Last November I entered TOUCHED into the Gotham Writers’ Workshop YA Novel Discovery contest. They announced the winners today. I was not one of them.
However, they had about 1,700 submitted entries which is pretty impressive. I’m not bummed, I know that when the time is right TOUCHED will enter the scene with force. Which means, I need to get off my butt and work on revisions.
Congratulations to all the winners!
This week I write an apology and review a wonderful marketing book catered to artists who want to turn their artistic passions into a full time career. Go read the article to find out why I had to apologize to the author of I’d Rather Be in the Studio.
2009 has come and gone and I wanted to do a nice wrap up post on all that I accomplished. While I didn’t post goals I had for the year publicly, I did have a few of them. Click on the link below to read what I was able to track through the year.
I have a few cool things to announce this month. On a whim, I submitted Touched to a Young Adult Novel Discovery Contest offered by the Gotham Writers’ Workshop. The contest asks for the first 250 words and the title of your novel; but the grand prize gives the winner the opportunity to submit their manuscript to a YA literary agent and a free writing course. It was mostly a spur of the moment thing, but I have just as much of a shot any one else. They’ll announce winners in February 2010.
I received news today that the Women’s Voices in Magic anthology is now in print! Order a copy of the book online through either amazon.com or the publisher. Please note that Immanion’s US fulfillment team won’t have copies in hand until the latter half of December, but they’ll keep track of pending orders.
This is the last installment of Perpetual. It includes some of the hardest writing I’ve penned to date. Warning: some passages in this entry may seem harsh or a bit emotionally hard to deal with. And for the record, yes, I did cry. A lot. Thank you for reading. NaNoWriMo 09 winner with 50448 words (Scrivener tells me 50462 words however).
When I opened my eyes, I am no longer standing out in the cold. My hair is plastered to my face, wet with the melting snow that had fallen down from the sky. The sky no longer appears above me and I do not see my friends. Instead, I find myself standing out in the middle of the Consortium Chamber Room of the Council. I blinked and wonder if everything I had experienced was a dream, that the Portal had not yet transported me to the other side.
The storm crept over them almost unexpectedly. The evening sky surged with dark and menacing clouds. Large, fluffy clouds began to fall from the heavens. Sardonios turned on the windshield wipers and they scrubbed the break proof window with a loud squeaking sound. He reached out with his right hand to turn on the internal window defroster system and then gripped the steering wheel with both hands.
I thought about taking today off but after having a good time at the local WriMo Game Night, I felt compelled to add a thousand words or so to my story.
A bald eagle circled over head. The wings of the bird stretched long and it dipped down as the tail feathers twisted and shaped themselves. Through her enhanced hearing, Xep heard the bird call out and skreech to the sky. Xep smiled and strained her head against the window as to get a better view of the magnificent bird. She had read about the omens that many of the ancient cultures of the local area placed on the bird and smiled. “Only good things,” she repeated in her head hoping that the appearance of the bird meant that her journey would prove successful. “So many interesting new things,” she thought to herself, “it will be a shame that I cannot hang out here more often to explore and see what else is around. I never knew that this side of the veil had so many wonderful things.”
The goblins cheered as they carried the limp form of Xep through the street. Some people also raised up their arms and cheered as the small horde of hooded creatures moved in and out of them. They took the slightly heavy robot back to the large purple tent their master set up for the markets. In return, the hooded man tossed out small satchels to each one. The goblins dove down and fought over the small packets of food. Once everyone had a bag, they tore into it and started chowing down on the paste like substance inside.
The goblins marched around the market, occasionally sniffing the air around them as they searched out the person their master wanted. The market had grown in the past two stops and it was getting harder and harder to spot and find and take the things that their master constantly wanted. He was always on the look out for the rare, strange, unusual and one of a kind items that no one else seemed to have. He used a lot of his magical talents to hone in on the things that came through the market passage ways. Once he knew what items were available he would spent the rest of his days at the market locating the owners and then bartering with them to try and get them to trade away the unique toy with promises tainted with magic.
Sardonios drove the silver Nissan Sentra into the Goblin Market at about five miles per hour. Everyone sat silent and still, allowing their eyes to do all the talking. Once they passed the bus on the left and right, their eyes widened to the sights now visible. Off to their right sat many tents and tepees and other structures that could be built up and taken down quickly. Cars were parked behind the structures, many of the trunks were open to expose cardboard and plastic boxes full of items to be sold. People jammed the makeshift streets, which seemed to cram into one another in a labyrinth-like pattern.
