Cupcakes and Writing: Lemon

Lemon: Overcoming Setbacks

I must admit I'm not a huge fan of lemon, but vanilla cupcakes with a hint of lemon are moist and delicious.  While lemons can be bitter, the cupcakes themselves are sweet.

There are a lot of things in life that can lead to bitterness.  It can become so consuming you lose all the vanilla and sugary sweetness of life.  To be honest, I've recently had several bitter-consuming weeks filled with set backs.  I had a pregnancy complication that has me on limited bed rest (no picking up heavy things, bending, twisting, or walking/standing longer than 20 minutes) and unable to take care of my son and home the way I want to.  I'm in one state, so my parents can help me care for our son, while my hubster is in another, packing up our stuff and cleaning our place for our move and I'm missing him while we're trying to make major life decisions and prepare for the next stage of our life as homeowners, parents of two, and relocating to a new state.  Then there was a problem with our contract on our new home that we're supposed to move into on Monday.  As if I'm not already feeling bad I can't help with the move (being nine months preggo and on limited bed rest), the stress of trying to get the moving situation resolved has not been fun.  And then, as if that wasn't enough, I received three form rejections on my manuscript in one week.  Needless to say, I haven't written much in a while, nor had the desire to.

That wasn't meant to be a rant.  Just to prove a point: we can sink into bitterness and let it overwhelm us, totally changing the flavor of our lives.  Or we can rise above all the negative things in life and keep going.  We can keep on revising and sending out query letters.  Keep on writing.  Keep on loving our kids the best we can and know how. Keep on living and dreaming and persevering and do the things that make us feel alive.  That's what I decided to do. 

Today I've written 550 words on my new manuscript.  I revised my query and sent it out to three more agents.  I've written this blog post.  We got a lot of the housing situation figured out and under control.  I got to spend more time snuggling with my son and reading to him then I would if I wasn't on limited bed rest.  And I'm feeling good about life again.  Excited about what will be happening in the next few weeks.

When life hands you lemons, make lemon cupcakes.  Bon appetit!

If you've missed any of the first seven Cupcakes and Writing posts in this series, you can find them in the archive here.

Cupcakes and Writing: Oreo Cookie

I decided to combine two of my favorite things, cupcakes and writing, and each Wednesday another cupcake flavor will be compared to an aspect of writing.  Well, until I run out of flavors, or inspiration, whichever comes first.  Bon appetit!   

If you've missed any of the first six Cupcakes and Writing posts in the series, you can find them in the archive here.

Oreo Cookie: Writing "Magical" Dialogue

I remember as a kid watching the commercials for Oreo cookies: a child twisting apart the two ends of a cookie to "unlock the magic."  I viewed Oreos as a magical cookie after that, enjoying them dunked milk, swirled into my ice cream, crumbled atop chocolate pudding, mixed in cake frosting, etc.

The thing about Oreos is, it's essentially two separate cookies, bound together by that rich creme filling.  It's the filling that's magic, or at least, that's how I interpreted the commercials for a long time.

Now, when I'm writing, I view dialogue as something that has the potential for magic.  You have two characters, united by their conversation.  And their conversation reveals a lot about the character while simultaneously propelling the story forward.  It provides character development, emotion, action, and so much more.  See?  Magic.

Dialogue is easier for some to write than others.  I find it fairly easy, but then I've written a few plays and scripts, which rely heavily on dialogue.  But I have had to learn how to make dialogue sound realistic (especially as a YA writer--teen talk is just, you know, so interesting to, like, capture on paper), and I'm working on making sure each character has their own way of talking.  In fact, that's kind of fun: giving a character a word or a phrase they use often so that you don't always have to give them speech tags (those pesky he said, she said thingies.)

So anyway, just my two-cents on dialogue, and how it has the potential to "unlock the magic" of your manuscript.  Any thoughts on how to make "magical" dialogue?   And does anyone else want an Oreo cupcake now?  I know I have chocolate cake mix and Oreos in the pantry....

Between the Lines Book Review

By Jodi Piccoult and Samantha van Leer

Genre: YA fantasy

My rating: 3 stars

Summary, taken from goodreads.com: "What happens when happily ever after…isn’t?

Delilah is a bit of a loner who prefers spending her time in the school library with her head in a book—one book in particular. Between the Lines may be a fairy tale, but it feels real. Prince Oliver is brave, adventurous, and loving. He really speaks to Delilah.

And then one day Oliver actually speaks to her. Turns out, Oliver is more than a one-dimensional storybook prince. He’s a restless teen who feels trapped by his literary existence and hates that his entire life is predetermined. He’s sure there’s more for him out there in the real world, and Delilah might just be his key to freedom.

Delilah and Oliver work together to attempt to get Oliver out of his book, a challenging task that forces them to examine their perceptions of fate, the world, and their places in it. And as their attraction to each other grows along the way, a romance blossoms that is anything but a fairy tale."

I loved the imagination and creativity behind this premise as soon as I heard what it was about, and it was immediately put on the very top of my to-read list.  The book kept me enthralled for about the first third, and then my enthusiasm sadly dwindled away.  A few days later I finished the book.

It's not that it was bad.  It just feels like it's lacking something.  Conflict, maybe.  Or depth?  I think Jodi Piccoult may have given her daughter too much of the story-writing reigns, for I know Piccoult is capable of so much more.

The story is filled with fluffy fairy tale goodness that I know a lot of readers would gobble up.  What I did enjoy were the lovely illustrations that grace each page, and the creativity behind the concept.  It was a fun read with some beautiful descriptions, interesting and quirky characters, and some humor sprinkled in.

Overall, I found it an enjoyable read, but was disappointed.  I just really wish the writers had taken the concept to its fullest potential.