Archive for the 'Book One' Category

August 10, 2009 | "Whoa whoa I gotta go...back to schoooool...again",A Royale Pain,Book One,Book Stuff,Draven Atreides,Draven Atreides, Teenage Informant Series,How coolio is THAT?,Life in General,Movie Queue,Music Queue,School Daze,The 4-1-1 on Me,Weekend Wrap-Up,Writing Movements

Saturday morning, I spent the better part of the day with my BF. I’d received some info from Prescott College last week. Even though I’m not jumping into my chosen subject right away, they’re already asking you to come up with a tentative course title and flesh out your first mentored class. I was feeling a little anxious about that, so she did a reading. It was very positive. After that, we were able to come up with some ideas. So, first semester will be Math and that Interdisciplinary course (which will basically introduce me to the program), but I guess for second semester, my tentative course title is “Non-Profit Exploration”: Through research, hands-on projects, and interviews I’ll learn what a non-profit is, how to start an NP, and why people go into the NP sector.

Part of the class will be the process of sharing my findings and my wonderful BF suggested a blog. Well, duh. I don’t know why I didn’t think of that first. So, later on that day, I created a blog (Non-Profitation) that will chronicle my journey in getting my degree. I’ll be talking about school a little bit on here, but the bulk of it will be on this new blog. Feel free to follow along if you like. I’ll be posting the link to it in my posts here, whenever I talk about school. Right now, there’s only an introduction, but the real posts will start this weekend (when I attend a volunteer orientation at a local NP) and move forward with college orientation at the end of the month.

Saturday night, Mr. Maul and I attended a surprise going away party for one of our DSG guys. He enlisted in the Army and will be gone for 5 months starting Sept 1st. We had a blast. I didn’t get in the pool, though. Spent most of my time on land, talking about TRUEBLOOD. One of our Biker Scout dudes is a big fan like we are. I think he’s going to be Eric for Halloween this year. He told me I should be Tara. LOL. Apparently, the HBO store has shirts that say Merlotte’s and he thinks I should get one. LOL. I don’t know if I’m going to have my braids then, but it’s an idea. I don’t think I want to be Storm again.

Mr. Maul and I went to see G.I. JOE on Sunday. The best thing about that movie was the shirtless shot of Channing Tatum. Seriously. It didn’t help that the auditorium we were in had projector issues during the first few minutes of a new Denzel Washington movie. It had that post-apocalyptic, Mad Max feel to it. If you saw it, hit me up in the comments section and gimme the deets on that. It looked interesting. Anyhoo, the mgr came in and said they were having projector issues and that it would be a few minutes. He came back 5 mins later and said the issue was beyond their control and we were being moved into another auditorium. It was smaller, and, major disappointment of disappointments, they didn’t show the same previews! Which I totally didn’t get.

Do they show different previews in different auditoriums? If you work at movie theater and know the answer to this question, hit me up in the comments, because I’d seriously like to know. The hubby and I were a little miffed that we didn’t get to see that Denzel preview. And that we had to sit a few seats down from two teenage boys who reeked of smoke. Blech!

In the end, we got a free popcorn coupon for our trouble. Mr. Maul wanted to get a ticket refund and go another time, but I talked him into staying. Now that I think about it, we should have. We could’ve gone after I got back from Volunteer orientation and seen that preview. Not that I’m bitter about that, mind you.

(more…)

Technorati Tags: Prescott College, TRUEBLOOD, HBO, G.I. JOE, Channing Tatum, Denzel Washington, Mad Max

August 2, 2009 | "Whoa whoa I gotta go...back to schoooool...again",A Royale Pain,Book One,Book Stuff,Draven Atreides,Draven Atreides, Teenage Informant Series,Life in General,Movie Queue,School Daze,The 4-1-1 on Me,Weekend Wrap-Up,Writing Movements

BETA READERS WANTED! Check out this post for details

Saturday, Mr. Maul and I spent the better part of the day at Danny’s Family Car Wash. I spent $157 getting my car washed, seriously detailed, and an oil change. We didn’t get out of there until mid-afternoon. Apparently, everyone else had the same idea because it. was. Crowded. We had intended to see a 515 showing of 500 DAYS OF SUMMER, but when we got there, it was sold out! We didn’t find that out until after we bought the tickets. Instead of going to the counter, we went to the DIY ticket dispenser thingy. I imagine they would’ve told us at the counter, thereby saving us $14. We weren’t expecting a huge crowd for this movie. It’s playing at what I refer to as the “indie” theater. We were given passes, though, so maybe we’ll see it this weekend. It looks funny.

Sunday, we found out that our kitty has a really bad urinary tract infection. Poor thing. She’s trying to use the bathroom and only little drops are coming out. We have to give her “animal penicillin” for the next two weeks. Orally. Twice a day. As in drops. Yeah. Not fun. She acts like we’re trying to kill her. Mr. Maul has to wrap her up in a blanket and then practically shove the syringe in her mouth. This must be what it’s like when you’re trying to get sick kids to take medication. What’s worse is that we have to go back two weeks after this, get the second bottle, and do it all over again. For another two weeks. Needless to say, she is so going to hate us.

Writing Movements – Nothing yet. As you can see by the big notice at the top, I’m currently looking for beta readers for Book One. I’ll be sending it out to have it professionally edited soon. I started the revision process for Book Two, but had to sideline it while doing additional revisions for Book One. When it comes to writing and revisions, I can’t multi-task. I have to concentrate on one thing at a time or it doesn’t get done. Once I send Book One out, I’ll get back to Number Two.

School Daze – I’m preparing for orientation. I have to go to Prescott at the end of the month and I’ve been getting info by mail and email. Two weeks before I leave, I’ll find out my Core Faculty. I’m both excited and nervous. This is a very out-of-the-box experience for me, so I think it’s going to take some getting used to. They’re already asking me to come up with a name for my first class! Yikes! I have a generalized overview of my program, but I’m not quite sure how to break it all down. I have a feeling I’ll be conversing with my BF soon.

OT: TRUEBLOOD is gettin’ good! I’m starting to understand what Maryanne is, but Sookie and Bill need to get their asses back to Bon Temps. There is some serious shit goin’ down!

So, that’s it for me. How was your weekend?

Technorati Tags: Danny’s Family Car Wash, DAYS OF SUMMER, TRUEBLOOD

July 31, 2009 | A Royale Pain,Book One,Book Stuff,Draven Atreides,Life in General,Revision Heaven,The 4-1-1 on Me

I am done and done with revisions for Book One! I plan to send this off to have it edited professionally, but I’m also looking for beta readers.

Back Cover Blurb:

A day at the spa can be a “royale” pain.

Sixteen-year-old Draven Atreides has just started a new gig as an FBI informant. Her To Do list includes: adjust to new life, make new friends, and try not to tell said new friends about her secret job.

A French chemist is peddling his “specially formulated” products to high class spas and his latest target is celeb favorite, The Royale Treatment Day Spa. Unfortunately, his products cause some nasty side effects and the results are so not pretty. Just when Draven’s first assignment seems to be heading south, she receives unwanted assistance in the form of Rader Deschanel. What does he want with Draven? Will she be able to solve her first official case without blowing her cover?

WHO I’M LOOKING FOR:

~ YA critique group members
~ YA writers (teens and adults)
~ Book reviewers who review YA novels (teens and adults)

WHAT I NEED:

~ Detailed feedback on what’s not working, what needs improvement, suggestions, etc.

WHAT YOU’LL GET:

~ A complete 42,000 word YA fiction novel to read in MS Word format

~ Your name in the Acknowledgements section

~ A free copy of the book whenever it gets published

~ A chance to beta read the whole series

~ The knowledge that you helped edit a novel

~ Eternal thanks from the author

Contact me at celise[at]celisedowns[dot]com if you’re interested.

Technorati Tags: beta readers

July 29, 2009 | A Royale Pain,Book One,Book Stuff,Draven Atreides,Draven Atreides, Teenage Informant Series,Revision Heaven,Revision Report

I’m up to Chapter 9 in typing up revisions. In the process, I realized that Chapter 5 had only 5 pages within the chapter. 5 double-spaced pages, that is. Single-spaced would’ve probably been, like, 2-3 pages. LOL.

Nice. Not.

I ended up combining Chapter 5 and 6, so now the rest of the chapter headings are off by one.

Which could be a good thing. The Psych Eval section could be a whole chapter by itself, it’s that long. Well, it seems like it on paper. I could be wrong, but we’ll see.

July 27, 2009 | A Royale Pain,Book One,Book Stuff,Draven Atreides, Teenage Informant Series,Life in General,Movie Queue,Revision Heaven,The 4-1-1 on Me,Weekend Wrap-Up,Writing Movements,contests

YOU HAVE THREE MORE DAYS TO VOTE! Enter to win either a $50 or $25 gift card to an independent bookstore in your area. Should I change Draven’s last name? Head over to my FUN STUFF page and give your two cents. For teens only, ages 13-18. Deadline is July 31st, MST.

Saturday, I saw THE UGLY TRUTH twice in one day. It wasn’t a hardship, really, seeing Gerard Butler for a couple of hours. It’s interesting to see how well he can hide that Scottish accent of his. In 300 and ROCKNROLLA, he let it all hang out. But in this movie, P.S. I LOVE YOU and NIM’S ISLAND, he Americanized it a little bit, but the accent still slipped through. I didn’t think Mr. Maul would want to see it, but he surprised me by suggesting it.

Sunday, we went to breakfast at U.S. Egg. My co-worker and sometimes go there for lunch. It used to be called the Blue Plate Brunchery, but now they’re under new management. With a completely different menu. That’s one of the places I like to go that serves breakfast all day long. Sometimes, a burger or a sandwich just doesn’t cut it. We weren’t too impressed with the coffee, but the food we ordered was pretty good. Mr. Maul liked their protein pancakes (blueberries, cinnamon and slivers of almonds are baked into the pancake batter).

We also watched QUANTUM OF SOLACE on Blu-Ray later that night. I think he bought the regular version for me, but of course, this one looks a lot better.
Surprisingly, I have yet to finish typing up the revisions, but I had good writing movement last week: 12 new pages in The Lesson segment. Yeah, it had already been written, but when I was going back through it—and trying to find a place in the novel to put it—I realized I needed to add a little more detail. 12 new pages emerged. Yay me.

So, how was weekend?

Technorati Tags: THE UGLY TRUTH, Gerard Butler, 300, ROCKNROLLA, P.S. I LOVE YOU, NIM’S ISLAND, U.S. Egg, QUANTUM OF SOLACE