Category Archives: The Writing Life

Are You Prepared For That Big Rewrite?

Okay, so you’ve written a few drafts of your novel and you’ve gotten feedback from trusted sources, and slowly but surely it dawns on you that the story needs to go in a brand-new direction, whether through substantial changes to the characters or the plot or both.

Do. Not. Panic.

Friends, I too have been there, and over time have developed a list of key To-Do’s before embarking on any kind of large-scale revision. If you’re contemplating your own massive rewrite, this could be just the thing to boost your confidence and help you stay the course.

No. 1 Sever all ties with family and friends. The book is now your [spouse/significant other/BFF]. Hail Book!

No. 2. If you have a job, quit immediately. The tension that arises over how you’re going to pay your bills will feed directly into addressing your writers group notes about your narrative lacking conflict.

No. 3 Practice the art of insomnia. [Alternatively, replace your mattress with a bed of nails]

No. 4 Set the room temperature to touchy/reliably grouchy.

No. 5 Keep several chickens and/or goats at or near your writing space for weekly sacrifices to Book. Hail Book!

No. 6 Plastic surgery to replace your ears with noise-canceling headphones.

No. 7 Get comfortable with adult diapers. [See also: eliminating bran from your diet; See also: Google results for “eating antispasmodics like they’re Wild Berry Skittles”]

No. 8 Begin each morning burying your phone. Note: Also begin each morning drawing a map to location of said buried phone to avoid costly delay to revision due to nervous breakdown.

No. 9 Do not read a passage from your favorite book for inspiration. You don’t have a favorite book that isn’t Book. What’re you doing? Hail Book!

No. 10 Put together a writing playlist that’s basically one indefinite song with your own voice screaming over industrial EDM, “Are you done yet?!” “Are you done yet?!” “ARE YOU DONE YET?!”

Opening Lines To Unwritten Books

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Hell is when you’re picturing your grandmother French-kissing her Pomeranian and you still get a boner in gym class.

Yeah, when Mr. Jones was a kid he killed a kid, but the little girl who spoke to me with her mind wouldn’t trust anyone else to save her.

Beth-Ann Monroe was all ready with her comeback for when she got caught: If you idiots had just given me the job in the first place, I’d be selling your cars not stealing them.

Cute Little Puppy’s secret desire is to trap Farmer Wyatt inside a barn fire.

Am I bad person if I’d rather eat a bacon-wrapped razor blade on a dare than tell them the truth about what Jenna Quincy and I built in her basement?

Cute Little Puppy (rewrite 1): Cute Little Puppy’s secret desire is to be a franchise owner of an Assassins-For-Hire.

“Dude, check it out, that vampire left his wooden fangs in my neck!”

Ideally, happily ever after was forging a close personal friendship with Jake Jackson’s naked abs for the rest of eternity, but right now she’d settle for being spared the growing saliva in the corners of Mr. Dacker’s mouth as he rehashed the Pythagorean theorem.

Cute Little Puppy (rewrite 2): Cute Little Puppy’s more immediate goal is to monetize his abilities as an internet troll.

Forgive me if you’re a woodfairy reading this, but you dusted little bastards are delicious.

Giving the anti-vaxxers their own prom was the second worst idea ever, just behind me teaming up with Nurse Jimmy to crash it.

I can’t be the only You Tube star whose ex-best friend killed someone to make it happen.

Like beauty, the difference between right and wrong is often in the eye of the beholder who doesn’t confuse his cough syrup for cherry soda.

Cute Little Puppy (the last rewrite): Cute Little Puppy’s making a new bucket list, now that its doctor found a malignant cyst.

I’m just saying, if I’d known my parents were AI sleeper agents hellbent on destroying everything I love about human civilization, there’s no way I give up on that third meatball sub.

This Mystery Called The Writing Process

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Photo by Brunella Iannuzzi

There’s no one way to write a story. Everybody’s process is different. And I think everyone who’s tried it can speak to moments where certain elements have come almost instantly, instinctively, while others take weeks or months of questioning and searching to show themselves.

Creativity is a big, beautiful mystery and of course the act of writing is no different. Well, okay, maybe a little different in my case, as I’ve found that my writing process is actually, essentially, five distinct mysteries occurring on any given day.

I present them here in a public forum for the very first time. Remember, my friends, it’s not always about easy answers, but about embracing the unknown, in achieving our best work.

MYSTERY ONE: Is this digestive tea doing anything for that fish mistake in my stomach when I step away from the computer briefly to organize my drink umbrella collection by most to least graphic lost time accidents in the factories where they were made?

MYSTERY TWO: Who changed the alerts on my phone to sound like a small child trapped under a Chevy Silverado so that once the danger has passed I’m channeling my adrenaline into several hours in the comments section of every single Clash of Clans cheat site?

MYSTERY THREE: Why does that ticking noise stop when I stare open-mouthed at the refrigerator and why not clean out the freezer while I’m waiting for my napping pajamas to finish in the dryer?

MYSTERY FOUR: Are the cracks in the ceiling actually a secret code left by time-travelers about an impending alien invasion that can only be deciphered by just one more trick roping cat video?

MYSTERY FIVE: What am I doing here again, yeah, that I can’t be not doing and also bingeing on homemade cough syrup and all 8 seasons of “Kindergartner Hostage Negotiators”?

What’s mysterious about your writing process? Tell me about it!

LA Times Festival of Books!

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Photo by Carolyn Kraft

If it’s the end of April it can only mean a few things. One, that my wooden leg will start to yearn for the boreal forests of Norway and I will spend hours on the phone negotiating the fake limb rate with Virgin Atlantic, and two, the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. Held this past weekend on the luxurious USC campus, the LATFOB was once again a shining mecca for writers and readers, and, this year, the grounds for a clever-creepy marketing campaign for Hulu’s adaptation of The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood.

I was in attendance on both Saturday and Sunday, and heard many an inspiring word. Here are some of those words:

“Writing is like breathing to me; if I don’t write, I’ll die.”

“A really good novel is like a burlesque show.”

[Regarding “unlikable” characters in YA fiction] “I remember when I was a teenager, my thoughts were pretty evil; I just didn’t say everything.”

[Regarding a writer’s process] “Instead of ‘pantser’ or ‘plotter,’ I like to think of it as are you a gardener or are you an architect?”

“The daily mind is lazy relative to the reader mind.”

“Language can be twisted to tolerate lies.”

“My experiences as a teenager were kind of dull, but my emotions were epic.”

“Chipotle asked me, do you have something that we can put on a bag for a shit-ton of money?”

“When it comes to my characters, I am a horrible person.”

Photo by Carolyn Kraft

“The highest truth is a series of contradictions.”

“That first email to Erwin, that was confrontational.” “No, it wasn’t.” “Yes, it was.” “No.” “Yes, it was like ‘I’m here, looking for a fight.'” “No way.” “Do you want me to read it back to you?”

“You don’t write for ‘children’ you write for one child, or for the child you used to be.”

“When you’re writing a story and you get stuck, embrace it. It’s just the story telling you, ‘You’re not listening to me.’ ”

“People spend more money on yoga than on books.” “Maybe we could change that if we can convince people to read in hot rooms.”

“I used to have this condition when I was younger called Hemingway boner.”

“I don’t know if I’m gifted, but I do know how to work hard. I have discipline.”

“We’re able to entertain several different versions of the truth simultaneously.”

“I will defend trashy YA to my death.”

“First drafts are like I’m just shoveling sand into a sandbox; later on, I’ll build sand castles.”

WHO SAID THIS STUFF (in order): Benjamin Alire Saenz; Aaron Hartzler; Maggie Thrash; Ellen Hopkins; George Saunders; Saunders; Julie Berry; Saunders; Frances Hardinge; Saunders; strangers overheard before the start of a panel discussion; Melissa de la Cruz; Saunders; Lisa Lucas and Oscar Villalon; Saunders; Saenz; Saunders; Thrash; Shannon Hale

3 Surefire Writing Exercises To Keep Me Sharp This Summer

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Photo by Ellin Beltz

Ah, Summer!

Three months of siren song luring us to laze at the beach, the ballpark, the multiplex. When our brains crave the pinch of an inch in their midsections before the first chill of Fall begins to freeze off the intellect’s fat.

Alas, we writers…

If we’re going to look ourselves in the mirror at the end of each day with only self-loathing and not also unsightly spritzing tears, we must not succumb to these sunny pleasures so insalubrious to our work ethic.

It is true that writing can be such a lonely endeavor, and gosh this time of year is rich with the potential for shared experience.

No…must…resist….

Which is why I’ve created some new writing exercises! Not only to maintain my skills this summer, but also to bring me that much closer to my community without having to leave my desk.

To paraphrase George R.R. Martin, it’s not enough anymore for writers to rely on the stifling inner pressure of their own neuroses; it’s the onslaught of the outside world’s needs that will ultimately drag their projects over the finish line.

Everybody’s process is different, but I offer these up to you as well. Feel free to modify according to need, available resources, and current mental state.

3 Surefire Writing Exercises To Keep Me Sharp This Summer:

#1 Inciting Inspiration – Occasionally during the course of working I get stuck on a story issue, a plot point, or even just the rhythm of the sentences in a paragraph. It can be like walking into a brick wall, again and again and again. And again. Wouldn’t it be nice to go out and grab a frozen yogurt and then browse the antique cheese shops on Venice for a few hours?

Nice try, Summer, but you’re no match for the arrangement I’ve made with the friendly folks at Blooming Little Daisies Day Camp. I’ve got an hour to bridge my creative impasse or a busload of kids dangling over a sinkhole will know literally what the deep dark abyss of writer’s block feels like. Nothing greases the wheel of my imagination like blinking the stinging sweat out of my eyes to watch them plead with me via webcam. I mean, here’s hoping. Thanks kids, keep your heads covered and fingers crossed!

#2 Crafting Memorable Characters – Characters are the lifeblood of story, so if my protagonist or antagonist or a supporting player comes across lacking specificity, it weakens the whole body of the book, so to speak. Weakening one’s resolve to keep his hindquarters in his writing chair, to not stray when Baby Geniuses 3 beckons from the mall cinema.

Ha. Summer, you’re going to have to try a lot harder than that now that I’m collaborating with Peter Gruntergo and his doctors at This Dying Old Lady Memorial Hospital. I’ve got 45 minutes to spice up a dull character or Peter’s going to feel a little incomplete himself when he doesn’t get that new kidney. I can’t tell you what a lift it is when I’ve got medical staff and the Gruntergo family on Skype screaming me to victory.

Seriously, I can’t tell you yet. So at least I hope it’ll be a lift. We’ll see. Let’s maybe hold off awhile on ordering those balloons.

#3 Building Stamina for the Second Draft – It’s hard for me to read a first draft without agonizing over those areas that in the moment felt so magical now ringing false and flat. How do I gut up and build the stamina to tackle a rewrite? It’s a period where I feel most vulnerable as a writer, and perhaps most susceptible to the sweet-nothings of ocean air and a Nora Roberts novel, and burying strangers up to their necks in beach sand.

Wow. You almost got me, Summer. Almost. But you’ll need an extra biscuit for breakfast if you think you’re going to overpower my teaming up with an unquenchable passion, indefatigable imagination, and ironclad discipline. And my good friends at Callus Realty who’ve generously provided a closed-up home with two hundred baby rabbits trapped inside and a pernicious gas leak set to go off if I can’t finish by September 30. They are pretty cute animals, even on this grainy CCTV monitor, it would be a shame to see them…well, golly, I better stop writing this and get to it!

Happy Summer Everyone!

LA Times Festival of Books!

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Photo by Carolyn Kraft

It’s April again and that can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. My apologies to anyone looking for a post on whether or not creamed honey will finally be classified as an alternative fuel. (You’ll have to wait for my review later this year of the new Nissan Mecha-Grizzly.)

This post is about the 21st Annual LA Times Festival of Books, held last weekend on the beautiful brick and stone USC campus. Saturday was rainy and Sunday was sunny and both days were very well-attended. Here are some of the intriguing things the authors I saw had to say:

“Magical realism reminds us as human beings that there is hope and beauty out there.”

“If you believe along with the narrator that the [fantastical] things happening are true, it’s not magical realism. If you don’t, then it is.”

“Writers are often reacting to things that frustrate them about their other writing.”

“YA [literature] is so wide open. You can go anywhere you want. There’s no box you have to fit into.”

“When people have complimented me on my writing, they said it’s mysterious and cryptic and things are not explained. When people have criticized my writing, they said it’s mysterious and cryptic and things are not explained.”

“What’s cool about art is the exceptions.”

“I don’t really care what genre means. The work can take care of itself.”

“When you begin a novel you feel like a bit of a fraud. The more you do it the more faith you have in the viability of the world you’re creating.”

“I think about readers after the fact. It’s not what drives me to do the work. I don’t think it’s healthy to think about it.”

“Fiction, art, always has to be life plus.”

“Donald Trump is able to go for the jugular. It’s like he stole Jeb Bush’s lunch money, threw his shoes up on top of the school, and Jeb couldn’t handle it.”

“Disney told me, ‘We want a thriller, but nothing bad can happen.’ ”

“What’s special about this story? If I can’t find it, I don’t write it.”

“There’s no ‘Red Weddings’ in Middle Grade.”

“My narrator is the crotchety old man who lives inside of me.”

Photo by Carolyn Kraft

“Very rarely will someone buy your intentions. Finish the book.”

“The anxiety of not knowing where I’m going in a story is what drives me.”

“I wrote this [middle grade] book as a YA novel, but it’s not. My editor pointed this out to me.”

“Wonder isn’t about finding answers; it’s about being comfortable with the questions.”

“There are as many ways to be dead as there are to be alive.”

“Teenagers: Maximum personal responsibility with absolutely no personal power.”

“Some 17-year-olds are 13 in their heads and some 17-year-olds are 25 in their heads. And they have to hang out together.”

“The only thing worse than writing is not writing.”

“Every first draft I go through this question: ‘I don’t know how to do this.’ ”

“If you’re a young person and you have the choice between writing and having an experience, have the experience.”

WHO SAID THIS STUFF (in order): Sean McGinty, Shaun David Hutchinson, Peter Rock, McGinty, Rock, McGinty, Patrick DeWitt, Karl Taro Greenfeld, DeWitt, Greenfeld, Dee Dee Myers, Ridley Pearson, Soman Chainani, M.A. Larson, Tahereh Mafi, Larson, Chainani, Mafi, Leigh Ann Henion, Claire Bidwell Smith, Jeff Garvin, Jesse Andrews, Garvin, Don Calame, Aaron Hartzler

Going Back To The Well

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Photo by Lienhard Schulz

Last week after finishing the first draft of a new young adult novel I decided to do something different. Usually in these circumstances, after taking a moment to celebrate–helium, trampolines, etc.–I return to another project that’s in a more advanced stage awaiting a rewrite. I do have one of those, but this time, perhaps masochistically (perhaps an oxymoron when it comes to writing), I wanted to face the blank page again.

That this endeavor happens to fall within NaNoWriMo (November is National Novel Writing Month) is a coincidence. I admire all who take on the challenge, but my intent here isn’t to rush to a finish but to dig in and develop something that stretches me creatively. It’s going take some time.

And because I’m not the type of writer who has an IDEAS file, a repository stuffed with the odd narrative strand or character bio or bits of dialogue, this means going back to the well in search of something fresh to set off my imagination.

Which also means convincing my curmudgeonly sidekick Psygor to help get me in and out of the well way out there in the middle of all those cold dark woods. He’s already predisposed to grumpiness so this is really not going to please him; not when he assumed he was done until 2016. It’s going to take a lot of Sanka and moon pies and “yes, stripes do do a fantastic job of concealing your hunchback” to get him out there.

But as formidable as Psygor’s griping and Sanka-breath are, going back to the well so soon is more daunting. It could be parched. It could be packed with mud. Even if it’s knee-deep in water those things squiggling around my ankles could just be half-formed, exposed-rib entities previously abandoned. But I have to try and hope something new is lurking down there, something alive that’s going to launch me out of my comfort zone.

And if that also includes launching me out of the well hopefully Psygor stops obsessing over his hunchback long enough to catch me.

I’ll wear my puffy clothes just in case.

What Are You Reading?

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Photo by Serge Melki

As July slowly but surely starts to brown around the edges, it’s time to catch up with you, my fellow book lovers, and find out what’s been on your reading tables 0f late. As we all know, the most highly anticipated and controversial book this summer is Fudgin’s Doesn’t Not Play Nice, by P.I.X. Gwantonomous. But there’s been so much press and social chatter about it already, I won’t drag us down that rabbit hole.

But how about the second most highly anticipated and controversial book released this summer? Harper Lee’s Go Set A Watchman. Have you read it? Are you going to? I’ve read a few reviews and despite the lukewarm response it still piques my interest. But I’m a little queasy about buying a book that it’s dementia-addled author may have been coerced into publishing. Do I want to finance her exploitation? Am I being too precious about this? You tell me.

Anyway, in the past month I’ve read Ready Player One, by Ernest Cline, and The World According to Garp, by John Irving. Both books are great reads and rather topical; Ready Player One because 1980’s pop culture will never, ever, ever die, and Garp because it includes a zany but honest and humane exploration of a transgender celebrity.

At the moment and in anticipation of my attending the annual SCBWI Summer Conference, I’ve currently got my nose in The Diviners, by Libba Bray. To my knowledge, Ms. Bray isn’t scheduled to be at the conference, but her agent Barry Goldblatt is and I’d really like to talk with him. On the horizon there’s some intriguing nonfiction for me to get to, like Raising Hell: Ken Russell and the Unmaking of The Devils, and H Is For Hawk, by Helen Macdonald.

So that’s my book business, what are you reading these days?

LA Times Festival of Books! Day Two

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Photo by Carolyn Kraft

Back again and better late than never with another field report from the LA Times Festival of Books. The magnanimity continued on the second and final day of LATFOB’s 20th anniversary. Well done, folks!

Here’s a few pearls of conversation from the author panels I attended:

“Families are like their own civilizations.”

“A lot of the times I’m writing I feel like an actor; I have to feel the emotions.”

“I had kids smoking, getting drunk, and my editor’s worried about the scene where they aren’t wearing their seatbelts.”

“A writer’s only responsibility is to tell the truth.”

“If I want to know how great I am I call my mother; if I want to know the truth, I call my brother.”

“I’m always taken aback when people [who know I’m a YA author] ask me when I’m going to write a ‘real’ book.”

“People have suggested that hackers and artists are exactly alike.”

“Quality relationships allow for the right amount of solitude and the right amount of connection.”

“The digital revolution has undercut our need for expertise and professionalism.”

“I’m on board with the digital revolution being frightening, but I’m not so nostalgic about what we’re leaving behind.”

“All these media outlets want to ‘pay’ for your writing by promising exposure; exposure is just a way people die out in the cold.”

“Technology is whatever has been invented since you were born.”

“Why can’t we have a platform that actually benefits the people who use it?”

“Every time I hear how I am as a writer I want to rebel against it.”

“Most of what happens to human beings is funny; humor in stories is integral, it’s not a condiment.”

WHO SAID THIS STUFF: Jandy Nelson, David Arnold, Carrie Arcos, Arnold, Robin Benway, Nelson, Vikram Chandra, Joshua Wolf Shenk, Scott Timberg, Chandra, Jacob Silverman, Chandra, Silverman, Amelia Gray, Jonathan Lethem

LA Times Festival of Books! Day One

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Photo by Carolyn Kraft

One week after a great day at YALLWEST, I was off to the annual LA Times Festival of Books! It was like jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire for those of us who love being burned alive. By books. By writing. By mangling a shopworn adage into a tough leathery bit on which to chomp so as to contain our excitement and not draw the attention of USC Campus Security.

Anyway…

Congrats to LATFOB for celebrating 20 amazing years! Once again it was a privilege to attend, and as always the panel discussions I sat in on were nothing short of compelling and provocative. Did you go? What was the highlight for you?

Here’s a taste of what I heard on Day One:

“I thought I’d like to start a story with someone getting decapitated on a roller coaster, which I did. It’s on page 3.”

“I feel like it’s possible to fall deeply in love while also grieving a great loss.”

“What we remember about the books we love are the characters.”

“I’m an evangelist for fiction.”

“A big part of my writing process is forgiving myself.”

“Write what obsesses you.”

“To be a successful writer you have to be extremely disciplined.”

“Every book is a different labyrinth that somehow I have to get to the center of.”

“How do you learn to write a novel? You read a lot of them and then you write one.”

“I write so much because I’m hyperactive. I have the metabolism of a weasel. I have to eat my body weight every day.”

“There are probably 300 writers in America who make a full-time living from writing.”

“You owe it to yourself to be a big supporter of independent bookstores.”

“We have to practice and behave in the literary world we want to live in. We have to be good literary citizens.”

“I think we’ll look back on this time as a golden age of fiction.”

“I have a weird memory; I remember all of my parents’ license plates.”

“It’s more fun to draw something horrible and ugly.”

“New Yorker cartoons are like a magazine within the magazine.”

“People told me that when I went through the process of selling my parents’ house all the questions I had about who they were would be answered. But there was nothing; it was like they were spies.”

“The mistakes and the problems can become the greatest thing in the book.”

“You just have to draw a lot and then eventually you die.”

WHO SAID THIS STUFF: Robyn Schneider, Emery Lord, Meg Wolitzer, T.C. Boyle, Lord, Wolitzer, Sarah Dessen, Lord, Boyle, Boyle, Stephen Morrison, Sandra Dijkstra, Dan Smetanka, Morrison, Roz Chast, Mimi Pond, Bruce Eric Kaplan, Kaplan, Chast