Thoughts on the Last Jedi: This contains Spoilers

Okay, so I’m going to write a post below these words and it’s going to contain spoilers. However, because I am a kind and generous soul, I’m going to give you a lot of space between this intro and Spoiler land.

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I feel like the saddest girl in sad town.

Luke has always been there in my mind. I loved the movie, but I wanted Luke to join the league of Badass Old Dudes, you know, with Uncle Iroh, and Sifu the sword master.

On the other hand, Yoda’s words could have been written just for me. As in, I needed to hear those words, that failure is a teacher, not an ending. Mistakes were made, and we have to move on. That’s big stuff, and it’s big stuff that I needed to hear. But at what cost??? Why do the masters always go just when they reach enlightenment? It’s like there’s no room in the mortal realm for such powerful understanding.

Okay, enough of the navel gazing, on to the good stuff:

I love me some using a spacecraft to do things it’s not supposed to, and that was brilliant. Even more brilliant for the use of sound in that moment. A+

My favorite image is the moment of Luke standing in front of the At-Ats.

I loved that they let the droid drive some things.

I appreciated that they gave Luke an opportunity to come full cycle.

I’m enjoying Kylo Ren’s ascension to darkness.

I’m pleased that Rey is like “I’m not just a badass, but I’m more of a badass than Luke was at this stage in his training.”

The boy at the end. OMG I NEED HIS STORY, AND I NEED HIM TO BE OKAY!

I love that Leia got to use some Force Stuff, because Space Mom is Awesome.

I am completely down with how many women there were with speaking roles in this movie! Amazing! LOVE IT!

Middle Trilogy movies are always so difficult, but this one worked as a story. I can sense the next one will destroy me emotionally.

In short: I loved it. I loved it’s message. I loved the battle scenes. I enjoyed the humor. I LOVED the imagery (cinematography was ON POINTE!). Will see again, probably in theaters. WOW. 

Insecure about self-made barriers

Don't forget to check out all the other Insecure Writer's Posts at Ninja Captain Alex's blog, hop on the Linky and thank this month's co-hosts: Julie Flanders, Shannon Lawrence, Fundy Blue, and Heather Gardner!

This has been a heck of a year for me professionally and personally. On the writing side, I’ve done more new things than ever before.

I joined SCBWI

I went to a writer’s retreat

I went to a writer’s conference

I went to a class visit

All of these were terrifying to me, but I went and did them anyways. And, I didn’t die. I’d even be willing to do repeats on all of them. But the funny thing about these items were these were all items on my list of markers that denoted a “real author.” These were all things I had seen other writers posting about and feeling jealous about. And, like most things viewed from the outside, they are different once you do them.

I’m a little suspicious of Moving Target Syndrome, the sensation that you long for a thing, but once you achieve the thing, you long for something else to feel gratification. I’ve experienced this before with writing, and well, it’s real. But somehow these markers were a litter different:

I was the one lurking in the shadows not joining SCBWI for more than a year after publishing—you can join at any time, by the way! I just hadn’t felt worth it, somehow. Going to a writer’s retreat was amazing because there were people at literally every stage. There were people with multiple books, people with agents and sales, people with agents and no sales, people with no agent, and people who had never written a book. It was awesome. And that was another barrier I had given to myself, thinking that I needed to be wildly successful to participate in that.

I could go on (the class visit was fun, and I’ve taught a lot, so I already knew how to handle a group). My point is, these markers of success that I had were all things I could have done years ago, but I felt too much like an imposter to do them. If you can learn one thing from my fail, please learn this: if you’re writing, wherever you are in the journey, don’t write yourself out.

Anyone else suffer from False Barrier Syndrome?

Prom, Magic, And Other Man-Made Disasters: a Book Birthday!!

Today, I have unleashed my book onto the world:

Before Tessa can confess her feelings to her long-time crush, he beats her to the punch and confesses his love—for her best friend, Maria. Missing the crush of her dreams and her stag wingman for prom, Tessa’s on the prowl to make it a night to remember, and for more than the humiliation. Determined to not be the only dateless girl at the prom in Small Town USA, she asks the new guy. He has all the qualifications of a fun date: polite, mysterious―pulse―but the way Sean talks about magic like it’s real could ruin the illusion. But desperate times call for desperate dates.

To make matters awkward, Maria insists on double-dating for the pre-prom dinner. When a wizard shows up and kidnaps Maria, things go from jealous to deadly before the cummerbunds hit the floor. He’s mistaken Tessa’s friend for a powerful mage whose blood could help him conquer his world, but he’s got the wrong girl. Using the wrong blood wouldn’t make Maria any less dead, and Tessa has no plans to let some whack-job villain from another dimension murder her best friend. Working with Sean, she tracks the wizard to his home, a land filled with strange creatures, stranger customs, and a five-hundred year grudge match between three nations ready to explode into all out war.

Tessa’s starting to think she has a chance against the wizard so long as she has Sean by her side, but his kind words and sweet smile aren’t what they seem. He’s the wizard’s son.

Buy it on Amazon. 

Add it to Goodreads.

(Paperback versions available soon!)

Things I love: The Jack edition

This is Jack:

Yes, he's a cat

No he shouldn't be up there.

Note how much he cares about where he should or should not be

He likes to join in

And yes, he has a natural habitat:

Ragnarok: Things I love, now Spoiler Free!

I went and saw Thor: Ragnarok this weekend, and I gotta say, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

It was a fun romp, almost exactly as advertised. There is no romance (it's been replaced by the buddy feels), and it was always entertaining enough to keep my inner curmudgeon from raising it's head. Were there plot holes? Yes. Did they play gags? Yes. But it was fun. I cannot stress how awesome it is to have fun.

The interesting part is that it felt like the first Avengers movie.

I'd go see it again. Heck, I'd go pay to see it again.

Any thoughts? Any haters? No spoilers in the comments please, but if you want to have a longer discussion, you can always @RenaTheWriter and we can keep it going there (where I will talk to people in 280 characters, practically a novel, really!).

But teenagers aren't like that! An IWSG post

I think the thing I’m most insecure about is ever connecting with my audience and who that audience might be.

I am constantly under the attack of “that’s not what teenage girls are like.”

I think that’s my favorite statement ever. I love it because it seems to always come from men, but also because it completely ignores the fact that there’s no one thing that teenage girls are like. If you had fifty teenage girls in the same room, yes there are going to be some commonalities, but there’s going to be a huge spread about what they like and what they want to do. More importantly, there’s going to be a huge spread about who they think they are.

Caveat: I say think because the first encounters you have with college and adult life afterwards sometimes destroy who you thought you were in highschool. And sometimes, it only hardens it. One of my favorite quotes after coming back from college was that someone said “Wow, you haven’t changed a bit.” To which I replied, “I’ve changed a lot!” And the kind person said, “I know, but you’ve become so much more you than before!”

I digress. My point is that people are different and they have different desires. When I was in high school, there was this terrible choice you had to make: You could either be tough and sporty—able to change your own tire and throw a pass—or you could like pretty things. I see now that it was just another way for society to try to change me into a less powerful version of myself by letting me be tough, but denying me something that I really wanted.

As an adult, I see that it was a falsehood. Who would have stopped me from wearing pink fingernail polish while changing sparkplugs? Would the fashion police have stopped me if I’d worn a cute dress before the game? (okay, well, after the game, that might not have been as practical, but still). My point is I liked to do things where you got your hand dirty AND I liked pretty things.

This is something that I try to write into my characters, but it’s really hard because I’m constantly up against the “but teenage girls aren’t like that.” It’s something that I’m always insecure about. I’m always checking myself, when I start up a new character, are teenage girls like this?

And then I remember how I was forced to choose, how society didn’t seem big enough for my peers to not tease me mercilessly for have diametrically opposed likes. How could I possibly like fingernail polish and soccer? They teased me when I dressed nice. They teased me when I painted my nails. They told me I wasn’t taking my sports seriously enough.

It was all a lie.

Every scrap of it.

So when people tell me that “teenage girls aren’t like that,” I tell them to fly a kite. My only concern is that when you write a book with a character like the person I was, constantly rubbing against the grain of what others want you to do, it can be hard to find my audience.

Because my audience are the people who are still struggling with who they are and what they like and how life has pigeon holed them into “but that’s not what teenage girls are like.” I know there are people out there who are struggling, but trying so desperately to fit in, and I’m worried that their trying so hard to fit in makes them close off to the things they might actually love. And those people are my audience. I’m literally trying to reach the kids who are hiding who they are because they fear being called out the same way I was called out. In short, the people who might literally be afraid to pick up my book for fear of not fitting in.

Whelp, if you made it this far, fantastic! Consider hopping on the link and checking out the Ninja Captain himself, Alex! And a special thank you to this month’s co hosts: Tonja Drecker, Diane Burton, MJ Fifield, and Rebecca Douglass! 

Things I love: The FLASH

Now let’s be clear, if we’re talking about the DC universe, my favorite has always been Green Lantern (though, Wonder Woman is making a heck of a comeback!), but Flash is a close second. And the Flash on CW has been no disappointment!

So yeah, I’m totally loving this TV show, and I have a hard time getting into TV shows (I blame the cancelling of Firefly and the wishy washy handling of the end of Babylon 5).  But why do I love The Flash?

I find there are some tropes that I love coming back to (super hero loses power, friend rescued, betrayal of teacher figure, magical girl transformation), so as you can see the first season absolutely played in my wheelhouse. Season two played it strong as well. For me, the weakest season so far was season three (with a few notable high points), but I suspect my not enjoying season 3 was that I have a hard time with the self fulfilling prophecy trope, which was played on REALLY big for the whole time. I have my fingers crossed for Season 4. 

Alright, this one’s just a short post because I’ve got some writing work to do (OMG, Less than a month before my next book comes out!!!!!). 

What TV shows are you into? What's are your favorite tropes in stories?

A terror of beauty, hungry and angry

There are fires all around, and luckily, many of them are starting to be controlled by the relentless work of some amazing fire fighters. The pictures are stunning. At one point, I was close enough to see the flames in action (at night), and the fire is both terrifying and beautiful in person. It is a force of nature, like the veil slipped open and spilled something uncanny on the world.

I’ve been struggling with what to write since last week when it started. I spent last week with my ear glued to a scanner, trying to follow the progress of the fire and the efforts to contain it. Lately, I feel guilty. It is a form of survivors guilt because everyone I know is safe, and my families’ homes are all okay. I sigh with relief, but there are hundreds of others whose houses burned down. My heart breaks for them. They are my co-workers, my neighbors, people I went to school with. It is horrible.

The stories that are coming out of these fires are harrowing to say the least. Fire is terrifying. Wildfire is like a march of demons set to destroy the world, and this one moved so fast, just so so fast.

I had started the month doing a bunch of #inktober drawings, but now, all I can seem to muster is fire paintings. I don’t think I’ll be sharing those any time soon.

There’s rain in the forecast, and I can honestly say, I’ve never hoped for rain more. 

I'll be back to my normal schedule soon, but in the meantime, stay safe people. 

A Thief or a Vanishing Act: IWSG

I once wrote about where I find the time to write. I said I didn’t look through my pockets to find loose time. I said it had to be stolen, pilfered, and sacrificed to the god of words.

I’m clearly not making the right sacrifices lately. My word counts have been REALLY low this year. I finally drew a line in the sand and said “enough.” I went to a retreat and pounded out 11,000 words to finish a book I started in 2014, (a small miracle as far as I can tell), but since that retreat, I haven’t been able to just sit down and make the magic.

I worry that I’m broken.

I worry that the magic is gone.

I listen to podcasts and they talk about writing exercises and I despair at ever having enough time to write those exercises to try things on. How would I find the time?

And that’s when I realize I’ve caught myself in a trap. Doing a writing exercise is a literal act of improving the craft for the sake of improving my craft. If I can’t improve my craft prior to writing a book (or the second draft of said book) then how will I write a better book? Yes, all writing moves a writer in the direction of better writing, but sometimes, you need to spend a couple dozen pages of words figuring out a character. It’s worth the time to hone the craft before diving into the words, as the choice is really write it better the first time, or rewrite it, it seems more efficient to take the time out of my writing schedule to work on the elements of craft.

But my writing schedule has been insanely tight with edits and proofs, and marketing plans.

So, I’m insecure about the fact that I’ve been writing and publishing and I feel like there is SO MUCH to learn, and I’ve been blithely sending books off into the world without these elements. Which isn’t true, they were just there without me having to think about them because my betas stuck them in, or my editors pushed me to write those things in. But it’s time to level up.

What about you, dear reader? Do you feel like you have the time to work on craft as well as piling on the word count?

Don't forget to visit the Ninja Captain, Alex and this month's lovely co-hosts: Olga Godim, Chemist Ken, Jennifer Hawes, and Tamara Narayan!

FALL

I’ve decided that it’s time for my internet version of me to start lining up a little bit more with the real me.

Wait, Rena, you LIED to us???

Oh, gosh, internet, how quickly we jump to conclusions. No. I haven’t lied. In fact, I’ve been super duper cautious to never lie on the interwebs (the Easiest to Fact-Check place ever). But, I have left certain things out. Like lots of things. I've spent a lot of my online existence trying not to "offend the wrong people" and I'm starting to realize, that's just silly. Who am I going to offend? My readers? My opinions are in my books! All writing, at some level is autobiographical, so it stands to reason many of my opinions have already been heaped on my readers. And many of my opinions are downright silly (Yes, I love Sailor Moon, and No, I don’t see a problem with how often she gets saved by Tuxedo Mask. She saves his buns a lot too. A LOT! That’s what we call partnership. Also, he’s never bummed out about being rescued by a girl, so in some ways, it’s pretty girl positive, but I digress).

To that end, I'm going to run a bit of a series this fall to get back into the swing of blogging. This series is going to be pretty simple: Things I love, enjoy, or am generally obsessed about. Expect a lot of book and movie reviews, lots of talk about painting and museums, and some pictures. 

I want to talk about the things that make me really excited, and right now, it’s Fall.

I LOVE FALL. It is easily my favorite time of year. I know people like the other seasons, but I’m all about Fall. I love turning leaves and grass getting green again (yeah, I live in California, and our wild grasses go blond for the summer, but with the coming rains of fall, they green up again). I love how the days can’t decide and start with frost that melts into day with skies blue like glacier, but a sun bright enough to cut your eyes. I love the stars of fall, turning overhead to the great lanterns of winter, guiding us (in my melodramatic feels) through the darkness.

I love Halloween, and only wish that we could celebrate it a little differently.

And yes, I even love pumpkin spice latte. I know, I’m a walking cliché, but there it is. I love Fall. (Spoiler alert, I also really dig Spring!)

Son of a Pitch Team Rainbow Dash!!!!

That's right, it's time for Son Of A Pitch!

Check out all the details at Katie's blog Team Princess Luna, Here. For those of you who don't know, entries are posted on the four host blogs:

Samantha, Team Fluttershy
Myself, Team Rainbow Dash
Elizabeth, Team Discord
Kathleen,  Team Rarity

The hosts will critique the entries on their blogs, and the guest critiquers will also offer crits on the entries. This contest gives some very in depth critiques, and from multiple points of view. It's such a great opportunity (I'm so excited).

This process really helps take queries and pages to the next level, and can really help people see their writing in a new light.

After the critique round is the showcase round where editors will be making requests from the ten lucky pitches.

With that, the fun will start Very Soon.

A few FAQs about PROM, MAGIC, AND OTHER MAN-MADE DISASTERS!

I am so very, very excited about the next book I have coming out (this fall, November 21st!)

Oh, but Rena, what will I get if I read your book?
You will get the standard agreement in a Rena Book Reading Contract: Laughs, Feels, Explosions, Fights (guns or swords, depending), and a chase or two.

Wait, do I need to read your other books to follow this one?
Nope! This book is a new entry point into the same world. After this, though, no guarantees!


Rena, does this book feature Allyson and all of her Half Dragon Glory?
No, this book has a new Main Character, and a different plot.

But Rena, this book's title sounds very similar to your first book, are they related?
Yes! They happen in the same world. So the rules are the same, but we get to see the world from a whole new perspective.

Wait a minute, are events that happen in this book going to change what happens in your Half Dragon series?
YES! Oh, I mean, maybe. Possibly? Okay, there's crossover of some minor characters, and major plot points definitely change what else happens in other books (You know, sort of like how world politics influences global policy making?)

Is it funny?
I think so.

Are there sword fights?
YES!


It's going to be fun, witty, adventurous, Magic, and--sword,fighting--what's not to like?


PROM, MAGIC, AND OTHER MAN-MADE DISASTERS is already listed on Goodreads, and is coming out November 21st, so mark your calendars!!!

FEARLESS WRITING: an Insecure Writer's Support Group Post

I quipped the other day that I was checking Twitter to see if we were in the midst of Nuclear War. I’m pretty sure that’s how I’ll find out. It’s how I found out about the bombings in Boston. I’m absolutely terrified of nukes. I’ve studied nukes, so I have highly accurate nightmares about them (it’s a branch of the field I studied). Needless to say, my constantly being on Twitter and Facebook has made for fertile grounds for my Nightmare Bunnies. My productivity has tanked.

And that’s sort of the point, isn’t it?

If the artists and the thinkers stop making the content that drives the minds of the next generation, then where are we? If we let our creativity die, then we won’t be able to move forward. The point of art is to make people think and feel, to understand others and bridge the gaps between us. If we let our art die, we burn the bridges between us. We become isolated. We become divided without art. And that’s how a people are conquered. That’s how a minority rules.

Right now, we’re once again flirting with nuclear action. I have to remind myself that the writing I’m doing is more important than me being glued to Twitter. It’s more important to create. Art is resistance. So I’m trying to task myself to write as though I’m not terrified of nukes. Maybe fearless writing isn’t the right term, but “Write because staring at twitter isn’t helping anyone and sure isn’t getting this book done any faster” doesn’t fit in title slot very well.

Anyone else having a hard time reconciling the news climate with getting stuff done?

Anyhow, as you can see, this is an odd IWSG entry, but it’s what I needed to tell myself. Don't forget to check out the Ninja captain, Alex, and this month's co-hosts, Tyrean Martinson,Tara Tyler, Raimey Gallant, and Beverly Stowe McClure.

When will it be Fall?

I know that it isn’t going to be fall for weeks yet. I know that we are still at summer’s mercy. I know that I shouldn’t complain, and all, but it’s just ridiculous. It’s hot and miserable, and I’m not a fan of either condition. Add to it the fact that my actual favorite season—fall—has a tendency to get lost in the holidays and craziness, and now it’s going to start being fall with 100 degree weather (if things don’t settle down quickly). It's like summer is expanding.

Going into this weekend, it is going to be abnormally hot every day for the big weekend. In most cases, it will be within a degree or two of record breaking.

Meanwhile, in Texas, Honduras, and Nepal, they’re having record setting floods. These are, undoubtedly horrible disasters, and their magnitude far eclipses my inconveniencing (though we'll be in the danger zone) heatwave. 

I'm just ready for fall. 

Conclusion: When it comes to weather, record setting should not be a thing. 

What to do when things go wrong in a pitch contest

I made a video from the Writing Cave. I talk a little bit about revisions but mostly about Pitch Wars and what to do if you don't get picked for PitchWars.

Good luck, and happy writing!

Ramblings: anxiety dream edition

So, I've entered #Pitchwars. It's fun to hang out on the hashtag and watch the mentors tease people. Someone did a quick calculation and the odds of getting into #Pitchwars are less than the percentage of applicants Harvard accepted this year. So I already kind of know my odds of getting in, but that's not the point of entering.

I've been a bit of a recluse in the world of twitter and facebook (I'm having a hard time with the insanity of our news cycle these days), so I needed to get back into the swing of things. Besides, there's nothing to lose and everything to gain (and unlike previous years, I would actually have time if I am lucky enough to be picked!).

I'm trying to paint a picture of how chill I am about this particular shot in the dark. So chill. Like I'm handling this like a boss.

And then the anxiety dreams start popping up with their snakes and their slugs--


--wait, slugs?

Rena, when did slugs become part of anxiety dreams?

Yeah, I have no idea, but I had a very vivid dream of having to walk with my *pet* slug across an open field in a torrential downpour to make it to my car (and presumably the terrarium where I keep said slug).

Now, for those of you who don't know, I have a strict rule set for pets: we either have predators, or prey. We don't have hamsters and cats. We have cats. We don't keep rats, birds, gerbils, chinchillas, or anything that a cat would misconstrue as dinner. It's hard to explain death to a kid. It's much harder to explain Prized Mouse eaten by Favorite Cat. Trust me, that way lies madness.

All this to say, I don't keep slugs. Never. Not once in my whole life have I even entertained keeping slugs as pets. The closest I've ever been to slug wrangling was when I was working in the Nevada desert. We'd sometimes pick up horny toads and pet them (in our defense, it was hot and we were dehydrated).

Right, so I have this fancy slug, about an inch and a half, and it's super slimy and it's raining. And I was worried about my poor little fancy slug every step of the way (two football fields), as the sky gushed water on me.

I'm not sure where my brain was going with that one (is the slug a metaphor for my manuscript? Great, I have a fancy, slime filled manuscript and even my brain knows it), but I'm apparently not as chill about #PitchWars as I want to be. Also, slugs. Really brain? Really?

What are your anxiety dreams like? Typically, mine are snakes and nuclear detonation, but apparently, I have a subset for slugs.

Rushing to Happily Ever After: IWSG

If there’s one piece of advice writers like to give other writers, it’s “Don’t compare yourself to others.”

I cannot tell you how many times I sat with my laptop, viewing the success of others and reading the unwritten subtext put there just for me: You’re a failure because you don’t have an agent/book/deal/best pound cake on the block.

To be clear, the subtext of almost every book deal and I got an agent post is “Oh, gods, please don’t see that I’m a fake and have managed to completely bamboozle this person into liking my work! I’m so happy, but TERRIFIED because no one talks about the After in Happily Ever After.”

Yes there are a lot of writers who feel like they worked hard and deserve it (I applaud you confident writers who don’t suffer from the dreaded impostor syndrome), but there are heaps tons more who feel like some person with a clipboard is going to show up and say “I’m sorry, but we both know you’re a fraud.” (this, is a direct quote from Neil Gaiman’s Make Good Art commencement speech, good stuff)

Our stories tell us that the part that’s actually super hard is something those movie people cover up with one song (usually edited), and the whole process is really a great backdrop for a Rom Com. The stories most of us consume have endings (some happy, some not), and we try to fit our lives into these story templates. And it doesn’t work. We compare to other people, and we see that what they present to the internet fits the mold: worked hard, made the thing, queried and got the agent, BOOK DEAL!

It’s the perfect happily ever after rolled up in blog posts and tweets. Sometimes these success stories feel like fairytales, all wrapped up with a perfect little bow. And do you know what bearing this has on your journey?

None. Absolutely none.

If you’re anything like me, you’ll tear yourself apart comparing yourself to these fairytales. And they aren’t real. The path in writing is so very unclear. So much is about taste and preference, it’ll kill you to go about assuming the normal rules apply to publishing and agents and writing.

In the movies (which we’ve been taught to use as our gauge of how to process the world), it’s simple: You work hard, you put in the time, and you get the reward. Our stories are built this way so we understand that our culture values hard work. Unfortunately, the formula in movies doesn’t pan out in real life. In real life, you can work as hard as is humanly possible, and the reward you were working for might not come. You did nothing wrong, but you don’t win the game or get the book deal/agent/job. And we don’t have many stories like that even if it is a reality of our world.

But Rena, how can you talk about disappointment when you have Book Deals and even a book coming out in November??

Oh, sweet summer child, I know more pain than can be seen in my scars. I struggle everyday with the doubt born of how I clearly bamboozled my way into having a book deal, but I’ve never been a good enough con-artist to get an agent. My rejections folder is filled with “Not right for me,” “Send me your next project,” “I’m sure someone will snatch this up if they haven’t already.”

And I know those sound like I’m on the right track, but those were responses I got with the second book I queried. I’ve queried a number since then, and I still get those responses. And some of that is my fault. I tend to query my books too early. I have taken some of those books and revised them and that’s how I got my book deals (you know, after collecting a no from every agent who will even read SFF).

And here I am, on the brink of #Pitchwars with the very awkward path of trying to get a mentor for a book I’m probably rushing towards a Happily Ever After that probably doesn’t really exist while juggling an upcoming book release, trying to plot out another sequel and promotion. It’s awkward. I was supposed to get the agent, then get the book deal. I never did anything the standard way, but I’m worried my rush to get to Happily Ever After may have hamstringed my attempts to get an agent. I’m worried I’m no longer a fresh naïve writer. I’m wiser now, but I’m still worried I’m rushing. Just the other day, I realized there was a major revision I could put into my manuscript to make it significantly cooler, so I’m trying to nail that down before I throw my hat into the arena.

So that’s this month’s insecurity. How about you all, anyone else struggle with rushing their projects?

#PimpMyBio

For those of you scouring the interwebs, this is my #Pimpmybio for #Pitchwars.

This year I'm sending up STEAL THE SKY for all the love, so before we get started, here's a little about the book:

Sixteen-year-old Tashira has spent her life slipping through the cracks in the Shulloran’s reign over the city of Kaiou. Through prayers and songs, Shulloran priests keep sea monsters at bay, restraining the creatures from attacking the ships and eating the citizens of Kaiou. But not everyone likes the priests. They’ve forbidden singing since their teachings say voice controls water, and the untrained song could unleash the man-eating monsters at the bottom of the sea. Anyone caught singing is burned at the stake.

When Tashira witnesses a boy turn cloth to stone with his voice, she knows the priests are lying about their powers. To shut her up, the Shullorans burn down her home and send monsters to kill her. Tashira fights back, rescuing the boy who controls stone with his song, and learns the priests’ real secret. The protections keeping the monsters locked away are failing, and the monsters are escaping. To protect people from the creatures in the deeps, the Shullorans plan to combat years of sea level fall by unleashing a great flood. They hope the deeper waters will help keep the monsters submerged, and if it drowns one unruly city, then it’s all for the best. If she does nothing, her city and everyone she knows could die, but Tashira has a new weapon: her voice controls the weather. But she’s untrained, and she could spark off a hurricane or accidentally unleash the man-eating monsters. One way or another, the Shullorans know who they want to burn next.

STEAL THE SKY is a 90,000 word YA fantasy similar to what would happen if someone put Avatar the Last Airbender in a blender with the Pirates of the Caribbean and tossed in a splash of At the Mountains of Madness.


On to the Bio!


Okay, let me see, I think I’ve got an official Bio somewhere around here… A Ha!

Like most mad scientists, Rena Rocford has made an art form of living as a muggle. Today the bills, tomorrow the world. When she isn’t planning for world domination, Rena creates nerdy art and enjoys spending time with her family and friends. She unleashed her first book Acne, Asthma, And Other Signs You Might Be Half Dragon, on the world in 2015, and a companion novel, Prom, Magic, and Other Man-Made Disasters is sharpening its battle axe for release in late 2017.

That looks all official and shiny, but it’s pretty short. 

I sew costumes for fun: I particularly enjoy Dr. Horrible, but I make costumes for others as well. One year before Dragon Con, we measured the amount of thread I used in kilometers. When we added up all the spools I’d emptied, we realized I’d put nearly 5 km of thread through my sewing machine that summer.

I paint for fun. Mostly. Sometimes I paint because I absolutely cannot handle the world, and words are failing me. This year, I entered some of my art in the local fair, so, we’ll see how quickly my art aspirations get properly crushed. I jest—sort of. It’s hard to put pieces of yourself into the world and ask for judgment. We’ll see if I continue to share my pieces, or if I go recluse on these.

I have a day job, but I can’t really talk about it. Well, I can, but it goes from interesting to awkward because a lot of it is super duper confidential. Like I’d get fired and fined if I talked about the wrong part of it. No, I’m not a spy. “But Rena, that’s what you’d say if you were a spy!”

*sigh*

It’s a boring desk job, I swear.

But this is a long list of what I do, and I feel like that doesn’t really get to the who I am and why I write. That’ harder on so many levels. Turns out, for all my bluster and jokes, I’m a very private person. Yes, I’m the loud one telling the stories, but only to hide the fact that I’m mortally terrified of being awkward in public. I combat my fear by making people laugh. If you’re laughing with me, you’re not laughing at me. Wow, this went from funny to personal real fast. Quick, have a cat pic!

Okay, feel better after looking at the cute kittehs? Good, now onto why I write.

So, once upon a time, I decided to write a piece, I don’t know why, but it was super personal, and really—REALLY—TMI. But I put it out there into the world, and what came back to me was whispered in fear and lonely hope: “I thought I was the only one.”

It struck me that people were so afraid of the world that they’d taken their scars and tragedie and hidden them in their soul, isolating themselves for fear of being judged. So I started writing to eradicate that feeling from people. My books aren’t super personal like some of my essays, but my goal is to make the world less lonely.

“Whoa, Rena, are you saying Acne, Asthma, And Other Signs You Might Be Half Dragon isn’t biographical??? I feel betrayed. I thought you were half dragon!”

See, funny thing, it is, but it isn’t. I feel like the writing isn’t right until you’re a little worried people will see through all the plot and character development to the you in the book. “Oh, you just wrote this book because you were jealous and wanted to foist that on your character.” Or “You wrote this book because you were struggling with your identity and wanted to watch your character squirm through figuring themselves out.”

All true.

I write to purge my demons first (and boy, I’ve got plenty). I write so people won’t feel so alone. I write so I can know the way through my own life, and maybe that can shed some light on the path for others.

So what do you get when you read one of my books? Maybe you get something deep and meaningful to you, or maybe you get a laugh, a chase, and an explosion (all my books have explosions). One way or another, it’s a ride, and if you want to have fun, I’ve got an extra seat.

Posting from the Wilds of My Life

Some of you might have noticed that I missed an Insecure Writer's Support Group.

Yeah, it snuck up on me and ran right past.

But, Rena, How is that even possible? You always make your IWSG posts. Those are like your favorite ones.

Oh, sweet summer reader. Let me tell you.



Are you ready.



This one is amazing.







I'm human.


I not only forgot, I forgot about all the things. Between juggling a ton of manuscripts (turned one back in w00t!), managing my art for upcoming exhibit, doing a pop up promotion, worrying about the health of people I love, and making it from point a to point b for all the things in my life, I forgot.

For me, this is the stuff of nightmares. I keep lists of stuff I have to do because I feel like a flake. I spent the whole weekend worried I forgot to pay a bill. And of course, forgetting to post to IWSG made me super extra nervous. I'm probably going to go to work, clean my desk and scrutinize every message, post it, and email for action items I may have missed.

One of the biggest problems with having so much going on is that it's easy to forget something. So, how to fix it? Here's another big secret:

I can't. And I'm not going to.

Sure, I'm going to go over my super regimented schedule and see if I can build in another double check. At this point, I'm going to call it a win that I have a place to keep track of my submissions, and I haven't borked one of those up in years.

How about you, dear reader? Forget anything important recently?

Life After The Contract: Which Manuscript Was That?

I’ve mentioned that some things change when you sign a contract. Today is life after contract, the endless edits keep me from writing my next book edition.

I tweeted earlier today that within 14 hours of finishing a round of edits on one book, I received another round of edits for a different book, and this is now my life. My plan had been to draft between when I'd finished one set and received the next set. To be clear, I didn't write a novel in those 14 hours...

As of this exact second, I am juggling what can only be referred to as a ton of novels. A list:

MS 1: in pre-publishing edits

MS 2: on submission with publisher

MS 3: in the query trenches

MS 4: being drafted on lunch breaks with a wireless keyboard hooked up to my phone (this is the only time I can’t work on edits as I can’t take my computer to work without being willing to submit it to time consuming inspection by IT peeps—yes, my work is sensitive, but not at all how you think)

MS 5: in development

MS 6: waiting to go into the editing grinder

Yes, I have six novels running at the same time. Six. So at any moment, I could have good or bad news from an agent, an editor, or a crit partner, and I’m trying to stick words to the page. It’s a lot to manage. (and my email is officially a ticking time bomb).

Now, I don’t say this to brag, but I think sometimes we don’t consider what consequences our actions have. Action: I’ve written a lot of books. Consequence: finding a home for those books takes time. I wrote MS 2 in 2016. I wrote MS 1 in 2009 (yeah, it’s been a long haul with that book).

At one point, I looked up from my writing work and realized I knew exactly what I needed to be writing for the next three years, and that hit me in the creative noodle. I’d never been under contract. I’d just been frolicking about in the land of dreaming up the next great big book to lure an unsuspecting agent into my snare. Then suddenly, I know what I’m trying to put together creatively for the next few years. That’s a heck of a commitment.

I don’t regret any of it. I love the work I’m doing, but it sort of shocked me to realize that I started my publishing journey in 2009, I’m two books in, and my writing docket is all tied up until the end of the decade.

So I did something big name authors do all the time: I stole time from somewhere else to develop another project. MS 4 in that list has nothing to do with any of the other novels. Literally nothing alike. It’s not even an explosion filled action piece (but it does have dragons!). I found a piece of time I had, lunches and breaks at work, and figured out how to convert them into words. So far, so good. I’m averaging about 2K a week on drafting while I’m working on the endless edits for projects under contract.

Because here’s another hard truth: once you’re published, you still have to do EVERYTHING ELSE you had to do before you were published, plus revise, edit, and polish a manuscript. Market, prep, write a sequel, and do it again. And if you’re lucky, do it again. All the while, cooking dinners, cleaning house and fulfilling the whole full time job gig too. I’m lucky in that my SO picks up the slack when I’m ready to throw poptarts at the family, but I have to admit, my ability to create new work in the crunched time was one of the hardest adjustments.

So there it is, folks, find a way to steal time and write the next book. If that advice sounds familiar, it should. Writing the next book is almost always the answer. 

Announcing PROM, MAGIC, AND OTHER MAN-MADE DISASTERS

So a few weeks back (many more than a few at this point), I signed with Curiosity Quills for another book!

This book is near and dear to my heart. I have quite writing to focus on my serious (non-writing) career many times, but this was the book that brought me back to writing. This was the first book I thought was good enough to query.

It became the first book I decided wasn’t ready to query.

So I rewrote it. I wrote other books (MANY other books) and they each had their own journey (some of them not finished yet!). I rewrote this book because I loved the story and the characters, and now I get to share them with the world!

I’m so excited about PROM, MAGIC, AND OTHER MAN-MADE DISASTERS! And it’s coming out November 21^st!

You can add it on GoodReads!

Annoyed that it isn't easy

I have been struggling with personal issues lately, and, as always, that impacts my writing. And because I’m upset, I turn to the only real form of therapy that’s ever worked for me: Art. There’s art that I want to make—art that I need to make—but I find myself avoiding it. It’s not because I can’t make the art. It’s not that I don’t want to make the art. But it is hard.

And I find that sort of annoying.

I realize this is a personal problem, but there’s this feeling in our society that effortless is an expression of greatness. “Oh, I just wrote that novel in 6 days,” is somehow a greater novel than one that took 6 months because clearly writing a novel in 6 days is going to have way less belly aching than the novel that takes 6 months.

So I avoid the projects because they are not effortless.

Some would argue—and rightly so—that the effortless creations are only born of two places. One of these places is practice. Practicing day and night to achieve a level of greatness and skill with something is clearly a thing. After all, my first drawings of Stitch took hours and they were on cards that were 5 inches high. The one I slapped onto the concrete took exactly 3 hours and it was three feet by three feet. Obviously, practice makes the expression of art seem effortless.

The only other place where art is effortless is when it is made out of laziness. And this is where I’m worried my work is. I’ve been practicing a technique that is, at its heart, lazy. It’s easy and effortless, the only real drawback keeping it from being an absolute joy is that the art created through it is… predictable. It doesn’t show my vision or my ability, it shows my ability to follow a You Tube tutorial. It might look nice, but I worry that it’s lazy and repetitive to the point of not being worthwhile.

And, because I’ve studied the craft of story for so long, I worry that my novels are like this as well, that I don’t challenge myself and they are born out of my laziness. Cliche, repetitive. 

Does anyone else thread this needle of anxiousness between being lazy and thinking effortless art is somehow better (but worrying that because it didn’t receive it’s blood sacrifice it’s somehow not as good)?

As always, this is a blog hop, head over to the Ninja Captain, Alex and be sure to thank this month's co-hosts, JH Moncrieff, Madeline Mora-Summonte, Jen Chandler, Megan Morgan, and Heather Gardner!

Wonder Woman: A review without spoilers

First up, this will have no spoilers aside from Wonder Woman is an Amazon, though I do talk about all of it in terms of story beats from a plot structure stand point. 

To start off, I loved this movie so much that it’s hard to be objective about it. I feel like I should get something else out of the way because there are plenty of people who will tell me that “oh, you only liked it because you were a big fan of Wonder Woman before you saw it, so of course you liked it.”

I haven’t read a single Wonder Woman comic ever. Not one (unless you count Crisis on Infinite Earths, which NO ONE DOES). So I didn’t go into this movie as a great big fan of Wonder Woman, and I always thought her character was a little ridiculous (though, I definitely enjoyed the Lynda Carter series as a kid).

I came out of the movie ready to go buy all the things.

Characters:

The characters were done really well in this movie. A ragtag team is brought together to take on a mission of great importance. Through the movie, I kept looking for the weakness in characterization that’s very common in thrown together movies. It wasn’t there. They stuck to their characters, no asides, no “why would they have done that?” moments.

The only weakness in the characterization is that Captain Trevor only has one line that hints at his past, specifically the past that he clearly feels the need to atone for. With the addition of this one piece, his character would have potentially stolen the show, so it was a delicate balance. I feel like the choices in the movie were made perfectly to keep the light shining on Diana and not get overburdened with any inter character subplot (i.e. romance).

I do find myself wanting to write fan fic about the aftermath though.

Setting

WWI is a great setting. The stakes are prenuclear, and weapon featured is very believable for the time (though not from a chemical stand point, alas). The backdrop for much of the action is damaged and destroyed villages in Germany, and the German forest.

A story in Three Acts:

Act I: The early part of the film has some excitement and lots of women doing super amazing badass things, but the stakes are very low which causes for a disconnect between the action we’ve been promised and women talking about things. The conflict here is very low. This section has some great humor gags to ease that feeling of could we get on with it, but it still does a great job of introducing our characters and calling the hero to action. This is a pretty typical Act I complete with the secret, the question of whether our hero can really go to war, etc. This part feels a little slow, but only because we know there’s some amazing action coming.

Act II is both super funny and awesome. There are no pacing problems here, and I love how it very matter-of-factly addresses the inequality between men and women. In Act II we get the midpoint of the movie commonly known as “the bad guys move in” beat, and it is both brilliant and spectacular. Highly enjoyable and visually stunning.

Act III

To be clear, I loved this Act as well, but I have spoken with people who did not. Act III features all the same beats we expect in any Act III, “team falls apart,” “the whiff of death,” “the dark night of souls.”

For those of you who don’t study story structure, the dark night of souls is when the main character is made to feel alone and as though the fight is, perhaps pointless. In Harry Potter, the dark night of souls is when Harry realizes that he carries a piece of Voldemort in himself and he has to die for Voldemort to die. In Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the dark night of souls is when Henry senior has been shot and Indiana has to go along with the bad guys to get the one thing that will save his father. In Wonder Woman, the dark night of the soul beat comes right where you expect it, leading into the final battle, and some people don’t like Wonder Woman’s dark night moment because it seemed out of character to them. I didn’t see it that way at all. It made sense from a character stand point, because she was an amazon and she gave up so much to go on this quest. It makes perfect sense that she would Doubt in that moment. Then there’s the final confrontation which maybe lasted a little too long as our main character has her epiphany.

I loved this movie. I’m super excited about getting to buy the DVD when it comes out. 

Thoughts on Comics Part 2: The Prayer

Can I just level with everyone here? I'm super duper amazingly excited about Wonder Woman. I see all these article filled with hate, and I just want to shake people and say "Shhhhhs! I haven't seen it yet--AND NEITHER HAVE YOU!!" Then I calmly mutter under my breath "please be good, please be good, please be good."

I'm not sure if you've noticed this, but Star Wars the Force Awakens had a lead woman. An honest to Kenobi Jedi, and it smashed the box office (and was a good movie). But when we went to buy the merchandise for Rei, it just didn't exist. Nobody thought people would buy action figures of a girl.

The main character.

This is why the market is having such a hard time tapping the female market. People are under the impression that women will not put up the numbers that men will, but it's because we've been given scraps at this feast. It's been 13 years since Elektra. No one wanted to try a female superhero because that movie did so poorly, so my new mantra is "please be good. PLEASE BE GOOD."

So yeah, I'm absolutely looking forward to Wonder Woman.


Please be good. Please be Glorious!

Also, Chris, I'm counting on you to turn in some funnies, but leave it to Captain Kirk to accidentally find the island filled with women...

Thoughts on Comics, part 1

I love--LOVE--me some comics. I read every X-Men comic I could get my hands on as a child, and let me tell you, living in a rural town where I literally rode my pony to the store, the selection wasn't exactly wide. Today I'm watching the great DC TV shows (knocking it out of the park with Flash), but I have a hard time with this one common thread that crops up in comics.

It goes like this: Woman who is friends with main character, but sort of not showing any actual agency gets powers, and not just a little bit of power, but a whole crap ton of power. The power changes her into something evil, and just as she becomes super powerful, she turns on all her family and friends, killing them even.

Did you think I was talking about Caitlin Snow?

This is actually the original plot for Frozen, but Idina Menzel made Let It Go too amazing.

But this is the story line for Sarah Lance, Jean Grey, and Carol Ferris (bonus points to Sarah for coming back from the literal dark side, but that show really liked to drive its issues). All comic book ladies who get powers and suddenly go into killer mode because their powers made them do it. This is a pretty troubling trend because there are a huge number of plots where these things happen to men, but they can be helped. But women? Nope, once a killer monster, always a killer monster.

I suspect this is an issue of the fears of the demographic. Comic books are mostly enjoyed by men (search the Hawkeye Initiative, and you might figure out why comics are less read by women), so does this mean men fear women with power? I think it does. I think specifically that men fear women becoming more powerful than them, and to combat this fear, they take women with powers and turn them into these monsters. Women with power are scary. Anyhow, what's your take on the ladies getting powers only to be subsumed by them?

And while we're on the topic of the DC shows, I want Cisco to wear nerdy T shirts again...

Both too much and not enough

At this point it’s pretty cliché for a writer (or anyone on this planet) to talk about how they’re soooo busy. If you Google search Time Management, you’ll get page after page of relevant, fantastic time saving advice. It ranges from basic math—if you have 24 hours in a day, try cutting a couple hours of sleep to do more—to cutting things out of your life.

So I made a choice a while back to not visit as many blogs. I chose to stop engaging as much in social media—why is it so addictive?—and I chose to take more time to breath and relax and be a human being not constantly driving myself into the dirt.

Then starts the anxiety, have I abandoned the world of writers? Will they all hate me for not going around to all the blogs like I used to? Will they think I’m a snob for not jumping in on every blog hop or offering up discussion on the political hot topic of the day?

And what would anxiety be without the flipside?

Does my family still think I put too much time into online promotion? Am I being a bad Mom? Should I cook better dinners? Clean the house more? Spend more time doing activities with my family? Do I write or do I spend time with my family?

It’s really easy to see why there are life coaches dedicated to time management. I know this is a pretty common subject, but I really want to know how people manage full time jobs, full time families, and full time writing careers? Everyone tells me it’s a balancing act, but I sort of look at it like putting out fires. Everything is on fire, and you pick the fire to put out. Once that one is done, it’s on to the next, but by the time you’ve put out the second or third fire, the first pile is back on fire again.

Anyhow, that’s what I’m insecure about this month, am I doing a good enough job putting out the fires (did I mention, I’m also on fire in this analogy?). So how do you manage it? I've started a thing where I post pictures on my social media feed when I get too negative or whiny about publishing and time management. Here's a recent one I posted to twitter: 

Don’t forget to visit the Ninja Captain Alex and his team of cohosts: Nancy Gideon, Tamara Narayan, Liesbet @ Roaming About, Michelle Wallace, and Feather Stone!

Being skilled doesn't mean you'll get an agent, but it helps

One of the most important things I’ve learned about writing since I released a book with Curiosity Quills, is that Publishing is subjective.

When I queried the book that became Acne, Asthma, And Other Signs You Might Be Half Dragon, agents said they loved it, just not enough to represent it. As time went on I came to learn that there was a book very similar to mine that apparently flopped, and so my book was relegated to the back burners for a ton of agents because of a business happening.

At the time, what I thought was that all these agents were being nice. The invitations to sub again with a new project? Just politeness.

I had come to equate skill in writing with getting an agent. To a certain extent, that’s true. If the writing is really terrible, it’s very unlikely to be the one that lands an agent. On the other hand, even if your writing is spectacular and impeccable, if there’s something fundamentally not matched to the agent, or your story is in the unsalable category, it’s very unlikely to be something agents are after.

From the writer’s side, there’s a feeling that if my book is just good enough (great even), then I will have crossed that magic threshold of skill and be on to the realm of agent land, and it’s just not true. I really wish I had understood this earlier in my writing, and, to be honest, I still suffer a bit from this misconception. But today I’m here to remind all my writer friends that there’s something else, something more than skill when it comes to finding an agent. It's fit. It's passion. It's all the things you have about your book, the untranslatable bits that make you love it. If your agent doesn't have those feels too, it's not going to work. And I've seen enough writers part with their agents to know that process isn't always a walk in the park, but it's often a hit to the self confidence. They tell me it's worth waiting for the right one. 

What do you guys think? Do you feel like rejection is an indication of low skill and quality?

I have to remember things sometimes

Sometimes, I forget to enjoy writing.

Which is a funny statement on the surface, because writing is very much my passion. It's definitely the thing that keeps me up at night and drives me from my bed in the morning. It's sort of an impossible task, and I like that about it too.

My troubles with writing all stem from the difficulties associated with Publishing. Publishing has a unique way of making your craft a consumable product that you sell. For us writers, we spend way too much time making sure we are palatable to as many potential readers as possible, and I'm no exception. Before I tweet, I try to remember that a large chunk of my fanbase is very conservative, and I think that's wonderful. Everyone gets to be who they want to be. But knowing that definitely makes me hesitate before posting something polarizing and political--and considering how political my social media feeds have been, that should say something--I have sort of whitewashed many of my stances and beliefs on social media. I definitely don't talk about my family with the kind of candor I would if you were to meet me in person.

As well as combing through my public appearance, publishing has also sort of driven many of the stories I have tried (and sometimes failed) to tell. And that's simply no good. I have driven a story one way to be more on point, and then it suddenly wasn't. I've tried all kinds of things to make my stories fit into the buckets made available (or maybe more appropriately, known) by the market, and it just hasn't worked.

This has been a constant battle for me, and only recently have I come to understand some things about my work. When I have a project and it doesn't sell, or it doesn't get an agent, or it doesn't immediately have a huge selling, I used to think it was the writing. Now, to be clear, poor writing will often kill opportunities, so all writers should spend a lot of time absorbing craft. However, the idea of fit is starting to be a real concern.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that I qualify as an odd duck. No really. I'm a little off. I see the world differently, and that informs my writing. Some people like that, some people don't. And that's okay.

What isn't okay is when I try to write my stories to fit in. That's a no go. And I know I've talked about this before, but it's way better to fail as yourself than it is to succeed as a fake. Good luck out there, and some big news is coming soon (sorry, I'm such a tease).