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because it signifies their last night of freedom for an entire month.  for the 30 days following Halloween, we’re all doomed.

our fate can be summed up in one set-of-abbreviations-that-pretends-to-be-a-word: NaNoWriMo.  sound it out.  it works.

NaNoWriMo, if you’re unfamiliar with it, is short for National Novel Writing Month.  it’s a thing where writers all across the world (amateur, professional, delusional) band together and commit to writing for the month of November with a goal of 50,000 words by the end.  that’s a small novel (for most people- I’m cursed with a “knack” for writing 120,000 word novels.  I do not say that to brag, as I have much smaller chances of getting published with such a word count).  that’s an average of 1667 words per day, I think.

last year I participated (you, too, can make an account on the website here!) and used my 50K to finish out my first draft of Finding You and, when that was finished, work on Across the Lake.  I was up until about 11:30pm the last night.  it was awesome.treachery cover

but this year I think signing up might have been really stupid; 2014 has been the craziest year of my life, as many of you know because I’ve waited weeks to return your text messages.  I have my first grown-up job of my life, volunteer and church commitments, and – wait for it – a social life!  (disclaimer: what I call a crazy social life is seeing friends maybe two or three times in a week and it’s EXHAUSTING.  is this normal?  I just want to curl up in my bunk bed with my glow-in-the-dark stars above me and watch musicals and eat fruit gummies and avoid all human contact.)

I’ve decided to work on my complete rewrite of the first novel I ever finished, previously called Betrayal.  this time it’s Treachery (that just blew your mind, admit it), and you can read a bit of it on Figment, here.  my description “blurb”, if you’re interested, is as follows:

” a young woman is caught up in the dangerous world of espionage when she joins the plot to reinstate her exiled queen, all the while struggling with love and trust in the face of deception and betrayal. ”  (<– I’m terrible at blurbs.)

anyways, wish me luck.  I’ve set a calendar for myself, and I’m going to try and stay ahead of schedule.  we’ll see how that goes.

if you want to follow along, there’s a chance I’ll be adding some as I go.

thanks, lovelies!  comment and let me know if you’re doing NaNoWriMo, and if so, what your project is!  also, feel free to add me as a buddy on the site!  happy writing!  don’t die!!  (I already bought chocolate supplies…muahaha.)

(p.s. I actually never did celebrate Halloween as a kid; my parents were super careful about dark stuff and magic and ghosts and all that. then we moved to the boonies and nobody came anyway.  as a grown-up,

moral stuff aside, I totally see the need for a holiday where I get to watch Tim Burton movies (today was Beetlejuice – w00t w00t! totally dressing as Lydia Deetz next year) and eat pumpkin desserts and talk about fall leaves and paint my nails epically.  so yay!)

p.s.s. I totally did my nails.  I wasn’t joking.  10748609_10205056274468732_684370979_n

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the exquisite William Butler Yeats penned one of my favorite poems into existence somewhere around a hundred years ago:

A mermaid found a swimming lad,
Picked him for her own,
Pressed her body to his body,
Laughed; and plunging down
Forgot in cruel happiness
That even lovers drown.

cover that I made because that's my favorite

I am – and have for a long time been – so in love with this tiny poem as to consider tattooing a line from it on my body.  I have since narrowed down my tattoo plans, but that was just so you know how much I adore it.  it’s sad and beautiful, which all of my favorite poems are (don’t get me started on Annabel Lee – I melt every time).

all that to say, like many girls I have an interest in and love for the idea of mermaids, for whatever reason.  unlike many, however, I like the bleak, tragic side of those tales- the deaths, the retribution, the eeriness.  I love the siren myths, the old Norse legends of Rán- stories with hideous creatures singing themselves into the favor of unsuspecting sailors before drowning them.  while I enjoyed my fair share of Emily Windsnap books as a tween, the darker stories have always been that toward which I gravitate.  (we shouldn’t really get into what I think of the modern treatment of “vampirism” in recent “literature”.  I get a bit heated.)

I’ve had this story about a human-turned-siren in my head for a while, and in my secret boards on

pinterest for a while.  I tried writing it once or twice, and it fizzled out each time.  I think I want to turn every idea I have into a full-length novel and am only just now (um…maybe last week? yeah, it might be that recent) discovered that I can write short stories and novellas as well.

so yesterday I jotted down a few notes, and today I sat down at my laptop and recorded my first efforts.  it’s not that exciting, I’ll warn you up front.  it’s really just me typing and back-spacing strings of words and occasionally clicking over to pinterest for a refresher on something I’d wanted to include, or a dash of inspiration.  (I didn’t even spice things up with a trip to dictionary.com.)  so this is quite nerve-wracking, in a way, because you get to see that my writing process is really not that magical.  just in case you had been thinking that before.  which I’m sure you were.  so sure that I’m going to stop talking about it.

siren song pinterest screenshot

 

this post is also an opportunity to couple my new project with something that my lovely, amazingly-talented writer friends have been urging me to join in on: the newly invented “#WatchMeWrite” tag.  it took me a while to produce a sample because a) I don’t have a mac and needed my tech-savvy brother to help me find an alternate program and b) everything I tried to write “on camera” was coming out boring, awkward, boring, and did I mention boring?  hopefully this satisfies!

so here it is, my new project, temporarily titled “Siren Song”- because that was what I called the pinterest board, okay?  (p.s. bear with me on the tense in this piece – I cannot in words express my love for second-person-tense in fiction, when it’s done well, and preferably with longing and dismay.  however, this story is proving difficult in terms of remembering the perspective I’m supposed to be in.  I’ll work on consistency.)

thanks Sam Chaffin and E. R. Warren for making me do this!!  go check out their blogs/vimeos and watch their videos of the tag!  and to those of you who were tagged and haven’t participated, or haven’t been tagged but would love to make a video, get right on it!  it’s so much fun/pressure and I loved it.  make sure to tag it #WatchMeWrite and tweet about it, and feel free to share a link to it in the comments below!

(song: If I Had A Heart by Fever Ray (my love for this song is unparalleled.  that may be extreme.  but I love it lots, thanks to the epic show Vikings on the History Channel).)

(video assistance credits: introduction to and help with the program ChronoLapse from my big brother, video game developer extraordinaire, Jake Albano, and video/audio/slide work/help from my stellar film-editing-genius little brother Ben Albano.  they’re the best.)

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happy new year to you all!

if you’re reading this, you’re probably a better person than I am, because I am the worst at keeping up with blogs.

I don’t mean to bore y’all, but I want to talk about 2013.

folks, it was a great year. it was the most exciting, maturing, stressful, crazy, spontaneous, expensive year of my life and I’m so grateful for it.

what happened? so, so much. here are my highlights:

–my church. oh man, my church. I have a family of 300+ people that I couldn’t love more. they’ve welcomed me, taught me, comforted me, encouraged me, loved me. I’m so in love.

NaNoWriMo Finding You stats-Finding You = complete. until I start editing, of course. it took me a year and a half, but it’s my favorite thing I’ve written; I’m proud of it, despite its flaws. this is unusual for me. it took me a year and a half, and I’m relieved and sad and excited to be done. it has definitely been my most emotional book to write so far.

-crazy friendships I didn’t expect: you may be reading this, and you may know who you are- people I knew a little, who have come to mean a lot to me over the past year, people I didn’t know at all yet, people I have never met face-to-face but who have made this year worth it.  I love you all.

-travel: to be honest, travel always makes my year. when people ask me what my hopes and dreams for the future are, I have my answer ready these days: all I is want to travel the world, write books, glorify God and love strangers, with a true love and a family in there as well. literally, that’s what I want from life, and the time I spent roaming the country (and visiting Canada on my own) this year has been some of the best- visiting friends, visiting places, visiting events. it’s been phenomenal.

-CULTURE! seeing Les Mis twice (American tour, Canadian cast), a Ramin Karimloo concert in Boston, Red Sox game, Newsies and Cinderella on Broadway, surprise Afie Boe concert in D.C., a 1960s party, Shakespeare in the Boston Commons, a Matt Nathanson/Joshua Radin concert at the House of Blues…I feel so enriched and in love with life. just give me a seat in front of a stage and I’m happy.

-Matt Smith is gone. this is not a positive aspect of 2013, but it is monumental. I won’t burden you with my frustrations with his last episode, or my other issues/heartbreak. I do very much miss Amy & Rory. (we *did* have the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, and while I wasn’t 100% impressed, it was terribly exciting.) to sum up, this is what I felt/am feeling:tumblr_inline_mw359v1Mm61rhvd1v

-2013 was my first year not a part of TeenPact. to be honest, that’s hard. I wish there was a way I could have always been involved. but God has been so gracious to me in helping me handle “growing up”. I’m excited to be taking new steps in my life.

-I’ve had some really rough, stressful, depressing, and upsetting patches in the year, and I’ve been incredibly touched by the people who reached out to me. I am so grateful to all of you for caring about me, and not accepting “I’m fine” when I told you that.  thank you with all my heart for Jon McLaughlin - Holding My Breath signedseeing through me, sitting me down, and making me cry to you. I’m not good at the whole “being-vulnerable” thing. I like to think I can save the day or do a darn good job at faking it by myself.

-a few last things that made the year great: CATCHING FIRE CAME OUT. I started watching Supernatural. I went to Ikea for the first time. I registered for my first class with Harvard Extension, which is as close to all my dreams coming true (#nerdwholovesschool) as I’ve ever come. thanks to Jesus, I was able to restore a friendship that was was physically paining my heart and is now beautiful again. Jon McLaughin’s new album came out. I finally bought combat boots. I met a few of my real-life heroes.  I went Enjolrasing for the first time. and I found the love of my life aka Michael Vaughn on Alias.

 

and I finished out the year with my sister and a dear friend watching the fireworks at the Boston Harbor. it was magical. and freezing.

 

I promise I’m just about finished, but I want to list, online, publicly, what I have resolved for the new year.

-I will seek God’s voice and *actually listen*.

-I will practice self-control, in all areas.

-I will stop apologizing so much. it’s my worst habit.

-I will at least attempt to be published- something, somehow, somewhere.

-I will read good books; I have a tendency to stop reading when I write, and vice versa. I want to conquer that.

-possibly get a tattoo – nobody kill me, please. I’ve wanted one for a while. I’m just not certain yet, though I know what I want.

-finish another novel (either ‘Check’ or ‘Across the Lake’, I think).

-do a cartwheel. I’ve never done one; this year I’m going to learn.

 

what are your resolutions, victories, regrets? tell me while you listen to this song, about the last night of the year. it’s my favorite.

~Lydia

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I’m afraid I didn’t realize until after I had pressed “publish” that I was debutingCheck Cover a story about a girl deciding to commit suicide on “Self-Injury Awareness Day” itself. The (sad) irony of the fact did not occur to me until I was lying in bed later and then I wasn’t sure if I should be glad of the coincidence or sorry for it.

But there you have it, I’ve begun posting a new novel! You may have noticed the slew of updates on Figment, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest, and maybe you’ve even checked it out. I’ve had this story stewing in my brain for…a year and a half maybe? It’s been a little while.  But I’m finally really giving it a go, and posting it publicly so I’ll be accountable not to let it fail. 😉

I’m also a little nervous about writing this story, for one major reason: it’s a completely new venture.  I haven’t written a book that a) is in third-person present-tense (ever), b) alternates between two viewpoints (ever), or c) is set in a modern, real-world place (with any success).  So there’s lots of newness going on.  But I’m excited.

CarouselBesides, Stella is a mystery to me. I don’t really know as much about her as I would like.  And I’m figuring Cal out as well.

So here’s The Plan!  I’m going to update Check. every other day, and the other every-other days I’m going to update Finding You! Sound good? I hope so. 😉 Basically there will be some sort of update every day. 🙂

Hopefully “Check” will make an enjoyable read for y’all- please know that you can always tell me a brutally honest opinion on it.  It’s a first draft, of course, so there are going to be problems. 😉

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Also, “blog, revamped”!  What do you think? But on to the important stuff.

I’ve already mentioned that Proxy is returning, so here are a few updates:

Roe: I’m gonna let y’all see her great big personality changes for yourselves, but I’ve altered her appearance as well.  Instead of a kind of Saoirse Ronan look, she’s more of a slightly plainer Katie McGrath, pictured below.

 

 

 

 

 

The Messenger.  Calder (Jude Law-like in appearance, but younger) is going to be quite different from my original intentions, mostly because I didn’t have all that much personality planned for him.  One of the many reasons that I restarted this book: realizing it was laaaaame.  I’ve done extensive “interviewing”, background describing, and personality delving, and I finally feel like I’ve got a real, breathing person to work with.  Now if only I can convey him (and the others) onto the page.

 

And Jude is still Jude, but I’m deepening his character as well, with lots of character profiles and fake interviews .  He’s also still Liam Hemsworth with dark hair.

 

 

So anyways, I’m excited, and I’m so happy that some of you are willing to give this another shot and struggle through it once more with me. 🙂  I’m planning on posting the first prologue (which seems as if it’s unchanged, but is, in fact, much altered) tomorrow.  See you then!  (And I’m using a new cover- let me know what you think!)

 

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Emphasis on “may”…the first one.

I’m just going to get right to the point: I’ve got writing issues.  I can’t go three months without something new on my plate, or I get stir-crazy and frantic, like my world is closing in.  It’s sad, people.  Pity me.

Thanksgiving night (after eating far too much food, playing thanksgiving-themed games, singing in a talent show, tying for first place in said talent show, and then eating far too much dessert)I had a dream.  It was so epic I think it might have tied with Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream.  I’m not even joking.

It was set in the 1890s, in the alleys of London, carrying the feel of Newsies and themes from The Thief Lord, and woven with romance, jealousy, oppressive family ties, secret background-stories, betrayal, and adventure.  My favorite “character” in the dream was a carbon-copy of Alistair Brammer as he appears in the new Les Misérables film, and was consequently named Alistair.  (I’m more than happy to have him feature in my book since he’s rather a favorite of mine in the musical theater world.  If you don’t know his work, look him up!)

I definitely overslept, though it didn’t matter since I always do at Gramma’s house.  People kept trying to wake me up and I’d shove them away, because even mid-dream I could tell this would make a fantastic novel.  My consequence was that most of the Thanksgiving dinner left-overs had been eaten by the time I finally got up at almost noon.

But I think it was worth it.

I’d love to promise that I’ll be unveiling this new book soon (since the dream covered all the major plot points, and since I wrote it all down the second I woke up, I only have to write it now! cha-ching.) but I’m afraid I have to finish at least Esmeralda before I can conscience that.  If it sounds at all interesting to you, though, never fear! It will appear soon enough.

Anyway, I’ll leave you with a temporary cover image, since even before I post it I must have a cover (oh yes, I’m calling it simply “Dream” for now, since that’s what it was, even though that has nothing to do with the story).

(And I think that “Ava” looks something along the lines of the girl in this picture, though I’m not positive yet.)

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Perhaps you’re familiar with the musical  Rent.  (Now before my fellow-homeschooler friends stop reading this and disown me, hear me out.)  It’s a tragic story, made more tragic by the fact that Jonathan Larson died the night before it opened.  I don’t support many of the themes of the story, and I don’t agree with much of Larson’s philosophy.  As a parody of La Bohème, I think it’s a piece of genius.  All moral quandaries aside, the show itself has some definite moments of brilliance and others of…insipidity.  (“Finale A”, for instance makes me want to cry, while “Light My Candle” is crude and just…awkward.)  My favorite character is definitely “Roger”, partially because he’s one that any aspiring writer can relate to.

Perhaps the best known song from the show is the famous, “One Song, Glory”, sung by “Roger” (originally Adam Pascal) as he worries that he will never make his mark musically on the world before he dies of AIDS.  The words speak to a writer like myself who hopes to make her mark somehow, someday (though I don’t believe I’m dying yet).  And the song is made more beautiful by the fact that it’s sung by Adam Pascal (who I have a major crush on) in his lovely, raspy, rocker-like voice (which I have another separate crush on).


While the entire song is SO applicable to my dreams as a writer, there’s a bit that I especially love:

“Glory, in a song that rings true
Truth like a blazing fire
An eternal flame
Find one song- a song about love
Glory, from the soul of a young man
A young man…”

I don’t need to be the next Suzanne Collins, Shannon Hale, or Veronica Roth.  I don’t think I ever could be, by any means.  But I want to accomplish something, and to know that I have.  The theme quotation for my life is one by Franz Kafka.  He says, “I want to escape the unrest, to shut out the voices around me and within me, and so I write.”  My soul needs to write.  I can’t survive without stories.

In all humility, I don’t think I’m without talent, at least.  There’s a line in Aida (another favorite Adam Pascal musical) in the reprise of “My Strongest Suit” where Amneris and Aida lament that, “a life of great potential is dismissed, inconsequential”.  I’d like to believe that I have potential, at least, as a writer.  And I don’t want whatever gifts God has deigned to bless me with to go to waste, for my life to be inconsequential.  In one sense I would be happy just sitting at home writing for the rest of my life, but at the same time, I don’t want only that.

I need to do something.

With God’s grace, hopefully I will.

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How many of you have read even a bit of Esmeralda?  A few hands?  Okay, that’s good. I just need a couple of opinions.

I am nearly finished with my first draft (nearing that dreadful ending I have to somehow rewrite to work in with new elements of the plot) and I am starting the exciting/tedious process of setting it into book form, in the Blurb BookSmart editor, so I can send in the files and have a real live book-version of my story sent to me. *claps hands* Yay!!

I have this little love affair with witty/profound/poetic quotations (my “Wilkommen” about me page is proof of this) and I want to put a relevant quotation right before the title page.  I have scrutinized my “favorite quotations” Listhings board, and have narrowed the list of candidates to the five listed below.  Would you let me know which you think is/are best fitting for the story?

Here they are:

1. “We owe it to each other to tell stories.” ~Neil Gaiman

2. “Stories are light. Light is precious in a world so dark.” ~Kate DiCamillo, The Tale of Desperaux

3. “In the light, we read the inventions of others; in the darkness we invent our own stories. ” ~ Alberto Manguel

4. “Stories can conquer fear, you know. They can make the heart bigger.” ~Ben Okri

5. “All stories are lies. But good stories are lies made from light and fire. And they lift our hearts out of the dust, and out of the grave.” ~Mike Carey

And then, with the “book” version of Esmeralda comes a new cover…ish.  The image I’ve been using on Figment is too low in quality for a full-sized book cover, so I’ve done my best to enhance the stock image, and print the title as best as I can.  The font is new, but the picture is the same. Don’t be mad. 😉

Read Esmeralda Here!

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It’s kinda awkward when you have a crush on one of your own characters.

It is not, however, infrequent among writers, I’ve surmised.  And this is certainly not the first time it has happened to me.

Des (Despard) Morrisay is my most recent “crush”, though that sounds mind-blowingly vain and conceited and arrogant, since I did think him up, after all.  But….he’s kind of adorable.  Trust me, whether or not it works out on the page, he’s basically perfect in my mind.  In an entirely different way than Tam is perfect.  Because…*River Song voice*…”Spoilers!” sadly, most of this book is about Isla learning to be strong without Tam, so there isn’t as much character development as I’d like for him.

Oh! Before I forget, Finding You is on Pinterest! Check out the board I’ve created here (I’ll be adding to it fairly often)!

But anyway.  I mentioned when I first announced Finding You in this post that I had a cast of supporting characters that I was excited about, and now you’ve met some of them- so here they are.

Des, my personal favorite, is imagined quite a bit after Dominic Cooper in appearance, with a bit of Peter Pan’s personality thrown in (my impression of Peter Pan from reading it as an 11-year-old, when I fell in love with him).  I haven’t honestly seen Dominic Cooper in many movies (for Sense and Sensibility I prefer Greg Wise as Wickham) but there’s something about him in Mamma Mia! that I really love.  My impression of his personality showing through in the role definitely impacted the character in my mind who later became Des.  Here are a couple of images to give you an idea.

    

Quite the charmer, huh?  I think so.

I’ve also been introducing y’all to the other girls in the cell, one-by-one.  Here are two of them, who play larger parts than the others:

    

The first is how I imagine Valentina looking- I don’t know who the picture is off, but the second I saw it I knew who Valentina was. She’s a bit more upfront of a character than some of the cast- at least, I think she’s a little more open.  You can tell who she is right off by what she does in a crisis situation, how she tries to be strong/put others first, etc.  At least I hope that’s obvious.  Even still she surprises me at times.  I hadn’t planned the bit about her brother getting shot until I was writing it and thought, “Of course she had a little brother.”

The second image is Abbie Cornish, in Sucker Punch.  That movie….oh man, it rocked my world.  I watch it whenever I can get my hands on it, and blast the soundtrack like nobody’s business.  It’s…oh man. I don’t even know. It’s epic.  One of my favorite movies ever, and the opening scene is by far the greatest opening scene in the history of film.  Anyway.  The character of Sweetpea, played by Abbie Cornish, is strong-willed and kinda kick-*ahem*-butt, but aside from appearance, that’s where the similarities end.  Sweetpea is protective and, when it comes to her sister, selfless.  She’s also not one to take risks that have little-to-no chance of paying out.  My Phoebe is very different, as I hope I’ll be able to portray.  Escape, and not the people around her, is what she cares about.  She also dresses a little differently. 😉

I’m nearly ready to introduce y’all to Oliver, who I am super excited about, and Josiah Boyne, who is also….um, exciting.  He’s a character at least.  Though I’ve already let you briefly meet Zachariah Curram, I’m holding off from giving you my thoughts on him, and any pictures for the time being because I want his character to speak for itself.  There’s a scene with him coming up that I am really excited about writing.  I’ll post a second wave of character introductions a little later. 🙂

Thanks for reading!  Comment and let me know what you think of the way I’ve imagined the characters, and let me know how your imagination differs!

READ FINDING YOU HERE

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This past weekend I had the best night of my life: I saw Ramin Karimloo live in Albany.

It was honestly as simple as that- I was practically jumping out of my seat waiting for him to come on stage, and when he did I came seriously close to that embarrassing fangirling that I always find so repulsive in footage of Justin Bieber concerts.

When he sang “Bring Him Home” from Les Mis early on in the performance, I nearly cried.  His voice was so beautiful and powerful, and had all the emotion that the song should bear.  I think God has blessed him with one of the most amazing voices in the world.

After the show (which had a wonderfully long encore), which included music from Doc Watson, Johnny Cash, great musicals, and several of his own pieces (some of which were folk songs, and many of you must know my love of folk music), we went out into the lobby-ish area and waited to meet the man himself.

We actually talked for a bit, and I can honestly say that Ramin Karimloo was one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met.  He’s encouraging and real and super humble, despite being mind-blowingly talented.  His openness in giving God the glory in subtle ways was really wonderful as well.  Overall, it was seriously the best night I can remember of my life.  I’m torn between hoping his music takes off like crazy for his sake and hoping it doesn’t so I can always get tickets when he’s in the country.

I would seriously encourage y’all to check him out if you don’t know his music- the 25th Anniversary of the Phantom of the Opera, the Original Cast Recording of Love Never Dies, the 25th Anniversary Concert dvd for Les Misérables, and his own solo album, “Any Human Heart”, are just a few examples of the music you can look into to hear his incredible talent.

I dare you to watch the video linked below and not become a fan:

‘Til I Hear You Sing