Category Archives: Writing Comments and Info

Creating a book map


https://plottr.com/features/

As a determined pantser writer, I resist the outline and prefer to thrash out a mini version of my opus in the format of the 3DayNovelContest. Then, once I get it all down, I go back and create a structure around the blathering I’ve just completed. It takes a long time, but eventually I get everything laid out.

With my latest book, Spit and Polish, I found I was getting mired down in the historical tidbits and varied storylines. I had my main character’s arc, but it was…thin. I needed some other story arcs to wind about it to make the plot and characters more dimensional.

So I logged in to Plottr, something I highly recommend for this sort of thing. They have a variety of templates of story structures in the program that guide where you put events, show you where you need events, indicate whereabouts crises and climaxes and resolutions and so forth should fall. It is infinitely adaptable, has separate sections for character descriptions, location descriptions (good for if you forget what that place looks like by page 50), other notes, research, images, etc. You can create timelines for each character or even local/world events, helpful when writing historical novels. It is fantastically rich, though I wish I could easily print off the timeline.

Normally I use Scrivener for all things writing related. It’s way cool, and allows for separation of your project into sections that can be easily moved about or edited, and even eventually compiles all your precious thoughts into an acceptable format for submission. But I find the timeline feature of Plottr was terrifically helpful to have open along with Scrivener so I could slot in various events (historical, for ex) and then take them down to Scrivener to write the actual section. There are note cards in Scrivener, but I wanted a timeline that wasn’t all included in the text.

In Jane Friedman’s excellent blog, she recommends creating a book map for both fiction and non-fiction. The article, and indeed everything on the blog, is worth a read. Book maps help keep you from the dreaded middle languishing, a common problem with longer works. I’d like to have a plot wall with stickies all over it as illustrated on the blog, but a. I live in an apartment with limited wall space and b. I have tiny T-Rex arms that limit my reach and don’t relish all the step-stool climbing I’d have to do to include everything. So Plottr and a second display it is.

In other software I find helpful, I am seriously in love with ProWritingAid as it finds all of the times I write the same phrase, identifies my tendency to passive voice, catches my bad typing, and tells me gently when I’ve started the past several sentences the EXACT SAME WAY. It gets pushy, sometimes, and occasionally I have to push back to maintain my voice, but it’s a good serious look at what I’ve written.

Sweetly, all of these programs can work together, though it’s best to start with Plottr, go to Scrivener, run everything through ProWritingAid, then back to Scrivener or Word for assembly. With my pantser approach, I go back from the first Scrivener round to Plottr, which can get confusing. I plan to change that approach for my next book. Maybe it will save me some time.

So why not try a book map for your next writing project, if you aren’t already? I have to admit, a book map sounds more fun than an outline. It seems more adventurous somehow…like you are heading somewhere exciting with dragons around the edges…

Photo by Ekrulila on Pexels.com

Learning editing, or squeezing those little grey cells until they weep


Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

Photo is of course not me as I currently am perched at my desk in my bedroom, curled onto a footstool so I can reach the keyboard, dressed in my writing gear of my son’s LCVI class of 2008 sweatshirt and loose pants. I dream of being well-put-together and smiley, but instead I squint and growl alternately as I wrestle with the document I’ve been assigned for my structural editing class at Queen’s University. Occasionally I get up to walk to the printer which will no doubt be my step count for today.

Sometimes you just have to have a hard copy of a document to make any sense out of it.

It’s early days for the course and I suspect my classmates are equally wobbly as we try to figure out what is wanted from us, but the instructor is one I know and like, so I am relying on past positive experiences to get me through these early periods.

One of the things we learn in these courses is where to find resources to guide our practice. In the very second class, we’ve been directed to the very helpful website, The Book Designer. I highly recommend the site if you are looking to self-publish or working with a smaller publisher. It honestly is FULL of goodies. It’s a motherlode of useful information about all sorts of things, from how to put together a book cover to how to write out that little thing at the end of the book that talks about the font you’ve used and its history – ah yes, the colophon!

And this is where I am finding a bit of a challenge with my Multiply Sclerosed brain. I used to be able to remember things well. Of late, the little grey cells are a bit overtaxed and things keep falling off the edge of my memory table. How this is going to work with editing practice is anyone’s guess, but I have hopes that, as with all things, the more I do it, the more I will remember.

I do find that if I focus on one thing at a time things go better. Unfortunately I have overcommitted myself in every direction and now race to catch up, holding onto errant grey cells as I dash. Feel a bit White Queen in Alice in Wonderland-y, to be honest. Definitely feeling this vibe. Even dressed a bit the same.

art by John Tenniel

Or perhaps I am more like the sheep she turns into: “The meeting ends with the Queen seeming to turn into a bespectacled sheep who sits at a counter in a shop as Alice passes into the next square on the board. The Sheep is somewhat different from the Queen in terms of personality and gets “more like a porcupine every time [Alice] looks at her” because she knits with several knitting needles all at once.” from Wikipedia.

Ah well, they say using your brain to learn new things keeps us young, refreshes the pathways in the brain, creates new side roads and byways. Perhaps all this frazzled thinking will turn out okay in the end.

After all, it did for Alice.

Write what you know, they told me.


Every time I listen to a famous writer, I find myself wondering what I would tell people in an interview to explain what I write about. Or, more importantly, what part of my life could be used to make my writing more interesting? Deeper? More moving? What do I actually KNOW?

Truthfully, after a life of boring middle class white privilege, the cupboard seems pretty bare.

I could write about what it’s like living with MS (like everyone else with MS), or about being under 5 feet tall, or about surviving being beaten up every time after my Catholic education classes… but really, how interesting is that?

I suppose I could write about my scarred body- multiple surgeries, marks from pregnancies, my almost complete set of limb scars (only my left arm is untouched and now I am developing a twisted arthritic finger there). As a nurse I’ve found most of them fascinating; as a body, I suspect I’ve had enough.

Or I could write about relationships I’ve had. Maybe not. Most of those people are still living.

Or then there’s all the places I’ve lived, many of them odd. And then I think, as my son told me once, every time you move you bring you with you. Which makes me wonder if it’s me that’s odd, as vs the places.

What about you, readers? What would you write/talk about if interviewed? What would you highlight? What would you dig into for story ideas? What do you try to keep hidden that keeps creeping out into your work?

For me, I’m bad at intimacy, at even being a bosom buddy. Maybe it’s time to mine some of that, my awkwardness, the way I use humour to push everyone just a little bit away. While that may not be fascinating, it’s perhaps relatable… and I do know it, unfortunately, very well.

Cutting cutting cutting


Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels.com

It seems to me a lot of my life is spent cutting – physically, as I clip threads and cloth, virtually as I edit my writing and try to help others with theirs. I like to to throw a bunch of material on a table, pull off a long stretch of fibre, toss as many words around as possible.

Trimming at first seems easier, once the ideas are in place. But that’s deceptive. It’s easy to end up with too much to handle, to have threads and yarns and stories get tangled in knots as you try to work with them. Teasing out sense from the resulting mess can take longer than choosing words, threads, fabric properly the first time. Hard to do when you are just learning, difficult habits to break even as you gain experience. Thank heavens for editing, and the chance to rework.

Just ran across an excellent article by Jason Hamilton with the Kindlepreneur folks, listing the words you can and should minimize if you want to be read (writing for yourself is always a good idea, but some of us don’t feel validated until our reading is read by others and cheered or booed), and it threw a bit of salt on my writing wounds. I just know I simply use too many of these words all the time, repeatedly, inappropriately, and when I sit down at my computer I can hear them trying to escape into my writing. (as they just have, by way of an example).

“Just” is a pernicious weed in my writing. I pluck it out, it creeps back in. I overuse “felt”. Looking over my recent creation my ever helpful ProWritingAid told me I had my poor heroine say, “She couldn’t help herself” do something many many times, surely not the approach I wanted for a strong female character!

I have trained myself to flinch at adverbs, but I kindof like playing with run-on sentences. They are dangerous friends, though, easily transforming themselves into sets of wrongly linked clauses. Unplanned hilarity can result. And while I am all for unplanned hilarity, it is hardly appropriate in a death scene. Well, most of the time.

And so, and so, like the boy in Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky, I must grab my Vorpal sword, gird my loins, and get cutting.

One, two! One, two! And through and through 

      The vorpal blade went (goes) snicker-snack! 

It’s going to take me awhile, and golly I do wish I hadn’t sent my inelegant MS out to be looked over already. I have hopes, though, that one day, like the aforesaid boy, I’ll be able to cheer “Oh frabjous day! Callow! Callay!” and chortle in my joy.

And maybe, just maybe (she says, violating already her hard fought principles) someone else will chortle with me.

(On a side note, I highly recommend ProWritingAid. It catches the most amazing things, like when I start every sentence in a paragraph with the same thing, or when I babble on vaguely. It’s worth the investment, IMHO. Of course nothing helps more than a good editor, an outside set of eyes, particularly an understanding set. If you’re looking for one, check out Somewhat Grumpy Press, where I work with another great editor to help others avoid these problems and others.)

Happy writing!

Wallowing in research, or when did that happen, exactly?


I’m in the depths of finishing up my book about a nursing student in Kingston, ON, back at the end of WW2. I’ve got the plot mostly finished, I know where it’s going, I have my characters in place and they are mostly defined, though I’m working on deepening their portrayal.

But I keep getting distracted.

The other day I was writing about charting, as in recording medical records. It’s unlikely they’d be done in pencil, since they could be too easily changed that way. Did they have ball point pens at the time?

1950’s pen ad

It turns out, no they didn’t. The excellent Wikipedia (please donate) brought me to links about the Hungarian inventor, László Bíró, who noticed that newspaper inks dried faster and didn’t smear as much as regular ink, and created the first Biro. There was a previous design but it wasn’t fluid enough to use for writing on paper and so languished.

This was in 1931. The war intervened and Biro fled to Argentina, and subsequent development was vastly slowed. In 1945, Marcel Bich bought the patent and started with his Bic pens. He started manufacturing the steel balls for the pen tips, and apparently they are essentially the same construction now.

Back at the start, the pens were used for airmen, who found fountain pens leaked at altitude. They were seriously expensive, the first models at around $1000 our money, later ones still selling for $188. It wasn’t until 1954, when Parker got into the business, and competition lowered the price, that they started being ubiquitous.

So then I had to wonder about what sort of pens might have been used in hospitals at the time. Would they be pen and ink? Or fountain pens? Could the hospitals at the time afford fountain pens? Or would they just provide inkwells and cheap nibs everywhere?

And how did nursing students keep their aprons pristine while dealing with blotchy pens?

That led to another research hunt. Nursing students at the time sent their uniforms, aprons, bibs, cuffs, and caps to a local laundry. But my character gets bounced out of nursing school to work as a nurses’ aide. Where does she get her uniforms cleaned?

It’s like a link of puzzles, and at some point I am going to have to decide that’s enough, you don’t need that detail…

But it’s all so fascinating. I suspect by the end of writing this book I’ll have enough information for another. And that’s a good thing…I think!

Writing clothes, or what to wear when you really don’t want to be distracted


Photo by Ivan Samkov on Pexels.com

I am ashamed and a bit embarrassed to state I don’t have any sweatpants at the moment. I certainly don’t have a set that matches my surroundings and computer, allowing me to lounge in peaceful positions. To be fair, my surroundings when I write are anything but peaceful, scattered with pens, notebooks, reference texts, a cup of something, and the occasional chocolate item (for strengthening).

Yes, despite being a writer with my head in the clouds and definitely not in sartorial splendour, I lack this essential garment. I’m wondering if I need to invest, just to speed my writing along.

Part of why I don’t have sweats has to do with hemming – every pair of pants I own has required hemming and even with the elastic bottoms of the average sweatpants leg, the ballooning of extra material over my too short legs is distracting and potentially a tripping hazard. We won’t get into how things tangle up in my under the desk bike I use to fool myself into thinking writing is an aerobic activity. (Undoing tangles seems to be, though. That bike is heavy.)

Plus, they are expensive these days, sweatpants. And unless this book actually gives me more royalties than my first one, (Recycled Virgin, coming in at roughly $20 so far this year) (please buy a copy as winter is coming), I may have to do without. Even used ones at thrift shops are more than that and, ummm, used sweatpants conjure up images of underwear not worn…

I do have writing clothes, though. I just read this article by an author, Heidi Soyinka, who bought clothing like her characters would wear, to put her into the mood. She bought vintage clothing of all sorts as she tried to get into her characters’ heads.

It made me think about what I wear to thrash through my novel. I suppose, for me to be in the mood, I should put on a nursing uniform, one of the old ones from the Kingston General Hospital School of Nursing, the ones with the aprons and starched cuffs and collar.

I rather suspect the excellent Museum of Health Care might have something to say about me filching same from them.

And, unfortunately, I gave away my old nursing student uniforms. Maybe I could get away with my kitchen apron, just pretend the food stains weren’t on it, tie it up tight so I had the necessary chest constriction…this would help keep the chocolate stains to a minimum, I suppose…

Fortunately for my writing, I remember my nursing school uniform days, the nylon stockings that always grabbed, the uncomfortable shoes that were the cheapest available, and which squeaked unattractively and ruined my arches. My student uniform was pink and white striped, with a white bib and cuffs and it was unspeakably horrid, fitted tightly over my already too round figure. I was furious that the one male student in my year didn’t have to wear pink stripes, and got to wear a much more practical scrub suit, with no nylons to be seen.

So no, don’t want to repeat this.

I suppose I could try coughing excessively, as I am writing about Tuberculosis and a hacking cough and sore throat would bring me into the scene – but in these COVID times I feel my neighbours would report me to the health police as a vector of infection.

I could open the windows wide, as they did in the sanatoriums of the time, bringing in bracing and clear air, but it does get chilly sitting and writing, and besides, my companion birds would object. They dislike chills. Even in the slightest cross breeze they puff up and glare at me with their beady eyes. It’s disconcerting.

So I’m left with my usual not-so-glorious clothing for writing. These involve some jeans-type things (inexpertly hemmed) with elastic waists so they don’t compress, and some sort of overly loose top. These are things that I never wear out of doors as they are too disreputable for polite company – after Covid lockdowns I’ve worn the seams off some of them, and they look chewed. Could be I’ve chewed them in agony over some unexpected plot twist (characters WILL misbehave)–I can’t remember.

But something about putting them on does set me up for writing. It says, to myself and anyone who happens to come to the door, that I am not going out anywhere, that my focus is internal that day, that I don’t want to be disturbed. Add unwashed hair and anyone who doubts I am really busy would quickly grasp I didn’t want to be seen. I have frightened Amazon delivery persons on a writing day, and they are tough.

And in them, I’m comfortable enough to sink into my story, let my brain go play. That’s more difficult with fancy clothes. They distract, as I tug and rearrange them. But perhaps that’s only because I’m trying to cycle as I write?

I think, instead, I’ll turn on some music from the 1940’s to generate atmosphere – that’s easier than having to change, and the birdies even like it.

Keep an eye out for my upcoming book, Spit and Polish, expected Spring 2023.

WordPress Insights, or helloooooooo out there…


It’s a weird idea to write a blog. I started this one when blogs were relatively new, and I used to have a separate MS blog (“Musings of a MadSow”) back when blogger was a thing…The latter was a place where I could whine about various things about my Multiple Sclerosis – I’d been newly diagnosed and much seemed unjust and strange at the time. (It still does, mind you – I’m just quieter about it).

This one started as an exploratory thing, writing practice, a place for me to dump my thoughts and see how they floated. I’ve done crazy things with it, like try to write a profile of all those countries you see as you scroll down the lists when you sign up for things…(for ex: https://wordpress.com/post/dorothyanneb.com/1931) – that was interesting – for me anyway – and I still have ever so many countries to investigate. Sadly, many of them will be gone as tidal waters rise. Quite terrifying to see how many places will simply be drowned in the next few years. But I digress…

I’ve written about travels and parenting and dating and living alone, about the pandemic and Christmas and politics. In short, it’s been all over the place, grounded only in my mad brain and its various wobbles.

So it’s been interesting to look at the WordPress analytics and see where I’ve touched people, what seems to interest them, how they responded. It’s worth a look to see what tags grabbed attention, what links made people look.

Oddly, one of the most popular terms that sent people to my site was “heffalumps and woozles”! Who’d have guessed that? In any case I am now going to include a reference to h and w in every blog post just to drive traffic…

Scariest animation ever. Hmm. Reminds me of a certain elephant-themed political party…

I also found out how much I’ve earned from the ads that pop up on the site. I get a minuscule amount per click through and I have made an astounding $1.90!! Almost as good as my Kindle Unlimited income which seems also to be an astonishingly small amount (buy Recycled Virgin here and enjoy contributing to my coffee fund as well?)(You’d also be encouraging me to finish the others in the series which at present are languishing…)

Of course, none of this money is paid out until it reached some astonishing number like $100, a total I doubt I will achieve in my lifetime. One can dream of post-mortem success, but really, who will that help? If there is an afterlife, it must be crammed with artists ranting about how they lived in poverty and look, NOW people pay for their work! It must be tremendously annoying. I imagine Van Gogh is particularly incensed.

Not that I am living in poverty, I hasten to add. If you have extra money, please DO share it with people really living in poverty.

In. any case, I thank WordPress for its lovely analytics and its interesting if somewhat depressing statistics.

Do you blog? What were your most often searched for terms? Do people read your blog? Or is it all for you?

Read for free…or trying to do my bit during this madness


Okay, how many of you have a scratchy throat at just the mention of coronavirus? I’m sitting here with my MS and immune system malfunctions and etc and I probably can talk myself into a case of something, even as I keep myself inside. I am avoiding contact, trying to keep from adding to the healthcare burden.

Are you, like me, skulking out in the early hours to restock and then running back to hide inside as recommended by…well, just about everyone…? If so, bravo! Hospital workers and health care providers everywhere cheer you with their weary voices.

2120309711

How many are scanning your bookshelves and finding them wanting? Sadly, but totally reasonably, Amazon is cutting back on shipping things to help protect their staff, so that source of books is cut off, and if you are in the heart of the pandemic, local libraries are shut for the same reason. Even local bookstores are cutting back on hours and shutting up for a few weeks.

I can’t do much about the TP and sanitizer rationing but I can pitch in by making my book free on Kindle for the next three days (March 18, 19, and 20).

Maybe my book will give you a couple of happy hours reading about the Virgin Mary and her reincarnations through all sorts of plagues and world events.

It might even feel inspiring.

Why not grab a copy and settle down with a cup of something soothing and have a read? Let me know what you think?

Click here or on the picture to get to the Amazon.com page and download it! Enjoy!

And keep well, keep washing your hands, and don’t panic. We’ll get through this. Feel free to share this wherever you want.

We can do it! Woman's day concept

Clean handed, socially distancing, triumph

 

 

 

Being Seen (and read) or where the heck did that chin hair come from?


Well, it’s out in the wilds. The ebook version is launching on Saturday.

The book. My book. By me. All alone.

Recycled Virgin (Scleratis Series Book 1) by [Brown, DA, Brown, Dorothyanne]It all seems such a small story, so meaningless. I mean, I like it, but I am having trouble dealing with the thought of my friends reading it and then having to make a comment on it, either positive or negative or, ugh, patronizing. One fellah commented that “some of my chapters seemed fun.”

I’ve taken out a contract on that guy, and YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE! (Kidding, of course…)(Well, maybe…)

But it’s all a bit like doing a public speech, and meeting and greeting people afterward and when you run to the washroom at the end of the festivities and peek into the mirror, maybe giving yourself a confident, “you did it, girl!” smile, you notice a 3-foot long chin hair sticking straight out and wiggling with every lip flex.

Did they see it? How could they miss it? How do those things grow so damn fast? You know you’ve peered at yourself in your home mirror, holding your face every which way and shining lights and there was NOTHING THERE that morning, and somehow this hair grew like Jack’s beanstalk in a matter of hours. images-2

You wonder in a panic if the hair scraped the face of the people you were talking with, and if they felt it and decided not to comment, like those friends who don’t tell you you have spinach in your teeth or that your hem is tucked into your tights… Maybe they were being gentle with you, sensing your inner fragility, realizing that under chin hairs can destroy any semblance of professionalism. You can see it is almost reaching the mirror, across the sink.

Of course, you have not brought hair removal devices with you and it just won’t leave to tugging, so then you have to go out and REJOIN the mob, knowing full well your hair vine will be spotted by EVERYONE.

I took my beloved dog Pickles to the groomer once and when I was picking him up, shivering and pinkish and looking hurt to his soul (which is why I ended up grooming him after this because he didn’t find it so traumatizing, but I digress), and the groomer, who I had trusted with the animal I loved the most in the world (the kids were in a horrid stage, and let’s not mention the ex) told me that the dog hairs from her clients had slipped off and rerooted themselves in her face.

I gazed at her, non-plussed. What does one say? It seemed wrong to talk then about the biology of facial hair and how it didn’t behave like a seedling. She, after all, had a few sprouting from her chin. All different colors, she pointed out, because of all the different dogs. I was left speechless.

The more important issue was why did she mention this to me?

Well, yep. I ran my hand over my chin when I got into the car and sure enough, a hair-vine was extruding from my face. How long had I been going around like that? Who knew? Cos, you see, once these hairs grow a certain length (you official beard growers know this), the hair gets all soft and molds itself to your face. Well, unless it is yearning for freedom. Then it reaches out, struggling towards the unwary, terrifying them. Whacking against walls and tangling in scarves…

So, the book thing is sending its little horrifying curls out into the world and I keep wavering between singing and dancing (and being profoundly grateful for the support friends and family have shown me) and wanting to pluck it like a chin hair out of existence.

Either that or grow a beard so it all seems like it should be there, filling my author’s face with other books and articles and writing like a demon to get things out. (Next book: DIsgusting the Devil is on the assembly line) Creating a new framework so that this one eases gently into a crowd and thus is less obvious as a solo event. Maybe it’s time for me to embrace my writing beard?

So, I hope you have a look at my book, maybe read it, write a review, hostile, friendly, grumpy or bored. I’d love to hear what you think…No, really, I would. Just let me check out my chin…

 

 

beard-1.jpg.optimal

Faking it til you make it, or Hey! My book is out!!


Image result for fake it til you make it meme

So, how many of you leap into things, smiling through faces while hiding a certain amount of quavering within?

I’ve done it all my life, think I’ve come from a family who taught me about this, created another family who can do it. It’s a useful skill. Got me through university, job interviews, marriage, parenting. (Though those last two are debatable – not sure if I succeeded there.) (Probably ex-husband and kids would have something to add here – hope they don’t. Some illusions are necessary for me to keep my aging smile properly polished.)

The only problem is, the inner quavering is still there. Tapping on the insides, making your brain make bad decisions, sending you into wee tailspins of anxiety. It used to appear before I taught a class or did public speaking, only to slip away at the actual time of delivery. The only reminder was a feeling of unreality during the engagement and a curious fatigue after it, like I’d run a race. Stage fright, as they call it.

Now that I’m older and more uncertain of my cognitive abilities, that fright is stronger, lasts longer.

I haven’t slept well for weeks, and it’s all about the book, trying to get the book out, worrying about the book. Thought I had it all happily created, only to realize with a gasp the file I used wasn’t the one I wanted and besides, there were formatting things (like dual chapter headings) that loomed in my sub- and conscious mind. Eeeks! It wasn’t perfect, that I knew, but stupid mistakes are just that. They needed to be purged. Fixed. Redressed.

Currently, the revised files are being evaluated by Kindle Direct Publishing before they get finally uploaded. Thank heavens I had yet another look at things. Formatting computer documents isn’t my strong point and if I’d been smarter, I would have hired someone to do it for me, but there I went, leaping in as if I knew what I was doing, grinning madly all the while.

Not that I MIND waking up at 4 AM, really. It’s lovely and quiet out and the apartment is warm and cozy and I can schlep about in jammies without worrying about delivery men coming to the door. Even the radio is sotto voce. It’s pleasant.

The gnawing anxiety isn’t so good. It makes me nervous eat, sucking back carbs and needing things to chew on – popcorn, random pieces of string. Image result for anxious eating

So, I squash it, ignore it, put my mind in other places and pretend things aren’t happening, at least until someone mentions they have ordered my book and then the circle spins again. What will they THINK?

Truth is, I can’t make anyone LIKE what I’ve written. I am so grateful if they are willing to support my wee venture. I’ve learned a lot about publishing and have ever so much more to learn. I just hope not to embarrass myself into dust.

And my story seems small, given that it is, in fact, small. It’s not going to change the world. But then, I never really thought I could – no, that’s not true. I was brought up to believe I would.

I blame my mother for that. She KNEW we would all be mavericks, leaders, changers. (She was wrong, incidentally, but we’ve all been imploding trying to meet that expectation)

As I toddle into my 60’s, I realize that my changing the world probably isn’t going to happen. Except in the small ways that we all change a teeny part of our world as we go along. And of course, changing ourselves to make the world better. I can only hope my little changes are good ones.

Unlike in online publishing, I can’t resubmit and erase the errors.

Want to see the book I’ve been toiling over? Here’s the blurb for Recycled Virgin and a link:

Recycled Virgin (Scleratis Series Book 1) by [Brown, DA, Brown, Dorothyanne]What if the Virgin Mary never ascended? What if she’s been hard at work on earth for generations? What if she finds out that the real story of her religion’s founding has been lost in a melee of male privilege?

The former Blessed Virgin Mary has had enough. She’s spent the past 2000 years looking after others, only to find that her true story has been erased. No one knows the real Miryam, the flesh and blood mother, the woman who taught the foundations of a world-wide religion to her often disobedient son.

As she lives through her latest reincarnation, she struggles to understand why she keeps returning. Will her study at a Theological College finally allow her to free herself? Will she be able to retell her story, make herself real? Will she find the other half to her soul?

Recycled Virgin is the first book in the Scleratis Series.

Note: it’s the FIRST book, which implies there will be more, and there are. So it’s back to chewing string for the next while…