I bet that you struggle as much as I do with juggling social media, blogs and various other online forms of procrastination with actual real writing time. So today, I'm over on Writer Unboxed coming clean about my struggle to balance all of these things, some of which, let's be clear (I forgot to say this in that post), I think are very beneficial to a writer. These days, like it or not, part of being a successful writer is having a wide platform, and outlets like Twitter help you establish that, so even if my tweets seem like a waste of time (and sometimes, they are), most of the time, they're not. But how do you ensure that your time doesn't all get sucked into the great big social media black hole? I'm still working on perfecting this formula, but in the meantime, I'm discussing it here. Come over and share your own strategies!

Question of the day: What are your thoughts on blurbs? I'm an unpublished author but the more I hear about blurbs, the more nervous they make me...I have to actually ask other authors to review my work for me?

Well, since you asked, I'll voice what is likely an unpopular opinion, but that's never stopped me before. :) And that is this: I HATE blurbs - hated asking for them, hate being on the receiving end of being asked (more on that below - it's not how it sounds), hate the nepotism that comes along with them, hate that the industry expects authors to round up blurbs and that these blurbs somehow make a book more worthy or lucrative.

Have I made that clear enough? :)

Before I'm accused of not being a team-player, let me explain my reasoning. To begin with, other than for a debut author, I'm not even sure how much blurbs matter. I don't really think that, for all the anxiety they cause, they sell books. (I'm sure others disagree.) I think they do help get your marketing team excited, and that may translate to getting the sales team excited, but at the end of the day...do they make or break anything? I say no...though again, others may say yes. I've posed this question here and to others in the past, and I really don't think the number of readers who buy a book due to a blurb equals anything more than a fraction of sales.

As an author who has asked for blurbs in the past, I can confirm that this process is excruciating. As if getting published and facing rejection after rejection isn't hard enough, you're still not done: you are then expected to go out to your peers and ask them to read your manuscript and pray that they don't reject you. You try not to have hard feelings if they do (or if they ignore you), and when they do, you may take it personally. When someone is kind enough to indeed blurb you, it feels like the greatest victory in the world. But that we need this validation, and that authors are expected to endure seeking this validation, kind of sucks. I truly think that asking for blurbs is almost humiliating for an author, for lack of a better word. Like Sally Field, begging to be liked. (Please note that this is my perspective from having gone through it, NOT because I think authors SHOULD feel humiliated for asking - very big difference.)

As an author who is often asked for blurbs, I can also confirm that the process on the other side of the equation is no more enjoyable. What I mean by that is that I'm THRILLED to help other authors - I hope that much is clear, and I'm THRILLED to take a look at someone's ARC. But then the pesky problems set in: what if you "know" this person (with Twitter, blogging, etc, these days, the networks are wide and tangled) and you don't like their work? What if you offend someone, unintentionally, by not having the time to get to his/her book? What if you're simply taxed from having a 10-book deep stack on your nightstand and want to be selfish for a few months and solely read for pleasure? What if you blurb one author who knows another author whom you didn't blurb? It's equally tricky - and exhausting - on the other side. Again, this isn't me saying I'm not happy to blurb or take a look at ARCs, it's just me saying that it's a complicated process and one that I wish none of us had to endure.

So to answer your question, unfortunately, I think that there is anxiety for ALL parties when it comes to blurbing, and no one really likes it any more than anyone else. I wish the industry could come up with some other way to distinguish one book from another (notice I didn't say one GOOD book from another, because half the time, I swear, people just blurb their friends' books, whether or not they're good), but since they haven't, I'll return to that 10-book stack on my nightstand and try to ensure that one debut author whom I really think deserves wild success gets my endorsement. Having been on both sides of the coin, I don't know what else to do.

I'd love to hear from you guys out there: blurbs, yay or nay? Anyone want to share his or her experience from whichever side of the process you're on?

Question of the day: I have three or four book ideas roaming around in my head.  I try to set a deadline to have a certain amount of pages done by a certain date, because that tends to make me actually sit down and write.  Do you find it better to work on one idea (or book as the case may be) at a time and maybe just keep notes on the other ideas or do you work on multiple ideas simultaneously?  I realize this is probably more a personal preference, but as I've never written a full book I thought a published author's perspective might prove helpful. 

Some authors can juggle manuscripts like playboys do girlfriends, but I am not one of those authors. I am, in keeping with the analogy, a serial monogamist. For me, my protagonist's voice is so important that if I don't give myself the space and concentration to focus solely on that voice, I really lose my way. I struggled with this in the initial drafts of The One That I Want, not because I was working on another manuscript but because I hadn't purged my previous protagonist from my brain, and thus, Tilly, my new heroine, ended up sounding like a weird mash-up of Jillian, my old protagonist, and someone who was trying awfully hard not to sound like my old protagonist. It didn't work at all.

As to whether I keep notes on future projects, the answer to that is also no. To be honest, I swear that when I'm right in the muck of writing a book, I never even think I have another one in me. I always tell myself that this one will be the last because I can't imagine a) coming up with another concept and b) putting myself through this all again! :) So the last thing on my mind is coming up with other ideas. I always feel sort of grateful that I've come up with the one I'm dealing with as it is. THAT said, I do think that a lot of other writers entertain different concepts, and certainly, some writers alternate between manuscripts. I admire the hell out of that, it's just not for me.

If anyone here does juggle, maybe you can post your technique as to how you do so, since I don't think I've been too much of a help in answering this reader's question!

So good news in the little world of the Time of My Life movie: I heard this week that The Weinstein Company has re-upped their option to Time of My Life! Whoohoo! So what exactly does that mean? I thought this might be a good time to break down movie lingo and how (on the rare chance) an adaptation actually gets made.

So, first of all, you have your book and you have your literary agent. In most cases, your literary agent will connect you with a film agent, and this film agent may or may not agree to take on your book/work. Many times, he or she doesn't. Getting a film agent is, believe it or not, even harder than landing a lit agent, and they pass on many more projects than they say yes to.

But if you do manage to land a film agent, your agent will then (at a certain point - timing may matter, revisions may matter, publication date may matter), take your manuscript or book out to studios, production companies, directors, actresses, etc. Much in the same way that your agent will take your book out to publishing houses. Many, many of them will pass for a variety of reasons: they're developing a similar project, they think that transgendered vampires are all the rage and exclusively looking for scripts with that angle, they think your writing just plain sucks, etc, etc, etc. Hopefully, however, one or more will think, "aha! This is just what we're looking for to really bolster our chances at the Oscars," or "Gee, this book will bring us in boat loads of money and fund our children's college tuition plans for life!"

If this fortuitous turn of events should happen, your agent will negotiate an option deal, and what this means is that the studio/producer/whomever, retains the right to make your book for a designated period of time for a lump sum: I believe the standard period is 18 months, but I've heard of 12-month deals, so there may be some flexibility...not sure. After that period of time has expired, the same studio/producer has the right to renew that deal (and pay the author another lump sum) to give them another 18 months to get the movie made. This is where we currently are with Time Of My Life. That the option has been renewed is very positive news because the studio has had quite some time to digest the book and their hopes for it, and often times, options are NOT renewed because the studio realizes that the project (for them) isn't going anywhere. They're not going to write you another check if they have zero expectations for it.

If nothing happens after this second period of time, you and your agent then have the right to shop the book around to new buyers. In fact, if the option isn't renewed the first time around, you can, of course, do that as well. And on the very fortuitous chance that the movie gets made, you then get paid a much bigger lump sum than the option money. A win-win for all involved.

So that's how it breaks down. (More or less: I'm sure that there are a lot of other variables that I haven't covered, and I'm not an expert, so don't sue if you've heard of differing experiences!) Right now, it feels like Time of My Life has cleared a lot of hurdles, and my fingers (and toes) will remain crossed that things keep moving in that upward direction!

Hope Noelle, come on down! You've won the final galley giveaway contest! Will you please email me your mailing address, and I'll get a copy in the mail asap?

Also, thanks to everyone who played along in all of these contests! What I loved MOST about this last one is that it proved that people are definitely still reading and buying books, even in the sea of gloom and doom in our industry. Good books find people, and whether it's the old-fashioned way or via Kindle or iPad or whatever, readers still love reading. Yay!

If you didn't win, don't fret. I'll be getting actual real copies of the book (the galley is an unedited version with mistakes and some wonky sentences, etc) in less than two months, and I'll give oodles away. OR, if you really want to get a jump in the game and make me happy at the same time (!!), feel free to go ahead and pre-order it now. :)

Thanks again, guys! So much fun.