Convergence

By Hannah

A quick email from Gail Konop Baker mentioned she returned from Tillie Olsen’s memorial, and with that I wiped away today’s first draft. Wow, I wish I had gone. I read Tillie Olsen as an undergraduate in Western Massachusetts’ Happy Valley twenty-five years ago. The stories in Tell Me A Riddle were challenging, demanding, and gave so much in return. Stories about people different from anyone I knew, yet familiar in little ways; the use of language breaking the rules I was taught for powerful effect. How did she know these things?

Years later I read five non-fiction books, one after the other: Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique, Mary Catherine Bateson’s Composing A Life; Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own; Carolyn Heilbrun’s Writing A Woman’s Life; and Olsen’s Silences. After reading them, I re-read them, in bits and pieces, about the complexity of life and of being a woman and unspoken guidelines nobody ever tells women, women writers, or anyone who needs to create space and prioritize, as Amy touched on here so beautifully yesterday.

In that meeting between life and the written word, Tillie Olsen’s Riddle and Silences were special, and I cannot do the justice to her that John Leonard did in The Nation after her passing:

“…see how it's done: First what Cynthia Ozick calls "a certain corona of moral purpose." And then the prose that lashes like a whip, that cracks and stings. And then the judgment coming down like a terrible swift sword. And then a forgiving grace note, like haiku or Pascal. Memory, history, poetry and prophecy converge. Reading her again, and again, and again, I find that when you love a book, it loves you back.”

Tillie Olsen’s books will continue to love us all back.

(Speaking of the meeting of real life, women's lives and writing, Gail’s very personal column, Bare-breasted Mama, is at LiteraryMama.com.)

The Power of No

By Amy

These past weeks it seems my flesh has been cut away from my bones and there’s very little left of me. The worst part is I’m the one holding the knife.

Instead of feeding my writing, refilling my store of creative energy, I’ve given it all away. You know how it is, there are many demands on our time. The more I try to do, the more I want to do. Truly. But I can no longer allow it to be at the expense of my writing.

I met Ann Patchett a few months ago and she talked about this very subject. When she was asked to be the guest editor for Best American Short Stories, she said she hesitated. Ann said she turned down most requests associated with the writer’s life; she had learned to guard against such intrusions. At the time, and until this week, I couldn’t imagine such a thing.

Oh, to be asked! To be invited to sit on a panel at a writers’ conference and talk about craft with a room filled with others who share the same passion; to be asked to read another’s work and line the dust jacket with compliments; to have bestowed a title of any literary sort, honorary editor, guest judge, keynote speaker. An author could fill a calendar year with such obligations.

But really, those are simply the trappings of the writer’s life. A little bit and we grow dizzy with the fevered pitch, the glory. It’s good to feel appreciated, to give back even. Too much of this life though, and we succumb to the insatiable flesh eating vanity that could devour our work.

I’m not such a writer as Ann Patchett. I am, however, a mother, wife, daughter, friend, employee, volunteer with just as many demands on my time. Now it’s time to learn the power of no. In a way, I’m grateful to have learned this lesson now. It’s my lifelong goal to become an author, to write something honest and true. More than awards, more than bestseller lists and lunches in New York, I want to write something that makes a reader say, yes. In order to do that, I need to be as protective of my writing as I am of my children. After all, my babies are never made to go hungry.

How do you do it?

The Music of Words

Posted by Lisa

Parts of New York City are similar to Montreal. Last weekend, the area near my hotel (the Hilton on 53rd Street) reminded me so much of the city where I grew up. Nothing in New York is the same as Montreal’s Old Port or the McGill Student Ghetto with their signature walk-up apartments with balconies. But some busy streets remind me of Crescent Street or Ste. Catherines. The chi-chi shops, the cave-like restaurant hideaways. And the idea, indeed much of the plot to some future novel came to me. With it came memories: the smell of a Montreal metro – not unpleasant, but distinct, the icy blue of the Montreal sky in winter.

One of my characters in this imagined novel lives in rural Quebec. Having spent my teen years growing up in such a place, I know there’s a ‘feel’ to it, and French Canadian Folk Music brings it all back to me. I HATE to try to describe its sound as I won’t do it justice. It is fiddles and foot stomping and joie de vivre. It is midnight feasts on Christmas Eve. Spring parties with sap running and maple syrup bubbling and burning. It has the quickest beat.

In Sherry Ellis’s book, Now Write, novelist and Grub Street Creative Director, Christopher Castellani, describes an approach to writing wherein he listens to the music of the era: “It’s a quick and powerful path to the empathy you are always striving for as a writer. You imagine yourself as a character responding to the lyrics or the emotion of the music.”

Hear the music in Christopher’s prose (from A Kiss from Maddelena):

“Vito scanned the crowd: the girls in their sundresses rubbing their arms, the men counting and pooling their bills, Maddelena in a pack with Carolina and Ada and Fiorella. Her hair, unpinned and freed from the hat, lifted and fell onto her bare shoulders as she talked.”

As I work on my contemporary novel, set in New Hampshire, you can imagine the radio stations Rose, my protagonist, must endure as a passenger in her dad’s car. (Poor thing, she can’t afford an IPod). It’s unreal, to me, the power of music when I write. It takes me there, where I need to be.

Making a Literary Life: Seizing the Day

For anyone in the Boston area, the Writers Group has signed up en masse to attend Grub Street's Grub Gone Silly event on March 16. We will hear from Jonathan Ames, Kris Frieswick, and the ever-wise Leslie Talbot. Exactly what we need to look forward to after the drop in temperature, winds, snow, ice, slush... a bright spot on our calendars.

Lisa
Sigh. And sigh again. I'm back from the SCBWI conference, but a part of me is still there, basking in its inspirational moments.
Although unrelated, enjoy reading Grace Talusan's piece, My Father's Noose, in Brevity today. It's images are haunting and real. Starting a writing session by reading work of this quality is one way to improve your own writing.

Amy
I've started writing my next book. You understand, don't you? That sense of release when the characters come, when they confide their greatest fears, and then you confront your own: the blank page. Finally, the words are with me. Also, I'm working with several authors to arrange readings in the Boston area. I'll let all of you know when the dates are firm. As Therese Fowler blogged this week, it's important to support your fellow writers, and vital for you to get out there and network with them.

Hannah
I am very much looking forward to the lunchtime revision session with Hallie Ephron through Grub Street coming up on March 6. It will be nice to get into the big city and do some critical thinking.

Lynne
I outlined the additions and changes I will make as I tackle the second draft of my novel. With next week being a light work week, I am eager to get started. One character, in particular, is ready to tell her story in more detail. I read a gem of a book called, Plotting and Writing Suspense Fiction, by Patricia Highsmith. Patricia's novel, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and her short story, The Terapin, are not to be missed either. In keeping with our blog posts about reaching out to authors we admire, I wrote letters to two writers I've read recently. I simply wanted to offer my thanks to them for sharing their writing with the world. Can you imagine how nice it must feel to get a thank you note from a reader? If you live in Boston, you'll want to take advantage of all the great opportunities to connect and learn from other writers. Amy and Hannah mentioned Grub Gone Silly, and Hallie Ephron's revision workshop. Here are two more Boston opportunities:

Hallie Ephron, will speak about character development on February 24, at 3 pm at the Milton Public Library. And PEN-New England presents an Evening with Dave Eggars, author of The Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius on February 26, at 6:30pm in Cambridge.

Involve me

Posted by Lynne

I'm a teacher who teaches teachers. On a daily basis, I remind myself and other educators that there isn't any one right way to learn anything. It's so easy to forget this simple truth. It's easier said than done to remember that there isn't one way to create a character, or interpret a poem, or outline a plot.

Some of us prefer to learn by watching, others by doing. No matter which way you prefer, each of us use our five senses to learn. I believe when it comes to learning anything-- especially learning to write well--the more those senses are engaged, the better. In this way, I don't think there is a right way to learn, simply richer ways. Ways in which all five senses are in hyperalert.

Imagine a scene with only one sense engaged. A woman is in the kitchen cooking dinner. This is tell me writing.

Let's see and hear and feel the scene through Tracy Chevalier's senses.

I was chopping vegetables in the kitchen when I heard voices outside our front door--a woman's, bright as polished brass, and a man's, low and dark like the wood of the table I was working on. They were the kind of voices we heard rarely in our house. I could hear rich carpets in their voices, books and pearls, and fur.

With sights, sounds, smells engaged, a woman making dinner becomes the poor girl Griet in The Girl with a Pearl Earring. Chevalier's pearl is a beautiful book, rich in sensory detail, compelling characters and plot. This book is a beautiful example of how to put all the pieces of craft together--not in the right way--in a rich way.

For me, learning about writing involves using all of my senses. I'm always eager to go to readings where I can listen to other writers tell me what works for them, and what doesn't. I love to read, so that other writers can show me how to execute the rules of writing, and then show me that rules are meant to be broken. And of course, I learn by doing. Writing, rewriting, receiving feedback from my writers' group, and then revising again. When I encourage myself to use all of my senses to learn, it makes it easier to use all of my senses to write.

I have a favorite saying that captures this nicely for me.

Tell me and I may forget. Show me and I may remember. Involve me and I will understand.

Bits and Pieces

By Hannah

The education of a writer comes in all the traditions of the stories themselves. Listening to bedtime stories by my uncle, who appeared from far away and challenged us to name any topic, any topic at all. Learning grammar and to enjoy the Wild Bard of Avon from teachers like Mr. McKee, so solemn except for his eyes twinkling over his glasses. Learning to ask questions from my mother, who loves to find out how people live, what they think. From my father, who loves humor. My brother is in a writers' group, too, no surprise!

It comes from conversations with others, like my great-aunt who translated fairy tales in thick volumes, and who wrote her own tales on onion-skin paper with a Royal typewriter. Neighbors like Monica Dickens, who let me feed her horses even as I read her World End series in the height of my horse-loving ‘tween years. There are friends, such as Lane Von Herzen MacWilliams and this group, all gracious and encouraging and generous

There is the book-learning, the reading of literature and of course the books about how to write. My aunt-no-longer-married-to-my-uncle did not like Stephen King, and told him so. Her tastes ran in different directions; still, something about his writing really set her off and she sent him a letter outlining her deepest feelings on the matter. She told me this during a long conversation about the craft in which I finally mustered the courage to tell her I found his book On Writing useful. Interesting. I didn’t go so far as to utter the word enjoyable, also true. She informed me he stopped writing soon after receiving her letter, and she changed the subject.

Gail Godwin, writing in her mid-twenties in a journal that would become part of The Making of a Writer says: “I know that I am never alone because in my highest moments I am thinking thoughts that others of my kind have thought in the past or will think in the future. And I see myself as part of a link in a chain.” Three sentences later, she describes how “American pragmatism takes over” and suddenly “I think no longer of time eternal but of the unforgiving minute.” She chronicles every lift of the heart, every drop in self-esteem, every painstaking step toward a dream.

The education of a writer is in the bits and pieces: the people we meet, the words we read, our experiences, and the moments when they come together. My aunt didn’t have to read Stephen King. Why could she not simply put him down; why was she compelled to send him, of all people, instructional correspondence on how to redirect his talents? It was coincidence, of course, that he stopped writing after her letter arrived in his mailbox. Probably also coincidence that news of his return to writing was announced the week after she died. I’d say there’s a story in there, somewhere, wouldn’t you?

Be Bold

By Amy

It was late October and I was nearing the end of my novel. Before I typed the first word of the story, I knew the ending, but as it evolved, I wanted the final pages to be somehow more. The problem was the scene I envisioned writing wasn’t something I thought the publishing world would find acceptable, certainly not for literary fiction. I should play it safe, I thought, go with understated, yet, touching.

About that time, Lynne and I attended a benefit for PEN New England, A Reading of Best American Short Stories (in the interest of full disclosure, I work for Houghton Mifflin). Though I wasn’t the Cinderella in this story, I still felt as though we were at the same ball. First there was the reception with publishing royalty. Giddy, Lynne and I chatted with some of our favorite authors: Tom Perrotta asked if we’d yet seen his film, Little Children; Ann Patchett regaled us with stories about her mother, Jeanne Ray; Michael Lowenthal told us a charming anecdote about Grace Paley; Scott Heim shared his angst about his third book; Mameve Medwed asked our opinion about the title of her latest book; Atul Gawande thanked me for gushing; and Paul Yoon accepted our compliments with grace and humbleness. I would have been content with that; I could have floated home. But there was more.

Soon we were ushered into the theater where Ann Patchett greeted the audience from the stage. Three stories were to be featured and as the editor of Best American Short Stories 2006, she chose to read Self-Reliance by Edith Pearlman. To be honest, I hadn’t yet gone through the collection and didn’t know what to expect.

What followed was perhaps the most important lesson I’ve yet learned in my writing journey: Be bold. Her story is the most breathtakingly beautiful short story I’ve ever read. Yes, better than Alice Munro’s best. Edith Pearlman is bold. She is bold and elegant and brilliant and stunning, quiet and touching, but most of all bold.

A week later, I wrote the ending I wanted. After my writers’ group critiqued it, I then wrote Edith Pearlman to tell her how much her writing means to me. Let me share with you a portion of her reply:

“I'm delighted you enjoyed the story; and further delighted that it inspired you to be unafraid with your own work. In fact, boldness is something we can all use. That and endurance. You can't imagine how many times I revised that story. You make me feel that it was all worth doing.”

So writer friends, heed Edith Pearlman’s advice. Be bold. Endure. Will you?

SCBWI Conference: Education and Inspiration

Posted by Lisa

Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Oh yes, and edgy YA; sadly a passage one reader shared brought images of Britney Spears to mind. The SCBWI winter conference this weekend was about learning and inspiration. There was a most innovative graphic novel by Brian Selznick, who was one of many unreal keynote speakers. Wartime stories were told by brilliant Susan Cooper, and a story of Japanese enemies turned friends by Katherine Patterson.

Now I bring my experience home to share with my soul mates (read: Amy, Lynne, and Hannah). “Write everything down!” One of them instructed me. She spoke slowly, wanting to make sure I understood. She knows me well – was I paying attention? I will share my high points with them, a couple low points, the times I felt lost.

“It’s about the love. The Beatles had it right.” Linda Sue Parks said in her keynote. “When you love what you are writing, the story will be your best,” she said. Light bulb moment, important to remember! The same advice was repeated by my agent when I asked him on Thursday, our first ever meeting, “What advice would you have for a new writer?”

He leaned back in his chair and took in his window view of New York City. “I’ll answer that in a roundabout way,” he said. He took his time explaining that when reading a manuscript, a story may engage him almost magically - when it all works: the characters, the plot. He told me to write what draws me in, in a similar way. When a writer is bored, it shows in his work.

“And don’t quit your job,” he added. He shared that the timeline for a writer’s success is a mystery. It reminds me of Susan Cooper’s quote the next day, as she looked out over the motionless sea of faces. “For a writer, time is not altogether linear,” she whispered into the microphone.

Education. As a writers group, we push ourselves, we push each other. Hopefully it’s the same in your writers group, too. Seventy four-year-old Katherine Patterson just published Bread and Roses. She read a hilarious passage – she makes a great Italian mama! Writing is a lifetime of learning, I suppose.

Making a Literary Life: Possibilities

This week felt as though the literary life is ignoring the frigid weather, and readying for a burst of spring growth. There are so many small signs that good things are coming in the next few weeks and months. Possibilities is a gorgeous word!

Lisa
As you may know, Lisa is at the SCBWI conference in NYC, and she's also meeting with her agent. Have fun, Lisa. Can't wait to hear the details when you return.

Amy
For the past couple of weeks, I've been having fun helping various authors arrange readings, get press coverage, and encouraging them to go after awards. I know many writers are uncomfortable marketing their work, but, really, it's more exciting than you realize. It's a rush dealing with booksellers (they love books!) and press (they're writers too!), coming up with fun hooks to get a book noticed. My advice is get a couple of writer friends together, a bottle of wine and good chocolates, and brainstorm your publicity campaign. C'mon, you're creative people, it's easier than you think.

Hannah
Editing is more of a rewriting; rather than being depressing, it's quite energizing. I am trying to do a chapter a day. I don't know if that sounds ambitious or pathetic? The nerdy me is polishing word choice as well as fixing threads, adding "tension," trying not to lose the humor. I have told my children that they are not to be on the computer after dinner, so rather than breaking my own rules, I have been re-reading Gail Godwin's The Making of a Writer.

Lynne
This week I received a testimonial for my book that brought me to tears. Jane Healy, author of Endangered Minds and Failure to Connect is a beautiful writer and an amazing advocate for children. I was deeply honored she agreed to read my book, and even more grateful for her enthusiastic response. Thank you, Jane! I also had the privilege of talking with freelance writer and soon to be book author Sharon Cindrich about book marketing. Watch for the June release of her book about raising tech savvy kids.

All in Good Time

Posted by Lynne

Trust
Synonyms include: faith, hope, conviction, confidence, expectation, reliance and dependence.

In previous blog entries, prior to and including this week's themed entries on trust, we've written a lot about this five-letter word. As a writer you hope you can trust your instincts as a storyteller. You struggle with your conviction to trust your characters as they reveal the way their story should be told. You must be confident in the face of conflicting feedback from trusted readers. There is a quiet expectation that trusted readers will love your writing. There is beauty in the reliance and dependence that can be found among fellow writers, and in writers' group.

But what about the connection between trust and faith?

I've always been a person to do things quickly. As a child, in order to get outside on a beautiful summer day, I'd make my bed by simply pulling up the spread. In school, papers came back with red letters careening across the top of the page with an oft repeated phrase, "slow down."

Even in Kindergarten I was looking ahead, focused on the future. I remember once saying to my mother, "I wish I was in first grade." She said, "Don't wish your life away."

When I told her I couldn't wait to be married and have children, she said, "All in God's time."

My religious faith is important to me, a central part of my life, as it was my mother's. My faith challenge has always been to take my time and relax in the moment. Trust the journey. Sometimes I struggle with enjoying the ride, because I'm working so hard to focus on arriving at my chosen destination. Don't get me wrong, keeping your eyes on the prize and being determined to get where you want to go is important. Certainly the theme of another set of posts. But trust and faith and time are strongly linked for me.

When I started writing fiction, it was the first thing I'd come across in my life where I intrinsically and completely allowed myself to enjoy the writing, letting it come at its own pace and in its own time. When I started my novel, I believed it was for me alone, and I had no expectations related to publishing it. When I joined writers' group, my goal was to immerse myself in learning; I enjoyed relying on my new writer friends to teach me. In the absence of the hope to be published, confidence that I was a strong writer, or expectations to be the best--I found what I'd been looking for; what my mother had been talking about.

I'm still learning--and liking it--that a work-in-progress is exactly that. It's not ever really finished, you simply decide when you will no longer edit it. With writing, I'm learning to trust the process, take my time, have faith that when a work is done, I'll know it. I've come to believe that trust is faith. And I'm starting to trust my mother's words --with writing at least--not Lynne's time, in God's time.

Got "It"?

By Hannah

We didn’t start with it, the four of us, despite our smiles. After a few weeks, we suspected it might exist; after a few months, there was a base. Each person had something to offer, in her background, her skills; we could see it in the edits that slid back across the long wooden table. It took about a year before we confided quirky phobias to each other. It took longer to talk to the worries and fears of our inner creative beings.

I used to think a writers’ group would rise or fall based on multiple factors; chemistry, differing talents, different needs and goals. A writers’ group lives or dies on trust.

Our group continues to discover new things about what makes us work. We look for certain things when we read. We have differences and similarities in what we want to see in a story, in our approaches to the world, in our dreams, in what keeps us going with our fiction and what keeps us going outside of it. The areas where we overlap, or don't, are equally fascinating. Underneath it all, we have earned each other’s trust.

It is critical, at many levels. First, let’s all confess to and quickly dismiss that fear of bringing 20 pages to strangers, only to have someone steal the idea. Anyone who could come up with the missing 230 pages of compelling plot and prose overnight does not have an imagination problem and would find Bulfinch's Mythology sufficient. You do need, of course, to trust that a mostly or fully completed manuscript will be treated as sacred.

Still, it goes far beyond copyright. Trust is required in the feedback. This has nothing to do with talent and intention, but if what they offer is right for you. You need to think about whether the edits help strengthen your work, whether they offer false praise or insufficient criticism, whether they are pushing you when you need a push, and in time, whether they will be there for you through inevitable ups and downs.

Writing is a solitary activity. The success plays out in a highly competitive arena. Your writers' group must be based on the trust that together, you are becoming the writers you are capable of being.

The Crux of the Matter

By Amy

The others came to me quickly, easily. Clara was guileless, sharing all of her self through intense conversations that would last long into the night; unexpected considering how life had hollowed her out. When I woke, she’d resume talking in that melancholy way of hers, just a hint of a Rhode Island accent rolling off of her R’s. She needed me to tell her story.

Linus was a more patient conversationalist. He would wait until I settled myself on my ancient desk chair, a cup of coffee warming my hands, and then he’d start, Where was I now? Oh, yes… It never took long to write his chapters, I copied them verbatim as he spoke.

But Mike wasn’t used to sharing the particulars of his life. Not with anyone, not anymore. He was guarded, a ghost of the man he used to be. We, Mike and I, weren’t close friends; our talks weren’t conversations, but interviews. I would ask him questions and he would offer up one word answers. I’d have to ask him the same question cloaked as something altogether different to draw out a few more words or expression of sentiment.

Each of my characters needed to tell their stories from their points-of-view and while Clara and Linus were eager, Mike didn’t trust me. As a result, I didn’t trust his chapters.

When I announced at writers’ group that I was considering deleting Mike’s sections, I was more than halfway through the manuscript then, I remember Lynne waving her hand.

“But I don’t think they’re working,” I said.

“Oh, they’re working,” Lynne replied. Both Lisa and Hannah nodded their agreement.

They trusted Mike and, because I trusted my writers’ group, Mike’s chapters stayed. Months later as I neared the final pages of my manuscript, I was grateful to have had that trust in my writers’ group. Contained within those last pages was a passage only Mike could tell. If I hadn’t listened to my writers group, trusted their judgment in a character who made me earn his trust, I don’t know if my story would have had as satisfying an end.

Don't misunderstand, it wasn't a matter of trusting the instincts of my writers' group over my own, it's more complicated than that. I believe my writer friends trusted me to tell the story, trusted that I would find my way through the thicket that is the middle of a novel. Or maybe they trusted that I could fix a narrative if it didn't work after all.

And that's crux of a good writers' group, isn't it, trust.

Lynne Goes to (the) Salon

Check out our very own Lynne Griffin over at Salon. As a nationally recognized parenting expert and author of the forthcoming Negotiation Generation (Berkley/Penguin, September 2007), she was interviewed for the big splash on spanking. Way to go, Lynne!

Gallop on at the Middle

A very wise and get-to-the-point British woman I know gave me a pearl of wisdom when I was seventeen. She said "Gallop on at the Middle." I used to compete in three-day events, the equestrian sport where you gallop your horse over solid obstacles on a cross country course. So she meant, quite literally, for me to gallop on at the middle of the fence. A rider doesn't think. She acts. But Mrs. O's words, they echo in my mind when I'm nervous, I'm intimidated. It's all about throwing your heart over a fence and hoping your body follows. Same with writing. Same with writing when you share work in a writer's group. It's trusting you're going to make it to the other side.

Writing, alas, is, at times more thinking, reflecting, re-reading, re-wording. For me anyways, not enough galloping on at the middle. But every now and then, I read a book, put it down halfway through and think: "Wow, this author had courage." It happens when I am blown away by a cool concept, a plot turn. You know the moments.

When sharing work with writer's group - especially the first six months or so - I used to turn to jelly when it was my turn to share work; I'd melt into one of Amy's lovely dining room chairs. Now I know it's because I had little control. Or none, actually, over what my writing friends might say. I have learned that I needed to trust that they would help me on this road to becoming a writer. What I needed was courage. To give them my pages. To take their feedback. To trust that they would help me.

Making a Literary Life Friday: Packing for Conference City

Lucky Lisa. She's packing for her trip to NYC for what promises to be a wonderful learning experience and loads of fun. The rest of us secretly wish we could stow away in her luggage. Take a look at this week's round-up of literary happenings.

Lisa
This week I had wonderful encouragement from Kirby Larson, author of recent Newbery Honor book, Hattie Big Sky - as my middle grade novel visits editors' desks. I also welcomed her tip on not-to-miss outings while in the Big Apple. Still counting... 6 days until SCBWI. Busy packing. Very excited. I'll tell you all about it when I get back!

Amy
I attended a workshop at Grub Street South with author Jamie Cat Callan. Her latest book, Hooking Up or Holding Out was released this month and she let our group be the first to use her soon-to-be released novelty kit The Writer's Toolbox (Chronicle, April 2007). As a longtime writing instructor, Jamie knows all the tricks to connect the right brain to the page. I also spoke with the brilliant writer and Grub Street director, Chris Castellani; the list of authors who will be attending the May conference is astonishing. You won't want to miss the Muse and the Marketplace this year.

Hannah
Edits were the task of the week, with rewarding, large chunks of time between paid work and daily two to three-hour school play dress rehearsals. I sing Be Our Guest as I revise. I'm so close and excited about the changes. I hope this is The Huge Leap Forward, not merely A Huge Leap, but for some reason, it will be fine either way. I also am close to finishing Brazzaville Beach, and William Boyd's earlier books are supposed to be even more stunning. Love that feeling of knowing what to pluck off the library shelves at my next visit.

Lynne
On the non-fiction front, I saw my final cover for Negotiation Generation. I really like it, and I hope to share a preview of it once it's been finalized by the art department. As far as fiction goes, I made some difficult choices regarding revisions to my novel this week. I plan on exploring in richer detail the forces motivating my protagonist. I'm also going to expand a major plot line as it relates to two other main characters--soon to be even more central to the story. I was apprehensive about doing this earlier in the week, but reading and writing about the fear theme this week has bolstered me up. I'm ready to tackle those edits, now, largely due to my trusted readers. Thank you, Tom and the members of The Writers' Group; your reassurance was a huge gift.

Pantophobia

Posted by Lynne

When I heard our topic this week was managing fear, as it relates to writing and publishing, I immediately thought of Charlie Brown. It was only a month or so ago that I watched A Charlie Brown Christmas with my teenagers. (Yes, they still cling to childhood traditions, but that’s a post for my parenting blog) Perhaps you haven’t watched the show in a while, so I’ll refresh your memory. It opens with Charlie down about not having the right attitude about the holiday. He steps up to Lucy’s psychiatry booth, and asks her opinion. After she lists all the possible phobias he might be struggling with, she gets to pantophobia. Charlie shouts, “That’s it! That’s it; I’m afraid of everything!”

When it comes to writing, receiving critique, submitting work, editing a manuscript, and on it goes, to some degree or other, I’ve been afraid of everything. Truth be told, I still operate with trepidation. Sometimes I’m apprehensive, because it may be only the first or second time I’ve done something; I’m afraid of the unknown. At other times, I may not fully trust the process, or perhaps, I don’t trust myself.

What I’ve learned in writers’ group is that it’s okay to be afraid. Fear is a powerful motivator. The one caveat is that fear must be contained, so it doesn’t have the power to immobilize you, keeping you stuck in the fear, so much so, that it becomes impossible to move forward. FDR said it best; “There’s nothing to fear, but fear itself.”

You might think that now that I’ve been through some of the most intense parts of the writing/publishing process, that the fear goes away. It doesn’t. I’m not saying this to contribute to any fears you may have. It’s simply a matter of truth to say there will always be new things to fear. Not only am I okay with this, I embrace it, too. Whenever you choose to learn the rules of a new game, take risks to put yourself out there, or adopt different thoughts, attitudes, and skills—there will be fear.

I believe what matters most isn’t the extent to which you struggle with fear, but how you choose to contain it. I lean on my writers’ group. In my own Charlie Brown moments, I tell Lisa, Hannah, and Amy, that I realize I might be acting needy, or crave a tidbit of reassurance. They don’t care why I need them for support; they deliver. They do so, I think, because they know the next day I will be strong again, reenergized by a day where the words created a tingling sensation as they traveled from my brain, down my arms, and out my fingertips. They know I won’t wallow in self-doubt for long, because that would pull me further away from what I want more than anything, to live a literary life. They do this for me, in large part, because they know there is nothing I would rather do than push my fear aside and bolster myself up, so that I can do the same for them.

Choices in Fear

By Hannah

Writing is not a word I associate with fear. Writing means freedom, ideas, passion. Writing is communication, frustration, craving, exploration. I love the craft, improving on it, the learning, the doing. There are many things going on in writing. Not fear. Fear is being present yet powerless when action is needed, when doing nothing, even, is a conscious choice with impact.

Fear in this business comes to me at the thought of sending my work into the wider world. The work is complete, yet it is not everything I have to say. There is so much more. Will it be heard the right way, heard at all, be something to which others respond? Where is my control?

What are the choices?

Choice One, of course, is never send it out. What’s done is done; use it as a learning experience. Get going on that next story lurking, pushing, waiting its turn. This choice can be tempting.

Choice Two, to set out all options, is to shop around draft one. Don't know about your first drafts, but in my case, that would be ugly. I am a rewriter, so while this may be a choice, it is not an option.

Choice Three: Rewrite until it perfect, until it contains everything I know and everything I have learned. This endless cycle could amuse me for years. Of course, it could get me kicked out of Group, faster than Choice One. Not an option.

Choice Four: Rewrite until it is the best it can be at the moment. Perhaps it does not have to be perfect to meet a level of perfection I can live with. Linda Sue Park rewrites. She won a Newbery for the beautiful A Single Shard, rewritten only six times after the first draft. How does she know when it is ready, when she is ready? I will ask her; I will let you know. In turn, you have to share how you know your stories are ready for the wider world.

I am down to Choices One and Four. Interesting, in that while the fourth option creates the most fear, it is the one I have to -- will -- make happen. I am rewriting already, and everything Group loved about my first draft is there, plus more. The stakes are higher, or for those who prefer a different turn of phrase, it is more compelling. I am excited to show it to Group. They will be caring, yes, but tough. They will be supportive, but honest. The most curious thing is that getting it to them again is not daunting, but exciting. That means something. My story might be ready, or very close to. I might be ready, too.

Fear the Unknown

By Amy

There are many aspects of this writing life you should fear. High among them should be an awareness of you don’t know what you don’t know. Huh, you ask. Let me explain.

When I started writing my first manuscript – the one I recently deleted from my hard drive – I followed Hemingway’s old chestnut, “Write what you know.” Unfortunately for that novel, I am the Queen of Mediocrity: I live in the suburbs, my well-traveled road leads to the supermarket, and, thank the merciful gods, there is no real conflict in my life. You can imagine how boring that book truly was. So as arrogant as it may be for me to dispute Hemingway’s advice, here goes: Write what you want to know. If you are interested in the topic, if you find yourself wanting to learn more about the setting, plot, conflict, characters, chances are readers will too.

As a writer you should know to avoid clichés (e.g. soft as a baby’s bottom), but do you know to avoid structural clichés? Lowenstein-Yost agent Rachel Vater has blogged extensively about this. Read the archives. Know not to introduce your character's physical description by having her look in the mirror; know not to open your book by having your protagonist drive/fly/boat and reflect on her life; know not to have your antagonist kick a dog to show he’s the bad guy (thank you Hallie Ephron!). Instead, your book should begin on the day when everything changes for your protagonist and every character, whether she’s a spree killer or devout priest should be nuanced, complicated, with both ugly and endearing traits. You should love all of your characters so your readers can empathize with even the most detestable among them. Strive for complexity.

Do you know your genre? Be honest and ask yourself if you’ve done a thorough read within it. Be brutally honest and ask if your WIP is just another rehash of what’s out there. Are you writing about a woman whose perfect life is suddenly upended when she discovers her husband has been having an affair? The man whose perfect life comes crashing down when he loses his job? Does your middle-grade novel explore the loss of innocence when your protag’s parents get divorced? Sure there’s no such thing as an original storyline, but you had better know how to write it from a fresh perspective. I read the fiction slush pile for a literary journal and the same themes are explored over and over again. The ones that overtake me are the stories that somehow make fresh the tried and true. A perfect example is Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier which found its inspiration from Homer’s The Odyssey.

The one aspect of this writing life you shouldn’t fear, the one that chills the depths of most writers’ hearts, is failure. Your writing will be rejected. You, too, may someday delete an entire novel from your hard drive. You will feel the sting of a harsh critique from your writers’ group or a reviewer. But make no mistake, you haven’t failed. Failure comes only when you no longer strive to learn more about your craft or reflect on your mistakes. The worst failure of all is to give up. That is my greatest fear.

In Spite of Fear

Posted by Lisa

I got scared Saturday morning.

It was a lost in the snowy woods at night time scared. (Which actually happened to me last year, but that's another story for another blog entry - or maybe it isn't).

What really happened was that I was on my way to give a presentation for work and I got turned around. I found myself lost in the middle of nowhere (which is technically called Framingham). If you haven't lived in Massachusetts, you wouldn't know there are black holes in the infrastructure here. Of course, you may have heard of the tragic ceiling collapse in the Route 93 tunnel last summer. But you may not know that planning of highways, naming of roads, it's all been done in a rather haphazard, higgedly-piggedly, random manner; I used to work at Tufts-New England Medical Center in Boston where Stuart Street turns into Kneeland Street, just because. Go figure!

As the clock on my dashboard ticked it's way toward 9:00, I struggled to find my way to the company, Therapro, where I was to speak. I made it - somehow. But I haven't been that nervous in a long, long while.

Getting lost, getting scared got me thinking. In regards to writing, I ask myself, how can I stay on track? Does my writers' group help me? I think it does. The novel I'm working on now... it's, well, a little different. I have only shared five chapters with my writers' group, and the different part is going to come in the next installment. I wonder what they will say. Taking on this challenge introduces an element of fear; I hope I'm not completely off the mark.

Michael Lowenthal, an instructor at Boston College and Lesley University, as well as Grub Street, has recently published his third novel, Charity Girl. I bought it over the weekend. It is based on a little known period in US history, during World War I, when the government incarcerated thousands of young women found to have venereal disease. Did Michael Lowenthal experience a level of fear in writing about this, well, very different subject? Perhaps, if he did, he faced that fear and in doing so, produced prose that are unique: compelling yet challenging, all of it beautifully written - I'm halfway through and busy turning pages. Maybe fear produces greatness. Maybe fear motivates. Maybe fear of getting lost is good. Heck, maybe actually getting lost is good sometimes.

Making a Literary Life Friday: Behind the Scenes

Whether you spent time putting words on the page, or turning a page, or talking to someone who's published their pages, everything counts when you're taking steps toward living a literary life. Here's this week's round up on what the members of The Writers' Group tackled.

Lisa
Congratulations to Kirby Larson, author of Hattie Big Sky which was named a Newbery Honor Book. Hattie Big Sky is the beautifully written story of sixteen-year-old Hattie Brooks who must prove up her late uncle's homestead claim in Montana. It's an inspiration that Kirby's engaging story received this formal recognition. You HAVE to read this!
So...on to continue to work on my own craft...Thirteen. That's how many days until the SCBWI (Society of Children's Book Writer's and Illustrators) conference in NYC. Yes, you could say I'm looking forward to it. Plus, I've arranged to meet my literary agent on the Thursday afternoon before the conference. Can't wait! And...the list of speakers at the conference. Wow! Surely I will get smarter - fingers crossed anyways.

Amy
This week I spoke with Lissa Warren, author of The Savvy Author's Guide to Book Publicity about, you guessed it, book publicity. If you don't own this book already, run to your local independent bookstore and buy it. It's a must have. I also received my galley of Kristy Kiernan's Catching Genius and, oh my goodness, you must buy this book! I won't ruin it for you, but Sara Gruen (yes, that Sara Gruen) was spot on when she blurbed it: "Kiernan proves she's a writer to be reckoned with -- find a comfortable spot, turn off the phone, and lose yourself in this gorgeous debut."

Hannah
In addition to the fact that I'm signed up for a Grub Street lunchtime revision course with the wonderful Hallie Ephron, I made it to the middle of my New Favorite Book, Brazzaville Beach by William Boyd. What took me so long to discover Boyd? Couldn't say. Hurrah that the local library network has about a dozen more! An Ice-Cream War, anyone?

Lynne
I finished my edits on Negotiation Generation; this was round two, and I'm feeling good about my editor's suggestions. I drafted a query plan for connecting with the major parenting publications for features; Penguin will be taking care of obtaining first serial rights. As far as fiction goes, I am reading a beautiful novel by Margot Livesay, Banishing Verona. Livesay's writing is lovely, truly inspirational. Her novel, Eva Moves the Furniture is on my top ten list.