How To Tap the Darkness Within

October 11, 2012 By 9 Comments

We were discussing in our Advanced Novel Workshop with Jonathan Maberry about digging deep and putting your pain on the page. Jonathan talked about how he has found his writing highly cathartic. Tiffany Schmidt talked about the difficulty of writing emotional scenes and then finding a way to leave the pain in the book and not let it color your real life. As Jonathan said, leave the tears on the page.

Except in a very few instances, I have not shed tears while I write. I have not felt emotionally drained like so many writers talk about in their blogs. Apparently, I have not tapped into my deeper levels of pain, anger, darkness, and, yes, joy, love, and healing and laid them bare in my writing.

This could explain why beta readers feel my characters are not quite “real” or that they don’t “connect” with them on a deep level. It’s always a struggle before I get the characters in shape.

Why can’t I access these deeper places? There could be a few reasons. One, I don’t HAVE deeper places. Two, I lack the empathy to connect to other people. Three, I’m afraid to go into the darkness.

As for number one, I’m sure I have deeper places. I know I feel things deeply at times, and seemingly benign things like commercials can unexpectedly bring a welter of feelings in me. Examining number two shows that I am close to my family and while my close friends are not many in number, the friendships run deep. So maybe I’m just afraid to go into the darkness?

It is true that I don’t like letting strong emotions loose. I find it very, very hard to put emotional genies back in the bottle. I have an anxiety disorder, so once emotion wells up, it often spirals out of control. It can impact my life for days—not a good thing when you have a toddler to take care of. As a survival technique, I have gotten very good at surpressing the anxiety, but perhaps that comes at the cost of cutting myself off from connecting to the world as wholly as I might like. Which then might mean I can’t connect my characters to the reader the way I should.

I don’t doubt there’s some subconscious fear there. But the other side of the coin is that I don’t really know HOW to access those stronger emotions. Not consistently and effectively. If my character is sad and I’m not, how do I call that up? Or anger? Or fear? And I don’t know how to turn them off when I’m done. Maybe I can call on one of my actor friends to help me with that.

So what do you think? Do you need to be so emotionally invested in your book that you cry (or want to) at times while writing it? Should it drain you emotionally?

And do you have tips on how to access those emotions—and then leave them behind when you’re done?

Writing While Traveling

October 4, 2012 By 3 Comments

Whew! I have been doing a lot of traveling the last few months. A trip at the end of August, one in September, one coming up soon, and of course Thanksgiving travel in November.

All these trips are relatively short—3 days to a week. But it still totally throws me off my writing game. I usually get no writing done, or just a little. The travel days themselves are usually write-offs. Anyone who has traveled with a small child understands this—there is no writing at rest stops or while eating. And the trip takes longer because of frequent bathroom breaks.

And of course once you reach the destination, the days usually fly by in a chaos of activities. Obviously we traveled to somewhere for a purpose (usually to visit relatives) so most of our time is taken up with visiting (which is great—I don’t get to see these relatives nearly enough!). And the whole sleeping, eating, visiting with a small child whose schedule has been totally disrupted can make my down time not so “down”. By the time I finally get time to myself to write, I’m usually exhausted!

I’ve long since decided that while traveling I can only do what I can and try not to beat myself up too much about it.

What are your writing while traveling secrets?

Adventures in Queryland

September 27, 2012 By 2 Comments

I’ve sent out 4 queries for my WIP. I’ve heard back from one, and am in limbo for the rest. The long wait times are not unexpected—I’ve been here before. It is funny, though, how jazzed I get when I first send queries out. I check my email every hour for the first couple of days. Then slowly the adrenaline fades and I check a couple of times a day.

I wrote a while back about patience being a writing virtue when it comes to revision. Patience is also needed once you reach the query stage. Sometimes it takes weeks for an agent to get to your query. And some agents have that no-response-no-interest that lengthens the silence into eternity. While I am not a fan of that, I do understand where they are coming from. I do wish that all agents would set up an auto-response confirming they got your query, though. As the silence stretches, I can’t help but wonder if my email missed the mark and is lost in the ether somewhere!

So I am back to patience again. I do intend to send out a few more queries this week, but then will likely wait a few weeks before sending out another round. And of course if I get no responses by November, I will probably suspend querying until January, since the holidays make things grind to almost a halt in the publishing world, as far as new acquisitions go.

I have heard over and over on various blogs and from successful authors that to make it in the traditional publishing world requires (aside from a great book) patience and perseverance. I think I’ve got the patience thing going on, and I don’t have any intention of giving up, so hopefully I’m good!

I already can hear some of my writing buddies wondering why I don’t just self-publish, and cut through the waiting. I have nothing against self-publishing, and fully expect to use it for certain projects in my career (particularly the genealogy books I am writing). But for my first book, and hopefully for the majority of them, I would like to have the backing of an agent and publisher. It’s just a personal preference—what I need to feel more secure when starting this new phase of my career.

So for right now I am waiting. But I am not idle. I am working on an outline for a sequel, and I have another middle grade in mid-revision right now. I am also returning to a YA paranormal that I feel is almost “there” but needs another look now that I have learned so much in revising my current WIP in submission. Because that is another piece of advice I have heard over and over:

Never. Stop. Writing.

It is the cure for over-active nerves while waiting to hear from agents.

Patience. It really is a writing virtue.

Genealogy Overload

September 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment

I finished my middle grade fantasy, and have begun sending it out to agents. While I’m waiting to hear back, I have several other projects to work on (as most authors do). However, I like to take a little time between writing projects to get a non-writing project finished, or at least well-started.

My current project is a Genealogy Database of all my scanned and filed documents. (Update: 1,234 files entered, 241 more to go from my side of the family.) But the genealogy information never stops coming!

I squeezed in two short vacations in the past few weeks. The first, with my husband, also involved visiting 3 cemeteries in Delaware to find my ancestors. The second, with my mother and daughter, also involved 3 cemeteries—this time in New York. So now I have photos and cemetery records to add to my database.

I got a huge surprise in the mail, too. The day after I got home I received a package from my aunt. It contained a scrapbook of my ancestor Capt. William M. Wooldridge, who died in 1863 from a disease contracted while fighting in the Civil War. There are at least half-a-dozen contemporary newspaper articles outlining his artwork, architecture, and inventions. It also had articles about his marriage and some of his Civil War action.

I have found that this is how genealogy goes—droughts and floods. For long periods, every attempt to research will meet with a brick wall. Then suddenly evidence and data will fall into your lap. Sometimes it’s a response to a forum post I put up years ago. Sometimes it’s the opportunity to visit cemeteries or other historic places. Sometimes it’s an unexpected package from a relative. Then one clue leads to another and sometimes an entire wall falls.

I haven’t reached a breakthrough with all this new data, but I have tied up some loose ends and rounded out my data for several generations.

Genealogy is much like writing. You know that feeling when the words are coming so fast you can’t keep up? When the story is rolling and you are high on the exhilaration? When new data come in for my genealogy, I get the same excited rush. And when it leads to a breakthrough, I actually get giddy.

Maybe that’s why I love both writing and genealogy—the unexpected highs more than make up for the long stretches of routine, nitty-gritty hard work.

Do your hobbies complement your writing? Or are they polar opposites?

Organizing Chaos: Reclaiming My Research

September 13, 2012 By 6 Comments

I live in a state of organized chaos (don’t most moms of toddlers?). I am not a person with an empty desk at the end of a workday (or pretty much ever). My folded clothes reside on the floor for several days before they find their way into the drawers. And my piles of papers survive until I can’t stand to look at them anymore.

But here’s the thing: as disorganized as it looks, it is organized to me. I can find things. It all makes sense to me on a basic level. So there is a method to the madness. And the things that seem most disorganized are the things that are lowest on my priority list—things that can wait a while before I get around to them. My folded clothes can wait until I finish my blog posts for the week, for example.

And I am meticulous where it counts. Appointments on my calendar are not only written down, but color-coded. My finances are computerized and updated. My writing projects are ordered and backed-up regularly. My editing changes are tracked via spreadsheet and color-coding (and sometimes graphed for good measure). My queries are tracked similarly. To-Do lists are kept and updated daily (or as needed).

You see, I can only keep so much in my mental organizer before I get brain fatigue. So I focus my organization skills (which are pretty sharp when I bring them to bear) on the most important things in my life: keeping my family and writing obligations. Other things can wait until I have time to get around to them.

Unfortunately, I failed to bring my organization savvy to bear on my genealogy research. I have been doing genealogy for about 15 years, and have amassed a huge amount of data. When I began, I had no idea how complex genealogy could get, so established only a rudimentary organization scheme. 15 years later and over 2,000 files later, I have no idea what I have, or where of several places I have it. I know I have duplicated research, thus wasting time. I have just started a database, where I can sort everything out, find and delete duplicates, and then re-organize the files into a cleaner and more intuitive organizational scheme that will make things easier going forward.

I learned a great lesson from this genealogical tidal wave: Start a database from the moment you start researching a topic. When I research for future books, I will definitely do this, and thereby save myself a great deal of time and headache trying to find or confirm research.

How do you keep your research in order? Any tips to share?

Patience Is A Writing Virtue

September 6, 2012 By 1 Comment

After reading my Facebook post on completing my 2nd round of developmental edits and beginning my polish edits, my best friend (not a writer) commented, “Geez, aren’t you ever allowed to FINISH a book?” I laughed and replied “After agent edits and publisher edits, yes!”

Still, her comment got me thinking. Of course I can finish a book—I have completed drafts of more than 16 novels. So getting from beginning to end of a book is not an issue for me. But finishing a book and completing a book are two different things.

Most of those 16+ novels will never see the light of day. And while I may poach themes and characters from them, even plot points, they will never be completed in their present form. Completing a book—making it shine in all facets—takes a whole slew of skills I didn’t have back then. Some are life experience skills and some are craft skills, including both techniques on the page and story theory, learned from thousands of hours of writing and reading.

But the most important skill I learned is patience.

It takes patience to complete a book. As a new writer, I’d finish a manuscript, give it a couple of proofreads, and it would be “done.” Of course, I was mostly writing for my own amusement back then, so the bar was set much lower. Now, with my sights set higher, that level of “done” would never cut it.

Now, instead of saying, “It’s good enough!” I ask myself, “Why isn’t this good enough?” In other words, I look for ways the novel can be stronger. Yes, I actively seek out ways to make more work for myself! I ask critique partners and beta readers and professional editors to poke all the holes in it they can so that I can fill them, learn from them, and raise my writing to the next level.

And that takes a lot of work. A lot of time. A lot of patience. To go back into your manuscript for 7+ revisions can make your head spin. You can get sick of your own novel. You can lose perspective and wonder if it’s any good at all. You can want to throw it in a drawer and move on to something else.

When I was a new (and young) writer, I never could have done what I am doing with my current WIPs. I never could have approached yet ANOTHER revision with eagerness and excitement. I never could have made myself stay up late, eyes like sandpaper, to edit this for the billionth time.

It takes patience to do that. Patience with my work (understanding that this process is not infinite, it will end), and patience with myself—allowing myself the mistakes I make, and learning from them.

The result? I am more excited about my current WIP (now in revision 7 and headed for query land next week) than I have ever been about any other work. Or rather, I am more realistically excited about it, since I now have also learned what goes into making a marketable book.

I said to my writing buddy Nancy Keim Comley the other day that this is the first manuscript I really feel has reached that professional bar. And it only took 16+ novels and 28 years to get here.

Patience. It’s a writing virtue.

 

Developmental Edits: Complete!

August 30, 2012 By Leave a Comment

I’m on vacation this week, but I wanted to update on how my editing on my current WIP is going. When you last tuned in, I had gotten back my developmental edits from fabulous developmental editor Kathryn Craft. After a few hours of despair (“I can’t do this, it’s too hard!”) I buckled down to it and found that it was not as hard as I thought. In fact, it was a challenge that I ended up enjoying!

Put succinctly, my main problem was that some of my scenes were out of focus, not keeping the main underlying idea front and center. Luckily, I was able to keep most of my scenes and just refocus them (explained in more detail in this blog post). I only wrote 2 completely new scenes and a half of another one. The rest were all repurposed with judicious trimming and adding of content. The edits Kathryn suggested helped a great deal–the story really came together.

Working hard, I managed to finish all those edits BEFORE I left for vacation. I’m going to let it sit until I get back, then go through a final polish/tighten edit. With all the cutting, pasting, and adding of words, I only added a new 513 words, but I would like to trim the whole thing down by about 1,000 words to get it to my ideal word count. Shouldn’t be too hard!

Then (drum roll, please!) I start the query process and see if this manuscript has legs!

Enjoy the end of summer, everyone – I am!

Connecting the Dots: Meeting My Grandfather

August 23, 2012 By 12 Comments

This weekend, I came into possession of my grandfather’s sketchbook. Grandfather Gans died when I was four, so I have no memory of him—just “memories” generated by photographs and a stuffed bunny that he (and my grandmother) gave me for my first Easter.

Three of my grandparents died before I was old enough to remember them, and unfortunately the fourth was ill for some time before she died, so I never knew the real her. In all the most important ways, I never knew any of my grandparents. I have always felt the deprivation of this, especially as I have grown older and become more and more interested in family history.

Getting this portfolio had an unexpected effect on me: I felt like I knew something of my grandfather for the first time. Art is so emotive, so expressive of the artist, that something of the person remains long after they are gone. What my grandfather chose to draw, and the style in which he drew it, gave me a peek into his mind and soul.

He drew people:

And scenes:

And ships:

And cartoons:

The style of my grandfather’s drawings are very much like my father’s drawing style. The similarity is rather spooky. The precision of line, the attention to detail, the choice of materials, even the subject matter was all eerily familiar. My grandfather came alive as he never had before.

But among all his wonderful drawings, a small slip of paper, only about half a finger long and a finger wide, spoke most loudly to me. On it was his careful calligraphy:

The name of his wife. Saved for 75 years.

For the first time, I touched my grandfather.

Total Control

August 16, 2012 By 6 Comments

Have you ever thought you were totally in control of something, only to find out you weren’t? I had that happen recently. I thought I had absolutely everything I needed for a meeting at my daughter’s school, only to find I didn’t have the proper immunization records, the registration form they had mailed me, AND that her birth certificate had disappeared.

Sometimes the same thing happens in my manuscripts. I am a partial-pantser (writing friend Marie Lamba calls us “thongers” but that’s just not an image I want burned in my brain), so there’s plenty of space in my manuscripts to go off the rails. Reading over the rough draft, I find things like neglected plot clues, inadvertently changed place names, and minor characters left in the bathroom from chapter 2 until the end of the book.

So what to do when things firmly in hand spiral out of control? The only effective way I’ve found to deal with this is to concentrate on fixing one thing at a time. I called my toddler’s pediatrician and got her records, picked up another registration form at the meeting, and still haven’t found the birth certificate, but I can pick up another copy from the vital records office.

As far as mistakes in the manuscript, the same rule applies: tackle one thing at a time. I always go from big picture to nit-picky because changing big picture items will inevitably change the smaller things. Why waste time fixing commas in sentences you might cut out altogether?

Sometimes I can’t have everything as under control as I’d like. (This is a lesson I am learning over and over as the mom of a toddler.) All I can do is control what I can, not beat myself up for what I can’t, and fix what needs fixing.

Total control is impossible.

Getting to the goal by tackling one issue at a time is not.

The Dreaded Synopsis

August 9, 2012 By 1 Comment

While my WIP is with an editor and readers, I am filling time by working on my query and synopsis for that WIP, so I will have the marketing materials ready ahead of time. That way, once I get my WIP feedback, I can set to work revising and be ready for querying immediately.

I have a query I quite like. A few other people are going to give me feedback, but I feel the underpinnings are solid.

My big problem is the synopsis. I can easily tell the story of what happens, at whatever length is required. What always seems to elude me is the voice of the book and the emotional heart of the story. By the time I have editing the plot down to something synopsis length, all of the voice and life have vanished and it reads like an outline in prose. Boring!

I have a first draft, which I will return to and try to liven up. But even if I get the voice in there, I feel I have missed the heart. A lot of the plot points I include are only important because of the emotional arc attached, but that somehow does not come through in this draft.

This part of the process always frustrates me, because I feel that I should be able to do this much better than I do. After all, this is my book—who else knows it as well as I? My passion and excitement do not come through on the synopsis page, and they need to. It reads like one of the many college papers I wrote. I got A’s on them, but the synopsis is judged by a different metric.

Perhaps I will approach the synopsis more like a short story. Perhaps viewing it through that lens will open up that emotional heart I’m lacking.

I believe that if I can write a great synopsis once, I will have the “lightbulb” moment that will show me how to do it consistently. Here’s hoping the lights come on soon!

How do you approach synopsis writing? Any advice to share?

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