Gina G writes

 Juggling Perhaps I have too many balls in the air? I have my finished WIP that I am on round three (feels like three hundred) of edits. A new idea that is approaching the second act. A third idea that is near the third act. A blog I should be writing every week. Work. My dog. My cat. My family. Friends.  I am lucky if I have an hour to write each day. And sometimes, all I can write is a paragraph. But my personal rule is: You must write every day. Every day.  I enjoy editing. Line edits. Continuity. When I am in editing mode, I am going through each line, each paragraph, each page. I check for grammar, punctuation, and repetitive words, to name a few. Is there a better way to say? Does it flow? Is it true to the era? The character? Then I go through it again, checking for continuity. If I struggle with a sentence, I try to fix it. If the sentence does nothing for the story, I take it out.  I have gone through the current chapter twice and now realize the only way to...

 The Journey I am in the editing phase of my novel. These are my edits before I even attempt to find an agent or publisher. I will not send a first draft out to anyone. No one should. You may think your darling piece of work is perfect, but it's not. I've harped on this before, and I can harp on it for years.  Edit. Edit. And edit again. I can honestly say I have spent months on one chapter to make sure it is as close to perfect as possible. I do line edits first. I read each line out loud. I read it backward. I go through the whole chapter and mark what stands out. Then I go to the beginning of the chapter and fix those issues. I go back through it and check for continuity. Does my character take off a hat and then still have it on? I need to catch these things. Continuity is a big thing for me. The story has to ring true. I can't have a blood spatter on a jacket on one page and then have it in a different spot on the next page. I just caught one error in the chapter I am ...

 Crossroads Do you ever look back at your life and wonder what would have happened if you had made a different choice?  Where would you be now? I don't wonder this often because I have learned to live with my choices. I weighed them, I pondered them, and I threw the dice and went with them. But what if ... the dice had landed a different way?  My first big crossroads happened the year I graduated from High School. I was dating a man who was a year younger than me. His parents weren't too happy with that and offered my parents an ultimatum: either your daughter breaks up with him, or we ship him to his cousins. I weighed this one out. I loved the guy. He was smart, wonderful, handsome, and funny. Why should I break up with him? It wasn't my fault that his parents couldn't handle the fact that we were in love. But then again, it was young love. Puppy love. First love. If I stayed, they would send him away. Could I live with that? No. I broke up with him and went to colleg...

 The Z Books We have made it! The final two books in the challenge! I will tell you, I honestly didn't think there would be much of a choice with the letter Z. I found two books written by authors I will most definitely read. Book 1: "Eye of Cat" by Roger Zelazny I don't read a lot of science fiction, but this one intrigued me when I picked it up.  William Blackhorse Singer is the last Navajo on a future earth. He is a tracker and hunter of alien species, hired to protect an alien diplomat. To succeed, he must enlist the help of a dangerous, telepathic shapeshifter he previously tracked and captured. One of Singer's secrets, and his greatest guilt, is his suspicion that Cat is an intelligent life form. The creature, known as "Cat," agrees to assist Singer on one condition: when the deed is done, Cat can hunt Singer down and kill him. The God's powers and monsters of Navajo legend provide the backdrop for the Singer's fate. The chase is as much fo...

 The "Y" Books "The Bark Of Zorro" by Kathleen Y' Barbo A Cozy mystery, about a woman who works for a veterinarian and a dog rescue group. On a dark and stormy night, Cassidy Carter is called out to pick up a stray dog with a Z painted on its side. This is not the first dog in the area to be running around Brenham, Texas, with a Z painted on it. Cassidy is a huge fan of the Scooby Doo series, torn between wanting to be Daphne yet feeling more like Velma. She sets out to track down the mysterious person spray painting dogs. The case is complicated by a handsome, single Texas game warden and a viral social media crew filming a segment featuring him.  Cozy mysteries are great when you just want to chill with something fun. This is a nice light-hearted one, but like most cozies, it was torn between the mystery and the romance. Which one gets more play? Maybe it's a formula the cozy-writer has to follow? Hmmm. But if you are looking for something to read when you...

 The "X" Books Books written by authors whose last names start with an X are hard to find. Lucky for me, I have a fellow author friend who writes under the name Scarlett Zavier. The Celtic Men Series by Scarlett Xavier. Irish Fire and Forbidden Love Maeve Quinn is not just a business owner; she's a force to be reckoned with. She is the co-owner of a bar in Galway. When Rory shows up, sparks fly between the two. Rory is there to buy the bar, but how can he take away the business Maeve has given her heart and soul to? How can he tell her why he is really there when all he wants to do is drown in her intoxicating scent? The two are falling hard and fast for each other when the truth comes out.  Scottish Legends and Lost Love Lachlan is a troubled landowner who is contemplating selling his ancestral estate in the highlands to a developer when he meets Fiona, a dedicated historian. Fiona is there to research the hidden runes on the property. She drags Lachlan along for the rid...

The Unnamed W book Or  Why Editing is Important  There was a third "W" book I read for the alphabet challenge. I have chosen not to mention the title or the author's name. The reason for this is the many editing and formatting issues in the book. It was not self-published. But it did go through a small press. The issues were so bad that I started marking them, circling them, and making notes as I read the story. They distracted me to the point that the story suffered, and, really, it's too bad, because it had potential to be good.  I will create my own examples of the errors to give you an idea of what NOT to do and what to look for when you are going through the Galley Proofs. Issue one: Punctuation. Jack and Jill are talking.       "Hi, Jack," Jill said. "Hi, Jill, where are you going?" "To the store."      When you read this, who is talking? Jill. Now, why would Jill talk to herself? Is she carrying on a conversation with Jack, becaus...

 The "W" Books The "W" books were all about mysteries, written by two of my favorite authors, Johnny Worthen and Nina Wright. Book 1: Thicker Than Water by Johnny Worthen. A Tony Flaner mystery. If you have not read any of Johnny Worthen's books and you love a quirky, fun whodunit, this series is a great one to check out. Tony Flaner, the sarcastic sleuth, has given up being a good detective and taken up pet sitting a pampered, untrained dog for a high-strung family. Naturally, the dog is kidnapped right under Tony's nose. Tony tries to care, but he really doesn't. He has other things to worry about, like the sudden death of his neglected aunt Vicky in Moab.  Tony travels from Salt Lake to Moab to figure out who killed his aunt and why. Along the way, he deals with the local police, tourists, small town politics, an ex-girlfriend's recently released, psychotic former husband, Nordic Indians, tabloid slanderers, elves, goblins, wine connoisseurs, hate...

 The Alphabet Books U and V The U Books: Book 1: Confessions on the 7:45 by Lisa Unger  Selena is on her way home from work when the train is delayed. Rather than get off, she stays and strikes up a conversation with a woman named Martha. Selena confesses that her husband is having an affair with the nanny. Martha shares that she is having an affair with her boss. The next morning, the nanny goes missing. What follows is described as a fast-paced thriller.  The book was okay. I had a few issues with it. One being the setting. When it started, I thought the setting was England. The second issue was Martha. She seemed like a cardboard character of a femme fatale. The backstory was interesting when it finally came out, but even then, I couldn't get into it. I was bored. But I did finish it.  I give it three stars. Book 2:  The Butcher and The Wren by Alaina Urquhart This was a better-written thriller. The characters were original. The setting was made clear, and th...

 Catching Up Yes, it has been a while since I posted anything about my book challenge. I will keep this short and sweet. Or as short and sweet as possible.  The R Books: Wildwood Whispers by Willa Reece  Goodreads describes this book as a "dark, tender, and thought-provoking, adding that it is a beautifully woven tale of fantasy, feminism, and mystery." I was so bored I couldn't finish it. I made it halfway through and put it down.  * blah Book two: Home Is Where The Bodies Are by Jeneva Rose This was a good mystery. It involved family dynamics and a secret, buried. When Beth, Nicole, and Michael gather together to sort through the family home after their mother's passing, they come across an old home video with a confession on it. What do they do? It concerns a missing person from their childhood. They have the answer or think they do. If you love a good mystery read this one. Very well written. The characters were great. ***** The S Books... Fever Dream by Sam...

 The Writing Journey I had the weekend off. I spent half of my time combing through four chapters in my completed novel. This is phase four of the writing journey. Phase one is getting the story down. Phase two is fleshing it out. Phase three is making sure everything flows. I let the book sit for a month before I went back to it. On Friday, I sat down and prepared myself for phase four, combing through each sentence, paragraph, page, and chapter. I read the page out loud. I read it backwards. Was there repetition? Did I use clichés? Did I have a hook? Page one is very important. You have to hook the reader and make them want to turn the page. You need to introduce the setting, the timeframe, and the main character. I moved on to the second page, where I introduced the "inciting incident." In this story, it is the introduction of a very bad, messed-up man. He is going to set things in motion that my main character and his best friend will have to right. I went through the sam...

 November Musings November is my grateful month. I love everything fall. I start celebrating the season in August. All of the summer decorations are replaced with autumn colors, and my all-time favorite Holiday, Halloween, arrives in October. I will admit that my Halloween decorations stay up far longer than my Christmas decorations, but then again, I'm not a fan of Christmas. It's too garish, too pushy, and too commercial.  Many people move straight to Christmas after Halloween, but I like to keep the holly jolly crap as far away as possible, which is a challenge given that I work in retail. I want to give November its due. This is a time of reflection, of relaxing over a mug of warm coffee while listening to music and reading a good book. This is a time for walking under the changing colors of the leaves and feeling the crisp chill in the air. It is finally (here)flannel shirt weather, and I will confess, there is nothing sexier (in my opinion) than a person wearing flannel....

 The "Q" Books Book 1: The Night Child by Anna Quinn I went with this one because the setting was in Seattle. :) Brown teaches high school. One afternoon, after she has dismissed her last class of the day for the Thanksgiving Holiday, she sees a disembodied face. She sees it again when she is out with her family celebrating the holiday. It's the sad face of a little girl. But who is she? And why does she make Nora feel trapped? She meets with a neurologist and a psychiatrist. Why is she getting these flashes of a Valentine's dress? What happened in her past? As Nora digs deeper, she confronts the lost child she once was, embraces her, and learns the sordid, horrible truth she tried to bury.  As the story progresses, a terrible secret is discovered--a secret that pushes Nora toward an even deeper psychological breakthrough. It is a story of resilience, hope, and the mind, body, and spirit's ability to save itself. It examines the impact of traumatic childhood exper...

 The "P" Books Book one: The Hangman's Daughter by Oliver Potzsch When I finish this challenge, I will read more books written by this author. When I started the book, I was confused about voice. Who was the main character? Was it the hangman? Was it the daughter? Was it the young doctor? It took a few pages to get into. The setting was after the witch trials. The son of the former hangman is now the hangman. He didn't want the job, but he inherited it, like father, like son. Only he knows natural herbs. In a sense, the hangman knows what the villagers consider witchcraft. His daughter is a beautiful, dark-haired, free spirit who is expected to marry another hangman, but she has her eye on the young doctor who has studied abroad. The young doctor has a lot of respect for the hangman. The village is stuck in the old ways. Its streets are muddy, the townspeople still think old-fashioned thoughts, and they are trying to compete with the wealthy neighboring city.  Amid th...

 The "O" Books Book one: Poor Deer by Claire Two little girls who live next door to each other go out to a muddy lake to play. They are seen by a teacher who tells them they should go home. They go back to their houses and decide to play a version of hide and seek. The neighbor girl climbs into an old freezer. It locks. The other girl can't figure out how to open it. She tries and tries, finally gives up, and runs home, pretending to have been there all along. Hours later, the neighbor's girl is discovered. Dead. Poor Deer is created at that moment. Poor Deer is part human, part little girl, and she tries her best to coax the girl into confessing, but it doesn't work. Poor Deer trails the girl as she grows up, becomes a teenager, deals with her crazy mom and her doting aunt. The girl figures the only way she can make everything right is to run away to Niagara Falls.  Okay why? I was interested up until this point because it made no sense. By the time I got to the ...

                                                                   The "N" Books Book one: The Cat Who Saved The Library by Sosuke Natusukawa A good friend of mine got me this book for my birthday. It did not disappoint. This is a story about Nanami, a young girl with asthma who spends as much free time as possible in the library. She loves to read and knows where every book is located. She is particularly fond of the classics, and when she notices several of them disappearing, she grows suspicious. When she alerts the staff, they dismiss her. Discovering a strange man perusing the shelves, she follows him. He disappears down an aisle that doesn't exist, but leaves behind a mysterious light and a talking tabby cat named Tiger.  Tiger, the cat, saves books. He takes Nanami with him to another realm, where they encou...

 The "M" Books Book one: "Lamb" by Christopher Moore. I love Christopher Lamb's writing. It is very tongue-in-cheek, sarcastic, and funny. This book was no exception.  Lamb is about Jesus's best friend, Biff, who is raised from the dead by the angel Raziel to fill in the missing gap in the bible when Jesus disappeared at the age of twelve and was not seen again until he reappeared in Galilee. The name Jesus was translated incorrectly. Jesus's known name was Joshua.   Biff and Joshua have been best friends since childhood. No one loves Joshua as much as Biff does, except for maybe Maggie (Mary of Magdalene) and Mary, Joshua's mother. They left Israel because Joshua wanted to track down the three Wise Men (a magician, a Buddhist, and a Hindu yogi) and learn how to become the messiah. Joshua learns how to multiply food, walk on water, and raise the dead. Biff went along to get laid since Joshua could not know the pleasures of the flesh.  Throughout his ...

 The L Books " Call For The Dead " by John Le Carre This is the book that introduced George Smiley to the world. I picked this book up at Shakespeare and Company in Paris. The original store was opened by Sylvia Beach in 1919 and closed in 1941. It was reopened in 1951 by George Whitman and moved to a new location across from Notre Dame. I suggest that any book lover who visits Paris check the store.  George Smiley works for the Circus , a government spy company loosely based on the SIS. Smiley is summoned early in the morning by his boss, Maston. Once arriving at the office, Smiley learns that Foreign Office Civil Servant Samuel Fennan has killed himself following a routine check that Smiley himself conducted. Because Smiley held the interview with Fennan out of the office, Smiley is questioned.  Calling on a few trusted colleagues, Smiley begins investigating the supposed suicide. Something about the situation does not make sense. For one thing, why does a man who ...

                                                             The "K" Books Book 1: Nothing But Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw My niece and I picked up this book two years ago. I almost bought it. I'm glad I didn't. Now, don't get me wrong, the book was well written. The story had promise, but it failed.  Described as a gorgeously creepy haunted house tale, steeped in Japanese folklore and full of devastating twists, the story is about four friends who decide to spend the night in a Heian-era abandoned mansion. Its foundations rest on the bones of a bride and its walls are packed with the remains of the girls sacrificed to keep her company. After a night of food, drinking, and games (yawn) the ghost bride appears with a hungry heart and a blackened grin. Lucky for me it was a short book. The characters were cliche. You had your...

 The "J" Books Book one: Oceano Beach Bedlam, written by my friend Topper Jones This is book two in the Thad Hanlon and Bri de la Guerra Mystery series. (I am eagerly awaiting the third.) In Book Two, Thad and his partner, Bri, are newly licensed private investigators. They do it all: fraud busting, background checks, surveillance, and anything else. They just need a client. When the body of a young man is discovered on the beach, Thad recognizes him from the day prior, when the now-dead young man was arrested with a few of his BVL 13 homies during a weapons search. After being questioned by the police, Thad and Bri head back to the tent where he and his son Zale are living, until the detective agency starts bringing in money. Bri lets Thad know that the fledgling company is in the red. They need a client or else. But where do you get a client?  And then, an exotic, dark-haired woman makes her way across the sand to Thad's camp setup and hires the team to find her missing...