Adults are as bad about being grounded as children are. Though I’m skitting by on a technicality, as the stipulations for my grounding were from writing my books……not from writing entirely. Truth be told, though, this blog is where I run whenever I give myself this restriction. So I’ll be on here for awhile, which is going to be fun.

Halfway through Writer’s Market Guide to Getting Published at 1am dark and ugly this morning, I forced myself to go to bed as I need to start transitioning myself back to societal sleep and wake times with NewJobMonday coming up quick. I rehashed what I’ve read before jumping into bed and declare, Nope, still not deterred by the disappointments I’m promised will follow this endeavor. Because not writing and not publishing is way worse than dealing with the multitude of rejections coming my way. I’m actually really excited about the prospect of promoting myself and my writing as a business. I’m also not embarrassed about my attempts at agenting several years back, cause I no longer have the wild desperation us writers-attempting-to-become-authors must all have that first go-round. I’ve been doing the Plan B career thing for way too long and I have to get back to my core. I’m living the alternative and it sucks. I was flipping through The Writer magazine and saw a prompt they’d had on Facebook awhile ago: “Write as if you are dead. Write as if you are alive. Write as if_______”, and my immediate reaction was “Write as if you are trapped in-between”, cause that’s where I’m at.

I’m reading this Guide…… and briefly ponder all the many other people just like me who are holding it in their hand and pouring through the advice, enlivened and eager and devouring each tidbit of information as though written just for us individually (but really only me :)). Then I declare No, I’m not worrying about that. I’m sticking with this profound delusion that I am the only one embarking on this, because certain blissful ignorances are necessary for sanity.

I get under my beloved and lifesaving heated blanket, intent on falling asleep as it’s 1am (early for me! Yay!), which of course doesn’t happen. I go back to those other writers who also know- not arrogantly, but confident and proud as me- that they are great writers. I know my style is good, my stories are good, and there are thousands of others who can legitimately boast the same. Which is comforting. They aren’t my competition. I’m a reader as much as a writer, and I need them.

I’ve read some brilliant, brilliant novels the last few years. I’m catatonic in bewilderment when I close that cover (or turn off my Kindle). But I’m not competeing against them. I like their Facebook pages, post a glowing review on Amazon for them, and read their blogs and pass their brilliance on because they deserve it and I hope for the same when I get there.

Unfortunately, our competition, according to these Guides, are the ones who are already published. That’s what’s harder, what’s horrible. I don’t understand these publishing trends. Why is it that only the same themes get published for long spans of time? If our books break the mold or the current trends, doesn’t that make them more valuable? What about the readers who refuse to read trends merely because everyone else is overhyped about them? Shouldn’t publishers be perched to create the new trend?

I’ve read some really horrible novels in-between those amazing ones. I get to the end, turn to the cat, and say something to the effect of ‘That was incredibly stupid!’ How do they get published? There’s so many typos and grammatical errors, horrible sentencing, and the plots prove to be weak and ridiculous. The one-paragraph description was immensely better than the whole 300+ pages. I’ve read a couple career novelists’ books and found them so bland and safe. I don’t post reviews on these, because that’s just invoking the gods of wrath as it’d be mean. Then all these stupid ‘celebrity’ books. I don’t understand.

That’s what’s aggravating, I think. That’s what makes everything overwhelming and difficult.

Alright, my soapbox is done. It’s Thursday, which is my designated short day of the week. TV night (Grey’s, Beauty and the Beast, and Scandal). Plus my youngest is in his very first play tonight! I finally convinced him to write as well as draw, too, as that kid’s plots are insane. He’s going to be brilliant when he gets older. And I have to go get cupcakes for my oldest, as he gets a year older on Saturday and wants to treat his class tomorrow.

But first, back to research I go!