Carol and the Future Fish Part 2

Revenge...Jealousy....Psychic Fish...and Polygamy, all in the epic tale of Carol and the Future Fish!

Ok, time for part 2...

Part 1 Recap: Carol is the youngest of the King Homain's three daughters. She is kind and sweet and everything the youngest daughter should be, and beautiful too. Her two stepsisters of two different mothers (apparently the king is a polygamist) are evil, mean and selfish.

Carol goes for a walk one day and is warned by the future fish that her sisters are trying to kill her mother. Carol runs home to save her, tries to crawl up a vine, falls into some water and drowns!

(And yes this is all the original text, unchanged from when my 9 year old self wrote this, with commentary by me now that I'm 26).

Carol and the Future Fish: Part 2

The three queens, Mary, Lynn, the king, the maids and even the knights came out to see what happened to her (Carol). The knights cut the vine and pulled her out. The whole castle had to believe she was dead (that's usually the case when someone has been underwater for awhile).

The mother cried and cried and cried (three times cried). "Why must it be my precious daughter?" wailed the third queen (as opposed to those other two b*tches in my castle). The queen cried for three days (because 3 is a magic number).

The princess slept for three years (ummm guess she's not dead? Yeah I didn't get the memo either). Every three days [she slept] the whole kingdom got even gloomier (I think this is where we enter the murky middle...)

After three weeks the kingdom looked like a garbage dump (yep, the murky middle has arrived). As three months passed (dude, don't ask, apparently the kingdom is in a time warp-I was 9!) an evil, evil witch came to the kingdom. She walked through what looked like a garbage dump and said, "This place is a disgrace. Nobody should be living here. Everybody here should die." (She is a neat freak evil fairy and she has condemned this kingdom! Call Clean House! or Prince Charming...)

The witch was about to cast her spell but there was a problem. The witch had been sick for many days and her magic was not working well. As she was about to cast her spell she saw somebody coming. The witch hid behind a tree. When they left she came from behind the tree and cast her spell on them. But since her magic wasn't 100 percent they all fell asleep. Three more years past and the kingdom was starting to look beautiful again. (I guess these things have cycles, gloomy...garbage dump...beautiful).

In another kingdom far away from Homainy was another king and he had a prince. His name was Chris (oooh finally, hurry up Chris and do something because the story is starting to suck!). Chris had been kicked out of his kingdom. His father had said to him it would be great if he could become a knight. Chris wasn't interested (I'm not you Dad, I have my own life!).

So his father told him about this bravery contest (aaah the good old bravery contest! Way to test his manhood!). Still Chris was not interested (Chris, I'm having serious doubts about your commitment to save Carol). So he showed him the prize which was a beautiful princess (clearly I was not a 9yr old feminist). So Chris agreed to go (woot). As the test was about to start, before even the bell rang, Chris fell off his horse (oh crap! Chris, you are the worst prince ever!). So he was out of the contest.

"You're so stupid," roared Chris' father. "You shall be killed!" (Oh man, should've paid attention to your old riding instructor). At that Chris ran straight away...

Will Chris escape his father's murderous rage? Will he ever get back on that horse? Can he find the princess and save her? And what was the deal with that evil fairy hating garbage? Stay tuned for the epic conclusion in part 3 of Carol and the Future Fish!

Randomness

I've been working on the blogosphere all morning and trying to step away because my revision is calling to me and after further discussions with Janine yesterday and some new notes, and talking to Atiya (my dedicatee-is that even a word? whatever) I am very excited about it.

But I just can't seem to stay away from the blogging. So anyway I shall share some things I think are exciting.

1) Kristi at the Story Siren has an awesome interview with Maggie Stiefvater up that includes some of Maggie's plans for books after her Fairie and Shiver books are done...sexy hungry monsters! OMG!

2) In more exciting Maggie Stiefvater news (I totally heart her in case you can't tell) film rights to SHIVER were just bought by Unique Features!!! YES!

3) Donna and Sara over at the FNC have ordered pretty looking bussiness cards, so I ordered pretty looking bussiness cards (can't be left out) and they are mighty pretty I might add and kind of match my blog. Look!

4) I am now posting my first epic story called Carol and the Future Fish. Part 1 is here and part 2 goes live tonight, where I promise you will meet the worst knight in shining armor ever!

5)Yeah...I got nothing, I just hate to end things on an even number (maybe that's something). Ok onto revisions!

Carol and the Future Fish Part 1

Just to warn you guys...this post is epic!

After I posted my smackdown today between two Disney princes at the FNC, thoughts about Prince Philip, Sleeping Beauty's honey jogged my memory about an epic fairy tale story I wrote in 3rd grade that sort of mimicked Sleeping Beauty, but IMO gave a little more character development to the prince.

Yes....I was 9 when I wrote this.

Carol and the Future Fish was my first epic story, a sure sign that I was destined to be a writer, and one who wrote about romance and knights with poor relationships with their fathers. It was also a sign that I was going to write A LOT. Handwritten, Carol and the Future Fish comes in at a whopping 11 pages. 11 pages! I was 9 years old, that was A LOT of pages.

Anyway I haven't thought about this story in years nor have I ever shared it with anyone since I was probably 10, and so I thought, hey why not post it here. Where else is it going to get play? Plus you know, the pages are starting to decay and I might as well preserve it for posterity.

So without any further ado...I present to you Carol and the Future Fish: An Epic Fairy Tale by Frankie Mallis (aged 9) with select commentary by Frankie Mallis (age 26).

P.S. Leave nice comments. You never know when we will discover time traveling and I'd hate for my 9 year old self to get a bad review, and be traumatized and never write again if you know what I mean.

Carol and the Future Fish

Once upon a time in a far away land called Homainy (yes, Homainy-whatever I was 9) there was a big gold castle. In that castle lived a king called Homain (oooh now I see where I got Homainy from). Homain had three beautiful daughters. Homain's three daughters were not exactly sisters (omg this is scandalous). They were stepsisters, for the king had married three queens. Each of the three daughters acted like their mothers.

The oldest one was Lynn. Lynn was mean and selfish. She was very haughty just like her mother. They slept in the same room and each of them had maids (to accessorize their sheer haughtiness). The second oldest was Mary. Mary was almost as selfish as Lynn was and she had everything she wanted. But no one was as selfish as Lynn (that Lynn, good for nothing...).

The youngest one was Carol. Carol was kind, far far far back from Lynn and Mary's selfishness (3 fars were necessary just in case you missed the first). She was very kind just like her mother.

As years passed Carol and her mother grew more and more beautiful (uh-oh I smell trouble). Lynn and Mary grew very jealous. So Lynn came up with a plan. Lynn knew how much Carol and her mother cared about each other. Lynn knew that if Carol's mother were killed she would surely give up herself (oh noes).

A few days later, Carol decided to take a walk in the forest. As she was walking she kept hearing little voices yelling, "Carol! Carol! Go home! Your mother is in danger! Carol! Carol! Go home and save your mother!"

Carol did not know where the voice was coming from but the thought of her mother in danger worried her (I should think it would).

She turned around and right behind her was a gold sea. Inside the sea were silver fish.

"Carol! Carol!" They yelled (don't you love it when fish are screaming at you?). "We are the future fish. We know all about you!"

"What do you want from me?" asked Carol.

"Nothing," replied the fish. "You must look into the water and save your mother."

"My mother is not in danger! (Sweetie the silver fish are talking to you, I think you should believe them) The last time I saw her she was with my father the king."

"She is now moping in her bed. Can you see Carol?" (I have no idea why she was moping and I don't want to know...)

"Yes. I can see. But then how is she in danger?" asked Carol.

"Well take a look in the room."

There Carol saw Lynn and Mary talking and laughing. But then she saw them sharpening knives.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" screamed Carol (The FNC is going to make so much fun of me for that). "Stop! Oh no!"

Carol ran home as fast as she could. When she came to the door it was locked.

"Let me in! Let me in!" cried Carol. Then she saw a vine leading up to her mother's room. When she was halfway up she lost her grip and fell into the water. She screamed for a minute and then sank to the bottom (Dun dun dun...).

To be continued...

Disney Princes Smackdown

Check it out at the FNC. Who do you think would win your heart? Philip or Charming?

Strawberry Pancake Fail!

I am le tired. I am grading papers. I don't want to grade papers. I don't want to read papers. You think you don't want to write them? Ha! You silly student, you only have to write one! I have to read 21! And I have to think of something intelligent to say about all of them.

UGH!!

I am never asking for papers again. Seriously, screw you homework! Homework for them means homework for me-this sucks.

Anyway, I'm sleepy and I still haves the work to do (yes I wrote haves, its not a mistake-I speak funny when I'm tired and I'm giving you the full effect) so yeah anyway as I was saying, I haves more of da work to do and I'm tired and so I thought it'd be a good idea to make some strawberry pancakes to wake me up.

For some reason it didn't work. I needed a lot of energy to make them, and it took some energy to eat them and now my stomach is in a food coma. WTF!

Bugger (oh apparently I'm English now...this happens sometimes when I get very sleepy).

Ok I'm literally blogging to keep myself from falling asleep so sorry if this is the most crazy insane post ever, but there you go. I shall be able to return with a regularly scheduled update tomorrow. No more pancakes.

(HI! It's the next day and you know, just a disclaimer....I wouldn't really stop assigning homework...but hey I feel the pain of it from both sides)

Writing Update

I managed to go back and revise AGAIN (omgzzzz) chapters 1-6, paying special attention to the scene I got critiqued on and letting the advice I'd gotten sort of guide every other revision I'd made this weekend. I still feel like the one scene at the end of chapter 6 could be better, but right now it's hopefully already an improvement and I can go back again and make it fantastic. For now I think it works where it wasn't working before, but who knows? I'm sending it back out for a beta reading to confirm.

So here are my stats!

Rose Lily Revision 2.0
Chapters Revised: 6
Chapters Remaining: 16
Page Count: 143
Word Count: 42,843

I also did some heavy work on my Wipit which was posted over at the FNC, and I think I made that a lot better because now in hindsight (of course) it wasn't really that good.

Anyway, that's it for now. My goal is to get through chapter 10's revision by this weekend.

Things I Learned This Week

1) There IS such a thing as vegan marshmallows. I found them (Sweet and Sara's) at this awesome health food store off South Street called Essene where I'd like to live from now on thanxkbai. And thus I had vegan smores and it was heaven!

2) Strawberry sorbet is banging! I discovered this when Acme suddenly decided they didn't want to carry soy ice cream anymore (WHY!!!!!!!!) and because I am still the biggest baby ever and need to hide pills and vitamins inside ice cream (I know, I know, but I'm 26 and it's not changing), I discovered sorbet.

3) Eisley's Invasion is my new most favorite song EVER!!!!

4) Sometimes critiques need to percolate in your brain and slide side to side and then jump up and down for a few days before they have actually sunken in and you are capable of doing something about it thus making your manuscript better! YAY!

5) The Vampire Diaries (books) are AMAZING!!! I'm in love. Where was I in the early 90's? I was totally alive! Maybe not near puberty yet, but holy crap I love these books!

6) Tomorrow is a new day and I'm going to kick some revision ass! For real!

Reinvigorated

First of all, check out my new musical obsession. I cannot get enough of this song and added it to my WIP's playlist now located down below at the very most bottom part of the blog.


Isn't that pretty? I love making my playlist full of mostly female singers because...well my MC is a female and I think they can more easily sing the emotions she is feeling and they sound more like her though there are some killer songs by men that I have. I'm still playing with the list. It's really helping me to visualize the mood and tone of different scenes as I'm revising.

Anyway I had a really long talk with Janine today about some of the issues I was having with that scene that I got critiqued on the other day and then had a breakdown over only to realize it wasn't so bad the next morning...yeah... So Janine gave me some tough love, except that coming from Janine, it sort of doesn't sound tough at all, but deep down, I know it was. We walked alot about the romantic relationships formed in my story and how to increase the flow of the story and the feelings of tension between my MC and her love interest. So now I'm feeling excited about these changes and her few small suggestions have been spiraling out of control through my brain and I'm seeing where I can make slight alterations to make things better all over the book.

So thank you, Janine.

Today was action packed for me, I didn't get home until 10, but I have big hopes for productivity tomorrow and all weekend. I have a new plan and I need to put it into action!

Vampire Diaries recap over at the FNC should be up tomorrow. And we have some new and exciting author news to post soon!

Critiques...a bad idea after 8PM

I'm feeling much better today than I was last night about the scenes that weren't quite up to par, though I imagined they were amazing the day before. Last night I knew, logically that it was all fixable, and this morning and for part of last night, I went back and made a ton of notes an came up with a plan that should make everything a lot lot better, and more awesome. The funny thing is, that though I knew this all last night I was still a wreck. And I think it comes down to this. Critiques and prime time hours leading into late night are a bad combination! Especially when I worked the whole day. It's late, your defenses are down, you're tired and you know that there is no way to fix the problems because you're about to fall asleep. That's the most upsetting thing...knowing that you can't go back to your computer and redo it all. So I've decided, I'm only going to look at critiques if its before 8, because then at least I will have enough sense to keep my wits about me and I'll have time to actually do something productive about it beside go up to my bed in a huff pouring over a print out with an angry pen.

Also, now that the sun is up, I'm glad I got the harsh critique. It always makes you a bettter writer in the end...just a little hard to swallow up front and after a particularly snooze worthy episode of Melrose Place.

Blaaaah! Frustration!!!!!!!!!

Ugh, after talking to Donna and Atiya I've realized that a certain section of my novel which I thought worked....actually doesn't. It's frustrating me to no end right now even though logic says it's no big deal and is totally fixable, but the issue they pointed out is one that I feel I should have been aware of already in my writing. I think that it has been mentioned before at FNC meetings...but I guess sometimes we have thick heads when it comes to critiques. I hate that!!!

It's so wierd how you can be totally confident in your writing one minute and then doubting every single word on paper a minute later. I'm trying to be rational about this...it's just one scene. But OMG!!!!!

So ok...taking a deep breath and I'm going to revisit the scene and be rational and look at it like a big girl.

Hopefully I can get it right this time (or as close to right as it will ever be) and then move onto chapter 7, though something tells me I'm going to want to look at all of chapters 1-6 again.

Le Sad...

Chapter 6 Is Done Now Too!

Wow, I'm having a productive day-the wonders of actually getting 8 hrs of sleep.

Anyway luckily, I really revised the crap out of chapter 6 last time and its one of those great chapters that kind of writes itself, so revising it again today wasn't too hard at all. I also went back and picked out a bunch of things to fix in the first few chapters based on FNC comments.

So here are the stats. I guess I should actually do some teacher prep....maybe get a latte...or an apple spice...and then tackle chapter 7. If I could finish 7 tonight-that would seriously make my day!

Here are the new stats!

Rose Lily Revision 2.0
Chapters Revised: 6
Chapters Remaining:16
Page Count: 143
Word Count: 42,507

Chapter 5 and Writing Update

WOOOT! SQUEEEEE! I have finished my latest revision of chapter 5! And I feel pumped like iron! The last few weeks I've been in a total writing slump, having an impossible time getting into revisions, barely writing anything new, but today I woke up feeling refreshed and invigorated and pumped out 5 like there was no tomorrow.

I think I might finally be out of my rut and whether that's because I had an excellent meeting with the FNC yesterday or my Alpha reader Lucas finished reading and is sharing the nicest comments, or it's just been enough time since I finished writing and attempted my last revision and started my new job that my brain has finally un-befuddled...I don't know, and I don't care!

I had a really good discussion with Donna and Sara about some world building issues. I still had a few loose screws when it came to my big bad guys...what exactly could they do? How did they do it? And the results have even me creeped out. Yuck.

Anyway I might just finally have all of my questions answered. I have to say, I'm great at ideas and tight plotting, but complete world building is not my strongest point. I'm not always the most detail oriented about these things. I totally blame this on astrology. You'd swim past certain details too if your sun and rising sign were both in Pisces! Seriously! I am sooooo Pisces it's ridiculous. I really need some more Virgo in my life...anyway...

Here are the stats and then I'm going back to lightly comb over some issues brought up in the meeting for the first four chapters.

Rose Lily Revision 2.0
Chapters Revised: 5
Chapters Remaing: 17
Page Count: 120
Word Count: 35,631

In My Mailbox 4

It's time for the awesome Meme-In My Mailbox, inspired by Alea of Pop Culture Junkie but hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren. Pretty good books this week that I'm really excited about!!

1. The Splendor Falls, Rosemary Clement-Moore:

     -This one looks really good and I'm already a few pages in and liking it

2. Cleopatra's Daughter, Michelle Moran

     -Squeee I've been waiting for this one, I have always had a really huge interest in Cleopatra's world and that entire time period-studied Latin and Greek at Cornell and spent a few semesters in the Classics department, and this seems very different since it follows her daughter after Cleopatra's death. Should be good.

3. Dark Visions, L.J. Smith

     -How pretty is this cover? I love it! I'm just falling in love with L.J. Smith's books, currently on the 3rd book in the Vampire Diaries-The Fury, and now I want to collect all of L.J.'s books!

4. Pysch Major Syndrome, Alicia Thompson

     -This just sounded really adorable and relatable so I decided to give it a try and I really liked the cover.

5+ 6. Nightworld 2 and 3, L.J. Smith

     -More L.J. Smith, this now completes my Nightworld collection. Still waiting on the newest Vampire Diaries to be released and I need to pick up The Secret Circle, but I'm making my way through. I can't believe I didn't know about these books as a kid. Though come to think of it, I didn't really read much YA as a teenager-I was into adult books or non-fiction, go figure its all I want to read now.

Anyway those are my books-Im really excited!! What did you get?

Chapter 4's Revision

I'm the most nervous about this because I wrote in a totally new scene. So we shall see how that works out, but at least for now it's done. It definitely made the chapter a bit longer but I cut down in a lot of other places so hopefully things kind of even out. Anyway here are the stats, then I need to go make vegan cupcakes for a party tonight (see when you invite me over I bring chocoalte) and then Im going to tackle as much of five as I can before I go!

Rose Lily Revision 2.0 Stats!
Chapters Revised: 4
Chapters Remaining: 18
Page Count: 95
Word Count: 28, 010

Friday Feels Like Fall

Fall is soooo here, yeah I know not officially until next week or whatever, but screw that, fall is here! It's cool out, it's brisk, Starbucks are making the caramel apple spice drinks that are just the littlest bit orgasmic. I have a new snack food-craisins, and I'm finally wearing my sweaters. I don't know why, but fall is jsut my most favorite season ever! I love everything about it! Everything feels cozier now. And I like the way the air smells.

Plus I can practically smell Halloween around the corner!

Anyway still plugging away at Chapter 4's revision. My new scene, the one I tried to force into chapter 3 is working out nicely in 4 so far, and I even wrote one more little extra bit that I like a lot and I think adds in just a little extra twist of the knife.


Oh and head over to the FNC for the weekly Vampire Diaries post.

Thursday Thoughts

A little alliteration for you in the title...

Ok so...didn't get any writing done today unfortunately! Class this morning was interesting. My students are going crazy trying to come up with the thesis for their first big paper, and I'm realizing how responsible I feel towards their succeeding. I kind of thought before I started that I'd be all, like, "Whatver...your in college now, figure it out suckah!" But I'm sooo not like that. I really want them all to do well and figure this whole thesis bussiness out. The problem is this paper I assigned...it is pretty confusing (not my fault-I didn't invent it). And I've talked to a bunch of other adjuncts and it seems like EVERYONE is having the same issue, so I blame the paper, not my teaching methods (which are AWESOME...yeah I'm sooo not modest at all...j/k), and I don't blame my students because they are trying. So...interesting-I never expected to learn so much about myself or the process.

Also, now that I'm on the other side of the classroom, I suddenly realized how obvious alot of my Bullsh*t was in school. You know you thought you were getting away with stuff too! But I used to be convinced that if I turned in a paper late or I wrote it really quickly or skipped class or didn't post something, that somehow I was totally pulling one over on the teacher. And now, OMG all of that stuff is soooo obvious, I can read everything all over their faces-it's kind of cracking me up. The things you learn in another's shoes...

OK and SADLY...I didn't get a chance to see the Vampire Diaries yet, so I'll have my new weekly VD post at the FNC up probably sometime tomorrow evening. I should also have chapter 4 finished by then (sorry Atiya, can't get it to you any sooner).

Oh yeah...one of my alpha readers, Lucas, ended up taking a copy of my manuscript with him to college and I was pretty sure that you know, being an 18 yr old boy, and a math major and away at college for the first time ever, that there was no way he was actually going to be reading my book about forbidden love, secret kisses and sports bras....and ok demon slaying, but he called me tonight and said he's been reading constantly and can't put the book down. Totally made my night!!! Thanks Lucas! My favorite part...he was telling me he was rushing home from dinner to read about my MC dancing at a fairy ball.

Alright need some sleep so I can be oh so super productive tomorrow!

Chapter 3 Hath Been Revised (Again)

I finished my revision of chapter 3 and I think I'm starting to get the hang of this. I'm also really cracking down on uneccessary wordage and passive verbs. I'm like the passive voice exterminator, though I'm not deleting all because you know, they're a natural way of speaking, but I'm keeping it to a minimum.

The one thing I'm sort of iffy about was I really really want to add this scene that is pretty important for character development and also plot related things (and its brand spankin new) and I had deemed chapter 3 the place for this scene, but that was just not happening. I tried to fit it in and chapter 3 wasn't having it, and evicted the scene. The nerve!

Anyway, the pacing of chapter 3, especially the end is pretty good and I don't think I can mess with it anymore, so I think now that this scene will be transferred to chapter 4. Alas.

I better post my stats fast (I've totally neglected teacher prep to finish this chapter-also I watched Glee).

Rose Lily Revision 2.0 Stats
Chapters Revised: 3
Chapters Remaining: 19
Page Count: 64
Word Count:18, 344

Melrose Place

Any fans out there? I'm trying to decide if I like it or not. I've watched the first two episodes, they come on the moment I get home from my night shift at the library and trust me, after a morning of teaching and then being in the lib allllll night long, I need some brain candy.

Some its kind of hot, some of its...eh. The problem is I don't really feel much for the characters at this point and NOTHING seems to be happening. That's usually the problem when there are too many characters to follow-not a lot goes down in an episode so that everyone's storyline can be moved along...inch by slow excruciating inch...

What do you guys think?

Now Vampire Diaries...FTW!

Also, Lisa and Laura...I know you'll be excited to hear this...I think I'm going to tune into Glee tonight.

Writing Update-Monday

YAY! I have finished the revision on chapter 2! I'm a little sick of looking at these two chapters, but I'm pretty pleased with the way they are shaping up.


Plus my friend Atiya (whom I'm dedicating my book to) finally was allowed to look at the first two chapters. I've been hiding from her because she is the pickiest reader I know and while she is my biggest fan, she is also my biggest critic. So today I finally felt ready to show her what I had and she LOVED it! Yes! (Trust me, this is well deserved she has told me that previous drafts suck!)


And I finally settled on my excerpt for Sneak Peek Week at the FNC. I've done the posting already and its scheduled to go live at midnight tonight! So check it out, show some love. I'll post the link when it becomes available.





Want to hear something else really exciting? I bought a frame for my diploma! Finally! It's really pretty and now my masters and my bachelors can hang out and be friends, paint each other's toenails...ok whatever, I'm pretty happy about it! The frame is sweet and it has a castle on it!





See!





BFFs 4 Life!


And yeah that's a picture of me wearing the sorting hat in the corner of the top picture.

Ok here come the numbers!!

Rose Lily Revision 2.0 Stats!
Chapters Revised: 2
Chapters to go: 20
Page Count: 41
Word Count: 11,844

Writing Update-YAY!

Wooohoooo finally, I finished editing chapter 1-and its much much better and tighter and sassier! Now, I just need to pick which scene I'm going to use for my Sneak Peek Week WIPIT over at the FNC...

Also, I just had one of those WONDERFUL bursts of inspiration and totally wrote the end of book 3 (I know Im crazy, but it's there!). The beauty of it...it ties in perfectly with the first scene of chapter 1 book 1-I'm squeeeing inside, you just can't hear it.

Anyway, finally, I can return to my numbers obsession.

I started on a blank word document so my numbers will be much lower now.

Revision 2.0 Stats
Chapters Revised: 1
Chapters to Go: 21
Page Count: 17
Word Count: 4,834

Sunday at the BN

Hey All,

I'm writing to you live from Barnes and Noble, thank you so much free Wifi! Loves it! And I thought I'd make a few observations while I'm here settling in with a vanilla soy latte (yeah, I know) and getting ready to finish revisions on chapters 1 and 2.

1) Whole body spandex is just NEVER a good idea, especially when the spandex is about two sizes too small. Just...no!

2) I'm seeing a whole lot of crazy neck tattoos and arm tattoos that span from shoulder blade to wrist and you know what...they are very green. It's definitely making me rethink my whole tattoo thing when I finish the book. I don't know...I don't want green.

3)I love watching teenagers scan the YA section. I overheard these two girls and apparently they just decide what books to read based on the cover. Though they said, "you know my mom told me not to judge a book by their cover." Anyway, they will not read a book if the girl on the cover is wearing an ugly skirt. Also, they like to guess what books are about based on the title. And every other book, they'd go, "Oh...vampires" and burst out laughing. I think I could interpret their laughs to mean, "Are you kidding me publishing industry? Another one? What dod you take us for!"

So there you go.

Also, I want to put up some pictures I took with Donna yesterday in New Hope, PA. We had one of our adventures that involved driving down back roads that probably weren't roads, getting rained on and allegedly seeing Joan Rivers sitting in a psychic shop awaiting a tarot card reading. I say allegedly because we never could come to a conclusion about whether or not it was really her or not. We walked by the psychic's 3 times and I am CONVINCED it was her. It was too lifelife. But Donna isn't so sure even though I made her walk past the shop 3 times and on two different sides of the road to see. However I looked into this and it turns out that Joan owns some property near New Hope, and she hasn't updated her blog since September 8th, so it's possible she came there for a little mini vacay and decided you know that she just had to have her tarot cards read... I don't know. I think I saw her. So Joan, if that was you, I'm really sorry I didn't talk to you, but you're probably the most intimidating woman in show bussiness to approach, and also if that wasn't you, I would have initiated one very AWKWARD conversation.

And last...I think I'm going to change the title of my WIP again.

So here's a recap for you of it's title history.
1) The Seven Sisters Brandywine
2) Brandywine
3) Rose Lily
4).....

Title 3 I think is a bit confusing because it sounds like a name, particularly the MC's name and her name is Lilliana, so I think it's better to leave things less confusing. In keeping with the rose theme (and because they are VERY symbolic in my story) I'm thinking right now....Secret Roses.

so...

4) Secret Roses

It doesn't quite have the ummph that I feel with Rose Lily, but I dont know. Who knows maybe I will change back to another title tomorrow. We'll see.

Anybody really awesome at titles? I could use some more ideas.

Ok, off to work!
so...

In My Mailbox 3

In My Mailbox was inspired by Alea of Pop Culture Junkie but hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren.

Here you go!

1. Immortal, P.C. Cast-I've been wanting this book for months, but I couldn't find it anywhere-it's a Border's exclusive and no longer on Amazon new. They are supposed to be rereleasing it with a new pretty cover and an additional story by Rachel Vincent, but I can't tell when that is happening so when I finally found the old version, I jumped!

2. Real Ultimate Power, Robert Hamburger- this book goes with the website http://www.realultimatepower.net/ which had me in hysterics in college. So when I happened to see this in a little indie store in New Hope with Donna today...I grabbed it!

3. The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall, L.J. Smith-hahahah to complete my collection. I'm 100 pages into the first VD.

4. Blue Flame, K.M. Grant-Don't know much about this book, but the back of the book spoke to me and some of the story reminded me of my own so...bought it!

5. Crashed, Robin Wasserman-Book 2 in her Skinned series. I really enjoyed the first book, super excited for this one.

Ok that's what was in my box...what was in yours?

Ballad Teaser-More things I'm excited for!

I posted a review of Maggie Stiefvater's first book Lament over at the FNC today along with a teaser of the next book, Ballad, which I'm going to share with you down below.






This is a teaser from Maggie Stiefvater's BALLAD, a novel involving homicidal faeries and kissing that's coming out October 1st.


He turned towards me. For a long moment, he stood facing me. I was held, anchored to the ground – not by his music, which still called and pushed against the music already in my head and said grow rise follow – but by his strangeness. By his fingers, spread over the ground, holding something into the earth, by his shoulders, squared in a way that spoke of strength and unknowability, and most of all, by the great, thorny antlers that grew from his head, spanning the sky like branches.

Then he was gone, and I missed his going in the instant that the sun fell off the edge of the hill, abandoning the world to twilight.


Buy it here. Enter the contest at Maggie's blog here.

Enjoy!

Friday!

Have you seen the FNC's upcoming event, Sneak Peek Week? Eeeek! I don't remember whose idea it was now to post excerpts of our books, it was either mine or Donna's....sometimes I forget where my brain starts and her brain ends we work so closely together on projects. My point though was while I was totally excited for this great new idea, now that I'm seeing it in print, I'm kind of freaking out. OMG-that is nerve wracking!

Now I need to comb through my first few chapters and pin point the exact exercpt I want to share...do I choose a funny one? A steamy one? An introspective one? An action packed one? I don't know!!!

In other news...last night before bed I had a total Lorelai Gilmore moment (besides Angelina Jolie-I want to be Lorelai). For those of you who watched Gilmore Girls, do you remember right before she opened up the Dragonfly Inn and she couldn't sleep bc she kept thinking of things to do. Rather than write herself out a to-do list, she called the Dragonfly and left herself messages on the answering machine-which greatly pissed off Michelle when he got to work and heard them-all 30 of them!

Well sometimes right before I fall alseep, or in the middle of the night I get an idea that I absolutely must write down lest I forget it in the morning. But for some reason (blasphemy probably) I did not have a pen or paper beside my bed and I was way too deep in the covers for getting out-great idea or not. But I knew I'd better not lose this idea (because well...it was a goood one). So that's when I decided to leave myself a message on my phone.

Easier said than done...

First of all, you can't just call yourself-that's awkward. But you can call your voicemail and leave a message for your inbox-which I did.

Here's the thing. I get these ideas and little snippets of inspiration all the time, and I write them down (because you know-writing is what I do). But telling yourself your idea on the phone is a whole other story. I got all like "umm ok so like...uhh its like ...well you know...you're you and you're talking to yourself so you know what you mean-OBVIOUSLY!" I know-it's one of the early signs of being afflicted with writer's crazy.

I found it so hard to articulate the idea outloud when it was so fresh in my head that now I'm kind of wondering what neurons are fired off to make your brain speak to your mouth and are all of my brain neurons shooting towards my fingertips? Wierd, huh!

Luckily, I woke up this morning with the idea still in tact in my brain and I haven't had to listen to my awkward self to self voice message-not yet.

Work Updates: It's going well! I never expected I'd actually LOVE teaching so much. I get really nervous about my class the night before and while I have a syllabus I'm still kind of making things up as I go along-but somehow I stumbled on my own method (right off the bat) and it works! It's alliiiiiiive!

Not quite sure yet where I stand on the whole blogging about work thing. Many of you know I was a pre-school teacher before I became a college professor all of two weeks later. And I NEVER blogged about pre-school because well...that would have been really unprofessional and I don't think it's appropriate to mention other people's kids on the internet for many obvious reasons. But college is a whole different ball game, because my students could potentially read this and I don't know yet....so I don't mean to hold back on the funny stories and bloopers (you know they're there) but we'll see.

Writing Update: That has not been going so well. Unfortunately I've been in a huge transition period with my new job and planning for each day is something I'm still getting used to. But I have big plans for tonight to get back on track.

So yeah...back later with more.

Posted Over At The FNC Today

Head on over to the FNC to see my commentary about the CW's Vampire Diaries.

Succubus Shadows Cover And Other Things I'm Excited For!

Look what I found on Richelle Mead's blog today! Sooooo excited, I need this book now!

Also....the cover for Rachel Vincent's Shift (also the 5th book in her adult series like RM above).

The Vampire Diaries on the CW starts tomorrow! Tell me this promo is not HOT! Seriously! I need to crack open my books!


And finally....9....

...which ok doesn't look at all sexy after the last three pictures I showed you...but there is a little special person attached to this movie by the name of Elijah Wood.

I rest my case.

Aaaaah! You Tube Video!

Oh boy...it's been posted! I just love having my face on You Tube with NO make up on!



Anyway as for my update...

I had a green smoothie this morning, and I woke up at 6:45am to teach and I didn't feel tired (ok I didn't feel exhausted) which is pretty big because I haven't had to wake up at 6:45 in a looooooong time.

So yeah, enjoy my humiliation.

What's Happening?

I feel like I've been running non-stop like the usual crazy person I am. I haven't made any progress with my revision (under the direction of my new revision plan and half plotted out revision). I guess with my new teaching gig and the fact that I'm about to return to librarian duties, I'm all out of whack getting used to my new schedule. Maybe by Wednesday I'll have a chance to get down and dirty. Maybe tonight...if I finish all of my teacher prep for tomorrow (fingers crossed).

Anyway I am sticking to my little goals program with Arnold at Arnold's Way. Yesterday I went for a run with Eva. Since I'm supposed to be able to run 6 miles at the end of 4 weeks we started off at the track and timed running one mile. Now mind you, I wasn't trying to run very fast at all because I knew we would be going on for a much longer time...but I ended up running one mile in 12 minutes (not quite Arnold's 10, but oh well). So now that we knew it took about 12 minutes for a mile, we headed off for more interesting terrain around the neighbor and 52 minutes later...I plopped on the floor.

I didn't really keep track of the distance after the first mile...I didn't want to bore Eva with constant running around the track-she had enough of that in high school, but I think I may have run around 4 miles...so not so bad. I technically need to track this -and decide if I am totally awesome and reaching my goal (6 miles...who knew?) or if maybe the goal wasn't as big a deal as it originally sounded and maybe I need to run 7 miles....hmmmm 6 is still sounding good right about now.

Also, I've been making up a storm of green smoothies and had a really yummy salad for dinner last night and tonight. Woohoo!

So now I really must get back to prep! It's very frustrating because I'm actually really enjoying my class but I just really really really want to write. I'm sure all will settle once I get out of this transition period.

Also I spent an obscene amount of time with Donna at BN today gushing about Suzanne Collins...makes me want to reread Hunger Games and Catching Fire right now!

Ok seriously getting back to teacher prep!

Win The Glass Series by Maria Snyder

How freaking awesome is the cover for Sea Glass?

Very, it is very awesome as is Maria V. Snyder who just posted a guest blog at the FNC. Become a follower and leave a comment and you two can own your own set of Glass books. Go on, you know you want to!

In My Mail Box 2

This was another big book acquisition week, so I'm doing a second In My Mail Box Meme...
inspired by Alea of Pop Culture Junkie but hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren.

Here you go....

I'm super excited for the premiere of The Vampire Diaries on the CW so I decided to get the books. I'd been considering getting them for awhile especially since L.J. Smith's name came up a lot at our last FNC meeting. I recently noticed that they had new covers out featuring the actors from the show and I really wanted original covers if I was going to make a purchase (well original in that these have been re-released after a decade or something, right?). Anyway the re-released covers look like they are becoming very rare, so if you want...go get them now.

1) The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening and The Struggle, L.J. Smith

2) The Vampire Diaries: The Fury and Dark Reunion, L.J. Smith

3) Lucky, Alice Sebold (this is her memoir and I'm a little afraid to read it but have wanted to for a while now)

4) The Sky Always Hears Me and The Hills Don't Mind, Kirsten Cronn-Mills

5) Devil's Kiss, Sarwat Chadda (sounds awesome but I would have bought it anyway bc the model on the cover looks just like my MC, Lilliana!)

6) The Tear Collector, Patrick Jones

7) Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins (OMG AMAZING!)

8) Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World, Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero (how awesome is this title...and it so doesn't go with my last post, but that's ok...I can still make cupcakes and in 4 weeks I can eat them, Im going to eat mostly raw but don't really care to be 100%).

Ok that's what was in mine:-) What was in yours????

Damn this Meme is FUN!

What Have I Done????

I haven't talked much about raw food lately (even though its one of the things I promise to discuss in my about me section) mostly because I just haven't been eating very raw (ie. uncooked food, or food not heated above 115 degress killing off all the enzymes). It's a fun diet to do, it makes you feel awesome and happy and energized and healthy, but it can be difficult to do and maintain, especially when you're a crazy high concept dancing-writing-teaching-librarying(ok thats not a verb)-blogging girl on the run like me.

But today I decided to make a trip to my favorite (local) raw foods restaurant Arnold's Way after my mom said she really wanted a smoothie (they have the BEST smoothies). So we went for lunch, I got a green smoothie and chili and checked out the new raw books for sale. Arnold, the owner who I've been pals with for a few years decided to go on his usual quest to get me to do a youtube video with him (I've refused for years).

What was different was this morning I'd been feeling like I could use a change in my life (as if I don't have enough of those lately) but you know, like a small positive change to make all of the other ones go more smoothly and possibly reduce the amount of times I make friends with barristas ordering my infamous vanilla soy lattes. (I love you guys but I know too many of you!)

So when Arnold suggested I do a youtube and then enroll in his 4 week raw program...I mean I had just asked the universe for a small change and here was a way to do it...so I said yes.

OMG!

The youtube will be up in like a week and I'm going to cringe and turn bright red when I see it bc I absolutely HATE seeing myself talk on camera (dance? sure, but no talking allowed). I guess because I'm a glutton for punishment and never ever seem to be capable of holding back on things that humiliate me, I'll provide the link when it's available.

So basically I am going back to drinking a green smoothie every morning for breakfast and basically having a salad for dinner. Lunch I'm free to do whatever I want. I kind of like the idea of salad for lunch and dinner being a free for all, but I'll do Arnold's method -its not like I'm going to get crazy...dinner is often like cous cous and tofu with mixed veggies-satisfying but not super exciting.

I also had to pick a physical goal outside of my comfort level to achieve at the end...so I casually suggested I run 3 miles because that sounded good to me and 3 is a magic number and Eva and I go running and can last for about an hour and maybe in that time period I run something close to that -so 3 miles seemed good to me.

Well when I told Arnold that I would do 3 bc I did one hour runs with Eva, he started recalculating things in his head. I mean, I can run for an hour, but do I run far? Not really. So he suggested well let's say you run a 10 minute mile, and do that for an hour...6 miles!

I'm all giddy at this point, like yeah sure 6 miles, your math sounds good to me.

OK I DO NOT RUN 10 MINUTE MILES!

I just don't!

And I definitely don't run them 6 times in a row!!!

Which is not to say that I have to...this is a distance thing not a timed thing..


BUT OMG!!!! WHAT WAS I THINKING and I agreed to this on youtube and omg I'm going to dieeee!

Here's a really wierd way that art is imitating life or life is imitating art...

But there is a scene in my novel when the MC discovers that after no athletic training ever, she is now required to run for an hour every morning before class (part of her knight training and of course she is running against students whose athleticism is enhanced by their ability to tap into magic power, so they run REALLY fast). Man, I don't know what she was complaining about...I have to run 6 miles.

Ok...that's all. Will update later.

Ewwwwwwww!!!

OMG have you guys seen this????




I already don't drink soda...only occasionally I'll get a sprite at the movies, but seriously if I did drink soda, this would be enough to make me stop!!

The Nutty Professor

Oh you have no idea how long I've been waiting to use that title post.

Well I had my first day of teaching and I haven't released my blog address to my students yet, so I can write about my experience for you and not worry about them seeing it...not yet anyway.

Surprisingly...it wasn't that eventful.

I was expecting something like a day out of the Page 10 Club...the Page 10 Club for those of you who don't know is the term I give to any event where everything goes wrong. The term came from a creative writing class I took where literally I was having the day from hell, had to turn in copies of my short story for critique and then realized for copies were all missing page 10. I should have a post about this, because the Page 10 Club story is epic...but I can't seem to find it. Anyway, over the course of getting ready to turn in my copies, I broke two printers, ran out of paper on a copy machine, ran out of money, found out my atm card wasn't working...you get the idea. So I selected 4 people in the class who I knew wouldn't rat me out for a missing page and inducted them into the club. I did not do this story justice...oh well.

Now that I'm teaching, I'm suddenly really nostalgic for when I was in school-oooooh so long ago...3 months ago...

Anyway, I walked into my class 5 minutes before class was supposed to start and my whole class was just sitting there, dead silent staring at the wall. They must have been there for a good ten minutes. Oh freshmen, coming early to a morning class. I'm sure this won't last long.

I think overall it went as well as it could go. I went over the syllabus, gave them their first homework assignment, made them all do an in class writing assignment.

I tried to go over our online disucssion tool called Blackboard, though I was having some technical difficulties with it myself. But I checked and asked if they knew about it and they all shook their heads, oh yeah yeah, we know all about the blackboard! Well it turns out-none of them knew what blackboard was. They let me ask them about it thinking I was crazy or wierd talking about the chalkboard behind me. It did get a laugh out of them though...

So what else can I tell you...well Donna and I are planning on a sneak peak week over at the FNC, where we will finally start sharing some of our writing with you...eeekk!

Ok off to finish reading Catching Fire!

Don't Ask...

How I found this...but omg soooo amusing!!!

Enjoy!

Short Daily Update

Alright, well I am more or less prepared to be a professor tomorrow. I have many a professor-type thing.


Like...I have a faculty parking permit so I can park my car anywhere I want to...oh yeah!

Also, I have a brown cardigan, because everyone knows that writing professors wear brown cardigans.

Ok so I totally made that last part up, but the cardigan feels professory. Thus I wear it.

I have a syllabus.

I have a professor profile online with things like office hours listed-because yeah, now I do office hours...crazy!!!

So fingers crossed that tomorrow goes well-I'm sure I will have an interesting story to tell-my first day of anything (because it's me) usually contains bloopers. Let's go back in time to my favorite grad school story ever! It was last January, and it was the first day of the spring semester and I managed to supremely piss off the most esteemed professor on campus in the worst way possible-read my humiliation here! Did you read it? Ok, just so you know...I ended up with an A in the class and now have a great relationship with the professor, who I guess is like my colleague now. Also...I'll be teaching what he taught-kind of ironic.

Anyway, got to read a little more of Catching Fire in between babysitting and school prep and I'm telling you-it's ALL THAT! I'm falling more and more in love with it. Can't wait for the weekend so I can finally get into it.

Oh yeah and I need to get back to writing-sheesh! My life is insane right now.

Ok Thursday...show me what you got!