Pen Tales

SKELETONS

2010-11-16T11:18:00.000-08:00

Personally, I like a nice, solid, well designed skeleton, perfectly articulated, every bone accounted for, each joint working properly, adequate space for all the organs, tall, big boned, and naked.

Definitely naked.

Once created, I like to display my skeleton properly under some bright museum lights in the laboratory and then allow the scientists and anthropologists, the anatomy specialists and the interns a good thorough look while I take a little break.

I pat myself on the back for developing and assembling such a well developed set of bones.

I shuffle back home, turn on the television (DEADLIEST CATCH!) read a few books, get caught up on the months of laundry and wander out to the laboratory to gaze on my creation and celebrate my huge success.

Such a pretty skeleton.

Eventually that skeleton starts staring back and whispers little secrets to me: wouldn't I be a better friend if I had a brain—you know, if I only had a brain? Wouldn't you like to shake my hand . . . my flesh covered hand? Warm, good grip, firm. Don't you think I'd like to see you? Glasses, 20/20, lasik, whatever. Clothes . . . it's getting a bit nippy in here! I need a heart . . . I'm not the tin man for god's sake. Teeth? I might like to enjoy a meal now and again—or a throat even, for some beer. Fingernails? Hair? Muscles? I wanna be ripped.

I argue with my skeleton, my most perfect creation, and remind him that I put a LOT of hard work into his design. I really worked my butt off to get him assembled correctly. Maybe I like him naked.

Ah, yes, perhaps, but I'm only HALF a novel and a half is not a whole.

Whatever.

We argue a lot. I tell him to move aside from the TV because Breaking Bad is up next. He blocks it and I have to peer between his ribs which starts to get old really fast.

Other people start dropping by and commenting on how I've taken this skeleton thing a bit too far, how my work is CLEARLY only half done, dude, can't you give that guy some clothes to wear.

And then I watch some more TV.

And THEN the voices really start to annoy me and I get really pissed off and I return to my skeleton and start looking at him. At his bones. And they just don't look like enough anymore. I thought I liked him that way . . . but he could be so much more if someone just loved him enough to dress him. And get him a beer.

It's a painful process. The novel and I both suffer a lot.

But the neighbors all thank me in the end.

Huge news for a fellow writer

2010-11-09T13:41:00.001-08:00

Only a month or so ago I pointed out that my hard-writing friend K.M. Walton signed with a great agent. Well, less than a few months later she has done the unbelievable.

Go check it out for yourself.

Go Kate!

Breathing New Life into Old Stories

2010-10-27T11:35:00.000-07:00

I love old stories told from new perspectives (and really, aren’t they all?) My first favorite, The Mists of Avalon, retold the King Arthur legend from a female perspective, in Ahab’s Wife Sena Naslund wrote brilliantly about life during the 19^th century using Moby Dick as a foundation, and O Brother Where Art Thou turned Homer’s Odyssey completely on its head. Recently in young adult literature I particularly liked Elizabeth Bunce’s retelling of the Rumpelstiltskin fable in A Curse as Dark as Gold.

Even high concepts from The Twilight Zone can have new life, so to speak. One of my favorite TZ episodes from 1969, Nothing in the Dark, stars a very young and handsome Robert Redford as Death, and it was reincarnated in 1998 as Meet Joe Black and starred a not-quite-as-young-but-just-as-handsome Brad Pitt as the grim reaper. (I've posted Nothing in the Dark below for those of you too young to remember.)

So that got me thinking. There are other stories or concepts would I like to read or re-write as young adult novels. Here are a few that came to mind. Feel free to add your own.

The Great Gatsby as a modern coming of age story, featuring Jane Gatsby.

James and the Giant Peach—How did James spend his teen years, after his adventures in the peach? (Alternatively, I'd like to know what Charlie Bucket was like as a teenager).

A fantasy version of Little House on the Prairie.

I'd love to do something with bad old feline, The Cat in the Hat. (But then again, he is himself a re-creation of the trickster god archetype).

How about you? What fables, myths or stories from your childhood would you like to see turned into young adult novels?

If you haven't seen Nothing in the Dark, you can find it here.

Baltimore Book Festival

2010-10-08T09:47:00.001-07:00

This was a lot of fun. Lots of people, books and some great YA authors. I stood in a gaggle of teen-aged girls (feeling extremely out of place) and listened to a debate:

Team Zombie: Justine Larbalestier, Scott Westerfeld and Carrie Ryan vs Team Unicorn: Holly Black, Kathleen Duey, Diana Peterfreund.

It was, um, interesting. All of the authors had some funny things to say. I don't really know who won the debate. I got tired.

MT Anderson was very cool and funny. I wish there had been more people there to hear him speak. Then again, it wasn't an SCBWI conference, so most of the people were just book lovers and locals wandering around. I wanted to go grab people and shake them. "Don't you know one of the most talented writers on earth is right over there!?"

(A not very good pic of MT Anderson)

He has a middle-grade book based in Delaware and as he signed my copy of Octavian Nothing, I told him I was from there and we had a laugh.

All in all, a fun event.

Speak Up!

2010-09-23T11:05:00.000-07:00

Most of you in the writer community have heard and read a lot about the recent challenge from a Missouri parent to have Speak, The Twenty Boyfriend Summer and Slaughterhouse Five banned in his local schools.

Hear what Laurie Halse Anderson wrote in response to Speak being challenged and banned. Her poem speaks for itself. Thanks to Stephanie Perkins who posted this today.

Mockingjay

2010-08-23T13:40:00.000-07:00

Any Hunger Games fans out there waiting with bated breath for the final book in the trilogy? I came to the party late, and am only just now finishing Catching Fire. Don't like it as much as the first one, but I'm curious to see what the fate of these characters will be.

I'll support my local indy kid's bookstore and pick it up tomorrow. So who's looking forward to this release?

Halfway There

2010-08-09T14:12:00.001-07:00

"When you've flown as far as you can, you're halfway there."*

I am dead smack in the middle of my WIP--the halfway point. I love my story, and my characters. But being in the middle is simply awful. It's scary. It's like weaving a huge tapestry and realizing that some of the hundreds of threads I'm sliding through my fingers are the wrong color, or in the wrong place. It's that point in the story where I just have to forge ahead and overlook the flaws in the pattern, get to the end, and then go back and, with heartless precision, snip those threads that don't fit in.

But what if I pull out that glittery gold thread right over there (the one I took such pleasure in weaving) and the whole thing unravels and ends up in a tangled, senseless pile at my feet? Worse, what if I don't pull it out? It could be a blot on the landscape I've woven, an ugly scar that every eye will fixate upon, detracting from anything else I've managed to depict.

In the end, I'll rely upon the golden rule of both needlework and writing--be ruthless. I've stitched many things, including a wall-sized rug, and have had to tear out thousands of stitches in the process--so many that I could make a bed quilt out of them big enough to suffocate beneath. That's just how it goes when you do needlework.

Cutting those threads is not the hardest part for me. It's making it to the end. To do that, I need to keep flying and not look back. I can't think about how far I've come and how far I have left to go. But I often feel as if I've flown as far as I can, which is why I need my critique group--they keep me going, assure me that my goal isn't as far off as it seems, cheer me on and bolster me. No, I won't say they are the wind beneath my wings, although it's SO tempting. Oh, I just said it. Sorry. But it's true.

Quote and photo are from Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'hoole, which I can't wait to see. The photo is simply blatant cuteness and has nothing whatever to do with this post.

THE UNSELFCONSCIOUS WRITER

2010-08-05T11:30:00.000-07:00

Rediscovering, and then rediscovering and then rediscovering again:

THE UNSELFCONSCIOUS WRITER

Tuning out the voices is a constant fight for me—most days I succeed and the manuscript keeps chugging along. But the battle itself is hard won and sometimes exhausting.

I took a detour there (oh, say, like two years or so) working really, really hard on writing for the market, my perception of the market, my sense of what would sell, and what certainly would not.

And this very detour is what led me away from my own writing and right into the heart of unauthenticity (is that a word? disauthenticity?) A kind of writing that was good enough but not full of my heart and soul.

So what's a writer to do when it turns out that their lusty passion for writing is very very different from what "the market" knows and loves. If you're me, you, um, avoid writing what you love. For way too long.

I can't speak for you, but part of the appeal of writing for young people is to give my characters some of the confidence I lacked as a child, some of the adventure I longed for, to sympathize with their feelings of angst and disconnect from the world. And so, being highly tuned to this time in my life, I also sometimes feel like I AM still a middle school kid.

And this feeling, this need to fit in led me away from the real meaning of my art.

I was at the annual SCBWI conference this previous week and had the AMAZING. AMAZING. opportunity to hear MT Anderson speak. I went to a session on experimentation in children's literature and the first thing MT said was that there is nothing original in this experimentation: it's all been done before. But with kid lit—we as writers have much more freedom to make use of these devices than if we were writing for adults.

According to MT, none of what I'm doing is new, or innovative—some of it just hasn't been seen in a long long time and some of it not in children's literature.

My new goal? Buck the trend. Write what I love. And wait to see if that passion is what sells books . . . not being just good enough to follow the trends.

Inspiring

2010-08-04T06:21:00.001-07:00

My friend K.M. Walton has some really good news today. Proof that we should never give up on our dreams.

STARING AT GOATS

2010-07-23T10:04:00.001-07:00

I'm curious about YOU as a writer.

Five Important Questions:

1. WHERE DO YOU DRAW YOUR INSPIRATION?

I could ponder this questions for days. I love the idea of dissecting my odd little writer brain.

For me, a good deal of inspiration comes from my little farm and the rural corner of Washington State that I live in. I find a lot of very human traits in the animals: a desire for attention, selfishness, a need for touch, greediness, joy (usually when they see the feed coming). The livestock guard dog fascinates me! She is hardwired for her job and can not be distracted from driving the eagles away, howling at the coyotes, walking her "loop," visiting with the ducks, goats and chickens, and of course, discipling the bird dog.

I'd say I also find inspiration in the most minute details: a cloud, a hot air balloon over my house, gossip at school, trees heavy with cherries, motorcycles, the weather.

2. WHERE DO YOU WRITE?

Um, everywhere. Really. In bed. On the couch. At soccer practice. In the car (a lot). At cafes. Locked in the bathroom when there are 5+ kids in the house. On the front porch. At my husband's office. On the back deck. Did I say in the car? I love the third floor loft at my husband's grandparent's house on the water. That's one of my very favorite places. The house is like the inside of a ship and the third floor loft is up a narrow staircase and is a tiny open room with fantastic brass lanterns all around. You can hear the herons and the water (and the kids on the beach, too, sometimes).

3. MUSIC OR NO MUSIC?

Depends. In a cafe or at the office, yes. But the music must be something I know inside and out so that I'm not really listening to it, and it must fit the manuscript. I was working on a novel for awhile (I will return to it) that I ONLY listened to Dave Matthew's Band.

4. DO YOU EVER FINISH ANYTHING?

Yes. All the time. And then I finish it again. I write a lot. And fast. I have tons of projects. Finishing in not my problem (I have other problems).

5. WHO DO YOU TRUST?

Michele and Ron. My husband. My fellow writer, Amber Lough. That's pretty much it. I don't show my work to anyone else and for various reasons, it will always be that way. The first opinion is always my husband's. I think he's the smartest person I know, he reads a lot, he remembers everything and I'm pretty sure he's honest with me. He has read every single thing I have ever written. If he says it's okay, and I won't embarrass myself too much, then I throw it at Ron and Michele and yell, "Duck!"

Dear Freshman, or What I've Learned So Far

2010-07-19T12:47:00.000-07:00

In our local high school, kids finishing 9^th grade are tasked with leaving letters for incoming students. They pass along what they’ve learned about surviving that first difficult year, and share their tips and insights.

I love this idea, and decided to so the same thing here. In my fiction writing career, I feel a bit like a 10^th grader. I’m working on my second YA novel, so I’m not a Freshman, but not quite ready for graduation either.

Dear Freshman, or What I’ve Learned So Far:

Be careful about picking your friends.

I’m talking about critique partners. Sometimes hanging out with the wrong crowd can cause lots of drama. Choose carefully and change critique partners if you aren’t getting what you need from them. These are the most important people in your writing career (aside from your agent and editor). Be picky.

Get involved in extracurricular activities.

Conferences and workshops are a terrific for meeting other writers, and I’ve found these connections to be a real comfort during those long, lonely hours at the computer.

Respect your teachers, even if they are strict.

Agents and editors can sometimes be tough critics, but even the really mean ones have something to teach you. And don’t piss them off.

Do your homework.

Work hard every day and stick with it, even when you hate it and don’t understand what’s going on.

Don’t let the bullies and mean girls get you down.

There are going to be many acquaintances and even a few friends that wonder why, after toiling away on that novel for two whole years, you aren’t published yet. They may even suggest (gasp) that you self-publish). Ignore them—they don’t know any better.

Be fearless.

Fear causes writer’s block, procrastination and perfectionism. Personally, I am terrified of first drafts. It’s hard for me to let the story go wild and worry about perfection later. I’ve found NaNoWriMo to be really helpful in allowing me to bungie jump into a new story, without over thinking it until my hands freeze at the computer keyboard like I’m clinging onto the side of a bridge for dear life. Let go. It’s not as scary as it seems. (Well, actually it IS as scary as it seems, but it won't kill you. Probably.)

Share with others.

Read your work to kids in your target age group. DO NOT tell prospective agents they love your story, because for some reason agents hate to hear this. They assume that young listeners will say nice things to placate you. But kids are painfully honest. Even the most polite of them might listen patiently, but if they don’t beg you to read the next chapter you know you aren’t hitting the mark.

Who do you write like?

2010-07-17T08:27:00.001-07:00

Much to my utter amazement, I write like Ursula K. LeGuin.

If one believes in such things.

But it's fun.

Be sure to check out the blog.

ARE YOU TEAM POTTER?

2010-07-07T14:51:00.000-07:00

At our house, the question has never been "Team Jacob" or "Team Edward." We've always been one for all and all for one—Team Potter!

We reached Potter-Nirvana a few days ago when I looked around and saw Eldest rereading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Thing Two reading Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets, Thing One reading Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone, all three girls listening to the audio version at bedtime and I was shopping at amazon.uk for a full British set of hard cover HP with original illustrations as a Christmas gift for myself (I like to plan ahead).

Nirvana.

If you've ever asked yourself what the characteristics of a lasting book are, look no further than Harry Potter. Eldest, after reading the entire series came to me and said, "Momma, I can't stand it. I keep trying new books but nothing compares to Harry Potter."

I looked at her sadly and said, "Join the club, honey."

I have always found the series extraordinary and the scope from book one through book seven simply amazing. JK touched something in an entire generation, and the next generation and the next that will last a lifetime with these children.

I cried when I finished the seventh book because I couldn't stand the idea of not having Harry, Hermione and Ron in my life anymore (not to mention Luna, Neville, Ginny and the rest of the Weaselys). I knew I would desperately miss the Hollow, travel by portkey, the Ministry building with the nifty phone booth entrance, floo powder, Diagon Alley, Hogwarts, the portrait of the fat lady, all the professors and most of all the idea of an entire parallel world, right there next to us, if only we weren't Muggles and could SEE it.

I've been lucky enough to have three daughters that are also team Harry and so the joy of Hogwarts hasn't ended along with the series. We have lengthy dinner conversations about all seven books.

It's not that the books don't have flaws—all books do, but the world of Harry Potter is such a fully realized one that you can become so immersed in it that the rest of the world melts away. That's the truest sign of a lasting book.

Online writing contests

2010-06-25T06:07:00.000-07:00

Writing is a solitary craft and we often hold our work close to the vest, sharing only with trusted critique partners.

I only share work when I feel it is worthy enough to be critiqued, free of the early blunders of those first few attempts.

That said, how do you feel about entering online contests? Miss Snark's First Victim offers quite a few and they're usually judged by a guest agent or editor. Nathan Bransford has also offered some.

The prize is usually a critique of your full manuscript. I like the idea of these contests but have never entered one.

It seems like a free-for-all or a huge casting call, with writers coming out of the woodwork with their first pages and lines, hoping they can make an impact, be the one to rise above the others. I know they can do some good, and the winners, I imagine, get a great ego boost and possibly even a match with an agent.

Ever entered one?

Top Five Books About Writing

2010-06-15T10:25:00.000-07:00

It's time again for another Top Five post! I'll follow up my previous posts on the Top Five Books I Wished I'd Written and Top Five Authors I Want to Have a Martini With with this short list of my top five favorite books about writing. These are the five books I return to time and again for encouragement, practical application, inspiration.

1. On Writing Well, William Zinsser

I received a copy of this classic book from the staff of San Diego Magazine after completing my college internship there, and while I chose not to go into journalism I learned a lot from this book and from the internship. From Zinsser:

“Clutter is the disease of American writing…the secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components.”

2. On Writing, Stephen King

I love King’s book because it is filled with humility, practical wisdom and a good dose of humor. One of my favorite nuggets is this, and to fully understand it you will just have to read the book.

“…while it is impossible to make a competent writer out of a bad writer, and while it is equally impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one.”

3. Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott

I encounter my greatest self-doubt on first drafts. This helps me muddle through.

“You need to trust yourself, especially on a first draft, where amid the anxiety and self-doubt, there should be a real sense of your imagination and your memories walking and woolgathering, tramping the hills, romping all over the place. Trust them. Don’t look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.”

4. The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers, Christopher Vogler

This one ranks right alongside Story by Robert McKee for delivering a road map through the forest of your story.

“All stories consist of a few common structural elements found universally in myths, fairy tales, dreams, and movies. Used wisely, these ancient tools of the storyteller’s craft still have tremendous power to heal our people and make the world a better place.”

5. The Writer’s Guide to Crafting Stories for Children, Nancy Lamb

Although she spends more time on writing for younger readers than young adults, she helped me understand the differences between the audiences. Her book is a terrific starting place for any writer, especially those writing for children, full of tips, exercises that help illustrate the concepts, and examples from the compendium of children's literature.

Flights of fancy

2010-06-08T15:11:00.000-07:00

Does anyone know this book? The author is Eleanor Cameron.

Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet holds a special place in my childhood memory (what little of it I can remember.) I believe it was the first sci-fi/fantasy book I ever read. This was years before the Hobbit or Narnia -- I discovered those in junior high.

Mushroom Planet must have been third or fourth grade. That was eons ago. Those years are all a blur to me now – memories so jumbled I don’t know where they begin or where they end.

I grew up an Air Force Brat. I was born in Maine and have lived in Japan, Michigan, South Carolina, Ohio, Delaware, Alabama, Washington, DC and a bunch of other places I don’t remember. I do remember the pain of becoming friends with kids, and then, after two years or so, moving away to another state. I recall the tearful farewells as our station wagon pulled away from the house. Timmy or Susie or Johnie or Steve standing at the end of the driveway, waving goodbye, their eyes damp, faces flushed…

Hold on a sec…

Ok, I’m back. *sniff* sorry.

Mushroom Planet is about a couple of kids who, with the help of a mysterious benefactor, build a rocket ship to explore a tiny planet. I rediscovered it a few years ago on Amazon and was pleased to read the reviews of adults who have the same fond memories.

I think I ordered it from school. The teacher would pass out the little brochures with the books we could order. An envelope from mom with one or two dollars was all it took, and a few weeks later we would get the books. I remember the teacher handing them out, the smell of inky paper; the glossy covers, thumbing through the pages, eager to be taken away to new worlds.

Ah.

So what’s your special book? The one that first took your imagination on a flight of fancy?

How to Make a Book a Bestseller...Will it Work for Shawn Klomparens?

2010-06-04T15:49:00.000-07:00

Many of you have already heard the buzz about Catherine McKenzie's Facebook page I bet we can make this book a bestseller! If you haven't, get ready for grassroots social networking at its best. She is calling it The Author Effect, and began the group because she felt there were books out there that deserved more attention than they were getting.

Being a big fan of Shawn Klomparens, she decided to start this effort to see if she could make a difference. Catherine is a lawyer and the author of the novel Spin, and both Catherine and Shawn were gracious enough to answer a few questions for us.

PT: Catherine, when did you start the Author Effect, and what are your results so far?

I started the project around May 15th and the results so far have been pretty good, I think. Over 600 people in the group, lots of people telling me they are buying the books and Shawn has had some pretty high rankings on Amazon.ca and Amazon.com. I've also noticed that his books have sold out there a few times. I've also been contacted by a few booksellers who have said they have ordered his books. Project has started to get some local attention where I am in Montreal - local news programs, radio etc. Of course, I'm hoping this is just the beginning.

PT: What is your goal with this group?

My goal with this group is to create a focused online book club for books that I feel passionate about. As an author, you spend so much time talking about your own book and not much about other people's (at least that's been my experience). I don't know about you, but I personally don't like talking about myself that much, but I do like talking about other people's books that have affected me. To take but one example, and I'm not saying he owes me anything, but when I read A Million Little Pieces I talked about that book to everyone I knew for months because I loved it so much. I'm just amplifying the volume a little here to see what effect social media really has.

PT: Can you address the suspicious naysayers? There are those who don't believe that someone as busy as you, a lawyer and published author, would spend the considerable amount of time it takes to do this, and that you must be on someone's payroll, either Amazon's or Shawn's. What do you have to say to the critics?

I have to say I laughed out loud the first time someone suggested this to me. As if Amazon would be paying me to pump a book - my book is not even out in the States! The idea of Shawn paying me to do this is equally odd to me. Wouldn't it make more sense for him to pay a professional online marketer - and there are many. No, the truth is Shawn didn't even know I was doing this until after I set up the group and there are a few things I would do differently if I started over (like ask him first, for one!). As for the time question, I'm actually taking the summer off from law so I have some time on my hands. I needed a little project to keep myself busy and this is what I chose to do.

PT: I would imagine you are getting bombarded with requests from authors to feature their book next. Will you do this again with another book, and if so, how will you make your selection?

Yes, I have received many requests. My current intention is to do it again depending on the results of this go around. I am not sure yet how I will select the next book - it has to be a book that speaks to me but is not getting enough attention so it might be a little hard to choose. Maybe I'll pass the mantle to Shawn :)

PT: So Shawn, how does it feel to have a Fairy Godmother? How did you hear about Catherine’s undertaking, and what has it done for your writing career so far?

I'm extraordinarily grateful that Catherine chose my books for the project. I learned about it on Twitter, and have to say I was pretty stunned when I clicked over to check it out. As for writing, this has served to remind me that books are great things, and the greatest reward in writing them is knowing that people are reading and enjoying them.

PT: Has Random House had any reaction to this yet? How about your agent?

I haven't heard anything from my publisher, but I can only assume they'd be okay with it. My agent seemed pleased the books were getting some attention.

PT: What’s next for you? Are you working on another novel?

In fits and starts, yes, I've been writing another book.

PT: Tell me about the bread baking.
(If you follow Shawn on Twitter you will find he frequently posts pictures of his delicious looking creations!)

You need three things for good homemade bread: an unglazed ceramic pizza stone, high-protein flour and a sponge starter fermented overnight in the fridge.

Final note from Michele: I started reading Two Years, No Rain two days and am loving it! Amazing dialog, terrific characters, and I especially like how Shawn is gradually revealing the layers of his main character...it's keeping me turning the pages and staying up way too late! I will have to add Jessica Z. to my reading list.

VILLAINS AND WHY WE NEED THEM

2010-06-01T11:40:00.001-07:00

The Villian can be surprisingly difficult to write. Our first inclination is to make him / her simply bad all over, rotten to the core, brutal, the most nefarious creature in literary existence. And that is, by all accounts, not a bad place to begin. But the true villain, to be believable, must be far more complex.

Take Lord Voldemort for instance—one of the most evil characters in modern literature. But then in turn, think for a moment about Tom Riddle—the poor orphan boy, isolated, desperate, alienated and perplexed by the inexplicable power he has. I think part of JK Rowling's message about Tom Riddle was that he was evil before Dumbledore even got to him, BUT, he is also an extremely complex character. Harry is, even at times, confounded by him, and particularly so when he understands the similarities in their backgrounds.

And that makes Lord Voldemort one of the best villains of all time—he is complicated, mysterious, and most of the time his actions are impossible to rationalize. But I would argue that the worst kind of evil in the world, simply can't be rationalized. Think of the serial killers the terrorists, the child abusers—and the neighbors who always say, "I had no idea. He seemed like a nice guy to me."

Evil must have duality. There is a dark and a light in every character. And even if that light is pure fiction, the purposeful act of a sociopath, it still exists as a personality marker.

And of course, without a villain we don't have conflict, and without conflict there is nothing at stake. What's your conflict? Who is your villain? And are they at times as good as they are bad?

Here is a villain for your enjoyment (from my novel in verse):

And she is a dragon! The name not a quip

Or tease of the language

Her skin is scaled from tan to pale and back again

Snarls of grey and white hair whip around her head

And I see her nails are coiled at the end like claws

Fingers and body as long as coiled rope

She wears a cloak where others are wrapped in oil cloth

Or old worn rain slickers

It is green velvet and someone has painstakingly

Stitched peacock feathers around her collar

Into a glistening ruff

Her eyes are huge blue gems but plain

And dark at their dead centers

And she has a snap and thunder to her voice

Looking Down One's Nose

2010-05-28T03:02:00.000-07:00

Found an article from a few years ago that talks about the "stigma" of being labeled a YA writer when you really want to be regarded as A Serious Writer. Like our friend to the left there.

It makes me so happy I discovered the YA genre and stopped trying to write Serious Literary Novels That Make You Ponder The Meaning Of Life.

It made my head hurt.

Plus, you can do that in a YA book, too.
Without all the self-observation and meandering interior thoughts.

BREAKING NEWS: I was just told by one of my astute crit partners that the link goes to a registration page for the NYT. It is free to register. The article is really worth reading.

The Top 5 Authors I Want to Have a Martini With

2010-05-24T20:57:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my second post on Top Five's.

Last week, I listed the top five books I wished I'd written. This week, I decided to make a short and oh-so-simple list of the top five YA authors I'd like to have a martini with. This quick and easy post would focus only on the authors who would be great conversationalists and intimidating enough that I'd require a martini (or two) to uncleave my tongue from the roof of my mouth.

Turns out it was a very hard list to assemble, and has required actual work and deep thinking on my part, and now I'm tired and cranky and wishing I'd written something truly easy, like a list of my top favorite deserts, or my favorite places to sleep, or perhaps my top favorite excuses for not making a top five list. But nonetheless, here it is.

1. Neil Gaiman. A bit of Roald Dahl with a large dollop of Poe and a smattering of King, with crazy hair and a charming British accent. Totally deserving of number one status.

2. Markus Zusak. Because of The Book Thief, and because he describes his next book thus:
"It's about a boy. His name is Clay. He's building a bridge. And he wants that bridge to be something truly great and miraculous."

3. Laurie Halse Anderson. Chains, Speak, Twisted, Wintergirls, Fever. I'm hoping she won't speak in stunning, one word sentences. Because. I. Will. Freak.

4. John Green. Brilliant, funny, and brilliant. Did I mention brilliant? That, too.

I know, I know. That's only four. I'll come clean here. My real number one choice, and the reason for writing this bogus list in the first place is that I want to have a martini with Anthony Bourdain. He's not even a YA author you say? His writing is quite inappropriate for the young ones? Ah, true enough, but you have to admit, he's well educated, irreverent, potentially dangerous and a bit untrustworthy, making him the perfect number one choice for sharing an adult beverage with.

If you still aren't convinced, please take a culinary moment here to watch this video of Bourdain and a few other impressive cooking types eating dinner at the French Laundry. How they managed to peer into my dreams to reenact my personal fantasy dinner I don't know, but watch while you snack on your leftover meatloaf, or bowl of Top Ramen, or whatever inadequate thing you are eating at the moment. I dare you to refuse a martini (or three, with a side of Marlboro granita) with Bourdain.

Double-dare you.

How do you query?

2010-05-19T14:12:00.001-07:00

Have you ever been so excited by one of your works-in-progress that you queried before the book was finished? And if you got a request for the full, what did you do?

I haven’t, but I can understand the urge. I’m really excited by the YA I’m working on now, and can’t wait to see how agents respond.

Of course, most of us know this is a complete no-no. That along with calling your work a “fiction novel.” Uh, what other kind of novel would it be?

And while I’m on the subject of queries, do you only share them with your crit group, or post them on other writing sites? I hold everything pretty close to the vest and only share with my trusted group. Same goes for writing excerpts. I know there are sites out there where you can get feedback from other writers, but I’ve never shared with strangers. Of course, complete strangers will read our books eventually…hopefully.

Just curious to hear from other writers on this.

Top Five: Books I Wish I'd Written

2010-05-13T05:00:00.000-07:00

Today I'm starting a Top Five series. I'm doing this partly because I love lists, and partly because when I’m so busy that the thought of blogging freaks me out, I know that I can at least muster the time to write five things on almost any topic.

These are the top five things I wish I’d written--and for the purposes of this blog I've limited my choices to literature for young adults or middle grade. These are not my top five favorite books. I can never answer that question because my favorites change constantly, and I love so many books for so many different reasons that it's just impossible to choose.

1. Charlotte's Web: Because it is, as Charlotte would say, “SOME NOVEL”. It would actually fall into my favorite book category if I were to commit to creating that list. It's here because I wish I had written this part in particular, because it demonstrates that writers can and should be brutally honest when writing for kids. This passage makes me gasp every time I read it. It's sad, but it reminds me that the most courageous deeds often slip by in the quiet moments, without fanfare--and that these deeds are the most precious of all.

"She knew he was saying good-bye in the only way he could. And she knew that her children were safe. "Good-Bye!" she whispered. Then she summoned all her strength and waved one of her front legs at him.

She never moved again. Next day, as the Ferris wheel was being taken apart and the race horses were being loaded into vans and the entertainers were packing up their belongings and driving away in their trailers, Charlotte died. The Fair Grounds were soon deserted. The sheds and buildings were empty and forlorn. The infield was littered with bottles and trash. Nobody, of the hundreds of people that had visited the Fair, knew that a grey spider had played the most important part of all. No one was with her when she died."

2. Hunger Games: Pure page-turning prowess.

3. Twilight: The money, honey.

4. Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian: I love funny books, but Alexie achieves that hardest kind of humor by making us laugh and wince and the same time, because truth is both funny and painful, and the main character is so brave. It's an amazing lesson in the power of the human spirit, without ever, for a moment, becoming preachy. I'd love to have that command of humor.

5. Are You There God, It's Me, Margaret: Because all girls coming of age need to feel that they aren't alone.

The Fantasy Novel in Verse - A Writer's Guide

2010-05-11T08:30:00.000-07:00

The novel in verse is not a new form for fiction yet our departure from it in literature makes it feel a little more obscure and fanciful than your typical prose piece.

When I mention to people that I am writing a fantasy novel in verse, eyebrows go up. Even the few editors and agents I've talked it over with look to be in equal parts fascinated and somewhat appalled.

The decision to write a YA fantasy novel in verse is one I've thought through quite carefully. We have a magical history in literature of what would now be classified as "fantasy in verse" and we as modern writers have lost touch with this form completely (please feel free to argue with me and send the names of current fantasy in verse because I'd love to read them).

This history dates back to some of our most well known and influential literature: Dante's Divine Comedy, Boccaccio's Decameron, Sir Gawain and and The Green Knight, The Epic of Gilgamesh.

In particular, the Decameron is a fantastic example of an apocalyptic fantasy novel with the travelers gathered at an inn, fleeing from the Bubonic Plague, telling their fantastic tales and ruminating on the hand of Lady Fortune in their lives. It serves as both an allegory and an excellent depiction of the effects of the plague on the populace.

The novel in verse was the form of choice for Dante, Boccaccio, Chaucer and others yet it is a form that has been virtually abandoned in our literature and become a rare phenomenon in children's literature. Obviously, there are many excellent and popular works in verse out right now, but fantasy or allegory in verse are essentially non existent.

So how does one go about writing a novel in verse and how is it different from a novel in prose? The first question is a complex one and the latter deserves a flip answer: write poems instead of prose.

But how do you create a coherent work completely in verse? Much like any other manuscript, you begin with an outline, but I believe, you reduce the scope of the work significantly. Transitions are used in a completely different way and the pacing is exceptionally different from a novel in prose. The "action" happens in great brevity and the character development must come quickly. First person seems to lend a hand in creating a sense of immediacy and moving the verse along. Voice is everything.

When I write in verse, I think more of the novel as a series of scenes rather than a collection of chapters. Each scene (or poem) must grow into the next and form a set of roots for the entire novel. Yet, while each poem must remain related, they don't necessarily have to contain the same kind of exposition you find in a novel in prose . . . the form can handle more abrupt changes in time and place.

The novel in verse is also highly dependent on metaphor and simile in order to keep it firmly placed in the realm of poetry and keep it from reading like a traditional novel that's been broken into disparate parts. There is a delicate balance between action, movement, and language.

Carefully planning the pace of a novel in verse is also a difficult operation. The form of poetry is an oral tradition and the sound of the words, spoken aloud, is a factor in both the pacing and even the more minute details of line and stanza endings. A novel in verse is not meant to be read quickly and I find that the right pacing can create an equally full experience for the reader despite the huge difference in word count between a traditional novel and a novel in verse. If I can, as a writer, give the reader the sense that they've just read a 350 page fantasy poem that feels as full as a 350 page prose novel then I have created a complete story that holds similar depth.

The time involved in writing a novel in verse seems equal to that of a novel in prose. Each poem is so dense and each word must hold the weight of an entire prose sentence that the writing is far slower than pounding out a 1,000 words in a sitting. Imagine that . . . each word must be chosen as if it takes up the same space as a sentence.

Is it more challenging to write? If you're not a poet by practice, then I would venture to guess it is far more difficult. But if you find yourself thinking and writing in verse and concentrating as much on language - the taste and feel of the words on your tongue, the rhythm of the language and you're the type of person that finds unusual metaphors exciting, then you might find the novel in verse the right outlet for that sense of story telling. I know I have.

Are you prolific?

2010-05-06T14:36:00.000-07:00

(Imagine there's a cool picture of a mountain of books to go with this post.)

I was reading something recently where the writer talked about how many novels she was working on at one time—shifting from one to the other like, uh, I can’t think of a good metaphor.

For me, I have to stay on track with ONE piece. While I’m writing that piece I am constantly thinking about it—totally immersed in the world, the theme, the characters. Jumping to another WIP would just be too jarring. Plus, some of the traits of one character might migrate to the other book.

And then there would be a fight between characters to see who gets to be Top Dog.

Now, I do think that people that can do this are really amazing. But for me, I have to finish something, take a breath…and dive back into another world.

What about you? Can you jump from book to book like…like…tiddly-winks? Jumping beans? You know what I’m getting at.

Writing Prompt!

2010-05-04T14:08:00.000-07:00

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words-literally. This one has been in my writing prompt file for awhile, waiting patiently.

I stumbled across this gem of an imagination booster at McMenamins Hotel Oregon in McMinnville. The hallways and rooms of the hotel are covered with interesting and strange paintings. Most of them are not framed like this one, but painted directly on the wall. Despite this creepy example, the Hotel Oregon is charming, and comes with creaky floors and hundreds, maybe thousands, of stories to tell.

I have no idea who the artist is, or what they were depicting-and I wouldn't want to know, because this odd little gathering has got me wondering, and wondering is a terrific way to begin writing.

I'm certain there is a story here that needs to be told. Look...you'll see it just there to the right of the sign, lurking behind the Douglas Fir trees.

Why do these children bear such uncanny resemblances to each other? How is it that three of them are circling the institutional-looking building on flying tricycles? Was the placement of the institution, precariously at the top of a steep hill, meant to dissuade curious passersby? And what happens inside?

Who is the boy in the blue suit and why does his expression make me think he's the ringleader? That girl in pink just behind him has other ideas in mind. Don't worry about the boy wearing the gray suit and idiotic grin...he's harmless...until the moon begins to wane. The youngest boy with the gray vest, knows something forbidden and will use that to hurt someone innocent in the very near future.

And most importantly, who cut their hair? Because with foreheads like those, bangs are definitely What Not to Wear.

Maybe this will turn into a story, and maybe it won't...prompts are fickle like that. But any time an image gets me asking questions, I take it as a good omen. And I just might need some good omens with a crowd like this lurking about.

MAKING THE MOST OF TOOLS

2010-04-29T12:03:00.000-07:00

Yes, I have to admit it. This lovely device is now sitting beside me on my desk, syncing all my video, music, and photos as I happily type away.

In my defense: It was a gift. A lovely, generous, thoughtful gift from an equally wonderful man.

At first I was a bit skeptical (and yes . . . I have heard ALL the jokes), but now that it's sitting here next to me, I have to admit that it really is one more useful tool to aid in my writing.

Pages is available as a download for the iPad which means that I can drop this in my purse and pull it out on the whim to work on my manuscript. It saves automatically as you go and has most of the features of the old fashioned desktop version (and they're working out bugs faster than I can type). I'm already using Scrivener and Pages interchangeably on my laptop so having Pages on the fly makes it even simpler to sneak some writing time in here and there.

I love new technology and part of the reason is that I'm eager to accept any extra help to make my writing both more accessible and easier. I'm a mom. I'm on the PTO. I have three kids who ride horses, take enrichment classes, play soccer and I rarely find myself at home. In fact, the majority of my writing takes place in the car waiting for activities to finish up, or in the car between activities, or waiting in the doctor's office, the dentist, while someone else is driving, and other equally odd and uncomfortable spots.

I have the dock / keyboard accessory for long typing session but the graphic keyboard is surprisingly easy to use and the auto correct and auto fill-in capabilities make it even better for a spelling challenged person like me. I'm working on a novel in verse and the writing is very different. I can easily type out a poem or two on the on screen keyboard.

It really is small enough to stash in your purse and with the safety cover, it should remain safe (unless I drop it in front of a bucking horse or prancing elephant). It's pretty, too.

So come on now, confess it. What little tricks, devices, and treats do you use to keep the muse happy?

SCBWI Western Washington

2010-04-27T01:58:00.000-07:00

I grew up as an Air Force Brat and have lived all over the place. But in all my travels, as a kid and as an adult, I had never been to the Pacific Northwest.

That changed a few weeks ago when I flew to Redmond, Washington for the SCBWI Western Washington Conference.

The main reason I wanted to go was to meet my critique partners Elise Murphy and Michele Thornton. We've talked on the phone and Skyped several times but had yet to meet in person.

It was a great trip. When people saw that my name tag read Maryland they did a double-take. That's a pretty long trip. Six hours. Oofa. But it was worth it.

A few of the highlights:

Jay Asher's keynote speech: How to Sell a Book in Twelve Years... or Less!
I missed this at the NYC SCBWI a year ago so I was glad to finally hear it.

Mitali Perkin's speech about moving to America from India, a stranger in a strange land, and how her love of reading allowed her to find her own place in the world. (With a lot of funny anecdotes along the way. Her slide-show was hilarious.)

Laini Taylor's speech on Plot. Brilliant. That is one talented woman.

Agent Edward Necarsulmer's speech about his role as an agent. By the time he was finished, everyone in the room was talking about how great he would be to have on their side.

And what was REALLY cool, my crit partner, Elise Murphy, along with a few other writers, was called out and given recognition for...drumroll...The Most-Promising Works-in-Progress category!

How cool is that?

It was a great time. I didn't have a chance to see much other than Redmond, no down-time at all, but it was a great conference.

Now I just need to get them to come to the one in DC!

Uh, I'm serious.

Writing Retreats

2010-04-22T11:55:00.000-07:00

THE IMPORTANCE OF A WRITING RETREAT (or why us writers have to just get away from it all sometimes)

When I'm deep in the creative zone, nothing adds fuel to my writing fire like complete physical (other forms of communication are okay, though -- otherwise I'd be in a straight jacket!) isolation from other humans. I'm fortunate that where I live upstate is pretty remote, but there are always many loved ones to see, social things to do, and quite a few delicious distractions from the task at hand; in this case, writing & revising my current YA WIP, GRIMOIRE.

So I seek out those opportunities where I'm able to -- literally -- zip off to a desert island and hunker down for a week or so, and JUST WRITE. And nothing else, except stuff that relates to writing, creating, refilling the well (such as swimming in the ocean and taking long nature walks) and. just. being. with. my baby/WIP. It's a total luxury for me, and yet a necessity, too.

Thanks to my loved ones and their various abodes, I just spent a super-creative week alone on Fisher Island in Florida, and I'm off again next month on another retreat to another semi-island on Long Island. Both places offer isolation, nil distractions, and the ability for me to utterly focus on the WIP. It's a vital part of the way I work, when I'm writing a first or second draft and I'm feeling my way through a manuscript.

How do you create best? Do you need that 'desert island' isolation? Do you go on writing retreats with other writers? Or are you just as happy creating in a coffee shop, surrounded by people?

[CC photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/notsogoodphotography]

High Concept: Just More Snakes on a Plane?

2010-04-21T08:39:00.001-07:00

At last weekend’s SCBWI-Western Washington conference, I attended a session held by Jordon Brown, called High Concept Doesn’t Mean Low Quality. (I can't resist breakout sessions that validate my own opinions, especially when its the Editor at Walden Pond Press/Balzer & Bray of HarperCollins Children’s Books doing the validating.)

Briefly, high concept is a notion derived from movies where a story can be understood or explained in a few sentences. Like, heaven forbid, “It’s Harry Potter meets Snakes on a Plane”.

What makes high concept more than Snakes on a Plane? For me, it’s several elements. I love a story that takes an otherwise well-trodden theme (for example, the story of a girl who feels alienated from her busy and clueless parents) and turning it into something strange and wonderful. I’m talking about Neil Gaiman's Coraline.

The other thing that makes high-concept work for me is what makes all stories work: fully realized characters that grow and change in a believable way. A plot that sucks me in and makes me forget I’m reading a book, and an over arching theme that makes my soul and intellect hold hands across the great divide separating logic from spirit.

Of course, it's a given that those of us who read and/or write speculative or fantasy fiction love to live in the world of high concept, but I would argue that even readers who are dedicated to the realistic would do well to step outside themselves from time to time and gaze at the world through the prism of high concept.

One novel that I think hits the mark on both high concept and literary fiction is The Brief History of the Dead, by Kevin Brockmeier.

The book is set in two separate worlds: that of The City, inhabited by the recently dead, who remain there only as long as they survive in the memories of the living; and in the Antarctic, where scientist Laura Byrd is trapped by extreme weather and unable to contact the outside world. Meanwhile, the rest of Earth is succumbing to a perfect storm of catastrophes, leaving Laura as possibly the last living human on earth. And yes, at this point the only dead who remain in The City are those whom Laura remembers. The two narratives eventually converge as both the living and the dead fade past the reach of living memory into an uncertain future.

It’s definitely not Harry Potter Meets Snakes on a Plane, but deeply philosophical and literary, it is also wonderfully strange.

Also: Don't miss Laini Taylor's blog post on PLOT. More great stuff from the SCBWI-WWA conference, and it's FREE!

Photo credit: Beancounter Parodies

IN OUR OWN HEADS (or) PLEASE DON"T CALL FOR THE STRAIGHT JACKET YET

2010-04-14T07:23:00.000-07:00

I attended the SCBWI Western Washington conference this last weekend with two of my fabulous critique partners, Ron Smith and Michele Thornton (while the lovely Jules lounged by the ocean somewhere working away furiously on her fabulous WIP).

There's so much to take in at an event like this, and Western Washington puts on an amazing show with over 400 attendees.

Of the myriad anecdotes I heard and garnered meaning for my writerly life, there was a theme that kept popping up with the editors and agents in attendance. It was the refrain of, "we know you writers spend a lot of time alone and in your own heads so we understand . . . " fill in the blank. Understand how crazy we are? How limited our view? How we don't understand the shmoozing side of the book business? How tender and vulnerable we are? How you must treat us with kid gloves and ignore our crazy mutterings?

And for the most part, this is true. As Theodore Roethke said, "Art is our defense against hysteria and death." And if the average tortured artist is out there trying to stave off hysteria and death, we're probably doing it behind closed doors.

Ultimately, this presents a bit of a problem for us. Yes, writing is a solitary act and it is in the silence that we find space for the creative. We delve into the most fantastic depths of our worlds all alone, sometimes in the darkness before dawn or the middle of the night, but even if we sit in a coffee shop, the world in our heads is ours alone and we have control there.

The problem you ask? The problem is that sometimes we don't know when to stop being in our own heads and get out and LIVE in order to feed more stories to our hungry solitary minds. You may argue, and argue well, that Emily Dickinson never really set foot outside her garden gate and yet created a vast and truly meaningful collection of poetry. I'd argue back that the woman was crazy. Crazy and art go hand in hand . . . I'm good with that idea. And the fact that she was off the rails does not diminish the power of her work. But lest we want to find our heads in the oven some day, and we desire to ward off the straight jacket, we'd all be right to consider LIVING and writing.

Ah, yes, I see you there, smirking at me. Nodding knowingly. You can see I have been in my head, in that solitary world of the imagination a bit too long now. My skin might be a bit sallow, my eyes a little dark, my mood a mite . . . difficult. But don't judge me too harshly or call for the restraints yet. The argument here is for balance. A way to divide one's day between the personal world of the creative mind and the abundance of sensory input from the outside world. And while I do drive my kids back and forth to school and go to meetings and work (you know, the good old fashioned paying kind) and see friends and drink coffee, I sometimes find that even in those moments, I am half there, and half in my other world.

How do we honor our solitary souls and yet push ourselves to live freely? As Henry David Thoreau so famously said,

"I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to put to rout all that was not life and not when I had come to die discover that I had not lived.”

Shall we all head for the woods?

A bit of wonderful

2010-04-08T17:48:00.001-07:00

A wonderful story from Neil Gaiman. Enjoy!

Rituals

2010-03-12T09:36:00.000-08:00

What is the one thing you must do every day before you write?
•Say a prayer to your god of choice?
•Stand on your head?
•Take deep breaths?
• Scream?
•Or just dive in, like me?

I've always found this a curious subject. I've never really had a ritual I would carry out before writing, but I think I just found one.

The book I'm reading, Write Away, by Elizabeth George, not only has a lot of great advice, but a few words of inspiration, that come in the form of chapter headings: Journal of a Novel. This one really got my attention:

This is the moment when faith is called for. Faith in the creative spirit within me, which is part of what I've been given by God; faith in the process; faith in my intelligence and my imagination. If I've managed to imagine these characters and this situation into being, doesn't it follow that I should also be able to imagine my way through to the end of the book? It seems so. Thus...I suit up and show up. I sit down at the computer and I do the work, moving it forward a sentence at a time, which is ultimately the only way there is to write a book.

I found this so inspirational, I think it will become my wallpaper for my computer so I will see it every morning before writing.

So, what helps you clear your thoughts and get into the creative space of writing?

How To Write YA When You Are Too Old To Rock and Roll, but Too Young To Die

2010-02-18T13:58:00.002-08:00

I’m 48, and I write books that have teenagers as the main characters. How, you ask, does my age-addled brain manage it? How on earth do I, a suburban housewife and martini-swilling cynic dare write about that weird, painful, funny and awkward time of life? Brain yoga.

I’ve tried to rise above the dangerous chasm of cynicism and fatigue that can creep in around age 40 and keep my inner teenager alive and thriving. This takes effort. The aging brain wants to harden opinions into kidney stones of belief, and I have to be agile, flexible, and open to new ideas.

1. Become a parent late in life. My 7-year-old challenges my assumptions, pushes me into situations I’d sooner avoid, and generally forces me to engage with the world in ways I never would without her.

2. Reflect on old diaries. I managed to save one of mine, and I’m also fortunate that my BFF saved an entire shoebox full of notes we passed during classes. (Yes, we used to write actual notes on paper and palm them around in the prehistoric time before texting.) If I ever tried to write a character that was as shockingly profane and ridiculous as my diary and notes indicate I was, the book would be banned. (Think Go Ask Alice meets Carrie and travels to Narnia, where they eat chocolate cake and talk about boys.) My unabridged teenage voice allows me to connect with what it actually felt like to be that age, at that time.

3. Don’t be too mature. Fortunately for my writing (perhaps unfortunately for my psyche) I still often feel like a teenager—unsure of myself, intimidated by those who seem cooler, smarter, wiser or richer. I still get a winning-the-lottery thrill when I remember that even the coolest rival is not very different from me once I’ve scraped off the gray veneer of personality with my sharp-edged dime.

4. Remember how to play. Do goofy shit. The older you get, the harder it is to be silly, to giggle uncontrollably until soda comes out your nose, to look foolish, dance wildly and act out.

5. Have a crush or two. Teenagers spend a huge amount of time talking about, thinking about and in some cases, having, sex. I’ve been married for 20 years and wouldn’t trade my wonderful man for the world, but indulging a nice, harmless, never-act-upon-it crush or two reminds me of what it feels like to be a girl. I can call upon that blood-rushing, heart-fluttering, sweaty-palmed nervous delight when I think about my crushes (and no, I’m not telling who they are, for they are legion and they are unattainable).

6. Use the tools age has given you. Age may have slowed my reflexes, but it has also given me real experiences. I’ve lived in many places and met thousands of people, all with weird and wonderful personality traits that feed my characters. I’ve suffered permanent losses and heartbreaking tragedies—and so I can, with authority, write these kinds of emotions. I’ve experienced great joy, the kind that fills my chest and makes every difficult moment totally worthwhile, like being the parent, wife, daughter and sister to some amazing people. I’ve failed at things that were important to me. I've succeeded through sheer stubbornness. I've LIVED. I’ve lied. I've been stupid, cowardly and greedy. I've also (hopefully more often) been brave, generous and kind. These are my tools that make writing possible for me.

I know I'm not the only "person of age" to write for young people. How do you keep your brain agile? What's your favorite brain yoga tip? I can always use more...but hurry, I'm not getting any younger.

Down the rabbit hole of book cover art

2010-02-14T11:31:00.000-08:00

It's been a loooong time since I posted something, partly due to traveling (a lot) back and forth to Los Angeles the last few months, which has meant I've just not had time to devote to either my blog (sorry, blog!) or to the fantastic PENTALES. I've also been working hard on a partial of my new YA contemporary dark fantasy novel, GRIMOIRE, for my lovely (and patient) agent, Mitchell Waters of Curtis Brown, Ltd. I'm delivering the partial on Tuesday, so wish me luck ;)

In the meantime, friend and fellow Enchanted Inkpot member, Gretchen McNeil (who also happens, by a fabulous coincidence, to be repped by Curtis Brown, Ltd -- her agent though is the lovely Ginger Clark) is putting together a vlog on book trailers and cover art. And I thought it would be fun to spend a little time (okay, it became A LOT of time, especially when I have this partial to finish!!!) to create a MOCK cover for GRIMOIRE. Please note the word MOCK in big, capital letters, as this is purely something I knocked up thanks to the creative commons license over at Flickr. I took an image from Pareeerica's CC stream, and played around a little to make something I hope looks pretty cool.

So there we go! And here it is. Of course, now I've been playing around with it, there are like a thousand different covers I'd like to see as my cover art. Favorite books covers include Gerald Brom's THE CHILD THIEF, Katherine Howe's THE PHYSICK BOOK OF DELIVERANCE DANE, and Lev Grossman's THE MAGICIANS.

What cover art do you covet?

Coping with Rejection

2010-01-31T12:28:00.000-08:00

Rejection stinks, but if you are a writer trying to get an agent and get published, it's a fact of life that you have to deal with somehow. I thought I'd share some honest methods I use that keep me pushing forward through the rejections without drinking myself into an early grave (although the occasional martini has been known to cross my keyboard).

1. Take My Power Back

After a rejection, whether it's a "nice" personal rejection or a cold form rejection, I feel the need to sling a little pain back at the rejector. Of course, being a professional, I can only do this in the privacy of my own office, but believe me, it helps. I track my submittals on a spreadsheet, and instead of dwelling on the rejection, I immediately delete them from my email and move their name to the top of my "Done" list.

2. Rant--In Private, of Course

Occasionally, a rejection feels particularly bitter. In those cases a full-on rant with my fellow writers is in order. Yes, Mr. or Ms. agent, we do rant about you. It's just a necessary venting that keeps our tiny little writer heads from exploding.

3. Go Back to Work Immediately

Once I’ve gotten the negative stuff out of the way, which I do quickly, I get right back to the creative stuff—my paid marketing work, helping my husband run his businesses, raising my daughter and of course, writing my next novel. It is always empowering to remember that my life does not revolve around searching for an agent.

4. Remind Myself of All the Positives

I take all the complements I've had from agents, my Pen Talers and other professionals and reread them, just to remind myself of what is good about my work. I can't go back to the business of being creative if I think I stink.

5. Talk to My Pen Talers

I can’t tell you how many times these beautiful and smart friends have talked me off the ledge, and vise-versa. All of my loved ones support my writing and are terrific cheerleaders, but no one on earth understands the feeling of having your work rejected like your fellow writers.

6. Be Stubborn as Hell

I constantly remind myself that published writers had the fortitude to stick with it no matter what. You write because you love to write, and not just to get published.

7. Focus on the Benefits Beyond Publication

Although getting published is my ultimate goal, there are countless benefits to being a writer. My first novel is based on The Odyssey, with a strong black female main character. I wrote it with my seven year old daughter in mind, who loves adventure stories but wanted to know where the black girls were. Now, she’s an avid fan of mythology, and we are reading the Percy Jackson series. She’s seen the mythological archetypes in many kids books and is so excited when another Cerberus or Pegasus figure shows up in a novel. As that great philosopher American Express says, "Priceless.

RUNNING A SUCCESFUL ONLINE CRITQUE GROUP

2010-01-26T18:27:00.001-08:00

I've got to brag just a little about Pen Tales. I am pretty sure we've got the best critique group ever in the entire world and maybe even in the galaxy.

I know you're just dying to ask us how we do it. How do we maintain our youthful appearance, continue with our day jobs, tend to our families and still have the best critique group in the solar system?

Even more importantly, you want to know how to emulate this greatness.

Here are a few tips on forming and maintaining a great online critique group.

1. Find a leader. This person doesn't need to wear the hat for long, but you've got to have one person willing to set things up and recruit.

2. Set up some kind of online group. We use Yahoo Groups for our critique group but I also participate in another group that uses Google Groups. They seem equally good.

3. Write some bylaws and qualification requirements. Our group put together a list of rules concerning length of submissions, frequency, critique style, etc. Before recruiting members, we also decided on what materials we'd need to see to evaluate the strength of their work

4. Start recruiting. Post a call for critique partners at the Verla Kay Blue Boards and at the SCBWI discussion boards. Be really specific about what it is you're looking for. We wanted members with a strong, professional focus on their writing, willing to submit up to 3000 words a week, with an interest in fantasy and a leaning toward YA rather than MG (but we took Ron anyway because we so adore him and his MG writing is awesome).

5. Sift through those responses. Be diligent. Read them carefully, exchange several emails, call references. Seriously. I know it sounds extreme, but one bad apple can ruin the whole experience for all the members. If you have a funny feeling about someone, listen to that little voice. Put all members on a probationary period. Reevaluate often and don't be afraid to remind people of the bylaws or ask a member to leave (nicely) if they aren't behaving accodring to the rules.

6. Start submitting. We established a pattern of up to 3000 words a week. You're not obligated to critique right away if you're not submitting. And you're certainly not welcome to upload a new file until you've met your obligations to your fellow partners.

7. Start critiquing. Despite the fact (I think) all four of us are on Mac's and using Scrivener, we convert all files to Word and upload to the files section in a folder marked for our own manuscripts. We then download each others work, choose a color to critique in (I'm purple. I've always been purple. I will always be purple.) Decide ahead of time if you're there to make line edits or if you're looking at the big picture, or both. Mark that manuscript up. Write a longer note at the beginning of the chapter or section summarizing your comments and always remember to use the sandwich method. Just because you're not saying these things right to someone's face doesn't mean your comments can't hurt. But be honest. There's no point in doing this if you aren't really going to help out your partners and improve their writing.

8. Read carefully through the responses you receive on your own work and then open a discussion forum. In Yahoo Group we title a new post: Questions About Michele's Critique. Or Clarification on My Manuscript. This is an opportunity to fully understand what your critique partners are saying.

9. Use the Group to keep in touch. We talk about more than just our manuscripts. We share business news, read each others query letters and synopses, and sometimes just complain about life in general. For us, the critique group has turned into a real friendship. You'll need to decide whether that's right for your group or not.

We also use iChat or Skype to have occasional phone / video conferences. Particularly when someone is struggling with a big issue or trying to think through a new plot, being able to talk things out, every once in awhile, is a great way to stimulate clear thinking. Plus it is such a treat, after looking at our computers all day, to get to see our critique partner's smiling faces!

I ASK THE HARD QUESTIONS

2010-01-25T11:24:00.000-08:00

I've heard more than once (ahem, maybe more than a dozen times) that I like to ask the hard questions. Even my wonderful critique partners accuse me (lovingly of course) of making them think too hard about the big picture.

It seems to me that the hard questions are the most important ones. In the context of a critique group, the hard questions often take the form of:

Are you really writing to your strength here?
Do you think your voice really lends itself best to this age group?
Do you think you might be writing down?
Have you carefully looked at this plot, checked to see if it's overdone?
Are you letting yourself off easy?

And my all time favorite hard question:

See this sentence right here, yes, the perfect one? Why doesn't the whole book read like this?

I also push people to explain to me why they write. This one plagues me all the time. I guess I'm just obsessed by who sticks with it and why. The pondering of this question informs my own writing and makes me think a lot about patience. A trait we all know is essential to a long writing career.

The hard questions also belong in the writing itself. I ask myself often:

What is the point of this plot?
Am I trying to convey something beyond just entertainment?
If I do have a greater theme, is it evident? Too evident?
Are my characters real enough?
Does my story arc bring a conclusion?
Is there an emotional change?
A change of circumstances?

So yea, go ahead, accuse me of asking the hard questions. I can take it. But then maybe sit down and try answering them. You might find out something about yourself that you never knew before.

Happy New Year!

2010-01-01T05:47:00.000-08:00

Hello? Anyone there? Pen Tales has been woefully neglected due to the craze leading up to the holidays and our own various projects. We all hope to post more in the new year and grow as writers.

What about everyone else? What are your goals for 2010? I don't usually make resolutions, but I hope to finish my new YA novel and get an agent. Still working on the agent thing. I've had some close calls but so far no representation. It'll come. It has to!

We hope everyone has a great year full of success.

Why I Love The Hunger Games

2009-11-16T15:28:00.000-08:00

I love The Hunger Games because I can't resist a genuine page-turner.

In The Hunger Games and its follow-up Catching Fire, Collins hits the reader on all fronts, putting Katniss is at risk physically, emotionally, psychologically and romantically. Talk about torturing your darlings.

Katniss is not only plagued by a relentless series of trials, but she resists trusting others, rarely agrees with anyone else, and constantly confronts people in uncomfortable and sometimes inappropriate ways. Her rare moments of peace and calm are immediately shattered by Something Very Bad.

After reading The Hunger Games, I figured that Catching Fire would have to be disappointing. After all, I was a seasoned reader. I knew what to expect from Collins, and yet somehow the tension was even higher as she took me relentlessly up the ramp of the largest thrill ride roller coaster in the world, let me enjoy the view for just a second or two (ah, look at those cute little monkeys in the trees, I think that one is waving at me...) and plunged me down to the bottom.

As a writer, I know that creating this kind of tension much harder than it seems. Fear, anger, controversy, uncertainty, self-doubt, suspicion, angst…these are all emotions most of us avoid. As a human, I don’t like being uncomfortable, physically or emotionally. My natural tendency in life is to create balance, stasis, calm and equanimity. As a mother, I have an ingrained need to make my child's life as chaos-free as possible.

But what works in life and child rearing spells death to storytelling, and I have to remind myself that my characters are not my children--they would be better described as my victims. Even keeping this in mind I have to constantly sniff out scenes where I've solved my characters problems too quickly, or failed to solve one problem without introducing another, much worse, one.

Writers That Like To Panic

2009-11-10T09:36:00.001-08:00

Ahem. Yes, that title refers to me.

WSJ published an article entitled How To Write a Great Novel. Huge thank you to Tina Lee for blogging about it first and bringing it to my attention.

I read it with great interest, certain this erudite knowledge would become mine and at the very least, I would see myself and my process reflected in these great writers.

Instead I panicked.

As I read the profiles of each author I thought to myself: I don't do that. I'd never even think to do that. That's AMAZING, why didn't I think of that? This is why they're brilliant, because they think of things like this!

I hyperventilated for a bit and figured this was pretty good proof that my career as a writer was over before it got started.

And then I went back and read it one more time and saw that I do a few of these things, in a very different order, to lesser degrees and that I employ my very own unique techniques when it comes to writing a novel.

Yes, I realize unique is kind of the cornerstone of the creative life, but sometimes I like to panic first and think second (I'm working on this, I swear).

So no, I don't write by hand while a cute pool boy stands by ready to read my dialogue aloud and a transcriptionist floats on a pool chaise with laptop attached to a long cord. Nor do I write all of my novels from a biplane while mixing martinis with my toes.

But I do love to start with an image collage and plaster my work space with pictures of objects and landscapes that I think might inform my work. I download several new music collections that have the right energy for my work. And I do write on a boring old laptop unless I feel stuck and then I write in this ratty old red leather journal and sometimes make little maps of plot arc and lists of a 100 characteristics of my landscape or characters. Sometimes I think only about theme and write myself an essay about the internal world of my characters. When newly in love with my work, I will create an image system that will run beneath the novel like an underground river.

I have this certain stretch of highway I'll drive where in one direction I can see the mountains in Canada and in the other direction an unbelievably vast sky. The shower is also a great place to think but I can't say I just jump in whenever I need a new plot idea (my hair would be a mass of dreadlocks if it was wet and dry ALL day long).

And you? What is unique in your process? Does it change depending on the novel? During Revisions? Do you try new techniques when you're stuck?

Come on! Tell me. I need something new to panic about.

In Honor of Zombies and Werewolves

2009-11-04T08:46:00.001-08:00

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. And now Little Women and Werewolves. In honor of these classic books gone . . . feral, we've come up with a few titles of our own. Please fee free to join the discussion and add yours!

The Grapes of Wraith

The Vampire also Rises

Gone with the Werewolf

The Count Dracula of Monte Cristo

Anne of Green Ghouls

Of Mice and Monsters

A Tale of Two Zombies

For Whom the Bell Trolls

Alice in Zombieland

Uncle Tom's Cabin of the Dead.

Around the World in 80 Days. With Zombies.

And for another little treat, check out this interview with Francesca Lia Block - about her new book called Wood Nymph Seeks Centaur . What's your true animal nature?

National Book Award Finalist! Laini Taylor...

2009-10-14T14:25:00.000-07:00

How awesome is this??

Laini, I thought nothing could improve Jim's gorgeous cover...but look! That sticker is just what it needed. Congratulations!!

Wordstock and Ten Tips to Turn Up the Tension

2009-10-11T17:39:00.000-07:00

Sunday was the first time I've been able to attend the Portland literary festival Wordstock, and it was terrific. For starters, it was a day away from the suburbs. That alone was worth the price of admission (which was amazingly cheap at $5 for the exhibit hall and $35 for each conference session). There were acres of signed books being browsed by hundreds of wonderful and strange writer types that ranged from ear-tunneled manga-toting twenty-somethings to slick New York literati. There was even a mountain man with matted beard fur, whom I named Leonard Sasquatch. With all these elements in one place, Wordstock could hardly fail to be a great experience.

I even met Sherman Alexie, which was a personal thrill and enabled me to blather incoherently about The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian while he signed my new copy of War Dancers.

But the blathering aside, the best part was the sessions. Mystery/thriller writer April Henry had a terrific list of 49 Ways to Turn up the Tension. Some of these applied mainly to the genre, however I've pulled ten of my favorite tips that I thought were useful for any type of novel.

Start with action.
Replace an overcome obstacle with a greater one.
Make an old fear even worse when it becomes reality.
Omit beginnings and endings of scenes and jump from middle to middle.
Cut backstory. She said that Donald Maas recommends holding all backstory until after page 100.
Keep chapters under 10 pages, or 2,000 words
No chit-chat. Whenever possible, two speakers should be in conflict.
End a scene with a character making a decision not revealed to the reader.
Number things. She cited John Greene's technique in Looking for Alaska, where he uses headings that number the days before a monumental and life changing event, but does not reveal the nature of the event.
Look for passages that describe the weather, the landscape, the aftermath or travel. Then cut them. (Of course, depending on the type of novel you are writing, you may not want to take this idea to its extreme. But I believe every description must serve to move the story forward in some way.)

There were no soccer games, no marketing work, no meals to cook--just great writers with practical tips and strategies. Wordstock rocked.

Later this week, I'll post again about a Wordstock session on characterization.

Wordstock, Here I Come!

2009-09-29T21:49:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy summer, capped by even busier and somewhat sucky start to autumn. There has been little time to flex my writing muscles lately, but I have two new books in the works. I'm am almost ready to wrap up the worldbuilding, character creation and plotlines for the one I call Porcelain Monkeys. You know, after the Warren Zevon song. (If you aren't familiar with the song, or God forbid, Warren Zevon, don't admit it out loud. He's a genius. Go immediately to iTunes or your local record store and get Excitable Boy, at the very least.)

But I'm feeling a bit tired. A tad uninspired. What to do...what to do? (taps chin)

Wordstock.

A book and literary festival, right here in lovely Portland on October 10th and 11th. Perfect! Writers, workshops, a sea of books...just what I need to feed my creative spirit! I'll have a full report next week.

It's National Punctuation Day! It's National Punctuation Day!

2009-09-24T11:36:00.000-07:00

That's right, kids. You remember it. Dad coming home with nicely wrapped apostrophes, mom dressed in a flowing gown made of semicolons. Ahh, the memories.

No seriously, today is, in fact, National Punctuation Day. Don't believe me? Look here.

So what's your favorite punctuation mark? I don't have a favorite, but I despise semicolons. Just make up your mind and decide whether you're a period or comma for God's sake.

I also have a particular fondness for the old em dash--love it.

Ice Cream and Meatballs

2009-09-15T06:00:00.000-07:00

I get business.
I get art.
But art and business together?
It’s a bit like trying to mix religion and science.

Or a tastier analogy—and one in keeping with fellow Pen Taler Elise’s foodie frame of mind—art and business are like ice cream and meatballs. You can enjoy them both, but they really don’t go well together.

Writing and publishing--the ice cream and meatballs of the book business.

Writing books is an art. Publishing them is a business. Obvious. The only problem is, that in too many cases, they clash. They can even make you downright nauseous.

Ice cream, like the art of writing, is pure joy. It should be savored on the tongue. It needs the right environment to be truly appreciated: too hot and it’s dreadful goo. Too cold and it loses all its nuance of flavor.

Meatballs, on the other hand, are substantial and satisfying but not necessarily joyous. Before you meatball lovers protest too much, consider this. No one has meatball socials. No one makes a cake out of meatballs. No one leans over a meatball with eyes pressed tight in anticipation and casts out a heartfelt wish or unspoken desire.

I work in marketing, and spend a fair amount of time writing for a living. I make tasty meatballs all day long, and they never cause me angst or indigestion. I take pride in my work, and it’s satisfying in a plain, solid, meatbally way.

But the joy in my life comes from my art, fiction writing. Along with that joy comes angst and self-doubt. The reason is simple: my art is personal. It’s tied to my identity and sense of self-worth in a way that my work will never be.

We create our art, and publishers judge its value in monetary terms. Editors hold the purse strings and agents are the gatekeepers to the money. We've all heard stories about editors who sat on sellable manuscripts for months, even years, holding the fragile career of the writer under a bell jar. Alternately, get the right editor at the right moment in the space-time continuum and you could be suddenly dealing with complicated contract negotiations and hiring an accountant.

While it would be pretty darn joyous to get published, the business process of the whole thing just doesn't sit well with many of us who write. Even those of us who are seasoned businesspeople find it just plain painful to shove our tender manuscripts out into the cold world of money, contracts, priorities and schedules.

But what's a writer to do? Keep turning the crank and putting tasty words on paper until they are irresistible.

"A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song."
— Maya Angelou

HOW WRITING IS LIKE COOKING

2009-09-10T11:26:00.000-07:00

And not a bit like baking . . .

I'm a cook—I like to make it all from scratch, think it up in my head, gather ingredients and just dive head first into the unknown.

I've been known (frequently) to taste a dish and be able to tell you nearly every ingredient in it. A red wine reduction? Got it. A lovely sachet of thyme and rosemary, cooked in broth in a slip of cheese cloth but then removed for the final presentation? Got it. Are those figs? With the brandied chicken? Grass fed beef as opposed to grain? Heirloom tomatoes?

And with cooking, I understand that the unexpected can sometimes bring forth the most original and sophisticated flavors. When flavors are combined in a way I've never thought of before, it thrills me (as long as it's a good combination).

I trained briefly as a chef—truly it was less "training" and more just being dropped in the middle of a kitchen with a sharp knife and a big white hat. One of my favorite recipes I learned when I was young and green was to stuff a whole chicken with citrus and then mix fresh orange juice with the pan drippings for a tangy gravy. Sounds simple enough. You've probably all even thought of that on your own. But I hadn't. And now I can't have a chicken gravy without it.

Baking, on the other hand, is a chore for me. I have some carrot cake cupcakes in the oven right now for the love's birthday and they weren't much fun to make. There are all these rules to follow, and exact measurements and if you accidentally add too much flour or an extra tablespoon of baking soda you pretty much blow the whole thing.

You have to level things, and sift things, mix cold butters or room temperature butters, salted and unsalted. There's the pure vanilla extract, the vanilla bean and the imitation. So many rules, so many instructions to be followed to the letter.

I was quite young when I learned the hard way that when the apple pie recipe says add flour to the apples they mean it. It sounded all wrong to me at the time. Flour in the crust, not the apples! And we had a less than savory apple soup for dessert that night.

The long winded analogy is coming up here, so just be patient for a minute while I get the cupcakes out of the oven . . . .

Querying is a lot like baking. You have to follow the rules. Know who you're addressing your letter to, follow the instructions, wait the correct amount of time to status check, indent, use 12 point type, snail mail it or email.

There's no way around it—it you want to land an agent or an editor, if you want to go on submission, you've got to bake that query and the whole manuscript to perfection. No drips on the edge of the cupcake pan, no extra dash of sugar, no combing recipes at will. And absolutely never try and pass off store bought for the real deal.

Now the writing itself. Oh, the glorious writing! Cook away! Throw in an extra pinch of salt, add hot peppers, stir in a cup of real cream at the end and give it a lovely pale color. Use spices at will, throw savory in with the sweet, serve it chilled. Just do something different. Take a chance.

I've been particularly enjoying writer's lately that take risks, move their writing into unexpected places, wow me with a line of thinking that feels fresh.

Fresh food is the best.

My addiction

2009-09-08T09:45:00.001-07:00

As much as I try, I can't beat my addiction: buying new books.
Lucky authors. I hope they return the favor when I'm published (think positive!)

I bought The Hunger Games, which needs no introduction (unless you're some kind of literary snob and don't think there could be anything of Real Cultural Importance in a YA book.)

I'm looking forward to reading it.

I also picked up a book that has been getting some buzz. The Magicians, by Lev Grossman. I've already read about 100 pages and can't stop. It's really good fiction. Harry Potter for grown-ups, is what some reviewers are calling it.

The premise: what if there really was a school of magic, concealed right on the edges of our world. That's what perpetually daydreaming high school senior Quentin Coldwater finds at a school called Brakebills in upstate New York.

When we read fantasy for kids and young adults, we accept that the worlds of magic, vampires, faeries, etc. are real. We buy into it. That's something you have to accept on page one. In adult fiction, we have to be convinced. Grossman tackles this concept with great wit and wonderful literary abilities. There are a few other books that come to mind in this field of Literary Fantasy Fiction: Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke; The Stolen Child by Keith Donohue, and of course many others including Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere and American Gods.

Know of any great books by "literary" authors in the field of fantasy or speculative fiction? Tell me about them.

Look for my spoiler-free review of the Magicians soon.

ALA Convention in Chicago

2009-07-14T05:02:00.001-07:00

I have to thank my crit partner, Juliette, for letting me know that author Cindy Pon would be signing her book, Silver Phoenix, at the American Library Association Convention in Chicago this past weekend. Until she told me this I had no idea this convention was going on here in my fair city. And even if I had, I probably wouldn't have gone. Library Association? I mean, I love libraries and books but I had no idea it would be an incredible two days of networking.

After studying the ALA website, which was very hard to navigate, I just decided to go down to the convention center to see how much it would cost to get in. (I couldn't even find that out on their website.) I made my way there and it was mobbed with people. I had to register ($25) which allowed me in for the whole event, but only in certain places, which were publishers and authors, the place I wanted to be anyway.

So I got my badge and wandered around. I met Cindy Pon at the Harper Collins booth and had her sign my book. She was very nice and seems like a cool person. Sitting next to her was David Macinnis Gill (Soul Enchilada) who also signed my book.

So I wandered around some more and got ...more books. One is the sequel to a book I reviewed on my blog last year: Elfquest, by Daniel Kirk whom I met, he seemed nice, but a little taken aback when I said I loved his book. Maybe he thought only kids would read it? I don't know.

Met Ellen Jensen Abbott who wrote Watersmeet, and is a member at Enchanted Inkpot, along with Cindy. She was very nice and we talked for a long time. I bought her book at half price, because she was so nice and the book looks interesting. (I also felt I should give some money to authors since a lot of books were free!)

Got a lot more books and then something struck me. Dude, you're at a convention. Publishers and editors are here...helllooo?

I'm not going to name any names but I proceeded to make some great contacts from really wonderful editors.

It was an incredible networking event and I had no idea the ALA was that type of convention. It wasn't swarming with writers looking for agents, so the editors/publishers were easy to talk to.

Neil Gaiman was there but a line of at least 300 people prevented me from joining the queue. Saw Holly Black chatting with people. I think they were friends of hers. She is very striking and I was intimidated. Didn't want to be a fan wanker boy.

Wow.

So day two I set out with a list of a few more editors/publishers to talk to. Success again. Yay! One highlight was getting an uncorrected proof of a book a lot of teen girls would probably kill for: Maggie Stiefvater's Shiver. Also picked up Patricia C. Wrede's new one-- The Thirteenth Child.

I have to say, I left the convention center with a backpack of books and a bunch of business cards. Suffice it to say I had a very good weekend!

Importance of procrastination

2009-06-13T07:25:00.001-07:00

Procrastination: doesn't it get all of us, at one time or another, during our WIPs? So when I came across this post on procrastination by the uber-talented Katherine Howe, I did a happy dance. Because procrastination is gold time. You just didn't know it. Enjoy! :)

Katherine Howe is the author of “The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane”

Katherine: "When people first hear that I wrote The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane while I was in graduate school for American studies, preparing for my qualifying exams, teaching undergraduates, conducting dissertation research, their eyes widen by a noticeable fraction. “Wow,” they say. “How did you do that?”

Usually I am honest. “By getting nothing done on my dissertation.” I confess. In fact, one incontrovertible lesson that I have learned from writing this novel is the paramount importance of procrastination.

Perhaps procrastination isn’t the proper word. After all, procrastination has a substantially negative connotation. It implies the wasting of time, the willful failure to make any progress. It suggests the active avoidance of appropriate tasks. We are an achievement oriented culture, after all, and we privilege effectiveness. Procrastinators like me are a blight on improvement and efficiency. Whole support groups exist for the procrastinator’s eradication.

What I am really talking about is the importance of creating open space in the mind, room for ideas to move around. This kind of room is only available within a measure of idleness, and that comes only by effort.

For instance, there I am, roaming around town with my dog, putting off reading another book for my qualifying exam. As long as I am out here, on the street, in motion, I can’t possibly be expected to read another book from my orals list, can I? I can’t grade any freshman composition papers either. I can’t check my email. The dog needs his exercise – this is important work. I have an excuse, but it’s a thin one.

Over the course of our rambles, we come upon a house down near the water, empty for some time. Years, judging by the level of decay to the clapboards. In the interest of a delayed return to my desk, and because the dog is a bit of a noser, we elect to traipse up the steep approach to the house. We peer in the windows, kick the flagstones on the path for awhile. In the back, along the overgrown shortcut to the waterfront, we find a shed. The shed’s door has a rusted horseshoe nailed to it, surrounded by what look like carved names that the dog and I have trouble making out. We gaze on the door for awhile, sifting through reasons why the horseshoe might be there, shading in a back story to substitute for the absence of any credible explanatory facts. After awhile the dog grows restive and insists we proceed to the beach as promised. I file the odd horseshoe away with all the other observations collected in the time when I am not doing what I am supposed to be doing, another ingredient added to the stew.

My dog and I have a fundamentally different approach in this regard. He is focused, goal oriented. Investigate, and then reach the beach, where there will be swimming. My goal is more diffuse. Idleness and laziness are not the same, after all; in idleness work is still being accomplished, albeit of a different kind. In the space created by my procrastination, an idea can take shape, built on the magic in that horseshoe.

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane begins with a Harvard graduate student named Connie Goodwin, who is also studying for her qualifying exams. But Connie is a better worker than I am. When she is forced to spend the summer cleaning out her grandmother’s abandoned house in Marblehead, she resents the idleness and distraction that this task will foist upon her. Luckily, procrastination has allowed me to create a world for Connie to explore, peppered with surprising turns of events. Connie will discover that one of the Salem witches wasn’t so innocent after all, and that discovery will have profound, and dangerous, impact on her life.

I am glad that Connie isn’t a procrastinator – she has work to do. She has a mystery to solve, a life hangs in the balance, and the truth about Deliverance Dane hovers just out of her reach. But for my own part, making my way with my busy dog, down to the beach with my head suddenly knocking full of ideas, it turns out that procrastination has its uses after all."

A rediscovered memory

2009-06-13T05:43:00.000-07:00

It is common knowledge in my family that I don't remember much of my childhood. It's a running joke. Sometimes I think I was abducted by aliens and had my memory erased. The reality is that, growing up an Air Force Brat, we moved every few years and all the places I called home blurred into a mish-mash of small, military airbase homes.

I was born in Maine and have lived in Japan, South Carolina, Delaware, Michigan, Ohio, Alabama, Washington, D.C. and a bunch of other places.

But one vague memory has always been in the back of my mind, and, as my life has led me to become a writer, it's interesting that this memory has always been with me.

The memory is of a poem.
Actually, a poet reading a poem.
In school.
About trains.

Was I in Kindergarten?
First grade?
Who knows?
(Remember, I have issues with memory.)

I don't remember what the poet looked like, but the first few words of that poem have been stuck in my head for decades. The rhythm of it was what captured me:

"Stop Look Listen/as gate stripes swing down/count the cars hauling distance/upgrade through town:/

This mantra stuck in my head for years. Trouble was, that's all I could remember--that first line. I remember being so impressed by the poet that I memorized the whole poem (or, at least I think I did as a child.)

I've often thought about that poem over the years. Only recently, maybe about a year ago, I realized there's this thing called the Internet and I could look for it!

With a minimum amount of searching I found it. The poem is called The Crossing and the poet is Philip Booth. It was a joy to read the rest of the poem, and hear the wonderful rhythm of those words.

And the more I read about Philip Booth, the more I unraveled a piece of my own scattered memory.

Booth was known as Maine's "clearest, poetic voice."

Maine.
Hmm.
I was born in Maine.
So maybe Philip Booth came to my school when I was a little kid in Maine!
Eureka!

This was a great revelation for me.

Here's the poem, The Crossing, still in print, and accompanied by some amazing illustrations. I'll have to get it from Amazon.

If you have a child who likes trains, or just wonderful words strung together, I promise you and your kid will enjoy it.

Before you sign...

2009-06-03T14:31:00.000-07:00

Now that I am querying the Glimmerlings & the Book of Sleep, my middle-grade fantasy, I'm researching everything I can find on agents. There are a lot of great articles on the Web. One in particular, from writer Sarah Ockler, author of Twenty Boy Summer, which just came out two days ago--congratulations, Sarah!--offers must-know information about agent representation. Sarah was kind enough to allow me to repost her article here. Take a read and pop by her blog when you get a chance.

Literary Agent Offers: Don’t Settle!
Sarah Ockler

You’ve perfected your query letter, done your agent research, and sent your letters to a targeted list. You’ve crossed your fingers, rubbed the genie lamp, kissed your lucky troll doll. You’ve gotten requests, sent out partials, sent out fulls. You may have even suffered a few (or many) rejections along the way.

But then… what’s this?

An offer from a literary agent to represent and sell your work?

Congratulations! An agent! A real agent! You’re on the road to publication! He’ll sell your book for millions of dollars! She’ll rocket you to best-sellerdom! He’ll get you on Oprah’s couch with the literary elite! You’ll thank her in your acknowledgments and become BFFs for life! Right?

Not.
So.
Fast.

Making an Impression

As writers, we spend a lot of time trying to make a good impression on potential agents with our polished prose, personality, and professionalism. We’re so excited (rightfully so!) when an agent responds to our efforts—especially if we’ve already endured a few (dozen) (hundred) rejections—that we forget one very important point:

An agent interested in representing your book should work just as hard to impress you.

If an agent makes an offer, she’s already excited about you and your writing. She’s in love with your book, and believes she can sell it. She probably already has editors in mind that will love the project as much as she does. See? Your good impression was a success!

Now, it’s her turn.

Your agent works for you, and should have your career and best interests in mind always. Accepting her offer is the beginning of a long partnership—one that you must consider as seriously as you would any long-term commitment or career decision. Enter it with both eyes open.

Pre-Literary Counseling

I don’t know what the author/agent divorce rate is these days, but I bet it’s higher than failed marriages and, in some cases, more complicated. The souring of a literary partnership isn’t always predictable, but having an honest, two-way conversation up front might help you avoid future drama.

Before accepting representation from an agent:

* Thank him for the interest in your work.
* Let him know that you’re excited about the opportunity to work together.
* Tell him that you’d like to take a few days to think things over and prepare your questions.

Don’t skip this crucial step because you’re worried that questions will scare him off, or that the offer won’t last. This isn’t a TV promo, it’s a potential business partnership. His offer is on the table, waiting patiently for your consideration and ultimate response. It’s not going anywhere unless the offer or the agent isn’t legitimate, in which case, that’s not the person you want representing your work.

Questions to Ask Literary Agents

Craft questions to help you learn about the following:

1. Working and communication style. Some agents offer more personal attention and career development than others. Some are heavily involved in the editorial and revision process, while others are more interested in selling and contract negotiation and will not spend a lot of time reviewing your work. Certain agents encourage you to call them informally and often, while others will rely more on email communications or scheduled appointments. What do you prefer? Don’t enter a relationship with someone whose working and communication style will overwhelm you, confuse you, or leave you wanting more.

2. Ideal clients. Ask the agent to describe her ideal client. Of course it will be you, but beyond that, get specifics. This will give you another perspective on her working style and help you determine whether you’ll be a good fit. If the agent likes clients who are highly involved in brainstorming ideas for their next projects and career path, but you’d prefer someone who just focuses on contracts and managing the author/editor relationship, this agent isn’t for you. Similarly, if you’re looking for a lot of hand-holding and the agent tells you she likes clients who leave her alone to do her job, that’s not a match.

3. Client load. The number of clients an agent has and wants will impact his time. Some have as many as 60 (or more!) clients to manage. If you want an agent who can provide personal attention and a more hands-on approach, look for agents with fewer clients.

4. References. Ask the agent to put you in touch with some of his current clients. You can ask them for firsthand accounts on what it’s like to work with the agent before and after the sale. You can also look at the blogs and Web sites of the agent’s clients to see if they’ve said anything about their agent experience. If an agent is reluctant to provide you with at least one client reference, be wary!

5. Sales and non-sales. You should have a good idea of the agent’s track record for selling books before you query him or her, but you can ask about additional details after you’ve received an offer. Understand how the agent treats your manuscript if it doesn’t sell—does she set it aside and get ready to shop around your next project? Does she revisit the original project later or help you revise for another round of submissions? Or does she drop you as a client if she can’t sell it in a certain time frame?

6. Genres / specialties and co-agents. You may query an agent with your adult historical fiction manuscript, but what if you decide to write a middle grade novel in the future? Non-fiction? A paranormal romance? A teen guide to surviving the zombie apocalypse? Ask the agent if she represents other genres you may be considering and if not, if she has a partner, co-agent, or referral for you, should you decide to write something different. There’s nothing wrong with using a second agent if your primary agent doesn’t represent what you want to do next, but it’s an important question to ask before you sign on.

7. Finances. Most agents will take the standard 15% fee from the monies that you earn (may be higher for foreign rights or other special circumstances). Be sure you understand the rate, and ask about how the money is distributed. Generally, the publisher will send your advance and royalty money to the agency, which will cut you a new check, less their 15%. Ask about how (and how often) your money is managed and distributed.

8. Breaking up. No one wants to think about ending a relationship before it even begins, but asking about it now could save you and your agent heartache (and legal fees) in the future. Find out about the agency contract and how and when either party can dissolve it. Also, ask about what happens if your agent leaves the agency, is unable to work due to illness, injury, or death, or if the agency itself dissolves.

It’s tempting to give an instant YES to that well-earned agent offer, but remember, an agent making an offer is already interested in you. She’s not going to change her mind just because you’re asking questions or taking a few days to think about it. Just the opposite, actually. By doing your homework, you’re showing potential agents that you’re professional, committed, and serious about your writing career—all qualities that make you a better client.

Danger! Bad Agent Warning Signs

If the agent you’re considering exhibits any of these behaviors, get thyself back to the querying board:

* The agent is uncomfortable or terse in answering your questions, or responds with canned marketing-speak designed to evade your research.
* She’s reluctant or refuses to provide client references.
* He makes you feel like you’re wasting his time or like he’s doing you a favor, or he pressures you into making a hasty decision.
* She charges a fee to read, consider, or submit your work, or charges more than the standard 15% fee for domestic sales.
* He charges for or refers you to a paid editing service or “book doctor,” or charges for these services in-house.
* The agent or agency is listed on Writer Beware’s Thumbs Down Agency List or has a negative rating on Preditors & Editors: Literary Agents.

You should also Google the agent and agency’s name to scope out any bad press or client comments about them. If you do find any negatives, evaluate them carefully, considering the source and not jumping to conclusions. One ranted-about experience doesn’t mean the agent is bad or even at fault. But if you find numerous complaints or warnings, you probably want to steer clear.

A Not-So-Perfect Union

Even with your questions sufficiently answered and agency contract signed, sealed, and delivered, stuff might happen. Your book doesn’t sell. Your agent doesn’t responded to your emails. You’re having problems with your editor and your agent hasn’t stepped up to mediate. You’ve experienced a misunderstanding or miscommunication, or someone has made an outright screw-up.

Like in any relationship, things aren’t always sweet and rosy. It doesn’t mean that you have a bad agent, that you’re a bad client, or that it’s time for a divorce. It just means that you need to pick up the phone. Be open and honest with your agent about how you’re feeling, and see if you can find some common ground.

It’s unrealistic to expect constant perfection, but you should expect a willingness to communicate and a commitment to resolve issues as they arise. Sometimes what feels like an insurmountable obstacle turns out to be a laughable misunderstanding. Sometimes it doesn’t. But either way, it’s worth checking out before you make a hasty decision.

Ultimately, if you do decide to part ways, let your agent know that your seeking other representation before you jump ship. This is a business and should be treated respectfully, even if you’re the only one being respectful. If the partnership isn’t working and you just can’t reach an agreement, be honest about your intended departure and try to leave on good terms.

An Affirmation to Remember

If you’ve got an agent offer, that means you’ve achieved what most people never will—you’ve written an entire book. It didn’t happen overnight, and you’ve certainly poured a lot of blood into it. Give yourself and your hard-earned accomplishment the respect you both deserve—don’t settle for the wrong agent just because she’s the first to show an interest in your work. There are hundreds–possibly thousands—of hard-working, dedicated, talented agents out there waiting for your query.

This is your writing career, your passion, and possibly your life’s dream. Take your time, do your homework, and find the right agent to represent you. You deserve it!

There are many publishers out there for writers and this Board doesn't pretend to know everything about all of them. I just want to remind everyone that BEFORE you sign ANY contract on the dotted line, you should always check out everything you can about the company you are considering before making any commitment.

How long has the company been in business? Does it have a good reputation? Check it out on the Preditors&Editors website. http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/pubwarn.htm

Is it a traditional publishing company or is it a self-publishing or vanity publisher where the authors pay to have their own books published? Will you have to pay any money up front to have your book published? (If it's a traditional publisher, there will be NO out of pocket costs for you. The publisher takes all of the risks.)

How will your books be distributed and to whom? Are they going to be carried by the big distributors -- like Ingram? Will they be carried by Borders and/or Barnes & Nobles? Will your books be submitted to the big reviewers like Publisher's Weekly, School Library Journal, and The Horn Book?

How many of your books will be in the first print run? How many free copies will you receive? What will your royalty rate be and will it be based on the retail sales price of books or on their net earnings? (Net base means you get about half of what you would get on gross sales totals.)

How much money are they offering you for an advance and when do you get it? You should get part of your advance at the time of signing, then depending on the book and the terms they set out, you should receive part when the full book is submitted and the rest when the full book has been edited and is ready for publication. Do not make the mistake of agreeing to receive your advance after the book is published. It could take 6 years (or more) or it might even never make it to publication!

Make sure there are no hidden costs for you to pay! Traditional publishers always pay YOU, not the other way around. Otherwise, you are signing up for a "self-publishing" deal, or are using a "vanity publisher." Neither of these options will give you much, if any, help in distributing your books and you pay for the costs of the publication yourself.

By doing your homework before you sign on the dotted line of any contract, you can protect yourself from a potential financial fiasco and know when you do make that sale that you have made a GOOD sale -- one that you can be proud of.

Props

2009-06-01T14:19:00.000-07:00

I find props helpful when I'm writing. They can range from items that appear in my manuscript to tools to keep me on track and happy while I type away.

Top of my list these days? Pandora. This free, internet radio site allows you to build your own stations based on songs or artists you like. The software then pulls in similar music and adds to your selections. You can give songs a thumbs up or a thumbs down and further focus your station so you hear exactly what you like . . . commercial free. I have classical, blues, a station called Orange Sky Radio, a Bruce Springsteen station, work out music, etc. I just pop on the headphones and pick the right music for the mood, or scene I am in.

Now that summer has made it to the Pacific Northwest, I am also finding an iced Starbucks Green Tea Latte really hits the spot for the afternoon writing session.

Additional props include ducks, chicks, goats, cats, and dogs. PLEASE don't try this in an apartment, or small condo, but taking a break from my work to go pet a baby goat, watch the duckling waddle away in terror from the human that has obviously come to eat them, and hoe a few rows in the garden is a great accessory to writing.

What props do you use?

Bridget Zinn Auction

2009-05-21T07:58:00.000-07:00

If you don't already know this special person, you should. Bridget moved to Portland about a year ago, and I "met" her in the kidlit blogging community. She's a librarian and young adult writer, a health food enthusiast...and now a cancer patient. Although the words cancer patient bring to mind sad and tragic images, Bridget is anything but. She's a fighter and an optimist.

Bridget was featured in today's Oregonian.

As if battling cancer isn't enough to deal with, there are the enormous costs of medical care not covered by insurance. Please check out the silent auction for Bridget and bid, bid, bid! There are some one-of-a-kind items up for sale...first editions, artwork, vacations...you name it!

You can also follow Bridget on her blog.

But really, go BID. The auction closes on May 30.

I am now officially accepting rejections

2009-05-19T03:31:00.000-07:00

With excitement and trepidation I venture forth into the next phase of my writing career: querying.

I've read the posts by agents on what to do and not to do.

I witnessed with horror the event that was Queryfail.

And I read the Agent Response Times and the Good News section on the Blueboards obsessively.

It will be interesting to see the responses I get. I'll either be very happy or suddenly get a reality check on how difficult it is to get an agent.

But, I have faith. My group has helped me tremendously and they're all great writers.

So I'm off! Wish me luck.

Or not.

Very cool Site

2009-05-14T09:49:00.000-07:00

If you are into graphic design and book covers, you'll probably really like this site: Mishaps & Adventures

Chad Beckerman is an art director and illustrator for Abrams Books for Young Readers and Amulet Books.

Wow.

He does a lot of great covers for kid's books and YA and updates regularly.

You may find a lot of familiar titles. He seems pretty prolific.

Bones of Faerie

2009-05-06T14:20:00.000-07:00

What an amazing book. Janni Lee Simner is a really wonderful writer. Bones of Faerie is dystopian YA at its best. (I don’t know if I’ve seen at its worst, though. Who knows what that would look like?)

Fifteen-year-old Liza lives in a world like ours. This is a time after the war against the fae and the land is blighted and desolate. Indeed, the very trees and nature itself possess the power to do great harm.

Magic is only known as something evil—the weapon of the faeries. And the telltale mark of a person cursed with faerie blood is pale hair, “Clear as glass,” Simner writes.

When her sister is born with just such a trait, things begin to unravel in Liza’s world. Her mother disappears, her father’s abuse toward Liza worsens and Liza herself ventures out into the wild to seek answers: what happened to her mother--and the faerie child she brought into the world.

There are a lot of genre books out there that deal with faeries, but this one takes a wholly different approach. We are never sure what to expect from the denizens of this world and I was constantly surprised. At its heart, Bones of Faerie is a coming of age story told in the most original of voices. I won’t give away more here, but the book is a quick read but full of wonderful language and vivid detail.

Check it out. It’s worth the time.

CBI: A Resource for Writers

2009-04-30T13:20:00.000-07:00

I only have time for a quick post as I prepare for the Mother of All Garage Sales. (Maybe I'll use my painful experience to write a horror story some day about a girl trapped in a worm hole that delivers her to one garage sale after another, without end. She saves herself by wielding her gold Nordstrom card and chanting, "Yes, I'll pay $50 for Tommy Hilfiger flip flops.)

Those of you who write for young readers (chapter books up through young adult) should check out The CBI Clubhouse. The site is inexpensive to access (under $5 a month) and has a lot of information including podcasts, author interviews, writing tips and marketing strategies.

Now, I must go decide if that old jar opener is worth a quarter or not. Then, I'll have to gouge my eyes out.

Debut day for YA author Cindy Pon

2009-04-28T09:32:00.000-07:00

It's time to share the love. So listen up, people! The fabulous YA author Cindy Pon is having a contest on her website to celebrate the publication *today* of her excellent YA novel SILVER PHOENIX, and you should absolutely go check it out. Here is what the contest is all about from Madame Pon herself:

"i can hardly believe it.
my debut is making its way out in the world
finally–after months of rough drafting, fighting
my own fear and immobility, revising for over a
year with the help of my wonderful critique friends,
querying too many agents and receiving too many
rejections, selling the manuscript last may and learning
so much from my revisions with my editor, virginia.
SILVER PHOENIX is released and has already been
sighted in bookstores and recieved from online vendors!

and in celebration, i’m holding a contest and giving
away some awesome prizes. namely, an original framed
brushpainting. if you have not seen my art, please click
over to the chinese brush art link to your left. i can’t
say for certain which painting it will be, but a flower subject
or bamboo or cute critter / bird is very likely. i’m in the
midst of some art events so anything i
have on hand may sell. i price my framed paintings from
$200 to $400. along with a signed copy of my novel.

then i got to thinking. i realize i have some admirers
of my art, but it’s really rather presumptuous to assume
that everyone would be interested in that as a prize. so
another possible prize for the winner is a $100 gift card
to a book store of your choice. also offered with a signed
copy of my novel.

depending on how many participants there are–i may
give away more than one painting / gift card prize!!
so of course, in my bid for shameless self-promotion to
help my debut become the little asian fantasy novel that could,
i’m asking you to help spread the word!

there are many ways to earn a “raffle” ticket. you can
do part or all of these listed." Just visit Cindy's blog to see what those myriad ways are -- just click HERE to be transported over.

And watch this really cool book trailer for her book, too. I think it's a preview of what's to come when SILVER PHOENIX is made into a film :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihJ1xy009bk

SCBWI Summer Conference

2009-04-25T09:17:00.001-07:00

I really enjoyed the winter con in NYC last year and now that I'm no longer a conference virgin, I'm looking forward to LA. The Annual Winter SCBWI Conference takes place August 7-10. If you want to read my report from the winter con, check it out here.

Looking forward to meeting another of my crit partners, Elise Murphy!

Why Characters Need Wild Places

2009-04-22T10:06:00.000-07:00

I've always believed in wild places and their power to inspire secrets, wonder, and imagination. In my own (unqualified) opinion, it is part of what inspires great creativity in children and allows them to build their own secret worlds of imagination and play.

Last night, my three daughters introduced me to one of their wild spaces . . . and I felt like a bit of an intruder. Their games were very complex and nuanced, the natural environment more representative than literal, and the secrets they couldn't tell me about their hideout outnumbered the facts they could share.

They've laid claim to a copse of Birch that came down during a winter storm—varying levels and thicknesses of tree trunks, balanced over bramble and having revealed a hidden field. They take the goats down there with them and the animals are an integral part of their wild play. I didn't understand much of what was going on, but I could understand why. Their secret place is magic, in part because it is a secret—full of code words, hidden passages, buried treasures, and endless imagination.

My characters, like my children, tend to be attracted to and seek out their own wild spaces—the tiny hideouts the greater world can't penetrate create a sense of isolation that reflect their feelings as teens. A secret is a delicious thing, particularly when you are first asserting your independence and trying on the heady possibility of privacy and autonomy. A place only your MC knows about, something wondrous and full of sensory details often reflects the inner mood of the character . . . feelings of isolation being an important theme.

In the same way that wild places can inspire us as writers (isn't this why we're all looking for a retreat in the mountains, a writing cabin on the beach, a villa on the cliffs of Spain?), our characters also benefit from the inspirations of nature. It seems to me it's part of the human spirit to want to experience the wild world around you, or as Henry David Thoreau best put it, "I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately, I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to put to rout all that was not life and not when I had come to die discover that I had not lived."

The best fun a writer can have...world-building

2009-04-21T13:37:00.001-07:00

My days (and nights) are consumed at the moment with one of the most fun parts of being a writer: world-building (or story boarding) for my new YA contemporary mythic/fantasy novel. I'm always fascinated to see what other writers do when they world-build. The director and writer Guillermo del Toro (who is currently working on THE HOBBIT with LOTR's Peter Jackson) carries a notebook around with him when he is creating a new project, and his sketches from PAN'S LABYRINTH (one of my favorite films) are fascinating to see. A gallery (thumbnails) of his sketches are below -- click on an image to see it full size. Enjoy! And be inspired, as I was...

(c) Guillermo del Toro

Guillermo del Toro was interviewed by the Guardian newspaper in 2006 about how he world-builds. "Pan's Labyrinth started with a visual image. As a child, I was convinced that a goat man lived in the bedroom closet and was going to come out and grab me. This goat man later became the basis for Pan, the central character of the film. I also wanted to create two opposing worlds. I used the angular, cold world of fascist-era Spain to represent reality, and a very rounded and uterine world to represent the fantasy that the child escapes into. I guess you could say that I am obsessed with images of stillborn things, and seduced by the idea that the womb is the most comfortable place to be. I also have a fear of reason and dogma; it gives me the shivers. But maybe my upbringing keeps getting in the way. When I showed Pan's Labyrinth to my friend Alejandro González Iñárritu, he said: "That's a truly Catholic film." And there was me thinking that it was a truly profane film, a layman's riff on Catholic dogma. It's true what they say: once a Catholic, always a Catholic.
This is my notebook, which I carry wherever I go. You can see it's been rained on; I should really take better care of it. It contains visual ideas, character notes and plot details for Pan's Labyrinth; everything from historical background about 1930s Spain, to the design of an insect, to the chemical meanings of the faces of the moon, to the way I want to destroy the hand of a thug. Sketching a film can sometimes be more fun than actually making one, particularly with all the economic problems you have to deal with. Maybe one day I'd like to have my own gallery, paint full time and express my ideas that way.

Arthur Rackham's illustrations were a big influence on Pan's Labyrinth. You can see it in the big, knotted, primal trees. And Goya was an obvious reference, specifically with regards to the character of the Pale Man. There is a scene in which the Pale Man bites the heads off the fairies. That comes straight from Goya's painting of Saturn devouring his son.
I think that all fairytales have a grim setting. Hansel and Gretel is essentially about a famished family who send their children into the woods to die. Cinderella is about a child being tortured. You can go right up to the Narnia stories, which take place against the bombing of the second world war, or Harry Potter being an unloved orphan. Fairytales pit harsh circumstances against a fantasy world. Pan's Labyrinth is no different.
Fairytale logic is not linear, it's random. When people ask, "Why does the Pale Man have his eyeballs in his hand?", I say: "Hey, because that's the way things are." I suspect that the linear, logical mind is going to have a tough time with Pan's Labyrinth."

So, writers, do you world-build? What's your process?

Agent Edits!

2009-04-17T08:24:00.001-07:00

It's not an official relationship, mind you. He's interested. I'm flattered and a bit nervous. It's like dating without the hand-holding and moon-eyes. (OK, I was never a big moon-eye-maker on a real date, but you get my drift.)

The point is, this week I received edits--really fabulous, detailed and thoughtful edits--from an AGENT. It was like Christmas in April. A real live agent, a professional, thinks my story has merit. He spent what must have been hours making general notes and line edits. For those of you who have been here, you know that almost nothing feels better than when someone in the business pays attention to your work. (Although I have the feeling having young readers love the story will be even more amazing.)

So, over the next few weeks, and in between a flurry of paid writing work, I'll be tackling a major revision to Mark of Courage! Eagerly cutting, adding, enhancing...I'm a happy writer!

I do my job well, I might have an agent announcement to make this year.

(Er...if I don't, this conversation never happened.)

That moment when you finally, finally get your book!

2009-03-31T06:32:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite online writing peeps is author Cindy Pon, and she just took delivery of her new book, SILVER PHOENIX, which is coming out in April 2009. She has posted the moment she got the book, in all its new-book-smell glory. It's a moment we should ALL share with her vicariously, until we, too, take delivery of our very own books! The link to her post is HERE and I'm also reposting a couple of Cindy's pictures so you can have a taste of what I'm talking about. This is one of those pivotal moments in an author's life, when all the hard work is done, and you get to hold the physical product of your love in your hands :)

Cindy puts it well:

"eeeeeeeee! i can't believe it! my dream in my hands!!!"

Now, I highly recommend you hotfoot it over to Amazon and pre-order your very own copy :)

Hooking the Reader

2009-03-31T06:00:00.000-07:00

Bill Johnson of Willamette Writers reviews the opening preface to the novel Twilight and provides a wonderful in-depth evaluation on exactly how Meyers raises questions, gives answers and raises more questions in a way that makes the reader want to keep turning those all-important first pages.

The Forest of Hands & Teeth: a Review

2009-03-24T14:54:00.000-07:00

No spoilers here.

Just finished reading Carrie Ryan’s The Forest of Hands and Teeth. It’s a good read.

If you don’t know the story, it’s about a young woman, Mary, who lives in a village in a post-apocalyptic world very much like our own, but with zombies. Well, technically, they’re zombies, but in the novel they are the Unconsecrated. Unconsecrated. Just the sound of it makes you want to hide under the bed. It brings to mind something...unholy. Or, if you are not of a religious bent: something...defiled.

The Unconsecrated are creepy and they moan a lot. And their flesh hangs from their bones.

I became familiar with Carrie’s blog over a year ago and followed her Road to Publication. I’ve found it interesting to live vicariously through other writers until I can enjoy my own success. (I hope.) She has done a great job of building hype and getting people interested before the book came out.

Her writing style is somewhat spare and very tight. The story is engaging and a few scenes are beautifully horrible. By that I mean horror written in a way that gets under your skin and doesn't make any--excuse me--bones about what it is we are dealing with.

The book is YA, and I assume that’s because of the protagonist’s age, but it could sit on the adult fiction shelf. It’s funny the way booksellers/publishers categorize books. (Why isn’t Catcher in the Rye in the YA category? Maybe it is. Actually, I haven’t checked. I guess the book was published before YA was a real valid category?)

The story is told in first person from Mary’s POV. There are no shifts to other characters or subplots. This made me really get inside Mary’s world: her hopes and fears. There’s something to be said for one linear journey told at a pace that starts slowly and then builds to a devastating climax.

When you strip it all away, it truly is a love story and also one of survival.

Perhaps that is the theme that runs throughout: survival. Allegorically, I imagine this could fit into the world view of any young adult trying to find their place in the world. Mary is certainly trying to find hers, and takes solace in the idea of an ocean, far from the ravages of the Forest of Hands and Teeth.

I recommend the book. It’s a fairly quick read at 308 pages, but what it lacks in pages is made up in really good writing and a character we can believe in.

Scrivener: A Great Writer's Tool

2009-03-18T08:44:00.000-07:00

I wrote my first novel in MS Word. Since it is set in Bronze-Age Greece, it required a fair amount of research. The end result was approximately 3.5 million word files and one handwritten journal containing research notes, character studies, experimental scenes, outlines, critique group notes for later consideration, etc, etc. My office wall was covered with printouts of Nubian Pharaoh's, Greek gods, maps, and photos of islands. Not to mention the long list of websites I've bookmarked. Although I couldn't find any empirical proof, I was starting to suspect that MS Word was created in the Bronze Age.

And then, Pen Tales member Ron mentioned Scrivener in his blog. Soon after, I discovered that PT'er Elise had started using it and loved it. So, I downloaded the free trial. I used it for about an hour, then bought the software.

It was like moving from stone carved tablets to an intuitive tool made by a writer, for writers.

Let me just say that I'm not getting paid to endorse Scrivener (but would entertain offers). I'm just a big fan. It's a bargain at under $50, it's easy to use, and it works.

It has so many features I can't go into them all, but the workspace is organized like a big binder that holds everything you need for your work in progress. My first-impression favorite features are the cork board, research folder, and export capability.

In the cork board, I create separate files, which look like index cards, for each scene. This makes it really easy to edit, rearrange, and organize the story. The research folder is pure genius. I can store notes, pictures and information for easy reference (ah, no more searching file folders for that photo of a modern reconstruction of a Greek Bireme), and the ability to export the story and have Scrivener do all the formatting work upon export.

There are a vast number of features I haven't used yet (like outlining and synopsis) but I was able to get up and running with the new novel in just a day. Now, it feels very natural to use Scrivener.

If you are a Scrivener user, what are your favorite features? Have you discovered any cool, little-known capabilities? Has anyone figured out how to save a web page to the research folder? Please, do tell!

Is our creativity linked to the changing of the seasons?

2009-03-13T12:36:00.000-07:00

As spring is finally upon us (at least it is here in upstate New York) and I was feeling the first creative stirrings, I wondered if there was a 'real' link between our own creativity levels and the changing of the seasons. I think mine are very closely linked; this last Winter has felt like a 'time out' and a time to regroup and mull on what (and where) I want to go next with my various creative projects. And now that I see the first green shoots on the lawn and in the trees, I feel something akin to them myself in the flush of vigor and inspiration flowing through me, that (like those buds) has been dormant for many moons...

In my perusal of Google on this very topic, I came across this insightful essay by Dr. Jorge Ferrer, which was (I was excited to see) somewhat in keeping with my own wonderings. Dr. Ferrer has kindly given me permission to post an excerpt of his essay here:

The Integral Creative Cycle by Jorge N. Ferrer, Ph.D, Associate Professor, California Institute of Integral Studies

"Whether in nature or in human reality, a creative process usually unfolds through several general stages that correspond roughly with the seasonal cycle of nature: Action (Autumn, preparing the terrain and planting the seeds; the body, studying what is already known about a subject matter, i.e., the body of literature); Germination/gestation (Winter, rooting and nourishment of the seed inside the earth; the vital, conception of novel developments in contact with unconscious transpersonal and archetypal sources); Blooming (Spring, emerging toward the light of buds, leaves, and flowers; the heart, first conscious feelings and rough ideas); and Harvest (Summer, selection of mature fruits and shared celebration; the mind, intellectual selection, elaboration, and offering of the fruits of the creative process).

Autumn: In the human creative cycle, Autumn is the time for preparing the physical body to be a solid and porous receptacle for the germination of new vital seeds. It is important to release the body from accumulated tensions to make it more open and permeable. During Autumn, the mind can stagnate the creative process if it spends too much time wondering about the ultimate outcome of the inquiry, tries to predetermine its development, or arrive at its own answers before the stages of the creative process have had the chance to unfold. Autumn is the season to trust the body, to support the structural dimension of reality, and to rely on the power of action.

Winter: Winter is essentially a time of waiting, of darkness, of silence, and, most important, of gestation. It is imperative to stop the activity of Autumn so that the planted seeds can do their own autonomous work: splitting open, rooting in the soil, and getting fed by earth’s essential nutrients. As with the dormant appearance of nature in Winter, it may appear to the conscious mind that 'nothing is happening' at this juncture of the creative process, but it is important to remember that tremendously powerful and creative forces are actually at play in the darkness—forces that will eventually catalyze in Spring not only the regeneration and blooming of life in nature but also the emergence of the creative impulses in the human soil.

In Winter the mind needs to cultivate an attitude of patient receptivity, not-knowing, and humble respect. It is important to develop patience and receptivity toward stages of the creative process whose rhythm and unfolding elude the mind’s intentional control. During Winter, the mind can abort the creative cycle if—out of ignorance, impatience, or mistrust—it attempts to take control of the process and/or get to know prematurely the nature of the still embryonic creative drive.

Spring: In the creative process, Spring is the season to open the heart, breathe deeply and widely, listen to one’s affective world, and make room within so that the raw sensations associated with the upwelling creative energy emerging out of the gestation process can be organically incorporated as emotions and feelings. This is the stage of first contact with and embodiment of those creative impulses gestated in Winter. The second part of Spring calls for activities such as somatic expression, verbalization of feelings, embodied practices that facilitate listening to emotions and feelings and artistic expression (music, painting, sculpture, plastic arts, poetry, singing, etc.) Peer-group work becomes central at this stage, because it provides a social context for nonjudgmental contrasts and cross-fertilization among incipient creative expressions.

Summer: In Summer, some flowers have matured into fruits and some of those fruits become ripe. It is the season of harvest, celebration, sharing, and gratitude. In the creative process, the “fruits” represent the ideas or expressions selected for further elaboration and refinement. If the mind has accompanied the entire process with the appropriate stage-specific attitudes of a sensitive farmer, it will easily discern at this stage those fruits that are mature and deserve further consideration. Summer is the season of the mind—a time for the intellectual/aesthetic elaboration of ideas. It is also an auspicious time to open oneself to the transcendent dimension of the Mystery, which can now illuminate the mind with insights that may enrich the refinement of the creative fruits."

Neil Gaiman & everything you wanted to know about literary agents

2009-03-13T10:49:00.000-07:00

I'll be posting later on how closely I think our creative currents are in cycle with nature's own, but in the interim I came across this gem from author Neil Gaiman. Here is an excerpt (see below) and a link to the original post, which Gaiman has kindly said can be copied and used as a resource. It's a must-read for those wanting to know more about finding the right agent, from one the best authors around today. Thank you, Neil!

From Neil Gaiman: "I'd been a writer professionally for about five or six years, and had three or four books published before I decided that it was time to get an agent, and I got that agent (Merrilee Heifetz, of Writers House) because she'd just sold DON'T PANIC! on behalf of Titan Books in the UK, and we met while I was in New York, and I liked her and felt very confident in her; she's been my agent for almost 18 years now; which is my way of saying that I don't know much about the ins and outs of getting agents...

And best of all, I know Teresa Nielsen Hayden. Teresa's an editor at Tor Books (she's edited other places too over the years) and a weblogger besides -- http://www.nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/ -- and she knows publishing better than anyone else I've ever met. So I asked her...

What I got back was the kind of comprehensive post that aspiring authors should read with care. Study, even. Mark it and copy it and use it as a resource:

"Hi, Neil --

Happy to answer.

1. If you're writing fiction, the True Secret Answer is "get an
offer." If you've got an offer, you can get an agent. If you don't
have an offer, you don't want the kind of agent you're likely to get.

a. If you're good enough to get published, having an agent may prove
helpful. If you aren't (yet), you definitely don't want the kind of
agent you're going to get.

i. There is no substitute for writing a book that people want to buy
and read. If you can do that, you can get published. If you can't, no
clever workaround will help, because we can't force people to buy and
read books they don't like.

b. Some ways you might get an agent without getting an offer: Be
obviously and extraordinarily good. Sell a lot of short stories. Have
some other seriously hot credentials.

2. Don't start by looking for an agent. Do your research first. Start
by learning about agents, submissions, publishing houses, the
industry, et cetera. Note: This is a huge subject.

a. No matter how you think it works, the publishing industry doesn't
work the way you think it does. This is true even for publishing
professionals. They know how their part of the industry works, and
they know a lot about adjacent areas, but the further afield they go,
the less reliable their expertise will be. People who aren't in the
industry generally don't have a clue.

i. A phenomenal number of articles about how publishing works are
written by people who don't know what they're talking about. This is
partly because writing about writing, or writing about publishing, is
what wanna-be authors do when they've given up on writing, but don't
yet want to admit it. It's also because a made-up version of the
publishing industry is going to be much simpler and more logical than
the real thing, and thus is easier to write about.

ii. Look askance at articles that credit some industry practice to the
stupidity of people working in the industry, who have failed to see
the simple and obvious solution the author of the article is about to
suggest.

3. There are easily as many scam agents, useless agents, and clueless
agents as there are real ones. They all swap bad information with each
other. The difference is that the scammers know it's bad information.

a. You can't research this subject just by getting online and looking.
You have to stick to good sources.

4. Did I mention that any idiot can write a book about how to be a
writer? When you see someone who's never sold a book, but who's
written a book about how to get your book published, and said book was
published by a vanity house, and said author is nevertheless accepted
as an authority on the subject by a great many aspiring writers, you
know you've wandered into strange territory.

a. The scary part is that I've just described more than one
Authoritative Source of Advice about Writing and Publishing.

b. Any idiot can put up a website, too.

c. Check out your source's credentials.

i. It's always worth your while to assess the quality of the info
you're getting, because bad advice can cost you such an inordinate
amount of time and effort."

==============

The Essential Resources:

The Association of Authors' Representatives
http://www.aar-online.org/

There are some legit agents that don't belong to the AAR, but not
many; and if an agent belongs, they're legit.

Writer Beware: http://www.sfwa.org/beware/

Preditors & Editors is one site in two places, mirrored:

http://www.anotherealm.com/prededitors/
mirrored: http://www.invirtuo.cc/prededitors/

Aspiring writers should read both Writer Beware and Preditors &
Editors. Reading them from start to finish wouldn't be a bad idea.

==============

Further Agent-Specific Resources

Agent Research & Evaluation has a good reputation and a stern
attitude: http://www.agentresearch.com/

Agent Query, http://www.agentquery.com/, is an online database of
agent info. I haven't used them. They've been casually recommended to
me.

==============

People who give reliable advice:

Victoria Strauss, who ought to get a Special Hugo or something. She
has a collection of very good articles on her website, a couple of
which are specifically about finding an agent:
http://www.sff.net/people/victoriastrauss/articles.html

Ann Crispin.

Jim Macdonald, sometimes known as Yog Sysop. He hangs out at
AbsoluteWrite, fighting scammers in the Bewares Board, and teaching
writing in Learn Novel Writing with Uncle Jim.

Me (she said, modestly) mostly, unless I'm feeling irresponsible. You can usually tell.
Further down is a list of some of my Making Light posts about writing,
publishing, and related subjects. I put it at the bottom because it's
so long.

John Savage, a pseudonymous lawyer who specializes in law for writers.
He does a weblog, Surreality Check:
http://savage.authorslawyer.com/journal.shtml.

C. E. Petit, a lawyer who specializes in law for writers, has a weblog
called Scrivener's Error: http://scrivenerserror.blogspot.com/.

Michelle Sagara.

Kent Brewster, of Speculations/Rumor Mill, has overseen a great many discussions of publishing, editing, and agenting.

Andy Zack is a legit agent who answers questions online.

==============

Selected other sites that track and discuss good guys and bad guys:

Speculations.com, the Rumor Mill:
http://www.speculations.com/rumormill/

especially see Speculations' "Search for the Killer Agent" thread:
http://www.speculations.com/rumormill/?z=451718&f=452061

AbsoluteWrite, the Bewares Board:
http://p197.ezboard.com/fabsolutewritefrm11

WritersWeekly.com, Whispers and Warnings
http://forums.writersweekly.com/viewforum.php?f=14

==============

Miscellaneous:

Sillybean's Publishing 101 has a good selection of current links on
writerly issues, and I'm not just saying that because it links to a
lot of my articles:
http://www.sillybean.net/article/510/writing-and-publishing-101.

Internet-Resources.com is an oppressively compendious list of writers'
resources: http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/

==============

Bad Resources:

Avoid the list of agents at writers.net. Anyone can type in their own
name there.

The more you know, the more errors you see in the "Everyone Who's Anyone in Adult Trade Publishing and Tinseltown Too" website. http://everyonewhosanyone.com/index.html

==============

Stuff from Making Light, roughly in order of its relevance:

On the Getting of Agents
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004772.html

Slushkiller
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004641.html

A Brief Note on Linguistic Markers (recognizing scammers)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005540.html#005540

More Linguistic Markers (more of the same)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005555.html#005555

Bad Advice on Cover Letters (Todd James Pierce's bad advice)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005212.html#005212

Taking Your Own Bad Advice (Todd James Pierce digs himself in deeper)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005218.html#005218

Varieties of Insanity Known to Affect Authors
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004307.html If it amuses you, "Varieties of Insanity Known to Affect Authors" isalso available on assorted t-shirts, sweatshirts, and tote bags:http://www.cafepress.com/nielsenhayden

Cover Letters (a brief note on bad cover letters)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/001505.html

Nudge Note (short: waiting through a submission)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004668.html

Extratextual Characteristics (on categories)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/000159.html

How Books Sell (addressing some common errors)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/002858.html

Squick and Squee (fanfic as an R&D lab of techniques)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005871.html

Namarie Sue (Mary Sues, and other iniquities)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004188.html

Is It Me -- (things the editor doesn't want to hear about)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004900.html

>From Correspondence: Sneaking Out Under the Literary Radar
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/002703.html

On Writing Genre Fantasy (brief)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/003897.html

The Evil Overlord Devises a Plot (cheap plot tricks)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/000290.html The weblog post talks about and links to The Evil Overlord Devises aPlot, but the actual thing is at http://www.sff.net/paradise/plottricks.htm. The fancy automated version of the Evil Overlord Plot Generator (with Murphy's Laws of Combat) is here: http://nielsenhayden.com/overlord/

Looking at The Writers' Collective (scam publishing)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005292.html

Hanging Out In Someone Else's Argument (PC magazine)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/002630.html

Look Quick, Before It Goes Away (can't summarize it)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005569.html

Yetanother Book -- (very brief, on stupid advice books)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005596.html

Deserts of Vast Literacy (extremely brief)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/001477.html

Wocky Jivvy, Wergle Flomp (scam poetry competitions)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/002693.html

The Power of the Press, Sort Of (hapless vanity publisher)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/005922.html#005922

Prose and Cons (scam agent Melanie Mills gets busted)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004041.html

Yetanother Variant (touches on publishing scams)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/001541.html

Rowling vs. Stouffer (I thought it was interesting)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/001463.html

The Underlying Forms of Fraud (a general article on fraud)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/001509.html

Communicator Awards, and Other Coincidences (Cris Robbins Agency)
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/000357.html

==============

The importance of self-promotion

2009-03-10T09:55:00.000-07:00

I created a blog a year ago for something to do when the Muse was not cooperating. A place where I could write about things related to writing -- a kind of therapy to keep my fingers moving on the keyboard. I never really thought it would become a place where I would actually get visitors. And while I'm certainly not as active as a lot of bloggers, Hello, Carrie Harris! I try to at least get a few posts up every few weeks.

I want to point out two bloggers who, I think, have done excellent jobs of promoting their soon-to-be-released books and have gained quite a following.

The first is Carrie Ryan. Her book, the Forest of Hands and Teeth comes out today! I will be picking it up. I've never read a zombie book before, but from what I understand, it's quite an original take on the genre. I started visiting her blog a year ago or so and have kept track of her progress. The book isn't even released yet but as of yesterday she had twenty reviews on Amazon, not the least of which was from Scott Westerfeld. She also has links on Amazon to her blog, a Q and A and other stuff. Now, I am sure a lot of this is PR from the publishers, but she garnered quite a bit of interest just from her posts about her Road to Publication.

Another writer who has done a great job is Jackson Pearce. Her debut, As You Wish, comes out this fall. She has really let people into her world, even posting an audio snippet when she called her grandfather to tell him her book would be published. She has also posted some great Vlogs

But yet sometimes I see other writers who have debut books coming out soon and they have no web presence at all. If you look at some of the signatures on the Blueboards, you often see a book title and date of publication. Obviously these people have a book coming out but they have yet to do a blog or a MySpace or a whatever.

I think it's really important to have some kind of presence on the Web. I was at a conference once where Cheryl Klein, an editor at Arthur Levine books, said that she often looks for a person's blog when their manuscript is making an impression on her.

Obviously, a good book is a good book, and plenty have sold before the advent of The InterWebs. But today, it is quite a good tool to get interest in your book before it comes out.

So what's your POV on author blogs? Why did you start yours?

What's in a Name?

2009-03-06T14:18:00.000-08:00

When I was a kid, my parents attended a yearly party at Santa Anita Racetrack. My mom was not a gambler but once a year she'd bet a few dollars on the horses. I used to love to sit down with her and read all the names, and then watch as she made her decision based not on the chances a horse had of winning, but on the names of the horses themselves. The better the name, the faster it went to the top of her list (and rarely the faster it ran around the track).

I must have absorbed this method thoroughly, because I find I can't buy a bottle of wine without it having a really good name. Mad Housewife is a particular favorite. This hasn't always been in my favor . . . there have definitely been a few very bad bottles of wine that have crossed my path.

I'm a sucker for a good book title, too—something witty and evocative is likely to get me to pull a book off the shelf and buy it. Again, this doesn't always work out for me, but from the perspective of the writer trying to sell books, it's a win-win situation.

I think John Green had a hit with Looking for Alaska. I love that you think you know what this book is about from the title, only to learn that Alaska is the name of a girl.

The Hunger Games is another great title . . . how could you not want to know what it's about?

How do you go about naming your books? What are your favorite book titles?

Photo Credit: Race Horses in a Landscape, Edgar Degas, Wikimedia Commons

Inspiration

2009-03-03T05:00:00.000-08:00

A whiff of wood smoke through a cracked bedroom window.

A fragment of a conversation overheard in line at the coffee shop.

A glimpse of an object misplaced, deformed, or nearly perfect just before it is obscured by dusk.

Where does writing inspiration come from?

For me, the strangest things can spark an idea that, with a bit of nurturing, could bloom into something with a life of its own.

A shoebox with two dozen pieces of spiral notebook paper, their frayed ends still clinging to the edges--notes passed between myself and my best friend in high school during study halls and algebra classes, which revealed a long-forgotten side of our relationship and sparked the idea for my newest WIP.

A newspaper article about a taken-for-granted school janitor with a hidden talent and mysterious collection in school basement became a character.

My late father-in-law’s love of native Hawaiian slack-key guitar music sparked an idea for a story I haven’t written yet…I know it will somehow involve the colony at Molokai and Hawaiian mythology. (By the way, if you haven't listened to Dennis Kamakahi, Sonny Chillingworth, Ozzie Kotani, and the Pahinui brothers, to name a few, you're missing something special.)

Reading Magic Tree House books to my daughter and pondering the lack of strong black female protagonists in young people’s literature sparked the idea for Mark of Courage, my completed first novel.

So, to all you writers out there: what inspires you?
Photo Credit: Holly Barry

SCBWI Winter Con 2009

2009-02-24T08:07:00.000-08:00

So I finally attended my first big SCBWI convention. It was the Annual Winter Conference in NY. I came away from it feeling somewhat inspired.

It was definitely helpful, though. Having a few editors look at my pages, along with other writers at the table sessions was a great experience. I’m also proud to say that my 500 words got good reviews. I was told it had a great opening which is good news.

Alas, Mega-Agent didn’t corner me in the hallway and say: I MUST HAVE YOUR FULL MANUSCRIPT! But I did give my little pitch to two editors, one who thought it sounded cool and to send it along. This was a nice meeting because the editor grilled me on my world-building and character motivations. Fortunately, I was able to answer with confidence, thanks to my crit group urging me to work on the backstory.

Editors were not on my list, prior to this Con. I’ve only thought about agents, so it will be nice to send my work to some of the editors I’ve met at this conference. These are houses that are usually closed to Slush.

It was nice to meet a fellow blogger, the wonderful K.M. Walton. Also met one of my lovely crit partners, Juliette.

Rather than a day-by-day recap, I’ll just give you some of the high points…and low.

***
Seeing one hundred people lined up to pitch an agent was a strange thing to witness.

“There’s an agent! Get him!” Stampede ensues.

I felt kind of dumb standing in line like that. Please, no offense to anyone. I know how much we all want contact and an “in” with an agent. I felt like a lemming, though. I didn’t even know who the agent was, for one, and had no idea what the agent was looking for. So I left the line.

Hey, I’m picky.

Some other things I learned:

There are a lot of people who want to write picture books.

YA/MG genres mostly consist of women writers. Although I knew this just by browsing bookstore shelves. Why is this? There were 1,056 people there. 890 women, 166 men.

Some people are not up on agent and editor blogs.

Some people don’t realize how great a tool the Interweb is on finding what agents accept what.

I had a bout of anxiety and missed Jay Asher's speech entitled How to Get Published in Thirteen Years or Less. This was during the Big Lunch. I got there a few minutes late, right when the staff was putting out the salads. I should have just plopped down and grabbed a seat, but my shyness took over and I kind of wandered around, pretending like I was looking for someone. I did this a couple of times until finally I said Oh screw it.

Now, if I had arrived early, I wouldn't have had this problem. Then, other people would have been the ones wandering around looking for a seat. The tables were crowded and I didn’t feel like putting on my smiley face and wedging my way into a group already in the midst of conversation. I know...Lame. I know you have to get over that at these things. I’ll do better in the future. Promise.

Really enjoyed the Agents Panel on the last day. Agents hold so much power! We hang on their every word. The room was packed for this. One good thing I took away from the panel is that although we’re in tough times, the YA MG market is doing fairly well, and good writing will always win.

They had a lot of different opinions but agreed that if you're going to do multiple submissions BE HONEST and tell the agent that's what you're doing. They say nothing is worse than falling in love with a book and then getting a call the next day telling them that you're going with so and so agent, without even getting the chance to talk to the prospective client.

Editors and agents can help with a great voice and a not so great plot, but not with a great plot and a terrible voice.

High Concept is the New Black.
In other words, is your idea big enough to express in a sentence and a half? I wrote a post about this a while back called Do You Have a Hook?

The editor was Claudia Gabel, I think. She talked about how they were looking for High Concept books. Her example: Imagine a story where teenagers born at the stroke of midnight have the ability to gain an extra hour of the day unavailable to the rest of us.

Wow. What a concept. The book is Scott Westerfeld’s Midnighters, as I’m sure a lot of you know.

She said to look for stories that are part of the popular zeitgeist of the moment. Well, she didn’t use zeitgeist, that was me. Is there something in the news that you can play off of? Any strange little story you heard that you could flesh into a novel?

When I first heard this I was like, Hey, that’s no way to write a story. We writers must sit with a glass of red wine and ponder the meaning of life.

Whatevah.

But the more I thought about it, it’s a good way to come up with an idea. Why not? Explore all options.

She gave another example of drawing from real life. I think she said she was traveling somewhere in the South and saw a bunch of young women dressed for a debutante ball. So she thought, Debutantes? Wow, I’ve never even thought about that little pocket of history and social…whatever it is they do.

So she got back to her office and looked on Amazon for stories about Debutantes.
Nothing.
She was excited.
She continued to look.
Nada.
So she called, uh, somebody, and started looking for books on YA debutante stories. Sure enough, Voila! What comes out in a year or two? Teen books a la Gossip Girl about young debutantes.

There were a few other highlights, one of them being picture book writer Jarrett Krosoczka and his funny video about getting published.

Middle Grade author Bruce Hale, who reminded us, amidst the action and the drama to always remind young people about beauty. He also talked about how important it is to grab readers immediately in your opening paragraph. He read a few great examples. One of them being Rick Riordan's Lightning Thief.

Richard Jackson was wonderful. I will post part of his bio courtesy of SCBWI:

...a past chairman of the Children’ Book Council and an LMP award winner for editorial excellence, was co-founder of Bradbury Press and more recently editor of Richard Jackson Books at Orchard Books, DK Ink, and Atheneum. In his forty-six years as an editor he has published writers who have been received three Newbery and ten Newbery honor book awards, one Caldecott and four Caldecott honor book awards, four Boston-Globe/Horn Book awards, one National Book Award, one Coretta Scott King and one King honor book award, two Siebert honor book awards, one Edgar, one Batchelder and one Batchelder honor book award, two Margaret Edwards awards, and two Hans Christian Andersen Medals. In 2005, the year of his retirement, he gave the May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture, sponsored by the American Library Association in recognition of his life’s work.

Wow! Talk about a distinguished career. He was a soft-spoken, white-haired gentleman and his lecture really rang true. His opening line was: Are we all crazy? He then went on to talk about what it means to be an artist--the dedication and love of it. He ended by quoting '60's icon Ken Kesey who said: The worst thing a writer can do is write what you know, because what you know is boring.

Love that.

I'm glad my wife was able to come with me (she was out exploring during the Con.) We had a few great dinners -- one at ...Balthazar!!! A restaurant I've always wanted to try. Thanks Juliette! Add to this a lot of professional drinking and I had a great time. I'm looking forward to the one in LA, which I heard is a lot different.

Cheers!

How Agents Are Just Like You and Me

2009-02-19T10:29:00.000-08:00

There is a mystique about agents and editors. When you're trying very hard to write the best novel you can and they are the gate keepers to your eventual readers, you can find yourself obsessed with how to make a connection with one.

Of course the advice, and it is the very best advice out there, is to always focus on the writing and the rest will take care of itself. And unbelievably, it's true. The writing is all that is going to sell you in the end and if the writing sings like a siren, flies off the page like a winged seraph, settles in the mind like a heavy stone, then you have achieved what you set out to do. And when you send out that query to the perfect agent, she'll reply with an offer.

And yet the reality is, there is a business side to this business and at some point you've got to focus on it. The time for that, though, is well after the manuscript has been written, revised, set aside and revised again.

I was lucky in a sense in that I knew nothing, no, less than nothing, about the industry when I sent out two queries. I'd submitted some poetry in the past to small presses and so I understood that if you wrote something and you wanted it read, you had to send it. So I did. And I got an offer.

I never had time to obsess about the business, or multiple offers, or how many queries I'd sent and keep spread sheets and send status updates and requests. When it's time, though, and the manuscript is as done as it can be, then you must address the business side of writing and do all the things I just listed above.

If I'd been less naive, and knew more about the business, that's exactly how I would have handled things.

But only after the manuscript is totally done. Fully written. Revised. Revised again. And then revised some more.

The second best advice after focus on the writing is don't rush.

The crazy thing about these agents and editors though, is that they're a lot like you and me. They have their quirks, and their preferences. They like only certain kinds of novels and not others.

Just. Like. You. And. Me.

Aprilynne Pike has a great blog post up right now about what Jodi Reamer likes to see in a query. What Jodi likes is totally different from what other agents like.

Google the heck out of these people. Read all of their interviews, blog posts, transcripts of their speeches and study their lists.

Query the agent you most want to work with.

How to Maintain Your Self Confidence

2009-02-17T06:00:00.000-08:00

How does a writer maintain (or find) the will to keep going, even when the path to publication is long, arduous and often filled with years of rejection, rework and revision? Editor Alan Rinzler summed it up so beautifully that I felt obliged to link to his blog. Thanks to Agent Nathan Bransford for finding this post.

How Successful Writers Keep Up Their Self-Confidence

If you are a writer, I encourage you to read Rinzler's post. My favorite tips are to stay connected, keep writing, and be patient.

Stay Connected: Having a daughter and a marketing job forces me to stay connected to the non-writing world, and my Pen Tales partners keep me grounded in the writing world.

Keep Writing: I rarely let a day pass without writing. Even on my most distracted, non-creative days I still put something down on paper--outline details, character studies or a just a few interesting research notes. It keeps the project from growing stale, and I find that any forward momentum is better than stagnation.

Be Patient: It's a hard one, for sure, but I find that keeping my focus on the writing and not on agent searches and publication possibilities is key. In my agent search, I send out queries, requests for partials, and promptly close my tracking spreadsheet and forget about it. Back to the writing (or the kid activities, or paid work, or whatever else I have to attend to). It keeps me sane, and focused.

Layers

2009-02-09T07:32:00.001-08:00

And no, this is not about chickens. As many of you know, I have those, too.

What I really want to talk about is the layering process in novel writing.

I should tell you right up front, that I am not a NaNoWriMo kind of writer. I gave it a shot this year and failed pretty miserably at it. It was a useful failure because I became even more clear about my method and appreciative that I have one! I can not write a draft without looking back.

CAN.
NOT.
DO.
IT.

Even for the fame and glory of a NaNoWriMo badge on my blog!

When I am in the throes of a new novel idea, I typically jot a note down in long hand—usually just a one liner that says, "Ohhhh, wouldn't that be cool?"

Then I get out the laptop and write the first chapter. With no real idea where I'm going, other than, "Wouldn't that be cool," I forge ahead. Sometimes I'll write as many as three or four chapters.

Then I begin to outline.

But I can only outline a few chapters ahead because the writing always goes where it wants to, despite the outline.

Now, with Scrivener (my bestest-friend in the whole-big-entire-world) I am able to make notes in the sidebar as I'm writing. These notes are the beginning of the layering process.

I am not inclined to "finish" a book until the first half of it is just right. And this requires layering.

1. Typically my first pass has all the yummy language—delicious, mouth-watering, eye-squinting, breathless-wonder language. This is the time that I begin to feel a little emotional about the work.

2. Pass two requires PLOT. I have to go back in and layer on the plot elements that will create the appropriate amounts of tension, the plot devices that put my characters in peril, the cliff hangers and a good strong backbone.

3. The next layer is all about characterization. I have to go back and make everyone real. And this is the second time I begin to feel weepy about my book, and need occasional breaks. The feelings are intense (and this usually means I am getting it right).

4. Then it is time to add the layer of synchronicity and flow.

Each of these elements is its own rewrite from page one.

Once this process is complete, I tackle the second half of the book in the same manner. Just rinse and repeat.

Then there is the final bout of weeping, the part where I am crying not from joy, but from the sheer pain of having to go back AGAIN and read it all, edit it from the beginning and employ all the steps above ONE MORE TIME.

The sobbing begins when I find I need to do it one more time after that.

Do you layer? And what are the steps in your process?

Favorite Authors

2009-02-05T20:23:00.000-08:00

One of the most difficult questions to answer for any passionate reader and especially for a writer is: "Who are your favorite authors?" It's like asking a pastry chef which dessert is most delectable, or a mother which child she prefers.

How does one choose a favorite? It's impossible, of course. No one reads a novel for any one element: plot, characterization, theme, setting, language and voice are all part of the whole. There are, however a few authors that I'll highlight here for their particular skills.

Characters and plot: Stephen King
Yes, I'm an unapologetic Stephen King fan. I am compelled to turn each page of his best novels until the sun rises. That is a skill any writer should aspire to.

Language: David Wroblewski
First-time novelist Wroblewski makes music out of language...an enviable talent. My experience with The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is enhanced because I'm listening to the excellent audio version read by Richard Poe.

Setting: Anything Steinbeck, especially The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden. Maybe it's the years I spent living hours from Salinas, but I feel like I've walked, seen and breathed every step with his amazing characters. Steinbeck makes it come alive with unpretentious facility.

Voice: MT Anderson seems to have the range of ten writers. I dare you to read Feed and then Octavian Nothing and try to remember it's the same writer.

These are just a few of my favorites of course. My list numbers in the hundreds, and I'd never be able to chose just a few that represent my taste in literature.

Janet Krusi-The Big Picture

2009-02-04T06:00:00.000-08:00

On a weekly basis, I have no doubt that my critique group has my back covered. Misspellings, logic offences, incorrect word usage, inconsistencies in character, dialogue revisions, as well as a myriad of other writer crimes and misdemeanors, can be wrangled with the help of any decent critique group. I’m in one, so I should know.

But there is one common failing in the critique process, one that can be easily remedied: That is the honing of the big picture. Most of us have encountered the occasional break out sessions with an editor, peer group, or prospective agent, courtesy of groups such as SCBWI, in which writers present Page One or Chapter One of their novel. Such exercises are helpful, but their benefits are limited. So, too, is the critique system. What we sometimes lose in our imperfect process, is a good look at the big picture – the beginning, middle, and end of our stories – the structure that is the very foundation of any worthy work of literature.

Would you purchase a car having only inspected the steering wheel? Would you buy a home having just inspected the front door? Or how about adopting a rescued dog, having just seen its nose? Due to the segmented nature of our posting system, we read each other’s work in chunks, with days and sometimes weeks between readings. Needless to say, it’s hard to keep track of plot intricacies, character arcs, and the inevitable crescendos and decrescendos of story and conflict. While the individual “post cards” of our stories may be smokin’, the actual story may read like a cool, limp rag, and even the most astute eye may miss glaring errors in story structure.

Even worse, thanks to many incisive notes along the way from my peer critiquers, I find myself moving backwards in my work-in-progress on a regular basis. In order to address a single note, a domino effect of story revision is unleashed, and many of these changes are never seen by my critique group. I may inform them of the general notes addressed, while valiantly pressing forward each week, my literary machete at the ready to cut my way through that formidable thicket we writers call the blank page.

What’s a worthy critiquer to do? I’m proposing an extra step that our group has used on occasion. Once a draft is complete, we post work in its entirety to the group for comment. Reading a document from cover to cover can give us an intimate look at a piece that a chapter by chapter analysis can’t. Do the characters grow at the proper speed? Are they fully realized characters? Does the conflict or conflicts propel us forward? Do the plots and subplots coexist in harmony? Are the long term goals of the characters fully realized? Is the reader continually on the edge of their seats? Inevitably, the question centers on the ultimate test: Is the journey worthy of the book’s purchase price?

In the film business, a commissioned script is developed in the confines of the business deal, a deal, that it turns out, equally serves the creative process. A screenwriter delivers his or her document in several stages, detailed in the typical “step deal”. First, an outline is submitted for comment. An astute development executive or producer can save a writer a lot of rewrite time in this stage by sorting out story errors in this important stage. Then, the writer proceeds to a first, second, and third drafts, culminating in a “writer’s polish”. All of these steps are spelled out in the deal, and the “critique group” comprised of network/studio executive and various producers, takes a look at the document through the lens of the “big picture”. It is unheard of (and a contractual violation) to give notes on merely a single act, or small segment of the overall story. Each draft is seen from the opening to the conclusion, and the story is judged as a whole. While the process isn’t foolproof, it is highly successful. In keeping, it may be worthwhile to post an outline before starting the actual document. Outlines, in my experience, are just the most general of indicators of how the story will unfold. Changes can be made along the way as characters develop skin and teeth and a will of their own. Yet, the structure of the story, the rise and fall of conflict and resolution, can still stay in place.

It’s not entirely clear to me why this process works so brilliantly in the screen trade, and is largely ignored in the business of literature. I welcome your thoughts on the subject. How can we make our critique groups an even better Petri dish for examining and producing great works of literature? Blog on, folks. I welcome your ideas.

Book Cover Art

2009-02-02T10:58:00.000-08:00

This post enters (somewhat) the realm of fantasy and day-dreaming...I *heart* good cover art (and, also, really cool interactive websites, such as the one for Harry Potter and The Spiderwick Chronicles) and I love seeing what other authors are using to entice the reader into their world. It's a very powerful tool. And it's one aspect of book publishing that I find especially intriguing, and I'm often inspired by the cover art I see..and a good part of my day-dreaming is imagining what I'd like to see grace the cover of my books one day. What are yours?

Here are some of my current YA favorites from 2008/2009:

LION AMONGST MEN by Gregory Maguire

This one falls into the realm of adult fiction, but I absolutely love the art that Stephen King commissioned for his book DUMA KEY (which was a thrilling ride, BTW -- especially as I was reading it on Casey Key!)

Critical Thinking

2009-01-30T14:45:00.000-08:00

I am in NY at the SCBWI Annual Winter Conference. What a day it's been. I'll be writing about it soon so stay tuned.

What I wanted to talk about today is critique groups. Do you have one? You should. At some point you have to move beyond your spouse, significant other or friends and get some feedback from other writers who face the same challenges and issues you are facing. Not to say that the viewpoints of those people are insignificant, but I think one needs all the help they can find in making their work shine.

This is my first group and it has been a great experience. Reading and editing other writers' work makes me a better writer.

We get so close to our work sometimes it helps to get viewpoints that are fresh and unbiased. I know I changed a lot of my book after getting the same notes from all four of my partners.

I did think for the longest time that I didn't need a crit group. I just put a lot of days between myself and my work to give it a fresh eye. But that's not enough. I learned that lesson with my first submission to the group. After my first comments, I thought, "How could I have missed that?" Or, "I can't believe I overlooked that huge contradiction." Crit groups make your work more focused.

So whether you find people online or in your city or town, it is worth the effort of getting a good group. Fortunately, my group kind of clicks, so we know each others' sensibilities. I've learned more in the past six months than I have in that many years.

So, do you have a critique group?

Exacto Knives and Seam Rippers

2009-01-28T06:00:00.000-08:00

These are the two most important tools in my revision process. They need to be sharp, exact, and under my control.

I just received some extensive revision notes and they were mind bending and illuminating. These are the first *real* revision notes I've received and they require more than a little tweaking here and there.

These revisions require me to disassemble my WIP, separate each stone and bit of glass in the mosaic and replace them in a new more concordant pattern.

Ah the beauty of language makes it all sound so simple, no?

The first thing I did, before attempting this was to download some new software. If you're a Mac user, it's worth downloading a trial version of Scrivener. Ron opened up a great discussion of it over on his blog and the developer even dropped by to comment!

This program has allowed me to separate out each of my chapters, then break them down by scenes and keep each of these files active in a sidebar that I can also look at as a series of note cards (if I so choose).

You can drag and drop pdf's, video, photos, and any other research you might have and all of those files can stay active in order to scroll between them.

It is working beautifully for me.

I can't say it was necessary before beginning these kinds of major changes to my WIP, but it is an invaluable tool when you are taking an Exacto Knife to the pages and leaving little shreds all over the floor (far less messy, too).

How do you revise and does it require tools?

Choose Hope Over Fear

2009-01-26T06:00:00.000-08:00

It was a landmark week for our nation, and one that infused me with renewed optimism. I don't expect the rough road ahead to be magically transformed by Obama, but I do feel that national optimism is a key factor in getting through these next few years. Out of all the moving images and words on inauguration day, these struck me the most.

"In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of shortcuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted — for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things — some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom."

--Obama Inaugural Speech.

It spoke to me on a personal level, and on a professional one. Writing novels certainly qualifies as laboring in obscurity. The fact is, most of us will never see our painstakingly crafted stories in print. We all know the odds of getting an agent, being published, and

selling enough books to see any kind of royalty--and it's enough to make a writer shiver with fear.

But hope drives us on, and the need to write fuels that hope. I think all of us in Pen Tales will write whether we ever get published or not. I know that every new project, each round of edits, and even each rejection brings us one step closer to finding that perfect agent, the right publisher.

A writer can't focus on fear of failure. Writing and getting published can only happen when we are willing to take one more step each day toward that goal no matter how difficult it might seem, no matter how remote the possibilities of success.

So, here's to Hope.

Janet Krusi - The Bliss Zone: Getting Ready to be Good

2009-01-23T05:00:00.000-08:00

Imagine this: You’re on a roll. The characters are taking shape. No, your characters are finally speaking to you. The road ahead is as clear as a windy LA afternoon, and the story is rocking. There’s conflict, tension, surprise. Subplots are dovetailing. A climax looms on the next page. It’s as if you are one of the Whirling Dervishes, with dozens of plates spinning on sticks in perfect, balanced harmony. So perfect, in fact, that you can almost hear the plates humming on their axis. The phone rings. One of your kids is stuck on a freeway with a flat tire and they’ve lost their Auto Club Card. The plates come crashing down, shattering on the floor around you like they do at a good Greek wedding. In that instant, it’s possible the world has just been denied yet another great piece of American literature. The loss is immeasurable. What’s a writer to do?
In the back of my mind, I remember some comedy feature film with a tortured writer as the lead character. It’s no surprise that comedy so often feeds on the foibles of tormented writers; comedy is, after all, closely aligned with tragedy. And it’s a condition most writers need not research; we know it all too well. But I distinctly remember that comedic/tragic soul sitting at his desk in a state of intellectual constipation while he straightened the tape dispenser and stapler on his desk, the pictures on the wall, and pulled the fuzz balls off his sweater. Writer’s Block, we were led to believe, had gripped his psyche like an out-of-control virus, and until all was right in his world, no word would emerge from his crippled keyboard. Sound familiar? If not, you may immediately click the “x” in the red box in the upper right hand corner. If so, please read on.
My husband likes woodworking, my son loves basketball, one of my daughters loves the theatre, another, martial arts, but my passion is writing. If writing for you is as discomforting as a root canal, find another endeavor. But if you love it as I do, you need to get ready to be good. Ready to be good enough to be worthy of the time your audience, be it an agent, editor, or your car mechanic will spend reading your words. A self-respecting writer can’t just sit at the keyboard and vomit words, although some writing gurus have praised this practice. Short of brushing some cobwebs from your head or loosening stiff fingers, “word barfs’ do you and your potential audience no good.
A singer sings the scales, an athlete runs through a series of rote warm-ups, a musician tunes up and rifts, and a writer needs his or her own regime to enter that realm we enter where good work prevails: I call it the bliss zone. In that special place, the mind is open and clear, possibilities bubble up like Old Faithful, and a flexible world in vibrant color unmasks itself.
“How do you get there?” you may ask. A writer needs to learn how to control his or her entrance to the Bliss Zone. If you know how to unlock the door to this glorious place, you can enter whenever you wish. Writers who have not found the way to the door spend weeks, months, or sometimes years trying to find their way back. The path is different for each of us, but I will unveil my twelve step plan to bliss.

1. Give your story and characters development time. Before you even begin, spend some time thinking about your style, the characters you want to create, the message you want to get across.
2. Think about your audience. Know your audience. Become your audience and then think about what you’d want to read.

3. Once you are clear on what you want to do....spend time getting to know your characters. Draw pictures of them, or clip photos of them from magazines. Create their life history. Clarify their hopes, dreams, fears. Fill their world with detail. More will come in the writing of their story, but start with fully formed characters.

4. Keep a pad and pen with you at all times. That means when you’re driving (kindly pull over before putting pen to paper), sleeping, or going about your daily business, always be prepared. You never know when inspiration will strike, or a solution to a story/character problem will hit you in the head like a falling coconut. Write it down, or risk losing the thought all together.

5. I cannot stress the importance of being in good shape. That means exercise. A good, brisk walk will do, or any other exercise of your choice that involves some heavy breathing and a little sweat. It’s amazing how easily the door opens once you’ve gotten the old blood flowing.

6. Eat right. It’s hard to think straight on a junk food binge. Studies show that when the blood sugar level spikes, the brain gets foggy. Try writing with brain fog, and you’ll see what I mean. It’s not the best for promoting inspired writing.

7. Take care of business efficiently. That means, get the kids off to school, organize meals, pay the bills, return phone calls...and do it as quickly as possible. If those responsibilities aren’t barking at you in the back of your mind, you’re free to follow the path to writing bliss and work their without interruption.

8. Clear off that desk or office. Find a clear, clean, cozy spot where you feel comfortable. Take a deep breath and begin!

9. Pay keen attention to everyone and everything in your life. I have this crazy notion that things happen for a reason, that people come into our lives for a purpose. However, it could be that people randomly come into our lives, and we can choose to mine great material from them if we look deeply enough. I find seeds of inspiration all around me. From my family, to someone I’m standing in line with at the post office, there are wonderful, quirky people everywhere, and you never know who will reveal a great line of dialogue, character trait, story twist, that will kick your story up a notch, or give your characters greater dimension. Study human behavior. Study why people do the things they do. Be a good listener.

10. Read. Always read. Always have a book in progress by your bedside. The more you read and analyze what works and doesn’t work, the better your own writing will be.

11. Don’t talk about what you are going to write, just write! This is a caution about conferences, blogs, critique groups, and writing classes. They are good to a point. But when the going gets tough, the writer better get down to writing.

12. Become your characters. Of all of the tips I have listed above, this is the most important one. If you build good characters and step into their skin, every act, every reaction, every word, every deed will be real. Don’t be true to yourself. No one cares about you...except maybe your family and close friends. When you are creating in the Bliss Zone, all that matters is the characters you create. Shed your skin and become them. If your character speaks incorrect English, then get over it...that’s their language, not yours. If they have annoying habits...well, too bad if you don’t like it. It’s about them not you. If they make foolish choices, mistakes, faux pas, oh well. That’s who they are. Embrace them.

Enough about writing. I have to go...and well... write. Write something good, I hope. But first I’m picking the plates up off the floor and getting back into the zone. How about you? Would any of you like to share your path to the Bliss Zone?

Where's my muse? And how to woo her...

2009-01-21T11:23:00.000-08:00

Gustave Moreau's Hesiod and the Muse

My muse -- or my creative spark -- is elusive at the best of times. La Muse refuses to be corralled, questioned, sought out, or depended upon. She is erratic, impulsive, spontaneous, and liable to visit me at the strangest times -- like when I'm in the shower, driving the car, cooking, walking outside or doing something that requires my attention on anything BUT sitting down quietly and writing. So it goes. But I have found ways to woo La Muse...I keep a notepad and pen handy at all times, such as by the bed and in my purse; you just never know when those "aha" moments are going to demand journaling. When I sit down to write, I light a candle, turn off the phone and close down my email... and I also play music sometimes when I write, as that provides its own wonderful inspiration (CSNY is a particular gem) and eases La Muse into the room and, one hopes, beside me at the computer...so tell me, what's your method of muse-wooing?

"Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns
driven time and again off course, once he had plundered
the hallowed heights of Troy." Homer, in Book I of The Odyssey

Conference Tips

2009-01-19T06:23:00.000-08:00

I will be going to my first big SCBWI conference in New York in a few weeks and am really looking forward to it. I pretty much signed up for everything. Except for the stuff for illustrators. Because, well, I’m not an illustrator.

What I’m most looking forward to is the roundtable with editors and agents who will look at my work. That prospect is exciting and nerve-wracking at the same time.

I don’t have the little elevator pitch down for my book yet. I still need to figure that out.

I did attend a regional event here in Chicago a few months ago. I enjoyed it although I was a bit of a wallflower. I did manage to ask a few questions.

So the question is: any tips on what to do or what not to do at a conference? I know networking is a good thing. I printed up a business card with my name, email and blog (which reminds me, I need to add Pentales blog to that card!)

Any other tips? Aside from not getting really drunk and knocking on an agent’s hotel room door in the middle of the night?

Craft Report - Dialogue

2009-01-16T06:00:00.000-08:00

Since we're all still getting to know each other, I'll give you a little background on my relationship with dialogue.

I was a poet all through college—pretty words, lots of metaphors, not a line of dialogue to be seen.

It was not until 2007 that I ever wrote anything akin to a short story or a novel. I landed my agent with the first picture book I ever wrote, one that had about three lines of dialogue. That picture book led to the suggestion that my more mature voice might lend itself better to middle grade or young adult novels.

So I decided to start writing some. I had no idea how to write dialogue, nor did I have any idea how to write the kind of dialogue my book required—characters with accents, dialogue from the 1950's, boys voices and girls voices, and the voice of an old lady.

Being an avid reader meant I at least had a place to start. I knew instinctively what good dialogue sounded like and what cringe dialogue sounded like. This did not mean I could write it, though.

First thing I did to tackle this problem, was call on my connections through SCBWI and the blogosphere and asked for help from more experienced writers. My dear friend Jill Corcoran opened up a great discussion on dialogue over on her blog and ideas and suggestions poured in.

And in the end, the best advice? Practice, practice, practice.

I moved out of my lovely little manuscript flat with the organza curtains and the fresh flowers on the table. I dragged all my characters into an all white interrogation room with a bare bulb and a single, scarred wooden table. And I made them talk.

I brought in a detective. I made them answer questions. There was no setting to speak of, and no story to tell unless it could be told through dialogue.

And slowly, over the course of a few days, their accents started to emerge, their strange ticks and colloquialisms. They interrupted each other a lot (especially the Jewish grandma), they talked over each other, and they trailed off in the middle of sentences when they got too shy to finish.

Once I found their voices, I came to love their voices. I was able to hear them speaking in my mind. And then they began to speak directly onto the page.

Have you ever exiled your characters? How do you tackle the difficulties of good, believable dialogue?

On Beginnings

2009-01-14T05:00:00.000-08:00

I recently finished a young adult novel, and am starting a new writing project. It’s been awhile since I’ve been in this ‘new story’ phase, and it’s both exciting and intimidating. See, my completed novel is full of places I feel like I’ve lived, and even though it’s set in ancient Greece, the places, smells, and sights are as familiar to me as my own little town in Oregon. I can still smell the salty Aegean and see the sunrise and spread her rosy fingers over a strange island just off the port bow…

And the people? Well, Malika, Alexandros, Agatha (and even Odysseus) are old friends. They’ve been with me nearly every waking and sleeping moment for over a year now, and I know what they’re going to say before they utter a word. I love them all dearly, even though I’ve tortured them relentlessly for 350 pages and thousands of waterlogged miles.

My new characters (I still call them characters, because they aren’t yet real people to me) Maizie Grace and Darcy Ann McDermott are the new kids on the street. I’ve waved at them, and we’ve chatted by the mailbox a few times. I know that Maizie is a bit shy, and that she has an unusually well-developed sense of smell, because she told me I showered with Dial soap this morning, and that I have cats. (I’m worried now that I smell like a cat.) Darcy Ann? I’m not so sure about that girl. She talks a bit too loud and I think she was lying when she told me that her Dad was the ambassador to Mumbai. It was the way she covered her mouth when she spoke that tipped me off.

When I sit down to write Maizie’s story, I feel like an outsider still. I’m not sure yet what she’s like, or how she will respond to some of the strange things I have in store for her. I’m at that stage of story writing where Maizie just plain clams up sometimes. She won’t tell me what she’s thinking, and I can’t always discern how she’s feeling. But it will get better.

The more I put Maizie into situations and let her deal with them, the better I’ll come to understand her. It sounds a bit crazy, and maybe it is, but that’s how it works for me. I’ll write a bit, outline a bit, and try to make some sense of Maizie and her world. I’ve found that when I start a story, I know the beginning and end…it’s all the stuff in the middle that takes time to work out. My first draft will suck, most likely. But my second draft will be decent, and my third? I should have Maizie fully in my head, alongside Malika and Alexandros.

How does the process of starting a new story work for you? Do you have the whole thing in your head? Do you know your characters right away?

What is PEN TALES?

2009-01-13T10:17:00.000-08:00

PEN TALES is a group blog that grew out of a fantastic critique group.

I'm Elise. I write YA. My current WIP is called AGENT OF O. And my completed manuscript, FORTUNE'S GIRL, is currently with my agent (squeee!)

A good critique group is like a good marriage, but even harder. There are five strong, opinionated and very different voices among us. And the key, like a good marriage is respect, fairness, compassion, and truthfulness. And there are five of us. Did I mention FIVE? That's a big marriage.

For some reason - fate, alignment of the stars, SCBWI, good drinking water, Verla Kay 0r a combination of all five, brought us together. We write YA and MG. Two of us have agents, one is just beginning to query, one has queried and is polishing her requests for fulls, and one is making a manuscript sparkle before getting it out the door.

We take our work seriously. We post 5,000 words a week and that means we critique 20,000 words. We are writers . . . and we can do math!

We started this group blog for several reasons. We all think it's important to encourage aspiring writers to find a critique group and find a GOOD one. We'll be posting about critique groups, resources for groups, how to have a healthy one, and how to get out of a bad marriage (or find counseling to make it work).

We want to talk about craft. That's why we're all here right? To pen the best tales we can.

Interviews, networking, and resources for writers can also be found on these pages.

And we want to offer all of you readers a chance at the wonderful support we receive from each other. Share our triumphs and tragedies, learn from us and teach us.

So new readers - do you have a critique group?