Elizabeth Schechter's Blog, page 5

So Many Stapler Memes

You know, up until yesterday, I couldn’t have told you that the character in Office Space was named Milton. Then they named the hurricane Milton, and now there are just so many stapler memes.

Dark comedy is dark, and Tampa is about to get slammed for the second time in two weeks, as Milton is projected to come on shore in that area, and take I-4 across (expecting the usual slow downs in Champions Gate and around the theme parks because you cannot take I-4 through those areas without a traffi...

Give Me The Coffee And No One Gets Hurt…

Otherwise known as the Monday after a convention. Today is definitely a “give me the coffee and no one gets hurt” kind of day.

We found out Thursday night that Necronomicon was going to happen, so Friday morning, we packed up and headed out. The normally two hour trip to Tampa took us over three, but the hotel was lovely as always (except in a few places where it was… not. No functional elevators while trying to load into the room was not fun.) The area of Tampa where the convention is held i...

Ready…Set…Wait….

That’s the current mood on our house. Ready…set…wait…wait…wait… We’re almost entirely ready for Necronomicon. We just need to pack. But there’s a blob that’s soon to be named Helene in the Caribbean right now. She’s heading for the Gulf of Mexico at the moment, and she may ALSO be heading for Tampa this week.

Driving into what projections say might be a Category 2 hurricane doesn’t seem like my idea of a good time. Hence, the “wait” part of the program. Right now, IF she comes to Tampa or the...

Prep All the Things!

Today is September 16th, and I have the first of five shows in a little under two weeks. It’s time to PREP ALL THE THINGS!

Books have been ordered (and in the cases of three titles, more books have been delivered than I ordered, because mistakes were made.) Stock boxes are packed. Prices lists have been printed. Hotel reservations have been made (actually, they were made a while ago.) Vaccines have been onboarded (yesterday.)

Still to do? Haul the boxes off show stuff from my office down t...

The Rain Rain Rain Came Down Down Down…

“The rain rain rain came down down down. In rushing, rising riv’lets…” (from The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh.)

Our weather has been a song cue lately. The picture above is the view from my office window as I’m writing this, and it’s been like this every day for over a week. There are mushrooms growing in one of my potted plants in my garden, and it’s usually in full sun! That’s how damp it’s been recently. Which… I can’t complain too much — usually it’s too dry. But now there’s bee...

Falling into Fall

September 2nd means that Summer is on it’s way out, and we’re falling into fall. Officially, it won’t be Fall until the 22nd, but there’s Pumpkin Spice and Halloween everywhere, so… yeah. It’s Fall.

I’m also falling into what’s going to be a very busy seven weeks, starting with Necronomicon Tampa on September 27th, and running until Maker Faire in November. The full list of events is below, so if you’re in the area, come see me!

We’ll see how the writing goes during that period, but I’m v...

Raise the Wordcount!

It’s time! I have reached that point in the manuscript where the numbers don’t add up! It’s past the midpoint in the projected wordcount, but I haven’t yet hit the hinge — the midpoint in the book where we start moving toward resolution and the end. What does that mean? It’s time to raise the wordcount!

It’s not the first time I’ve done this — in truth, I think I do it at least once in every manuscript. I start out with a target of 90,000 words. That’s, on average, a good goal for fantasy rom...

A Long Day

Any Monday that starts with a visit to the dentist is by definition a LONG DAY. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Thankfully, it was a routine visit, but still. Long day is LOOOOONG.

It’s currently 7:22 PM on the East Coast, and I’m just now sitting down to write this. I have written perhaps a grand total of 50 words in King of Swords, and if I make it to 500, it’ll be amazing. I’m not sure I will, though. The next part of this involves a ritual, and I need to write it.

Maybe I’ll wr...

Joy

This past week, I’ve been watching all the writers I know come together to celebrate and support Harris/Walz. And I think I figured out why this particular ticket is so attractive to writers, and especially to romance writers, even without knowing the platform or where things are going to go. Most of us were already going to support the Democratic ticket because Never Orange Never Again. But this feels more than that. This is electric.

Part of it is the whole Project 2025 “porn will be illeg...

Time to Boost the Signal

I’m doing something I rarely, if ever, do. I’m copying something into my blog from my newsletter. But I think the message is important enough to boost the signal. Last week, my August newsletter went out, and instead of a newsy update about writing, I talked about politics. And I’m going to repost what I wrote in that newsletter, in case you haven’t seen it.

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I’m going to do something I don’t often do in this newsletter.

Talk about politics.

If you’re not US-based, and don’t care ...