This blogging everyday nonsense is starting to get to me. I can't even think today. I've been sick and I suspect my body is telling me, "Stop it already!" Sometimes when I think about the amount of writing I've been doing this past year, these lyrics come to mind-- You're like a disease without any …
Author: mapelba
I'm a writer, artist, teacher, mother, wife, daughter, friend, coffee addict... What else? A success, a failure, a mess, a fan, a hater of housework, a lover of dogs, a liberal, an obsessive, and a bunch of other things that probably would never occur to me. I reveal myself in more ways in my writings and art than in any list of adjectives. And whoever you are, I hope most of all that you are a reader.
You know you spend too much time staring at a computer when…
My dreams are starting to look like they're running on a computer screen--complete with underlined blue bits. That can't be good.
Little Demon
Jealousy. That little fire-spitting demon curled up warm and sharp in a corner of the brain. I try to keep it in a cage--a pretty one so it won't get restless too quickly--but it knows how to pick the lock. Free, it scampers around and chews its way through the more sensible emotions. And it …
Nice Girl Syndrome
How far can your imagination take you? Sometimes I creep myself out with what I've written and I can barely read my own scene. A dread churns in my stomach and I peer at my manuscript as if I'm watching a horror movie. I've actually closed one eye and squinted out the other. And it …
Cinderella Stays Past Midnight…
Yes, it will have been worth it after all if Cinderella had stayed at the ball. --Ellen Kushner --Cinderella Sonata I love that. No matter what story you tell, there is always a new way to look at it, another side to the story, one more what if... Cinderella might stay and be rejected in …
Fear and Desire’s Late Night Waltz
After drinking way too much coffee, I decided to post an excerpt of this years NaNo novel on my NaNo profile. I'm not sure how it is that the fear-of-exposure resides so closely with the desire-to-be-read, but they are constant companions in halls of my caffeinated soul. So, if you care to see what happens …
Into the Woods…
What to do? What to do? This fellow in my NaNo novel is either about to do something wicked or something good. He's capable of both... That point has come in NaNo where nothing makes sense. And since I've created this world before I started, this Lake Belle, these characters, I've got more contraints than …
…and your most promising partner is?
Here's the task--figure what kind of writer to be. Not just whether to be a good writer or a brilliant writer (as if I could shoot for one of those adjectives and hit the target) or whether to go pulp, trade, or vanity press. Too many choices dance in my head (pure pain for a …
When You Start Throwing Adjectives Around, the Trouble Starts
Okay, I give in. I'll just say it and get it over with. I'm a writer. I must be because my hands are killing me from all the typing. And I'll confess. It isn't about whether or not I'm a writer--I write everyday and when I'm not writing I'm thinking about writing. Surely that is …
Continue reading When You Start Throwing Adjectives Around, the Trouble Starts
Won’t Somebody Think about the Trees?
For a while--perhaps a whole month!--I will give the am-I-a-writer-angst a rest. Maybe it will become a habit. But that doesn't mean there isn't some other angst running around in here waiting to be wrestled with. So, I go into a bookstore and see the shelves of books, most of which no one will pick …
Marta Pelrine-Bacon 