Updates, I guess

I have a very short lull in my semester right now, and I'm so relieved!  I'll teach a writing session tonight, and then I have a few days in which I do not have to teach.  Some might call such days "days off," but there is no such thing in my life.  There is ALWAYS school work to do--prepping the next unit and creating lesson plans, grading old homework, trying to find the mythical "perfect textbook" for next semester, suddenly realizing that textbook orders were due several weeks ago and that I should get on that.... oops.

But, during this special time, I may also have some time to do somethings I want to do!  Sadly, my list is mostly comprised of housekeeping chores that have been neglected for months (notice the passive voice here--a clever way of not placing blame on an individual.  The chores have simply been neglected.  By whom?  Well, I don't know; it just says they've been neglected.)  BUT after approximately 45 hours of non-stop house cleaning, I might squeeze in some sort of hobby.

Abrupt topic shift with no transition whatsoever.

I decided yesterday that I want to write the next huge teen sensation of novels.  But instead of a trilogy like those now-rich gals have been putting out--and which the greedy movie studios keep turning into four films, I intend to write a tetralogy--a series of four book.  Yes, the word is so unfamiliar that my spell check says it is not spelled correctly.  I shall introduce this term to the masses!  The only trick is... what to write about....

Actually, I spent some time thinking it over yesterday.  There are some models already out there--just follow the models!  But, first, it needs a hook: Twilight has teen vampires and werewolves (i.e. the supernatural). Hunger Games presents a dystopia with teens and the whole danger and suspense aspect mixed with rebellion and revolution.  Divergent has... well, what the hell does it have?  It's not very good.  Okay, try again: Divergent has teens who must choose their lifetime clique at age 16, and if they choose to join the cool clique, the might die or become homeless.  Okay, try again: Divergent presents a seeming utopia that has teens making difficult decisions, being tough when faced with the consequences of their choices, then the series takes it up about 20 notches and reveals the actual dystopia with (fairly small-scale) conspiracy (which needs to be addressed by teens) and moves up to extremely large-scale conspiracy/revelation of government interference and control of entire cities of people.

Common themes: first person teen girl narrators (age 16) with the usual teenage emotions and angsty complications with boys.  These girls do things and make decisions that no 16-year-old girl would ever, ever do.

So, after bouncing some ideas off Jon, I ran upstairs to my office and frantically typed out three pages of notes.

It's a promising start, right?

Now I just need to figure out how to write fiction. 
Compelling fiction. 
Compelling fiction that a publisher will actually publish--oh, and that people will read. 

Yeah, I think I've already got the hard part out of the way with those three pages of notes.  Phew.  I was beginning to think this might be too impossible a task for me to even consider under taking.