Monday Mentions: Character Jobs, Author Parents, & Hitting the Wall

I have a lot to share this week. There’s been a lot out there the last week.

First, a post by Jami Gold on the perfect job for our characters. She talks about if our stories require a certain profession. Certain mystery/suspense series will, they might follow a private detective or cop. Or a series might focus around firefighters(my Flames series), or some other profession. She also lists ways to tie the career into the story, since it shouldn’t just be a footnote. She also included a few links for career lists and even career placement tests. I haven’t checked all these out, although I did bookmark a site for the tests. Most of the time, my characters tell me what they do, but not always.

Then, Kristen Lamb posted about Common Core and Vegan Zombies. and the follow-up to it: Being an author parent. These aren’t writing posts, but they really stuck with me. Some of you who have been following me for a while, may know about my daughter. She was a late talker, a late walker. Really, pretty much a late everything. We had her in Early Intervention when she was 2. She wasn’t even saying about half a dozen words then. By the time she aged out of the 0-3 program(so a year later), she was saying about 2 dozen words, and short sentences. Another year later, and she didn’t stop talking. At 4, she started in the pre-k program through our school. She was still getting some services, for her speech as well as fine and gross motor skills.

Part of these “delays” I still think are just her personality. She’s quiet, likes to sit and read/draw/do puzzles. She’s just like me. One of her teachers’ concerns during her first year in Pre-K is that she didn’t interact with other kids. Again, she ‘s like me. I’m not a social person. After a lot of weighing options and going back and forth, we decided to keep her back a year. Along with the social issues, she had a late Summer birthday and was one of the youngest/smallest in her class. And even though I doubted the decision at times, it was probably the best decision we made. She really blossomed the next year. She’s still quiet now in Kindergarten, but she does interact with the other kids. She’ll never be a social butterfly I’m sure, but she’s extremely advanced in her reading, knows all the math skills, and loves going to school. But, she doesn’t understand figurative language. She takes everything literally. But, her imagination is crazy. She’s always coming up with little stories. And I love it.

Her brother, on the other hand, is very active. He hardly sits still, is always moving around(I swear, he’s barely even still when he’s sleeping).  He’s not old enough for pre-k yet, but I doubt we’ll have the same experience there. He didn’t have the same issues with talking(even though my MIL worried simply b/c he wasn’t talking as clearly as her niece’s twins who were just a couple months older). He might not sit for long with a book or puzzle, but he’s already trying to figure out how things work. He’s a lot more like his dad. I don’t know how this will translate to his school experience, but I know I want to encourage both types of learning.

Back to the writing posts, Ava Jae posted about 7 Signs You Should Cut Your Prologue. I have written some in first drafts, but I don’t think I have any in current drafts.

Elizabeth Spann Craig wrote about Passage of Time and Transitions. This is something I tend to struggle with. I feel like I either write too many of the little details, or there’s not enough. Trying to find that middle ground isn’t always easy.

And Kait Nolan wrote about hitting The Wall and Letting Go of the Flail. I usually hit that wall when I’m reading over the first draft and go “what the hell did I write? this sucks.” Then, I scrap it and start all over. Sometimes this is a good thing. I think if I would have just tried to revise the first version of Flames of Redemption, I would have gotten mired down. But, you can only rewrite so many times. Sometimes you have to just put in the work with what you have or you never get anywhere.