First off, I need  to express my gratitude to a group of women I lovingly refer to as my "Crazy Ladies." These are a group of friends, family and acquaintances that took the time to read my entire book and comment...my "beta testers", as it were. I have to begin with Shanna Sloane who was the first person, outside of my husband to read my book. She's an avid reader, a fan of chick lit and I'm just happy I got to her before her second baby arrives and she has her hands full. I have plenty of thanks to go around to Julie, Ellen, Tina, Veronica, Melinda, Marsha, Robin, Mary, Patti, another Patti, Marcia, Belle, Amanda and MaryAnn. If I forgot to include your name, yank my chain because if I EVER get this puppy published your name will be in the acknowledgements. You can take that one to the bank. There are two other women I need to thank and they're not from around here. First is Lisa. I've mentioned her in a previous post and she read my book after I posted it on authonomy.com. She's from Ireland and has become my soul sister in this journey to become a published author. Secondly, I need to thank Abi. I haven't know Abi long. She's a friend of a friend but has quickly become a friend of mine. She's lives in the U.K. and has taken on the task of reading and editing my book along with trying to cure my of my severe case of "tense-itis." This is an affliction where I use past tense for the most part, but get lazy and slip into present tense on occasion. She has also sent me off to work on the first bit of my book. Abi seems to like my writing and sense of humor just fine, but says I need to strengthen the tension in the beginning (and quite possibly the middle and ending) but she's only returned the first 150 pages for revisions this point. This is where the learning comes in and the "fixin' to get busy" begins. Novice that I am, I thought that the story of a lonely young woman searching for answers about her parents' death, interwoven with stories of the relationships she forms might be enough. I now realize this tension thing is a weakness I need to work on and I'm excited by the prospect of learning. Abi says the book has sheds-load of potential. I don't have a clue what that means, but I'm taking it as a positive. This entire process is great fun for me. Even if it is a ton of work, it's the kind of work that leaves you feeling as though you've accomplished something. Many of you know that I majored in art in college. I think most creative types have had that moment of terror when they look at a blank canvas or a blank page and think "Now What?" Just putting a stroke or a word on that field of empty whiteness can make it so much less terrifying. I'm off to kick those pages butt.

While I’ve made no secret of my affinity for the English, I’ve been pleasantly surprised how many of my U.K. acquaintances actually like all things Southern. When the wife of my friend David, who lives in Northern England in Durham County, read my book, she had to go out immediately and rent “Sweet Home Alabama” with Reese Witherspoon. I have mentioned on a couple of occasions that I found someone to edit my book. She’s a friend of my dear friend Mark Darlington and, like him, she’s British. In my first discussion with her, I was adamant that the southern voice of the book not be lost in the editing process. Lucky for me she seemed up to the task, and though she’s only about halfway through the book, she’s given me the positive reinforcement I was hoping for. Much like the character in my book, I couldn’t wait to leave the South when I got my first big job in D.C. The woman who hired me, and later became a close friend and mentor, actually confessed to me that she didn’t want to hire me. Why? She thought I was stupid because of my accent. (I didn’t have the heart to tell her I was in Mensa.) When I moved back to Atlanta ten years later, I felt adrift. It took me a good three years to feel at home again. But after buying a house, having two kids and being married for 22 years, my roots are deep and strong once again. I make a pretty mean banana bread and peach cobbler, and although I’ve never mastered the art of the homemade buttermilk biscuit the way my grandmother Bea made them, I do know they should have apple butter in them or gravy on them. Growing up, there was no need for the word “soda” in my vocabulary as there was only Coca-Cola. I knew to “speak up” but not to “talk back”,  and I learned the hard way that a “switch” wasn’t just that up and down lever on the wall. And while I don’t think I have a Southern accent, I need only go up North, where a simple query as to the time is met with a puzzled look and the question, “Who is Tom?” I have read Flannery O’ Connor, yet I’ve never spent time with  Eudora Welty or my grandfather’s literary hero, William Faulkner. But that is my plan for summer vacation. I want to write about love, loss, friendship, sex, family, pain, doubt...all the  things that make us human, but I hope I can do that with grace and humor, through that magical prism of what it means to be southern. Someone left a comment on my authonomy page the other day, asking if I might be the Southern Jane Austen. Does it get any better than that?

I joined the Atlanta Writer's Club about six months ago, after my husband got involved with the group, but I'd never attended a meeting. Until today. Either the timing wasn't right, or the subject matter didn't interest me or I had a full blown case of lazy. Hubby has actually been to a monthly gathering though he spends most of his time meeting monthly with his smaller critique group of about a dozen members/writers. He graciously took me along to his December/Holiday meeting and as nice as the folks there were, I knew a critique group like that wasn't for me. I'm not an experienced writer, I don't particularly like writing critiques of other people's work and I think my skin is far too thin at this stage of the game. I choose instead, to count on the support of a handful of people I trust and whose writing I like very much. And I know they view me as much more than the words I've put on a page. This month, however, the speakers at the meeting did interest me. George Scott of Peerless Bookstore gave a mini-talk about "What Self- and Independently Published Authors Need to Know about Dealing with Bookstores." The main speaker was successful author Ann Hood who spoke about "How to Write Through the Land of Sorrow." She was so funny and honest and open as she talked about the sudden death of her five-year-old daughter and how she turned to knitting as a way to work through her grief and get back her writing mojo. The more she spoke, the more a little bell went off in my head. It was then I realized I had read her essay on the subject in Real Simple Magazine. As sad as her story was, it was also incredibly uplifting, but what I took away from her talk had little to do with grief and everything to do with patience and tenacity. I don't doubt for a minute she has some innate talent that we mere mortals lack. And I don't doubt that she's had some luck and some people along the way that believed in her. But she wrote and wrote and wrote and it just reinforced for me how much time this will take. I think sometimes, when you tell people you wrote a book, they wonder why it's not in the bookstore and you haven't quit your day job and been on the Oprah show, as if the act in and of itself realizes your dream. That's like saying I deserve a gold medal in swimming because I actually got in the pool. Although my hero, MKA, is so prolific she generates a best-seller a year, Ann, no slouch in the best-seller department herself, will take two years to write a book, and when her daughter died she didn't write at all for two years. Ann did touch on the advice MKA gave me and the inspiration for the name of this blog: she said you have to sit in the chair and write. And that's what I'm going to do -- walk the walk, talk the talk, and sit in the chair. You know, maybe I won't even talk the talk. Maybe I'll just post blogs and wait until I can say I'm a published author. I'd like to think my first book has potential. Is it perfect? Hell no. But I found an editor to work with me to make it better (more on that in a later post). I hope my second book will be better and my third better than that, and one day when I've honed my craft, learned some lessons and weathered some rejections I can go back to that first book and say "I know what I need to do now to make it better." I may not go to another AWC meeting. Not sure it's for me. I think the median age was around sixty; not much older than me to be sure but most of my friends will tell you I can act like I'm eighteen. Folks looked so earnest. They had their pads and pens with them in the event words of wisdom were imparted that would make their writing dreams come true. And though I was inspired by the speaker today, rather than sit my butt in a seat in a dim auditorium at Dekalb Perimeter College, I think I'll sit in this chair right here. And write.

In August of last year, I stumbled across a website called authonomy.com. It's a site out of the U.K. and sponsored by Harper Collins publishers. Basically, folks wanting to become authors or better writers can upload their manuscripts to this community of writers and readers and get critiques, feedback, support and advice. There are over 5,000 books on the site and new people are joining every day. There's a rating system whereby your book can move up the ranks. If you read and comment on a lot of books, it helps your rating. If you put highly-rated books on your "shelf" it helps your rating. And if a lot of people put your book on their "shelf" it really helps your rating. The prize, as it were, is a chance to have your work reviewed by the HC editorial board. This happens at the end of every month when the top five rated books are given gold medals and removed from the fray and make their way toward the coveted "editor's desk". The site has come under some criticism for books seeming to move up the ranks based, not on the strength of the writing but, on the writer's ability to get a lot of folks to back them; alliances are formed. The other criticism is that not many books actually get published and there are rumors that the site is actually of most benefit to self publishing concerns. I did read recently of a woman who was found on the site by an Avon/Harper Collins editor who was out trolling. I read parts of her book and it was very, very good. She got a three book deal, but she's the rare exception.
Having said all that, my greatest joy on the site has come from the friendships I've made; three in particular. Because this site is based in the U.K., most of the people on the site are, as you might expect, English, which is just fine with me. I am after all, a self-admitted anglophile. All of these folks came into my orbit because either I read their book or they read mine. We struck up a conversation and carried it off the site. Now we email one another on an almost daily basis.
First came David Blackdene (his pen name). Even though I'm trying to break into the chick lit market, I do appreciate a good thriller. I've read all of the books in the Vince Flynn/Mitch Rapp series. I absolutely loved David's book "Don't Look Back." He has created a strong main character and his book has action, suspense and a dash of sex. He lives in Northern England with his family and his book takes place in and around his actual home county. He's not a chick lit sort of guy, but he's seriously funny and off the charts nice. A big hiker, he can be found outdoors most days, climbing the hills around his home with his wife, daughters and border collie, Moss. His wife and daughter Emma have both read my book and been terrifically supportive.
Next I found Lisa Halpin, or rather she found me. She read the chapters of my book that I had downloaded to authonomy then immediately messaged me that I was cruel not to let her read the ending. I emailed her the entire manuscript and then settled in to read her book, "Someone Else Not Me." I could barely put it down. I fell in love with it and her. Though I'm extremely jealous of her talent, I consider her my Irish sister from another mother. We just "get" one another. She sent me a beautiful leather journal; I sent her son a superhero cape. Already, I can tell you I would walk through fire for her. Fortunately, so far her "down" moments and mine have come at times when we were able to prop one another up. She's a keeper.
And lastly, I met Mark Darlington. Oh, Mark. What to say about this fella. I stumbled upon his manuscript, "The Story Maker" (co-written with Abi Burlingham; more about her in a later post) and had never read anything like it. It was somewhat metaphysical, somewhat stream of consciousness and wholey unique. I saw in his bio that he was a photographer and followed the link to his website. He had a beautiful black and white photograph of Tower Bridge in London for sale, so I emailed him immediately to ask if I might purchase a copy. Tower Bridge has sentimental value to me and figures into my second book (a work in progress). From that moment on, a friendship was formed. His emails always bring a smile to my face; he can be funny, deadly serious, irreverent, humble and has a way of looking at the world unlike anyone I've every met. After a recent email, where he went in great detail on the sights and smells of a small shop where he grabbed a bite to eat, it hit me. His words do the same thing as his photographs: they totally captivate your senses and put you right in the moment. They make you feel. He is totally devoid of bullshit and I love him for that.
I've always said I believe people come into our lives for a reason. We may not always know right away what that reason is, but with time it will be revealed. I know these three came into my life to help me become not only a better writer, but a better person.

The title of this blog comes from some very good advice, a quite successful writer gave me. She said, "Glue your butt to the chair until you have a breakthrough or a breakdown."
To tell you the the truth, it was the mantra that got me through NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month, where insane people attempt to write 50,000 words of a new book in 30 days). With a trip to a family wedding in Delaware at Thanksgiving (and no, I can't really write in a moving vehicle), I was stressing about how I would ever meet the deadline. On my worst day I didn't write at all and on my best day I sat in the chair for hours pumping out 9,000 words. I'm not saying they were all "good" words; in fact at one point I was ready to just put words on a page and sort out the order later. But when the final bell sounded I had an incredible feeling of accomplishment, a neat t-shirt, a congratulatory dinner from my husband and a good start on a chick lit book I think could be interesting.
I try to do a little something every day toward this dream of mine. Today, it's starting this blog. Some days it's editing, emailing other writers, entering a contest or reading and critiquing other struggling writers on authonomy.com (more about my love/hate relationship with that site in a later post).
I was in the newspaper business for over 25 years and was surrounded by talented writers. I can only guess how crazy they must think me: a designer trying to become an author. I tell myself I'm new to this and I can only get better if I work at it. I'm on no timetable except my own. I know the publishing world is changing a lot and it's a tough nut to crack for a new writer, but hopefully there will always be agents, and publishers and readers out there. At the end of the day, a good story well told is my goal.