Subdued Intrinsic

Personal Note: My husband and I have been to see very few bands in live concert, but we've made the effort to catch shows of our favorite bands (Train for me, and Nickelback for him, respectively). He took me for our anniversary that year and I surprised him with tickets for his 27th birthday. There are only two other bands we'd move a mountain to see because BOTH like them so much, Matchbox 20 and Aerosmith.

Last year on January 28th, sometime in the middle of the day . . . wait, you know what? That's not the beginning of this story. Let's try again.

Sometime in late November or early December of 2007 I went to Wal-Mart and, as is usually the case if I'm in any store that sells books, the glorious aisle of reading material called to me, and I ended up purchasing a paperback copy of a book called Twilight because I'd seen an interview with the author the week previous and figured, "Eh, why not. It's only twelve bucks."

And then I read it. And then I read the next two a couple weeks later. And while I absolutely loved the books reading them made me sad, and I couldn't explain why. I didn't understand it myself. Until I went on Stephenie Meyer's website to see if/when a fourth book might be coming, and then I got it, because while reading about the eventual existence of Breaking Dawn I also found Meyer's "Unofficial Bio" and her "How I Came Up With the Idea For Twilight" sections. I'd been bummed because part of me knew I could do that. Not that I was 'allowed' to do that or 'free' to do it, but that I, Amethyst, had the ability, but I'd never used it. That's really sad, to have a skill, something you come by naturally, and never use it, right?

So, this realization rattled around in my head for a couple of months, which brings us to January 28th, 2008, sometime in the middle of the day.

I made the command decision to try to write a novel of my own. I didn't tell anyone but my best friend Denise because I was scared my tendency to drop a project halfway through would rear its ugly head and bite me in the butt. I emailed Denise because I knew she'd keep me on track, and boy did she ever. From her first email to the end of the first draft, she propped me up and railroaded me into finishing.

So, by April 19th, 2008 I had a 127,000 word manuscript. And I in July I sent it out to fifteen agents who all rejected me, which was the nicest thing they could have done, because I knew Jack about writing WELL. So, I sucked up the hurt and my indignation and decided I'd fight for this book, which meant learning how to write it. I took a year reading everything online I could, joining writer communities, making excellent writer friends, editing, hack-n-slashing, rewriting, and over all committing myself to the project. A YEAR, people. I've never voluntarily dedicated a year of my life to anything before, but this? I'm doing this, come Hell or high water, folks.

And now with my first novel, Silver, a hairsbreadth away from being ready to submit once again to agents (along with a crap-ton of new knowledge just how to go about that), armed with so much more education than before, I am ready to put the book to bed.

And I'm following one other piece of advice from the sages: Do it all again.

Readers, welcome to the journey henceforth known as Golden.

It's okay with Jules If Tristan's too stubborn to realize he's fallen for her; she's brilliant enough to make him see the light.

Jules's best friend Joss may have fallen in love with her own Guardian first but there are some trends Jules doesn't mind following, and that includes making the eldest Solis triplet realize running from Fate doesn't do anything but give you leg cramps. But Tristan's trained to persevere under any torture and he intends to use every superhuman trick up his sleeve to make Jules's job impossible. Add a whirlwind chase across North America to track down escapee villains from the summer before and you've got yourself a tale of masquerade balls, Guitar Hero marathons, and gritty cells in the pits of New Orleans.