Only ten days left!

All this month, Elena over at Your Write. Except when your Rong, is holding contest wherein you must write a 100 word sentence in the hopes of winning $100. The amount of the prize depends on the number of participants.

So far we're all in the running for $24. Come on people. Someone wants to win big. Join us. You know you want to spew out a hundred word monster setence too!

Check out the link above for all the current entries and visit some great writer's blogs. You just might find some new procrastination destinations... err... blogs to follow.

My 100 word offering:

Gentle blue waves lapped against Ciralia’s pale shoulders as she fluttered her long, slender arms around her in order to maintain her view of the great wooden ship with its crew of dirty, land-dwelling, dark-skinned men who were running to and fro with buckets on long ropes, throwing water on the bright orange fires that licked hungrily at the sun-drenched timbers, spreading and growing faster as if mocking their futile efforts, and she smiled knowing that their beautiful white bones would soon adorn her underwater kingdom far below the glittering surface that men foolishly claimed as part of their realm.

Things I learned by hosting a book drive

You may have caught wind of the worldwide bookdrive to benefit National Novel Writing Month that took place last October through December.

My region managed to gather roughly 2,200 books. After typing in all the ISBNs of the books recent enough to have them, about 600 were accepted to Better World Books, who will be selling our donated books on behalf of The Office of Letters and Light . A percentage of those sales will go to fund their writing programs, including NaNoWriMo. The rest of our books will be sold in a local book sale (happening in my garage) this spring. The proceeds will go toward our regional donation to OLL next NaNo season.

As the bookdriver for our region, I learned some interesting things about books, subjectivity and love.

1. Asking writers to give up their books, even for a good cause, is like asking them to pull their own teeth.

2. When picking books to donate, I discovered my bookshelves were subconsciously divided into three areas. Nostalgia (top shelf): books I keep for the memories. Love: books I will read over and over or are of a series I loyally follow. Storage (bottom shelf): books I will not read again, but I haven't found another home for.

3. There are books that many people buy and read because they are popular. I have a lot of them in my garage right now (a lot of the same books, I might add). Popular does not equal love.

4. I currently have 1,600 books in my garage just sitting there until spring that I can read. Awesome! Not that I have the time, but still...

5. Of those 1,600 books, about 10 looked interesting at first glance. That rather reminded me of this 'subjectivity' thing that we're always getting harped on about by agents and editors. The 'not right for me' phrase went through my head 1,590 times as I picked up each book to scan it. I wasn't skimming bookshelves, with only a spine to attract my attention. I had each book in my hand and had to turn it over (and, of course, spend a couple seconds skimming the blurb by habit) to locate the elusive ISBN number. I got a good look at every title and cover. Still, 1,590 books were not for me--sadly a good third of them were even genres I regularly read. And these are published books, with every tool available to grab my attention. Don't worry lonely novel submission, I love you.

6. I discovered that even if the book is free and sitting in my hands, I will very likely overlook a new author, interesting cover, snappy title and possibly awesome back cover blurb because I'm looking for names I know and trust to deliver a good story. Damn. That doesn't bode well for most of us, does it?

7. Book Regret. People will donate books and then realize they miss them and want them back. Awww. Love.

8. A room full of used books smells far more pleasing than a room filled with used clothes.

9. People leave things in books, including book marks. Lots and lots of bookmarks. Many of those were mid-book. Does this mean the reader never finshed reading? We'll never know. The most unusual thing I found was a photo of ice. It may have been an ice cave, it was hard to tell.

10. If you tell people about a book drive and remind them as often as politely possible (in person, by email, and by handing them flyers) for two and half months, some of them will follow through and deliver. However, there will always be one or two that pop up two weeks after the fact and announce they could get piles of books if they were given a few more weeks/months. Procrastination at its finest.

Thanks to all who donated! If you're looking for good books, check out Better World Books. They offer free shipping worldwide, have a huge selection, and support many non-profit literary organizations, including my favorite, NaNoWriMo. :)

To paint or write

In admiring Ian's paintings over at Views from the Bald Patch, I was urged to post some artwork of my own. I must admit that I put my painting supplies away almost twenty years ago, the oil sort anyway.

Way back in high school (we won't talk about how many years ago that was), my creative writing teacher wanted me to pursue creative writing. My art teacher wanted me to pursue art. I did my best to make both of them happy, drawing pictures for the school creative writing book and doing some writing for it.

Then there came an arts contest. All entrants could only enter one category. I could write or I could paint. Darn it. Both teachers tried their best to sway me to their cause. It came down to the fact that I personally liked my art teacher more. I painted.

I had a thing for fantastical peacocks at the time

(that floated on backgrounds and had absolutely no contact with the foreground)

I, along with the other involved students, went to the art show. I distinctly remember it being a long, awkward ride to some college in a car with my guidance counselor (our chaparone), his wife, and three other students. None of us won anything, but we all got a certificate. I have no idea where that certificate is now, but I still have my painting. It currently resides in the back of my husband's closet where it won't haunt me with the idea that perhaps I should have written something instead of painted.

It's not all sad though, I did enjoy many years of staining my carpet and clothing with paint after high school, and I still enjoy painting things, just not on canvas.

Christmas ornaments

Gargoyles

and Fairies, amongst other things.

A productive weekend

My traffic cone, duct tape and chainsaw session finally wrapped up last night, but I came through with a finished short story that should be steamroller free. The Employer is a hopefully somewhat humorous fantasy tale about Sam and one of the worst jobs I could imagine. You know, if I were stuck in a medievalish fantasy setting.

Sam has a job to do. Unfortunately, that means he's been stuck in a cave, serving a bloodthirsty dragon for the past two years. He's watched the dragon eat countless innocent people and he's filled inventory books with pages and pages of tribute brought to appease the fire-breathing terror. Through it all, he's served his boss with devotion. But when supplicants start spouting off an odd phrase, Sam's loyalty is truly put to the test.

What's the worst job you can think of if you were stuck in a medievalish fantasy setting? Yeah, I pretty much wanted to say medievalish again. I'm happy now. Carry on.

Houston, we have a problem

My entry for the 100 words for $100 blogfest is here

Don't you just hate when you write a story and think it's great, only to read it a month later and realize it doesn't work at all? Ok, maybe you like when that happens. Each to his own. Personally, I hate it, and it just happened to me.

The second short story I wrote during NaNoWriMo should have been released to the critique hounds last week. I was on track for that to happen, busy rewriting here and there and getting rid of the general NaNo issues that come with vomiting a story onto a page in the midst of a ten hour, sugar and caffine infused write-in. Then that fatal moment came.

Three quarters of the way into the story, I realized that the twist I'd prided myself on fell flat. Not just flat, but run over by four lanes of highway filled with steamrollers flat.

This realization sucked, to say the least.

What sucked almost equally was that when double-checking the guidelines for the publication I'd planned to send this to, I discovered I also had to cut at least 850 words. And the tone was a dreadfully confused mix of dark humor and just plain dark. Oh, and the submission cut off is the end of the month.

Good thing I work best under pressure. Now I'm off round up my chainsaw, duct tape, and trusty stack of traffic cones. I'm not giving up on this one yet.