letter to the editor

Somewhere up there, someone is looking down on me with a smile on their face. Does this mean they're about to laugh at me? Or have I finally managed to earn a bit of goodwill?

Well, it's a mixed bag, really. I still have electrical outages all over my house, including the heat pump, the stove, too many outlets to count, the lights going both upstairs and down to the basement, and the entire basement itself. So yeah, I'm a running joke for someone...but at the same time...as if throwing me a bone in the face of adversity, I managed to score an editor who keeps the same crazy hours as I do.

And let me just say...I love her. I do. I know you're supposed to lie in public and tell the world how much you love your editor, while planning their gruesome death in  your next foray into fiction. But not me. I'm not lying when I say, I love her. She hasn't fled the country to escape my quirks, she actually responds when I send her a Facebook chat message (even my own mother ignores me half the time), and she has no qualms with debating the merits of my book, often coming to metaphorical blows when we disagree over key points.

Ok, that's kind of a lie. So far her ideas have been pretty good, and she's managed to pull some of my best work out of me, and hey, that's sorta her job, so yeah...she rocks.

Now, if I could only find away to banish the word, patience from her vocabulary. I have no idea how I'll pull that off.

Until the next time...I'll be waiting for my next round of edits.

to erica with love

Welcome to the Weekly Guest Spotlight

Laura Kolar

Tonight’s guest is Laura M. Kolar, author of the soon to be released young adult novel, Captive Art. For more about Laura, click here to visit her website.

I have no idea how to start this blog post out so I;m just typing until the ideas start to flow. Erica asked me to be her guest blogger and now I’m a little freeked out since I only post on my own blog about once a month and I never feel like I have anything that great to say.  But here I am typing away because that’s what you do, right?  You type until the ideas come and when they do you can’t stop typing then suddenly something hits you and now you couldn’t stop typing even if your house was burning down around you because if you stop you’ll loose your train of thought and losing your house pales in comparison to losing your thoughts.

Yes, the paragraph above is awful.  It has typos and misspelled words and run on sentences.  It’s the makings of an editor’s nightmare, or in my case, the beginning of an adventure.

After six months of being part of a critique group Erica started, I finally got around to reading To Katie with Love.  Now I’m going to admit something here that she doesn’t know.  I’d actually tried reading Katie several times before, but could never get past chapter one. *ducks and waits for Erica to throw things at me*  Unfortunately, the poor lonely girl in the bar never drew me into the story, but I promised Erica I’d read it.  So I started reading at chapter two, and by chapter three I was hooked.

I don’t know if it was fate, but I ended up having to take two weeks off work immediately following my reading of Katie and I can honestly say I spent more hours ‘working’ those two weeks than I do in two weeks at my day job.  I can also say I enjoyed it immeasurably more.  Delving into Katie’s world has been an experience I will always remember.  In fact, I would have to say it’s been life changing.  (I want to say it’s been ‘earth shattering’, but I’m afraid only Erica would get that.)

When I first emailed her with my comments I gave Erica the same disclaimer I’d given the other ladies I’d done critiques for.  Basically, I was willing to offer my help, but ultimately this was her story and she will always know these characters better than anyone else.  My job as a critique partner is not to rewrite the story in my words, but to offer suggestions to make her story better.

And so it began.

With the insight from another one of Erica’s readers/editors, Kelly Gamble, Erica and I started what can only be called a major overhaul of an already great story.  And the first thing that had to go…chapter one.

Ok, so maybe she didn’t dump chapter one, but it’s unrecognizable from what it was before.  Yes, still the same poor girl in the bar, but now that girl is like a new best friend.  Over the two weeks spent editing, Katie was the last person I talked to at night and the first person I talked to in the morning, other than my husband of course.  Actually, if I’m being completely honest, the person I went to bed thinking of was Katie’s love interest, Cooper Maxwell.  But only because Erica kept sending me pictures and interviews of the man she imagines him to be.  And to say her imagination is vivid would be an understatement, more like scintillatingly luminescent.

At any rate, my new best friend made me laugh so hard I had tears rolling down my cheeks.  When her heart raced, so did mine.  And when she was acting like a complete fool I wanted to scream at her and tell her to straighten up.  But that’s the way a story is supposed to make you feel.  You are supposed to have a vested interest in what happens to the characters.  If you didn’t, the book wouldn’t be worth reading.

So what exactly did I do?  Well, aside from correcting the occasional period instead of a comma at the end of a quote (I’m being kind here, there were lots of those.), I helped find the slow spots of the story, or the lines that didn’t flow and things that didn’t match up with what she’d said in another section.  I made her take out absolutely ridiculous phrases, because nobody says ‘making love’ anymore, Erica.  And I made her take out words thatjustsuddenly appeared.

I also tried to give her encouragement by telling her which parts I loved or thought were funny and insisted she keep.  Believe me when I tell you I will never look at a white orchid the same way again.  Mostly though, I think I was just there.  There for her to call or text when something wasn’t working out or to bounce ideas off of to see if it fit the rest of the story.  (It’s a good thing I have free long distance and unlimited texting.  It’s also a good thing she didn’t mind me eating on the phone.)  But like I said, she’d already written a great story.  And when the last red pen correction is made, I hope what I suggested, if even in a small way, makes the story better.

If you had a chance to read the excerpt of To Katie with Love when Erica had it up on her site, then you should feel very lucky.  Because one day, when Katie is a New York Times Bestseller and a major motion picture, you’ll be able to say you were one of the first to read this fabulous love story.  I know I feel lucky, but then again, I got to go to bed dreaming of Cooper Maxwell.

Thank you so much to Laura…not just for this wonderful post…but for pulling me through this editing process and never once letting me give up or cry. Without the tireless efforts of Laura (and Kelly Stone Gamble), this book may not have been given the chance to find its audience.

Katie and I will never be able to thank you enough!

Until the next time…I’ll be dreaming of Cooper too!

I go, you go, just let go of the ego

I’ve been called a diva, a rock star, a bitch and a brat.  I know I’m a control freak with chronic impatience and OCD that rivals Howard Hughes, and I’ll willingly own up to every bit of that without batting an eyelash.

But don’t ever accuse me of letting my ego get in the way of a good story.

Oh, you can say I have an ego, sure. I ordered mine custom. But despite my lack of balance and coordination in most things, I know how to wield my ego with finesse.  

Basically, if you’re a writer you need to know when to keep the ego at bay.

I have very literally spent the past month running through edit after edit on my book, To Katie with Love. I had no less than five writers and editors with their hands in the story, each urging me to cut here or add there…each with a different perspective on my story, and the best direction to take.  And each one was right in their own way. The decisions were ultimately mine. And for the record, I think I made the right ones based on the feedback and suggestions from my crack team of writing experts, all working toward the same goal…making sure my story doesn’t suck. 

And not only does it not suck it’s a pretty damn good story! (Enter just the right amount of ego.) All thanks to the writers I will forever be indebted to, and friendships forged that I’m certain will last a lifetime.

That, as they say, is how it’s done.

Until the next time…I’ll be sending off that query letter (the one my crack team of writers helped me write!)

all hail the mighty pen!

How do you describe a French restaurant so a reader can taste it…or the texture of a marshmallow on your tongue? Or paint a non-descript room in an unimportant house so it jumps off the page and pulls you in? And how do you breathe life into a group of fictional characters to make your readers so attached to them they laugh, cry, and root for them every step of the way?  

What I’m really asking is…how do you put a feeling into words?

These are the things writers do.  We pull you in until you completely forget it’s only a collection of words on a page.

I have officially burned myself out. I know…it was bound to happen. The good news is I’m done. At least for now. The book has been edited to the point of no return and it’s as close to perfect as I can possibly get it.

Now that I’ve said that, I’ll find mistakes everywhere I look…and I’ll fix those too. But until that happens, I’m popping that cork on the champagne.

And I’m collecting donations for a new laptop. Mine has burned its last bridge with me. I’ve called it every name in the book, and still I need more names. The cursor jumps across the screen, taking me to places I didn’t want to go. It powers itself down without warning, just to keep me on my toes. And it generally has no respect for the reverence of the writer.

I’m seriously considering going back to a manual typewriter…maybe even paper and pen!

Well…maybe not.

Until the next time…I’ll be resting (for just a minute)

honoring the streak

Ok, I know the guys out there will get exactly what I’m talking about. Your team is winning. You’ve made it through a few games, but you still have a ways to go. You’re on a streak. And a streak has to be honored.

So what exactly does that mean? For some it means you follow the same ritual each day. Maybe you eat four eggs, white toast and juice for breakfast without fail. You put on the same pair of shoes, the same shirt (and you’d better not wash that baby, cuz that’ll jinx it) put your hat on with your left hand and spit three times over your right shoulder.

I know it’s weird…but you’re honoring that streak!

So why should editing a book be any different? I’m more than half way through. I’m kicking ass and taking names. My story is better than I ever even imagined it could be (and I already thought it was good) and I want to make sure nothing gets between me and the New York Times Bestsellers list. I need to honor my streak in a big way, and this is how I’m going to do it.

I roll out of bed at the crack of noon (ok, I’ve been getting up waaay earlier than that) after being awake past four am. Before I take the dog out or brush my teeth, I drag my laptop into the bed and dive into the story. When I finally force myself out of bed to throw on clothes, I start with an Eddie Bauer sweatshirt—unwashed since at least Monday—paired with my favorite pair of jeans and my suede slipper moccasins. It doesn’t matter that the temperatures dipped far below freezing and my slippers barely keep out the cold inside the house, or that I refuse to wear a coat over the sweatshirt, or even that I don’t have a hat to put on with my left hand (or the right one for that matter)…I’m honoring the streak, and the streak doesn’t care about the cold.

The streak wants me to eat cookies for breakfast (because I may as well save my calories for something tasty), quesadillas for lunch, and chicken pot pie for dinner. (Ok, so the streak may be listening to my stomach, but who cares. I’m not about to mess things up now!)

My husband has begged me to give it up…not the editing, but the whole thing with the streak…he doesn’t get the sports metaphor and he’s tired of seeing me in the same sweatshirt every day. He wants his wife back, but I keep telling him he needs to wait it out. I’ve only got a few more chapters to go…I can see the light at the end of the scary tunnel…and I’m ready for a celebration befitting a Super Bowl champion.

And I’m ready for a shower and some clean clothes. Just sayin…

Until the next time…I’ll be editing!