Lynn Raye Harris

Can you guess which desk belongs to which author? Come on over to eHarlequin and give it a try: http://community.eharlequin.com/forums/cafe-social/whos-desk-belongs

My desk is on there, along with the desks of Kate Walker, Holly Jacobs, Carly Phillips and Maria V. Snyder — just to name a few.

There are prizes!

Also, I finally typed The End! Except it’s not done yet, of course. But I’m always happy when I write the story to the finish. Makes it easier to go back and see what I need to revise to keep the story arcing. So, today, I’ll be doing a reread and hoping I didn’t take a detour somewhere along the way.

But you know, for just a little bit there, I felt like Joan Wilder. I love that scene at the beginning of Romancing the Stone when she’s crying and typing and then she can’t find tissue. Love the celebration with the cat. I tried to find that clip on You Tube — but they don’t have it. I think some techno geeky person needs to upload it! That is the best romance writer movie ever.

Oh, provided my editor lets me get away with it, there’ll be another Italian hero in the next book I write. And while I have a heroine already, I don’t have him. I know who he is, but I don’t have a name. Suggestions?

Well I’m pretty much just wore out. Tomorrow night is a birthday party for a friend and I am SO looking forward to getting out of my cave, putting on my new leopard print boots, and whooping it up with a bunch of the gals. I cannot WAIT.

I didn’t realize, when I accepted the invitation, that I’d be in deadline mode. Oh I should’ve, considering how I practically had the date stamped on my forehead, but it just slipped my mind. And you know what, I’m glad I accepted, because I have about 5k maximum to wrap this book up — and over a week until it’s due. I hope to finish it today, but who knows. Or maybe tomorrow morning. And then I’ll be partying guilt free.

Until I have to reread and make revisions on Sunday, LOL. Yeah, I could take the whole weekend off and still safely get the book in on time. But did I mention I’m an overachiever? A perfectionist?

So, got any great weekend plans? (I think Hubby is doing a SuperBowl thing — but I am NOT involved in that. Going to Starbucks to write if necessary….)

I’ll often get ideas about blog topics, then by the time I sit down to write one, I’ve forgotten all the interesting things I wanted to write about. Just yesterday, as I was working to finish this book, something struck me as a good blog topic (and it was unrelated to writing). By the time I got around to starting a new post, I’d forgotten it.

But something that has been on my mind with this book is that ever-evolving mysterious thing known as Process. When I was unpublished, I wrote when I pleased. I tried to do it everyday. But I didn’t always. And I wrote and rewrote books two or three times. Spent 3 years on the book that ended up being my GH finalist last year. Gah, that’s too long!

But now that I’m writing for an editor, I’ve realized a couple of things.

1) Procrastination and perfectionism are not my friends.
2) I have always known I can write fast when I put my mind to it — but I can in fact produce a whole book in a matter of weeks if I respect my process.
3) My process, which is probably still evolving, goes like this:

a. Write one chapter.
b. Rewrite chapter.
c. Write second chapter.
d. Rewrite first and second chapter.
e. Write third chapter.
f. Rewrite first, second, and third chapter.
g. Write fourth chapter.
h. Cry about how bad the whole thing is.
i. Revise four chapters.
j. Write chapters 5 and 6.
k. Tweak first several chapters along with 5 & 6.
l. Stall on chapter 7.
m. Finally write chapter 7.
n. Tweak all chapters.
o. Write rest of book in varying degrees of speed — sometimes slow and easy, other times breakneck.
p. Reread all the above. Add, subtract, or revise as needed.
q. Send to editor.

It takes me twice as long to write the first half as it does the second. It’s been that way through two contracted books now, so I can only hope I will evolve further and not need so much gnashing of teeth on the setup. But that setup is so crucial that it just twists me into knots and takes me forever to get it worked out.

And now, back to the mad dash…. What’s your process like?

That would be me at the moment. No, not crazy enough to take on a million cats (Hubby would kill me), but crazy from brain overload. Not much happening in the Harris household except eating, sleeping, and writing. Laundry & grocery shopping managed to occur over the weekend, but I had help. If I was right up against my deadline, even that wouldn’t get done.

So, nothing intelligible from me today. I’m closing in on the end of the book. Saw it all very clearly while torturing myself with a 2 mile jog on the treadmill. Now, if only it works out that way in truth. Because if I have to think of something else, I may really go crazy.

Feeling crazy lately?

Is it Thursday already? I’ve been a bit, um, mired in the writing lately. The good news is that the mountain is being scaled. The bad is that I haven’t reached the top yet. *sigh*

So, not a lot of coherent thoughts today. Just working like a dawg and trying to get to the magical end of the book. There comes a point in every book for me where I think I just can’t pull it off, can’t manage to make the whole thing into a coherent tale, and that I’m just writing a series of unconnected scenes that I make up as I go along. That’s where I am now.

But it usually works out, so I can only hope for the same result this time around. What are you working on?

Don’t forget about the auction to help a homeless teen and her mother! You can bid on a one chapter + synopsis critique from me. Or many other cool things! Click here. Information about the auction in general is here.

See the post below. The auction is live today!! You can bid on some terrific things, including a critique by moi.

This is a short post because I’m pretty worn out, but I actually accomplished almost as much in front of my home computer yesterday as I did at Starbucks the day before. I think it was *knowing* that I’d successfully worked through my WIP problems while NOT clicking over to email/Facebook/MySpace/etc that forced me to acknowledge the problem lies within me.

And so I was disciplined. Not much choice really. The Deadline of Doom approacheth.

But I may head out to SB today as a way to shake up the routine. Or not. Now that I’ve taken the time to register for Pandora Radio, I’m loving it as I write. So much easier than trying to find stuff in my iTunes library.

In other news, my diet/exercise program is going fairly well. Jogged nearly 2 miles. It’s only my 2nd week back, so that’s not too bad. Soon, I’ll be able to hop up the pace and get my miles done quicker.

Okay, to work. What are you up to? How’s your New Year’s diet/exercise program going (come on, we all have them!)?

Here in this small town where I live, we have one Starbucks. When I lived in Hawaii, there was an SB on every corner. I could easily get to one without much effort, and I did perform the SB experiment there: could I write more if I were in SB, without internet connection (because I won’t pay for day surfing)? The answer in Hawaii was yes.

And I guess my blonde self didn’t quite internalize the facts. Because, just yesterday, I performed the experiment again. After such a sucky Monday, I thought I’d try something different. When facing a problem with the WIP, it’s veerrry easy to say, “I’ll just click over to email or Facebook, etc, while I think about this.” An hour later you realize you’ve forgotten the problem and you’ve been checking out Parsons chairs at Target.com for twenty minutes.

So, after lunch with a friend, I headed for SB. I’d forgotten my iPod, which almost made me decide against the experiment, but I gave it a try anyway.

And I got work done. Duh. When you HAVE to stare at the WIP, and you can’t click over to Target, your brain tends to work on the problem. I made it through one of the roughest patches of the story thus far — and though I actually lost closer to 3K words on Monday (didn’t realize it until I counted it up yesterday), I made up a lot of ground. I wrote 2K sitting in SB, without an iPod, while at least one little girl threw a huge mini-diva tantrum (seriously, foot stamping and hollering that it wasn’t fair and she wouldn’t eat it, etc, and all because her dad bought her a different cookie than the one she wanted).

I may have to go back to Starbucks a lot before this book is due. I wonder if the IRS will accept latte deductions?

Does the Starbucks Effect work for you? Or do you have the discipline to shut off the internet access at home? I wonder if telecommuters have these issues. What do you think? I bet they get a certain amount done because they’d obviously get fired if they didn’t — but do you think they check out websites more often than they would in an office? Hmm….

Sometimes they happen, yeah? So, yesterday, I cut more words than I wrote. Or maybe I wrote enough words, but I cut so many I kind of lost count of what I had. One minute I had X many — the next I was down 1000. Same thing happened again.

This is, unfortunately, the way it goes sometimes. But, OMG, how freaking depressing!! I kind of understood how Hemingway became a lush because I suddenly, desperately, needed a drink. And, because I have a will as solid as a slice of Swiss cheese, I caved. A glass of wine takes the sting off.

And I really couldn’t face the WIP any longer. Sometimes you need to go away and return with fresh eyes. Sitting in front of the computer and staring at the screen with the same words on it won’t necessarily spark a new idea. I think, at times like this, it’s okay to go away.

I also think it’s very normal to get twisted up and worry about what you’re doing. Yes, I have a contract and a book coming out — and I STILL think I’m terrible sometimes, that it’s a fluke, that they’re going to catch me and kick me off of Mount Olympus. Yesterday was a bad day. I hope today will be better.

I’m leaving you with the song that ran through my head after my battle with the WIP. Do you like this one? I sure do; it’s catchy, even when the day isn’t so bad.

Tell me what you do when the WIP isn’t working, or you have to cut a couple of scenes….

Saturday was my RWA chapter meeting, and even though I have a deadline rapidly approaching, I wouldn’t miss my Heart of Dixie day for anything (I have another chapter too, Southern Magic, but it’s a bit farther away and I don’t get to the meetings like I’d like to).

Just the camaraderie of meeting with other writers, laughing and talking about things that concern us (and often only make sense to us) is worth losing a day of writing for. I head out around 10am, drive about 40 minutes, and stop for lunch at a local deli where a lot of the members gather beforehand. Then, after an hour of laughing and fun, we head to the museum that hosts our meetings. There, who knows what’ll happen. We start at noon and often don’t finish until between 2 and 3. After that, I can talk for hours with friends, sometimes even heading to a restaurant or bookstore to chat. It’s a great time, and it’s the kind of socializing that I definitely need.

I have other friends, of course, but so many times they don’t understand what it is I do and how it works. I can’t tell you the number of people who have asked my husband if he’s retiring when my book comes out. Other writers know how funny this is.

Publishing is a strange and hopeful business. You can make enough to live on; you can become very popular and make a lot of money; or you can barely get by and need to work a day job to make ends meet. You never know where on that scale you’ll end up, but we all hope we get option #2. Friends — writing friends — help keep you sane!

Okay, so I have some changes coming up in the next month or two! For one, I’m getting a new website and blog. I’ve found the perfect person to do my design work, and I’m so excited to be working with her. I’ll also be retooling the newsletter, and hopefully start sending out some regular news.

There will be contests; not sure what or when, but stay tuned so you don’t miss out on the goodies! I won’t stop talking about writing, but I need to talk more about reading. If you’re on MySpace, come friend me. Same with Facebook. I can be found on both — just type in Lynn Raye Harris. I’m also on Twitter (been there for a couple of months, but still haven’t figured out how to get my feed on the sidebar here). Follow me, and I’ll follow you.

Finally — what are you reading right now? I’m reading a delicious Harlequin Presents by Jennie Lucas and enjoying it very much. I love an arrogant Italian prince — in fact, I’m writing about one for the next book!