Now having written a novel, several short stories, and being in the middle of two more novels, I have figured out that I am not really a pantser when it comes to writing. I don’t think I am a true outliner, either. For those of you who don’t know, a pantser just starts writing and sees where the story takes them. I did that with my first novel, up until the point that timelines and locations and descriptions all got too complicated. I had to start taking notes and planning ahead.

My biggest difficulty came with where to take the notes. A spreadsheet? Notes in each chapter that I would carry over and revise as I went along? A notebook? A book like “The Complete Novel Plotting Workbook” by Weston Elliott? Which is very good, by the way.

I have heard that some people use index cards on a wall, or lots of sticky-notes. Being able to re-order scenes is very appealing to me, but I have never tried it. It seemed too cumbersome. With less-than-readable handwriting, I would rather stick to electronic means. Still, I really would like to try the card method.

Scrivener has saved me. I don’t have to mess with paper. It allows me to reorder scenes as much as I want, mark scenes according to their progress (draft, second revision, final, etc), and keep everything in one place. And, since I save the files into my Dropbox account, I can access them anywhere. (Yes, I am doing backups locally should the Dropbox folks vanish from the face of the earth.) You get to do custom labels too, and organize your files and folders any way you wish.

One of the coolest features: Research. I can take a long URL to a specific picture or place on a website, drop it into a Scrivener note, and click on the link to bring up the page. Or copy the page entirely and paste it in as a document for off-line access. Or, let Scrivener do it for you: it accepts PDFs, images, and websites as media imports. I think it will even embed youtube clips. I’ll have to try that…

If you have never checked it out, I would suggest you take a look. Scrivener is made for Linux (what I run), Windows, and Mac-OS.

I may yet get an agent for a future project. I may yet find a national audience for the things I write.

But if I do, they are going to have to take me as I am.

I like to write RELIGIOUS fiction. I like to talk about my beliefs on this blog. I like to talk occasionally about politics.

Will that keep me from getting a national contract? Maybe. Maybe not.

But this much I know: There is a fire growing within me. A desire to express the way I feel about world conditions, about my faith, and about things which are important to me as a Christian. And I don’t think I can pull punches anymore. I have been too quiet. Perhaps I have been too afraid of what I might say, and that my words my close doors of financial opportunity to me somewhere down the road.

Maybe that is true. But you know, I don’t care anymore. I don’t care about the prospects of money and fame. I DO care about a great many other things, however. I care about who I am.

Who am I?

I am a believer in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, the Messiah, the Redeemer, and our Advocate with the Eternal Father. I am Christian.

I am also a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I am a Mormon. I hope that I am never, ever labeled as one of those wishy-washy, can’t-make-up-his-mind Mormons like Jon Huntsman Junior. I don’t understand why he can’t seem to answer the question in an un-equivocal way. Either he is Mormon, or he ain’t. Step up to the plate, buddy.

I am very conservative–politically, and in my religious and moral beliefs. I believe the Second Amendment is my personal right to bear arms and defend my family. I believe in the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman. I believe in the rights of religious freedom, and freedom of speech.

I believe in people taking responsibility for their actions. I don’t believe that freedom of speech gives a person the right to injure other people.

I believe in being trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent. Yes, I am an Eagle Scout. I earned that award, the “On My Honor” award, and the “Duty to God” award. I believe that program helped me to become the man I am today.

I fully support our troops. I am patriotic. I am forever grateful for the sacrifice of those who gave their all so that I might enjoy the freedoms which I have.

I love my family. They are dear to me, and the greatest treasure I have now and in the eternities.

That is who I am. Or at least, who I strive to be. I hope that I may continue to strive for that excellence.

And if there are readers out there who think it’s not appropriate to be so direct about beliefs and politics and such on a writer’s blog, all I can say is that I respectfully disagree with you. I want the world to get the same ME, whether online, or in person. God gave me the gifts which I have. I suspect that He has not raised me up to be ME so that I can hide in a corner, afraid of what people might think if I open my mouth and share what I believe. If you read my writings–short-stories or novel–you are going to see these beliefs come out in the words on the page. I can’t help it. And in fact, I think you can tell a lot about a person by reading what they write.

Around here, you’re going to get the real me. It’s who I am. I hope that means we can still be friends.

The three days have given me some time to reflect on my writing projects. And the jury is still out.

Do I finish the second book in The Chronicles of Gan right now? It’s currently at about 55 thousand words. Or, do I switch gears, and work on the project which I intend to submit to the national scene once I get it done? I am so conflicted.

I did learn from David Wolverton (a.k.a. David Farland), that I need to get some exercise and get up earlier. And not eat junk. Only a little guilt there. Well, perhaps a lot of guilt.

I have been so incredibly busy. New job, new assignment at church, getting ready to move . . . I have to figure out how to balance family/work/church/writing.

HOW MANY people out there really want to see the sequel to THE THORN? That project is dear to my heart. I WILL finish it. I just don’t know when. Do I simply jump in and get the thing done? Or do I work on it after I have my national-bound project out to agents?

OR . . . do I just forget the whole publishing dream? Let’s be honest here, the publishing industry is a LOT of work, and most of it has nothing to do with writing at all. Besides, I didn’t start this journey just so I could be a rich and famous national author. I started it because I wanted to write. At the moment, I don’t seem to have a lot of time to do the thing that I love.

I need to find the time to write!

Held on Thursday, Friday, and again today, it’s a bargain as far as writers conferences go. It only cost me 20 bucks plus my meals for the three days (I registered early).

I plan on making it a yearly occasion, and next year, I hope to take Marny Parkin’s up on her offer to participate as a panelist. Perhaps I will actually have something to say by then.

Here are some highlights from my experience for those of you who don’t do twitter:

“Jealousy is important in this business. Let it make you ambitious.” –@jamesdashner #LTUE

“@ElanaJ Come find me when you get here. We’ll talk about Life, The Universe, Everything, and Bacon”

Larry Correia: “In real life, human beings do not have hit points. They have blood pressure.” #LTUE

idea: Rather than threaten w/”Be nice to me or I’ll make you a villian in my book”, say “I’ll put you in my dystopian. Everybody dies.” –@DaronFraley

I once heard @David_JWest joke about making his novel disclaimer say: “Except for BLANK, every one of these jerks is real.” #LTUE

“Post apocalyptic; Like Hunger Games & The Giver; some kissing.” — @ElanaJ about POSSESSION #LTUE

“Horror is one of the most moral of the genres: the wicked are punished.” — @johncleaver #LTUE

@scatteredjules: fav #ltue quote: All fiction is lying. Our job, as authors, is to make the lie plausable.

Accckk. Somebody in the Short Story session just farted. It wasn’t me. #LTUE

@taffylovell: People! Just because you’re @#LTUE doesn’t mean you should smell like science fiction!

One of the draws to YA for adult readers is the combination of the clean read and the internal conflict (paraphrased) –@jscottsavage #LTUE

“To figure out YA voice, go hang out at the High School. No . . . wait. Don’t. Creepy.” –@ElanaJ #LTUE

@luannstaheli I was thinking of having him autograph my kindle. With a silver permanent marker. @robisonwells

Good conversation about staying healthy as a writer/artist. No matter what the panelists say, I still feel guilty. I need chocolate. #LTUE

***

There you have it. Sampled favorites from the three days. I hope you had as much fun (and got as much education) as I did.

Just a quick note for you folks looking for work: All three recruiters found me on LinkedIn. If you are looking for a job in a professional field, and you aren’t using it, you are missing out. Although my new job didn’t originate with the site, when I was hired at Cisco Systems, the opportunity came from there!

I am very excited for the new position (Senior Data Center Engineer) at Cache Valley Electric. Their office is an easy commute away from home. And I get to play with more toys than before. Who wants to play with just servers when you can also play with networks and storage and software too?

Anyway, let’s get to the point of this post. I noticed something about this whole process in relation to my writing. When all of the attention started to come, my creativity faucet began to flow. The week before, it had been more of a drip, not quite shut off. And maybe the desire to write also has something to do with feeling better.

Last night I had some breakthrough character development ideas for Heaven’s Garden, and I took a lot of notes. I even wrote the beginning to a crucial scene in the book. Villains are great fun to write. And one in particular, especially since I have permission to loosely base the character on a friend of mine, David J. West. I’ll take all his best traits, promise. I warn you, however, he calls himself a rogue. His literary twin, also named David, will be a true scoundrel.

I certainly hope this creativity trend continues. I’d like to get this sequel done sometime this century. I haven’t looked recently, but I am over 50,000 words. Just about 35-40k to go. Too bad I don’t have a nice relaxing month scheduled in St. Thomas, or Hawaii, or somewhere. Then I’d be done, right?

Oh, one more thing, since I used milestone in the title: The Thorn recently hit 500 downloads at Smashwords. That was done in just over a month. I don’t know what the rate was at Barnes & Noble was. The Nook Store report comes out about once a month.  Did you know it was free? I have my reasons for doing that. Just trust me on this one. Did you download it and read it? If so, I’d love to hear from you.

Here is a bigger question: If you did download the free ebook, and you liked it, did you tell your friends and family?

Help me spread the word!

One more one-more-thing: I get to go to LTUE this year!! I linked to the schedule so you can see why this is a big deal. The past two years, work has gotten in the way. I’ll be there all three days. If you’re going, find me! It would be fun to chat.

Dearly Departed by Tristi Pinkston

The Upside of Down by Rebecca Talley

Bumpy Landings by Donald J. Carey

We will be signing books at the following places and times:

Saturday, Jan. 15th
11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.
The Book Table
29 South Main
Logan, UT 84321
(435) 752-3055
_____________

Saturday, Jan. 15th
3:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Wisebird Bookery
4850 Harrison Blvd # 5
Ogden, UT 84403
(801) 479-8880

If you are in the area, please come by and see us!

Straitjacket - courtesy of Marc NL

Yeah. I stinketh as a blogger: Occasional. Intermittent. Haphazard. All of those being circumlocutory descriptions of what I do with this bloggy thing.

But here’s the scoop:  I am trying to clear some things from my plate. For example, I have been reading blogs at lighting speed. Which pretty much means that in Google Reader I click on the post, see if there are any pretty pictures, then move on to the next one. All except for posts by Rob Wells or Marion Jensen. They are both certifiably crazy, and since I seem to be heading in that direction myself, I am curious as to how they are getting through life while wearing one of those fancy white shirts with long sleeves and shiny buckles. Oh . . . and that uncomfortable strap that wraps . . . is cinched . . .  OY!

(shudder)

Anyway, as I was saying, I am trying to clear things from my plate. So far it hasn’t worked really well. But would you call this progress?:

1. Today, while stuck in a lobby behind security doors and waiting on a customer to come fetch me into their inner sanctum, I spied something on window shelf that caught my eye. It was a decorative orrery. No planets marked. Just a bunch (9 to be exact) of movable rings around a central sphere, all mounted on a pedestal like a globe. And a very nice copper finish. It immediately got my mind racing. And in less than ten minutes, I significantly planned out some characterization ideas for a major new character in Heaven’s Garden.

2. Yes, that means I am writing again. Thanks for asking. In fact, I am almost half way done with the first draft. I fully plan on being done before the Christmas holiday. Some people are going to do the NaNo thing. I am going to keep going on this one. I have GOT to get it done.

3. And since we are talking about writing, I wanted to spotlight a new website by a dear friend of mine. And editor. And all around funny-bone tickler: Tristi. If you have ever wanted to be a writer, but just didn’t know how to get started, she is the writing instructor for you. Affordable. Smart. And she will have you in stitches (not the emergency room kind).

4. Last, but not least: THE THORN is now in the Kindle Store along with WATER, my short anthology. THE THORN print edition is linked to the Kindle edition as of last night. I was going to wait for Smashwords to get their system updated to push the books to the Kindles store, but decided that: A. I didn’t want to wait. B. I needed the experience of reworking the layout. SO… I reformatted the entire book in HTML. And learned how to place TOC links. And insert the cover art. I used the following tools to get it done:

a. Exported the DOC from WORD as an HTML file (the one that says Filtered).
b. Cleaned the HTML file up in OpenOffice by creating all of my paragraph styles and applying them where needed.
c. Opened the file in gedit for Linux. Did some fancy search-and-replace things on it.
d. Opened the file in vi to better see the file with syntax highlighting. Fixed other things while I was there.
e. Re-opened the file in gedit and finished up some inserts of TOC links, page breaks, the cover image, etc.
f. Checked the file in a browser, fixed a few more items, then uploaded the file to the Amazon DTP site.

Yeah. I’m a geek. But now I know the process. HTML knocked on the door. I opened and conquered.

5. I am also embarking on a super secret project with two other authors. Nope. Can’t tell you. You don’t have a high enough security clearance.

So, there you have it. I will be around occasionally. But next time you wonder where my blog posts have gone, just think of how much you are going to enjoy reading Heaven’s Garden when I am done with it.

Shameless Plug: Books only get considered for the Whitney Awards if they receive 5 nominations. If you loved THE THORN, have you nominated it yet?

Powerful words for the day: circumlocutory, certifiably, cinched, orrery, vi, nomination. Learn them all, you must. Use the words, you will. Especially the last one.

And I love it. Fall is my favorite season. I realize we still have 20 official days of summer, but I am ready for the change. Cool nights and apple cider, red, orange, and yellow trees, and pumpkin pie, cinnamon and nutmeg. OK. So, its really about the food. Nevertheless, the season invigorates me.

I haven’t felt much like blogging this summer. It has been a tough couple of months. But I think things are back on the upswing, so I thought I would spend a moment and let you all know what I am up to.

First of all, I have started writing again. I needed a break this summer. Or, at least that’s what I am telling myself. Truth is, I didn’t feel like writing. But I AM going to get Heaven’s Garden done by the end of the year. My goal is the end of November (NaNoWriMo should help with that). I must do it! I plan to release HG sometime this spring, and I need to get the manuscript in the editor’s hands for a few months before we can get it ready for typesetting. All that takes time.

Second, it’s not like I completely wasted my time over the last few weeks. I worked really hard on the artwork for my covers, and finished the first one, The Thorn, which you have seen.  The second one, Heaven’s Garden, will be posted up soon for your comments. Like the cover I did for The Thorn, it has a similar theme and font usage, etc, but a different background, and the font colors are greens, and it has a glow-stone lantern on the cover. The kind of lantern that Pekah makes. If you have read the first book, you’ll remember that near the end of the story, he takes on a job as an apprentice tin-smith. If you haven’t read the story, that tidbit shouldn’t ruin anything for you.

Third, I am about to get back into a schedule of doing book signings. In fact, the next one is on Saturday, September 11, 2010 at Eborn Books in Provo. The address for that signing is listed in both my sidebar and the main page of my website (click on HOME in the menu). It will be a 4 hour signing with fellow authors and friends Tristi Pinkston and David J. West. We are planning on having some cool drawings every hour, refreshments, and of course, our books. We would love to have you stop by and say hello.

That pretty much wraps things up for the moment. Go get yourself a cup of hot cider!

***

photo courtesy of Edal Anton Lefterov

Thanks for taking the time to look.  Let me know what you think!

One came from a twitter friend @duane_scott. He is a co-founder of “The Authentic Blogger”, a popular group of bloggers on Facebook. If you have a blog you would like to share with the group, they are open to new members. Contact either Duane or Dawn if you are interested.

I have been greatly impressed with Duane ever since I started reading his blog sometime last year. He is truly authentic, his blog full of introspection and uplifting thoughts, inspiring readers to develop a relationship with God. I highly recommend you follow his very well written blog. You can read his review of The Thorn here.

The other review came from fellow Valor Publishing author Andrea Pearson, author of the soon to be released YA Fantasy book, The Key of Kilenya. She is a hoot to talk to on twitter, so you might want to check out her profile and follow her: @andreapearson2. You can read her review of The Thorn, here. If you would like to know a little bit more about Andrea, I recently did an interview with her.

Have a great weekend!