Writing | marieqrogers

Posts Tagged ‘Writing’

Looking Forward

Posted in Marie's Musings, Novels, tagged COVID literature, Editing a collection, Matheson History Museum, Pandemic experiences, Volunteering, Writers Alliance of Gainesville, Writing on January 2, 2022| 2 Comments »

Over the past few days, my inbox has been filled with notices of new posts by fellow bloggers. Most recap the past year and list their intentions for the year to come. But where have I been?

They say the Road to Hell is paved with Good Intentions. If that’s so, anyone who hasn’t posted on their weblog since September must be on that very road! In my defense, I’ve been slammed with projects over the past year. It’s my own fault. I need to go back to middle school and take that “Just Say No” workshop.

I won’t bore you with the many organizations I volunteer for, only say that I’ve threatened to go back to work so I can get some time off. With a job, you work 8 to 5, weekends off, and you can call in sick. A volunteer position owns you body and soul and is no respecter of holidays or even wee hours of the night. My advice to new retirees is to watch out for that “V” word.

No more complaining–in my writing life, I have been productive. Season of the Dove, my book on Kindle Vella, is doing well. Quest for Namai, the sequel to my YA book, Trials by Fire, will come out this month if I can get KDP to cooperate with my uploads.

Coming soon…

Another project I’ve been involved in has finally come to fruition. Back in August 2020, the history museum in Gainesville, Florida began collecting material from local residents on their pandemic experiences. Someone got the idea to involve local writers, i.e. the Writers Alliance of Gainesville, with which I am intimately involved. The idea was to compile stories and artwork into a book which would chronicle the lives of ordinary people in these unordinary times. It sounded like a good idea, so I jumped in feet first.

Wise people test the waters first, but in reality, these waters were untested. Most of my partners in crime are writers, but this was the first time we’d taken on a project like this. It proved to be a learning experience. In our innocence, we thought we would have the book put together by December and published by January, 2021. Nope.

However, we persevered. After the vaccines came out, we worried the pandemic would be over and forgotten before we released the book. Dream on. Setback after setback, over a year after we started, Local Lives in a Global Pandemic: Stories from North Central Florida finally saw the light of day!

I was both unprepared for and pleased by the attention we received in the community. It feels good to be appreciated. It feels even better to have this project behind me.

In the coming year, you will hear more from me. I haven’t stopped musing over curious things. In the meantime, click on the titles of the books and links will take you to them. Enjoy!

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Happy New Year!

Posted in Marie's Musings, Novels, tagged Adventure, Bacopa Literary Review, Grandchildren, Memories, NaNoWriMo, Novels, Science Fiction, Travel, Writing on December 31, 2019| Leave a Comment »

You may have noticed I haven’t posted in a while. It’s not that I’ve been idle. This year I’ve done a lot of traveling, besides to Djibouti in January. During the summer, I traveled as far as upstate New York for a family reunion and spent time with my children and grandchildren in the mountains of Virginia and West Virginia. Then in October, I realized one of my life-long dreams and went to Greece—Athens, the Parthenon, and beautiful islands in the Aegean Sea.

As if that wasn’t enough, in November I joined my sister Sue in Connecticut for a genealogy expedition. This was the first time since childhood that I ventured to a northern clime during winter. I survived. When my granddaughter was born in the Blue Ridge Mountains in December, I braved snow and ice for this happy occasion.

So I have many adventures to write about, including the rest of my journey to Djibouti. I promise to deliver.

That doesn’t mean I haven’t been writing, because I have. I’m polishing a novel I wrote during NaNoWriMo a few years ago, while another simmers on the back burner. One of my short stories was published in Bacopa Literary Review this fall. But what I’m excited about today is the novel I just released, Trials by Fire, which is the first volume of a trilogy, The Long Road to Namai.

This story has been down a long road itself. When I was a kid, my sisters and brothers and I would camp out in the backyard on summer nights and tell ghost stories. This was science fiction, not a ghost story, and it was so long ago I don’t remember much about the original version. During college, I developed the story a little more. Through the intervening years, I wrote at least one short story which bears little resemblance to the present incarnation. None of these previous efforts bore fruit.

Then I retired and spent a month writing the first novel length version. I went so far as to self-publish it, but gave away more copies than I sold. A few years later I reread the book and thought, “What a great story, but what lousy writing!” I took it off the market and totally recrafted the whole thing. The story was still good and the writing much better, but it was too long and I couldn’t get the word count down without sacrificing important elements.

I decided to follow the suggestions of friends to divide the story into at least two parts and market it to Young Adult readers. I won’t bore you with all the details involved in getting a book market-ready, but as one person warned me, it takes longer than you think. Finally, here it is.

I’m sure you’ll enjoy this novel even if you’re not into science fiction. It’s also a human interest story and unlike anything else you’ve read. During the coming year, I will finish parts two and three and release them for your reading pleasure. Stay tuned.