Slow and Steady Wins the Race?
Some of you may be aware of this already, but I've spent the past couple of months toiling as a field hand on my sister and brother-in-law's farm/plan to end world hunger.
While the work has been extremely rewarding--my family has never eaten so well in the history of my being in charge of meal planning, procurement, and preparation--the death of the prepackaged meal has come at the cost of my timely completion of the second book in my Genie Chronicles, Solomon's Bell.
Farming has not proven conducive to creativity in my experience. Sure, I still talk to my characters while I water the green beans with the very sweat cascading from my brow as I bake like a crab cake in the Alabama sun, but mainly I just wish for a genie in the form of a tiny tornado that would gleefully take out half of the rows I'm supposed to pick before lunch. I haven't much mental energy left after a day in the dirt and itchy squash, zucchini and okra plants. That I manage not to claw my own skin off because of the chiggers seems like accomplishment enough some evenings.
I am taking advantage of less demanding days to write, but I think the sun has liquefied parts of my brain. Today I wrote for NINE STRAIGHT HOURS and got down a mere 597 words. That's less than 67 words per hour! Still, I got them down and I'm pretty satisfied with them and the direction of the story. In celebration, I'm sharing them here (with a few others for context) as a sort of teaser. I hope you enjoy them!
Remember me, as I labor away this summer in the Green Bean Forest. And pray for rain--it's good for the crops and gets me out of the fields for awhile to write!
(Unedited Excerpt: Genie Chronicles, Book Two: Solomon's Bell, All Rights Reserved)
(The Shops of Golden Lane, Prague)
The old man’s bald scalp, the only part of him not wrinkled, protrudes from the thick dark garment he wears and glows in the firelight. His nose is large and hooked, his bushy brows heavy over eyes that hang like watery black moons in his weathered face. In the firelight, his dewy eyesThe noise begins to fade, lifting like a dissipating fog. I regard the scrappy yellow-haired man standing in front of me with genuine interest. I’ve never met another genie other than Rashmere before. This Marek is nothing like Rashmere, however, with his fluffy tufts of blond hair and emerald green eyes. His smile is wide and toothy but insincere and never reaches his cold, languid stare. Where Rashmere is calm and centered, Marek seems nimble and spry with an innate capacity for cunning; he looks ready to pounce. “What do we have here?” Marek purrs.
While the work has been extremely rewarding--my family has never eaten so well in the history of my being in charge of meal planning, procurement, and preparation--the death of the prepackaged meal has come at the cost of my timely completion of the second book in my Genie Chronicles, Solomon's Bell.
Farming has not proven conducive to creativity in my experience. Sure, I still talk to my characters while I water the green beans with the very sweat cascading from my brow as I bake like a crab cake in the Alabama sun, but mainly I just wish for a genie in the form of a tiny tornado that would gleefully take out half of the rows I'm supposed to pick before lunch. I haven't much mental energy left after a day in the dirt and itchy squash, zucchini and okra plants. That I manage not to claw my own skin off because of the chiggers seems like accomplishment enough some evenings.
I am taking advantage of less demanding days to write, but I think the sun has liquefied parts of my brain. Today I wrote for NINE STRAIGHT HOURS and got down a mere 597 words. That's less than 67 words per hour! Still, I got them down and I'm pretty satisfied with them and the direction of the story. In celebration, I'm sharing them here (with a few others for context) as a sort of teaser. I hope you enjoy them!
Remember me, as I labor away this summer in the Green Bean Forest. And pray for rain--it's good for the crops and gets me out of the fields for awhile to write!
(Unedited Excerpt: Genie Chronicles, Book Two: Solomon's Bell, All Rights Reserved)
(The Shops of Golden Lane, Prague)The old man’s bald scalp, the only part of him not wrinkled, protrudes from the thick dark garment he wears and glows in the firelight. His nose is large and hooked, his bushy brows heavy over eyes that hang like watery black moons in his weathered face. In the firelight, his dewy eyesThe noise begins to fade, lifting like a dissipating fog. I regard the scrappy yellow-haired man standing in front of me with genuine interest. I’ve never met another genie other than Rashmere before. This Marek is nothing like Rashmere, however, with his fluffy tufts of blond hair and emerald green eyes. His smile is wide and toothy but insincere and never reaches his cold, languid stare. Where Rashmere is calm and centered, Marek seems nimble and spry with an innate capacity for cunning; he looks ready to pounce. “What do we have here?” Marek purrs.
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