2011 October » Leah Cutter -- writer/traveler

Another night in Budapest, another day in Paris

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Oct 092011

I started the next story. Only got about 1500 words done on it. I’m somewhat disappointed with myself for not getting more done. It’s the weekend, I have the time, I should be writing a lot. On the other hand, it was difficult to start tonight. I even told myself I didn’t have to write tonight if I really needed the time off. Surprisingly enough, I found I did want to write, I just needed a touch more time to myself before I could start.

I like this next story, I *love* the character. I’m still trying to figure out where it’s going. I need to spend a bit more time with the beautiful Gabriella though. I don’t have a title yet, either. Soon, I’m sure. As soon as Gabriella reveals more of herself.

I am still working on my life/writing balance. It’s part of the new normal I’m determining. I am taking “me” time, but I can’t continue to feel guilty about it, as if it’s taking away time from the writing. It isn’t — I need that “me” time, it enhances the writing. Makes the writing possible. Just need to get my head straight. And to balance better, between my relaxing time and my writing time.

But now, it’s bed time!

New Story Available!

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Oct 082011

I finished the second story last night. I edited it today, and published it. It’s available for free for the next week here on the challenge page. It is also available on Smashwords for $.99. I will post the links to the Amazon and Barnes & Nobel versions when they’re available.

When Sarah finds a beautiful, porcelain bird hidden inside a hollow brick inside her fireplace, she just thinks it’s odd. Then her jewelry starts going missing. What will the magpie steal next?

Enjoy!

PS. Yes, I am still futzing with the website. I am hopeful that I’ll be able to finish it tomorrow. I already have a good idea of what the next story will be, so I want to write that early, and have the rest of the day for everything else.

Number Two

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Oct 072011

Sooo — I finished the second story. Or at least I got to the end of it. Is it the best thing I’ve ever written? Ah, hell no. Is it at least not bad enough that I feel as though I can post it? Yes. I’ll print it, read it out loud, clean it up some tomorrow and publish it.

Then on Sunday I’ll start the process all over again. (Saturday, I think, I’ll update my website.)

This story is about 4000 words long. I wrote it over four days, directly into the computer. I still have that other story I started on Sunday, at about 1500 words, just sitting, that I may or may not pick up someday.

Though I say I’m crap at writing every day, that’s what I’ve been doing. This is not necessarily a bad thing. I’m hoping for a “hot” story to come in this week, something that pulls me in and under. This story was nice, but not as passionately written as some of my other things. At least some parts. Other parts just flowed.

Today I had a fire in the fireplace for the first time. Kitty isn’t sure about it. It makes a lot of cracking and popping noises, which she is not a fan of. However, it is also very warm, which she is rather fond of. I’m hoping that she’ll get used to the noises and feel comfortable enough to stretch out in front of it before the end of the winter.

Changing horses midstream

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Oct 052011

Yes, I’m still doing my Baker’s Dozen challenge. I wrote for two days on a story that I couldn’t really get into shape, and so had to change, start writing a different story, one that I believe I’ll be able to finish by Friday.

What happened with the first one? Two things.

1–I know it’s a story, I know the arc of it. I can still easily conjure the voice of the person telling the story. But that was the problem — she’s pretty strong-headed, and wants to tell the story her way, with flashbacks and jumping right in and it just wasn’t working as a story. No one but me would ever understand it, not the way she insisted on telling it.

2–As a result of #1, I kept imposing my “authorial voice” on her. And it pissed her off and she’d get quiet and I’d lose all the momentum I’d built up. I could tell the story my way, I knew how it was supposed to go, but without her Voice and input, the story was pretty dead in my hands.

I may go back and pick up her thread, let her have her head and tell her story her way. I may end up with something. Yet again, I may not. Part of the point of these 13 weeks is to finish a story a week. If I’d continued on the previous story, I couldn’t guarantee I’d have something. So I picked up a different story instead — smaller, very creepy, but doable. And I have a lot of energy for it. (Current title is, “Magpie.”) I’m typing it straight into the computer, as I’ve managed to do that one or two times before with short stories. If I start having problems with this story I’ll switch to hand writing.

And all of that, the switching and trying new stories and new process and new things is such a huge part of why I’m doing this challenge, to give myself the freedom to write in whatever damn way works for me at the moment.

PS. I’d typed this up, then found out Steve Jobs had died. I won’t do an RIP post, but consider this: the iPod came out in 2001, the iPhone in 2007, and the iPad in 2010. The world changed after each.

Word wrangling

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Oct 032011

Wrote about 1500 words on the new story tonight. Did about 1000 last night, which is actually more than it seems because I wrote the start of this story three times by hand before I finally typed it up. It keeps fighting me — switching between a memoir and a first-person story. I keep running at it though. Wrote the start of this next scene twice now. I’m hoping to finish this story soon, because I’d like to take a night and fix my web site. Plus, all my fiction has made it through Amazon and B&N so I need to update all the links for my fiction. And I still have collections and stories I want to clean up and publish. And. . . yeah.

Tomorrow afternoon I hope to start fixing my fireplace. Going to take a few days before it’ll be ready for fires. It’s just getting to be that time of year. I put together a rack for firewood (will hold half a cord) and I hope to get the firewood this weekend.

I can’t tell you how excited I am to be able to write in front of a fire again. Before I moved in here I imagined all the places I would write in my new house, and in front of the fireplace played prominently. Hopefully by this weekend, I’ll be able to make that happen.

First up

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Oct 012011

I put up “Hell By Any Other Name” this afternoon. You’ll find the story here for free until I finish the next one. It’s already made it through the Smashwords meatgrinder, and you’ll find it for $.99 here.

Where this story came from:

I started this story last Saturday. I’d been talking with someone about what I would write the night before. I had thought I’d do something with ghosts, but that was about as far as I’d gotten. Hadn’t a clue when I went to bed that night, but when I woke up the next day, here this story sat. Like most stories, for me, I saw that first scene, and a couple scenes in the center, and I absolutely knew the last scene. I just had to figure out how to get there. The Disruption stone didn’t show up until I hit that part of the story.

From the blurb:

December 21st, 2012 hadn’t been the end of the world, only the Great Unraveling. The veils between the Seen and Unseen worlds shredded.

The living suddenly found out they weren’t alone.

Andy had seen it all, done it all as a detective when he’d be alive. Now, as a ghost, he still works as a PI. This time, he’s investigating a myth: a stone that could change his destiny, and open the gates of Heaven to him.

Hell By Any Other Name

(PS. Yes, I will change the formatting of my web site tomorrow so the reading experience is better. I apologize for the single column for now!)

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