Hi! 

My name is Margarita (oh, the jokes I heard in middle school), but you can call me Maggie. I love writing, and I guess I've been writing most of my life. I remember being really little and recording stories into a tape recorder. That's how obsessed I was!

I have an English degree from UCLA, and I've written for a bunch of magazines and websites. You can find almost all of my articles here: margaritawriter.wordpress.com. Note how I said almost, because I've written a bunch of articles under a pen name. Which shall remain a secret. *smirk*

I'm currently a freelance writer and private tutor who is working on several YA novels, including an urban fantasy and two contemporaries. I hope to be published by the time I'm thirty, and I can really hear that clock ticking! Seriously, I'm sitting next to a clock right now, and it is LOUD. 

Anywho, this is my blog where I will talk about my journey on the dark and lonely (kidding! Or am I?) road to publication. I love to meet and talk to other aspiring writers so feel free to friend me or send me a private message. 

Happy writing!

I've been reading Francesca Lia Block's work since I was 12 years old. No other author has ever been able to capture the light and darkness, the magic and gritty realism of my hometown, Los Angeles, so perfectly. Weetzie Bat and I Was A Teenage Fairy were the first books I ever bought of hers and I still have the original (they're about 15 years old now) copies in my bookcase. I know that I will treasure them forever. About two years ago I had the honor of meeting Francesca during a one-day writing retreat in her home, The Faerie Cottage, as it is known to many. It's not always a good experience when you meet your heroes, but Francesca was as sweet, humble, intelligent and generous as I had imagined her to be. 

Just a few days ago I found out that she is having trouble refinancing her home, and is in danger of losing it, despite never having missed a payment. You can help spread the word and put pressure on Bank of America to refinance the Faerie Cottage by signing this petition:

http://www.change.org/petitions/save-the-faerie-cottage

It will only take a few seconds. Please help Francesca keep her home, and if you've never read her work before, I highly recommend you check out some of her books immediately. My top two favorites are I Was A Teenage Fairy and Wasteland.

Happy New Year, everyone! May this year be full of joy, love, health and lots and lots of writing!

That is in an actual office. And I have to clock in and clock out. Even when I go out to lunch! And I have co-workers! 

This is obviously the norm for most people, but for the past two years, I had been working almost exclusively from home, freelancing and tutoring. It's definitely a change to be going into an office every day before the crack of dawn. Like, literally before the crack of dawn because I have to get up at 6AM to get there on time. It is dark and cold as I stumble out of bed and attempt to brush my teeth every morning. I also hate my life very much during those first several minutes. But then when I get to work (as a product describer/blogger for a fashion website), I forget all of that because my co-workers are awesome, and aspiring novelists/screenwriters like me, and we never run out of things to talk about. 

I think I can get used to this 9-to-5 gig (actually 7-to-3, but it doesn't have quite as nice a ring to it), but I don't want to jinx myself. I've only been going to work for two days, and I'm already exhausted. 

Look, ma, I'm in the real world! Ha, just kidding, I freaking hate that expression.

My vocabulary is elementary. My ideas are unoriginal. My characters all sound alike. No matter how much I research I will never know what it's really like to be a teenager in Alaska. I use "just," "even," "totally," and "really," way too much. I use "much" too much. I don't know how to forward a plot; I just keep writing random scenes. I will never be able to write a beautiful, complex sentence.

I feel stupid.

I'm still working on the third draft of TAINTED FROST (TF). I'm still excited about it, which I cannot believe at times, because I've been working on it for over two years now. There have been several novels in the past that I started working on and then gave up because I wasn't invested in the story enough. But with TF? I feel like it's a story that absolutely must be told, for whatever reason. I have a little dry-erase board on the wall by my bed and yesterday I wrote "Write the book you want to read." I don't know exactly where I heard or read that quote, but it definitely struck a chord. And I think TF is something I would want to read, especially once I'm done with this round of revisions. It's slowly becoming exactly what I imagined it would be.

Oh, by the way, a few days ago I stumbled up on yet another discouraging blog post about how hard it is (almost impossible) to get published and how hard it is to have success as a writer. I was bummed for about 24 hours, but then it went away. I think I still manage to remain optimistic because I've never queried a novel and, thus, never been rejected. (Although I've queried a short story and received about three rejections, but that's probably not enough to crush an aspiring writer's spirit.) I just hope this optimism holds once I start getting rejections that number into the hundreds. *fingers crossed*

Happy writing! And revising!

I had to take a break from revising my novel to write for money, but now I'm back on track. I did have some time to read about half of my novel, and there are a lot of passages (and even entire chapters) that I want to keep. Which is reassuring, because I tend to hate almost everything I write. I have about two months to complete this revision before I send the manuscript off to my first-ever beta reader EVER!!! I'm so nervous! But also excited. But mostly nervous.


I think I will die from anxiety before the beta reader returns the manuscript to me with her comments. People have read my work before, but never an entire novel from start to finish without interruption. I've gotten mostly positive feedback (which is GREAT!), but I can never be sure if people are being 100% honest. This particular beta reader does not know me and is not a friend, so I hope they will give me lots of constructive feedback. I really want to query TAINTED FROST next year, which means that I might have to deal with some negative feedback if I want to make it the best it can be. *gnaws fingers* I think I can handle it though. I used to work at a magazine, and whenever the editor asked me to make some changes I always liked that better than when they said it was perfect. I think criticism can only make you a better writer as long as you don't let yourself take it TOO seriously.


Anyway, this whole journey has been so exciting, and I can't wait to see what happens the rest of the year.


Happy writing!