Life among the Dandelions: Another great thing about being a writer

To follow up from my last post, I discovered another great thing about being a writer. Being a writing means never having to dig out the dandelions. Really, why would I? What would be my motivation? Do I have a character who is a gardener and I want to feel the earth under my nails? - not! Do I have an evil antagonist who is concocting wine made from pesticide contaminated dandelions to take over the world? (hmmmm... maybe). Writers have to prioritize and dandelion digging just doesn't make it on my writers to-do list. Besides, if I dug them out then I'd never win that World's Tallest Dandelion award that I've been preparing for. I am still on the look out for an international level competition to test if my concoction of crushed up chick peas is the world's best humous. Do you see a pattern here? Blog post on embracing the inner narcissist to follow ;-j.


Here are two pictures of my young neighbours Thomas and Claire standing, in my front yard, beside what is a contender for the world's tallest dandelion. They've got that 'seriously? giant dandelions?' look. Claire and Thomas are great neighbours. Not only is there a constant lemonade stand outside their house, they routinely greet me at the door with a bouquet of said dandelions.

As I sat in the blistering rays of the sun today, dandelions growing unhindered around me, I read Fire in the Fiction by Donald Maass aka the God of Agents. That's what we call him, he probably calls himself Donald or something equally humble. And he's currently being stalked, pursued, er, professionally courted by Jocosa of the Earrings.  This and his first book Writing the Breakout Novel are must reads for writers at all stages of their journey.


I'm two chapters in and lots of gold there. He's got me thinking about my protag, my antag and my side kick characters. Here's my favourite line from the introduction: "It disappoints me when authors perpetuate the myth that writing is magic." That's what we've been talking about here at Three Dead Moths ... Writing is about craft, wrangling your talent into story, butt to chair time, and occasionally stopping to smell the dandelions.