How about that – doing nothing sometimes really works.

I began writing this post last week but never had time to make it past line one. I am certain that since then my thoughts have changed considerably, and I wanted to take a moment to say thank you to Laura Best, and Ev Bishop, two fantastic bloggers and writers (yes, I have been lucky enough to read both of their work) for honouring me with the Prolific Blogger Award. I will be passing it on to seven others shortly.

Ok, back to post…. It’s not that I’ve really been doing nothing. I have been very busy, just not in my usual busy kind of way. I have been editing the first draft of my second novel. A little while back I mentioned that when I began this process I spent an enormous amount of time re-writing the opening pages. Since then, I have not allowed myself any form of re-writing at all. I even use the strike through feature if I think something needs to be cut. What I have been doing is reading and taking footnotes and notes. To date, I have read through 174 pages of an odd 350 and have 420 footnotes. I keep waiting for the computer to tell me that I have reached a limit.

I am also writing my thoughts in a journal as I read. Doing these two things has been probably one of the most productive steps I have ever taken in my writing. Seems very simple doesn’t it? Yet, in my first novel I did not progress in this way. I made the changes as I went. This time, I find by not making any changes into the text I am able to focus on it so much better. I clearly see thoughts and dialogue that is out of character, scenes that make no sense, etc, etc. Plus, I have been able to see the larger picture and the little details that are absent from the first draft that would make it so much stronger. I am actually exited when I know I have an editing session coming up! I never would have thought. I have never had an averssion to editing, yet it was not my favorite. Writing was. At the moment though I am connecting with my characters even more than when I was writing the draft.

In the meantime I have been reading A Writer’s Guide to Fiction: A concise and practical guide for novelists and short-story writers, by Elizabeth Lyon. I wanted to quote from the text as I have been finding her a great inspiration.

“Most stories have two levels: the external plot and the internal character need. Both levels culminate in the character – and reader – learning something fundamental about self and life. …. By my story, by my plot, you might be transformed.”

This is my deepest desire in my writing. That my story is so real as to be an experience. I know that this is the case for me as the writer, entering a world, and now refining it, and in some instances redefining it.

How did I not see that? Especially since apparently I created it!

I still feel like  a new blogger. I just checked and my first post was May 19th, 2009. 8 months ago, yet I still struggle finding sufficient blog time . Blogging does a lot for my morale/inspiration/eagerness as a writer just by allowing me to connect with other writers. When days go by and I do not have a chance to stop and read any posts I feel the difference. Something that is so rewarding should be easy to fit into a schedule. The problem is that I am too greedy with my very limited writing time (and I am totally useless after 7 pm  now! 6 months tmr!! ). Anyone else feel this way, and if so how do you manage it? Ok, not the being pregnant part, just the balancing part.

Well, this post was not meant to be a whiny one, but that thought has been in my mind for some time now.

I really had wanted to talk about a short story I wrote just under a year ago for a workshop. I liked it at the time, a lot. It was read by the group and given a small critique, not much work needed, and then I forgot about it untill Dec when I submitted to my writing group. I received a completely different set of feedback. Very interesting. I took some of it, applied it, made my story stronger, and disregarded some other feedback. Two point specifically: 1. where is your character growth? 2. what is your character’s motif? We don’t see it clearly, it’s too weak. Nah, this is just a snippet of life, I said. don’t want it, don’t need it.

I forgot about the story again untill last week. Re-read it, and poof, character growth and motivation appeared. In t his case it was guilt, and finally her ability to release it. Enough for a 2000 word literary short. But, what amazed me was how this aspect had been hiding in the story and I hadn’t even seen it! I spent the entire week re-writing this story, I thought it needed about an hour of work – was I wrong, and finally finished it. Amazing how things grow! Would I have seen this in my story if some members of my group had not asked me these questions? It made me really wonder how much more my subconscious knows that I do.

Shh – I’m working!

It was quiet this morning.  So quiet that my daughter fell asleep in the car on the way to preschool. I asked a teacher in the parking lot if she felt the same way, and she said, “odd, I just checked my watch to see if I was early, that’s how quiet it is.” The cloud covering must have been low and muffled all sounds. I drove home with the radio off, and tried to hang on to that stillness. I knew it would be good to begin editing with such outer silence brought in.

I can write anywhere, anyhow. It matters not to me if there is music and jumping and shouting. Yet, when it comes to editing, I need quiet.

“Sometimes everything has to be inscribed across the heavens so you can find the one line already written inside you.” David Whyte

I came across this quote the other day, and I scribbled it down. Being at an editing stage I thought it was very appropriate. Yet, I refused to place stake in it, even though at times it does feel like the stars have to align just perfectly for the words to fall into place.  I would not need some cosmic event to polish my prose!

My plan:  Read all the way through my ms while taking notes. Search for plot flaws, timeframe discrepancies, character weakness, omissions, and weak scenes. Once that was assertained I would begin with those problems. Prose would come later.  No need to make beautiful sentences if they won’t be in the final draft. I should know this by now.

So, I sat down and read to page 4. Then I began re-writing. I could not go 4 pages without stopping! Ok, the beginning needs to be redone, it just doesn’t fit, I have known this since I wrote it. I allowed myself to re-write it now because the words were there. They might not be there next week, I told myself. Then I proceeded to spend the rest of the morning writing one paragraph. One paragraph! I have a weakness for prose, can you tell?

Anyway, once I realized I had become utterly lost in the sentences, I pulled myself out and continued writing into the story. This morning I continued as well, not allowing myself to stop and make each sentence shine. This beginning might have to be scrapped and re-written again, and I do not want to give myself such luxury as polishing yet. I think another day or two and I’ll be able to move on and keep reading, sticking with the original plan.  Hopefully I’ll get further in than another 4 pages.

 Is there something that halts your progress when editing? Do you make a plan, or do you wing it?

Happy New Year!

2010. twenty ten. Occasionally I am still writing 2008 on my cheques.

Happy New year everyone! Hope the holidays were great! When I was growing up, my parents told me that every day of the year is a new year (same went for birthdays as well – you can imagine how that went over), and so I am wishing you a year of days that are new, exciting, stimulating, constructive, and filled with health, peace, contentment – the adjectives can go and on and on but I will stop before all you writers cringe in pain!  

I had thought to work on a short, revise, finish, and begin sending out about now. Instead, I got grabbed by the holiday world wind and that was that. Beginning to breathe, slow down, and thinking about the next steps.  unfortunately I have begun creating in the middle of the night again, always a sign that I need to get back to work asap, sick kids or not!

When I was not cooking, eating, cleaning, entertaining, or having a play date in the last while, I managed to knit my daughter a hat (yay!! I will try to post a photo later in the day for those of you interested. When Kayla wrote about a scarf she had knitted on a road trip and I was longing for a picture ).

I took the photo this morning. It looses a lot in the photo, especially the colour, but my 3 year old is happy. Now, it just has to be lined with fleece.

 And, I  read two books.

Her Fearful Symmetry, by Audrey Niffenegger.

 

Has anyone read this book? I almost wish I was part of a book club to discuss this book. I adore Time Traveler’s Wife, and cannot bring myself to share my thoughts on this novel here on my blog without biting my tongue. Suffice it to say, that after a rocky beginning of awkward pov switches and bizarre almost clichéd characters I was engrossed, untill I reached the end and was unsatisfied. This was one of those were I re-wrote the ending in my head. Hmmm, don’t think I bit quite hard enough.

Lost, by Jacqueline Davies

Set in NY in the early 1900s in the Jewish ghetto. Sad tale, heart wrenching at times, and I was shocked this book was YA, 12 and up it states on the inside flap. The hardship and loss it deals with seem too strong for kids. I was trying to imagine myself at that age reading it, and knew it would have gripped me, but in a different way. Somehow, when I was that young tragedy was still romantic.

Anyway, those are my literary endeavors during the holidays. I have new novel ideas brewing, yet do not want to begin writing quite yet as I wish to focus on editing. As for the reading, Outlander, and The Road. Odd combination, but somehow works.

How about you? Updates? I look forward to catching up on all your blogs!!

One of many

Endings that is. I met my deadline of finishing the first draft of my novel on Dec 18th. My plan is not to touch it until the kids go back to school on Jan 7, giving myself 2-3 weeks away from it. It has been over a year since I began so much of it will be completely foreign to me – in a good way. I will not be to close to the words.  At that point I hope to re-read the entire ms before making any changes to see where the major plot and character gaps are. I am certain the inconsistencies will stick out, as the characters have developed so much since their beginnings. After that the true rewriting/editing begins.

I have been thinking about the two novels that I wrote, trying to find similarities in two such different novels. One is set in modern day, and technology has a pivotal role. The other is set both in 1860s and 1914. One is very romantic, the other is not. One has alternating pov between multiple characters, the other has only two pov (first and third). Outwardly they seemed entirely different, yet I realized their theme is the same: live life in the moment.

In my first novel, the character misses out on his life due to his aspiration for power. In my second, my mc becomes obsessed with the life of another woman, and also with the life she wishes to lead. Interesting to me how I wrote two novels with a recurrent theme without realizing it until I was done. What is also interesting to me is the variation in outcome. In the first novel, my power hungry character does not attain his wish. In my second she does, but only after she succumbs to her own life, and lets go of her desires, and not because of any action she takes but due to the movements of our world.

Have you noticed yourself writing the same themes, or perhaps characters that seem to follow you from one story to another?

Ahhh, empathy!

Last week I was sadly writing towards a fast approaching end, not wanting to let go of my characters that I had become so attached to in the last year writing my first draft. I finally gave myself over to it, and the ending of this novel has been pouring out of me, as though in a long-awaited release. My character’s are coming to their conclusions, and I am feeling immense satisfaction for them. It is an odd feeling, to be happy with death, sorrow, and grief, for that is the ending many of my characters endure.

Last week, Linda wrote about fictive dreaming, and her post left me thinking. It made me realize that it was precisely this state, termed fictive dreaming (of which I had never heard the term for before reading this post) that was causing me such great fear.

When I write I enter this state very deeply. It is something I have always experienced, and is akin to reading except  it is  much much stronger when I am writing. Being pregnant, for me this state is actually deeper. I was not yet writing when I was pregnant with my first, and I do not remember writing at all with my second. Perhaps I was slowly editing that first novel. Yet this time, I am writing just about daily, and I find it nerve-racking how deep into my story and characters I fall. When I stop writing for whatever reason I am always shocked at how much time has passed before I even needed a breather.

The ending of my novel portrays quite a bit of suffering, and I just didn’t want to experience it. Now that I have given in to it, I find that there is a reason to this suffering. A reason I knew was there all along, but still, you have to experience something to fully appreciate it, right? It is human nature to believe all suffering and sacrifice is for a cause, even though this is not necessarily so in reality. But this is not reality, this is fiction, and fiction has to be better than reality.  In turn, the sorrows I write about must lead to a purpose, and in this case it is the growth of my MC.  Now my cause has focus, instead of only the pain.

I approach my last pages, probably about 10 to 20 left, and I know that this fear I had of suffering along with my characters has made me see the story in a more complete fashion.

Once in a while the flow has to go with me.

How many days between posts lately? I don’t check, I don’t want to know. Time is standing still for me, yet when I look it has kept moving…

I have been thinking about a post for some days now – since I began blogging it is funny how much of life can be turned into a post, yet my thoughts are scattered. The holidays are coming, and I am thinking back to Tricia’s post asking what we have sacrificed by being a writer. At the time I had a difficult time coming up with an answer. Now, I see one: the ability to share.

So many other art forms can be appreciated at a glance. I cannot offer my art as a gift, and so I knit. I think to myself that next year I will be illustrating and will be able to offer at least the children in my life something more personal and from the heart. (Even though I am certain they will prefer Lego!)

I have a self-imposed a deadline for myself: finish the first draft of my wip by dec 18th. Possible? I thought so until my daughter came down with something and has been sucking time. Yet, still I think I can make it. I have just under 72 k done. I want to write about 80 k. That means about 8 writing sessions in the next 10 days. The problem I realize is that I don’t want to finish. I sit down to write, and think, I am already here? I don’t want to be here, writing an ending. Of course, I will probable be re-writing for another 2 years, so it is no true end (I say this as a joke, but if my first novel is an indicator then I am in for 2 years easy!).

Do you ever think you read too quickly? Coming to too many endings too soon? Lately, that is how I feel. I write, and I know the world will only be entered so briefly. I read and I think of how much energy and love was pored into a book that I devour in  a matter of hours.  I cannot help it. I know the author has done a good job, and I think I should slow down and enjoy it, like how I savor a good piece of dark chocolate. This is how I feel about  my wip. I do not want to leave it behind. I do not want to exit that world, and say goodbye to those characters.

My fear is that I will overwrite, prolong the inevitable, and so I write in a way I am unaccustomed to, and that is with precision. I do not let myself be taken by the flow. This time I am guiding the current where I know it should go.

New snow

At seven this morning pounding feet woke me, and my little girl’s voice calling for her brother. She sounded so excited, that I sat straight up in bed wide awake. Normally I laze for a good ten minutes before I begin to crack open my eyes.

On my first glimpse out the window on the way down I knew what was causing such enthusiasm. Snow!

The kids have been waiting for this morning! My feet carried me as quick as they could down the steps while I called out the names of my children. I remember this feeling oh so well! The newness of it, the magic of it. And I was oh so grateful to be able to feel it again. My husband came down, and the kids threw themselves on him, full of giggles.

“Can we make snow angels?”

“I want to make a snow man?”

“Can we make snowballs and throw on it your coat?” asked my youngest.

My husband turned to me, and said, “I am not ready for this yet.”

I smiled, thinking about how when he first came to Canada from South Africa he had run barefoot through the streets swirling with white drifts .

While we drove to school, my son was amazed at how the snow melted and slid down the car window. My daughter was amazed at the snow melting and dripping off her boots. At preschool, the little ones could talk about nothing else. I came home, and only when I turned off the car did I notice the way the branches hung, thick with new snow.

I had missed the whole drive home, getting lost in grown-up thoughts (none of which I remember, I might add). Did I need my children to point out the world around me? Did I need them to remind me of the magic in it?

I am reading Hothouse Flowers. A character reminisces about his childhood, and how his father had taught him about the fairies that live in the moss.

As a writer, one of the things I relish is this belief of fairies living in the grass. Of house elves who come and steal all our socks, and eat the last cookie. Or the more mundane, such as love at first sight and soul mates. Chance, fate, destiny. And perhaps most of all, possibility. This can lead one anywhere.

I sat in  my car, watching the snow fall, the chickadees playing, and then I came inside and I wrote.

 

Getting to know you…

In my last post I mentioned how the Huguenots made a surprise appearance. I thought I was writing about the Huguenots, but I discovered this was not so. I was writing about one of my secondary characters.

Back in August, in More!, we talked about secondary characters. Yet, the full implications of my post did not fully hit home for me until yesterday. I suppose it’s human nature to not realize I had something to learn until I learn it.

Anyway, yesterday, this secondary character had a moment when she decided to become leading lady. There was so much about this woman, my MC’s midwife, that came out. I thought I knew my midwife, or all I needed to know about her, yet here I was diving through her childhood and romances. I am always amazed at what the mind produces when I think its dormant- this is one of my favorite things about writing.

I was a little startled while writing, a little nervous, but I let it come: where was this going? Was she trying to take over? Then I realized, no. I had remained in my MCs POV. She was getting to know her midwife. She was shocked at how much there was in this woman who tended her, so much she had never seen, or even supposed. So, at the end of all this I had learned something crucial about my MC.

Now that I know this particular secondary character all that much better I find I have a new connection with this novel. There are more layers, more nuances, and it is oh so much more interesting! I am curious to see when re-drafting how much her character has developed from her initial introduction. Perhaps, it is not about getting to know my characters, but about giving them room to grow into themselves.

We talked about the story having a life of its own…

Today I was writing when suddenly the Huguenots made an appearance.

My midwife said something like this: “My ma was a Roman Catholic, my pa of Huguenot ancestry.”

I had no intention of writing about this part of history – my setting for this part of the story is 1914. I did not realize I had been thinking about the Huguenots, but obviously I had been, somewhere. I think that the Huguenots represent an element of such mystery and horror to me that they found their way into the story all on their own. Next thing I knew my mc was discussing history post Bloody Mary. Ok, what’s going on? I asked myself.

I re-read and re-read what I had written. Normally I just write without pause, yet this was so unexpected that I had to stop.

Was this out of character? No, it was  just a short dialogue. My MC is an amateur historian.  Her midwife an educated woman.

Yet I wondered, what did this snippet of detail contribute, other than satisfying my own fascination? I had no idea, so I decided to make a note for myself, add a footnote, and continue on. Maybe the appearance of the Huguenots would have a purpose I could not yet deduce, or maybe not. Not, I could just cut in a later draft.

Perhaps this will reflect a trait of my midwife; perhaps there will be correlation with the war of 1914; or maybe it will be about my MC, and her response to this info about her midwife.

Amazing how one little line can creep into my book and cause all this mayhem. I look forward to seeing what it will turn itself into.