Series Character Need to Change

Happy Survival Day

Must admit we are going shopping ... even out to a restaurant for lunch.  We stuffed at my daughter's and only have pies as leftovers ... since I refused take-homes on ham since we ate it on the days preceding to the big overeating day.  Why go shopping?  We need to stock the larder for the coming week.

The Read ...

While the holidays don't change much for us, I'm thankful good series characters do change over time.  It keeps you interested, in reading ... to find out what's going on in someone's shared world.

Finally got to Karen Marie Moning's Dreamfever ... after it sat on the table for over a week in the hopes it wouldn't get lost in the dreaded to-read piles.  Moning didn't disappoint.  MacKayla was left in thrall of the Unseelie Fae as a sex slave in the last book.  

In Dreamfever, she is rescued from the Fae ... then, she had to be rescued by her nemesis who disagrees on how the Fae (Seelie and Unseelie) should be fought ... then, she had to be rescued from the nemesis ... then, she had to be rescued from her enthrallment with sex, something never having been know to happen ...  All this before the first 100 pages are read.

In short, Mac is no longer the picture of gentle Georgia womanhood ... Rainbow Mac of the long nails and groomed legs has become Black Mac.  The fight to save the crumbling world from all Fae is off and running ... before another third of the world's population is killed.  

Mac continues to make the semi-right decisions... spats with Barrons ... fights to correct her mistakes ... and Moning leaves Dreamfever hanging on a cliff as steep as the previous' book's.

Frankly, I wonder why I didn't notice the book on the New York Times Bestseller list.  If I remember right, this book has more twists than the first two. 

Web Links and Other Comments ...

Have a work you're editing rather than revising?  If you want to know how it might survive a slush pile, Roni Loren over at *Fiction Groupie* is offering a five pages or query critique to old and new readers of her blog: "Win a Critique".   The deadline is Sunday, so hopefully I'll get my blog up this afternoon.  

On social networking:  Jason Pinter, author and agent at Waxman Literary Agency, writes about the "10 Commandments of Social Networking for Writers". Lots of good advice there ... now, if only I can decide what to do with my Facebook and Twitter pages.  Decisions.  Decisions.  [I made the easy one and bookmarked the page.]

As I jump around the web, I see a lot of complaints about e-publishing pricing.  Brenna Lyons, from EPIC [the Electronic Publishing Internet Coalition] has a guest blog at "The Blood Red Pencil" on the business costs of e-publishing:  "But It's Just a Reprint".  My two cents?  Time always costs something.

Progress ...

I must be making some progress on my writing journey ... after all, didn't I just make another sale?  [Night for the Gargoyles by Spectra Magazine]  ...  Thing is, the story was written in 2008.  

The same question might be asked about Taking Vengeance [WolfSinger Publications] which was written in 2004 when I had this image of Mariah standing on a cliff face looking over the eastern ocean with a gale blowing her unbraided hair.  Then, her near-death daughter mindspeaks to her from the other coast. 

Thing is -- I can't remember spending that much time revising them.  I think I just found a market that would accept them ... after normal editing.  --  Hits self up the side of the head so I remember how important knowing your markets are ... even if I want to whine about writing what I want to write.

I have a couple other flash fiction pieces written in 2008 on submissions.  The stories have always been bridesmaids: they made the first cut, but ultimately weren't bought.  Wonder what will happen with them next year.