I finished my fourth novel at the beginning of June.  Yes it's finally done!  My cold readers have it right now (one is already done with it and apparently she loved it!), then it's time to edit, edit, edit before it's released to the masses.  I'm so happy to be done with it since the story arc started in Prophecy is done with Resurrection and I get to expand my writing skills by starting the next, much darker story arc that will finish with the end of the series.

While finishing Resurrection, I decided I would do something crazy and rewrite Prophecy for Camp Nanowrimo this month.  This has been an epic fail.

I still have half of the month left to work on it and I'm planning on jumping back on the horse next week.  There's been entirely too much personal stuff going on in this house lately to get as much done on it as I wanted to.

The other thing making it harder for me to finish this task is the post-novel wrap up hangover I always find myself in.

I finish a novel and I can't make myself write anything for weeks afterward.  It's like I've tapped out my muse and I have to wait until it regenerates.  It's not writer's block.  I can deal with writer's block.  I have music, books, and movies especially set aside to break through writer's block.  This is simply a lack of motivation.

I thought it was a lack of discipline.  It's not.  I simply sit at my computer, look at the blank page, know what I want to put there, but just can't seem to get it on the page.  I think it's partially distraction.

So next week, I've told myself that I'm going to get back on schedule and get things going.  I'm going to work on Prophecy, take notes for my August and November novels, and start the planning for Scandal (the fifth novel in the Chronicles) before I start editing Resurrection.

Hopefully I'll be able to get out of this hangover.

The first round of Camp Nanowrimo is set to start June 1.  I'm very excited by that because I need all the help I can get when it comes to improving my writing.  If you think you've hit the top of your game when it comes to writing and expressing yourself creatively then you're probably kidding yourself.  I know I'm not at the top of my game yet.

Script Frenzy is in April and for those of you who write screenplays, more power to you.  I tried and failed with an epic greatness all my own.  Novels I can do.  Screenplays I leave to the experts.  If you're participating in Script Frenzy, my hat is off to you.  Obviously you'll focus on that before Camp starts in June.

For me, I'm planning my next Nano novel and trying furiously to finish Resurrection on time as well as getting query letters written for Prophecy.  The Nano novel is the easy part.

I've had an idea floating around in my head dealing with Norse mythology and a teenage romance that turns deadly and it all being a game in the end.  I've been playing with it for years now.  I think I just might write it out this summer.

What ideas have you been kicking around that you haven't written yet?

Sometimes the creative process doesn't happen like we writers would like it to. Sometimes, when you wake up in the morning, you're staring at your coffee pot and thinking about the sweet (or not so sweet if you'd rather) elixir of life that will jump start your brain. But as my chiropractor would like me to abstain from drinking the coffee, I'm sad to say that I'm not enjoying that life giving serum as much anymore.

I've been harping on Nanowrimo for how long now? And you still haven't signed up? I don't want to hear any more excuses. If I can do it, you can do it.

I'm concerned about how my Nanowrimo novel this year is going to be received by my friends and family. One of the cardinal rules of writing to write what you know. I want to make sure that no one is concerned for my welfare because of the novel I'm writing.

My nano novel this year is about infertility and suicide. Since my husband and I have been struggling with infertility for awhile now, you can see where my concern is warranted.

This year, I'm taking on the story of a woman who attempts suicide after struggling to have a baby with her husband for almost twenty years. I'm throwing in her husband (I would be remiss to keep him out of the story right?), her psychiatrist, and her post partum best friend. Since one of my very good friends just welcomed her first son in August, my concern is increased.

For the record, I'm not suicidal or depressed. Well, maybe a little depressed, but nothing to be concerned for. I'm merely writing what I know this year.

When you have a difficulty in your life, there's nothing wrong with focusing a story around it. Most people won't lose a parent in a tragic accident at eleven years of age, struggle through an abusive boyfriend at 14, start doing drugs and drinking by 15, and attempt suicide three times in their lives. Most people won't have to endure the pain of rape and sexual abuse for five months of their lives or survive two miscarriages with most of their sanity still intact. By the way, that's my life story. See what I mean?

When you're blocked, when you question your muse or your calling, this is what you can look at. Everyone has something unique in their life that other people may have never experienced. Even if you don't think you do, your perspective on your life is unique to you. Start there. Sometimes it's the cathartic writing experiences that kick us off to something beyond ourselves.

Here's a fun little exercise to try. Go to a local hang out (the mall, the coffeeshop, McDonalds, whatever) and just sit there and watch people. That's what I'm doing right now (since the hours at the part time job changed and I'm now off on Thursday and Friday). I'm sitting in Fireworks, listening to Skillet and watching the cars go by. The music just changed to Fiona Apple. Cool.

There are people staring at me as I sit here typing this. I guess traffic is really boring today. They just want my coffee. I know, those people in the grey Dodge Intrepid are secretly plotting to take over the world by stealing the world's supply of coffee. Wouldn't that be a funny story to tell? Maybe they're really aliens and the only way to control the mass population is to take away our coffee. Those people in the huge Ford F150 are thinking the same thing. Aliens.

See that? Sometimes it's fun to just watch people and build a story around what they could be doing. If you're getting bored being stuck inside with your computer, take a notebook with you to a place with a lot of people, or a place like Fireworks where you can watch traffic, and build something around it. You never know, it could actually be good.

Now I'm going to take notes on the aliens trying to steal my coffee. That could be really funny for November next year. Remember, writing is the only profession in the world where crazy ideas are allowed.

I mentioned last week that I'm feeling the burnout and that is still true. It's not as bad as it was because I've been experimenting with new things, but I can feel it coming. November is going to be a welcome break from the world of vampires and werewolves, I can tell you that much.

I think I'm starting to exhaust my muse. What does that mean? You're lucky because I'm going to tell you.

I'm a vampire writer, first and foremost. I'll never stop writing about vampires and werewolves and mystical supernatural creatures. That is my passion, my muse, and I'll never fully stop doing that. I love being unrestrained by the laws of science when it comes to what my vampires can do. Between Seven and Roan and Ulrich, I'm like a protective mom with her children. I want to let them go into the world, but I want to keep them close to me so they are safe from criticism and scorn. So far, everyone has loved Seven and Ulrich. Roan is getting his introduction next year.

While I love writing about vampires and the supernatural, I'm exhausting myself. I'm running out of steam. It's time to write about something else. That's where Nanowrimo comes in.

I'm going to have the chance to write something different, something completely foreign to me. I've never written in first person perspective, and that's part of what I'm doing this year. I've never written a story where none of the characters can run faster than a speeding bullet or snap an oak in half with their bare hands. I'm doing that this year. It's scary and exhillarating at the same time.

No matter how good you are, eventually writing the same old thing is going to catch up to you. I told myself a year ago that I would never feel burnout. I love what I do too much. But here I am, on the verge. Granted, I haven't had a real break this whole time and I desperately need one. The point is, someday down the road, maybe not tomorrow and maybe not next year, but someday, you'll feel like your muse is exhausted.

So what do you do? Stop writing? No. Never stop writing. NP told me that last year and I haven't really. Even while I've been blocked this week, I've had my finger in one book or the other that I've already written. Dream about something different. Let your mind wander over what it would be like to write something completely different from what you've been doing. Read a new book. Watch a new movie. Sample something different in your life and let it inspire you. Or go out on the back porch with a glass of Captain Morgan and a cigarette and stare at the sky.

But don't stop. You'll find it again. Talk to other people, bounce ideas off of those you trust. Put whatever you do, don't stop.

Would-be writers talk about the novel they wish they could write. True writers talk about the one they're writing. Don't be a would-be.

Right now I'm getting ready for Nano and one of the things I have to do, now that I know who I'm writing about, is to find names for my new characters. It's important because it's part of their character (check out 8/13's post talking about the Name Game for more info).

Where do I go for a name? The writer's best friend is the baby name finder. No it's not just for parents to be anymore. I love the baby name finder. I've gone to the library for baby name books, but after getting so many strange looks from the librarians and finding that most baby name books are following current trends instead of simply listing names, their origins, and meanings. The baby name finder websites give you all of that and make the searching process a lot easier.

I have a love affair with Celtic, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish names and looking through a baby name book made finding those specific names almost impossible. Rhoswen's name comes from the Gaelic for white rose (yes that was intentional). It also means rose in Welsh. I found it on a baby name finder.

My advice to you would be to find a baby name finder that you're comfortable with. You find it easy to use, easy to understand, and the meanings of the names are more universal. Meanings can change from finder to finder sometimes, so make sure you try to use one that has meanings that are commonly accepted. Bookmark it, put it in your favorites, whatever. Just make sure you don't lose it.

When it's time to create a new character, the name is sometimes the hardest part. But if you know where to look, at least that's part of the battle that's been won.

After a much needed day off to breathe, I was thinking about the differences between writing a book that stands alone and writing a book that will have more story following after it. There are differences you know.

When I wrote Prophecy about a year ago, I planned on it standing alone. There was no more story to tell. I believed that Seven and Rhoswen were finished. Let the reader imagine what happened to them after that. I had no reason to keep going. Then I started writing Forbidden and I found myself bringing those characters back again. I just couldn't let them go.

With all the plans I have for Seven and Rhoswen and everyone in that universe, I don't think I'll be letting them go for a long time. But that doesn't mean that everything I write is going to involve them.

It's different to think that I'm going to have to finish a story in one volume instead of being able to stretch it out. I'm getting into the last half of Awakening and I'm thankful that I don't have to cram everything I'm thinking about into these last seventy or so pages. With a stand alone novel, you're done when you hit that last page. That means you have to have enough story to get to that last page.

My advice to anyone writing the first novel is to not plan for a series right from the get go unless you have so much going on in your plot mapping that it would require more than one book. I didn't plan on a series, and now I'm in the middle of one. But at least Prophecy can stand on it's own two feet. Now I can surprise readers with cliffhanger endings and driving plot lines that make you wish I'd written the whole thing before I released the first one.

But even a stand alone novel can make readers want more from you. That's not such a bad thing either. You just get to create new characters every single time. In reality, that's probably harder.

I know, I know. It's not November yet Kell. It's not even September yet and here you are, harping about three pages a day and now you're talking about nanowrimo. What's up with that? Here's what's up with that.

I did nanowrimo last year and I've never regretted a moment of it. Nanowrimo has made me a little bit of money by giving me the chance to publish my first novel successfully. If a very good friend of mine hadn't pushed me to do it (thanks NP. You'll never know how much) I would still be where I was last year, questioning my talent and wondering if I should just hang up my pen and go out into the real world again.

Here's why you need to do nanowrimo if you've never done it before. You'll be pushed creatively, you'll find you can write those 50,000 words (don't freak out at the number. It's not as hard as you think), and you'll be richly rewarded afterward when you do finish it. Plus, once you see that you can make the word count for the month, you'll never say three pages a day is so hard again. Trust me on that one.

So why am I bringing it up now? Come on, it's August still. Well, you can't work on an unfinished work for nanowrimo. It has to be brand new. That means you better get your research done right now. That means your character mapping needs to be finished next month or in October. It means you need to prepare for it right now.

"But I'm still working on a project. I don't have time." Stop whining. You think you're busy? So is everyone else. Believe me, I have too many irons in the fire right now. I'm releasing a book in November, as well as finishing up a first draft before November 1st, transcribing a novel for a friend that needs to be done by November 1st, and I'm doing my research for nano right now. If I can do it, so can you.

At least give it a shot. You'll get tips and advice along the way that will be very helpful for you. It's worth every sleepless night and stressful day. It's worth it to be able to say that you completed something. That's the first step in cultivating a successful writing career isn't it? You have to finish something.

So sign up and get ready. Once November gets here, you'll be shocked how fast it flies by.

My husband and I were having a very interesting discussion today. He said this would make a great post and I agree.

Have you ever tried to force yourself to be creative? Isn't that the worst thing you can do? I know some of my worst work has been done under the pressure to perform as it were. Then I go back in edits and ask myself how something so awful wound up in one of my works and I have to write the scene over again.

The whole point of being a writer is to be able to tap into something inside yourself that other people, normal people as it were, can't get into. We keep strange hours and think of bizarre things and make the librarians question our sanity when we check out various reading materials (I just checked out books on depression, infertility, and suicide along with the latest Sookie Stackhouse novel. The librarian looked at me like I needed help until I told her I'm a writer, then she seemed much more comfortable). It's not like writing fiction is a job with set hours (nonfiction might be different, but I don't know about that). That's the whole point.

Last night I got home from my part time job and wrote until after midnight. Then I got up this morning at 7 and wrote two more pages. I'll probably go home tonight and write two more. But that's only if I feel the need to write. If I don't feel it, I won't do it until tomorrow. And that's what this post is about.

I know I harp on writing three pages a day. Three pages a day, five days a week. That equals fifteen pages a week. You do that for ten weeks and you have 150 pages. If that's single spaced pages, you have a book right there. Prophecy was 152 pages single spaced before chaptering, and it's 440 now. After editing and formatting, you'd be surprised how long a book can be.

The biggest thing you can do for yourself is keep writing. Just keep writing. If you don't feel inspired, step back for a little bit. Listen to some music, watch a movie, read a book, take a walk. Then come back refreshed and ready to take on the world. But don't force it. Stifling your creativity is a bad idea.

I'm not referring to things like Earl or Duke or King or whatever else you can think of. This is about the title of your book of course!

You may not realize this, but the title is extremely important. It can be the hardest thing you have to do in your writing career (if that's the case, you haven't done any editing yet have you?) and it can be so easy you'll smack yourself on the forehead and say "I could've had a V8".

In my experience, I don't title a novel until after it's finished most of the time. If I have a cover page on the novel while I'm writing it, that's entirely too much pressure and I can't even get started. Once the book is finished though, I find it so much easier to sum up the work in one or two words. I think it's because I know the story by then and I know what the point is. When I'm starting out, I don't know what twists it's going to take. What if I gave it a title that gave away the ending?

There are exceptions of course. Awakening and Resurrection (book 4 and 5 in my series right now) are already titled obviously, but I'm still writing Awakening. The only reason these are titled early is because I know what I'm doing with these two books. The first novel in the spin off series though isn't titled and the first draft is completed. I know what series it's in, but I can't think of it as anything more than Order Of The White Rose Volume 1 right now. Obviously that won't work as a working title.

Titles don't have to be elaborate works of philosophical meaning to be awesome. Is the word Twilight enough to cause a person to have an existencial crisis? No. Neither are titles like Dead Until Dark or Bad Moon Rising or City of Bones. I know when I saw Acheron as a title I almost stopped breathing, but that's because I knew instantly what the book was going to be about and Acheron is one of my all time favorite fictional characters.

If you need help finding a title, pay a visit to your local library and/or favorite bookstore. Write down any titles that strike you. Go home and read your novel while you're editing and see if anything sticks out in your mind that would sum it up without giving anything away. Prophecy is titled that way because...the story involves a prophecy and it's big. Simple and straight to the point.

Now get back to your work and finish your three pages unless you're on a minor sabbatical like I am right now. I obtained my replacement computer today so I'm taking the day off from fiction. I'll probably take tomorrow off too while the information is being replaced. I might even take Sunday off and actually have three days where I don't do any writing at all! Let's not push it. Also, if you find yourself inspriationless on Sunday night and you have HBO, check out True Blood. It's awesome if you don't mind the sex and nudity and bloody scenes. If you do, rent something.

First of all, I want to apologize for my absence this week. No, I don't have a note from my mother. We have had some internet issues this past weekend and since I post in advance (and no one is surprised by this because I have no internet at home), my posts were postponed. I'm sorry.

Last week we talked about characters. Knowing who your characters are is extremely important. But what good is it to know him inside and out but not have a name for him? It might not seem important to have a good name, but you should never underestimate the importance of what you call him.

I never really thought names were important. It's a name, what's the big deal? It's not like it's a child or a dog or something right? Wrong!

If you have this romantic hero and you name him Herbert, it ruins the image of the character. Is Herbert even a name that's used anymore? However, this same hero could be named something like Leif or Justin or Marcus. Suddenly, he has a whole different look right? Just the change of the name changed your perception. That's why it's important.

In Prophecy, I named my vampire king Seven. Why? Everyone's been asking me why lately. It's easy. Sometimes a character will tell you what his name is. I know, crazy right? The look I got said something like this: "Okay Kell, now I'm going to back away slowly. Please don't like knock me unconscious and drink my blood." But I'm completely serious. Seven told me that was what his name was. When I tried to change it, I could see him rolling his eyes and smiling at me like I'm an idiot.

Naming villains and secondary characters are just as important as naming a hero and heroine. Seven wouldn't be complete without his Guard, Ulrich and Chocon (that's pronounced SHO-coan for those of you who wonder). Ulrich is in homage to the late Heath Ledger's character in A Knight's Tale. But Ulrich agreed with me on it. Chocon on the other hand wouldn't let me call him anything else. The story wouldn't be the same with the Guard being called Rufus and Edgar.

Speaking of villains, I got Varick's name from a baby name finder. His name literally means conqueror I believe. It was picked off of a list and it suits him. His name originally was going to be Vincent. It wouldn't have worked out very well. For my villain in Legacy, my husband found the name Nathail, which means snake. It was too good to pass up.

Now that I've put you to sleep thinking about character names, please take note of one thing. The more unique a name is, the more questions you'll have about it. Chocon's name is hard for people to pronounce. I get a lot of questions about it. Rhoswen's name is another one people are having trouble with (pronounced RHOS-when). It's gaelic for white rose and there's a double meaning in that.

Remember that a character won't be able to change his or her name later on. When you're character mapping, take into consideration what that character's name is going to be. And remember, you wouldn't like getting beaten up on the playground in school right? Neither would a character. Until tomorrow!

Today I'm going to put up something short and then tomorrow, the Fang Marked Office will be closed for three days because I need a vacation. Who am I kidding? I'll probably post something. A day without writing is a day of staring at the walls and wondering what I'm supposed to be doing instead.

I've talked about characters a lot this week. That's because without good characters, you have nothing. Sure, the plot is important, but the best plot can be killed by horrible characters. Character development is so important that I'll probably touch on it again at a later date. I also picked up a copy of How Not To Write A Novel at the library a couple days ago, so I'll be re-learning some things and putting them up here too.

Today I'm talking about uncomfortable scenes (hence the title and here's an example of a mistake. I'm repeating myself). What are uncomfortable scenes you ask? They can be anything from sex scenes to scenes of horrific violence to scenes with male characters buying underwear in Victoria's Secret. Uncomfortable scenes are basically scenes you as the writer don't want to write.

My personal uncomfortable scene is a sex scene. I can't do it. I feel stupid when I try to do it, and I have tried to do it. I can't use words like manhood to describe the male genitalia. I just can't. It's a total invasion of my characters' privacy. I tried to write a sex scene for Forbidden and as soon as I typed the word nipples, I was done. I had to start over. So don't feel bad if you can't make yourself write a scene that you are uncomfortable with.

The best advice I can give you in this situation is if you don't like writing it, then don't. I won't write a sex scene that's not what it should be. I'd rather it not be there or have it alluded to. If the characters have sex, you'll know they did, but you don't need a play by play. If you don't like writing a scene where someone's head explodes, don't. If you can't handle a male character running his hands over a pink satin thong, don't do it.

That's it for me this week (maybe. I'll probably be back Saturday if not tomorrow). I'll be writing at home tomorrow because I'm on deadline and it's not where I want it to be yet. Awakening needs to be done by November 1st and Forbidden is going to be published by then. I hate deadlines, especially when I don't have my data recovered yet from my hard drive. Oh well. Time to go back to my Charlaine Harris novel and lose myself in vampire mystery. If you haven't written your three pages, then you know what you have to do. If you have, go get a novel and enjoy some reading for pleasure.

I don't know about you, but I hate novels that have anticlimatic fight scenes. My husband says it's like having the foreplay but no climax. For example, did anyone else hate the fight scene at the end of Twilight (the novel, not the movie) when she doesn't give any details about the fight? It really bothered me.

For lack of a better example (because I have only one example published) I'm going back to Prophecy. Sorry if this bothers anyone else, but when Forbidden and Legacy are published, I'll have more to go from without giving stuff away. In Prophecy, my hero and my villain meet up twice. I wanted big blowup fight scenes for both with the second being the biggest of the two. To make this more believable, I got out wooden spoons and a fly swatter (I'm not kidding either. Just picture it in your mind) and I played both sides of the fight. I wanted to see what the body would actually look like in battle. It was so much fun.

It was like choreographing a dance. Every movement had to be planned out, each counter movement slid into place alongside it. I wanted to know how the body looked when a wrist was bent with a sword (spoon, fly swatter, whatever) or how someone would stand when counterattacking. By making my body move like that (or as close to that as I could manage) I could describe it accurately.

What would you do to make a fight scene believable? How would you prepare for it? Would you just write it out and then edit later? Or would you choreograph it to make sure it all fit together?

Yesterday I talked about character mapping. Today, I want to continue on that path. It's important to change your character map with each book you write about that character. Seems simple right? Well I forgot about it. I'm sure other people forget about it too.

Currently I'm writing a series (unless you live under a rock or don't read the other posts, you know about that) and I have the same characters revolving through each novel. But they aren't really the same characters. Seven, my vampire king, isn't the same guy in Awakening that he was in Prophecy. If he was, I would stop writing. So when I map out characters for each novel, I have to remap him.

When you think about it, are you the same person you were yesterday or last year? Absolutely not (well maybe from yesterday, but definitely not from last year). Your characters are the same. Things happen to them in each novel. They lose people or have major life changing events. Those kinds of things change people. Your characters aren't any different.

I made this mistake when I went from Prophecy to Forbidden. I thought Seven was Seven and he wouldn't change. What a mistake. It took awhile to change that in Forbidden when I went through the editting process. If I had done my homework when I started, I would've saved myself some time.

However, if you aren't using the same characters, then you're not in the same boat. But the more lifelike a character, the better the story. At least, as lifelike as you can make them. Since vampires don't really exist (or do they? I'm not going there) I have to do the best I can.

Hopefully this is helpful for someone. I hate making big mistakes.

Since yesterday we talked about plot mapping, today I want to talk about the next obvious step. This is something I love doing and I picked it up from my friend NP (You can find her at the coffee stained writer. Here's a link: http://coffee-stainedwriter.blogspot.com/) and from a great book I read called How Not To Write A Novel.

Character mapping is again my term because I have no idea what it's really called. I did not attend college for writing, so I have to make up my own terms. Anyway, character mapping is when you take your character and you go through his or her personality traits.

I have quite a few homemade templates for this. I ask myself questions like "What would my character do if he were a high school boy? What music would he be into? Who would his friends be? What are his parents like?

If he's the Vampire King (just paying homage to my own character), what was his family like? What kind of history has he lived through? Has he done things he isn't proud of? What would he be interested in now? What kind of person is he? What does he do for fun? What does he do to wind down from an evening? What kind of movies does he watch?

See what I mean? You go from trivial stuff to important stuff and back again. I go through and list a physical description, why they are called what they are called (if it's significant), what kinds of clothing they wear, whether or not they want pets. I go on and on. I don't recommend that everyone gets as into it as I do.

Why does this help when you're getting started? If you end up not knowing what your character would do in certain situations, that character map is a lifesaver. I don't know how many times I got lost in what my vampire king was doing and I fell back to that map.

The character map is also constantly evolving, but I'll talk about that in a later post. For now, enjoy your weekend and write your three pages on Monday.

I'm in a love/hate relationship with plot mapping. Now I realize that might not be the technical term for it, but that's what I call it for lack of something better.

Plot mapping is when you write out the points you want to hit in your novel. For instance, if I want to make sure that certain characters fall in love, I put that in the plot map along with the journey they have towards falling in love. If my hero is going to fight the villain three times, those scenes are in the plot map. You get my point right?

I have written books with a plot map (Prophecy, Forbidden, Legacy, the third version of Awakening) and I've written one without it (the first in the spinoff series) and I really hate plot mapping. After writing without it, I thought I didn't need it to do it anymore. I was so wrong.

Now that I have to rewrite the first novel in the spinoff series, I wish I had a plot map. I wish I had something to guide me in putting characters in the right places without leaving something out. I'm on page seventeen and I know I'm doing stuff that didn't happen until page twenty before. What's missing in those three pages? It's driving me crazy.

The moral of this post is this: just because you can doesn't mean you should (thank you Acheron). I will never again write without doing the tedious plot map, even if I hate it and just want to get going already. Thank goodness I have the plot map for Awakening saved after my computer fiasco last week. After writing that twice, I really feel better looking at a third rewrite with some kind of guidance.