A good time to get back to basics

 October 25, 2020

Earlier today I started making the rounds in the Facebook groups to promo the release of The Quest. Before I began posting, I took some time to go down my timeline and see who was up to what. That led down a bit of a rabbit hole, but I feel a lot better for the trip. What I learned was quite a few writers have had a 2020 that echos, and equals, mine. 

As I type this blog, The Quest has just gone live and I'm fighting with Amazon to get the re-worked manuscript of A Hero's Bargain to upload correctly. The Amazon system continually reverts to the older manuscript - very annoying to say the least. It'll get worked out or not offer it there, but it proves Amazon is nothing but free publicity for me. My Apple sales outstrip Amazon about 10 to 1. 

It's time for me to get a story or two into development, republish the rest of my backlist (both as KC and Rayne), and it's time for me to go back to basics with character information sheets. Having written seventy books, you'd think those sheets would be obsolete, but I need the refresher course. The character's physical traits, mannerisms, values, expectations, flaws, the tragedy of his life are all detailed on the sheet for reference. It builds the characters in the writer's consciousness before the opening lines are typed. I also have a sheet of compatibility points that comes in handy for developing the characters. 

I'm excited about this back to basics approach. I've been mired in caregiving, winding down my career at the day job, and grieving the loss of several people I was close to for too long. And let us not forget the pain in the ass the Year of Our Lord Two-thousand Twenty has been. 

It's probably enough fodder for an entire library. Surely I can get three stories out of it. Stay tuned. 

 _*_*_*_*_*_*_

 KC Kendricks

My home on the web- Between the Keys: 

http://kckendricks.blogspot.com

Visit my bookshelf at: 

https://kckendricks.blogspot.com/p/the-bookshelf-of-kc-kendricks-and-rayne.html

Social media links:

twitter.com/kckendricks

pinterest.com/kckendricks/boards

instagram.com/kc_kendricks

facebook.com/kckendricks

Life through the eyes of my black Lab, Greenbrier Smokey Deuce: deucesday.blogspot.com

My country life at Holly Tree Manor: hollytreemanor.blogspot.com

Words I don't want to say

August 20, 2017

August has not been a productive month. It's been unseasonably cool, too. Not once in this month have I been brave enough to jump in my little pool and soak in seventy-degree water. I'm paying the price for that at the moment. The PH levels are all wonky. To keep them stabilized, you need to get in the pool and move the water. I dropped two cups of baking soda in this morning in the hope that the water temp will reach eighty today. 

Like the weather, I've been unseasonably quiet. The people around me have demanded my time leaving the people in my head unable to tell their stories. I've seriously considered running away from home. I think about how great it would be to take my laptop to a motel room for a weekend. I doubt I would actually write anything but just getting away from the constant barrage of phone calls and the subsequent time-sucking acts of dealing with problems not my own would be wonderful.

Do I sound selfish? Too bad. 

It's time for me to put my foot down. 

Time is critical for a writer to actually write. If one is at the nursing home visiting one's mother for thirty minutes every day, on the phone with one's stepfather thirty minutes every day, and on the phone with a different chatty friend for thirty minutes every day, that's an hour and a half. Walking the dog adds another half hour. Cooking and other household chores add up to at least an hour. So we're up to three hours. Full-time job? I get up at six a.m. to prepare and don't get home until five p.m. That's eleven hours which puts us at fourteen hours a day, Monday through Thursday.  Friday evening is bowling. When I finally get the computer around eight or eight-thirty p.m., I'm too exhausted to focus. 

I spend my days doing things for everyone else. Even my day job is all about aiding people in crisis. If I'm to continue being a writer, it's time for me to go back to basics. It's time to write first and allow the people around me to stop being lazy. Because that's what it is. They're too lazy to solve their own problems. It's too easy to call me. I'm too available. That's ends today.

It has to end today. It has to because the last thing I ever want to say to anyone is, "I used to be a writer."

KC Kendricks
www.kckendricks.com
www.twitter.com/kckendricks