Hi all, aside from the usual writing related music, I am keeping myself accountable. I’m querying out the book again this week. So, not only is it daring music for my characters, it’s music to dare me to do it too. Even if I totally talk about them instead…

There have been times I have been forced to take a life break, leaving behind the writing world for periods of time. Days when I thought it might be over, or that this wasn’t enough. No matter how many times I wrote this series, no matter what draft of the title, one thing remained. If I went too long without it, the voices in my head would start popping up in the absence. A funny story overheard, a song on the radio. The character it belongs to would come to mind. Woods, Tweety, and Sly all live rent free, and appear. Woods is the most dangerous, because he trained Tweety on one key phasing, so if it randomly comes to me around a song, it triggers both Tweety and me. Let’s just say that he earns his book boyfriend potential future. But also? Every time I think I am done, or that this isn’t worth writing for you all anymore because I am not good enough for the story? Every time I reread it, it is never chapter by chapter. Even edits are handled with care because I know this story inside and out… Yet, I still get hooked deep in it, and read it from wherever to the end. If I still fall in love with it knowing everything about it, I wonder what it will do to you readers who don’t live in that world yet.

The biggest dare of them all, the one that has already proven it can happen over and over again…

Dare To Fall In Love – Brent Bourgeois

At first guess, this feels like a Tweety song. Tweety doesn’t talk that bluntly about herself, but there are good points. This one is more Bebe, maybe Malta. The side characters you remember for their ways. They inspire with wilder take charge moments, and for me? The spoken word intro is the booster to remind me to keep striving. Even if this brand is small, and I only promote the one series mostly, I know how I write. The what I’ve got thing. I just need one to see what I see and take a chance on a wild card.

The Wild One – Suzi Quatro

Woods lives in my head, louder and louder with each book. He wants to be heard, seen, dares you to want to know him. To be a musical book boyfriend. All he asks of me? You can hear it in this song, a song he definitely would play as a challenge and sing along too.

If You Dare – AC/DC

This next one? Feels like it’s something played about Tweety, but it’s also the thing I need to work on believing. More than once, the Tweety that was growing and shaping in the back of my head gave me the confidence to follow her example. I was far shyer than she ever started as. And when she gave me the idea to do better in my real life, her fictional life grew stronger. Tweety grew into a character that went from being afraid of people to being able to do the hard things and command a room’s attention. I am nowhere near that, but even now? There are days I think a book tour or convention table would be doable and make me happy. So I aim just that far, and whenever I get closer, I aim for another higher goal. Because it’s intimidating if you look at the top of the mountain from the starting point. But if you break it into “I’ll be proud of myself if I just get there”, a visible spot that seems far but not to far? That helps. They say something like a journey of 1,000 miles starts with one step. Keeping check points helps out. Because there were times when I thought I had no skills to write one book worth reading. 15 years later? I have multiple books and characters worth reading. I can look back and see how far I have come. And when I look forward? It’s still a little scary, but it’s not as far away as it used to be…

Confidence – ¡Mayday!

And finally, one from me to you. The simple fact that you keep reading, keep checking in? Tells me there’s something worth it in here. So, it’s the year I promised myself to get out there and get it done one way or another.

I will dare… how about you?

I Will Dare – The Replacements

A personal bonus? If you’ve followed me, you’ve heard or seen me use Elvis a lot. My mom loved him, and could find an Elvis song for any mood. This one? Yes it feels like a kids bop kinda song, but for me? Feels like this is the right path forward, because my biggest supporter has a song for that…

All it takes is one person to believe in you when you don’t fully trust it. I don’t feel alone here, and that’s not just because I have a lot of loud opinionated characters in my head who want to come out to the world at large.

Confidence – Elvis Presley