revising

Notes to My Revising Self

A friend is in that tough stretch of novel revisions where you’re so close to the end, but you’ve been putting in long hours and you’re starting to lose perspective. That place where you start to question your sanity and how far off the finish line really is and if it’s all worth it anyway and maybe you should just give up and do something practical or validating or relaxing with your time. I was in that same spot so recently, it was easy for me to slip back into that suit of anguish and self-doubt. My friend wrote to a group of writers asking for advice.… Read the rest

What to do with Your Inner Critic(s)

Since I last posted I’ve been working on something fun that will be taking place in this spot starting next week. If you’re interested in creative people and hearing more about how they work, especially children’s book writers and illustrators, make sure to check back here on Monday. I’ve also been chipping away at my revisions. I have to say, one of the biggest challenges in writing for me is stifling that inner critic. Critics plural, really. I imagine them all up there in my brain, squished together on a couch (a large couch, there are a lot of them) watching my creative process like it’s their own personal reality show.… Read the rest

Breakthrough

I had a sun-rays-part-the-clouds-to-beam-down-on-me-while-angels-sing-hallalujah writing moment this week. I figured out a solution to a problem with the structure of my novel that had been niggling around in the back of my mind, and which I had been denying was actually a problem. And, as is often the case with a S.R.P.T.C.T.B.D.O.M.W.A.S.H writing moment, once the solution came to me it was so obvious. Obvious as in “I have two eyeballs” obvious, or “the Running Man is a far superior 80s dance to the Roger Rabbit” obvious. The first part of my book has been worked over roughly 632 times, but it still wasn’t feeling quite right to me.… Read the rest

Big Sur Writing Workshop Comes to Boulder, CO

Halloween weekend I attended the Big Sur in the Rockies writing workshop organized by Andrea Brown of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency and our local SCBWI. It was fantastic. Fantastic! And exactly what I needed for my writing at this moment in time. It was a weekend of total immersion in my work-in-progress. I got so lost in thinking about my story and characters that at one point, in casual conversation, someone referenced a big current event that was going on and I drew a complete blank about what they could be talking about (rhymes with “residential detection”). The weekend workshop was modeled after the annual one that Andrea Brown runs in Big Sur, California.… Read the rest