Good morning! Yesterday, I didn't do much of anything, but I recieved something that made my heart thud. It was from such an unexpected direction that I still can only be grateful.

My daughter read part of my wip. She hated it, but still, she says I taught her what she knows. She's angry because I seem to have tossed everything I know about writing out the window. She's right. I did. I focussed on the story, kept my overly critical brain out of the loop, and kept moving forward. That did manage to get words on the page, but now I'm having a devil of a time with the re-write.

The most fantastical part of this is the amount of enthusiasm my daughter brings to her thoughts. She likes the story, just not the way I'm working it. So, she wants to help on a more permanent basis. I do, though, have to keep in mind that she's a busy kid, with a kid of her own and one on the way. She's paused now, won't begin school again until fall, so I have a couple of months to figure out how to entertain her with the writing.

I know having family members critique is usually not something one really wants to rely on. They tend to tell you nice things, candy coat it and never mention that the idiotic thing bored them to tears. However, my daughter will tell me what's wrong. She's proven that already, so I'm going to just be happy.

For four years, I think (not sure, my time sense is pretty screwed up) I had no internet, no writing group, nothing but the whirls of thought in my head. For a while, I gave up writing altogether. I had an invalid husband to care for, and two kids, and a granddaughter on the way for half that time, and before that, I was lost in a fog. Not sure what I needed at that point, but I was extreemly depressed, frightened of life, and I think huddling in my home and not dealing with anything helped.

But that's not who or what I am. I've come out of the shell again. Writing began a few months ago, and I've been fairly steady since then.

And my daughter made me cry last night. Not a bad cry, especially since I tend to weep at the drop of a hat, but a good one, a relieved one. Someone noticed how I struggled, the problems I had, and responded rather than walking away. It does make one feel appreciated, loved, and otherwise cared about.

She said she knew how much writing meant to me, and she'd been worried about me since I stopped. Now that I've resumed, she's worried I'll stop again. She wants to help, and wants to read my work for personal reasons as well.

Then, on top of all of it, my mother said she wanted to read the thing. Coulda knocked me over with a feather. Ma doesn't really like fantasy, or anything that treats good and evil with too broad of a stroke. She's never been unkind about my writing, but she's never gone out of her way to say she wants to read it. Okay, so now I have to do more than write ahead. I have to make it worth reading.

The entirety of life is merely a search for approval, I think. First, we want to please Mom and Dad, who are the only humans we really know at that age. Then, we want to please teachers and friends, and then only friends as we hit teen age. Friends stay the focus, I think, until later. And mixed in there, some of us want approval from God, from other authority figures, etc. Then, at the end of life, we still haven't gotten everything we want, the approval was either for things that don't matter to us, or it was muted or non-existent. And, no matter how loving our parents, our friends, our co-workers, or even our God, it is never enough.

Life isn't futile, I tell myself. It's always a work in progress, and we still might figure out how to force ourselves to approve of our own lives, which is really the answer to all of it.

Okay, lesson done for the day. I think I'll go write something.

Just keep writing.

Good Morning! I have to go places this morning, so things are going to get a little crazy in an hour. But, again, balancing life means priorities. I think groceries are above my writing -- at least when the frige is empty.

Yesterday's thoughts did give me an answer. Maybe not the right answer, but a direction anyway.

I did, however, give my daughter the text I have from my WIP. She might read it. She's got a busy life, with her little one and a half year old, a boyfriend, and all her own priorities. I am proud of her, though. She's managed to find herself through everything she's going through. I think she's making a difference in the world. Not as if she was on the fast track to making a lot of money, but by being the best mom she can be in spite of some truly difficult things that are happening to her.

While shopping today, I'm going to be looking at people. This is what I mean by balance, as well. If you never see people out in the real world, how can you hope to write about a real type character. Yes, I do take a small notebook with me. I jot down things so I remember them. (I have a swiss cheese mind -- holes in it.)

Things to look at while shopping -- people and how they react to things. Feelings of my own. Watching the people I'm with and noting reactions or gestures. And then there are the new people, interesting people. Sometimes I see them and a story to go with them pops up in my head. Like the guy who sits on the corner of the street with the sign -- WILL WORK FOR FOOD. There's a huge story in that, and I have some of it already.

I did it yesterday, though. I moved a fountain top on my waterfall, after restructuring the fall. My back went, I got stuck, and had to call my son to help. There are times I feel so helpless. I'm all right now, but the rest of yesterday was shot. But even that, you see, is fodder for a character. The kind of pain, the feeling of helplessness, and the fear that I might not be able to ever get up. Above it all -- anger that this happens when I'm just trying to take care of things.

Also, although it doesn't really have much to do with writing, the things that happen tend to help me understand other people, thus making relationships easier. It's always been easy to put myself into other people's shoes, and I think this exploration of how I would feel if I was them helps me all the way around -- writing and living.

Well, on with the morning. I'm sure I'll find something to inspire me out in the world.

Just keep writing.

What interests a reader enough in the beginning of a book that he will continue reading? I know, most books, even the simplest, are difficult to get into. At least, that’s the problem I’ve had all my life in reading. The Stand, which has since become my favorite novel, took me three tries to get beyond three chapters. My persistence paid off, but most human beings are not as doggedly persistent as I am.

The most trite and pat answer to that is to create a hook to grab the reader. But just what is a hook, and how does it grab a reader?

In my own researches, a hook is merely a huge conflict from which to extricate the protagonist. I’ve been accused of starting a story in the middle, jumping headlong into it without thought of what went before, forcing the reader to catch up to what’s going on. Okay. So start anywhere before that and I’m accused of creating nothing but an info dump. (Which is telling the reader all the information he needs to understand the current crisis. Long ago, this is the way a lot of books began. It’s fallen out of favor, and is now considered boring and unnecessary.)

The problem, I guess, is how do I know my story isn’t trite or just plain stupid? It interests me, but do I really have a brain? It comes down to – do I really have anything interesting to say? I’m getting older, and the readership is getting younger. The world moves far faster now than it used to, and I feel like I’m sitting on my porch – just watching and wondering how these people have so much energy.

All right, ask that question of myself as if someone else asked it. How do I know my story is worthwhile? I’d tell the aspiring author that all stories are worthwhile. If it interests you, then it will interest another. All human beings have the same kinds of feelings. Concentrate on those. Find the things that connect you with the rest of the world and include those things. Love, friendship, anger, sorrow… All feelings.

A story is always about a person, not a thing. It may revolve around a thing, but the story is always about how a person reacts to that thing. So the character is the story, not the crisis the character has to overcome.

Ah, I’m starting to think again. It’s morning, and I’ve only gotten to my second cup of coffee, so I’m a bit slow, perhaps.

The character has to be someone the reader likes and wants to see overcome the crisis. What helps a reader to like the character? Not that the character is beautiful or smart. The reader will like someone who is just as flawed as the reader is. Someone beautiful might make the reader feel jealous or insecure, promoting not attraction, but its opposite. Someone portrayed as smart and beautiful would make me think the writer is just doing some wish fulfillment.

The character has to have self-doubt, just as everyone on earth has. The character must have imperfections.

Not that the character needs to be ugly and stupid in order to win over a reader. The character needs to balance those things out and be, perhaps, beautiful to others, but sees all her imperfections in the mirror rather than her good points. Smart characters need to know how much they don’t know. Golden hair and sky-blue eyes do not beauty make. The internal view has to be different than the outside one. A character who seems smug and pompous on the outside might really be insecure and frightened on the inside. Get to know your character.

Okay, so what has all that got to do with the hook?

A hook, since it’s merely setting the character into a conflict that needs resolution, is to find something in the story the character needs to overcome in order to reach the goal, the end of the story. In that first scene, the conflict has to be unsolvable. It has to force the character to take some action or the consequences will be unlivable. Then put yourself in the character’s head. Find out all the reasons why this is such a large problem. Find out while the problem whirls around the character, and make the flaws in the character responsible for not being able to solve the issue.

That sounds pretty pat, easy, and otherwise obvious. Why, then, do I have such trouble doing it?

Just keep writing.

Today I must mow lawns, trim edges, plant a mandavilla that's been sitting on my porch since Friday, and otherwise deal with the real side of the universe. While this sometimes makes me a bit insane if I'm working on something, it's also good for me.

Balance is all. Balance real with imaginary, otherwise there isn't anything in the imagination from which to draw. Live, and then write. Then live again. Work, play, and sleep. If a writer gets too caught up in writing, he just might miss the next inspiration.

I have to keep reminding myself of that.

With that said, I always take the morning to deal with writing, even if I don't put a single word of text on the screen. I find that waking to write makes it easier to get out of bed in the morning. So, coffee and cig in hand, I turn on the computer, check emails, and anything I've put up for crit, and then think a bit about whatever that inspires.

I don't work to music, but to the silence morning engenders in my home. I used to work to music. I wonder why that changed?

If I spend the afternoon at the computer, I mix in some housework, and critiques to do for others, and then concentrate on my project. If this lasts into the evening, I usually have so much written I know it's going to be bad. I do try to get off the computer before I feed my family and spend the evening with them, but sometimes I'm just too caught up in the world in my head. It's difficult to maintain balance.

Just keep writing.

Anyone watch American Idol? Simon is my hero. He tells it like it is. I, though, cannot do that. I'm bound by some kind of 'be nice' ethic that won't let me tell people not to quit their day job.

I did a few critiques today, returning the favors others do for me. I see things that are good, and things that really, really don't work. I wonder, sometimes, if these people actually listen to crits or if they merely want the candy-coated stuff like -- "I LOVE YOUR WORK!"

Ugh.

Personally, I do manage to feel bad when my work is hammered, but I do my level best to overlook the protective need to strike back. It might take me a day or three, but I'm a rational adult who knows I've asked for it.

If you put your work out there for critique, don't be surprised if someone actually tells you what's wrong with it.

Okay, I feel bad. I read a piece today that was, well, written by someone who has no idea what a story should contain. Passives all over the place. Description to yawn through. And the story? It was there under all the rubbish, but I had to piece through to find it. My inner Simon is screaming for attention, but I remained civil. I remained encouraging. I did NOT mention that, if I was a publisher, I'd toss it in the circular file after the first paragraph.

And then I looked at my own work, saw it from Simon's eyes, and practically wept. All right, the pot calling the kettle black. Aren't I just the bomb.

So I will continue to be nice, pleasant, and encouraging, because who knows? I might teach someone something in a manner they might hear.

Keep on writing...