The Roller Coaster of Writing by Lynn Lovegreen

 Every career has its ups and downs. Writing is no exception. I’ve had my share, as most writers have. 

 

The downs can be dramatic. Many of us go through periods of writer’s block, periods when we can’t come up with ideas or don’t have the energy to write. I’ve only had a few of those when I’ve been too stressed because of personal events (or a global pandemic). My advice is to let yourself rest and refill the well. Usually, the block will go away with time.

 

Writing is a profession that is famous for rejections. If you’re traditionally published (or working toward that goal), it’s a matter of getting the right book in the right hands at the right time. Agents, editors, or publishing houses may reject your manuscript. I’ve been in that boat, too. Even if you’re self-published, not every person will love your book. Negative reviews are part of the career. It’s tough to persevere after a series of rejections, but it’s good to keep your eye on the prize and try again.

 

And there’s the whole “my publisher folded/editor moved/agent quit agenting” kinds of situations. Even when you seemingly have it made, something can fall through. In my case, my publisher was bought by another publisher. Then I wasn’t a good match for the new one. No villains in this scene, just not a good fit between publisher and author. I moved on and survived, but writers often need to find their way through similar scenarios.

But it’s not all bad. The ups can also be dramatic. Finishing a book is satisfying. Getting that “I’m interested in your work” email is exciting. Holding the first copy of your own book in your hands is heady. Reading that first fan email or comment is wonderful! That’s why I do it, to hear a reader say that they enjoyed my book or that it touched them in some way.  If I can reach one person, or show them that they are not alone, I have fulfilled my mission. That makes the roller coaster ride worth it.

 

To all the writers out there, I wish you more ups than downs in your own career. But when the tough times come, remember to hang in there. You’ll make it through this, and come out on the other side.

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for most of her life. After twenty years in the classroom, she retired to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering for her local library. Her young adult historical romance is set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. 

My Current WIP: A Tough Note to Crack by Lynn Lovegreen

This month, Genre-istas are sharing their current WIPs (Works In Progress). My current project is a YA historical mystery with romantic elements—a good example of how you can mix and match those subgenres!

The idea started with a question: What if Veronica Mars was a teen in in Anchorage, Alaska in 1941?⁠

Fifteen-year-old Peggy Jones is the perky, fearless queen bee of Anchorage High School’s freshman class of 1941. She has plans to become first flute in Orchestra, Honor Society member, and future crème de la crème of the territory of Alaska. When the new kid’s flute is stolen, she gets the blame, and has to nab the thief to clear her name. Life gets complicated when the shy boy she’s just noticed becomes a suspect, Peggy’s best friend thinks she’s taking over her student government campaign, and her mother is keeping a secret from her. What’s a girl to do but take a cue from Humphrey Bogart and solve mysteries to keep her dreams alive?

Here’s the beginning:

It started with Humphrey Bogart.

I was halfway through filing thirty slips of paper with locker assignments when the third-period bell rang. My mind drifted off to more interesting things. A thousand miles away from Anchorage High School and Alaska, I searched the docks of San Francisco with Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon. I saw the movie three times at the Empress Theatre, so I could picture the fog rolling in and Bogart’s handsome face half in shadow from the brim of his fedora. If only I could solve a mystery with him and gaze into those dreamy brown eyes. I sighed. I glanced around to make sure that nobody overheard me.

Then the new kid walked in. A tall drink of water with a slim build and dark, he had wavy hair you could run your fingers through. His argyle sweater had seen better days, with stretched out sleeves and a fraying strand of yarn hanging from his waist. Standing next to him was an elegant, petite lady wearing a stylish velvet hat.

“Good morning, may I help you?” I asked in my best office girl voice. Excited at meeting a new student—and a cute boy— before anybody else, I bounced up on the toes of my new saddle shoes. Thank goodness Mother got me into this class as an extra elective—her status as president of the Anchorage Women’s Club and her friendship with the registrar sure came in handy. It kept me in the know around here, and out of boring old gym class.

 The woman opened her mouth, but the kid spoke up first. “We just got into town.” From the way he had his hands shoved in his pockets, he probably didn’t want to move here four weeks into the school year.  I could help set things right. 

“That’s great! Welcome!” I gestured to the office, the walls hung with festive orange and black pennants, and our eagle mascot. “I’m Peggy Jones, freshman. Pleased to meet you.” I stuck out my hand and shook both of theirs heartily, pep club and welcoming committee rolled into one.

Writers, what is your latest WIP? Or if you’re a reader, what’s the more recent read you really enjoyed?

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for over fifty years. After twenty years in the classroom, she retired to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering at her local library. Her young adult historical fiction is set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. You can also find her on Facebook and Instagram.

The Heady Experience of The First Book by Lynn Lovegreen

Like your first love, your first book holds a special place in your heart. I feel so fortunate that I’ve had that experience.

Each author’s journey is different. In my case, it took about three years to write my first novel Fools Gold, since I had no idea what I was doing. Luckily, I had brilliant critique partners in my local RWA chapter, AKRWA, which got it into decent shape. I had a relatively easy time finding a publisher—it only took fifty queries and an online contest. And I had a couple great editors (at the former Prism Book Group) who worked with me to make it the best book I could write at that point. After that, it was publication time.  

In December of 2013, a box of books arrived at my door. I let out a little girl squeal, then cried, overwhelmed at the thought of my dream coming true. I set the open box in the living room for a week, gazing at it as often as possible. (Shout out to my loving and patient husband for stepping around it without complaint.)

Later, I got the thrill of sharing Fools Gold with others, seeing it in local bookstores and talking with readers. That was a heady experience, too. And I’ve published a few others now, which is also wonderful. But there’s nothing that compares with holding that first book in my hand. It still makes me sigh.

Wishing the same feeling for all of you, whether it’s a book or something else that’s special to you!

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for over fifty years. After twenty years in the classroom, she retired to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering at her local library. Her young adult historical fiction is set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. You can also find her on Facebook and Instagram.

A Different Drummer by Lynn Lovegreen

(Note: this was previously posted on www.lynnlovegreen.com.)

I was the nice, quiet kid who read a lot. I had friends and could be social when I was in the mood or circumstances called for it, but I was a bit weird. One of my favorite things to do was find a quiet place in the woods and tell myself fairy stories. While other kids played sports, I curled up with a book or listened to Beatles records with my oldest sister. (For those of you who missed out on records, the best part was the LP covers. They were huge canvases for art and often had the lyrics inside or on the back, so we could follow along and analyze them in a way that’s hard to do with downloaded songs on our phones.) 

In high school, I had requisite crushes on cute guys, but I also had a thing for Elizabethan playwright Christopher Marlowe and Romantic poet John Keats. I was a drama geek who memorized the soundtrack of A Chorus Line years before I ever saw it. I listened to music in my room for hours. The Beatles were still sacred to me, but I also learned lyrics by Billy Joel, Elton John, and others. Starting to notice a pattern here—words and stories?

It was no surprise to anyone that I became an English teacher. I loved reading and writing with teenagers. And sometimes they did, too. There’s nothing more rewarding than giving a teen a book and watching them fall in love with it. And a class NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) project led to writing my first novel and a new passion connected to words.

Skip a few years, and here I am, writing young adult historical fiction set in my home state. I hope to inspire and entertain teens (and those who love them) with stories of old Alaska. I am still marching to a different drummer, as there are few of us in this particular niche. But I couldn’t be happier about my current calling. It feels right for me, and gives me joy. Whether it’s researching, writing, connecting with other writers, or hanging out with teens, teachers, and librarians, it’s all fun, interesting or both at the same time. 

How are you stepping to the music of a different drummer? What are the rewards you’ve found in doing that?

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for over fifty years. After twenty years in the classroom, she retired to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering at her local library. Her young adult historical fiction is set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. You can also find her on Facebook and Instagram.

Writers of Influence by Lynn Lovegreen

There are so many ways to define a writer of influence. I love reading authors in different genres, and often try to emulate them in elements of their writing craft. But today I’ll talk about a few writers who I admire for walking their talk and living up to their ideals. They influence me to try to do the same in my own writing life.

The first is one of our own Genreistas, B. A. Binns. While B. A. is a talented author of middle grade and young adult novels, she also shares her expertise in writing diverse characters through teaching workshops in the subject and honoring diverse authors at events like Romance Slam Jam. Learn more about her at http://www.babinns.com.

Another is author Cynthia Leitich Smith. She is a children’s and YA author, and her website https://cynthialeitichsmith.com is full of great resources including topics like “Diversity and Inclusion in Children’s and Young Adult Books” and “Free Speech, Censorship, and the Right to Read.” She also gives shout outs to diverse books and authors on her Twitter account.

A third is Alaskan author Dana Stabenow. She is best known for her 31 novels. After several years of success, she recalled her influential experience at a writer’s retreat and decided to pay it forward by creating the Storyknife Writers Retreat, where women writers can create in a peaceful, inspirational setting. Learn more about this at https://storyknife.org.  

All of these writers (and others I don’t have room to mention here) share their hearts and minds through their writing, and also through their actions. I want to be like them. My advocacy for libraries and my blog theme #Let’sThinkAbout Critical Thinking is a start. I hope I can refine my mission and techniques by following these masters of influence.

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for almost fifty years. She taught for twenty years before retiring to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering at her local library. Her young adult/new adult historical romances are set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. You can also find her on Facebook, Goodreads, and Pinterest.

My Writing Dream Come True by Lynn Lovegreen

I’ve been lucky enough to have many writing dreams come true. When I first started writing, my dream was to finish a book. Once I did that, thanks to NaNoWriMo (https://nanowrimo.org), then my dream was to write a good book, one people would want to read. After many years of writing, critiquing, and revising, I did write a decent novel, which became Fools Gold.

The next, and in some ways the hardest, step was to reach my dream of being published. After lots of learning and rejections, I entered a blurb contest at savvyauthors.com and found my publisher. Prism Book Group had great editors and helped me polish my novel and several others in my Gold Rush series. My words were released into the world! It was a thrill to see my books in print and have readers enjoy them.

But businesses change, and after a while my publisher was bought by another, and my books went out of print. I’m not crushed by this, any more than I was by all the rejections and setbacks before this. I have a new writing dream, to get my WWII series published. And I’m sure I can make that happen, with the same perseverance and dedication to my craft I’ve had all along.

I love writing, and I will keep at it. My biggest, overall writing dream is for my words to touch readers, to inspire them to keep going and reach their own dreams, whatever they may be. 

First posted at www.lynnlovegreen.com

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for almost fifty years. She taught for twenty years before retiring to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering at her local library. Her young adult/new adult historical romances are set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. You can also find her on Facebook, Goodreads, and Pinterest.

My Broken Shoulder by Lynn Lovegreen

Something you may not know--About five years ago, I fell on the ice and broke my right shoulder (the top of my humerus). Because of the location of the fracture, they didn’t do surgery or put a cast on it. Instead, I had to wear a sling strapped to my torso to keep my arm still, and let the bone heal itself. For three months.

Thank goodness my prince of a husband did the cooking, fetching and carrying, even helped me dress and bathe until I got the hang of using only one hand. And friends and other family members pitched in. But still, it was not fun.

I was in a a lot of pain at the beginning, so sitting or lying on the couch was fine with me. But after a week or so, as the pain eased down to a dull throb, I got bored. And stir crazy, not being able to move around very much. I could read, but it was hard to prop up a book with one hand for long, so I devoured magazines and read books when I could. And there was TV and such, but what I really wanted to do was write.

Of course, I’m right-handed, and I only had my left hand free for most of those three months. I taught myself how to type one-handed, which is fine for typing letters, but awkward when using the shift and special keys. I managed to write comments online and short emails, etc. But I couldn’t manage long forms of writing. The draft I was going to revise had to wait.

Life goes on. The shoulder healed. I did PT exercises faithfully, and gained full use of my right shoulder. I finished that draft, then wrote another. It all turned out well in the end. I did learn a few things from that experience:

• Always wear ice grippers in the wintertime.
• It’s okay to ask for help.
• My husband is wonderful. (Okay, I knew that already, but it was reinforced during that time.)

May you never break your shoulder, or have any other malady that lays you flat for months at a time. But if you do, I hope your experience turns out as well as mine did.

P.S. Happy anniversary, Romancing the Genres! I'm honored to be a Genreista!

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for almost fifty years. She taught for twenty years before retiring to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering at her local library. Her young adult/new adult historical romances are set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. You can also find her on Facebook, Goodreads, and Pinterest.

Changing seasons of my writing life by Paty Jager

This month on Romancing the Genres is about Changing Seasons and Anthologies.

If you read the Saturday blog here, you know I wrote about anthologies. What to look for when you are asked to be in one and how to approach writing for one.

Today, I'm writing about changing seasons. I'm not talking about winter, spring, summer, or fall. This is the change in seasons I've discovered in my writing.

When I started out, I wanted to write mysteries. If you've been a follower of this blog you know I had trouble finding the help I needed to perfect my craft. I switched to romance and had a wonderful time writing steamy historical western romance books. The Halsey Brothers Series is still a favorite with my readers.

I tried to write to a trend. I'd heard editors at a conference say they wanted historical paranormal romance. Unfortunately, they didn't want Native American historical paranormal romance which is what I came up with. Luckily, the small press I was with at the time didn't care it was hard to categorize. They just loved the trilogy.

The self-publish wave grew and crashed through the barriers that made it hard for an author like me, who didn't write stories easily tagged. Author friends who were already self-published prodded me to join them.  I finally took the plunge and I'm happy I did.

With the power to write whatever I wanted, I wrote an action adventure trilogy with a female MacGyver/Indiana Jones character. I loved writing them and the readers who have picked them up have enjoyed them. The first book won an award. But I either haven't promoted them right or the covers aren't a good portrayal because I'm lucky if I sell one of those a month. This is when I wonder if self-publishing was a good choice.  Maybe an editor or publisher would have known where to market the books, but then again, Maybe I need to promote them as Romantic Suspense rather than Action Adventure. And change up the covers. That is on my to-do list for this year.

My historical western fans weren't happy with the stand alone westerns, so I came up with a few more Halsey books. Halsey Homecoming trilogy involves the younger people who came into the Halsey family through marriages.

However, my desire to write mysteries came back and I became determined this time, I would come up with a series and I would write it and self-publish. The Shandra Higheagle Mystery series has been a joy to write and it is my best selling series. There is a bit of paranormal as her deceased Nez Perce grandmother comes to the amateur sleuth, Shandra Higheagle, in dreams giving her clues to help her solve the murders. And she has a love interest in the County Detective, Ryan Greer. There are wonderful quirky characters, a big cowardly dog, a cat that thinks its a fur collar and horses. All set at and around a fictional ski resort on a mountain in Idaho.

And now, I've come up with a wonderful new historical western series that I hope my readers will enjoy reading as much as I am plotting and making up characters. It will be: The Ladies of the Silver Dollar Saloon. With a handsome saloon owner who has saloon girls who sing and dance and entice the men to buy more drinks. They, however, are not to bed any of the clientele. He doesn't run a brothel.

And that is how the seasons of change have come to my writing life.

blog / website /  Facebook / Paty's Posse / Goodreads / Twitter / Pinterest

My Bucket List by Lynn Lovegreen

I’m a “woman of a certain age” now, so some expect me to have regrets and a bucket list. I don’t, really, because I’ve had a pretty good my life so far. But there are some things I hope to do in the future.

First, I want to go to Dutch Harbor, Alaska, and the village next door, Unalaska. I’m not a reality TV fan (except for Dancing With the Stars—long story), so it’s not about crab boats and their crews. I want to see the history there. You see, Dutch Harbor was bombed by the Japanese military in 1942. And I’m writing a series about World War II in Alaska, so I hope to do some research there next summer. 

Second, I want to publish the series I mentioned above. The first book, about the building of the Alcan Highway, is almost done. Then, I want to write the Dutch Harbor book, and a book about the AlSib program—a part of the Lend Lease program that brought airplanes to Fairbanks for the Russian allies. And I have a few other ideas if I need more than three books in the series. There are some fascinating stories about that time period in Alaska, and I hope to introduce them to readers.

Personally, as I said, I don’t have much of a list. But I do enjoy traveling, so there are a few places I’d like to see. I have relatives to visit in several places around the U.S. And I’ve never been to Ireland, or Scotland, or Australia…okay, maybe I do have a bucket list after all. 

May you cross off the items on your own bucket list, and do all the wonderful things you wish to do in your lifetime! 

Lynn Lovegreen grew up in Alaska, and still lives there. Her young adult historical romances are set in the Alaska Gold Rush, a great time for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com.

Life Is What Happens....

Life Is What Happens…. by Lynn Lovegreen

“Life is what happens while you’re planning something else.” It’s not clear who said this first, maybe John Lennon? But I agree with it, anyway. Whether you’re a plumber or counselor or homemaker, any role in life, you’ve experienced this at one time or another. It happens to writers, too.

It is now December 2015, and I was supposed to be done with my current work-in-progress long ago, so I could go on vacation and sit on the beach drinking a Mai Tai or whatever to celebrate. But, of course, that’s not what happened.

I have been working on my novel about the building of the Alcan (Alaska) Highway for over a year now. Last fall, my husband and I drove the Alcan on a research trip to clear up any historical questions remaining, and I revised the draft a few more times. Somehow, it just wasn’t jelling. In June, I talked with an agent who helped me pinpoint the problem: I had the wrong hero. So I wrote a new draft and revised that a couple times. But it’s not finished yet.

So my husband and I are on vacation, but the novel is simply on hiatus, taking a break like I am. When we get back to Alaska, I’ll go through it one more time, show it to a few trusted colleagues, revise a little more, and then, maybe, it will be finished. Perhaps if we take a vacation next spring, that will be the celebration trip. Oh well. That’s okay. I’m hoping this extra time will lead to a bigger and better book. Writers are usually optimistic about our work. :-) 

Happy holidays to you, wherever you are today!

Lynn Lovegreen grew up in Alaska, and still lives there. Her young adult historical romances are set in the Alaska Gold Rush, a great time for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com.