L. H. Walker

Maternity Leave

2011-05-13T13:25:00.000-07:00

Not the kind where you have a baby and are up every few hours feeding, changing and rocking that precious but exhausting newborn nugget. Nope, this is the kind of maternity leave where you realize your world is compressing again, where you shed non-essentials and focus on family. It's the end-of-the-school-year season, and these babies of mine have grown into big, walking, talking, independent creatures with lives of their own, lives that involve lots of carpooling and mommy management.

Maybe it’s a season where I realize how quickly their youth is slipping away. Or, I’m just terrifically terrible at time management and must neglect the blog, really, the whole internet world, while I make Barbie princess cakes, cheer on my lil' basketball player, applaud band concerts, complete "room parent" duties, etc. My three little monkeys are keeping me busy.

I made it today! Don't
look too closely. Exploding
volcano cakes are my real forte.

And when they go to school and I'm not volunteering there (which seems like EVERY day lately)
or grading student papers for my teaching job? I’m sitting on my porch double-fisting margaritas. No. Not really. Really, Mom, I’m not.

Toe Twiddling the Day Away?
Yes. Like a year ago.

But if I were writing regular blog posts, they’d sound slurred, rant-a-vicious or non-sensical. A couple months ago my author/mentor friend gave me her first novel and some words of advice, "Write from the heart." I've lost count of how many books my friend has published, but that first novel of hers, the one based on something that really happened, the "one from the heart"? It quickly became my all-time favorite. So, I've been writing heartfelt (to me) short stories, soul-piercing attempts to make sense of enigmas from the past (Why yes, I am talking about YOU and YOU and THAT). This kind of work gets me in a mood, mostly a foul, weepy one, a mood I have to get over (via kickboxing not tequila) before I pick up the kids. This leaves little time for the sweet, encouraging, "gotta share about the best book I just read" blog posts I'd like to write. So many new good books to write about!

My two eldest babies and friends running

into freedom a few years ago.

Barreling into adolescence

full-speed these days.

Bless you out there in the blog world. There has been good news, lots of laughs, interesting info. Glad it’s all archived (unless your best ever post was lost during yesterday's maintenance). And, yep, when I come back to regular blogging, you can assume I’m neglecting my children and have gone back to penning those non-emotionally demanding tales of the Yetti family who move in next door or the picture book about the flamingo family who are professional wrestlers. Actually, that one does make me tear up . . .

Fifteen Minutes to Be Inspired by Failure

2011-04-11T10:55:00.000-07:00

"Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement." -- C.S. Lewis

If you have time, watch this video. Then go try something beyond your abilities, just for fun, just to experiment, just to crash and burn. My experiment is re-writing a short-story I thought was DONE. Instead, I'm trying it six different ways, and, um, it's getting better.

Happy Writing, Friends! Happy Living, and Happy Learning from failure!

Thanks to the husband for the link and to Mr. Sivers for the video.

Related Post: The Way Forward is Practice!

Winner Winner Dodger Dog Dinner

2011-04-07T21:37:00.000-07:00

So, you don't win a dog at Dodger Stadium, but you knew that and are more excited about books than hot dogs, right? The winner of Quacky Baseball is Solvang Sherrie. Congratulations! Thanks to all who participated in the blog tour for this fun book.

Quacky Baseball Blog Tour Day 6

2011-04-02T00:00:00.000-07:00

That's the true harbinger of spring, not crocuses or swallows returning to Capistrano, but the sound of a bat on a ball. ~Bill Veeck, 1976

Thumby nervously steps up to the plate while the crowd looks on.

Just in time for spring comes a new picture book, Quacky Baseball. My children and I are delighted to be part of the Quacky Baseball blog tour. If you'd like to get in on the fun and win your own copy of the book, leave your name and a way to contact you in the comments, please.

Novelist and sports writer Paul Gallico said, "No game in the world is as tidy and dramatically neat as baseball, with cause and effect, crime and punishment, motive and result, so cleanly defined." That kind of drama is what fuels this book. Children of all ages can relate to Thumby Duckling's desire to "shake his jitters" and save the day for his team. My nine-year-old said, "I think kids will like it because of the excitement and the suspense." True. Bases loaded. Webbies trail by three. Thumby up to bat. Will he strike out? Or show his team he's a star?

To read the review my six-year-old wrote, click on the image above to enlarge it, or I've transcribed her words here: This is an awesome book about a duck named Thumby Duckling. He is the main character. I love this book because I love animals. I love nature. My opinion on this book is great. You did a really great job. She later said, "Please write that I also like it because it reminds me of when I played t-ball."

My eleven-year-old laughed and said, "Ducks can't play baseball." Yeah, yeah, Mr. Fifth-Grade Cynic. He was quick to add that young kids who love baseball would really enjoy Quacky Baseball. I mean he himself memorized Casey at The Bat at age two and half. Quacky would have been on the top of his nightstand, too. This older son also liked the message at the end of the book under the adorable heading, Four Things Ducks Know About Baseball: "Some games you win, some you lose." I liked that too.

Quacky Baseball is a delightful picture book and one to add to your child's collection or to your own. I absolutely buy myself picture books; I mean they are so lovely, aren't they?

To read interviews with the author, Peter Abrahams, and the illustrator, Frank Morrison, and to learn more about all things Quacky Baseball, check out these other posts on the Quacky Baseball Blog Tour:

Monday, March 28 - Megan Frances Abrahams - On Beyond Words & Pictures - interview with Kristin Daly Rens, Senior Editor, Balzer & Bray

Tuesday, March 29 - Julie Musil Julie Musil - interview with Thumby Duckling - the main character - via author Peter Abrahams

Wednesday, March 30 - Corey Schwartz - Thing 1 and Thing 2 - author Peter Abrahams on the genesis of Quacky Baseball

Thursday, March 31 - Diane Browning - Out of the Paintbox - interview with illustrator Frank Morrison

Friday, April 1 - Hilde Garcia - The Pen and Ink Blog - interview with author Peter Abrahams

Rules for the Giveaway: One entry per person. Random Number Generator will be used to select a commenter. Contest open to U.S. residents only (my apologies, foreign friends). Entries accepted until midnight PST on Weds., April 6th.

Book Review: Please Ignore Vera Dietz

2011-03-24T23:17:00.000-07:00

A.S. King’s writing wows me because it’s fearless and original. King writes about everyday, ordinary people who are extraordinary on the inside. Take for example, Vera Dietz, the main character of Please Ignore Vera Dietz. Vera is an eighteen-year-old “pizza delivery technician” bound for future greatness. Readers aren’t actually privy to fictional Vera’s ultimate destiny, but if she were real, Vera would be one of those high-schoolers who transcends a not-so-perfect, sometimes ugly-duckling adolescence to soar like a bad-ass swan. Vera = main character you’ll root for instantly.

King also makes me adore flawed people like Charlie, Vera’s true love. He’s the troubled boy next door, “a bright blazing sun [because] He came from [a home that is] endless, cold black space.”

Then, there’s Ken Dietz, Vera’s Dad. Ever notice how parents are mostly missing in YA books? To be fair, what teen wants to read about Mom or Dad? But King gives this father a narrative voice, and Mr. Dietz has something important to say. The Ken Dietz monologues and flow charts detailing life lessons were some of my favorite chapters in this book.

Of course, I also love that A.S. King even gave the town monument a narrative voice. How much does that rock? Having inaminate objects speak to readers is something very few people can pull off, but King can.

The reason you should read this book, though, is not because it won a Printz Honor Award. Nor is it because King is a force of nature writer with a terrific voice (see my review of her first novel, too).

Read her books because they have substance; they deliver important social messages without being preachy. The theme of Vera Dietz, for example, is “Tell!” There are secrets we keep as people, as a society, that we shouldn’t. There are times we turn a blind eye to crime, to pain, to say, the man next door who is beating the hell out of his wife. Things like this happen in King's novel; yet Please Ignore Vera Dietz provides a compassionate look into why people keep secrets while also showing what disasters can happen when they do and what hope is gained by speaking out.

Another theme in this book is that of nuture or nature. Can the MCs rise above bad genes and/or bad environment? Can anybody? In sum, Please Ignore Vera Dietz is a novel full of pain and redemption and grace. And in the end, those are always my favorite kind of stories.

The Approach of Evil Love

2011-03-13T09:56:00.000-07:00

My little car is frequently filled to maximum capacity with children. And frequently, I push "record" on my phone’s voice memo feature* because the conversations are just too good, too brilliant, too hilarious.

True identities are revealed in the car.

SON: Sometimes I wake up with dog fur in my bed; we don’t have a dog, So, I think I might be a werewolf.

SON'S FRIEND: I turn into a poodle with an upside-down umbrella when the moon is full.

Elaborate plots are hatched on the back roads, plots to protect fairies and other magical creatures from exploitation, plots to dig an underground tunnel from the elementary school boys’ bathroom to the local pizza place, and plots for novels. Yesterday my six-year-old daughter announced she was going to write a book called, “The Approach of Evil Love.”

SON: I don’t get it. What’s Evil Love?”

DAUGHTER: It’s about this girl who falls in love with this boy, and he seems nice, but he’s not really. He’s tricking her.

ME: What happens to her?

DAUGHTER: Well, she changes. Her friends notice she changes.

Who is this teenager posing as my first-grader?

ME: Does it [the book] have a happy ending?

DAUGHTER: Yeah.

But really, who cares?! I am HORRIFIED more than intrigued. How in the world is my baby girl coming up with this concept of Evil Love? I have zealously protected her from all things non age-appropriate, haven’t I? Has she overheard her college age babysitter counseling a friend in bad relationship? Does her best friend’s high-school sister talk about things like this? I intend to find out.

ME: Where did you get this idea?

DAUGHTER: It just came to me while I was chewing on my bracelet (a candy bracelet leftover from Valentine's Day booty). I slyly grill my daughter the rest of the way home. There is no Evil Trickster Love in her young life, thank God. Boys her age care about Legos, handball and fart jokes; no interest in tricking innocent classmates into loving their evil little selves. ;)

At home, my daughter begins to write, asks me how to spell the word “approach,” then asks, “How old is a girl who dates?”

ME: Eighteen.

She doesn’t question this because she trusts me. Then I realize, she also listens to me and everyone else. She is ALWAYS listening and recording. No voice memo app required. As she writes, it hits me that my daughter got the idea for "The Approach of Evil Love" from me. She must have overheard a conversation I had with a mother, a conversation about which Young Adult novels have “healthy portrayals of relationships where girls don’t change because of an obsessive love,” etc.

But as I wrote this post, I realized there might be a more somber source, too. Cue major shift in tone. This week, I gave permission for my child to attend a Good Touch/Bad Touch presentation given by our local child-abuse prevention agency at her school. I sat in on this presentation with my sons. It's gentle (read tailored to the age of the listeners), well-done and important. I'd forgotten that "a change in a friend's behavior" is one of the signs of abuse children might observe. I don't think my daughter intends to write a novel about child abuse, but she must be processing the idea that there is Evil in the world. Which is sad even if it's necessary knowledge.

The Approach of Evil Love was abandoned for coloring, but we'll see where it goes. For now, there is a girl, Ida. She is eighteen, at school, and I’m assuming, about to be approached by Evil Love. This novel could be very educational. For me. How does a six-year-old girl conceive of this sort of thing?

I record things my kids say because their speech is a window into the child brain. The view is sometimes funny, sometimes sad but definitely one of the most fascinating mindscapes in the world. Maybe there isn't a child in your life, but someone else to listen to, someone else who will reveal to you a most interesting thing about the way a mind works.

Ernest Hemingway said, "I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen." And now . . . it's time for me to stop rambling and do that. One of my children just said, "Dad, is there such thing as a meatatarian?" Guess she's not fooled by the creamed spinach I advertised as "Just like macoroni and cheese but with spinach instead of noodles."

*I tell the kiddos when I've just caught them on voice memo. They love to listen and laugh at these recordings now, but no way will they let me do this in the teen years. Also, we keep a family quote book in our kitchen, which I highly recommend. This is favorite reading material for all of us.

Pushing Paper

2011-02-23T23:30:00.000-08:00

My husband jokes that writing books is like trying to invent the next buggy whip when the automobile age has arrived. “Books are a dying industry.” He is forgiven because (a) he reads almost as much as I do, though, yes, he’s all about his Kindle and I-pad and audio books; (b) he buys me “antiquated” paper books every single holiday and birthday; and (c) he only makes this joke when he’s going into his Protect-My-Wife-from-Delusions-Certain-to-Yield-Depression-When-Reality-Hits mode. For example, he might say this right after I’ve written a first draft and am imagining who'll star in the movie version of my best-selling novel. It’s not a bad thing to be married to a realist, especially since he doesn’t complain (much) about the hours I devote to tweaking my ~~buggy whip~~s books.

E-books, Borders’ bankruptcy and the sad fact that there is now ONE book store (not counting used book stores) in my city of 100,000 people . . . well, maybe those things should concern me more, but they don’t. People still love to read. Including the next generation.

For the next five days, I’ll be devoting myself to the annual book fair at my children’s elementary school. I’ll be pushing good old-fashioned paper books. And while the regional book fair rep is sure to be totally disappointed by the complete lack of glitter, foam board and painted decorations I’ve made (very her thing, very not mine), I’m going to sell about $8,000 worth of books in a school of less than 200 kids in three days. At least, that’s the goal. Delusional? I do sometimes over-dream, but we’ve done it before.

In lieu of decorations, I cajole local authors to come visit and sign their books. I comb the kid lit blogs for reviews to print out for parents and teachers. These are especially necessary to display near good books with unfortunate titles or covers (there are some).

I try to make sure that if I haven’t read one of the books we sell, I at least have some knowledge about it. I also get kids to write reviews, and I grill our librarian on what’s hot for what grades.*

Then, my co-chair (who rocks all things organization and accounting) and I pay close attention to “buzz.” It’s fascinating to watch which books kids clamor for. One year, everybody got into Jeff Smith’s Bone series. Another year they all wanted Calvin and Hobbes.

No matter what they choose, generous parents have made it possible for every child to go home with a book. And I go home hoarse, exhausted, but totally excited about the buggy whip industry and its power to change a child.

*Plus, we get sixth-graders to dress as Clifford, and we provide donuts! Donuts! Lest I give the impression that I'm above "Come into my lair the spider said to the fly" marketing tactics. I'm not. Oh wait, the donuts are only ingested with parent permission. There's a big battle about sugar at school right now. I don't even eat refined sugar. Maybe I should rethink the donuts . . . Ugh. Moral dilemma.

Beta Darlings, Alphas of My Eye

2011-02-08T20:35:00.000-08:00

It's love-letter season in the writing world. Some of my friends are penning words of admiration to their agents; others are declaring their love for beta readers. I'm going to have to join in on celebrating the beta, though how I can say it any better than my friend, Kimberley, did?

For the un-agented writer, beta readers are huge (linking again to Sherrie's posts all about betas). For the agented and even published writer, well, they use beta readers, too. And I've learned from that. At the moment, I'm waist deep in reading a friend's soulful, sexy and sometimes heartbreaking book. Totally obvious why an agent snatched it up. Also, totally obvious that the work doesn't end just because someone has said, "I love this book. I can sell it." I've appreciated watching my friends with agents (and even editors) push themselves harder and keep on revising until they're sure their work represents their very best effort. Their example is a gift to me.

But in exchange for the 240,000 words I've read and critiqued since 2011 began, I've also been given the gift of people reading MY work. These writers have sifted through various drafts of my manuscript, pulled weedy words, typed happy faces into the margins, or given me notes like, "Totally not buying this!" They confirmed that I needed to cut pages from the beginning, rewrite the murky middle, "hotten up" the romance and intensify the emotional plot. In short, they've been brutally honest and incredibly generous.

I didn't post goals for 2011, but I've got them: dig deeper, work harder, read more. I haven't been around the blog-o-sphere much because, well, see the photos; you'll get that I've been working on these goals. I have, however, happily discovered a few amazing things via the Internet and blogging friends. One is Darcy Pattison's Shrunken Manuscript revision technique. Another was the third Save the Cat Book and the last is the book, The Hero Within, by Carol S. Pearson, Ph.D. Hopefully, it'll be helpful in learning about character archetypes. I found this book via R.L. LaFever's blog. I've mentioned before that LaFever's posts are a gold mine for writers. PURE GOLD. Dig around over there. Happy Writing and Happy Living, friends.

My entire novel to review using the "Shrunken Manuscript" technique.

All Marked Up! The middle section needed to be rewritten, so seeing what would go where was super helpful. And, I think, by Jove, I got it.

Wound Up About Unwind: Book Review

2011-01-25T21:53:00.000-08:00

"Do you work out?" Those words will never be the same for me. This morning when I woke up, they popped into my mind, and I wasn't at all thinking about getting my bum out of bed to exercise. I was remembering them in the context of one of the most shocking chapters I've read in a long time, in the context of the pages of Neal Shusterman's novel, Unwind. Sometimes the most unexpected lines, given the right set-up, are the most powerful.

And, sometimes you don't unwind with a good book. Sometimes a novel stirs you up, gnaws at your brain for days after you've finished it and reminds you of what you fear most about human nature, which is that we are, too often, capable of "infinite stupidity."*

Unwind is set in a future version of the United States, now a country which has endured a second civil war. This time the battle was about pro-life vs. pro-choice. What resulted is that while abortion became illegal, parents and other officials could choose to selectively "unwind" children aged thirteen to seventeen. These teen "unwinds" are harvested for their body parts. People on both sides of the war found this satisfactory, and it's an accepted practice in society. The predominant viewpoint is that unwinding is not murder since life doesn't end at disassembly. Rather, these teens continue to live in a "divided state" and to serve society much better than they did in their "whole state."

To me, the premise was fascinating, but if it seems far-fetched to you, you won't think so when you read the book. Shusterman is a masterful plotter who answered any and all logical objections I might have had. Perfect world-building. He's also someone writers should study if they struggle with creating suspense. Even though the book is told in multiple viewpoints (more than I've ever seen in one novel), there is no let up in forward momentum.

And there is nothing held back. I got to the closing chapters, one in particular, and could not believe he'd taken me to such a terrifying emotional place. Yet, that's why this book was so poignant. Shusterman made it all too easy to imagine a world where people call evil "good" and good "evil." Because his villains were just like us, it is easy to see ourselves, our ugly bits of history and our present disputes in this light. I finished the last page around one in the morning and went on to a night of unsettling dreams (lions killing baby giraffes, etc.).

Lest you are scared off by thinking this is a dark, hopeless book, it's not. The heroes are heroic, and I don't want to spoil the ending, but you'll believe in the good side of human nature too.

*Shusterman uses this Einstein quote in the book: "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe."

Amour for Anna and The French Kiss

2011-01-18T21:18:00.000-08:00

By request, Santa gave me this book for Christmas, but for a time, I denied myself the pleasure of reading it, utilizing it instead as a motivational tool: When you finish this draft, you’ll get to read Anna. The reviews (so many good reviews!) I’d seen made it that enticing. For me, Stephanie Perkins' Anna and The French Kiss lived up to all my high hopes and then some. It’s a delightful book, and even if you’re somehow not a fan of witty romances set in gorgeous places (Paris!), you’ll like it. Nay, you'll love it!

Anna Oliphant’s father has decided his daughter should get some culture, so he ships her off to boarding school in Paris for her senior year. There Anna befriends a group of smart, interesting kids including Étienne St. Clair, now rising in the ranks of my favorite fictional male characters of all time. Aside from being "ridiculously beautiful," St. Clair is funny, intelligent, and also short -- must point out how much I adore Perkins going against type and casting her lead as a guy confident enough not to care that the girl he likes has a good three inches on him.

St. Clair is so enticing that readers can absolutely sympathize with Anna falling for him against her better judgment. See, St. Clair already has a girlfriend. Plus, over the course of the year, he and Anna become best friends.

Did I mention that Anna is entirely lovable as well? The story is told from her P.O.V., and she’s no dippy love-struck girl needing a boy to complete her. But at the same time, she’s vulnerable, sometimes insecure, empathetic and funny. She’s the kind of girl you’d want as your best friend.

Bertrand Russell said, “Love is a little haven of refuge from the world.” Getting lost in the pages of Anna and The French Kiss was a heavenly haven for me. In fact, I reread it a few nights ago when I was in need of solace, in need of getting a well written but terrifying dystopia out of my mind (I'll be reviewing that scary page-turner soon).

P.S. I highly recommend you check out Stephanie Perkins' web page. The links in her On Writing section will lead you to some excellent writing advice.

Book Giveaway Winner

2011-01-14T22:44:00.000-08:00

The winner of a copy of Across the Universe is 52 Faces! Congrats and Happy Reading!

This weekend I'm headed to the library. Between beta reading two exciting manuscripts, I've been doing some research for the next book I want to write.* My local library doesn't have a desk like THIS (Oh, how I love this desk, this website!), but it is the sweetest little place in the village, and it's frequently staffed by one terrific writer.

Happy Weekend! Happy Writing and Happy Reading!

*That's right, friends who staged an intervention and demanded I quit starting over instead of finishing a draft already. An end came to me! The draft is in the hands of Round One of Beta Readers. Hooray! Finally.

Across the Universe: Book Review

2011-01-11T01:26:00.000-08:00

Across the Universe comes out today, and I hope you’ve been waiting for it! After reading the mesmerizing opening pages, made available by Razorbill/Penguin HERE, I know I was. Luckily, a friend loaned me her ARC, but I’ll still be ordering my own copy and one for you if Random Number Generator chooses your comment number. Contest open until ten PST this Friday. More details at the end of this post.

The book opens on earth in the not-too-distant future as seventeen-year-old Amy and her parents are about to be cryogenically frozen for a three-hundred year journey aboard the spaceship Godspeed. In chapter two, we meet Elder, ruler in training of Godspeed during its journey through space. The novel successfully alternates between the viewpoints of these two main characters who have more in common than just their age. Both are, in a sense, trapped, and as their stories unfold, it becomes clear that lives depend upon each finding a way to break free from his or her physical and emotional "boxes."

Across the Universe was blurbed as “Brave New World meets Titanic." I’m not a huge Titanic fan, but I did LOVE Brave New World, which I first discovered in my late teens. Revis echoes Huxley’s book in a fresh way as she explores the larger themes of demorcracy, power and love.

Huxley once said that, “All democracies are based on the proposition that power is very dangerous and that it is extremely important not to let any one person or small group have too much power for too long a time.” On the spaceship, Godspeed, there is one ruler, Eldest, and the book pivots around the ways this man uses his power and the mystery of who is unfreezing the cryos early and effectively murdering them.

Another theme Revis examines is the idea that a lack of knowledge is a form of imprisonment. While pursuing her writing, Ms. Revis taught at a rural high school and in her Letter to Readers, (I wish I still had this in front of me) she wrote about how she had come across students trapped by a lack of options or by their own small world-view. She said she attempted to capture this idea in her novel as she encased her characters in a metal spaceship and shot them into space. I loved that concept because who hasn’t at one time or another felt claustrophobic? Constricted by a lack of choices? Or petrified to make a move, not knowing if you really have enough knowledge or experience to make a good decision? Main characters, Amy and Elder are likeable, layered characters who wrestle with these emotions. These two fictional people and the challenges they faced stuck with me long after I finished the book. Also, I appreciate that while this book sold to the publisher as a trilogy, Across The Universe, has a satisfying ending. But yes, I'm excited to read more about Amy, Elder and the rest of the people on the Godspeed!

Contest Rules:

You don't need to be a follower, but by all means, feel free to become one.

For economic reasons, I can only ship to Canada and the U.S. Sorry.

Make sure I have a way to contact you if you win.

The Time Suck Revolution/Resolution

2011-01-03T17:40:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite pieces of advice from Write On Con was given in this vlog. Author Lindsey Leavitt spoke about an assignment her jr. high band teacher gave students as a way of tracking where/how they ~~wasted~~ spent their time. The technique comes from the book, Psycho-Cybernetics. I recommend watching Lindsey's vlog to learn more, but in a nutshell, spend a week writing down how you spend your time and voilá! You might be horrified at where the minutes and hours go (sucked 30 seconds of my time to find the correct spelling of the word, voilá. ).

I have yet to track my time in such a manner, but I can say that four days spent in a snowy corner of Utah with slow internet service, and, kabam, I'm 170 pages into my first revision of the "Love Potion" novel draft. Also managed to have time to ski, cook, read a novel, play with the kiddos, watch a movie and . . . FIFTY more pages to go, Beta Reader Friends!!! So, yep this means, immediately after hitting "publish post" I'll be going into INTERNET LOCKDOWN slash HIBERNATION mode. Facebook, I'll miss you so. Blogging friends, I promise to catch up on your posts next week. I've missed you more.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL, and resolve to put a stopper in your time drain sink. Love, love, cheer and joy in 2011!

Holiday Cheer and Danish Doughnuts

2010-12-23T00:24:00.000-08:00

Ages ago, in cricket lifespans, I married a man who was half Danish. I don’t remember when my mom-in-law gave me my first AEbleskiver pan, but I do remember her teaching me how to make these treats. The key is butter. Lots and lots of butter. And aside from the special pan (sorry, but you must invest in the special pan), you’ll need a knitting needle to turn the doughnuts. The knitting needle is key.

Pans come in all sizes. This is a larger one.

My recipe comes from a book (self-published in the 70s maybe?) called Delectably Danish: Recipes and Reflections by Julie Jensen McDonald. She collected recipes from Danes throughout the U.S. This one comes from Hulda Sorenson, and I've added my comments IN ALL CAPS.

Ingredients:

2 cups flour

½ tsp. salt

1 tsp. sugar

2 cups buttermilk

I put in hunks of butter, melted it, then poured that batter in.

2 eggs, separated YOU DO NOT NEED TO SEPARATE THE EGGS AT ALL, BUT DOING SO WILL MAKE YOU FEEL MORE LIKE A PRO-CHEF.

1 tsp. baking soda

melted butter

jelly or applesauce YOU NEED STRAWBERRY JAM! PREFERABLY JAM FROM DENMARK WHICH YOU CAN SOMETIMES FIND AT TRADER JOE'S.

Recipe continued below pictures . . .

Jam your knitting needle into the dough after a few minutes and turn each dollop of batter on its side.

Let it cook a bit then turn some more . . .

Then again until the dough is cooked on all sides. Check to make sure they're not doughy in the middle because biting into raw batter is gross.

Dip them in jam and sugar and enjoy!

Mix flour, salt and sugar. Beat together the buttermilk and egg yolks, and add the flour mixture. Add soda and fold in stiffly beaten egg whites. Heat the pan and put melted butter in each hole AT LEAST A TEASPOON. Pour batter into holes, but do not quite fill them. I FILL THEM. Place over low heat BUT NOT TOO LOW. Serve hot with jelly or applesauce. SERVE HOT WITH A DOLLOP OF STRAWBERRY JAM AND A SPOONFUL OF POWDERED SUGAR.

Happy cooking! I've already taken a bit of a break from the blog-o-sphere, but I'll be back in the New Year sometime. Happy Holidays!

Books to Read While You Eat Aebleskiver

2010-12-15T01:09:00.000-08:00

It’s getting to be that time of year, time to make aebleskiver, the Danish donuts we traditionally breakfast on every Christmas morn. And it's list-making time. I've got my lengthy to-do lists. My kids have their Christmas wish lists (my daughter wants “a hug from Santa," so, yeah, I may be renting a costume). Then there are the lists book-loving bloggers everywhere post: The Best Reads of 2010. Here's my Favorite Reads list, in no particular order. Next week, I'll put up my recipe for scrumptious aebleskiver and then turn out the lights on the blog for the holidays.

Top Ten Young Adult Novels I Read This Year (in every case, the link will take you to someone else's book review, so you can get additional deets, and not just take it from me that these books are amazing):

1. Marcelo in the Real World (2009) by Francisco X. Storke.

2. The Sky is Everywhere (2010) by Jandy Nelson

3. The Deathday Letter (2010) by Shaun Hutchinson

4. The Hunger Games 5. Catching Fire and 6. Mocking Jay by Suzanne Collins

Aside: My friend loaned me the first two books in the series mere days before Mockingjay came out. Then, of course, I immediately downloaded Mockingjay for my Kindle. It was a sleepless four days, and I can honestly say that as cool as it was to read these novels back to back, the return to reality was rough.

7. Hero by Perry Moore (2007). The sequel is coming soon!

8. Across the Universe by Beth Revis (2011). Same sweet friend (you know who you are) who loaned me The Hunger Games AND recommended Hero and The Deathday Letter loaned me her ARC. I'll review Across the Universe when it's officially released.

9. An Abundance of Katherines (2006) by John Green

10. Looking for Alaska (2005) by John Green. See how I'm working my way through the Repeat Offender of Awesomeness, John Green?

Top Three Adult Reads (proportionately less because I didn't read so many adult books, though I'm in the middle of two interesting ones at the moment):

Lift (2010)by Kelly Corrigan. I recommend the audio version.

The Help (2009) by Kathryn Stockett

One Day (2010) by David Nicholls

Not even gonna include the Picture Book and Middle Grade Faves this year. Sorry, but I didn't keep track of them, though there are a few GREAT ones reviewed on my Books page.

Hope you'll leave me titles of your favorites books of the year in the comments. Not that I don't have a ginormous stack of books in the TBR pile, but who cares?! Why not add more?!! Happy Reading, Friends, and thanks to those of you (Mary!) who've already given me recs.

Santa Delivered or Persistence Pays Off or Ain't We Lucky We Got Friends?

2010-12-05T22:52:00.000-08:00

“If all my friends were to jump off a bridge, I wouldn't follow. I'd be at the bottom to catch them when they fall.” – Author Unknown

A few weeks ago, I got an e-mail from my one of my critique partners, Sherrie, with these four words:

I give up. Seriously.

She was ready to pull a u-turn on the road towards publication of her novel. But she kept on trucking, and if you haven’t already read her post on persistence paying off, GO HERE! To say that I’m thrilled for her is an understatement. See, Sherrie, you got your Christmas wish! A year late, but Santa is what? Pretty pickin' old! Prone to forgetfulness maybe? Or an over-worked elf just found your request from last year buried in a barrel of eye screws in the workshop. Oops. Either way, Santa came through!!! How old is Santa anyway? Read answer #2 if you click that link; someone (a poor speller? a grinch?) confused Santa with Satan. :) Congratulations, Sherrie! Santy Clause had NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. All you, all hard work, all persistence pays off. Amen.

Santa: young enough to run a marathon
but may need reminders about what's
on your list.

Sherrie is the second writer in my critique group to sign with an agent this year. Two other writers had books come out this summer. Yes, I'm totally fortunate to be part of such a group, but not because they’re all so dang talented and not because they’re all amazing cooks bent on fattening me up by making me choco-licious cupcakes when I beta read their books. It’s because they speak my language: Writerese.

Do you remember what it was like when you had nobody to talk to about a fictional character driving you crazy or about the happiness of finally figuring out a scene? I do. My friends who don’t write were SO very patient with my ramblings on, but it’s great to be in a group where we ALL ramble on about writing and books. And it’s great to be in a group where we not only celebrate the successes, but where we catch each other after the falls. These ladies are at the bottom of my bridge with great big arms. And they're at the top, ready to strap a jet pack on me and encourage me to shoot for the moon.

Hope you have someone to cheer for you and someone to catch you. Happy Monday and Happy Writing!

Photos don't adequately capture Gwen's baking skills.

P.S. Apologies that there is no regularity to the blog right now because it’s One-Crazy-Day-at A-Time over here, but woo-hoo December! I love all the frenetic fun and holy, sweet, smiles this month brings.

Book Review: The Deathday Letter

2010-11-24T07:50:00.000-08:00

So, Thanksgiving week . . . I've got a guest post on pain as motivation over at The Moxy Project blog. And speaking of pain (or, rather, pains-in-the-neck), I've had a week dealing with people who need a dunking in gratitude gravy. Bring on the holiday.

Still, hardship builds character, and nothing builds character like staring death in the eye. I'm NOT staring down death, thank God, but I have been musing on appreciating the time we get to live, mostly because I just finished Shaun David Hutchinson’s debut novel, The Deathday Letter. It’s a reminder that we might live life more fully if we knew we were going to die. Which we are. All of us. Someday.

But what if you received 24 hr. notice that this day was your last? That’s the premise of Hutchinson’s novel, set in a contemporary world that looks exactly like ours except for the fact that everybody gets a death notice prior to kicking the bucket, an opportunity to do what needs doing, say good-bye, right wrongs. Incredibly cool idea for a book, right?

Incredibly cool book. Anyone else (besides my crit. partner, Sherrie who tells me about all the good ones) read it? I loved this novel so much that it’s going on my Top-Five YA Reads of 2010 list even though there’s a good month left in the year. The Deathday Letter is a solid, un-bump-able pick. Don’t be glancing at my book review section thinking I don’t read much either. I try to get to a YA every week or two.

Why The Deathday Letter is such a great read? Voice. Voice. I fell in love with Ollie, the MC. And voice! From the clever introduction to the last page, Hutchinson’s exquisite writing style had me laughing and sobbing. The writing is exquisite not because Mr. Hutchinson is Mr. High-Brow Literary, but because he’s Mr. Mad Skills; he never wastes words and is excellent at characterization. Hutchinson wreaked havoc on my heart with metaphors and similes either beautiful or laugh-out-loud hilarious, but always spot on. No pressure, Mr. Hutchinson, but if this is your first book, I'm expecting you to be a repeat offender of awesomeness a lá - well let's not put that kind of pressure on him. Let's just commend the good, tight writing.

Another thing I loved about this book was the relationship between Ollie and his best-friends, Shane and Ronnie (Veronica). Ollie has a romantic interest in Ronnie, and it’s part of the plot for him to figure out how to resolve things with her. Still, it was the bromance between the boys that really captivated me. Their friendship is a commentary on what it means to truly be there for someone. Am I talking about these characters as if they were real people yet? Hutchinson made all his characters, even the minor ones, seem real.

In the acknowledgements, Hutchinson thanks his agent for “believing in [his] ability to build an entire book around death and penus* jokes.” Yep, there’s a lot of penus* humor in the book. The main character is a fifteen-year-old male and, as mentioned, realistically portrayed. But aside from the humor, there’s also the sublime. Is the idea that we all die sublime? Maybe not. But life is sublime. And The Deathday Letter is ultimately about how we choose to live it, especially when we’re made aware that life is short. What Ollie comes to realize in the end about life, but especially about death, is pretty amazing.

Happy Thanksgiving! Happy reading! And thank you to Angela at Soap Box in My Mind for the Stylish Blogger award. Angela reads way more than I do, so check out her book reviews.

*Yeah, I misspelled the "P" word. On purpose. Once, I used the "V" word in a post discussing a feminist art-show and got TONS of traffic from people Googling . . . well, don't ask. Kinda creeped me out. Now only the poor-spellers searching for "P" porn will find the blog. ;)

Scraps of Honesty

2010-11-17T00:22:00.000-08:00

Melissa over at the always interesting This Too . . . blog gave me an Honest Scrap Award. I'm supposed to share ten honest things about myself. Not so hard because I can do honesty in snippets. Move into my house and you'd get The Full Monty of how my life really is, something nobody wants to see, trust me. But, here are ten glimpses:

1. The very best thing about getting older for me was realizing I am truly not in control of other people, but instead am responsible for my own attitude and actions. The honest bit: I'm a recovering control freak.

2. Before I turned eleven, I lived in New York, Colorado, Saudi Arabia and California. For middle school and high school I lived in Oklahoma. My choice to go to college in California was based on, um, following a guy. I think I’d scream if my daughter did that, but it (the college) was the perfect place for me. I’ve been in California ever since, and I LOVE it here.

3. The first date I had with my husband was to his post-game Christmas party. He showed up at my dorm room worried I might have stood him up because I didn’t go to his basketball game beforehand. In fact, I had never gone to a college basketball game until we started dating. Today, I’m a huge basketball fan.

4. My mom kept Glamour, Vogue and Ms. Magazine by her bed. I snuck looks at/read these as a little girl. Result: Proud to wield power tools, change my own flat tire and wear these (never at the same time people!):

5. Three of my favorite films are The Princess Bride, Babette’s Feast and Fight Club.

6. A favorite book is The Great Gatsby because it’s brilliant.

Guaranteed Results

7. Sometimes my husband and I stay up until three a.m. listening to music together. We also stay up looking at pictures of our kids, watching SNL shorts, reading The Onion or, once, reading customer reviews for this shirt (pictured on my husband, right. Totally click that link; the reviews are hilarious).

8. I am living a life my nineteen-year-old self would never have approved of. She’d have thought me a total sell-out because younger me thought Faith with a capital “F” meant turning your back on material goods a lá Mother Teresa. Back then, I was certain I’d be living a spartan life in the poorest of nations, teaching literacy. Currently, I teach immigrants literacy/English as a Second language, but I do so while living in one of the wealthiest communities in the nation. It still sometimes feels like I took a wrong turn except I feel so grateful for life as it is now.

Photo by Jacinta Richardson and Paul Fenwick

9. I went through a vegetarian phase and ordered sea cucumber at a Chinese dim sum restaurant thinking I was getting an ocean vegetable not ingesting a giant slug.

10. Dancing! Love, love, love to dance. I miss being young enough to go out and do it all the time. Now, I resort to embarrassing my kids during spontaneous “Hey everybody, It’s Family Dance Time!” sessions.

The last instruction for the Honest Scrap award is to pass it on. I'm giving this award to bloggers who don't necessarily have the format to post ten things about themselves, but these are authentic people whose honest words I've enjoyed reading:

Pauline at the Fun Table: I met her after she read an award-winning piece at our local writer's conference. I sobbed it was so beautiful. Her stories are lovely and she's my favorite local librarian.

Kristen Kittscher: This is a newer blog that's always provocative. No pressure, Kristen. :)

Travis and Craig over at On The Fence With Jesus: A pastor and a skeptic discuss religion. I knew Craig, the skeptic, from high school and got sucked into this blog mostly because it amazed me to see the commenters and moderators discuss religion in such a civilized manner. More truth = I cut myself off from commenting because I knew I'd end up writing long emo treatises on one side of the fence or the other, but it's an interesting, non-writing related read.

No Context Quotes III

2010-11-11T20:08:00.000-08:00

Somewhere in my garage is a giant roll of paper that was once stretched across the wall of the home that my husband and five friends rented in college. On this paper, they scrawled down funny, dumb or interesting things people said. Every guy who lived in that house still remembers every story behind every quote.

I write down quotes, too, not just words I want to remember like cute things my kids say, but things total strangers say, things that might spark a story. I discreetly write them on whatever scrap I have at hand and am heartened to read that I’m not the only person who does this. One writer who spoke at a workshop I attended said that he’d constantly excuse himself from conversations at a bar, sneak into the bathroom, and jot down dialog he'd just heard. He kept a pocket-sized notebook with him at all times. He also made periodic notes on the color of the sky.

Here are some snippets from my latest collection of scraps. For some quotes, I know the context, others not; but I think it’d be a fun experiment to try to work every one of them into the same story. What about you? Do you write down things strangers say?

No Context Quotes Part III (yes there is a Part I and a Part II):

“No. I’m not asleep. I’m just incredibly bored.”

Child: Mom, do they make giant suction cups?

Mom: You mean like the kind you could attach to your hands and feet so you could scale walls like Spiderman?

Child: Yeah.

Woman: Just let me stew in my anger a little bit, contemplate forgiving you.

Man: I’m contemplating telling you to eff off.

Woman One: You don’t want to lead two lives like that. Not anymore.

Woman Two: I know, but I’m like Don Draper.

“If someone came to the door and said, “Your husband murdered someone, you’d say, “I knew it. That bastard . . . Have a little faith in me.”

“I did a few uppercuts first and I knocked him down in two hits. Going crazy is the best.”

“Yeah. Church surf camp. Surfing and checking out all the hot girls.

“I didn’t throw that. I tossed it.”

“You get to eat as much dessert as you want. Unlimited. Up to two helpings."

Life is Not an Interruption from Writing

2010-10-27T07:37:00.000-07:00

Let life happen to you. Believe me: life is in the right, always. -- Rainer Maria Rilke

Oh how life is happening to me this week, a week where my writing goals were set sky-high. But I am not pounding out the pages. Too busy coming and going, opening and closing a series of doors: the metal door to my classroom, the sliding door to a greenhouse full or orchids, the heavy door of a mortuary. There are the mundane habitual doors to the grocery, the pet shop and the gym and the chipped paint doors of Victorian houses where my children take music lessons. I open and close the door to my car so often it's like I live in it. Please. Set me in front of the weathered teak door to my sanctuary, my home. Let Life sit still, take a nap behind a closed door. Please. But yet . . .

In between Life happening and, for a dear friend’s mother, ending, I’ve been recording it all in the tiny notebook I keep in my purse. I’ve scribbled down words, images, “poems on the run.” The feeling of life's moments small and large, I seem only able to capture in verse. Funny since I don’t call myself a poet, but this week my journal is full of poetry, mostly bad poetry, absolutely unfit to share, melancholy and brooding as it is.

See, this week also marks the anniversary of my dear mother-in-law’s death. Verse after verse of sadness, but then something unexpected: a memory of her voice saying something hilarious. Maybe memories of my mom-in-law are stronger because I just went to a friend’s mother’s memorial, but I find myself putting more and more of my M.I.L.s character into my novel. In it, there are lines that only she would say.

Do you do that too? Have moments where you realize a fictional character has smiled exactly the way your best friend does? Or where the dialog you’ve given your character, Oswald, is coming straight from some randomly recalled memory of a conversation you once had with a boy named Stuart? Are there times when what's present in your real life bleeds onto the page?

Mostly, my characters are pure fiction and it’s more bits of me versus bits of someone else that seep into them, but this week, so many observations from real life are appearing on my pages that I keep having to stop and jot them down somewhere else. Not all of them belong in my story, you know. But I do believe these moments belong here, in this week, in this time of my life. I do believe real life should never be viewed as an interruption from writing, but rather as that which provides the need to write, the reason, the inspiration.

There's my take for this crazy, chocked-too-full week before Halloween: embrace it. Hope you're having a good week of life and living it well.

Lift This Book Off the Shelf*

2010-10-20T08:43:00.000-07:00

*And don't forget to pay for it. ;)

We bring our own personal biases to our reading choices, so right up front I’ll say I wouldn’t have picked Wendy Toliver’s Lifted off the shelf. It’s about a compulsive shoplifter, and since I’m compulsively judgmental, I don’t have much grace for people who steal, well, not for middle class or rich people anyway. But my friend and crit. partner, author Kimberley Troutte, said I’d love the voice. Kim has never steered me wrong, so I read it. I’m so glad I did (you knew I was going to say that next, right?). :)

Why I loved it? First, Toliver created an incredibly likeable and authentically teen main character in Poppy Browne. I didn’t root for Poppy because she was the new kid at school or because she styled herself in a refreshingly different way than her peers. Sure, I liked that she showed fire and spunk when dealing with the guy who appeared to think he was God’s gift to women. But the meat and potatoes of Poppy's likeability was Toliver’s portrayal of her heart. This girl was kind. This girl had a conscience. This girl was honest about the conflicts she faced in everyday life, particularly as she tried to navigate friendships with peers on both sides of the popularity fence.

Toliver should also be commended for her avoidance of stereotypes, particularly her portrayal of teen Christians. When Poppy’s mom, a college professor, gets a position in a small Texas town, Poppy is sent to private Christian school, though neither she or her mother are very religious. Now, I don’t know what “y’all” picture when you think of a Baptist high school, but having been a teen in the Bible Belt (Oklahoma), I’ve got a pretty strong image in my mind, and I think Toliver nailed it. Teens who profess the Christian faith can be spiritual and/or hyporcritical, loving one minute and hateful the next. In short, they’re human. Toliver's characters struggle with the cultural pressure to appear religious. Some characters embrace only parts of their faith while ignoring others, and some seek to authentically live it. Poppy observes many inconsistencies in her new Christian friends, but Toliver doesn't deliver judgement via her MC. The book is neither overly critical of the teens who fall short of their faith nor preachy or heavy-handed about those who don’t. In fact, it felt like a refreshingly realistic picture of the Christian high-school scene.

Finally, I’d recommend this book if you’ve ever been like me, if you’ve ever chalked shoplifting up to bad parenting, greed, lack of morals, etc. For Poppy, it becomes an addiction. I felt her struggle as she sacrificed her morals to her absolute need for the thrill of “lifting.” Her growing compulsion to steal, her promises to herself that this would be the last time, etc. are so like the journey of an addict or an alcoholic that I was dying for her to get help. The subplots re: struggles with friends and guys are also engaging. I was compelled to read to the end the day I cracked open the book.

So without spoiling the ending, I'll say that the book takes some interesting and surprising turns, and I think a lot of teens will enjoy and relate to at least one aspect of Poppy’s story.

Crazy Writer Lady

2010-10-15T00:21:00.000-07:00

In fifth grade, I wrote an article for the neighborhood newspaper I’d co-created with other kids on my street. My news story was entitled “Rosie the Cat Lady.” I didn’t know that calling a single female who owned twelve cats “The Cat Lady” might not be complimentary. I only knew having that many furry felines was newsworthy stuff.

But you know what kind of people are crazier than cat ladies? Writers. They think – some of them do – that their characters are more exciting than most real people. They’d rather curl up with the story they’re creating than, say, go to a concert at one of the best venues in the state of California.

“Forget it. It’s my night off [teaching]. I’m going to stay in and write.” That’s what I initially told my husband when he scored some last-minute tickets to see Jack Johnson at the Santa Barbara County Bowl.

Then, I remembered the contract, the unspoken one that dictates my primary wifely duty: Thou Shalt Be Partner in Adventure and Amusement. I know for a fact that all Mr. Adventure (aka The Husband) really wants is a Ms. Adventure. I know I fooled him into thinking that was me. As newlyweds, we quit our jobs, went rock-climbing in Joshua Tree, kayaking in Hawaii and then backpacked all over Europe for three months, where we often slept in parks and on forest floors because, well, we were on a budget. Beds with actual mattresses were an optional expense.

I used to be fun. Sometimes, I still am, but I’m also a bone-tired mom, content to stay in and write as soon as I get the crumb-snatchers little dears in bed. I like my quiet time. So yes, it’s great, hon, that someone has tickets to sell or give-away, but I don’t need to see the Lakers, the Kings, the Dodgers, the local college teams, the band playing downtown, the play, the movie . . . or even one of my favorite singers because I. Need. To. Write (imagine one-hundred exclamation points follow "write").

“Look, I don’t know you that well, but you should go to that concert with your husband,” a mom at my kids’ school said. If I’d told her my pages were calling to me, I’d be the “Crazy Writing Lady.” And, truth be told, I’m that woman more often than not. I turn down a lot to get the writing done. So, I gave up my first free night all week, and went. I smiled for four hours. Can't believe I almost missed that.

What about you? Are you ever torn between writing and going out?

P.S. This is a great Jack Johnson song and a funny take on Andy Samberg's SNL imitations of Johnson:

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Kickboxing Your Way to a Better Book

2010-10-05T13:07:00.000-07:00

“Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those, who do not write, compose, or paint can manage to escape the madness, the melancholia, the panic fear, which is inherent in a human situation.” – Graham Greene

You know what else is totally therapeutic? Kickboxing. Why? Really, why did no one ever tell me how good it would feel to punch and kick a bag for an hour?! I suppose because, for most of my life, I didn’t know anyone who’d tried it.

Try it. It’s kind of amazing. Amazing, as in I’m signed on for six days a week. What began as a nine-week fitness program to get some muscle back in my "writer’s butt" is becoming my new Object of Compulsion.

Alright, I get that I'm violently twisting Greene's quote to suit my needs. It may be a stretch to compare the therapeutic benefits of kickboxing to those of creating art . . . Some even argue that if/when the sport of kickboxing is divorced from martial arts philosophy, it only teaches violence. True perhaps, but I’m training at a Hapkido dojo which embraces several philosophical tenets including self-control. Also, I’m beating the hell out of a bag not a person.* What I’m practicing is “fitness kickboxing,” the kind where instructors have made adjustments to some of the hard-core moves so that we beginners don’t break our toesies.

I’m also practicing discipline, the discipline of getting my body away from the computer and out to exercise. Turns out lots of writers already have this kind of discipline. At the SCBWI writer’s retreat, I met another kickboxer (one who actually spars with people) and a yoga fan. My super prolific “writer friend” teaches Zumba classes. Another writer** I know uses her running time to untangle plot problems á la Joyce Carol Oates, who said running helps her with this. And while I don't know what he does to exercise now, I recently discovered a favorite author, John Irving, is a member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame.

So, what about you? If you exercise, do you find that it helps your writing, or is it just therapy of a different sort?

*In my dreams, I'm beating that bag. Reality = it's a bit of a comedy show to watch me rumble.
**Click the link to read Anna's cool post on the connection between exercise and story-making.

Down to Earth Writing

2010-09-30T12:46:00.000-07:00

For someone who writes, I certainly don’t trust the power of words when it comes to public speaking. As a student, I brought in visual aids for all my speeches. For example, the Hungry Man chicken dinner I shoved into my mouth for the diatribe-like talk on good manners --- as if a visual for not talking with your mouth full were needed. Yuck.

As a teacher, I never give a lecture without my Power Point or Google Docs Presentation. Part of my rationale is a desire to reach visual learners. So when I teach the importance of having a good introductory paragraph, I show the opening scene of the movie Cliffhanger. Seen it? It's suspenseful even if you have, and I cut it off right at the scene's climax. Students get exasperated, beg to see more, but I remind them that’s what a good opening must do: Compel me to read on.

Wednesday's class reminded me of another favorite visual lesson: the ladder of abstraction. The linguist S.I. Hayakawa discusses this concept in his book Language and Thought in Action. I learned it in my teaching courses. You can read more about its uses in composition classes here.

Or, picture this: You, the writer, are in charge of your reader’s journey. You want that reader to walk along with you, not climb away into his/her own musings. If you give your reader examples that are too general, then bye-bye. Up the ladder he/she goes, head in the clouds. For example, if you write, "My mother was honest," the reader will be thinking about their own idea of honesty or their own mother. But, if you ground the reader by giving specific, concrete details about your mother's honesty, then he or she will stay in step with you, feet on the ground, seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling and touching the story you want to tell. See?

Students get that ladder explanation. Later, when I draw it on their pages, they know they’ve got to revise to add concrete details. Really, it’s the same principle of showing vs. telling.

On a different note, I'm coming down the ladder of Writers Retreat High back to reality. I spent the weekend reading, critiqueing, listening and learning at the SCBWI Working Writer’s Retreat in Los Angeles. I met some great new writing friends who've blogged about the specific details here and here, so I've nothing to add except this:

BOOKS! I bought so many books! Mostly last year's releases, but I can't wait to share them with you.

Be Clear, Baby, baby, baby, ooh . . . ♪♪

2010-09-12T22:41:00.000-07:00

First, thank you all for entering the You Wish giveaway. Random Number Generator chose Pen and Ink. Congratulations!

Alright, so I never outgrew children's books. I'm an adult fan of Lego blocks, too. So, I was thrilled to find some writing exercises utilizing them.

Clarity is crucial when writing for any audience. To demonstrate this, I had my composition students divide into small groups and build a structure out of seven or eight Lego blocks. They documented the process and wrote instructions so that another group could replicate the structure without looking at anything but their, the original builders, written guidelines.

Easy? Not so much. Out of six groups, only two wrote really clear directions. One student said, “Now, I see why you are always wanting us to add details.” Music to my ears.

The exercise reminded me that often my own words seem totally clear to me. Then, I bring my pages to critique group and, drat, readers point out all kinds of things that confused them. Been there, done that?

“To be clear is the first duty of a writer; to charm and to please are graces to be acquired later." -- Brander Matthews

P.S. As I write this, my husband is watching the VMAs, and I'm reminded of a conversation I had with my fifth-grade son regarding Justin Bieber:
Me: Do girls your age really like Justin Bieber?
Him: Yes.
Me: Why?
Him: Because he sounds like one of them.

LOL! The Bieber boy can dance, though, yeah, I did outgrow boy bands and their ilk. Happy reading, writing and getting your groove on to Baby. :)

Wish You Had A Copy . . .

2010-09-06T21:57:00.000-07:00

of Mandy Hubbard’s You Wish? Leave a comment for your chance to win one.

From the back cover: “Just before Kayla blows out her candles, she thinks: I wish all my birthday wishes actually came true. Because they never freakin’ do.

The next morning, Kayla wakes up and sees a life-sized, bright pink My Little Pony outside her window . . . Each day, another wish from her childhood comes true.”

My thoughts: After reading this interview with Mandy Hubbard, I knew I'd read this one. I mean who doesn’t see the possibilities for fun in a novel featuring a sarcastic, rebel teen girl and a hot pink pony?

Anyway, you know those people who shout at characters in a movie as if the character might actually hear? I’m not one of those, but I do holler at the author when I’m reading, as in, “You are kidding me!? Perfect! Soooo perfect.” That’s what I "said" to Ms. Hubbard when the main character, Kayla, opened her closet to find her third birthday wish staring up at her. And no, it wasn’t the pony.
It was . . . no spoilers, but know that every wish gets better. I read this book in one afternoon because I had to see what hilarity would ensue next.

Aside from humor, I appreciate substance in my book diet. You Wish has it. In Chapter Sixteen, I said, “Now, that’s smart.” This is the chapter where one of the Wishes teaches Kayla a lesson about friendship, happiness and being true to yourself. Kayla doesn’t get it -- yet. But, this was where the larger theme came into sharp focus for me. Oversimplified, it's this: it can kind of suck to grow up, to outgrow your toys and childhood dreams, and maybe even your best friend. Do you remember thinking that as a teen? I do, so I felt for Kayla as she wrestled with this and tried to answer the question, "Who am I at age sixteen?"

Why Writers Should Read it: Hubbard creates fully dimensional characters. No perfect people and no utter villains appear in this book. Well, alright, the love interest, Ben, is pretty perfect, but the M.C., Kayla, isn’t, and yet, it is through her eyes that the reader comes to see high school stereotypes crack open, revealing the very real people behind the labels.

This is the kind of book I’d give to my teen neighbors and their moms. It’s hilarious yet meaningful.

Contest Rules: You don’t need to be a follower, but I have recently added that button, so, yes, feel free to make me feel less lonely and more “powerful” by clicking it. Random number generation will select the winner, and please make sure there is a way I can contact you if you win. Thanks!

First Classes, First Pages

2010-09-01T09:07:00.000-07:00

Throat Clearing: The blog has a new look. Hopefully, the whole shebang is easier to navigate. Thoughts?

Ahem.

Speech: Why Should I Care About This Class? This is the unofficial title of the lecture I give my writing students the first night we meet. It’s what they want to know, really, aside from “Is this class an easy A?” It’s not.

This semester I’m teaching an intermediate ESL writing class. Before non-native English speakers can transition into regular college courses, they must pass a proficiency exam or complete our program. My class is a rung on the ladder for most, but it’ll keep them from falling to their academic death, I assure them. Plus, good writing skills are essential not only for college, but for life. Armed with real-life samples of bad writing, I try to convince them of this.

We begin with a heartwrenching video clip about the benefits of basic literacy. Then, I remind them that they all have MORE than basic literacy. Students, “with great power, comes great responsibility.” Basically, I aim to convince them that the writing process is essential to democracy and also good for their brains. And, then we have a lively discussion about why some most of them hate writing (a useful link for writing teachers, I think). Class Two is about overcoming the hate/fear.

The first day of class is about setting the tone, building community and making sure the time spent is worthwhile. It’s the class I spend hours planning. The opening pages of a book have a similar function. We are either convinced the book will be worth our time or not.

For me, finding energy for the first class or for writing first pages is easy. Sustaining the love throughout the semester or when I’m on page 150 of a draft? Not so much. How about you?

P.S. Sadly, Of course, I didn’t finish my summer math. Excuses: Reading! I beta read a friend's novel, devoured another John Green book, and, then, rectified my secret shame of not having read The Hunger Games by blazing through all three books in four days. Who cares about sleep when Katniss Everdeen's life is at stake? BTW, it's still summer vacation for my kiddos. Woo-hoo! and Whew! Looking forward to Labor Day rest!

Blog Sabbatical Adds Up

2010-08-02T22:24:00.000-07:00

“Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of nonessentials.” – Lin Yutang

For the month of August, I’ll be taking a blog sabbatical to focus on one essential: VACATION. Mostly, I’ve planned a staycation, a local celebration of the last month of summer.

Since I’m ~~slightly~~ completely addicted to the internet, I’m sure I'll be following blogging friends' summertime adventures, but mostly I hope to write, sit on the beach and be with family. Tomorrow, we plan to hit the local bowling alley. See, today, my son completed this tedious math worksheet requiring him to tally bowling scores by hand. I aim to show him what a useless exercise that was . . . Hello computerized scoring.

Actually, his summer math book has fun games in it. You read that right: summuh math, baby. My husband surprised us last night with shiny, new math books! Special treat indeed. Huh? Mine is titled Math Power: How to Help Your Child Love Math, Even if You Don't. Surprisingly, it's incredibly cool. I'm incredibly serious. I really do hate math, and this book is teaching me that I've long misunderstood the value of sweet, lovely, engaging, m-a-t-h.

The author of the book, Patricia Clark Kenschaft, argues that our educational system assumes that "math power depends more on innate ability than hard work." I'd never argue that good writing can't be taught. I think with years of practice, those who are teachable, do get better. Yet, I describe myself as "sucky at math" versus "too lazy to learn it," or unwilling to work at it. I know I've seen a question on someone's blog about how many writers consider themselves good at math (sorry I can't find the link) Guess how most writers responded?

In sum, may your August days add up to an august month. Apparently, I wasn't just lazy at math, but also at vocabulary because I'm stretching the meaning of august there. May your month be “marked by grandeur and befitting for a Lord or Lady." :) See you in September when I shall be able to explain Fermat's Last Theorem to you without spraining my brain. In the meantime, happy summering and happy writing.

Books for Young Teens: Recommendations?

2010-07-26T22:53:00.000-07:00

“As we have seen, conventional fiction can be an instrument for examining the world; and, like any humanly devised instrument, it can malfunction. Like a faulty microscope or telescope, it can persuade us of things that are not true. For example, the conventional love-story ending as we find it in Jane Austen can subtly persuade the careless reader (though Jane Austen never intended it) that for every woman there is some perfect man.” – John Gardner, The Art of Fiction

Gardner goes on to critique far more damaging fiction archetypes than the romantic “perfect man.” But, as I browsed my bookshelves for young adult novels to loan my neighbor’s thirteen-year-old daughter, I was very aware of how many YA books I have that perpetuate that very ideal, books where the teenage heroine meets the perfect guy, the guy she’s going to be with FOREVER! Even though that hardly ever happens. Google your chances of marrying your high-school sweetheart. Slim to none.

I’ve talked books with a fair number of teens. Most seem smart enough to deconstruct the messages thrown at them, to distinguish between fantasy and reality. Yet, does being smart enough to see the truth make you immune to the influences of a beautiful lie? The lie is sometimes so appealing. Even as an adult, the only way I can stop pining for my own personal Mr. Darcy after a re-read of Austen’s book, or heaven help me, another viewing of the film (the version starring Colin Firth of course) is to chase it down with some Henry James or back-issues of Ms. Magazine. Or, re-read my own Notes to Self.

Books and magazines definitely shaped my teen mind. Go Ask Alice made drugs seem terrifying. Anne of Green Gables made me hope to marry a best friend. Seventeen and Glamour -- well, thank God, they were balanced out by my mom's feminist rags. Fahrenheit 451 and Brave New World made me skeptical of government. The Book of Ephesians made me feel brave.

A book is a gift. Sometimes a light read is called for, but for my neighbor, Claire, I pulled out two books I wished I’d read when I was thirteen: The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau Banks by E. Lockhart, in which a fifteen-year-old girl refuses to be mere candy on the arm of a long-desired boyfriend, and Because I am Furniture (my review here), a very different story of a girl finding her own voice. I'd love to hear what books you'd recommend to a thirteen-year-old (boy or girl).

As for me, I still plan on escaping into a delicious Jane Austen novel now and then. By now, we all know those books are about far more than romance. But, if you become mired in wishing you were Elizabeth Bennet, may I suggest you rinse the sap from your brain with this genius piece of literary criticism (quickly making the rounds on the internet, but if you haven't seen it yet, well, Happy Monday!):

P.S. My friend, Michele's, husband recently told my sister and I that he fell in love with his wife because she was Lizzie Bennet as far as he was concerned: smart, funny and with a pair of fine eyes. It was a pretty emotional moment for us, Michele, hearing your husband talk about you that way. It would have been for one for Shelley, too (had she been there).

Summer Writing with Children

2010-07-20T21:41:00.000-07:00

This past week I’ve been reading John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction: Notes on Craft for Young Writers. It’s heady stuff, brilliant and beautiful advice that’s giving my flaccid brain a real work-out. I planned to share some of my thoughts here, bust out the big vocabulary to weight my insights, try to make myself sound far smarter than I am on the subject of "Fiction as Art." Actually, I just wanted to tell you how much this book is affecting my soul, give you some quotes.

I had typed this “. . . at heart, all fiction treats . . . our love for people and the world.” This sentiment sends my mind soaring, blah, blah . . ." when my eight-year-old son's laughter interrupted my train of thought. He is the only child of mine not in camp this week. Yesterday, we played Dance, Dance, Revolution together. For hours. Today, I told him he needed to write a story while Mommy wrote. I told him to try not to interrupt me, but he wanted to read me his story, his very hilarious (to him) story. Fine.

"Once upon a time there was a boy named Eugene who locked his mother in the basement because she was being mean to him." And so on. The End. I didn’t bite. Instead, I offered my critique in an even voice, “You know, I don’t feel sorry for Eugene at all. You haven’t shown me any examples of how his mother was mean.” Like how his mom is so busy writing she won't play DDR with him! BTW, don't call CPS. We don't even have a basement, and I've never locked my kids into anything but a seat belt in the car as required my law.

My son set about revising, adding one sentence: “For example, Eugene’s mother made him go dumpster diving.” Now, it was my turn to laugh. As if this child of mine hadn’t begged to get in the dumpster with me! For the record (and for the sake of my hygienic mother who reads this blog), I took my children dumpster diving once at the college near our house. Good stuff is thrown out at the end of the semester. They loved the experience.

Clearly, my boy wanted my attention more than he wanted to pen a story. We took a break, and once he'd had his Mom Time cup filled, my son was ready to write. I was ready for a nap. While I dozed at my computer, Wonder Boy opened a new doc. and became engrossed in the tale of Catastrophe, a cat who plays pro-basketball, wins television quiz shows and is, at this point in the story, upside down in an out-of-control airplane en route to Hawaii. Who knows what will happen during tomorrow's "Writing Time with Mom."

“I think it’s easy to write a children’s book,” my son said when we took a lunch break. “But maybe that’s because I’m a child.” Maybe.

“Do you think you can get this to an agent for me when I’m done?” Absolutely. Gotta love his ambition. Here's a photo of the future author, who already enjoys taking risks, something Gardner says is part of creating good art.

Now, back to John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction. If you haven't read it, do. It’s the kind of book that won’t just stretch you as a writer, it’ll stretch you as a human being. I'll try to put up some quotes from it in a future post.

Physical and Mental Writing Afflictions

2010-07-12T21:46:00.000-07:00

“I believe virtually everything I read, and I think that is what makes me more of a selective human than someone who doesn’t believe anything.” – David St. Hubbins, This is Spinal Tap

I am a woman who is extremely susceptible to the power of suggestion. I was raised by a Doom and Gloom mother whose own mother was a hardcore follower of Chicken Little philosophy. Suggest to me that the sky is falling, and I’ll fight not to believe you, but keep looking up just in case.

Every time a tornado warning was in effect anywhere in the great state of Oklahoma, my grandmother called to let us know to “watch out; be careful.” No tornado ever hit my home while I lived in the Sooner State. I’ve also been lucky enough to avoid other dangers my mother or grandmother warned me about. For example, I have yet to contract mercury poisoning from eating tuna fish. Heating my food in a microwave hasn’t caused me brain damage -- yet. I have not been struck by lightning because I failed to put rubber bands in my hair during a thunderstorm. I haven’t contracted Bird Flu or tapeworms or restless leg syndrome or even lead poisoning from chewing the red paint off of toys I don’t play with. Thank you, Mother, for forwarding me e-mails warning me of these things, however, because you never know.

The problem is that my mom is, in fact, a little bit psychic and a lot wise. She did steer me away from real dangers both obvious and subtle like OU frat parties, toxic mushrooms, a certain deceitful person, etc.

And, of course, as a little kid I always believed my mother: “You’ll get a heart attack if you eavesdrop on grown-up conversations.” It took her years to convince me that wasn't true, that she’d said it in anger. Now, I’ve got my own kids to “teach.” They totally spout the party lines I feed them: “Yeah, Jack, sorry but we don’t eat at McDonald’s or shop at Wal-Mart because they don’t allow their workers to unionize or pay them adequately.” Preach it, my young six-year-old Padawan.

See, despite my best efforts to pick it out, my mom’s crazy (and good) advice sticks in my craw and is often heeded. Example: I can’t use the leading brands of antiperspirant because my mother showed me a study linking the use of aluminum to Alzheimer’s. I switched to metal-free deodorant. Just in case.

So, where does that leave me? Slightly crazysauce and wondering if I am really showing the first signs of carpal tunnel syndrome OR if it's only in my head, placed there by another person who has me under a mental "voice of wisdom in your head" spell: my husband. Holy crow, my right wrist was F-I-N-E until he had to go and say, “What are you doing typing like that? You’re going to get carpal tunnel syndrome.” The very next day my wrist was killing me. I had to go out and buy a brace and then a little padded thing that renders my laptop essentially useless.

Yeah, maybe you writers who actually do have CTS could suggest some ways to alleviate it? I'm sure I'd believe you, advice parasite that I am. By the way, my throbbing wrist pain is not why I’ve been so absent from the internet. It’s because I’ve been on multiple vacations with more unplugged time to come. Gonna be a sporadic blog this summer, friends.

Here’s a photo from my last vacation spot, a perfect place for a person like me to read Maggie Stiefvater’s Lament. Walking through the forest late at night, I was sure homicidal fairies were going to leap out and kill me. If only I weren’t so prone to wild imagination/suggestion!

From Obligations to Lovely Distractions

2010-06-21T13:55:00.000-07:00

“One of the things I learned the hard way was that it doesn’t pay to get discouraged. Keeping busy and making optimism a way of life can restore your faith in yourself.” Lucille Ball

I am definitely keeping busy. Have you noticed I’ve been gone? Gone reading. One of my critique groups is also a book swapping group. Pictured above is the pile I ended up with when we last met. The book on the bottom is a new all-time favorite.

But before I could dive into summer reading, there were obligations. Fellow mothers know that the end of school = crazy time drain. I drove, I baked, I supervised, I painted, I ate, I attended. Beach party. Cupcakes. Final field trips. Gifts for teachers. End of year Mom’s Night Out. Awards ceremonies. Kinda wore me out.

Still, the real reason I’ve been off the internet is romance. I’m hugely optimistic about and totally in love with my latest manuscript and spending every spare second writing it. The degree to which I’m infatuated with this story probably means I’m in for a big let-down, HUGE, but, for now, I’m firmly ensconced in the honeymoon stage and must get back to it. Happy Summer Reading, Lounging and Writing!

Fan Girl Gets a Response

2010-06-08T09:43:00.000-07:00

Some years ago, I attended a workshop with Carolyn See.* In her book, Making a Literary Life, See says this: “In addition to [writing] your thousand words a day, you write one charming note to a novelist, an editor, a journalist, a poet, a sculptor, even an agent whose professional work or reputation you admire, five days a week, for the rest of your life. Then . . . you mail it out. These notes are like paper airplanes sailing around the world, and they accomplish a number of things at once.

They salute the writer . . . they say to him or her: Your work is good and admirable! Your’re not laboring in a vacuum. There are people out in the world who know what you do and respect it."

Ms. See is not the only one to suggest this. I’ve seen this reiterated in many an author friend’s blog, so I’ve written a lot of fan mail over the years. The thing is I often neglected to send it. These days, the internet makes it easy. It’s not hard to go to an author website and say “I loved your book.” And, I don’t actually get all fan-girl on people. As Ms. See cautions, these are “just notes. You don’t want to burden someone with the entire story of your life” or a request to read your manuscript.

Sometimes, the author writes me back. Sometimes they don’t. But this weekend, an author whose novel I adored sent me a full page e-mail ending with this: Thank you so much for a letter that means the world to me. I'm going to print this one and save it!

Apparently, my note of praise came at just the right time for him, a day he was needing encouragement. What? Even award-winning writers get the blues? Ha. Who doesn’t need encouragement? Author Robert Collier said, “Most of us, swimming against the tides of trouble the world knows nothing about, need only a bit of praise or encouragement – and we will make the goal.” I hope you all find that bit you need and pass some on to others.

*I have to tell you that I once received mail from Ms. See. It was a little note scrawled onto a postcard announcing her daughter, Lisa See's, book signing in my area. I imagined the elder See sitting down and lovingly putting a personal touch on hundreds of postcards. Very cool mom, don't ya' think?

The Way Forward is Practice

2010-06-01T00:02:00.000-07:00

My husband has been raving about The Outliers. I have promised him I'll read it, too. All I know about this book is that it asserts greatness can be attained through practice: 10,000 hours of practice or 20 hrs. a week for ten years.

I was re-reading Brenda Ueland's If You Want to Write, the best book on writing EVER. Carl Sandburg said it first. IMHO, it's true. Ueland wrote this (long excerpt but worth it, I promise):

" . . . we writers are the most lily-livered of all craftsmen. We expect more, for the most peewee efforts, than any other people.

A gifted young woman writes a poem. It is rejected. She does not write another for perhaps two years, perhaps all her life. Think of the patience and love that a tap-dancer or a vaudeville acrobat puts into his work. Think of how many times Kriesler has practiced trills. If you will write as many words as Kreisler has practiced trills, I prophesy that you will win the Nobel Prize in ten years.

But here is an important thing: you must practice not perfunctorily, but with all your intelligence and love . . .

And so now you will begin to work at your writing. Remember these things. Work with all your intelligence and love. Work freely and rollickingly as though talking to a friend who loves you. Mentally (at least three times or four times a day) thumb your nose at all know it-alls, jeerers, critics, doubters.

And so that you will work long hours and not neglect it, I will now prove to you that is important for yourself that you do so." You'll want to buy Ueland's book and find out why it's essential to set aside housework in favor of writing. You'll want to read her book again and again, photocopy the pages and wallpaper your house with them. It's that good.

All May, I've been writing like a madwoman, having picked up the word count gauntlet thrown down by a friend. Most of my words are garbage; not all were practiced with love and intelligence, but I count them toward my 10,000 hours still.

I used to think, "Heck, I've been writing since I was eight, I'm way ahead." But I'm not. Reality = this is only Year Two of regular practice. I'm not counting all the writing I did in college and grad. school because I took such a long break when my short story didn't get accepted by The New Yorker or The Atlantic, that it was like starting over.* So, Year Two. How about you? What year are you on? And what books do you read when you feel like giving up your practice?

*you might think I'm kidding, but I'm not. One story. Eight rejections. Long, long break. I've since developed a slightly thicker skin and made friends with people who are like nicotine patches in reverse -- they won't let me quit my writing habit.

Morning in the Writing Club

2010-05-21T09:27:00.000-07:00

This morning I spoke at the writing club at my children’s elementary school. Each Friday, twenty to forty kids (the numbers have dwindled as the school year comes to an end) show up before school to write. The teacher in charge makes it fun for them, allowing them to e-pub a school newspaper.

I was asked to speak on revision, something I focus on in the college writing courses I teach. Because I'd be speaking to kids not adults, I was a bit worried. But, the good news is there are amazing kids' writing teachers out there, and they share. There’s this guy who teaches his class to put the BAM! in their writing 'a la Emeril. And, there’s someone who teaches her students that the writing process is a butterfly.* The pupa = revision. "What’s going on in that cocoon?" I asked. "Big change or little change?" Radical change!

Next, I added in a food demonstration:

“Kids I brought you in some vanilla yogurt. Is that exciting?”

“No.” Gotta love the honesty of children.

“Didn’t think so. So, I also brought in a bunch of toppings.” We talked about how writers need to add details or "toppings." Then, I showed them the picture below and explained that as delicious as this cookie may look to some, writers also need to take away. This will make you sick. The elegance of a simple sugar cookie is far more delightful. Not sure they bought it, but I brought in examples of first pages shared by SCBWI friends showing mark-ups from agents and editors, so the kids could see what a difference the delete key made.

My spiel ended with a page from my diary at age nine projected onto a screen (my young self would have been horrified). Then, I cracked open a book and showed them how that diary entry turned into one of my first published pieces as an adult. It's just a small essay excerpt in someone else's book, but it went from that seed years ago to print.

At the end of club, a kid read the story he'd started based on one of the visual prompts I'd given out. Dragons were coming TO RULE THE WORLD. I wish I had a copy of his amazing first paragraph.

I'm always on the lookout for materials for my writing classes, so please share if you have any great ideas. I teach essay writing, but often assign fiction exercises for extra practice.

*I did an insane amount of research for my twenty minute talk, and, unfortunately, lost the link for the writing process as "butterfly" source.

Rock-lifting, Writing and Hand-Holding

2010-05-10T09:43:00.000-07:00

Auction* Item up for Bid: Eight sessions of circuit training with a super-fit fire chief/exercise guru. I totally signed up for that one, along with fourteen other women. The money was going to our kids’ school after all.

Starting tomorrow, I get to have firefighter, Nikki, pushing me to do one more lap. “We’ll probably hit the beach and do some running on the sand, maybe lift some rocks,” Nikki told me. Could she see the look of fear on my face?

I lift my coffee cup and my fork, not rocks, not weights. I sit my butt in the chair and type all day. We do go on family hikes, but we stop to wade in streams and watch snakes slither across the path. Not strenuous.

Still challenge is good. Knowing people are watching you, making sure you do your sit-ups or send them your pages is good. If you’re self-motivated, congratulations! I’m not, so I’m grateful for those people who keep me accountable.

Do you need someone to push you, or can you motivate yourself? If you need a push in writing, I recommend Heather Kelly’s Monday Meetings where you can check in with your weekly writing goals. Or, there’s Mary over at Writer’s Butt Does Not Apply to Me. Her honest account of her journey to be published and to lose weight is like a cuppa liquid encouragement.

As for me, I’ve got these two Nikki’s** on my back, so I won’t be around the blogosphere much. Come end of May, I’ll either have a new book draft and a bodacious bod or carpal tunnel syndrome and shin splints.

*Speaking of auctions, check out this one -- the one where amazing authors, editors, agents and other book-lovers are donating their services to help out Nashville. I'm sure you've heard, but new items are being added daily.

**Nikki is, coincidentally, also the name of the Texan Devil with whom I made the 20K in May word count pact.

True Stranger Stories

2010-05-05T23:43:00.000-07:00

I forgot my mother sometimes reads my blog. She sent me an e-mail re: my last post. It said, "OMG. Don't encourage crazies. By interacting. Did I not teach you anything useful?. . . Please, weird has its place. In your head, on the page. Do you think Stephen King acts out all that weirdness in his life?" My mom is so delusional sweet for thinking I’m anything like Stephen King. Ha.

Still, I feel bad for worrying my mother with my “mostly true” story. So, let me teach you what she taught me about “stranger danger” by telling you some totally true stories. The first takes place in Honduras on a dark, non-stormy night.

I’d gone out with friends. The cab driver refused to drive up the hill to my home, fearing he’d get stuck on the jagged dirt road. He dropped me at the bottom where the paved road ended. My host family lived near the top, so it wasn’t a short walk. During the day, I’d trudged up and down the hill to get to and from my college classes or work. Once, I’d been robbed of my rain coat on this road, but I still felt oddly safe in a country where everyday security guards toted machine guns. Crazy.

The neighborhood was neither particularly good nor particularly bad. Some homes were shacks, some cinder block, some stucco. The home where I stayed had electricity most of the time and indoor plumbing some of the time; when the water ran low, we bathed with a bucket, but I was there for the cultural experience not luxurious living.

A Honduran army base was part of the neighborhood, too. The soldiers I never saw until one appeared beside me on the road that night. We were at a curve where there were no houses, just mud and bushes. I did the only thing I could. I kept going and started chatting with Soldier Boy like we were just two people walking to our respective homes. Maybe we were. All I knew was that I wasn't going to show fear. In my head, I recited Psalm 91 over and over, that line about angels being commanded to protect me. You taught me to do that, Mom, to pray when I'm afraid.

I don’t know what I said to that soldier. Probably, I told him about the large older brothers who lived at the home where I was staying. Maybe I casually mentioned my black belt in karate (a lie). Maybe we discussed unjust wars or government or Jesus or the abundance of mangy dogs on the road. I don't remember. Our conversation isn't recorded in my journal, just the feeling of fear being replaced by peace even before I reached the safety of home.

My mother taught me caution and common-sense. She also taught me to stand up for myself, to not act like a victim and to trust my instincts. But the idea that we can fully safeguard ourselves from danger is an illusion.

Story Two: 9:30 tonight, a guy walks into my classroom. He’s wearing sunglasses (Inside. At night.) and baggy clothes I hoped weren’t concealing a weapon. His lower lip was split open and scabbed. He wanted a key to the locked computer lab. I told him to check with security; none of us teachers had keys. He left, and I dialed security to report him. Just in case. It crossed my mind that had he been crazy or on something, maybe had a weapon, well . . . no amount of carnales con cajones (my class has a few) could have done much.

The world can be a dangerous place. Bad things happen. My mom’s “Be careful” voice is forever in my head. I’ve passed caution on to my own children. But, I don’t want them to live in fear.

The world is also a good place, a place where every encounter with a stranger doesn’t end badly. My story about the Alice Cooper guy is true except that I didn’t keep blathering on. We had a small human connection over a song and went our separate ways, both of us smiling. Most of my chats with strangers, in fact, have been funny, odd, delightful and completely non-scary.

A Mostly True Story

2010-05-02T00:18:00.000-07:00

   As advertised, here is a mostly true story with some complete fiction thrown in. It's like the game Two Truths and a Lie. Guess which part is a lie!?
   The morning was shrouded in thick, spooky fog like something out of a Sherlock Holmes’ story, (you know like the Hound of the Baskervilles with the creepy moor?). The parking lot was pretty much deserted. Certainly, the security guard wasn’t there, the guy hired to keep people like you away: drunks, hobos, crazies, refugees from the shelter down the road.
   I got out of my car, clicked on my car alarm and started walking. You saw me coming, sped up so that your steps clomped right behind me as I headed for the safety of the store.
   “Welcome to my nightmare,” you sang. I turned.
   “I know that song,” I smiled.
   “Really? It's Alice Cooper. From way back.”
   “Yep. I know it."
   “Cool,” you said, surprised, and you headed down the street but I said, “Dude, welcome to my nightmare. I’m writing a book where a bag of potato chips appears on the first page as a central character. O.K. maybe not as an actual character, but pretty dang close. What is wrong with me? Why did I listen to that 'just embrace your weird side' voice in my head?
   “Because you know what my Weird Side is? Not clever weird, not cool, creative weird*, just weird. Analytical Thinking Side is hammering stream-of-consciousness Weird Side on the head. I thought I needed Weird-Side to write that first draft, but now I think Weird-Side got too crazy.
   “It’s like when I was seventeen and Weird Side, said, ‘Yeah, sure. Tell Katie and Laura if they buy you two tacos and a bean burrito you’ll go up to that guy over there and serenade him.’ And I listened. Weird Side thought it’d be sort of brave and funny for me to come up with a little rap and sing it to a total stranger, a cute boy in the mall. It wasn’t. It was just weird. And humiliating.
   “And now? Well, it’s too late for me to worry about the Chip Character. A Texan Devil finagled a promise out of me: twenty-thousand new words by the end of May. Yeah, I’m busy with my kidlets and this Power Point Jeopardy Game I’m creating for my ESL students. They’re gonna love it. It’s not weird. It’s educational awesomeness. But anyway, I’m in trouble.
   “You thought we were gonna talk Alice Cooper? Sorry, man. I’m a music dilettante, well pretty much an everything dilettante. I actually only know the first line of that song.”

*Note that the lie is NOT that this guy couldn't see my link to that awesome blog (which sometimes contains words offensive to some of you, so be warned). Also, I discovered that blog over on this blog where I've found Cake Wrecks and book recs. and many other funny things.

Book Crush: Leaving Gee's Bend

2010-04-25T22:17:00.000-07:00

I bought Leaving Gee’s Bend a few weeks after I “met” Irene Latham via MotherReader's blog Comment Fest. Irene’s first novel, Leaving Gee’s Bend, was just being released. It sounded interesting, and Irene seemed nice (yes, that does affect my purchasing choices), so I went out and bought a copy. But like so many good books, Irene’s novel languished in my TBR pile until today. O.K., I actually started it late last night, but Gee’s Bend is the sort of book easily gobbled up in one sitting.

Set in 1932, Leaving Gee’s Bend, is the story of Ludelphia Bennett, the ten-year old daughter of Alabama sharecroppers. Spurred by her mother’s illness to leave her isolated town for the first time, young Ludelphia learns many of life’s big lessons: inner strength can get you through the worst of external circumstances; meanness gets into some people and doesn’t let go; yet others are full of grace and mercy; and, sometimes, you have to leave a place to know you belong right back in it.

Latham was a published poet before she turned to fiction, so the voice is spot-on and the writing clean and crisp. Every word does its job, but the big beauty of this book is the story itself. Ludelphia’s journey is a rough one, and it just keeps getting rougher and rougher. But that’s why I couldn’t put the book down. I had to find out what was going to happen to this brave little girl and her family. In the end, which I won’t give away, this is an inspirational tale of a young girl’s courage and strength in desperate times.

The novel started as a poem Latham wrote after she saw an exhibition of story quilts. Latham notes that she wrote three novels set in Gee’s Bend before Ludelphia’s story "grabbed hold" of her. The quilting tradition of this real Alabama town is woven into the book with Ludelphia's attempt to stitch her own story quilt. Every choice she makes as to how she’ll piece it together mirrors what’s going on in the plot.

Richard Peck summed up Latham’s novel in this way, “[it is] . . . a beautifully stitched quilt of a novel.” I couldn’t agree more. I'm a sucker for stories that reflect the strength of the human spirit; these are the ones I want to pass on, but also the books I re-read and keep in my library. This is definitely a novel I'd recommend you add to your own and to your children's library.

*Quilt by Zora Moore of Oakland, Illinois. Part of an exhibition “Looking at Lincoln” which appeared at Eastern Illinois University in 2006.

Non-Idle Threats: Get your Butt in That Chair!

2010-04-23T16:16:00.000-07:00

My lovely, prolific writer friend, who I met at last fall's Backspace Agent-Author Seminar, challenged me to write 5,000 new words this week. I needed a push; she needed a push, so we decided to do this together. Then, she threatened to publicly shame me if I didn't get it done. But yes, darling, sign me up for next week because, hard as it was, words are on the page. Finally! I so needed that.

I need these fabulous prizes, too. Sunday is the last day to enter Sarah's über-cool contest. I'm gonna admit to lurking on Sarah's hilarious blog. Often. I found out about her via Lisa and Laura's blog. These ladies are having a contest, too. I think it involves mud wrestling or sumo -- some sort of video-taped lady wrestling. Seriously, these two sisters know lots (about writing not wrestling), so please sign-up to follow them. I'm talking directly to the one reader who doesn't already know about LiLa, huh?

Wait. I'm pretty sure I hear the sound of margaritas being mixed. Where did that come from? Thirst. And tonight is the big school fundraiser. I'm off to dine and dance and drink in the name of dollars to provide for all the programs our Gubernator (and his predecessors before him) have cut from California public schools. Sometimes, I think we'd be better off lobbying vs. fund raising. We could still throw a party. Everybody needs a party. Especially when they don't get to sit in a chair and write all day. My BIC day = a pretty lucky, blessed way to spend eight hours, don't you think?

"Want to know my secret? BIC. That's right. BIC. Butt in chair. There is no other single thing that will help you more to become a writer." -- Jane Yolen

God Forbid Your Files Fall into My Hands

2010-04-20T00:09:00.000-07:00

Because someday, I’ll turn them into wildly inaccurate historical fiction. Plus, a post on What's in Your Genes, Baby?

Six years ago, I cared for my husband’s dying aunt, a writer, who took care of her aunt, the daughter of writer and erstwhile Cosmopolitan Magazine editor, John Brisben Walker (hard to imagine now, but Cosmo was a literary rag before he sold it to Hearst).

The younger aunt collected research for a biography she hoped to write on J.B. I have her files, but most info. they contain is boring. The good bits are the scraps of paper with headings like “Family Secret” or the stories passed down at dinner. Wanna know how it was discovered that Red Rocks Ampitheater was “acoustically perfect”? Think a scandalous word (for the early 1900s anyway) starting with -S and ending with -EX. That's the story Great Aunt Nathalia told anyway.

The sad thing is most stories were lost or, perhaps more accurately, not discussed. Accounts of how the fire at Walker Castle really started vary wildly. In the family history, there were scandals: probable infidelity, definite divorce, fortunes lost, made, and lost again. But there are also amazing achievements and tales of courage and wisdom. Shortly before he died, my father-in-law told me there were loads of skeletons in the family closet. I think he was inviting me to ask, but we both thought he’d have more time to tell me. I’m all for family history being written down often, recorded in scrapbooks or journals or on video.

Sometimes, history helps explain things. Like I’m pretty sure my Walker spouse inherited the risk-taking gene from the entrepreneurs/"gamblers" preceding him. Want me to wax vitriolic on my man with walking pneumonia who today passed up chicken soup for a Double Western Bacon Cheeseburger? (trust me this is the mildest of examples; recounting his truly risky adventures/choices will give me a heart attack). Photo of the three kids = hubby's grandfather and great aunts outside the house their father, J.B., dreamed would become a summer home for presidents.

As for me, I mostly avoid risk. My own genetic history includes a grandmother who dreamed of being published, but pursued her writing half-heartedly. I don't think she wanted to risk the heartbreak of really putting herself out there, so she shared her work in small, safe venues, classes she took or letters sent to the editor of the local newspaper. Far as I know, her novella and her poetry were only seen by us, her family, after her death. That doesn't mean her writing was for nothing; typing those words gave her great pleasure, and we still love reading her pieces. But back then, writers worked mostly in isolation. My granny had no fellow bloggers or critique partners to cheer her on, nobody to push her to take those risks. Here's a photo of my lovely grandparents in an Oklahoma field.

Maybe every shy, scared writer needs a wild "go for it" cheerleader. Who knows, but I'm grateful for the people who threaten (you know who you are!) encourage me to take some chances. So, do you have the risk-taking gene?

Fictional Needs

2010-04-12T17:47:00.000-07:00

While in Chicago, my husband and I went to see The Second City. So good. Everyone should have such a night of merriment.

The show made me think about connections between acting and writing. During the improv segment, actors switched from one role to another in seconds. Each character had a distinctly different voice and style from the last one the actor had played. We have to be able to do something similarly tricky in fiction; we have to channel multiple personalities, refrain from making them seem the same.

YA author Davida Wills Hurwin was the first person to link acting and writing for me. While volunteering at a writer's conference a few years ago, I finally got brave enough to attend her workshops. I'd been nervous because I knew she used drama, and just forget that I took four years of drama classes, the idea frightened me.

Sure enough, Davida started her class with "out of your shell" acting warm-ups. Then, she assigned a scripted conversation we were to have, something simple like, “Hi. How are you? Fine. And you?” -- something that revealed nothing. The trick was that prior to this role play, Davida gave each person a little slip of paper stating a need or want. For example, you might get, “You really want people to love you,” or “You really want to have a good cry.” Our task was to somehow communicate those desires in our, “Hi. How are you?” casual dialog without ever explicitly stating them. Subtext.

You get subtext from knowing a character so well that dialog doesn’t have to do all the work. Good ‘ole Wikipedia states that, “Character motivations are an important part of successful improv scenes, and improvisers must therefore attempt to act according to the objectives that they believe their character seeks.”

I asked a much published friend if she always started out knowing her characters’ objectives. She did. Surprises occurred along the way, but she began with the MC's need and want, and it shows in the subtext of her novels, in the smallest character actions and mannerisms.

Now, I hardly ever start a story knowing my character so well (the term discovery draft makes absolute sense to me). Do you? Do you know what your character wants/needs right from the get-go, or do you discover it along the way?

Rejection Royalty

2010-04-06T09:23:00.000-07:00

I interrupt my regularly scheduled weekly post (once a week is what it comes to when I get busy ~~piling work on~~ motivating my ESL students) to mention this challenge over at Bo’s Café Life.

If you don’t daily snort coffee out your nose laughing at Bo’s writing adventures/misadventures, I highly recommend the pleasure (of laughter not snorting). Creator Wayne Pollard is hosting a contest rewarding persistence. He/She with the most rejections so far this year wins a cool prize.

Me? I am neither brave enough nor prolific enough to have received any rejections this year. Yet. Wait. Is that true? I think it is, but we don’t talk about what is out and about, under consideration/no longer under consideration on this blog because OMG, the agents/editors might stop by. No seriously. I defer to the Shark’s advice on this one. Lucky, unlucky and unlikely events could happen. Best be prepared with a post containing the word "piss". So need to clean up the blog. :) Seriously, my only advice on rejection is that when you send out, count on it, AND find yourself some empathetic writers to cheer you up/on. Raises bottle glass to amazing writer friends.

Speaking of fear-inducing things like rejection, I had two scary dreams. Prepare yourself for the dream sequence. The first occurred after staying up to read Marcelo and The Real World by Franciso X. Stork. I dreamed I was wiping tears away as I told my agent that I’d never write anything even close to as beautiful as Marcelo. “It deals with big issues: justice and good vs. evil, judgement and grace,” I said. Then, I realized this doe-eyed woman was NOT my agent. She was just considering my work, and I was blowing my nose into a hankie, telling her what a hack I was. In the real world vs. dream one, let me highly recommend Marcelo; great book.

Dream two: an evil bully named Billy Collins was picking on my kid. So, sorry to the Billy Collins. Love ya and your Osso Bucco. This weird dream resulted from horrifying tidbit/party conversation with a smart, hip M.F.A. student, something to the effect that Mr. Collins is disparaged by her prof. I had to think back to who it was my writing professors disparaged; someone's always out of fashion to somebody. That writing world is full of snark, but also kindness, generosity and loads to laugh at. Have fun, my dear writing friends. En-lots of-joy I send thee to thy keyboards whither I shalt go myself.

April is the Coolest Month

2010-04-04T22:03:00.000-07:00

For Poetry. It's National Poetry Month. I love to read poetry. I love to write it, probably because I make no claims that I can write it well; hence, no pressure. It's been years since anyone actually graded or judged a poem of mine. Hmm, the freedom of not producing the grad. school poetry workshop chapbook. What was I thinking?

So, in celebration of N.P.M. and the fact that I've declared April to be my own personal Kill It Month, as in murder the fear of judgement, experiment more, get naked, etc. writing wise, here's one from my hard drive archives. Nikki, you 'showed me yours; I'm showing you mine.'

Feel free to post your own poem in the comments, and go read yourself some T.S. Eliot, Marianne Moore, Ginsberg or whomever you fancy. My current poetry crush is on this guy (you have to scroll down to his Poetic Facts because a direct link was impossible, but it's worth it).

At the Nunnery

You look sideways at me

mischief in your eyes,

brows raised,

code for, Are you thinking

what I'm thinking?

I am, of course, but I have to look

away, stifle a laugh.

We must sit silently,

chew silently,

pass plates silently,

contemplate God.

Silently.

Complete silence at meals?

No, too much to ask

the abbess thinks,

so a nun shall read aloud,

ease our unease and

direct our thoughts heavenward.

“God,” your eyes say,

“Are you hearing what

this woman is reading?”

I am.

She has not chosen

Scripture or Saint Augustine,

But a titillating romance:

In the walled garden

Her hair flows onto her bosom,

Her face flushed, her body

Afire. Eyes hungry for the sight of . . .

I glance at you,

your body convulsing

with laughter forced

to be silent.

Look away

or lose it, too,

the nuns, pretending

not to notice.

Eyes hungry for the sight of . . .

Who? Wait.

For the sight of God?

Later,

having to sleep away

from you, alone in the women's quarters,

The silence swallows me,

and I wonder

how we laughed at such desire.

LMAO in Chicago w/B.C.s and a B.A.D.

2010-03-29T20:45:00.000-07:00

My husband and sons came back to the hotel this morning with Dunkin’ Donuts and the news that, “Hey Mom, it’s 32 degrees outside.” Great. I think it’s 78º back home, but we’re spending spring break in Chicago. My husband thought it’d be fun for us to fly out and join him when his conference was over.

Fun? Yes. Cold? Of course. Exhausting? That too. “O.K. I’m glad you got your city legs so fast, but can we take a cab?” My husband was not amused by that question. We cannot take a cab. We have city subway/bus passes. Fine. Turned out to be just as well since riding on the “L” train is a daily highlight for the kids. Still, my poor boot-clad feet have trod many indoor miles. Hours at the Field Museum, the Children’s Museum, up and down Navy Pier.

There are lots of impressive things to see here. Yet, like my children, my vacation highlights so far are simple things. Example: invented game while waiting close to an hour for a table at Famous Pizzeria. Middle Son and I waited in a different spot than the rest of our family because, yes, it’s just not worth it to constantly tell our boys, “Stop karate-kicking/wrestling/fighting.” Separation is preferable.

So, M.S. and I stood at a distance and played a word game using various signs hanging in the window. The rules are 1) pick a sign and 2) make as many words as you can out of its letters. Being the Boggle and Scrabble lover I am, I expected to play dumb a bit, give the boy a chance, but for the neon “Amstel Light” sign, my eight-year old immediately shouted the word stealth. For Zagat Rated, the first word he spat out was target. He wants to be a ninja when he grows up, BTW.

“You’re really good with words,” I told him. Well yeah, at dinner, we discovered that he and his brother had created their own “code language” using invented acronyms. “Dad is a B.A.D."

“Bad-ass dude?” their father asked. They howled with laughter and said, “No, bald aggressive dude.” We all howled at that. “No offense, Dad. We weren’t actually thinking of you when we made that one up.”

“And, Mom is an M.O.F.C.” That one means Master of the Fart Clan. Lovely. For the record, they weren’t really thinking of dear me when they came up with that.

Unfortunately, this conversation was followed by my little girl's attempt to write "I love pizza" on the walls (graffiti is encouraged at this eatery), but she reversed the Zs and the A sort of disappeared under the word. "She just wrote 'I love piss'," my son whispered.

"Tell her and you're doomed." To make up for not letting him laugh at that, I pointed out the sign in our hotel that said, "Poo and Fitness Center Fourth Floor. Some other person had scratched out the "L". Darling, Mommy promises to take you to the Poo and Fitness Center tomorrow. Is anyone really surprised how well bathroom humor books sell to young boys?

Changing the subject to lovely words, I saw some amazing subway poetry. I vowed to remember three beautiful lines about lifting the blanket of fog off of . . . what was is it? Off the master of the fart clan? It’s going to be a long week. And blogging friends, my husband has scheduled every day with more museums, activities and fun, but I'll check your posts when I can. Wishing you a week filled with beautiful words!

Yammering and Hammering

2010-03-24T08:44:00.000-07:00

My father never read a storybook to me without putting on different voices for each character. This week, he’s visiting, and I almost cried (sentimental, happy tears) when my daughter crawled into his lap and he read her a Sesame Street book doing a perfect impersonation of Cookie Monster.

It’s a powerful memory-inducing elixir to see my father with my own children. He gives my middle son a few baseball pointers, and I remember him teaching me how to hit, how to stand, how to hold the bat. He gives my daughter a turn at the mixing bowl, and I recall him teaching me how to cook a perfect omelet.

For days, I’ve been thinking of how much my father has taught me. Because of Dad, minor plumbing issues like sinks and garbage disposals are no problem. O.K. I did give myself a black eye on the last sink repair, but that’s because I was so dang excited I’d fixed it, I leaped up and caught my eye on the corner of the pedestal basin. Taking apart my dryer was a bigger challenge. I only got it working for two days before it broke again, but I did get it working. My Mr. Fix-it Father is the reason hardware stores are right up there with book stores in terms of places where I’m thrilled to lose myself for a few hours.

So, this week Dad and I have been yammering (the man loves to talk) and hammering (he can’t come visit my house without fixing at least one thing). When, I finally had to say, “Dad, I gotta grade some papers,” he went into the living room and tinkered with the erector set. Here you go, kiddos, it’s a sawmill just like the one Grandad built as a boy. Yes, it's motorized and it works but the "blade" isn't sharp enough to actually cut. We hope.

Dad has made us a large pot of coffee, and is gearing up for another story, so I'm off to listen. Happy world building to my fiction writer friends. I’ll be immersed in "memoir" all week. My Eagle Scout dad flew spy planes in Vietnam and jets with gold-plated sinks for oil sheiks in Arabia, so believe me, the man has some stories . . .

Combatting Piss Poor Writing via Imaginary Battle Games

2010-03-17T09:16:00.000-07:00

These are not real clovers, not the Irish kind. This is a patch of sour grass we pass on the walk to my children's school. For three years, a group of kids would stop to pick out a strand or clump to chew on. Then one day, some grumpy mother, Elvira, (not her real name) said, “You know, dogs pee in that.” The older kids were grossed out. Fun over. For the younger kids, sour-grass joy is salvageable. Every day I point out dog-free spots in the mass of weeds. “No way would a dog pee on that part. Go ahead.” I mean, I have never seen a dog in the sour grass patch. Ever.

So often in life, things that were once fun lose their appeal. I get that my “chewing sour grass as ultimate fun” image is sad. But, I’m tapped out. Writing, once fun, has lost its appeal for the moment. No Elvira came along to discourage me. It was me, me spending virtually every free minute revising the same six chapters for a week. I’m not worried that writing will never be fun again. I just know that when I feel like all I’m doing is typing things more suited for lining a litter box than for publication, it’s time for a break time for, say, a game of Capture the Flag.

Here’s a shot of my foot, agonizingly close to the enemy “flag” (we used light sabers). I was tagged and frozen before I could grasp it. My husband, stood nearby “frozen,” but quaking with laughter. And here’s a shot of the son who took me out of the game, triumphantly heading off to help his brother take our flag, though our daughter guarded it long and well.

My day off set me back from meeting a personal revision deadline, but writing is not my full-time job; it’s not even my part-time job. I treat it like work in terms of the hours I devote to it, but I’d forgotten the importance of taking a day off. I’m raising my Shamrock Shake (so much better than green beer) and saying cheers to a holiday. Maybe you need a day off, too. If so, happy break or happy writing. And thank you to Megan over at On Beyond Words & Pictures for giving me a One Lovely Blog award – I haven’t forgotten I’m supposed to pass that on!

So Much to Learn, So Little Time

2010-03-09T09:11:00.000-08:00

My online writing class is close to an end. One last week of workshop via chat, submitting pages and reading classmates’ work. The upside will be not having 100+ pages to read and critique each week; the downside is I’ll miss those pages, those stories, those writers who put up with the occasional dumb joke I made during chat and who gave me such great feedback.

Then, there’s my teacher. In a word: generous. Still, the fact that she's an actual editor was more than a little frightening. I had to make myself NOT think too much about how this woman who comments on the books of famous authors’ was also commenting on my rough mess (the rough mess I'd spend hours on before posting). I tried to remember that I signed up to learn, that if I worried obsessively about ways I was gonna trip up, I’d take no risks. I did NOT risk posting chapters of my "Yetis go to Vegas" book, but I did play with some plots and get some new ideas.

And, I learned these things (I hope they’re helpful reminders if you’ve already mastered them):

A scene should incorporate all five senses, but definitely more than one.
Talking heads are bad. If you’ve got dialog, you need to show what’s going on with the characters physically, too.
Virtually every page will have at least one word to delete.
A character can’t just report on external events; he/she needs to have some emotional reaction.
If ten people have the same question/concern, LISTEN! (o.k. maybe listen if it’s just two, but definitely when the whole class sees an issue).
The writing community is generous; people want your work to get better, want to help you make it the best you can. I’ve experienced this one before, but it never gets old.

Kids' Books, Basketball and Other Objects of my Affection

2010-02-28T21:38:00.000-08:00

Friday, I lost my voice. I spent the day giving Book Fair Preview Day speeches to every class at the elementary school. And, it was totally worth it. The kids are so excited. One first grade girl hugged me and said, "This is the best day ever!" Yeah, the book fair hasn't even started. She doesn't even know that Clifford the Big Red Dog will be at school to greet her this week. The sixth graders nearly mobbed me when I went into their classrooms to seek volunteers for the dress-as-the-dog job. Who knew they'd be vying for that role? Their teachers had to split the job into multiple shifts.

So, for the next couple of days, I'll still be in book fair mode. I've got a local author coming in on Tuesday, and one kid squealed with fan-girl delight when I announced that. Seeing as children's books are something I haven't outgrown reading, I'm pretty excited about this whole B.F. event, too.

And speaking of things not-outgrown, my 6'9"tall, getting "old" husband can still dunk. Today, he came home with a piece of the glass from the backboard he broke. That might've been cool had he been in an NBA game, but yeah, now we're buying a new board for the community center. O.K. clearly I still think it's kind of cool.

Here's some pics. of our Book Fair (nearly ready for the kids) and one of the Still-Got-It-Dunking-Machine:

P.S. The guy pictured here was once offered a book deal for a non-fiction software book. He turned it down. Apparently, not every one cares about being published . . . :)

Book Fair Mania and Ginger Tea

2010-02-23T10:26:00.000-08:00

Sunday my head cold and I went downhill skiing. Not too strenuous since we mostly stayed on the bunny slopes with my children and took a long lunch at the grill to mack down on some seriously delicious jalapeño nachos. Sinuses love spicy chiles.

But yeah, I’m still paying for it. The head cold is dominating. I’m way below half health as I head into Book Fair Mania. “Don’t even complain. You signed up for it,” my husband said. I did. I willingly signed up to co-chair the school’s book fair. At a school full of über moms/über volunteers. These women were lawyers, architects, professors and published novelists before turning their talents towards transforming an elementary school into a powerhouse of fun and academic excellence.

Apparently, our book fair is NOT just about the books. It’s about the décor, the cool contests involving surveys and the tallying of gum balls. It's about the special lunch and breakfast hosting so parents can come and eat with their child/children, buy them a book or two or twelve.

“Should we say your goal is $9,000?” my sales rep. asked. Why not. It’s a three-day fair at a school with less than two-hundred students, but sure. Go big. It's already HUGE.

Aside from the upcoming book fair, which eats up four hour a day right now, I’m grading the five-page, mostly short answer test I gave my students. I signed up for that, too. And motherhood and wifedom and writing class and all the stuff that promises to create a perfect storm only because I require clear lungs and minimal sleep to get it done. Minimal sleep and maximum gratitude. That’s the other thing that makes life doable: an attitude of gratitude vs. complaining.

My amazing Snow Day Family Sunday did give me loads of gratitude. So, yeah, let me try and readjust my Book Fair attitude here and think how grateful I am for this event, how much I loved it as a kid, how I’ve still got the copy of Doctor Doolittle I bought for one riyal at Dhahran School in Saudi Arabia (does that look like a desert to you? We had sandbox yards one day and grass the next) . . . Alright, back to planning.

Goal X'ed Out

2010-02-16T10:42:00.000-08:00

My husband writes his goals for the year on index cards and tapes them to our bathroom mirror. It’s a big enough mirror, and this is the downstairs bathroom with the brown sink, pink toilet and dried-lizard-turd colored tiles. Index cards hardly hurt the décor.

Last year, I followed my husband's lead and taped up my goal cards. One said: Send out more short stories. Actually get one accepted. I finally did! I have a backlog of short stories since I write them when I take breaks from my NIPs (Novels-in-Progress). I also rewrite a certain YA of mine into a Zombie novel whenever I'm stuck, but that’s another story.

Anyway, I am happy to announce that in my blog's “Links to My Writing” section, the –s ending indicating the plural, as in more than one link, is NO LONGER A LIE. Check out my new link to my new story in Literary Mama. This is a journal I loved long before they published my piece, so that made it extra awesome for me.

The story is about a married mom who has a bad habit of stalking her ex on Facebook. Yeah, that would NOT be me because my ex-boyfriends and I are not on Facebook Friend terms. I've done internet stalking once or twice, though. So have you. Right? Really? O.K., me neither, but where my fiction gets close to fact is that the mom in the story narrates her status updates internally and thinks of herself in the third person. Lori Walker has totally done that.

Powering Up to Write

2010-02-12T08:45:00.000-08:00

This is Radish. Radish is a major character in my son's game, Stuffed Animal Wars. I don't exactly know the rules, but my child moves Radish, Oliver the Puppy (pictured below) and other "warriors" around the living room, making his stuffed creatures do flips, kicks and other ninja-warrior type moves. These animals battle it out. And when they don't, I'm told they "power up" in the stuffed animal basket, sometimes advancing to whole new levels while just sitting there.

I'd like to think that's what I've been doing in my non-writing time this week: powering up. Because I just didn't have time to actually write. The night-job of teaching required fresh thought. Most of my lessons are already planned, saved from previous semesters. Yet, I'm often creating new activities, so that my ESL students don’t look at that clock at 9:10 p.m. and think, “Thirty more minutes to go!”

The Mommy Job was in full swing, too: one Lincoln costume created, one performance attended, three special snacks made and toted to classroom Valentine’s parties, two sports’ practices, two musical instrument lessons, one special hair-do for daughter's annual Daddy/Daughter Valentine's Dessert and Dance, and one half-hearted chiding of sons' rendition of a hilarious but inappropriate song about milk, milk, lemonade, and Tootsie Rolls. It was the kind of week where I felt like I was running on low batteries no matter how much sleep I got.

Meanwhile, my mind was "powering up" on all the great feedback from my online writing class and my live-in-the-flesh critique group. It frustrated me that I had no big chunk of time to sit down and work. But that turned out to be the best thing. All week, my little brain struggled over scenes while I chopped cheese and whipped eggs, folded laundry and laid out Valentine making supplies. This thinking time was exactly what I needed. Last night, I sat down and whipped out 2,000 words and a plot outline, all the stuff that’d been crawling about in my head all week. So, yeah, thank goodness for idle "power up" times that help you advance to the next level.

Happy holiday weekend. Power up!

No Context Quotes II

2010-02-05T09:17:00.000-08:00

Everybody knows writers like to record things. You never know what scrap of conversation will lead to a story. Here are some things overheard or spoken to me, little snippets that may or may not turn into stories. Free for the taking.

Oh, this is so great. I look like a pink ninja.

Dad, say mustard three times slowly.

You won’t even know when I’m using the secrets of the book on you.

How shiny do your lips have to be, Grammy?

Can I buy a chew toy for my fish?

I think this toast has gone on long enough. Our wine is turning to vinegar here.

Great. You’re even more psycho on the internet than in real life.

I told him about a million times he should name his mealworms “Breakfast” and “Snack”. He’s the only one in the school who eats worms and kisses girls.

God answers your prayers that way [so directly] because He knows you’re remedial.

Then, the truth is mean.

Your arms might be getting really tired from holding them up so long. It doesn't matter. You keep dancing.

And then she said, "If you get breast implants, it’s not fair to the rest of us."

You can read that to me, but don’t read me Moby Dick.

Boy 1: Let’s get our weapons for the club.

Boy 2: My weapons are my fists and my feet.

It’s just one little candy. It’s about as big as your mouth.

Mom, it’s not about creativity. We’re gonna strike it rich.

Me and Luke have fallen hard a million times and two seconds later, we’re on our feet.

Wrestling bites are gentle bites.

I’m gonna teach you something that’s an important life skill: squeeze from the bottom.

Dream Writing and Killer Were-Ants

2010-02-02T15:13:00.000-08:00

You know how your subconscious mind is supposed to be smarter than your conscious mind? I’ve heard of more than one writing or art book examining this philosophy. Such books suggest that if you go to bed thinking about your massive plot problems in your novel, you might solve said problems in your sleep. Maybe you’ll even dream a best-seller. Happened to Stephenie Meyer – and NO ONE else I’ve ever heard about, but o.k.

Guess what I dreamed last night? Are you ready? It’s big! I dreamed that the invading ant army I’ve been trying to control with non-toxic methods took over every surface in my kitchen. Finally, I succumbed to unleashing a can of Raid. The push button on the can got stuck so the spray of poison couldn’t be shut off; worse, the can stuck to my hand. After I knocked out the ants inside my home, I went outside, uncontrollably shooting a stream of nasty methin, thenyl, killing cides onto trees, dirt, any natural habitat I could defile. I awoke with the story of a mutant were-ant who falls in love with a vampire ant fresh in my brain. No, I woke up to the brilliant realizaton that my friend might be on to something when she said I pen such unlikeable, psychotic characters because I’m slightly repressed (whole other blog post, me and my unlikeable fictional characters).

Anyway, no plot problems were solved UNTIL I fell into bed for a mid-day nap -- hey, I'm still adjusting to getting home late from teaching nights. So, during my luxurious cat-nap, I dreamed, no lie, that I was typing the first sentence of my next chapter. The phone rang (in real life not in my dream). I woke up with that sentence fresh in my mind, and that one sentence solved everything – well, not everything, but I’m good for another ten pages. Thank goodness for afternoon naps and the subconscious mind!

Mighty Fine Read

2010-01-28T14:15:00.000-08:00

I thought to blog about my inattention to plucking out mole hairs and other slips in hygiene resulting from busily pounding out a new story draft, but nope. I’m gonna review a cowboy book: The Adventurous Deeds of Deadwood Jones by Helen Hemphill. This book came out two years ago, but dern’ it if I ain't always late to the book party.

I bought this one for my son, thinking to add some variety to his usual fantasy fare with a story of the Old West. The Adventurous Deeds of Deadwood Jones is about Prometheus Jones, a young black Southern boy who wins a horse in a raffle. Prometheus knows right away the whites in his town aren’t gonna let him keep that horse, so he hops on, pulls his cousin, Omer, up behind him, and gallops west.

The story follows Prometheus and Omer as they hook up with an outfit driving cattle through Indian Territory. The cattle is being sent to feed the Sioux in North Dakota because “If the settlers and miners can’t kill the Indians by autumn, the government feels obligated to feed them.” That’s not the only bit of irony regarding race relations subtly explored in this book, but as Hemphill said in her notes, often the racism that might exist in towns disappeared on the cattle trail. Men were judged by their skill with horses and beeves (cattle) and their “elegant shooting”.

Hemphill’s narrative is based loosely on the true story of cowboy, Nat Love. Her book is an education in what life on the range was really like, and I loved it for this. The historical dialect and cowboy jargon did make this a difficult read for my fourth-grade son, though; so while it’s recommended for ages ten and up, I think it’s better for older kids, even teens.

Hemphill’s language impresses. It’s crisp and active, driving her story at a perfect pace. Of course, she didn’t use phrases like “dern it." No. Her language feels authentic and in step with the characters and the setting. Even the images she uses to describe her characters bring the Old West to mind. For example: “brown eyes the color of oiled leather”.

Towards the end, Hemphill put in some brilliant plot twists. The wannabe writer in me looked on admiringly thinking, “No. She did not just do that. How did she do that so well!” Clearly, I think The Adventurous Deeds of Deadwood Jones is a great book by a smart writer. Much better to hear about a good book than a woman’s neglected facial hair, right?

Wannabe Master of the Delete Key

2010-01-25T08:53:00.000-08:00

Class time! Tonight will be my first evening back to teaching after a long winter nap break. Excitement. Love the night job.

More excitement: I’m a student again. It’s week two of my online writing class with children’s book author and editor, Jill Santopolo.

Ultra-in-the-know Sherrie clued me in to Media Bistro classes in December. We signed up for different classes, so check out Sherrie’s post for a fun story from hers.

The course is essentially a workshop. Each week we post ten pages. During the week, we read each other’s work and give comments (14 students X 10 = 140 pages = me becoming super organized to fit this in to my chock-full schedule). Mondays, we workshop a few people’s pages via chat and get to ask our teacher writing craft and business questions. It’s an intense format, but extremely helpful. And fun. No divulging of other people’s WIPs, but I’m reading the coolest, most creative stuff!

A part of me wanted to turn in pages I’d already work-shopped ~~to death~~, get an editor’s opinion, but I decided I’d learn more if I started something new. So far, everything I’ve learned applies to all my old work, too.

Example: The power of the DELETE key. Week one, Jill wiped my pages clear of ~~all-kinds of~~ excessive words and phrases. And, I'd thought my words to be spare. Nope. Fresh eyes to cut, ~~cut, cut.~~ Week two: I submitted an outline. Hello magical outline. So sorry I didn’t do one for that last project. Having people spot your plot holes in advance of writing a first fifth draft is pretty dang fantabulous. So, yes, I'd recommend these classes.

Happy writing and reading. I’m just beginning Ingrid Law’s Savvy. First impressions? Wow.

Random Links Related to the Word Cut (but not at all in the editorial sense): Pretty Link and/or Gross Weird Link

Warding off Self-Destructive Behavior and Zombies

2010-01-20T09:19:00.000-08:00

Procrastination is a form of perfectionism or so I’ve been told.

The reasoning goes like this: I need/want my writing to be perfect. Yet, the pages I’m going to submit to workshop, critique group, etc. potentially suck big-time. If I can convince myself that it’s only because said pages are so rough, because I wrote them just before the deadline, then, “Hey, I’m not such a terrible writer after all. I just needed more time.” Note how the insanity of the premise “my writing will be perfect” is never explored. The lack-of-time excuse trumps all others.

Time to write that wasn’t there. I needed to blog. Visit blogs. Writing related blogs. I mean this post by Nikki totally inspired me. I was going to follow her advice. When I had more time. Sidenote: Nikki's posts really are good medicine for writers; they make me smile.

I needed to go to breakfast with one of my critique partners. To talk writing, of course.

There was lunch at the Arts and Letters café. Doesn’t that sound creative? It’s actually a café attached to an art gallery. Makes me lust after $30,000 oil paintings I can’t afford. Good news since God knows I’d get out of control greedy if I had that kind of money to spend. I’d cover every inch of wall with original artwork, forget that people can’t eat art. I did think of something good to write about at lunch. I just can’t remember it.

Then, there was research to do for my new book. That went awry. I googled a myth, but couldn’t help clicking a link to wiki.answer regarding the question, “If zombies were to attack where is the safest place to hide?”

Some answers:*

The Mall. The mall is seriously the safest place.
On their backs. They couldn’t reach you.
A large boat or ship would be perfect.
They only attack if they can smell your brain. Put a plastic bag over your head and tie it really tight around your neck. *all answers provided by wikianswer respondents.

Finally, finally, I quit making excuses and sat down to write. Deadline. I really thought I had gotten over the whole perfectionism/performance anxiety thing, you know that thing where you shoot yourself in the foot waiting until the last minute? But nope, guess I’m still working on that. Guess I was lying a lil' bit when I said I never got writer’s block, that I had no problem writing stinky stuff to revise later. That only applied to stinky words no one would ever see.

Book Review: The Dust of 100 Dogs

2010-01-15T12:54:00.000-08:00

If you missed out on A.S. King’s 2009 YA debut, The Dust of 100 Dogs, add it to your twenty-ten TBR pile.

King is the author I’m referring to in Reason Number One on my list for buying books.

Set in the late 17^th century and the present day, The Dust of 100 Dogs is the story of Emer Morrissey, a young Irish girl forced from her home by Cromwell’s invasion. Tragedy after tragedy befalls Emer who eventually becomes a feared pirate in the Caribbean. Just as she’s about to escape this life with her true love and a boatload of treasure, Emer is stabbed and cursed with the dust of a hundred dogs. The curse will lift only after Emer lives and dies one-hundred lives as a canine. Then, she’ll return to a human body, her memories intact.

The sheer creativity of this plot impressed me. King expertly shifts between Emer’s life as a teen in two centuries with a few heart-wrenching glimpses into the character's dog lives. I was never anxious to get back to one POV or place in time, though. Emer’s past life, and her reincarnated life as a contemporary teen girl itching for a ride to Jamaica and a shovel, were equally engaging.

Aside from the wonderful writing, there are so many amazing themes and morals in this book. This is a book about love, justice, punishment, retribution and even the ethical treatment of animals. Yet, because these topics are addressed through masterful story-telling and well-rounded characters (somehow King even made me have a moment of compassion for the ultra-creepy, evil antagonist), it doesn’t read like a moralistic tale. Still, long after I finished this book, Emer and the things she learned about how we love and live our lives stuck with me.

For more on King and her upcoming release, Please Ignore Vera Dietz, go here.

For King's advice to writers go here. She's got a series of posts titled "The Writer's Middle Finger," and they're all good stuff.

Don't Know What to Call This

2010-01-15T08:42:00.000-08:00

I watched the film, It’s Complicated, yesterday. One of the big draws for me was the fact that it’s set in Santa Barbara where I live. And, oh does my city look beautiful on film. Because it is. I remind myself of that often. Even with the crazy wildfires we had these last two years, "blessed" is the word that comes to mind when I think of getting to live here.

Lots of people already know that Santa Barbara is home to many celebrities. Of course, by celebrities, I don’t just mean Oprah, John Cleese, Rob Lowe or the super-models who, just so you know, drop their kids off at school while wearing sweats and no make-up just like every other tired mom. Frankly, I get more excited when I spot one of the famous writers who have homes here. “Kids, that man is T.C. Boyle!” Blank stares. Now, if we were ever to run into Bruce Hale in his signature hat, well, they’d be ecstatic.

Today’s post, however, is not really about author sightings or how beautiful my city is because S.B. has always had a lot more going on than its well-known residents, red-tile roofs and palm-lined beaches. Some people call it the birthplace of the modern environmental movement. It's also home to Arlington West. And, Santa Barbara is headquarters to Direct Relief International, a credible and efficient agency, which sent two million in aid to Haiti this week. If you’re looking to donate towards that effort, check them out.

Why I Bought Your Book

2010-01-12T12:36:00.001-08:00

I read with interest these agent and editor posts with statistics regarding reasons why they rejected books (via Fine Print Literary). So, I thought I'd do a post on the other end -- why I bought the books I did in 2009.

First off, I bought about 70 books last year. To some people, that's a pathetic few and to others, a waste of trees. Try not to judge. I know my own book budget and believe me, it requires that I visit the library A LOT.

Many of these books were bought at second-hand stores, library sales, etc. I utililized the Scholastic book catalog often. And if your kid invited my kid to a birthday party, your kid got a book or a certificate to a book store.

But, for some books, I paid TOP DOLLAR and here's why (this list covers books for ME, not books for my kids and not picture books which I'll do a separate post on maybe):

Reason One: Your guest blog post re: advice to writers was so beautifully written that I tracked down everything else you've ever written and bought your debut YA the minute it came out = 1 book.

Reason Two: I first borrowed your book and read it, then decided I had to own a copy. I knew I'd want/need to read it again = 2 books

Reason Three: I met you at an SCBWI gathering. You were nice. I BOTH wanted to support you and read your book = 3 (2 debut authors and one award-winning author)

Reason Four: I was given your first book as a gift and needed to find out what happened next in the series (the library waiting list was ultra-long) = 3 books

Reason Five: I owed you. You beta read my book = 2 and no offense that I bought your books out of gratitude because when we met, I had no idea you'd written two cool novels, so no inkling of how amazing it really was to have you offer to read my WIP.

Reason Six: I met your literary agent at a conference. He/She was adorable, smart and positively giddy about his/her client's new release. Also, I planned to query your agent, wanted to get a sense of his/her taste, the book cover was great AND the jacket flap intrigued me = 1

Reason Seven: The fabulous photograph on the cover called to me. The jacket flap was interesting, AND it was set in the South (yep, I read 3 books by Southern writers this past year along with my usual dip into Flannery O'Connor's short stories. Set it in the South and it's probably on my TBR list) = 1 book

Reason Eight: You were funny, interesting and thoughtful in college. No reason to believe your memoir wouldn't be the same = 1

Reason Nine: highly recommended or award winner = 4

Reason Ten: Read your work before, expectation of liking more of it = 1

Reason Eleven: Might be useful for teaching job = 1

Moral = If I "meet" you (online or in person) and like you, your book wins an award, or is otherwise fabulous in my eyes, you're at the top of my list.

More stats. for these books:

YA: 8

MG: 1

Adult by category

Graphic Novel: 1

Chic. lit (more or less): 3

Literary Fiction: 3

Short story anthologies: 2

Memoir: 1

Non-fiction: 1

Total: 20 (books I bought at full-price just for me)

Second-hand store books and/or discounted for a library or SCBWI fundraiser: 17-20? I didn't keep track of these as well.

Books as gifts: maybe 8-10 books plus gift certificates to local independent book store.

Books bought for my own kids: 25 or more (middle grade, graphic novels, picture books, comics, series books, audio books, etc.)

More stats on those 20 I bought full-price just for me:

Books by male authors: 4

Books by female authors: 12

Books by non-white authors: 1 (bothers me to see this stat. I was thinking it was because I read so much YA vs. adult lit., but have since discovered I'm wrong and wasn't looking hard enough).

Books by Southern authors: 3

So, my reader friends, what compels YOU to buy a book versus borrow it?

My Reading List is on Accelerated Growth Hormone

2010-01-10T11:30:00.000-08:00

Books excite me. So, when I got an e-mail about Mother Reader’s comment fest and the challenge to discover new kidlit book blogs, I was in. EXCEPT, ooops, you were only supposed to sign up if you had a kidlit book blog. This will totally go on my list of lessons NOT yet learned: read instructions carefully! Mother Reader let me stay in the fest because she's cool with aspiring children's writers joining in and/or her mothering instincts made her pity me. :)

So, if you came here, looking for book reviews, um, yeah, I’ve posted two (will try again, even though I'm likely to put the book's title and write, "Awesome! Awesome and More Awesome!"). Still, I’ll certainly be checking out your site this month for the following reasons:

1. There are kid readers in my family, in particular a boy, who last week read while we walked to school, at recess, after school and far too late into the night. He'd discovered Artemis Fowl. Next week, he’ll be done with the series and searching for something new.

2. Parents are starting to ask me for recommendations. They notice how I seat myself next to their teen daughters at gatherings and say, “So, what are you reading? Why do you like it?” Actually, I don’t even have to ask the second question. If a kid wants to talk books with you, they’ll go on and on.

3. I’m co-chairing the book fair at my kids’ school. Book reviews help us know what to order. And they also help us in defending the books that parents question. For example, we had a title last year that, at first glance, appeared to promote an unhealthy body image and the ideology that you’ve got to be thin to be happy. I was pleased to be able to send the concerned parents links to book reviews and the author website that showed the book, in fact, carried the opposite message.

4. I’m that annoying middle-aged woman who hangs out in the teen section of the bookstore and library, borrows her childrens' books and forgets to put them back, and says, “Honey, that’s Mommy’s copy of Cowboy and Octopus.” Get your greasy-cookie hands off, sweets!

So, if you like kid's books and want to discover even more to add to that "want to read" list, I highly recommend you get on over to Lee Wind's site or Mother Reader and check out some of the links.

An Old Favorite: Little Women

2010-01-08T13:01:00.000-08:00

Maggie Stiefvater’s, Shiver, is on my nightstand calling to me, but first I’m finishing up Little Women, a childhood favorite.

One reason I wanted to revisit Little Women was because in my graduate program we studied some of Alcott’s other writings from a feminist viewpoint, and I’ve been thinking about how young women view themselves today, ways in which that’s changed and hasn’t changed.

In their article, A Feminist Romance: Adapting Little Women to the Screen, Karen Hollinger and Teresa Winterhalter assert that the novel, “Not only contains a potential critique of nineteenth-century gender ideology, but also is thick with patriarchally complicit aspects of that ideology.” In other words, it’s not all about feminism.

I found this to be very true. Alcott’s biographical writings show that she was under tremendous pressure to marry Jo off in her sequel. And in Meg’s marriage to John Brooks, Meg learns “that a woman’s happiest kingdom is her home, her highest honor the art of ruling it, not as a queen, but a wise wife and mother.” Alcott either believed this or felt she couldn’t stray too far from the morality of the day.

In another section, Jo laments the idea of being “a literary spinster, with a pen for a spouse, a family of stories for children . . .” But this is followed by the telling line, “Jo sighed as if the prospect was not inviting.” So perhaps, the idea of a life without a man actually appeals to Jo, but Alcott marries her off in the end.

And in the end, the expectations on young women today have changed a lot. Still, I’d guess the pressure for girls and women to live up to their society's expectations remains as strong as ever.

Little Women feels long to me in some parts. The writing style is so different than the contemporary novels I read. Alcott both shows and outright tells her moral lessons. One could do that back then. Still, I treasure this novel. It's a sweet portrayal of family life, and Jo remains one of my all-time favorite characters. I look forward to reading it with my own daughter when she's older and hope for lots of great conversations about what it means to be a little woman in today's world.

Your Online Presence is Showing

2010-01-06T20:50:00.000-08:00

I did not start my blog to have an “online presence” or horde of devotees who’d anxiously await my next post popping up in their reader. That’d stress me out actually (the pressure to perform). Rather, I started it for these reasons and to practice writing for public consumption, even if the "public" were few. I was comfortable letting the thing evolve UNTIL NOW. Today, I discovered that I’m committing a few blogging travesties:

1. DON’T MAKE IT ABOUT YOU: I have whole posts labeled “about me”. Michael Hyatt writes (thanks to Allison for the link): "Unless you are a mega-celebrity, readers don't care about you. Not really. They care about themselves." O.K., that’s kind of true. So, I’m going to change all those “about me” labels to “about me but really about YOU.”

I, for one, totally enjoy reading people's personal posts, like this one, this one and this one, but ALRIGHT, I probably love them so much because they elicit feelings of either:
a) been there done that or something similar to that
b) totally wish I’d been there done that, or
c) glad I haven’t been there done that.

Your personal posts are really about me, me, me. A little bit. And, mine are about YOU. Please say you can relate.

2. KEEP IT PROFESSIONAL: Got it, but you have no idea how much I want to post pictures of my geckos or rather, animated videos where they appear to be reciting poetry and/or singing show-tunes. The Intern's post warns us against posting photos of our pets, but mine are somehow so cute with their slitty eyes and bumpy skin -- they truly are.

3. STICK WITH YOUR BRAND: No problem, if I had any idea what that brand was. Amped-up-on-coffee, sliding-down-the-banister-w/her-kids-mom? Slightly wacky reader/writer woman? The brand is TBD as of now, but now keeping me up nights.

4. BE YOU, NOT SOMEBODY ELSE: Sonia Simone explains this better, but this really means that you can’t try to be the super smart, funny, etc. blogger you love (too many examples to link to here). Of course, my mind is running w/a dift. interpretation of “being somebody else”. Ever thought how much easier it’d be to blog under a pseudonym? You could really tell the truth then, just like writing memoir and labeling it “fiction”. Let me confess there are "guest posts" on the hard-drive, posts written by my alter ego. She's quite evil. I want to keep her caged. Mentioning it should be just the steel lock I need.

5. KEEP IT SHORT: Sorry, but I really, really need these words to drive my point home. And the WHOLE point is this: I read an interview wherein an agent we all know and love says what I’ve heard so many times: writers must have an online presence, must be Google-able.

6. PLEASE, NO. "I" don’t show up when someone Googles “Lori Walker” but I do when they Google “L.H. Walker.” That's why I picked the initials for the blog. Someday, I'll want to be Google-able.

Now? Have I ever submitted work under the name L.H. Walker? No freaking way! I only told a few people I was starting this blog because I’m an insecure writer who scarcely sent anything out until LAST YEAR, but I’m getting over it. Any insecure people out there who secretly feel soul-naked when they write/blog?

BTW, I also read you should always ask questions: invite engagment. Engage. “Engage” That word just made me miss Star Trek and Captain Jean-Luc Picard SO much. All my shows are off-the air: Firefly, Arrested Development . . .

7. AND IN THE MEANTIME: My blog is a WIP, and I was enjoying hanging out on everybody else’s and seeing how it’s done. Now I'm brainstorming its future as much as my new plot idea . . .

did you see how many links I got in this? nobody else remembers when they first started playing with the link button, huh? everybody else is well over the honeymoon stage of playing with the basic blogging tools . . . sigh.

Stories Going Nowhere

2010-01-05T20:53:00.000-08:00

Untitled Snippet One:

Frieda is on the stool next to you. Frieda, your true friend, is munching curly fries. She sips a beer. Slowly. Not the way you drink yours.

Frieda’s copper-colored hair is in a single braid, hanging down her back. A rope you want to pull. Later, you will gently yank that braid, say “Ding-Dong! Dong. Dong. Dong.” Her head a church bell.

“Easy, Mells,” she’ll say, grabbing her hair rope, tossing it onto her left breast, away from your reach. She’s your best friend. She will let you drink as much you want, but wish you wouldn't. “Have some fries,” she’ll say, sliding the basket in front of you. But, you are not here to eat.

Untitled Snippet Two:

He stood out in the lift line because he was tall, loud and wore a mini barrel around his neck. It was like those barrels Saint Bernard’s supposedly wore in the old days when they rescued skiers stranded in the Alps. But, we were at Mammoth Mountain in California in the year 2010. Who did this guy think he was?

What ARE these snippets?

Part of the large "Stories Going Nowhere" collection I've amassed. And, surprise, these two are both about drinking which is odd since I'm hardly a drinker, but then I'm not a talking flamingo skilled at wrestling alligators either. Feel free to share your own false story starts or to finish one of these in the comments (but keep it sparkly clean please).

Resolutions: Notes to Self

2009-12-31T13:58:00.000-08:00

and to Shelley, who lurks here and keeps you accountable so that you don't blog about your resolve to wake at 5:45 a.m. to run stadium stairs w/her. No, in 2010, 2nd person you will not have a better butt, but (love homophones) YOU WILL (love that caps lock button, too):

1. Quit slouching. Every passing year brings you closer to fulfilling your mother’s prediction that you’ll get a permanent hump.
2. Think before you hit send, publish your comment, etc. No. Really. Stop. Wait. Not yet. Think again and again and AGAIN. Send or delete? WHEN will you learn this one?
3. Do not try to be funny. History shows that you are only funny when you least mean to be. Feel more gratitude for the clowns, known and stumbled upon, who make you smile every day.
4. Do not use the word YOU in a sentence with “are making me crazy” when talking to your children. EVER. The shame will eat at you.
5. Quit being eaten by shame for your sad inactivity while your beautiful friends are out there lunching with the homeless, taking children into foster care and bringing cancer patients soup. Act instead. And, you are not being cheeky here because you really do have amazing, generous friends who do these good things and more in the world and inspire you.
6. Admit that you are powerless over chocolate. Your life has become unmanageable. Recall the so-recent sickening day of a box of chocolate-covered pomegranate seeds, six truffles, five triangles of Toblerone and an organic dark chocolate bar. Seek help.
7. Recycle recipes with names like Chia-Crusted Tofu Delight. Resolve that 2010 will, like so many other years, not be your year to go vegan.
8. Do not name female characters after your ex-boyfriend who will stumble upon your little story and wonder why you’ve emasculated him. Sorry. And sorry in advance to Allison, Karen G., my neighbor, Mr. L., and any old friends named Steve, Jayson or Taylor. I know you aren’t reading this, but should stories with your last name or your first name (never the twain shall meet) ever get published, those wacky characters AREN’T you. I just love your name. But, remember it is o.k. to tell your husband that you've named a character after him, a character who gets bit by a rattlesnake so that his tongue and lips swell up making it impossible for him to nag/talk for days. Certain people know you, love you and will hold no fictional damage you do to them against you. You hope.
9. Keep it shorter.
10. Live this: “Above all, love each other deeply because love covers a multitude of sins.”

Cleaning House

2009-12-29T19:13:00.000-08:00

This is my loft “office”. The desk hasn’t been this clean in a year. The dot in the center of the window is a spider who keeps me company.
To get to the chair, I had to teeter through an obstacle course of papers, boxes and books. But, I did some end of the year gutting, shredding and recycling last night.

Among my piles, was a box of old journals. I read the one from when I was fourteen and fifteen. There were prayers to Jesus: save me from the clutches of sin and my annoying mother. There were notes about my dog, Lickey, and long musings about whether or not a guy like Anne of Green Gables’ Gilbert really existed in the world. I kept records of silly conversations with friends and a neighborhood boy who relentlessly teased me. Then, there was this: “Snuck out with Joe. Very sweet.”

Who was Joe? It took me awhile to remember he was the boy who mowed my grandmother’s lawn. Shortly before my visit to her house ended, I stayed up all night with Joe, my cousin, Aimee, and another neighborhood kid. I was a gangly fifteen with braces and a bad hair cut. In my fictionalized memory, Joe was good-looking. Who knows. I don’t remember what we talked about all those hours, or why I thought he was sweet. I don’t remember if my shoulder touched his as we leaned against my grandma’s garage door. I mostly remember the thrill of climbing out the window, but I’m sure I was an innocent, unkissed sneak in those days.

Sometimes, it’s pathetic to me, all these records I’ve kept, scraps I’ve saved. I shake my head at the self-centered, sometimes mean girl/woman I was, but I also remember an article by Joan Didion about the purpose of keeping a notebook. She wrote: I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind's door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were.

Mostly, I’m fine forgeting who I was. I have lots of advice for those old selves: If only you knew what I know now, YOU. Yet, it occurs to me that the naive, selfish girl I was at fourteen might have some advice for me. Maybe there is something I can learn from the nineteen-year-old non-cynic who thought she’d make a difference in the world or the starry-eyed mom of a newborn I was. Or maybe I’m just feeling philosophical staring out the window at these (birds do that to me):

I stopped to take a picture of these birds, and now a story is coming on. That bird about to alight carries a message, a missive for a boy named Joe who is trapped in a Dystopian Dallas. It says: Find the duck-faced girl. Tell her the key to saving the city lies in a micro-chip hidden in her braces. See where these old journals, or those pigeons, can take ya?

A Little Holiday

2009-12-14T19:21:00.000-08:00

I'm taking a little unplanned holiday from the blog. Yep, I know about auto posting, but I'm sort of taking an internet holiday for the 12 Days of Christmas (is today technically Day 11? Already?!!!). "Sort of" means I'm struggling to make that vow. I mean I do have to post my student grades online, check my Google calendar -- I'm lost w/out my e-mailed reminders of where I need to be, but . . .

But sometimes, I get a little too sucked in to checking my Google reader, catching up on everybody's blogs, the news, watching Hulu, etc. I get a little, shall we say, addicted. It runs in the family.

Saturday at 3:00 a.m., I heard the floors creaking. I knew one of my kids was out of bed. Probably just using the bathroom. Sorry I left all those boxes for Goodwill in the hallway, buddy. Gosh, he was being loud. Should I go check? Too tired, I waited for quiet and fell back to sleep.

But in the morning, I had a revelation. The rule for our house regarding video games is that you're free to play them all you want on weekends BEFORE Mom and Dad wake up (how sweet it is to sleep until 8:00 am!). We often let the kids play later in the day, but we're usuallly out and about or insisting they play outside. Apparently, however, our sons needed more time to get to the next level of Lego Star Wars. A lot more time.

I checked my boys' alarm clock: 3:00 am. I walked into the garage -- that's where we keep the TV. There were my young sons (young enough to have an 8 p.m. bedtime) buried under blankets on our old couch, playing Wii. "Think carefully before you answer," I said "because I know the truth. Did you or did you not set your alarm for 3:00 so you could get up and play Wii?"

"Um. Yeah." I hope they were remembering that time I told them I had retractable eyes in the back of my head and other super powers. I hope they were thinking, "Whoa. She does see all."

Bye-bye Wii (for now and, cruelly, we have NOT announced the date of its return). Anyway, I'm joining the kids in taking a little break from electronics (except some classic Christmas films) this holiday. So, I'll be back sometime post-Christmas. Hope you all have a wonderful holiday!

Holiday Stories Going Nowhere

2009-12-09T21:15:00.000-08:00

The Bloody Office Christmas Party

“Eeww. What is that?” Leigh squealed. Colton was dangling something from a string held above his head. It looked like a vienna sausage wrapped in a bloody bandage.

He lowered it so the thing was Leigh’s eye-level, and she let out a little scream, swatting it away.

Colton cupped the object in his palm so she could get a better look. “What? It’s just a missing little toe. Miss lil’ toe. Get it? A missing lil’ toe? Mistletoe?”

“You’re sick.”

“It’s not real.”

“I realize that, but you’re still sick.”

He held it back up above his head. “Come on, Leigh. I’m standing under the missing little toe. Don’t you wanna kiss me?”

But Leigh had stopped paying attention to the antics of Colton Dunn. Michael had walked into the room, dressed in a dark suit . . .

TO BE CONTINUED . . . NEVER because I'm not inspired to write about holiday office parties or women who choose the suit over the funny guy, but I've got lots more false and horrific story starts to share, believe me.

Yelling at Earth and Air

2009-12-07T11:15:00.000-08:00

Wednesday night was the last night of instruction for my city college class. I brought salty and sweet treats and we reviewed for the final exam, talking about topic sentences and independent vs. dependent clauses all night. Well, not all night. One girl begged that I explain the meaning of a few English cuss words she’d overheard on the bus. To be honest, we were all shocked she didn’t know these. Sadly, the bad words are the first English words most people learn.

So, after the impromptu lesson on the meaning of words like slut, and other non-repeatables, I wanted to leave the students with something inspirational. I was reaching (really really reaching, come on, there’s gotta be a video clip I can slip into my Power Point) when I came up with this, believe me. But, the story had easy enough vocabulary, so I typed it out, made copies and closed our class with it. I know it’s sentimental, but I’m not kidding, some people got misty-eyed. Even I was moved by their reaction. “It’s so true, teacher,” they said. So, here’s a little encouragement for Monday: think about what you’re putting out there in the world. I know that's something I don’t consider enough.

A Meme, A What? A Me Me? Ahem.

2009-12-06T14:25:00.000-08:00

Alright, since I'm new to the blogging world, when Mary tagged me in a meme, I wasn't sure what that was. But, I'm a quick learner (except with HTML code -- look how the fonts and spacing are all mucked up here). I'm technologically challenged, I know. Anyway, per instructions, I'm tagging Lupe and Emery to do this as well.
1. What's the last thing you wrote? What's the first thing you wrote that you still have?
Last thing = a short story about a young girl finding out her father has been keeping a big secret. I wrote it last night. One time, in real life, a significant person arrived at our front door unexpectedly. That's part of the first paragraph, and then it's all fiction. No idea where it came from. First thing = The Adventures of Doggie Doodles, a stray dog who has all kinds of scrappy fun. I was ten.

2. Write poetry?
Used to. Not so much now.

3. Angsty poetry?
Absolutely!

4. Favorite genre of writing? The short story.

5. Most annoying character you've ever created? The girl who insists on talking to the man who is wearing a sign that says he's taken a vow of silence.

6. Best Plot you've ever created? That would be the plot of the WIP middle grade. It's a secret because Editor at writer's retreat said, "This is a cool idea." Editor did NOT say, "This is so cool, I must have it right now even though it's not finished." But, if I can ever finish it, it could be good.

7. Coolest Plot twist you've ever created? I often repeat this one: character you thought was good/perfect is actually kind of bad, kind of in no position to judge and is, in fact, failing utterly as a human being.

8. How often do you get writer's block? Never. I have no problem writing garbage that no one will ever see (and sometimes even garbage that people may see), so I don't get blocked by a need for perfection, etc.

9. Write fan fiction? No. What is that? That sounds fun.

10. Do you type or write by hand? Both.

11. Do you save everything you write?
Yes and no. I am constantly cutting and only save my cuts to a new doc. if I think I can use them in something else.

12. Do you ever go back to an idea after you've abandoned it?

Sometimes, but by then, it's morphed significantly.

13. What's your favorite thing you've ever written?
An essay about my Granny who was a writer.

14. What's everyone else's favorite story that you've written?

I don't really know. I'll ask my critique group. They praise and shred it all pretty evenly.

15. Ever written romance or angsty teen drama?

No romance except for some love poetry (so sappy). Angsty teen drama? Of course.

16. What's your favorite setting for your characters?

Grocery store parking lots.

17. How many writing projects are you working on right now?To steal a metaphor from this hilarious woman, I'm totally playing the field. The part of her post where she talks about idea promiscuity, that's me right now.

18. Have you ever won an award for your writing?
One first-place, three honorable mentions (essay; fiction; poetry; poetry), and I'm totally counting awards given out by the English depts. in college and grad. school for the poetry. For the essay, though, I won an actual cash prize.

19. What are your five favorite words? I am with you always.

20. What character have you created that is most like yourself? Hmm. Lara Winters. I was SO embarassed when that piece got published and the character had the same initials as me, three kids, a witchy temper, etc. The husband was total fiction as I had to explain to a few worried people.

21. Where do you get ideas for your characters?

The voices in my head. That's right. They talk. I type/transcribe. Sometimes, I do have to interview them, dig deeper, etc.

22. Do you ever write based on your dreams?

Yeah. I dreamed about an encounter between a sparkly vampire and a girl named Bella and then . . . No. Last night, I dreamed I was hanging out with Mark Wahlberg only to discover that I was wearing this wrinkly blue dress that was so low cut you could see my belly button. Very embarrassing. Why would I write about that?

23. Do you favor happy endings?

No.

24. Are you concerned with spelling and grammar as you write?

No. I'm an English teacher, so Ithink I'm o.k. with spelling and grammar. I check it later.

25. Does music help you write?
Hardly ever.

26. Quote something you've written. Whatever pops into your head. Paris is not an option when you are newly seeded with child, smacking on saltines and doing all you can to not be so obviously sick in front of your parents.

The Bearded Mountain

2009-12-04T19:41:00.000-08:00

I climbed a mountain today. Just a little one. Elevation = 3173 ft. Distance: nine miles. Traveling companions: fourth graders, some teachers, some parents and a hybrid Chihauha/weiner dog named Chili.

It’s tradition for the fourth graders to hike to the top of this peak. They reach the summit about the time the rest of the school is at lunch recess. Students on the mountain hold mirrors and CDs up to the sun, signaling the students back at the school that they've made it to the top. There are squeals of delight as those down below (students, teacher and the principal) signal back.

I don’t know how this tradition started. I bet some kid looked out his or her classroom window and said, “We should climb those mountains.” That's where it starts.

“We should climb that,” we said for weeks as we looked out the window of our rented summer cabin in Waterton National Park. And one day, we went for it. Here we are (me and my sister many years ago) near the top which proved to be totally impenetrable scrub brush. We had to chew our way out.

Here is my father gearing up for a longer mountain climb, one of many overnight back-packing trips. We wore bear bells (run Grizzlies run from our fearsome tinkling bells!), bandanas and, in my father’s case, a mountain-man beard.

Did ya’ notice my dad’s cool beard? Because I could talk about conquering mountains, metaphorical and real, the mountain of essays I need to grade, the mountain of chapters I need to critique before my next writing group meets, the need to keep on "climbing," put one foot in front of the other, set the pace, go, go, go, but nope I just want to segue to the subject of BEARDS. See somebody e-mailed me a link to this (via The Nerdist). I love this and the guy at the beginning has a beard ALMOST as cool as my younger brother, Lex's.

And now, if that image freaks you out, let me leave with something more lovely, a view from the top: