#Writerly Wednesday Beauty When It Blooms #writing

Beauty, when it blooms, takes my breath away. It doesn't "burst" but unfolds with a simple kind of grace that not all things have. In a way, that's how my writing process often is. It doesn't burst onto the scene always, but infiltrates my mind slowly, sometimes slower than molasses on a cold winter morning, but, things begin to take shape and sometimes it's the most beautiful awe-inspiring thing to me when bits and pieces of a character start to come to life.

A little while back, I posted about my eagerness to start the next story, except for the research I need to do and that I'm getting bits and pieces of background info, like things about the heroine's grandmother. The other night, after working to clean the bathroom, kitchen and living room and wearing myself out so severely that I woke up every hour in bodily pain, I started "brainstorming" in my sleep.

Yes, I guess brainstorming it is, as I wasn't technically dreaming anything, but for several hours before I awoke, my brain worked out a BUNCH of background info on my heroine, who was otherwise a stranger to me. I mean, I know more about the hero. He is the baby brother of the other Pryce brothers, so he's made his appearances, albeit, most the time brief, but he's there and I know his family. The heroine was a complete stranger to me, until more recently and as her background and past begin to bloom for me, even in the deepest and darkest of the night, I feel exhilarated that "she" is showing me who she is, where she's from, the life she had before the story begins.

And from the looks of it, her past is haunting her with significant losses and rebellion in her youth. Her past is not going to be spotless. Not that all my characters pasts are, but this one seems exceptionally dark considering she's a surfer, but then, I'm starting to understand that surfing isn't just something she loves doing- its also her escape and her sanctuary. It's a dangerous sport, but one that brings her momentary peace from her demons, and its the thing she has just for her that saved her life after all the tragedy in her youth. No one else in her life, up until now, understands it, but Mark will and it's just making me SO SUPER excited to start writing their story!!!

(Laugh if you want, but the swell of excitement about starting a new story has brought me to tears this afternoon. It feels so good to be this excited about writing again!)

And thank heavens Mercury is back direct! I feel the shift, the movement of forward motion again in my life, and writing...and it's about time.

Hope you're having a wonderful Hump Day!

~I can see the weekend from here~

#Writerly Wednesday- I'm #Dreaming of an Awesome Book Cover

As a writer, it's sort of my birthright to dream and dream big, but I also dream vivid, at night, while I sleep, too.

You see, yesterday I spent a good portion of my afternoon just scrolling through image after image on a couple of those stock photo sites, trying to get ideas for book covers, perhaps find models who resemble what my characters look like in my mind, or themes that might make good background layers for book covers.

Then last night I dreamed I was designing covers and they were great, just cover after cover and even some I did were so good they impressed publishers. One in particular had a young woman's face, cast in dark shadows, her skin shimmering with perspiration or rain, with a title like "Overwhelmed" and the young woman looked, well-  overwhelmed, tears rolling down her face, from her bright blue eyes, as though I had captured exactly what was needed to grab the reader's attention.

Of course, it was just a dream, but it was vivid and inspiring and that's the little burst of air I need under my wings.

Now, years ago, I used to piddle around with Paint Shop Pro, making signature tags and cutesy banners for my computer desktop and for a Mommies forum I belonged to. In fact, that's where I cut my teeth on graphic design, making cute images with my children's pictures on it to put in my signature when I was chatting on the forums with other moms. Or making tags for them, as well. Of course, I'm by no means a professional, but I can manipulate images, crop, layer, adjust the opacity, etc.

When I started writing, I stop designing cutesy sig tags and I started searching online for images of actors and actresses who fit my characters...I made tags with them for my own personal use, sort of like putting them up on an idea story board, but using them as the desktop backgrounds, so I could see the characters while I was on the computer, which helped me with the descriptions. Eventually I made my own "faux" book covers for each story I wrote, just to give myself "inspiration."

As I've mentioned before, I am giving serious consideration to self-publishing, but I'm one of those people who like to get my ducks in a row, take my time about researching and discovering the ins and outs of things. I'm kind of riding the fence on the to self-pub or not to self-pub, but I'm liking the idea the more I read about how to format novels and I kind of like the idea of having more control over what goes on with my books and so since I'm considering self-pubbing, I'm also considering cover design, too.

In my youth, the idea of self-publishing was something I once knocked because back in the day it was more about vanity publishing and paying hundreds of dollars to someone to put everything together for you. I couldn't image spending all that time writing and polishing and preparing a story and then not getting that validation from a big house. And then spending unimaginable amounts of money I couldn't afford to have it published myself. Nowadays though, I think I'd rather get my validation from readers who enjoy what I write. I write because I love the stories and want to share them. Being a best-seller would be great, but it's not a requirement for me regarding how I value my career success.

Self-publishing is not vanity publishing. The author puts in a lot of time and works hard to see that they put out a good product. It is not vanity publishing, as I'd say the majority of what's "spent" is time and hard work rather than a lot of moolah. Sure there are a few fees (editors, formatters, cover art, etc) unless you are able to do those things yourself, but it's not the same as forking over a lot of money like back in the day.

I mean, after all, I also once doubted the viability of digital books because I wanted to cling tight to my paper books. I love the smell, weight and feel of a real book and shopping for a real book in a brick and mortar store, but I'm coming around and I now see the logic and viability- and the mobility of eBooks. I actually love my Kindle Touch, so it can't be all bad, right?

But as for covers, if I find I just can't hack it with designing covers, I'll hire someone, but first I want to see if I still have the graphic chops to do a few myself and I'm eager to learn more, so if you know of websites that are great for amateur cover artists, sites that offer great stock images that don't hurt the pocketbook, or other things that you've found work well with design, let me know. I'd love all the help I can get and it would definitely be appreciated more than you know.