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Tonight is the second writing phone call with Mr. Ronn. Our goal to enter the conversation with our one-sentence book synopsis and some basic plotting, maybe for the first couple of chapters.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I completely underestimated the one-sentence synopsis. It's not at all as easy as I thought it would be. My initial attempts ranged from the obscure to the "train wreck" as Ronn put it.

I had been struggling with this and realized that my problem was that you can't write a synopsis of a book when you don't know what the plot of the book is. Which went directly to the real problem I had: no plot.

Well, for NaNoWriMo, "No plot? No problem!" But this isn't NaNoWriMo. So I'll need a plot.

Talked to Ronn via IM tonight after finding a really cool writing program for the Mac called Scrivener. Here are the results of tonight:

Scrivener

I think I'll give this writing software a try. It looks to allow me to keep my notes, my outline, and my synopses organized and in plain view; something that I liked about RoughDraft. This may be a piece of software that I actually buy rather than substitute with free versions.

Synopses

Writing a short, one-sentence synopsis of my story is proving difficult. Mainly, it's because I don't have the story fleshed out in my mind. This is actually helping me generate ideas, though.

Well, Ronn and I had our first call regarding the writing of our next novel (each writing his own). In this call, we discussed the stories we had in mind to write -- or at least the germ of ideas that we have that will need to be turned into a story.

For Ronn's part, his story about angels, nephilim, and their interaction with us mortals sounds to be very interesting. It has a lot of potential for conflict (both physical and interpersonal) as well as the examination of several emotions (such as love, longing, responsibility, and indecision).

I think talking about it helped the ideas gel a bit more in his mind. I tried to add some suggestions, and ideas from a reader's perspective -- what to conceal, when to reveal -- and how the characters might interact.

So, I was IM'ing with buddy Ronn the other night and he tells me he has the writing bug. As is usual with our friendship, once one of us has a bug, he wants to spread it. He's trying to infect me.

I've been interested in writing for a bit, likely inspired to fiction by Ronn, way back when. So we've decided to have a weekly chat via Skype to talk about writing; what to write, how to write, when to write ... characters, scenes, settings ... the whole shebang.

I realize I'm addressing this a bit late, but this is definitely a good read of how the Iowa Supreme Court made a fair, level-headed, and well thought out decision in regards to their constitutional definition of marriage:

Iowa's Gay Marriage Decision: What it Says and What it Means

I highly recommend you read how this decision "so clearly, cogently, and conscientiously dismantles and destroys each and every one of the arguments that the anti-gay forces have made — and continue to make — against sex same marriage."