When my muse messes with me

Thank you, Ginger, for letting me play at your house today! It's always fun to meet my friend's friends. Hopefully we can all play together nicely.


Those who know me also know that at times I'll complain about my muse abandoning me for vacations in Mexico. Those who don't know me look at me when I say this and either laugh or give me that look...you know? The look you'd give if you found a monkey working in a nuclear power plant. But the fact remains that there is many times when I'm in the middle of a project (or many for that matter) that my muse decides it's time for her to take a siesta. "Go ahead, Trent, you got this! I'll be back to see how you're doing in...well, I'll be back at some point!" Poof! She leaves and I'm stuck trying to figure out where my plot is going or wondering why my story just doesn't seem "likeable." So today, instead of just promoting the works my muse has blessed me with, I decided to talk about things I've done to pull her butt out of Mexico and back at my side.

1. Reading
When I was on active duty, we used to say you couldn't be a leader if you weren't at one point a follower. The same goes for writing. How can you write if you don't read? We all have great ideas, but those ideas do nothing if you don't know if it's been done before, or how plots are developed, characters created. So reading is important.

When I feel my muse has left me for longer than I like, I pick up a book. Sometimes it's in the genre I love to write and sometimes I play in other author's back yards. I actually found that when I read outside my genre, my muse gets upset and comes in and kicks me in the butt. As I stated in a previous blog, I wrote Ghosts of the Storm primarily because my muse came in and introduced me to my character as I sat in the hot tub reading an anthology.

2. Talking to myself
It's not as creepy as you might believe! Sometimes, when I'm in a deep, dry rut of not writing, I pick up a notebook and pen and just start writing anything. Gibberish, notes, thoughts, jokes, doesn't matter what goes on the page, just as long as something goes on the page.

Sometimes, I begin to ask myself questions on paper. Why is this character like this? How will he meet the girl? Why does she not like him? What's the big deal? Sometimes my questions are more detailed, more precise. I do it so I can start trying to think of the things needed to make a story realistic. Not all the time does this work, but every now and then, it sparks my imagination and from there, more of my story comes to life.

3. Putting down the pen
Oh my God, Trent! Did you just tell someone to put the pen down?

Yes. Unfortunately, we are all in the rat race. We are all trying to get our name out there and put our stories in front of as many readers as we can. But sometimes forcing a scene, character, plot, story, does nothing more than damage it. Well that's my opinion anyways. I find that if I write in a troublesome work in progress just to write, just to put down as many words as I can to meet some personal deadline, it sucks when I go back to read it later. A lot of the time, I scrap the entire portion because I couldn't believe what I had done. For me—and most writers will tell you that each of us has or own ways and what works for some doesn't always work for all—if I put the pen down every now and then and start playing with my friends online or participating in blogs, my muse comes home and asks me what the hell do I think I'm doing? That and I find it's always fun to keep my friends around me so a break every now and then helps me to remember they're there as well. So there you have it folks! Will it work for you? I can't guarantee that it will. We all have different minds that work in various ways. I hope these small things of mine can help you. Truth be told, you must find what works for you.





http://www.trentkinsey.com/

Oh, The Torture!

I've been a sick puppy for the past few days.  No energy, so I apologize for not coming back and announcing the winner of my April Fool's story contest.  Martha Lawson...congratulations.  Your PDF copy of White Heart, Lakota Spirit is on  the way.  As sad as I am to admit that the true story was NOT number one or two, THREE is the real deal.  Yep, that's my Kelly...a disaster waiting to happen, but he's like a good book you can't put down.  You have to stick around and see how it ends.  *lol*

I don't often use my blog to promote my other "appearances," but I do hope you will take time to stop by Trent Kinsey's website and see what a fantastic interview he's posted of little ol' me. He asked some pretty interesting questions and gave me an opportunity to explore my own self, and I made a revelation about why I'm so non-productive in my own "cave."

I've spent the past two days watching TV movies, but according to the class I just took, that's a helpful thing to do because it helps me notice plot points, how conflict, both internal and external, are used in the story.  Soap Operas...not so much.  I find myself talking out loud to the TV over the unrealistic way the story unfolds.  We, as authors, get chastised if our stories are not believable, so how can TV directors and producers get away with it?  Just drawing on my own life experiences, I know prisoners are never allowed visitors in a private room, or, in the very least, searching or using a scanner to check the incoming body for weapons or contraband.  Heck, when I was a correctional officer, we had a sweet looking Granny bring in a big milkshake for her grandson...who at the time happened to be a trustee.  That's a position earned on trust, as the title indicates.  Anything brought into the jail was still searched, but on this occasion, the other C.O. took the drink and tried to insert the straw into the cup.  It met with resistance which of course led to him pouring the shake out and discovering a baggie of tobacco, wrapping papers and a lighter in the bottom of the cup.  You can't trust anyone in the environment.

But back to my original gripe.  Who wakes up in the morning with makeup that looks like it was just applied?  With breath fresh enough for delving kiss?  Or hair that isn't flattened on at least one side.  Really, fiction is fiction, but let's have a little reality in the presentation.  While the hero rolls over and gives the heroine a "deep throat" type of kiss, I'm saying, "YUCK," because I know what my mouth tastes like in the morning.  It can't just be me.

And predictable??? Today, the young soap star jumps into his girl friend's (although she claims she's only his tutor) car, tears out, wheels a spinnin' and an angry look plastered on his face.  She's in the passenger seat, begging him to slow down.  Instead, he whips out his cell phone and begins texting.  Imagine my shock when she yells, "Watch out!!!!" and bright lights flash in their faces.  Who saw that coming?  And was I surprised to see the two in a public service message about the dangers of texting while you drive in the next segment?  So predictable.  But the hook?  Now I have to watch Monday and see what happened to them.  So, even soap operas, although often asinine can teach authors what NOT to do in their books.

So, now that I've had a good couple of days learning lessons, maybe this week I can get something accomplished on one of my WIPS.  I really would like to have a new release in the not so distant future.

And, don't forget to visit Trent's site and tell him what a wonderful job he did. 

Even horror needs love

First, I'd like to thank Ginger for having me here today. I always tell her I got her back and today she's given me a forum so she now has my back. When she asked for authors to come out and speak during the month of love, I held my hand up. Yes...Even a horror author has a heart.
But what's funny is I'm starting to move away from horror and into more of a tragedy genre in writing. I'm still holding onto some of my demented personality and, yes, I do keep aspects of love in my horror, but something about a tragedy has gripped my mind, broken my heart and made my soul ache.

Maybe it's because I used to be a fan of Shakespearian Tragedies such as Romeo and Juliet. Maybe I just like to cry and make others cry with me. But there's something about a tragedy that makes us appreciate what we have or could have.

I'm about to submit my first tragedy about a man who's true love is killed and he's left with a wife that doesn't love him and only uses his loss against him. Being a man of horror, I had to keep some of my roots by adding a supernatural aspect to the story, but nonetheless, it remains a tragedy that even makes me cry.

With that said, I'd like to share a short excerpt of my my soon-to-be-submitted short story, Ghosts of the Storm:

"I've heard the rumors."

"Like hell! I'm amazed she hasn't tried to get you in the sack with her." I felt a pang of guilt seize my chest but I fought it back. It's not like I screwed the woman, regardless of what fleshy parts she tried rubbing against me at the Pig.

"Joe, you're starting to confuse me. What's this gotta--" Joe waved his hand at me in a shooing nature and I knew I was out in left field so I shut my mouth to see what he had to say.

"I know she's been sleeping 'round on me. It's part of the deal we made a while back." Joe stopped and looked at the spot in the road again. I couldn't help but look with him. What did he see that the rest of us kept taking for granite?

"I have to tell you, Bobby. Not because she'll be blabbing to everyone in town--"

"You know no one will believe her Joe." He gave me the wave again.

"I have to tell you because if I don't, the rest will seem even more crazy than it already does."

I could see the street lights refracting through the tears in his eyes. Seeing a man of thirty-five crying in the dead of night just ain't something anyone should see. A man of Joe's age is supposed to be vibrant, robust; past the age of trying to stick his dick into everything, yet still young enough to feel life flowing throughout his body. Joe looked like a man who made his peace with death.

"Oh did I love that girl. And what many didn't know is that she loved me too. That boy Michael was just window decorations for her. As long as everyone thought the two of them were a couple and he kept being an asshole, they'd never dare think the two of us were a thing.

Fact is, we would’ve been married had I not been stupid. We'd known each other for years but my being five years older never set right until after she turned twenty-four. A twenty-five-year-old seeing a twenty-year-old doesn't sound nearly as bad as a twenty-year-old seeing a fifteen-year-old. By the time she turned eighteen, I was graduating college and she was heading to it. Then there came Becky.

I tried to catch a falling star when I started seeing Becky. Oh you could get close enough to make a wish but trying to hold on for the ride? Never possible with her 'cause she'd burn you right up. The first month with Becky I could never described but by month two, everything started to crumble. Then came the scare of pregnancy and of course what did I do? I went off and hitched myself to a falling star, burning up in the atmosphere each second after we both said 'I do.'

A miscarriage and two years later, Amanda comes home from college and I'm stuck married to a woman that can't keep her drawers in the up position and I can't seem to catch her in the act." Joe stuck his hand in the air, seeming to know what I was going to ask.

"I know the stories, Bobby. That didn't happen until after Amanda's death."

"So Amanda finds me after so many years and we feel it. That sense that there's a happily ever after. You ever feel that, Bobby?"

Again, I'd like to thank everyone for coming by to see me today and hope to see more of you in the future. Love is always around us and takes many forms. If you're lucky, you'll see and snatch it when you can because life is nothing without love...and neither is anything worth writing.