Writing When You Have No Time

 

I WROTE THE MOST when I was a teen. On top of a school schedule. On top of friends and sports, and “zero” hour choir practice. I could find that otherworldly creative zone fondly known as “the Flow” with ease. Now writing with a fulltime job and family to take care of, I’m mourning that loss of freedom and energetic youth in general. Time to yourself is this incredible endangered thing that you have to fight fiercely to protect. It’s essential to writing. So how to you prioritize it without feeling like you’re shortchanging all those other new responsibilities in your life?

#1 Remember that you are a Writer and will always be a Writer. Nothing can take that from you. If you are a Writer, then it is your core identity. You will be drawn back to writing no matter what life throws at you. It’s how you find balance. It’s how you make sense of the world. So you will always still write…the question is how.

#2 Set Realistic Expectations. The struggle of finding time is real. Lord help you if you’re an epic fantasy novelist. You read about how J.K. Rowling wrote the  first scenes of Harry Potter on napkins while riding the train, or how George R.R. Martin locked himself in a cabin (and still no Winds of Winter…?).

My first child was a rude awakening. See, I had this fantasy that maternity leave meant so much “free time” to write. (I’ll give all parents a moment to spit out their tea.) Yes, I had no idea how much work raising a child is. Once the reality settled in, I realized that in no world would I be able to both feed a newborn and type. However, I could edit. So I repurposed that time to edit manuscripts instead. I researched. I experimented with voice command. I actually did write a short children’s story on my phone.

You eventually do get time back. However, there will always be something. If it’s not the refrigerator broke down, then it’s the car, or the newest bug from daycare. Or heck, what about just making the time to catch up with friends?

Navigating your Writer identity when you’re adulting is a challenge. There’s often no reliable schedule. However, identify the most consistent windows of time available. For myself, I made a commitment to write 15 minutes a day. Short enough that you could sneak it in before work or after you put the kiddo down to bed. Long enough that you can find “the Flow,” that beautiful feeling when the floodgates open and you’re just hammering away at that keyboard, deliriously lost in your own little world. Those 15 minutes will fly by, but they add up, day after day. Find what can honestly work for you, and commit.

#3 Stoke the Fire. Stay connected with what drives you to tell your stories. Read the latest review of a favorite author’s new book or watch a show closely related to your story’s theme. Spare a minute or two on what gets you fired up to write so you stay the course. Always be asking what action you can take today to help your story get one step closer to completion. Sometimes just reading a bit from the previous chapter is enough to get you back into the Flow.

#4 Shatter the Block. What’s your writing methodology? Are you linear in style where you like all chapters of Part I to be complete before you move on to the next one, or do you jump around in the storyline as inspiration strikes?

Once you get to those 15 minutes of precious writing time, you don’t want to waste them staring at the screen. Come with a clear idea of what you want to accomplish. If you’re stuck, I heartily recommend jumping ahead (or behind). Write a different scene in the book that’s calling to you. Tell a chapter from a different character’s perspective. Work on the outline. If you took 15 minutes to move the needle closer to the goal, then that’s progress.

#5 Make Mistakes. This is a first draft. Punctuation be damned. If you’re in the Flow, you need to keep up, not pause to look up a continuity question from the previous book (“Did I give the grizzled warrior deep emerald or hazelnut eyes?”). Highlight the passage for future review and move on.

#6: Prioritize for You. Lastly, we all choose what to prioritize. At different stages of your life, writing may not be the most important thing. That’s ok. Again, doesn’t mean you’re not a writer. Remember that nothing takes that from you, but sometimes we value things differently over time—especially once we realize how short it is! However, if you’re not prioritizing writing, then it won’t get done. It’s a simple fact. Make a realistic commitment to your writing and then guard it fiercely. Some people want to become the next New York Times Best Seller. Others just want to make sense of things. Know what your goal is as a Writer, and then make your peace with it.

Looking forward to your next work of sleep-deprived greatness!

My Writing Process Blog Tour

I'd like to give kudos to Kyra Halland for inviting me to the Writing Process Blog Tour. This one's been ongoing for quite a while and authors from all over the blogosphere have been weighing in about how they write what they do. Read Kyra's contribution here.

My Writing Process (The Heffinator Style)

1) What am I working on?

As usual, my mind goes in many directions before it finally hones in on one writing project to get it done (or as done as it get can get, anyway). I'm currently working on the first Changeling Sisters novella (Summer 2014) about a minor character in the Year of the Wolf who really surprised me by demanding to share her story about what really happened to her. I'm also formulating the plot for Changeling Sisters III: Year of the Dragon, in which the stakes get higher for our Alvarez sisters, as well as streamlining ideas into my Afterlife Chronicles II cache, so the latter two are still in their nebulous phases.
 
2) How does my work differ from others of its genre?

My work stems off others in the fantasy genre in a lot of ways from a lot of different time contexts, because I grew up reading fantasy favorites Tamora Pierce, Terry Brooks, Roger Zelazny, Octavia Butler, Robert Jordan, Ursula K. Le Guin, T.A. Barron, J.K. Rowling, Eoin Colfer, and those authors can never leave my writing. So in a way, I processed fundamental writing techniques from their books that I really enjoyed--memorable characters, fully-realized fantasy worlds--and channeled them into my own world-building and writing. While I developed my craft, the urban fantasy phenomena was unfolding to a wide-reaching audience. However, high fantasy books like Eragon still enchanted readers as well, so I definitely saw how contemporary and high, epic fantasy elements could combine to create resonating stories that capture the imagination. 

My personal touch is to tweak or turn tropes of the fantasy genre on their head. I'd like to challenge how they came to be that way, or make them feel uncomfortable. Why is a happy ending equivocated with a main character finding their soul mate, when many of us go through many different kinds of soul mates during our lives? What happens when neither the hero or the villain wins, leaving the state of things in an unclear mess? What am I reproducing when invoking "Light" as good and "Dark" as bad; how can I complicate such binaries? How did concepts like the hero's journey or characterizations like Mary Sue/Gary Stues become things, anyway, and how do they serve to constitute what's considered "normal"?

3) Why do I write what I do?

In mainstream fantasy regulated by the traditional publishing market, I did see how a certain dominant narrative was re-articulated again and again. Main characters are often white and heterosexual, as are all of their friends. People of color are relegated supporting roles; gay characters are routinely cast as "the gay best friend". People with differently-abled and marginalized body types are also non-existent, unless the entire story revolves around Character A being fat, for example. We've all heard the stories about publishers pushing for a main character's age to be younger than perhaps what the original manuscript called for (ahem, high school instead of college age). 

When Citlalli Alvarez revealed to me that she would, no ifs, whats, or buts about it, be the lead kick-ass heroine of the Changeling Sisters Series, I realized that I had a choice about whether or not to perpetuate this dominant mainstream narrative. I chose to craft the Changeling Sisters world in a way to disrupt that, to incorporate Korean and Mexican-American culture and language as dominant and just as legitimate as "white", to challenge the mainstream reader with what they may be unfamiliar with, and to spark their curiosity about what they're missing by sticking to traditional publishers who sell a certain kind of story. I'm white, so my presence is still there, and any mistakes I make are my own. But I have the opportunity to write about the world and friends I know, a colorful, diverse world, and I will keep taking that path again and again.

4) How does your writing process work?


*It begins with a question or an idea. For example, with The Tribe of Ishmael (Afterlife Chronicles I), I read Dante's Inferno for class and found myself riveted by one encounter with the demons, who had been cast into Hell to torment wicked human souls for an eternity. I wondered about how Hell would look when built from their views and experiences.  

*So I build the fantasy world, pulling on things I've seen outside of me and more often than not, dreams. Dreams are awesome world-building fuel because they combine things in ways you would have never imagined in waking life. 

*From there, I search for my main character(s) to carry the story and explore their relationship with the world. Have they just been dropped into it? What could have brought them there? How do they interact with each other and why? I'll usually settle on four main characters, one of which is...

*The villain(s)! Where's the points of friction between them and the main character(s)? Where do their interests coincide, in that they could seduce the main character(s)? What's the baddie's back-story (No one ever comes out of a vacuum)?  

*By now the beginning just flows out of me. Easy as pie. Stream of consciousness. It could go in all directions, it touches on a mystery and attracts attention, it's wonderfully bizarre and difficult to make sense of. It might be a sign of my generation: I think in terms of multimedia. I plot out "scenes" through movie or video game frames, and then I translate these visuals to paper. Anyway, beginnings are easy to write because they could go anywhere.

*The middle is tough. There aren't as many possibilities. What gets told and by whom needs to be weighed and re-examined. I might have to go back and re-write the beginning, or re-assess a previously minor character's role. The story is unfolding toward some semblance of an "end," and I have to choose where that resting spot will fall and the degree to which it will be satisfactory. The middle is also difficult because it is where many nuances in character development take place, so they've grown to a point the reader can recognize as "changed" by the time the climax approaches. During this middle part, I often write brief character conversations or scenes I see revealed in the end.

*I like writing the climax. Dispense with all flowery imagery--(although I'm prone to doing that)--just use hard, fast verbs that convey urgency and atmosphere. Then the winding down after the climax isn't so bad either--although by that point, my characters will probably already be waving on a path(s) ahead about where they see themselves going next. The hardest part is to leave them to wave so I can revise, revise, revise, edit, edit, edit, and then glance up to see if they're still there.

*Beta-reading time: I submit the manuscript to people I trust--and people I trust to be honest with me--and hope that what I wrote makes sense. Do they understand what I was trying to do with Character A? To what degree do I succeed? How does the story feel all together? I put away the manuscript and don't look at it for a while so I can re-visit with a fresh pair of eyes. Maybe I write about my waving characters and ideas for future books, but by then, the moment has been lost.

*I collect the varying sources of in-put and continue re-editing. At some point, the manuscript reaches finished-draft status. Then I get to share it with everyone I know and everyone I don't, which makes me incredibly happy! The engagement process with the book continues with every new reader who reads, and I truly enjoy hearing how their reading experience unfolded, what worked, and what didn't. After all, writing is a process and it is constantly in a state of becoming, never finished.

The Writing Process Blog Tour continues! Pop by next week to visit:

Dennis Upkins
Upkins is from Atlanta, Ga. An urban fantasy author, his writing credits include Hollowstone, Stranger Than Fiction, and West of Sunset. Upkins also regularly critiques and analyzes the representation and portrayal of minorities in comics and media as a regular contributor to Ars Marginal. Follow him at DennisUpkins.com and on Twitter, @drupkins.

Also check out:

Autumn M. Birt
Birt, author of elemental and epic fantasy books, shares her thoughts. 

Yvonne Hertzberger
Hertzberger shares her love of magical realism here.

Have a Book you'd like to Promote?

Hi Authors,

Here's a limited time free sign-up advertising service called "The Fussy Librarian." You can submit your book and they will email readers tailored book suggestions, which yours could be a part of. Your book must have a minimum 10 reviews on Amazon or Barnes and Noble as well as an average of 4.0 stars, or 20 reviews with 3.5 star average, ect. Check it out here: http://www.thefussylibrarian.com/ and click the "For Authors" tab located along the bottom. Good luck!

Ebook Cover Design: Create Layers in Powerpoint

Tips for Indie Authors on creating your own book cover!

Create Layers

 Under "Self-Publishing on Kindle," I recommend fellow author William King's method for creating an ebook cover in Powerpoint. Now here's some tips for creating layers in Powerpoint, if you have two or more images you'd like to combine.

1. Assemble the Pieces

Let's create a basic romance cover as an example. Here is a screenshot of my cover components laid out in Powerpoint. I have the title, genre, and author name laid out on the left. I have my background image of a romantic beach laid out in the middle. I have my overlaying image of a lovey-dovey couple on the right. 

The Page Width and the images should be set to 6x8 width by height. Click on the "Design" tab on the top and then click on "Page Setup" on the ribbon to set the dimensions for Page Width. Right click on the picture and click "Size and Position" to set dimensions for images.

2. Set the Top Layer as Translucent

 Now here's the fun part, where you can play around with your top image and how it looks. First, move the top image (lovey-dovey couple) over the background image (beach). Next, select the top image. Right-click on the top image. Scroll down the pop-up menu and select "Format Picture." In the Format Picture menu, select "3-D Format" from the column bar options.  That will bring you to the screen shot shown below.

Here you notice the section called "Surface" under 3-D Format. Click on the "Material" drop-down arrow. You can now change the material to be "Translucent" so the the background beach image shows up underneath. Try it out! I selected the middle "Translucent" option under "Material." It's the middle of the three Translucent options. After the image turns translucent, notice that you can play around with the color/other image effects on the 3-D Format menu. For example, I clicked on "Lighting" and then selected the middle coloring option under "Warm." This makes the cover colors seem warmer and cozy. Play around with the different options under "Lighting."  Notice how many different ways you can alter the image under "Angle," "Contour," and "Bevel," under the 3-D Format menu, in addition to all the other ways you can change image brightness/coloring/contrast/artistic effects on the regular Format ribbon!

3. Add Text

Now that your top image is translucent, add the text to the cover. Make sure you've right-clicked on each text box and chosen "Bring to Front." That way the text will be the top layer and won't get hidden behind the images. Drag all of your text boxes over and position them--and presto, you have a basically layered cover that screams, "I'm a romance!"

Photo Credit:
Lovely Couple © Fredgoldstein | Dreamstime Stock Photos & Stock Free Images
http://www.stockfreeimages.com/

Text Font Websites:  

Obviously the color choice for the title may not be the best choice--yellow doesn't stand out well--but to amp up your creative font style to match the genre of your book, check out some of these websites for exciting font downloads (majority should be free):

1. http://www.dafont.com/

2. http://www.urbanfonts.com/free-fonts.htm 

3. http://www.fontspace.com/

Author Interview

I want to give a big shout-out to fellow author Sharon Stevenson and thank her for interviewing me! Find out five random things about myself, what the future of the Changeling Sisters Series holds, and what inspired the series here.

Citlalli Named a Top-Five Kick-ass Female Character!

Check out the article by Sharon Stevenson here, as well as discover four other badasses :)

If you're a fan of zombies, you'll want to fill out this survey for the chance to win a $25 Amazon Gift Card, also available at her newly launched website! 

 

May 2013 Book Review of the Month: Vessel

Vessel

By Sarah Beth Durst

~Book Review~

I'M USED to reading books fast. Might have something to do with the library I'm expected to read for grad school. In days past, I may have had more time, but now I read with one eye on the clock, conscious that in another hour, I will have to go to work, school, cook, clean, whatever. 

Vessel by Sarah Beth Durst stops that clock. It forces you to read slowly. The world unfolds from the small patch of sand upon which Liyana’s Goat Tribe lives to reveal a lavishly-imagined desert where glass serpents ripple across the sky, and an empire is slowly but surely encroaching upon the border.

The mythology at work is a pleasant surprise—an original pantheon of gods, one for each tribe of the desert, who bring rain and blessings to the people by entering a mortal body. The one problem—the person of that chosen "body" dies. It is a sacrifice for the greater good of the people, in a communal-based society where emphasis is less on “self” and more on “helping others,” and heroine Liyana feels fully ready to become her goddess’s vessel.

But then her goddess doesn’t show. When it quickly becomes apparent that her goddess isn’t the only one missing, Liyana sets out to sacrifice for her people in a different way than originally intended—not by easily giving up the reins to some supreme higher being, but by making the tough choices, passing judgment, and living with the consequences of her decisions.

And such decisions she makes! I truly appreciated that Liyana wasn’t a passive, but an “active” heroine, who takes on a leadership role among the group of other vessels searching for their gods. Her companions sounded fascinating and all received strong introductions—blind Pia has a beautiful singing voice and is unshakable in her faith, while stubborn Raan questions why she should have to die for her goddess without a choice, without protest. Korbyn, a trickster god, entertains with tales of his past misdeeds, and Jidali, Liyana’s younger brother, is an adorable scene-stealer.

However, the storyline felt unevenly divided into two separate parts; the first one is powerful and engaging, but the second one introduces a main character too late in order to feel sympathetic for him. More time is spent focusing on a love triangle that feels out of place—what with the story’s main focus being finding the gods—and it almost seems as if Durst felt “required” to have the mandatory two love interests because of YA trends these days. As such, our earlier well-developed companions slip out of the story too soon, and a villain is introduced too late, with motivations that feel a tad cartoonish. Durst tries to bridge the two parts by having POVs from the empire early on, but they simply aren’t as compelling as Liyana and her companions’ journey through the desert.

All in all, these qualms are easily shrugged off in light of the fascinating world-building and fierce fortitude of Liyana. I enjoyed picturing the jeweled sky serpents circling her above and the huge sand worms tunneling down below. It was a welcome stretch of the legs outside of typical feudal Western Europe: values are different, and Liyana challenges the empire’s assumptions that the rooted life is vastly better than the nomadic one. I look forward to more from this author.

Recommended for fans of Tamora Pierce and Maggie Stiefvater. 

May Read of the Month

This month, I'm looking forward to sinking my teeth into:

Vessel

by Sarah Beth Durst

Why It Caught My Attention:

• A heroine who isn't perfect. Liyana was expected to be the vessel for her tribe's rain goddess...but the goddess never shows. Angry, her people abandon her to the desert, where she will learn how wrong they were...
• Not your typical Western European-influenced culture. Don't get me wrong: I still love Game of Thrones, but it's nice to see more fantasy books breaking out of the stately Tolkein mold.
• Features a trickster god. I love tricksters, and any characters who talk in riddles and generally confuse the protagonist.
  

 
Upcoming:
Eon by Alison Goodman

Two-part fantasy series set in feudal China, which features the Chinese Zodiac as elemental dragons who can renew or destroy the earth.













Wishlist:
The Eternity Cure by Julie Kagawa 

Wildefire by Karsten Knight 

Create A Riveting E-Book Cover...in Powerpoint

Very few people are blessed with mad artistic skills as well as writing ability, which leads most indie authors to dread the cover image creation process. That small little rectangle on the screen with your title and name scrunched in is the first impression readers will have of your e-book, before they even get to the book description. That being said, the text and sharpness of image must be just as clear on the product description page as it is on the e-reader. Make sure to check your final cover image on a variety of views in JPEG format by zooming in and out.

Cover Image Requirements:

Amazon.com: 600x800 pixels

Smashwords.com (Imports to Apple, Barnes and Noble, Sony, ect.): 1600x2400 pixels

Cover Image Options:

1. Hire A Cover Designer 

Quick Steps: Check out your favorite self-published e-books. See an Indie cover you like? Look who the cover design is by. Contact them via email to receive quotes.The cost will range, depending on what you want done. Some packages are available for $100-200. Other professional designs that include custom illustrations can range from $500-1000.

No idea where to start? The Kindle Boards have a list of artsy folks:

http://www.kindleboards.com/index.php/topic,123703.0.html


2. Create the cover yourself using public domain images/stock photos

Public Domain Images: free images for use that are not under intellectual property rights. Always examine a "public domain" image carefully for licensing agreements, however.

Stock Photos: a collection of random images to be used for creative purposes-at a cost, available on a variety of websites. Stock photos can be as little as a dollar to hundreds of dollars, depending on the size and resolution. Make sure you read contracts carefully to understand what the copyright limitations are for that photo. If you are using a stock photo with a model who is identifiable in any way, make sure the website has negotiated a model release, meaning the model is giving their permission to use their image to create and sell. (This is also important if you've decided to create your own original artwork and are using a friend as a model, for example.)

www.istockphoto.com 

I have worked with www.istockphoto.com for my book covers without complaint. The website can be on the pricier side, but a little extra for imagination and quality will matter that much more to readers. Plus, istockphoto.com always negotiates model releases, gives you a legal guarantee, and offers a wide range of how the image can be used for e-book authors. (In print, the image can be used for book covers up to 499,999 times, before it requires one of their extended licenses.)

Create the E-Book Cover:

Most Important: At the beginning of the post, you noticed that Amazon.com asks for your final book cover image to be 600x800 pixels, while Smashwords.com recently changed their cover requirements to 1600x2400. Always keep these in mind when buying images, as stock websites like istockphoto.com will offer you a variety of photo sizes to choose from. You might have heard the saying, it's easier to scale an image down than to make it larger, and it's true- no one wants to try and resize their cover image pixel count in Paint and wind up with a blurry image. 

However, I bought  the original YEAR OF THE WOLF cover at 1132x1696 pixels and was able to make it work for both retailers. How? I followed fellow author William King's steps for creating an e-book cover yourself in Powerpoint. I give full kudos to Mr. King for his clever thinking and conciseness: 

http://www.williamking.me/2012/02/22/create-your-own-ebook-cover-step-by-step-with-pictures/

Mr. King has written instructions for importing a 600x800 cover to Amazon.com. For Smashwords.com, when you are setting up the slide's dimensions, simply play around with the ratio. For example, I set my slide's dimensions to 16.7 by 25 inches, and then followed Mr. King's steps. When I saved the slide as a JPEG photo, it clocked in at 1603x2400 pixels.

Check Your Pixels: 

Unsure about the pixel count? Hover over the JPEG image icon to see the dimensions. Or open the image up in Paint and check for the Pixels--PX--count along the bottom blue tab. 

Public Domain and Stockphoto Websites: 

Ready to shop around for cover images? Start at these websites:

1. www.istockphoto.com

2. www.dreamstime.com

3. www.shutterstock.com

4. www.publicdomainpictures.net (free and commercial use)

5. http://www.public-domain-photos.com (free)

6. www.flickr.com (check licensing restrictions)

7. www.sxc.hu (free)


*If you are a cover designer who would like to be featured, send me a message.

Sources:

1. King, William. "Create Your Own Ebook Cover, Step by Step, With Pictures." 02/22/2012. Accessed January 2013. http://www.williamking.me/2012/02/22/create-your-own-ebook-cover-step-by-step-with-pictures/.

YEAR OF THE TIGER is Published

Thank you to every one of my readers! This has been an incredible experience so far. I truly, truly appreciate your support.

I've been getting a lot of heat for ending the last book in a cliffhanger... I deserve it, I'm evil like that.

However, I think you will be pleased with the direction YEAR OF THE TIGER goes. 

Thank you again, and without further ado, below is the link to the second book in the Changeling Sisters series. I look forward to expanding to Barnes and Noble and Smashwords soon! If you would like to rate, review, or like Book I: YEAR OF THE WOLF, it can be found on Amazon.com, Goodreads.com, and now has its own Facebook group. Cheers!

Link: http://www.amazon.com/Year-Tiger-Changeling-Sisters-ebook/dp/B00AWO8J4I

In the second book of the Changeling Sisters series:

Citlalli spearheads the mission to rescue her sister when she accepts an invitation to the treacherous Vampyre Court. Meanwhile, Raina discovers a transformative family secret of her own. As sides in the Were War grow blurrier, the innocent fall, ghosts pray for second chances, and each of the sisters’ budding romances face the trial of a lifetime. The Lunar New Year is coming, and the only thing certain is family.