It’s depressing. You can’t do anything. You can’t move forward and you can’t even go back. Oh, you keep writing but you wonder what the point of it all is. You’ve got stacks of stories but why write more? No one’s ever going to read anything you’ve written anyway, right?

Even your blog posts start sounding the same.

I’m not quite sure what to do really. The quicksand is steadily sucking all my enthusiasm for writing away and soon I’ll have nothing left. The real world is calling and a job that actually pays money for hard work is seeming all the more attractive.

I thought this year I would start to get somewhere. I’ve had few modest successes and I think my writing is better than it’s ever been. But now the successes haven’t lead anywhere but into more quicksand, things are starting to feel like retread of last year. And the year before that. And the year before that.

So what’s the point with continuing to standing here, stuck in the middle of a journey that isn’t going anywhere?  Anyone got any sage advice for a quicksandee?

My heart is sinking cause I know I’m going to be in the supermarket FOREVER at this rate, and then I happen to see a checkout that only has one old lady in it. So I nip in behind her, looking at everyone else and feeling smug because I know I’m going to get out before them.

And then the old lady starts taking coupons out of her bag. And she’s got a LOT of coupons. And then the other queues start going really fast and I realise, with another sinking sensation, that I have picked the wrong queue. *dramatic music*

Desperately I search for another queue that looks like it’s going faster and get into that one. And it works. For a minute. But then the man in front of me pulls out something he has in his bag that he wants to return, and starts arguing with the checkout operator. Another wrong queue.

I skip to the next one but this one has a young woman who is trying to buy alcohol and has to have her ID checked and the operator clearly doesn’t have the authority to authorise it and has called their superior. But their superior is currently arguing with the man who is still trying to return something.

I find another queue and this one looks like it’s going fast, and I’m feeling once again so pleased with myself. But just as I start putting my shopping on the conveyor, the checkout operator slaps a ‘checkout closed’ sign down and goes off on her break.

So I whip in behind a mother and her kids and hey, she’s got a LOT of shopping but there’s no one else behind her, and it’s going really well. Until her kids start playing up. And she starts arguing with the checkout operator about the specials. Then she realises she’s forgotten to get something and heads off towards the shelves.

I am beginning to think I will never get out of this supermarket.

I try the queue with the man returning stuff but he’s still arguing and now there’s another checkout operator involved. Brieflly I consider the queue with the young woman buying alcohol but realise her operator is now the one involved with the man arguing. The mother still hasn’t come back from the shelves and the old lady is still fumbling around in her bag for her coupons.

At this point I know that my fears are correct. There are no shortcuts. Some queues are faster and there’s no rhyme or reason to them, they just are. If you’re lucky you’ll get a short queue. If you’re not, you won’t.

I go back to the queue with the old lady. And I wait. And wait. And wait.

That new-fangled self-serve checkout is starting to look better and better.

In the meantime, since it’s Valentine’s Day I am going to give all you wonderful blog friends a little gift for making Unpublished Author Waiting Limbo just a little more bearable (not to mention blocking all my cunning escape routes you evil wenches, hehe).

Now, I’m not feeling very Valentiney since all I got this morning was a cup of coffee and a stale croissant. However, the day is still young(ish) and Dr Jax may yet redeem himself. So, to that end, please enjoy this small inspiration on me. Hoo is making cocktails (Sex on the Beach if you must know) so feel free to settle in. For those of you who have already seen it (and I’m sure most of you have, do indulge again. Personally I think you can never have too much of a good thing. Especially if that good thing is David Gandy wearing next to nothing.

And I think it decides the argument about white speedos quite conclusively. Yes, they are sexy.

Happy Freaking Valentine’s everyone.

Yay for brains.

Anyway, my brain is a master of making stuff up for me in the absence of not knowing. Currently, I have three subs out. Sub number one has been gone four and a half months now and since I have been passed to a new editor, I fear my Unpubbed Author Waiting Limbo clock has been reset back to sub number two, which has been gone six weeks. Sub number 3 is SYTYCW and two weeks after everyone else has had responses, I am still waiting for mine. I do not know why I haven’t heard but currently my brain is telling me they either never got my entry or they’ve lost it. This is making Unpubbed Author Waiting Limbo a very unpleasant place to be right now and I wish I wasn’t here.

I’ve got quite familiar with Unpubbed Author Waiting Limbo. It’s actually become like home. I’m starting to put up pictures and photos, put a nice rug down, got my special pillow. But you know, it’s not really home. I see people who have been here less time than me get that magical response which fires them up to heaven or down to hell, and I am jealous. I don’t want to be here anymore. I want to move on to Published Author Waiting Limbo which is just through the fabulous double doors down the end of the hallway. The doors that are guarded by two-headed dogs, a lake of fire, and a 900 million foot high barbed wire fence.

Some days I am okay with being in UnPubbed Author Waiting Limbo. I’ve got friends here and the vodka is cheap and plentiful. But today is not one of those days. There is a way out though. There’s a small doorway behind the bar that will let you crawl to freedom and I’m sitting at the bar contemplating that doorway right now. It’s in the opposite direction to Published Author Waiting Limbo of course but there aren’t any two-headed dogs or lakes of fire or fences. Just five minutes walk and I can open it and be free of Unpubbed Author Waiting Limbo forever. And it’s starting look very, very attractive.

Yes, I know the best way to handle it is to write, and yes, some days that’s what I do. But Unpubbed Author Waiting Limbo wears you down. It can sap your creativity. And no matter how hard you try, you just can’t get your brain to stop thinking about why you haven’t heard yet and devising various hideous scenarios about how lame your sub is and how your email filter is somehow deleting every email that could possibly be from an editor.

Today, as I am waiting for some sort of SYTYCW news and failing to get any, is a day of no creativity or inspiration. It’s a day of frustration. It’s a day where I think I will NEVER escape this place. I will be here for ever and ever and ever. It’s a day of thinking that it isn’t worth it and that it would be so easy to end the torture and just walk out the doorway at the back of the bar.

And right at this moment I want to.

Anyway, now I have to wait until NZ Tuesday before I find out anything. I know, drama queen right? Well, I’m afraid that’s me. Drama queen extraordinaire. And when you know you’re going to hear about a sub ‘any day’ you just can’t just forget about it. At least, I can’t. It has made writing this week very difficult (waking up at 5am every day to check your email gets a little tiring – and no, I didn’t purposefully wake up at that time!). I’ve got ‘waiting paralysis’ basically. Plenty of stuff I should be getting on with but I keep coming up against the ‘will they even want the rest of this?’ barrier. Same with all my new ideas, especially since – when you’re targeting Riva – you have no idea whether what they’re looking for…

Well, that’s my vent of the month. Anyone got any tips as to good distraction techniques?

I think I must be the only person (apart from Maisey) who hates weekends.

Ah well, in lieu of news, have another round of drinks on Hoo. Elissa mentioned eye candy so here’s a bit of David Gandy for you too. He’s currently – or this picture in particular – the inspiration for my chess grandmaster. Now, look at that and tell me that’s not sexxxayyy!

Alright, so, while I am waiting, pull up a chair and share your SYTYCW stories. Got an R you want to vent about? Some feedback you can’t understand? Still waiting like me? Share! I’ll get Hoo to mix some drinks…

And while he’s at it, check out the Sisters’ blog and the awesome post Maisey has written re strengthening that first chapter.

The above picture is the sound of silence. Both in my house just now and also from the mighty offices in Richmond. I was actually feeling quite good about the silence (in both places) for a while but it’s been 8 weeks since I sent in my chapter and synopsis and…well, getting a bit impatient now.

I know, I know. They’re inundated with NV subs and no doubt with all the SYTYCW subs too, not to mention being snowed in – literally – so it’s no wonder I haven’t heard really. And what with polishing up the Hammer Pants and my SYTYCW sub too, hearing about my other sub is not really what I want right now…

Oh, okay, I tell a lie. I DO want to hear about it. I want them to ask for the next two chapters please. The timing would be terrible but hey, I could manage it! Unless it’s a flat out R of course. But OTOH, at least I’d know.

So, how about it M&B? Can I find out before Xmas please? Pretty please?

……*more tumblweed rolls by*………

Sigh.

Aaaaanyway, I am having a lovely weekend of writing provided for me by the wonderful Dr Jax. He’s taking the kids out so I can polish up my subs and get them away next week before we head away for a few days up north (where I have NO internet. Sniff). Hence the lovely sound of silence in my house.

So, anyone else waiting right now? How long as it been for you?

On the up side, I have decided to give myself some goals with all the unfinished stories, with the aim of finishing them so I can try my hand at something a bit different. So, lovely blog friends, I hereby solemnly swear, upon my honour, to God and the Queen, that I will finish my soldier story by the end of September. I will also endeavour to have a polished partial and synopsis of IT Girl, just in case I get a request from the NV competition. Because yes, I am throwing caution to the winds and will be entering. If nothing else, it’ll at least feel like I’m doing something positive instead of just waiting around.

Okay, so those are my goals for this month and by putting them on the blog, I must achieve them or – sob – lose face.

What goals do other people have for the new month? Other than world domination and/or selling your first book for millions?

It’s not the best week to be hearing to be honest. I leave for Sydney on Monday and I’m not sure I want to know while I’m on holiday/conference. Especially if I get an R. I kind of like to lick my wounds in private and I can see it putting a huge damper on my holiday. Wahhh, poor me. Dr Jax has promised to vet my email for me just in case and I will be complaining loudly and long to Rach and Janette (be warned guys!) so that helps too.

Anyway, I have no idea what the ed will actually say, but I have come to the conclusion that Modern Heat is one of the harder categories to break into. It’s not a clear cut line like some of the others and I suspect, once the line changes to Riva and they see how its selling, the editorial direction may change. Not that I know or anything, just a suspicion. They have said they want ‘different’. But what is ‘different’? I think the New Voices comp is an indication that they themselves don’t really know until they see it. They want public input from readers about people’s chapters which I guess means that they want to see what kind of stories resonate with people and which won’t. Scary huh?

Well, if there’s one thing that I think matters with category as it is now, it’s voice. There’s not much in the way of originality in plotlines in romance but the way you CAN make it original is the way you write. And of course, including what the eds have recommended like new spins on old conflicts, 21st century issues, etc , etc. The trick is to do all that within the category guidelines. Who said writing category was easy again??