The Writing Process Blog Hop!

Happy Friday!  I’ve been tagged by Bethany Myers in a blog hop to discuss my writing process, so here goes:

1.   What am I working on?

 

I’m thrilled to announce Reality Re-Do, my romance novella and hopefully the first of a three part series is being published by The Wild Rose Press Rose Press. I just found out this week that it will be available 9/3/14.  So aside from promoting, making this blog prettier and making the jump to a website, I am actually writing as well.  I’m working on edits for Reality Re-Mix and still tweaking the first draft of Reality Rewind.  Re-Mix is a follow-up novella and Rewind will be a short, fill in the past novella which will end the storyline. I only recently came up with ending which surprised me.

 

2.   How is my work different from others of its genre?

 

I hope it is different!  The MC, Beth, takes a chance on writing into her favorite reality television show, aka her coping mechanism, and ends up taking a chance on love in the process.

           

3.   Why do I write what I do?

 

I didn’t set out to write romance; in fact I’m shocked I did!  I initially wrote a YA four years ago that is now getting dusty and tried a couple of other projects, the story of Scott and Beth came to me last year and the two wouldn’t leave me alone until I wrote about them.  Thankfully, this novella found a publisher who loved them as much as I do.

4.   How does my writing process work?

 

Everything I have written has started off in a spiral notebook.  I have stacks of them!  I write a messy outline then actually start writing the story, usually in order, in messy longhand.  Sometimes I type a chapter if I think I nailed it, but usually let the ink dry for a few days then type it up on the computer. I consider the longhand the first draft and the typing the first edits.  I know others think this is archaic and nuts, but it works for me!

 

Thanks so much for this opportunity, Bethany, and thanks for stopping by blog-hoppers!

Ally

 

Big News!
72 days 0 hours 20 minutes to Reality Re-Do Releases (Wednesday, September 3, 2014, 12:00 PM).

Character Flaw

I have a confession to make, an apology to give. Tom, I’m sorry, but I really didn’t know what happened to you until last week. I left you dangling, and that was unfair. I hope you’ll forgive me as I think you’ll be happy with how I took care of your storyline. Well, as happy as you can be considering you are a fictional character and dead.

Allow me to begin at the beginning. As I drafted my novella, Reality Re-Do, I knew a few things about Tom – he was my main character’s husband, a great guy, a proud father, a successful travel writer and deceased.  As the story took shape, with the main character, Beth coping with her widowhood by losing herself in reality television I came up with the idea that Tom had died while the couple was on a cruise to Greece for work.  I let, “Lost at Sea,” and, “Tragic Disappearance,” account for his demise.  I planned to elaborate further in later installments of Beth’s story. I told my editor I was saving the details for when Beth was ready to tell the new love of her life and it wouldn’t be in Reality Re-Do.

Somehow it didn’t bother me that I didn’t know what those details would be, it worked for me and I felt like it would come to me someday. Someday finally arrived last Thursday.  On Wednesday I submitted my manuscript for the second novella, and still hadn’t answered how Tom had died, but it still felt okay with me. In the post-submission high I began to pen (literally, my first drafts are always longhand) the final novella that would feature Beth and her new boyfriend, Scott revealing their pasts to each other. I now had to come up with the story of the night Tom died, I had no choice. 

On a beautiful sunny afternoon in my backyard I finally killed Tom. It came to me clearly and quickly, my handwriting is barely legible. I did not see this scenario coming; I’m as surprised as I hope the readers will be too.  Maybe my character flaw will turn out to be just a minor imperfection this time.