FABULOUS FRIDAY BY DONNA FITZGERALD

Its Friday need I say more! Here at the Fitzgerald home we cherish the weekends. It starts when everyone finally comes home usually with big smiles on their faces because it’s whatever you want to do time. The boys usually play the guitars, watch a movie and yes most Fridays its pizza night!

I’m usually at the keyboard writing away or chatting with Talina about plots, characters and sometimes nothing!

Since I live in a home that is always full of music, the steady clicking of the keys on the computer keyboard and chatter, I sometimes wonder if other people could come into our surroundings and function as a unit as well as we do.

The boys will sit just yards away from my writing nook and watch a movie without ever going “hey mama/honey could you stop that racket.” I think they have grown immune to the sound of my fingers tapping along with the ideas flying through my brain and I sit here working away while the background sounds of Bob and Jacob playing anything from tunes from the 80's to Joe Satriani in the garage to watching a fast paced action thriller on the TV. Perfect example they sat down with their dinner last night to Avatar blaring on the big screen and yes EXTRA stereo surround sound while I sat silently in my nook and worked on my WIP. The truth is when the house is quiet and they aren’t in the background, I find it hard to write.

The comforts of my family, moving along in the background, doing what they normally do whether it’s the music or stopping by my nook to chat are the greatest creative noises I know. It’s the sound of a house full of love and mutual respect for the individual things that we all love to do.

Now that I’ve given you a glimpse into the fabulous Friday here in the Fitzgerald home, I would love to know what our bloggers consider to be a fabulous Friday in your home. So drop us a comment and let us know.

Here’s hoping that regardless of the individual hobbies you may have, your home is filled with as much love and happiness my home is always filled with.

Happy Fabulous Friday everyone!

INTERVIEW WITH WRITER DONNA M. FITZGERALD

Welcome to our first novice writer interview!!!! Today I have composed a few questions for writer Donna Fitzgerald to answer for us so that we can get to know a little about her and her style.


So let’s get this party started!!!

1) If you could write a blurb starring you, how would it read?

A. Donna Fitzgerald may look like the five foot petite blonde Southern Belle but sometimes looks can be deceiving! With a tongue that can cut you to shreds one minute and make you forget she ever insulted you the next. It will be so quick you’ll wonder if it were an insult or if she just handed you a compliment!


If you don’t want her honest opinion then for heaven’s sake don’t ask! Despite the fiery temper that can be ignited if she is wronged, her unconditional love and gentleness will almost always give you the benefit of the doubt.


She strives to give it her all no matter the situation, whether it’s loving, writing or just living life. Once her mind is made up she will take the journey to accomplish whatever she set out to do!




2) What three words would you use to describe your writers’ voice?

A. Wit, Heart and Guts.



3) Tell us a little about your WIP. What kind of word count are you aiming for?

A. Word count to me is just a number. To me it’s over when all the twists and turns have been wrapped up to form that bow of Happily Ever After.



4) Can you tell us what genre you write? How did you choose that genre or did it choose you?

A. I knew Talina would try and get me on this one! As of right now it’s still up for debate in almost every chat we have! And just to give you the honest truth, the genre definitely chose me.



5) What does your day normally look like? How do you fit in writing with everything else you have to do?

A. I get up and take Jacob to school around 7:30 a.m, Come home and straighten the house, and start up the computer. I write off and on until bedtime taking time out for cooking dinner, laundry picking up Jacob and family time until I fall into bed and get ready to do it all again!



6) IS there anything that you have found out about your writing process that you would like to share with us today?

A. For me it’s listening to your heart. Don’t worry when you sit down to write and the chapter takes a turn that you didn’t see coming. That to me is when the magic happens. Sometimes music can be your best inspiration. And lastly writing is not easy but if you truly love your story enough that you cry and laugh in all the right places at the end of the day you’ve done what you set out to do and that’s makes someone feel good even if at this early point in your writing its yourself. At the end of your manuscript being happy with the story you tell is what’s makes the journey worthwhile.

Therapy Thursday by Donna Fitzgerald


                                ROCK CONCERT THERAPY !


            For everyone that knows me y’all know that I live with my husband Bob and my son Jacob.  You also know that if you show up to visit or call me on the phone for a chat, chances are you will hear music in the background.  No it’s not the radio, it’s coming from the garage because you see I live with two Rock stars!  To use that term loosely would be a mortal sin!  Before you get all excited and want to know where you can get your tickets, I should tell you all that no tickets are needed for these superstars.  They will play for free for anyone who shows up to listen. 
The following account of Wednesday night is based on true events and should not be mimicked unless you are a professional.  My guys as, I lovingly refer to them as, set off yesterday for Atlanta at 3:30 p.m. on the nose.  Their journey would take them to the Phillips Arena to see Nickelback. Now I need to remind you that they are some die hard rock and rollers and this isn’t their first time around the block in the concert neighborhood.  Together they have an astounding number of concerts under their belts. And yes although Jacob is only fourteen he has seen more bands than most guys twice his age.  They hauled their cookies two hours away to see three opening bands and then the mother of them all for that night Nickelback!
            I text them a little before nine p.m. to see if the headlining band had taken the stage yet and they were anxiously waiting.  I got worried when the bewitching hour rolled around and I still hadn’t heard anything else from them; so I called.  They were just getting on I-85 when I talked to Jacob and they were heading back home.  I asked him how the concert was and without taking a breath he informed me that Nickelback was better than Kiss or Motley Crue!
 Now everyone knows that since my son was the tender age of two he has been a die hard Kiss fan.  He got his wish when last September his three aunts and I took him to his first Kiss concert. He walked up at the Bilo center with an entourage of women sporting a ‘Yeah, Their All Mine’ smile.  He came out proclaiming Kiss as the greatest band he had ever seen.  I smiled to myself because I had taken him as a Christmas gift in March of ’09 to see Motley Crue.  And after that concert he again proclaimed they were the best band he’s ever seen.  Well that phase has stuck up until last night. I think the Crue may have some competition.
            They came rolling in about two a.m. I asked how was the concert?  We spend the next hour talking about how Nickelback was the greatest band he had ever seen with Bob ranking them in the top five.
            Today the hubbub has died down somewhat.  Bob is now in the garage playing Boston and Jacob has been to my computer showing me the songs of Nickelback that would great to write to.  I smile to myself because I know that for now Nickelback rules until the next band rolls into town!
            A little background info there for those of you who had no idea; when I met Bob he was hawt, but when he picked up the guitar and played a song for me I was done.   Jacob has followed in his B-Daddy’s footsteps since he got his first guitar at age twelve and with the help of B-Daddy he has been tearing the rock songs up! We are now up to two guitars and he hasn’t lost his passion and yes, he knows even more songs!  So with that being said, if you’re ever in the neighborhood stop by, you won’t regret it!

            Oh yeah and my thoughts on Rock therapy you might be wondering.  Well, lets just say that without the music I find on utube, the songs Jacob and Bob tell me about, or that I hear them playing in the garage when I’m having trouble with a chapter or a scene, I couldn’t get the first line typed!  

Totally Tuesday-Writing Buddies by Donna Fitzgerald

Recently my writing buddy Talina and I hit a bump in our writing partnership.  I should say or so we thought.  It seems we both got a little worried that we are now writing the same genre.  Well of course we talked about this at some length yesterday both at a loss for what to do.  I mean how could we both write the same genre and discuss it with one another without giving up our greatest twist and turns?
To make a very long conversation short, we called in who we like to call the experts.  Some in the form of Google and others well-closer to us-our husbands.  We know that they are experts on the matter for two reasons.  One, they are both highly intelligent individuals who shoot straight from the hip.  In other words if you don’t want to know the truth, for heaven sake don’t ask one of them if you don’t want an honest answer. The second reason is they both have seen this relationship blossom first hand and know that more than our writing would suffer from this new turn of events. 
For those of you that don’t know, Talina and I have been joined at the hip since we met.  Our friendship was sealed first when we both realized we shared a love of writing and the passion of wanting to be published authors. 
That paragraph doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of the relationship that we share.  Not only do we encourage one another when the other feels that their writing is going nowhere.  We will sit for hours on a subject that our story line contains but we haven’t figured out how exactly it’s going to work in the land of make believe that we spin daily.  And yes, then there are times when our brains are mush from being mom’s all day and the last thing we can try to do is work on our current WIP.  It is during those times our friendship really shines.  We know instantly when the other one is having a bad day without saying a word or isn’t motivated in the least to write, so we do what any good friend will do and that’s sinking down into the abyss and grab each other’s hand no questions asked and sweetly smile and say “Hey chica, I got your back and we’ll get through this together.”  And oh, by the way did I mention we do every single bit of this online sight unseen?  Don’t ask me how we know these things about one another through our comps.  We just do, thank goodness!
So back to the topic on how we can possibly continue all that we have going on with our own WIP and not cross over in the ideas department.  Well, as I said earlier our husband’s came up with the solution we were diligently looking for.  Although one husband actually found it, the other whole heartedly agreed and it is as follows:
Top Ten Reasons to Write with a Partner
10. It’s a dog-eat-dog business-and vice versa- but when you write with a partner,   
      there’s always one person in town looking out for your interest.
9. Writing is lonely. It doesn’t have to be (and it isn’t if you write with a partner).
8. Two imagination really are better than one.
7. Collaboration leads to better brain storming.
6. A writing workout partner helps you stay focused and productive.
5. Complementing (and complementing) each other leads to stronger ideas.
4. Writing with a partner improves mental health (and it’s cheaper then  
     antidepressants).
3. A partner can help you conquer writer’s block.
2. Collaborating makes you a better writer (and maybe a better person).
1. Carpool Lane. (You ride to the finish line together.
I do want to add that these ten reasons must be mixed with the right measure of total trust, value for a friendship that is everlasting, and the most important one, a heaping measure of your gut feeling. That last ingredient allows you to revel in the fact that you can whisper those magical twist and turns to your writing buddy and they will only be revealed when your precious current WIP that has you wearing your heart on your sleeve because you’re so passionate about it but you just knew when you met, that those kind of secrets would not be revealed until that WIP has made it to the bookshelf for all the world to discover.  I have found that in my writing partner. I could have never handed over that trust if Talina hadn’t first became my friend. 
The moral of this story, if you are considering a writing buddy you must find the one that will tell you that line stinks, will not allow you to cry alone over those beloved characters you’ll choose to cut out but most important when it’s all said and done and you become a published author she will be in the front row cheering the loudest because your dreams are coming true. If you have been blessed to find a unique person like that then you have my word you have found a forever writing buddy and friend.


Seriously Saturday by Donna Fitzgerald


Hi everyone, it’s seriously Saturday here at Over the Clothes Line.  This is the day Talina and I have chosen to update you on our WIP or work-in-progress.
I have learned a very important lesson this week about characters and their placement in my WIP.  Through my writing this week, I’ve learned that a character that seems indispensable can turn out to be the most important character of all.  The one character that pulls the entire story together, no matter how brief their presence is. 
The perfect example is my character Abby.  For all of you who follow our blog Abby gets a lot of attention from me.  I had almost decided to write her out of my WIP completely except for reference to her through back story.  The more I thought about her the more I kept going back over the beginning stages of my WIP.  That is when I realized that Abby, although a secondary character, served as the connection that linked all of my other characters together.
Without Abby my hero would not have found a reason to live.  My heroine would not exist and my villain would not have a reason to be twisted.  I could name a hundred more reason, but you get the gist.
The bottom line is without Abby my story wouldn’t exist.  She has been the ever present voice that has cheered me on and literally handed me the ideas for her character.  She has even conceded to allow me the use of her character as I see fit, even if it’s not in the most flattering of circumstances.  All for the sake of my WIP.
So for all of you out there stressed with your own WIP, my advice is always listen to what your characters are telling you.  They will not lead you down an endless path, in fact sometimes they lead you down the very path you were sure was a dead end, but once you reached its finality, you might find that that particular path holds all the answers you’ve been searching for.
I hope this has helped anyone that may be struggling to keep a character or write them out. Talina and I would love to know how much influence your characters have on your writing.  Drop us a line and share how you handle this kind of situation.  Happy writing everyone!
           

Therapy Thursday by Donna Fitzgerald


                                 MIGRAINES, MEN AND MUSES
I have had the misfortune for the last few days to have a migraine from hell as we call them here in the Fitzgerald house.  That means the windows in my bedroom have been blocked from all sunlight, the temperature in the house has been dropped down dramatically, I’m in my pajamas all drugged up and my husband has put his foot down and put me on lock down in our bedroom.  I’m too sick to fight him at this point so I settle in and try to sleep. 
There is only one problem, someone forgot to tell my muse he’s not supposed to breath my way much less talk to me.  He starts off quiet,… you know a quick whisper as to what he thinks he should be doing today.  When I refuse to give him my attention, he gets a little louder with his ‘request’.  I promise him if he will just give me an hour of sleep and when the roaring in my head stops, I’ll listen to him for as long as he wants.  I listen for some kind of response –nothing. AHH… I think I have managed to appease him.  NOT!
Next, I hear the sound of moving furniture in my brain as he is talking to me all at the same time.  I get up to grab a tablet and a pen.  My husband gives me that ‘what are you doing up’ look as I pass through the living room.  I shake my head as if to say don’t ask and head back to bed.
I write down the idea my muse has and think I have satisfied him, only to hear him whisper again a few minutes later. This is also about the time my husband -the warden- is doing his rounds and I’m caught writing on the tablet I got earlier.  He wants to know what I am doing awake and I sheepishly look at him and say, “honey it’s not my fault it’s the other man in my life that’s keeping me awake.”
 He doesn’t say another word as he closes the door to my cell quietly.  I think he remains silent because he knows he can only control my environment when I have a migraine, but when it comes to a muse on a mission it’s best to bow out gracefully and leave it to me no matter how bad my migraine is, because it’s better than having to deal with me once I’m well and my muse has gone into hiding thanks to my well meaning husband!