I hope you have had a good two weeks and I want to apologize again for not posting last week; things weren't going very well for me and I didn't have it in me to sit at the computer an blog. The effects of that might have been devestating.
So, what have I done in terms of Treason? A lot, actually, although no one would be able to know because I haven't actually put it down on paper or saved it to my laptop's hard drive. Nevertheless, the work that I do in my head - that isn't obvious to many - is perhaps the most important work that I could do. It's one thing to put words on paper mindlessly, but it takes real care and dedication and imagination to make those words mean something to a crowd of people.
I doubt that anyone would want to read about Sara and Nick if all they ever did was sit around and play go fish as the world slowly continued on normaly around them. No one would ever want to waste twenty dollars on something like that. So, it takes careful planning and plenty of mental work to make something interesting. On top of that, I've also been doing research, both with books and with my amazing anthropology skills. You know, so many people would be hesitant to agree that anthropology is one of the key points in writing. For me, I found it necessary to focus on anthro before I even started putting my thoughts into words. In order to create a story that is compelling and interesting, an author has to be able to study the lives of those around him or her, to register and carefully sort through a wide range of emotions, to experience a multitude - I like that word - of situations and record how every person involved responds. I once read something that said "Drama is life without the boring parts." Admittedly, it was about writing screenplays and not novels, but what's the difference? In both cases, the author had to come up with characters that are believable and that readers can associate with. If not one person is able to relate to the character that you have come up with, then no one will be able to feel empathy towards that character's situation. Without empathy, you have lost your audience.
The entire lovely speech was all to explain why I need to associate Nick with a certain smell. The sense of smell is the strongest sense that your body possesses and your brain is able to retain a certain smell years after the last time that you've encountered it. With this in mind, I find that the characters that I get attached to the most are always associated with a smell. Patch in Hush, Hush is said to smell like mint soap, Edward in Twilight is said to smell like sunshine - or am I getting that mixed up with another book? -, and I'm pretty sure that Sam in Shiver smells like laundry detergent - although I may be getting that one wrong, too. I've read too many books to keep track of! So after deliberating for days, I've decided that I'm going to associate Nick with cinnamon. Why cinnamon? Well, because I'm the author of these novels so I get to make executive decisions sometimes, and I like cinnamon. I haven't decided yet if it's going to be the artificial smell form say cinnahearts or cinnamon favoured gum, or the smell of real cinnamon found in grandma's spice cupboard. I feel weird saying that because I have my own spice cupboard that I worship and couldn't live without and I am nowhere near being a grandmother.
Well, since I didn't start off this posting by going on about my personal life, I'll give you a tip: wear sunblock. Whatever you do, wear sunblock. You will regret it if you don't. I was out in the sun over the course of the weeken and had the brilliant idea to wear a tank top to try and even out my farmer's tan. Not a good idea. Aside from the fact that I was wearing a ball cap and one arm is more burnt than the other, the arm that really got the sun is burnt to the second degree. That's right, it's blistering. And boy does it ever hurt. There are so many old wive's tales about how to make a sun burn feel better that I didn't know where to start so I did them all at once. Something I tried had to have worked because one arm is significantly better and the other doesn't hurt as much.
You're sunburnt and want to know what helps? Start with Advil, apply aloe to the burn as soon as you get inside, after that, I took a bath in cold water and eucalyptus oil to try and draw the heat out - hence the cold water - and heal a bit of the burn - hence the eucalyptus. After that, I coated the burn with zinc cream - more commonly known as diaper rash cream - and fell asleep. Somewhere between doing that and right now, the burn healed a bit.
The moral of this story? Enjoy the summer sunshine as much as you can but be safe while doing it. For the gingers like me, one word: SPF 110. I will post the song as soon as I get home. I am on my iPhone at the moment as I sit in a coffee shop feeling more like an author than I ever have before.
Have a good night, and remember: you need not be published to be a happy author, you need only to have written a book and enjoyed it.
Love,
Di
Song of the week! Tattoos On This Town by Jason Aldean. It reminds me of the time Sara spends with her friends in Brooksdell.
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