Cathryn Louis, Author of Contemporary Fiction

When writing my first book, I would hear others say that the second one is harder. I had to toss those words out of my brain because even the first draft of the first  book was hard enough. I’ve recently started drafting the second book and I saw that those folks were right. I now have subtext and ‘writing toward a genre’ and dramatic irony and dialogue vs. conversation and word count and plot holes in my head… Oh my! Far more stuff than with the first.

I second-guess every word; third- and fourth-guess every sentence. In truth, I’m getting absolutely nowhere. I’ve already set up my artifacts document and am beating my head against the wall trying to use it for the first draft. WAY too complicated. I’m finally forced to admit that it belongs to the rewrite phase. It’s good that I have it as a guide, but using it to shape the story when it’s far too early is bending me into a pretzel instead.

To get to a first draft I can work with during rewrite, I need an artifact that doesn’t stem my flow of words. I don’t know how first drafts work for you, but I need lots of words – 100K, 200K, 500K, – from which to distill the final story. On the other hand, I can’t ignore what I’ve learned so far. I had thought my hard-won knowledge would make the first draft closer to the final version of the story. What I have found is that I will use it mainly during rewrite.

So how do I guide the story during the first draft? Maybe it’s my new propensity to simplify, but I’ve found the answer is the most basic of artifacts – the comment. Since I write in MS Word, all I have to do is use comments to mark places where I want to explore things further, deepen the story, or question the characters, POV or direction. Duh…

I’m back to just writing – no scene, action, dialogue or even plot checks. Having fun again. 🙂

Filed under: OnWriting by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « artifact - comment - first draft - fun - n2 - rewriting »
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It took all summer, but just as Jarin will, I’ve put down my brush and pushed away from the easel for the last time.

Sparks is ready to be published. Look for it in October, 2012. My marketing plan is helping me to plan and execute. The professionals I am meeting along the way are courteous, tremendously helpful and are making all the difference. Many thanks to you all. For example, just take a look at the cover. It rocks!

I know you will enjoy Sparks and I can’t wait to share it with you. Like my Facebook page for an invitation to a Sparks giveaway.

Filed under: Sparks by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « invitation - love story - marketing plan - novel - Sparks - suspense - technology - thriller »
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Welcome to my new site! I know, I know… I made myself a new one just last spring. I loved my new-old Posterous website. In fact I still do. It’s just that I now need a full-fledged domain with more content possibilities and email. Look around and let me know how you like it. FYI, the graphics for Sparks are placeholders – not the real cover. I’m a couple of weeks (more or less) away from revealing it.

My blogger and posterous sites have seen their last posts – this one. The links on the posterous site are broken and I won’t fix them, but I’ll keep both the sites around as long as I can. Maybe until next year. August 10 seems to be an appropriate date for taking them down. If memory serves, that’s the day I decided to respond to the call. Yes, Google links will also be broken for a while – again – but I have about a month before I release Sparks. Many errors should have disappeared or healed by then.

This new site is self-hosted, with WordPress as the content management system (CMS). I’ve avoided self-hosting because as a techie, I know how much work it is to build and maintain a full website. I want to use my time for writing – not plug-in, widget and theme chasing. But since I’m publishing Sparks, I have a true need for my own site. Luckily, there are now a host of tools for making site maintenance easy – almost pleasant – without impacting my writing time.

Another win-win. Seems I’m on a role. Luvin’ it!

Filed under: onPublishing by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « publishing - technology - website »
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It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words. True – but which words? In the case of my sepia flower, the thousand words distills down to exactly two: Cathryn Louis. As my profile avatar, it is on just about every site I’ve joined. Because I’ve been involved in social media and portions of the online writing community for just about three years, it has become my brand.

On the other hand, common wisdom insists that readers are more comfortable when there’s a picture of the author. Even so, I can’t recall ever choosing – or laying aside – a book (print or electronic) because of the author’s picture.

For me, including a picture is not a problem. Currently, there are several on my Facebook page from which I will choose. But what about my flower? Cathryn Louis, the author, is easily recognizable because of it. I truly believe that doing away with it is a mistake.

After much thrashing of my brain cells, I finally figured out that I don’t have to choose. I’ll keep the sepia flower as my profile avatar, and use my picture on my website and novels. Win-win! Love it when that happens.

Filed under: OnWriting by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « author - avatar - Facebook - profile »
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This week just about finished me. Even so, I’m determined to stay on track for releasing Sparks as an ebook in October.

Getting hold of the reins of a runaway horse while trying my best to stay in the saddle would be far easier – and I can’t ride.

Can things get any more complicated?

Oh no, I shouldn’t have asked that…

Filed under: Uncategorized by Cathryn Louis
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Even now, in the age of computer games, puzzles are my thing. The more pieces there are, the better I like them. Creating the ‘big picture’ is thrilling. For a few years now, there has been only one puzzle on my table. I’ve fit pieces, pondered a little, fit more pieces, pondered a bit more… Well, you get the picture.

Then out of the blue, a grander, more vivid puzzle fell into my lap. It had far more pieces than the one on my table, but it is a puzzle I completely understand – a geeky puzzle. Hold on… Can it be? It appears that the puzzle on my table is merely a piece of the one that fell into my lap. Now, pieces in both puzzles are coming together far more quickly – and in ways that I could never have foreseen.   I need a bigger table.

Filed under: OnWriting by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « puzzle - worldbuilding »
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My characters are not based on real people. Sometimes I wish that they were. But then, I would have to fictionalize them, which would make them not at all the same. Since that’s so, it’s probably best that they live only in my imagination.

I love inventing people. If I were a gamer, I would like the games where worlds of imaginary people are created. But wait – that ‘s what I do now. It’s just that my canvas is the page and not a set of animated renderings.

Once I know what every character wants, I throw them into a big free-for-all and record what happens as they each try to achieve their goals. Even if we all know that in the end, the hero and heroine get together, their journey isn’t predictable. I am always surprised to see the conflicts and alliances that the characters develop along the way. Those who read my stories are also surprised.

Isn’t that the way it should be?

Filed under: OnWriting by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « characters - surprise »
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Silhouette of a lady with emotions of sadness, Photo Credit: Maa-Illustrations, Dreamstime.com

Each of us sees life through an emotional prism. The light refracted through it colors our every thought and act. It may be that some of the colors are of pain. It may be that some of us are, in some ways, ‘walking wounded’.

The phrase, ‘walking wounded’, is a medical term, originally used to refer to those of the battlefield-wounded whose injuries were minor enough that they were still able to ‘walk’, or function almost as normal. It was later also applied to those who suffered cognitive impairment resulting from a traumatic brain injury. They appear normal, but require far more concentration to get through the normal tasks of the day than they did before the injury, leaving them with chronic mental fatigue.

With apologies to those in the medical community who may be offended, I’m using the phrase, ‘walking wounded’, to describe those of us who are survivors of emotional trauma. There isn’t a physical injury as in the above two cases, but to the afflicted, the suffering is just as severe.

I’ve found that writing for the emotionally ‘walking wounded’ in my stories have surfaced some of the hurts that I bear, and also, some for which I’d like to atone. Calling folks out for having hurt me in the past isn’t something that I will do. My hurts are small. So for me, it is up to the ones who inflicted the hurts to own up to them and apologize for them. My only responsibility is to rise above them and live abundantly.

On the other hand, I shall make an effort to apologize for hurts that I know I have caused. I am hopeful that they too, when looking through the prism to the past, now seem small.

Filed under: Randomness by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « atonement - emotion - guilt - walking wounded »
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Artists – painters, sculptors, authors, poets, et al – express emotion with their work.

Authors creating characters that show only one emotion is akin to painters rendering on the canvas in only one color, or at worst, only one hue of that color. Making lists of emotional attributes works for some authors; interviewing them works for others. Neither works for me.

My characters have to show me who they are. So I derive two scenarios: a positive one into which I introduce an element of increasingly negative degree, and a negative one into which I introduce an element of increasingly positive degree.

For example, a character, Jake, is at a restaurant with a long-time love. They are enjoying the evening, looking forward to the movie that is to follow.

• Negative element: A man walks by, and Jake sees his love and the man exchange glances.
• More negative element: After the exchange of glances, Jake hears a TM beep in her purse, and sees a slight, melancholy change in her expression.
• Even more negative element: The man walks up to the table, sweeps her into his arms, and heartily plants a kiss on each cheek. He is introduced as an old friend.

I write the scene, each time with one of the negative elements and Jake’s reactions to that element. The scene will most likely not be in the story. I don’t take the time to write it perfectly. I merely want to evoke action from Jake so that he shows me who he is.

This time, I’ve tried to write the above scene for the heroine in my new story, but it isn’t working. She says she wouldn’t ever be in a situation with a long-time love.

Omigosh… Why the hell not?

Filed under: OnWriting by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « emotion - love story - n2 - scenario - scene - showing »
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Filed under: onPublishing by Cathryn Louis
Tags: « chaos - mashup - simplify - storycraft - synergy - technology »
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