Taking on to much

Last night I was up till just a little before one in the morning painting. So far the painting I'm working on is terning out wonderful, If I could find my camera I would add a photo of it. I was a bad artist and neglected it for far to long, But I know why. I just didn't like the way it was going, and I had other things to work on. I have my book, Helix, and two books I was critiquing, (down to one, I finished what I was given for one.), a sick husband the past few days, and three sons to care for. To say the least my hands are full, to tell the truth I love it. I love my family, taking care of them is important to me. My husband understands at the same time I need to paint and write, it is part of who I am. Getting to critique and being critiqued I like a lot. To help some one polish there own work so they can put out the best book they can makes me feel good, and to get that in return helps me look at my words with new eyes. I have taken on to much, but I wouldn't be me If I hadn't. warning to others, watch how much you take on, don't let your side project get in the way of what is important. Be it family or your work, everything you do is important in one way or another. Sorry this post is so short, but I have somewhere to be with the boys. Plus there is still plenty of day left to blog. Talk to you all soon :)

To do or not to do? That is my question.

So I have posted my first draft prologue and my first draft first chapter. The thing is my critiquer said my prologue isn't needed, the first part of my first chapter dose the work for the prologue. On the other hand my sister and one of my best friends think its awesome and want to read more. Now I stand at a cross rode, do I keep my prologue and move forward with my book, or do I make it into a short story for something else and move forward with my book. I don't know what to do. I like my prologue and if I don't use it for my book then I want to use it for something. my prologue is in posts: part one is in Information overload/ Nuclear war and then Prologue part 2. Terns out I didn't post my first chapter, funny. I have lots to think about, I guess we will see how it terns out. Here is the first part of my first chapter (first draft). This snippet should do.

chapter one

My name is Sora, named after one of my family, I was 
born the day the doors opened. So my birthday goes 
unnoticed every year, which is fine with me. I never 
have understood birthday celebrations, it's only the 
passing of another year. Besides age is nothing but 
a number, its what is in your heart and mind. You 
can be 45 and still be just like a child. How you 
carry yourself, the way you think, the path in life 
you choose, everything you say and do, we are our a
ctions not our age. Like my dear uncle Rasputin, he 
throws fits like a child. This year I turn nineteen, 
no mater what happens I know I have a job to do. 
Take my father's place and lead our kind into battle 
for the future of all. Most start there training 
when finished with school, but my uncle has kept me a
way from it all “for the memory of your father” he 
keeps saying. So when I take over I'll only have a 
short time to train with the others. None of them 
think I can do the job, mainly because I've never 
trained with them. What not a single one of them 
knows is, I have a special place no one else knows 
about, my very own oasis I spend all my spare time 
in.
   This week is the festival that is thrown every 
year in celebration of the day the door opened, 
the day our thousand year imprisonment underground 
ended. Let me explain how we got here, how the 
human race ran deep in the earth from our own 
mistakes, from the destruction we knew we would 
do. How human kind changed on the genetic level, 
and why we now have yet another war coming. Can 
human kind live without war or violence? Will we 
ever find peace and happiness, or one day destroy 
everyone and everything on this planet. We almost 
did over a thousand years ago, why not again. I 
intend to make sure it never happens.
   You see in 2009 some very wealthy people in 
congress and the white house got together and 
decided a nuclear war was coming, and that they 
would be the first to strike. The U.S. army struck 
the first blow 9-11-12, an anniversary of a 
terrorist strike against the U.S. The first nuclear 
bomb launched only 13 days later. It was only a 
matter of time with the way the world was going. 
Greedy government types taking all they can while 
homeless people fight for food, sleep in boxes and 
die from simple sickness out in the cold. Fat 
slobs watching this thing called television 
stuffing their faces with who knows what, men 
beating their wives, children dying in the 
streets. That is the world we left behind, the 
world that destroyed its self.
  With the help of engineers and scientists the 
U.S. built massive underground cities. Every 
city had a main square with shops, restaurants, 
game stores, playgrounds and a park with trees, 
flowers and a pond. we could grow trees and 
flowers and food because we have artificial 
sunlight. We have a public library stocked with 
thousands of books. I spend a lot of time there. 
Off from that in equal rooms like the square is 
ample lodging not only for the people locked 
away, but for the ones to be born. The doors 
closed early in 2012, months before the war began.

Information overload/ Nuclear War

So today I have bin working on my prologue. At first I wasn't going to do one, but one of the people critiquing my work thought it would be good to fallow a couple through a nuclear explosion, or something having to do with the war that started the 1000 year stay underground. I have chosen to do two parts, which I will post at the end of this post.
Needing to describe how the explosion looks, what happens to the surrounding aria and the people in it. Now I have video overload. I know there is a lot of information out, in may forms but holy cow. Type in just a few words and your smacked in the face with a tone of videos and documents. To see the charred bodies in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the buildings completely leveled, and the pain of the survivors was hart wrenching. I watched a video with a man that survived, they had to peal card skin off his back, one of his arms the skin was hanging off, he spent 18 months in the hospital. I watched another video with a son clinging to his father, the both of them dead, their bodies looked mummified.
The thing is there are videos and article about how we are heading for world war III, only with more devastating outcomes. Are we as a race on the fast track to destruction? Could part of my fiction become reality? What do all of you think? How do you feel about the state of our country? Do you believe we are bound for WWIII, or is it a lot of scared end of the world scenario creeping into the mind of otherwise sane people?

That being said I would love feedback on my prologue, its long so I am only posting the first half. this half isn't as good as the second half, but I cant give it all away at once can I.

Helix War of 3031
prologue


“Mr. President, can I have a moment of your time?” Mrs. Pickett knows he wont listen, but she has to try one more time.
“Yes, of course. Give me five minutes.” The President is very busy these days. Planing a war, making shore as many people as passable are safe deep under the earth's surface, all while still keeping the peace would take a lot out of any man. He would have little time for his family if they where still home, he barley eats any more, five minutes is a lot to ask of him. 
“Grace, this isn't the best time, the Secretary of Defense is waiting in my office.”
“I know, that’s why we are here, this office has bin empty for months. I had to come and say good bye.” Tears are starting to swell in her eyes. He takes a handkerchief from his breast pocket dabbing at the tears gently, making shore to not mess her makeup.
“I know, I'm going to miss you too. I can't go with you, no matter how many times you ask my place is here. Our country needs me, I can't just run away from my responsibilities.” Fighting back tears of his own, trying to be strong for her sake, he holds her close and kisses her tenderly.
“If you stay you could die, I don't wont to live in a world without you. If we don't win the war I'll never see you again. I'll stay here with you, I'll die, I don't care as long as I'm with you!” She realizes she has raised her voice to much, regaining her composure she takes a deep breath. 
“Don't worry about me Grace, I'll be fine. We will win the war, and then we can be together again. Just give us some time.” He has to lie, if he doesn't she will stay and die with him. The united stats is out matched, but he is going down fighting.
“If that's true, why can't I stay with you?” Her makeup is running down her cheeks now, she can't hold the tears back any longer.
“Grace look at me, you know I love you, and that is why you have to go. Put my mind at ease and get into the Washington colony. With you there safe I can do my job, and when it is all over you can come back to me.”
“I will go my love, just know I leave my hart with you.” They kiss, a long and passionate kiss reluctant to let go of one another. He gives her his monogrammed handkerchief to whip the tears from her eyes.
“Hold onto it Grace, you can give it back when I see you again.” Kissing him one more time, straitening her jacket and smoothing her hair she go's to the door. She stops for just a moment with her hand on the doorknob, but she knows she has to go, if she terns around she will stay, and she needs to make it to the colony before the doors close.
 He stands in the hallway watching her leave, his hart pulling at him to fallow her. He knows he will never see her again, or his wife and kids, but it is his duty to stay and fight with the others, and die like a true soldier.

Critiquing

So as a new author writing my first book I had never bin critiqued, and had never critiqued someone else. Now I find its another part of the writing process I like a lot.
The more I write and the more I talk to other writers, getting feed back from two of them, I know this is what I want to do.
I have only critiqued one time, I'm still working on it. It is a lot like reading any other time, only you get to tell the author what you think. Say "this confused me" or "I really liked this part", and "this could be better if you...". I didn't think I could do it at first. How could I tell someone I didn't like what they did here, or this doesn't sound right. I felt like that wasn't me. When I got to doing it, I realized I could and I liked it. The book I am critiquing right now is very good, I'm enjoying working with the author. our dialogue is helpful to me, she is going to critique for me as well. I feel having more then one opinion will be good for me. but just two maybe three people will work for me. different people will have different ideas and thoughts, so I get more insight.
My first two chapters have bin critiqued by one person, and I'm waiting for the other to be done going over it. The feed back I got from the first person really helped me see my words from a different perspective. Not as the author but as a reader. Parts I was unsure about, dose this fit here or this doesn't sound quite right, and hearing what she thought of those parts made it clear for me. some need to go, some need to change, and some are perfect. To hear that I capture the reader in the first sentence amazed me, made me feel confident. I didn't work on my book for over a week because nothing came to mind, with the first for chapters done and not being shore about them I couldn't move forward. Now I can't wait to work on it, but I have to. I want to wait for my other critique partner to finish, then with both of there ideas I can make my book even better.
I am happy I started writing this book, I had waited long enough. Now with a better idea of how to go about writing certain parts I look at my book with possibilities. I think critiquing in a wonderful thing, helping the author to move forward with there work, to see it in a new light. thank you to my two wonderful critiquing partners!

what I have lerned about my self

Okay, I've said it before but this is my first blog and had no idea how to go about things. I was going to scrap this blog all together and start over, or not blog at all. After talking to some new friends, and reading some tips for blogging I think I can do this. I found an agents blog (thanx to a new friend) that I think would be help for any aspiring writers http://www.rachellegardner.com/ also http://warriorwriters.wordpress.com/ has some grate tips. I have found both helpful. Not saying that now I am a blog expert, but knowing a little more shore helps.

I knew writing a book wasn't going to be easy, but until I started I had no idea what I was getting into. With three young kids at home (8, 2, &1) I don't have a lot of time, but I knew a long time ago this was something I wanted to do. It doesn't mater if I don't get this book published, what maters is that I'm happy with my work and enjoying what I'm doing. I'm an artist so I have always looked at what I do that way, at the same time being my own worst enemy. Just because I don't like something I have done does not mean it isn't good. So now I am taking my time, and figuring out who I am as a writer. I paint, tattoo, design most of the tattoos I do, and have written a lot of poetry, none of this compares to writing a book. I am creating hole new people, a new world, a different life from our own, I find it to be magic. Most of the time when I site down to write I'm excited, unless of course nothing is coming to mind. I know this post isn't very long, but learning that in my mind I can do this is note worthy to me.
I would love to here from other writers. When you started did you feel like maybe you weren't meant  to be a writer, that maybe you where wrong? How did you come to realize you where just being over critical of your work or self?

What is Helix about

This is my first attempt at a blog, and at writing a book.
My book Helix-War of 3031 is in the beginning stage, wont you come on a literary journey with me?

My heroine Sora. All she wants is to run Helix in a way that would make her father proud, and be ready when the war comes. She has to save humanity, and the advanced humans she calls her people. Her father was a strong, wise, and loving man to say the least. Her uncle murdered him in front of her without knowing, her mother killed her self after that, leaving her uncle to care for her. She wants to kill her uncle for what he did, but he is the last living family she has left. A prophecy seen bye one of the first generation of advanced humans, one of there own kind will rise up with an army to destroy all humans and devastate the world. She is his direct descendant, it is her duty and right to stop this from happening. She takes over Helix on here 19th birthday as her father wished, but no one believes she can do the job. She was kept from training in Helix, but that doesn't mean she didn't train, now she has to show them that. She has to finally let someone know who she really is, the parts of her she hides will be her greatest strength when she embraces them all. lucky for her the right person just came into her life. what is the strange feeling she gets from her lover's brother, what is it he's hiding? With new knowledge of her past, the possibility of strong allies, and a new found love. Can she keep humans from knowing about her kind, while fighting a war in plain cite? Can she find the true potential she holds, can she become the saver her father new she could be, come find out with me.