Perception of self

One of the things I love about reading a novel is that you often get more than one view of a character. There’s the view provided by the character herself, and there’s the way another character or characters view her. Usually these views don’t match up, which would come across as a cliche, except that in real life, this happens all the time.

I was thinking about this after discussing three separate real life people this week.

The first appears to have no self-awareness. She takes no pride in her appearance. Her hair is a disaster, her clothing unflattering and she wears no make-up — which is a bit odd in and of itself, but seems very strange considering she’s an attorney. I often wonder what (if she’s even got one) her perception of herself is.

In a freaky coincidence, I described what I think the perpetual emotional state of a dear friend is, and she, almost verbatim, voiced the same description of herself later that day. Now, I personally think her vision of herself might be harsher than my vision of her, but they’re certainly in-line.  I think this friend is in touch with her feelings and the world around her and is magically self-aware.

Another friend made an observation about me this past week. She said that while she can always count on me to come through in a difficult situation, I often turn down invitations to her parties. This got me thinking that she thinks I’m a party-poooper (which I admit I can be). This had never occurred to me before, so I had to adjust my perception of myself. You KNOW I’ll be using that for a character soon…

Sleepwalking

As a general rule, sleep is not my forte. I often battle insomnia, but not this week. No this week I’ve been sleepwalking.

Every. Single. Night.

(For the record, I never did the sleepwalking thing as a kid. No, I had to go and develop it as an adult. Who does that?)

Before Thursday, I thought my stress level was pretty low, definitely manageable, but apparently my psyche doesn’t agree. It’s got me getting out of bed and waking up in the kitchen, bathroom, or bedroom. Every. Single. Night.

Last night I walked to the phone. Why?  Because I’m waiting for the agent who called me on Thursday to finish reading my book and call again like she said would (this is reality) and last night she called (this is sleepwalking reality) to offer representation.

I hope she calls soon because I’d really like to spend the entire night in my bed.

You know you’re a crime writer when…

you find out that someone in town has been killed and you drive over to try to get a peek at the crime scene.

Measuring success

It can be pretty difficult to measure success on a day-to-day basis when writing a novel.

You might think that a climbing word count is a pretty good indicator, but what about the days when you figure out wha’s WRONG with your book and you start slicing and dicing? It’s conceivable that your WIP could end the week 10,000 words LESS than it was when the week began, BUT it’s now a better book.

How do YOU measure your success?

Hey, hey it’s my birthday!

Okay, not really — my birthday was in March, but it sure feels like my birthday.

I had dinner with a fabulous friend on Friday and she gave me the BEST gifts (seriously, you can’t EVER go wrong giving me journals but adding matching coasters was pure genius!). Last night I had dinner with another friend and she gave me the COOLEST necklace and earrings.

Both of these friends had terrible things going on in their lives around my birthday (the kinds of things that left me feeling like an inadequate friend because I didn’t know how to help them). That they both even remembered my birthday was amazing, that they each gave such perfect gifts was a testament to the kind of friends they are, and that they both gave me the gifts within five days of each other was just a little bit freaky.

Thanks so much! Love you guys!

When I’m arrested

I have no doubt it’ll be at the local supermarket since that’s the place I get in more arguments than any other.

Take yesterday’s situation: the lines were ridiculously long and everyone was muttering about it.

A cashier walked over and opened the line next to mine, saying, “I can help the next person in line.”

I strive to be a decent and polite person, so I pulled my cart back and waved the person who was waiting in front of me (who was the next person in line) over. But out of the corner of my eye, this *%*&^ who hasn’t been waiting on line at all decides she’s going to jump into the just-opened line.

Hell no!

I swung my cart into her path so that she crashed her cart into it. We had a heated exchange — I know I called her selfish and inconsiderate and let loose a diatribe about entitled idiots.

DH says I shouldn’t let my righteous anger get the best of me (c’mon it’s not like I smote her) and I say that people’s bad behavior is CONSTANTLY allowed to go unchecked and that it just encourages those who treat their fellow human beings poorly. What do you think?

For more aggravation check out the post Angela James put up on her blog on June 12th “Is this what we’ve come to?” http://nicemommy-evileditor.com/blog/

Tempting Evil by Allison Brennan

Read it, loved it, ’nuff said!

 

Why I don’t go to the movies (besides the annoying people)

There was a time, when I was writing screenplays, when I watched tons of movies.  Then I stopped. I watched them with a too-critical eye. I knew exactly where the problems were with the structure and rarely got caught up in the acutal story. Quite frankly, movies no longer entertained me.

Most of the time they still don’t.

I watched two movies this week: Iron Man and No Country for Old Men (I have a wide range of interests)

Iron Man was…okay. Not great, not awful. It was okay. Yeah, yeah I know people LOVED this movie. Not me. I just don’t get all the hype (though it WAS good to see Robert Downey Jr. again in “fighting form”).

This weekend werented No Country for Old Men which I hadn’t seen. EVERYONE said it was so great. It was nominated for and won tons of awards. Why?  I could not wait for it to be over. I have NO IDEA what people that was even remotely good about it (except that after a long time it eventually ended).

I didn’t care about ANY of the characters in either of these movies, so what is it that audiences found so irresistable about them?

 

Can you put a voiceover in a novel?

Last night I was telling DH about a scene I want to insert at the very beginning of my WIP and he said, “So you want to add a voiceover?” (DH is a wonderful man who has made a great effort to understand what I do, and I was appropriately impressed he knew what a voiceover is.)

My most successful screenplay (successful as in it’s done well/extrememely well in numerous screenwriting contests) starts with a voiceover. You know, one of those times when a movie starts with a character (usually the main character) talking while the camera pans over scenery or some such nonsense. The voiceover usually sets the tone and raises questions in the viewer’s mind.

DH is right. For all intents and purposes, I am thinking about adding a voiceover. Now the question is whether I can make it work in a novel’s format. What do you think?

I love you all over again

I haven’t written in almost a week (a family wedding, followed by a staycation ate up my time) and I miss it. As DH left for work this morning, he was laughing at me because I was furiously scribbling notes about my WIP.  That’s the beauty of not actively working on a project for a length of time, when you return to it, the creative well has been replenished. Yesterday I re-read the first third of the book and all of the sudden I’m loving it again. Hooray!