The Next Big Thing

Thanks to Gabrielle Prendergast and Ilima Todd for tagging me in The Next Big Thing! Melodie Wright told me she *will be* tagging me, so thanks in advance, Melodie, but I beat you to it. ha ha! (Two tags and one intended tag ... how could I say no?)

It was hard to pick which WiP to highlight, so I just closed my eyes and jabbed the air in front of me, pretending this action would somehow illuminate the correct choice.

What is your working title of your book?
Under Dark Water

Where did the idea come from for the book?
One evening I saw a teenager driving a student-driver car down the freeway and thought, "What if that were a stolen vehicle? What if that kid jacked it from his school and is out on a joy ride?" The novel has morphed into a completely different creature now, but that was the original inspiration. The next question was, "What kind of kid would do something like that?" That's where I got my main character, Hope Wallace.

What genre does your book fall under?
Contemporary YA

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
I hardly ever watch movies, so I have no idea! Though my MC's love interest looks a lot like the tallest kid in the "I'm Farming and I Grow It" LMFAO parody.



What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
When sixteen-year-old Hope finds a suicide note from her brother, she sets out on a cross-state journey to save him, with a wanna-be skater boy and a ultra-conservative reality show star and his film crew in tow. 

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
(hopefully) represented by an agency

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
One month! I wrote it during NaNoWriMo last year. (And my good buddy Christa Desir put herself through the hell of reading it. That defines friendship right there.)

May we see an intro?
Sure! First paragraph: He ran the vacuum cleaner late last night. It should've tipped me off. Or maybe I like living in denial.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Since I haven't pitched this yet, I really haven't thought about it. #fail.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Lots of inspiration: the student driver I already mentioned; the ultra-conservative families who live in my area; the reality show 19 Kids and Counting; cherry orchards; long drives to Portland...

What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?
My MC is half Hmong, which is an Asian ethnic group without its own country.

Now for the fun part: You're it!

Faith Elizabeth Hough
Julie DeGuia
Janet Johnson
Krista Van Dolzer
Kristin Rae

***
Rules of The Next Big Thing:

*Use this format for your post
*Answer the ten questions about your current WIP (work in progress)
*Tag five other writers/bloggers and add their links so we can hop over and meet them.

Ten Interview Questions for the Next Big Thing:

What is your working title of your book?
Where did the idea come from for the book?
What genre does your book fall under?
Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? May we see an intro?
What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Who or what inspired you to write this book?
What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?

Include the link of who tagged you and this explanation for the people you have tagged. Be sure to line up your five people in advance.

Wordless Wednesday: Garden

Does This Post Demotivate You?

 
Sometimes I think writers must indeed be crazy.

I mean, not only do we have to be weird creative types, but we have to be the type of person who's motivated by defeat.

We have to be that kid who, when someone tells him, "What you produced here is absolute crap," replies, "Okay. Now watch me do better!"

I've been blogging for about three and a half years and I've made a lot of bloggy friends during that stretch.

Some are still writing and going strong. Others have fallen off my bloggy/writing radar because they've stopped blogging or asking for critiques.

I've had critique partners who lost hope in the query trenches and moved on to other dreams. But this is what I figure: if you're living a fulfilled, creative life, why complicate it with the complexities of the publishing biz?

Nobody's standing over any of our heads with a hammer saying, "YOU MUST KEEP GOING UNTIL YOU'RE PUBLISHED, OR ELSE!"

No. We do it because want to, because we're a little bit crazy.

If we change our minds and decide this isn't as important to us as we thought it was, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Right?

Or does a decision like that always hang over our heads? Is QUIT always a four-letter word?

What kind of person are you? Do you think you'll ever give up? 

Photo credit: despair.com

On Waiting

It's nice to have company while we wait, yes?

Any writer will tell you, the hardest part of the getting-published process is the waiting game.

It's not the writing. That part's fun.
It's not the editing. Even though it's sometimes painful and sometimes makes your head want to explode, at least you're being productive.

Waiting is the worst.

When you're querying, you wait to hear back from agents.

You get a request, you send it off, and then wait for the decision.

You sign with an agent. Maybe you have revisions to make. You send them off and then wait to hear if your manuscript is ready for editorial eyes.

Your manuscript is declared ready and goes out into the scary world of big publishing houses. Again, you wait.

Your agent tells you there's interest, but to wait a few more weeks....

I could keep going, ad nauseam, but you get the idea. The waiting  never ends, even after you've signed the contract, even after your book is on display at B&N. You're waiting for sales figures and royalties and to hear back on new projects.

So, what do many of us brilliant writer folk do to pass the time while we're waiting?

We ... WRITE, of course!

This is so genius because it gives us a new manuscript-baby to invest in while our school-aged manuscript is away. The problem is, that manuscript-baby grows up and gives us ... something new to wait for.

I hit a couple milestones this past week. I laid my little book, Seagull Rising, to rest after just under a year of having it out on submission. It wasn't too heartbreaking, to be honest, but only because I have two new manuscript-babies ready for manuscript-kindergarten (a.k.a. my ninja agent's opinion). That's the other milestone -- I sent my agent two manuscripts in under two weeks. (I'm not sure if that's against some unwritten rule, but ... they were both ready to go! What's a girl to do?)

So, here I am, between projects ... waiting.

I have two new ideas. One is a YA contemporary set in Hong Kong and the other is a MG historical verse novel. I really liked how this worked the last few months -- having two very different projects going simultaneously. I hope this new pairing will work well together, too.

That's all from me! What do you think of waiting ... and moving on ... and waiting some more? If you're a writer, how do you spend your time between projects?

Photo credit: whistla from morguefile.com

Dancing Horses

Maybe I'm so fascinated by this because I'm a Hong Kong girl and in Hong Kong there aren't many horses. Maybe all of you reading this blog see this sort of thing every day and are like, "Okay, that's boring."

But for me this is SO COOL.

Every year on Labor Day our little town has a States' Day parade, which is kind of a big deal. Everybody goes, all the floats decked out in princesses glide past, and people throw candy to our kids. We look forward to it.

At the end of the States' Day Parade are these dancing horses. I'm not kidding. They really dance.

I was cheering so loudly for them, I actually went hoarse. (*ahem*) If you don't believe me, you will hear all the stupidness of my cheering in the video.

And all the people around me probably thought I was crazy because they've lived in our little town all their lives and have watched the dancing horses EVERY SINGLE YEAR of their entire existences.

But for me, it's pretty cool.


So, what amazing thing happens where you live?

Promoted

Don't freak out. I'm still a mom writing away during those kid-nap-time hours. That hasn't changed.

And I really didn't get an actual promotion, but it feels that way.

I've been promoted from Soccer Mom
(who runs kids around town from one activity to the next)
to

Gymnastics Mom

(who runs kids around town from one activity to the next AND drives forty minutes three times a week to a larger city where her six-year-old daughter is on a competitive gymnastics team)

This means I have:

1. Less time
2. Organizational/logistical skills required that were previously optional
3. Stress increase
4. Excitement increase (I'm super excited for this opportunity for my daughter)
5. Kid-management/mad-snack-distribution skills required that were previously optional

The truth is, after dinner every night, I'm ready to crash. At least two nights this week I've gone to bed with the kids. Staying up late to write just isn't happening.

I'm still getting writing done, but it means I have to be productive during my kids' nap times.

A friend asked me just last night, "How do you have time to write?"

When I said, "Nap time," he gave the response most people do: a small chuckle.

But it's true. I'm fiercely protective of that two-hour (sometimes three if I'm lucky) nap time. I know there are a million other things I could be doing  (laundry! mopping! general tidying! taking a nap myself!) but I IGNORE THEM so I can write. That's the only way I'm going to get anything done.

I'm hoping once my body and mind adjust to this "promotion," the stress will decrease and the nightly productivity will increase ... but until then, nap time is IT.

The goal is that we'll all be able to pursue our dreams, big and little kids alike.

Do you have an insane schedule? How do you manage it and make time to do what you love?

Photo credit: karpati from morguefile.com

I Recommend: Belinda and the Glass Slipper

We made a fun library-book-discovery this week.

BELINDA AND THE GLASS SLIPPER is a delightful twist on the Cinderella story.

I've read it at least once a day since we brought it home. Even my son stopped to listen when I was reading it aloud to the younger girls and he laughed in all the right places.

My favorite part is this one:  

Lola smiled sweetly at Belinda and said, "I really want this part, and I always get what I want. Plus, I have perfect, tiny feet -- just right for Cinderella."

"Belinda had perfect feet, too, but they happened to be huge.

As a fellow large-footed person, I was rooting right away for Belinda!

This is one book that when my kids say, "Read it again!" I say, "Okay!" without any hesitation.


Any book recommendations for me? What are you reading?  

Big Reveal: Fact or Fiction?

So.

You came here for a reveal, huh?

You came here to find out if I was LYING.

Yeah, I know you.

I expected you to show up here today.

So don't pretend you're here just to "read a blog post."

You totally came to find out which of my stories was fact and which was fiction.

Don't try to deny it.

(tee hee ... just felt like working on my *threatening dialogue.* Did you feel threatened?)

And now, on to the BIG REVEAL!

Story #1 was ... FACT. Yes, Perfect Pool really was that perfect and that scary to reach (if you were coming from the top of the mountain).

Which makes Story #2 FICTION. I did lose myself on several hikes growing up, but this particular getting-lost story was unfortunately made up.

In the summer of 2011, I visited my family in Hong Kong and we spent the night on Sunset Peak in one of the cabins, for old time's sake. Here are a few pics of that trip, just to give you a visual of what Hong Kong hiking is like. We didn't attempt to visit Perfect Pool this time around ... would have been pretty treacherous with a baby strapped to my front, especially going across that cliff face!

 

My beautiful sister, Michelle

My mom (in the background), my then-9yo, Baby & moi

Enjoying a top-of-the-mountain meal ... we were trapped in clouds for our whole stay!

A big thank you to Emily and Melodie for the superb blog hop!

Fact or Fiction #2

The summer before my senior year, I went on a hiking binge. My friend Chris was also an avid hiker and for one excursion we thought it would be fun to climb Hong Kong’s Eight Fairies (or Eight Immortals), a hike we’d never attempted before. 

We began on the trail, but when we came to a stream and took a break, for some reason we decided to leave the meandering (read: boring) path and try our luck going straight up the mountain following a stream. 

We could see the first summit from the path through a break in the trees. How hard could it be?

After an exhausting hour of steep climbing, we reached a point where we couldn’t stay with the stream because of a waterfall, and couldn’t climb around without traipsing through the jungle. Instead of admitting defeat and heading back downstream, we plunged into the trees.

We kept climbing, picking our way through, getting slaughtered by mosquitoes and, after awhile, running out of drinking water. It was horribly humid, which both helped and hurt—drenched outside, parched inside.

I have no idea how much longer we hiked, but we were at times literally on our hands and knees, crawling under prickly bushes and through rust-red mud.

When we finally came out of the forest onto a trail, we found we were on a completely different mountainside than the one on which we’d started. We gave up on finishing the Eight Fairies that day. We didn’t even make it up one! Instead, we turned tail back down the trail, passing fellow hikers who gave our mud-smeared appearances quizzical looks. 

The train ride home was memorable, too. We were so dirty that all the other passengers gave us extra bubble space, which is pretty priceless in Hong Kong, let me tell you!

You’d think I would have learned a lesson about trailblazing after that, but unfortunately this wasn’t the last time I got lost while hiking. 

Not too long after, my class got lost on an overnight group hike, in which we ended up camping in a clearing literally blanketed in huge black cicadas.

But that’s another story.

**

Thanks to Melodie Wright and Emily King for hosting this fun bloghop!

Now tell me in the comments, is this story fact or fiction? You can read Monday's story here. 

Fact or Fiction #1

Sometimes in a summer, we packed large backpacks full of as many belongings as we could carry and made our way an hour by ferry to Lantau Island where we hiked up a mountain and made our home for a couple weeks on the windswept saddle of the third tallest mountain in Hong Kong. 

I don’t have any bad memories from our time on Lantau. 

There were stone cabins in which we lived, without electricity, and with only the water that collected in water barrels next to the roof.

There was a naturally-fed swimming pool in which we swam and bathed.

There was a mess hall where volunteer cabin-goers took turns by the week preparing food for all the cabins’ residents.

It was a lesson in community, in not being bored, in having nothing and everything.

The summer I was sixteen, several of the teenagers decided we would hike down the opposite side of the mountain (there’s an airport there now, but there wasn’t one then) to a place called Perfect Pool. 

I’d heard of it, but had never been there. It was the stuff of Lantau legend.

We took off with a couple adults, down to a saddle and straight down the back of the mountain through the jungle without a trail. We reached a bare cliff face that we had to cross without safety belts, holding on to one threadbare rope while our feet rested on another. 

After a grueling but exciting journey, we reached the pool, which was on a small river.

There was a cliff above the pool, and a waterfall feeding it. At the bottom of the waterfall sat a huge boulder. The water hit the boulder and slid down gently, generating bubbles, so that it felt like sitting in a cold jacuzzi.

If you dived into the deep of Perfect Pool, you could see large fish as long as my forearm swimming. I didn’t inspect them too closely; I definitely didn’t want to find out if they had teeth! 

We had so much fun jumping from the cliff. This is where I discovered my love for cliff jumping. I don’t get to do this often anymore, but Perfect Pool was my introduction. It unleashed the daredevil in me – the girl who wouldn’t stand and wait around to find her strength. I found it easier to suck in my breath and jump.

We returned to camp by a safer route: heading down stream until we came to civilization and taking a bus that took us to the base of the actual trail.

I still think of our trip to Perfect Pool as one of those times when I was perfectly happy. 

I’ve heard Perfect Pool isn’t the same now. Something happened to the boulder, so the waterfall tumbles differently. It's sad to imagine this place, which I hold so vividly in my memory, as changed.

**

Thanks to Melodie Wright and Emily King for hosting this fun bloghop! I'm excited about hopping around to see if I can guess who's fibbing and who's not. 

Let me know in the comments if you think my story is TRUE or FALSE. I'll post another (possibly true, possibly false) story on Wednesday.

All you Americans out there, enjoy your Labor Day! <3>