laurenwaters

*Sigh*, I need a break from my endless editing! The good news is my editors are SO meticulous; the bad news is that it takes so LONG! I completely understand what Oscar Wilde meant when he said, “I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again.”

(As I was looking for this quote I saw these and just had to include them: “I am not young enough to know everything” and “A man can be happy with any woman as long as he does not love her”.)

Anyway, where was I? Oh, right, I need a distraction.

I started daydreaming about all the other ideas I have for future books (something I usually do while I’m hung up on my series). My other ideas are not in the same genre as my series (reincarnation fantasy), actually, they vary from YA paranormal, adult paranormal, historical fantasy, and a paranormal thriller–although I do see a connection here 🙂

Honestly, I can’t imagine staying within one genre. I’m sure it’s beneficial since a writer can hone their talents and perfect their skills. Plus, it’s wise from a promoting standpoint to keep a specified audience that will stick with you, but my ADD will not allow me to stay within the creative borders of one genre. I must dream of taking on new parameters and jump into the adventure of a new literary world.

This choice most likely reflects the fact that, as a reader, I’m all over the place. I’ve never looked for a book based on genre. I’ve always walked around the book store just looking for the cover that jumps out at me or peruse the best seller shelves. If something sounds good, I buy it, regardless of whether it’s fantasy, historical, paranormal, YA, and even non-fiction.

So I write like I read.

I need diversity and when a crazy idea jumps into my mind, I’m thrilled that it’s so different.

Which made me wonder, what genre are all your works in progress? Procrastinating minds want to know.

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Email from Santa

*Go to http://www.portablenorthpole.tv/home to make your own! FREE!*

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We sometimes forget the great story behind our holidays, since each holiday usually requires so much hustle and bustle. We forget while our grocery carts are crammed inside overcrowded aisles. We focus on cleaning the house, making a new recipe, ordering desserts that will surely please. Some, even resent the holiday since it usually entails twice as long a trip to relatives you might not even want to see to begin with.

Children, of course, remember,  since they’ve spent all week sitting cross-legged in circles listening to the tale and metamorphosing hand prints into fat turkeys.

But there is a great story here.

A group of desperate, starving outcasts and adventurers struggle to tame a foreign wilderness and barely make it through their first winter. If it hadn’t been for the generous Native Americans, teaching them how to live of the new land, they would surely have perished. I’m sure it was difficult for these pious settlers to rely on these ‘primitive’ people, but they had no choice. After their first bountiful harvest they celebrated with a three-day feast with the natives who made it all possible.

You could decide to end the story here on a happy note, or you could use it as a cautionary tale, since things didn’t turn out so well for the natives.

So, for some of you, you might embrace this time to give thanks for what we have. While others might decide not to travel or host their difficult relatives in hopes of avoiding yet another Thanksgiving family argument. Either way, it all goes back to the original Thanksgiving story.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

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Due to a nasty cough that is circulating around my house, I’m neglecting my blog today. Hopefully, I will dodge this germ and be up and be back and blogging on Wednesday. Don’t forget to enter the giveaway!

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I never feel dumber than when I receive my ms back from my editor. Nevermind the fact that this time I went through specifically looking for all that she pointed out before. These are all the new things I got wrong this time around:

1) I overused the word look/looks/looking/looked. Sad thing is I think I did a search for this word before I sent it off so I need to open a thesaurus for this exhausted verb.

2) On occasion I began sentences with And or But, apparently these make weak sentences and my editor suggests just removing them.

3) She flagged many run-ons and comma splices and suggests to use periods or semi colons.

4) Many words were repeated close together. These are so hard to point out to yourself.

5) I need clearer sentence tags in instances where I have people talking of the same sex.

I wish I could see what someone else’s draft looks like after an editor return so I might feel better at all these corrections. But then again, that might depress me if I saw much cleaner versions. Part of me worries that if I keep making my editor work this much she’ll realize it’s not worth the time and money to help me or she’ll increase her charge since I make her work so much more.

Honestly though, the corrections were half the amount this time than the first of the series, so I guess I’m improving, but I really thought I’d done a good job this time…oh well, maybe by the fourth of the series I’ll impress her with my grammatical improvement.

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So sorry for the delay everyone. I’ve been in baby heaven this whole week! I had a fantastic and virtually pain-free delivery and I’m over-the-moon with this little cutie:

My sweet little Annabelle

I might have to delay a few more posts until I can bear to put her down for the computer, but I will be back in action and working toward my launch once again soon I promise!

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