October madness write-a-thon

I'm a day behind on posting for the write-a-thon hosted by Britney Gulbrandsen. http://www.britneygulbrandsen.com/.

This is a great way to get back on track with my writing. I didn't get to post my goals so I'll post them here:

These are my long term goals and this week during the write-a-thon I will work one hour on each.

Goal #1 - Finish editing short story, "The road to my love" a historical romance. Get it polished and ready to enter Writer's digest contest due by Oct 31st. http://www.writersdigest.com/competitions/romance-writing-competition

Goal #2 - Edit a chapter a day on my WIP, "Far From Normal" a YA paranormal romance and complete edits by November 17th.

Goal # 3 - Get "Far From Normal" query and synopsis ready for submitting. Work on my pitch for agents at the writers conference in Feb. http://anwa-lds.com/pitchsession

It's pretty scary to actually voice these goals and put it out there for the universe to see if I succeed or fail. But since it's October and it's time to face the spooky scary world of contests, queries, and writer conferences. Here we go...

Monday writing challenge #1: The story must have a hellhound at the beginning. The story must involve a sack in the beginning.

My five minutes of writing:

     Aaron whirled around and pointed his finger in my face. I could feel his hot breath from standing to close.

     “Seth if you don’t get this job done your going to experience the agonizing bite wound of a hellhound. I put my neck out for you and I can’t and won’t take the downfall if you mess this one up. How hard can it be to make a stupid, worthless girl follow you? Throw her in a sack and take her away, show her how miserable life is and make her regret the choices she has made. It’s as simple as that.”

My thoughts: I kept writing and erasing so my five minutes was up pretty quickly and I didn't get much written. My creative juices weren't flowing but I took two characters from my WIP and added hell hounds and a sack to one of their discussions. It was fun. 

Tuesday Challenge #2
Pick your favorite character from a book. Add this character to a scene in your WIP. 

My favorite character is Zenobia from my father-n-laws book Zenobia - Birth of a Legend. Zenobia is a 3rd century girl and she would rip my current WIP character Krystal Teigen to pieces for not standing up for what she believes in. Here goes the writing:

     "What is the deal with me and ghosts?" I threw my hands up in surrender. The women standing there was tall and extremely beautiful. Her dark hair and skin were like milk chocolate and her dark eyes watched me intently. I could have sworn they sparkled a little. I blinked a couple times hoping that my mind was playing tricks on me and I wasn't seeing another strong women from the past. I mean Princess Kristina was an ancestor so her visit was normal. Well as normal as having ghost visits you are. 

     "How can I help you?" I decided to be straight forward and find out what this marvelous looking woman wanted. I knew she wasn't from my time not only because I sensed the spiritualism but her attire was straight from Roman times. The white tunic had a gold rope wrapped around her waist. She had a bow around her shoulder and arrows in a pouch behind her back. She looked absolutely deadly as a sword hung on her hip tied to the golden rope. Her whole persona yelled,
"Ready for war." When she didn't answer right away I thought maybe she didn't speak English. 

     "Krystal, I am here as a friend to help you see your worth." Her voice exuded power and she looked deep into my eyes. 

I wanted to squirm but I couldn't look away from intense look that held my interest. I knew whatever she had to tell me it was going to be important and life altering.

My thoughts: This was fun because I like both characters a lot and would love to see how a girl from today would interact with Zenobia from ancient history. 

Now to work on my goals. Happy writing.