The Writing Life Too

2012-02-16T13:13:00.000-08:00

Today's Writing Prompt:

Monet's Sunrise

2012-02-16T13:06:00.000-08:00

Every Writer Has a Thousand Faces: Are you in it for the long haul?
Steady rain coming down here in Portlandia and I'm at my desk trying to keep my head above my own version of water. Here's a link to a thoughtful piece on the writing life by David Biespel. In this segment he's describing a workshop with Adrienne Rich and how she challenges the writers in the room. Here is an excerpt: "If you only read one sentence in this book I hope it’s this one: A lot of the time just sticking with it is what this whole business of writing, making art, playing music, making songs, performing, and living a creative life is all about."

2012-02-14T08:02:00.001-08:00

Show, don't tell

Most readers do not pick up a novel or memoir to admire the writer’s clever phrases, but instead to experience vicariously something they cannot experience in real life. Your job as the writer is to make readers forget that they are reading, and give them the illusion of being in the story, seeing, hearing, smelling and feeling what is happening to people or characters.

Show, don’t tell,” is advice so often given to writers that it’s practically written into law. Simply defined, show, don’t tell means that an accomplished writer will tell (explain) a little and demonstrate (show in action) a lot. But like all simple explanations, it can lead to confusion. All writing requires action, dialogue, summary, exposition, and description—a blend of techniques and delivery systems, all aimed at involving the reader emotionally. And all writing requires both showing and telling. Too much telling and the work is distant, static, emotionless, and lifeless on the page. Too much showing and the story can be too drawn-out or relentless. And contrary to conventional beliefs, it can also be flat and dull when overdone.

Whenever possible, instead of giving the reader the directions or outlines of an experience, a writer places him in the midst of unfolding action. When the reader is watching a scene unfold he is worried and thus involved and can then draw his own conclusions and interpretations. Showing also requires that the writing is solid, not abstract, and this means that at least one of the senses is involved to create a specific realty.

Telling: Alice looked at the men in anger.

Showing: Alice’s eyes smoldered.

Telling: The house was rundown and shabby.

Showing: Weeds crowded the foundation and the paint curled around the sagging door and empty windows.

Tip: modifiers tell, verbs show.

Telling rather than showing breaks down into several problem areas:

Describing characters rather than showing them through action and dialogue.
Disclosing thoughts of non-viewpoint characters
Summarizing dialogue as indirect discourse instead of quoting it directly.
Using generalities rather than specifics.
Events that happen off stage but need to happen in real time.
Information that is not delivered through a viewpoint character.

2012-02-12T10:31:00.000-08:00

Folks--Please consider funding this imaginative, originatl and well- written tale by an unemployed and hard-working writer. Let's all support writers and artists, let's all be the writers and artists we are called to be.

2012-02-12T10:26:00.000-08:00

Writing Prompt:

An essential skill in storytelling is to create a mood, atmosphere, or tone suggested by setting details and various levels of conflict. Mood and tone add to tension and impact. Write a scene or based on the mood from this photo.

2012-02-11T09:02:00.000-08:00

Summer in Words 2012
Folks, I'm finalizing (drum roll) the schedule for the 5th annual Summer in Words 2012, but just wanted to let you know that the funny, smart, amazing and bestselling author Chelsea Cain will be our Keynote speaker. More to come as things shake down. Registration will open in March.

Dates are June 15-17.

Your workshop time will be spent at the Hallmark Inn & Resort, overlooking Haystack Rock and the wide, wide Pacific. You can book your room now at a reduced rate. Nearby in Cannon Beach you'll find great places to explore and wide beaches to stroll along.

This year's theme: Refinement, Resonance, & Resolve

Immerse yourself in a focused, intensive and exhilarating writing venture this summer. Well, it will be almost summer. Join us and experience the power of words. Summer in Words will improve your writing and outlook. Really.

Why consider Summer in Words?

Because you're serious about making breakthroughs in your writing. Under the guidance of published authors and writing coaches, you'll receive the individualized—and top notch—attention that you've always wanted.
Limited registration ensures that you receive a friendly, yet thorough and professional laboratory experience.
Critiques on your work will be insightful.

If you would like to stay informed on this program as well as others offered during 2012, please contact me at jessicapage(at) spiritone(dot)com

2012-02-10T18:49:00.000-08:00

I've posted an article about theme in fiction and memoir at my website. Here's the link. A longer discussion on the topic is available in Between the Lines: Master the Subtle Elements of Fiction Writing.

2012-02-10T18:09:00.001-08:00

2012-02-10T09:02:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:

There's so much power and truth to be found in fiction. Here's some proof:
"Grief can destroy you or focus you. You can decide a relationship was all for nothing if it had to end in death, and you are alone. Or you can realize that every moment of it had more meaning than you dared to recognize at the time, so much meaning it scared you, so you just lived, just took for granted the love and laughter of each day, and didn't allow yourself to consider the sacredness of it. But when it's over and you're alone, you begin to see that it wasn't just a movie and a dinner together, not just watching sunsets together, not just scrubbing a floor or washing dishes together or worrying over a high electric bill. It was everything, it was the why of life, every event and precious moment of it. The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly, and when the loss wakes you to the deeper beauty of it, to the sanctity of it, you can't get off your knees for a long time, you're driven to your knees not by the weight of the loss but by gratitude for what preceded the loss. And the ache is always there, but one day not the emptiness, because to nurture the emptiness, to take solace in it, is to disrespect the gift of life." ~ Dean Koontz, Odd Hours

What do your stories teach about humanity?

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2012-02-07T10:04:00.000-08:00

Bonanza! 7 Free e-books for Writers:
Links brought to you by Jane Friedman, friend of the people.
Happy Tuesday everyone.

2012-02-07T09:49:00.000-08:00

Quick Take: Make Speech Tags Invisible

It doesn’t matter if J.K. Rowling or other authors use lots ofadverbs or colorful speech tags to describe how a character is talking, thissort of thing wears on editors and agents. The dialogue should imply the toneof voice, not the author’s instructors to readers. Use 'said' most of the time. The worst offenders are: stated,answered, explained, exclaimed, warned, recalled, complained, suggested, interrupted, replied, announced, interrupted, replied,responded, muttered, whispered, insisted, concluded, observed, volunteered, interjected, reiterated, guessed, snarled,hissed, chuckled, murmured, growled,sobbed, smirked, shrugged, nodded, laughed, spat, stuttered, squealed, grumbled

2012-02-04T20:34:00.001-08:00

Thought for the Day:

Yes, I realize you don't know what I'm talking about,because beauty vanished long ago. It vanished under the surface of noise--thenoise of words, the noise of cars, the noise of music--we live in constantly. Ithas been drowned like Atlantis. All that remains is the word, whose meaningbecomes less intelligible with every passing year. - Milan Kundera from TheBook of Laughter and Forgetting

2012-02-02T23:07:00.000-08:00

Biography of a Bad Guy ©

The more you know your antagonist, the easier it is to bringhim to life. Name: Alias:

Age: Occupation:

Appearance:

Trauma, influences,or events from his past that turned him into a bad guy:

PsychologicalProfile:

Location of lair:

Associates:

Motivations and goals instory:

Relationship toprotagonist:

Rap sheet—criminalactivities/back story:

Fear factor—howdangerous is he/she?

How far will he/shego to achieve aims?

Achilles Heel—a flawor shortcoming the protagonist might exploit or can lead to his downfall.

2012-02-02T20:59:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will find them gradually, without noticing it, and live along some distant day into the answer. ~Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

2012-02-02T16:34:00.000-08:00

Month of Letters Challenge

Sweetest blue skies again in Portland today. I have garden projects beckoning but I'm avoiding their call and finishing a project indoors. At my desk. Watching the wind make the trees dance.

I should have posted this yesterday but it was my birthday and as such required a celebration. I'm enclosing a link to the Month of Letters Challenge here because I think it's such a sweet and creative idea. You could write fan letters to your favorite authors. You could write to old friends, your aunts and grandma and children who live in another state. You could write letters to your characters or in your character's voice. If anyone wants to write me I can be found at P.O. Box 820141, Portland, OR 97282 and I'll write back.

And it's so much easier than NaNoWriMo.....keep writing--even the short stuff counts.

2012-02-01T05:51:00.000-08:00

February

In these days as spring is germinating below ground, stay focused on your writing goals, keep dreaming, have heart.

2012-01-31T13:42:00.000-08:00

But there’s a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking.
~ Mitch Albom

2012-01-31T03:14:00.000-08:00

If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash. ~ Leonard Cohen

2012-01-29T21:25:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:

"What I like in a good author is not what he says, but what he whispers." Logan Pearsall Smith

2012-01-29T13:22:00.000-08:00

A big thanks,
Steady rainfall here today in Portland. I wanted to thank again Monica Drake, Christina Katz , Adam O'Connor Rodriguez and Emily Whitman for teaching at my first annual Making It in Tough & Changing Times Writing Conference. Thanks also to Athena and Amy Baskin for their help and Amy Pulitzer for the fabulous cookies. Thank god I only ate a nibble. These post-conference days when I'm both exhausted and exhilarated are some of my favorites of the year.

Stay tuned for information on Summer in Words, 2012. Fifth annual to be held at the Hallmark Inn & Resort, June 15-17. I'm finalizing the line up of speakers.

2012-01-27T05:42:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day:

I sit in the dark and wait for alittle flame to appear at the end of my pencil. ~Billy Collins

2012-01-26T19:34:00.001-08:00

Thought for the day:

Sometimes you have to go on when you don’t feel like it, and sometimes you’re doing good work when it feels like all you’re managing to do is shovel shit from a sitting position. ~STEPHEN KING

2012-01-26T07:11:00.000-08:00

Quick Take: Listening in
The trope of overhearing a conversation or a plot hatching as when Huck Finn overhears Injun Joe's plot to murder Widow Douglas or when Tom and Huck listen in on their funeral exists in fiction. But here's the thing: Twain was spinning tall tales and he was writing for a less-sophisticated readers back in the 1800s. Contemporary readers want realistic devices in their fictional plots. So avoid scenes where your characters listen in or overhear other conversations, especially those told at a distance. This sort of thing is usually done for the author's convenience. And the more realistic the storyline, the more realistic the means by which you deliver it.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2012-01-24T07:34:00.000-08:00

Recommendedfor anyone longing to get more words on the page, better words on the page, andbreak into the new publishing landscape.

Last Chance

To register for Making It in Tough & Changing Times 1-day conference on January 28th

You know where to find me.

2012-01-23T09:40:00.000-08:00

When Do You Need To Secure Permission

After I sent out my January newsletter one of my readers wrote and asked permission to use my article as an "outline" and then give it to her art students. She sent me the document she was planning to use as this "outline." Basically, she had cut and pasted my column titled True North in its entirety and then had changed a few details and words so that it was her story and not mine. I wrote back and politely told her that my column was copyrighted and her use of the whole document didn't fall under fair use. That she was welcome to quote a few lines, but that she needed to write her own blasted column. Well, to be honest, I didn't say blasted and the word I was thinking of didn't begin with B. Mostly I was baffled that she'd imagine that this sort of thing is permissible.

Copyright and fair use is difficult to explain and I don't understand all the intricacies of it. I always try to attribute everything I use here and use what's in the public domain. Again, difficult to define. Which is why this piece by Jane Friedman is so welcome. Here is the link.

2012-01-23T08:28:00.000-08:00

Questions to ask yourself before you plot

I've been working on a memo for a client and created these questions that I thought I'd pass along. You can find them here.

Fog is thick and haunting this morning here in the Northwest.
Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2012-01-22T14:10:00.000-08:00

Quick Take:

Just like dandelions, adverbs grow thick roots when left undisturbed. Serious weeding is needed if you plan to get those suckers out of your manuscript.
And that’s only if you can find them.
See, for many novice writers, adverbs are like miniature Klingon warships, zipping around your manuscript with their cloaking devices activated. They hide in plain sight until an agent or editor requests a partial, and then BAM—they drop their cloak and wave their little “-ly” appendages like pirates toting skull and crossbones flags. We hates them, precious. ~ Heather Howland

2012-01-22T08:57:00.000-08:00

Mark Twain’s Rules of Story Writing

A tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere.
The episodes in a tale shall be necessary parts of the tale, and shall help to develop it.
The personages in a tale shall be alive, except in the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the corpses from the others.
The personages in a tale, both dead and alive, shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there.
When the personages of a tale deal in conversation, the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject at hand, and be interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the people cannot think of anything more to say.
When the author describes the character of a personage in the tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage shall justify said description.
When a personage talks like an illustrated, gilt-edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven-dollar Friendship’s Offering in the beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel in the end of it.
Crass stupidities shall not be played upon the reader as “the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest,” by either the author or the people in the tale.
The personages of a tale shall confine themselves to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and reasonable.
The author shall make the reader feel a deep interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad ones.

The characters in a tale shall be so clearly defined that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given emergency.

In addition to these large rules, there are some little ones. These require that the author shall:

Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it.
Use the right word, not its second cousin.
Eschew surplusage.
Not omit necessary details.
Avoid slovenliness of form.
Use good grammar.
Employ a simple and straightforward style

2012-01-22T01:20:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day: Noticing
"You know what I believe? I remember in college I was taking this math class, this really great math class taught by this tiny old woman. She was talking about fast Fourier transforms and she stopped midsentence and said, 'Sometimes it seems the universe wants to be noticed.' That's what I believe. I believe the universe wants to be noticed. I think the universe is improbably biased toward consciousness, that it rewards intelligence in part because the universe enjoys its elegance being observed. And who am I, living in the middle of history, to tell the universe that it - or my observation of it - is temporary?" ~ John Green

2012-01-21T10:00:00.000-08:00

Just for fun:Handy Field Guide to Thriller Characters via Chelsea Cain
Trust me, this list is too good to be true from the ever-talented thriller author Chelsea Cain. If you haven't read her series set in Portland, you're missing a thrill ride.

2012-01-20T13:45:00.000-08:00

Question for Writers: The legendary Etta James died today and I'm working with her songs playing in the background, giving me chills and stirring the deepest parts of me. What if we wrote the way she sang? That is, bringing in every part of us. What if we transformed all the pain, rage, angst, worry, faith, fragility, fierceness, and hope onto the page?

2012-01-20T12:51:00.000-08:00

It's been raining, deluging, flooding around here and I'm home at my computer watching it all, working on a memo to a client. Phone just rang with cancelled dinner plans for tomorrow night--they cannot get out of their driveway since it's underwater. Like six feet of water.

Quick Take:

Everything a character does should not only forward the plot, but should also be designed to allow the reader to discover more about that character- -and in particular, to learn the vital elements (secrets, emotional needs, desires, inner conflict, attitudes) that are relevant to the story.

2012-01-20T09:55:00.000-08:00

Making It in Tough & Changing Times One-Day Writing Conference

2012-01-20T08:16:00.000-08:00

What do Editors Want?

Withthe publishing world changing at a dizzying pace sometimes writers wish they owned a crystal ball or had more access to editors' thinking about the current marketplace. Here's a link to an article where British editors weigh in on the topic.

To find out what Adam O' Connor Rodriguez editor at Hawthorne Books is looking for in a query to their publishing house, join us on Saturday, January 28th for Making It in Tough & Changing Times. Contact me for information.

2012-01-19T21:24:00.000-08:00

Update from Planet Published

Here is the livecast of LP O'Bryan's book launch in Dublin. http://twitcasting.tv/lpobryan/movie/3478923. What a great crowd! In it he mentions how he began writing every day 12 years ago.

2012-01-19T09:06:00.000-08:00

Planet Published

In the past year the number of writers I know who are now or are soon-to-be on Planet Published has risen dramatically. LP O'Bryan wrote to me from Ireland about a year or so ago after he read my book Bullies, Bastards, & Bitches, How to Write the Bad Guys in Fiction. I've been following his progress since then.

I remember the first day I started writing that book. I had gotten the contract from Writer's Digest in March, but I was finishing another book at the time, so I pushed the project off until May. The morning came around that I need to start working on it and I walked into my office with such fear and worry. How the hell was I going to get across my ideas? No one had written a book about characters like the one I was proposing. I wanted readers to take risks with their protagonists, I wanted to really nail the role anti-heroes in contemporary storytelling, and talk about creating fully-drawn villains. I wanted to remind writers that all characters are vulnerable.

I was scared when I wrote the book and I stayed scared throughout writing it. The book got written,with lots of hiccups and back and forths with my great editor Kelly Nickell. She didn't like the early drafts, my logic, my organization. So there was a lot of rewriting and heart ache. But it was published and I hear from a lot of writers about how they learned from it. Back to LP O'Bryan. He writes:

"On the 10th December 2010 I attended a crime writing workshop at Harper Collins' offices in Hammersmith, west London. While I was there I met an editor. She asked to see the novel I was working on.

One year, one month and nine days later that novel is out in mass market paperback format all over the UK and Ireland. Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, Turkey and Greece are all expected to release the novel this year. The name of then novel is The Istanbul PuzzleIt is the first in a series of novels featuring Sean Ryan and Isabel Sharp, being published by Harper Collins. The Istanbul Puzzle starts when Sean discovers a friend and colleague has been beheaded in Istanbul." O'Bryan risked so much to get this book published, since he's a husband and father. You can read Chapter 1 here. Also, check out his whole blog, author's site, noticing how effective it is at telling his story and selling his books.

You know the drill: Keep writing, keep dreaming, and support other writer's dreams and accomplishments. Meanwhile, I'll keep bringing more stories and interviews from Planet Published.

2012-01-18T07:23:00.000-08:00

Photo by Bellen Drake

Monica Drake on Writing

A few years ago I appeared on a panel about writing with Monica Drake at Marylhurst. I remember being impressed with her approach to writing, her vast curiosity about so many aspects of the planet, and her steadfast belief in the power of words. She's the author of a novel Clown Girl, has published short stories and essays, and teaches writing at Pacific Northwest College of Arts. She has been the recipient of an Arizona Commission on the Arts Award, the Alligator Juniper Prize in Fiction, and a Millay Colony Fellowship, and was a Tennessee Williams scholar at Sewanee Writers Workshop.

Q: I recall you mentioning that your parents were poets, that you grew up with a mimeograph machine in your household, and writers visited your home. Since many of us didn't experience that sort of background, could you please talk about this and other things that influenced you to be a writer?

A: My father, Albert Drake, grew up in the Lents area of Portland, aka "Felony Flats." It was a working-class, mostly white neighborhood, the same area that later raised Tonya Harding, among others. For reasons he can't explain, when he was about six he started keeping a journal. Nobody around him was a reader, much less a writer. The basic act of writing things down changed my father's life. It's how he made a life.Writing brought him from poverty to college, the first one in his family to go to college, at Portland State, then to grad school at the University of Oregon. He landed a great job at Michigan State, where he ran a small press, the Red Cedar Review.

My life wouldn't be the same if my father didn't start writing.

My parents met in grad school, and I was born into the U of O writing program.

We did have a mimeograph machine on the front porch. We bought what's called a "clam shell" letter press in California, and drove with it back to Michigan, and later brought it back to Oregon. If you know how heavy even a small letter press is, all that hauling it back and forth starts to seem like craziness, but my family valued this kind of thing.

My mother is also a writer, a poet and essayist. She has a number of publications, including a how-to book, Writing Poetry, that continues to sell years after initial publication. It's the kind of book writers find and love, and carry around until its tattered.

When I was a kid, they taught Poets-in-the-schools programs, and they'd take us, the three kids, along. I had more poetry workshops than any other child in Michigan. We'd work on concrete poetry as a regular habit.

These days, my father still publishes work, now as Flat Out Press, with an emphasis on automotive history. My mother, Barbara Drake, recently retired from teaching at Linfield, in McMinnville, Oregon, and is writing, too.
Q: In Clown Girl, your protagonist Nita, or Sniffles is a professional clown complete with balloon-tying skills and pratfalls. What was your inspiration for this story and do you ever find clowns creepy?

Clowns, creepy?
A: Ha! Well...I suppose sometimes they are, but sometimes ordinary people are creepy too, right?

A long time ago I worked as a clown. I didn't set out to be a clown, didn't have "the calling" necessarily, but work came along and it paid well, and one job lead to another. After serving as a clown, every job I've had ever since has drawn on clown skills. A person might not realize it, but even teaching takes performance skills, and clown work is based on risk taking. Writing is all about risk taking. It's one and the same. I hope my novel shows the parallel in creative urges, and the urge toward possibly foolish self expression in the name of being known, in the name of finding love.

Q: Since you also teach writing at PNCA, how do you balance writing, teaching, and parenthood? I believe other writers would especially be interested in how you weave small increments of writing time into a larger project.

A: This is hard. I've been working since I was fourteen, when I worked for the Michigan AFL-CIO on behalf of the Carter campaign when he lost to Regan. Since then, I've always had one or two or sometimes three jobs. My own creative work has been a way for me to hang on to my humanity at times when I've played a cog in the wheel, working at Burger King as a teenager, with late hours that caused me to drop out of high school. But stories I came across, like Updike's, "A&P," and Orwell's "Down and Out in Paris and London," showed me how work could be the source of art. Later, in college, I moved into restaurant jobs, offices, traveling art auctions--anything to pay the bills. Some jobs were more fantastic than others, like interning at the Oregon Zoo, and working as a paid intern at the Smithsonian, but overall I've really never had much in the way of "time off." So I'm used to writing when I can, not to a strict schedule. I keep details and stories in mind and throw them on the page when I find time. Then I carry the pages around and return to them, making changes and adding details, ideas. Slowly, the work comes together.

Now that I'm a mom there's another aspect to the ongoing time struggle. Writing is important to me, so I fight to give it space when I can, without letting it become an added stress.

I write late at night, and I still carry my pages with me, marking edits and ideas when I have a minute.

Q: Can you offer any insights on finding or perhaps hearing a character's voice and then translating it to the page?

A: I'm not really sure how to advise on that. For me, sometimes the voice just is apparent. The words, content and delivery appear as one character, a world view.

As a child I was big on dolls. I know it's not cool to say that--girls like to claim they massacred their Barbies. But I played with all kinds of dolls obsessively, and I think it laid the foundation for writing. Dolls tell stories through voice and actions. When I get too serious about my work, I imagine I'm still playing dolls. It keeps it all in perspective, and grants me freedom to mess around.

Q: What is your best advice to writers in 12 words or less?

Every sentence should set the tone, advance the plot, define the character.

Q: Sushi or pasta?

A: Ha! That's a hard one. Sushi in the summer, pasta in the winter.

Q: What's on your night stand?

Clutter. And a Kindle, I admit. I've got thrillers by Chelsea Cain, and I'm re-reading One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest right now.

Q: What's next for you?

I'm working on a novel set in Arizona, which I hope speaks back to a lot of what's going on there in terms of the environment and racial tensions. They've just banned all books by Native American and Mexican authors. That's incredibly backward. But the novel I'm writing is also a supernatural psychological thriller. Thanks for asking!

Monica will be teaching on January 28th at Making It in Tough & Changing Times Conference Her workshop is called One Strong Sentence After Another. Here is the description: Editor Gordon Lisch famously said that good writing is a matter of one strong sentence after another. In this craft workshop we’ll examine techniques that build muscle and cut the fat in each sentence. Participants may join at any level of experience. They’ll leave with examples and ideas to improve their own work quickly. This may be applied to any genre of literary fiction and nonfiction.

2012-01-16T23:28:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
"When I am taken by a subject, by a situation, the words tend to bubble up. Sometimes they stutter, but what you describe as the dance between thought and action is not at all conscious – it has to be a natural flow. Well, that’s not entirely true, I am so in the habit of measuring words that there is a little editor at the gates of wherever it is that the language comes out in my brain, and that little editor is kind of like a person hired to watch an assembly line of, say, beer bottles, and the bottles go rattling past him, and his job is to pick off the misshapen ones or the ones that are only half full – but it is important that he not stop the flow, if you see what I mean. So the process is not conscious, but at the same time there is a conscious witness to it who keeps the flow moving as best he can. The process has to be a natural flow. As Robert Coover said, the best stories he’s written were ones that he let happen. Or as Beckett said, about Waiting for Godot, it all happened between the hand and the page.

But as you also suggest, during the revision process, you have to take a certain control of it all – but you can take so much control that you destroy something. I’ve experienced that. You don’t want to take too much control of it – you have to let the creative impulse have its movement. You have to let it happen.

As Henry Miller said, “You have to listen when the Muse sings, or you get excommunicated.” And sometimes the Muse might sing a song you don’t want to hear. Miller, for example, talked about trying at first to resist the song of his tropics books. Like, “No, please, don’t make me write that, they’ll kill me.” But if you don’t listen, it goes dry.~ Thomas E. Kennedy

2012-01-15T23:35:00.001-08:00

Update:
The full scholarship for the mini conference has now been taken by a deserving writer, but a half scholarship is still available. Tell your friends.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2012-01-15T09:24:00.000-08:00

2012 can be your break out year

At last, a practical one-day conference filled with just the information that you need to propel your writing career to the next level and muscle your way to publication. We’ll cover everything from creating potent sentences and writing irresistible query letters, to writing killer openers and making it as a writer in a media-saturated world.

Making It in Tough & Changing Times Mini Writing Conference

January 28th

Times: 8:30-5:30

Location: Tabor Space, 5441 S.E. Belmont, Portland, OR

Keynote by Christina Katz The Prosperous Writer: Tips For Navigating The Gig Economy

Workshops: One Strong Sentence After Another, Monica Drake; Killer Openers, Jessica Morrell; Anatomy of a Scene, Jessica Morrell; Paring it Down to the Truth, Emily Whitman; What Editors Want, Adam O’Connor Rodriguez.

Panel/Q & A: Risk It To Get Published with Christina Katz, Jessica Morrell, and Adam O’Connor Rodriguez

Cost: $99 includes continental breakfast and lunch

ALSO: A scholarship and half price scholarship are available. Please

contact me with details about your circumstances.

To register: Contact Jessica Morrell at jessicapage (at) spiritone(dot)com

Space is limited so early registration is recommended.

Payments can be made by check or through Paypal.

Mailing address is: Jessica Morrell, P.O. Box 820141, Portland, OR 97282-1141

Writers, we are a community. I work hard to support your endeavors and dreams with this blog, my website and newsletters, classes, and books. Please support me in return by telling other writers about this conference.

2012-01-13T22:33:00.001-08:00

A new word is like a freshseed
sewn on the ground of the discussion.
—Ludwig Wittgenstein

2012-01-12T14:41:00.000-08:00

Food for Thought: Kids Books are Selling ...and Selling

Here's a list compiled of the 100 bestselling books for 2011. A few things will jump out at you--that many familiar names are included in the list; that many of the books were written years ago; and that 25% of the books are written for kids. YA is still hot for those of you who doubt. And book number 100? Goodnight Moon first written in 1947.

2012-01-12T10:07:00.000-08:00

Quick Take: Tone
"Tone is the personal attitude writers being to their work. Just as in music a note has a specific pitch that characterizes it as a C or D sharp, so a writer's work has its own distinguishing sound as well. This sound can be joyous or self important; it can be bland, aloof, scientific, tongue-in-cheek--you name it. Inappropriate tone tends to confuse and finally to repel readers; just as a dull tone bores them, a self-righteous tone angers them...Careful writers are aware of this fact, and they mold their tone to conform to their listener's ear." ~ David L. Carroll

2012-01-12T08:15:00.000-08:00

One space rule

Fine, clearing sky this morning and it looks like another remarkable day without rain. This winter is setting records for the lack thereof.

I've mentioned in a previous post that only space is required after each sentence. This change has come about with the use of computers replacing typewriters in the writing biz. Here's an article from Slate that explains the reasons in more detail, such as, "A space signals a pause," says David Jury, the author of About Face: Reviving The Rules of Typography. "If you get a really big pause—a big hole—in the middle of a line, the reader pauses. And you don't want people to pause all the time. You want the text to flow."

Keep writing, keep dreaming, punctuate using logic

2012-01-11T05:13:00.000-08:00

Baby Steps

I believe in baby steps, especially when it comes to writing books. If you tackle the whole project head on, it's bound to be overwhelming. For more suggestions on taking baby steps go here.

Quick Take:

Avoid appending up to verbs as in hurry up, lift up, stood up, climbed up, rose up, spoke up. Up is rarely needed as an adverb.Standing or lifting implies an upward cast...

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2012-01-10T21:34:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
I believe that – if you are serious about a life of writing, or indeed about any creative form of expression – that you should take on this work like a holy calling. I became a writer the way other people become monks or nuns. I made a vow to writing, very young. I became Bride-of-Writing. I was writing’s most devotional handmaiden. I built my entire life around writing. I didn’t know how else to do this. I didn’t know anyone who had ever become a writer. I had no, as they say, connections. I had no clues. I just began. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

2012-01-10T08:53:00.000-08:00

Meet Christina Katz

Christina Katz writes, teaches and inspires writers and is such a whiz at promotions you’d be silly not pay attention to her work and work ethic. Her latest book, The Writer’s Workout 366 Tips, Tasks, & Techniques from Your Writing Career Coach has just been published by Writer’s Digest Books. It has a nice heft and paging through it you will find thought-provoking ideas and possibilities to push your writing career to the next level. I especially liked the focus on creativity and the muscle memory that happens when you work out regularly. Because writing is a workout.

I’ve been paging through it this week and have found myself needing to set it down so I can jot down new ideas---my favorite sort of reading. You can listen to a podcast of her reading the intro here. She’s also written Get Known Before the Book Deal, and Writer Mama. Her writing career tips and parenting advice appear regularly in national, regional, and online publications.

Q: You've really found your niche in writing about and working with mothers and writers to launch their careers and navigate the new gig economy. Can you tell us how this focus came about?

A: As a writing coach, I am a specialist, though my expertise can be more widely applied to suit a range of writer-types. So while I specialize in working with mom writers, I also serve a larger community of writers of all types and levels. Even though working with mom writers is my sweet spot, I also teach and coach folks who are not moms. Although I work primarily with nonfiction writers, much of my advice carries over for writers of other and multiple genres.

Q: In your new book, The Writer's Workout, you're advising writers to smash through all sorts of barriers and establish new habits and procedures. What has been the advice or uidance that has worked best for you in your career?

A: This is a great question. What works best for me is working with others as I grow my career and sharing the best of what I learn as I go. Teaching others inspires me. I inspire them. They inspire me. As my writing career progresses, I am always learning new and valuable (and sometimes painful) lessons about how to maintain the delicate balance of writer, teacher, speaker, blogger, trainer, lifelong student, and creative. Somehow, I’ve learned to make it work for my disposition.

Q: How do you think that writers can balance having a productive, profitable writing career and also write about topics and in genres that have meaning for them?

A: Well, in an ideal world, there would not be separation between what a writer is passionate about and what they write about. However, there’s always the danger that strong emotions will become stumbling blocks rather than bridges to inspiration. In my teaching and in my books, I coach writers to lead with and follow their gut instincts which I believe transcends mere emotion. The only way a writer can marry love and writing is to have a clear connection to their intuition on a moment-by-moment basis. If you begin with the assumption that you can combine the two, then you can. If you think you can’t, well then, by golly, you can’t.

Q: Over they years I've met so many writers who complain that they hate marketing and self-promotion. What do you say to these writers?

A: Well, first I chuckle like I’m doing right now. Yes, I’ve heard this more than a few times. By now, folks have wised up enough to know that if they say this to me, I’m not going to cluck my tongue in sympathy at their plight. I’m not a big fan of the writer as victim point-of-view.

We all have our challenges and tripping points. Our weaknesses are a lot easier to face if we also know our strengths and lean into those instead of harping on what we cannot or will not do. I’m much more interested in what the writer is going to do to grow. You don’t like marketing and self-promotion? But it comes with the job. So what’s the writer going to do about it? I have plenty of suggestions—books full of them—but if the writer is not willing, I won’t waste my breath.

Q: What is the most challenging aspect of writing for you and how do you tackle it?

A: I guess I have written long enough at this point (twelve years) and deeply enough (three books, eight classes, an ebook, and hundreds of articles) to appreciate all the aspects of the process—even running late on deadlines. I’d say my biggest challenge is that I love the immersion of writing, but the people I love are in this world not that one. I would say my biggest challenge is that I can stay in the writing world a lot longer than some folks would like me to. If I could clone myself, I would.

Q: What is your best advice to writers in 12 words or less?

A: All excuses are off. Get to work! (You know you want to.)

Q: Pasta or sushi?

A: Definitely sushi. I’m hypoglycemic.

Q: What books are on your bedside table?

A: None. I don’t have a bedside table and I am not much of a night reader. By the end of the day, I’m pretty spent. My favorite place to read for fun is at the local library while my daughter is gathering books. I grab a stack of magazines (O, Real Simple, and Living) and marvel at all the airbrushed people with all their perfect houses and expensive stuff. That’s not my life. My life is much more Wabi-Sabi. But it’s fun to fantasize.

Q: What's next for you?

A: Another great question. I tend to live in the moment. I’m not a planner in the traditional sense. The furthest ahead I tend to think is one year at a time and that’s really setting intentions more than making long-term plans. I’m not really looking to make any major life changes. My career momentum today comes from the momentum I already have. I just go with it. Every day the question is: where can I go from here? What’s coming next will let me know when it is time for me to know. My job is to stay open to whatever that may be and enjoy today.

Christina will be the keynote speaker at Making It in Tough & Changing Times Mini Writing Conference on January 28th. She’ll be speaking about The Prosperous Writer: Tips For Navigating The Gig Economy Writing well, closing sales, narrowing your focus, continuous learning, and a career-long willingness to self-promote—these are the five qualities of prosperous writers. But how will you sustain your creative productivity and juggle all of these skills at once? These are the creative productivity secrets that most writers rarely share. Myths will be busted. Truths will be bared.

2012-01-09T10:38:00.000-08:00

A Big Congratulations

to Emily Whitman. Her YA novel Wildwing has been nominated for Oregon Book Awards! She'll be teaching writers how to edit their own stories and sentences at the Making It in Tough & Changing Times Conference on January 28th in Portland. Join us--it's going to be a day of practical, doable advice and craft workshops along with a hearty dose of inspiration.

2012-01-07T07:01:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day: Jennifer Weiner's Advice for Writers
Among her tips:
6. Get a Dog
Okay, you're thinking, what does getting a dog have to do with becoming a writer? More than you'd think. Writing is about talent and creativity, but it's also about discipline - about the ability to sit yourself down in that seat, day after day, often after eight hours of work, and make yourself do it, day after day, even if you're not getting published yet, even if you're not getting paid, even if ABC is hosting an all-star reunion of your favorite cast members from The Bachelor and The Amazing Race. It's a form of training that's as much physical as mental in nature - you sit down, you do the writing, no matter what distractions are out there, no matter that you're tired or bored or uninspired.
Being a dog owner requires a similar form of discipline. You wake up every morning. You walk the dog. You do this whether you're tired, depressed, broke, hung over, or have been recently dumped. You do it. And while you're walking, you're thinking about plot, or characters, or that tricky bit of dialogue that's had you stumped for days. You're out in the fresh air. Your legs are moving. Your dog is sniffing the butts of other dogs. It gives you a routine, a physical rhythm, a loyal companion, and a way to meet new people when you're in a new place. It gets your body used to doing the same thing at the same time - and if you're walking the dog for half an hour at the same time of every day, it's an easy step to go sit in front of the computer and create for half an hour at the same time every day. So go to your local pound or rescue organization, and get a dog. Trust me. You'll be glad you did.

2012-01-06T11:06:00.000-08:00

Crafting Novels & Short Stories

Fog seems thicker as the morning goes along...mysterious and wintery looking and as if a Dickens-style counting house or some sinister outpost might appear in the mist.
Writer's Digest Books has compiled excellent advice in one volume, Crafting Novels & Short Stories. You can also download exlusive interviews with authors such as Stephen King and Ann Tyler. It includes a forward by James Scott Bell and a chapter on pacing written by me. I've been leafing through it this morning and it's a soup-to-nuts sort of book including suggestions for everything from the writing life to creating knowable, troubled characters (the only kind) to fixing a story when it stalls. I'm happy to say my advice is in excellent company here since the compilation includes some of the best experts on these topics.

2012-01-06T09:46:00.000-08:00

From an editor's desk: Baggage
The fog is so thick this morning that the Douglas firs half a block away are only a blur. Fabulous morning for staying indoors and reading my client's manuscript. Also, I've had this nasty cold, lung misery that's been circulating for weeks now and feeling the need for lots of tea, sympathy, and coziness.

I've written five books for writers now and sometimes I cannot remember which book I covered certain topics in. Somewhere along the way, I believe in Between the Lines, I talked about emotional baggage that a character carries. If your protagonist doesn't carry this baggage, and if his background doesn't create deep emotional needs for him or her in the story, then the story won't have enough potency. Now, some stories are mostly designed to showcase, or solve problems from the back story, especially those that have a frame structure. This means that they start in the present, then wind backward to explain how things came to be. Daphne DuMoire's Rebecca is a classic of this type.In most structures the character's motivations in the front story and emotional needs from his back story sort of collide, or collaborate to push the story forward.

It's especially important that serious traumas in a character's childhood are brought to light. Which brings me to DPS--Dead Parent Syndrome. In my book Bullies, Bastards, & Bitches ( go here for bonus tips) I wrote about how a key to writing characters is vulnerability. Readers relate to vulnerability because we have all felt these uncomfortable feelings, especially in childhood. If your characters aren't vulnerable, readers don't worry about them, and if readers aren't worried, they stop reading. Orphans bring on instant sympathy and empathy in readers. Novelists and storytellers throughout the ages have known this, and have used this trope, creating personality traits and back stories that screwed up their characters.

Which is why there are so many orphans in fiction--Dorothy Gale, Harry Potter, Tom Sawyer, Hannibal Lector to name a few. My favorite orphans as as a kid were The Boxcar Children and twisted little sister that I was, I played orphan for years with my cousins and sisters. Many characters also have one dead parent--Nancy Drew and Huckleberry Finn come to mind. And when if comes to missing parents, it's just plain easier for a writer to dispense with them and then send a young hero/protagonist off on rollicking, dangerous quests that any sane parent wouldn't allow.

However, and this is a big however, if your protagonist has a dead, or even a missing parent, this needs to leave a big, unhealed hole in the heart. The death of a parent is a scarring, lonely tragedy. Make this a factor in the story and how your character acts and reacts. Otherwise, you're writing a cheesy melodrama.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2012-01-05T10:01:00.000-08:00

10 Ways to Harness Your Fears and Fuel Your Writing

In the spirit of launching 2012 with a giant gallop, here's an inspiring article by the magical and wise Sage Cohen (see for yourself herehttp://pathofpossibility.com/).
I especially like this one:
#3 Focus on process instead of results.
Fear tends to be focused on projected outcomes—which we cannot control. So, why not use fear as a signal to turn your attention to your process, instead? What we do have influence over is the intention, commitment and labor of love that goes into our writing. When you give your attention to following through on a goal, taking steps to improve your craft, researching places to submit, or reading that book on marketing, you are creating a forward motion that makes it harder for fear to hold you back.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, harness your fears

2012-01-04T10:50:00.000-08:00

The sun is breaking through here again this morning. We might be having the driest winter on record, although when it does rain, it seems to do so with a vengeance. And just as I was giving up, the birds are finally finding our feeders in the backyard. I've been worried that all the cats and crows have been keeping them away. J and I keep speculating why there's such a big crow population in this neighborhood. I've lived in various neighborhoods in Portland, usually closer to the river and once on the banks of the Columbia, and have never seen or heard so many crows. Lately, they've been flocking and battling with seagulls for territory. Strange to watch this avian warfare in my midst.

Just wanted to pass along the link to this piece 25 Things Writers Should Stop Doing. Warning that some of the language is X-rated. But the ideas make sense for our times.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2012-01-01T22:17:00.000-08:00

“Write whatshould not be forgotten." ~Isabel Allende

2012-01-01T21:50:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day: It was wonderful to walk down the long flights ofstairs knowing that I'd had good luck working.I always worked until I hadsomething done and I always stopped when Iknew what was going to happen next. That way I could be sure of goingon the next day. But sometimes when I was started on a new story andI could not get going, I would sit in front of the fire and squeezethe peel of the little oranges into the edge of the flame and watchthe sputter of blue that they made. I would stand and look out overthe roofs of Paris and think,"Do not worry. You have alwayswritten before and you will write now. All youhave to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence youknow." So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go onfrom there. It was easy then because there was always one truesentence that I knew or had seen or had heard someone say. If Istarted to write elaborately, or like someone introducing orpresenting something, I found that I could cut the scrollwork orornament out and throw it away and start with the first true simpledeclarative sentence I had written. ~ Ernest Hemingway, A MoveableFeast

2012-01-01T19:00:00.000-08:00

Quick take:

Voice + style = writer

2012-01-01T11:27:00.001-08:00

101 Most Useful Sites

Make that extraordinarily useful sites for writing and online life. Find them here.

Happy New Year to all

Keep Writing, Keep Dreaming, Have Heart

2012-01-01T11:20:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day: Woody Guthrie's Resolutions 1942

Let's all adopt "stay glad"

2012-01-01T11:18:00.000-08:00

January

2011-12-30T11:30:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day:

"We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out" ~Ray Bradbury

Endings

Morning sky is sooty and bleak looking here in Portlandia. All the firs out my office window are still as sentinels and a flock of crows keeps circling around as if looking for trouble. I’m a person who sometimes writes about the bitter truths of the writing business. No starry-eyed romantic, I’m prone to depict the writing life with the bleakness of a frozen graveyard. In Minnesota. In January. And there’s been a rash of deaths in the land of the wind-chill factor (likely from pneumonia) and graves need to be dug. Or maybe we'll just need to store those corpses until a thaw...

And when it come to the elements of storytelling, I'm all seriousness. Good stories are balanced. No unnecessary digressions or complications, no skimpy endings, no added characters or subplots or silliness simply designed to fill in pages. It's hard to list what are the most important elements of stories, but stories live or die by their beginnings and endings. It's what editors buy and readers buy into.

Laura Miller of salon.com has written an intriguing piece about how difficult it is to talk about a great ending here. Here's an excerpt:

"The trick of a good ending, of course, is that it must capture and equal everything that has gone before. The line “He loved Big Brother” (from a novel that ends as masterfully as it begins) means very little until you understand exactly who Big Brother is. A first line or opening scene need only arrest a reader’s attention and stoke her curiosity; a final scene or paragraph is expected to provide that sensation so rare in real life: completion. The better the book, the more nuanced and persuasive, the more difficult this is. We want a novel to swell with a sense of limitless possibility at the start and in the middle, but we also want it to zero in to a point of inevitability as it ends.

2011-12-29T23:25:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:

“Teach yourself to work in uncertainty.” ~ Bernard Malamud.

2011-12-28T01:27:00.000-08:00

A poem a day. Alan Heathcock shares my sentiment about how reading a poem every day brings balance and inspiration. "The older I get, the more life passes in a harried traffic of cars and people and events. This world of shallow speed often sends me to sleep feeling I've been to battle. Battle at dance practice and the soccer game and the drive-thru window, battle to pick up the dry cleaning and get the kids new shoes before I have to attend parent-teachers conferences. Battles at work, battles in my relationships, battles with myself. If you're like me, you long for a bit of quiet, a morning in the chapel, a walk in the woods. If only I had the time to still my mind, take an accounting of myself, find my balance once again."

2011-12-28T00:57:00.000-08:00

Toward a more complete measure of excellence The end of the year always means a slew of "best of" lists appearing. I'm a suckerfor these lists and best of anthologies, though I often want the editors to range further when they make their choices. The Rumpus has a thoughtful assessment of excellence with a link to Jeanette Winterson's essay in The Guardian on literature and readability.

After reading the New York Time's Top Ten Novels of 2011 I bought Swamplandia! by Karen Russell and have been reading it and am wowed by the language and imagination of the story. Set in Florida Everglades, you can almost hear the lethal mosquitoes buzzing around you as you read.
Here is the opening to the novel:

"Our mother performed in starlight. Whose innovation this was I never discovered. Probably it was Chrief Bigree's idea, and it was a good one--to blank the follow spot and let a sharp moon cut across the sky, unchaperoned; to kill the micorphone; to leave the stage lights' tin eyelids scrolled and give the tourists in the stands a chance to enjoy the darkness of our island; to encourage the whole stadium to gulp air along with Swamplandia!'s star performer, the world-famous alligator wrestler Hilola Bigtree. Four times a week, our mother climbed the ladder over the Gator Pit in a green two-piece bathing suit and stood on the edge of the diving borad, breathing. If it was windy, her long hair flew around her face, but the rest of her stayed motionless. Nights in the swamp were dark and star-lepered--and although your naked eye could easily find the ball of Venus and the sappire hairs of the Pleiades, our mother's body ws just lines, a smudge against the palm trees."

2011-12-27T14:34:00.000-08:00

A Meaningful Life

My column about how writing leads to a meaningful life is at my website here. In it I imagine a town filled with writers....I fantasize, okay, I romanticize, about some aspects of the town, but cannot speculate on the murder rate...

Top Ten Blogs for Writers 2011/2012 is here....stiff competition and includes the illustrious Jane Friedman.

Don't forget about the Writing in Tough & Changing Times mini-conference on January 28th in Portland, Oregon. Space is limited and reservations are coming in.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2011-12-27T01:45:00.000-08:00

10 Tips for Good Storytelling

My first rule was given to me by T.H. White, author of The Sword in the Stone and other Arthurian fantasies and was: Read. Read everything you can lay hands on. I always advise people who want to write a fantasy or science fiction or romance to stop reading everything in those genres and start reading everything else from Bunyan to Byatt.
Find an author you admire (mine was Conrad) and copy their plots and characters in order to tell your own story, just as people learn to draw and paint by copying the masters.
Introduce your main characters and themes in the first third of your novel.
If you are writing a plot-driven genre novel make sure all your major themes/plot elements are introduced in the first third, which you can call the introduction.
Develop your themes and characters in your second third, the development.
Resolve your themes, mysteries and so on in the final third, the resolution.
For a good melodrama study the famous “Lester Dent master plot formula” which you can find online. It was written to show how to write a short story for the pulps, but can be adapted successfully for most stories of any length or genre.
If possible have something going on while you have your characters delivering exposition or philosophising. This helps retain dramatic tension.
Carrot and stick—have protagonists pursued (by an obsession or a villain) and pursuing (idea, object, person, mystery).
Ignore all proferred rules and create your own, suitable for what you want to say. ~ Michael Moorcock, from The Guardian For more on Moorcock, go here.

2011-12-26T10:42:00.000-08:00

Just for Fun:
The Elements of Style
Happy Boxing Day to all the Canadian and English writers out there...

2011-12-24T08:55:00.000-08:00

Yuletide Wishes:

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkuh and may 2012 be a year of writing productivity, vibrant health, laughter and happy memory making with family and friends, and peace within, and of course peace, on our small planet.

A book perfect for those who appreciate wonder such as my 8-year-old granddaughter Paige: The Flight of Reindeer: The True Story of Santa Claus and His Christmas Mission

And from today's The Writers Almanac:
It was on this day in 1914 that the last known Christmas truce occurred along the Western Front during World War I. In the week leading up to Christmas, soldiers all over the battlefields had been decorating their trenches with candles and makeshift trimmings when groups of German and British soldiers began shouting seasonal greetings and singing songs to each other. On occasion, a soldier or two would even cross the battlefield to take gifts to the enemy. Then, on Christmas Eve, the men of the Western Front put the war on hold and many soldiers from both sides left their trenches to meet in No Man's Land, where they mingled and exchanged tobacco, chocolate, and sometimes even the buttons from their own uniforms as souvenirs. They played games of football, sang carols, and buried fallen comrades together as the unofficial truce lasted through the night.

2011-12-22T04:30:00.000-08:00

8 Good Writing Practices according to Neil Gaiman

Write.
Put one word after another. Find the right word, put it down.
Finish what you're writing. Whatever you have to do to finish it, finish it.
Put it aside. Read it pretending you’ve never read it before. Show it to friends whose opinion you respect and who like the kind of thing that this is.
Remember: when people tell you something’s wrong or doesn’t work for them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.
Fix it. Remember that, sooner or later, before it ever reaches perfection, you will have to let it go and move on and start to write the next thing. Perfection is like chasing the horizon. Keep moving.
Laugh at your own jokes.
The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you’re allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for life as well as for writing. But it’s definitely true for writing.) So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I'm not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.

2011-12-20T00:55:00.000-08:00

Just for fun:
(well, sort of) 10 Ways to Stay Sane When Frustrated with Your Writing from Writer's Digest

2011-12-20T00:46:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day: John Steinbeck's letter to beginning writers
Dear Writer:
      Although it must be a thousand years ago that I sat in a class in story writing at Stanford, I remember the experience very clearly. I was bright-eyes and bushy-brained and prepared to absorb the secret formula for writing good short stories, even great short stories. This illusion was canceled very quickly. The only way to write a good short story, we were told, is to write a good short story. Only after it is written can it be taken apart to see how it was done. It is a most difficult form, as we were told, and the proof lies in how very few great short stories there are in the world.
      The basic rule given us was simple and heartbreaking. A story to be effective had to convey something from the writer to the reader, and the power of its offering was the measure of its excellence. Outside of that, there were no rules. A story could be about anything and could use any means and any technique at all - so long as it was effective. As a subhead to this rule, it seemed to be necessary for the writer to know what he wanted to say, in short, what he was talking about. As an exercise we were to try reducing the meat of our story to one sentence, for only then could we know it well enough to enlarge it to three- or six- or ten-thousand words.
      So there went the magic formula, the secret ingredient. With no more than that, we were set on the desolate, lonely path of the writer. And we must have turned in some abysmally bad stories. If I had expected to be discovered in a full bloom of excellence, the grades given my efforts quickly disillusioned me. And if I felt unjustly criticized, the judgments of editors for many years afterward upheld my teacher's side, not mine. The low grades on my college stories were echoed in the rejection slips, in the hundreds of rejection slips.
      It seemed unfair. I could read a fine story and could even know how it was done. Why could I not then do it myself? Well, I couldn't, and maybe it's because no two stories dare be alike. Over the years I have written a great many stories and I still don't know how to go about it except to write it and take my chances.
      If there is a magic in story writing, and I am convinced there is, no one has ever been able to reduce it to a recipe that can be passed from one person to another. The formula seems to lie solely in the aching urge of the writer to convey something he feels important to the reader. If the writer has that urge, he may sometimes, but by no means always, find the way to do it. You must perceive the excellence that makes a good story good or the errors that makes a bad story. For a bad story is only an ineffective story.
      It is not so very hard to judge a story after it is written, but, after many years, to start a story still scares me to death. I will go so far as to say that the writer who not scared is happily unaware of the remote and tantalizing majesty of the medium.
      I remember one last piece of advice given me. It was during the exuberance of the rich and frantic '20s, and I was going out into that world to try and to be a writer.
      I was told, "It's going to take a long time, and you haven't got any money. Maybe it would be better if you could go to Europe."
      "Why?" I asked.
      "Because in Europe poverty is a misfortune, but in America it is shameful. I wonder whether or not you can stand the shame of being poor."
      It wasn't too long afterward that the depression came. Then everyone was poor and it was no shame anymore. And so I will never know whether or not I could have stood it. But surely my teacher was right about one thing. It took a long time - a very long time. And it is still going on, and it has never got easier.
      She told me it wouldn't.

2011-12-20T00:41:00.000-08:00

Quick Take: Formatting
One of the first things I notice about a writer is if he or she knows how to format a manuscript. I'm always concerned that if a writer doesn't take care with formatting, then he or she might not take care with other aspects of writing either. This is the one area where you cannot show your creativity. I'm serious as a heart attack here. It's professional courtesy to make your manuscript easy to read and formatting rules are not arbitrary. Here's a link to accurate information on how to format a short story presented by William Shunn. And here are more tips on formatting novel-length manuscripts.

One thing that's changing in this digital age is that generally publishers or editors do not need you to underline italicized words. You also do not need two spaces after sentences--these practices are from the typewriter era. Realize too that publishers have their own standards for formatting and that British, Canadian, and Australian publishers differ slightly in formatting standards from American publishers.

Also, insert a space break any time you change POV.
Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2011-12-18T05:36:00.000-08:00

Timeless Advice from Kurt Vonnegut:

Here's a link to some timeless advice about writing from Kurt Vonnegut. Here is a sample:

5. Sound like yourself
The writing style which is most natural for you is bound toecho the speech you heard when a child. English was Conrad'sthird language, and much that seems piquant in his use of Englishwas no doubt colored by his first language, which was Polish. And lucky indeed is the writer who has grown up in Ireland, forthe English spoken there is so amusing and musical. I myselfgrew up in Indianapolis, where common speech sounds like a bandsaw cutting galvanized tin, and employs a vocabulary asunornamental as a monkey wrench.
In some of the more remote hollows of Appalachia, childrenstill grow up hearing songs and locutions of Elizabethan times. Yes, and many Americans grow up hearing a language other thanEnglish, or an English dialect a majority of Americans cannotunderstand.
All these varieties of speech are beautiful, just as thevarieties of butterflies are beautiful. No matter what yourfirst language, you should treasure it all your life. If ithappens to not be standard English, and if it shows itself whenyour write standard English, the result is usually delightful,like a very pretty girl with one eye that is green and one thatis blue.
I myself find that I trust my own writing most, and othersseem to trust it most, too, when I sound most like a person fromIndianapolis, which is what I am. What alternatives do I have? The one most vehemently recommended by teachers has no doubt beenpressed on you, as well: to write like cultivated Englishmen of acentury or more ago.

6. Say what you mean
I used to be exasperated by such teachers, but am no more. I understand now that all those antique essays and stories withwhich I was to compare my own work were not magnificent for theirdatedness or foreignness, but for saying precisely what theirauthors meant them to say. My teachers wished me to writeaccurately, always selecting the most effective words, andrelating the words to one another unambiguously, rigidly, likeparts of a machine. The teachers did not want to turn me into anEnglishman after all. They hoped that I would becomeunderstandable --- and therefore understood. And there went mydream of doing with words what Pablo Picasso did with paint orwhat any number of jazz idols did with music. If I broke all therules of punctuation, had words mean whatever I wanted them tomean, and strung them together higgledy-piggledy, I would simplynot be understood. So you, too, had better avoid Picasso-styleor jazz-style writing, if you have something worth saying andwish to be understood.
Readers want our pages to look very much like pages theyhave seen before. Why? This is because they themselves have atough job to do, and they need all the help they can get from us.

2011-12-14T09:25:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day

Do dialogue-let's say-between a hobo and a high-class hooker, then between an ambulance chaser and a guy who sells scorecards at the ballpark-let's say-about the meaning of money. Between pints, get the arch of the dart down pat. Shoot foul shots day in and rim out. Pick a sentence at random from a randomly selected book, and another from another volume also chosen by chance; then write a paragraph which will be a reasonable bridge between them. And it does get easier to do what you have done, sing what you've so often sung; it gets so easy, sometimes, that what was once a challenge passes over into thoughtless routine. So the bar must be raised a few notches, one's handicap increased, the stakes trebled, tie both hands behind your back. Refuse the blindfold, refuse the final cigarette, refuse the proffered pizza. Do dialogue in dialect: a Welshman and a Scot arguing about an onion. Hardest of all: start over. ~ WILLIAM H. GASS

2011-12-13T18:06:00.001-08:00

Book Christmas Trees
all the rage this season...to show love and support of books, book sellers, and publishers
If you want help in creating your own, here's some info

2011-12-13T06:36:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
"Remember yourself, from the days when you were younger and rougher and wilder, more scrawl than straight line. Remember all of yourself, the flaws and faults as well as the many strengths. Carl Jung once said, "If people can be educated to see the lowly side of their own natures, it may be hoped that they will also learn to understand and to love their fellow men better. A little less hypocrisy and a little more tolerance toward oneself can only have good results in respect for our neighbors, for we are all too prone to transfer to our fellows the injustice and violence we inflict upon our own natures."~ Anna Quindlen
commencement speech at Mount Holyoke College

2011-12-12T09:09:00.000-08:00

A Reader's Advice to Writers: skip the scenery

Laura Miller the book critic at Salon.com penned this column a while ago, but the advice still rings true. It seems that her advice boils down to "trust the reader." She begins:
"Recently, I was asked to speak to a class of writing students on what critics look for in debut novels. After canvassing my colleagues, I had a few answers — a distinctive voice, an interesting perspective, strong writing and so on — but they didn’t seem especially helpful. Presumably, every writer already starts out with the most distinctive voice and interesting perspective he or she can conjure. How about telling them what to avoid instead?

By far the most common gripe from readers was too much description, particularly environmental description — that is, of landscape, weather and interiors. This complaint struck me as especially pertinent because at that very moment I was trying to decide whether or not to recommend Tea Obreht’s “The Tiger’s Wife” in our weekly book column, What to Read. Obreht, recently named one of the New Yorker’s 20 best writers under 40, is undeniably talented, and the novel has much to recommend it. Yet no sooner does Obreht’s narrative work up a little momentum or present a masterful scene than it hits a patch of long, dozy paragraphs filled with way too much detail about the scenery."

And here is Miller's first column with solid advice for writers which includes:
1. Make your main character want something. Writers tend to be introverted observers who equate reflection with insight and depth, yet a fictional character who does nothing but witness and contemplate is at best annoying and at worst, dull. There’s a reason why Nick Carraway is the narrator of “The Great Gatsby” while Gatsby himself is the protagonist. Desire is the engine that drives both life and narrative.

2011-12-11T09:19:00.000-08:00

The Writer List: Favorite fictional characters

By Arthur Plotnik, Laura Miller, William Kowalski, Jessica Page Morrell

From Jane Eyre to Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom, four accomplished writers weigh in on the skillfully imagined people who refuse to fade away in their memories. How do your choices compare?

If you're not a subscriber, go out and buy a copy of the January The Writer--it's a great issue.
Meanwhile, keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2011-12-08T20:48:00.000-08:00

Making It In Tough & Changing Times

Mini-Writing Conference

January 28, 2012

Portland, Oregon

At last, a practical one-day conference filled with just the information that you need to propel your writing career to the next level and muscle your way to publication. We’ll cover everything from creating potent sentences and writing irresistible query letters that capture attention, to writing killer openers and making it as a writer in a media-saturated world.

Details at my website

Keynote speaker: Christina Katz

The Prosperous Writer: Tips For Navigating The Gig Economy

2011-12-06T09:15:00.000-08:00

Quick Take: When there isn’t enough character development in a story, especially when a character lacks a back story, a reader feels ill at ease in the story. The emotional needs of your characters should drive the story. Is your character after recognition, redemption, justice? Is he or she emotionally scarred? Especially vulnerable in certain circumstances? These motivations and needs will stem from back story.
This lack of intimacy can occur when a story features a lot of telling or reporting, rather than dramatized in scenes. Readers don’t meet characters on a playing field where they can take their measure. Also, when a story lacks insights into the character’s thoughts and emotions, then the story lacks intimacy. Without intimacy, and readers don’t have a strong knowledge of the characters and why they do what they do, the story ends up seeming more like a game board than a living, breathing world. Fiction is a world of unease, a battleground of emotions with pressures and choices coming at the main characters from all sides.

2011-12-06T08:07:00.001-08:00

Thought for the Day:
"In the end, writing is like a prison, an island from which you will never be released but which is a kind of paradise: the solitude, the thoughts, the incredible joy of putting into words the essence of what you for the moment understand and with your whole heart want to believe." ~ James Salter

2011-12-05T09:45:00.000-08:00

Quick Take:Find and eradicate your crutch words--the words you use too often in your stories so that they become annoying and/or intrusive. Lately I'm seeing these in various manuscripts I've been working on: exit, went, really, right, alright, literally, sweet, home, house, headed, some, sort of, recently, just, seemed, especially, suddenly, actually, aware,journey, smile, grin, grimace ... (My main crutch word is deep.These days I try to delete as soon as it shows up on the page.Come to think of it, these days is another crutch expression I use...)
A tip: Listen to your conversation and notice
words and phrases that you repeat out loud. Consciously try to vary your language when talking.

Tip 2: And here's an online site to help you catch these stinkers.

Thought for the Day: A classic is classic not because it conforms to certain structural rules, or fits certain definitions (of which its author had quite probably never heard). It is classic because of a certain eternal and irrepressible freshness.~ Edith Wharton

2011-12-02T08:34:00.000-08:00

December

2011-12-02T08:26:00.001-08:00

Thought for the Day:

Make your writing life a sustainable component of a broader living practice. Know what activities complement your writing work, and do them regularly. ~Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig

2011-12-02T08:23:00.000-08:00

Steal This List

Writing Advice that Saves You Five Years (from the Glimmertrain bulletin)By Janis Hubschman

A writer friend recently heard Colum McCann say he likes to give his students the kind of advice that will save them five years. As a fiction writer, I'm always struggling to figure out the rules, the most economical way to go about writing and revision. I have, in fact become a collector of "ten things you should remember" lists. I recommend Elmore Leonard's famous "Ten Rules of Writing," Laura Miller's "A Reader's Advice to Writers," and the Guardian's "Ten Rules for Writing Fiction." But here are the ten craft techniques, gathered from my notebooks, that have been most helpful to me. Many of them, I notice, address characterization, the element of craft that I most enjoy exploring. They've saved me a few hours of frustration, if not years.

When the story stalls, ask: what is the character thinking now? Is she thinking anything? If not, why not? Characters need to learn something about themselves, about their values and assumptions.

Characters reveal themselves under stress. Raise the stakes. Drive the character into a tight spot. What are the psychological crutches the character relies on under pressure?

Readers like to learn about something when they read. The details of an unusual job or hobby, the day-to-day activities of a particular place at a particular time in history, for example, draw the reader in.

Trust the reader. Remember Hemingway's iceberg theory: "you could omit anything if you knew you omitted it and the omitted part would strengthen the story and make people feel something more than they understood."

Take apart successful published stories (or the stories of writers you admire) to see how they work.

Give the character something to do in the scene. It brings the character and the scene to life. A character soaking in the bathtub, thinking about her rotten marriage is boring. A character performing brain surgery, thinking about her rotten marriage is a different proposition.

To gain insight into a character, consider her history: Think about what happened before the story, what tortuous path led the character to this particular moment?

Allow the character to misinterpret another character's words or actions. In life, we often misread a situation, jump to conclusions. Interesting things can happen when characters make presumptions or project their own hang-ups onto others.

Let the characters connect with others. Alienated characters, the whiney and self-absorbed protagonists that blame everyone else for their predicament have lots of precedent in literature, but can hold readers at a remove.

Build tension by slowing down a scene. Let the scene unfold moment by moment. Linger on the details. Build silences into the dialogue.

Although saving time is the point of the list, an argument can be made for the value of all those hours we spend working through problems in our fiction. Remember Malcolm Gladwell's ten years or 10,000-Hours Rule for realizing success. While there's no guarantee that ten years will produce achievement, sustained effort and sometimes tedious application is necessary. For example, I revised the story that won Glimmer Train's Open Fiction contest numerous times over a four-year period. However, the story and the protagonist really started to reveal themselves to me in the final drafts when I focused on techniques #1, #3, and #6. So, in the interest of saving a few years, you might consider stealing this list.

2011-11-30T02:30:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
"What better occupation, really, than to spend the evening at the fireside with a book, with the wind beating on the windows and the lamp burning bright. Haven't you ever happened to come across in a book some vague notion that you've had, some obscure idea that returns from afar and that seems to express completely your most subtle feelings?" ~ Gustave Flaubert

"Reading is a dialog with oneself; it is self-reflection, which cultivates profound humanity. Reading is therefore essential to our development. It expands and enriches the personality like a seed that germinates after a long time and sends forth many blossom-laden branches.

People who can say of a book, 'this changed my life' truly understand the meaning of happiness. Reading that sparks inner revolution is desperately needed to escape drowning in the rapidly advancing information society. Reading is more than intellectual ornamentation; it is a battle for the establishment for the self, a ceaseless challenge that keeps us young and vigorous." ~ Daisaku Ikeda

Writer's Resource: Written Sound

At last! An on line onomatopoeia dictionary. Find it here. Badaboom and a ratatatat.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2011-11-28T09:45:00.001-08:00

Thought for the Day: "For, while the tale of how we suffer, and how we are delighted, and how we may triumph is never new, it must always be heard. There isn't any other tale to tell, it's the only light we've got in all this darkness." ~ James Baldwin

2011-11-26T04:46:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
“Once you discover and become your characters, your story begins to draw itself. If you are true to your characters, they will do only what they would do within the limitations of the story as it builds itself, reinforcing the inner logic. In an almost symbiotic way, they will develop your story for you even as you develop them.” ~ Kit Reed

I hope you all had a grand Thanksgiving. I'll be transforming some of our leftovers into soup later today. One secret to great turkey soup is a bit of curry powder.

For fiction writers I've posted another cheat sheet at my website called Know Your Characters.
Keep writing, keep dreaming, have heart

2011-11-23T23:04:00.000-08:00

Where I Write # 19
Here's something you need to read from The Rumpus. It begins: "I write at a desk two gay men helped me pull from a dumpster and load in my truck. The legs are bruised, and its paint’s coming off.
I write in a chair my best friend gave me. Right where my thighs rub, the fabric’s torn and the cushion sticks out.
Stephen King suggested it, so I write in a corner facing a wall.
I also write with music on.
Best of all, I write in my bedroom surrounded by books. Meaning I write inhaling the sweat off the cadence of other writers: blood, tears, and come never hurts either. Sylvia Plath, Marguerite Duras, Lidia Yuknavitch. They took me there, so I write from the edge, sure. Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman. It’s more like a little unraveling. Come back down to Earth.
I write from a trailer I bought from the son of a woman who now lives in a nursing home..."

2011-11-22T07:49:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
"This writing stuff saved me. It has become my way of responding to and dealing with things I find too disturbing or distressing or painful to handle in any other way. It's safe. Writing is my shelter. I don't hide behind the words; I use them to dig inside my heart to find the truth. I guess I can say, honestly, that writing also offers me a kind of patience I don't have in my ordinary day-to-day life. It makes me stop. It makes me take note. It affords me a kind of sanctuary that I can't get in my hurried and full-to-the-brim-with-activity life." ~ Terry McMillan

All night a storm has raged through bringing mean winds from the west. Since my bedroom faces west, I was awakened again and again by the wind lashing against the window. However, the strongest winds are on the coast with gusts recorded at up to 97 miles an hour. Sheesh. I also kept dreaming about my upcoming writing conference on January 28th (Making It in Tough & Changing Times) because I'm finalizing the schedule and calling caterers. So stayed tuned for information on that.

A few reminders:Deadline approaching: The Writer 2011 Personal Essay/Memoir Contest

Deadline is Wednesday, 11/30/2011

Entry Fee: $10 per entry

Prizes: $1,000/$300/$200, plus online classes from Gotham Writers' Workshop and a year's subscription to The Writer for the top three. The winning essay/memoir will be published in The Writer; the top three will be published on WriterMag.com.

Description: Submit a personal essay or memoir of 1,000-1,200 words, any theme. Show us what you can do: Write an essay or memoir that catches our eye, touches our heart, or tickles our funny bone!

Must be submitted online only. See details and rules at http://www.writingclasses.com/essay2011.

Contact Information: contest@writermag.com
Please note "Essay/memoir contest" in the subject line.

Website: http://www.writermag.com/2011essaycontest

The Syliva K. Burack essay contest is now open. The Sylvia K. Burack Writing Award is a writing contest for high school students in grades 11 and 12 in the U.S. and Canada. The award is made in memory of Sylvia K. Burack, longtime editor and publisher of The Writer magazine. Burack was known for her dedication to helping writers and editors.Information is here.

You will also find a column about making time for writing over the holidays here, written by Brandi-Ann Uyemura. She writes: "Holiday lists, deadlines and intense planning may have some thinking turkey time and the pressures of presents, parents and parties. That is, unless you’re a writer. If you’re not getting burnout from doing too much, you’re feeling guilty about not writing enough. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could get your writing done and have your turkey, too?"

Writing Prompt: What are you thankful for?

2011-11-21T10:37:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day (!):
"Get yourself in that intense state of being next to madness. Keep yourself in, not necessarily a frenzied state, but in a state of great intensity. The kind of state you would be in before going to bed with your partner. That heightened state when you're in a carnal embrace: time stops and nothing else matters. You should always write with an erection. Even if you're a woman." ~ Tom Robbins

2011-11-19T09:05:00.001-08:00

Thought for the Day:
"I've gotten convinced that there's something kind of timelessly vital and sacred about good writing. This thing doesn't have that much to do with talent, even glittering talent. Talent's just an instrument. It's like having a pen that works instead of one that doesn't. I'm not saying I'm able to work consistently out of the premise, but it seems like the big distinction between good art and so-so art lies somewhere in the art's heart's purpose, the agenda of the consciousness behind the text. It's got something to do with love. With having the discipline to talk out of the part of yourself that can love instead of the part that just wants to be loved." ~ David Foster Wallace

2011-11-18T20:27:00.000-08:00

If rejection is getting you down
Check out these letters to famous authors. And look where they are today.
Into every life rejection, refusal, and heartbreak will fall.

Keep writing, keep dreaming, have faith

2011-11-18T09:28:00.000-08:00

Quick Take:

A plot point is an event in a story, usually a crisis, that pushes the plot into a new direction. Once a plot point happens, there is no turning back to the way things were and there will always be consequences. If you can figure out when and how they occur, you can designa plot. And once you lay out your plot points, you can also create a synopsis or outline.

2011-11-18T08:59:00.000-08:00

NaNoWriMo Writing Tip # 3 is at my website: Make a Scene

2011-11-18T08:53:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day:

from Chris Cleave's NaNoWriMo Week Three Pep Talk. For the full piece go here:

"It doesn’t matter what genre you write in. All literature is transformative. To make people laugh; to tell a light-hearted romantic story; to let intelligent readers forget their troubles for an hour in the absence of the politicians and the money men who make our lives hell – these are some of the hardest feats to accomplish as a writer, and some of the most serious political acts you can perform. You don’t have to be a Serious Writer to be a serious writer. I once read a beautiful paragraph about teenage vampires – teenage vampires, for goodness’ sake – that moved me more than all of Hemingway. You don’t need to be trying to change the world in order to change someone’s world. What you need is to be seriously committed to your work...

Something I’ve learned is that it’s very hard to tell, at the end of your writing day, whether you’ve done great work or bad work. The quality of the writing is hard to judge until you’ve had some sleep and got some perspective on it. Often sheer euphoria at your own brilliance will keep you writing late into the night, and you can hardly sleep because what you’ve written is so damned good. Then you wake up the next day and read it, and you realise it’s a pile of self-indulgent crap. This happens to me two days out of five. Then you get the opposite case, where you beat yourself up because the ideas are coming so slowly and all your dialogue seems timid and pedestrian. A week later you might look back on that day as a pretty solid performance, where your characters were honest with each other and maybe even created a couple of touching moments.

The more I learn about the writing process, the more I suspect that there is no such thing as a bad day at the keyboard. Sometimes you need slow days where you work through a dozen ideas that aren’t destined to fly. It creates a kind of intensity that eventually goads your brain into giving you a good day. Or sometimes, if you keep having slow days, then perhaps the novel really is asking you a deeper question about whether your plot, or your characterisation, or your theory about the human heart really is up to scratch. Experience is knowing when you’re having a slow day, versus when you’re having a slow novel.

The good days are when you perform; the slow days are when you learn to perform better. The only bad days as a writer are the ones when you are too cowardly or too lazy to sit down at the keyboard and give it everything you have.

If you can sit down at the keyboard every day in November and give it everything you have, then there is no writer on earth who is better than you. I hope that it will be an exciting, frightening, weird, joyful, unpredictable, transformative month for you, and I hope that you will produce fantastic work that you are proud of."

2011-11-15T12:16:00.001-08:00

A CALL FOR POETRY SUBMISSIONS

We are pleased to announce the birth of a new poetry publication,
Fault Lines Poetry. It is named after the Cascadia earthquake fault line that runs from San Francisco all the way to Vancouver, BC. We hope that its selection of poems will rock your world and make you all wobbly at the knees.
We invite poems of all kinds, addressing all types of themes.

Please participate in this home grown Portland project by submitting your poems to our web site: www.faultlinespoetry.org. The journal will be published Spring of 2012 and copies will be distributed to books stores throughout the West Coast.

We look forward to your submissions for this very exciting poetry project. Should you have any questions, please feel free to email me at tonypfan@aol.com.

Thank you.

Tony Pfannenstiel
Publisher/editor in chief

2011-11-15T11:49:00.000-08:00

Quick take:

Avoid using these phrases:
each and every
in terms of
one and only
forever and ever

2011-11-15T07:56:00.000-08:00

Fog everywhere this morning, so thick the stand of Douglas firs less than a block away look like shadows. November is the month when the most fog rolls in and I love these mornings with their muffled mystery and stillness. Perfect writing weather. Everything I write when the fog envelops the city seems somehow mysterious, as if I'm searching for lost memories.

Last night I stepped out onto the front porch for air, breathing in the damp, the smoke from a neighbor's fireplace, the quiet. My breath visible in the air. Some moments have such a pause in them. As if you're standing between two worlds, on the cusp of change.

Writing Prompt:
Write a scene or story that beings: The fog began rolling in shortly after midnight.

2011-11-15T06:39:00.001-08:00

Thought for the Day:
"I demanded a realm in which I should be both master and slave at the same time: the world of art is the only such realm. I entered it without any apparent talent, a thorough novice, incapable, awkward, tongue-tied, almost paralyzed by fear and apprehensiveness. I had to lay one brick on another, set millions of words to paper before writing one real, authentic word dragged up from my own guts. The facility of speech which I possessed was a handicap; I had all the vices of the educated man. I had to learn to think, feel and see in a totally new fashion, in an uneducated way, in my own way, which is the hardest thing in the world. I had to throw myself into the current, knowing that I would probably sink. The great majority of artists are throwing themselves in with life-preservers around their necks, and more often than not it is the life-preserver which sinks them." ~ Henry Miller, Reflections on Writing The Wisdom of the Heart

2011-11-14T09:44:00.000-08:00

Thought for the Day:
A perfectly healthy sentence, it is true, is extremely rare. For the most part we miss the hue and fragrance of the thought; as if we could be satisfied with the dews of the morning or evening without their colors, or the heavens without their azure.~ Henry David Thoreau

The Writing Life Too

Why consider Summer in Words?

But there’s a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking.~ Mitch Albom

Mark Twain’s Rules of Story Writing

But there’s a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking.
~ Mitch Albom