insurance. Whew!

Also saw some very interesting standing stones and cairns. Carinholy I and Cairnholy II date from some of the very earliest inhabitation in the area and were places of burial. Took quite a few pictures. I wonder how early people maneuvered some of those stones around? And they're still standing, when many grave markers from the 1800's are already down.

Tomorrow is the Wigtown Book Festival. I anticipate finding many good deals, or "can't miss bargains" as my grandmother used to say. Will upload more pictures tonight. Stay tuned! I just need to re-size them so they don't crash everyone's computer.

Charging your equipment in the UK

2010-09-23T10:50:00.000-07:00

Well, the inevitable happened. I forgot something. Or rather, I forgot to double-check something. I brought the voltage converter and an outlet adapter. However, it's a UK to US 2 prong adapter. The computer, of course, takes a 3-prong plug. You know, the one with the little round ground plug below the two regular prongs? and after much fruitless searching for the past 2 days, I've come to the conclusion that I'm unlikely to find said adapter over here. Because, of course, anyone from the UK would be going TO the US, not coming FROM it. ::sigh:: So I plugged in the voltage adapter and the converter plug I brought with me, and then just turned the power plug to the laptop upside down and it does charge the laptop that way. Needless to say, this is less than optimal. I don't leave it plugged in overnight or unattended for any length of time. But it works in a pinch, and that's what we're in, laptop-wise. Ain't technology grand?

New Occupation: Flax Heckler

2010-09-23T10:04:00.000-07:00

Okay, this is a new one for me. While this wasn't an occupation of anyone in our lineage, I stumbled across it. Flax heckler. "Hey, flax--you ever catch flak for your name? hahahahahah!"

In other news, made quite a bit of progress today after not finding much yesterday. But one of the few leads we got yesterday turned into gold when the librarian at the Ewart Library here in Dumfries knew how to find which farms we were talking about, and produced an old ordnance survey map showing the locations of both farms, which are just down the road from each other. Also on opposite sides of the parish dividing lines, which explains why we keep finding people in Inch Parish and Mochrum Parish.

Ate a delightful late lunch/early supper at the Old Bank Restaurant and Coffee house. Tonight is our last night at the Glencairn Villa B&B, which is situated perfectly for our needs, near town and VERY near the Ewart Library. Tomorrow it's on to Inch and Stranraer, with a side trip to check out the location of those farms we found on the maps yesterday.

I'll be back driving on the left side of the road, so watch out!

First stop. . . . Dumfries

2010-09-21T11:56:00.000-07:00

As in Dumfries & Galloway, tho this is the town of Dumfries, not the county of D&G. I have to say, Air France Business Class (Affaires) completely ROCKS. Ability to rest, wonderful crew members (one even looked like French President Nicolas Sarkozy) and outstanding food and wines.

We're staying at the Glencairn Villa B&B, which is an older Georgian-era home that's been turned into a B&B. We passed through Gretna Green on the way up here, but didn't see anyone getting a hasty marriage. Just sheep and cows. Sheep and cows. More sheep and cows.

Tomorrow we'll go into town and see if we can find a voltage converter that takes 3 prong American plugs, instead of 2-prong, which is all I brought. And fix up mom's credit card because it doesn't look like dad's call to the bank to tell them we're in the UK registered.

But for now we're just tired. Picture of the Best Western in Dumfries, opposite the train station. Not too many Best Westerns that look like this.

Over the Sea to Skye

2010-09-20T05:28:00.000-07:00

Well, not quite yet. Skye is a couple weeks away. But definitely heading for Paris, London, Carlisle (Scotland) and then, finally, Dumfries. We'll spend a day or so in Dumfries, then head for Wigtown, where the UK's largest book fair is held every year. And what a happy coincidence that it will just be starting up when we arrive! Huh. I wonder how that happened?
http://www.wigtown-booktown.co.uk/

Am I forgetting anything?

2010-09-14T20:20:00.000-07:00

Okay, we're 5 days out now. The dh (darling husband, dratted husband. . . . depending) is convinced I'll forget something critical. The red bag has all my electronics, chargers, passport, critical things that are going on the plane with me. The black suitcase is actually only about half full, and also has two more bags inside of it that fold flat for storage. I doubt they will be folded flat upon our return.

So will I forget anything? And if so, what?

Packing for Scotland

2010-09-05T19:47:00.000-07:00

Okay, we're 2 weeks out from leaving for Scotland. There are a few things in the suitcase, but I'm not sure what I'll forget. Will it be something critical? What should I take?