Let this be a lesson to you!

This is a lesson in letting opportunity slip through your fingers, your little calloused, carpel-tunneled fingers.

I'm a fairly notorious blog lurker. I like to comment on thought-provoking blogs, or even silly ones. One of the blogs I read regularly is Murderati. The writers are all interesting and have good information about writing, about publishing, and about how their lives intrude/enhance their work. Two weeks ago, Toni McGee Causey kicked off a two-week journey through people's workspaces. She shared pictures of her work area with descriptions, and invited 'Rati readers to do the same.

How could I refuse?

The Gods-honest truth is, I write all over my house, with the exception of my bathroom (um, no) and my son's bedroom (teenager, smelly, um, double-no). So I should have sent this photo:

This is the recliner in the family room. I spend a lot of time thinking and writing, writing and thinking, here. Usually, Turner Classic Movies is in the background.

Or, I could have sent in this photo. This is my very pretty desk with my writing books (Bird by Bird, On Writing, The Writer's Book of Days), a cute little lamp and my printer. I write here sometimes, although I can't really write in the mornings because the sun is too bright and I'm too cheap to buy a shade for the window.

Also, this guy stands by the fireplace behind me and he kinda creeps me out. A friend "gifted" him to me years ago and he didn't have any mane or tail, so he looked like a sheep. I bought doll hair and ribbons from the craft store and made him look like a horse again - a holiday horse, but I don't know what to do with him now. So far, all of my friends have avoided being "gifted."

I ended up sending this one, since it's the one place I truly feel my butt is in the chair and I'm working. I gave Toni a description of what's on the table, which I would repeat here, but then you might not go over to her entry on Murderati today and see my picture and blurb, mixed in with all the other 'Rati characters. If I'd known I could submit multiple pictures, I'd have added this one.

The puppy divides his time between trying to get me to play with him and looking like this. So sad.

Here's where I had a moment of true, epic failure: LOOK AT MY COMPUTER SCREEN in the picture. It's my Facebook page. My freakin' Facebook page.

Why didn't I have my website? My book cover? Why didn't it scream "This is Gayle Carline and what she writes?" Oh, oh, and to top it off, I didn't ANYWHERE mention that I'm the AUTHOR OF FREEZER BURN.

Gaaahhhh, what the hell is wrong with me?!?!?!?!

Learn, Tadpoles. Learn from my mistakes. Never miss an opportunity to tell the world about your work.

Does the shoe fit?

Before you read today's post, go to Murderati and read Toni McGee Causey's post, about trying to do things in our lives that don't fit our fundamental natures. By the way, if you write, and especially if you write mysteries, you should be tuning into the Murderati blog every day. It's a great group of authors with interesting things to say.

Today, Toni is describing a meeting with her friend who has become a vegan and looks great; Toni wonders if it's just that easy, but in the end decides it's not who she is. Being a vegan doesn't "fit" her.

This started me thinking about characters, on the stage, screen and page, and how we complain when they are not real, not fully dimensional human beings. In other words, they do/say things that don't "fit" them. I struggle in my own writing, between trying to make a character do and say the things I need for the plot and keeping them true to the personality I've given them. I'm afraid, if I take a misstep, readers will call me on it. Mean readers.

This is possibly why Peri is 50 years old and not 30. In my youth, I tried on a lot of things that didn't fit me - scuba diving, skiing, marriages to the wrong men. By my late forties, I was finally wise enough to decline suggestions to go skydiving and river rafting, because I knew what I liked, and neither tossing myself from an airplane nor being tossed into white water did it for me. At 50, Peri knows what fits her. She likes running and old movies and her independence… although life does intervene to make her question her choices.

By juxtaposition, I'd like you to take a look at a book I just read, The Belly Dancer by DeAnna Cameron. I don't normally read romances, but not only is DeAnna a friend of mine, the cover and jacket blurb was so intriguing that I had to have a copy. Her protagonist is a young girl, a new wife, who is desperate to join the elite Victorian society of Chicago. But what she thinks she wants doesn't fit her. I liked the story, even when I wanted to shake Dora by the shoulders and tell her to stay away from those awful society women. The story rings true, even while the character is being false (to herself). BTW, good job, DeAnna!

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the subject. Do you prefer a main character who is still trying to figure out what they want in life and is tossed about by the storyline, or do you want your protagonist to be the stable one in the story, the person you can count on when everything else seems to be falling apart?

Perhaps some of you can even extend this discussion on your own blogs… we'll make a chain post!