Silk & Shadows

Currently working on: Enjoying being done (again) with revisions on sci fi rom novella
Mood: Self-congratulatory

Every once and awhile I get contemplative. It usually happens when I’m between deadlines, which is yet another reason why deadlines are good things. I also have a mean self-help streak which I try not to indulge too often because I don’t think it’s helpful, to myself or anybody else. I’m sorry to say these two bad habits have come together in a brutal session of navel gazing lately.

Why do I write?

I’ve been asking myself this ever since I attended a writing workshop years ago where the presenter told us to answer this question and I had to cheat off the writers next to me. And then, only a few days later, I read a writing craft book that demanded an answer to the question too, and I decided the universe was making fun of me and even the answers I stole weren’t good enough.

When forced into a corner, my usual answers to the “Why do I write?” question are:

• Money and fame
• Casual dress code
• Free books (cuz I write ‘em myself)

You see why I’m not exactly winning self-help prizes with these answers.

But recently, in the midst of wrestling with this question once again (I don’t even know why it’s important! I just remember that the workshop and the book both talked about it so it must be important) I was listening to some self-help podcasts (somebody stop me!) and heard the question posited a slightly different way. Instead of asking “Why do you _____?” the question was this:

“What do you get out of doing ______ that reinforces the desire to continue?”

Yes, yes, I realize this is just a slightly warmer, fuzzier wording of operant conditioning, but I’m going with it for a moment.

What do I get out of writing? What is it about writing that fulfills something in me?

And after mulling it over on a  few dog walks, I decided that, for me, it’s about creating something out of nothing. There’s something amazing about taking words that have no measurable atomic density, no visible wavelength, no smell even, and creating…whatever — and by amaze, I mean “a maze” where there is a sense of mystery and discovery and adventure and even the danger of getting lost. Storytelling requires nothing but an idea, really, and from there you build a world that goes on to live in other people’s minds.

Which I guess is a slightly warmer, fuzzier way of saying: “Why do I write?”

• Delusions of godlinghood

Still, I like the idea of the question “What do I get out of doing ______?” I’ve been applying it to my characters, my unsuspecting friends with questionable love lives, my snack choices, my moments of procrastination, vacuuming.

Is this helping my writing in any way? Not that I’ve noticed, to be honest. Although I have discovered I’m not particularly fulfilled by a clean house and I don’t even need a deadline to justify the impromptu dog-hair carpet under my desk.

I knew this contemplative self-helping wasn’t good for me. Do you have a force you know motivates you, for good or ill? Do you try to encourage or fight it? Have you had any luck?

I happened to see a short interview with singer ADELE up on YouTube the other day. It precedes a rendition of Someone like You, but gives a bit of background on the song.

As you watch the video, it becomes very clear that she’s not afraid to share her emotions—in fact, she pours them into her songs, heart and soul.

There’s no holding back, not when she’s writing the songs and not when she’s singing them. Her words and her performances are intensely personal—she even admits to having cried as she performed Someone Like You at the 2011 BRIT Awards—yet she doesn’t shy away from the feelings they evoke. She openly bleeds as she sings, and her feelings reach out and grab you by the throat.

As a writer, especially a writer of romance, tapping into real emotions should be your aim as well. Don’t be afraid to reveal a big part of yourself in your writing. Dig deep, find those emotions that wring you out and pour them onto your pages. If you want your readers to feel, make your characters feel. To make your characters feel, look inside yourself. The truth is there.

Don’t be shy. Put it all on the page.

If you’ve never seen the series, but think someday you’ll want to, turn back now. There are a few spoilers in this list…

1. Throw them a curve ball: Take an ordinary high school cheerleader and give her an inescapable destiny as a vampire slayer.

2. Pit them against villains capable of killing them: Such as an ancient vampire who not only sucks the slayer dry, he leaves her face down in a puddle. Caveat: If you do this, you also need to give her friends who can conveniently save her life…

3. Make their nightmares come true: Afraid of spiders, clowns, or public speaking? Good. Because all the bad guys can’t be demons. Welcome to the slayer’s world.

4. Stomp on their hearts: Let her fall in love, only to discover that love can cause serious, earth-shattering problems, like awakening the soulless vampire buried in her boyfriend.

5. Kick them when they’re down: Ensure the only way to save the world is to run said boyfriend through with a very sharp sword.

6. And then just for the heck of it, kick ‘em again: When she finally gets up the courage to date again, have that guy dump her after one night of sex.

7. Take away all their support: Mentors? Fire them. Friends? Turn them into hyenas or magic-addicted dark witches. Mother? Make her a zombie, have her do the nasty with the mentor, then kill her.

8. When in doubt, make them sing: Literally, for a whole episode. And while she’s singing, have her blurt things she’d never say otherwise, wound all her friends, and almost go up in flames. Then blame it on a tap-dancing demon.

Fortunately, Buffy’s ego is never completely shattered by all that happens to her–she’s a terrific example of what doesn’t kill you (or does kill you but you come back to life) makes you stronger.

Any other Buffy fans out there?

Currently working on: Preparing for Chicago book tour
Mood:  Scattered

Writing rules start the moment you pick up your first pencil and stare at your first blank wide-ruled notebook when you are, what?, in kindergarten? Hold the pencil like this. Stay within the lines. Make the letters the same way as everybody else.

How is this creative?!?

Ah, but if you don’t make your letters the same as everybody else, if you make up your own alphabet (Tolkien aside) nobody will be able to read what  you wrote.

So already, we see that some rules exist for a reason. Here’s a good example. I recently received my box of new books from my publisher. Yay! I opened the box and…

Oh noes! They sent me a bunch of books without covers! How tragic! Jonah is such a handsome fellow too. Weep.

Now if I’d followed the rules a little more carefully, I would have seen this:

“Open Other Side.” This particular rule existed for a good reason. If I wanted to see my covers.

But the rules accumulate so quickly, it’s hard to know which are hard and fast and get you closer to your goal (“This Side Up”) and which (“Open Immediately” and “Rush”) are more like friendly suggestions.

I think there are a few rules we can all agree on:

1. Know the rules so you can break them properly.

Breaking rules “properly” seems oxymoronic. But the jazziest freewheeling jam session can be ruined by one out-of-tune instrument, and even the wackiest concept car needs to actually carry a passenger from point A to point B.

2. Do nothing to get in the way of the story.

This includes haphazard or intrusive writing issues (from big picture elements like theme vs. preaching to line edit problems such as spelling and grammar) that might interfere with the reader’s enjoyment of the story.

3. Tend toward the clear and concise.

When I look at the books I put down (and the biggest difficulties in my own writing) I see that muddiness is often the deciding factor. Muddy writing leads to slogging. Clear and concise writing (not necessarily short; concise means free from superfluous detail) moves along.

Just like Tolkien had a lot of rings but only One Ring to bind them all, I think there is One Rule of Writing:

Be Compelling

Compelling is a free pass past a lot of rules. Without compelling, even following every single rule gets you nowhere. What is compelling? Ooh, look, I’m out of space That’s a post for another day.

Do you have any rules you follow? Any you break?

Currently working on: Some bizarre futuristic postapocalyptic action adventure thing that came out of nowhere
Mood: Baffled

In the strange alternative universe that is publishing, even though Book 3 of the Marked Souls doesn’t appear on bookshelves until April 5, Book 4 is going to cover conference in some high rise in New York even as we speak.

Here’s how I imagine it is happening:

Editor: We need eye catching! We need hot! We need…the bold hero cover!

(Trumpets blare from the coffee room.)

Cover designer (who looks as rumpled and sexy as the males on the covers themselves): I can build him. I have Adobe Photoshop. I have the capability to build the romance novel hero cover. Better than he was before. Better, chestier, more rippling abs…

Editor (producing Author cover notes with a flourish): Here are the specs.

Designer (reading through notes): There are specs.

Editor: Yes, I said that. These are the author’s specifications.

Designer: No, this actually says spectacles.

Author (appearing out of nowhere, much like the aforementioned story idea and the aforementioned trumpets): Ha! Yes, I have given the hero glasses because I wear glasses and it’s about time more demonically-possessed heroes had to wear glasses. We will be bold heroes together! In glasses!

Editor and Designer (blinking)

Author (also blinking as she wakes from her nightmare back in her bed in the middle of nowhere): Yikes. I had this dream I was in New York at a cover conference. And I wasn’t wearing a shirt…

And in honor of my bold heroes, here’s the first glimpse of my Romance Trading Cards. Much like the Book 4 cover, RTCs are in development around the country at right this moment as romance authors gear up for the spring and summer conference and convention season. You can see examples of some of the gorgeous work at the Romance Trading Card website.

Here are mine, with much thanks to my designers and with hands-clasped prayers that Book 4 is as bold!

Have you seen any inspiring book covers lately?

First off, my heart and prayers go out to those dealing with the disasters in Japan. May all of you remain safe.

As for sagging middles…these aren’t the only options available to you, but if you’re stuck, maybe they’ll spark a fresh perspective:

1. Raise the stakes. Have your hero discover the looming disaster is even worse than he imagined. An example of this would be discovering the kidnapped child he’s hunting for is injured or sick. Or the road in front of the bus has not been finished there’s a twenty foot gap between the hero and safety.

2. Peel back another layer of your hero’s character. Use an event to trigger a memory that is very painful for the hero. This is especially useful if it causes conflict between the hero and heroine, or causes the hero to veer away from a possible route to success.

3. Change direction. Put a big roadblock in your hero’s path that forces the hero to discard his current plan and come up with a new one. A hero always has a plan. Sometimes the plan doesn’t work out. A literal example of this is the escape tunnel that ends up blocked, but it can be anything.

4. Unleash your villain. Have your villain do something really smart and really nasty. And if your hero gets injured in the fallout, so much the better. The best villains are always the ones that manage to outsmart your hero a time or two.

5. Deepen the romance. Turn up the heat and let your hero and heroine sweat it out together. This one actually ties in nicely to any of the above events, because there’s nothing like a near-death experience to stir up the hormones.

If you’re a writer, do you have a favorite way to juice up your story? As a reader, do you recall an awesome story twist that really worked for you?

Currently working on: Unearthing my brain
Mood: Exploratory

So it recently occurred to me — recently, as in 5 a.m. last Monday morning when I was hitting ‘send’ in my email to forward my revisions to my editor — that I don’t have a process for revising.

I know, I know, I have three published books (well, the third one isn’t out until next month) and a handful more unpublished and I still don’t have a process for revising.

I’m not saying I haven’t revised those books. I’ve revised them repeatedly. And painfully. Because I don’t have a process.

See, my mother is an artsy type while my father is an engineer. These two forces play nicely in me, given the chance. I love the art and craft of writing, but I also love my processes. I like charts, worksheets and outlines. I don’t necessarily follow them to the letter (hoo boy, do I ever not!) but it satisfies something in me* to have them around.

I have works-for-me processes for brainstorming and for hot drafting, which I’ve shared here before. But I don’t have one for revising.

This makes me sad. See below for a sample of my madness sadness.

This is a screen shot of my last revisions. In case it wasn’t obvious, the purple is stuff that changed. I’m not saying these were bad changes (in fact, I rather think they were all good and necessary changes) but they look as if the manuscript pages has been savaged by weasels. By The End, I FELT as if I’d been savaged by weasels.

Yes, this is a savage weasel with a cute baby, but trust me, a short story savaged by baby weasels leaves you feeling just as gnarly as a novel savaged by mama weasels.

Revisions for me are hard because I don’t have a process. I read chunks, I rewrite chunks, I rethink chunks, and then I re-read chunks, re-rewrite chunks, rethink some more… You see how this is not a process; this is flailing. Yes, the work gets done but with much more swearing than I think is strictly required.

So here’s what I’m hoping. I hope you writers out there have your own tried-and-true (or at least tried-once-and-it-kinda-worked) revision processes. And I hope you’re willing to share.

In comments, share a tip or a writing book or a link to your own blog post on the topic or a favorite post from another writer that you refer back to often. Maybe armed with a process or two, I — and anybody else struggling to find a way — will tame the savage weasels.

* This “something” is probably the illusion that any given process can make writing — or rewriting — easier. I know** there is no Magic Bullet but processes are the engineering answer to magic.

**I know there is no Magic Bullet, but as Mulder always said “I want to believe.”

When I first began writing, my idea folder was really a folder—one of those manila things that hang in your desk drawer. It was filled with newspaper clippings, notes scribbled on napkins, and one-page starts to stories. Now my folder is a file on my computer—but the point is I still have one.

If you’ve ever had the urge to write, even a temporary yen that quickly passed, I would encourage you to start an idea folder. Why? Because some ideas mature with time.

The good news? You can jot down the gist of your idea, toss it in the folder, and forget about it. This is a great way to relieve any feelings of guilt over not writing it, because it’s now officially on the back burner, waiting for the Right Moment. And the information is not lost. (Unless your computer crashes—which is why you should have back-up software, but that’s another post).

In my idea folder, I have all my manuscripts that have never been published (except one, which I actually typed on paper using a typewriter. Yup. I’m that old). I’m not sure any of those ancient stories will see the light of day, because they’re a mess. Let’s just say it took me a while to figure out plotting and pacing. They would require major revisions to become enjoyable reading material.

In that folder, there are also notes on ideas I’m reasonably certain I will never pursue, because my love for them died. Often quickly. Before the end of chapter one.

Which brings me back to the reason for having an idea file in the first place. In my file are also five ideas that still give me goose bumps when I re-read them. They make me smile. They make me want to pull up a chair and start pounding on my keyboard. I’m convinced that one day I’ll write those stories–even though a couple of them are…well…odd.

So, keep that idea file. Yes, your brilliant notion might bore you to tears in a year or two. But there’s also a chance it will rekindle your urge to write and motivate you to flesh it out. Life is full of detours, many of them great fodder for angst-ridden stories. Write down those ideas. Then let them stew a while, guilt free.

I use mine to remind me that I’ve always been a writer, even when my nametag said something else entirely.

Currently working on: Butter cookies
Mood: Pressed (because now I have a cookie press to make butter cookies — hey, why didn’t I use the cookie press as my blog post last week on favorite kitchen implements?)

Well, 2011 is 1/12 over. How’re you doing? I haven’t been so good about cleaning my closets — and evil XY actually put some of his stuff in one of my closets, which means I have negative goal success on that front. On the plus side, I’ve been fairly consistent with my workouts, which is why I indulged this weekend with butter cookies. Indulged in moderation (does that even make sense?) of course since butter cookies have a way of going from plus side to plus size.

Checking in on the progress of my projects is something I often forget to do until the next time New Year’s resolutions roll around. I like setting goals and I like reaching goals, but doing the work between… Yeah, that’s the tricky part.

So I want to rant for a moment on goal setting philosophy.

See, self-help gurus tell us we should set SMART goals, where SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely. Which is indeed smart, as well as lovely, balanced, popular, and perfect — all the things I DESPISE in a romance heroine. Because it’s completely NOT THE TRUTH. Oh sure, maybe there is some girl/goal out there who meets all those criteria, but more likely she/it is hiding some deep, dark, delusional secret. In the case of the romance heroine, I’ll like her better when I discover she has a secret she never wanted to deal with but is forced to confront during the course of the story. In the case of the goal, the secret is… Often in real life, we don’t get to pick our goals.

Seems to me, many a goal in real life is an I-SMACK goal. As in “I get smacked” by an Imposed, Sudden, Monopolistic, Aggressive, Chaotic, and Killer goal.

I’m being a little unfairly grumbly because the aforementioned self-help gurus do offer some advice that can still be applied to I-SMACK goals.

Break it down: What are the baby steps that compose this overwhelming I-SMACK goal?

Back it out: What’s my drop-deadline and when do those baby steps need to be overcome to get there?

Buckle down: How much caffeine do I require to make this happen? (Well, actually the gurus don’t say quite this, but I think it’s what they meant.)

Worse, my secret — which is not very deep or dark or delusional — is that I don’t care that much about cluttered closets and I’m never going to be able to benchpress my body weight. SMART goals forget to include the element of desire. And as any attentive romance reader knows, without the desire, this story ain’t happening.

I-SMACK goals at least have the element of onrushing doom to stimulate the desire to live. But it IS desire.

In looking at some of my goals again, I’m wondering, Do I really want this? WHY do I really want this? If I can’t answer — or if I answer, I don’t — maybe I need to change my goals.

Because as young Skywalker discovered, if the answer is “Do not,” the universe falls to evil. So… I’ll DO. And reward myself with a butter cookie.

Out of curiosity, how do you reward yourself for a goal met or a job well done?

I’m the furthest thing from a professional cook you can imagine. I used to joke that I was such a bad cook that I burned Jell-O. My skills have improved marginally over the years, but family dinners are still held at my sister’s house. For good reason.

I would willingly abdicate all cooking responsibility and resign myself to a life of mooching off others, but I can’t—I’m a mom. Which means there must be healthy food prepared on a daily basis.

BUT, I also have a mental problem common among writers called I’m-lost-in-my-manuscript. Ask my daughter how many times I’ve boiled a pot dry, overcooked the pasta to the point of mush, or burned the bottom of a pan. Too many to count. Seriously, my kid would a scrawny beanpole if it weren’t for carrots, pita, and hummus.

Enter the Slow Cooker. Also known as the Crock Pot.

My brother gave it to me for Christmas last year, and I love this thing. I throw things into the pot in the morning, work all day without giving it a thought, and by dinner time, I have tasty food to eat—with no burning. It even switches from high heat to low simmer on its own, if I forget to eat on time. It’s a miracle worker. Okay, no, it won’t make Jell-O, but it will make hamburger soup, teriyaki chicken, chili, pot roast, pulled pork, mushroom pork chops, short ribs, and stew.

I’m still experimenting with recipes, but there are tons of dishes possible—just Google ‘slow cooker recipes’ and you’ll see what I mean. I found one for lasagna that I’m eager to try.

Do you use a slow cooker? What food miracles do you produce?