A Writer's Soup

I was recently in the company of a woman who had to be the center of attention. I LOVE being around people, and I LOVE lively conversation--but don't need to work a stand-up routine, if you know what I mean. People like that tend to make me go to the other room at a cocktail party (which is what I did). Then I start looking for a wall to lean against (which I did). Then I refill my drink while hiding (ditto). Then I leave (which I did).

Which is NOT to say everything she was ranting about wasn't funny. Some of it was. But I'll get to that later.

When I first moved to my new home, I was cornered by another woman at a barbeque-type thing, and she went on--at length--about how terribly interesting she and her family were and how they would make a great book. I wanted to drown myself in the pool's deep end. One, she wasn't interesting. Two, she was rather imperious and rude. And three . . . well, they WOULDN'T make a great book, just a bit character for a laugh or to infuriate.

And that is what writing is about. It's like a soup. Made by Anthony Bourdain (because in my life, all paths lead back to Tony). He advocates throwing out your ENTIRE spice rack. Go ahead, throw it all out! Use only FRESH basil, oregano, garlic, parsley, chives in your food, in your soups. Dried stuff is for pout pourri (he didn't say THAT, but I figure it's true).

That is like a book. Don't rehash old, stale, dried-out characters. Even for your secondaries. Give them fresh, lively back stories. And DON'T let them take over your soup. A dash of the stand-up comic, and a modicum of the rude drone will do.

The trick, of course, is figuring out just what the right mix is. How do you simmer your work in progress? For me, it's making sure it all moves it forward, baby. Then I am sure the soup works. Even if I have to pull some stuff out. Part with it. Move it along. But make sure it's fresh. I love my grey characters . . . none of them tread fully in the light, and I like them that way. Keeps 'em lively.

How about your soup?

All for Love

I don't do this job for the paycheck. 'Cause there isn't one. I mean, I get an advance check, parceled out over the course of writing my novel, royalties are give out twice a year. But there's no health insurance, no sick days, no pension . . . and it ain't steady. I support a family of six entirely as a writer. When I get optioned (such as Warner Brothers optioning Mafic Chic), that's extra. But mostly I do it because I love it. And because I'm too flaky to work in a real office.

Lately, three of my four kids have been gravitating toward wanting to do things when they grow up that will be unsteady, too. One wants to be a violinist, one wants to be in a band (not sure what instrument . . . he plays more than one). One wants to be a drummer. My son has long hair so I can't see his eyes, and my younger daughter has a penchant for wearing bright pink Chuck Taylor sneakers. Conformists they are not.

But I think, years ago, before kids were a reality, I probably would have thought kids should pick "safe" things. I went to school with peers who became doctors, lawyers, and CPAs. I'm the only eccentric who signed on for this gig. But now . . . now I just think it's really cool that my kids will likely be unemployed musicians and maybe writers (two of them are interested in writing). Because life is long (hopefully), and at the end, as I wrote in The Roofer, they staple your mouth shut, put you in a coffin and give you a send-off (except for me--cremation, no coffin, scattered to the wind, thanks). One trip through this life. So why the HELL would you want to get up each day and honor "the man" and work a job you hate so you can put in thirty years, retire, and die?

Thanks, but no thanks. I'll take this gig. I'll do it because I love it. I'll sweat the royalty checks and the deadlines, and work these weird hours. And my kids . . . maybe they will be in a rock band and out on the road playing in dives. But it's one journey through this existence. Do it for love.

Thoughts?
E

A Word About Jesus

I bet you never thought you'd see this header on my blog. But it's not what you think. It's not even about him. It's about people bitchin' before they have seen or read something controversial.

See this? Short version? James Cameron (he of Titanic fame) is part of a documentary about this tomb that may--or may not--contain Jesus and his assorted family members (including one set of bones saying they belong to Jesus' son.) No one has yet seen the full documentary, which is going to air on Discovery. Which ain't stopping the tempest in the teapot.

But the same sorts of rabid complaints have been raised over The DaVinci Code. Over Harry Potter (Because according to some, yes, children are becoming wizards in droves and devil worshipping because of Harry). The same can be said of nearly ANY book that people want to ban.

Here's the thing, the way I see it, at least. I have reached this age in my life in which I am completely and 100% comfortable in my beliefs on good and evil, magic and sorcery, Jesus and the devil. Faith and dogma. War and peace. Buddhism and Christianity. The death penalty. Darfur. The CIA. Pick a topic, and chances are I have an opinion. If it's not something I have read about extensively, or spent time paying attention to, I will either not form an opinion, or I will form one and keep it to myself while being open to what other people say. But what I will NOT do is have a major opinion on a book, movie or topic without being informed.

I think, whether it's a movie or a book pissing people off, or whatever . . . unless you BOTHER to be informed . . . and unless you READ OR VIEW IT YOURSELF, you have little right to have a fit. And if it's fiction? Like Da Vinci Code or Harry Potter? Allow that it is a STORY, one the author had a right to tell as FICTION.

I had a woman tell me she found The Roofer so offensive she couldn't finish it. And she was MAD. This did not deter her, mind you, from telling me WHY she found not only the book offensive, but my--and I quote--"agenda." But you see, I didn't even BOTHER to engage in debate. Finish the book and THEN let me know if you think incest is fair game for a theme. THEN let me know if you feel I glorified violence or indicted it. THEN you have right to email me your bullshit. But until then? Nope.

Have an opinion. Be pissed off at this new documentary. Be mad about a book. If you want. But before you bash it? Bother to see it or view it.

That's my half a cent anyway. Thoughts?

Peace,
E

The Process

There was a funny bit on the Oscars last night about writers and the process. In one scene from a movie, a writer tossed her typewriter out the window. Way back when writers worked with typewriters, these movie scenes flashed of ripping the page out of the Selectric, crumbling it, and tossing it toward an already-full trash can.

Did you see Adaptation? Nicholas Cage hunched over his screenplay. AGONIZING.

So I started thinking about process. For one thing, the computer changed my writing life. Totally different now. Cut and paste is my friend. So is "Save As." I will often have as many as FOUR different versions of a book going on until I absolutely commit to one particular voice or opening scene. Neurotic as I am, I won't delete the losing versions until midway through the book.

But in general, my process is to write fast, without stopping, in a flurry where I am honestly not thinking, it's just happening. Some people say they are "channeling" something, as in some cosmic force. I think that's a load of well . . . . To be kind, perhaps they feel that way. Perhaps there's some cosmic jetstream of creativity in the universe and they hitch a ride on it. But I don't think that. I think I've just learned to get in the zone and write without self-editing. The editing has already taken place in my brain as I've been germinating the story.

THEN, when the chapter is done--because I usually write a whole chapter at a time--I go back and craft every word.

This was my sentence in my work in progress in the frantic, just-write-it stage:

Elena Girard looked out on the mosaic of tents spanning into the distance.

And this is the edited version:

Elena Girard gazed out on the weary mosaic of tents undulating into the distance.

The thesaurus is my friend.

Now, my process also involves my iPod, a lot of green tea, four kids darting in and out, stopping to yell at said four kids, the phone ringing, emails, popping Chinese herbs, occasionally talking to myself, and a LOT of staring out the window. Oh, and prayer. For inspiration, world peace, and all the rest of it.

And how about you? What is your process like?

The Naked Truth

Everyone who reads my blog knows I am in love with Anthony Bourdain. He has no idea who I am, but . . . I remain hopeful. Perhaps if I blog about him for long enough, someone who knows him will read this and he will want to come and do some shots of Black Death with me. My best friend, Pammie, tells me that if Anthony and I ever DO get together, she'd give it a year until we were dead. Not dead as in we would kill each other. But dead as in we would bring out the absolute worst in one another and would last be seen doing all sorts of shots in some strange little country where we would undoubtedly get eaten by cannibals.

But I digress. One reason I adore him is Kitchen Confidential. If you haven't read it, run out and buy it. He rocks as a writer. And one reason he does is he explores a subculture and nails it. Because nothing will expose you as a fraud faster than not nailing the subculture you are writing about. The restaurant biz, where I and millions of other have toiled, is truly its own world, where you can do tequila shots on the line caked in sauces, and party til dawn after hours with the chef, and the next day start it all over again.

When I wrote about my time spent in John's Bar in The Roofer, I think I captured the place. The real place. And I captured the apartments of my youth where the radiator was on Full Blast Temperature of Hell and there was no moderating it in wintertime, not even on Christmas when the place was so packed with people, it felt like a sauna. The Hiroshima cloud of smoke in the rooms and the bars, the nicotine-covered walls, the patina of yellow-brown on EVERYTHING. The coldwater flat of my grandmother. The bums in the hall.

If you write YAs, teens will spot a fake faster than I can blink an eye. If you play poker, as Lulu does in The Poker Diaries, you can spot a lousy bluffer, a fake, from what they have on the table, and what they do. Their "tells." And when teens write me, they tell me Lulu is "real." I take that as the highest compliment coming from a teen.

In short, if you are going to write about a world not familiar to most, but achingly familiar to the people who embody it, you better not be a fraud. You need to tell the naked truth. Show it all.

People ask me all the time how I research things. I say, truthfully, I'm a student of life. I can spot the nuances. I can live in the subculture. I'll drink Black Death if I have to.

So, here's to a shot of Black Death. And the naked truth.

Bye-Bye Pretty Words

It's killing me.

I wrote this really beautiful, vivid first-person scene for this Shiny New Idea (see post below). I wrote a great first line.

And I realized, I think, that if I build the world as I want to, I have to GIVE THEM UP. My beautiful words. I may be able to work them into dialogue. May be able to convert them into third person. But I have to give them up as they are now to write the book in third person, to give a sweeping sense of the book, to do what is right for this book.

And it kills me.

Have you ever had to do that? Part with really great stuff? You know you have to, but damn.

Shiny New Idea Syndrome

Now that I am not under the gun with deadlines, I am in that GLORIOUS phase of a writer's creativity. I have Shiny New Idea Syndrome.

Freed from the pressure of two deadlines, I am now working on proposals, tinkering with a screenplay idea, tossing ideas around. And yesterday, a SINGLE word in a profile piece I was reading on Darfur sent me off in a new direction on a book I have been toying with in my head forever.

I love being at this point. It reminds me of why I became a writer in the first place. It's like riding my bike with no hands on the handlebars, breeze in my face. Or catching a wave while body surfing. There is a pure joy to it.

Of course, eventually, all Shiny New Ideas become Old Tired Manuscripts Driving Me Nuts in the Middle. They are destined for Deadline Hell. But until then . . . Baby, I am enjoying the ride.

How about you?

Peace . . . and JOY!
E

What Keeps Me Turning Pages

My agent always says to make sure you have lots of "sizzle" in the first ten pages of a novel, the first 30, the first 50. Because if you are going to hook a busy editor, it better be up front. Every page, he says, should be a page turner.

And he's right.

One of my writers' group members is GENIUS at moving the story forward. If he can't see the sense of a scene, no matter how funny or well-written or brilliant, it gets cut. And I've learned to do the same, with him as my guide.

But what keeps me, as reader, turning pages? I think about that a lot because I am often asked in interviews "What do you read?" The truth is, I read a lot of quantum physics and religious texts. Nonfiction. I read one fiction book a month for the book group I am in. And I read a few authors I know I love, but who are completely out of my genre, like Neil Gaiman.

However, when I had a lot more free time, oh, like four kids ago, I read fiction voraciously. And what kept me turning pages was always character. Yes, I would race to see what happened in the plot. Did he save the world? Did she catch the killer? But if you look at those two things, I didn't word it as Was the world saved? Was the killer caught? A "he" and a "she" achieved that.

Character, for me, keeps me turning. I fall in love with them, and want to know all their quirks, their past, their oddities. And the plot can't bore me to tears, but even the best plot in the world can't hold my interest if I don't care about the characters. I can remember, even before I could truly articulate why I didn't like it, a book by a very famous, million-, zillion-selling author. He sticks a lot of sex in his books, a lot of racy, edgy stuff, so maybe that's why he sells. But I remember one book had a great plot involving terrorists. And I also remember it had so manay characters, none of whom I particularly cared about. I ended up caring about one cop, but I would skim over scenes between his because none of the other people seemed to matter to me. I knew I never wanted to be a writer like that.

I have to care.

So, what keeps you turning pages? Who is on your must-read list?

An Inconvenient Life

The word "hero" is so overused in our society that it has lost any real sense of meaning. Football players, basketball players, actors, whatever . . . they're called "heroes" for doing what they're paid big money to do--catch a pass, make a tackle, make a movie.

But being a real hero is, I have decided, inconvenient. It isn't convenient to get involved. We all go through our lives in our insular little bubbles. It's the person who, rather than driving by an accident, peering at the mangled bumpers and mangled bodies, jumps out and sees if they can help. It's the person--like the unwed teen mother I mentored for two years--who studies so hard, gets a 4.0 in college, and then comes home to the bullet-scarred projects, with prostitutes on the corner, drugs being sold in plain sight, and broken windows and crack vials in the parking lot, and locks the doors, studies like crazy, feeds her baby, tucks her in, studies more, and then wakes up the next day and does it all over again. It's HARD to do the right thing. It's inconvenient.

In my latest work in progress, which I just turned in, the hero really IS a hero by the end. He has a life, a psychology practice, and a painkiller addiction. But when a truly desperate woman shows up on his doorstep, bringing a lot of bad mojo and gunfire, and he BELIEVES her story, he gives up everything to help her. To leave his flawed but familiar life and go into the unknown. To do that which is inconvenient.

And when I think back to every single book I've written, though not every character was a "hero" in the sense of acting heroically, they all made inconvenient choices. Starting with Cassie Hayes in Spanish Disco, my first book. She uprooted herself to try to save her mentor's publishing house, and then, when she could have left the island she traveled to, she decided to instead stay and help Roland Riggs woo the woman of his dreams.

A life well-lived is messy and inconvenient, I've decided. And the characters I am most interested in nearly always choose the inconvenient path.

Thoughts? Do you live an inconvenient life? Do your characters?

Peace,
E

The Question I Hate Most

Well, the question I really hate most is Will You Marry Me? Makes me break out in hives. My second wedding, I literally did it in three weeks so I wouldn't chicken out, and was virtually DRAGGED to the location by my best friend. I didn't even do my hair until the cab ride. SWEAR it. My friend and her then-fiance paid the cabbie to drive slow, and I did my hair in his rearview mirror, possibly breaking traffic laws.

No, but my SECOND least favorite question was asked me last night by a lovely gentleman at a dessert reception. And that is . . . where do you get your ideas?

And the reason it is my second least-favorite question is because I simply have no answer.

None.

In fact, I will probably go over to BOOM! (Louise's PR blog--see link at right) and ask her . . . how do I answer that question in an acceptable PR fashion.

Because I don't know. I am not sure what it is that makes me hear a single line of a song lyric and come up with an entire plot for a novel. Or ride in my car with visions of storylines dancing through my head.

My Chinese medicine doctor always checks on me on my twice-monthly visits. "Have any weird dreams lately?" (Chinese medicine treats the person in total, not just symptoms.) My answer, "When don't I?"

I recently read this article in the NY Times about an autistic savant. He sees numbers and really has led an extraordinary life and a quest to be more normal in his human interactions. I can't liken my writer's insanity to that, but it is definitely something inner and something that makes me isolate in some ways, drawn to the worlds in my head rather than other people. But that's still not an answer to my second least favorite question.

So . . . blog friends . . . do YOU have an answer?

Peace,
E

Leaving Your Lover

I could never be a stand-up comic because I hate talking in front of crowds. But my life . . . well, I have plenty of material. You know, not "jokes," but that Roseanne Barr, Erma Bombeck, life-as-a-mom is oh-so-funny when dealing with baby puke kind of stories.

I "think" (maybe not) when people meet me, they think I am sort of funny. My books, like Spanish Disco, are SUPPOSED to (sometimes) be funny. I even think The Roofer was funny--you know the Uncle Two Times as a weeble joke (have to read the book to get it).

But one thing I have discovered about humor is you can't force it. I have been working, off and on, on a proposal for a quirky detective-type series. The main character, who narrates, is funny--she's seen and done it all. But the fact is, with a mystery of some sort, there is usually a dead body. And dead bodies, generally, aren't funny. Neither is heartache. So sometimes the humor was forced. I knew it was all going to amount to the voice--you can make almost anything funny with the right off-the-cuff comment. Hell, funerals can be funny if you nail it right. But the fact is, it wasn't coming.

So I took a break. I left that bad boy manuscript.

And when I went back, man, if it wasn't all crystal f***ing clear. Every line, every bit of humor. My life as stand-up. It works! It works and then some, and I am so thrilled with it.

But I needed a break.

So I am not sure where the line of demarcation is between working through something even when it's hard, and going out for a martini and letting it rest for a night . . . and taking a two-month breather and starting it fresh. I know it's some internal barometer. Something that tells me, Kid . . . walk away. For now.

Like Paul Simon's Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover, at some point, you figure it out. So, with a nod to Paul Simon, here are his words. Heed them well:

She said it grieves me so to see you in such pain
I wish there was something
I could do to make you smile again
I said I appreciate that and would you please explain
About the fifty ways

She said why dont we both just sleep on it tonight
And I believe in the morning youll begin to see the light
And then she kissed me and I realized she probably was right
There must be fifty ways to leave your lover
Fifty ways to leave your lover

So? Do you sometimes have to leave your lover?

Magically Delicious

My oldest child--turning 17 this year--likes to remind me that I am the weirdest mother EVER. As in, since the dawn of humanity, there has never been a bigger "freak." Ever. She is so kind. God, I LOVE having a 17 year old at the same time as having one in diapers. Really. It's so fun. As an aside, imagine my pregnancy with my teen around. Two women--a pregnant 40-year-old and an adolescent--with raging hormones should NOT share the same space.

Moving on, my father once polled the family as to who was the "weirdest" family member. We were drinking, having dinner, things were jovial. Why the poll? It was destined for trouble. I ASSUMED everyone would say HE was the weirdest. Imagine my shock when everyone in my family--including my significant other--had the unmitigated GALL to say it was me. Okay, now, if you've read The Roofer, which was dedicated to one of my family members, or even have heard me wax poetic on my family on my blog, what is it that I am the weirdest? That's a WTF if ever there was one.

My mother in law classifies me as evil incarnate. I think pretty much the entire clan on that side isn't particularly fond of me. I think they find me weird. As my best friend says, and I have quoted her before, "They don't find you winsome." My best friend is my best friend by virtue of many things, one of which is she DOES find me winsome.

Werid? Maybe. Different, yes. I am told that a lot. But I think of it in a good way--not into drama, no head games, honest, cheerful, delightfully eccentric. (Like Lucky Charms are "magically delicious.")

Which brings me to this post. You see, I do, in all seriousness, get that I am weird around the edges. And I tend to think it's because I am a writer and live in my head most of the time. Which didn't make for an oh-so-fun high school experience. College was no better. When I got out of college, and met a few fellow eccentrics--writers--I finally found true comraderie.

And when I think about my life now . . . I realize there is not one friend I have who isn't odd. In a good way. And my cyber pals have become so much a part of my day. It's like a club. The first club I ever wanted to be part of.

So tell me . . . am I the only misfit coming into her own later in life as she has met others like herself? Pull up a seat on the couch, as we have come to say here lately, and tell me about your magically delicious or delightfully eccentric lives.

Oh, and speaking of magically delicious and delightfully eccentric, and cyber comraderie . . . .Today, the lovely Vivi Anna has me as a guest on her blog. I blurbed her upcoming release and it is very, very different and cool. You'll love it. Buy it next month. Pre-order it now. Visit her blog today and say hi to her!

Peace,
E

Romance is . . .

OK, so it's Valentine's Day . . .

As someone who always has an element of romance in my books, I can't help but wonder what the heck romance is?

Is it my toddler, right now, feeding candy hearts to the dog?

Is it candles? Flowers?

What is the most wildly extravagent romantic gesture you've been the recipient of (or have done)?

Oh, at one time, it was a limo to the Bruce Springsteen concert. Or the Broadway show. Or walking in with a diamond.

Now that I'm older . . . I don't like diamonds (for ethical reasons). I don't eat chocolate (macrobiotic diet).

To me, romantic is giving me a few hours peace to write. It's saying, "I'LL clean up after the sick baby, you rest."

So what is it to you?

Peace and romance,
E

P.S. Check out Kelly Parra's blog (at right). She has an itnerview with moi. And all of you run out to buy her book when it is released.

Who's That Girl?

Okay . . . here I am. Big 80s hair and all. Yes . . . that is moi.

Who's that girl?

At the time this picture was taken, I wasn't sure I could write. Then, a series of letters back and forth with an angel, an author who convinced me I could write, set me down a path.

Who's that girl? At the time I was a single mom going through a truly ugly divorce. I was down to $400 in my checking account. I had the weight of the world on my shoulders. I was being threatened. And as bad off as I was? It was about to get a WHOLE lot worse. I was about to nearly die, I was about to get so sick my parents were told to fly to my bedside and think about a funeral. And in essence, that was the easy part. Because after THAT, I had to claw back to health--not in months but over the course of years. Time started being measured in different ways for me.

Who's that girl? She had to channel all of that hell and figure out she could write. And then go for it.

Do you ever wish you could go back in time? I don't. I mean, I like who I am right now, and as a sum total of all my experiences, I guess I wouldn't pick and choose which ones to have. But sometimes I wish I could go back and whisper to that girl . . . you're going to make it. You're going to be a writer.

But if you could . . . if you could go back . . . what would you tell your younger self? Who's that girl? Or boy?

Climbing Out

I turned in two manuscripts to my editor in the last two weeks or so. It was awful timing on my part. I had plenty of time to get both done--months--but the last push to deadline is always intense. And with two back to back? It got ugly. And now that they have both been turned in? I get to climb out from under a pile on my desk.

I have discovered that writers generally seem to fall into two categories. There are writers like a certain someone I will not name. She has color-coded Excel sheets and fancy notebooks with tabs and some kind of system that has to be seen to be believed. It involves different color highlighters and pens and . . . I can't even begin to describe it all. Her desk is always pristine. I could hate her if she wasn't my friend.

And then there are writers like me.

Up against a deadline, I can't even find my wastebasket. I can, but it is piled so high with paper and trash, that I have taken to stacking empty water bottles on my desk, the floor, anywhere. I have three cups of cold tea right now in different spots on my desk. Papers. Bills. Bottles of vitamins I haven't been taking. Plates of old toast. In short, it looks like I lived at my desk. In fact, I did. Except to crash at night, I pretty much haven't moved for three weeks.

I am not sure what it is. Why I go into insane mode when it's deadline time. My outfits decline. I got from nice jeans, sweaters, and socks and walking shoes. To . . . today. Flannel pj bottoms, socks, no shoes, and a sweatshirt that has seen better days.

So now I get to climb out. I will swear to myself that I will keep my desk neat. That I don't NEED to be this way to create. Until next time when I will inevitably do it all again.

So fellow writers, lurkers, pals . . . anyone else fall victim to this. Or am I the only one who lives at her desk come deadline time?

Peace,
E

Been There, Maybe Done That

There was a brief moment, back a few years, when it seemed like way too many members of my family had spent a night or two in the slammer. Doesn't matter why. Where. Nonetheless, nothing like that call at 2:00 a.m. Ahhh, community service!

Thankfully, I've never seen the inside of a jail cell myself. Though I have thought of trying to get arrested at a peace rally or two. But I have had some unusual experiences in my life. Met some amazing people. Seen some wacky things. Been through my share of pain and heartache. And I wonder . . . how do you convey that in writing?

You see last night, I finally saw Walk the Line. I never saw it in the theaters. And now, now I definitely get what the fuss was about. Reese Witherspoon may have won the Oscar, but Joachin Phoenix was robbed. He inhabited that role. I FELT his drug abuse. And the chemistry between him and Reese was electric. And somehow, even if you have never, ever, ever had a love affair like that, you could sense it.

And that, I decided, is what the magic is. Movies or books . . . it's taking you so deeply into an experience, that even if you have never done that, been there, seen it, you are there. I have not ever murdered anyone, but I hope in the key scene in The Roofer that you feel the thud of the claw hammer hitting brain matter.

Haven't done time, butI hope you see and feel it when I describe prison--the maggots in the oatmeal. The dysentary-like stomach conditions from the food. Thanks to a family member for enlightening me there. Never been there, DON'T want to.

But last night . . . I had this re-awakened joy at the process. At the magic. That's really how I feel about it today. It's magic what we do! Don't you think that?

What book transports you like no other to someplace, some relationship, some world you've never been, but makes you feel like you have? Even in the darkest scenes of Cash's drug abuse, as a writer myself, I marveled at how real it seemed.

Talk Like Me

My father liberally sprinkles his speech with the f-word. It's kind of like breathing. Necessary.

When I wrote The Roofer, a lot of the speech affectations of the characters were based on men I knew from my childhood, men my dad knows. Lots of curse words. I was at a book group once, which had chosen it for their reading selection, and I was questioned as to the "necessaity" of that kind of raw language. Damn right, it's necessary. Otherwise, it's not the reality of the Westies and the people depicted in that book.

One of my best guy friends always refers to his apartment as his "crib." Never his place, his pad, his apartment, his house. I guess he takes chicks back to his crib so they can play. ;-)

Details like that always end up in my books. It's not ME. It's not my speech pattern. It's them.

Every single character, in my opinion, should have patterns of speech and affectations and word choices that are theirs and theirs alone. I will always select patterns for different characters. Consistent but different. All your characters should not speak the same. I don't speak like anyone I know. Yes, I string words together to make sentences, but there are oddities. I refer to myself in third person to my kids, "Help mama clean up this room." I liberally use the f-word when discussing certain foreign policy decisions. I will knock wood whenever I say something about death or anything bad. It is me, uniquely my speech.

How about you? Do you have differences in your dialogue for each character? What's unique in your speech?

All the Marbles

As I sit here drinking my green tea at 5:30 a.m., I can't help but be aware the vultures are circling around the body of Anna Nicole Smith. And I can't help but have great empathy. And of course, this got me thinking about writing. Yeah, they don't seem related . . . but . . .

I have to give some credit to a girl who would do anything to get out of some backwater town that offered her no more future than to work in a Chick-fil-A or a factory. With no offense intended to Chick-fil-A workers nor factory workers--an honest living is an honest living. But if you wanted something more, that town wouldn't be able to offer it. So she got out on the one gift she had--yeah. Her body. She wasn't bright. But she had ambition. And she had a body.

When I look at my own career, it would be nice to take all the credit. But in fact, from the time I could hold a pencil, I was writing stories, and as early as second grade, my teachers were pushing me--into gifted programs, into skipping grades. They told me I could write. My father told me I could write. I got an academic scholarship because I could write--and had straight As. But I have to be honest in that I don't remember having to work hard. It just came to me. The writing. And the As. Except for math. I had to really work in math.

Now, I could have graduated college and taken a job and stayed there and worked my way up. But I did want more. I wanted to BE a writer. Which to me, meant a paying writer, but that was so far off in the distance, but still. I got married, had a baby, got divorced, waited tables. I wrote. I wrote any spare second I had. But I wanted it. I became a book editor . . . and still wrote. And along the way, I met an agent, sold a book. Sold a bunch more.

So I realize there is this cross section. It's like coming to a game of marbles. You reach in your bag. You pull out your best marbles, and you start to play. In that marble bag, you've got brains, you've got talent, maybe you have a hot body or beauty. Maybe you have an uncanny gift for writing dialogue. Maybe you're really good at telling stories. Whatever it is, you have your gifts. Some people have more marbles of one kind than another. Some people's bags come with marbles of amazing teachers and supportive parents. Some people, sadly, come to the game with maybe one good marble. It might be a really cool one with swirls of blue and yellow and purple. But it's their ONE marble.

And the rest . . . it's all in how you play the game. What you DO with your marbles.

So I realize what was in my bag. I was lucky. And I realize some of it was how I played the game. But the writing, that came easy. I had a good marble.

So what was in your bag? And what was in how you played the game?

Peace,
E

You Like Me, Right Now, You Like Me

Remember Sally Fields's speech when she accepted her second Oscar? Somehow it got spoofed as "You like me, you REALLY like me," but the actual line is the title of this post. Poor Sally is remembered more for her speech than the role she won it for (Places in the Heart). But it's a useful leaping-off point for this entry nonetheless.

Nearly every writer has to struggle with just how much readers will like (or not) their main character. Pop on over to Amazon and read some reviews for fiction. It is amazing, particularly in women's fiction and romance, how many reviews will get downright negative because the person writing it will say, "I HATED the main character. She was such a horrible person!" And most of the time, I am sure that was not the author's intent.

Even Mafia Chic, which is, I swear to you, my most light-hearted book ever--few curse words, no sex, just sweet and funny (and optioned by Warner Brothers!)--offended one reader who thought Teddi (main character) was just a horrible person because she managed to look past her mob-family's criminality and still love her relatives. As someone who manages to look past a lot of flaws and love people anyway, I don't get the complaint, but there you go.

But make your books more complex, more morally gray, and you walk a line in the sand. Ava in The Roofer definitely does some morally questionable things. Can the reader respond to her anyway? Tom, in the same book, does some REALLY questionable things. He's an alcoholic--the kind to pee in his own bed, choke on his own vomit, throw up in the sink. He's not a "Hollywood alcoholic," a film's way of somehow portraying a drunk in a glamorized manner. But I adore Tom. Readers, however, are mixed.

Think of Hannibal. Or Patricia Highsmith's brilliant book, The Talented Mr. Ripley. There is an element of horror at these characters. But it's carefully balanced, I think, with enough wit and daring and brilliance . . . to at least have readers, if not root for the character, to keep reading. Not so vile as to stop and hurl the book across the room. They fascinate. And maybe we even like them. A little.

What of your wip? Will readers like your main character? Really like him? or her? Or are you walking some wobbly line?

Peace,
E

Toto, I Don't Think We're In Kansas Anymore

When I was younger, my stories were pretty fantastical. I wrote about assassins and the sorts of plots that are a little hard to swallow. I was Dorothy--in Oz. Because Kansas just didn't seem very interesting.

And now, with whatever wisdom I've gained over the years, I realize that there really is no place like home.

Why? Lately, I've been trying to take a break from the news. I scan the NY Times every day, but I'm trying to stop my habit of checking CNN.com every ten minutes to see if the world is ending. Most of the news is bleak. It will still be there tomorrow morning when I read the Times.

But all I have to do today--or any day--when I read the news is to look at all the insanity next door. I don't mean NEXT DOOR, but I do mean in the ordinary. Today's headlines are about sickening predators living amongst us, or about a crazy love triangle (and I don't use "crazy" loosely here) gone awry. Or about a murder for hire when a husband tired of wife number one and wanted to move along to number two without having to pay alimony. In short, Kansas is pretty interesting, as twisted and dark as those flying monkeys

It took me a while, like Dorothy, to realize this. That human drama can be fascinating in the most intimate of settings. Even when I read thrillers, where a global conspiracy is taking place, I find that when you cut away at the story, the race against the ticking bomb, the traitors and the villains, it is still, at its heart, usually about Kansas. It is usually about a man or woman trying to preserve his or her family, or former lover, or child. Think about the first "Die Hard" movie--I cared more whether his wife would take him back than if the building blew up. (Of course, he would have to SURVIVE the building blowing up to get his wife back, but you get the idea.)

So after traveling to Oz, in my writing, I more likely find if I click my heels three times . . . I do believe there is no place like home.

Thoughts?

Peace,
E

Out of Character

We all do things that are out of character. I tend to be peaceful person, an "it is what it is" sort of person. It is the Buddhist way. Unless you mess with my kids, in which case I can be a real b*tch. It's out of character--and yet it makes sense since my kids are my life.

But there are other out of character elements to me. I am usually a vegan in my diet. But I'll eat sushi once every two weeks or so because I love it. And I read quantum physics books or astronomy textbooks for "fun," but I sometimes write chick lit. Or I will stop to pick up litter, and do all this "green" stuff in my house--new light bulbs that are better for the environment, etc. But I have to admit, I don't use cloth diapers.

I would guess that most of us aren't "in character" 24/7. We all do little things that on the surface of it don't make sense. But here's the thing . . . in fiction, I think it's hard to get away with that. I have edited a number of books in which the main character will do something completely out of left field, completely out of character. When I have questioned the author, I often get a "Yes, but . . ." followed by a long story of how once when the character was a child, X happened and so now he does Y. Which is fine. Except all of that story happens off the page, I wasn't privy to it as the reader, and I am still left with a jarring out-of-character moment that doesn't "fit" the book.

Sometimes, those moments snowball into "Too Stupid To Live" moments--those events that so infuriate the reader they want to hurl the book. NO ONE would be that stupid and still live.

Thoughts? If you were a character, would you make sense? Better yet, do your characters stay in character?

Take You Back

Okay, here's a confession.

You know that Gerry Rafferty song, "Baker Street"? It is my favorite late 70s song. I wasn't even in high school yet, I don't think, when it came out, but it was one of those songs that was played perennially on the radio. Later, in a mess of a relationship when I was 21, the song took on meaning. And NOW, when I hear it (it's on my iPod), I can be RIGHT back there. I mean, like in the car on a summer day, fighting with my boyfriend, bittersweet right back there.

Same with certain scents. I can be right back at prom . . . or in a happy memory of being in my grandmother's garden. But THERE. Not so much recalling a memory but IN the memory, if that makes any sense.

And I think that's what the best writing accomplishes. It isn't so much an act of reading, but an actual becoming . . . you become PART of the story. Your heart pounds in fear, you feel queasy with worry, or you cry or you feel joy. You are IN it. When I described John's Bar in The Roofer, right down to the way you could scratch your fingernail in the nicotine patina on the wall, I think a reader can be IN that bar. It was a real place. I can still smell it and see it, and be there on the barstool at age 8, legs dangling.

So . . . am I the only one who feels this way about certain songs, certain scents, and certain books? Am I crazy? Or do certain things transport you and take you back?

Peace,
E

You Don't Know What You Don't Know

After yesterday's post, I have come to the conclusion most of us agree we sucked as writers in college and before. I took every creative writing class there was at my university--and got all As. But you simply don't know what you don't know.

What do I mean?

Being a writer is a journey. You're constantly improving (hopefully). But at different times you reach what I can only think of as plateaus or the tops of hills, and from there you can survey the valley and realize, "NOW, I can see how far I've come."

For example, when I wrote in college, there was no such thing as subtlety. I wanted to make sure you got my message. I chose violent, dark, difficult characters and I made sure you knew they were violent, dark, and difficult. My symbolism was heavy-handed. Spiders, snakes, worms in tequila bottles. I made sure you GOT IT.

Dialogue, for me, back then, never contained anything important. Anything "important" you got from the heavy exposition between dialogue.

Yes, I got As. Yes, I had public readings during a writing program I took when I was 21. But NOW I see from a whole different place. A whole different vista.

You don't know what you don't know until you have a break-through, an "A-ha" moment. A Maslow "peak experience." An epiphany. A painful rejection. A moment of insight that takes on significance. And from THAT point, your writing changes. Until the next paradigm shift.

So, what do you know now that you didn't know that you didn't know? :-)

E

What Bad Poetry Taught Me

Before I became a novelist, I wrote a ton of poetry. Notebooks full of it. Some of it bad. Some of it awful. Some of it pretty good. I submitted, quietly and without telling anyone, several of my favorites to some literary magazines and got maybe a dozen or so published. I was in my twenties at the time, and I remember the day my free author copies came and seeing my name next to something in print. I even considered pulling together enough poems on a theme for a chapbook competition. But then I started writing prose.

I realize now that poetry was actually a great stepping stone on my path. Here are two lines from two different published poems:

Daddy breezes in
Smelling of his sins

and

My grandmother has
hate tattoos
carved into her skin

Now, I am not trotting out my old poetry for the collective groan they are likely causing. LOL!

BUT, I realize now how poetry taught me to be a spare writer. Every word counts. Every adjective. I don't have a long-winded exploration of what the hate tattoos are--from the Nazis. I don't say what the dad in the poem's sin is--alcoholism. You get it without a lot of words.

Here's another exercise. Pick something on your desk or outside your window to describe in perfect detail. Write quickly. 50 words. Now cut 25 of them. Now pick different adjectives and do it with 15. Now get it down to a line of poetry with 10.

You get the idea.

Anyone else start with poetry? Still write poetry? Read it? And what has it taught them? And any lines you care to share?

Peace,
E

Raise Your Shields

I used to, once in a while, watch "Will & Grace." Debra Messing had this great bit whenever she had to see her mother, played by Debbie Reynolds, in which she raised an imaginary shield to deflect her mother's evilness. I used to laugh out loud.

I happen to have a GREAT Mom. I talk to her for an hour every day. However, every once in a while in this biz, I need to put up my shield.

You see, no matter where you are on this journey in writing, there are going to be people who want to bring you down. If you're not pubbed yet, it will be the imperious neighbor who says something like, "Hmm . . . not published yet? Too bad." Or the relative who says, "Haven't you given up on that little hobby of yours yet?"

When you get an agent, other writers may say it's not a big enough agent or a hard-working enough agent (a.k.a., "It's not MY wonderful world-famous agent."). You get a contract and someone will sneer at who it is with or that it's not for seven figures. (I should be so lucky.) There is, apparently, some traditional pubbed vs. e-pubbed snobbery. Or romance vs. erotica. Whatever. You get the idea.

True story . . . when I started out, I had a picture of myself I liked on my website, and I found a publishing site where people swapped information about agents and deals, and some guy went on a rant about my breasts and my freckles (an "I'd like to screw her" gross rant--on a publishing site!). Give me a f*cking break. It was SO mean-spirited that the owner of the site literally took it down, unprompted by me, for being so sickeningly beastly and sexual. I have no idea who this writer was or is, thank God. WTF?!

Your book comes out--reviews. I have one reviewer (a blog owner and aspiring chick lit writer, not a reviewer for PW or Kirkus) who feels the need to re-post a bad review she wrote four years ago every six months or so on Amazon and to cut and paste it elsewhere all over the 'net, as if I personally harmed her by writing "Diary of a Blues Goddess."

Conferences . . . I have in the past blogged about a horrible yet well-known author who spread gossip about me to someone--that was blatantly false. For reasons I have no idea since I never met the woman. Ever.

SHIELDS!

This is, for better or worse, a public business. Pubbed or not, people will have their opinions on what you're writing and the horse you rode in on. I try to stay overwhlemingly positive. Smile and nod. But truly, the thick skin you need to face rejection also needs to be developed for other aspects of this business. The more you can do it in a positive way . . . the better.

For me, it's a Buddhist perspective. Look neither left nor right but simply straight ahead and BE in your own career, in this moment. Anyone else have a shield?