www.flickr.com

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Imaginary friends...

The blogging here lately has been very scatterbrained lately.  I mean, more than usual.  I have all the usual excuses involving horses that need exercise, kids needing to be yelled at (lovingly of course) and a husband who works in a rather unpredictable job.  Add two house critters and I'm up to my eyeballs.

Meanwhile, my imaginary friends have crept back into the front of my brain.  

Seriously, I feel like I'll be editing this book forever.  How long has it been, two years?  

Not long enough, it seems.  

I couldn't leave Trouble alone.  I had to go picking through it again.  Honestly, I was dreading it, but you know what?  

I love these people.  They have tons of faults, all kinds of insecurities, and not one of them likes horses, but despite that, they're fascinating.  Sometimes I forget that they came out of my head.  

At the risk of sounding like a loser, I've sent out a few queries to some literary agents over the last year.  Clearly, none of these were The Right Person.  I also know now that my query letter could be just a little bit stronger, and as of today, realized my first 50 pages could use some fix ups.  

I can cut out a few superfluous sentences.  Plus, I need to drop in a few hints here and there as to the awful event in the past that started the whole mess, and what kind of nastiness is about to happen.

Is it weird to dream about people I invented?  They are so real to me.  They are part of me.  

Occasionally I get asked here about my book, and I don't know what to say.  I say nothing.  If you were ever wondering what's going on, all I can say is, not much.  YET.  I can assure you, if there's one personality trait that has kept me going with pretty much every aspect of my life, it's STUBBORNNESS.  I'll plow into this slow and steady until I get some action out of this book.

I have to.  Jenny and Katie and Adam and Will and Tom need me to tell their story...


11 comments:

Biddie said...

This is what I am thinking..Maybe, just maybe, you need to stop all of the tweaking and editing. Your book is perfect and like you said, you just need to find the right person for you....
Imaginary people are in my head all of the time..Some are my own invention and others...who knows? Maybe they invented me>

dilling said...

hahahah...yes, i think you could make some more reference to the tragedy, just saying, it could be/is integral....and i have been telling myself my own stories for so long about the same characters, i dream about mine, too. i don't think i could write them out, though...i can't come up with a coherent plotline...or? it would be a story about 2000 pags long.
you'll get there.

Kerri said...

Lights, camera, action. Since I dreamed it's going to be a movie, it not only will be agented but a huge bestseller. Who would you cast? I'm sure there'd be a place for Johnny.

JKB said...

MMMM johnny.

Biddie, your comment just gave me a very Matrix-y like moment.

I am officially creeped out.

Well done. :)

Heidi the Hick said...

Whoo! Biddie, you are like, a professional creeper-outer! It's okay, you do exist. Maybe the imaginary people created you, but you do exist!

You're also a profesh cheerleader. Perfect, seriously? You are too good to me. You know that. (xo) But just one more round of edit-tweaks, okay? Just one and then I promise I'll be done. Until someone who's going to publish it wants changes, oh boy.

Dilling, some of us have stories that are way too big for just one book! Maybe that's the purpose of imaginary friends... they are just there, when we need them? In a way I kind of hate writing about tragedy but it's part of life.

Yep, I'll get there. (stubborn.)

Kerri, yes. let's talk about CASTING. First of all, I can't think of a role for Johnny. Isn't that awful? He would have been a pretty good guy to play Tom, about twenty years ago. However, I have already picked Bad Brad to play Will's ol man. I'm sure Brad can do us a faded Scottish accent and we already knows he can grow a pretty serious beard!

I have someone picked out to play the singer in the band from Ride. He's not super famous yet but I figure when this season of Amarrrican Idol is done he could be. Maybe Pattinson for the creepy guitarist.

Who would you cast?

Jkb, I promise you, I will write a part for him in the future. It can't be too hard... he is one of my muses!

Adrienne said...

It isn't weird at all. Trust me, I've been obsessing lately over my characters as well.

As to the whole query letter thing . . . I'm with Biddie. Maybe it's a matter of simply tweaking the letter, but not the story. I think sometimes we look to editing as a security blanket, "All I need to do is fix this one last thing . . ." After a while we just have to let it go.

At least that's what I tell myself.

As I read the first half over again for the 100th time.

Heidi Willis said...

Heidi - I'm glad your getting the fortitude to go back at it. Your writing is impeccable.

You know, I don't know that it's that your story really needs tweaking to make it better... but maybe to make it more alluring to agents who only read a page or two. Does that make sense?

I mean, that your book is awesome. If an agent sat with the entire thing they would fall in love with it. But that first page or two... if that's all they see... maybe that's what you tweak.

I don't know. I'm in the same spot. I'm not getting more or less bites with my "new" chapter than I did with my old.

I still think someone is going to read part of it and immediately fall in love with you writing and say, "I don't care what the heck this story is about... this writing is awesome!"

Keep at it. You'll find that person eventually. Someone has to have good taste, right?

Coffeypot said...

If you keep editing your book long enough you will be right back that the original beginning.

Shelli (srjohannes) said...

it is not wierd to dream about them. is it weird to talk to them out loud? That is what I do? OI!

mugwump said...

I am so far behind you guys. If I think the word "book" my hand freezes. My mind tangles into a knot and pulls itself tight.
So I am just writing. In sequence. The sequence my mind takes me through. As long as I don't think the B word.
Can I join in anyway?

Heidi the Hick said...

You can join in!