Life has taken a big ol' bite out of me these past few months, and I'm just now in a spot to get my head above water. It feels nice to be seeing the brighter side of life again.
Even though things have been rough, I do have positive things to report. I've met one of those goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year! I'm only pointing this out because I realize I'm failing miserably at at least one of my other goals (namely, ahem, blogging regularly) and I need some cheerleading.
(Unrelated: why do all the good gifs seem to come from Glee?)
But I digress. The goal I'm about to cross off the list is attending a writer's workshop. A local friend who is also working hard at this writing thing told me we had to go to the Lighthouse Writers Workshop Book Fair together. I agreed. Then dug around the workshops being offered for Lit Fest and stumbled across this little ditty: https://lighthousewriters.org/workshop/detail/id/587/
I promptly swallowed my fear and paid for a spot. Then made my friend sign up, too. Then proceeded to hyperventilate.
(Sheldon is actually probably even more awesome than Glee. Hooray for TBBT!)
My m/s is still very much a work in progress. But signing up for this critique was just what I needed to kick me back into gear. The result is that in the past week I've made more progress on my novel than I have in the past year or so. WAY MORE.
Which is shameful. But the truth.
Revisions/edits are proving to be rough. I'm finding huge sections of story that can be completely eliminated for various reasons (mostly because I wrote a crap-ton of scenes that do nothing to advance the plot) and I've got some decent drafting to fill in some holes ahead of me. Apparently, I don't like to describe ANYTHING. This is a problem, natch.
But, you guys, my hubs has been so dang supportive. He wants to see me finish this thing and take it as far as I can as I do. Having his support means more than I can say.
Even if the agent hates what I submit, the feedback is going to be insanely valuable. Likewise for the insight she'll give on other workshoppers' submissions. This is too good of an opportunity to pass up, and I'll be damned if I let my procrastination and self-doubt squash my dream any longer.(And I might as well admit it - along with the nerves, I've been semi-indulging in wild fantasies of Kristin reading my pages and demanding a full.
So I want my m/s much closer to being at that stage than it obviously is now. Hey, a girl should have dreams. Even if they're WAY OUT THERE.)
Now, back to work!
Cheers,
Rheana
