Blog - Page 75 of 83 - Memoirs of an Imp of the Perverse

Mar

2011

>Back.

>Okay, I’ve been bad.

Well, I suppose that goes without saying, really. But I mean I’ve been lax about keeping the blog up. I haven’t posted anything since the shuttle launch, and Discovery came home last week.

I have been writing. I’m working on Sable Locks, and making inroads. Except now I’m at the hard chapter — the Flashback chapter. The chapter where we have a sixteen-year-old being emotionally and physically abused by someone who didn’t start out as a psychopath, but seems to have turned into one.

This is a very hard chapter to write, and not just because I have to keep it out of the “he’s legal for his time period” gray area. I don’t know of ANY erotica publishers who will run with a sexually abusive relationship between a sixteen-year-old and a seventeen-year-old that starts out with manipulation and goes straight into dub-con and torture.

And no, I really don’t want to know where the darkness in my skull comes from. I don’t. I’m not looking, and I suggest you don’t look too closely either. I’m a nice person. Really.

So, I’m writing, and the novel is over 50,000 words now (I have to update the ticky box). But this one chapter might drive me nuts before I’m done with it.

However, once I’ve finished it, the rest of the book will be smooth sailing.

Feb

2011

>So, what did you do yesterday, Liz?

>Oh, not much.

Needless to say, there was NO writing done.

Feb

2011

>Signal Boost: Dear GOP – You are killing people!

>Originally posted by LJ User acelightning at Signal Boost: Dear GOP – You are killing people!

Passed along from many people – original post by LJ User suricattus. (Laura Anne Gillman) .
This is not MY personal story… that will come later.

There is a move afoot in the nation -driven by the GOP – to repeal the new health care laws, to protect corporate interests, to defend against fear-mongering (and stupid) cries of “socialism!”, and to ensure that people are forced to choose between keeping a roof over their heads or getting necessary health care.

This movement is killing people.

Think I’m overstating the fact?

Ask the friends and family of writer/reviewer Melissa Mia Hall, who died of a heart attack last week because she was so terrified of medical bills, she didn’t go see a doctor who could have saved her life.

One person. Not the only one. That could have been me. Yeah, I have access to insurance — I live in New York City, which is freelancer-friendly, and have access to freelancer advocacy groups. Through them, I can pay over $400/month ($5,760/year) as a single, healthy woman, so that if I go to the hospital I’m not driven to bankruptcy. But a doctor’s appointment – a routine physical – can still cost me several hundred dollars each visit. So unless something’s terribly wrong? I won’t go.

Someone who lives in a state where there is no Freelancer’s Guild or MediaBistro to put together an insurance plan for freelancers? Someone who has been laid off or downsized, and can barely make ends meet? SoL.

That could be you. That could be your best friend. That could be someone you’ve never met. That could be any of us – because there are people out there who think that taking care their neighbor is someone else’s problem.

No. It’s our responsibility. All of us, together. As a nation.

EtA: Nobody is trying to put insurance companies out of business. They will always be able to offer a better plan for a premium. We simply want to ensure that every citizen – from infant to senior citizen – doesn’t have to choose between medical care, and keeping a roof over their heads, or having enough to eat.

We’re trying to get this to go viral. Pass it along:

This entry was originally posted at http://acelightning.dreamwidth.org/136573.html.

Jan

2011

>25 years

Jan

2011

The dreaded list

>Yep, it’s time for the To-Do list. The first three on that “To Write” list seem to be getting done simultaneously. When Steven doesn’t want to talk to me, William or Tarjiaan do. (Which is nice, because Tarjiaan hasn’t wanted to talk to me at ALL in almost a year. I’ve been driving poor Danielle nuts with anticipation.)

To Revise:

Fools Rush In. (was Fool’s Gold. Technically, this one is already spoken for.Yes, that does mean I sold it. But there might be another revision before it gets put to bed.

To Write:

House of Sable Locks (novel, in progress — second priority)
Drum Mage (Bumped up in priority since “The Hand You’re Dealt” came out)
Sea Prince (To be written with Danielle Jones)
Wanderer’s Moon (next book in the Midnight Moon series.)

To Outline

Coral Throne (sequel to Sea Prince)
Hidden Things (Mystere Book 1)
Mystere Book 2 (which hasn’t given up the title yet and may turn into book 3 and A&L will be book 2)
Ashes and Light (Mystere Book 3)
Tablets of Stone (Mystere Book 4)
Tales from the Arena

To Sell

Nomad’s Moon
Exile’s Moon
Princes of Air

Allow to percolate

Professional virgin story (no title as of yet)
Wandering star story
Rainbow Wars (the Teach-in idea that might just have legs)

Jan

2011

Quiet…

>I realize this morning that I’ve been very quiet in the blog recently. Part of that has been the holidays and the two weeks that my son had off from school that kept me from doing much writing of any kind. However, I know the truth…

I have a new fandom.

I am a somewhat… obsessive individual. When I fall into something, I fall HARD. And I tend to focus on it to the detriment of everything else. Usually, it takes a few weeks for the initial obsession to ease up enough that I can think about other things.

So, the timing is about right for me to be able to start to think about writing again. Because it’s been about six weeks since I fell in love with Sherlock.

If you don’t know, Sherlock is the new BBC adaptation of the Sherlock Holmes stories, updated to bring our favorite detective and his Boswell… er.. Blogger, Dr. John Watson, into the 21st century. There are three episodes to the first season, and they’ll be starting filming the second season in the spring. The show stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock, and Martin “I’m-gonna-be-a-Hobbit” Freeman as Watson.

Now, Martin Freeman is the most adorable BAMF! ever. He is going to ROCK as Bilbo.

However, the one to steal the show is Ben Cumberbatch. Oh… boy….

He’s just… yeah. You have to watch the show to see. But I am a sucker for a deep voice, and one reviewer I’ve read said that Ben Cumberbatch sounds like a jaguar hiding inside a cello.

Trust me. TOTALLY worth six weeks obsession. But now I have to get back to work.

Soon as I finish looking at more pictures of Sherlock…

Jan

2011

>So…..

>Anyone want to nominate me for a Hugo?

Jan

2011

>Writing round-up for 2010

>It was an interesting year. Eleven submissions, and of that, I sold four. (Five if you count the reprint that sold and then didn’t…)

The breakdown —

Two novels — one submitted to Baen in May, one submitted to Circlet in October. No answers yet on either.

Four new short stories — One sold to Cleis, two sold to Circlet. One short story was submitted to Circlet in December, no answer yet.

Reprints — One of the Circlet stories from 2010 is out for audio submission to Escape Pod, no answer yet. The story that I sold to Cleis in 2010 is out to Cleis for Best Bondage Erotica 2012, and I won’t know about THAT one until September. One story from 2009 was accepted for an anthology and then the publisher decided not to use it. And another story from 2009 was accepted to the same anthology as the new story I sold to Cleis.

I had one story that I sold in 2009, and that the publisher decided not to use, so they gave me the rights back.

And I had a story rejected from Realms of Fantasy, which I then turned around, reworked, and it became the novel that is currently out with Circlet.

Not a bad year.

Dec

2010

>Musing on New Year Traditions

>So, I’m sitting here in my jammies sniffling (Hubby brought a cold home from work. Isn’t he sweet for sharing?), surfing the web and cooking a pot of lentils, all while avoiding the novel that I’m trying to get finished for first quarter 2011.

The glamorous life of a writer, hm? What a way to spend New Year’s Eve?

Well, yes, actually. Those lentils are a very important part of my New Year’s Eve prep. When it comes right down to it, if I do nothing else but have a spoonful of lentils at midnight, then I’ve had a fine New Year’s Eve.

Southerners, you have hoppin’john and greens, right? (What is hoppin’john, anyway? Not the recipe. Why do they CALL it that?) You have to have your black eyed peas for the new year? This is the same thing. Italians have lentils at midnight. This, my friends, is kitchen witchery at its finest. You have this food that is imbued with all the qualities that you want from the new year — prosperity, health, wealth, luck, fertility. Good times, fat times, times of plenty. You put all of this into the pot and you cook it down with hope and love, and you feed it to your families and your friends at the stroke of midnight, the threshold time, the time when what was, and what will be are in the balance. You eat this, and you take all these qualities into yourself and you make them part of you.

Magic.

There are other traditions. I didn’t know about some of yours until I read them on Facebook. Up until about two days ago, I had never heard of the “the house must be spotless and the laundry must all be done before midnight” one.

(looks around at the messy family room and the pile of laundry just visible around the bedroom door).

Yeah, that one isn’t happening in this house. Not this year, anyway. I like it, so I might coopt it for next year. If I remember.

But I will never, EVER forget my lentils.

So, since I’ve rambled at you enough, I’ll leave you with another tradition. Auld Lang Syne. This is an arrangement that I really like, performed at the Maryland Renaissance Faire by the Pyrates Royale.

Happy New Year!

Dec

2010

>Plans for the New Year

>So, since my brain is still frozen, I’m thinking about what the goals are for 2011. I should have some goals, something to shoot for. I didn’t have a list like this for 2010, and did surprisingly well. So if I make some goals, I should do better.

Well, that’s the theory, right?

To, the 2011 to-do list.

Sell Princes of Air
Sell Nomad’s Moon
Finish Drum Mage
Polish and Sell Drum Mage
Finish House of Sable Locks
Write Tales from the Arena and pitch it as a shared world series.
Outline Hidden Things
Short stories — at least four, to equal this year. More would be better.

>Back.

>So, what did you do yesterday, Liz?

>Signal Boost: Dear GOP – You are killing people!

>25 years

The dreaded list

Quiet…

>So…..

>Writing round-up for 2010

>Musing on New Year Traditions

>Plans for the New Year

Works in Progress

Appearances

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