Thanks, everybody, who came and read and commented on Annette Dashofy’s guest post last week. Son pulled out a name for me this morning, for a copy of The Writing & Critique Group Survival Guide, and the winner is…
Norma Huss!
Norma, if you can send me an email at beckylevine at ymail dot com, with your snail-mail address, I’ll get a copy of the book out to you soon!
Last week, I pretty much followed through with my plan of getting back to the YA WIP. I’m still working on the Breakout Novel workbook and got started with the plot worksheets. I didn’t get far, which was a little frustrating, but I’m still there and working.
An incidental character got bigger, I think, and I got closer to figuring out my antagonist’s goals and how they match up with and conflict with my hero’s. I imagined a scene of hope for my MC, just before it all starts to fall apart in a bigger way…and this was new. I had Scrivener open most days and dropped ideas for a potential scene or two onto the corkboard.
The plan for this week is about the same–get my fiction time scheduled first and make some progress. This morning was tough, for some reason: the wrong dose of caffeine, negative ions in the air, distracted thoughts about my picture book–take your pick!), but I did the “showing up.” I sat in the chair, I opened the file, I worked through the exercise. Sometimes, those are the steps you take, while you wait for the muse to come calling again. I’ll be here again tomorrow.
Here’s hoping your muse is not only visiting, but has brought leis and spiced chocolate and confetti!
Lately, I feel like I’m checking in a blogs a lot, but not necessarily posting comments. I know there’s a lot of discussion around about whether blogs are on the way out, and I never know if my pattern is part of a trend or just a piece of my general business? Either way, I know there is still a lot of good stuff out there, and I thought I’d share a few today.
1. First, in case you missed it during the week, a link to my own blog–but to someone else’s post! Annette Dashofy guest-posted here on Wednesday about managing and participating in an online critique group. She’s got great stuff in the post, and if you leave a comment before Sunday night, I’ll enter you in a drawing for a copy of The Writing & Critique Group Survival Guide.
2. Have you been following the Ed DeCaria’s Madness 2012! Poetry Competition? I’ve been popping in and out to see some rounds and give an occasional vote. I’m not a big poetry expert, but when something wows me, well…then I feel like adding my reaction to the count. It’s an amazing concept, I think–each poet gets a random word to build a poem around, and their poem comes up against another poet’s poem, written around a totally different word. Susan Taylor Brown wrote a great post here on dealing with her word and her fears–check it out. I wasn’t sure what page to link to for the contest itself, but here’s the scoreboard for the competition, which does have links to some of the poems. I think! Myself, I’ve just been watching for status updates on Facebook and then following those posts to the poems. Whether or not you’re a poet, I think this is both amazing and fun.
3. I’ve had people see me at the bookmobile, with my (yes, rather largish) stack of books to check out, and sigh that they wished they had time to read that much. Ack. Yes, I get that there’s never enough hours in the day to do all we want, but I also know that nobody in my family would want to live with me if I didn’t get my reading time in. Even so, I totally know what Jennifer R. Hubbard means about the rarity and the delight of just curling up with some reading time, not letting anything else demand your attention or your minutes. And someday, I’m going to get myself away on the kind of reading retreat Debbi Michiko Florence has been scheduling for herself this past year.
4. Until I was scanning my blog roll for links today, I actually missed this post by Nicole at Viva Scriva on getting back to her WIP after a forced “vacation” from it. Oh, so much here that resonates with me this week, plus some of the links that helped Nicole get back on track. Blog links within blog links–that’s what it’s all about today, folks. BTW, if you don’t have the Viva Scriva blog on your reading list, check them out for a few weeks–I’m guessing they’ll be a permanent add.
5. Another post I missed until this morning (okay, maybe I AM skimming too much!) is Jen Robinson’s review of Robin LaFevers‘ new book, Grave Mercy: His Fair Assassin, Book 1. I am a huge fan of Robin’s Theodosia books and enjoy her Nathaniel Fludd books, too. Not to mention I read Robin’s blog posts avariciously for her help with plotting. I haven’t read this new book yet, because if the car works and the creek don’t rise, I’m hoping to go buy my copy (and finally meet Robin!) at her Books Inc signing on April 4th. Jen’s review should give you a good idea, though, about why you want to read this book.
6. Here’s a fun post from Beth Revis, where she polled the members of her debut-authors group, the Elevensies, on the top three things they learned in their first year of publication. There’s a definite thread of letting the things that are out of one’s control be, well…out of your control. And another one on getting that next book started.
Enjoy the links, and enjoy your weekend. Happy writing inspiration to everyone!
When I was little, I named my pet guinea pig after this song, even though I’m not sure I’d even heard it. Something about the title…
And it’s what came into my mind today, when I was thinking about this post. I spent part of the morning working on my WIP, alternating with popping on and off of Facebook to whine about working on that WIP. I’ve been reading an old favorite: Jean Webster’s Dear Enemy, and smiling & laughing on just about every page. Basically, I was feeling jealous of the “they” out there who are working on light, funny stories, with true heart, and wondering how much longer I was going to commit to digging deep into figuring out the dark, grim one I’m working on.
Yeah, whine, whine, whine. Instead of, you know, gratitude that I HAVE this awesome story idea to work on, that’s pushing me to explore my craft, my values, and my understanding of human nature & personality dynamics.
So instead of whining, I thought I’d look a little more closely at what’s going on with me today, and see if any of it sounded familiar to you guys, and check out what you do about it!
Okay, yes, I took three yoga classes in three days, which perhaps has made me a little extra tired. And I came back to my WIP after three weeks off to deal with my husband’s broken bones (healing well!) and my own NF deadline. And the days of this week have been pretty chopped up into small pieces, pretty much interspersed with me getting into a car to drive somewhere, getting out at that somewhere, getting back in, driving home, and a little later, getting back into that car. Which never does wonders for my mental state.
But…separate from that: the book. I think one of the big things getting to me is the time that this story is taking me to write. Longer than anything I’ve ever actually come close to finishing, so that question of Will/Can I ever finish does loom large on certain days. I have a weird brain that sees books I’ve read and books I’m writing as typeset fonts on physical pages, and this book looks light and sparse with short chapters, short paragraphs, and lots of white space. Which is cool, except that the physical reality of this book is, currently, long chapters, long paragraphs and yawning amounts of space covered with text. So…how long is it going to take me to make the reality fit the vision?
And the question always arises: Do I chuck this and pick up something else. I could revise that light, funny MG mystery that’s in the drawer (I know, bad idea!). I could do some plotting on the urban fantasy idea that’s been sitting in a file for a bit. I could take a look at that MG novel idea that has a little boy I am SO in love with. I could go back and spend a lot of time on the picture books. Lots of choices that would feel like real reasons to put this book aside.
But then I open that file, and I spent five minutes, and the questions I’m trying to answer catch me up again and shout at me and get my juices flowing. Even if I don’t get very far in answering them. The feeling of slog has that one sharp, bite of Yes! mixed in.
Backing up that Yes! is the strong feeling that there is a craft learning-curve involved here for me. A big one. Which is, of course, tied to the fact of how long this book is taking to write. And the almost-certainty that if I fool myself into letting this go, all I’m going to face are more story ideas that need me to learn that missing part of the craft.
So there you have it. Not sure if I succeeded in keeping the whine out of this post, but I do think I’ve come back again to the fact that the best thing for me to do is push on. Push on and push away thoughts of the calendar.
How do you handle this struggle: this battle between the I-Want-to-Finish and I-Want-to-Write-THIS-Story? Do you put things away for a while and work on other ideas? Do you play lots of loud music that shuts up that evil counting-down-egg-timer monster? Do you have a mantra taped to your computer?
I’d love to hear your thoughts. And if you haven’t tuned into Debbi Michiko Florence’s posts on her Year of Writing, check them out here. They’re a good sanity check and reminder that this is a problem other writers face, that we’re not alone in the battle.
It’s that time again: time for the monthly guest-post on critiquing. Remember, leave a comment on this post, and I’ll enter you to win a copy of my book, The Writing & Critique Group Survival Guide. I met Annette Dashofy when I went to Pittsburgh for the Pennwriters Conference (one of the best conferences I’ve ever been to, btw). We’d talked back and forth on Twitter before, and meeting her in person confirmed everything I thought about her from our online conversations–she’s sharp, funny, and a great person to be around.
Annette Dashofy is secretary of the Mary Roberts Rinehart (Pittsburgh) Chapter of Sisters in Crime and vice president of Pennwriters. She’s a regular contributor to Pennsylvania Magazine. Her short fiction includes “A Murder Runs Through It” from Fish Tales: The Guppy Anthology (2011) and “A Signature in Blood,” a 2007 Derringer Award nominee. She is currently working with an agent on revisions to her mystery novel set in the world of Thoroughbred racing. She blogs at Writing, Etc. and Working Stiffs. To learn more, check out her website .
And here’s Annette’s excellent post.
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Over the years, I’ve belonged to a number of critique groups, both face-to-face and online. Becky has asked me to share a bit of my experience with my online group.
I started out as just another member. When the owner put out a call for assistance, I became one of three moderators. Now the three of us have taken over as owners. We divide the tasks. I’m known as The Cleaning Lady.
Our group is genre-specific. We’re crime-fiction writers, although we span a wide range from historical to traditional to thriller to paranormal. And anything in between. We keep a maximum of 20 members, and participation is required. Each member must critique three submissions and post one chapter each month. If you want to run more than one chapter a month through the group, you must critique three for each one.
I’d love to say the system runs flawlessly, but I’d be lying. It’s my job to track everyone’s submissions and critiques. If a member stops participating, it’s up to me to nudge them. If they continue to drop the ball, I drop them.
Sometimes I hate my job.
But with only 20 members, we need to keep everyone honest. Besides, I’m not the wicked witch (although I’m sure there’s at least one member who might disagree—you know who you are!). If life has simply gotten in the way, I’m happy to put a member “on hold” for a month or two, reserving their space until they can get back to writing.
There are good and bad points to a critique group of this size. With twenty members, not everyone is going to be on the same level skill-wise, whether you’re talking about writing skill or critiquing skill. We have published authors. We have rank beginners. Not all the stories are to everyone’s tastes, either. But the good part is that members do tend to gravitate toward those they can best work with. No one has to read all the submissions (although there are those over-achievers who try—you know who YOU are, too!) We tend to have “clusters” of members who critique each other’s work.
Each member gets at least three critiques on each of their chapters. Often they’ll get more. So while they may not find one person’s comments particularly helpful, another critique might really ring true to them. Even the very unskilled, beginning critiquer can offer some insight from a reader’s point of view.
Regardless of how helpful a particular critique might be, I think it’s of the utmost importance to be gracious in receiving it. You may disagree with the feedback, but that person took the time to read your stuff and offer suggestions on how they think you might make it stronger. You can take it or leave it, but it’s nice to offer a genuine thank you to the critiquer. After all, that person spent time on your story. Time they could have spent working on their own.
I’ve been a member of other online critique groups as well. Most weren’t as structured as this one. But those didn’t seem as productive either. Having the obligation to post and critique each month keeps our members plodding (and plotting) ahead. I’ve run three and a half manuscripts through this group and my writing has benefited greatly from the feedback I’ve received.
The last few weeks have been a reminder lesson that we can only split ourselves onto so many paths. My husband’s recovery from the bike crash has been great, and he started driving himself around last week, which was MORE than great. Still, of course, work hours were reduced for me the first couple of weeks after he hit the ground, and last week I set up to spend many more hours at home, pulling together the delivery draft of my NF kids book.
Which I did. Yay! It was a ton of fun, and I had a lovely week of writing and revising and trimming and more revising, with little tidbits of last-minute research thrown in. And then I sent that draft out the email door on Thursday.
I know this week is going to be a catch-up week, but I also don’t want to let the whole time go by without getting back to my fiction. It’s too easy, you know, after a crunch, to slip into take-it-easy-and-relax mode. Yes, for a bit, that’s necessary, but I’ve found I can let it go on too long, and then I find myself frustrated and, yes, intimidated about getting back to the story. So I’m mapping this week.
I have one simple goal, to do something in the Maass workbook every day, Monday through Friday. I’ve got it on the calendar. I may or may not make that every-day accomplishment, but you can bet that, by scheduling it, I’ll get more done than I would have otherwise.
There you have it. Stepping back into things gently. How about you? Writing goals to share for the week?
Today, I finished up the main draft of the NF kids’ book I’ve been working on. Somewhere between 1600 and 1800 words; simple, clear text; and–I think–a nice balance of interest and entertainment. I did my happy dance and decided to celebrate with an evening and a day off work.
This post is not going to be me eating a piece of humble pie. I’m really proud of my book, of the fact that I got it together to submit samples to the publisher, and that they were good enough to get me this opportunity. I’m happy with the writing I’ve done, and I think it will be a book that the kids for whom it’s meant will also like.
But…
Kadir Nelson. Again, wow.
We Are the Ship is a tribute, a work of art, an incredible story. When I first looked at the size and the format, I had that thought I sometimes to with rule-breaking books: who, exactly, is this book for? The gorgeous full-page illustrations are interspersed with long stretches of text (for a “picture book”), in a font-size small enough that I was reminded I really do need to get some new bifocals. The wondering absolutely disappeared as I started to read.
I am not an artist. I never will be. My son takes much longer to read picture books and comics than I do, because he really looks at the art. I pretty much check it out and move on to the words. I admire and am seriously impressed by Nelson’s paintings. I know, understatement. But it’s also, for me, an opinion of relativity, because this book with the incredible art in no way has to rely on that art. Nelson has taken a too-little-known piece of history and told it brilliantly. Is the story accessible to young readers? Yes. More than accessible. The players of Negro League baseball come alive on Nelson’s pages–the more famous players, but perhaps even more importantly so many players that most of us have never heard of. The drive they had to play; the persistence with which they met problems, obstacles, and sheer nastiness; the personalities they were either born with or created for their fans–it’s all here.
When I was readying my samples, I wrote a few chapters of a kids’ biography of Satchel Paige. I had recently read Larry Tye’s excellent biography of Paige, Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend. I loved Paige’s story and felt like it would be a great one to play with for kids, even if I and the editor I hoped would hire me would be the only two to read the sample. Tye’s book is several hundred pages and, while it naturally focuses on Paige, it does contain a lot of fascinating detail about the Negro Leagues.
Nelson still taught me plenty of new things about that world and the people in it. I picked up the book, opened it to the first page, and was caught. I caught myself reading the page of footnote references and realized that’s how much I wanted to keep reading.
Go pick up a copy of We Are the Ship–whether you want to read a truly lovely tribute to the Negro Leagues or you want to read a brilliant example of writing nonfiction. And, yes, stare at the art!
Over the weekend, I had a chance to really dig into my nonfiction project again. The deadline is coming up, and–yay!–the book is coming together. As I got into the flow, I remembered, once again, why I love this kind of work. Just a few of the reasons:
I love trivia. One of my favorite board games is Trivia Pursuit. Even when I moan and groan about the Science and Geography questions (okay, honestly, about ANY questions that aren’t about books), I love hearing the answers that I don’t know. There’s something about findout that that tiny detail of information that intrigues me. As I write this book, I get that same spark when I hit on a cool fact or tidbit in my research.
I like playing with words. On the first pass, I tend to overwrite–both on the amount of content and in terms of the reading level I’m using. That’s okay. Because I absolutely love fiddling around with my sentences to get rid of the excess material, make the wording more active, and smooth out the sentences into a simpler clarity. I’m not fond of the term wordsmithing, but it almost fits here. How about word-tuning instead?
This kind of work is about as close as I get to instant-gratification. I know there will be revisions. I’m absolutely positive my editor will have changes for me to make. Cool. BUT…as I work, I can see myself getting closer and closer to Good. My fiction projects are all just so…big. Big in length, big in concept, big in pretty much any kind of unit of measure you want to apply. Can you say….overwhelming? There’s always that sense of how much work I still have to do to see it all turn into something I’ve done well. My chapters in this book have 3-4 paragraphs. Those paragraphs have 3-4 sentences. Give me a few minutes, and I can take a rough draft of one of those paragraphs and make it sparkle! Talk about positive reinforcement.
I love my audience. I’m still not sure how much info I’m supposed to be sharing about this book’s subject matter, and, no, I’m not just trying to be mysterious! The main target audience, though, is kids who may not be the strongest readers, but who deserve to have a book with material they’re interested in, that’s presented to them in a way that makes them want to keep reading. How important is it to have books for these readers? And how cool is it that I get a chance to write one for them? Pretty much totally awesome-sauce.
It was definitely a weekend of happy writing. I hope you all had time for some of your own!
It’s been a chaotic couple of weeks. Husband is recovering well from his bike crash, and life is starting to return to normal. But with extra driving and not always getting enough sleep, the productive hours of my days have been a bit chopped up. Today, I’m at home with several uninterrupted hours for work, and the quiet and calm seem to be settling over me and waking me up in a happy way. Just a few minutes of solitary thought this morning, checking in at the Internet, and spending a little while with my current read–all this is stirring my imagination and getting me ready to work.
Things that have me thinking:
1. I have an empty house today. I love my family very, very much. And I love their company. But there is something about a quiet space that I know won’t be filled for a while that lets my brain expand. Which, ironically, is what will let me narrow my focus to my writing today.
2. Robin Brande posted on Facebook that her new book, Replay, is available FREE for Kindle today and tomorrow. Not only did this get my mind musing on what the new book is about (AWESOME opening lines: “I DIED. For forty-two seconds I died.”), but off I went thinking about how great it’ll be when I can actually read it ON my Kindle, which the guys know they’re getting me for my birthday in August. It’s a big birthday, which calls for a big gift. So I downloaded Robin’s book to my Kindle for PC account, but I think I’m going to save it for the summer and figure out how to get it from one Kindle account to another…another extra great birthday present. That’s assuming, of course, that I can wait that long!
3. I checked the movie times for The Lorax tonight, at our local theater. All three of us are huge Seuss fans, and this is a must-see. We’ve all been pretty zonked, so we may be joining the little-kid crowd at the early show tonight or tomorrow, but thinking about the movie makes me go back and remember the book and imagine forward about how the movie will be different–for better or worse. Either way, Seussalways gets me into creative mode.
4. I’m rereading a book I loved as a kid: Phyllis A. Whitney’s THE MYSTERY OF THE GULLS. I picked it up last night as a relaxing, no-stress, comfort read, and instantly I’m back in Taffy’s world, trying to help her mother save the old hotel while digging out the secret of the locked room. Who doesn’t want an island where cars can’t come, there’s a goblin wood at the top of the hill, and your bedroom has an extra little nook just perfect for a little desk and chair, just for you? So I’m back in my nook today, with my desk and chair, ready to put words on the page.
5. Time.
As I said, the past couple of weeks have been broken into a lot of little pieces. I’m pretty proud of myself for getting a lot of little things done with those pieces. But to really look at a project, to get the big picture, you need more than pieces…you need a long stretch of clarity. Today’s the day to look at my nonfiction project and start seeing what all is there, to get a sense of what I actually have and what I need to do. I’ve only been home for an hour after all the drop-offs, and I can feel my brain breathing more slowly, relaxing into the day. Which means good organizing and good writing. Hallelujah!
What’s got your imagination going this week? What helps you tune into your creative self, to relax and know that you will write, that you will be productive? Here’s hoping some of whatever that is comes your way today!
Just a quick check in and update on life over here. Last week was just a BIT crazy, what with the bike crash and all. I actually got a lot of work done by driving my husband into work then tucking myself into a spare cubicle there and opening up my laptop. Definitely more productive than I’d have been at home, where the bed would have called to me with offers of more sleep, and all my books would have been laying there just waiting to escape into.
The weekend was about recharging.
Today I’m working at home–lovely, and basically gathering up the threads that spent last week loosening and tangling. Little stuff, but pulling all the scattered feeling back into coherence and sanity and peace.
No, I don’t know if I’m using redux correctly, but it has a nice ring to it. It reflects the fact that, as I sit here getting ready to type, I feel like I already wrote this post. Probably because I did. Those of you who have read my blog since I was over at LiveJournal MAY remember about 5 years ago, I wrote about my husband crashing his bike.
Guess what happened this weekend.
Everything’s good. He’s got some broken ribs and a broken scapula, and I can tell you that getting him in and out of bed is NOT fun, but those are the small down-sides, believe me. The big gratitudes far outweight them.
Today, I am MORE than thankful that:
My husband is here.
My husband did not, this time, hit his head. If I leave you with one piece of advice today, it’s this: Skip the concussion. Seriously.
That the day he crashed was a sunny February day, so that other people were on that trail, who could call the paramedics and stay with him until he got off the hill and into the ambulance.
That Hedy Lamarr, yes, that Hedy Lamarr, invented and patented a frequency-hopping device that somehow (no, don’t ask me how) played into today’s cellphone, so that those people COULD get hold of the paramedics.
That we have a hospital in town with an ER full of wonderfully nice, helpful people who methodically take you through the steps of the process and check in with you and take care of you.
That morphine exists.
We have good health insurance. Yes, despite how I feel about the insurance industry and the “game” that is cost-negotiation, it’s an excellent thing to have.
That my marriage is so good and that I love my husband so much, that the fact that he’s here matters more than any of the stresses and inconveniences.
That my son is an incredibly mature, responsible, kind, supportive kid who gets what’s going on, helps out whenever and however he can, and pretty much takes care of me and his dad as much as we take care of him.
Becky Levine 