What I’m realizing now is that I have a long way to go.  It is sad to realize but at least I am getting somewhere.  My first draft had 106 pages.  My second one, hopefully by the time I finish, should be around 150.  I am extremely happy with what I have but the fact still remains, that isn’t enough.

          It is hard to face because part of me says not to push the word count just to push it.  But on the other hand is the reality that for the genre I’m going for, or most adult fiction, my book is so short that it would get passed over easily.  I want to get to 250 but I’m struggling with how to do that.

          At least I am getting there though.   The hard part, coming up with the story, is behind me.  Now I just need to find a way to really make it complete and perfect.

          And of course there is still the matter of a title.  I really, really liked The Beautiful Blood but decided it was way to close to The Lovely Bones so I’m still thinking.  I have post its all over the wall by my bed with ideas.

Alright, now that I’ve said that, I was so excited this week to actually see Chelsea live.  Guy Branum opened and he was just as funny as on tv.  I would have liked to hear more Twilight jokes but that is okay. His hipsters ones cracked me up.

Of course the highlight of the night was Chelsea’s set.  Do you call them sets in comedy? I don’t know.  Anyways, from start to finish I was cracking up.  My favorite parts were when she talked about her dog Chuck.   I was a little scared she was going to do a bunch of stories from the book so I would already know them all but she only did a couple.  Her saying that the reason she broke up with her boyfriend was that he said he was going to give Chuck Alpo dog food was so funny.  Yes, she talked about the Alpo in this book too but her phrasing it so it sounded like she was a mother deciding to take her child out of an abusive relationship was hilarious. 

So yeah, I had a great time.  I suggest anyone else that gets a chance, go see her.  Hopefully one day I will go to the actual show.  Do I hear a Cali trip coming?  I miss Long Beach. Oops, getting off subject.  If you haven’t read Chelsea Handler’s books, I highly suggest checking them out.

Still tons more left though.

Okay, back to editing for this girl.

          At this point, I’m starting to get very excited.  I just finished editting the first five chapters. I am extremely happy with them.  It is funny because all of the sudden I am wanting other people to read it.  Today was the first time since I started that I had that feeling.  There was one line I editted that I just sat back and said, wow, I can’t wait for someone else to read that.  It was such a good feeling.  Pride in your work is important no matter what you do and I feel like in this case it is saying that things are falling into place. 

          I also had a huge realization.  I am not Angelina Jolie nor am I John Green or Kathy Reichs.  I am never going to write something that I think is as life changing as Notes from my Travels, as well written as Paper Towns, or as interesting of a read as Deja Dead.  That is fine.

            But the catch is, none of those writers are going to ever tell the story of Natalia Rizzello like I am.  Plain and simple, they can’t tell the story I am writing like I can.  Absolutely nothing against them but it is true.  It is the same of most books and authors out there.  Like Nicholas Sparks could never write a Harry Potter book as well as J.K. Rowlings even though obviously he is a great author. 

          I’m not trying to say I think I’m this absolutely amazing author or anything but I do honestly feel that I’m doing justice to the story I am telling.

          The only author I have gotten the oppertunity to ask about this said that once she was ready it all fell into place really easy.  She editted herself as far and I know.  After that point she said finding an agent was quite easy.

          So I guess the answer is when you are ready? How do you know that though?  Honestly at this second with my book, I feel like within a month I could be completely happy and ready to present it to publishing companies.  I know there is always the option of trying to get the deal on my own but I know that I’m not all that good when it comes to business.  All it would take was one place being nice at all and I would say yes to whatever.  This is why I let other people handle photography business stuff for me.  If it were up to me I would do everything free because the second someone comments on me being expensive I feel horrible. 

          I don’t completely get why everywhere says to take classes.  I already have a degree so shouldn’t that count?  I get they are saying to perfect your craft and all that kind of stuff but I think I’m pretty good.  Writing was something that always came easy to be.  Editing even more so.  I would LOVE to get a job as an editor.  I know I probably have lots of mistakes online here so you are probably thinking I’m crazy but it is true.  I’m the girl that would mark the hell out of any paper in front of me.  My peers loved me looking over that stuff for that fact. Sure, I would point out what was good but I would circle every little thing that was wrong or off to and give advice.  I think on my own I’m going to do pretty okay editting my story.  Plus I have family that will read it too.

          Is there any authors or writers out there that have any advice on when to look into book agents?

          The reason I have been missing is actually VERY exciting.  Since quiting my job I have been writing a lot more than before.  In the past couple of weeks I started concentrating on one particular idea I had.  I think I wrote a good ten chapters over the past four or five months. 

          I have now completely finished the book!

          Well kind of.  It is a first draft for sure.  There will be lots of editting to do still.  Right now it is about 100 pages long. I’m aiming for about 250.   I feel like I have the big part done though.  The skeleton is there so now it is just filling in all the details.  

          My game plan on editting is to go through my printed copy at this point adding and marking as much as I can.  Once I get that down I will go through it again on the computer for another revistion as I’m fixing the paper ones.  From there, as long as I feel fairly happy with it, I’ll give it to some people to edit.  Probably my mom and grandma to be honest.  Maybe my dad too.  I haven’t yet figured out exactly what demographic it is for.  I intended to write a chick lit novel but looking at it now it is far more action and way less romance than I though.  Still probably chick lit since there is some fashion stuff and the view point is from a female. 

          From there, not to sure.  This is all completely new to me.  If you have any advice, let me know!

http://www.contactmusic.com/news.nsf/article/justin-timberlake-to-pen-golf-book_1109191

          So yeah, Justin is writing a book about golf.  Personally I’m not a golfer so I don’t care at all.   I think it will be interesting to see how well it does though.  It seems like it might have trouble since the target audience is a little unclear.  I don’t pictures many hardcore golf fans being Justin fans.  It seems like everyone I know that golfs is guys that would not be caught dead owning a book by Justin.  I would imagine a book by Justin would have appeal to young girls for the most part but I don’t know how many of them will care about golf.  What do you think?

          What do you think about celebrities writing books in general? What, if any, celebrity penned books have you read?

          Personally the book that has honestly had the biggest impact on my view of the entire world is Notes from My Travels by Angelina Jolie.  I have talked about it on here before.  It is such an honest account of someone seeing the reality of a third world country for the first time.   It is done in a journal fashion so it isn’t like it is award winning writing but it is very real. She is intelligent and an okay writing doing her best to convay what she was feeling seeing everything.

          One book that surprised me how much I did actually enjoy it was The Truth About Diamonds by Nicole Richie.   It was written on a young adult kind of level and reminded me a little of something like Gossip Girl.  The plot and characters were all interesting though.  It seemed to parallel her own life quite a bit which was interesting.   The book is about a girl in LA so it is interesting having the things this celebrity character is doing be described by someone that has seen them.  More in depth then say if someone life me where to try about write about it.   I wouldn’t have first hand expirance which many writers that have character’s that are supposed to be famous don’t have fame similar to their characters.

          If I see it somewhere eventually, I will probably pick of LA Candy by Lauren Conrad.  I have never watched The Hills so I don’t really care that she wrote it.  I am interesting to see how it compares with Richie’s. Conrad has gone on record saying that she came up with an idea then other people helped her write it.  The same goes for Pam Anderson’s books (which I have brought but haven’t read yet). Richie as far as I know wrote the story out before approuching the publishers.

          The one and only cookbook I own is from the lovely Amy Sedaris.  It is so funny.  I don’t ever cook (plus I never have people over to cook for anyways) so I haven’t tried the receipes.  The whole book just makes me laugh though.  From the stories, to the pictures, to the drawings, it is just hilarious.  The first time I read through Children’s Game I almost died laughing so hard.  Example:

7. JR Cat Burglar- Lock the kids out of the house and see if they can break in.

9. – Train Robbery- Make a pretend train car by setting up chairs in a line.  Now have some of the children act as train passengers.  Have the rest of the children pretend they are Indians and rob the passengers.  If one of the “passengers” is a blond girl, encourage the “Indians” to kidnap her in hopes of making her their savage bride.

12. P.O.W. – Confine s0me of the children and give them a secret.  Now have some of the other children escort the confined children one by one into another room.  Once secure, the “guard” children will attempt to get the “prisoner” children to tell their secret through coercive means.

          So overall, I don’t mind books by celebrities.  What about you?