Lisa Writing Wild

I'll keep this simple since I almost never follow them (or remember them by February) anyway. These I should be able to do: Finish my Rules for Revenge novel that I'm writing. Start writing and complete my novel, The Have Nots. Not cut my hair (except for trims). Read at least 100 books in 2011. Have the adoption of another child in the works by the end of 2011 (I have no control over this, but I'm really hoping).

Some of the best writing advice I've ever heard was on a podcast done by Pilar Alessandra called On the Page . It's a podcast for screenwriters, but many of the shows pertain to writers in general. (I'm paraphrasing, but) She said that good stories have good news and bad news to keep them moving and interesting. I don't know if you've watched the zombie show, The Walking Dead , but this is the perfect example. The show is a constant stream of good things, then bad things happening. You're always on the edge of your seat. In one scene the cop appears safe from zombies as he grabs a bag of weapons. The next second, he's surrounded by zombies who all want one thing...him. Then he spots an Army tank and we think he's safe. He crawls underneath only to have zombies coming at him from both sides. We think he's a goner as he's about to kill himself. As he looks up from under the tank, he sees the hatch to get into the tank. He quickly crawls up and

I was up at 3:00am like I have been every night for the last week and a half. Feeding a baby in the middle of the night is a nice interruption of sleep. (And I only say that because she only gets up once. If she got up three or four times a night like some of our kids, I'd be writing a different post). I held the baby in one arm, with the bottle in her mouth. In the other hand, like every night, I held my iPhone. I usually take this time to check emails, Facebook and play Friends With Words (and addicting Scrabble-like game). I was in the middle of making a semi-awesome play, when I glanced down and saw the baby looking up at me. Her big dark eyes just stared at me. While I was staring at my phone. Being only six weeks old, she sleeps  most of the day. The fact that she was staring at me like that, two nights before we're to give this beautiful foster baby up, made me think. How many other nights did she stare at me, wide-eyed, while my eyes were glued to my phone instead

1. "Get your finger out of your nostril....that nostril, too." 2. "It's bow and arrow, not oh and barrow.'" 3. "Saying you blew hot air out of your butt is the same as farting. Now stop it." 4. "For the hundredth time, stop walking on the back of the couch!" 5. "No, you can not use glue to give the baby a mohawk." And this is all before lunch.

Last night after getting my four year old to bed, feeding the five week old and getting her down, I crashed on the couch for a few minutes of alone time (while the hubby showered). Earlier yesterday I'd heard Christina Perri's Jar of Hearts on the radio for the first time. I found her voice pure and haunting. I downloaded it right away, but didn't get to listen to it again until last night. As I laid there enjoying the first quiet minutes of my day, I listened to the song and thought about a future story idea I've been taking notes on. I didn't have much to go on except the basic premise...no specific characters, or well thought out plot. While listening to this song though, I suddenly envisioned the main character, and why she does what the plot is centered around. I love it when something comes together like that. Now this is my theme song for that story, and when I have time to work in it some more, I know I'll be playing it a lot. Have you had a son

1. Screaming at him to stop yelling. 2. Trying to look serious when telling him to stop making fart noises and singing about poop. But you can't stop laughing. 3. Telling him he can watch Spongebob, then hoping he forgets when you turn on Hoarders instead. You will most definitely hear, "But you said..." (I don't know where he learned that from). 4. Reminding him not to kiss the baby's face because he just looks germy. Then you smother her with kisses. ("But you said...:) 5.   Telling your child he can't do something because he's not old enough. Then telling him to stop doing something because he's too old.

It's been a stressful few days, so I thought instead of dwelling on things that aren't going right, I'll be thankful for the things that are: 1. We thought the baby we're fostering was leaving yesterday, but she will be with us for a little while longer. 2. We finally trapped our hamster after two months of him being MIA. 3. My son loves drawing, cutting out his creations, rolling them up and sealing them with tape, then putting them into an old baby formula can he decorated. 4. After a snow storm last night, my wonderful husband snow plowed the driveway, and did the neighbors too. Then he went out on the terrible roads and got us some coffee:) 5. We got one of the biggest, most beautiful Christmas trees we've ever had. Now that we have a big living room, it doesn't even look like it takes up that much space. I hope this one doesn't tip over. 6. We have awesome parents who are always there for us whenever we need them. 7. Yesterday I had a gr

1) What was the hardest part about writing Before I Fall? The easiest? Since the book tells the story of a girl who is reliving the last day of her life seven times, the hardest part was probably trying to make roughly the same set of circumstances interesting and new every time. I was very, very worried my readers would get bored. The easiest was probably evoking the suburban high school world, since Before I Fall takes place in a town very similar to the one where I grew up. 2) What do you consider the most challenging about writing a novel (or writing in general)? I think the most challenging thing about writing a novel is sticking with it every day, even when your characters are misbehaving, you hate every word you put on the page, and you have no idea what’s supposed to happen next. 3) What do you do when you’re in the middle of a book and you’re sick of it? How do you keep from stopping to work on your new shiny idea? Ha—see above! That’s the hardest thing about

As a fan of  Writing Down the Bones , I love this video because I think it's a wonderful piece of encouragement for all writers of all backgrounds.

1. I walked around three stores and the library today with the second toe on my left foot sticking through a hole in my sock. It felt weird. 2. Whenever I use a public restroom and there are people in there, I have to plug my ears to pee. Otherwise I think they're just listening to me and waiting for me to go. 3. I have a girl-crush on Taylor Swift. 4. When I was a teenager, more than anything in the world, I wanted to be a cop. 5. I ate most of Joey's Reeses Peanut Butter cups he got for Halloween. When he asked where they were, I told him daddy ate them. 6. I hate Star Wars because I can't follow it.

I don't have to cook dinner or clean up because, ::cough, cough:: I'm sick (insert weak voice here). I get to hang out in pjs all day long. I get to watch bad tv or read all day because no one wants to be around me. (Except for my four year old who keeps trying to kiss me). I can crawl in bed at 8:30 and read for hours under the guise that I'm resting. My husband keeps asking if he can get me anything. (And I always try to come up with something .)

I've had two different people ask me this in the past week, and I was curious what other parents did. Growing up my brother and I were spanked, quiet often as I remember (but I'm sure I deserved it). We got hit with anything from a hand, a wooden spoon, a switch (thin stick), and a ping-pong paddle. (By the way, it's never a good idea to put a hard cover book in your pants before getting hit by your mom's hand. That only results in her sending your dad in.) Before I became a parent I never had a doubt that I would spank my kids. I figured I turned out reasonably okay, so what was the harm? But I changed my mind once we had kids. As a foster parent, we're not allowed to spank foster kids, so that settled that. But once we adopted our now four year old son and we could (legally) spank him if we wanted, I just couldn't do it. I don't think I could bring myself to ever hurt him physically, no matter how angry he made me...especially when I'm angry. Tha

Most of the time I make my characters up out of thin air. But when I get stuck I like to think of people I know. What's even better is to mix and match odd quirks from different people and put them into one character. Do you use real people when making characters?

I'd like to think I'm green. But I don't really think I am. I bought all the recycable bags for groceries, but leave them in the car (or at home, or wherever they are) every single time. I try to keep the heat low in the winter, but I have a husband who likes to walk around the house in shorts then say he's freezing and crank the heat up. I intend to take three minute showers, but once my four year old bursts in the bathroom then leaves the door open, I'm too cold to get out so I stay in a little longer. Considering I clean houses, I can't really bike to work. I would gladly eat less or no meat, if it weren't for the disappointed look in his eyes my husband gets whenever I suggest a no-meat meal. I'm not good at all about recycling batteries or ink cartridges. I'm not even sure what to do with them. I DO, however, drink lots of water from my aluminum Yankees water bottle. So, maybe I'm a little green....like guacamole or algae.

Eileen Loveman is a freelance writer, author of four books, stand up comedian, radio show host, key note speaker and weekly columnist under her byline STORIES FROM THE LAKE. From her backyard of Lake Ontario, Eileen offers her unique perspective of life on the lake, sharing thoughts about family, raising children and anything else that floats her way. 1) What was the hardest part about writing this book? The easiest? "Stories From The Lake" is a compilation of columns I've written over the years for the Democrat and Chronicle and smaller newspapers in Wayne County, so it was relatively easy to put the book together - but the hardest part was picking the columns to put in the book. I decided to put them in categories such as 'kids' 'family' 'spiritual' and 'funny'. Towards the end of the book I put them in order of holidays, starting with Halloween. 2) What do you consider the most challenging about writing a novel (or writing in

Last week I started a pot holder on fire while trying to scramble an egg. Three months ago I started the toaster cord on fire when it was on the stove, and I lit the pilot to boil water. I only learned how to make Mac and Cheese in the past few years, since I have a four year old. I tried it once and added all the ingrediants at once and ruined it. I gave myself food poisoning from undercooked chicken. Twice. Last night I made over two dozen peanut butter chocolate chip cookies and burned every single one. Actually, only the bottoms were burned. The tops were still raw. I could go on, but, hey, the title only says 5! Have any of your own kitchen disasters?

What is your favorite fall memory? How old were you when it happened? My favorite fall memory would have to be a recent one with my husband and son. Last fall we went to Letchworth State Park and took a ton of photos.  We'd drive a little, get out of the car and take pictures, then drive some more and do it again. We ran around, hiked and visited the gift shop. It was a perfect day!

I have this weird thing that happens to me all the time. And I've been paying close attention to it the last few years. I'll be talking to someone about something, and make an off-hand comment about how I'd like something (table, something for the house, etc.), and usually not too long after that, I end up getting it somehow. Here are a few examples of this happening in the past week: 1. One of our cleaning customers went into great detail telling me about his microwave convection oven. To be honest, I'd never even heard of it. I had no idea the dozens of microwaves I clean every week also act as ovens. I told  him that it sounded cool and I wish we could get one since we're remodeling our kitchen. He even printed out a bunch of them for me to show me prices (which were too much for us!). Two days later while my husband was helping my brother move some stuff at his shop, my brother gave us a beautiful microwave convection oven. A stainless steel one. For free.

I first came across Jessica Brody on accident. I was Googling Blake Snyder's Save the Cat! book, looking for writers who have used it to write novels (it was written for screenplays). I was delighted to find Jessica's guest blog on the subject on Blake's web site. After reading her blog, I went straight to the library and checked out her first YA novel, The Karma Club. I read it within a few days and loved it! Tonight I just went and got The Fidelity Files, and look forward to the follow-up, Love Under Cover. 1) What was the hardest part about writing The Karma Club? The easiest? Believe it or not, the hardest part of the story was actually coming up with the various revenge schemes that the girls do when they “take Karma into their own hands.” I thought it would be the easiest thing in the world but it was actually very challenging. I guess revenge is not really my strong suit. The easiest part of the story was the beginning—the storyline for setting up the K

Being a writer of young adult books, I read a ton of YA novels. I also like to read a lot of YA non-fiction to keep up on what goes on with teenagers today. I was lucky enough to find Cheryl Diamond's Model, A Memoir at my library. I read it in two days and bought the book when I was finished so I could read it again. I can't tell you enough how much I loved this book. Cheryl moved to NYC at sixteen, lived on her own and worked her butt off to break into the world of modeling. She is beautiful, strong, determined, funny and someone you'll want to hang out with. Cheryl takes you with her on auditions, jobs and everything in between. Your heart will race toward the end when she recounts a particularly horrible experience, and you'll feel like you're witnessing it right alongside her. Cheryl was gracious enough to take some time out of her busy schedule to answer a few questions. 1) What was the hardest part about writing this book? The easiest? The har

So far this year I've read thirty-four books, almost all YA. I come across new authors in so many ways. Through Facebook I've become friends with tons of YA authors, I've gotten great recommendations on blogs, and sometimes I just stumble upon them like I did Jessica Brody . I was Googling Save the Cat! working for novels and found a terrific interview with Jessica Brody.  I ended up getting her book that same day and fell in love with it. I can't wait to read her others. Once I find an author I like, I check out their website to see what I can learn about them. Like a lot of writers, I'm interested in how they work, what they struggle with and, basically, anything else they have to say about writing. I was thinking today about questions I'd ask authors if I had the chance. I wrote them down and emailed them to two of my favorites: Jessica Brody and Kody Keplinger . They both got right back to me and agreed to answer them. Yay! The more I continue to read

I'm sitting here watching UP with my son, and it came to the part where the old guy was looking through his old photo album of pictures of  him and his late wife. At the end of the album she had written, "We've enjoyed our adventure. Now go make another one." (I'm totally paraphrasing here. It's the only part of the movie I've seen). It got me to thinking about life and how short it really is. If you sit back and let it go by without doing much to enjoy (or improve) it, it's your loss. You're not going to get another life. This is it. I can't count the amount of time the words, "Some day I want to..." come out of my mouth. It's usually followed by something like, learn to knit, cook, be more patient, get up early etc. If I don't do one (or any) of these things now, they may never get done. I don't know where I'm getting the determination to plow through the first draft of my new novel, but I'm not going to

I am in a much happier mood when I am writing consistantly. Last week I reached 10k on my WIP.  That was nothing short of a miracle for me. Even when my husband kept me up most of the night with his coughing from being sick, the next day he commented on what a great mood I was in considering my lack of sleep. Ear plugs! I've been using ear plugs for the past few months to help me sleep better. They're fantastic and I actually sleep deeply now (thanks to a low dose of melatonin, too). But the other day my husband was nice enough to take our four year old into the "movie theater" (basement) as my son calls it and play Guitar Hero with him. For some reason I like to sit at our dining room table to write, instead of my office two floors up. But the dining room is right above the movie theater. So I popped in my ear plugs and pumped our over four thousand words yesterday. When I have complete and utter silence, I crank it out. Outlines are my friend. I don't do ext

A year ago I was struggling to figure out what it was I wanted to write. I had worked on various genres of screenplays previously, and had a half-finished adult novel sitting in a drawer. One day I saw Taylor Swift on Oprah. I had never seen her speak (I'd only seen pictures of her) or heard her music before. There was something about her that made me want to hang out with her. She seemed like a nice girl, and like she'd make a fun girlfriend. It got me to thinking about being a teenager, and I started re-reading some of my old Judy Blume books, like Forever. After that I picked up Ellen Hopkins' Crank and Glass and basically never looked back. I admit since I'm so bad at sticking with things, I was very afraid of throwing myself into the YA world, only to change my mind a few weeks or months later. But it's been over a year now and I'm just as in love with YA now as I was back then. To narrow it down even more, I've learned that I love writing teen

I heard the Eagles the other day on the radio, and it brought me back to over thirty years ago when I was a kid. Certain songs evoke certain emotions. The Eagles make me feel calm. Bruce Springsteen reminds me of being in my bedroom in the eighties, with my Boss poster (the one of his butt) hanging above my bed. There's a Guns N' Roses songs I still can't listen to because it reminds me of a boyfriend from long ago and still makes me sad.  Same for Bridge Over Troubled Water by Simon and Garfunkel. My mom listened to that over and over when my dad was in Vietnam when I was little. Too sad for me now. My parents constantly had the radio on when I was little, which is probably why I'm the same way now. We almost always have music playing in the house and in the car. I remember being seven years old and calling up 92.5 WBBF and requesting "We don't need no education..." by singing it to the dj. We've gotten Joey into all types of music: classic ro

  While cleaning up my writing room yesterday (now that bat season is over and I can go back up there), I came across this story I wrote in high school. It's embarrassing now, but at the time I was thrilled with the grade I received. Mrs. Petrie was my favorite teacher and the first person to really encourage me to keep writing. Even after this story. (The assignment was to tell the story that leads up to the moment in the picture. It should also be noted at this time in my life I was fascinated with the police and planned on becoming a cop after high school.) Pictured here is Ralph and Edna, two lonely people who now live in an old-folks home in Brooklyn, NY. Edna is a retired factory worker and Ralph is a retired cop. In this picture, while playing chess, Ralph is telling Edna one of his many stories of when he was a cop. However, this one particular story he's telling was about one of the worst situations he's ever been in.  Out of the thirty years Ralph had bee

I posted on Facebook yesterday about an incident at work concerning a cleaning customer who is lying to her husband about us cleaning the house. That got me thinking about the lies we tell (or don't tell) our spouses. I was shocked at the lady hiring us and keeping it from her husband. In nine years of cleaning houses, we've never come across a situation like this. I couldn't imagine lying to my husband about hiring (and paying!) cleaners. Now I may stretch the truth a bit by telling my husband I spent $20 on jeans when they were more like $29. But I figure there's a "2" in there so I'm not that far off. And in a previous marriage I might have been known to buy clothes or shoes, take them out of the bag before going into the house, cutting the tags and ditching the bags, then putting them right into my closet. When I'd wear them a week later he'd ask if it was new and I'd say no. Well, it wasn't brand new. I'd had it for at lea

I only started reading YA a year ago, but I've read well over fifty books since then. I get a lot of my book recommendations from reading other writers' blogs. There are two series' of books I had no interest in reading, but ended up loving. Ellen Hopkins' Crank  is the first YA book I read.  I didn't think I'd like it since it's written in verse, but the opposite happened. I ended up flying through the novel in less than two days, and went on to the next one, Glass. The third book, Fallout, was just released and I can't wait to read it. Since then I've read Identical, Tricks, and I just got Impulse. If you haven't read any of her books yet, I highly recommend picking one up. The second set of books I had no intention of reading but ended up loving, are Lisa McMann's Wake series. I'm not normally into fantasy novels, but again, I devoured the three books in this series. I was also lucky enough to meet her at a signing and get my book

I made my son cry twice today. That's two times more than he's cried all week. He's a really good boy and almost never gives us any trouble. We don't normally yell at him because we just don't have to. And we never spank. This morning I started his day off on a bad note when I told him he needed a hair cut.  I even offered to let him get a mohawk. He said he "didn't want to go to the hair cut store," and suggested I get mine cut instead. I won that argument. After his hair cut he asked if he could buy Halloween make-up. I took him to four different stores to find what he wanted. He started to throw a fit as we walked to the last store, and I snapped at him telling him he should be thankful I was carting him around trying to find exactly what he was looking for and not whining. He immediately burst into tears and said, "You yelled at me." We hugged it out. Later at home he wanted to put his make-up on, but I had to make us lunch firs

Not all habits are bad. When my four year old is in the car or concentrating on something, he likes to sing. The songs rarely make sense, but he's in his own little world. He's also a head banger (and has been since he could lift his head as a baby) and will watch TV while banging his head back on the couch. It relaxes him. But it has to have the right feel. He's been known to test-bang on a couch or bed to see if he likes it. He'll also bang in his car seat and (face down) when he first gets into bed and in the middle of the night. It's usually accompanied by humming, which is the reason we've never been able to go on a vacation and share a room with him. For the last few nights we've been getting ready for Glee's new season by watching the last season on DVD. Our son  loves the show and we've been letting him stay up late with us to watch. He'll sit next to me and bang his head back on the couch while the Glee members sing. When he get

Creativity is  the opposite  of routine.                                               I'll never be a soccer mom, because I can't guarantee I'll get my son to the   soccer games. I keep our family pretty busy with activities, but most of them are spontaneous. We signed our son up to play baseball with our local homeschooling group, and we made one game. Every Monday night I not only completely forgot about it, but when my son said he'd rather play outside, I let him. We don't eat dinner at the same time every night, I can't stick to a writing routine for the life of me, our four year old doesn't have a set bed time, and if we have parties we wait til the night before to plan our menu. I like that we're spontaneous and we can pick up and leave to do anything. And I think we keep life interesting by deciding to eat hot fudge sundaes before dinner. And we love our house cleaning business because our schedule is wacky. My husband doesn

My husband and I were cleaning a house for a psychiatrist or psychologist or one of those ists the other day. We were talking about my writing and I mentioned that I have a hard time finishing my work. I'll get gung-ho about a new shiny idea and think about it day and night. Then I'll start to work on it, think it was stupid or not be able to come up fantastic ideas, and quit. I don't throw it out, I just put it aside and either move onto the next shiny idea or work on my last shiny idea I'd abandoned. I also have a terrible time making decisions. Which is a major problem when it comes to working on plot points. It's so bad that I can't even decided which project to work on, so I don't work on anything for a while. I'm wasting a lot of precious writing time. Before I even finished talking, she said that she thinks I have ADD . It all made sense when she said that. My dad says he has the same problem with finishing projects and deciding what to work on.

I found out three days ago through a Facebook email that a childhood friend had died. The person who died was a guy I hadn't seen in thirty years (I'm forty). His death unexpectedly hit me harder than anyone's death has (including my grandmothers'--whom I took care of--last year) since my mom died eleven years ago.  I was floored by his death, and not just because he was only thirty-six and had kids. He was best friends with my brother when we were kids, and I was best friends with his sister. Like a lot of neighborhoods in the 70s, us kids were allowed to run around all day going from house to house and came home when the street lights came on. I felt terrible having to call my brother and tell him about his friend dying, even though he hadn't talked to him in years. We still always considered the kids on that street our friends even if we hadn't spoken in years. He was crushed and felt terrible that he hadn't called him when I had given him his number,

I learned something the other day from Darcy Pattison's website,  Fiction Notes . She recommends writing one page a day, five days a week. I'm working towards that goal, but for now I've started doing what she used to do: write for fifteen minutes a day. It doesn't sound like much at all, but compared to getting nothing done, it's a lot. I'm usually home with my four year old all day and our days stay pretty full. We have lots of museum trips, park exploring, games and activities we make up and play dates. In a few days I'll be starting a regular schedule of homeschooling for him. Needless to say, I feel too guilty to sit and write during the day. He's constantly asking me to play with him and I can't say no. Every day I think I'll write when my husband comes home, but it just never happens. My son is glued to me anyway, so trying to sneak off for a while to write almost never works. Last Thursday I hung a calender in the playroom (where my t

I tried. I really tried. I got through Just Listen , then I tried Lock and Key and This Lullaby . And I just couldn't finish the last two. I like the plots of her stories, I just feel like they start to drag about midway through the book. I don't have any time during the day to read, so I read novels at bedtime. I know when I'm dreading going to bed because I don't want to read the novel I have next to my bed, I've got a problem. I'm still at the point where I can finish This Lullaby if I wanted, but it's just not keeping my interest. If I wanted to pick up Lock and Key again I'd definitely have to start over because I've forgetten most of it by now. On another note, I found a great book thanks to someone's blog on here (sorry, I forgot who). Jennifer Brown's Hate List has been keeping me up late at night. I'm halway through it now and hope I finish it soon so I can get some sleep. It can be a little dark and depressing, but it&#

When my four year old son was little, he was obsessed with The Wiggles and Sesame Street like most kids. In the past few months he's changed quite a bit. Instead of cartoons (which he does watch occasionally), he'd rather watch Michael Jackson concerts, documentaries on the Titanic or any show on Discovery or the History Channel. We go to the library 2-3 times a week for books and videos. Most of his books lately consist of Michael Jackson, oragami, maps of the world, weather-related incidents (tornados, hurricanes, etc.), and the human body. I LOVE this curious little boy I have.   This morning he woke up and asked if we could open his piggy bank and take out some of his money and go shopping. We took out $11 and he told me what he wanted to spend it on: a Statue of Liberty snowglobe. I took him to three Goodwill-type stores and he made a beeline for the home items at every one. Forget the toys, this kid wants ceramic houses, snowglobes and statues. He kept telling

Because I switched from screenwriting to novel writing, I already have a million ideas for movies, but not many for novels. And not only did I go to novel writing, but YA novel writing. I've had one idea I've been working on for a while, and I plan to use it for NaNoWriMo this year. I took my son to a library about 20 minutes away today. During the drive my mind wandered to new YA ideas, of which I have none. While checking out at the library, I noticed a good-looking guy with two little kids. He was checking out ahead of me and flirting with the woman behind the counter, who were in their fifties. They were all blushing and giggling like teenagers. It was fun to watch. He walked out ahead of me and it turned out he'd parked next to me. He let me put my son in my car first, then loaded his girls into his van. The whole time he kept glancing at me, but I ignored him. He smiled out his driver's window when I backed out. On the way home I kept thinking, what kind of

I like to write funny characters who do embarrassing things. Mostly because then I'm just writing about myself. I do embarrassing things all the time, and I sometimes think like a twelve year old boy (per my husband...Thanks, hon!). What characters are the most fun for you to write?

I started doing this thing lately where as soon as my alarm goes off and I hit snooze, I let my mind drift to my current WIP. Because my conscious isn't awake yet, all sorts of ideas flow through my brain. Mostly bad ones, but some good. I can't recall any dreams I've had where I've used the ideas. But I do remember a dream I had when I thought I came up with the BEST IDEA EVER! I was stuck on a part of my novel where I needed a guy to give the girl he likes something special. I wanted it to be small but have significance. I was thinking some sort of jewelry or something that could be engraved. That night I dreamt that the guy gave the girl Mighty Mouse. He actually handed her this little cartoon character and she was thrilled. I woke up in the middle of the night and thought this was such a great idea, that I actually woke my husband up and told him I'd solved my writing dilema. The next morning when we woke up he asked, "What was the great idea you had?

Everywhere I look there's talk of school starting, fall on its way and the summer winding down. This was our first summer in our new house and it was wonderful. We met lots of neighbors, cooked outside more often than not and my four year old finally made friends. Lots and lots of friends. I started work on a new YA novel and started rewrites on an old one. I met a great new writing friend and also finished my writing room (which I'm not using right now due to the humidity up there. Oh yeah, and the bats). We went swimming more than we ever have, hit about ten different ice cream places consistantly and still kept up with the festivals. We tore down a small tree, planted sunflowers, tomatoes and a watermelon. I learned how to use a weed wacker (not yet without huring my shins), trim bushes to the point I'm vibrating when it's off and we still argue whose turn it is to mow the lawn because we both want to do it. I prettied up our living room with grown-up stuff,

I have lots of writing books on my bookshelf. Lots. And some I haven't even read yet. I was talking to a writing friend tonight about Stephen King's On Writing . She just started reading it and I've read it twice and listened to it on CD twice. While that book is definitely on my must-read list for writers, I'm not sure if it's my favorite. When I was writing screenplays, I love Blake Snyder's Save the Cat! books. I wish they made a formula-type book like that for novels. At least I haven't found one yet. What is your favorite book on writing?

Everyone loves to receive compliments. You can be going about your day, maybe grocery shopping, when suddenly someone says, "Excuse me, I love your haircut!" That would totally make my day! So why not make someone elses day? I started thinking about this the other day when my dad and I ran into a girl that used to work for my brother. The last time I had seen her she was nine months pregnant and about to pop. The other day (her baby is well over a year now) when we ran into her, she looked fantastic. Really good. We made small talk about our kids then went our ways. Out in the car with my dad a few minutes later we both said how great she looked. But why didn't I tell her that? I know if she had said that to me it would have made me feel great. I felt even worse because it sounded like she was having a rough time with her kids. Someone telling her how great she looked might have lifted her spirits, if even for a little while. I'm going to try to compliment at

Like a lot of writers, I'm curious how other writers do things. I am not a writer who can go to a coffee shop or bookstore cafe and write. I wish I could, but I end up looking at everyone else and eavesdropping. The eavesdropping is good for dialogue, but not necessarily for my story. Since we moved into our new house, I finally have my own writing room , but I rarely get to use it. Since it's in the attic it's much too hot to use right now. Even though I have an air conditioner up there, by the time I remember to turn it on I either don't have the time to write when it's cool, or I forget about turning it on all together. Plus one of the main problems right now is that we have bats in the attic:( Also, I can't leave my four year old in the living room or playroom while I'm up on the third floor. I set up a desk in my son's playroom with my laptop hoping to get more writing done. And I'm writing a lot more than I was. I leave my WIP open in Wor