Writerly Wednesday: Dollies

So here how it works, or doesn't work as the case may be. I am going to do cloth sculptures, aka, dollies, of my characters because it sounds FUN! And like all things that I think sound FUN, require gobs of work that make it less FUN than I thought it would be. So I pull out every doll book I own, which is quite a lot because apparently I collect them, and find a pattern that might be the right basic size, except female because every doll book only sells female patterns, huge dearth of male doll patterns. Sigh. Anyway, I'm combining this stuff with my DH's workout books, because muscly men is exactly what I'm after for my entourage of Wild men, but then my daughter, we'll call her sweet potato, wants to get involved, and I think, 'practically seven, we'll have her do this black apple doll I saw on pinterest, easy peasy'. Only, sigh. Not so easy peasy when 5yr old we'll call him, atomizer, wants one too, and of course that means I'm sitting there making dolls for my adorable children all day instead of the one I wanted to make for me, MY DOLLY SATAN!!!!!!! Who is actually Saturn, but they call him Satan because he has a dramatic case of scary. At any rate, I'm still working on my dolly, and will at some point have a boy dolly pattern. On a positive not, I could market it.:)

Teaser Tuesday

Where we quote stuff from books we're reading, so here, from Marbury Lens by Andrew Smith

Something moved along the ground, a quiet vibration against the steel can beside my foot.
I felt it.
Tap.
Tap.

other quote:

The water was good, the only pure and refreshing thing I'd run across since that first day in this place when I found Genry Hewitt's head staked to a wall.

Actually don't think I'll make it very far with this book, kind of got sucked in by the cover, like all steampunk covers, like Boneshaker, which I also didn't finish. Oh well. It's one thing to like the idea of a genre and another thing to really like it:) Happy Tuesday!

Theatrical Thursdays: no movie, just drama

I am not blogging because I'm writing a novel, and I have to say, it's terrrrrrrific!

Somehow this suits my writerly mood although I have No wolves in my book, only bloodhounds. I read a werewolf book, Sisters Red, which was nicely thought out but kind of needed someone to die at the end. Oh well:) Either way, aren't those boots something? I'm trying to figure out what cuteness to wear to my library book talk, something writerly, obviously, but also cute. Hmmmm. Any ideas?

Fashion Friday: What kind of blue are we talking about?

This is such a nice photo, from DoeDeere, the unicorn queen of course, because it's the kind of blue that Dari has, or had after Lewis was good enough to wash the extra messy dye bits out of her hair.

Cute cute! Reminds me a little bit cindi lauper, little bit murmurs.

Writerly Wednesday: Love and blue hair

For this Week I've been focusing on Dari, the scene around the mall, the hair dye, the mysterious Hybrid Aiden who is so dangerous, and this is the scene I've rewritten a good dozen times because it has to be right. Whatever that means. It's the scene where Lewis and Dari meet again, with their right souls. I kind of love it. This is an excerpt, and here's hoping that I keep it.

I nodded and lay down on the counter, letting my head flop into the sink. The water from the tap was warm as it flowed over my head, his touch gentle, his eyes burning with warmth that scared me a little bit. I closed my eyes, determined to be as Cool and relaxed as I could be knowing that he was absorbing all the marvelous blueness of me—and my ear.

“Do you come to the city often?” he asked, the kind of question a real hairdresser would have asked.

“Only when I need to shop, have a last chance break from the tedium of life in Sanders.”

“Boring is good. That means no one is trying to kill you.” I heard the laugh in his voice and had to smile, even while I kept my eyes absolutely shut.

“I don’t know. It seems like people trying to kill me is very boring, particularly my trainer.”

His hands stilled, no longer moving along my scalp in a way that I was pretty sure was designed to lull me into a false sense of security. “Trainer?” His hands moved again, but I wondered why his voice had been like that, strangely empty instead of warm and full of life. I half opened an eye and saw his gaze studiously on my hair.

“I’d hate to be like the unstable Hybrid, Aiden? I guess that means training, right? Did you say that you were trained by a Wild House? That makes me feel a little bit better, the whole training thing is so harsh but if you could survive it, I guess I can too.” I opened my eyes to look at him while I smiled, only to see him staring blankly at a spot on the wall. I turned my head to see, but it was a blank wall, maybe dirty and grease smeared more than a Wild’s garage would be, but hardly interesting enough that he should stare at it with that much interest.

He turned off the water, once more looking at my hair as he squeezed the water out. “That’s right; I was trained by Wilds,” he said quietly.

I had this weird realization, that he was smaller now than he’d been before, not smaller exactly, but his energy was walled off so that I couldn’t see it. He looked almost normal as I stared at him, wondering what had happened to his aura.

He kept his hand on my hair, even as I sat up, feeling awkward again with this person that I didn’t know. Somehow I felt more comfortable around him with the blistering heat and intensity. This was a stranger.

I sat there in silence while he absently ran his hands through my hair, slowly and methodically until I realized that steam was wisping up from my hair, swirls that rose as he combed my hair with his fingers. In spite of the wall between us, he was hot enough that my hair dried while I sat there, trapped by those scarred hands that were stronger and gentler, than anyone else I knew. The walls slowly melted away and I wanted more than anything in the world, to put my head on the shoulder that was so close, so solid looking and close my eyes. It had been such a long day, a long week really, and it would be so easy to sink against him and forget about everything. Here in a garage I’d never been to, I felt safer than I had in a long time.




Hmm. Format got kind of sticky towards the end. Oh well:) Happy Thursday!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Today is the day of love, so I'll set up the scene, Dariana, loose in a mall with her new shiny soul has discovered a store that sells piercings and hair dye. She's found a lovely blue dye that reminds her of her pony at home, kind of beautiful blue and some sparkly tights.

Let's create a look for her on Valentine's Day. This is my inspiration. Happy Day lovers!

Music Monday: I Love You Always Forever

I realize somewhat belatedly that I've managed to make this blog more about fashion than about writing, because writing about writing is too abstract for me, and if I wanted to write about writing I'd be in pedagogy instead of writing novels, but I'm supposed to keep a blog current and interesting while trying to write, and write prolifically because I'm a drafter, (which means I write half a dozen or so drafts until I give up and publish.) I'm going to try and focus this blog on my writing world, but hopefully still have fun, because without the fun, it's just not going to be updated, like, ever, except I'll be all, "Hey, look, I wrote a novel", once a year or something. That was a long sentence. Hi! That was a short one.

So about the writing. It's Valentine's week, and love is in the air, and love is all around us, all you need is love... I'm currently working on the 5th draft of Hybrid, House of Slide, a novel about a girl who has a new soul and has to figure out how to not die. It's all very exciting, particularly the butterknife skewery. So, Music Monday will be about the characters. Doesn't that sound organized but still fun?

Dariana Sanders is young, naive, cute, and very very adorable. Donna Lewis's voice, the song, it's all so Dari when she gets her soul back, I love it! Whenever I accidentally make her sound like a Hotblood, I play this song and voila! Back in the right voice.

Even that picture is cute enough for her.

Theatrical Thursdays: in Time

in Time was a little bit like Robin Hood all, 'we are the 99' thing, so politically the timing was good. Other than that, Justin Timberlake? I still think of him as Britney Spear's boyfriend. It's like Marky Mark, who is not quite so Marky Mark, but it took at least five movies to get past that. I kept waiting for him to break out in his boyband moves, which would have been fun! Why don't they break out in dancing more often?

The girl with the big eyes had very big eyes. I liked it when she kept shooting people. That was funny. Why would shooting people be funny? Sounds terrible written out like that. Guess you had to be there.

Everything was very cinematically extreme, black against white with subtle gray, but not a lot of middle ground. You could probably say that about the whole movie. Rich people=bad. I think they were trying to draw a comparison to the way that monopolies control who lives and dies, health care maybe? but it was all a little too much. And. If you have the technology to live forever depending on how many digits are programmed into your arm, why would you have no other technological advancements whatsoever, except for narrower windshields. Seriously. One of the best thing about Real Steel was the green roof and the wind plants all over. Shows thought went into the thing.

So In Time was a solid okay movie where the girls all wore dresses. And Justin Timberlake did not break out in dance or song. Too bad.

Writerly Wednesday: Plaid

Plaid. The only thing he ever wore was plaid. It would have been less impressive if he didn't always have the goth, near death look going on at the same time. Black and blue plaid jacket, tight brown and green plaid pants, black boots, it's true, but his socks were always patterned, some kind of dark textures that were old fashioned, like he'd stolen them off corpses from the cemetery. At least, his spiked black hair and generous use of eye-liner gave that impression.

I worked in a bookstore right on main, and every day I could see him through the large sheet window, walking by himself from his apartment to wherever he worked. I noticed other people, naturally. I'm a reader, someone who watches people wondering what their story would be if it was written out in black and white. Mrs. Johnson with the orange hair, who thought it was the nice auburn on the box, Mr. Gallipolis, who always nodded even if he was only agreeing with himself, other goths, but never with the plaid.

One day, I was locking up the shop when I dropped the keys. I hurriedly picked them up, then turned. Unfortunately this person happened to have a chivalrous bent, or some kind of bent, because in my down, turn, up maneuver I managed to smash him in the face with my forehead.

He grabbed his nose, I stood there with my mouth open, and my eyes watering, horrified. He kind of backed off, crouched like I might head bash him again at any moment. I stood there, nodding like Gallipolis and wishing the earth would swallow me, particularly when I saw under his hand a trail of red blood.

The after was blurry, me apologizing like an idiot while trying not to make eye contact, him bleeding, until I was home, happy, alone with worlds of books to distract me.

At work, there was no more window gazing, no more plaid fascination, no, only demure nothingness until the day when I walked into the back room, turned and saw a plaid clad lad standing in the door holding a bouquet of anemones right beneath his bandaged nose.

Yep. I need all the practice I can get for the flash.