Well, I obviously haven’t been putting a lot of time into updating this blog lately, now have I? It’s going to happen soon, though, I promise. Encountered a road block earlier this week when I spilled ice tea all over my computer. Horror of horrors! After a very frantic phone call to a friend in California who’s a computer whiz, I removed the battery, turned the computer upside down and pointed two fans at it on high for 8 hours. Followed that with submerging the computer in a bag of rice to draw out the moisture. Three days later, hallelujah, the computer lives!
In the meantime, computer-less (which is strangely like losing a limb), I’ve finally had the motivation (read: nothing to do without the computer) to get my hind end over to the town archives (which is really, really cool) to start doing research for a historical fiction novel idea that’s been taking up space in my cranium for a while. Not going to divulge the secrets of the novel here on the blog, but I’ll let you know that I know quite a lot about prostitution in the early American West now!
I have scads more research to do (which is a bit overwhelming), but I am making some definite headway, tackling the information subject by subject. Historical fiction is HARD, folks. A writer can take some liberties, but not too many. It’s important to get all the little details right, down to the way interiors of houses looked during the selected time period, to what people wore, to how people spoke. But on the other hand, there’s something really cool about taking history and making it into something new. I’ve got tons of ideas buzzing around in my head now that were inspired by true events that I’ve begun to learn about.
The hardest part, of course, is writing. Getting those ideas to translate into words and sentences and paragraphs that sound coherent. And writing a lot of those words and sentences and paragraphs. Which is a stretch for a journalist who is used to writing stories in 30 inches or less! But I have lots of free time these days and I’m itching to be productive. Hopefully all this hard work pays off!
In other news, summer has arrived in earnest in southwestern Montana. It’s been pretty hot here the past week (mid-80s, which yes, is freakin’ hot by my definition). And so lilac season has ended (sadness). But not without some photos:
Remember to stop and smell the lilacs!
The Morning District 