Hello all!  I just wanted to do a quick post to let you all know that we haven’t fallen off the face of the planet. We are just incredibly busy! This time of year at our house is always a bit of a whirlwind getting ready for Christmas, but I am also finishing editing the last book in my Everlasting Trilogy series, so that has been taking up a lot of my time. 

Who am I kidding, editing eats up all of my time! 😦

 Let me tell you a little bit about book writing. I don’t always do posts like this, but I felt like I would because there isn’t a lot for us to tell in the doll world lately, and you guys deserve to know that we are still alive.

On to writing. I used to teach junior high and high school. Now I write books for Young Adults. Stories have always been my passion which is probably why we got into doll play in the first place. I loved all of their stories so much.

But let me just say, endings are the hardest. People always judge a story by how it made them feel at the end. An ending to a trilogy? Well, let’s just say that in the past few weeks, my mind has been working in massive overdrive. But there is no quitting. It just isn’t in my vocabulary. My brain would probably explode before I let that happen anyway. 

The ending, above all then, has to be perfect. So I am busy tying up a lot of loose ends. As a writer, I can’t just leave people hanging. There are so many characters that need to have closure. People need to know that everything was taken care of. Every last detail must be examined. Every knot must be tied. Every last story must have a decidedly suitable ending. Characters have to come together, and say, See? Here is how my story ends.

And it has to be natural. The reader must come away thinking, Yes, that’s naturally what would have happened, so they can go home, and be content with the way things turned out. There is nothing left to ponder.

Have you ever read a book, or watched a movie, and the ending was vague? I know that someone, somewhere out there, calls these kinds of endings artistic, but I just call them vague and annoying. It’s like the writer just gave up trying at the end! I try to avoid these kinds of endings. 

Stories don’t just end. There must be a natural rhythm to it, something that tells the audience, Don’t worry, the interesting part is over now, you can all go home. It’s a promise that nothing more exciting is going to happen, just a lot of normal everyday things like waking up and eating breakfast, things not worth telling.

And I like happy endings, or at least I like endings with closure.  I don’t like coming away from a story thinking, Well that was sad and unusual, or I wish that this would have happened instead.

Maybe it’s cliche, but I like giving the audience what they want. I like seeing characters come together, and get what I think they deserve. Like a happy ending. Or death. Those are the only two types of ways for a character to end I suppose. I don’t like it when characters just go their separate ways. It’s like okay, I will catch you later, and then the book ends. The reader is left thinking, When is later? Do I get to see later?  How frustrating! Massive thumbs down.  

I don’t write the way that I used to. It’s business now. I’m in the business of writing. That means that things have to make sense. Things have to be simple. They must be packaged up neatly, and be easy to understand. It’s what is marketable, I guess. Easy entertainment sells, and I get that. We don’t like having to think too much. We like to sit back, and be spoon fed our stories. That’s the luxury of reading, isn’t it?

So neat, meticulous easy endings are in, and vague, artistic endings are out. That doesn’t mean that my story isn’t spectacular. I’m getting so very excited. After writing something for almost five years, you start to think that it’s never going to end. Until one day, it just does, and it’s kind of surreal.

The third and final book of the Everlasting Trilogy series is called Infinity. It’s 566 pages for anyone who’s been counting, and over 200,000 words. If you like books and stories, go have a look at my Author Page.

I started this writing journey what seems like forever ago. It took me five years to write the first chapter of my first book. Next, I wrote 500 pages, and stuffed it in a drawer. I told myself that I couldn’t write books.

Then I wrote another one. And another one. And another still, until I finally decided that I should probably just be a writer since that’s all I seemed to be doing in my spare time anyway.

I started writing a trilogy because of a dream that I once had. To find myself at the very end of it now is truly amazing. I’m kind of impressed with myself in a very bewildered kind of way. I have been waiting on this one moment. It’s the moment that I get to write The End on a huge undertaking that so many people probably thought was kind of crazy, okay a lot crazy, but so much fun too. I’ve been hanging out with these characters, these people, for a very long time. I’m so excited to finally see their story end, but at the same time, it’s a bit sad.

They’re like old friends that I have to say goodbye to now. I have to leave them to go meet new characters, to have new adventures. It’s going to be so interesting to work on something new after five years of EverLast. Interesting and refreshing. I already have my next book planned. 🙂  

Sorry for the rambling. I honestly could have done a post on all of the doll clothes that I’ve been sewing up for Christmas because that’s another massive undertaking.

(Why do I never do anything small?)

I feel like all I have been doing lately is editing, sewing, and drinking gallons of coffee. I swear, I’ve been switching from my sewing machine to my computer, and back again all day every day with barely any breaks between for months.

My husband even bought me flowers for my efforts. 🙂 

Lovely. ❤ Next, I want a new computer. LOL!

Seriously though, my computer keyboard looks much the same as my old computer did now. All of the keys are wearing off. I wrote a few of my first books on my old computer, and by the time I was done, the letter ‘E’ key had a hole worn right through, the letter ‘N’ was missing completely, and the letter ‘S’ was faded right off.

My daughter has trouble using my computer now. She can’t find the keys that are missing. 

 Okay, I am going to go plow through my last few chapters of editing, sew up about thirty or more doll outfits for the Christmas boxes, and drink a small country’s worth of coffee.

Then we will be back with more of the lovely doll bloggy stuff! I promise. 

Wish me luck, and have an amazing day!

❤ ❤ ❤

 

 

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