Beginning with the Middle

In the monthly writing workshop I conduct at a local library, the other night I talked about Write Your Novel From the Middle by James Scott Bell. The concept is described as “like popping open the hood and showing writers how they can be intentional about the story.”

In this book, Bell claims that for a book to be effective, there must be a “mirror moment” where the main character can literally or figuratively look in the mirror and questions his/her beliefs about himself. It helps enormously to know the middle moment/mirror moment, because knowing this moment “illuminates the entire book” you’re trying to write. It’s the “deep tissue of the story,” (or the engine that drives it.) which many writers don’t discover until much later, sometimes after several drafts or even once the book is published.

When Breakfast with Neruda came out and reviewers had their say, they found things in my novel I hadn’t realized were there. 

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Bell also claims that a good novel [or memoir] is about one of three types of “death stakes”:

the real death of the body,

death of a career or passion,

death of the inner self.

Once the writer discovers what type of death takes place, the transformation the protagonist needs to make to accept the death makes the story fall into place more easily.

For example, In the middle of the classic film Casablanca, Ilsa comes to Rick after closing time, to explain about why she left him. He calls her a whore, making her cry and leave. As Rick buries his head in his hands, he realizes he’s a selfish man who all along keeps love at arm’s length. The rest of the film is about what his transformation, and his ultimate sacrifice in his love for Ilsa by letting her go.

Exactly in the middle of The Hunger Games, Katniss accepts that she’s going die, and she prepares herself for death, but when she doesn’t die, she makes the realization she has survived in order to fight on.

Interestingly, this concept of beginning with the middle works equally well if you’re a pantser like me or a plotter. Pantsers may write many drafts before brainstorming the mirror moment. But then, once you know it, your pantsing will have a focus and guide you to the end. A pantser could also start with a mirror moment “out of the blue,” and then write a whole novel around it. Plotters will love knowing the mirror moment because they usually have a structure to build around it, and planning scenes will be easier as a result.

In my workshop, I asked my participants to go into the library and find a book they had already read and find the mirror moment. In most cases, that moment was exactly in the center of each book. Books that have multiple main characters the position of the transformation will vary, but essentially it works best near the middle.

I looked inside my own book Breakfast With Neruda, and Michael’s transformation takes place at the end of chapter Eleven, smack in the middle of the book (no spoilers, in case you haven’t read it.) The upshot is, if you’re having trouble with your manuscript (In my current work-in-progress, the second half has issues) go to the middle and see if the main character has had a "transformational" moment, and define what type of "death stake" it is.

Happy Writing!

The Rest of the Story

Earlier today I shared coffee with a writer friend whose first novel is coming out in October. “I feel like I have imposter syndrome,” she said. “It’s as if I’m leading someone else’s life.” It’s a familiar feeling many of my author friends and I share: a belief that we’re all frauds. Maybe it’s the nature of creating stories that causes writers to feel like imposters. If we write fiction, we’re writing something that isn’t true. It’s all in our heads.

Except when the book goes out in the world, the story perpetuates into someone else’s consciousness. In The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon, protagonist Daniel Sempere is taken to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books by his bookseller father, who tells his young son, “Every book has a soul…The soul of the person who wrote it and of  those who read it and lived and dreamed with it,” and later, he adds, “Every book you see here has been somebody’ best friend.”

Perhaps Kristen, my author friend, senses she no longer owns her story, or that she never owned it in the first place. Yes, she toiled over multiple drafts and comments from her critique partners. She bargained with her editor over its content. But the true soul of a book exists in those who read it.

Writing fiction is a vocation that doesn’t make sense. We spend months, sometimes years, listening to our imaginary friends tell their tales. We take their stories and translate them to pages for others to enjoy. It’s a daunting and impossible task. 

Once the story is released, you’re open to criticism. Even if a book is well received, there’s always that devil on your shoulder poking his fork into you, whispering, you’re a fraud.

In order to promote the book, an author needs to talk about the work with strangers. What inspired the story? How much of this is true? How much of you is in the book? Why should I read it? What’s it about? 

Sometimes we don’t know the answers to these questions. No wonder writers feel like imposters.

Yet we’re grateful to those of you who take a chance and read/fall in love with our novels and characters. 

The reasons we write are ineffable. Most of us don’t do it for the money. Writing is a compulsion, a romance with words, driven by a similar force that makes one person develop a passion for cars or math. 

BREAKFAST WITH NERUDA and BLUE VALENTINES needed an audience.

 I just can’t tell you why.

The final installment in Michael and Shelly’s tale, THE LANGUAGE OF THE SON,  is available now in paperback, or pre-sale in eBook August 1.

I'd like to send a shout out to my awesome cover designer for this book and BLUE VALENTINES, Ashley Nicole Conway. You can find her on Facebook at Covered by Nicole. Because she's also a writer, she limits the number of cover clients she takes on, but she 's worth the wait.

Happy Reading!

A community of Soloists

A few months ago I shared a book event with a writer I've "known" online for more than a year, but had never met in person. We met at a book event at Mother Foucault's Books in Portland, Oregon.

It turned out Sheryl Scarborough and I had more in common than just being YA writers with a ton of mutual writer friends. While my book is contemporary YA and Sheryl's is a YA mystery, the protagonists in both our recent books were searching for their missing fathers.


I love the odd confluence of  bringing our similarly themed books books together.  We writers tend to work alone, yet occasionally we convene and share our work. Within my critique group (there are four of us) we occasionally have a "mind melds" where a couple of us will use the same locations in our books. In a funny coincidence, two of my peers had characters nicknamed "Boo."

So while we are soloists, we writers are also part of a larger choir. We share similar dreams of getting our books published, making appearances, and perfecting our craft. Yet ultimately our goals are to engage readers and build an audience. So even though Sheryl and I had not met in person, we eased into a conversation as if we'd been friends for years. It reminded me of times I've heard musicians walk on stage and "jam, "producing extraordinary music without ever having met before.

In another odd coincidence Sheryl and I both had surgery on our right knees, so we're both learning how to walk again without pain..


Happy holidays.

My Frankennovel Tale

You may have noticed my absence these past four months. I've been steadily working on what I believed was the final draft of my follow up novel to BREAKFAST WITH NERUDA. For nearly three years I've been accumulating words, adding scenes and chapters, moving things around, and rewriting the beginning. An earlier draft was rejected by my editor at Merit, with the comment the stakes weren't high enough. So I examined the book again, chapter by chapter, and reordered scenes and re drafted from the beginning.

At 72,000 words I thought the book was finished. Yet I accumulated more rejections. While most of the agents I sent this to complimented the writing and the well developed characters, they couldn't relate to the story.

And that was the problem. When people asked me what my book was about, the best answer I could come up with is "about 300 pages" because I had no story.

Had I wasted three years on writing a book going nowhere? Yes and no.

Yes, because I spent 3-4 hours every day, including holidays, on this set of characters and their journey. I worried about Michael, Shelly and the others. In addition, I spent many hours researching environment and oceanography to provide authenticity to one of my characters. (The result of that is I now know how precarious our future is. Dystopian novels are within inches of being reality.)

Yet no, the time was  not wasted because I know everything about my characters-- much more than the reader will know. Most of the 72,000 words are unusable. At least in this story. I may be able to use some scenes in a subsequent story.

So I set aside what I called my Frankennovel, and with the help of a few writer friends' suggestions, started over. The last chapter of my 72,000 piece became the first chapter of the novel that seemed to write itself in three months.

How was this possible? First, I stopped working on the Frankenovel for a couple of weeks. Instead, I read. STORY GENIUS, WIRED FOR STORY, THE ANATOMY OF STORY, and TAKE OFF YOUR PANTS. While reading the first three books listed I learned I had no sense of story, and my book had a theme, but no concept All of these guides include exercises to question what is at the core of my story. The fourth book helped me see how being a panster vs. a plotter is an inefficient ay to write. all these books taught me if you can't define the truth behind your tale in a sentence, there's a problem.

It took me 72,000 words to find the inciting incident. Once I isolated that final chapter from the Frankennovel, I was able to move the real story forward. Same characters and location, but only about 15,000 words of the Frankennovel survived, written in as flashbacks. Other than what is now Chapter One, the rest of the tale is new.

The new manuscript weighs in at 76,000 words. My critique group is helping point out where the book sags and where it sings. The best part is I can now sum it up in one sentence. (which I won't tell you yet...sorry.) Having that logline is a beacon to keep me on track so I don't invent great scenes (like the funny one in Costco) that have nothing to do with the plot. Like Luke Skywalker in the original Star Wars film, my mantra has become "stay on target."

Stay tuned. Once this baby is ready to submit, I'll let you know more details. Meanwhile, back to revision.

Happy Writing.

Authors on the Air

I've begun a new enhancement to my writing career. I'm still writing, but I'm now also talking to other writers on the Young Adult Cafe through Blog Talk Radio http://www.blogtalkradio.com/authorsontheairradio2

While there is a learning curve to understand the studio, research a the writer, match up time zones between the author being interviewed and me, and advertise the LIVE broadcast on social media, it's also been great fun. Writers tend to be solitary people, yet put two writers together and have them talk about writing the dialogue flows freely.

The focus of my show is authors of Young Adult, yet I also have plans for upcoming episodes where high school students discuss what they like to see in YA, the view from an editor in YA, and a panel of writers on their process.

The link above is for my show upcoming LIVE this Monday with Patty Blount at noon EST. Here are links to a few recent shows. Enjoy!

January 2, 2017 C C Hunter
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/authorsontheairradio2/2017/01/02/c-c-hunter-takes-us-live-inside-her-paranormal-world-in-the-young-adult-cafe

December 26, 2016 Beth Fehlbaum
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/authorsontheairradio2/2016/12/26/ya-author-beth-fehlbaum-visits-the-young-adult-cafe

December 19,2016 Rebekah Dodson
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/authorsontheairradio2/2016/12/19/author-rebekah-dodson-reveals-details-of-her-ya-novel-live-on-young-adult-cafe




Happy Listening

Writing.

Coming Soon to a Headset Near You

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/authorsontheair/2016/08/03/jacquelyn-mitchards-summer-scribes-presents-author-laura-moe


I've been quiet on the blog front lately and here's the reason; I'm being trained for my upcoming radio show called Laura Moe Presents the YA Cafe. It will be a live call-in show part of the Authors on the Air Global Radio Network. The weekly show will comprise of me interviewing YA authors of multiple genres, readers of YA, librarians, editors, agents, and writers in general about the process. And of course audience members are free to call in with comments and questions. Some guests in my lineup include Charlaine Harris, Cat Skoor, Elizabeth Christy and Valerie Stein. It should prove to be a fun 30-40 minute podcast which will be live at 3 PM EST on Mondays beginning.....SOON. Meanwhile, if you click on the Authors on the Air link above, you can hear my editor Jacquelyn Mitchard interviewing me.

Happy Listening.

The editor at my publishing house rejected my sequel to BREAKFAST WITH NERUDA; she said it lacked tension and not enough was at stake. When one works on a manuscript for two years, and tinkers through several drafts, this news can be devastating, and it calls for a night of wine and whine. Yet my editor was absolutely right. The tension and high stakes for the story were in there, but they were buried under 20,000 words worth of back-story.

I reread my book as an editor might, and asked Elizabeth, and she and I concurred on where I should start the story. As Les Edgerton says in Hooked The story begins at the inciting incident. It just took me 20,000 to show the reader where the good stuff was going to happen.

Just because I’ve written a semi truck’s worth of stuff doesn't mean I will remember my bad writing habits. Writing is like dating: you date the same damaged person over and over and try to save them, until one day, you finally acknowledge half of the problem is you. I get in my own way as a writer by clinging to my measly back-story as if the story will rush over a waterfall without it.

Admittedly, this is the highest number I’ve words I’ve incised from a single manuscript. Did the story fall apart? No. In fact, the liposuction helped give it a smoother shape. I’ve since added in 24,000 additional words, but these words are muscles, not fat. Around 8,000 of those words are reworked as flashback scenes from the 20,000 that fell to the cutting room floor, but most of the new material drives the reader deeper into Michael’s struggle. In THE LANGUAGE OF THE SON the stakes are clearer and the conflict apparent right away. It's a much better book.

So my next step is back to the soul crushing stage of of querying agents, accumulating rejections, and meanwhile writing book three of placing Michael in yet more peril.

Spoiler alert: Michael will be in this city:

Drawing on the Write Side of the Brain

The light hits the model’s back and highlights his bronze skin and sinewy muscles. He balances precariously on one foot and stretches his arms upward.  After a minute, the timer buzzes and he changes the pose. I flip to a new page in my newsprint tablet and quickly sketch.

I’m a writer, yet I’ve begun drawing again, which cross trains the creative centers in my brain. Most writers I know do other things. Some are daredevils who climb mountains, others play baseball, and some are musicians. Many regard writing as a ‘hobby,’ but for those of us whose job it is to write, we find other outlets.

I don't like the term hobby. It implies something of little importance, a lightweight activity to do in one’s spare time, an accessory, something expendable. An activity which captures one’s focus and critical thinking is not lightweight. Earning an income is necessary for paying the bills, but pursuing activities that engage one’s creative centers are crucial for survival. That engagement in rock climbing, bicycling, drawing, or fantasy football will manifest itself in other ways. Overall, pursuing a variety of interests makes one a more fully educated person.

Schools across the country made a huge mistake by eliminating “shop” and ‘home ec’ classes, and art, music and drama are facing the same fate. I’m glad I received a ‘renaissance’ education where learners were exposed to multiple sectors. By the time I was in high school I knew that while I was lousy in math, could sing well enough to be in choir, and afraid of shop tool, I was good in art, reading and writing. While the law forced me to stay in school, Art and English classes gave me motivation to accept the rest.

Algebra was a foreign language, yet my artist’s eye helped me understand basic trigonometry. Studying art history opened the door to knowledge of history in general. If you want to understand a culture or time period, study its art, music and literature.

I hadn't mean for this blog post to become a soap box rant on the state of education. I just wanted to share a few sketches and discuss how visual art helps inform my writing. If any of you writers out there feel “blocked,” get out from behind the keyboard and climb a mountain or sing your ass off. 

Happy spelunking, driving, surfing, swimming, climbing, bowling.... and writing.

I'm Blaming Rob Lowe

Writing is a weird job. Writers work every day, even though we don't punch a time clock and get far less financial return proportionate to our effort. Many writers, myself included, have preferred windows of uninterrupted time where the work is most productive.

When I still taught full time I had little choice but to work in late afternoon, evening and weekends. Now that my days are technically unencumbered I could write any time in my pajamas if I feel like it. I don’t though.

My best drafting happens when I go off site, away from all the distractions of home. Usually I work in a coffee shop or a bookstore cafe. Now that I’ve lived here in Seattle long enough I've discovered a couple of preferred spots. I look for a table near an electrical outlet, clamp on my noise-canceling headphones, choose a soundtrack, and start pecking with two fingers at the keyboard.

Revision has a different process; I print drafts after the work is “complete” because my eyes get tired of looking at screen for long periods. With paper drafts I don’t need to be next to a plug and I can color code my notations before making corrections on the computer.

Being off site does not guarantee a distraction free environment though. I discovered this today while doing an assignment for a free online screenwriting course. Our assignment was to create a short opening scene, where we post the script, storyboard, or video of the actual scene. I was curious what some of my classmates did and clicked on youtube to view them.

Youtube is crack for ADD people like me. After I watched a couple of  classmate’s videos, my eye trailed to the right of the screen where I noted Rob Lowe was on a show I’d never heard of: The Graham Norton Show. Hmmm. Rob Lowe. What could it hurt?

Graham Norton is a British talk show host and he’s hysterical. He’s one of those guys who pokes fun at everyone, including himself, and he brings out the funny in his guests. I ended up killing a couple of hours watching him interview Will Ferrell, Eddie Redmayne, Jennifer Lawrence (who may have been drunk,) Will and his son Jaden Smith, Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms and many others.

Did I waste my time? Well.... maybe. It’s hard to justify watching the show for creative purposes, unless my character is a talk show host or an actor. Norton did show clips of his guests’ upcoming films, so there’s a thin connection to my course. Overall, though, what I got out of watching was two hours of laughs but no writing.

Which leads me to why I’m writing this now. Usually I work for two to four hours a day between 10 am-3pm. It’s now after four. The cat has been fed, the wind is blowing a gale outside so I can’t watch TV (I use rabbit ears,(what is this 1950?) so until I get hungry for dinner, home is distraction free.

Happy (Distraction free) Writing.

https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/laura-moe/breakfast-with-neruda/

Five Reasons Why Seattle Is a Writer’s Haven

It’s no accident Seattle is full of writers, and now that I’ve lived here a few months I’ve narrowed down the key reasons.

The weather is sad. Summer is pleasant, with long days and low humidity, but in fall, winter, and early spring the rain, wind and early darkness are like an Adele song, perfect for crafting serious reflection and sad love scenes. The other day I revised a critical moment where Michael, my protagonist, despairs over his relationship with Shelly. He senses she is moving on. As rain pelts from the pewter colored sky and wind chills the air it’s easy to slide inside Michael’s nadir.

Coffee. During winter, when sixteen hours a day is spent in darkness, the caffeinated warm beverage is a portable happy light. When I was still teaching in Ohio I kept the ubiquitous morning brew on my desk, but I barely tasted it. My morning cup of Joe provided rocket fuel to jettison my night owl body into being awake and functional in the deadly dawn. Now that I am retired and choose my own hours, I savor my coffee at a leisurely pace. It warms my palette and hands and aids the creative process.

Because coffee is a necessity here, coffee shops abound in Seattle. There is a either a Starbucks or an independent coffee shop on each block of the city and its environs, and every grocery store hosts a coffee shop. (Except for WinCo. What’s up with that?) Coffee shops are nirvana for starving writers. We can spend as little as three bucks and occupy space for several hours as we create our masterpieces. Most coffee shops also provide food, plugs and free wifi.

Coffee shops are filled with other writers. Being in the company of writers is essential because we writers tend to live inside our own heads. We tolerate friends and family but prefer to spend large blocks of time in solitude. Yet writers periodically emerge from the darkness to commune with like-minded souls. As I write this I’m sitting across the table from my friend and fellow writer Cat. We ignore one another as we peck at our keyboards, yet we transfer an invisible thread of energy, like musicians jamming together, except our tunes are silent, the notes appearing on the page.

Because writers live near or in Seattle, the Pacific Northwest hosts several writers’ conferences every year, and is home to the Hugo House, which holds frequent readings and workshops .

Seattle has bookstores and libraries. Writers are readers, and Seattle has the largest percentage of library card holders in the nation (80%) along with 1.5 bookstores per 10,000, people. Almost any spot in the city is within a fifteen minutes drive to a library or bookstore.  No experience can replicate a physical bookstore. Even Amazon, the online behemoth, discovered this, which prompted them to open their own brick and mortar store in the university district. Sending a book directly to your device is convenient and cheap, but it doesn’t replace the experience of a book falling open in your hands, emitting its old or new book smell.

Seattle has its drawbacks. It's ridiculously expensive to live here, and unless your name is Stephen King or James Patterson, you ain’t making money off your words, so your favorite stores become Value Village, Goodwill and Grocery Outlet. Traffic is miserable, especially if it rains. There is public transportation, but it hasn't kept up with the exponential population growth. In cities like NYC and San Francisco one is better off without a car, but here, you still need a car. And yeah, the weather often sucks.

I haven't even mentioned the endless distractions, on how a good day it’s hard to resist jumping on a ferry to visit one of the nearby islands, or take a walk through Sculpture Park along the waterfront on Elliot Bay.

One can write anywhere, but I have chosen to write here. As long as I have my writing tools: laptop or pen and paper, coffee, and noise canceling headphones, I’m all set.

Where do you like to write? 

Getting the Details Right

In the manuscript I’m revising there’s a scene that takes place in Seattle’s Sculpture Park. Problem is I had not actually been to Sculpture Park. It’s free and open 365 days a year. Other than revising, I had nothing else on the agenda today.

Initially I planned to take the bus because 1,) my cousin gave me some free bus passes that expire soon, and 2,) driving (and parking) in downtown Seattle is a pain. But it was cold and rainy when I left my house this morning. Not the most ideal weather for an outdoor excursion but I couldn’t revise my scene any further without actually setting foot in the park.

I drove south on Highway 99 to 105^th and continued south through Ballard on Holman, which morphs into 15 th St. NW and changes into Elliot Way. Allegedly there’s a parking garage near the park, but luckily for me I couldn't find it. I saved myself 6 bucks by parking at The Spaghetti Factory, which doesn't open until 4:30. It’s located right across the street from the park entrance.

Sculpture Park resembles a boardwalk more than an actual park. It sits right on the seawall overlooking Elliot Bay, adjacent to the Port of Seattle. Today was damp, windy and chilly, so there were only a handful of walkers and runners braving the weather. The surf was high and choppy, and if you stand against the waterfront railing you feel like you’re on a boat. If I were a runner this would be a great place to train. One gets a waterfront view, a few cool pieces of sculpture, and ample leg room.

The sun came out as I began my walk. The entire park is a little over three miles, and I would have trekked the whole thing, but I needed to pee and there were no bathroom facilities, so I only walked about a mile of it and turned around and headed to the Port of Seattle. Because it’s winter, the waterfront on Alaskan Way wasn't crawling with tourists. Last time I was here was in summer and the crowds were so thick it was claustrophobic outdoors.

I dipped inside the Clipper Cafe, used their restroom and sipped a cup of coffee as I watched the cresting waves and ferries arriving and leaving the dock.

I’m glad I made the journey; it will give my scene more authenticity. , even though the scene itself is relatively short, it happens at a critical moment in the plot. Now that I know how to get there and where I can find facilities I plan to return before spring, before the crush of people spoils the view.

 Happy Writing.

Dialogue with Myself in the Rain

I’m sitting in the coffee shop, not really writing, just messing around. It’s raining too hard to leave, though, and I have a blog I’ve ignored for almost two months. I’m trying to write a session proposal to speak at a reputable writers' conference. It's a big deal. I’m not a big deal. Not yet, anyway.

One thing the conference committee wants on the application form is my ‘expertise with the proposed topic.’ I’m an expert in Being a Failed Novelist.

Yet that’s no longer true. My book came out recently. Perhaps I could skew my talk about How I Booted Out of the Epic Fails. But then my novel might be an epic fail.

How did I get that book contract again?

Oh yeah: Persistence and Plan B.

That title might work. My expertise is in continuing to write in spite of the astronomical odds against me.

There are innumerable reasons not to become a writer where you can avoid facing blank pages and blinking cursors, spending too much time inside your head, and ending up writing in the rain.

One could have a life.

But what is a life without pursuit of what charges your batteries?

Like any ineffable passion, writers write in spite of the rain, in spite of the odds of success and money are so remote that being hit by a meteorite is more likely.

Another question on the conference application is to list three things attendees will learn.

1)                  Writing the novel was the easy part.

2)                  Even if you have an agent, a book contract, or have begun a new project, you need to invest time in managing the details toward the book’s publication. It won’t get done for you.

3)                  Your friends and family don't mind that you write, but they don’t want to hear about the process. So the introverted writer must become part of a community of writers.

The committee also wants my life story in 100 words, a 50 word summary of my presentation, and worst o all, a photograph of me.

So here I sit next to a rain soaked window as high winds knock down tree limbs, contemplating persistence and Plan B, wondering if a photo of my cat will suffice.

Happy Writing.

Do You Have a Permission Slip?

A writer spends hours, weeks, and sometimes years bending over the keyboard or typewriter, suffering over sentences, scenes, and characters, creating his or masterpiece. One day, this writer reaches the end of the story. The draft is complete, the hard work is done.

Not so fast.

If you intend to get this tome published, the work has only begun, you foolish, silly writer.  There are steps they don't tell you in writer school.

First, this mass of pages is not a book. It's a draft, and if it's the first draft, likely a grainy one. But here is your chance to revisit your characters and sharpen the focus. Here you will delete scenes, correct typos, supplant repeated use verbs and phrases, and make it readable.

Next you will need to find a trusted reader or readers who will truthfully tell you what works, what doesn't, and why. Find at least one reader who writes well and is willing to be brutally honest.

You will revise and edit. If you are a typo queen, as am I, you will be smart to hire an editor before you submit or pitch this novel. This is money well spent, because this editor can also offer critical advice.

You are now ready to sell it.

You've go through the revision and the dreaded submission process. You form a band called Query Street and the Screaming Synopsis… no wait, you don’t have time to perform in a rock band.

You get a book contract (yay, ego boost) and are working with an editor who loves your book and has great plans for you. You have a due date for your final mss and a publication date.

Now is not the time to lie on the beach, dreaming of the Yacht you plan to buy with your millions…..Okay, advances aren’t what they used to be unless you’re James Patterson. http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jul/08/authors-incomes-collapse-alcs-survey But still, the hard part is over now, right?

Unfortunately, no.

It is up to the author to secure Permissions. Unlike writing a research paper or master’s thesis where supplying a bibliography will suffice, if you quote from another work, say a song, a poem or a novel, you must have written permission from whoever holds the rights to the work.

This can be tricky, because sometimes the publisher holds the rights, but there are caveats as to how works can be used. Even though the Nobel Laureate died in 1973, he left no heirs, so the Neruda foundation in Barcelona, Spain handles this negotiation.

Permissions aren’t always free. The foundation asked for a thousand dollars to use one poem, and two lines from two of Neruda’s poems. My book is called Breakfast with Neruda, so I need at least some quotes, so we settled on a much smaller amount to use two lines from two separate poems. My original draft opened every chapter with a Neruda quote, which in retrospect would have cost me more than my condo. (Luckily an early reader said, while she loved the poems, she felt opening each chapter like that was heavy handed.)

Permissions can be a wild sheep chase. I quoted another author, and the publisher told me to contact the agency, so I wrote to him, and he told to contact the publisher. I ended up deleting this quote.

I had planned to use an excerpt from a song, but the record company doesn't own the rights, and had no idea who did. Scratch that. I just name the song.

The author of a poem I planned to use in the final chapter died three years ago, and I had no idea where to contact her heirs. I sent a condolence note on the funeral home page, but I’m not sure people check those after the first few months of the loved one’s passing. I didn’t after my brother and father passed.

Working on permissions isn't as soul wrenching as writing a query and opening the flurry of rejections, but it keeps me from writing, so it feels like work.

The benefit of permissions. Obviously getting permission protects you from lawsuits and possible scandal, but it also helped me reconsider some of my decisions. Rejecting some of my content opened me up to look at alternatives.

I’ve gone through revision and editing, and I have approved the cover art, (smaller houses sometimes give authors input on their covers. Big houses don't.) The next step is the dreaded author photo. I stumbled upon a photographer who claims she can make me look twenty years younger...

Writing the novel was the easy part.

Happy Writing.

"That's My Spot."

I’m still trying to find my “ spot.” I am revisiting a Starbucks I disliked the first time I was here. It has an odd set up, the tables are squeezed together, and there are very few plugs, but I’m hungry and I have a free reward on my card. Also, it’s freezing in here, but the Starbucks in Zanesville is always cold, so maybe this is my new spot.

Starbucks has been a chief source of my meals on this journey. Several people gave me Starbucks cards as going away gifts, and out here I can buy Protein Bistro boxes, which comprise of a hard-boiled egg, grapes, apple slices, a multigrain roll, a couple wedges of cheese, and a packet of natural peanut butter. There are other types of boxes, and they cost five bucks, but each is a healthy choice. Today I am using my reward for a free one.

I need to learn about twenty new languages so I can eavesdrop on conversations here. Right now I’m in a middle seat surrounded by people chattering in various tongues. But since I can’t follow their dialogues, I can’t use that as a distraction from writing.

This location is only twenty blocks from my condo, which I will be moving into Saturday morning. Technically I can walk here, but most likely I won't since I will also be hauling a backpack containing my laptop.

My table faces the parking lot, and I’m getting glare from windshields. I could move to the facing chair, but it’s bad feng shui to sit with one’s back to the door if you are alone.  

The other day I met my fiend Cat at Third Place Books. I arrived early in case I got lost, which I didn't. Since I was inside a bookstore I knew I may as well peruse the volumes before Cat and I sat in the cafe area to write. Writers work alone, yet sometimes sitting with another writer optimizes productivity, as if we emit some shared creative energy.

At one point I got up to use the bathroom, and left my belongings with Cat. As I was walking back through the store, a woman stopped me and asked where she could find the James Lee Burke novels. I said, "I don't work here, but I'd be happy to show you."

She eyed me, and said, "You look like you should work here."

I've toyed with the idea of working in a bookstore part time, but two things come to mind: One, I might just have to sign my check over to the store from all the books I buy. At least that was the case when I was younger and allegedly supplemented my income with a second job in a bookshop. The other caveat is I like hanging around bookstores. If I work in one, will that omit a potential hangout spot?

Eventually I will find that elusive spot, or since I’m in a large city, many spots where I feel comfortable and welcomed. This Starbucks might make the list. The baristas are friendly and seem to enjoy their work.  (I’ve been to a couple where some or all of the employees are rude or indifferent.)

It's Always Sunny and Warm For My Imaginary Friends

It was -8 this morning, with twenty five below wind chill factors. No, I don’t live in the Arctic; I live in southeastern Ohio.

The winter of 2015 has been endless for those of us east of Kansas: sub zero temperatures, blizzards every other day, and just plain cold. I've never been a fan of winter, but this frigid season hit an all time low, figuratively and literally. Occasionally in January and February our mercury dips to below zero, but rises back up to the normal twenties and thirties. Not this year. We've had weeks where the thermometer didn't rise above freezing, and many days in a row where the wind chill factor kept us in the single digits and lower.

Yesterday, as I sat in Starbucks bundled in three layers of clothes, two scarves wrapped around my neck and finger-less gloves on my hands I wrote my protagonist into April. The scene originally took place in October, but I couldn't bear walking into winter, so along with Michael, I smelled the edge of warmth in the air, saw the daffodils and crocus erupt from the earth, and anticipated his upcoming summer.

My strategy for not sinking into the abyss of the remaining weeks of tundra climate is to immerse my story inside spring and move with it through summer.

There s foot of snow piled around my house, but not inside my novel. For a few hours a day, as long as I don’t venture outside, I can forget I’m actually in Ohio.

Happy Writing, and stay warm.

I Got Schooled

Recently I was called out for using the word “shrapnel” in the title of my last blog post which discussed the Italo Calvino novel, If on a winter’s night a traveler, and how this book speaks for the reading/writing connection. I entitled the post “Days under Bombardments, watching the shrapnel fly.” I received the following comment: “Shrapnel is not a synonym for submission, splinters or fragments. Do not use it unless you know that it comes from a shrapnel shell, as used to cut barbed wire in the First World War and against aircraft in the Second World War.”

Have I just been scolded online?

The word shrapnel is often used in conjunction to explosive events, and just the other night I heard a reporter describe wreckage from a plane crash as “shrapnel.” According to the American Heritage Dictionary, shrapnel is “an artillery shell containing metal balls fused to explode in the air, the metal balls themselves, or fragments from a high explosive shell, mine, or bomb.” The urban dictionary recognizes these definitions, yet adds it can also mean “loose change of little value.”

How many of you have heard words used in a manner where they sound atonal, like a John Cage concert or off key whistling? A co-worker says, “I have literally been to the moon and back today.” Or you hear a friend describe someone as “the most artistical person I know,” Then there’s my favorite: “I’m writing a fictional novel.” These things screech inside your head as if you’re braking a rusted schoolbus down a steep slope, so I suppose my use of the word shrapnel felt that way to my censurer.

This isn’t my first semantic faux pas. I grew up in a white, Republican household where my father regularly said things like, “see if you can Jew him down on the price.” (Is it any accident his favorite TV character was Archie Bunker?) I am ashamed to reveal I inherited his politically incorrect phrases. While having dinner at a conference one evening, I remarked someone was “very Jewish with his money.” One of my tablemates, who is also a friend, said to me, “I’m Jewish, and what you just said it offensive.”  It never occurred to me a statement like that denigrates an entire culture. It’s a metaphorical phrase I grew up hearing countless times, yet it never occurred to me to consider the literal meaning behind those words.

Because we are human and flawed, each of us has diction preferences. Most of my erudite friends wince at hearing “I have went there,” and “where’you at?” and other bad grammar. A former student says the word ‘snacks’ make her cringe, and a friend of mine can’t stand hearing the word ‘panties’. I hate the word “gals.” When I am referred to as a gal, I picture a woman dressed in buckskin wearing a ten gallon hat. I am not a gal.

The word ‘shrapnel’ does not appear in my essay, only the title, “Days under bombardments, watching the shrapnel fly.” I responded to my critic to clarify this, remarking “It’s a quote from the book. The character is describing his work in the military. I used it because I like the sequence of words.” To avoid confusion, I probably should have explained the quote somewhere in my post, but I thought the quotation marks surrounding the title let readers know this was a quote.  I could have saved myself embarrassment by choosing a different portion of text to quote, or by contriving a bland title, such as “My Feelings About Italo Calvino’s Book.” I chose to use the words for their cadence, not context.

Language is not static. Just as bad now means good, and phat does not refer to weight, the word shrapnel is commonly tossed around out of context. I’ve heard it used in many contexts, such as, “ice was falling like shrapnel,” and “After the tornado, the yard was nothing but shrapnel.”

At the beginning of this post I said I was “called out” by someone. This terminology is a recent addition to our vernacular to describe a scolding. Poets understand the liquidity of language and metaphoric use of words. When poet Naomi Shihab Nye says, “Music lives inside my legs,” she does mean her bones are literally connected to speakers that broadcast songs, yet her readers understand the visceral use of the metaphor.

I apologize ahead of time for any semantic foibles I will commit in the future. As I age, the one thing I know for sure is we are, to steal a title from Anne Lamott, ‘imperfect birds.’

Happy Reading and Writing.

Should I Be Insulted?

Recently I received a rejection from an agent thanking me for my query and wishing me luck.  She added links to three websites that might help me “learn about publishing.” Does this agent perceive me as a beginner? Should I be insulted?

I looked over the sites. One site, www.PublishingCrawl.com is group blog by industry insiders such as agents, editors, sales reps and writers. In spite of its push to market each contributor’s own books, this one looks useful. The other two links, however, looked like discussion boards for “newbie writers.”  Many of the questions posted are, in fact, by new writers, containing basic requests on formatting manuscripts and how to approach an agent or write a query.

The agent, I will call her Agent X, suggested one of the sites ‘as a place to post my query for critique.’ Should I be insulted this agent thinks my query stinks? That I know so little about writing I need to resort to an online discussion board comprised of random beginning writers?

Had I not already received glowing responses, albeit rejections, from several agents about the quality of my query and submission package, I might opt for seeking advice from one of these discussion boards. But should a writer, new or veteran, throw his or her work out there for perusal by strangers of dubious writing backgrounds?

I have heard of many friendships being formed by users of similar discussion sites. When I first started writing I welcomed input from anyone. I went through a series of workshops where participants shared their work with one another. Occasionally I was offered good advice, but for the most part it was the blind leading the blind down a steep rocky path.

Normally I’m not shy, but when it comes to my work I stick pretty close to my shell. I've been to enough writing circles where someone ends up in tears because others criticized her first draft of a story told through the viewpoint of a severed hand. Or when one of the participants prefaces each of his comments with “as someone who has had over thirty stories published in True Confessions,…".

Writers are solitary creatures, but there is value in attending writing conferences and workshops. Because I am in proximity of very few authors, I try to attend a conference once a year so I can discuss process and structure with like-minded people. Call me a writing snob, but I now only choose exclusive ones like Kenyon that require manuscript approval, where participants are (pardon the cliché and pun) “on the same page.”

I am reluctant to show drafts to anyone. Even Elizabeth, my number one person I select for seeking feedback, does not see first draft materials. My work has gone through the wringer at least twice before she lays her eagle eyes on it.

How does one know when his or her work is good enough?  Sometimes you don’t. It takes years of writing and reading to trust when your work is good enough. And there are days when I've had yet another rejection I start to question this writing gig is worth my time.

Perhaps Agent X suggests these sites to all her rejectees, and as usual, I am over thinking her intent, so I shouldn't take this as an insult. Just say ‘thanks, but no thanks’ and submit to the next agent on my list.

Or as my fiend Myra just suggested to me, “write a trashy romance. That’s where the money is.”

Happy Writing.