Posts - Kerry Gans, Author

Christmas Cards

December 17, 2015 By Kerry Gans 2 Comments

Today I am embarking on the yearly Christmas Card Ritual. Addressing cards, writing notes, signing names, putting in photos, sticking on stamps… A time-consuming and hand-cramping past time.

Still, I like the tradition. It’s a way to keep in touch with people I might not otherwise connect with, especially with those not on Facebook or other social networks. I also find some of the artwork on the cards to be beautifully evocative of the Christmas spirit.

Writing Christmas cards also connects with a long tradition—and anyone knowing my genealogy interest knows I like tradition. So I was pleased to find several Christmas cards sent out by my great-grandparents, Harold Stites and Clara Warren, among papers given to me by my relatives. All the cards displayed in this post are theirs.

People these days are creative with their cards, enclosing newsletters about their year in review, and customizing the photos on the cards. A writer friend of mine composes a newspaper with stories of the goings-on at the North Pole, pulled from the major news stories of the year. While I enjoy getting the photo cards from my friends and family—and my aching hand would welcome not having to write so many notes and sign so many cards—I am old-fashioned. I like my handwritten cards.

As I have gotten older and lost people I loved, I have come to cherish the fragments of handwriting I have from them. Handwriting is so individual, so personal, that seeing a familiar script is as powerful as hearing their voice. There is a life to handwriting that is lacking in printed text—even though the printed text is often more legible, especially after the first 20 or so cards!

For me, nostalgia pervades the act of Christmas card writing. As I look at these cards from my great-grandparents, I see a reflection of who they were. They were stylish dressers, as demonstrated by the nattily dressed candy canes on one card.

My great-grandmother played piano and organ, as well as composed music and hymns, as shown on the card of the angel playing the piano. In fact, my great-grandmother’s apartment grand piano sits in my living room right now.

The cards they chose reflected my great-grandparents’ taste—beautiful, elegant, and joyful, full of the things they cherished most: home and family. Maybe someday I will try the new-fangled customized photo cards and give my hand a break, but for now I choose to follow the tradition of my great-grandparents.

And maybe, if I am lucky, some of my cards will be found by my great-grandchildren among the precious papers saved by my descendants.

The Editing Puzzle

December 10, 2015 By Kerry Gans 2 Comments

My smartphone has a game on it called Move It! by AI Factory. The game is a spatial relations game, where you have pieces of various shapes on a board, and you have to move them around until you can guide a red square into the upper right hand corner. The game is fun, frustrating, and highly addictive.

Move It! is a lot like editing—at least the stage of editing where I am now. I have a WIP that I just finished putting through my critique group. I have reams of helpful suggestions that I cannot wait to get moving on—but there is so much work to be done, I find myself faced with a plethora of pieces scattered on a board of unknown dimensions.

Move It! specifies a target number—the least moves required to clear the board. Alas, my editing does not come with a target number.

My editing notes include checking for conflict in each scene, making sure Scene A leads logically to Scene B, noting my character goals for each scene. I need to follow character arcs, plot arcs, goal arcs. I have 3 POV characters, so I plan to separate their scenes out and listen to voice, check for character consistency, and make sure they are three-dimensional.

I also want to check continuity, symbolism, and rhythm. My ending needs some help, and the entire book needs a language overhaul because it sounds too middle grade and it’s YA. And of course there’s the nitty gritty of grammar, punctuation, and formatting.

Even with the target number, your game can run away with you. I had one game with a target of 72 moves and ended up with 265. I’m hoping to avoid that problem while editing, but you never know because when you change one story piece that changes them all.

At this moment, I am looking at the board, wondering how I can move those manuscript pieces in the most efficient way to get my book to the final position. I’m a bit overwhelmed and unsure where to start.

How you begin in Move It! sets you up for success or failure. A false start will get you to 265*. A good start narrows your available moves until only the successful path is left open to you.

Let’s hope I choose the right starting move with my manuscript.

How do you organize a huge editing project like this?

*My current score on that target 72 game is 76.

Our Characters’ Other Lives

December 3, 2015 By Kerry Gans 2 Comments

Today was Parent Visitation Day at my daughter’s school. We got a peek into this world she inhabits—a world we know very little about. The older my daughter gets, the more of her life happens out of our view, out of our sight. It’s her “other life.”

So she has this other life, this “offstage” life as it were, and what happens there impacts how she acts when I pick her up—when she is back “onstage.” If she had a good day, she will be happy and cheerful. If something is bothering her about school, she will be upset or pensive.

The same holds true for the characters in our stories. While our POV characters are rarely offstage, many of the secondary characters are. And of course any “walk-on” or “cameo” characters also enter our story having come from their own offstage life.

What happens to them while they are offstage is important. It will impact how they interact with the main character. A secondary character who was up all night with a screaming baby will react to a situation differently than one who had a good night’s sleep. And if you have a secondary character who is secretly working against the protagonist, what they do while offstage is vitally important.

Yet I find that I often do not consider my secondary character’s other lives when I write. They flit in and out of the story with just the right attitude, the needed info, fulfilling whatever need I have to fulfill. They are often too perfect in that way. And yet I find myself being lazy because it takes too long to visualize what they’re doing when they’re offstage. I mean, I’m juggling enough just trying to deal with the main character and the villain, right?

Wrong. I need to consider my other characters’ offstage lives more. Why? For a few of reasons. First, because it deepens their characters. I get to know them better, and so can write them with more nuance. Second, because it’s more realistic—life happens to people even when you’re not there to witness it. And third, because it can add tension to your story, especially in scenes where there is not much external tension or conflict.

After all, your secondary character could be having coffee withdrawal, and therefore be unlikely to follow the protagonist on a half-baked adventure. Or they could be coffee-stoked, and therefore they will follow the protagonist on that very same half-baked adventure simply because they can’t sit still. A variable as small as that can make a big difference in how a scene goes.

My friend Keith Strunk once said that even if your character is only borrowing a cup of sugar, there needs to be a motivation behind it (he’s an actor, can you tell?). What happened to that character before he showed up asking for the cup of sugar will determine how he reacts when you tell him that you have no sugar. If he had a bad day, he will react poorly. If he had a good day, he will react indifferently.

As a writer, which sugar-borrower would you want in your story? The one that bursts into tears or becomes irate when you have no sugar, or the one that shrugs and goes home to quietly eat the chocolate chips straight out of the bag? I know which one I’d want.

Do you consider your characters’ other lives when you write? How do you keep track of them all?

Thanksgiving 2015

November 26, 2015 By Kerry Gans Leave a Comment

Thanksgiving is a time when I think about all the things I am grateful for in my life. I realize I am very lucky because I have a whole lot to be thankful for.

Most recently, my debut novel, THE WITCH OF ZAL, came out this month! I have finally achieved the dream of being a real author with a real book. Many people don’t ever get to achieve their dreams, and I am so grateful to all the people who shared this long journey with me and supported me in so many ways.

I am also thankful for my family. My parents are still alive and healthy and very involved in their grandchildren’s lives. I have a friend who lost both her parents this year (only 12 days apart), and that has made me appreciate having them even more. I’m even thankful for my “little” brother—we are very different, but I know he’ll have my back if I ever need him. A far cry from the bratty kid I fought with all the time!

Of course my husband and daughter are high on my “thankful for” list. My wonderful husband supports me in so many ways, and we’re really two peas in a pod. And my daughter, my “Kinder-girl” as she is known on Facebook, keeps me hopping and makes me laugh and amazes me each day as she grows into her own person.

Friends are also precious, and I have too many to name here that have been there for me in times of need. Whether just listening to me vent, or going out of their way to help me out, my friends have helped me through a lot.

I have so much else to be thankful for. I have a warm house and enough food and clothes. We have enough money to be secure and we live in a relatively safe environment. Looking at the frightening things happening today, the masses of people who have nothing, who have left everything they knew, makes me hold very dear the things I do have—things so easy to take for granted.

So take a moment today to reflect on what you have to be thankful for. Life can get hectic and we forget what we have in the rush to try and get further ahead, further up the ladder, further than the people next door. For just one day, stop the rat race and cherish what you have—what you have accomplished. Life is short, so take a moment to enjoy it.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

The New To-Do List

November 19, 2015 By Kerry Gans 4 Comments

First, I want to take a moment to recognize the tragedies in Beirut, Paris, and Nigeria. The loss of life is horrific, and the grief is universal no matter what continent you are on. The terrorists wish to inspire fear and hatred and chaos. I choose not to let my fear turn to hate. I choose to stand with the grieving and raise my voice with those speaking for peace. The terrorists fear our unity and seek to splinter us. United we stand.

I attended my first conference as a published author this weekend. The NJ Association of School Librarians sponsorsan Authors’ and Illustrators’ Alley where you can display your wares and talk with the conferees. I’ll admit I was terribly nervous—my anxiety was running in high gear. But once I got there, it all went smoothly. Chatting with the librarians and teachers was fun, and I learned a great deal about presentation from my friend and table-mate Donna Galanti.

So now that is over and I turn my attention to the other things that need to be done now that THE WITCH OF ZAL is a real, live book. What sort of things are on this to-do list?

Updating my website: I need to get the cover on the front page, and add buy links, and some of the blurbs. I need to update my events page as well.

Book Trailer: I’ve sent the elements of the trailer to Keith Strunk, whose company will be putting it together for me. As a long-time professional editor, I actually did the trailer myself but my editing software is so old it does not support true High Definition, which is necessary.

Reviews: I have no reviews yet, but I do have a list of bloggers that I am ready to reach out to and ask for reviews. I have the emails mostly ready, I just need to add some final details (like the cover) and send them out.

School visit presentation: I need to sit down and concentrate in detail on what I want to say and cover in a school visit. I have a firm idea of the topic now (thanks again to Keith Strunk), but I need to think about the flow and the details I need to cover.

School visits: After that, I need to actually book some school visits. A big issue is payment—so many of the librarians at the conference said they simply have no budget for author visits. So, do I work for free and accept the book sales as payment enough? That’s a question each author needs to answer for themselves.

Interviews: I have at least one interviewer who has sent me questions, so I need to get those done.

Distribution: I have contacted the Doylestown Bookshop about handling pre-orders for my school events, and thankfully they have said they can handle that for me.

Taxes: I seem to have all the paperwork in order, but I am still unclear on how collecting sales tax works in states outside of my home state. So more research is needed.

Copyright: I need to register the copyright of my book within 3 months of publication. Some authors may say not to worry about it, but for $35 it’s worth having the extra protection. (Fees vary depending on how you register.)

Launch party: Now that THE WITCH OF ZAL is out, I need to celebrate! I’ll keep you apprised of developments there.

So, those are some of the things on my new to-do list. Oh, and write. Gotta keep doing that.

Anything I forgot that should be on my list?

THE WITCH OF ZAL Cover Reveal and Surprise!

November 12, 2015 By Kerry Gans 8 Comments

Hey, everyone! I am so excited to share the wonderful cover for THE WITCH OF ZAL! My publisher, Evil Jester Press, did a fantastic job.

And…SURPRISE! My book is available for purchase RIGHT NOW in paperback and Kindle.

I hope you love the cover as much as I do–and I hope you have as much fun reading the book as I did writing it!

I’ll keep you posted as my journey continues. Thank you all for coming along for the ride!

The First of Many Firsts: Preparing for the NJASL Conference

November 5, 2015 By Kerry Gans Leave a Comment

On Sunday November 15th I will be attending my first ever conference as an author. The New Jersey Association of School Librarians has what they call Authors’ Alley where authors can get a table and speak to the many librarians who are there for the conference. I am so excited to be able to talk to so many librarians at once about my new book. However, I am also quite nervous. Luckily, friend and fellow author Donna Galanti will also be there—which will make the experience much more fun and less nerve-wracking.

Preparing for a conference as an author is no easy thing. I need to have many pieces in place. Such as:

BOOKS

The first thing I need to do is order books to have with me at the conference to sell or to show the librarians who are interested in the book. I did that today and they will be arriving sometime before the 15th. I can only imagine what it will feel like when I open my first box full of my own books and see all those wonderful covers looking up at me. 🙂

SWAG/MARKETING MATERIALS

I would like to have bookmarks ready to give out to people who are interested in the book but may not wish to buy at this time. I also want to have flyers announcing my school visit topics and availability to give out. I’m thinking of getting new business cards to bring, if I have time to get the new card and if my pocketbook will stretch to that much expense. My old cards are certainly sufficient to allow people to get in touch with me on social media and my website. The only drawback is that the cards do not have the cover of my most recent book on them.

MONEY

There are also business things that need to be taken care of prior to that and I have already completed those. I needed to get a federal tax ID number and register my business with the state of New Jersey so that I could collect sales tax on any books that I sell at the conference. I have also bought a Square credit card reader for my smartphone so people can pay me with a credit card. I tested it out and it works great!

ERRATA

I need some sort of display stand to put up a flyer on the table. I need to bring order forms in case there are people who wish to order the book later, so they can still get the special pricing I’m giving for the conference. I also need to remember to bring things such as my laptop a copy book for writing, and snacks and water so that I can make it through the day without fainting away.

I had hoped the have my book trailer available by this time but it simply will not be possible to get it done. However I do hope to have that finished by the end of the month. I had a lot of fun putting it together and I hope people will enjoy watching it as much as I enjoyed making it!

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION

Eventually all those items above will be checked off my list, and the only thing left to do will be to pack up the car and head out. Then my worry will be: Can I actually find the venue? Thankfully my smartphone has a GPS, so now I have a little bit more assurance that should I get lost I will actually be able to find my way to where I need to go.

With this conference I am officially launching my career as a published author. I’m on the path that I always dreamed about the time I was young. I cannot express to you how amazed I am that this dream is finally coming true.

Anyone have more tips for this conference newbie?

October Madness

October 29, 2015 By Kerry Gans 1 Comment

I should be writing…

…but I am filling out invitations to my daughter’s birthday party.

I should be editing…

…but I am online searching for my daughter’s costume.

I should be marketing…

…but I am helping my daughter with a school birthday project.

I should be doing my galley edits…

…but this week my daughter’s school has 3 half days.

I should be sleeping…

…but I am doing all the things I didn’t get done when I should have.

I am sure everyone has a particularly crazy time of year. For some it is Thanksgiving or Christmas because they host family gatherings or travel. For some it is a time of year when work is heavy, such as CPAs at tax time.

I suffer from October madness at the end of October/beginning of November.

No matter how hard I try, I can’t seem to get far enough ahead of the rush to not have it be a rush. I thought I was sitting pretty this year—until my galley edits showed up. Always something unexpected! And then I have to readjust my plate-spinning.

Between parties for my daughter’s birthday and Halloween parties and her friends’ birthdays, it seems non-stop. And this year I’m also helping out at the school Halloween party in her classroom. For an introvert like me, this is a very draining time of year.

Still, it is finite, and I can look ahead to November 4th and say, “That’s when the craziness ends.” It’s coming, I just have to forge ahead until I reach it. I make lots of lists and hold myself to strict discipline as I strike things off. No time for naps or Word Scramble now!

What’s your “insane” time of year? Any tricks to get through it?

Adventures in the Land of Zal

October 22, 2015 By Kerry Gans 2 Comments

This week’s post is going to be short and sweet, because I am neck-deep in reviewing the galleys of my book THE WITCH OF ZAL.

What’s a galley, you ask?

Before a book goes to print but after it has been formatted, they create a galley of it—an uncorrected proof of the text. The author then goes over the galley to catch any last-minute typos or issues that might have been missed earlier. Since there is a substantial lag time between turning in the final edits and reading the galley, the author can see it with fresh eyes.

I found that the galley, which uses a different font and formatting than my final submitted manuscript did, makes mistakes easier to find. Thankfully, I am not finding many! I have to read both the print galley and the ebook galley. I’ve read the print, and hope to finish the ebook today.

The other exciting news is that the cover is finally finished! I saw a sneak peek earlier this week, and am eager to share it with the world. Having a cover makes the book very real.

And I’m glad it is real, because I have booked my first conference, at the New Jersey Association of School Librarians (NJASL) conference November 15th. Discussing books with hundreds of librarians is going to be a thrill, and I can’t wait to meet them. After all, I’ve known since I was young that libraries are magic and librarians are magicians.

THE WITCH OF ZAL is almost at the finish line, and the next phase of my writing life will begin!

The New Regimen: Checking In

October 15, 2015 By Kerry Gans 2 Comments

When my daughter started full-time Kindergarten in September, I celebrated. I was full of plans for how to break out my days and how to balance home-work responsibilities.

So now we’re halfway through October. How’s the new regimen been working for me? Time to check in.

First, I was going to get a lot of writing done. So much writing. I have not gotten as much of that done as I had hoped. I do get my blog post done more quickly, and I have been able to get to other writing in spurts, but not in the focused manner I had envisioned. Part of the problem is that I have taken naps in the afternoon far more than I would like. I’m just not sleeping well at night lately, and if I don’t grab an hour in the afternoon, I am wrecked by the evening.

Second, I was going to get some of these non-writing projects under control and off my To-Do list. I have actually accomplished several of these projects, although, again, not as many as I had hoped. Still, it’s nice to see that To-Do list get smaller!

Third, I wanted to incorporate my exercise routine while my daughter was at school. This I have done fairly well. I generally complete all my walking before I get her from school. In fact, the walk to pick her up usually finishes my step goal for the day. I break up the walking into a few short walks during the day, which gets me out of my chair and gets the blood moving again. So it helps me with the work side of things, too.

Finally, I wanted to try and end the constant push-pull of having to “choose” between working and spending time with my daughter. Whenever I would work while she was home, I would feel guilty. Whenever I would play with her instead of work, I would feel the weight of everything I could be getting done. It was a no-win situation for me—part of my mind was always somewhere else.

In this, at least, I have been pretty successful so far. Because I am able to get the things I must get done finished before I pick my daughter up from school, I can relax into spending the afternoon/evening hours with her until she goes to bed. We can chat or play or go to her extra-curricular events without me feeling pressured by things yet to do. I spent 4 hours at a local farm this weekend going hayriding, pumpkin picking, having lunch, and watching her play, and not once did I stress over things left undone. We had a fun, beautiful day out together.

My relationship with my daughter was the most important part of this new regimen for me, so I feel as if I have made a very successful start. However, I need to address the other parts of the new regimen that are not working so well.

My main problem is focus. The concrete things I know I need to do, I always get done. But then I drift on all the nebulous things I need to do but don’t have to do just yet—with the result that none of them get done. I need to break those things into discreet, concrete pieces and assign them a day. If I can do that, I believe I will find my productivity rising to the level I want. Without a focused, concrete list, my laziness expands to fit my free time.

So overall, my new writing plan is succeeding in the most important parts, but needs some work and adjustment. As is the way of the world, I expect I will finally have my new regimen tweaked and humming along just in time for Christmas break, when it will all fall apart again!

How do you make sure you stick to schedules?

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