April's Blue Funk

I'm in a little bit of a blue funk. Not sure why.A number of reasons probably.

I'm alone this week. Well me and my cats. But alone. You'd think that would inspire me to write a lot of new material but so far it has not. Still a lot more days to come though, so I might get out of my funk enough to work on it.

Months ago I entered the beginning of a novella in a writing contest. After I entered I subsequently contracted three novellas making me ineligible for the contest, but because I contracted after the entry date they allowed my entry to remain. Too bad. I got majorly sacked by two of my three judges. One judged loved it. One judge liked the hero, but hated the heroine, and the third judge just...hated the whole thing. Only my second contest for this story and I did get better scores for the last one but honestly it is discouraging. It does remind me why I really hate contests and think for the most part they are a waste of time and energy to read the judges comments. They are great for getting in front of a particular final judge you want, but if you don't final...don't bother reading the comments and scores. That's my advice and I am sure many others would argue with me. I've judged plenty of contests myself and also been a contest chair for contests and believe me the variety of opinions and judging capabilities varies widely.

I have two stories under submission and I have heard nothing on either of them. Patience is not my virtue, I freely admit it and as my friend, Ava, would say, I have been stalking my email. To no results. All it has done is make me convinced one of them is definitely a rejection. One she flat out told me to give her until the end of May so I'm not as convinced that is bad news as I am the other story.

I'm sure that is part of my funk, too. I put a lot of sweat and tears into that little short novella and wrote it fast and really worked my brain. I mean to the point where it drained me, my head hurt. So if it is rejected by my editor, it is going to sting. No doubt about it. I created it specifically for a theme series too so if it is rejected I am not sure I could really fix it enough to be sent elsewhere. So yeah, I am getting depressed or should I say pre-depressed since I haven't even been rejected yet.

Of course no one likes a Negative Nellie and I am trying NOT to be but I am pretty sure I am not succeeding very well.

The "real" job is swamped with work right now and it is majorly stressful too which certainly doesn't help.

I've still been avoiding serious work on Sinful. I am allowing the rejections my friend is receiving for her medieval to color my perception of working on Sinful. I freely admit it. The books are nothing alike of course but hers is excellent and is represented by an agent. Mine needs work and is not. Hell I need to add like 40,000 words to it to make a decent word count. Ask me how much I want to do THAT.

I was having fun working on my interracial novella, but now I am doubting myself. I know I shouldn't. I have six contracted works with three different publishers and another publisher where an editor said she loved my writing and would love to see more work from me. So I don't suck.