Jenyfer Matthews

I spent the morning at Blogthings when I should have been working - sue me. It didn’t seem worthwhile getting too carried away writing when I was going to have to quit early and go to a performance at my son’s preschool (that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it!) Besides, I love taking quizzes and blogthings is addictive. Since I didn’t do anything truly productive the least I can do it share my test results with you. It’s kind of strange how accurate these things can be:

You Are Internal - Realist - Powerful

You feel your life is controlled internally. If you want something, you make it happen. You don’t wait around for things to go your way. You value your independence and don’t like others to have control.You are a realist when it comes to luck. You don’t attribute everything to luck, but you do know some things are random. You don’t beat yourself up when bad things happen to you… But you do your best to try to make your own luck. When it comes to who’s in charge, it’s you. Life is a kingdom, and you’re the grand ruler. You don’t care much about what others think. But they better care what you think!

The Three Dimension Luck and Power Test

It has not been a terribly productive week. I’ve had a cold dragging me down and have been too exhausted to do much beyond lay in bed and doze. I have lots of ideas dancing around in my head and no energy to get them down on paper.

There’s another topic. There are days when I wish I could write my stories out longhand on paper and skip the computer entirely. Our computer required some maintenance this week and it should have been an easy fix. All it needed was a new power supply (fan died) and to have Windows reloaded. We threw in a RAM upgrade for kicks. That was when the fun started.

I was once enrolled in a computer program because I thought that I wanted to be a computer tech. I like using computers and I like teaching others how to use computers. I do not however like to fix computers. I swear there are gremlins inside them - you fix one problem and four more appear.

Have you ever tried to work on a computer that just cuts off and restarts itself at random intervals? It’s not easy. After several hours wasted reloading device drivers and other software, we finally determined that it was the new RAM chip causing the problems. The computer was rejecting it - sort of like an organ transplant, it wasn’t totally compatible. We had the chip switched out and everything seems to be functioning again.

Now, if only the cold would go away…

My neighbor came up to my place a couple of days ago to discuss a quilt she wants to commission from me and while we were talking she asked me a question about making jam — because of my “Martha Stewart ways”.

Those were her exact words.

More appalling than the fact that she was seriously comparing me to Martha Stewart, I actually knew the answer to her question.

I suppose it’s no wonder she sees me as a domestic goddess between the quilting, bread making and now home canning, but I wonder if she’d see me the same way if I gave her a copy of my book? Or would that just reinforce the image since we all know that only sad-sack desperate housewives and other lonely types like romance?

Obviously I’m being sarcastic but it does go to show why it’s tough to live an image down. People see and interpret things how they want to, making things fit the image that they already hold. Even if I did (get drunk enough to) pierce my nose, the likelihood is I wouldn’t be seen as a trendy Bohemian — I’d just be seen as some pathetic middle-aged woman desperately trying to hold on to my youth.

(I’m vain enough to add that I’m not quite middle aged just yet)

Oh well. At the end of the day, I know who I am and what I am about. And at least that lets me off the hook for piercing my nose…

Garlic!!

(But only if you’re both eating it!)

Who needs oysters? Dinner last night was fresh homemade pesto pizza, topped with calamata olives, sweet red pepper and mozarella cheese. Fresh sweet corn on the side. Nothing like an excellent dinner and little wine to put you in the mood…

I read a book on the plane this week (one and a half times actually - don’t you love delays?) called “Wife Living Dangerously” by Debra Kent. Here’s the blurb:

As a perfect suburban wife and mother, Julia Flanagan has played by the rules, done what she’s told and put her family first for as long as she can remember. If she’s honest, she’d like a bit more excitement in her life - but wouldn’t everyone?

Then her best friends dare her to break the rules just for once. Taking on their challenge proves easier than she could have imagined: first she’s mixing recyclable glass with plastic; then she’s passing off shop-bought cakes as her own.

But when she meets the sexiest man she’s ever seen, and their work throws them together, she learns the true meaning of what it’s like to be a wife living dangerously. Now she faces the dilemma of how far she should go. And, more importantly, what she has got to lose.

I enjoyed this book tremendously - I would have reread it even if I hadn’t been trapped on a plane with no other entertainment options. It was extremely well written, and since it was done in first person, it had a very intimate feel - as if you were sharing the experience with a friend.
The situations and emotions described were very vivid and alive - and some of the observations on married life struck extremely close to home. Either the author herself had firsthand experience or she’d done her research well.

Reading this book made me think about the nature of romance in fiction. This book was not a romance book - I suppose it would be labeled “chick lit”, it was a bit too light for “women’s fiction - and yet the relationships that Julia had with her husband and with her temptation were the main story. The entire process of the other man wooing her, the agony and obsession she feels as she falls for him, the highs and the lows, her final decision and the satisfying conclusion (sorry, no spoilers!). This was more a slice of real life than the clean HEA a reader gets in a classic romance novel, and yet there were many parallels. I was actually glad I was on a plane when I started it because once I picked it up I simply didn’t want to put it down. I was gripped - as I am in any love story.

And really, isn’t that what romance is all about?

Writing is a lot of hurry up and wait. When your mind is in the grip of a story, all you want to do is grab every spare moment to sit down and do your best to get it written down before the ideas and the passion slip away. At least that is what it’s like for me.

Now add to that the desire to have as many of your books before the reading public in as short a time as possible.

As slowly as I write compared to other authors who either have a longer attention span or fewer distractions than I do, I still put a lot of pressure on myself to write faster. And when the story is finally told and the editing process is complete, then what?

You wait.

If you are a new author, you write a query letter and a synopsis and you send it around to literary agents and / or editors and wait to hear back from them (if you ever hear back at all). If you are really fortunate, someone will like what they read in your query letter enough to want to see more. So you send the manuscript off and you wait some more. And don’t forget, many agents / publishers won’t accept simultaneous submissions once they get to the manuscript evaluation stage so you potentially have to go through this process over and over and over again.

I am lucky enough to have a publisher at this point, but that doesn’t make it a done deal. I still have to submit the manuscript and hope they like what they see. My editor reads fast so my wait is shorter than some.

And in the meantime I can always start something new. Today I think that will be a loaf of bread…

I finished my first round of edits last week and have been taking a little mental break since then. I wanted - needed - to take a step back so that when I do one more pass through before I submit this manuscript to my editor I’ll have a fresh eye to catch problems.

In the meantime, I’ve been playing. Adding pictures to my website and to myspace. Customizing my blog. Tinkering.

Tomorrow I’m taking a real break. I’m leaving the family at home and going to visit some friends in Dubai for the weekend. (Sounds exotic, huh?) Should be fun at any rate. Having a little mini-vacation on my own will help me gather my strength for my annual global adventure vacation this summer. Traveling on my own with two small creature in tow to visit family scattered far and wide across the US will do nothing if not keep me on my toes.

So, I won’t be around here for a few days. But I hope that you will join me on May 14th when I will be a guest blogger at Romance Reader at Heart Ponderings Blog.

I’m it.

Fellow CP author Vicky Burkholder is responsible for this
Here are the rules:

1. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.

2. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.

3. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.

4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

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Here’s more than you wanted to know about me:

1. I’m a cheapskate. I don’t really need to be these days but I think it’s hard wired. Nothing gives me a bigger thrill then hitting a sale or figuring out a way to make something from scratch myself. I have clothes that are older than my kids.

2. I didn’t really know how to cook until about five years into my marriage. DH did all the cooking and I did the cleaning up. Now I do both - I think I messed up somewhere.

3. I’ve been on vacation to Cambodia — twice. It’s a fascinating place.

4. Chunky yogurt makes me gag. Gotta be blended.

5. I know the difference between “Belgium” and “Belgian” but when I’m speaking I always have to pause and I *still* mess it up half the time.

6. A glass of champagne on its own is fine. Champagne after a few other drinks makes me puke - every time. (told you it was more than you wanted to know)

7. I can’t stand runny egg yolks.

8. I’m strangely addicted to personality quizzes. If ever I go to Blogthings I’m stuck for hours.

I am tagging: Nina, Anny, Raven, Lise, Heather, Vanessa, Cindy, and Anita

My blog has a new look. I’m finally figuring some of this customizing stuff out. Even took the flower picture myself. So, what do you think?