I haven't gotten much done the last two days, half because I'm not sure what to do next, half because I don't want to lose focus on A65, and half because I'm just a bit too lazy. I know the math doesn't work out, but it does in my head. So I lazed most of my time away reorganizing my shelves of books on Northern Ireland and watching videos of Irish history and dealing with emails and Facebook and basically being a slug.
I did lay the groundwork to try and get a review for A65 out of "Publishers Weekly." Once I've got the next draft done, I'm doing the e-book format, first, and sending it to them to see if they'll look it over. Nothing guaranteed, but it doesn't cost anything...and I can post about the book on their associate page -- "Booklife." Get a bit more awareness of it.
And I now have 13 people reading this draft of the book to give me feedback -- people who are editors and/or writers, and people who just read for fun. As much of a cross-section as possible. And that includes some family members. God knows how long they'll take to get back to me, but I have it printed and ready to go to incorporate my notes, and am able, so far, to keep my grubby red pen off it.
Of course, I'm going through the usual writer's paranoia -- "OMG, I got it to them 2 days ago and they haven't responded? They must hate it!" That's the second-hardest part of being a writer -- learning patience and accepting the fact that other people have lives of their own.
I'd watch one of the Miss Marple episodes on Acorn to get my mind off it, but I'm finding them problematic. I haven't read all of Agatha Christies' works, but while these movies are supposed to be based on their actual stories, I know things have been added to "update" them...and the additions don't work.
One I watched was A Murder Is Announced and it was ludicrous. The writers put a lesbian couple into the story (NOT something Agatha would have allowed) and a son with a Oedipal complex (that is strictly a maybe), and when the murderer is revealed, it was preposterous because of the timing involved and one amazingly stupid detail -- the killer was female with her salon-coiffed hair in perfectly sprayed 1950's condition...after having committed a murder in the pouring rain only a short while prior. No way in hell could that have happened, let alone having the killer know she had to be there at that particular time to kill that particular witness.
The last one, Sleeping Murder, relied on a young woman not remembering she'd lived in England for a couple of years, as a toddler. I don't have the best memory, but I can recall being in my grandmother's back yard when I was 2 or 3. It also required the child to say nothing to her father about witnessing a murder...not asking about it, not referencing it, nothing until she returns from India as a 21 year old woman about to be married and begins having visions. Didn't buy it, at all. And on top of it, an incestuous angle? PUH-lease.
Oh, well...I guess they can't all be Hetty Wainthropp.
I did lay the groundwork to try and get a review for A65 out of "Publishers Weekly." Once I've got the next draft done, I'm doing the e-book format, first, and sending it to them to see if they'll look it over. Nothing guaranteed, but it doesn't cost anything...and I can post about the book on their associate page -- "Booklife." Get a bit more awareness of it.
And I now have 13 people reading this draft of the book to give me feedback -- people who are editors and/or writers, and people who just read for fun. As much of a cross-section as possible. And that includes some family members. God knows how long they'll take to get back to me, but I have it printed and ready to go to incorporate my notes, and am able, so far, to keep my grubby red pen off it.
Of course, I'm going through the usual writer's paranoia -- "OMG, I got it to them 2 days ago and they haven't responded? They must hate it!" That's the second-hardest part of being a writer -- learning patience and accepting the fact that other people have lives of their own.
I'd watch one of the Miss Marple episodes on Acorn to get my mind off it, but I'm finding them problematic. I haven't read all of Agatha Christies' works, but while these movies are supposed to be based on their actual stories, I know things have been added to "update" them...and the additions don't work.
One I watched was A Murder Is Announced and it was ludicrous. The writers put a lesbian couple into the story (NOT something Agatha would have allowed) and a son with a Oedipal complex (that is strictly a maybe), and when the murderer is revealed, it was preposterous because of the timing involved and one amazingly stupid detail -- the killer was female with her salon-coiffed hair in perfectly sprayed 1950's condition...after having committed a murder in the pouring rain only a short while prior. No way in hell could that have happened, let alone having the killer know she had to be there at that particular time to kill that particular witness.
The last one, Sleeping Murder, relied on a young woman not remembering she'd lived in England for a couple of years, as a toddler. I don't have the best memory, but I can recall being in my grandmother's back yard when I was 2 or 3. It also required the child to say nothing to her father about witnessing a murder...not asking about it, not referencing it, nothing until she returns from India as a 21 year old woman about to be married and begins having visions. Didn't buy it, at all. And on top of it, an incestuous angle? PUH-lease.
Oh, well...I guess they can't all be Hetty Wainthropp.
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