Tag Archives: Writing Process

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So You Want to Write a Book – Well, Now What?

William Faulkner's Underwood Universal Portabl...

William Faulkner’s Underwood Universal Portable (Photo credit: Wikipedia)


Has this ever happened to you? You’re with a group of people – let’s say a moms’ group, with everyone exchanging tips and anecdotes – and someone says, “We could write a book.”

“We really could!” someone else chimes in.

Another mom even throws in a title: “Temper Tantrum on Aisle Four – How to Survive the Toddler Years!”

Everyone laughs, and they go about their lives and forget about it. But you linger on the thought that maybe you could write a book. Then again, the idea that you don’t know how to start – and what would make your book any more special than any other, any more worthy of the New York Times Bestseller List? – is intimidating, so your idea stays an idea and no more.

On the one hand, you might be right. Everyone does have a story (or three), and some of them aren’t worth telling (and those are the ones that seem to be repeated the most). But any time you impart a nugget of knowledge to someone else who seems to get something out of it, you feel that I-should-really-write-this tug.

Nowadays, blogs (much like this one) pick up the slack. A mom blogs about potty-training her strong-willed toddler, and other moms unite behind her or take comfort that they aren’t alone in the struggle. A man loses his job but figures out how to make a living from home – and writes a great how-to post. Someone with an incredible weight-loss story posts a menu and workout routine online to help others in the same situation. Blogs are great resources, and the topics they cover are endless.

But still, there are those for whom blogging and swapping stories around the water cooler aren’t enough. The problem is that they aren’t necessarily writers and don’t know what to do. The idea persists, won’t let them go.

Sometimes for decades.

I get all kinds of mixed reactions when people find out that I’m a writer. They want to know what I write. (“Novels? How can you write so much?”) They want to know how much freelance work I can handle. (“How do you manage it with two kids?”) They marvel that I’ve actually made an occupation out of this – you know, it’s not just a cute hobby. (“You mean you edit and write for a living?”)

And sometimes they ask me, kind of sheepishly, if I can help them with something they’ve been wanting to do for years.

One such person is a client of my parents’ business and happened to mention to my mom that she had a writing project. My mother said that I’m a writer, and the next time the woman came in, I was there. I gave her my business card and promptly forgot about it. I talk to a lot of people about my services, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re going to hire me.

A few weeks later, to my surprise, she called. She went into great detail about this project, one that she started over ten years ago. Her kids have been encouraging her to write a memoir because she’s led such an interesting life, but she doesn’t use computers, and the woman who helped her start it has been too busy to continue.

As I talked to this woman and learned her story, I realized that there are so many people who lead amazing lives, but some of the best details will die with them. They may not have a great command of the English language, but they have stories worth passing on. It would be a shame for this woman to never see her dream fulfilled just because she’s not a “writer.” I feel privileged to help her share her bit of history with her family.

Another opportunity arose in late May. I had just published my children’s book Hero (shameless plug – buy it here!), and Peter shared it with his kindergarten class. Afterward, one of his teachers mentioned that she has always wanted to write a book but needs help.

“Sure, let’s do it,” I said before I even knew what she wanted. Hey, I had just illustrated and published my first children’s book – I was flying high and felt like I could do anything.

Her face lit up as she described her 20-year dream. She used to take her children for bike rides around Amelia Island. They would stop at interesting trees, and she would make them create stories about how those trees came to look like that. Combining her love of nature with her interest in developing writing skills in children, she wants to create a book with photos of interesting trees and writing prompts. As with her own children, kids will “Look at this tree” and be encouraged to write a story about it.

It’s right up my alley. Although I’ve never created a book like this, I must admit that I love writing prompts. I love anything that starts with a tiny seed and blossoms into a beautiful story.

I really feel that I could give her a push – much like with a child on a bike with the training wheels removed for the first time – and watch her go, but I also understand that I’ve been in the publishing world for a while now, and it’s no longer mysterious to me. If you’re not right in the middle of it, though, you might think writing a book is unattainable.

I was there once. I’ve talked about my college fiction workshop before, and the second time I signed up, our instructor Ari pulled a group of us together (the ones who were serious about getting published) and gave us the low-down on publishing. 1) It’s a competitive market that’s difficult to break into, and 2) it’s still not guaranteed to be everything you hoped and dreamed even if you do get published. What Ari suggested was that we pull our best stories together and create our own publication. And so Fiction Fix was born. With his direction, we figured out what we were supposed to do, and more than 11 years later, Fiction Fix is going strong as an online fiction journal. We’ve grown quite a bit from that group of desperate writers who just wanted to see our stories in print; now we receive submissions from all over the world.

We were lucky in that we had someone who saw our desire to write and be read and who knew just when to push us. But for those out there with the desire but no direction, no help, no idea except THE IDEA for a story or book, the task can seem daunting. But here’s the thing: if you have a book that you want to write, the only thing in your way is your own indecision. Instead of dreaming or joking about maybe writing a book some day, you need to take action.

Indie (self-published) authors are more prevalent than ever. The internet has done many wonderful things for writers, on-demand and e-publishing being two of them. And even if you don’t write, these tools and their practitioners have made publishing a much more attainable reality than it used to be.

An internet search can give you everything you need, from writers’ support groups and social networks to online book publishing to lists of freelance editors (like me!). Don’t ever assume that the person you’ve just looked up is the real deal until you’ve done some research. (I learned this the hard way, regarding literary agents – read my story here.) Also don’t assume that the big companies are your only choice. Everywhere you look, you will find writers and editors with different levels of expertise. You’ll even find local printing companies, graphic designers, and illustrators who can all help bring your book to life. These are real people with whom you can share a cup of coffee – and your dream.

But if you’d like some resources, here are some websites to check out:

  • Kindle Direct Publishing and CreateSpace (Amazon.com’s answers to e-publishing and on demand publishing)
  • Smashwords.com (distributor of eBooks to every conceivable e-format)
  • Writer’s Digest and Writer’s Market (tips for writing and publishing)
  • LinkedIn (where professionals go to network – Facebook and Twitter are great, but if you want to connect with writers who can help you get started, I can’t think of a better place)
  • NaNoWriMo.org (Ever wonder if you could write a novel in a month? If you’re serious about this, I promise that you will have the writing experience of a lifetime.

So… do you have a story to tell?

Want to help with the writing prompt book?

Look at This Tree

Look at This Tree

The writing prompt book I mentioned is the brain-child of my friend Karen Saltmarsh. We’re going to title it Look at This Tree, and we’re looking for high-quality photos of interesting trees that could tell a story. To the left is an example from a park that I visited in Washington State. (Don’t you think there could be a secret hideout for some mythical, woodland creature under the roots?) If you have something you’d like to submit, please fill out the contact form on my Writing Services page, and Karen and I will consider your photo for her book.

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Adding to My Personal Soundtrack

Quarta gregoriano

Quarta gregoriano (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I don’t talk enough about the musical influences in my life. I know it’s all books-this and writing-that, but I really wouldn’t be the well-rounded individual that I am (ha) without the music in my life.

There are times when music surprises me; a song that I’ve heard many times will suddenly awaken a creative something within me. Since I’m a writer, that “something” is usually a scene in a book I’m writing. Sometimes it’s the “aha!” moment I’ve been waiting for. Other times (like what I posted about most recently), a novel almost gets derailed by a new scene that I never would have imagined, were it not for hearing the right song at the right time.

Then there are other times that music doesn’t necessarily evoke a specific image or scene, yet it fulfills some emotional (and I would go as far as to say spiritual) hole and leaves me pleasantly full and happy, even energized.

What brings all this up? Well, I’m kind of riding a high from attending an evening of uplifting, choral music. A boring way to spend a Friday night, right? Well, not if I got chills during the first song (I did) and can’t stop thinking about the sound and the joy on the faces of the singers (I can’t).

You see, that’s how it is in this relationship I have with music. Many songs or musical events become a part of what I think of as the soundtrack of my life. (Don’t worry, as a writer, I sometimes narrate my life, too, but today it’s all about the music.)

Alanis Morissette

Cover of Alanis Morissette

For instance, any time I hear “The Sign” (Ace of Base), I’m overcome with nostalgia – it’s the title song of my first CD. The same goes for Alanis Morisette’s Jagged Little Pill; I bought that CD in the seventh grade, and so did my husband. It’s part of our middle school soundtrack.

And so it continues: musicals I participated in as a teenager, such as Annie and Fiddler on the Roof; Metallica’s S&M CD (one of the best Christmas presents Thomas ever bought); our first System of a Down CD, which we bought and listened to when we drove to a Gator football game; the mix CD Thomas’s brother burned for us a couple days before we got married, so we listened to it everywhere we drove on our honeymoon. And our wedding itself contained a mini-concert. Some people told me it was a long ceremony because of all the music. But we’re musical people. Thomas’s grandfather was in a band. My mom’s mom and dad’s dad were both organists. It’s in our DNA.

Bohemian Rhapsody

Bohemian Rhapsody (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

So I’m raising my kids right, making them listen to “Bohemian Rhapsody” and “Thriller” wherever we go. (Hey, I also downloaded “Let It Go” – don’t worry.) I’m helping them create their own soundtracks.

Most recently, I’ve discovered Rachael Sage; her single “Happiness (Maddie’s Song)” just came out on iTunes. I heard it once and couldn’t stop humming it for a couple days. And then there’s Pentatonix. I love it when someone posts one of their new songs on Facebook – which I’ll watch over and over, to my children’s chagrin. And Bastille – who doesn’t dig a rocker with a cool British accent?

Rachael Sage

Cover of Rachael Sage

Every new song, every concert, is a possible source for inspiration, but it goes deeper than potential best-selling novel ideas (as nice as they are). Songs are little triggers. I can hear one in the grocery store and be transported back to the fourth grade. Or remember the last concert I attended with a friend before she passed away. They’re pieces that may not always seem to go together – discordant, you might say – yet they make up the puzzle of me. And as strange as it may seem to hum classic rock in the store, listen to folk songs in the car, and spend an evening listening to choral music, I totally dig the big picture.

And it just keeps getting bigger. But I wouldn’t call that a bad thing.

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Another Project Bites the Dust

 

The setup for NaNoWriMo at home, if I need to ...

Getting ready for NaNoWriMo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This past week was the big deadline: after June 30th, the CreateSpace coupon code for two free copies of my NaNoWriMo novel would expire. As a perfectionist, I found it difficult to call my novel good enough. But then I realized that not only had a written a novel – from scratch – in just a few months, but I had also fully revised it a couple times. That’s a record for me – and quite an accomplishment, considering I’m so picky.

Now, if you’re reading this and wondering, What in the world is she talking about? What is NaNoWriMo?, I will tell you. NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) comes around every November. Why November? I don’t know. You can read more at nanowrimo.org. All I know is that it’s awesome. And it’s also for crazy people. Like me. Even some really successful novelists participate in NaNoWriMo. Like Sara Gruen, who wrote Water for Elephants, and Erin Morgenstern, author of The Night Circus.

While brainstorming my last blog of October – the one in which I would list all the reasons why my sorry butt wouldn’t participate in NaNoWriMo, yet again – I had an idea of novel-sized proportions. So I figured, What the heck? I just had a couple days to wait, so I held off until November first, then started writing like… what did I say earlier? Oh yeah – a crazy person.

A novel, as defined by NaNoWriMo, is 50,000 words. I wrote over 80,000 in November, so I “won,” but I wasn’t finished with the book. I kept at it until I finally finished in early February. Then I sat back and let it rest for a month – something Stephen King recommends (maybe I read it in On Writing – can’t remember).

When the month-long waiting period was over, it was time to start editing. I usually enjoy editing just as much as writing. Sometimes it’s the joy of discovering a detail I forgot I wrote. Sometimes I realize I really screwed something up, and I feel liked I’ve accomplished something after I fix it. And I always, always try to cut extraneous words and make the manuscript as clean as possible.

Now, I know this will sound gross, but the first draft is kind of like diarrhea of the pen (or keyboard, whatever). Many – way too many – writers leave their first drafts pretty much alone, so consider how awful it is for editors to read diarrhea-on-the-page. One of the goals of NaNoWriMo is to just plow straight through, so there’s going to be lots of crap. It’s necessary if you’re going to write so much in such a short time. But if you want to have a chance of the success that Sara Gruen, Erin Morgenstern, and authors like them have enjoyed, you have to return to that original draft and pull out your ax. After all the useless words are cut, you pull out your chisel and try to make the story as close to its intended shape as possible.

One great goal to help achieve this is another that Stephen King recommends (which I read in the same place as “wait  a month”): he says to cut the manuscript by 10%. I have tried this with other novels and short stories – always to no avail. If you haven’t figured out by now, I’m wordy. I mean, I almost always break the blogs-should-only-be-500-words rule. And I had new scenes that I wanted to add to my book. How in the world would I cut a 148,000-word book down to a little over 133,000? (A double-spaced page in a word processing program has 250 to 300 words, so that’s like cutting 50 to 60 pages.)

My mom's amazing cover art.

My mom’s amazing cover art.

But I did. And for once in my writing life, I surpassed my goal. A couple days before the deadline, I trimmed it to just over 129,000. I even managed to design a cover. I got the basic outline done, told my mom (who is an amazing artist) what I really wanted, and then she waved her magic wand, and BOOM! Cover, done. It’s wonderful having a talented mom.

I sell my children’s book through CreateSpace (shameless plug – buy it here!), so I knew I needed to submit my story one day early to make it through the reviewing process. Hero is an illustrated book, so I had to submit it as a PDF. Like a dummy, I assumed my novel needed to be a PDF, as well. It was only after I submitted it that I saw they would also accept .doc or .docx.

Sure enough, the morning of the 30th, I saw that they had rejected the PDF – it cut off all my pages numbers. So I resubmitted it as a .doc, then waited. And waited. I went to sleep and set my alarm to wake me a few minutes before midnight, so I could still order my copies before my coupon code expired. But at midnight, July first, my book still wasn’t approved.

Grr. By the time I woke up the next morning, the book was approved. Isn’t that how it always goes? Part of me felt like giving up and continuing to edit my book to supposed perfection. But I’m enough of a realist to know that that will never happen. The whole reason I even considered sending it to CreateSpace to begin with was because of the two free copies, but I was already planning on buying a few more. They’re not expensive, and I wanted to have something nice to give my beta readers. So I went ahead and ordered them anyway.

My books should arrive early next week. I am both excited and nervous. If you had told me this time last year that I would have a sudden brainwave and write an entire novel in just over three months – and edit it and print it for its first critique-ers within eight months – I would have thought you were nuts. I had no idea that I would love NaNoWriMo. Even though I had to write ridiculous amounts every day, it wasn’t a chore. Maybe it’s just that serendipitous magic of the right story coming to me at the right time. As is my goal every time I write fiction, I created the story that I wanted to read. My only hope that my beta readers agree and won’t give a unanimous, What was she thinking? This is terrible!

Either way, my third big project of this year is done. I’m currently living in a bit of a fiction-writing vacuum. Yes, I still have plenty to do. But at night, when the kids are in bed and I’d usually be revising, I sit around and think, What do I do now? It’s hard to adjust back to a normal life, whatever that is.

There is, however, one consolation. I know that when my beta readers get done – even if their comments are miraculously positive – I’ll have my work cut out for me again. And I look forward to that day.

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Bread and Circuses and Why I Write

The chase

The chase (Photo credit: focusshoot)

I grew up on all kinds of nature shows. My dad has always been fascinated with all things wild, and since he was in charge of the remote, I saw quite a bit of PBS and Discovery Channel back in the day. Later add channels like Animal Planet, TLC, and NatGeo, and I was in nature heaven. Was.

Steve Irwin 1962 - 2006

Steve Irwin 1962 – 2006 (Photo credit: pauliepaul)

My kids love these kinds of shows, too. When we can find them. My elder son recently took an interest in reptiles, and so my husband told him about Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter, and looked for some of his old shows on the web. I’m glad for this resource because good luck finding anything like that on TV. We finally found a different reptile guy with some shows on Netflix, but it’s rare to find a good nature show on TV anymore.

Then this week I just happened to see this article about Animal Planet’s Call of the Wildman: “Animals Are Injured in This ‘100 Percent Fake’ Reality Show.” Not only is it bothersome that apparently animals were drugged for a good number of these shows, but the attitude behind it all is what drove this deception to begin with. In 2008, Animal Planet’s president Marjorie Kaplan said, “We’re looking to be an entertainment destination, not a natural history channel.”

I suppose this makes sense, considering that I can never find the good old lioness-chasing-a-hyena type show anymore. Still, it sickens me how so-called reality TV (or what the article calls “guided reality”) has taken over.

Think about TLC – The Learning Channel, for goodness’ sake! What do you learn there? I’ll tell you: what not to wear, how to make a cake that looks like a person, and how bratty, four-year-old beauty pageant contestants behave at home (and worse).

Who came up with the idea that we need to watch how people supposedly live in order to be entertained, anyway? Hey, I’ve got an idea: follow me around with a camera all day. I’ve got two young boys. It should be entertaining, right? Well, maybe not. I know! You can jazz it up by putting us into some kind of controversial situation. Or rile my kids up, and make them drive me crazy.

Someone please tell me when reality became so fake.

As my mother pointed out when I mentioned the Animal Planet article, human nature hasn’t changed much over the millennia. As we did in Ancient Rome, we continue to do now: give us bread and circuses (food and entertainment), and we’re pacified. Just because we’re not watching slaves-turned-gladiators slaughter each other anymore doesn’t make us more sophisticated. Instead, we exploit people who are too ignorant to know that the world is making fun of them (or worse yet – they don’t care and just want the money); we turn ludicrous contests into “must-see” TV; and we stage all kinds of nonsense in order to make people think that the so-called “Wildman” is a hero.

I’m not saying that all TV shows are worthless or that tuning in upon occasion is bad. Hey, my husband and I used to love watching Top Shot and cooking competitions on the Food Network. But at some point, enough is enough. Nowadays, people think that the only way you can break into the music or cooking or fashion industry is to win a competition on one of these shows. And if you don’t, you’re worthless. Whatever happened to trying to break into your industry of choice the old-fashioned way – by forging out there and proving yourself without all the attention and sensationalism? And whatever happened to being entertained by, I don’t know, a professional entertainer instead of a “real” person’s stupidity?

All of this got me thinking. As my regular readers know, I am an avid reader, and my dream is to be a published novelist. Years ago, I was forced to consider both why I read and why I write, which goes right back to bread and circuses, right? No, I’m not talking about reading The Hunger Games. I’m talking about reading and writing indiscriminately.

Back in the days when I attended my friend and mentor Ari’s fiction workshops, he sometimes cornered the class by making us think about things we often take for granted. We knew that, according to the Gospel of Ari, we always had to read something, but he also wanted us to consider why we were reading. And we went around the room, each of us saying why we read. On another occasion, we had to say why we write.

Here are the answers that Ari did not want to hear: “I read to escape” and “I write for the money.”

I can’t remember what I said, but if Ari were to ask me now after years (okay, over a decade) to think about it, I have plenty of answers. I don’t read fiction to escape but rather to augment my life. I read to find out what could happen if. I love it when an author creates a setting (dystopian America) or a character (vampire) that is obviously not real, but I believe anyway. I love it when a story transports me to a new place, and I don’t even have to leave my couch. And as an introvert, I can meet all kinds of new people without ever having to introduce myself.

As for why I write, if I’d had the guts, here is what I would have said:

Of course I want to make money writing fiction. That’s why I’m not getting a useful degree that will get me some high-paying job. I’m young enough to still have the hope to make a living writing novels.

But that doesn’t mean writing any old novel. Unlike Animal Planet, I’m not going to change my M.O. mid-course to make a buck. I sometimes joke that if I decided to write Forty Shades of Pink or something raunchy like that, I would make it big. But at what cost? And besides, I can’t write that kind of garbage, anyway. At the end of the day, I can only write what brings me joy – which is what I want to read but simply hasn’t been written yet.

So I continue to be a starving artist (or nearly so).

There are writers out there who can memorize a formula and whip up a story that fits the mold. And people will continue to read them. People who maybe haven’t stopped to think why they read. People who have never considered that fiction can be more than an escape or sensationalism.

But I am not one of those readers or writers, so I’ll keep writing what moves me. I’ll go against popular culture and do something really real for a change. I’m happy with who I am and what I do – with not a single camera in sight to document how I go about my life – and I’m trying to raise my kids to find that same satisfaction. It’s going to be tougher for them than it was for me, but thank goodness for parental controls, archived TV shows, and zoos. We can keep it real just fine on our own.

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Don’t Judge a Book by Its Author

You can’t blame a writer for what the characters say.

                                                                                                                                             –Truman Capote

 

The Casual Vacancy

The Casual Vacancy (Photo credit: Darlene Acero)

 

Avid readers, do you remember a time when you discovered a new writer, fell in love with one book, then went crazy looking for all of his or her other publications?

This has happened a number of times with me, from my early days of reading with authors like Beverly Cleary and Louisa May Alcott, then ramping up to Agatha Christie, J.R.R. Tolkien, Michael Crichton, and then Stephen King. In every case, I devoured their books, as many as I could get my hands on.

But sometimes… sometimes this doesn’t happen. Sure, every prolific author has an off-book or two. Even in the middle of bestseller series, it’s not uncommon to have a middle-of-the-road slump. (Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix comes to mind.)

Sometimes, it’s no fault of the author’s, though, because they get pigeonholed. They commit the unforgivable sin of writing outside of one particular genre and so get panned by masses of once-adoring fans.

This often happens with actors. Think about how many of them, in the effort to avoid being typecast, take on just about any role they’re offered to prove they can do something other than what originally made them famous. You might be disillusioned when your favorite child actor tries to show she’s all grown up by portraying a risqué character.

Now, authors aren’t going around in the nude to prove that they’re all grown up. But sometimes we treat them as if they’re doing just that. If you find out that your favorite children’s author has an adult title coming out soon, don’t be shocked that it’s not all “See Dick and Jane” anymore. Dick and Jane might be doing something that you don’t want your children to read about. And that’s fine. Writing for children doesn’t mean they have nothing else to offer the writing world.

The opposite it true for authors such as Stephen King. Many people shy away from him because he’s known primarily as an author of “horror” stories. But I’ve found that he actually writes much more fantasy and suspense than horror, not to mention moving love stories, at least one hard-boiled mystery, and one of the best non-fiction books on the craft of writing that I’ve ever read. (Check it out here.)

Truman Capote was right: we can’t blame writers for what their characters say and do. There is a certain amount of censoring that automatically happens if your story is meant for younger audiences, but the truth must always prevail. As Stephen R. Donaldson writes about the creative process:

[N]one of us can explain how it works. In a sense, writers don’t get ideas: ideas get writers. They happen to us. If we don’t submit to their power, we lose them; so by trying to control or censor them we can make the negative choice of encouraging them to leave us alone.

I don’t know about you, but it sounds very unattractive to tick off my muse by not letting the story be the story. I recently posted about striking gold with a story idea for this year’s NaNoWriMo. When this idea first occurred, I assumed that it would be another young adult novel. After all, the main characters are teenagers, and most of my stories end up going the middle grade or young adult route.

Yet the more I’ve thought about this new premise, I’ve realized that my novel might actually be for adults. That’s not to say that young adults wouldn’t ever read it – after all, I started reading Stephen King when I was 14 – but the amount of censoring I’d have to do to make it appropriate would change the intent and tone of the story. I suppose I could make it work, but would that be right?

This reminds me of a book I read recently, The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling. Oh, you’ve heard of her? Yeah, she wrote that itty bitty Harry Potter series that a few people around the world seem to like.

Okay, if you know me, you know that I’m a Harry Potter nut. I bought The Casual Vacancy, which Rowling published as an adult novel, with no illusions of it containing wand-wielding teenage wizards. In the early pages, I sometimes scratched my head over this being the same author of the seven books I so dearly love. True, there are teenagers in her new book, but they’re facing very real temptations and demons, not the fantastical kind. The language, the grittiness was sometimes hard to reconcile with my previous experience of this author.

But knowing how hard it is to force a story into a genre that it’s not, I had an easier time – making my preconceived notions of Rowling disappear into the background – than many other readers who gave up on the book when they discovered it’s not about adult wizards. Rowling still has her fingerprints all over it, but in the form of turns of phrase, descriptions, and little gems that claim her no matter what the genre.

As much as I love most things young adult and fantasy, what I love above all are characters that come to life on the page and stories that pull me in. When I allowed the story to take over, it both compelled and moved me. It took a lot of courage for Rowling to put herself out there and publish something so different than the series that made her a household name. I know of people she’s upset because they expected more of the same, but I admire her for letting the story take the lead.

If you’re an author wrestling with a story unlike anything you’ve ever written, here’s some great advice from Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird: “[S]ome days it feels like you just have to keep getting out of your own way so that whatever it is that wants to be written can use you to write it.”

Getting out of your own way means ditching those preconceived notions about what you can and should write. Let the story tell itself – at least in the first draft – and you can figure out what’s still appropriate to keep in the revision process.

And if you’re a reader who tends to pigeonhole, open your mind a little bit. Realize that the best authors, the ones that convey the truth through pages and pages of lies, are simply doing what Stephen R. Donaldson wrote about: they’re allowing the creative process to work as it should. To censor it, to hold back, would be to lie in the worst possible way.

For writers to deny themselves the chance to branch out into other genres and interests is to deny growth within the craft, to deny them doing what they’re meant to do.

Writers don’t just love to write – they must. Lamott also says:

We write to expose the unexposed. If there is one door in the castle you have been told not to go through, you must. Otherwise, you’ll just be rearranging furniture in rooms you’ve already been in. Most human beings are dedicated to keeping that one door shut. But the writer’s job is to see what’s behind it, to see the bleak unspeakable stuff, and to turn the unspeakable into words—not just any words but if we can, into rhythm and blues.

Amen? Amen.

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The NaNoWriMo Loophole that Could Solve Your Early Inspiration Problem

Gearing up for NaNoWriMo.

Gearing up for NaNoWriMo (Photo credit: This Year’s Love)

Okay, I know I said “loophole,” but the solution I’m about to address isn’t really in the fine print. Anyone who cares to know what it is can just go to NaNoWriMo.org and read their FAQ. (Thank goodness for an organization that gives clear and concise answers.)

So what is this “loophole” that I’ve discovered, and what does it address? Well, excuse me if I digress by way of explaining…

Readers who have stuck with me since the beginning know that in 2012, I thought people were crazy to participate in NaNoWriMo (writing a 50,000-word novel from scratch, all in the month of November). Then in 2013, I had a change of heart. Or, that is, mere days (like two) before November, a story idea popped into my head, and I realized that I could wait a couple days to write and hope that magic would follow.

It did, and I am glad to say that it’s been the most fun I’ve ever had writing. Not only did I finish my novel, but I’ve edited it once and am currently putting the finishing touches on it, so I can send off to CreateSpace for my two free print versions, which I will then distribute to beta readers.

After participating once, I sometimes wonder what this November will bring. Will another idea come out of nowhere in the nick of time and make it possible for me to enjoy the same success as last year? Or could I possibly write a sequel to one of the other novels I’ve written, waiting until November to start? (This is what I consider a fallback option – but at least I do have a sequel that I’ve considered writing.)

I received an unexpected answer to these ponderings this past week. It hit me as inspiration almost always does – unexpected, uninvited. It’s not that I don’t like inspiration, but why can’t I be inspired at times when it’s a little more convenient?

I was driving across town when an image popped into my head. Two characters. And then a scene began to form. From there, it was a novel-size idea. And I was on my way to teach four- and five-year-olds in Sunday school, with no time to even jot down my idea.

I realized that this could be the idea I’d hoped for, except that it had arrived six months too early. I didn’t dare write anything except notes – character’s names and ages and little bits of backstory. If I wrote an actual scene or dialogue, that was it; I could forget using it for NaNo and would have to hope that either I could make the sequel idea work or that another novel-size idea would be born in the intervening months.

As it happens, I have several big projects in the works, and a new novel does not fit into my busy schedule. I barely had time to capture the scope of my idea in writing, much less sit down and let the prose flow. I figured that if I could stall long enough to finish these projects, maybe I could endure until November.

Being extremely busy, however, does not mean that I’ve quit thinking about this new, unwritten story. I’ve been walking around in a daze of possible scenes, sometimes whispering lines – maybe if I do this, I can make them stick. I’m sure anyone who catches me at it will think I’m nuts.

And in stolen moments, I’ve written loose descriptions of these scenes, where and when they happen in the flow of the story, creating – ugh – a sort of outline. Despite being a planner, I like to outline as little as possible when writing fiction. Yes, it’s great to know where a story is going and even some destinations along the way, but during the writing, the adventure is letting the story and characters dictate, day by day and scene by scene, what happens next. So waiting until November to write, allowing myself to put down bullet points and thus possibly boxing my story into a particular shape, isn’t sitting too well.

It’s gotten to the point that I’ve realized I can’t let this go on much longer. Once these projects are no longer occupying my time, and especially once school is out and the kids and I are spending a lot less time commuting and a lot more time at home, it’s going to be hard not to write.

I decided to check out the NaNoWriMo FAQ again, thinking that I would have to use the sequel idea if I wanted to be able to participate this year. I was sure that was one of the questions I saw listed before, but I wasn’t worried about it at the time and didn’t read the answer. Upon checking the site, I didn’t see the sequel question after all, but I did find something else. From their website:

We think NaNoWriMo works best when you start a brand-new project. However, what’s most important is being excited about what you’re writing. If you want to work on a pre-existing project, you have our full support!

Outlines, character sketches, and other planning steps are encouraged. Just be sure to only count words written during the month.

Here’s the loophole, people! Not only are sequels okay, but I could pull out something I started five years ago and pick up where I left off. The only words that count, however, are the ones I write in November, of which there must be a minimum of 50,000.

Hmm… This is very tempting. I can go ahead and write the scene that keeps popping in my head and won’t leave me alone – that way I don’t have to continue whispering it to myself like a crazy person. What I’m afraid of, though, is that once a little fissure opens in the dam, I’m going to invite the whole flood, and I won’t have 50,000 words left to write, come November.

It’s a risk I’m willing to take. After all, I have that sequel that could still work if this new idea takes off. And I think the NaNo people would agree that it’s wonderful that new ideas are still occurring to me and begging to be written. So I’ll hold off as long as I can, but when I can’t keep the creativity in any longer, watch out.

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5 Reasons You Should Join a Writers’ Workshop (and One Reason You Shouldn’t)

English: Tessa Laird writing workshop

Writing Workshop (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A common flaw among many new writers is the idea that criticism is bad, and any corrections made to their golden prose mars the original genius.

With the right attitude, however, this can be overcome in the workshop setting.

Yes, I was a new writer at one time – or at least new on the workshop scene. I was in my late teens and had been writing for years, but as for my serious attempts at fiction, the only people who had read it were teachers or family members, none of them writers. My mother can proofread like a fiend, and my teachers could tell me all day long what was wrong with my grammar, but as far as improving my stories, I was kind of on my own.

So I wrote grammatically correct, typo-free stories that just weren’t all that easy or fun to read.

I thought I knew how to write a bestseller. After all, I’d subscribed to Writer’s Digest from the time I was old enough to afford a subscription, and I read anything about the craft that I could get my hands on.

After visiting one fiction workshop, just to test the waters, I realized how much I could benefit from not just knowing how I should write but receiving critiques and criticism from other writers.

 

The Workshop Format

Not all fiction workshops are created equal. I’ve attended anywhere between 120 and 150 individual sessions, the majority in person (usually in a classroom setting) but a few online. Anyone who tells you online is preferable either has only experienced this version and doesn’t know better or hasn’t attended a live workshop with a successful format. Dialogue between the critique-ers is such an important element, and in my opinion, it’s hard to capture that online.

There are workshops for creative non-fiction and fiction alike. Choose whichever best fits your needs. I chose fiction, and I took my friend Ari’s semester-long workshop seven times, four for credit and three post baccalaureate. Workshops are available at colleges at the undergrad and grad levels, but I’ve attended others put on by small groups of writers who couldn’t commit to an entire semester or weekly meeting. The Internet is a great resource for finding one in your area.

Ari’s format was pretty straight forward. We almost always received stories a week in advance, read them and marked them with edits and critiques, and when we met for the workshop itself, we sat in a circle, and he read the story aloud. Then we started in with our comments and critiques, in no particular order, and we kept going until Ari felt we were done. The author sat among us the whole time but was not allowed to say one word or make any kind of gesture or facial expression to “help” the conversation. Authors were merely flies on the wall.

It’s tough being the author in this situation, especially those times when it’s obvious that no one gets it. But as Ari pointed out, the majority is often – although not always – right. If an entire room of people can’t make sense of the story, chances are that changes need to be made. How to implement those changes is up to the author, often based on suggestions from the other participants.

I’ve heard of other workshops in which the author is allowed to respond or engage in the dialogue, but as hard as it is to just sit there and take it, it really is beneficial to be silent. For one, the workshop is full of other writers who will all be in the hot seat at some point, and if you can’t respect one another, you don’t need to be there. The workshop is not a place for personal attacks but a place of learning and growth. It’s a place of safety, although not necessarily comfort. By not being able to respond, the author can learn where the story falls short because other readers are allowed to express their own perspective without the author’s bias.

I also know of workshops that allow the author to read the story, instead of the instructor or another writer. The problem with this is that the author will read it how he or she intends it to sound – whether it’s truly written that way. Another reader may not get the inflection right, may not get the exact cadence, but this will highlight for the author problems within the text. This is how, after all, the general public will likely read it – something the author needs to know.

 

5 Benefits of Joining a Writers’ Workshop

1. Meet other writers.

Many of us are introverts, and the idea of venturing out to meet new people is frightening. My writing meant enough to me that it was worth the discomfort of meeting a roomful of new people. I never intended to make life-long friends, never intended to spend time with these people or become involved in their lives. And that didn’t happen at first. But the wonderful thing about workshops is that if they’re effective, the same people will attend again and again. My second semester, a group of us bonded and created Fiction Fix, and it’s still going strong today, well over a decade later. My instructor and friend Ari gained such respect for me that he agreed to workshop my first finished novel. A few of the friends I made in the workshop have even chosen me as their editor. One recently published her first novel. (Check out Brightleaf.) Don’t complain that you don’t have any connections – join a workshop and start making some!

2. Develop a thick skin.

The publishing world is harsh. I know this from both having my own fiction rejected numerous times and working for Fiction Fix, where we’ve rejected a lot of… refuse. If you’re serious about publishing but cry every time someone says something negative about your work, you won’t make it long in this industry. Sure, some of the comments you’ll get are unwarranted, but you need to learn to filter out the hurtful stuff from ignorant jerks and utilize the nuggets of pure wisdom.

The workshop environment is the perfect place to grow your alligator hide because, as I said, it’s a safe place. No one’s out to get you, just to help you. Criticism is merely a means to help you improve. Your first workshop will be tough, but it gets easier, I promise.

3. Sharpen your editing skills.

Even if you don’t plan to edit professionally, it’s handy to be able to self-correct. Spelling and grammar may not be your thing. They are for me, but there are amazing storytellers who can’t spell their way out of a paper bag – and that’s what the professionals are there for. But after you’ve attended enough workshops – and I’m talking about workshops that tackle others’ stories, not just your own – you’ll start to pick up on things by osmosis, and you will inevitably meet an author or two who has concrete editing advice that will stick. You’ll soon find yourself looking for the errors in your own work that you’ve found in others’ stories.

4. Discover your own style.

My earliest stories were formatted after Michael Crichton‘s style. A few years later, I moved on to Stephen King. If you’re not careful, you can easily fall into the pattern of imitating whatever author you’re reading at the time. While imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, it’s not good to let it dictate how you write.

What you want is a consistent style that is yours and yours alone. Just as you may be able to hear a song on the radio and immediately know who it is because of the distinct sound, you want someone to pick up your story and say, “Yep, this is Bob through and through.” (And I mean that in a good way, of course – not “Oh great, it’s him again.”) Sure, you may borrow different aspects from your favorite writers, but the end product should be all you.

In the workshop setting, I learned about POV (point of view), clichés that drive people nuts, and “rules” that may not be grammatical law but are certainly stylistic norms among seasoned writers. Yes, these issues are covered in any number of books and blogs and interviews, but it’s so much more informative to get this information in a practical setting. It took me a year of workshops to find my own particular style, my writer’s voice. And it sticks whether I’m writing children’s picture books, middle grade fantasy, young adult dystopian fiction, adult sci-fi, or even this blog.

5. Improve your writing.

This may be your ultimate goal, and it’s certainly a worthy one. If you come to the writing table with an open mind, the above four will automatically improve your writing. You’ll have friends who care enough to be honest about what does and does not work, who will support you in every literary endeavor (and then some); you’ll mature enough to be able to hear their criticisms without getting your feelings hurt; you’ll develop the tools necessary to not only fix what needs to be fixed but to not make those mistakes next time; and you’ll create a style that becomes your own literary hallmark. Sure, I still write garbage that’s not fit to print. But I’ve internalized so much valuable advice that I have an inner critic who says: You’re going to write that?! You know better! Many of my first drafts are better than what I thought of as “polished” in my pre-workshop days.

 

Why You Shouldn’t Sign up for a Writers’ Workshop

There are many other benefits of joining a writers’ workshop, but if you read #5 above and thought, I don’t need to improve my writing, then maybe you need to step back and do some soul searching.

I find it sad that some people are unable to improve because they simply use workshops as a venue to receive accolades for their writing. They are very disappointed when someone points out flaws. How dare they! these writers think – and sadly, a lot of them are not new to the writing game. They should know better. One older writer who attended my first workshop quit after his story was critiqued because we didn’t give the response he wanted, and he didn’t think he could get anything else out of our sessions. Another writer was so disillusioned when no one understood his story that he refused to go back and make changes. These are the  type people who most need the workshop and, sadly, get the least out of it because they refuse to think they need to improve.

I do admit that I expected praise for my brilliance when I workshopped my first story. Turns out it wasn’t quite as brilliant as I thought. I was taken aback, sure, but I learned a lot. So I guess I need to add, as a prerequisite, that you should leave as much of your ego as you can at the door – and then just leave it there for good.

If you can do this, your workshop experience will change your writing life in unexpected, life-changing, and lasting ways.

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When to Write in Reverse

Memento (film)

Memento (film) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Remember that Guy Pearce movie Memento? Before I ever knew what it was about, someone mentioned to me that the interesting thing about it is actually the structure of the movie. In case you haven’t seen it (and I’m really not giving much away here), it’s told in reverse. That is, the first scene you see is the last scene of the movie, chronologically. And each scene is just a few minutes before whichever scene you just watched.

This is an interesting technique, especially when you realize it puts the audience in a similar frame of mind as Pearce’s character, who has short-term memory loss. I’ve always loved movies and books that mess with time. The most recent book that comes to mind is Erin Morgenstern’s The Night Circus. I just can’t help but be drawn to stories like these; I think it’s in my blood.

Now, here’s the thing: when movies and books like these are still in the creation process, you wouldn’t want to watch or read them. That’s where the cutting room floor comes in; it’s the part of the creation process that is necessary but that the consumer doesn’t need to see. The final product isn’t messy but – if all goes well – seamless and sometimes mind-blowing in its intricacy.

Last week, I blogged about not being able to finish writing my novel on my own timeline because I got sick. But once I was well and able to get to work again, I realized that getting sick was merely a diversion from the ugly truth: I was stuck.

I hesitate to call this writer’s block because I still had plenty of ideas bouncing around my head, but the problem was how to write my way out of the current scene in which my character found herself. I realized that, even if I’d been perfectly healthy, I wouldn’t have been able to finish my book unless I could figure a way around my problem.

And then Memento popped into my head. Now, my story isn’t going to be told out of order, mainly because it’s narrated first person present. But Memento gave me an idea about the process of writing, and that was to write outside of the box. You see, I’d already written the end scene of the book weeks before. When scenes come to me, I get them down whether they’re in order or not because, otherwise, I’m likely to forget them. I knew where the story was going to end, but I’d lost my way. Unlike being lost on a road trip, however, I could jump right ahead to the end and forget the middle until I knew what to do with it.

All this week, I wrote in reverse. That doesn’t mean that I started with the last letters of each word but rather that I started with my last scene – the one I’d already written – and thought, What comes just before this? And I wrote it. The next day, I wrote the scene before that. And so on and so on, until today. Now, I’m writing right up to the scene where I left off. How could I not have known what my characters were up to?

It’s messy, full of repetitions, and I’m sure it will be a bear to edit. But it’s moving – even if it’s backward – to where it needs to go. My cutting room floor will be littered, but by the time I finish, the process of getting there will just be a cool story, not something someone can point to and say, “As you can see here, the author used the writing in reverse technique when her story stalled.”

I love writing by the seat of my pants. I know where I’m going, but the adventure is getting there, and it doesn’t have to be straightforward. I’ve had a lot of fun letting my story reveal itself in reverse. And even though it’s a little more than a week overdue, I am much closer to finishing (maybe tonight!) than I would have been if I had continued to plod forward.

So forget the rules. Drive in reverse for a while, and see where it takes you.

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If Morning Is the Best Time to Write, Why Does Inspiration Strike at Night?

Français : Logo de la société de conseil en sé...

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I’m driving home, minding my own business, thoughts jumping all over the place, from the uplifting choral concert I just attended to all the necessary housekeeping things that I have to do when I get home. And for some reason, my novel decides to join the mix. I don’t know why. I’ve given it a rest while sending out queries to literary agents. It’s no good thinking about what I should have written because the letters are all sent. I know they’ll all be rejections, so why dwell on what’s going to turn into a bunch of nothing in the end?

I can’t help it, that’s why. I’ve invested an awful lot of time and effort over the past decade into this unpublished book and its sequels. I’ve written my soul into it. And is it even any good? I’ve had two other writers (neither one related to me) read its latest revision and praise it. The pacing is good, the plot is solid, the fantastical elements aren’t too out-there, and even the ending is satisfying without wrapping it up too neatly. Sure, they suggested a few tweaks, which I made. So why am I not happy? Well, because I can’t sell the damn thing, that’s why. And you know I’m frustrated if I start throwing the D-word around.

As I’m driving along, enjoying my little pity party and wondering what else I can possibly do to make my story a little clearer to someone who doesn’t know me from Eve, an analogy pops into my head. It’s pretty good, too, one that should make my fantasy kingdom understandable to people who live in this world. Not perfect, but it’s the start that I need. I can get it on paper, show it to my mother, ask her if I’m crazy, then do a lot of research to make sure I understand what I’m trying to say. . . And hope it works.

Yay for me. I only wish I wasn’t in the car at 9:45 P.M. with my children in the backseat, a million things to do between having access to paper and pen and the actual chance to use them – and my alarm is going to go off at 5:00 A.M. if I like it or not.

I call these kind of out-of-nowhere ideas brainwaves. And they usually come at completely inconvenient or inappropriate times. Sitting in the pew at church? Good time for a plot twist to finally gel. Washing my hair? What a great moment to have a story-changing revelation! In a meeting, in the classroom, in the middle of the night – that’s when these things happen. Not ever when I plan to sit down and write. Good stuff happens then, too, don’t get me wrong. But not life-changing. Not story-altering. Rarely revelatory. It’s why I carry a little memo pad in my purse, and I use the digital notepad in my iPhone all the time (and email my notes to myself afterward, just in case they accidentally get deleted).

A couple years ago, I read that early morning (we’re talking pre-dawn) is the best time to get those creative juices flowing. At the time, I was pregnant and exhausted all the time. I dreaded even thinking about getting up before six to get my son to school, especially with a second child on the way. Fast forward to now, when I get up at 4:30 during the school year and 5:00 during the summer. The problem is, I don’t do it to write: I do it to exercise. I can squeeze writing in during odd hours, but I can’t fit a workout into five minute increments during the day, not to mention that if I’m going to shower after exercising (and believe me, that’s a must), I have to do it while my kids are asleep. That doesn’t mean that the writer in me stays quiet and waits patiently, though. On a day when I really need to shed the extra pound or two that I packed on by overindulging the night before, a brainwave inevitably hits, and I end up chasing a wild hare down a winding path that doesn’t end until after the sun’s up.

So why not wake up half an hour earlier? What’s thirty minutes, anyway? I suppose I could. But inspiration doesn’t pay attention to alarms. It comes with its own alarm bells, especially when I’m already running late and don’t need another distraction.

Even so, I love those moments.

If I didn’t have them, I don’t think it would be worth it to keep on writing. Of course I write on days when I’m not inspired because I know I have to – and because, thank goodness, there is a happy medium between writer’s block and writer’s, um, diarrhea. But if I never had that spark of inspiration to begin with, I don’t know if I would have been motivated to write for the love of it in the first place. Maybe that explains why so many people who can string words together beautifully don’t have the passion for it that others of us do.

Brainwaves grab me, distract me from things that were important moments before. Granted, they kind of turn me into a monster if I get interrupted, but the jubilation that comes when I’m done makes it worth slogging through dirty dishes and loads of laundry and long car rides – and the bags under my eyes and frequent yawns the next day. Those epiphanies, few though they are, keep me excited about writing. And I hope they make what I’ve written worth reading.

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