Inspiration on the Loose

So, my friend and I have a theory.

You see, she's an artist, and when I say artist, I mean art-school-candidate-oil-painting-pastel-using artist.  Yes. (Also, she is insane, but that's beside the point).  And the two of us realized that when one of us is working like mad on a particular project, be it a drawing, painting, story, or whatever; the other has no inspiration whatsoever.

So we have kind of created this anthropomorphic 'Inspiration' that is prone to running away from home.  We fight over it.  We insist that 'it likes me better.'  We sometimes lose it.

And for about two months, she's had it locked up in her basement.  She's been drawing pastel pieces with tons of deep meaning and men in gas masks, and I haven't done anything since finishing Naomi.  However, I do believe that it's on its way back to me, or at least it should be, because I'll need it for November.

If anyone sees it, let me know.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

It's Banner Thursday!

Woooo!

Ahem

So, here we have a revamped Ordinary Enough banner.  I made about twenty of these, using royals and other historical figures as models for my characters, which seems kind of weird when I say it.

This is the only one that's in black and white and not recolored by an insanely awesome person on deviantArt, so it's the one that gets uploaded.

Yes, that is Anastasia.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler   

Paris Pt. 4

Oh look, some more Paris essay-eque things:

The Paris Relapse

So you go on with your life like you never saw Paris; like you never ran your hands over the spines of ancient books in those green boxes along the Seine, like you never ran out of a café and left your hot chocolate waiting to catch a glimpse of the Republican Guard, like you never went weak in the knees when you laid eyes on la Notre Dame at night, all lit up and glowing.

And then you open that folder on your computer of the pictures that you took while you were there.

And it's the heat wave all over again.

You close your eyes as tight as you can and it still doesn't conjure up those priceless hours of pure inspiration that you experienced, so you dig out that coat you wore when you saw the l'Arc de Triomphe and even though the coat is long and black and all wool felt and it's August, you slide it over your shoulders and you can smell the cigarettes and the coffee and the bakeries that smell like home, although you can't quite tell why.

And you wrap the scarf that you bought in a little boutique around your neck just the way you wore it there and then something in your mind clicks.

And you declare that you have to go back to Paris; that you have to see the Eiffel Tower one more time and drink little strong coffees out of pretty little mugs; that you will absolutely die if you don't see the golden gates of Versailles again.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

P.S. I am trying to conjure up interesting things to write on here, but as far as I can tell, I should focus on the fact that I'm having trouble meeting my word count for Camp NaNoWriMo.  Later, okay?

Paris Pt. 3

I wrote two follow ups to those strange Paris essays that I wrote when I got back to the States.  Here is the third chunk:

The Paris Cure

You go home after Paris, feeling exhausted, like someone has kept you up at a party far past your bedtime, but your mind is still trying to process all that you've seen.  In any case, you drag yourself home, falling out of bed in your room above the discotheque that never seems to close, and you get in the car and you take the connection to Amsterdam and stumble through the Amsterdam airport that is really like a city, but all you can think about is Paris.

You think about Paris as you hand your ticket to the attendant, and you think about Paris as you find your seat and you think about Paris like you're some sort of character in a romantic tragedy, and you've just remembered that childhood sweetheart that you swore you'd go back to someday.  And you remember Paris like that childhood sweetheart but before you can do anything, the plane takes off and all you can do is read the Dutch airline magazine about some new line of men's watches.

You think about Paris for about a week after you get back from France, before falling blindly back into normalcy and nearly forgetting your love.  It's like you've gone through a very effective, very painless stint in rehab.

And you speak French in class, and you read that book you picked up from that store in France, and you try your very best to remember that annoying discotheque and that mother and her two sons on the train and how beautiful some people look with smoke swirling out of their mouths like little deadly ghosts.

But it's no use, and you've been cured; cured of your sickness, cured of your addiction, and cured of your love.  And you should feel a huge hole in your chest, but you don't.  It's like it never happened.

Later.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

Finishing and Starting

Finishing novels is really hard on me.  I'm not sure if I've only just discovered the pain that all authors go through or if it's just me and I'm irrationally attached to my books.

But when I finish a novel or indeed any project, I suddenly find myself feeling very empty.  I believe it's because I basically put all of my eggs into one basket and try to power through a book, only to have nothing to do at the end.

If anyone would like to answer this poll, it would be greatly appreciated.  You can see it over there, to the left.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

Notebooks

I literally just noticed Miss Juliet Horror's comment on my post.  Honestly.  No one ever comments so it caught me off guard.

In case you are periodically checking back, Juliet Horror, here is a post about notebooks.

I have about fifty of the things; lined up according to height on two shelves in my bedroom.  Most of them are empty.  Some of them are full.  The rest have about three sentences to a page in them and are then abandoned.  I adore notebooks so much that I have trouble writing in them; this is because my friends give me tons of notebooks for my birthday, notebooks that are simply too gorgeous to write in.

However, I have just acquainted myself with the novel idea of a scrapbook for my stories.

I have a large spiral notebook that I decoupaged myself with things that I found laying around my house.  It is this notebook that holds pictures, ideas, newspaper clippings, and story snippets.  I find that it is the best supplement to my writing and would highly recommend it to anyone out there who is having trouble either keeping track of things like which color a character's eyes are or needs a good place to write down ideas that don't necessarily present themselves in chronological order.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

NaNoWriMo Will Be the Death of Me

Honestly, Nano, one month was enough, wasn't it?  One month of painfully delicious writing was enough for us.  One month of tough love from the forums and pep talks from you lovely folk was enough.

But then there was Screnzy, right?  And of course even us novelists jumped right on it.  One more month; what harm could it do?

And now CampNaNoWriMo?  Two more months?  Of course, I know we can choose which month, but still.

All I can say is:

You rock.

Thank you for transporting the idea of NaNo to the summer when I have more time. (Not that I do).

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

The Amazon Breakthrough Novel

Several months ago, I entered Alex in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel contest.  However, he did not make it past the first round, and I accepted that and moved on.

The winners have been announced and I congratulate them and hope to join their ranks someday.

However, for entering in the contest, I received a discount code for one free book from CreateSpace.  Now, I quite adore that website, but I find myself struggling to make a decision.

Do I resubmit Alex (this time without the horrendous formatting) or do I finish Naomi in the upcoming eight weeks and submit that?  We shall see.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

Easter City

In the business of organized crime, there are several rules a man should live by.

Don't get shot is probably the most important and the most self-explanatory.

Obey your boss's every whim is another good one, especially when your boss is Mr. Korenna, who runs the Easter City underground like no other.

But above all, under any circumstances, just simply do not fall for your boss's daughter.

Especially not when said daughter is a seventeen-year-old jailbait femme fatale who calls herself Chainsaw Jane.

Kurt should have listened.

#

That's another thing like the Helen one.  Story premises with nowhere to go.  Tell me what you think!

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

Full Titles of EVERYONE.

So...I may or may not have gotten a little bit into the royal wedding.

And when I say that, I mean that I laughed myself silly over this:

Oh dear.

Well in any case, all this royal talk prompted me to think about Princess Naomi's full titles once she takes the throne of Oxlerran at the end of the book.  I adapted Queen Victoria's titles and whipped up some Oxlerranian names and let me tell you, it was fun.  

Her Imperial Majesty Gwenaelle Franceline Naomi Louise of the Venceslas Clan,  by the Grace of God, Empress of Oxlerran, Betrorai, and the Wayrhyme Islands, Defender of the Faith, Queen of Erea'e, Duchess of Kr'r, Countess of Vaxim, Baroness of Ryka.

So fun.

Script Frenzy!

Hey guys. Guys, guess what! I won Script Frenzy! It was a grand effort involving not reading my biology book (which is awful, by the way). Naomi is racking up quite the body count. I worry about her. 

Action!

By the way, it's Script Frenzy, people!

Since last year's script is currently being transformed into a novel, I decided to skip that step and am writing 100 pages of Naomi, which is very exciting.  Seriously, this new story is consuming me even more than Alex did, which is really saying something.  I have my dream cast, and my family tree, and my detailed outline, and it is just so much fun.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

P.S. You can find me here.

Banner Thursday?

Yes indeed!

Now, I made three different banners for the new novel, and here is the first one!

It was okay, but I like this one better:

What do you think?

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

**ROMANCE ALERT**

So.

As most of you know, I'm not the best author when it comes to romance.  Seriously, I'm not.  This is hard for me.

Murder, death, vampires, and zombies?  That I can do.

But romance?  Nope.

So for this new novel, I've recieved several different stances on romantic relationships.

Have the princess and her rescuer/caretaker fall in love?

Or is that weird because he practically raised her.  I don't think so, personally, but we'll see.  Right now she's twelve and utterly traumatized, so I have time.

TTFN

M.K.Wissler

Family Tree

The Venceslas ruling clan's family tree is done.  I made it on Inspiration, and I'm quite proud of it, seeing as I named almost all of them on the spot, which involved a lot of researching at 20000 Names.  There are little crowns on the rulers of the family and little skulls and crossbones on the...dead...ones.

It fills up an entire page in point eight font and goes from the early 1830s right up to 2011, when the most recent royal child is born.

I had a lot of fun making it; so much fun that I think you'll be hard pressed to stop me from making others for about every single one of my stories.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

Helen

"They said she had a face that launched a thousand ships. I saw the ships. I saw the soldiers. I never saw Helen. Later, I realized that was because I was Helen. They never told me."

Anyone have any input about whether or not I should persue that?

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

Paris Pt. 2

More of that weird Paris essay thing:

#

The Paris Love Affair


Paris doesn't stop there. You realize that what you thought was a dangerous virus is actually an equally dangerous yet insanely thrilling addiction that's potentially just as destructive as cocaine; but unlike cocaine, you might get something productive out of this addiction even if it's just a three line poem.

And that's when your addiction turns into full blown infatuation. You start seeing the little things, like how the silent owners of the equally quiet, cozy cafes smile and nod when you apologize for eating pastries from another bakery, or how people may be discourteous enough to smoke like chimneys, but courteous enough to blow the smoke up away from your face, or how the train station security guard on a smoking break directs you to his favorite cafe without you even asking.

And just when you think Paris can't get any more beautiful, you see a mother put her two young sons on a train for the countryside near Lyon with slightly tearful hugs and kisses and you watch as another woman runs to catch her train, her gray cocker spaniel jogging faithfully behind her.

And you think that maybe this isn't an addiction any more than it is a virus, that maybe, just maybe, Paris loves you back.

#

TTFN

M.K.Wissler

Paris

So, when I was in Paris, like I said, I was very inspired, and I wrote a little thing.  You should have seen me.  I was hunched over my phone, typing this little thing out.  I've censored it, by the way, but my mom suggested I post it, so I will.

#

The Paris Sickness


The inspiration here is so intense it's almost mythical. It hits you like a heat wave right as you enter the city limits. Like a heat wave, insanely hot and going a million miles a minute. It floods your brain like you've just burst a vessel in your mind that until now held all of your imagination, concentrated like a can of soup.

And it only gets worse. You walk from the Seine to the Eiffel Tower dodging the overly persistent venders who walk up to you, jangling their metal hoops strung with miniature Eiffel Towers and all you can think is that you wish you had your notebook or your laptop or at the very least a napkin and a pen.

It consumes you in less than three hours; it seeps through your veins until you just want to open an artery and write in your own blood to get it out of your system.

But you can't. It's not a virus, not really. Even though it infects you and there's absolutely no cure in the world, it's not a virus.

It's an addiction. Because you just know, as your eyes desperately drink in everything you see, that after you leave, you'll be aching to come back. You'll thirst for it until you find yourself back in the City of Light with two thousand years of history at your fingertips.

#

TTFN

M.K. Wissler

Back Again

I'm back from France, and, as was anticipated, nothing happened on this blog.  Lots happened in France, though.  I finally learned how to ski.  Yes, I never learned how to ski when I was younger.

My host family took me to Paris and Versailles and I encountered the mystical, magical incredibly awesome inspiration that hits you in Paris.  Seriously.  It's mythical.  I wrote a little something about it, but I was in a pretty weird mood and ergo there are lots of bad words. 

I liked Paris, but (and don't kill me)  I thought Versailles was prettier.  It was calmer, quieter, and people didn't try to run me over.  I visited the Palace at Versailles and I got mega-inspired.

This new story might very well be the next big obsession for me, mainly because it's just easier to talk about.

For example:  When I wanted to talk about Erika, I told people:

"It's kind of like a mystery novel.  With a teenaged hacker...and a murder.  Well, a couple murders.  Okay, so there's this psycho heiress and this airplane designer..."

And when I wanted to talk about Alex, I told people:

"So it's post apocalyptic, and there's this man who wakes up on a train with a baby and no memories for the past nine years, and he used to work for the government and he fought Lamia, which are kind of like zombies mixed with vampires..."

But with this new one, I just say:

"It's based on the Romanovs."

and people say:

"Oh, alright.  Cool!"

So easy.  In other news, I got Alex published through CreateSpace with a proof copy and I already have people lined up to read it!  Its formatting is all whack like Erika's, but in the other direction.  Erika had huge margins and teeny print while this one has huge print and no margins.  It makes it easier to read, but it looks pretty strange.

TTFN

M.K.Wissler

Happy (Late) New Year!

My friends are so good to me.  They get me notebooks for Christmas.

Now, I'm just warning you, I'm going to be out of the States for a while.  This will either mean absolutely no posting (normal) or over-posting.

And...ah...I started Alex, Version 2.0, which basically means the sequal.  I know you're not supposed to write the sequel if no one has read the first one, but I don't care.

TTFN

M.K. Wissler