Today on My Overstuffed Bookshelf, I have the wonderful pleasure of introducing you to author Katie Salidas. She agreed to stop by my blog for a guest post for one of her stops on her blog tour schedule! Be sure to stop by the other stops on her tour for some great giveaways, interviews, and guest posts! Let’s give a warm welcome to Ms. Salidas and see what she has to share with us!
“A Day in the Life of a Writer”
Hmmm… When asked to write about a “day” in the life of a writer, I was stumped. I sat staring at the computer screen, watching the little cursor blink, mocking me as I wracked my brain, trying to recall what my “typical” day is like.
While writing is something I take very seriously and look at as my job, it almost never happens during the “day.” Both Immortalis Carpe Noctem and my newest release Immortalis: Hunters & Prey were written almost exclusively at night.
I can often be found bleary-eyed, late at night, clicking away at the keys of my laptop. Even us “Housewives” have day jobs. The house doesn’t clean itself (oh God how I wish it did though), the laundry won’t fold itself … okay, you know where I’m going with this. Seriously though, daytime is when I work on the household stuff , do my critiquing group critiques and posts, and take care of business related things for Rising Sign Books.
As it is, the everyday minutia tends to take up the bulk of the daylight hours, leaving only the calm of the evening for me to “get a few words in.” Once my daughter is nestled all snug in her bed, that’s when the words spring out from my head.
So let’s start with that. I work nights. My shift starts promptly at 8pm. I crack open a can of redbull (the 12 oz one), open up my current manuscript, and get started.
8:30PM – While writing the start of a lusty scene between my two main characters, my email chimes. I’m a little OCD so I have to know what it is. (I know I should just leave my email closed… *sigh* I’ll never learn.) “Oooh Book Marketing tips. I need to know this!”
9:15PM – Email led to a quick pop over to facebook which led to a round of “poke wars” and three hundred updates. Whoops! I finally close both Thunderbird (email) and Firefox (internet) and realized I have only written one decent paragraph. Time to get back to work.
10:45PM – I need a synonym for ‘ethereal’ and a bottle of water. After a quick stretch and run to the kitchen, I silently swear as I click open firefox. “only Thesaurus.com… no Facebook. No Twitter. No LinkedIn. No Myspace. No blogger…”
11:15PM – airy, celestial, spiritual, sublime, supernal, tenuous, unearthly, unworldly… See, I’m working. I wasn’t surfing the web. Promise.
11:30PM – Kiss Hubby goodnight. He reminds me to come to bed instead of asleep on the couch, no matter how late I finish work. (It’s a bit of a regular occurrence in our house) I swear I won’t fall asleep on the couch. “Scouts honor.”
12:00AM – Email chimes just as I finish up a rough draft on the lusty scene I’ve been working on. Perfect timing, an email from my critting buddy (many of them are up as late as me on a regular basis too). I’ll shoot over the pages I just wrote and see what they think.
12:30AM – Delete Delete Delete… Okay, bad Idea to send off something that rough. That scene was crap, but at least I heard it from a friend, right? Time to rewrite it and grab Redbull #2
12:35AM – Stare blankly at the ceiling, wondering if inspiration will strike. Oooh, was that my email again? Yay Facebook Updates! Oooh new Twitter followers. Awww, some poor man in Nigeria needs me to help him get his inheritance.
1:00AM – Spin around in my chair to see how long it takes to get dizzy. Maybe I shouldn’t have had that second Redbull. Hmmmm. Maybe a change of location will help. It’s too late for a coffee shop but I’ve got a laptop I can at least get away from the desk. I hop over to the loveseat.
1:30AM – Back on track!! Words are flying from my fingers to the screen. Characters are falling madly in love. It’s getting hot and heavy in their bedroom… Boy, I use the word embrace a lot. I need a new word. Ut-oh… I silently swear as I click open Firefox. “only Thesaurus.com… no Facebook. No Twitter. No LinkedIn. No Myspace. No blogger…” I can be strong this time. I just know it.
2:30AM – How many versions of that farmer game are on Facebook now? Not that I was on Facebook… for that long. I mean, does the word snuggle sound too cute? What about nuzzle?
3:30AM – Things are really moving along. I’ve gotten 1k words into the rewrite on my love scene. Getting a little sleepy but I think I can hang until I get it finished.
7:00AM – Hubby wakes me up, looking very disappointed. I fell asleep on the couch again. Time to start another day. I promise I’ll sleep in my bed next time.
So there you have it, a typical day…er night… in my writing life. And just for fun. It’s now 11:30pm as I type this and I am already on Redbull #2. It’s going to be a productive night, I can just tell!
That was so funny Katie! I seem to do that a lot when I am trying to write up blog posts for advance posting! My vices are Coca-Cola and Twitter as well! I might miss something good if I don’t check it just for a second! I am so glad you stopped by and I hope you stop by again soon!
HUNTERS & PREY
Paperback: 300 pages
Published: Rising Sign Books (December 14, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0984419659
ISBN-13: 978-0984419654
Kindle ASIN: B004DNWEGS
Published: Rising Sign Books (December 14, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0984419659
ISBN-13: 978-0984419654
Kindle ASIN: B004DNWEGS
Find Katie at the following:
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
The youngest of four children, Katie has always had a desire to entertain. Since, early childhood, she’s dreamed fantastical characters and scribbled them into pages of various journals and notebooks. Taking an interest in vampires, she devoured every book, featuring those blood sucking creatures, in any genre she could find.
It was only natural that a love of reading vampire stories, turned into a love to write them.
Katie is also a Las Vegas native, having grown up in the famed City of Sin. She loves to feature it as a recurring setting for many of her stories.
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