Too Many Books

I'm getting a little lost in a world of diapers and daycare. So I decided to start writing again. I've revamped my WIP and it feels amazing to work on it. I struggle with every sentence. I have this issue with perfection; I don't just want to spill it out. Stooopid. Before I got pregnant (or maybe while I was, I don't remember) I had an idea that I felt would take my WIP to a better place: a mysterious narrator, with a payoff for the reader at the end. So, I'm working with this idea, and playing with the ways to include narration without overtaking the "present action" (I'm generally a past-tense writer, so saying "present action" always seems funny and false to me.) And, I'm trying to be a more scene-oriented writer. When I read, I find it very irritating when a writer chooses to skip time without so much as a paragraph break. Yet when I look at the chunks of text I've already written, I find I do it, too. So, I'm off...

I am now I journalist! I signed up with Examiner.com  and I have already published two articles. I am the "Louisville New Moms Examiner" and I get to write about whatever I choose, so long as it's pertinent to my local audience. Won't you take a look at what I've written. (Because, you know, I get paidspice for pageviews/ length of time you stay on the page/ etc.) Here's a link to my first article. And my second. Won't you support my Day Care Fund by reading one or both?! Also, if you are interested in becoming an examiner in your town... it's easy to apply! The cool thing is that the possibilities are pretty much endless. You could be a Book Exmainer, a Creative Writing Examiner, a Restaurants Examiner, a Cupcake Examiner (I'm talking to you, Sierra Godfrey !) or a Pocket Link Examiner. (Okay, maybe you couldn't be a Pocket Link Examiner. Though, if you did, I would totes read your work.) It's kind of like blogging, except...

This weekend, hubs spent $300.00 on a lawnmower. Yes, you read that right. Three.hundred.smackers. I feel it is my wifely duty to make sure he gets his money's worth out of said purchase. Just sayin'. In related news, I, Amber Leigh Tidd Murphy, do not have green thumbs. Tasks like mulching and weeding and sowing and reaping are really not in my arsenal of talents. That's why my neighbors have cutespice flower beds and I have overgrown shrubs and some out of control greenery from a failed attempt a few years ago. (I want to call it very all very organic  looking, but that would be a lie. What it is , is a hot mess.) (Though I don't dig outdoorsy gardening, I do prune the interior. Let's not get carried away.) Now, I could go all writerly here, and use some lame metaphor about weeding and pruning ones first draft, but since I haven't completed my MS, I am not allowed to do that. I sent my inner editor packing. She's currentl...

I've been feeling a little guilty lately. I think I'm sort of obsessed with my own blog. Seriously, I adore coming home for lunch in the middle of my workday. My plan is always to sit down and write. It's the perfect time to work. There are no distractions (other than the hungry rumble in my tummy) or reasons that I shouldn't be able to churn out a good amount of words before I head back to the world of checking account deposits and cash-in tickets. However, I find that when I come home for lunch, all I want to do is blog. My reader is full as a good girl's Christmas stocking, and then there's my own post -- just waiting to be written. Something alarmingly witty, for sure. Something that will generate the multiple comments I will hungrily read from my cell phone when I sneak out for a cigarette break at 4:00. So, I avoid the writing -- you know, of the fiction variety. I sit here, instead watching the text fill the blank screen of a New Po...

Thank God. (Virus 2010: defeated.) I was starting to get the shakes from having quit social networking almost cold-turkey. And, boy did I need to get out a good blog post this afternoon. I can always tell when I'm feeling particularly rant-y. My fingers fly over the keyboard with ease. I don't think twice about what I am going to type or how witty I will sound -- and usually, if you'll excuse my vanity, I think these posts end up being some of my best. Work has me a little stressed out today. I am so thankful for my lunch hour -- and that I am now sitting at home (that was for the benefit of the suits, you know, letting them know that I am not in the office as I compose this blog entry) sipping leftover morning coffee. And perhaps letting out a primal scream or two. To be honest, the marriage of my former bank and my current bank hasn't been that bad. Yesterday was kind of like our wedding day, and now we're on our honeymoon -- already bickering like an ...

Why is it that I'm the most creative right before I fall asleep? Maybe it's because I'm free of distractions -- no basketball games in the background, no ABC Bachelor drama to captivate me, no husband yammering in my ear (unless you count, at that moment in time, his snoring.) Yes, I lay awake and stare at the ceiling and the internal monologue/ narrative of my ms just flows through my thoughts as if it had been there all day, waiting for my undivided attention. I'll think of a phrase so beautiful, long to get out of bed to write it down, but stay where I am -- because if I get up I'll start writing and I'll never get any sleep. My husband will wake up and find me hovering over the laptop (or sitting on the floor of the bathroom with notebook paper) and gauntlet's will be thrown about what lack of sleep does for my overall sanity well being. Yes, I stay where I am, warm and full of words. I'll keep repeating things I particularly like -- sentences...

I am not a morning person. (Hell, I'm not even a morning blogger.) This morning was particularly bad, though. My stomach is all crampyspice. I didn't feel well all weekend -- sat around the house like an agoraphobic. My couch is all butt-indented. Luckily, I was able to take a half day off. Now I'm home sitting on my butt-indented couch, chillaxing. Ahh, the afternoon is mine. Aside from stirring my husband's chili every thirty minutes, I can do whateveriwant for the rest of the day. Perhaps I can start book number two of the one hundred I vowed to read in 2010. (Yeah, I'd better get a move on. I can't be taking ten days to read one book... but in my defense, THE LITTLE FRIEND was 555 pages long.) So, in case you're interested, here's my to-be-read list. These titles, recently purchased from Half Price Books, cost me a mere $24.90. Sue Miller's LOST IN THE FOREST Nick Hornby's HOW TO BE GOOD Kelly Corr...

I got my first spammy-anonymous comments today. I am not happy about this. I have no interest in seeing Miley Cyrus nude. If the commenter left a link about seeing Ryan Reynolds in the buff -- well, that might have been a different story. Anywho, I hope this does not become a regular occurance on my blog. I post enough smut on my own, and don't need the from some nameless commenter in that arena. Nor do I need viruses to infiltrate my computer. Stay away, H1N1 of the internet! Moving on. Many of my followers are the writerly type, and I so enjoy your tips and advice and reading about your journeys. I wish I had the focus to blog about writing every day. But, it's six days into the new year and I am not happy with a word I have written in 2010. (Well, except for the no kissy blogfest scene. I definitely dig that.) I was stressing about the middle of the book -- it was sagging, it was lacking something -- so after struggling through a few scenes I decided to abando...

     So, people have been posting scenes from their writing today in which the characters kiss each other. It's the Official Kissing Day Blogfest , and I am applying Soft Lips, spritzing Binaca, and trying my hand at this virtual tongue tousle. If you participate, you can link to the hub here. This is an excerpt from my current WIP, which might be titled ANOTHER MAN DOWN, or FOR THE LOVE OF LAUREL LANCASTER or THE DEAD END, or perhaps none of those. Warning: it's a sad kiss.      They sat on top of the picnic table outside Latte Da. Adam dangled his legs off the edge and Laurel looked down at her jeans and picked at the frayed edges around her ankles. She could not look at him.      "I don't know that I've ever really been myself with you," said Laurel. "I want everything you don't. I want the white picket fence and a husband and children."      "What are you trying to say, Laurel?...

I was tagged by Tina . I love that she tagged me, because I like to answer questions about myself, escpecially with words. I am not a fan of surveys that require a click of a radio button to opt for one of multiple choices. So now that I have established that, I am required (upon penatly of nothing) to tag to other writerly souls. I pick Travener and Roni , and will happily await their responses should they feel compelled to participate. 1. What's the last thing you wrote? What's the first thing you wrote that you still have? Well, the last thing I wrote was a little re-vamp of my mc's breakup with her first serious boyfriend in my WIP. It was kind of fun to be a bit melodramatic, since Laurel is well aware that she is acting that way, and it sort of scolding herself for it. I dig it. The first thing I wrote (creatively) and held onto was a children's book for Young Author's called FREDDY THE BAKER. But, in fairness, I had help from my dad. So, the first t...

Here in Louisville, Kentucky is it below fifty degrees and drizzling. I quipped on my facebook status that the song of the day is November Rain. But, I digress. That is not the purpose for this post. When I want to avoid actually writing the words of my work in progress, I read about how I can make it better. And since I am often stuck behind my desk at a computer and can't spend endless hours at bookstore cafes sipping one hazelnut latte after another while browsing through books on my craft, I often look for websites that provide useful insights. Today, I found author Sandra Miller 's website, which offers great fiction writing tips on aspects of writing ranging from character development to point of view and perspective. She also has this to say about creating a vivid setting: What about weather? The weather in your character's world will change. Depending on the season, you may have rain, or snow, or blistering heat. If you don't provide a sense...

I'm feeling rather inspired with my writing. I guess it stems from deciding on a jumping off point: beginning with my main character's childhood. Waves of euphoria rush around in my brain as I rework two short stories into the beginning of my manuscript - fingers fly across the keyboard as I type the words I penned so thoughtfully years ago. My eyes are focused downward, in my lap, where the short stories live on yellowed pages. The word count soars upward, which is fullfilling, and it's interesting work, too. I've made changes to certain sections, adding more depth to the characters, extending certain scenes, giving a more solid voice to the talking heads in Laurel's early life. But, the unwritten lingers in the back of my mind. Now, I can't wait to work on the rest of the book. I think that the majority of my previous frustrations hinged on a strong desire to start from Laurel's childhood. Because, as much as the story is about her attempt t...

As I have referenced in past posts, I'm having a bit of difficulty with the present action in my thus far untitled wip. Here is the meat of the story: Laurel is tweny-five-ish (don't worry, she'll have a definite age before her creator queries anyone) and her exboyfriend dies. She believes it was suicide and that she was, in large part or in some part, to blame, even though they broke up a couple of years before the accident. (Are you intrigued? I hope you are intrigued.) (To prologue or not to prologue? I love my prologue. My mc gets the news: the boy died.) Either way, when the story begins at chapter one, where should it start? I have started it a few ways. I started it a couple of months before David, the aforementioned exboyfriend, died. I started it with Laurel having trouble sleeping. She spirals downward into a certain mental anguish, a manic depression... a preocupation with her past, her present, her, her, herself.  I wrote this for a coup...

While stumbling around this blog  called The Elegant Variation, I discovered a really great article on autobiographical fiction  written by Melvyn Bragg. I'll quote the same passage from the article that Mark Saavas did: It is often thought that autobiography cannot reach into the core of fiction; that the author’s own direct experience is too limiting a factor. That only if you step wholly outside yourself can fiction be formed. But why not step inside yourself? The brain, we now know, is more complicated than the universe, and we are just at the beginning of the exploration of what happens in there. What better laboratory for fiction than the brain that writes it? The more I write fiction, the more I see it as the best way to get at the truth and the only reason for writing it. Autobiography can be a high road to that end. Yes, it might be nine months old, but the article really speaks to me...What do you think?

I had never heard of Nano ( National Novel Writing Month ) until this year. For those of you who don't know, you better ask somebody. Well, since you asked, I'll tell you. It's insanity, that's what it is. The goal is to write 50,000 words - the equivalent of 175 pages -- in the month of November. I didn't sign up to officially participate, but figured I would write the approximate 1500 words per day in an attempt to finish my manuscript before Christmas. I thought it would be such great motivation, knowing that other writers out there were sitting at their laptops and pounding the keys, forming sentences and paragraphs and scenes. But I'm behind already and considering the wave of a white towel. I'd written 1500 words by this morning and proceeded to quickly delete the crappy half this afternoon. I think that November is a sucky month for writing - November 1st, particularly, is really not the best day to start doing anything. Whether you were in a ...

I did it! I wrote 1000 words today, give or take 139 words. I also enlisted over at the new Writer's Digest Community , which I learned about from Lydia over at The Sharp Angle.  In her post today, she wrote that "the site is being coined by some as the "facebook for writers.". " Um. Maybe they can teach me how to quote someone who has already quoted a quote. You should check out the community (as well as Lydia's blog) and join the groups that suit your fancy. I joined The Writer's Edge as well as Fiction Writing . And, I must say, I am quite proud that I got some writing completed before wondering about the website. Now, I am going to do just that! I hope it hasn't been a total snooze fest over here at musings of amber murphy this week. Please, keep coming back to my blog; I promise that my next post will include something that will make you pee your pants  (more professional blogging, amber, remember?!) witty. In the meantime, answer me...

A little while back, I blogged about being published my alma mater's  honors literary journal . I spotted my pieces yesterday when I google image searched myself , which I did because I'm so vain. Enjoy! Critique! Compliment! (Especially, compliment.)

"blank stares at... blank pages... no easy way to say this..." I'm feeling all Sara Bareilles today. Actually, I am settling in to write, as the hubster is out of the house for the evening and I am left to my own quiet and focused devices. This entry will serve as a little warm-up exercise. My copy of  Rolling Stone came in the mail a couple of days ago, and I spent a bit of time tonight on the  toilet couch reading a few of the articles. This issue's bookshelf column featured a conversation with Nick Hornby . Jonathan Ringen wrapped it up by asking Hornby if he had any advice for "would-be novelists." Here is Hornby's reply: Anyone who says they're writing for themselves is full of shit. That's something that you hear writer's say a lot. I always wonder why their drafts happen to be 90,000 words long, because that's a really strange, random length for a book, but it happens to be the length of most books. You know what I ...

Bank holidays, especially Monday bank holidays, make me so happy when it's Sunday night and I'm up late, or when it's noon on Monday and I am just getting out of bed. But then there's Tuesday, also known as today. I've had about zero down time today. No time to browse through blogs, eat lunch, update my checkbook register (and I'm in dire need of a "how much money do I really have in my account?" update) or even stop to take a piss. What's a working girl to do? I could tell by around noon that it was going to be one of those days, so I decided that instead of working until six, I was heading out of the office at four. Ahh... home now for a little uninterrupted me time, which I shall spend working on my WIP instead of balancing said checkbook, because after a day at the bank, who feels like looking at numbers? Not me!

Last Wednesday, Roni over at  Fiction Groupie made my day by bestowing upon me the Heartfelt Award! Apparently, I write one of the blogs she has "recently discovered and enjoys." To quote the very witty JmDiaz ,  I'd like to thank the bloggcademy. Do you reach for a cup of cocoa or tea when you're relaxing, seeking comfort, sharing a plate of cookies with family and friends? You know the feeling you get when you drink a yummy cup of cocoa, tea, or a hot toddy? That is what the Heartfelt Award is all about, feeling warm inside. Rules:Put the logo on your blog/post. Nominate up to to 9 blogs which make you feel comfy or warm inside. Be sure to link your nominees within your post. Let them know that they have been nominated by commenting on their blog. Remember to link to the person from whom you received your award. So, I shall pass the e-torch to my fellow bloggers. Here are my nods to the blogs I stalk read on the regular:   Amber at  A...