Denise Vega's Blog: Denise Vega's blog and website, page 8

I Can’t Even Slog

Today I was having lunch with a friend and was telling her about the ups and downs of the YA I’ve been working on for over five years. If you’ve been with me awhile, you know all about my trials, tribulations, breakthroughs and milestone successes.

I mentioned how that for me it’s not all fun and creativity. Sometimes I have to just push through until things start to click.

“Slogging,” I said. “That’s what it feels like.”

“And right now you don’t even feel like slogging,” she said.

Yes. That...

Coming Into the Light

Gloria Estefan’s song, “Coming Out of the Dark,” jumped into my mind yesterday, though curiously, I was singing “Coming Into the Light” to the tune of “Coming Out of the Dark.” I only saw my error when I went online to double-check the title.

Transitions

So last week I was in anunmotivated placedue to lots of changes and a general feeling of malaise, which doesn’t happen to me very often.

We got Rayanne all moved in at USD and were thrilled with the size of her room and the sheer beauty of that campus. Her roommate is a rock star and the girls on her floor are really great. It’s been awesome to talk to her the last few days–each day she feels a little more adjusted, though there is a lot to learn! Just knowing she’s happy and not too stressed...

Unmotivated

It may seem sort of odd to follow up three posts about being inspired and pushed from the SCBWI LA Conference to now talking about being unmotivated. But such is the nature of life and writing.We are in San Diego, about to move our youngest into her college dorm. We’ve been talking about it for weeks, knowing it, but I’ve been ignoring the anxiety and sadness that has been at my back for that same amount of time, not wanting to feel itshot breath on my neck. So I keep just ahead of it…for now...

2016 SCBWI LA: Biggest Takeaways

This is the third and finalinstallment of briefinsights and observations from the 2016 SCBWI LA Conference that was held July 29-31. Look for specific, but perennial, tips inmy Blab-o-Tips newsletter!

So here are some of my biggest (mostly) time sensitive takeaways from the conference:

From Justin Chanda, Editor and Publisher, Simon & Schuster

Demand for picture books going up – character-driven, humorous, rising interest in pbs with a classic feel.

Middle grade – interest in stand alone, lit...

2016 SCBWI LA: Hope

This is the second installment of briefinsights and observations from the 2016 SCBWI LA Conference that was held July 29-31. Look for specific, but perennial, tips inmy Blab-o-Tips newsletter!

At lunch at the conference friend and I were talking about how overwhelming it can be to walk into a library or bookstore and see all of the books available. We catch ourselves asking: “How will anyone find my book?” or even more despairing: “What’s the point?”

This second one has plagued me as I strugg...

2016 SCBWI LA: Community

In the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing some insights and observations from the 2016 SCBWI LA Conference that was held July 29-31. I will also be sharinganyspecific, but perennial, tips through my Blab-o-Tips newsletter so if you aren’t subscribed to that, I’d encourage you to check it out!Community always strikes me when I arrive at the conference each year. Not just seeing familiar faces and reuniting with friends, but just the feel in general. These are our people, our “tribe” as author Bru...

Get Out of the Harbor!

“A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are built for.”

—John A. Shedd

I like the security of the known, of the familiar, and yet the times when I’ve grown most as a person and a writer are those times when I’ve stepped away from the unknown, leftthe harbor and sailed out toward uncharted (at least to me) waters. Case in point:

I have spent the last several years taking classes and spending time atUnity Spiritual Center of Denver, a new thought/metaphysical center that aligns wit...

Slow and Steady

It’s been three weeks since I’ve posted and it’s mostly because I’ve been working on my YA–yay! Slow and steady progress.

This video is of me cleaning our pool. To pick up as much debris as possible, I have to push the vacuum very slowly; otherwise I stir up the debris and send it off to another part of the pool.

As I was cleaning the other day, it occurred to me that this was a metaphor for how I was working on mynovel. The more slowly and deliberately I approached each scene and chara...

Workshop Notes Overload!

In addition to having the privilege of teaching at Lit Fest for Lighthouse Writers Workshop, I also had the pleasure of attending two craft seminars–more on the fabulous content of thosein a future post.

Today I want to talk about notes: the taking of them, the keeping of them, the not referring to them ever again (at least rarely in my case).

Recently I’ve been purging or rather—as Marie Kondo recommends in her book,The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and...