7/3/04 I just sent off my series proposal to my agent, now I'm just waiting to see if he likes it or not. The entire proposal-writing process was so different and new, and I felt terribly insecure and inadequate doing it. I've never had to rely on God's grace more in my writing as when putting together those storylines. I mean, how do I know God's will, and what stories HE wants to tell through me? How can I be sure it's a true and Biblical message this storyline would convey? How to battle the insecurity that I'm not talented enough or even worthy enough to be His vessel and write His stories? I've never felt so weighted down with my own sin before, and had it undermine my love for writing. I had to bathe each hour in prayer in order to keep the words flowing. I started a fantasy short story to take my mind off of it. (I tried "pantsing" the story, but discovered that I'm too much of a "plotter" to do it--the prose is rambling aimles...

WHAT A GIRL WANTS by Kristin Billerbeck (An Ashley Stockingdale novel, book 1) Book blurb: Ashley Stockingdale, 31, has a respectable (read: boring) job in Silicon Valley as a patent attorney. It's the kind of life that causes her mother to ask repeatedly, "Now what exactly do you do there, dear?" Given that in Silicon Valley the single men outnumber the women 2 to 1, Ashley can't help but wonder why a cute, eligible, Christian girl ("with absolutely adorable shoes") sits home most weekends. Even her church singles group fails to satisfy, endlessly watching The Matrix and "splurging", obnoxiously, on un-cool dinners at Applebee's and unhip franchise restaurants. So Ashley resolves to go for it! If only she knew what "it" she's going for. Perhaps that ever-illusive promotion that would give her the glamorous career girl image she's longed for? Or maybe the wardrobe to end all wardrobes, turning her glowing, possib...

ROMANCE RUSTLERS AND THUNDERBIRD THIEVES by Sharon Dunn (A Ruby Taylor Mystery, book 1) From the back cover: No one makes a fool of Ruby Taylor . . . or her friends. A tough cookie with an attitude, but also a soft heart, Ruby finds herself in a perilous search for a young man who disappeared just days before he was to be married. Her sometimes harrowing yet often hilarious quest to right the wrongs of love pit her against helicopters, wild buffalo, and some desperate people who have every reason to want Ruby to fail. Camy here: EXCELLENT book! The heroine, Ruby Taylor, is real and gritty, and non-Christian at the beginning of the book. She's awesome. Her hero/love interest is also a "real" Christian guy, still suffering through the mistakes he made in his own past. I've been so tired of so-called "tortured" heroes, where it turns out their only sin is a decision made in ignorance that resulted in something bad happening to them. Puh-leez...

6/30/04 Just random thoughts, today. I'm not feeling well and called in sick at work. I don't think I'm prego (and I hope I'm not) but I also know that anything's possible with God. There's an interesting discussion about Secular and Christian fiction on the ACRW email discussion loop (American Christian Romance Writers, www.acrw.net). Where do I fit in? I'm not very interested in "sweet" romances, but my current wip(s) are turning out to be too "preachy" to be secular. Will God allow me to be published? Will He allow me to write full-time someday? I had a good evening last night developing the storyline and characters for my wip. God is so good. The ideas just flowed, despite the fact I wasn't feeling very well. I've almost got a handle on Aiden's story. I also got an idea to link my first ms THE CORINTHIAN RULES with Aiden's story into a series. Four cousins, all Christians, trying to cope with the stigma of OSFC: Oldest...

6/17/04 The time has just sped by. I finally finished a bit of Spring Cleaning, and now that I can see the floor in my guest bedroom, somehow my mind feels less cluttered, too. The biggest news is from yesterday. I received a call from Sharon at Arabella Magazine, who said that they want to publish a short story I submitted to them in March! I'm so stoked. The story is "Dom Perignon," a romance about love at first sight in a San Francisco art gallery gala. God is soooooo good. This is a faboo publishing opportunity He's given to me. I'll also have an article being published in "Nikkei Heritage," a quarterly journal published by the National Japanese American Historical Society. The Fall/Winter edition is themed "War," and my piece is a light-hearted description of how World War 2 impacted life in the Hawaiian country town of Waialua, O'ahu, where my grandmother lives. I had a great time interviewing my grandmother and my mother, and I learn...

Wow, I finally finished "The Corinthian Rules" manuscript! I wrote the last word around 1 AM February 1st. I finished the line edits to the manuscript yesterday. I will lay it down for a week or so before doing a more general review, checking for character/plot development pacing and consistency. What a sense of accomplishment! While doing the line edits, I noticed how much my writing has improved even during the 2 months while I wrote the manuscript. It really helped that I had plotted everything out and done a scene outline. I could just look at my scene spreadsheet and go on to the next scene, or if I had a brainstorm and added or deleted things, I could easily alter the spreadsheet. I noticed that it also made it easier to look at pacing when I had the scene spreadsheet. I could see at a glance the goals and actions, or reactions and decisions. I love Excel! Also while doing the line edits, I sometimes ran into snags, like a scene I wanted to rewrite because it sounded st...

Hi! This will be my personal diary to let people know whatever's new with me and my writing. It will also be good for me to be able to track my writing progress. This New Year, I've been convicted to finish my current manuscript, so I'm really taking advantage of my unemployment to write and finish my ChickLit novel by the end of January. I realize that just because I finish it doesn't mean God will allow it to be accepted for publication, but I think I'd like to at least complete it, to know that I could do it. I also wanted to see if I could really keep a full-time writer's hours. It's been tough, so far, but also lots of fun. Hopefully by my next post, my Chicklit "The Corinthians Rules" (working title) will be done! Camy