Seems Like A Good Time For A State of the Writer

Posted on by accordingtohoyt

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Sorry I’m so late with this.  I’ve been fighting some kind of weird virus, this time brought home by the kind, sharing efforts of #2 son. Mostly stomach, URI and ABOVE ALL extreme tiredness.

It was so bad that over the weekend (It was on the way out, but whomped me hard after I overdid it with house cleaning. So Saturday and Sunday I had brain fog and could barely stay awake.  I was starting to wonder if my thyroid had gone off kilter again.  However today my head is clear, though I slept late and might need a nap once this blog is up.

This week I’m teaching at Fyrecon. So if any of you guys are in the area and want to come on down…

Other things being considered, because we still have that massive hole in our finances due to the Norwegian Airlines fiasco (I will explain it, honest, probably after LC.)

One of the things you guys have asked me to do for years is publish a collection of my political essays.  Beyond the fact that it’s going to be a pain (but not impossible) to collate, there’s the issue that I don’t want it on Amazon, because I am not PRIMARILY a political non-fiction writer.  Or at least I don’t want to be one. (Which is why the implosion of PJ as far as payment for me is a help. It helps me refocus on what I really want to do.) So I don’t want people looking for my latest novel to trip on it. Because my books are, if not apolitical, not primarily political (I’ve been doing a re-read of Simak and realized that I still enjoy his stuff, though I disagree vehemently with the politics embedded in it.) I don’t want to turn off readers I don’t need to turn off.

Which means I don’t want it out there in Amazon.

But I still need to pay the 10k we’ve gone in debt due to the snafu. And we probably need another 10k to get through till indie picks up.

Which means… I’m going to do a book of essays and offer it for private sale here. Probably sometime in July. Probably towards the end.

I’m also going to be teaching a limited number of writing workshops, this year only. Because we need to make it through May next year, after which we should be okay (though it will probably take a couple of years to recover from the she lacking we’ve got these last two years, in terms of “it’s not a disaster, but it will cost you money to get over it.”)  That too will be advertised here.

However, those things will be done with great care so as not to stop the writing, which is FINALLY going again.  After all the health issues, I got into this pattern where I wrote for three or four days, something happened and I lost the thread of it, then I started again.  So I have several almost-finished books.

How do I know this is not just one of those outbursts? It feels different. I actually have started day-dreaming stories in detail again. And the writing is coming easily, not like pulling teeth. I think a great part of it, is the reading of books I read while young, which I’m doing again.

And that’s the state of the writer.

Blogging will be unpredictable the next two weeks, because of Fyrecon and Liberty con, after which things should settle down a bit.

I’ve received book plates for Guardian. I’m going to get Larry to sign them this week, then I’ll sign them, and then I’ll tell you guys where to send the SASE for one, okay?

And I think that’s it. Except I might go take a nap. Because if I don’t rest a bit these next two weeks, most of July is going to be recovering from the two cons.

Eh. Things are getting incrementally better. The keyword being incremental. I wish I had the recovery times of when I was 20, but I don’t.  So…  I’ll try not to kill myself with work.

And now I’ll go nap and write.

68 thoughts on “Seems Like A Good Time For A State of the Writer”

  2. I had been under the impression that the state of the writer was Colorado, which is certainly sufficient burden.

  3. There is something disturbing in the fact that every time I see the phrase turn up here State Of The Writer I worry, ‘Have things gotten so bad the woman has forgotten that she lives in Colorado?

    Yes, it is excellent news to hear that your health is improving. I agree with B. Durbin above — if that means more stories, that’s awesome too.

  4. OMG – in Layton, Utah!
    I lived for almost three years, just around the corner from Layton, in South Ogden!
    State of this author: slogging away on the ACW-era novel. Worried that the writing is not coming in the generous waterfall of words that some of the previous books did.
    Sigh,

      2. BTW, folks: This is your big chance t get your MH: Guardian EARC signed by Sara and Larry! So if you can get to Fyrecon, don’t forget to bring along your copy!

  8. *is glad she was snooty enough to avoid the Mandatory Y in teen girl made-up names*

    ***********

    Sudden vision of a new pen-name:

    Sarah d’Hun.

    1. Hmm, 4 nieces, three with the Mandatory. Only one of which has customarily been spelled with one. “Why Y?”, he asks. 🙂

      1. Because a y is special. Exotic, especially when it’s not at the end of a name.

        It’s like the opposite of ending a name with an i to make it feminine.

        Plus, a y in the middle of a name lets you do all kinds of pretty loops and swirls in writing the name.

        ….I may have managed to work a heart into the loop of a y at one point. 😉

          1. Your name doesn’t count for two reasons– one, it’s SUPPOSED to be a Y there, and two, it’s at the end. 😀

            Although the cool stuff folks do with an ending-y is probably why it got going. Based off of old books, switching an end-y for an i in a girl name was an old fashion to do it. (so Mari instead of Mary.)

          2. You’re good just to have made past that nasty ‘x’ to ‘y’ with out going too far and ending up on the strange red planit (not a typo this time), Marz.

  11. “Four Hours? Well, aren’t WE special! I put in a WEEK for a REASON, young Lady!” SIncerely, the Word

    2. Well, six days. The last day He took off and left the finishing in the hands of some overeager angels, which is how Australia happened.

    3. Needs to last four hours. Have to wait for them to dry before packing up the miniatures. oh, wait, are we talking about his world building seminar or his miniature painting?
      /sigh
      Layton is a bit out of my travel range.

  13. Got a list of your workshops? Can’t pay you money for them until we know where and when they are.

    1. well, of course not, yet.
      I’ll be announcing what they are and how to pay sometime in July. My idea is to take up no more than 7 days a month, since I still need to write.

  14. Can’t send you money without more details. Like when and where are these workshops, and how much?

    1. Please note everybody. WordPress’s hamsters sometimes take a few minutes to process your post. Unless it tells you you are in moderation, you should see it posting in a few minutes. Well, that’s usually (95% or so) the case. If it’s Weird Ralph doing the processing, your post might fade into the ether, but the others get it right. Eventually.

      And no, there’s no obvious way to tell if your post is going to be delayed.

      WordPress Delenda Est.

      1. Hamsters? I thought WordPress uses ferrets (distracted by shinies), often vapor-powered… which explains the long time to come up to power. Steam-weasels!

        1. The ferrets outsourced the work to the email hamsters. Nobody is really quite sure just what Weird Ralph is, though.

                    1. I had a two-novel set from the SF Book Club, first two novels, if memory serves. Looks like it was victim of the Great Weeding, when I had more books than bookshelf space, or room to put more bookshelves. Sigh.

      1. “Over the net” – yay! Colorado is just one State over and one State up. No problem, if this were New England…

        Starting to lay some money aside now. (Although – two cons and requisite crud recovery coming up? Sounds more like August, not July.)

  15. I feel like putting in that clever Latin saying here, but frankly my brain isn’t working too well, so I’ll just go with the English, “Don’t let the illegitimate ones get you down!”

  17. Layton? Two, two-and-a-half hours.

    So is there a meet-up any time Saturday? Because I could burn a tank of gas . . .

  20. I almost feel bad saying this…
    I know you’re a “fiction amd fantasy author that dabbles in politics on the side,” but with one recent exception (your entry in Noir Fatale), I generally -prefer- your econosociopolitical musings more than your fantastical efforts.
    It’s not that I don’t enjoy your stories. But I generally don’t remember them for long. Your essays, however, almost never fail to get me thinking, chewing over both new concepts and old ideas from new perspectives. They take my own views, positions, opinions, and folds amd spindles them into new forms, seen from new angles. So far, at least, I have found I tend to share much, maybe most, ideas of how the world works, being (if I may so assume) a fellow conservative libertarian with Christian principles (and juggle those monikers around as needed, for there is no hard and fast box to conveniently drop me into for purposes of description), but reading how someone else, especially from such a different background, comes to and explains those same principles is a test of my own thoughts, to break them down into their components and rebuild them in stronger forms.
    In short, and speaking solely for myself, while I enjoy your writing regardless, I simply get more out of it when you turn your talents towards description of the real world.
    I’m looking forward greatly to Guardian, but I’m now equally anticipating “Sarah’s Thoughts on the World.”

  21. Already have a fine collection just by searching for “socialism”, “Marx”, “liberal”, “communist”, or “progressive”. Which in a way is even better as it pulls in guest posts on those crazy ideologies also. In fact, that might be a better idea. Rather than a collection of Sarah-only posts, an anthology of the failures of socialism and the virtues of conservativism. That way it’s harder for the opposition to discount our esteemed hostess because she’s only one disgruntled voice, when you have a dozen or more others providing support.

  22. Okay, sounds good. Do well. One hopes that that “fyre” part of the next con isn’t as bad an omen as it sounds after that certain disaster thingie recently which was also named “fyre” something.

      2. Yes. I have Calibre. I’ve done conversions. Just would rather get correct format to begin with.

  24. The several comments about “the State of the Writer” being “Colorado” inspired this idea:

    Imagine a US president choosing an actual state as a metaphor for the State of the Union as a whole:

    “The State of the Union as a whole resembles that of the state of Missouri, with urban elites on either side of the state trying to impose their views on the vast areas in between. Fortunately, they have failed so far to reduce the middle of Missouri to serfdom.”

    Wouldn’t such a metaphor be awesome?

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