I'm a writer...in progress

I'm an author, a writer, a person who sits at the keyboard and bleeds words all over a document. It feels so good to admit it, but haven't I always admitted it? I have a blog where I write about my adventures in self publishing. I share my many set backs and my accomplishments. I have a book for sale on amazon (Zombie Bite) and I'm about to have another book available soon, but I don't introduce myself to others as an author. I don't hand out my business cards, or do anything to bring attention to me. It's almost like I'm ashamed to admit that I'm a writer. Why? Do I feel like people will judge me or my work? Well, yes, I do feel like that. Whenever I tell people that I'm a writer I feel like I have to live up to a certain standard. I feel like I can't make mistakes and even my blog has to be 100 percent error free. At work I throw away papers that I've written on if I feel like I may have misspelled a word or that the word doesn't look right written out. I hold myself to such a high standard that I end up hiding this part of myself. Why do I do that? Is it because I get negative comments about the amount of money authors make? Maybe because I had a coworker tell me that there were plenty of writers and there was no way that I could stand out and make a living. Maybe it's because the ex that I thought I would marry showed no interest in my writing. He never once asked to read my writing, and he also never encouraged me (even after I said we should write children's books together based on my dogs). It could also be because I don't think Zombie Bite is very good. I wrote everything but the opening when I was in a dark place. I had just been through a break up and wanted to get it out there because I needed to be successful at something. I regret the way I ended Zombie Bite, but that doesn't mean that I regret writing it. I need to own the fact that I'm a writer, an author, and push myself outside of my comfort zone. I need to pass out business cards in my spare time and promote my books on social media. There will always be people who don't like me or my writing, but that doesn't change the fact that I am a writer and a published author.

Internet trolls and Zombie Bite conclusion

My last post was about an internet troll who attacked my novel: Zombie Bite. I will admit that Zombie Bite was not my best work. I wrote it when I was dealing with a lot of different things, and I think it suffered as a result. I decided to write a short conclusion to the story (which I will be posting here, divided into two parts). So here's the first part, in all its unedited glory:

I forced my heavy eyelids open, taking in harsh lab lights. I tried to sit up, but something was across my chest, restraining me. Pain suddenly flooded my body, causing a single tear to escape my eye. Where the hell was I, and what had happened to me? I looked down to find that my arms and legs where covered in mud, and I remembered that I had been shot and left to die in the mud.

I heard a door open and close and suddenly the room was filled with sound. I couldn’t escape it. A chair slid across the room, a woman was gossiping about another doctor, and someone was chewing gum loudly. Every sound felt as if someone were playing the drums inside of my ears.

“Who are you people?” I asked.

Everything seemed to stop. It was like they hadn’t expected me to speak. I heard the loud clicking of heels as someone walked over to me, but my vision was too blurry to make out who it was. “I’m sorry for your loss,” said a female voice.

“My loss….” My voice trailed off as I realized she meant Eli. Eli had been everything to me and now he was gone. I wanted to feel something, but I just felt numb and exhausted. Maybe it was because I knew what Eli and I had was over long before he’d been infected. Did I even love him anymore? I thought I did, but I had left him when he needed me.

Suddenly, the table I was lying on moved forward. “Where are we going?” I asked as shapes and forms moved past me in such a hurry that I couldn’t make out what any of them where.

“We weren’t sure you were going to wake up so we had you in the morgue, but now I think it’s more appropriate for you to be in a guest room,” she said, her words echoing in my ears.

“I’m not your guest. I want to leave,” I said, as if it would do me any good. I knew I was at her mercy, but what did she want from me? Was she working for Dr. Haines, the woman who claimed to have a cure for ‘zombie’ infections or was she working of her own accord?

There was a loud buzzing sound and then everything became clear. I could see the pretty brunette woman who was pushing my bed into a large elevator. “What is this place?” I asked her as she pressed one of the buttons.

“It was an old women’s hospital. We’ve turned it into a medical center to help those taken by the late Dr. Haines,” she said the last few words with a smug smile.

“If you wanted to help me you wouldn’t have tied me to this table,” I said, nodding towards the thick ropes that bond me to the table.

“The ropes are for your own protection. We weren’t sure how you would react to being here,” she said.

The elevator doors opened with a low humming sound that seemed to crawl inside my ears. Everything was loud again, it was as if voices and sounds were magnified. I heard everything, from the whispers of a nurse, to a chair scraping the floor in the cafeteria. I barely had time to wonder what was wrong with me as people rushed past us in lab coats and scrubs, it was as if I were in a real hospital. Was there such a thing as a real hospital anymore? I thought the world had ended three years ago when the dead stopped being dead and started eating the living.

A young man wearing a lab coat joined us. “I’m glad to see you’re awake. May I ask your name?” He said as he flipped through some papers on a clipboard.

“Zoey.”

I felt the ropes that bound me go limp and I realized that he had cut them away. I sat up, but the room seemed to spin. I was dizzy and I felt nausea overtake me. I struggled to regain my composer as I was wheeled into a quiet room. The young man closed the door behind us, just as my surroundings settled. I wanted to stand, but I knew that I wasn’t well enough. “What the hell is wrong with me?” I asked.

“I’ve never seen anything like it, but you’re healing,” he said, pointing to my arm.

There was a bandage on my arm, right over where my bite mark had been. I slowly pulled the cloth from my arm, surprised to find undamaged skin beneath it. What did that mean? Was the wound killing me, or was it actually healing me?

Art in Writing

I remember when I went to elementary school and I took an art class. It was a lot of fun, but one thing the teacher told us has always stuck with me. She said that every artist puts a little bit of themselves in every project. I found myself thinking about that recently and it hasn't ever been more true for me than it is now. I find myself relating to the characters that I write more than ever. I wrote one who worked in a shoe store at the time that I was working in a shoe store with the same inner thoughts as I had. I also just started writing about a character who distances herself from most people, someone I find that we can all relate to. No, I don't think the average person is anti social and ignores others, but I think we've all faced times where we've felt alone. The character that I am writing now is a werewolf named Anyssa, she's someone that I find myself relating to more than I've ever related to any of my other characters. She's been through a bad relationship and does her best to avoid getting into a new one, but sometimes things just happen. Although it's not a romance, it has elements in there like a love interest. A good story is more complex than just going from point A to point B. The reader has to enjoy the ride or they won't pick up anything else that you've written. In a way, your reader knows you better than anyone. They are reading something you put time and effort into, something some people might say is part of you.

Why I decided to write about one of the worst things that ever happened to me

I came across an article recently asking for personal essays that involved any stage of romance, and since I am not doing so well financially, I decided to write an essay. I sat for awhile, just staring at a black screen. Anyone who's written anything in their life can relate to that, and also how annoyed they get writing the first sentence and deleting it over and over. I usually write fiction since my life isn't that interesting. Finally I thought of something, but I wasn't sure that I wanted to go there. I wasn't sure if I was healed enough to write that particular article. Would anyone even want to read what I had to say, or would they think that I was just trying to shame my ex? I thought about some of my favorite authors and started to write the article. In the past I had cried whenever I thought about the event, but this time I didn't. This time I flew through writing the article, even finding things to add when I was finished. When I was completely done I sat there, staring at my computer and thinking about what I had written. Should I submit it under a pen name?After some debating I decided to submit it under my name. While I hated what he had done to me, I knew that he had only made me stronger. I'm not sure if the magazine will publish me or reject me, but I really hope that it publishes me. If it doesn't I plan to revise the article and try again.

Comic books and angry women who don't understand them

Normally I wouldn't bring attention to something like this, but I am so annoyed with this video and many others on this woman's youtube channel. I wish I could just write her a quick comment getting my point across, but she has her comments disabled. I'm talking about this woman:

She clearly doesn't read comic books, but feels ok talking about them because she's seen someone else's youtube video. Oh, and she says Fable 2 is a video game in which you are forced to play as a male getting revenge for the death of a female family member. The funny thing about that is that I have that video game and I play it as a FEMALE character. In this video she talks about all comic books being so awful to woman because a lot of females die in the comics. Well a lot of males die too, and not only that both male and female characters frequently come back from the dead, most of the time stronger. Jean Grey is the perfect example of this, since she comes back as the Dark Phoenix. Gwen Stacey is back as Spider Gwen. This woman also keeps referencing the Killing Joke and Barbara Gordon being shot by the Joker. Yes, she does get shot by the Joker, and she does later become the Oracle (which many people look up to as a strong female character), but she also later gets to walk again and even takes up the mantle of Batgirl again. What about comics where female characters don't die? Does this woman even know there are comic writers who are FEMALE? This woman also claims that many of the male characters who died went down fighting and the female characters did not. Elecktra dies by fighting Bullseye. Just about every female who died in the Walking Dead died fighting, and I know a lot of bad things happened to some of the women in that book, but I believe that the Walking Dead portrays violence very accurately. These are things that actually could happen to people if they were in the same situation. There are many others who have, and yes some woman in comics were killed in very unfair ways, but there are many different genres of comic books and to just group them all into one genre is unfair. One of my dreams is to create a comic book. Sorry for the rant, but it's clear this woman was just looking for something to be angry about. If she happens to stumble upon my blog I would like to advise her to do research next time before posting an angry video.

Your dreams won't come true unless you push yourself

I am about to publish my zombie novel, the one that I had shared an unedited first draft chapter a few months or so ago, and I couldn't be happier about finally wrapping that up and putting it out there. I feel like I've worked harder on that than I have anything else. I plan on working on some other old novels that I have on here after that. I know that I wouldn't have gotten that far if I hadn't pushed myself, but there was a time that I wasn't pushing myself. In 2015 I had just about given up on writing. I got to do it every now and then, but my ex made it clear that my free time belonged to him. He was a person who didn't push himself. He wanted to be an artist, but it seemed to me like he only wanted to sell his art to his friends and family (people who were safe and wouldn't say that his art sucked). I often pushed him, even saying that we should write a children's book together where he could draw and I could write. There came a point where I gave up on motivating him because nothing that I said stuck with him. I became kind of mean towards him, but that's a story for another day if at all. One thing that I have not been pushing myself towards is the let's play channel that I made. I plan to do more with that soon. I'm considering playing the second season of the walking dead, since I haven't yet. The let's play channel isn't my dream though, it's just something fun to do. I already like playing games and it's fun to record myself playing them. Anyway, the point of this blog is that you can not be successful unless you push yourself to be. You need to put in the effort, work towards your goals.

Changes

I feel part of writing a successful novel is to have the characters go through changes. To be able to write about changes you have to go through them yourself. Right now I'm going through a lot of changes. Like I said in a past post, my last relationship taught me a lot about life, myself, and what I'm actually looking for. I don't want to dwell on that relationship any longer, but it did make me start changing myself for the better. In many ways that relationship changed me for the worst. Before I started dating him I was very into foreign movies and learning about different cultures, something he was not into. I also really liked video games, but I felt that I couldn't play them with him because he always felt that he had to be the best (he would also rage quit Halo). I always felt the point of playing a game was to enjoy it. I didn't care about winning or beating the game. I just wanted to play something fun. I wanted to have fun with him as well, but I was afraid he wouldn't be happy if I wasn't good at the game. I sat out playing the latest Batman game because of it. I also didn't go back and do all the missions that I wanted on Dead Rising because of it. I also stopped going to school and the gym while with him, things that I should never have done. I'm doing those things again, and rediscovering who I am and learning new things about myself. I'm trying to change in good ways this time, and I'm learning a lot about change and myself along the way.

Do you need a college education to become a writer?

Recently I wrote a blog about the long ridge writer's group, but something else has been on my mind recently, college writing courses. I am currently in college studying liberal arts. I've taken a few writing classes along the way and know that I have many more to take along the way, but do I need these classes? To go into my chosen profession I will, but to be an actual writer I will not. While my dream is to be a writer, I have chosen to go to school and study journalism. Both jobs involve writing, but I only need a degree for one. I don't believe you need to go to college to write a book, as long as you know enough about grammar and spelling and you have natural talent. There are lots of authors who didn't go to college, some of which have made their way to the best seller's list. The few college classes on writing that I did take only served to heighten my confidence. There was one class I took where the teacher had us read boring short stories instead of writing. I honestly don't think that class helped me at all. College writing classes may help some, but you don't have to attend them to write a book. It's easier now with self publishing.

I'm a blank canvas

In the original draft of Hair Of The Wolf (my werewolf novel), there was more romance than there is now. Sure, there's a little flirting, but no real romance. There's a love interest, but again no romance. It's an urban fantasy, so it doesn't need romance, but I do want Anyssa to end up happy. She's been through so much that she deserves it. Why did I cut out the romance? The first answer to that is that Hair Of The Wolf is going to be part of a trilogy, and I didn't want to rush the romance. I hate reading a book where the romance seems rushed, or watching a movie where the two leads have known each other for three days. It takes time to build a relationship, even a friendship takes time to develop.  Another reason is that I have never been in love. I've been in relationships before, but never any where I thought I was in love. I've had strong feelings towards someone before, but I knew it wasn't love. Part of me isn't sure how to write about love if I've never been in love. Do I write about what I think love feels like? I am pretty much a blank canvas when it comes to life experiences. I've had some, as you can tell by reading this blog, but not as many as I would have liked. I need to have more. I need to be more carefree and experience more things. I need to think about what it means to be in love, and what it means for Anyssa to fall in love. I'm going to write about her falling in love, in fact I already have the whole second book outlined. I just need to get out more and do more things. I've heard of authors going on road trips, or doing extreme things to find themselves and experience more. Maybe that's what I need to do. I need to force myself out of my comfort zone. 

#PromoteYAInstead

I don't read much YA. I don't have anything against it, I just have never really read much YA. I read the Fear Street series when I was in my early teens, but other than that I read adult horror. While my friends were reading Go Ask Alice, I was reading Carrie. I guess Carrie could be considered YA. Recently I read an article on Slate. The article stated that adults should be embarrassed to read YA. The reasoning behind this was basically that the people who read YA wanted a neat little story that got wrapped up with the happy ending bow. Not all YA books have a happy ending, and a lot of them are about learning a lesson. I don't think anyone should feel embarrassed for picking up any book. What's wrong with reading a book about characters you can relate to? Characters that have gone through or are going through what you are? I've recently read a YA series by Jesi Lea Ryan, and Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher, and I found them to be enjoyable. I don't want to give too much away about the books, but they didn't have happy endings. The characters went through changes. The characters were damaged. They went through things both emotionally and physically that they may not recover from. I didn't feel like I was reading a "children's" book when I read these two books. I felt like I was reading a book. Just a book, no labels needed. Right now I'm writing an adult series, but someday I might want to write YA. I wouldn't want anyone to shy away from my book, or any book, because it's YA. No one should feel embarrassed to go into a bookstore or library and read the book they like. I actually plan on reading more YA. I've been hearing a lot about the Immortal Instruments series and may have to give that a try. A lot of YA books are just less violent/less sexual books that feature a younger group of characters. A lot of adults read books like these because they don't care for overly sexual or violent books. I don't think people are going to stop reading YA because of the lame article, but I do think the author of the article is going to end up missing out on some great books.