I was lucky enough to be invited to become a member of a blog chain. This blog chain is made up of WRITERS!
These wonderful, like-minded individuals (yeah, I know I'm sucking up here...my regular blogger friends just keep a lid on it) are members of QueryTracker and also RallyStorm. They have several forums set up, (a romance writers critique group, blog chain group, and a general romance writers forum) that are by invitation only.
How cool is that????
If you are anything like me, you have no idea how a blog chain works. From what I understand so far, I will link to the last person in the chain who posted, http://www.colegibsen.blogspot.com/ Senshi....and then to the next person to post http://brimfire.livejournal.com/ Brimfire.
http://leahclifford.livejournal.com/ GypsyGurl started this chain.
Kiddoc, http://hldyer.wordpress.com/ will pick the next topic and be posting soon, so go check her out!
Speaking of topics, this one is, "How real are your characters?". So here we go:
I have heard many writers can see/hear, sometimes even smell their characters (never smelled mine). When I started writing TCH, it wasn't to become published, or to write a book, it just evolved into the historical romance that it is now.
Originally, it was just to tell a story. A story that Margaret, my main character, was telling and showing me. Sounds a bit schizophrenic, huh? All of my characters speak to me, some more than others, of course.
One of my favorite characters was a complete surprise to me when he showed up. I was writing a scene towards the end of TCH, and Margaret sat in the garden, on a bench, alone. It was early morning, and I could see the swirl of fog covering the ground. Footsteps could be heard coming down the path, and a figure emerged from the wall of mist.
I typed as he made his way toward Margaret, describing the boots, the long overcoat, that swirled about him. Upward to the long dark blonde hair, chiseled jaw, intense stare...I was expecting Patrick, but instead it was one Duncan McCue (picture Fabio, add a Scottish accent, and NEVER EVER think of the word BUTTER....that's pretty darn close!) .
He will be my MC in the third book, and I so can't wait! I wanted him to be a pirate, but he had other ideas. He was a bit too honorable for that, but not quite so honorable that he wouldn't smuggle Scottish Whiskey to France, so the Brits couldn't tax it. So we both ended up happy over his chosen vocation.
Um, I guess, as you can see, my characters are very real to me. That is also a problem when you write. YOU know so much about them, that often while writing, you neglect to point things out that the reader may not know.
That's where crit groups come in! If they don't know your characters, or your story, it's easy for them to question the why, when, where, or how that you already know, but perhaps didn't convey well.
Okay, now I can't wait for my next topic! Be sure to check out the blog chain members, they are all great!
