Amanda Torrey's Blog, page 2

Achieving Your Dreams Through Positive Visualization

{Originally published in Romantically Speaking (Rhode Island Romance Writers), May, 2008. Written by yours truly.

Romance Writer Who Doesn’t Like Valentine’s Day? Huh?

Okay, so maybe I roll my eyes when Valentine’s Day is mentioned. Maybe I don’t get all goo-goo over the prospect of flowers, candy, and a date on the “Special Day.” Does that mean I’m not romantic?

I love romance. I love to find romance in every moment of every day. If there isn’t a happily-ever-after in a book or movie, I’m seldom interested. Make me laugh, make me cry, make me despair or panic about what might happen, but give me a happy ending!

It doesn’t take much to make me ooh and ahh. If you read my small town romance series, you know I’m a sucker for a grand gesture when my hero and heroine need to grovel after behaving badly (but never cruelly!) But the things I find most romantic, and the things my characters are best at, in my humble opinion, are the small things. (I like to think that they do all of the things I mention below, even if off-screen, so to speak.)

In real life, I’m lucky to have a true hero–the kind who wants to lavish me with gifts and sweet gestures on what I have dubbed The-Most-Commercialized-Love-Fest-Of-The-Year, but he’s learned not to bother. It doesn’t impress me. (Remember how I said I roll my eyes? Yeah, I’m obnoxious.) What does he do? He shows his romantic and kind side every day. Even when he’s annoyed with me. (Believe me, I test this theory a lot.)

So what does this romance writer deem more romantic than roses, candy, jewelry/gifts, and well-planned date nights on February 14th? Oh, so much.

A sweet smile. A random massage. A surprise delivery of chips and chocolate when that time of the month is approaching.  An out-of-the-blue compliment. Taking out the trash. Helping to clean up the house without being asked. Listening when I’ve had a bad day. Being wonderful to our children. Driving them around when I can’t. Telling me I don’t suck when clearly I do.

The Ugly Truth of Publishing & How BEST to Support Writers

Kristen Lamb's Blog

Original Image via Flickr Creative Commons, courtesy of Anurag Agnihotri

Well, I figure I have one more day to drunkenly torch my platform. Sad thing is I don’t drink. I am apparently this stupid when sober

Solitary Writer at the Boston Book Festival

Each year, I try to attend the Boston Book Festival, held in October. It’s a well-organized event that has a little something for everyone.

As usual, I made sure to attend the event I look forward to each year, Writer Idol. It is exactly what it sounds like–a literary version of American Idol. Brave writers submit the first page of their work, and someone reads them aloud. Three agents listen intently. They raise a hand when they would have stopped reading the submission, and when two of the three agents have raised their hand, the work stops being read. The agents then explain why they stopped reading.

I have never submitted my pages for this event (I am SO NOT BRAVE!), but I love listening to everyone else’s work, and it’s always interesting to watch the agent’s faces as they listen. It’s especially interesting to hear their thoughts on why they stopped.

Here are the takeaway lessons I got from this year’s Writer Idol event.

*New writers often “over-write.” The agents stressed that excellent writing should sound like the author barely put any effort into the prose. It should not be clunky or “too creative.”

*Writers need to simplify. Or, as one agent put it, “You don’t need all that shit!”

*Get rid of all the adjectives.

All of these lessons are sort of the same idea, but since I’m not allowed to over-write my manuscript, I figured I could take advantage and spell it all out in a blog post.

Making Things Up As I Go Along

I’m a writer.

I make things up.

Stories, conversations, people.

When I write a story, I don’t model my characters after anyone I know. This can be hard for non-writers to understand.

Don’t get me wrong, bits and pieces of everyone I encounter make up the characters I create, much the same way we are all made of stardust. I can’t pretend to understand where my ideas come from… nor will I ever be able to truly explain the process. I shock myself with some of the things that happen with my characters and my books.

Do my characters act like me? Ha. I’m rather boring in person, so I hope not! My characters make decisions based on who they are, not who I am. (Imagine how boring the book world would be if authors only wrote about themselves???) Readers are way too smart–we know when a character acts in a way that isn’t congruent with their psychological profile. How many times have you screamed at the television, “She’d never do that!”

Just as I/we read to escape, I also write to escape. To dream up a world with problems that are different than mine. To coax two characters toward the happily-ever-afters they deserve. To give my characters the opportunity to say the things I wish I could or would say. (You know what I mean–like when the perfect comeback forms in your head HOURS after the argument? In a book, the author can go back and add that bit of dialogue when it percolates. Don’t you wish you could do that in real life from time to time?)

Writing can feel like magic. Seeds are planted early on in a story, and I’ll often have no idea WHY a certain something was mentioned. Later, it becomes clear. “Oh, so THAT’S why he grows flowers!” Or whatever. By the time the story is written (and rewritten, and rewritten, and oh, did I mention rewritten?), I hope to have pieced together enough of the magic to bring the characters to life in a way that can make them feel like living, breathing characters.

So someday someone can play the guessing game about who I modeled my characters after. Because if I tell you that the hot hero on the cover is really tied up in my basement, you probably won’t believe me.  But if I tell you that the people you’ve grown to think of as friends (hopefully!) were complete figments of my imagination and not my friends, family, or neighbors, it may be even harder to believe.

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