Tomorrow, I’m going to begin a month-long blogging challenge called, “The A to Z Challenge.”  The basic idea is that you blog everyday in April except Sundays, and that gets your 26 posts, one for every letter of the alphabet.  *I can see your jaw dropping*  Not only do I have to come up with a post for each letter, I need to comment and participate on other blogs that are doing the same thing – a whole LOT of participation is needed for this event.

I know, it sounds crazy.  It’s going to be a TON of work, but I’m actually pretty excited about it.  It’s been suggested that you find a theme to help you focus on what you want to write for each letter and after some consideration, my desired theme is: Exploring Fairy Tales.

This does not mean that I’ll be posting about princesses everyday, even I would be a little bored with that.  (And I honestly don’t think there is one with a name that starts with “X”?)  I had to stretch the boundaries here a little and I’ve included a nursery rhyme or two, some American tall tales, and one Marvel character.

As I was preparing for this challenge, I got a little excited because some of the stories I selected I hadn’t read since I was a little girl and revisiting these stories kind of reminded me why I like to write.  Hopefully you will enjoy this journey as much as (am hoping) I will.  And who knows, at the end of the month maybe we will have let our “inner child” loose.  What was your favorite story when you were a kid?

Glasses are clinking, kids are running around, and the men are crowded around the grill.  You are holding a glass of wine, because it’s something to do with your hands and someone, you think they are the wife of a friend, comes up to you to introduce themselves.  It’s going great and then she asks the question you’ve been dreading, “What do you do?”

As a writer, or as a my friend Kristen Lamb would call us, “pre-published authors,” I’ve made the unconventional decision to pursue my dream of writing for a living.  What a quaint idea. 🙂  If you’re like me, you’re thinking about how you’ve loved books for as long as you can remember.  You are thinking about how you might sit in class and daydream about a story, maybe not even realizing that you are crafting a story in your mind when you’re supposed to be studying some equation, but it’s as real to you as anything else.  You can make jokes with people that you “hear voices” and that’s ok, and you can argue how you get frustrated with a movie’s plot or characters.

I have decided that traditional careers weren’t for me and decided to give this writing thing a shot.  But how do you explain that to someone in casual conversation and why do I feel the need to explain why I’ve made that decision?  Do you know what I mean?

Why are we so sure that our identities are tied to what we do for a living?  And if that is the case, are you that person who is proud to say what you do for a living is who you are?  Deep thoughts for this Friday, sorry. 🙂

I wanted to announce that my website has be remodeled and wanted to give a huge “THANK YOU,” to Brittany Dawson on all her help to get that done.  🙂  I hope you like it!

I hate reading the news.  One of the best things about working from home is that I don’t immediately switch on the news in the morning while clicking through emails.  While still dealing with emails (there is no escape), I usually start my day with a large cup of coffee and glancing through social media.  I’ve found that I’m less stressed when I start my day with funny Facebook memes and goofy videos on Twitter about two dogs farting.

I keep this same principal when I’m selecting a movie to watch or a book to read.  I don’t mind drama, but prefer that to be kept to my “entertainment.”  When I go about my day to day life, I would prefer to keep the stress and dramatics to a minimum, you know?

Let me give you an example.  I just went to a new tab and pulled up today’s news.  These are some of the top headlines:

It makes my heart sick.  I’ve always wondered why we can’t have some balance with our news, you know for every horrific headline, lets say, have an article about a little boy raising money to help homeless in his neighborhood.  I’m not criticizing here, it’s just my personal opinion.

So, when I write/read, I’m always looking for the Happily Ever After (HEA.)  I don’t just mean with romance, but also having a general sense of all things working out/coming together in the end.  I love being able to loose myself in a story and at the end having a sense of completion with it.  I really hate when things are left unanswered or the ending has this weird unbalance to it. Have you ever read a book like that?

Recently, I read a book where the main character kind of had to save herself, she was being falsely charge with murder and she was on the run and couldn’t trust anyone.  I was hooked because I wanted to see how this woman would save herself and I like a good mystery.  She realized that her current boyfriend wasn’t the one for her and she begins to have feelings for another guy. At the end, she solves the mystery and is able to save herself, but the author added one more twist, it turned out that the new guy was a bad guy.

I was so bummed and a little disappointed.  I really felt that the story could have ended before this moment, and I didn’t like that after everything the character went through she didn’t even find someone that she could trust.

Now, I’m not saying that the author was wrong, I’m simply stating a preference.  An example where I think this works is in the Hunger Games trilogy.  I really like how the author brought everything together in the end and without giving away too much, I’ll just say that despite everything Katniss went through, she deserved to find some peace.  (I have a lot of friends that disagree with me on this.)

I like closure in my stories, even if it’s not happy, the closure helps me to move past the book.  Do you know what I mean?

How about you?  What kind of stories do you like?  Do you prefer to have things come together, or do you like when the ending leaves some questions?