Kelly Flowers

writer

Tag Archives: writing goals


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The Time Has Come, The Time is Now – Write Your Book!

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Remember when you said, “If only I have time to write that book I’ve always wanted to.” *sigh* “If only…”

Wellllll, guess what? What else are you going to do for the next couple of weeks (indefinite future)? It’s tempting to sit at home and guzzle Netflix or watch the painfully repetitive. And of course —-> Eat. Cook. Nap. Eat. Repeat.

When you surface into society again, all you’ll have to show is the weight you gained. How about you eat that frog and write your book? If you can’t write a novel when you literally can’t leave your house, when will you? I will give you the players handbook on how to write a book and you will emerge into the world inspired, recharged, slaying.

Are you in? I said… ARE YOU IN?!?!

So let’s get down to business. 4 steps to starting your book start here —>

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That Time Of Year… Costuming

(I once thought this was a blog about writing. Really, it’s a blog about the things that get in the way of writing, like procrastination and writers block and things I consider important because they require creativity but ultimately eat up what precious time I have to actually write. Really… it’s a blog about costuming.)
October… ahh. Fall. 🍁 You’re celebrating pumpkin spice lattes, leaves changing color and wearing scarves.
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Me? I’m celebrating Halloween. (Not for the spooky stuff cause I’m still legit afraid of the dark. 🙄) I love Halloween for what it really is, an excuse to make costumes!
I put as much emphasis on this as any other thing in my life, a result of my inability to prioritize. My evenings are suuuper productive with things like sewing and gluing and the like.
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For me, making a costume is like any big project that I must first break into many small projects.
So instead of my to do list saying…
-Make xxx costume
It says…
-Sew vest for xxx costume
-Find wig for xxx costume
-Pick shoes for xxx costume
-Build chest plate for xxx costume
As you may guess, I get to cross stuff off my list ALL. THE. TIME. That’s what I like to do, cross stuff off my list. I metaphorically body bump myself like… Yeah. 👊🏻 You get sh*t done! You’re so damn productive. I can’t even handle how productive you are right now.
Meanwhile, my large projects are collecting dust on said list, trickling down from day to the next. Submissions? That’ll be a November list item for sure. 
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In the meantime, blogging is taking precious time from googling how to sew boot covers. Such breed of domestic I have become.
No spoiler alerts! I know you can’t wait. MUAHAHA!
November 1st blog post forthcoming. 🙂


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New Years – How To Find More Time

After drinking our champagne at dawn, my husband could not stop congratulating himself on his artsy photography skills.


It’s that time of year again! Time to careen into January full of gusto and resolve. So what if we sputter halfway into February. That’s a whole month (and one twelfth of a year) of progress. That has to be worth something!

It seems like just yesterday I was writing last years new years blog, “Resolutions” Don’t Work. I get really excited about this. My readers, all five of them, know that New Years is one of my favorite holidays.

Once, I saw something on HONY (for those of you that are not up on HONY, I’m obsessed with him. It stands for Humans of New York and this photojournalist, Brandon Stanton, walks the streets and takes people’s pictures, telling little bits of their conversation. I’ve followed him for years and its always poignant and powerful and I feel he miraculously reveals a bit of soul in two or three lines of conversation. Readers, all five of you, follow him! You’ll thank me.)

So back to my point… Years ago, there was a post of a woman. She said something like… (Excuse the lack of verbatim. This is how I remember it.)

“I have this theory. We are all given the same amount of time but time is a subjective concept. So if things in our lives are always changing, it feels like we get “more” time.” Continue reading →


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8 Ways To Work The Writing Critique Group

Teenagers and Writing Critique Groups = Creativity Killersscared-face

Remember being a teenager? It seemed you had to hide any bit of individuality from the mob of your peers and their judgy-ness.

Maybe that was just me. It wasn’t weird that I quoted Shakepeare, danced to swing music and carried vocabulary flashcards in my purse. No. Not weird.

I have teenagers now and guess what? They’re still judgy! And I’m still weird. (I’m told this constantly.) But now, I like my weird. We’ve grown attached to each other. We clique off and snicker about our critics. In my head, we ARE the popular kids.

I’m all grown up now. But writing critique groups can kill creativity in much the same way as the high school mean girls can.

The first time I went to a writers critique group. I was young, not much older than a teenager, really. The group met in an adorable bohemian café that had ombre walls, sold forty different types of tea and had jam poetry sessions that packed the place. This is being a writer, I said to myself. How romantic! Continue reading →


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Book Excerpt: Gone Dark – The Sirens

Sam’s eyes snapped open. The dark room was grainy with the promise of morning. She lay still as the sound of sirens rose from the fog on the marsh. At first, Sam understood. Just as everything presented while straddling a dream is accepted without question. The sirens somehow made sense.

When the sirens began a second time, Sam bolted up. She stumbled to the sliding door and scanned the light beyond the glass. The Kawainui marsh was the same. The Ko’olau mountains still steepled in prayer beyond it. But it all felt different. A dense shroud of grey pressed its belly into the thickets of mangrove. The trees looked bent like blades of grass.

She stood at the door, pulling the dream back. A woman, her mother but not her mother, her finger circling the rim of a crystal glass. Sam felt like she knew something she hadn’t known before. And then the dream slipped away, a stone sinking into the pond of her mind.

A shot rang out, sending a buzz down the walls. Sam didn’t move. She watched the wind digging into the cane grass. A mango rolled down the slope of the roof landing with a splat on the pavement outside the door. Continue reading →


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Sowing The Seeds Of A Novel – Writing and Gardening

Gardens are like books. Ok, gardens are not as delightful as books and, well, gardens have bugs soooo… 😕 But maintaining a garden is like writing a book because…

Both gardens and books need constant care to grow. I liken that perfect, red glittery strawberry to a jewel of an idea you get at 3am. You know you should stop what you’re doing and pick it/write it down but “meh.” You’re too tired.You’ll do it later. Then poof! You turn it over and the potato bugs have swiss-cheesed it. giphy

They both look easy, until you’re on your knees in aguish because grasshoppers have scarfed down your harvest or you discover that your protagonist is just boring.

Aaaand, if you garden (or write novels) only for food, you’re in the wrong business!

Way back when, I loved the idea of food being a simple equation. Seed – plant – stomach. Easy, right?

But after many moons of battling weeds and insects, I’ve realized three things:

1. I have not outgrown my childhood skittishness of all things crawly.  Continue reading →


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How To Write Consistently – Location, Location, Location!

I once told a fellow writer that every time I sit down, I feel like a different person and my work reflects it. My multiple personalities bloat my writing with their twisted humor, inflated description, gushing prose or snarky syntax. Whoever shows up that day.

“It depends on how caffeinated I am or how quiet it is or whether my dishes are done,” I said wistfully. “How do I write an entire book if I can’t even keep my scattered brain in line?”

My friend replied, “What is your workspace like? Where do you normally write?” Errrr. I did that embarrassed side-pursed-lips thing that you do when someone asks what you do to workout, then replied, “Wherever I guess. Cafes, the library, bed, my kitchen table.” She nodded knowingly.

So, apparently we writers are supposed to keep our environment stable if we want the tone of our writing to be consistent. I hope not EVERYONE here is like “duh” because this had actually never occurred to me. It makes sense, I just thought it was one of those in your perfect world scenarios. Continue reading →


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How Do I Stay Focused? No, Really. How?

From my Attention-Deficit brain to yours, a thoughtful Haiku for Monday…

Steaming coffee cup

A blank screen glows before me

Did I lock my car?

 

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Writing Lessons From My 4-Year-Old In A Whack-A-Mole World

The other day, my 4-year-old, to a room full of cousins and aunts and uncles, performed her song, an original masterpiece called “Flowers In The Field”.

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It went like this…

Flowers in the field

Where is everything that grows

A girl walks with her daddy

And picks a flower and the flower dies

But she puts it in water and it comes alive 

Flowers in the field

Flowers in the field 

I turned to my friend Neil and said, “Remember being that fearless about your own creativity? Brave enough to write a song and then sing it out for a room full of people?”

“No,” he said.

“Yeah. Me neither,” I replied.

But I was braver as a child. There’s proof. My first “publication” was a poem in my school yearbook. When running for Elementary School Treasurer (laughable, I know) I gave speeches off-the-cuff. And I sang in talent shows, LOTS of blood-curdling talent shows. Now, I can’t even drunk-karaoke without hyperventilating.

And why is that? Surely, I have a better vocabulary; can more likely carry a tune; and have a lot more thoughtful things to say. I just no longer have the guts to say them. What about growing up beat the bravery right out of me?

So, it got me thinking… How do we recreate the fearlessness we had as children?

3 solutions come up mind…

1. Always be amazing, superhuman – a genius even. Get all A’s. Problem solved.

2. Only show your work to people (like your doting parents, spouse, etc.) who will love you, praise you and top off your confidence cup, regardless of what you produce.

3. Just not care. Seriously. Sociopaths aren’t worried what other people think. Continue reading →


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The 48 Hour Wedding (Also, Apparently I’m A Stress Junkie)

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Hot tub’s are just places where bad decisions are made. It wasn’t “Swimming Pool Time Machine” or “Couch Time Machine”. They knew what they were doing. Hot tubs are their own kind of transport, rife with half-baked schemes, incomplete epiphanies, insincere flattering and unreasonable promises (and usually a fuzzy enough memory to never learn).

Late at night, sipping something strong and looking at the stars, more things are possible. Like running, for instance.

“I swear,” you say in a staccato mash of words. “I’ll be up at 6am to run that 10k with you. I loooove running.” Bah!

A polar bear swim, that extra finger of Sailor Jerry (you know who you are), committing to a 6am 10k, writing a book, a fourth child. You know. Whatever.

But occasionally an intriguing idea actually pops up and whoever is present swats at it for awhile. (In my hot tub’s defense, much of my book has been concocted while sipping something strong and staring at the stars)

Last Friday, with my sister and her fiancé in town, we sat in the blue glow of the jacuzzi, ripe for making life-changing decisions. Out of the blue, my sister’s fiancé says “I want to get married. Like now.” And we laugh. Hahaha. Get married now? Haha.  You’re hilarious. But… “Would it be that crazy?” I say and we swat at the idea for a little bit.

The answer is yes. It would be crazy. 48 hours?! My kind of crazy. I was already planning a wedding in my head. You didn’t know I liked planning weddings, did you? It’s a little hobby I have.

This was on Saturday. Wedding day would be Monday, before they left town on Tuesday. Muahahaha! What a thrill.

Aaaaand 48 hours later, we were sipping champagne and giving cheesy, teary, impromptu speeches. Fondly admiring our masterpiece, shotgun wedding.


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