Daily Archives: August 21, 2007

On my mind

Concerts:

Hannah Montana and the Jonas Brothers are coming to town. Not to be confused with Santa Claus coming to town, although both events could cause the same amount of frenzy around here.

 

Andrew likes the Jonas Brothers. Kyra likes/loves/reveres Hannah Montana/Mylie Cyrus (yes, the offspring of Billy Ray Cyrus for those of you not up on your pop princess factoids–and honestly, I don’t blame you).

 

I’m not worried about content. I know this will be a kid-friendly venue. I took Andrew to the American Idols concert a few years back (the Carrie Underwood/Bo Bice year) and he had fun. It was good, clean fun.

 

The problem: it is also good, clean, LOUD fun. Kyra has very sensitive hearing, which I don’t want to damage. But I did a massive Google search on earplugs and that might be the answer. For all of us, since I’m not wild about the whole head ringing, slightly punch-drunk feeling I have after concerts.

 

Clearly, this is an all or nothing deal. I either take them both, or we don’t go at all. Besides, Kyra already has a concert outfit: “rock star” jeans, a Hannah Montana t-shirt, and hot pink cowboy boots.

 

Revisions:

These are definitely on my mind. Saturday I was, quite honestly, a little scared. It was silly really, because if we make a change and it doesn’t work, we can change it back or do something different.

 

Darcy and I chatted (via IM) on Sunday and that helped. Well, when we weren’t chatting about other things and I wasn’t fielding questions from Kyra (who spent part of that time on my lap–yay wireless keyboard), such as:

  • Do raccoons pee? (Yes.)

  • Does Darcy have a baby in her tummy? (No.)

We went to the dentist yesterday, so Darcy can anticipate questions related to her dental hygiene. (D., you’ve been warned.)

 

One thing I’ve really been thinking about is back story and the when, where, why, how of it. If you’ve read any fiction writing books, spent time near any fiction writing workshop, you’ve heard the conventional wisdom: delete/delay back story.

 

Conventional wisdom isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

 

Our (!) agent has asked us to not only move some back story closer to the start (!) of the novel, but add some in as well. I know. Color me surprised. But I’m starting to see the real possibilities in this. Anyway, by Sunday evening I was in that writing mode where you rub your hands together and cackle gleefully in delight. Kind of scary for those around you, but them’s the breaks.

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Filed under Kids, Writing