Kindle Version
Late Tuesday night, I checked the Amazon site one more time. The Kindle version was there at last. I ordered it right away and uploaded it to the Kindle app on my iPad. I was afraid it would be a jumbled mess, but it looks fine. What a relief!
Both versions are now available, and Zen Flowers is officially launched.
What, and who, will I write about next?
Available soon!
“She lost her family, and now her relationship is over, too. Can a woman be more alone? Sabina doubts it. But she’s living her dream. Zen Flowers, her West Village floral shop, is hers if she can only keep it afloat… and that’s turning out to be a big problem.
Brendan was blindsided when Sabina told him it was over. She wanted to start a family, but he’s terrified of the responsibilities that come with children. His life wouldn’t be his own anymore. But going on without Sabina? He can’t bear that, either.
Swamped with book offers after a harrowing hostage experience, photojournalist Niall starts writing. It’s harder than he realized, and he longs to be out on assignment, traveling the world. He doesn’t know yet that his ex-wife is about to arrive with an ugly secret that could leave his family in ruins.”
It has been a while since I posted; between Zen Flowers rewrites, walking 10,000 steps most days, and gardening (the weeds are relentless), my days have been full. Finally, the book was ready. Amazon has always walked me through the process of getting my books out for people to read, and I called them to order a cover design and have them format the interior–what a nasty surprise. They no longer do that; they have changed to a “do it yourself” model. The tech support person did email the names of a few companies that do design book covers.
Suddenly, “Indie publishing” really became indie publishing–a huge challenge for the likes of me.
Totally derailed, I freaked out for a day or two. Then I decided to try and format the actual pages myself, as I had already uploaded the manuscript before finding out they wouldn’t format it. It was incredibly complicated and took days of endless trial and error, but I learned how to format a book in Microsoft Word–not the design application of choice, but it was all I had. After researching book design companies, I ordered a cover. I received the cover design this morning and couldn’t be happier!
She belongs to my daughter, Eithne, and she just showed up in my latest work in progress, “Zen Flowers,” as I pants my way through. Dogs have a way of doing that. Elizabeth is seven, old enough now to tell part of the story.
“When Mom’s not looking, John sneaks a piece of sausage under the table and gives it to Ruby, our dog. We have a dog now. Me and John wanted one so bad, but the house we lived in was No Pets. Now we live in a different house, and we get to have a dog at last. We got her at the humane society. Mom says she’s probably half basset hound and half German shepherd. You should see her. She has short, crookedy legs and a tan body with a black back, and her ears are really huge and stick up but the tips flop over. She makes you want to laugh and hug her at the same time. She poops a LOT. The only thing I don’t like about having a dog is having to pick up smelly poop when we go on a walk.”
I couldn’t resist this book. I was grocery shopping at New Seasons this morning, and it was on a table along with notepads, coasters, books, and ornaments. “4000 Questions for Getting To Know anyone and Everyone,” by Barbara Ann Kipfer. What on earth? I leafed through it–being asked a bunch of arbitrary questions makes me feel like a bug under a magnifying glass, but whoa–these are wonderful writing prompts!
When I’m writing a character, I’ll grab a notebook and my trusty fountain pen and plop him or her in a chair and ask questions. It’s a tried-and-true method of finding out things you never knew about the person. This book has all the questions I never thought to ask. A few examples…
Childhood: What has changed most about the neighborhood where you grew up? What activities besides eating went on at the kitchen table in the home you grew up in? What did you do when you came home from school? What are the stupidest rules your parents had?
Friends: Would you lie to keep a friend out of trouble? What do you find interesting about people? What traits do you not like in other people?
Romance: Define “commitment.” What is the scariest thing and the most rewarding thing about commitment? What is something someone said or did that you found extremely attractive? What words would you love to have whispered in your ear?
Outlook: Are you jealous of other people’s success? How do you deal with things you cannot change? Do you like snow? What do you hate most?
… and thousands more questions. I can’t wait to see how my characters respond to some of these.
Thought I’d share a bit about my own creative process since I spend so much time parked in front of a computer. The great thing about writing is that you can do it anywhere. Sometimes I’ll take my laptop to a coffee house or to the library, as a change of scene stirs things up and lets new ideas download into my fingertips. I often don’t know what’s going to happen until my fingers type it. My friend Kelly and I sometimes get together and write for a couple of hours at one of the Burgerville hamburger joints here in Portland.
Mostly, though, I write at my desk. I honor my writer self—put flowers on my desk, and sometimes I light a scented candle. While I’m having my morning coffee infusion (which I can’t function without), I read over yesterday’s writing to get a run on where I am and what I want to do next. I use Scrivener. It’s a scene-based application for authors. I write from multiple points of view and it’s perfect for me. Because I’m a “pantser” instead of a “plotter,” my chapters and scenes end up needing to be rearranged, and it’s a lot easier in Scrivener than it was in Word. I keep two documents open, side by side. On the left is my main/real manuscript; the one on the right is for notes, where I type in new ideas for something several chapters ahead so I won’t lose them. I also use that “notes” document for rewording something I’m not happy with, which happens quite a bit. Then when I finally get it right, I paste it in. Having the two documents open at the same time somehow makes it less scary, because I have to admit, writing can be a very scary business.
Sometimes I have no idea what to write or what comes next. When that happens, I grab a spiral notebook—I buy about 10 a year during the back-to-school sales. With notebook in hand along with my Waterman fountain pen, I sprawl on the sofa, music pounding in my ears, and free-write anything that comes to mind. Peeves I have, what the dogs are doing, what I want for my fictional characters, who by now don’t feel fictional at all and are as real as my friends. What I end up with is always a surprise—but that’s what makes writing fiction so much fun.
Music drives my pen, or my fingers on the keyboard. I have iTunes playlists for every imaginable mood: Laibach for the dump trucks full of gun-toting cops in Isla Vista; Crosby, Stills, and Nash for Joel and me, the Beatles’ “Hey Jude” for my whole philosophy at the time… music puts me in whatever place I need to write about.
How about you? I’d love to hear about how you write.
Noticing Magic Everywhere 