It's been a long few weeks, Lurkdom. I've reread my WIP about six times and now have 13 pages of revision notes to implement. In addition to the crazy amount of notes, I also have a 3 page long task list of things this revision must accomplish. My revision process will hit the triple digits hours-wise. The first thing on my task list was to create a timeline of events. This step may sound like a procrastinator's task, but when your story includes a ticking clock device, it's important to make sure that everything works within that time frame. (It's also important that events that happen on a Friday actually do happen on a Friday.) What PHOENIX RISING currently looks like. Here's a snapshot of my timeline as it currently stands in my WIP. Not all the dates/days are specified within the story, so I had to guess a few things. The problem with that is that there's way too many unknowns. Then you develop the problem of large gaps in time. (If you don...

Zombie Thur sdays is a weekly feature with guest blogger, Miranda. You can read more about her here . Hello! And welcome to another edition of Zombie Thursday! Today I want to profile another cool actor. He's not especially famous for playing a zombie, but he is incredibly famous. He's been in over 90 films and television shows, and even though you have most definitely seen him, you may not even know or realize who he is! Around my birthday back in February, I was watching the Disney Channel. I'm a huge Disney fan and watch it rather frequently. I'm not embarrassed by this fact. It just so happened that one of my favorite movies of all time was on, and one that features a zombie! A zombie in a Disney movie? On the Disney Channel? Not as strange or out of place as you might think (Disney has produced some f@*ked up movies... I love them! But they are messed up. Something Wicked this Way Comes, anyone? But I digress...) Anyway! The movie I'm referring to is Hocus Pocu...

Dear Blog, This is to let you know that you and I won't be seeing each other as much over the next few weeks. Please know this has nothing to do with you, but everything to do with revisions. I'm five weeks behind my self-inflicted revision schedule. (My original plan was to use EdMo to revise my NaNoWriMo '11 project.) Don't worry, Blog. This isn't goodbye and I'll come back when something inspiring strikes. Most likely this will be when I have more brain power to do so. Love, Alicia

If you've been following me on Twitter or have seen my life via Facebook, you know the following things: I'm still unemployed, I'm still revising, and I've developed an unhealthy addiction to several Facebook games. The first thing isn't related to the last two things, though I'm using my unemployment-ness to my advantage. Example: A revision that would have taken me several months of nights only took a month and a half to complete. True, it could've taken less time if I didn't play as many rounds of Tetris humanly possible, but revisions are hard. Let me repeat: revisions are hard. Now that I've completed revisions on my contemporary, it's time for me to put my focus back on my urban fantasy. This is harder to do than I originally thought, partially because I'm approaching revision burnout. The other reason is shifting gears from one world to another is a challenge. The thing that sucks is that I have to revise: the urban fantasy wi...

Zombie Thur sdays is a weekly feature with guest blogger, Miranda. You can read more about her here . Writer's Block. Terrible, horrible writer's block. I've been plagued for weeks. Have you ever had so much stuff going on in your mind that you feel like you creatively have room for no more stuff? That's how I felt all last month. I'm still on a bit of a block. And as someone who loves writing, it really sucks. Since most people who read this blog are writerly types, what do you guys do to get past writer's block and periods of non-creation? This problem is a real first for me. Thank you for your patience with my absence! I've been thinking of things to write for weeks, and it hasn't been easy. I've had some pretty long and heated Walking Dead debates at work, but unfortunately those topics would be so riddled with spoilers that they're something I couldn't even talk about here on the blog (although contact me privately for some good old fas...