All Writers Were Once New

There is a saying that all music was once new.

This is true.

All writing was also once new.

But I'll go one further. All writers were once new.

Who knows when the next King, Rowling--or whoever your favorite author is--will come along and knock down the conventional doors of writing?

So, with this in mind, I write on. And blog when I can.

I wanted to sort of review some of the books I've read this past winter.

Lately I've been really into Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse books. These are fun to read--a blend of fantasy, romance, and mystery. Charlaine isn't the only one doing these types of books, but for me, these are the ones I personally like, out of any of the other writer's I've read.

Harris' last book All Together Dead, I thought had been her best, in as far as bringing all her elements together--the mystery,the danger, the romance--creating a romantic cliffhanger for her heroine over which man she'll choose. I can't wait until her next book, but I really can't afford a hardbound book. So, I'll have to bide my time and wait until a year from now, when it should be out in paperback.

Basically, her vampires have come out of the closet, as they say, because of the new "synthetic" blood developed by the Japanese. This enables the vampires to blend into society, and be accepted (as far as they can be).

The sometimes funny things that happen along the way, and the different characters that she introduces in every story, is what gives these stories their magic, and keeps the reader interested.

This was her seventh book, her eighth one is due out next month.

I was curious about Laurell K. Hamilton, and unfortunately I didn't know she wrote porno (erotica in writing terms, but a manager of a bookstore said flat out that it's unabashed porno, and I had to agree). Thus, this is all I'm saying about the one I tried to read, Incubus Dreams, but I truly became sick of the multiple menage a trois, throughout, and what I was told was an interesting premise in the very beginning turned into an ugly beast. Her character doesn't do any vampire hunting, as far as I can see. Most of her time is spent on bathroom, bedroom, office floors, in a bed occasionally, on a desk once, and the back seat of a Jeep. Well, I'll be honest. Every now and then she was on top. But it was always with two men. If this is your fantasy, be my guest, check her out in the fantasy section. You have a who array to choose from. I personally don't care to have nightmares about sex, thank you. So, I put it down and couldn't finish it.

I then went to the other end of the scale, chose Lynsay Sands' Vampire, Interrupted, and found it very tame compared to Hamilton. It is a romance, and thus nothing really happens at all. As in all romances, the basic plot is easy (easy to figure out who's going to go to bed with whom), and so, I became easily bored, sleepy, and couldn't finish it in a week, as I do any of the Harris' Dead books. This kept me in reading material until All Together Dead went into paperback.

The one thing I didn't like about Sands' vampire explanation was that their ancestors came from Atlantis, thus were advanced scientifically, and used something called "nano" technology, and bioengineering, and to stay alive forever they feed on blood, I guess, to become "immortals". This part for me was okay. But her other premises just weren't in the vampire mode, such as women (vampires) aparently can give birth at any age, and in this book, they were able to go out into the sun. So, why did they need to do things at night? I haven't a clue. I couldn't get their being able to attain blood (in plastic bags, like you find in blood banks, hospitals, etc.). It was a total turn off reading about them sucking blood from the plastic bags.

Sands' books are probably okay, if you don't get into the usual vampire fantasy thing. If you want to read romance with a vampire or two in it as the main characters, but you want more of a romance-read, Sands gets my vote.

Personally, I like the whole fantasy creation, and true vampires who are somewhat evil, or at least bite during sex. I don't know why, but the mild erotic eliment of this is just pushing the envelope just enough to be naughty but not something that gives me nightmares.

As far as the Dead books by Harris, she has her Sookie character dating vampires as well as Weres. It makes for a good mix that isn't boring at least, her characters feel real. She doesn't try to gross you out in crutial points (it's why I quit reading King. That was pure horror, and I fell away from it years ago).

Okay, that's all for me. I'm looking forward to checking out a different writer, one that Harris mentioned in her blog the other day. Karen Chance. Touch The Dark, is her first book. I just want to read it, because her main character is a clairvoyant, as is my character I'm writing about in Were There's Blood. I need to make sure I'm not copying an idea. But mainly to see what my other copetition is doing.

Happy Spring!

I WRITE THEREFORE I AM

Hello. I've been busy.

For those of you who have yet to read my blog, and don't know it (other than the very title of this post), I am writer . . . hear me roar. Or squeak. Whichever.

I've been busy, of course, with my latest book--Were There's Blood--and working (more or less) full time. It has also been very cold, here in northern Illinois, most of the time, and heating my office has been a challenge, since I live in a 107 year old farm house, without insulation, and my office just happens to be the far western fringe of the main house (almost in Bismark, but I'm willing to bet it's closer to Siberia). With tall ceilings, may I say. Why did people have 10 foot ceilings when they were only five and a half-feet tall? That's the question of the day. How do you get to the cobwebs? How do you paint, or change the lightbulbs without having to find/buy a 15 foot ladder???

Just got my latest Writer's Digest. I recommend it for any writer. Subscribe to this and/or The Writer, and you will be able to self-educate yourself. That is my tip of the day--or of the month, since I can't get in here as often as I would like.

This issue (June 2008) has 101 best websites for writers. I spent the last couple of days hi-lighting the ones I want to visit. I'll never have time to see them all, until I retire, I think. But a few will get a peruse, when I get some time, and I'm not so damned tired. I may want to see some of the freelancer ones, since it would be nice to see if I can't get a job writing. I'll write for coffee (most flavors) and chocolate, but since I can buy those things, I'd rather have a little cash, instead.

Writers are a different animal, believe me. A true writer never stops writing. This I can say with full authority. If you are a true writer, you write while you are doing anything else, like doing dishes, walking (esp. walking), doing laundry (my husband does the laundry so I can write), you can even write while asleep. Ah. This I can do. Which is annoying as hell because you really don't feel like getting up, finding your reading glasses, and the pen and paper you left by your bed-side. I do have a recorder. But I also have a bed partner. If I start talking, he would hear it and think I'm talking in my sleep and kick me. If only you could just record all those ideas, dialogues, scenes that spin around up there through some electronic device that you can hook up to your brain, then, well, you'd just have it made. That's what I want for Christmas, this year. The electronic thingamajig that records your every thought, and you just plug it into your computer and it comes up on screen--complete with pictures. Wow. I don't know if I've just invented this, but maybe I should get the patent, and maybe I'll get rich that way. You think?

I once read that Rod Sterling had written his stories from his dreams (if you've ever seen Twilight Zone, you'd understand why the weirdness), and I believe also Lovecraft, did the same, but I can't say this for sure, (and I'm not looking this up, since it would take hours of digging), however both men had on-going dreams. That is they could get up from a dream, go do whatever, and go back to sleep, and return to the dream, sort of like reading a book, or watching a video. In fact I think one of them could go back to the same dream the very next night. Cool. And I'm envious. My husband claims to have done this on occasion.

Okay. Since I have only so many hours in my day to devote to writing, this was my first stop. I hope you enjoy my blog. Eventually I will get some pictures, and make this blog more interesting. I'll have more time to play with this in a little over a month from now, since I'm taking some time off this summer to WRITE!