Month: February 2019

Writing

‘Story of My Life’ Book Covers Are My New Reason for Living

Amanda Gibson

I’ve just discovered the Story of My Life book covers Instagram account, and I don’t think I love anything more.

This is one of my favorites:

It’s speaking to me on many levels this week because a) I engage in hypothetical arguments in the shower on the regular, and b) The shower is where life slows down just enough for my brain to dwell on a tricky plot point I’m struggling with. And this past weekend I finally figured out how the third point of view in my latest WIP is going to factor into the plot.

I’d been writing this third perspective that I considered cutting so. many. times. He just wasn’t quite fitting into things very well. But I finally argued it out (literally, I was talking out loud to myself/the tile) and came up with a rough plan of how his story line will weave into the plot of my other two characters. Voila! All it took was dozens of gallons of hot water down the drain.

Sorry, environment. I’m part of the problem.

These will make me feel better:

Uncategorized

Does anything make you feel better than JK Rowling talking about failure?

Amanda Gibson

I came across this video of Jo talking about hitting rock bottom as a low-income single mother, and how that set the scene for her to have nothing to focus on except her one passion project (three guesses what that was).

There have been a lot of distractions in my life that have kept me from writing, and not all of them have been bad (the most notable being my daughter, who, depending on the day – or the hour – is the funniest toddler in the world or a wailing, yogurt-stained creature of nightmares).

But something about this video makes me feel like maybe the times when failure seems to pile up (I’m looking at you, generic rejection emails) aren’t such dire times after all because they clear away the distractions and make you focus on what you’re really yearning to spend your time on.

I love this woman.

 

Uncategorized

20-new-ineteen?

Amanda Gibson

Yeah, it sounded better in my head before I typed it out, but stay with me a moment because 2019 is the year I finally step into, I don’t know, this decade? I’m moving my blog over to WordPress from Blogger, and then maybe next year I’ll get a car with power windows (not joking) and see what all this Twitter business is about (only kind of joking).

The point is, my genetic makeup is 1/5 Luddite, and it took me awhile to get here, but now that I am, I’m going to share something that is really going to make you cringe:

I have a mantra for my goals this year. Which is… unusual for me, to say the least. I hate New Year’s resolutions. I tend to think that if you cared enough to change, you’d do it any time of the year, not just January 1. But for some reason, the stars aligned enough this year that I was starting a new job at the beginning of January, and it set the scene for a lot of big changes in my life. I felt like I was finally “getting after it” (“it” being the things I really want to achieve in life). So now, any time my natural inclination to shrink down and withdraw into a little patch of wallpaper seems like it could keep me from getting what I want, I think, “Hell no, get after it.”

If this is getting a little too “Girl, Wash Your Face,” I agree, so I’m going to move on because I couldn’t even wade through the introduction to that book without making the stink face fifteen times.

In summary, I’m an introvert who’s forcing myself to be a little less introvert-y career-wise this year. Being an introvert can be really awesome, and I’m endlessly tired of people trying to use “quiet” as some sort of insult, because it’s not, but I also think you generally have to do things that scare you in order to get anywhere, so this is my theme for 2019 (and hopefully beyond… we’ll see how it goes. I may decide to just hermit it up in 2020).

In writing news, I’m nearing the finish line with my third book, which is not the conclusion to Children of Guerra, but something else entirely that I’m really excited about. Stay tuned for more on that soon!