Sooo, I've been working pretty hard on my latest writing project since my husband deployed in late April. And while it's not finished YET, I feel confident enough to tell you that shortly I'll have completed the first draft of my VERY FIRST screenplay!!!

I know that I'm a novel girl by trade, but I have always seen my third novel, The Wanderer as a "big screen" story. Who better to write the screenplay than the author herself! Whatever comes of this great journey, I'm happy to have expanded my horizons! What a FABULOUS experience this has been so far!

As any book to movie story goes, there will be some additions, some cuts, and some modifications in order for the story to flow better on screen. The thing is, I wrote The Wanderer, as mentioned before, as if it already was a movie playing out in my head so if you know the story and love it as is I doubt you'll be disappointed. In fact, I sort of wish a few of my favorite novels turned movies had been written by the authors for this very reason.

Screenwriters change up novels for a lot of different reasons when converting them. One reason being that they need to throw in their own creative flair. They need to make the story their own. Well, as the author, the story already is my own, and I love it how it is in its essence. So now I get to work on just perfecting it. And of course as I've been writing the screenplay I've been tortured to some degree by questions like, "Now why didn't I write this the first time around, it sounds so much better?!" But as any fellow writer knows or will tell you, the job of writing a story is never "complete". There simply comes a time, especially as a self-published or indie author ,where you just have to walk away. That's what Re-writes and new editions are for.

As for trying my hand at screenplay writing, it certainly is much different. I will most definitely have to go back and edit, edit, edit, before I even CONSIDER submitting it anywhere. The style of writing a screenplay is much more technical. Entirely technical in fact. There's really no "flair" in the bare bones of the story, it's all a matter of setting a scene and putting dialogue together. This has made the experience all the more interesting for me because it certainly is a challenge for me since I can be a bit wordy in my writing. It forces me to find ways to get out of the character's head and figure out how to convey the same story with the same inflections and mood/tone with only actions and dialogue.

What a great exercise this has been!

To those of you out there who have enjoyed any or all of my novels, don't worry! I am equally as exciting to get back into novel writing as well but when this opportunity presented itself I just had to go for it!

I'll be keeping you posted! Until then, Happy Reading!!!