Fifty Shades of Writing a Novel

The color of dread, to me looks like a dense, menicing fog that slowly swallows everything around it. A fog so thick, you can barely see your feet planted on the trembling ground beneath your body. It crawls across the landscape slowly and piece by piece everything around you disappears

I guess it started, for me, just after Christmas. Scrolling through my social media news feed. Slowly, at first, articles and videos of a virus in a far off land. Ravaging the public, creeping in slowly… an invisible threat. As this continued to develop and the news became more and more bleak.

By the middle of January my mind was littered with videos of over filled hospitals, people collapsing in the streets. So far away, I tried to remind myself, but the slow crawling feeling of dread inched closer with every week. Little by little the threat settled closer and closer to home. International flights cancelled, talk of school closings and possibility of impending martial law. Conspiracy theorists blog about a new world order, out with the wicked, another civil war on the horizon.

Stop! I discipline myself, no more research. I set my phone down and become aware of my surroundings, in hopes, that it would ease the tightening in my chest. Unfortunately, this somehow only made it worse. I studied my children, innocent, no sign of fear in their eyes. They sparkle as they look to me. Those eyes of my pure and perfect little humans caused me to succumb to my fears.

The fear that I cannot protect those I hold most dear to me. The fear that they could, at any moment, be swallowed up by this insidious virus. There would be no warning, no visible monster that I could fend off, no horrible criminal that I could destroy and rip apart with my bare hands to protect them.

I am helpless. Knowing the only thing I can do to keep them safe is to lock my home down. It doesn’t seem like enough. There isn’t a magical spell I could cast around my home to keep the outside away. With every sniffle and cough that any of the three of them display I become crippled with fear. I spend most of the day talking myself out of an anxiety attack. They’re fine my heart beats faster, they’re fine my throat tightens around my voicebox, allergies, it’s only allergies my breathing becomes somewhat labored. I chant to myself in my head while we keep busy with online learning, picnics and different forms of art.

Somehow I claw through each day. I thicken my mask, fasten it to me face with a staple gun and JB weld, focus on the eyes, their sparkle, their sense of wonder. So at ease, even with all of the vast and momentous changes happening around them. In their eyes I can see that I have been successful at protecting them from at least one thing, The dread. They don’t feel it, They don’t see it and for this, I am exceedingly grateful.

Perhaps I could hide out tomorrow and reward myself. Delve back into the lives of the characters in my story. There is, in fact, some pretty dreadful circumstances happening in that world as well. Now more than ever, I can explain this dread, this fear and share it with the world

I’ve done it! Finally and very, very long overdue! Book 2 has hit the streets harder than my clumsy bum after 2 large margaritas.

I am overly excited and feel honored to be able to share this with you all.

I have had to overcome many challenges during the completion of this second novel. A new baby, who is a living version of a sour patch kid, threw my mind, body and soul into a tailspin!

Such a sweet baby, such an over tired trainwreck of a mother. Let me tell you, we battled jaundice, gurd and babysitter drama galor over the last 1.5 years.

From pumping and breast feeding on demand, my body was literally being siphoned into oblivion. My mind went numb with the new and dilapidating adventure that I had found myself buried in.

I worked tirelessly pushed through and awoke as a mum of 3. Juggling a new home and a 10, 5 and 1 year old like a seasoned circus clown.

The realization that book 2 was WELL overdue loomed.

Will everyone have forgotten the love of Ian and Marie? Have I left their followers high and dry?

Yup, and for this I apologize. But the rose-red heat fills my cheeks as I am over the moon excited to share with you, book 2!

Hopefully life will be kind to me and I will dance with my overwhelming every-day to be able to complete book 3 and wrap up my story.

My stomach churns with those words. A feeling of dread follows the lines of my legs from the bottom of my feet and crushes my stomach.

Maybe I should thank the crazy life of mine for harboring this story inside me, if only for a couple more short years.

Steadying my breath, I will live in the moment and take in this glow around me.

Hang in there and enjoy!

In an attempt to add a link to purchase book 1 of 3, I have learned, I suck at this computing thing! Comment with tips please, or just click below to read a sample and purchase via ebook or paperback!

Deep Breaths https://www.amazon.com/dp/1522045996/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_8iMWBbMZ992WX

A magician can have a complete stranger reach into a deck of cards, seamlessly shuffling away, with a secret. He already knows how to pull off the trick. He can find you amidst the the 53 other cards, he already knows just where you are.

How I envy you, to be effortlessly found.

I’ve been lost for a while. I must have slipped carelessly out of his skilled fingers and worked my way into the shuffle. Somewhere between the ace of hearts and the king of spades. The grape jelly from a stranger’s fingers has caused my smooth backing to become stuck to the card above me.

Each of the wrongs around me are plucked from the deck and presented to the world around as I scream from my spot, I’M STILL HERE! FIND ME! Find me…

Find yourself, my smug inner monologue whispers, somehow louder than any scream I can muster up.

I know, I know, dramatic right? But it’s not dramatic enough! I promise this is just a small fragment of the battle inside of me.

The birth of a new baby is glorious. Sweet chubby cheeks, that new human smell. I am genetically programmed to thrust my time, energy and literally my everything into caring for my little human. Assuring him the best chance at a balanced psyche.

His adorable, fat fingers were the ones who shmeared the jelly to me. The cause of the stick.

I couldn’t possibly worry about the stick. The reason is noble, innocent and pure. The sugars will eventually break down. Through the years he will need me less and I’ll wriggle from my hiding spot, emerging from the deck again.

All I can hope for currently is small snippets of sky, when the deck is shuffled just so. Allowing me to peak through the cracks and smell the freshness of the day around me.

Today is that moment, I can smell the rain, the mud, the molds that grow in the moist leaves that are scattered.

Goodmorning world how long will I be allowed to see you today?

It’s a blurred mess of color, life flying past you at record speed. Waking up, getting ready, getting the kids together, getting out the door, getting to work coming home, getting the kids dinner, doing the dishes, going back to bed and doing it all over again the next day. If you’re really lucky you may be able to stop, take a breath, slow things down just a notch. Yes, if you’re fortunate enough to do this on occasion you will witness something beautiful. Your kids are growing smarter and more compassionate each day. They do things that remind you of you which is sometimes infuriating and sometimes overwhelmingly touching.

On the weekends you attempt to plan things to capture the moment. Sometimes it’s a success and you’re able to make memories that will last a lifetime. Sometimes you fail and whatever activity planned has unfortunately gone by faster than you intended. Tempers flare, nerves get lit, fits are thrown into embarrassing public displays of exhaustion. All of these things causing the hours to blend into a mess of what ifs.

It makes a thought of “me time” a sick joke. If I don’t have time to make memories, good memories, with my children how do I have the right to take any time for myself. Time to relax, time to shave my legs, time to paint my toes, time to write my book? I have to find it, Marie and Ian are suffering, stuck in limbo, story untold, unfinished.

Also, to think of it, how in the world will I find time in this blurred mess of days and nights and weekends to not only finish editing the first book but finish writing the second and start writing the third all while trying to figure out how self promote a self-published book? It does help to have a partner who takes hand and some responsibility. Although, then, you get stuck in a cycle of guilt for taking time away from your family to do something that you’re passionate about. Nobody’s there to make you feel guilty. It’s the demons in your own mind picking away at you telling you that you’re not enough, you don’t do enough you can’t possibly think that you’ve earned the right to do something for yourself.

How do you push through? How do you find the time to make the memories, to feel that you are worthy enough to locate a smidge of one or two days to work on something for yourself? I’m still working on that. Working on a balance that will allow me to do all the things that I need to do and that I want to do. I just have to figure out how to slow the days, slow the lights passing by. 

Stick with me people, I know you’ve been waiting patiently for snippets of the first few chapters. Or if you’re one of the few that I followed my journey and read what I have so far,  you’ve been waiting for more . I’ve promised these to you and I will bring them to you. I just have to find a way too slow the time. Let me know if you’ve mastered that in your own life. Show me the instruction manual on how to fit all this in. I will, hopefully, find the time to read that too.

Angela Edmonds 

Flusterated is a feeling. You may think to yourself, “Now this wacko is truly crazy!” But hear me out, flusterated could certainly be a word! Today there are more ridiculous words being created that are acceptable to the masses.

 Take, for example, ‘totes’ the slim down word to the very 90’s word totally and infuriating words like ‘bae’ which is I guess a term if endearment that kids these days like to use in place of babe? Yes that’s a question mark. It’s supposed to be there.

Flusterated is an Angelism. Which is another made up word meaning crazy ass words or phrases Angela comes up with. 

Now see this in your minds eye: You get up obscenely early every day. You think you have time for one heated cup if coffee from yesterday’s pot before the kids wake up (let’s be honest you don’t have time to make a fresh pot and wait for it to brew). You sit down with said cup of bitter stale caffeine and take a sip. Yum. Just then, you hear the dreaded threenager (another socially acceptable made up word) say “Mommy, I want milk!”

You jump, startled, betrayed by your own attempts to stay quiet while using the microwave, sure to open it before it hits zero and beeps a high volume beep of “WAKE UP EVERYONE!” You spill coffee on the only new clean nightgown you own. Damn it, you get the milk for the little benevolent dictator, pat yourself dry with someone’s old shirt and flip on the cartoons.

As you take your second sip you hear your eight-year-old shuffle up to you only to announce loudly “Mom, I have to go poop.” You attempt to be the loving supportive mother you aspire to be and say through your teeth “Alright, go on then, do you need something? ” he just giggles and makes his way into the bathroom. 

Ok, good everyones happy. You then think to yourself,  I’ll just head outside and drink this and listen to the birds chirp. You sit on the cold damp cast iron chair and take the third sip of now cold coffee that you heated up fifteen minutes ago and attempt to start a new blog post. 

“Mommy! I need to go pee!” Shouts the little tyrant through the storm door, hanging from the doorknob that is due to fall off because, no matter how many times you tell them not to, they still insist on slacking their body weight whilst being suspended by a five dollar replacement doorknob you purchased only last week.

You sigh, your head begins to spin, you hands ball up into fists and your eyes blur with tears. You can’t help her, there is but one bathroom and you know it’s almost too late to even make it to a bush behind the house. You vow silently to yourself that you will just have to clean up the pee and soak the pjs in the tub. 

You attempt to ignore the little pleas for potty needs and grasp at your cup, making a small waving motion towards the door. You miss judge your hand placement and thrust the already cracked cup to the concrete at your feet, spewing coffee all over the porch, breaking your cup and speckling your legs with the stale liquid.

You know the fuzzy distorted colors on the tv when the cable fails? Yeah, that’s the color of Flusterated. That’s all you see as you hold back your sobbing, you can’t let the rugrats feel as if they have upset you. You know they would be devastated if they did. So you laugh, your neighbors probably already think your nuts, so laughing like a psychopath at 6:05am is not out of your crazy Realm. You laugh and go inside, thankful as you see your son walk from the bathroom and just make it with the threenager to the toilet.

What does this have to do with writing a book? It has everything to do with it. I push through that fuzzy distortion, most days failing, but occasionally fighting through the flustration to successfully become immersed in writing.

Hopefully enough to give my readers one hell of a story to enjoy…eventually.

Angela Edmonds 

Exhausted, utterly and profoundly dead ass tired. Having a full time job and being a mum of two has made exhaustion and I two of the very best of friends. Add a dash of attempting to erase debt and buy a house and a splash of becoming a self published author . You’ve now got a great recipe for pure and utter walking dead zombification.

Exhaustion takes my hand every morning, climbs up my arms to hang from my eyelids, swinging back and forth, creating a nice twitch in my lash line that will last for months. She has wicked little chuckle that drowns out any other sounds when I vow to drink less coffee. Ready to pounce into my vision when I sit down to write. She bounces, finger to finger, distracting me from my task. 

Every day I deny and avoid her. Starting in the morning when I bounce up and down and convince myself I wont fall asleep in the shower, again. The effort it takes for me to listen attentively to a 3 and 8 year old as they chatter in the back seat while also focusing on the roads an head of me. Adrenaline aids me by the time I make it to work, whether it be new animals to snuggle or the need to dodge gnawing teeth and thrashing nails. At some point I may (or will, rather) call an energy drink to aid me and pull me through the afternoon.

After lunch my friend finds me again. She spots the crash from all the caffeine I’ve consumed and rides it like a wave to the shore of my consciousness. From there she’s got me. I drag my feet, begging her please!  Leave me alone! I can’t let her in, there is still half a day of responsibility on the horizon. She only laughs at my wishes and morphs into weighted ankle bracelets, fastening to my legs, making it all the more difficult to walk.

It may take hours, but somehow I pull her from my body. Most days I am successful at completing all of my tasks and making it to my crisp, white unused pillow just after 8pm. Dinner has nourished my children, dishes are cast from my sink and the only remaining truth for the day is giving in to her. Letting exhaustion follow my dragging feet to my bed.

From there the little demon sits down to have a nice long conversation with her old friend anxiety. They  reminisce and giggle like school girls at things I’ve done or said that day and/or things I said or did 5 years ago. Their chatter does not allow me to rest for at least an hour and when my eyes finally close for the night, they take turns making my dreams more exhausting than my day was.

In trying to find a positive in this, I’ve come to the realization that my pillow will last longer than most. Yes, it may be due to lack of use, but it’s true just the same.

In the next coming days I will battle with my annoying friend and complete the first round of corrections for book one. I will use my elation to pull me from the claws of exhaustion. I will leave my pillow unused happily, knowing that I am that much closer to sharing Ian and Marie with you all!

I’ll sleep when I’m dead, or later tonight, whichever comes first. 

Angela Edmonds 

To me chaos is a swirling grey color. A mixture of whites and blacks, twisting around the day to day, hurling the to do lists sideways. Watching the responsibilities of adulting fly towards you, ripping the wants and wishes from your grasp, no time for imagination or creating today. No, today you have to clean, get the laundry started, feed the little ones and run a few errands.

Maybe if You’re really, realy, lucky you’ll have consumed enough coffee to keep you awake enough to focus on you. If only for a moment, I tell myself, I have time to delve into my subconscious and crank out a couple thousand words. Some days it comes easily. Ian and Marie graciously accept me into their world. I walk with them and create another few days of adventure and intrigue, love and drama. I bring them together, only to tear them apart, allowing chaos to enter their pages as well.

I’ve been fortunate to have found my calm after the storm. A partner that takes on the twister with me, picking up where I lack, rebuilding after the winds settle. He allows me more time and encouragement to enter the world of the written word. Keeping the little ones entertained as I immerse myself into my writing.

Somehow the currents still tend to sweep me up into the whirlwind.  Try as I may, I forget to pull myself from the suction and allow my passion to take hold. Everyday reminding myself that I am worth those few hours. Ian and Marie need me, they depend on me to complete their story. I am stuck, antler tangled with antler, knowing my family needs me too. 

I am aware the storm will only get larger with success. An F-5 of responsibility, pulling and pushing wants and needs into a circling cyclone. I can only focus, trust that I am doing what I can to float gracefully through the winds. Allowing myself time, finding that mindset to persevere. Fastening my wings tightly to the flesh on my shoulders. 

I will glide through the storm. I can juggle, skillfully, with my best friend and greatest supporter by my side. My children will see that you can achieve anything. Work the winds to your will and make your life what you need it to be. 

Steady your wings people. You have the ability to conquer the currents. Morph the storm into what life can become for each of you.

Come, soar with me, I’d love to take your hand as the winds swallow us all.

Angela Edmonds 

The sun rises, with new possibilities and new hopes. It is almost tangible, the changes a person can commit to in one day. You reach out and grasp at the notions that, in one day, your life can shift to a new.

I am lucky enough to be the type of person that can see what I want. Not just see I guess, I can envision the change or path that I crave the most. It is a daily practice. I see the new deep orange and I imagine what I can produce from that one, beautiful, new day. 

Some would call it being a positive or  having a ‘glass half full’ outlook. I guess your sort of right, but it’s about so much more than that. For example, trudging through each day, pulling through the depression that threatens your very being. Waiting for that orange, every day wishing and envisioning what you need from life.

One day you see it, the opportunity that you’ve been grasping at. A set of decisions are the only thing between you and the need. You follow them, the tiny glowing wisps of change, caressing their floating energy as you pass each one. The picture becomes crisp as the realization of your dreams focus from the world of thought to reality.

It’s done, you’ve created your visions and gaze at the new day you’ve built. Everything around  you has the same glow around it. That same captivating orange that felt so far away at first sight. Your life morphs and bends with each day into the things dreams are made of. 

There have been quite a few creations from my visions of late. Finding the man of my dreams, and a best friend in him. Having the love that, until recently, I have only read or written about. I am lucky that I could believe and had the ability to notice the floating orange seeds of change. Fortunate that I found the courage to follow them.

I am currently also following wisps that will bring me to where I need to be with my publishing. I handle each one delicately as they are delivered from my minds eye. I have faith that they will lead me to where I see my future heading.

I was recently asked “What’s your plan B?” Flabbergasted, I replied “I don’t need a plan B. This is where my path is taking me. There is no other possibility.” I know I’m right. I can feel it in my bones. My future has already taken root in the curves of my feet, ready to bud and branch up my legs and take hold of my soul.

In the coming blog posts I will be introducing chapters of the first book: Deep Breaths. I have only just started working with an editor that appeared on my news feed. I believe she was sent to me as a direct product of what I envisioned the next steps for me were.

Happy reading all,

Angela Edmonds 

Too many people feel the sneaking, slithering chill of depression and anxiety. Silently, small crawling creatures, use sharp talons to grip the tissue. Relishing in your uncertainties and over thinking tendencies. They smile as you start having a hard time breathing and as your vision starts to blur they are euphoric, sinking their claws even further into your soul, lapping up the gor that slips from your fresh wounds.

It’s kind of a grayish blue. Like the fog of blur that sets into the corners of your vision, closing in as you start to hyperventilate. Hands trembling, you attempt to regain composure. You’re an adult, you have bills to pay and can’t afford another unpaid day off. Up comes your breakfast, luckily you made it to the bathroom because you would have no energy to clean up after yourself if you didn’t … again.

Staring blankly into the mirror you take three steady breaths and head to the fridge. Hesitantly, you grab one of the sugar filled energy drinks and silently hope that this one won’t be the one that gives you a heart attack. Checking for the 17th time, you have everything you need, you tell yourself as you rush through the door.

A blue swept under the rug. If your anything like me, most days you push through just as I do. Making sure that no one can see the seams that I blend so effortlessly on the edges of my mask.

I have had little time to find that book. The book where the main character is similar to me. Fighting the fight and pushing feelings of inferiority back, as I  am far from perfect. Marie is that girl. She was born into a troubled family life. Domestic violence feeding the anxiety and depression tendencies that are welded into her DNA. Letting them grow into a monster by the time she’s an ‘adult’.

She battles through feelings of Self loathing, partly due to the way media has made her feel. To the mainstream public she is plus sized and this makes it all the more difficult for her to blossum. ‘You’re not good enough’ the creatures hiss into her ears as she focuses all of her energy towards appearing normal.

She has no idea how people actually see her. She is clueless, watching her feet as she shuffles them through each day. No idea until Ian happens. Overly attractive and seemingly very confident, Ian uses his powerful hands to pull the demons from her skin. One by one they fall, retreating to the back of her mind as he saves her. 

That’s too easy though, they are not gone. They wait patiently, gnawing at the chained box, finding precisely the right moment to seep out and grasp at her ankles.

As it often happens, life hurls Marie from her safe place. Thrusting her back into old habits. She will never be safe, never be worthy of anything more. The evil entities take control of her decisions once again. Once again breathing becomes impossible and seeing through the fog becomes a futile effort. It will never change.

Or will it?

Angela Edmonds