Denise Vega's Blog: Denise Vega's blog and website, page 6

Writer Back from Paradise: Tips for Re-entry

I had every intention of writing a post last Thursday. After all, we returned late Tuesday night and I had Wednesday to do it. Ha. Between sleep deprivation, the time change, and a mountain of other things, I completely forgot—in spite of the reminder that pops up on my phone and laptop each week. So here I am, still adjusting to the time change, but feeling better. I feel rested, happy and energized to dive in to life and writing–and I did!

In terms of my writing, here are some things I did...

Writer in Paradise: The Sailing Writer

This post will be short and sweet because we got on a catamaran on Tuesday and are sailing around the British Virgin Islands! It’s possible I would have wifi on the boat, but I didn’t want to count on that so I wrote this the night before–on Monday, February 6. 

I will enjoy our sailing time and spend a little time working on my novel in my head and possibly on paper—I’m still not sure how I want to end it specifically and I’d like to work through that.

This grand experiment of going longer a...

Writer in Paradise: Adjusted Expectations

So yes. I had to adjust my expectations during my “big week” of writing/revising the NaNoWriMo novel. This was one of the few times I had 8+ hours a day to work on a book and I envisioned myself cranking

through the hard copy, making notes to myself and finishing in a day, leaving the rest of the week to input those notes and possibly begin the next revision soon after.

Uh, not even close

First of all, I kept getting stuck, which makes total sense. This is a frickin’ first draft and not just...

Writer in Paradise: The Novel!

This has been my big week for writing/revising my NaNoWriMo noel. My husband is taking sailing lessons so I’ve had since Saturday to work–with a little play thrown in.

The video I’ve included here is my view out the back of the apartment we are renting. Earlier this week Isat out on the dock/deck in the late afternoon after the sun had shifted and read some pages of my manuscript. I went back and forth about bringing it in paper form because it’s 200+ pages heavy. But ultimately I decided to...

Writer in Paradise: Playing with Poetry

So some of you may know that my husband and I have been planning a trip to the Caribbean for some time. We’ve been before, but our dream has been to go for at least a month–and here we are!

Thismeansmy posts may be a little sporadic for the next four weeks. Some days I’ll have wifi and others I won’t because I’ll be on a catamaran in the middle of the Caribbean–woop!

My post this week is inspired by the Regis University Mile High MFA in Creative Writing.We just finished the Spring residency a...

Evaluating Readers for Feedback

If it weren’t for many tireless and generous readers of my work—authors, editors and agents—who gave me thoughtful, helpful feedback, I know I wouldn’t have seen such improvement in my craft. But choosing who will read my work is a task I take very seriously.

Thanks to writer and wonderful human, Jennifer Smith-Daigle, for sharing a post by author and speaker Elizabeth Gilbert, which includes four questions that I believe many of us intuitively ask when we feel ready to share our work with ot...

Happy 2017!

“Goals are dreams with deadlines.”

~Diana Scharf Hunt

The new year. This one has a different feel to it, but I’m not interested in delving into the political realm here. Here, I want to focus on what a new year can mean for our careers.

Right now I’m working on a workshop I’ll present at the Regis MFA in Creative Writing residency next week. It’s called “Write Now: Tips and Tools forOvercoming Resistance & Procrastination.” Being one of many Queens of Procrastination, I enjoyed a small chu...

2016 in Review

Unlike 2015, I’m posting this at the end of December because I want to dive into the excitement of a new year the first part of January.

Write Fast, Write Slow…Just Write!

Argh. For some reason my post didn’t publish yesterday as schedule! So here it is…

One of the biggest challenges I now face is keeping up with thewriting practice I developed during NaNoWriMo. Beyond whether I’m a fast writer or a slow writer is the question of my commitment to my practice.I’ve said this before, but it’s very much like my yoga and meditation practices. I want to write every day or nearly so to keep my skills up. And like yoga, some days I’m feeling flexible, other days I’m no...

Staying in the NaNo Groove

I’m still flying high from participating in NaNoWriMo, and find myself working on the book almost every day since writing every day feels more likea habit now. To keep it going, I have to continue to:

Create a new deadline.My next goal is to have a decent draft for my critique group by March. That means I must organize my scenes, fill in holes, and decide on one of those endings! Make time for writing. To meet my new deadline, writing must continue to be a priority or it gets shoved to t...