Weekends Are A Lot of Work
I used to be a normal person. I used to look forward to weekends.
Now, I see weekends differently. They always come too soon and I always give a little sigh of relief when they are over. That's because Monday through Friday, I work: do research, read books, write stuff. Whether it's for school or for my fiction, it's enjoyable. On weekends, I do a lot of things I don't particularly enjoy. Clean the house. Drive all over the place. Shop at Costco. Drive all over the place. Try to fight the crowds at Fun Places we are taking the kids.
Don't get me wrong, the part I enjoy is spending time with the kids. But if we "do something" with them, beyond just crashing at my brother's house for the day, it's exhausting. For instance, yesterday we took them to a birthday party and to an aquarium and it took us FORTY MINUTES just to find a place to park the car. Circling and circling three levels of parking lot, with three crying kids in the car.
Can I just say: Oy.
I ranted in a previous post about deadlines, and I'm still a struggling to meet mine. So I'm up a 4 am this morning, at work again. I've reluctantly removed one story I had planned to include in the anthology, because I realized it needed to be re-written, not just edited. Too bad, because it was space opera and a had a happy ending. I've noticed that a lot of the short stories I write are kind of tragic. Or at least melancholy. That's funny, because my novels are usually upbeat, and I don't want the people who love tragedy to read my stories and then feel annoyed with my novels because they wanted more gloom, or people who are turned off by the sad endings of a few stories to not read the novels because they want HEAs.
I replaced the removed story with another story, that also has a happy ending, but it's not space opera. But it was already published somewhere so it doesn't need a lot of editing. The previous publisher seems to have gone out of business, so I am happy to bring this story back into print.
I'm also writing introductions to all of the stories. I like anthologies where the author shares a bit of the story behind the story; it's like reading fiction with a side of autobiography. In some of the introductions, I've shared rather personal stuff, and now it's making me nervous. I'm afraid maybe it's TMI. After all, it's NOT an autobiography. Maybe no one really wants to hear about how I was homeless that one time, or about how I tried and failed since I was nineteen to make it as a professional writer, or why I wasn't accepted into college, or all the other ways in which I've managed to screw up my life.
I've read some other introductions to stories in anthologies, and sometimes they are impersonal and upbeat, other times they are more autobiographical and mention more serious things.
Hmmmm. *deep thought* Gotta decide by Monday. I need to send this baby to the editor.
Now, I see weekends differently. They always come too soon and I always give a little sigh of relief when they are over. That's because Monday through Friday, I work: do research, read books, write stuff. Whether it's for school or for my fiction, it's enjoyable. On weekends, I do a lot of things I don't particularly enjoy. Clean the house. Drive all over the place. Shop at Costco. Drive all over the place. Try to fight the crowds at Fun Places we are taking the kids.
Don't get me wrong, the part I enjoy is spending time with the kids. But if we "do something" with them, beyond just crashing at my brother's house for the day, it's exhausting. For instance, yesterday we took them to a birthday party and to an aquarium and it took us FORTY MINUTES just to find a place to park the car. Circling and circling three levels of parking lot, with three crying kids in the car.
Can I just say: Oy.
I ranted in a previous post about deadlines, and I'm still a struggling to meet mine. So I'm up a 4 am this morning, at work again. I've reluctantly removed one story I had planned to include in the anthology, because I realized it needed to be re-written, not just edited. Too bad, because it was space opera and a had a happy ending. I've noticed that a lot of the short stories I write are kind of tragic. Or at least melancholy. That's funny, because my novels are usually upbeat, and I don't want the people who love tragedy to read my stories and then feel annoyed with my novels because they wanted more gloom, or people who are turned off by the sad endings of a few stories to not read the novels because they want HEAs.
I replaced the removed story with another story, that also has a happy ending, but it's not space opera. But it was already published somewhere so it doesn't need a lot of editing. The previous publisher seems to have gone out of business, so I am happy to bring this story back into print.
I'm also writing introductions to all of the stories. I like anthologies where the author shares a bit of the story behind the story; it's like reading fiction with a side of autobiography. In some of the introductions, I've shared rather personal stuff, and now it's making me nervous. I'm afraid maybe it's TMI. After all, it's NOT an autobiography. Maybe no one really wants to hear about how I was homeless that one time, or about how I tried and failed since I was nineteen to make it as a professional writer, or why I wasn't accepted into college, or all the other ways in which I've managed to screw up my life.
I've read some other introductions to stories in anthologies, and sometimes they are impersonal and upbeat, other times they are more autobiographical and mention more serious things.
Hmmmm. *deep thought* Gotta decide by Monday. I need to send this baby to the editor.
Comments
Good job on completing the anthology. Too bad the space opera won't be in there. I was looking forward to reading some space opera by Tara Maya.
As far as the introductions go, I've read some that were very personal and some that were not. (Though to be honest most of the personal ones were put together after the author's death. There's not something you need to tell us, is there?) I think either way is fine; it's just a matter of the tone you as the author choose to set.