My Writing Journey: RSJ Contest

I thought I would do something different this year. Share my writing journey toward publication with you. You know I'm a book critic and a literary publicist, but I am a writer also. So if i don't forget and you remind me, I will post my progress. What's going on and snippets of my writing style.

This week I am working on a novel contest for Romance Slam Jam. I encourage you to enter also.) Truthfully, I should have this contest entry finished, but I was sick last week and I have a challenge putting too much time in my business, then in my writing. This exercise is an attempt to find balance. You all will hold me accountable right? :)

Don't forget to stop by Media Candy tonight. We're talking about Sour Candy. What not to do when Marketing and Promoting Yourself. 8pm EST. at www.blogtalkradio.com/mediacandy

So here's a snippet of my story. Tell me what you think. I have a very tough stomach...

Bishop squinted across the blood red sky, but what he saw next forced him to his knees. He stretched his eyes underneath his goggles until he saw within three paces of him a woman dancing in the sweltering Iraqi desert. She twirled on top of the sand like someone he knew when his life seemed so big and wide and growing.Life was shorter now and he hadn’t seen a woman looking like a woman—let alone dancing like one-- in nineteen months. Either he was dying, finally, or already dead. No wonder her feet didn’t touch the ground. He thought.


He extended his arms toward the woman, then a voice so sweet and still called out to him. “Save me.”


He recognized the voice, scrambled off the ground and blinked. Mia? Mia Carmichael?


But she was gone, and now a sandstorm approached in gallops.


He lowered his head and wondered if he should run toward that car graveyard to his right and take cover or just give in to the inevitable. No one had written him in weeks. Stacy had stopped answering his emails months before that. Stacy was his girl friend. Yet, Mia Carmichael had somehow become his lifeline since his deployment. Her last letter mirrored his own longings. He wanted to share that discovery with her. He should have. Now...too late.


Bishop felt the warm wind whipping over his cheeks and thought of her again. There were whispers that the new president would bring them home sooner that expected, but what did he have to go home to? Where was Stacy? Where his Boys? And Mama...he sighed...she was lost to him long before he left. There wasn't a reason to return to Conyers anymore.


The storm and sand began to serenade him now. It must be my time. He assumed. Perhaps Mia's vision was God's way of calling him home, and so he quietly surrendered the little bit of fight left in him. I'm ready.


Mia. He prepared himself for the approaching pain and gulped. Mia. The thought of her, the strawberry smell in her hair, the plum taste of her lips, the plump soft touch of her lips against his cheek made him close his eyes again and wish her back just until his change came. And then he remembered he hadn't kissed or really looked at Mia Carmichael since they were six-years-old.


He opened his eyes and gasped. Wait! I don't want to die.

from (Untitled/Bishop & Mia by Dee Stewart )