Samantha made this from scratch!

Well I attempted to write this yesterday, you know, on my birthday, but things kept coming up. It was a great day! For me, birthdays are what New Years is to others. It’s a time to look at what you’ve accomplished this year, and using what you’ve learned to make the next year better. This year, it was mostly about writing for me.

I realized that I haven’t done a writing update in awhile while I was thinking about what this coming year will mean to me as a writer. I’ve gotten behind on it. First of all, The Forest Awakens jumped up to 100% on my editing goal. It’s pretty good, grammatically speaking. The rejections I’ve gotten from agents have made me look at it under a new microscope though. They all like my writing, they all like the story idea, but they all also said they didn’t connect with the main character enough.

I’ve more or less come to the inevitable question that most writers probably go through. My assassin book has been sitting at about 20% completed on the backburner while I edited TFA, and now I have to decide if I want to work on the changes to my YA novel that agents have suggested, or if I want to put it aside for now and finish my new book?

Currently I’m leaning toward another draft of The Forest Awakens. It would be a big draft, basically rewriting many parts of it, although most of the current material doesn’t need to be cut, just have more added to it. We shall see over the next couple days, while I have a podcast to finish anyway.

Happy (now late) Birthday to meeeee!

Hurray! I’m happy to finally announce the release of our of Tuesday Night Stories homepage! You can follow that link or you may have noticed it was now in the menu above as well. We currently have 4 full-length stories that you can listen to and download, and Founded In Battle will be added in full soon. In addition, I’ve decided to add the text to each story for those that like to follow along, and those who prefer to read a story instead.

As I’ve done more and more research of this insane industry that is publishing, I’ve discovered, quite by accident, that I’ve done pretty much everything people suggest. I can’t recall where I read it but there is this quote I like. The only difference between a writer and a published writer is persistence, or something close to that. This is seen nowhere more than in the arts. So many writers spend their whole lives hoping what they have to say will be worth reading by others. That, of course, requires talent, agents, publishers, an audience, etc, etc.

It could be said that I’m on the “right path” to publishing a book. That could mean nothing of course, but if you look at the writer checklist (didn’t know there was one? Muahaha welcome to the crazy) then the argument could be made that if I stick with it I’m bound to sell a book. Let’s examine then, shall we?

1. Write a book – Indeed, this is an important step toward publishing. You could add plotting, creating characters, and all that if you’d like, but this is more or less the start. You have a finished book, what to do with it? This was the first thing I got right. Woo!

2. Set aside said book – My book was terrible. I loved it, don’t get me wrong, it was a great feeling to read it. But it was terrible and I put it away in a folder (where it’s still sitting). Hurray, I completed step two.

3. Writer another book using skills learned the first time – I happened to have another story to tell. You know, it was one of those “What a GREAT idea!” moments. Well skipping all the juicy bits, I wrote another book. I was on the right track and didn’t even know it at the time.

4. Edit, edit, edit, then get someone better to edit – I have the supreme pleasure, and the slight terror, of having a wife that is far better at editing than I am. After 4 drafts there was no page of my manuscript that didn’t have marks from top to bottom. You don’t need to research publishing to guess this step is important!

5. Discriminate against agents and test the waters – Yup, you heard me. Choose your top 10 agents then send your query to 5 others. Or better yet, attend a conference and try those agents first (which is what I did). You keep your top 10 list, you’ll see why in a second.

Send out those first 5 queries, wait patiently for your rejections, and hope for some tidbits as to why. My responses were dead on (that’s why they’re agents). “The prose is good and you do a fine job setting the scene (always take the compliments where you get them!), but I felt a bit removed from your main character, Colby.” That’s a direct quote from one, the others said the same, but not as clear. One good, detailed response out of 5 is GOOD luck. Now you know what’s missing and you know what these agent’s were looking for. Fix these things, then fix up your query to show other agents that you’re strong in that area (note: that’s show NOT tell). Most agents want at least a few pages. Make them stronger.

6. Write another book and keep submitting – Here is where you wait, and show your persistence. Almost every single published author has stories of rejections. Your book very well may not find an agent. Maybe the market isn’t ready for it. Maybe it’s not very good. Maybe you just aren’t ready for it. Write because you want to tell stories and each book you write will be better than the last. Patience and Persistence.

What do you think, agree or disagree? I’ve found it to be pretty accurate in the fantasy genre.

It’s kinda funny that I am adding two football posts so close together. It makes me look like I am a big fan when I’m not really. I’ve never been against the sport though. Other than ice hockey, it’s even the only sport I enjoy watching. The Davey O’Brien award is a national quarterback award given to one college player every year.

My grandfather, Charles Ringler, founded the award. So it’s extra fun for my family to get to go. We take up about three tables in all (alright, about 2 1/2!). My grandmother always sits with the family of whoever is getting the award. It was fun getting to meet McCoy’s parents and grandparents this year. They were so very friendly. Unfortunately, Charles wasn’t able to come because of his health. But McCoy and Fouts spent part of the day with him before coming tonight, also very nice of them.

Colt McCoy of UT won the award this year. He seemed like a really nice guy. A lot of people I’ve seen get this award came across arrogant, but he didn’t at all. I guess that’s what comes from growing up in a small TX town, go Texas! Dan Fouts, retired player from the Chargers, won the Legends award, and his speech was absolutely hilarious. This award you DEFINITELY see arrogance during, but Fouts gave a good speech and didn’t come across that way at all. All around, it was great fun. Here’s a picture of my family all dressed up before we left.

One of of the best things about going to this thing every year, despite the fun of getting to dress all fancy and meet professional athletes of course, is the food. MMMMMmmmmmm! This year was delectable as always, but the desert is always the most fun. This year it was orange cheesecake on a crazy-rich chocolate crust, I looove cheesecake, have I mentioned, love it. See picture below for mouth watering goodness.

P.S. Sorry about the feed problems the last couple days, if anyone noticed. Was tinkering with the blog and, of course, I should have left well enough alone. Fear not, for I have fixed what should not have been broken!

I wanted to drop by and wish everyone a great Valentine’s! It’s fun when it ends up on a Sunday, since more people have a tendency to have some free time today. Samantha and I have had a whole lot of fun today, and I’m promised a fantastic dinner that is yet to be announced. Surprises are great fun.

I have a lot to share with you guys since I haven’t had the time to post much lately. It’s important to me that we keep the podcast episodes coming consistently for you guys, but that means some of the in-between posts get pushed aside at times. I think things are calming down now though.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Alright, I’m not all that into football I admit. But I enjoyed the hell out of tonight’s Superbowl game. I was rooting for the Saint’s all the way, and not just because they were the underdog (but I do really like rooting for the underdog!).

It was fun getting to root for Drew Brees since we went to the same high school. Not like we were friends or anything, I just think it’s kinda fun. I was a total geek in high school. Certainly not out partying with the football players. Shocking right? The fantasy writer was a geek in school?

Even if I’m not all that into football, this game was crazy fun to watch.  Both quarterbacks did a phenomenal job. Good times. I didn’t see the interception coming, but what timing!

The streets of New Orleans are going to be partying it up for quite awhile I’m guessing. Especially with Mardi Gras coming up soon! Congrats Saints!

Today is a very blah day in the Leonard household. I thought a little blog post about accomplishing the first of my 2010 goals would make me feel a little bit better. My super-nerd obsession with MUDs is the focus of today’s post.

I’ve told you guys about the little text-based online RPG I run, called Lands of Draknor. Well for the new year David (who is also the narrator for our podcast) and I decided on 3 big changes we wanted to add. The first, which we finished up this week, was a brand new creation system for characters. It’s very cool! I’ll post a screenshot soon and talk more about it!

Hopefully today ends up better than it has started. If anyone wants to try the game, we have a free client to play from!

Resolutions are a somewhat silly thing. Every year people decide they are going to make a huge set of goals that they aren’t all that likely to keep up. Somebody put it a funny way to me yesterday. “I hate the first 6 weeks of a new year. It’s the only time of year the gym is crowded.” Har har har.

How very true though, isn’t it? Everyone makes resolutions with the best of intentions. Few are willing to keep it up once real life begins again. I think it’s because we all do so much over the holidays. We feel like we can do anything if we got through that, but day-to-day life isn’t so fascinating and resolutions get repetitive and dull.

Instead, I’ve decided to make a set of specific things I would like to accomplish this year. I’ll give updates on them throughout 2010. Perhaps this will be better for me than resolutions.

1. Move to San Marcos, TX.

2. Create a home page for my fantasy podcast.

3. Finish my Assassin Novel

4. Finish last edit of The Forest Awakens. Start submitting it again.

5. Add new creation system, Alchemist, and Woodsman to the MUD.

6. Get my writing guild website into BETA testing.

All should be manageable over the next 12 months. Here’s to a great year, everyone!