Dark and Stormy Night Publishing

I just want to say that I am so proud of Sean for finally working on my new blog and getting it to look like an actual blog--although not anything like the finished product. In light of these actions, i'd also like to officially announce that Sean is making me a new blog that should be up and running by October, and I will be moving over there as soon as I can. In case you were wondering the difference, this one is going to be on wordpress, and since it is coded by Sean it means I can do lots of extra stuff that I haven't been doing on here--hopefully. I have grand plans for it, including book reviews, tidbits of my writing, things that I learn about writing from my own experience and from others, a list of books that I plan to read, and perhaps occasionally anecdotes from my authors at work. But more on that later!

Teaser Two!

One of my failed attempts to start this story. I got stuck here and realized that it was not going in the right direction.

Bracken Carnegie. Not much thought went into that name. Bracken, a type of fern. Also the name of my mother’s grandfather, who was a lord of something or other in England. Carnegie, my father’s surname, of course. Passed down from the unknown generations. We’re said to be cousins to the famous Andrew Carnegie, the steel guy, and that’s why we’re rich, but not as rich as he was. And that’s all there is. No middle name, no nicknames, nothing. Just Bracken Carnegie. My parents consistently told me that their expectation of me were very low. Everybody else in their family had already done everything impressive. All I had to do to make them happy was play the violin like an angel, attend Harvard or Oxford, and marry a Kennedy.
Harder than it sounds.

NaNoWriMo 2010 teaser

"She had told me, three months ago, that she could breathe underwater, and I had believed her. But now, waiting for her among the cattails, glancing at my watch every two seconds, I realized that I hadn’t, not really. Despite the years of repression, my hero instincts wanted to take over. My heels kept lifting off the ground, allowing me to peer into the murky brown water, wanting to save her. Needing to save her. She had done so much for me, and now, here I was, still standing helplessly by. She told me to trust her, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to protect her. Why didn’t she ever need protecting?"

This isn't going to make it into the final draft, because I decided that the time frame for the story is going to be restricted to before he met Rahab, but I did this as a little pre-writing to get into Bracken's head. (Also I decided to make the story 3rd person.) Only 42 days until NaNoWriMo...

NaNoWriMo 2010 goals

So I feel much better now that I've chosen what project to work on for November 2010. And what project is that, might you ask?
Bracken's novel! Something I've always wanted to write, but never really sure how to. I didn't know whether I should basically re-write Into the Flames from Bracken's perspective (chose not to do that as soon as Midnight Sun came around), write about his childhood, or about his relationship with Rahab after the events in Into the Flames. Well, I still am not completely sure of the answer to this, but I do know that I feel I have a very solid opening scene, set a few months before he meets Rahab. The craziness of NaNoWriMo will hopefully drive the plot along. I mean, it's not like I have nothing to work with, I basically know everything about Bracken's life, it's just deciding which part of his life to document, and in what way. First person, or third person? Retrospectively (since we all know what's going to happen) or from a more active stand-point? Any suggestions along these lines would be welcome. But I'm just glad I know who my specimen is going to be for this year! *sigh of relief*

Now excuse me while I go update my nano profile.

Non-fiction works at Tate

You know it's going to be a bad day when you have to read this:
The practice of students dropping out and re-enrolling in high school or General Educational Development (GED) programs has recently gained the interest of researchers, public officials, and school administrators due to the low academic achievement of high school students across the nation (Berliner, 1).

Then you force yourself to get through 7,000 words of this:
Zechariah’s second and third visions are closely tied together. In them, God is still dealing with the Gentile nations. He is still “sore displeased” with them because they have “helped forward (increase) the affliction” of his people. Zechariah sees the four empires (“four horns”) which have increased the affliction; and then he sees the “four carpenters,” which represent God’s power (and method) of destroying these four empires. The Lord says that the carpenters have “come to fray them, to cast out the horns [power] of the Gentiles, which lifted up their horn [power] over the land of Judah to scatter it” (Zech. 1:21).

Only to find that what you've been waiting to "reward" yourself with later is this:
The book explores how a company can successfully alter its strategic policies and organizational methods in response to or anticipation of environmental changes without provoking instability or increasing the undue stress experienced by people.

**Copyright 2010 Tate Publishing and/or their authors.**

Ode to September

A new month means:
A new set of books to read at Tate.
A new book to review for the Consortium.
My birthday is almost here!
Bouquets of freshly-sharpened pencils.
Sneakers with shiny white shoe-laces.
It is almost not summer anymore!