I’ve been asked by professionals several times in the world of publishing if they are corresponding with me or my personal assistant or if they should send things attn. to me or my PA.

Oh, dear God, what I would give for a personal assistant! Who exactly do they think I am, anyhow? *g* How much money do they think I make?

I can’t imagine getting even a part time a personal assistant until I clear more than 100k a year. I do just about all my WEB work myself, much less everything else. That podcast? Yep. I recorded it. I edited it. All me and my Adobe software and my lovely Loopology royalty-free music CD. (I hate the way I sound when my voice is recorded, but I decided to grit my teeth and get over it because I ain’t hiring anyone to do the voice for me.) And I’m going to eventually figure out how to post the sucker on iTunes. (Yes, I’m having problems! My RSS feed seems to be incompatible with iTunes. To that I say: Pfffth. I CAN learn how to hand-write RSS code, but I really, REALLY don’t want to take the time. If anyone else has done it EASILY…help?)

What I want desperately right now is a part-time housekeeper. Oh, I’d give my eyeteeth, even if I would look pretty silly without them. One of the reasons I want to work my backside off this year is because I reaaaally want someone to clean my danged house, especially since I’ll be homeschooling full-time starting this summer. (No, that sound you hear is NOT me whimpering. I don’t care what you think you hear. I am not. I am stoic and brave.)

I’m hoping to be able to afford someone to come in 4 hours one day a week next fall. And maybe by next spring, twice a week. You’ll know I’m rich when I have someone working for me 20 hours a week. My house would stay spotless! My heart would sing! (Except, of course, for the kid toys and rooms. I have very strong feelings about kids learning to pick up after themselves. Yes, I am the original Mean Mommy.) I am a slob who craves order.

And then…eventually…I’d love a personal assistant to maintain my website, pay my bills, do my filing, make my appointments, play chauffeur for kids, and just take care of all the STUFF that snows me under when I’m stressed. Like now. (Positively twitching, BTW.) At first, just four hours a week. Some day…some century…maybe half time.

Ooooooh, wouldn’t that just be heaven?

(Oh, and Lauren? Saw your post. Thanks and hugs! One of the reasons I’m backing off posting much right now is the insane, mind-boggling amount of work that rebuilding my site is taking. The other main reason is going to be posted on Saturday.)

SHADOWS is coming out next month, and there are already a few reviews! I really think this is my best-crafted book from a storytelling point of view–my first novel that I might call a true, through-and-through success in this regard. (VEIL was pretty darned close, but that was much less ambitious.)

I don’t want to go into what I was like while I was writing this–the crazy meter was certainly going whoopwhoopwhoop–but you get to reap the rewards of all that. *g* I think I’ve finally conquered the Demon of Pacing and have banished him to the nether regions of hell. (Well, actually, WICKED INTENTIONS, which I just finished, has pacing issues at the end, but I know it does and am fixing it in line edits right now.)

SHADOWS tells the story of Colin and Fern Radcliffe. You meet them on their wedding day. They know one another socially–that is to say, hardly at all–and have decided to marry for all the conventional reasons. They have every expectation of a conventional marriage, but swiftly, they each discover that a conventional marriage is the one thing they cannot tolerate.

In Booklist, it is a Featured Review–totally hot stuff!

Brilliantly blending atmospheric elements from Ann Radcliffe’s classic gothic novels with a generous dash of Bronte-esque romance, Joyce creates an elegantly dark and intensely sexy Victorian historical romance that is certain to cast its own mysterious spell over readers.

Romance Reviews Today calls it a “must read”:

SHADOWS OF THE NIGHT is a very unusual story, certainly not a run of the mill historical romance. It has excellent writing and good pacing [WOO-HOOO! *clears throat* Dignity. Yes, dignity.], as well as a very original premise. Colin’s wife makes him feel alive. Everything had always come so easily to Colin that his life was filled with ennui, but now, all is beginning to sharpen and change. Fern is both attracted to Colin and dismayed by him. As Colin feels the change in his life, so also does Fern begin to feel her power. Besides being a hot sensual romance, a fascinating mystery evolves at Wrexmere that could destroy the Radcliffes.

SHADOWS OF THE NIGHT is a captivating and absorbing story that readers will definitely want to put on their “to buy” list, a must read. Congratulations to Lydia Joyce for a most original tale.

Converting money between historical times and the present is notoriously difficult. It’s not that prices change; that’s a given. It’s that prices change relative to one another.

So, what does that actually mean in practical terms? Versus today, in the 19th century:

-housing was much less expensive, being no more than 10% of a middle class family’s income

-servants were much less expensive–again, taking perhaps 10-20% of a middle class family’s income

-laundry was hugely more expensive, taking up to 10% of a middle class family’s income

-lighting and heat were much more expensive, even though each new technology lowered the price. Paraffin (kerosene in the US) was cheaper than oil or candles at its introduction. Gas was cheaper than paraffin at its introduction. Electricity was cheaper than gas at its introduction–and electricity was relatively much more expensive than it is today. Coal was much cheaper than wood, but only the very rich had fires in every room they spent time in. Bedrooms, particularly, would only be heated during times of sickness in most middle class houses because of the expense. The English stubbornly clung to inefficient fireplaces despite far superior iron stove heating technology as far back as the 1700s. Masonry heaters, which were essentially closed fireplaces that provided heat to large areas through their thermal mass, were widely used in northeastern Europe but were unknown in England. The change from fireplaces to steam heat made heating the entire house affordable for the first time, and it also greatly lowered the level of dirt in English homes.

-food was much more expensive, taking perhaps 30% of a middle class family’s income
–wine was much more expensive and could be considered an investment!
–gin was cheaper than today
–but meat was less expensive relative to vegetables and fruits most of the time than it is now

-clothing was a bit more expensive except that the family had fewer garments requiring a lot more work on the part of the wife, taking perhaps 5-10% of a middle class family’s income

-most consumer goods were quite a bit more expensive

If you go back before the industrial era, prices for everything except housing and servants generally rise relative to the others quite a bit. The prices for servants fall. Clothing rises the most, to the point where an average middle class family would consider itself well off to have one new set of outerwear and a couple of sets of body linens per year. Servants in the middle ages, in fact, might get little more than food and one change of clothing per year as their entire pay–the rest could be so small that it would be properly considered pocket money.

Here’s a great link.

As a preamble, I will say quite definitely that Terry Pratchett is a brilliant writer. He’s been a hardback auto-buy for me for years–part of a very short and privileged list. But the level of devotion to him among his fellow professional writers is amazing. Everyone seems to love him. And despite his brilliance, it makes me wonder why.

See, there are a fair number of other brilliant writers out there, but no one else seems to hold the same appeal. And Terry Pratchett isn’t entirely without fault. He has a great grasp of language and a fabulous storytelling sense. But he reuses jokes. He repeats words clumsily instead of for effect sometimes, which can be quite evident in his very spare, simple style. He can verge on the didactic. Sometimes, his incredibly crafted endings just don’t quite work. And most of his books have the same or very similar messages.

Remember, I love this guy’s books, and I was bereft when his publishing schedule changed so he no longer came out every November–November’s my birthday, so it always felt like a present! But he’s not perfect. No one is. So why is he so widely beloved among authors when other writers who are just as talented with just as much potential mass appeal aren’t?

Well, the reason’s simpler than you might think. We writers are an egocentric lot, and Pratchett tells us the one thing guaranteed to earn our never-ending adoration. He tells us that human reality is made up of stories and that storytelling is, therefore, the most powerful force in human existence. He considers mankind to be homo fabulis. So who would be the most important people in the world? That’s right. The people making up the stories!

It is a very alluring idea to authors in particular, and it’s certainly not entirely wrong. After all, much of how we define ourselves as a society is based on the fictions that we tell ourselves about others and our own past. We lie to ourselves about the Victorian era (stuffy and repressed!) and the middle ages (socially repressive and backward!) to portray ourselves in contrast. We lie to ourselves about the Romans (noble and intrepid) and the Greeks (democratically just and scientifically minded) to associate ourselves with an imaginary golden age. We lie to ourselves about what science is now, about biology and psychology, and about medicine–all to make up a story about our present that matches what we want to believe about ourselves. So little of it is fully true, but its falsity doesn’t matter to the internal validity of our image of the world, despite how poor of a representation of reality it is by any halfway critical examination.

And writers… Well, we’re a peculiar bunch. We take a lot of lies, wrap it in a pretty package, and in that way, we hope to get at some truth that is deeper and more universal than mere facts. And society believes this, too.

So Pratchett isn’t wrong, but he isn’t entirely right, either. He does realize this, of course, and has spoken of it at length. His world, the Discworld, is a far better model of a mental world than the real world is. In Discworld, human stories do shape external realities, something that is universal to fictional worlds but becomes explicit in his own. In our world, on the other hand, human stories shape only the mental world, not the physical, and an external reality does exist that is very important to the actual development of society and the outcomes of individual lives.

Nevertheless, Pratchett gives storytellers great importance in his books and, shameless egomaniacs that we are, we love him for it.

Myself included!

Designating a Writing Space

Every writer should have a designated work space.

For those who primarily use desktops this will, of course, require a desk and all the usual computer paraphernalia. But many writers now use laptops, Alphasmarts, or other handheld devices.
Whatever your preferred writing device, you don’t need a dedicated office. You can use a corner of your bedroom or the living room for a desktop set up or you can choose wherever is most comfortable for a portable device. I recommend, though, that your workspace be orderly (this will probably mean regular cleanings!), that there be lots of space for you to spread out, and that the room be as free as possible from distractions and noise. If you have six kids, the kitchen table is only a good idea if they’re all off at school. If the TV is constantly on in your house, the family room is a very poor place for your computer desk.

Portability provides a lot of flexibility, but it also opens the doors to some dangers. I do not recommend working in bed, for one. This has a high chance of leading to either sleep problems or work problems. On the one hand, you now associate your bed with more than the two activities it should be reserved for, and so you may now find sleeping harder. On the other hand, you will be more likely to fall asleep while working! While Karen Hawkins, for example, has talked about working from bed in her pajamas, as a Reformed Bed Worker myself, I have to recommend against it. All the sleep experts will cheer.

You can have several places to work. I do! In the early mornings, I prefer the living room because it gets the most sunlight. In the late mornings and afternoons, the kitchen table gets the best light. I move where the light is. I use my desktop when I’m editing a lot at once. I recommend paying attention to natural light when choosing your writing location. It is a luxury that few office workers have. You should make the most of it!

You don’t even have to work indoors. Alison Kent likes to work outside on her Alphasmart whenever she can.

Wherever you are, working at a table with your feet flat on the floor and your knees at a 90-degree angle is best. If you prefer to work with a portable device in your lap, get a lap desk or even a laptop table to bring your work up to the night height. Writing with a laptop directly on your lap is a bad idea. It can lead to chronic pain needing physical therapy intervention. You can also get a condition called erythema ab ignis, a reddening of the skin caused by repeated exposure to heat that raises your chances of skin cancer. And if you’re male, it can damage your sperm and even make you temporarily sterile!

Many authors don’t work in their houses at all. This has the advantage of taking you away from all the distractions at home. Some have set up writing sheds in their back yards, taking over or even specially designing a small outbuilding to use as a writing den. Roald Dahl had one of these. Others work at coffee shops or restaurants or even public parks. A few take jobs like as a night desk clerk–this gives them a schedule that they must meet and some extra income with very few job duties to take them away from writing. (In college, I did most of my writing while working as a computer lab assistant!)

Wherever you choose to work, you should make sure that you can write regularly and productively without being unnecessarily distracted.

As a part of a campaign to make life easier, here’s my planned blogging schedule:

Monday - About writing
Tuesday - About reading
Wednesday - History
Thursday - About my own writing
Friday - Rotating theme (current topic: frugal living)
Saturday - Personal day
Sunday - On the web or Giveaways, when I can do them

I’m redoing my site right now, so it’s a bit of a mess. *crosses eyes*

Wish me luck!

LJ book: 11 pages
non-LJ book: 6 pages

Aren’t I just FASCINATING recently? The truth is that my house hasn’t been decently cleaned since CHRISTMAS (been on deadline), so I am spending a huge amount of my time on that. Whee!

LJ book: 13 pages
non-LJ book: 7 pages

That’s really unusually fast. This will slow down soon enough.

Oh, and that isn’t Book 6. It’s Book 7. I can’t count.