Michelle Garren Flye's Blog, page 83

Virtual Tour Kicks Off Today: Come See Me at My World of Dreams

Yay! My virtual tour begins today over at My World of Dreams. I’m guest-blogging over there about my writing space, so come by and check it out. Here’s a link: The Writer’s View: Michelle Garren Flye. Oh yeah, and there are prizes to be had!

I’m partying with Goddess Fish today! Tour starts tomorrow!

How a chronic beginner finishes writing a novel

I have a confession. I’m a chronic beginner. I have loads of interests, and I’ve been fortunate enough to be able to indulge a lot of them. However, I have to admit something. I never stick with something long enough to get really good at it. If I look over the past few years, I see myself enjoying lots of really cool hobbies. Horseback riding. Tennis. Sailing. I love all of them. So how come I can’t stick with any of them long enough to become good at them?

I found the answer in a friend of mine who owns horses. She loves horses. She lives horses. She rides really, really well, competes when she can, and is so comfortable around the enormous beasts they’re like another limb to her. She was meant to be a horsewoman.

Part of me envies her. I love horses. When I have time to ride, I really, really enjoy it. I even competed once. It was fun and terrifying all at the same time. I think I got a pink ribbon. Not sure what place that is. Seventh?

So how come I can’t be a horsewoman?

But I know the answer. It’s the same reason I don’t haunt the tennis courts or go sailing every weekend or even kayak, bike or garden as often as I probably could. I’m a writer. When I’m at my keyboard with the words flowing, I’m happier than I could ever be riding a horse. The chronic beginner in me becomes a finisher in the quest to achieve that transportation that comes when I’m writing well. It’s not even that hard to write 40,000 to 50,000 words if I let all my other hobbies go. If I let everything in my life go, I could probably write Michener-size novels.

Of course, that’s not going to happen.

I mention this because I just wrote the last line in the romance I’ve been working on for a while now. Since before summer started, actually. It’s a good feeling writing that last line, even when I know the story still needs a lot of work like this one. I’m still working on it, but I know how the story ends. I finished it.

Summer colds, blog tours and free stuff!

Are summer colds the worst or what? I’ve been out of commission with one for the past week and a half. Every time I think my regimen of green tea and wine has defeated it, it comes back! Now it’s really just the sniffles (and a cough), not the sore throat and body aches I had last week, but it’s bad enough. And in an interesting twist of irony, I sound worse now and felt worse last week! So I’m getting more sympathy now than I did when I actually felt like a train had backed over me twice.

But I’m getting myself back on track blog-wise, anyway. And I’m taking this opportunity to announce the Where the Heart Lies Blog Tour by Goddess Fish Promotions. For three months, I’ll be stopping by some wonderful blogs to share my thoughts about writing, Where the Heart Lies, and a host of other topics. Here’s a schedule of the events, with links:

September 10: Welcome to My World of Dreams

September 17: Queen of all She Reads

September 24: All I want and more

October 1: MeganJohnsInvites

October 8: My Reading Addiction

October 8: Once Upon a Time…

October 15: Ramblings From This Chick

October 22: The Bunny’s Review

October 29: It’s Raining Books

November 5: The Brunette Librarian

November 12: Jersey Girl Book Reviews

November 19: Stitch Read Cook

November 19: Guilty Indulgence

November 26: My Devotional Thoughts

Each of these stops will feature a giveaway of a promotional postcard for Where the Heart Lies (signed, if you like) with a 10 percent off coupon from Carina Press and I’ll do one grand prize giveaway at the end of the tour for a $10 Amazon Gift Card and a copy of Bartlett’s Poems for Occasions, which, if you’ve read Where the Heart Lies already, actually inspired the book of poetry Liam gives Alicia.

And speaking of giveaways, I’ve already been remiss in not mentioning the one going on over at Ramblings from a Chaotic Mind for Foreign Affairs, the romance anthology from Turquoise Morning Press with my story “Agapi Mou” in it. Drop by, read some thoughts from me and some of my fellow Foreign Affairs authors about the sexy men of the Olympics, and leave a comment for your chance to win a free e-copy of Foreign Affairs! Hurry, though, the contest ends on September 7!

Plus, stay tuned in October…some of my fellow horror writers and I are cooking up a Halloween surprise…hopefully.

We need a hero, or, What would happen to Superman if he really existed.

Imagine for a moment if Superman really did appear in the sky. A man flying through the sky would certainly raise a few eyebrows, and I imagine the red ink would really start to flow. Surely he took some performance enhancing drugs in order to fly, right? He couldn’t really be stronger than steel, and dammit, if an Olympic athlete can’t leap over a building in a single bound, no way can some honest-to-goodness superhero do it without taking drugs of some sort. Never mind that we can’t find it in any of our tests. Hell, he’s made of steel. We couldn’t even draw blood. We had to depend on the urine tests. And no, none of those were conclusive, and yes, he always cooperated with us, but there’s a whole bunch of people who used to work with him that say he took drugs. Reliable folks like Lex Luthor.

I know I’m exaggerating, but really, I sort of felt like somebody took a hero away from me when I heard Lance Armstrong was going to be stripped of his Tour de France titles. It’s just wrong. Lance Armstrong has never tested positive for drugs, and I have no doubt whatsoever that he has been tested more often than any other athlete ever in any sport. And he’s finally just gotten sick of fighting this battle with a federal agency whose jurisdiction in his case is questionable, at best, and they jump on his refusal to continue fighting and strip him of everything he’s earned.

What message is this supposed to send us?

I’m not a competitive cyclist, as anybody who has ever seen me pedaling along on my two-wheeler could tell you. I’m not an athlete or a sports writer (thank goodness). Maybe I don’t even have a right to speak up here, since I’ve never even watched the Tour de France on television. What I am, however, is someone who admires people who accomplish amazing things. Some of my heroes: Steve Jobs, Walt Disney, Bill and Hillary Clinton (yep) and Kofi Annan. And, still, Lance Armstrong. Even if he never gets his titles back.

I believe some people have extraordinary abilities. Superheroes? No. But I believe it is possible to love something so much and work at it so hard that you hone your abilities and surpass anything anyone has ever done before. You can fine-tune your body to do amazing things if you have the drive to accept the pain. I do not believe that anyone could pass drug test after drug test for years and years and still be using drugs. I just don’t believe it’s possible.

What I do believe exists, however, are witch hunts. I think sometimes a group or an individual can convince themselves something is or isn’t true and search and search until they find “evidence” that supports their convictions, in spite of all the real evidence to the contrary that they’ve encountered over the years. These are the people who tell their kids the tooth fairy doesn’t exist, by the way.

I want someone to overturn the USADA’s decision. Give Lance Armstrong back what he earned and deserves. And for God’s sake, stop the witch hunt, already. Accept that he’s done something amazing because he worked hard to achieve it.

Update: I got the date wrong!

Surprise! My mommy-addled brain got the date wrong for my WEEDS AND FLOWERS giveaway. Somehow I started it a day late! So, it will actually start at midnight tonight instead of last night. Sorry about that, and I hope you will still join me for it!

End of summer post and celebration; Get WEEDS AND FLOWERS free!

The end of something, the beginning of something new. I’m looking forward to this year, but I always find it difficult to let go of my kids at the end of the summer, to turn them over (part-time), even to the teachers who share my quest to bring out the best in my offspring. Every year, they get taller, smarter, more beautiful until it breaks my heart to look at them because I know someday I have to let them go completely.

Take a breathing moment. Get a hold of the motherly “perklempt”, if I can be excused for quoting Saturday Night Live.

And on to the celebration part. In a couple of weeks, my youngest will follow her brothers into the world of school and I’ll be free at least four mornings a week, four hours a day, to write! Ah, the beauty of it. I’ll get a lot done, right? Right?

Maybe.

At any rate, I am celebrating back to school this week by giving away WEEDS AND FLOWERS for five days. That’s right, you can save 99 cents! I know you’re speechless. If I could give away all four of my novels and the couple of anthologies I’m represented in, I would, but W&F is the only one I have control of the price. At any rate, starting at midnight, you can download it for free. If you’ve already read it and enjoyed it, tell a friend about it and maybe they will download it. (And by the way, I’d love to have a couple more reviews!) If you do like W&F, maybe you’d like one of my other books, as well. (hint, hint)

And if you’ve never read any of my books before, well, free is a good place to start, right?

Breaking my silence to congratulate the foreign affairs winner!

Just a quick post to thank those who participated in the Foreign Affairs Contest. The winner was Laurie Kransky, who did some super spying and sent in the first (and probably best) entry, so I was thrilled when I pulled her name out of the hat. Congrats, Laurie!

Contest and taking a break…or a breathing moment!

The days are getting shorter. Have you noticed? It’s no longer almost light at nine o’clock in the evening. The lightning bugs are still around, though. The oppressive heat has eased off a little and the sky is clear blue today. It’s August. Four months left until the Christmas season, two months left until Halloween, and only a week and a half left of summer break.

All this is my long-winded way of saying I’m taking a short break from the blogging thing. You might have noticed my teaser a few days ago. I want to do a something about Romance vs. Sex in fiction (not real life, although maybe I’ll mention that in reference to how it influences our preferences in fiction). I’m working on that and a couple of other things right now, but mostly I just want to enjoy these last few days of summer with my kids.

That doesn’t mean that my spy contest for Foreign Affairs isn’t still on. I will announce the winner of the random draw on Wednesday evening, so go check it out here: Mission Possible.

Get outside, kick a ball, go swimming or biking or take a walk. Breathe in the last bit of summer.

Teasing you…