They're taking the hobbits to Bloglovin!

Dear followers,

No. Wait.

SONS OF GONDOR. OF ROHAN.

A day will come when we will cave in to the fall of Google Friend Connect... a day where the lack of blog following platforms will strike fear in the hearts of many. A day will come when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship. A day will come when this blog is a veritable desert... BUT IT IS NOT THIS DAY.

Long story short: Google Friend Connect is going away. That's the little "followers" gadget on the sidebar. Without GFC, you won't be able to keep up with our posts.

So, follow our blog with Bloglovin.

Please.

we are wanderers.

I found an article on Pinterest today. Click below to read it.

>> One Thing YA Authors Must Know, by Amy Zhang <<

This. This wins everything. I can't think of anything that more accurately described what I feel about myself, about my entire existence. Don't let the title mislead you: I think every teenager, ever, needs to read this.

Stay awesome. And know that I'm wandering, stuck in this teenager paradox, too. But, to quote Pressing On by Relient K, I think "we're gonna make it after all."

-- Pepper

evanescent fireworks

lights will guide you home

and ignite your bones

and i will try to fix you
// coldplay

Yesterday I accidentally started a novel. Again. That seems to be how all my novels start: accidentally. 

 See, I was adamant I wouldn't start another novel. I already have Broken Wings that I need to write, and editing Because I'm Irish and plotting for that book's sequel. As for writing, I'd been hoping to make my main focus on writing the currently four-book fantasy series fondly called The Silverthorne Mafia. I just don't need  to start another project right now. I want to finish what I've already got going, because the Silverthorne Mafia is really important to me.

But that doesn't mean my other projects aren't important to me, either.

It started with a couple of pins, then morphed into a pin board. For some reason the phrase "Evanescent Fireworks" came into my head, so that's what it was called. I wanted to leave it in the transitional planning stage indefinitely.

But that's not the way things work sometimes.

Last night, Scarlett posted in the group calling for a word war. Caroline joined, and they did one word war. I wasn't going to join at first, but then, as it so happens with word wars, they're infectious. Scarlett went to bed, but Caroline and I decided to do another one. There was just one problem: I had no idea what to write.

"Write something from Evanescent Fireworks," she said. "It'll be fun," she said.

All kidding aside, I started it. "I'll just write the beginning, as a snippets," I thought. I write snippets all the time. "And then I'll leave it for when I officially start writing EF."

Hahahaha. Haha. Ha.

That's when Annah and Wren came on, respectively. And five or six word wars later, I had a 2,000 word long beginning to EF.

The premise is this: it's a romance, set in the South. Evyn is my girl main character, who was born into a rich socialite family, but she doesn't fit in and only prefers to watch endless TV shows on Netflix. Don't let her seemingly carefree lifestyle fool you, though: she carries around a lot on her shoulders and has some really deep stuff to sort through. Her penchant for Netflix only disguises the pain she feels. As for the other half of the lovely couple, Chris is the lead singer in a band, and he's being very mysterious thus far. I do know he plays guitar and rides a motorcycle and he has some secrets about his past that I don't think he's telling me. He also sang Part of Your World while dishing up his green bean casserole at Evyn's mom's party.

There's also Alec Mumford, aka Mum, who plays guitar and loves Eragon and wears Ring pops and is an incorrigible flirt. I adore him. (That's him playing banjo on the right.)

I don't know what this story is about in full, and I don't know how I'm going to write this, or what will happen when I do. But I do know that I love Mum and I connect with Evyn more than I ever thought I would and this story does need to be written.

I just don't know how or when. But I do know that my best and most beloved novels happen by accident. I have an inkling that this one will be no different.

(if these images belong to you, please let me know.)

In a World of Pure Imagination

(BROWNIE POINTS TO YOU IF YOU GOT THE CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY REFERENCE.)

It struck me the other day what a beautiful gift the imagination is. And how powerful it is.

I mean, seriously! If you just simply close your eyes, you can go to Africa. You can go to London. You can go to Ireland (my personal favorite!). You can also go places you've never been. You can see things you'd never see otherwise.

(Like unicorns in a cotton candy sky, which I believe happened to me once, but let's not talk about that.)

Imagination is one of the most important things as a writer. Seriously, think about it. If you don't see your story in your mind first before it ever hits the shelves, who will?

So, here's my advice to you. Picture your story in your mind as the words hit the page. Live through it, vicariously. Living vicariously through my writing is one of the reasons I started writing, and it is amazing. It's the best thing since bread and butter. (Or is it sliced bread?) But seriously. Nothing compares.

Write vividly. Never stop! The imagination is quite possibly the best thing on earth. Enjoy it.

Now go, live your dream.

"Your dream stinks; I was talking to her."

When Your Brain Is Exploding

When Your Brain Is Exploding: 

Step by Step Tips on How to Handle an Abundance of Inspiration

It is generally known that writing can be a frustrating and difficult experience. Often inspiration is welcomed, but sometimes it comes too fast, bowling one over like a semi-truck on a freeway. Novel ideas spring from everywhere, taunting us with their tempting freshness and beautiful hints of what's to come. As most professionals will tell you, sometimes this can be a good thing, but in rare cases, it has been known to make one's brain explode. If you should find yourself in this situation...

1. Find a writing buddy who can be a moral support for you during this difficult time.

2. Create Pinterest boards so that you can keep your ideas online rather than in your head.

3. Open a word doc and spill out all your ideas onto the page. This will save you from having to remember all of them.

4. Prioritize which ones you'd like to write in which order.

5. Talk to your support group, or your writing buddy, if you have one. Tell them about your ideas and don't be afraid to be honest about the strain this is causing you.

If you try all these steps and still find no relief...

6. Grab a roll of duct tape. Just in case.

Assassins in the 1950s?

assassins in the 1950s? green fedoras? time travel? oh no! ... oh, yes. 

 Yes, that is my new story idea.

Last night I was laying (lying? Which is correct?) in bed when a crazy idea jumped out at me.

Assassins in the 1950s.

What? What the heck?

And yet, I have this inexplicable image in my head of what this novel will be. It will possibly involve time travel, it will involve spies, evil people, and lots of intrigue--and most of all, it will involve green fedoras and an amazing character named Adam.

Not sure exactly how to explain him. Is he an assassin? Maybe. I do know for sure he's a bit of a rogue. Is he for the good guys? Maybe. Most likely. But he's used to being in bad places, I'd definitely say. Rough around the edges, and yet totally charming. I love him already.

It will also involve a love interest for him (duh) and lots of suspense. Because I love suspense.

And did I mention that it's about assassins?

Anyway, I don't even know how to comprehend all this inspiration and ideas that are coming my way. Normally I'm scrounging for ideas like I'm in an inspiration-starved desert. It's so unusual to have this many ideas hit me at once. First this idea about 50s assassins... then Here Comes the Sun, then Evanescent Fireworks. (You'll likely hear about these in upcoming posts.)

My mind is exploding with ideas.

I love being a writer.

(check out the pinterest board to see more pictures & the green fedora itself.)

Stay awesome,

-Pepper

Introducing Pepper

For your perusing, 

At times confusing, 

Slightly amusing

Introducing me.

(yes, i couldn't resist throwing a little nick jonas in here.)

So, I'm Sky, but my nickname on this blog is Pepper, short for peppermint tea. And also after the character in Iron Man. "Only 12%?" "An argument can be made for 15."

Obviously, I'm a writer. I don't know when exactly it started, but I do know that I've been writing for about as long as I can remember. My first book was a picture book, written and illustrated by myself, that I wrote when I was five. It was titled Dogs and Cats Castle.

I remember sitting at our old dinosaur of a computer before I was allowed to use the internet, and typing away in WordPad docs. I must have had thousands of WordPad files, and I wish I could still find them. Maybe I could, I don't know.

Off the top of my head, one of the earliest things I've found that I wrote was this Wizard of Oz journal. I received it when I was around five, and I wrote a story about Madeline. (I'll admit that it was partially fanfiction for the Madeline books.) The story went from when she was very young to when she fell in love and got married. (She fell in love at the age of like nine or something crazy like that. Obviously I wrote this at an extremely young age. Recently I looked back on it and just laughed and laughed.) Most of the book revolved around her expanding her family and having lots of kids, as well as her friends expanding their family and having lots of kids. At the very end, I even started writing about Madeline's daughter, Molly, as a teenager. It eventually faded away, but I was really emotionally invested in that story, and I guess you could say it was one of my first stories that had a ton of characters and plot threads.

At age 10 I finished my first book (maybe not full-length novel, but book at least). 'Twas the first project I saw through from the beginning all the way to the end. It was about five kids, all of which were named after states. They lived in Rock Rapids, Iowa and solved the mystery of a missing baby, whom they eventually found in a warehouse. (I've since written about warehouses in my finished novel, Because I'm Irish, so warehouses hold a special place in my heart.) It was written on a brick of a computer and it was my first dabbling in the wonderful world of suspense. That computer has since broken, but I want to try to hook it up again to see if I can retrieve the files.

Then, at the age of 12, I started what I consider to be one of my first novels. I sadly didn't finish it, but I still consider it to be a novel since I had the whole plot planned out, as well as two plots for two books after it. It was called Talryn's Tale, and it was my first dabbling in the world of fantasy. I still miss it and hope that something can be redeemed from it someday.

Many writing projects later, I started Reese's Pieces. This novel was just a project for fun, something for me to spill my brain into at the end of the day. I handwrote it sitting up in bed late into the night, and ended up finishing it at 60,000 words. I actually got a proof copy of it, which was one of the most insane feelings. Holding a book of yours in your hands is a feeling like no other.

As for the actual plot, it was about a girl named Reese who wanted to play drums and loved coffee (very indicative of my personality at the time). It was basically about her, her friends, and quite a bit of matchmaking. There's not a lot there that could be salvaged, so I've shelved it for now. But maybe someday I'll come back to it. (And it ended with me spilling a potted plant onto my character's lap. SCORE.)

The next milestone is what indirectly started this blog and got me on the path of writing vicariously every November--it was my first time doing NaNoWriMo. The year was 2009. I wrote "my Shae story," which was about Hollywood, fame, and mistaken parentage. I did the Young Writer's Program, which allowed you to set your own goal wordcount, and finished with 30,000 words. I still don't really love my story in the slightest, but I am irrevocably grateful for what that NaNoWriMo did for me, and the way it sparked me to do NaNo for years after.

In November 2010, I wrote a story titled Chandler and Paislee about two grieving adults who found love again. (Not really my cup of tea.) I didn't intend to shoot for 50k since I had a friend visiting for the beginning of the month, but in the last week, a friend encouraged me to try to make it. I ended up writing 25k in the last week. It was absolutely insane. After that year, I realized that I could do pretty much anything. ;)

And then November 2011 rolled around, the thing that I'm pretty sure has made me get absolutely serious about writing. My project was Silver Tears, and it was a fantasy. Out of that year I got a new appreciation for outlining, an amazing experience, and a fiery desire to continue writing like this. I also got Riah, who is one of my favorite characters of all time. (She made a skirt out of leaves and has an extremely fiery personality. She's awesome.)

Oh! And how could I forget? That year, I also learned how to gut a deer.

The December following that year's NaNo, I started a project on a complete whim. It was supposed to be a short story, a little thing for my own amusement. It was based entirely off of an inside joke between me and a friend. But then it exploded into something much more. That novel became Because I'm Irish. It became my second, and my favorite, finished novel in July of 2012. It's about a violinist, Fiona, who gets kidnapped by a boyband (it's suspense, obviously, with a fair dose of hilarious humor if I do say so myself). I just can't even with that story. It's one of my absolute favorite things I've ever written. It's currently on hiatus at a standing total of 60,000 words while I get up the courage to edit that lovely thing. (Editing is one thing I have no idea how to do and I'm nervous to attempt. I don't want to make a mess of a story that I love so much, and I'm afraid I'll mess it up if I try to edit it when I feel so inexperienced.) However, out of all the stories I want to shop to get published, Because I'm Irish is pretty high up there. You'll probably hear more about it in upcoming posts.

So then, we reach November 2012, which is when I met my lovely, gorgeous Tea-Spitters. We met completely by accident but we've really got an amazing bond and I'm so grateful for them. We supported each other through NaNo, fangirled, keysmashed, and sent gifs. It was amazing, and they made my NaNo experience 10x better.

I wrote Broken Wings last year, which is my current work-in-progress. It's about people who don't fit into normal society, bald eagles, wolves, living in the forest, an insane villain, and love. It's about love. That year, I learned that I really could write romance. And I also created Lynx and Rane, who are some of my favorite characters. (And Rane is a favorite for others as well. Who knew?)

So now that's where I'm at. I just finished reading over what I have written of Broken Wings two days ago and I hope to start in on it again soon. I think I'm pretty close to finishing, and I hope I can wrap it all up soon. I'm also gathering inspiration various projects, which you can see on my Pinterest page. (My head is exploding with ideas.) And actually, I think my various novels may deserve a post of its own.

I will also have to go into my fandoms sometime (of which there are many) and maybe do a rambling post of all the things I find interesting. Who knows? Anything can happen when you're a Tea-Spitter.

Sincerely yours,
-Pepper

And so it begins.

Well, welcome to the official Tea-Spitters blog! Whether you are a member of the Tea-Spitters, a friend of ours, or just a hapless stranger, welcome!

We still have to get this blog up and running, but until then, you can check out our about page, or our Pinterest board.

We'll see you soon, and don't forget to be awesome.

#lamefirstposts #ohwell