Warrior Wednesday: Tales from the Unpubbed Welcomes Nas Dean

I'm so glad you've decided to join me for another segment of Warrior Wednesday: Tales from the Unpubbed. The authors I've asked to be guests I've met from various places all over the web, and I am happy to call each of them friends.

Please welcome my next warrior and friend - Nas Dean...


Thanks very much to Melinda, who asks unpubbed writers (warriors) to show their scars. God, these scars hurt too much, yet being a warrior so here I am.

My love story with books started when I was around nine years old and had appendicitis removed. Bored, alone and crying in hospital, my dad brought me some books to cheer me up. For me this was a special gift specially and not to be shared with other siblings. Yay! I was in heaven. So books became my special passion. Later the same year after coming first in my class I received a big colorful picture book of “Gulliver’s Travels”. The world depicted in that book kept me enthralled for hours. So I was away in my dreamland most of the time. Though poor, our family life was happy but rather than squabbling with other siblings I preferred to escape in my books. The common refrain from that time is “Earth to Nas!” because I was always dreaming about my characters and their stories!

Then came Enid Blyton’s The Famous Five series, Secret Seven series, Nancy Drew series (I loved the little bit of romance amid the mystery and the thrill!) The Hardy Boys, The Three Investigators. I still remember character names from all these series.

Later, when I discovered Mills & Boons, mind you, at the time (1979-80) the covers were not that hot but still I covered the novels with newspapers so my parents would think it’s school work! I read one M&B in two days. Now I finish one in a day, by the way. Many times I’ve burnt food while cooking because I’m too busy reading. I blame M&B for that and these other things, eg. Being a virgin till the wedding night (around that time all heroines were virgins!) then later expecting romantic gestures from my husband without telling him!

And all these times I wrote. Not exactly a journal, but whatever caught my fancy. I have whole note books filled about my trips abroad. About the hotels, hire cars, exchange rates and the sightseeing.

By the time I had my first baby, I had read so many baby magazines and books that for a while I wrote articles for a community newspaper ‘The Community Globe” on Baby Nutrition, Mother/Child Nutrition. It was a new publisher trying its hand at publishing but folded up later. This was in 1987-88.

I think I was a closet reader and writer. Living in Auckland, New Zealand, I became a member of Manukau Libraries and took out books. All my colleagues and contemporaries were skeptical and I was asked a lot, “You still read?” They went out dancing or nightclubbing and I preferred to spend a quiet night in with a book.

It was only last year, August 2010, that I heard about HM&B Medical Fasttrack, and I decided to submit for the first time ever. God, that rejection hurt! But I had by then discovered the subcare on eHarlequin forum and the support, advice and hugs were awesome! The multi published authors hang out with aspiring writers and answer all their questions and give so generously of their time and support, it simply is staggering. I made many friends online and one such friend (Nancy) asked to see my work. She did a line by line critique of almost five thousand words! I can never forget her generosity. She was gentle with me and said she believed in my plot. And advised me a lot.

It was then I saw that I needed to work on my craft, technique, and the mechanics of writing. I started spending twenty three hours on line out of twenty four! Visited all published authors websites for writing articles and honing the craft articles. For example there’s Liz Fielding, Kate Walker, Lynne Marshall, Michelle Styles and many more authors who all have articles for aspiring writers. Then there are writing workshop handouts from RWA America conferences, hundreds of articles from previous few years. I was submerged in these for some time. At the same time I was writing a Nocturne Bite, using the mechanics I was learning. Start all chapters with a hook, end with a cliffhanger, see that the story and plot moved forward with every scene. Michelle Styles and Donna Alward advised on the forum when I asked about writing craft, to get Kate Walker’s 12 Point Guide To Writing Romance and a few other craft books(Writing Romance Novel for Dummies by Leslie Wainger and Donald Mass’s Writing the Breakout Novel). So I invested in these books from The Book Depository. I think it must have been my best move.

I submitted the Nocturne Bite and started on a Medical. Almost but not quite! forgot about the subbed NocBite. After a turnaround of twenty eight days, I received another rejection, but it hurt less! This time the letter contained the magic words,” Although your story contains some of these elements, it lacks others.” This meant I was doing something right. I also realized that I have to make my presence online. So I started a blog and found a whole new world out there. Almost everyone was blogging about their writing so what could I blog about that would be different, I asked myself. My writing journey is not that interesting!

After winning books on blog giveaways I remembered the RWA handout saying that the whole purpose of book giveaways is to create a buzz by word of mouth of the book. It’s marketing strategy by authors to do giveaways yet I realized that the winners were keeping quiet about the books after reading… so I decided to start blogging about all these new release books after reading them. And I invited the authors to talk about their latest releases on my blog: www.nas-dean.blogspot.com. Yet again I must be doing something right as my followers increased and I have a presence online.

Now for the next step I asked HM&B Desire Author Rachel Bailey:
I don't have critique partners or belong to any writers organisation, the nearest being RWA Aust/ RWA NZ.... the membership is not a problem but the airfare is!.....can you recommend any online writing groups/courses?

I think it's a definite advantage to join RWAust or RWNZ even though you're not in the country. Both organisations have members living in other countries - and a lot further away than Fiji - Switzerland, America, Scotland, etc. You can get the monthly newsletters online or posted (I'm just retiring as RWA's newsletter editor, so I'm biased, but they're choc full of info and craft articles), you can join the CP scheme and match yourself to someone, or a group, be on the e-loop and ask authors questions, etc, etc. The only thing face to face you might want is the annual conference, but not everyone goes to that anyway (RWAust has a Claytons Conference online for those who can't make the main one each year).

Rachel Bailey is another such multi published author who takes time out from her busy schedule and answers any questions I may ask, so huge thanks to her and all other authors I’ve mentioned. I’ve also gone to Joanna St James for advice, so you are also included.

At present I have a partial in the slush pile from the first week of November 2010, v-e-r-y- s-l-o-w-l-y moving towards the editor at the Medical HM&B!

Thank you Nas for guest blogging this week. To continue to follow Nas on her journey to publication, click here. And, join me next week as I spotlight another warrior fighting their way to publication.

The Good, The Bad and The UGHly!

I'll start off with the good - a short story I submitted to Mezzo Magazine was chosen for publication in their January on-line issue. I couldn't be more thrilled! I have been doing my version of the "happy dance" all week waiting for it to go live. Check it out, it's entitled Where You Least Expect It:

http://www.mezzomagazine.com/100101.html

Next, is the bad. I didn't win the Perfect Pitch Contest with Donna Alward. I didn't even make the top eleven. However, I did get back some great feedback from Donna and I think she is very amazing for even holding the contest. I am very embarrassed to find out that I let some grammar errors get through. See what happens when you spend so much time on what you are saying and not enough time making sure you are saying it correctly. Even though I didn't place, I did want to share my pitch and her comments:

Hell Bound is the story of a contemporary demon hunter, consumed by revenge, who finds redemption in the arms of an unlikely savior.

Healer hunts and kills demons on a daily basis, but there is one demon who continues to elude his capture – the demon who murdered his sister two years ago. He has sworn to use any means necessary to destroy this demon, and won’t let anything or anyone get in his way. Now, his closest lead is the demon’s next target, the naive and outspoken Krystina Hall. Krys is a research assistant for the local newspaper and enjoys her normal, easy-going life. All of that changes when she is the witness to a demonic ceremony that results in the murder of her boss; and suddenly she is thrown into the middle of a world she never knew existed.

When Krys shows up at a Catholic Church seeking protection, Healer sees this as the opportunity he has been waiting for to take down his sister’s killer, and he intends to use Krys as bait. Krys only thought she was the one in need of saving, but she soon finds herself willing to do anything to save Healer’s soul from being eaten up by revenge. So she goes along with Healer’s plan on one condition,when she returns to her normal life, he must give up demon hunting and come with her. As they work together to stop a demon from releasing Hell on Earth, they quickly discover true Hell would be to lose one another and the passion they have found.

Donna's comments were that she really liked my logline and the use of the words revenge and redemption. Her more specific comments regarding the body of my blurb were, "Tiny nitpicky item: no conjunction after the use of a semicolon. In your last paragraph, you have a slight problem with tense agreement. "Krys only thought she was the one in need of saving, but she soon finds herself..." First phrase is in past, second in present. Since pitches and synopsis are usually in present tense, I'd simply change it to "Krys thinks she's the one in need of saving, but she soon finds herself..." The onward - after condition I would use an em dash rather than a comma."

Feedback can't get any better than that!

Now for the UGHly - While I have worked quickly to finish my ms and I think my pitch is ready, my inner critic is still plaguing me with doubts about it being ready to submit - is the conflict strong enough? Are the sex scenes sensual enough? Is anyone really going to care about my hero and heroine? Okay, I could go on forever. Well, guess I will be sending the edited pitch in within the next few minutes and then I will have to move on, ready or not.

M

Isn't it funny?

Isn't it funny how one word spoken by a stranger can affect us the rest of our lives?

Prime example - I was in elementary school and our teacher announced our class would be part of a writing contest. We were all given bounded white books and told to write a story and design our own cover. I was thrilled. I had the best story ever (according to me). It was about a little girl who rescued a kitten from a field where its mother had been stomped to death by a horse. The kitten had a really long tail and large ears. All the other kids made fun of the girl's kitten because of its looks, but she loved it with all her heart. (I did mention this was elementary school, right?) Eventually the kitten grew into a beautiful cat and all the other kids felt bad they had ever made fun of it.

My teacher's evaluation of my story was summed up in one word - morbid. Yep, she actually said that to me. To my young mind that equalled horrible. I think my self-esteem took a severe blow that day. I can't even remember that woman's name, but I remember the look on her face and what she said. Every time I write something to submit, I worry that someone is wrinkling their nose up in distaste on the other side.

Worries aside, I am still writing and submitting.

Writing goals for 2010

I did a lot of whining last year and wasted a lot of time. Time that could have been spent doing more of what I have started to love - writing. I never thought of myself as a writer. Ever. In fact, I have told no one (hubby, family or friends) that I have started writing as a hobby. I like doing it in secret. That way if I am a complete failure at it, no one will be the wiser.

2009 was a bit of a bummer year for me and my family. Without boring anyone with specifics, I will just say it felt as if someone had put a hoodoo hex or something like that on us. Almost every month it seemed as if we received a little kick in the pants. Well, 2009 is finally over and hubby and I have decided 2010 is going to be a great year.

Part of what will make this year great for me is taking writing a little more seriously. I have decided to set specific goals for myself and keep an update of my progress here for all the world to see (except for hubby, family and friends).

GOALS:

1. Write. Almost every published writer has published some form of a "how to" for writing. Their practices and opinions vary widely except in one area, writing. They all say in order to become a writer, one must sit down and write, daily. Common sense, right? My goal for this year is to sit down and write at least five days a week and to post a blog entry at least once a week. Doable? We shall see.

2. Style and Grammar. All writers can continuously improve their writing by studying the various grammar and style principals. My goal is to study up on these subjects and try and learn or refresh my knowledge on a specific rule at least once a week.

3. Submit. There is nothing more rewarding to a writer (at least I think) than to see their work published. Last year I dabbled a little and submitted a few short stories to Writer's Digest for their short story competition, submitted a short story to Mezzo Magazine, and I participated in eHarlequin.com's Write a Date with Destiny. This year I will submit a short story for all six of Writer's Digest short story competitions, I will write at least three short stories to submit to Mezzo Magazine, I will participate in every Date With Destiny posted on eHarlequin.com, I will write a novella to submit to Harlequin's Nocturne Bites series and I will begin work on a novel for submission to an agent.

4. Patience. Several writers have stated that it took at least 10 years to see their writing published. Well I can wait. I hope. I shouldn't be too old before then. I think.

5. Read. This is an easy one. I love to read. Losing myself in books has got me through some troubled times. My goal is to read 50 books this year with five of them being classics. This may mean turning off the t.v. occasionally.

6. Come out of the writing closet. This will be the hardest. Several times I have had my writing confession on the tip of my tongue, but I have held back. Like I said above, if I fail no one will know. However, if I tell someone close to me then perhaps I will be held accountable for my goals.

Well, there you have it. To some writers my goals may seem mild, but not to me. I have a lot to do, so I'd better get started.

See you soon,
M