Category Archives: Blog

Resolutions. I have none. Well kinda.

Last year I swore that it would be the year I finished my book and became published. I got 50 percent there, which is not bad for me since I usually don’t fall through with the resolutions.

So my promises are not promises so much as deberes, homework on a to do list that has already started moving since before midnight Jan. 1.

First of all grad school. I’m getting my MFA in creative writing-fiction. Super excited about it.

Next, will finish the second book — Los Boleros de mi padre — this year.

Thirdly, will submit short stories to be published.

Then, will launch my online only fiction series — The Brown Sugar Mysteries. (more on that later)

And finally, network, network, network.

Those are my resolutions as a writer. I’ll do my best not to break them before Jan 15. We’ll see.

The Last Single Girl serial

1. First part
2. Second Part
3. Third Part
4. Fourth Part
5. Fifth part
6. Sixth and final part

Resentment serial

1. Vodka is the only thing that gets the hurt out
2. Murphy’s Law
3. Getting back on track
4. Fake it ’till you make it

That’s what I keep saying to people when they ask how my recent trip home went.

“The Muses were kind.”

And they were. I just didn’t create anything new.

What they did was inspire me, blew new air my way and awaken me from within as if I had been sleeping. It helped that I attend the 6th annual and FINAL Edward James Olmos Latino Family and Book festival. I saw my old friends who knew me before I was Icess Fernandez, journalist. They knew me when I didn’t put periods at the end of sentences. It was pretty awesome.

And it was nice to see friends and enjoy Houston like a native instead of a visitor. I miss home even after nearly six years of not living there, and the more I’m away the more I want to be back. You can take the girl out of Houston ….

The city empowers me creatively and makes me feel all things are possible, dreams come true, and that the world is your oyster. Don’t know why it does; Houston is not Paris. But for me it’s life and I could only wish that one day I’ll live there again.

Again, the Muses were kind.

Okay, so I didn’t finish everything on the Project: Finding La Diva list but it’s not a failure.

Far from it! I have direction now and am formulating what kind of storyteller I want to be. The voice is coming, stronger this time, and it will be something to contend with.

So I’m putting together a new list for the New Year. If you have any suggestions for part two of the list, send them my way. This year I’m reading for grit, grab by the throat literary voices like Dagoberto Glib. Unapologetic voices like Junot Diaz. And strong, can’t keep your eyes from the page voices like Juila Alvarez.

What is faith and where does it come from? Is it belief in self, in someone, in someone or thing higher than you? What’s the different between belief and faith?

I’ve been questioning faith a lot lately, probably more than I should. The holidays are tough for everyone. For me they were especially tough in 2003, the first Christmas after dad died. It was tough in 2005 for about 2.5 seconds. And they are tough this year.

I am having a crisis of the spirit, at least that’s what I’m calling it. My faith, mostly in myself, is waning. How do I continue to believe in myself, my abilities as a writer, as a woman when I consider myself a failure?

I live in a strange city with no one I would call a friend, sick and just about muse less. I’ve not written in some weeks now and I can’t bring myself to write more that just a couple of blog posts. My spirit is weary, as is my mind. I feel that I’ve not accomplished my goals and never will. I feel an internal ticking signaling that time is running out to make my mark on the world.

What will be my legacy? For awhile I thought it would be my work. But newsprint fades. Well then, my words. The road to publishing is not for the weak at heart and I keep bumping my head on a brick wall with so many challenges against me. Children? None and there are no plans for any.

That leaves the people and the lives I’ve touched. My friends would say that I’ve somehow made their lives better. I thank them for their gracious words but how could I be a good friend, the type that I want to be, living so far away (even though I’m closer than I’ve been in awhile.)

I should be thankful because except for my limp, I am in good health. I have a job. I have an amazing cat. I have friends and family. From that aspect, my life is good but like all stupid mortals, I want more. I want to be more, more of a friend, a daughter. I want to have happiness swirl around me and live the life that makes me weep with joy. I yearn for it. I use to have that life until Oct. 16, 2002. Until March 26, 2003. Respectively, the day my dad died and the day I moved away from my home town.

It feels a bit like a life interrupted and that I’m working in vain to recover it or from it. Is that life gone? Are there prospects for a better one?

Faith.

Faith in myself that I will pull through this. Faith that there is a better life. Faith that I will leave a happy legacy.

I’m just finding it difficult to cling on to it lately.

But what is faith if it is not tested?

The latest (well not so latest) gimmick, marketing tool, advertising technique — take your pick–in the book world seems to be the book trailer.

A trailer. For a book. So that people can read it. Didn’t studder.

So anyway, book trailers are all over YouTube and probably on your favorite writer’s website/blog. (I don’t have one yet ’cause I have nothing to sell but give a minute. )And they range from the really well done to the absurd.

Frankly, anyone with any knowledge of Soundslides or Final Cut Pro can put together a one minute why-you-should-read-my-book-feature. Really doesn’t take much actually.

I don’t know how effective this type of marketing is. There are some that are so funny that I would watch the trailer again but I’m not sure if I would pick up the book. On the opposite end of the spectrum, there are trailers so awful that there was no way I would spend money or energy to get that book. Goes to show that it doesn’t take much to shoot yourself in the foot, even when you have the best of intentions.

But when you have a good trailer for a book that’s equally as juicy, pay dirt! I want to read it instantly. It’s also a great way to scope out new ones. Here’s a link to Book of Lies .

And there are other blogs such as Watch The Book, that posts book trailers and companies like Circle of Seven who create them.