Boston

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.

I do not give to you as the world gives.

Do not let your hearts be troubled.

Do not be afraid."

John 14:27

Holding my breath...

"Typewriter Keys" - Vintage Typewriter Jewelry

"All good writing is 

swimming under water 

and holding your breath"

- F. Scott Fitzgerald

The good news is that 'The Good Professor' is 32,000 words strong. That's encouraging because my tentative end word count is 50,000. The bad news is that I've hit another wall (grimace). Not writer's block - I know where I want to go and where I want to end up. It's that I'm still fumbling my way in the dark, no idea how to actually get to where I want to go (sigh). For a day or two I was completely freaking out - I've got a deadline! Then it hit me: one of the perks of being a professor is knowing well the advantages of being a student - potential and opportunity abound. Thus, I've enrolled in two R.W.A. chapter online writer's workshops - the teacher becomes the student: lectures, research, homework... And I'm SO glad that I did. Inspiration abounds; lightbulbs flashing all over the place. 

So please excuse my paltry posting. My posts will be sporadic at least while I work my way to the end of 'The Good Professor.'  My sistah-mentor assures me that the first book takes the longest amount of time to complete; my subsequent wip/ms will go faster - or so I hope and pray. In the meantime, I'm holding my breath...swimming under water, and I love it ;-}

'Til we meet again,

Temple

I love...

"I love unmade beds.

I love when people are drunk and crying

and cannot be anything but honest in that moment.

I love the look in people's eyes 

when they realize they're in love.

I love the way people look when they first wake up

and they've forgotten their surroundings.

I love the gasp people take

when their favorite character dies.

I love when people close their eyes

and drift to somewhere in the clouds.

I fall in love with people and

their honest moments all the time.

I fall in love with their breakdowns

and their smeared makeup and their daydreams.

Honesty is just too beautiful 

to ever put into words."

- Anonymous

'Til we meet again,

Temple

Breathe

Photo: 'The Art of Writing' - Darlene Quinn

"I love deadlines. 

I love the whooshing sound they make as they go by."

- Douglas Adams

Had to come up for air. Looks like another night writing 'til the sun rises and I'm debating whether or not to put on a pot of java. My deadline is a self imposed one - perhaps the worst kind of them all. How can I simultaneously love writing and the creative process and yet hate their fucking guts at the same time? Don't answer that.

'Til we meet again,

Temple

Alpha inspiration

Joe Manganiello - yeah I know, yuuuuummmmm!

"You saw. They're all teeth and fight and sex."

Alcide Herveaux, True Blood

I've been working on a nasty little sex scene between my heroine and hero and decided that I needed to do a 'net photo crawl for a bit of inspiration. I have a clear picture of my heroine in my mind. As for my hero, he's my uninhibited mental compilation of everything I love about the male spirit, mind and body. You know the man who'd you'd only kick out of your bed so you could fuck him on the floor. Still, I needed a visual inspiration for my alpha male - the better for quality writing, of course. Joe/Alcide is Ridge Copeland personified...sigh. Oh how I suffer for my art ;-} Okay, back to work.

'Til we meet again,

Temple

Breakthrough?

E - the inspiration for my newest heroine.

"There are three rules for writing a novel.

Unfortunately, no one knows what they are."

- W. Somerset Maugham

I've been diligently plugging away on my keyboard - working on the seemingly never ending journey of finishing my first wip. But of late my plugging has sputtered down to a spotty ineffectual tap-tap-tap. Nearly two weeks ago I admitted the biter reality - I've hit a mental, creative wall. And that wall is solid, massive and a stone cold fucker! Trying to force my muse made my distressing situation even worse, even more frustrating. Arghhhhh!

Though I tried, as best as I could to best that wall, I couldn't go over, under, around or through it. After another long fruitless brain racking night, I gave up (again) and crawled under the covers. Several hours later, my dreams woke me. But I wasn't dreaming about my wip. No, there was a whole other crop people (characters) crowding my mind. A series I think. Time, place, people, sights, sounds, smells - all in technicolor surround sound. They woke me up, encouraged me to pull out my notebook and pen and write, and write and write. And somehow in the process I found my latest heroine.

I didn't know it at the time, but I had made a breakthrough. I'm not a one-trick-pony. And I can't say strongly enough how relieved I am to discover that there's plenty of imagination and creative mojo hiding in the depths of my little grey cells. I think that I've also found a way, in part at least, to deal with that stone cold mental-wall fucker - diversify ;-}

Now all that's left for me to do is finish The Good Professor - sigh...

'Til we meet again,

Temple

When I Was Your Man

"LadyBird" - Stephanie McDowell

"My pride, my ego, my needs and my selfish ways..."

Bruno Mars, When I Was Your Man (2013)

It's ironic. When I began writing my ms I was most worried about the plot. While of course I want my novel to be chock full of hott steamy squirm in your seat sex. I want all of that lovin' to be intertwined with an interesting engrossing plot - and for the sex and plot to be the backdrop for the heart - a good old fashioned, honest to goodness love story. Don't get me wrong, I love smut. There's something pure, honest and simply enjoyable about raw lust and fucking. Yeah. But I came of age in the 'Bodice-ripping' era, i.e. Kathleen Woodiwiss, Thea Devine and J.D. Robb; and cut my teeth on the illustrious likes of Jaid Black and Lora Leigh. Those are my favorite books. The ones that have always stuck with me. The ones I love to read. The ones I want to write. 

Photo: MiLaDiMOLuRMuSuN

The ironic part? My fertile imagination may be challenged with connecting the dots, but the actual plot? I'm there. And I've been pleasantly surprised to discover that allowing my naughty thoughts full rein has not been a problem - although it's a job of work to find a variety of ways to describe a cock (ha!). But my greatest challenge has been writing a full and nuanced Heroine and Hero - and I don't mean conveying realistic idiosyncracies, hang-ups and assorted baggage. No, what I've been struggling with is writing the tender voyage of discovery part(s). My Hero is a yummy Alpha and my Heroine is an ambitious, self-sufficient ball-buster. My conundrum? How to write about, how to fully communicate the very real human emotions involved in revealing oneself to another, to being a safe loving place for that another (and vice versa), to get to a vulnerable place of trust, to write it - not easy between an Alpha and a ball buster.  What to do?

Photo: MiLaDiMOLuRMuSuN

I've researched, read and watched a few of my favorite erotic films - always helpful. But in the end for the best inspiration I returned, as I always do, to...music. I think that songwriters, especially lyricists have it the hardest. They have to tell a complete and hopefully nuanced story in the smallest 'space' possible: an introduction, a few verses and a refrain. But the best ones, the ones that stay with you always, do it beautifully. Over the years I've compiled quite a collection of such songs - that do what the best romance novels do in the smallest space possible. The other day Mr. Gorgeous gave me a new song to add to my collection - perfect for my Night Owl Music playlist:  When I Was Your Man (Bruno Mars). 

Leave it to my man to introduce me to a song that encapsulates the passionate turbulent drama(s) of the earliest part(s) of our 30 year long love affair. Mr. Gorgeous told me he's the guy in the unwritten verse - the man who managed to get his shit together in time to get his woman in the end. Otherwise known as the perfect writer's fodder. Alright, back to writing. In the meantime, enjoy this gorgeous song.

'Til we meet again,

Temple