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What I'm writing in YEAR OF THE DOG

I just finished writing Year of the Dog ! It had a massive plot hole that I had to fix which turned out to be more work than I expected. Here’s a snippet: “Hey, Auntie Nell.” He wrapped his arms around her, bussing her on the cheek and breathing in pikake flowers and shortbread cookies. And suddenly he was nine years old again, and her solid presence had made his chaotic world stable once more. “What are you doing here?” He usually took her to dinner on Wednesday nights, but today was Tuesday. The edges of her smile faltered a little before brightening right back up again. “What, I can’t visit my nephew?” She angled around him to enter his home. “Is this your new house? Looks lovely.” Which was a blatant lie, because the fixer-upper was barely livable, much less acceptable to a neat-freak like his aunt. She also left four matching pink and purple floral suitcases on the stoop behind her. Only then did Ashwin notice the cab driver standing slightly to the side of the walkway. “Can ...
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Cosmo

9/6/04

Finished chapter one last night. The end has more emotion than the beginning, and I'm wondering if that's what is making the scene lack zing. I'll have to look at it again and see. Maybe I can change things in the beginning so that Lex has more at stake, feels more anger or humiliation or whatever it ends up being.

Since this is a sort of "first date" scenario, and I wanted it to be absolutely horrible for the heroine, I had to come up with the worst things to happen. So I Googled "what not to do on a first date" and it came up with tons of hilarious--and frightening--articles. "Research" for a novel is a blast!

I also realized that the language of many Cosmo articles reflects the current culture. It was refreshing to read the terms being used, how some have changed and some have not, and some new ones that are rather clever. I think I need to read these articles--hooey as some of them are--if only to keep up with the "language trend." Isn't that funny?

I picked up more books at Salvation Army/ GoodWill yesterday. Woohoo! I love getting books for cheap. I'm stoked because I found a copy of COLD FEET by Brenda Novak. I read the first chapter on her website and it looked intriguing.

The Psalms have been comforting, especially because they remind me to put my hope in the Lord. The 6-month mark is this Wednesday. I'm not certain if I heard from God about that, because I don't want to put words in God's mouth, but at the same time, I'm really hoping for Him to do something wonderful, immeasurably more than I could ask or imagine.

Well, this week is in God's hands. I need to stop trying to grab it out of His hands into mine.

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