Woe is me. It's one of those days. One of those days where you ask yourself if you're really supposed to be doing this and if it wouldn't just be better if you'd quit kidding yourself, deceiving your spouse, and go get a friggin job.
Critique has that power over me, and not because we actually did much critiquing last night. It was the stuff passed on by one of the members that Ann Peach had said to her. Stuff about the market for fiction, how it seems as if the things getting published are over the top ideas, the bigger and more over the top the better, etc. Paranormal is hot (which she'd already said and I'd already heard). I don't care for paranormal. Vampires don't excite me in the least. Ghosts and witches and all that? Not interested. So how could I possibly write about that? I can't, at least not until the idea of a lifetime strikes me and I have to write it. I did start a paranormal chick lit sort of thing, when an idea struck me that I loved, but there's not a demon or vampire anywhere in it. *sigh*
I love my stories when I'm working on them. They are wonderful and brilliant and the best thing ever written. And that's how it should be, I think. You should feel that way when you're caught up in an idea. (And no, I don't really think my stories are the best thing ever, just when I'm working and caught up in the process and in love with the characters; the honeymoon ends fairly quickly, ha!)
So what's a girl to do? Keep writing and hoping one of the ideas sticks to the wall in New York? Give up? (I'm just asking; don't intend to give up) Get depressed? Eat chocolate? Get off her ass and write that thesis because she's gonna need it to work when the writing thing doesn't pan out?
Oh, I am so wallowing this morning. But when I talked to the hubby last night after I got home, he had smart things to say. He said keep writing, don't try to write something you don't like or don't understand, trends come and go, things change, keep telling your stories your way because you have a voice and it comes through in what you write. He's a smart man, that guy. Now, I'm going to drink my coffee and wallow a bit in my own misery and think about how to toss a vampire into my story (not really, hee hee). 🙂
Currently Reading:
Still working on Kristin Hardy and the Princeton guys' The Rule of Four, and various other stuff. And though I said I don't care about paranormal stuff, sometimes a great premise comes along and you have to read it no matter what it's about. So, I could not resist buying Julie Kenner's Carpe Demon. If the title wasn't clever enough to pull me in, the cover, blurb, and smart-ass comments would have done it. I want to read it NOW. But, I need to finish a couple of other books first. Damn it.
Music:
Heard last night on the “Nights with Alice Cooper” show (as I was driving home): “That's the song ‘Bad Company', by Bad Company, off the album titled Bad Company. [dramatic pause] Very creative.” ROFL! Why does that amuse me? I don't know. I'm an easy laugh, I guess. Hubby pointed out that Alice appeared in one of those Wayne's World movies and was spouting brilliant stuff, so sedate, backstage while Wayne and Garth gaped. It's as if you expect this guy to be an idiot and yet you find a professor under the black eye makeup and long hair. Anyway, he amuses me in a smart-ass kind of way. You go, Alice!