Featured Artist Tuesday!

G'morning everyone....it's my favorite day again; when I get to show off someone special! I am doing something a bit different today. I figure an artist is anyone that is dedicated to their craft, well this young lady is very dedicated to her craft and very talented to boot!

So without further ado....I give you the pleasure of reading about .......

Amanda Trisdale!  Dedicated, aspiring writer! Let's learn a bit about her in her own words:

Sherri asked me to write about myself, and I can’t seem to figure out exactly how to. 

Maybe it’s because I’m so shy.  You know the person who is hiding against a wall at social gatherings?  That’s me.  I hate talking to people about myself.  I have no problem describing the characters in my writing, just who I am. 

 I’m a twenty-nine year old Air Force wife who just moved to Las Cruces, New Mexico.  My husband was gone long enough for me to finish my first novel that I thought others might read.  You can imagine his surprise when he came home to me querying agents in an attempt to get published.

I love writing.  I tend to break the rules on writing all of the time.  This is probably because unlike most writers, I have not spent years listening to professors tell me how I am supposed to write. 

Supposedly, before you write a story you are supposed to sit down and figure out where the story is going.  I tried, but my characters just won’t let me.  I wasn’t even planning on writing about these characters in the novel. 

One day, I was just sitting at the computer and the next thing I knew I had two hundred pages about Alexandria Houston (my main character.)  I tried to figure out where Alexandria was going, but she obviously had other ideas.  Yes, I kind of think of my characters as people I know.

I also break the rules about how to write.  One of the other rules I break is writing so that your reader feels they are a character in the book.  Besides, I get in to my writing.  I tend to start feeling what my characters are feeling, especially my main character.  I still haven’t figured out why this is a problem.  I don’t know about you, but if I can feel attached to a character I am more likely to continue reading the book. 

 I don’t write at certain times of the day.  I’ll write for hours some days when the plot bunnies start running wild.  I’m the type that will forget to eat and sleep if the plot bunny starts to lead me down a trail.  I can’t sit down and force the words on the page.  Oh, and I write too much and have to break it up in to smaller bites for the general public.  (You can probably tell I am a little wordy.)

You can find samples of my writing on my website, or my daily blog.  I am trying to chronicle my journey to becoming a published writer.  Obviously, that hinges on me finding an agent and being published.

Sounds like a best-selling author is in the works ey?

 Here are a few links to find out more about Amanda:

Amanda's Blog: A Writer's Journey to being Published

Twitter @antrisdale

www.amandanicoletrisdale.com