Michelle McLean's Blog, page 55

Back To School Pros and Cons

Well, my baby started kindergarten yesterday, and my son just started first grade. Which means for the first time in seven years, I will be ALONE for the majority of the day. I think it's Pro and Con time.

PRO: I'm alone!!!! I can do whatever I want, whenever I want, wherever I want. Wooohooo!

CON: So far my alone time has consisted of sitting at the kitchen table basking in the silence. Wonderful, sure, but not very productive.

CON: Alone Time seems to move a lot faster than Regular Time - I se...

A Haunted Contest!

Jessica Verday's The Haunted, sequel to The Hollow , is finally here! To celebrate, I will be giving away a copy of either The Haunted or The Hollow (whichever you'd prefer).



To Enter:
Just leave a comment ON THIS POST and you are entered! Be sure to tell me how many points you have :)

Extra entry opportunities:
Blog, Facebook, Tweet about it - 1 extra entry each
"Like" The Haunted fanpage - 1 extra entry
"Like" The Hollow fanpage - 1 extra entry
"Like" my Author Page - 1 extra entry

The contest will ...

Monday Meltdown

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Okay, so I had a bit of a rough day yesterday. I had to play a piano piece (accompanying a young lady who was singing). I practiced this song till my fingers ached. I played it perfectly (well, very well at least). I was nervous (as I always am going in front of a crowd), but I was prepared, I had worked hard, I was ready, I knew this song in my sleep (literally, the tune is still running through my head).......

I get up to play.......

I BOMB. Holy cow, choke city. I don't know what happened, b...

Friday Funnies

Many people hear voices when no one is there. Some of them are called mad and are shut up in rooms where they stare at the walls all day. Others are called writers and they do pretty much the same thing.— Meg Chittenden 


Writing is pretty crummy on the nerves. — Paul Theroux


There are few things, apparently, more helpful to a writer than having once been a weird little kid. — Katherine Paterson 


When he was nine, he protested. "Everybody else in my class stays up until nine or ten o'clock," he ...

Thirty Word Thursday - Another Way to Describe

Sometimes I can better describe a person by another person's reaction. In...my first book, I couldn't think of a way to sufficiently describe the charisma of a certain boy, so the narrator says, "I knew girls who saved his gum."  — Amy Hempel 
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Blog Chain - Worth the Hassle

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This round of the ol' chain was started by our awesome Eric, who wants to know:

What do you find to be the most challenging aspect of being a writer? What is your greatest reward from writing?
Fabulous question. There are a lot of things about being a writer that are hard. Juggling writing with kids and family and jobs, dodging queries, revisions, edits, revisions, bleeding-red critiques, more revisions, W.A.I.T.I.N.G., querying, submitting, pressure, and all that other wonderful stuff that co...

Ten Word (plus a few) Tuesday

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.  — Scott Adams 
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My Pot Boileth Over

I was talking to my dad yesterday, jabbering on about how happy I was to have completed another chapter in my new book and he said something along the lines of "I don't get how writers can just sit down and start writing. How do you go from cleaning the house to just sitting down and writing?"

I wasn't sure what to tell him for a second. Because the short answer is - you just do :D I did say that I try to treat writing like a real job. I'm on summer hours now, but once the kids are in school, ...

Friday Funnies

Best Newspaper Headlines of 1998

1. Include Your Children When Baking Cookies
2. Something Went Wrong in Jet crash, Experts Say
3. Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers
4. Drunks Get Nine Months in Violin Case
5. Iraqi Head Seeks Arms
6. Is There a Ring of Debris Around Uranus?
7. Would-be Women Priests Appeal to Pope
8. Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over
9. British Left Waffles on Falkland Islands
10. Teacher Strikes Idle Kids
11. Clinton Wins Budget; More Lies Ahead
12. Plane Too Close ...