Yelling at James Patterson

     If I had to name my favorite authors at the tippy top of the list by a landslide would be James Patterson.  He is indeed the master of the page turner.  I can’t really get into his suspense-thriller books, mainly because I hate not knowing who done it until the end, but I know they are awesome reads (I’ve read two of them).  I’ll tell you the books I love, his occasional romance novel and his teen series.  If you love fast paced stories then look up The Angel Series and start with The Angel Experiment.  I was hooked in the first paragraph and read it in a day.  Then he did Daniel X which my son and I absolutely love since we are huge A.I. fans (artificial intelligence=aliens fyi).  And soon after or maybe soon before we discovered his “Witch and Warlock” series…sort of a Harry Potter but way cooler because it Patterson, but I never got into those books since that’s just not my genre (not a fan of vampires either).  But that’s all me and my humble opinions in what I like and dislike as far as genre.

     So I wrote in a blog somewhere in december that I went to my local Barnes and Noble to scope out the recent reads and catch up on my literary saavy.  In the store are about 6 shelves side by side and about 5 shelves high.  There was a recent release section, books turned into movies, award winning, new fiction, new non-fiction, and JAMES PATTERSON.  Yep, he had an entire shelving untit dedicated to just Patterson books…and it was filled with recent releases, from teens to romance to drama, and I stood in awe.  It was like standing at the bottom of Everest.  I was speechless.  I think gum fell out of my mouth.  There was music playing like cherubs strumming harps.  Quite spiritual for the Barnes and Noble.

     I immediately called my boyfriend and told him I knew what my goal in life was…To have entire shelf dedicated to my writings, like Patterson.

     So a few days ago I am sitting in my living room with my mom and this commercial comes on for what looks to be some seductive new thriller movie.  It has a man kissing a girls neck and she’s all caught up in the throes of passion with heavy breathing and I’m like, “Wow.  Where’s the popcorn,” then the creepy narrator voice stops speaking and I’m thinking, “I gotta take my boyfriend to see this.” Then the narrator comes back as the music rises and a book cover flashes across the screen.  “James Patterson, Private.” And I yelled something, not even sure if there may have been a mild curse word in there, and my mom looks at me like I’m crazy (which happens quite a bit).

     I felt bad that I yelled at James (yeah, after owning at least twenty of his books I think I can safely call him James, now).  Its not his fault he’s so talented…I mean it is his fault, but he’s awesome.  So I told my mom that James (hehe) has a new book out almost every month…only two months prior was his commercia for the Witches books (sorry, not sure their true names).  Can you tell me how many novelists have commercials? I haven’t seen any other than his.  I didn’t mean to call him an obscenity, its just that I now have to make sure that my book doen’t come out when one of his new books comes out.  “Seriously, ” I wailed to the t.v., “leave some room at the top, Patterson.” 

     I’m not sure I can ever climb Everest, but I’m sure at the top of the mountain is a Patterson book waiting to be published.  I get winded just walking up my second story stairs… baby steps, I must tell myself.  Baby steps.  I had the opportunity to attend a Nicholas Sparks book signing once, but never got there.  I’m telling you all right now, if James is ever at my Barnes and Noble I will hold back no punches to be the first in that line.  Seriously, there will be kicking, gouging, and so help me if you stand in my way there may be a fast snapping groin kick.  All I want to ask is one thing, “Mr. Patterson? What’s it like at the top of Everest?”

     Happy writing my friends…and strive to reach for Everest, even if you have to start on the stairs in your home. 

Link to the trailer for Private, by James Patterson http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3Sz_RhFNMc

Trailer for my favorite book series EVER http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzNDMDej5kw&feature=related

Mount Everest

Emotional Writing

     In my book waiting to be published, “Be Still,” I mentioned before that I went through a hard day and added in two pages of my own personal emotions expressed through Travis Silver, the character.  I found that to be rather therapeutic, but also chalked it up to needing to express myself and nothing more.  So, today I will discuss how emotions play into writing, because, although I may not have noticed it before, it became a raging, blaring, red, flashing light this past weekend for me. 

     Let me start with something funny, or what I perceive as funny.  My son pointed out a shirt he wanted to buy me online which read, “don’t make me mad or I’ll kill you in my book.” We laughed so hard, because that has so much meaning in its hilarity.  I told my ex-husband the same thing once; he made me so upset thatI killed off the main character that night.  Of course it didn’t follow my story line so I revived the character the next day: No harm, no foul.  Do I have a cemetary of  “offed” characters? Abso-freaking-lutely.  W actually have a make shift small pet cemetary in my back yard: the turtle that died, a baby kitten that didn’t make it past the first few hours of life, a few finches, and a smaller red-eared glider turtle that had pneumonia.  Lots of popsicle stick crosses out back, but the roses sure do grow up nice and pretty.  So after many unfinished and finished stories, I realized I grew so close to my characters that I was going to have to start a memorial wall for the fallen hero’s and heroines of my imagination.  That’s how close they are to me, plus the fact that they lived inside my head for months.

     How does this come down to emotions and writing? I don’t know, I got off track.  Let me get back.  When I write I have to drown out the white noise around me, so I play my Itunes lists.  Usually, I listen to slow music on low volume which keeps me very zen and focused.  I tried writing to Metallica once … those poor baby bunnies never stood a chance in that chapter.  Two more popsicle crosses popped up in the backyard that night.  So for me to stay focused I must have certain things: peace, slow music, no outside distractions.  This is my harmony (homeostasis to us science nerds).  What I don’t need to is to be upset with my boyfriend, like I was this past Friday.

     Okay, so without giving details into my romantic life, let’s just say the boyfriend was, “wrong,” and I was, “right.” For the sake of the rest of my existence, lets just assume this will always be a permanent fact.  So, I came home and started pounding on the keyboard (writing with tenacity sonds better, yeah?), trying to build the back storyline of my character Ben, in the new book.  Now this is my hero, mind you.  He’s a good guy.  He survives the book, the zombie apocalypse, revelations, Dec 21, 2012…you throw it at him and Ben is a survivor.  He sings the Bionce song until the end of time.  Except for one thing… after being slightly miffed at my boyfriend, Benjamin ends up with a spork jabbed into his eye by the end of chapter two.  Yes, a spork (plastic spoon/fork combination).  Why a spork, you ask? So he can be stabbed with the pointy nubs of the fork part in the eye, but still have a spoon to actually scoop out the eyeball from it’s socket.  By the way, my very first genre of writing was scifi, horror.  It’s hard to break old habits, especially when writing under the influence of emotions.  That’s right, I am guilty of WUIE.

     Rest assured, the next day I revived Ben and his boo boo face and set things straight.  The moral of the story is, “don’t make me mad or i’ll kill you in my book.”  Happy writing people, and keep those emotions in check.

Heart and Soul

     I’m frustrated! So very frustrated.  I have a book waiting to be edited, another book I am working on, and a million ideas in my head.  On one hand, I want to move on with my new book, it is about a man who’s girlfriend breaks-up with him after about eight years, but during that eight years he helped in raising her daughter.  He was even there for the birth.  The story follows his struggles to fight for any kind of rights to continue to stay in the life of the daughter he loves as his own.  But it also follows the heartache and emotions of the eight year old who doesn’t get a say in the matter, and truly loves the man she knew as a father all those years.  It’s about the bonds we make with people, and how some bonds affect more than just two people when the ties are severed.  I’m seven chapters in, but I stopped to edit my book that I sent in for publishing.  Except, I can’t move on with that book until I get the money for the edit.  I’m in a dilema here.

     On top of all that, I have to start thinking about returning to work, which sucks.  Not because I don’t like to work, but because for a solid year, writing was my work, and I love it.  I love nursing, even though the medical system is grossly flawed; I love what nursing is supposed to be.  Okay, imagine yourself at a job you really like, then for one year you do a job you really love-yourdream job-then you go back to the job you just really like … it blows! It makes the job that you really liked seem like the worst job on earth.  I want to write.  It’s in my blood.  It’s in my head all the time, morning, noon, and night.  I stay up nights monologuing my characters.  I hear them speak, I see them move, I know how their voice sounds.  Okay, now don’t rush out to 5150 me, because it does kind of resemble schizophrenia, this I am well aware of.  But I’ve had te opportunity to meet other writers who feel the same way, so it’s not just me, or most writers suffer from writer’s psuedo-schizophrenia.  It’s awesome.  No really.  To be able to see this entire fictional world and be able to write it down for others is nothing short of amazing.  Especially when it is mystical. 

     Ther are several scenes in my book, “Be Still,” (yep, another shameless plug) where I described a world of a man in a coma and what he sees.  He is caught in a struggle in a world between life and death (this is only a part of the book, there’s more to it).  My favorite parts of the book revolve around these enchanting, mysterious, colorful scenes, because I can make them anything I want.  It’s creativity so nothing is too much or too little.  I get to share what is in my head, and that is a fabulous job, even if i sound a little whacky when talking about it.   It would be stupendous if this was what I could do for a living.  Then I could say I am living up to my fullest potential (research Maslow’s heiracrchy of life).

     I suppose I’ve teased you with what my book is about, so let me give you the inside jacket version (no, really, this is my jacket):

     Holly Rose Silver died at only 3 days old, leaving in her wake a shattered family: Shannon and Jack, her parents, and Travis, her older brother.  Shannon immediately became withdrawn from the family, harboring a dark, inner secret.  Jack committed the ultimate form of betrayal in the eyes of his son, by abandoning the family and delving into work.  Years later, to the exact day of Holly’s death, Shannon was killed by a motorist—under peculiar circumstances.

    Jack hid bleak facts of Shannon’s death from his son, the only family he had left, in an attempt to preserve her memory.  As years passed, the relationship between Jack and Travis became estranged and a new woman entered Jack’s life­­­: Dr. Christina Kriss, a young, quick witted, redhead who became a friend and confidant.

    When Jack learns he is dying, he attempts to restore the relationship with his son. As Jack struggles with living, an unlikely friendship forms between self-proclaimed archenemies, Travis and Dr. Kriss. After a serious accident, Travis finds he must make the harsh decision whether his father will survive on life support or be taken off and left to die.  Meanwhile, Jack is thrust into an enchanted world somewhere between life and death where he is reunited with his dead wife and daughter—but not everything is as spectacular as it seems.

    This emotional story follows the journey between a son seeking the truth and resolution from an absent father before it’s too late, and a father caught between living and dying, who must mend relationships on both sides while confronting his own guilty demons.

                           ****                  *****                *****              *****           *****              *****                 *****

     I like to write about the things I see around me; real struggles from real people.  Now this book isn’t based on any real person or family, but as an EMT and nurse I have been caught in the middle.  Many nurses and medical professionals will be able to relate to the nurse in this book, but so many other people can relate because we have watched a loved one die or be on the brink of death.  I wrote this to capture the point of view from family, the man dying, and a friend.  There aren’t a lot of twists and turns; it’s not a mystery or thriller, but it does have some startling aspects and truths.  I can’t tell you how much of my heart and soul is in this piece.  I can say, it was exhausting going through the rollercoaster of emotions.  And there is one part, and only one, where the son finds the truth and must battle his emotions, where I can honestly say, that is all me.  I wrote that on the day I found out horrible news; the worst news, which devastated my family.  I wasn’t facing a death of a familymember, but at one point it hurt that bad.  I pulled out my computer and found where my character discovered the truth, and in that chapter I added in two pages of denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance (research Kubler Ross stages of grief).  I personally went through them all, and what Travis (my character) felt, is exactly what I felt.  That particular chapter is very personal to me, and is very much an insight into my soul and how i felt that awful day. So I can honestly say, I poured my heart and soul into this book.  This is why I stressed out so badly about reading my review, because it was a judgement of my heart.  My next book has the same effect on me, because I have seen and lived the circumstances of my characters.

     I was once asked why I didn’t write about about Paris, New York, or exotic places.  My answer: because i haven’t been there. I can’t write things I don’t know.  What I do know is heartbreak, romantic love, motherly love, devastation, regret, remorse, sorrow, joy, delight, and hope.  These are the things I have to offer.  I can only hope that what I write will touch someone in a positive way.  My books are general fiction, but they pose questions, and if I did my job correct, I was able to give at least one answer.  So, okay, I am going to get off my soapbox now and play on Facebook.

     Thank you again to those who have followed me, or read my posts.  And to the RN who commented on one post I would like to say, thank you,  it feels amazing to finally follow my dream.  I don’t think it is too far off from nursing.  I may not be tending to medical duties, but hopefully I’m still helping mend people.

Point of View rewrite

     It’s Sunday night and I’m anxious.  I’m confused … which is first person point of view. Yay me.  I’ve spent the weekend studying points of view and my oh my there are so many: first person, second person, third person, omniscient, limited omniscient, subjective, objective … Holy cow! No wonder I went so terribly wrong in my point of view, and no wonder editor’s charge so much to correct this mistake.  I went to school for two years to be a nurse, but editor’s went to school for four or more.  You come to your own conclusion there.  So, I rewrote a total of five chapters in my book from what I believe is the third-person, omniscient, subjective point of view, but I’m certain my editor will laugh his butt off and say I’m pretty far off base.  Maybe I should have pursued my writing degree at UCLA like I once said I would.

     On a very good note, I am glad I am forced to look back at this novel, because I now see where I can interject some subtle symbolism into the story.  And big thanks to my project editor who explained all that to me in great detail.  A book is more than simple words and characters put into print for the world’s enjoyment (or the part of the world in my case that likes general fiction), it is about tantalizing a reader’s mind with subtleties so the subconscious picks up on things they didn’t realize were there.  Example: everyday Sam wears old, wrinkled khakis and a white t-shirt, this point comes up several times, then at a pinnacle in the story he is said to wear a perfectly pressed pin striped suit.  In that instance the reader would pick up that he has somehow changed, and from the looks of it, for the better.  Okay, these are the subtleties that I am working on, and there are so many places for me to sneak them in.

Insert advice: after you write your book, put it on a shelf for a week, if you can’t think of any changes then submit it, but odds are, you’ll have changes.

     Until I can come up with the money to edit I am stuck in creative writing purgatory.  Now that these errors in point of view have come to my attention, I no longer feel this book is ready for publication.  I would do myself a disservice to let it be printed so raw, and my readers wouldn’t feel the full emotion of my characters.  I also took to reading a few pages of other authors and here is what I have discovered: rules are meant to be broken when it comes to creative writing.  Also, the more famous you are the more rules you can break.  In my own defense, I am self-publishing, so I can simply tell the editor to send it in to press and ignore all the rules and advice, but I have to ask myself: Would I grow as a writer?  As someone with no schooling in writing, it is most beneficial that I at least learn the basics.  After that I can be a stubborn writer and throw the words, “creative rights,” around if I chose.  My brother laughed and told me not to give in to the man or be a sell-out, but right now is not the time for me to hold my own personal, “Occupy the Arts,” campaign.  Maybe I’ll do that later.

     I find out tomorrow if I get the money to continue with developmental edit, but I also found some great grants out there so I will look into those, too.  I was told if this was something I really wanted to do then I would look for the funding until I had it.  Right now I feel like a pregnant mother ready to give birth and there are no freaking hospitals around to do it!!! Come on people, even Mary was offered a stable.  I have a book to give birth to and in my own opinion it is Awe-some.  Insert shameless plug for, “Be Still,” by Tania L Ramos… Anyway, I’m anxiously awaiting the birth of my book and hopefully the start of a new career.  Until then, I will continue to learn and find ways to raise the money to see this dream through.  I’m still looking into this ad thing.  I think it has real merit.  More tomorrow on whether or not I am still stuck in limbo, which, by the way, is part of the basis of my book in a fictional perspective and different scenario, of course.  Just a little morsel to give to the masses, or the two people who have followed this blog.  Thank you for reading.

Advertising in my book

     Today has been an insane day, between juggling the swapping of kids, and trying to locate my brother, I am exhausted.  I had an indepth conversation with my boyfirend about how to pay for this publishing thing.  We have one credit card left-living in California has some pitfalls, money matters is one of them-and that card might have enough to pay for this editing I have to go through.  This card is one of the highest interest rate cards I have, this is why it is empty. at 24.99%, by the time I pay this card my publsihing deal would have cost nearly twice as much.  Of course it is all worth it if i’m one of those lucky few who make it big, but what if i don’t? Then I put my family deeper into debt, which is something I haven’t been in since my early twenties.  I’ve prided myself on my clean credit record and A+, credit rating. Heck I was an 801 back in January of this year, but after the divorce and a major dispute with a huge timeshare, my credit dropped to 645. Wow! In january the timeshare asked if i wanted to buy an island, last month my BofA card dropped my credit limit.  What a diffierence a year makes, right? For the most part it was paying out for crooked attorneys that burst the finance bubble, that combined with no overtime made for a red numbers year.

     The best I can hope for is to be fired when I return to work. Sounds strange, huh? But the truth is, being fired will save my behind.  I can collect my 401K, which is quickly dwindling due to the powers that be (already lost $3k this year  alone), and I can pay my credit cards and be back in the black. I won’t come out ahead, but i’d rather be at a zero bottom line than a negative.  As for retirment, well … what good is money when the dollar dies? Ok, so I still have lots of years to rebuild that retirement nest egg.

     Back to the topic at hand: to debt or not to debt? I’m still contemplating. I tried my hand at a one chapter rewrite and although it is possible, it is very hard, and i think i’m missing some concenpts.  Having this help would be a great service for my future writting.  I’m trying to think of it as a crash course in writing.  I mean that was the cost of one year in college, so i can’t complain.  Okay, so i am going to look into grants, but I had an insane epiphany, too: adevrtising in my book. I mean is that a sell-out? Is it even possible. I mention a Coca-Cola product inmy book, in good review and nature, so is it feesble to get Coke to sponsor the book, maybe have a small ad on the last page? Magazines do it all the time, right? Is it worth Coca-Cola paying, say $4k to put an ad in a book that can potentially reach millions (dream big, right), and will remain in that book unless the page or book is destroyed.  Any takers? Anyone want to place an ad in my book? I think it could work.