Silk & Shadows

Currently working on: Expanding a story
Mood: Widening

Last weekend, I went to the Oregon Coast with some writer friends for a beach retreat. (I accidentally typed “treat” and it WAS a treat.) Writing retreats are enormous fun, of course, but I also want the time to be productive. So here are some of my suggestions for a productive writing retreat:

Go to the beach at a yucky time of year.

At the Oregon Coast, you can be guaranteed gusting rain November through July (and prohibitive prices August through September). So usually the horizontal “moisturizing and exfoliating” is enough to keep us inside at our computers.

Here’s a picture of me, measuring how many words I have yet to add. See, this is why you go to the beach in bad weather. Sunshine DEMANDS a walk on the beach.

Bring the right friends.

It’s best to surround yourself with writers who share similar productivity goals. Friends who constantly tempt you to walk on the beach as the sun sets are counterproductive.

Sadly, it turns out I am that friend. So don’t bring me. Except you have to bring me because I always bring the mint brownies.

Find an inspiring spot.

Not only is the right physical spot important — like this lovely little beach house surrounded by chirping frogs — but the right spot in your mindset and your work in progress.

I try to prepare for a writing retreat by making sure I have the right sort of project and that I clear my “real life” of distractions that might creep into the weekend. Actually, this last weekend, I did a bad job of choosing the project. I’m working on revising, and I found that I did not do as well as when I bring a hot draft to a retreat. I’ll know that for next time.

Never mind the inspiration, just focus!

Part of my problem with choosing a revision project instead of a hot draft, is that when I’m revising, I tend to stare off into space while I think. When I’m at home, in my little office, there’s not much to look at and I quickly go back to work. But at the beach… I just stared at the waves for hours! I needed to bring my focus closer.

A good writing retreat has a clear focus, whether it’s writing, brainstorming or just refilling the well. Be sure you know what purpose your retreat will serve.

Track progress on the retreat days.

Like tracking the sun across the sky… It’s easier for me to stay accountable if I track my progress in three chunks during a retreat day: morning session, afternoon session, evening session. If I only review my progress once at the end of the day, I might find I didn’t do enough, but now it’s too late. If I track in chunks, then a slacker morning session (sun on the beach!) can be rectified in the afternoon, or a slow afternoon (afternoon nap on the sunny beach!) can be made up in the evening (no sun).

Indulge.

As much as I want a writing retreat to be productive, well, it is a retreat. I try to capture some of that glory — and some of that sun — and take it back with me to rainy Portland.

Do you have a favorite getaway that never fails to rejuvenate you? Do you bring back souvenirs? I love to find good rocks.

Currently working on: Unpacking
Mood: Sandy

My parents were in town this weekend and the weather was that gorgeous secret of the Pacific Northwest: the sunny week in October. See, right before the rains close in, nature gives us one more week of glorious blue skies and balmy temps. A cruel taunt? A promise? Whichever.

So we headed up to the Olympic Peninsula for a bit of walking, then back down Hwy 101 to the Oregon Coast.

While we walked, I thought about the new story I’m working on, and it seems to me, that our hiking and my story have a lot in common.

1. The stuff

When I start a new idea, I am excited and overwhelmed by all the stuff I might stuff in the story. Secondary love triangle! BB guns! String theory!

Much like my car has five doors for stuffing, I figure my story has many, many openings to be filled. But as you can see, Monster Girl is concerned about where she will fit. So it goes with my story; I have to ask myself — fun though it might be — whether I really need a talking, one-armed octopus.

2. First steps

I love the beginnings of hikes and the beginning chapters of a story. Both are so filled with promise. I feel strong and confident, with plenty of chocolate in my backpack.

The way ahead doesn’t necessarily look easy. There are barriers to be surmounted, but the adventure calls.

3. Lost

This part is less fun, but it seems to be true of hikes and stories, at least for me. Okay, I’m not EXACTLY lost, but there comes the moment where I definitely want to sit down, where the way seems a little more hazy and bleak than just a few steps or chapters ago.

This is where hikers and writers are made, I think. To quit? To continue? Walking out into the waves isn’t really an option (not on a Pacific Northwest beach, at least, not without a dry suit!) but I could parallel the shore on a new path.

Or build a boat of driftwood and dreams.

4. The view

I must continue — somehow — because I know — somewhere — I will come to the point where I can SEE the point. THIS is why I am here.

5. Panting fun

I’ve said before, I love love love The End. Whether writing or hiking, coming to the end (in mostly one piece with relatively few debilitating blisters) is a great feeling of satisfaction. But the satisfaction does seem relative to the exertion. Some of our best hikes (and by best, I mean make the best stories, of course) have been the worst technical hikes. Too long, too wet, too ridiculous, waaaay too much panting. But in The End, totally worth the reliving.

Especially if there’s a little chocolate left.

Do you find a certain pleasure in some kinds of hard work? Got any favorite hikes I should try someday?

Currently working on: Revisions
Mood: Persnickety

I’ve been in a funny place recently. Not just a place-place as I mentioned in last Monday’s travelogue, but in my writing. I’ve been all over the map — literally and metaphorically — and it is time I settled down to ONE thing.

This is a good time of year (in this part of the world anyway) to settle to a project. The weather is closing in. School has started and focused energy is all around. Even my garden reflects the need to pick. It’s harvest time!

But how do I pick my next project?

1. Flip a coin.

I’m not being flip when I say this. I find that flipping a coin helps me refine my preferences. If I flip and the answer comes up that I want, sweet. If the coin says I should choose some other thing… well, suddenly I realize that thing isn’t the thing I wanted. So I switch. After all, I don’t have to abide by the decisions of a coin.

2. Try a few things on for size.

Like new school clothes, the right story need to fit me this year; not have too many holes; and reflect the writer I’m trying to become. And if it is purple and sparkly, that’d be cool too.

3. Ask my sounding board.

Sometimes I can’t decide. But when I talk out my options with someone else, often I start talking myself into a choice, even if my listener never gets a chance to speak. (That happens around me occasionally.) Even if I can’t hear an answer coming into focus, the other person will no doubt have an opinion (other people always do). I guess this technique is very similar to the first technique except most people don’t appreciate being flipped.

If you haven’t read Malcolm Gladwell’s BLINK, I highly recommend it. He talks a lot about the power of instinct in decision making. Then you can read THINK by Michael R. LeGault, who prefers a more rationed approach. They provide some interesting points/counterpoints. Do you have favorite ways of making choices?

Note: Speaking of picking, we’ll be pulling a giveaway winner from our newsletter subscribers soon.
If you haven’t signed up yet, use the link at left.

Currently working on: A new world
Mood: Adventurous

So I’ve been writing hard for awhile. This is not noteworthy, really, since writing is what writers do. But because I’ve been writing hard, I’ve let a few other chores slip.

This is one of three dust-apatosauruses I found under the bed. I’m not proud of my lax housekeeping skills (actually, I am, kind of; you think just ANYbody can manage a herd of dust-apatosauruses?) which is why I finally dragged out the vacuum cleaner (pictured here for scale) to tame the beasts.

[Editor's note: No dust-apatosauruses were injured in the cleaning of this house. All dust-wildlife was released into the wild.]

Is it just my imagination — which I admit runs rampant on occasion — or does it seem to you that we’re all busier than ever? My brain is constantly humming with to-do’s and deadlines and wish-lists.

Really, the bees in my poppies got nothing on the buzz in my head.

Which is why Silk & Shadows is taking a summer vacation. We’ll be back the first week of September, fresh and spunky, maybe with new notebooks and first-day-of-school shoes.

In the meantime, we will be frolicking in the misty fields like Nils Blommer’s Meadow Elves:

Nah, actually, we’ll all probably be writing like fiends. Because that’s what writers do.

See you in the fall!

After two and a half years of blogging here at Silk and Shadows, it’s unfortunately time for me to say goodbye. I’m still writing fiction and still blogging over at my own website, but life is forcing me to scale back a bit.

Celebrating romance novels and dark, delicious heroes with you has been a lot of fun. I’ve truly enjoyed the opportunity to meet the avid readers and writers who visit the blog. I’ve met some wonderful people—including the wonderful authors who’ve blogged with me, Sharon Ashwood, Kim Lenox, and Jessa Slade—and I’ll miss you all.

As I head out the door, I’ll leave you with some parting thoughts about surprises…

Do you believe a good story is as much about what you don’t say as what you do?

Voltaire did: The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out.
Alfred Hitchcock did: Drama is life with the dull bits cut out.

I do, too. However, this was a piece of craft I didn’t fully understand when I first started writing.

My initial attempts at story starts were rampant with backstory. I believed it was necessary to explain the hero or heroine’s past or to allow the reader to ‘catch up’ on some of the events that recently happened. People suggested that I take the backstory out but I still didn’t understand that not only was it okay to do so, it made the story better.

Two reasons:

1. Pacing. This reasoning I got first. It made sense to me that by giving all this information I was slowing the story down.

2. Drama. It took longer for me to realize that by dumping information on the reader at the first opportunity, I was taking the fun out of reading.

When we meet new people or start a new job or take a trip to somewhere we’ve never been before, a large part of the excitement is related to discovery. We don’t know everything about a new person when we first meet them — in fact, we usually only get a very superficial glance. The fun in meeting someone new is learning about them, bit by bit. Yes, we form first impressions, and those are often lasting, but they’re based on tidbits of information, on subtle clues, not on a detailed accounting of the person’s life story. Why should reading about a fictional character be any different?

Now, to be fair, in fiction our goal is to have the reader identify with the protagonist, so it’s important to give more insight into that character than any other. But choose your moments. Give the reader tidbits of information at the moment when it makes the most impact. Keep secrets. Real people do, so it won’t surprise the reader that your hero/heroine does, too. Well, the information might surprise them , but not the keeping of a secret.

What sort of info do you hold on to?

Well, motivations is a good place to start. We usually don’t get to know what’s motivating people. There’s often a surface reason — a quest for riches, for example — but the underlying motivation — I need to prove to my dad that I’m not a worthless piece of crap — is something we often don’t discover until we’ve gotten to know someone extremely well.

Backstory (all that stuff you wanted to tell upfront) is another place to look for what to hold back. The hero got a letter that set him off on this journey? Why not hold back the details of the letter until them finding out will incite a crisis? The heroine has three sisters? Why not hold that information back until you have a moment of intimacy between the hero and her that gives her a chance to tell him what those sisters mean to her?

If you’re holding back key pieces of info, dropping clues is vital. Readers get a little peeved if in a moment of crisis the heroine suddenly displays her black belt Karate skills when there’s been no indication she possessed them up to now. For important elements you’re going to use later, drop one or two clues along the way so the reader isn’t scratching their head going ‘huh?’. We’d much rather have reader going ‘I knew it!’ or ‘Now I see the connection!’

To use a popular TV show example: Remember the first season of Grey’s Anatomy? Yeah, I know I’m asking a lot. From the very beginning (in fact, from the first scene of the first episode), Derek Shepherd is a mystery. Several episodes before the finale, Meredith Grey, who’s dating him, gets a little frustrated about how little she knows about him. The episode ends with a romantic moment of sharing, and Meredith is satisfied that she’s finally learned the truth about him. Then, in the last minutes of the last episode of the season they produce Shepherd’s wife. Not ex-wife. Wife. Viewers are delighted with the shocker, but prepared because it’s been made clear that Shepherd has secrets.

Wouldn’t it have been dull to know he had a wife all along … even if the viewers knew, but Meredith didn’t? I think so. I love surprises.

Currently working on: Missing all my friends in New York
Mood: Wistful

As you read this, about 2,000 romance writers are converging on New York City for the annual Romance Writers of America conference. Con attendees will take workshop, “network” at the bar, giggle too much, and get blisters in the miles of hotel corridors.

In the weeks leading up to a major conference, the blogging world, Facebook and Twitter are full of advice for newbies old war horses trying to be more efficient with their conference time and money. The advice runs the gamut from the eminently practical (“stay hydrated” and “bring a sweater; some rooms are cold!”) to the sublime (“RWA is not a popularity conference. Which makes it easier to win”) to the ridiculous (“Remember, editors and agents are human too”; no they aren’t, if they hold the life of your work in their hands, that makes them demi-gods at least).

But I haven’t seen as much on post-conference advice. To rectify that…

1. Don’t lose momentum.
Conferences are exhausting. With the prep time before you leave, the travel stress, and the forced extroversion (not to mention the laundry and dirty dishes that mysteriously piled up at home while you were gone) it’s easy to come back from conference utterly drained. Take some time to recover, but don’t let it derail you for more days than the conference itself, which can easily happen.

2. SUBMIT your requested work.
The anecdotal number varies, but editors and agents all say that they get surprisingly few of the manuscripts they request at conferences. Don’t be that writer. Or if you want to be that writer, don’t take away the ed/ag appointment from a writer who WILL follow up.  After conferences, there’s always a flurry of emails on writing loops asking “How long do I have to send in my story? Cuz, uh, actually, it’s not done. Really, it’s not even started.”

My answer (and not everyone agrees) is: Send it fast. It has to be good too. Not fast OR good; fast AND good. An editor or agent isn’t going to ding you on points if you take too long, but if she asked for it, it’s because she thinks she has a place for it.* Later, that maybe not be the case.

* Or because she’s just being nice. Which is a waste of everyone’s time. But don’t waste more time by NOT sending your work.

3. Do something with those business cards you collected.
If you followed the pre-conference advice and networked like crazy, you probably have lots of cards. Hopefully you followed good pre-con advice and jotted down a note on the card to remind you who this person was. Now to figure out what use you can make of those cards. Rather than keep scraps of paper around, you can data enter names, email addresses and the identifying feature you noted earlier into a word doc or spreadsheet for later retrieval. Send a quick email to people you want to remember so you have their addresses handy in your contact system.

4. Distribute all that swag.
You probably came home with more bookmarks, pens and plastic whatnots than you thought possible.  Contact your local romance book club or indie bookstore to see if they’d like to paw through it for the vicarious thrill. Your local RWA chapter might be interested in deconstructing the swag to see what marketing efforts seemed effective.

5. Put your favorite workshop advice to use.
Handouts and jotted notes seem to accrue more easily than mastery.  Actually TRY some of the craft, business or inspiration ideas that you learned. Also, share them with writing friends to reinforce them in your own mind. Keep a folder of only the very best (for you) of what you learned. That’s a great folder to take with you to writing retreats when you need a boost of remembered excitement.

6. Stay hydrated.
Hey, can’t hurt.

What’s your best post-conference advice? Anybody going anywhere else fun this summer? I’ll be at RomCon in Denver the first weekend of August and Authors After Dark in Philadelphia the second weekend of August. I’ll let you know if I follow my own advice!

Congratulations to Kaysi, who wins the ARC of Frostbound from my book release contest!

Last week, I launched FROSTBOUND, the fourth of the Dark Forgotten series. I’m not totally out the zone of guest blogs and promo contests, but the initial push has passed. Now I’m eyeballing the dates for the RWA Conference in New York and wondering if Air Canada is still going to be on strike when it’s time for me to get on a plane. File that one under “never a dull moment.”

In the meantime, I’m in that odd post-book launch mood.

It’s two parts fatalistic, one part empty nest. We wind ourselves up to be dynamos of energy and, once the confetti has settled, feel let down. We’re no longer the centre of attention. Another book has come along, displacing our moment in the sun. All that’s left is the anxious wait to find out how our baby is doing in the big, bad world. Will people treat it kindly? Will my hero and heroine remember to wear mittens and cross only at the lights?

I’ve never learned how to effectively deal with this state of mind, other than to plunge back into writing. Put another way, the only antidote for present nerves is future plans. I did the same thing when I was entering contests prior to publication—I always made sure I had one more entry out there, because if entry A didn’t do well, entry B just might. Having lots of irons in the fire kept my nail-biting at a bearable level.

And while I fret and wonder and wring my hands for my newborn novel, I’m also jubilant because a story I desperately wanted to tell is now in the hands of readers. How lucky is that?

Currently working on: Scouring dirt from my fingernails
Mood: Soiled

The garden is finally in. Took a couple extra weekends because the ground was so wet and cold that nobody — not me, not XY, certainly not tomatoes — wanted to be in the dirt. But as of today, all the chicken poop is scattered, all the starts are started, all the stakes are stuck through the hearts of vampires are ready to bear the weight of future produce.

Which means it’s time for this spring’s edition of “All the Ways Writing is Like Gardening.”

I’ve noted before, in past editions of ATWWILG, when I read authors’ bios, a lot of them comment about their gardens. I’ve hypothesized that writing is such a head-bound pursuit, writers need an excuse to get outside and connect with life. Gardening fulfills that need to immerse ourselves in the real world — while still letting our minds wander in our storyworlds. Sneaky, I know.

1. Gardens and stories don’t look like much at the start.

As the picture above demonstrates. Baby plants and blank pages aren’t very impressive. They are vulnerable to the late-night predation of slugs and self-doubt. But they are also so fun and exciting at this point; just think what they could become! Their potential is limitless (especially in the case of cherry tomatoes) and they are still easy to weed around. But just wait for high summer when plants and pages have exponentially run amok.

2. Gardens and writing will bug you sometimes.

We do have some terrifying spiders that may or may not be black widows, brown recluses and hobo spiders, but these yellow cuties are infant common garden spiders (sometimes called diadem spiders, which sounds so pretty). In the spring, they are as numerous as the words in a very good writing session. (Although after a few weeks, they will eat each other down to just a few; much like the words after a very good revision session.)

For me, walking face-first through a spider web and getting stuck in my story engender very similar responses: lots of swatting, swearing and skin-crawling. (Ack, it’s on me, get it off, get it off!) Nothing for it but to brush away the sticky strands holding you up and continue onward.

3. Don’t forget to play.

It’s possible — likely? inevitable? — that not everything you find in the garden and in the story will be what you expected. Take, for example, the vast variety of spherical throwing objects the garden apparently sprouted over the winter. Who knew spherical throwing objects could breed and bear offspring? There’s no other explanation for why there are so many in my backyard. Digging them out of their various nooks and crannies was super entertaining. (And part of the reason I have so much dirt under my nails; Monster Girl wasn’t going to have ALL the fun…at least not when the fun came at the expense of my strawberry bed.) Take some time to enjoy the weirdness and see what might work better than what you planned.

So what’s growing in your garden — or your word garden — these days?

When you have a busy life, filled with work, family matters, and chores, it can be hard to find the time to write. This is especially true for those just starting their trek through the jungle of the publishing world. Why? Because at that stage no one believes in the dream except you.

Family and friends tend to see writing as a hobby, as easily put aside as their plans to scrapbook the family vacation to Disney World. And in the face of children who ask for snacks while doing their homework, husbands who want you to watch the latest episode of Law & Order, and friends who beg you to join them on a shopping excursion, it’s challenging to see it any differently.

But writers write. Preferably every day. They make sacrifices (like turning off the TV) all the time. If you’re serious about being a writer, then you need to carve out the hours necessary to craft a story.

One of the easiest sacrifices a writer can make is sleep. That’s because the only person who’ll complain when you trade an hour of sleep for an hour of writing is you. Try getting up an hour earlier than normal (if you’re a morning person) or going to bed an hour later (if you’re a night owl).

Another easy sacrifice is lunch hour (or lunch half hour). Brown bag your lunch, take it to a quiet spot where your co-workers won’t be tempted to interrupt, and go for it.

If you’re a work-at-home mom, perhaps the twenty minutes it takes the washing machine to clean a load of laundry would be a good place to start. No guilt if the laundry is getting done, right?

Some writers I know hop down to the local coffee shop to write—because they don’t have family demands there. Others manage to write while attending Little League games, skating lessons, and doctor’s appointments. If you carry a small notepad and a pen everywhere you go, you can ‘bring your office’ with you.

Start with a small goal—even if it’s only a paragraph per day—and work yourself up to longer writing stints.

The good news is there’s no defined amount of writing required to get that story written. The more you write, the faster the story will be finished, but a page a day for 365 days will give you a whole novel. If you only write a ½ page per day, it’ll take you two years to get that novel written, but it will still get written—if you keep going.

Good luck and good writing!

Currently working on: Chicago booksigning tour
Mood: Easter candy overdosed

I’m in Chicago for the Easter weekend, touring most of the bookstores within 50 miles. [Side note: If you live in Chicagoland and want a signed copy of VOWED IN SHADOWS, check with your local bookseller to see if I blew through.] I spent two solid days on the drive-bys, hitting as many stores as I could, signing the books in stock, and handing out goody bags filled with bookmarks and romance trading cards from fellow writers along with my book. Stock signing tours are fun, but tiring.

Yesterday, I spent Easter with my family. Woozy with exhaustion and excessive sugar intake, I listened to the priest’s homily and contemplated the Easter story of resurrection. I was also thinking about chocolate Easter eggs as well as the surprise elements and features on websites, DVDs and other electronic media which are also referred to as Easter eggs. The common element to all these Easter moments is rejoicing, whether that’s rejoicing in the  promise of eternal life or rejoicing in the discovery of a hidden chocolate or digital treasure.

As tired as I was after all the running around, I might have forgotten for a moment I should be rejoicing about having a book to sign. But even worse than that, sometimes I forget to rejoice in the writing itself. Just as eternal life shouldn’t overshadow that “This is the day the Lord has made” (emphasis mine), so I have to be careful that the joys (and trials) of being an author don’t overshadow the writing.

As I move forward with Book 3 launched and Book 4 almost a year away (yeah, yeah, it’ll be here before I know it) I am going to remember to rejoice. I will:

• Write anew and write a new…something
• Try something short and fresh as springtime
• Find the heart and spirit of my writing and set it free

Which aspects of writing or your other favorite pastimes continue to surprise and delight you? Leave a comment any time this week for a chance to win one of the goody bags I handed out this weekend.