Author Archives: The Velvet Zebra

Okay, for Festivus, you get two – yes, 2 – chapters. It’s getting more and more embarassing. This has a return of Emo Kid Syndrome, and all manner of smarmy crap that causes my eyes to roll in memory. Reading this now, as I scan quickly for grammar booboos and typo gremlins, makes me ashamedContinue reading “a festivus miracle!”

Well, I posted my intelligent (or not) post at Castle Debacle  so I figured I’d post Chapter 5 here today.  The disclaimer dejoir would be to watch out for falling em dashes!  I was in love with those things in my early, formative years. I also had this habit of writing dialog, then action, then dialogContinue reading “Hump-day Chapter, eh?”

Five weird facts – since Ed tagged Pete and Carrie, and Pete tagged Lori and I, here you go: 1) I was born on April Fools Day, was an “accident” and my parents were hoping for a boy, and were going to name me Michael. Not really weird, I guess, but I use it as an excuseContinue reading “5 weird things”

Writing a novel, then editing, polishing, editing some more: 3-6 months. Writing a query letter good enough to catch an agent’s eye: 2-4 weeks. Researching agents that are legitimate, accepting queries and have made sales this century: 1-4 weeks for round 1. Waiting to hear back from partials and requested pages: 6 – 18 months.Continue reading “Melodrama, I haz it.”

I’m going out tonight. My sister’s office is having their holiday party at the Yacht Club, and they get to bring significant others – and insignificant others, as in my case 😀  So at the end of my work day today, I’m bringing in the change of clothes sitting in my car, changing, and headin’Continue reading “friday chapter comes early today”

Writing Science Fiction requires a knowledge of bolognium, a word author Larry Niven invented to explain inventions SF authors come up with that don’t or can’t exist. Warp Drives and Worm Holes and Time Shifts Oh My! Your average reader is going to overlook your bolognium if, and only if, it makes perfect sense withinContinue reading “she blinded me, with science!”

In order to keep you guessing, and so this won’t take until April 24th since that’s really kind of ridiculous, I’m posting Chapter 3 of: When the Stars Walk Backwards. And since I like to include a little disclaimer with each posting – to save face, as it were – again keep in mind thisContinue reading “Two-fer Tuesday”

Dialog tags (or dialogue tags if you prefer, I don’t) are considered invisible – that is, if they’re not overused or abused or made to appear ridiculous. And by that I mean, we’re told the reader’s eye seemlessly flys over the term: he said. as if it weren’t even there. Dialog tags keep track of who’s speaking,Continue reading “He said, She said.”

I’ve decided not to trunicate the chapter this time – it’s when you click to Read More that you get the squished margins, thanks to this template, and I love this template too much to switch. Black is so very slimming, yanno. So here’s Chapter 2 – what I call the Emo Character (I feelContinue reading “Friday Project Chapter 2”