Blood and Loam

Revision Surprises

March 14, 2011 by admin

I have written previously about taking twenty years to finish one novel…and I’m still not satisfied. Who knew that I would write the second one in about six months? I started Change of Plans about a year ago when some wonderful women entered my brain and started to tell their stories. I had one real problem: Claire, a corporate attorney and force of nature, started to take over the book. As writers, when this happens we have two choices. First, we can go with it and let the character lead the way. However, I really felt that this story was best as an ensemble piece. Claire and I duked it out for a few months and came to an agreement. I would have a lot of fun letting her character loose on the page and, in return, she would let me include the stories of the other characters. Once we negotiated our settlement, I finished the draft easily–too easily. Normally accustomed to sweating over every word, I am flummoxed about how well the first draft came out. I’m currently revising, and yes, I find areas to work on, but no major plot problems or difficulties. Mainly, I’m revising particular scenes to up their ante, and wondering what I am missing in the text to have it come out so well so soon.

In the meantime, that first novel still won’t let me be. I’ve vacillated between letting it go to move on (Change of Plans came about by doing so), or digging deeper. As I have poked and prodded with this story, it still compels me. I have chased after it for years, struggling to find the right voice, even changing genres in the process. Slowly, with persistence, the real story is starting to emerge. I have removed all supernatural references but added many historical ones. I changed the time setting from 1980 to 1970, which added an interesting dimension to the story as I incorporated the turmoil of that time period. As I keep going, I see how this story has required me to grow as a writer first in order to tell it properly.

Last week I reread the draft. Pleased with the writing and flow of the story, something still nagged at me. I’ve come so much closer to where the story should be, but I still hadn’t gone far enough. Something was missing, and I felt determined to find it. I took a walk to clear my head. As I did so, an insistent idea emerged: change the story to first person.

I couldn’t wait to get home and try out my theory. So far I am about 20% into a new draft, and the change works well. The oddest part is to write “I” and “me” but still be somebody else, and her voice has the authority I’ve looked for all this time. I’m ready to let her lead the way now, because she knows better than I what to say–and it’s coming out almost as easily as the voices in Change of Plans.

This process of discovery excites me, and that, more than anything, is my reason for writing. I know people who can plan their novels ahead of time and set up tidy outlines, but I seem to need multiple, messy drafts with lots of walks in between to sort out what I want to say. I love the surprises my characters bring to me, and I’m excited about the months to come as I move from revisions to seeking an agent. Change of Plans is ready for that stage, and soon, I hope, a new and improved Blood and Loam.

Reconnecting to the Blog

March 8, 2011 by admin

Author Sherman Alexie wrote that the more words you put in your blog, the less words you’re putting into your novel. I paraphrase, I’m sure, but that was the gist of it. He’s right, but I think I’ve taken his advice a tad too far, having disappeared from this blog for several months. I spent that time writing a novel, tentatively titled Change of Plans, which only took six months to draft versus 20 years for Blood and Loam, which I continue to revise. Now it’s time for a little balance. Yes, Sherman, I believe you, but I’m in the revision phase, and blogging allows me to continue to write without making heavy commitments to a new project. I need to write every day, or I get cranky. So there.

I first encountered Alexie’s work many years ago in an independent bookshop in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven, a collection of connected short stories that would later appear in movie form in Smoke Signals, literally fell on my head. That got my attention. Later, after reading other works by him, I heard him speak in Houston and stuttered and stammered as I stood in front of him for a book signing. Given our long literary relationship, then, when I read his comment about blogging I decided to heed his advice.

Besides, I needed time to figure out what this blog is about. I wrote about writing and travel, but the garden had started to take over, and I wasn’t sure what to do with that. Before 2010 I couldn’t tell you a thing about gardening, and suddenly my passion for the subject threatened to hijack this blog and turn it into something very different from what I had intended.

I also needed to step away from the whole blogging as marketing thing. Yes, I sell books, and I won’t turn anyone down who wants to buy one, but more than anything I want to connect with others, writers or not, who may have an interest in what I have to say. I write because I breathe, whether or not anything sells, and I hope not to stop writing until I stop breathing.

The net result of my pondering is that I have moved my gardening thoughts to a new blog, Art of the Garden (artofthegarden.wordpress.com). Also, if I feel the need to write about yoga, which I do from time to time, I’m putting those musings on the YogaHub.com website. If you are into yoga, check them out for some cool online yoga programs.

As I move forward into 2011, I am seeking agent representation for at least one of the novels, maybe two. I’ll share those adventures, along with some upcoming fun stuff: a literary tour of Massachusetts in April, and a writing retreat in Vermont in May. I’ll introduce the characters in Change of Plans and share stories of how this book developed and what I see for its future. I’ll talk about what’s going on at She Writes, where I’ve increased my involvement. I’ll share details of the annual Writers’ League of Texas Agents and Editors conference. I’m currently working on the text for a yoga relaxation recording that I’ll offer for free to anyone who is stressed out. In other words, there’s no shortage of possibilities as to what I’ll write about here, and the year is just getting started!

It’s great to be back. Thanks, Sherman, for getting me to write a novel. I’ll take it from here.

Tale of Two Broccoli

April 13, 2010 by admin

A fledgling gardener, I am a wide-eyed kid on a daily basis as I watch my garden grow. Yes, the cantaloupe seeds sprouted, even when I was sure they wouldn’t. I picked more than two dozen baby lemons, their tart scent clinging to my fingers, because the precocious tree they came from is too young–it needs to put its energy into roots, leaves, and branches. My grape plants, purchased during a freeze, unplanted for weeks due to a move, finally sprouted. In fact, I’m amazed at the plants and trees, so sad after a series of rare Houston freezes, that now produce new growth, new hope, and a tenacity I wish I had.

I’ve learned that gardening, like life, requires that I accept a certain amount of mystery. Take, for example, my broccoli. Please. Since I’m new at this, I purchased four plants, all from the same nursery, all about the same size, and I cared for them exactly the same way. One of them went crazy and has become the Scary Mutant Broccoli Plant in the garden. We didn’t know if we were ever going to get the actual vegetable, or if the plant instead was destined to become another tree in the back yard. The first head is finally growing, and I’m thinking I may not need to get out a ladder to harvest it. SMBP threatens to overshadow my golden sweet peppers, though they seem to hold their own, tolerating their bully neighbor.

While SMBP threatened to take over the entire garden, two other plants, perhaps intimidated, rolled over and died. I had watered, I had fed them rich, organic fertilizer, I had mulched, and yet they couldn’t hold on.

Which leaves, of course, one last broccoli plant, and this one intrigues me. It’s little, having followed in the path of its deceased siblings, but it didn’t die. In fact, it bravely boasts a few new leaves. It will never match the ferocity of SMBP, but maybe, just maybe, it can grow. I have lowered my expectations. You don’t have to produce any fruit, just don’t die, please. Hang in there, and let’s see where this can go.

My writing, my characters, tend to resemble the mystery of my two broccoli. A new story is emerging, and with it a character, Claire, who has seized the story and made it her own. Yes, she says, I know you’re making an ensemble cast, but one of us has to be in charge, and it’s going to be me. My other characters, who are softer and less dominant, struggle to survive. Still, I think we’re going to get a nice harvest from this story. It feels as though I can hear what it needs from me, and I am stronger in my commitment than I used to be. I feed, I water, I sing to it, and maybe it will grow.

Less successful are Blood and Loam and Patchwork. A completed, harvested book, Patchwork struggles to find an audience, and I have had to admit that even the most beautiful fruit rots when no one eats it. Granted, there is much more I can do, and I am stubborn enough to keep finding ways to let people know it exists, and that it’s worth purchasing.

B&L has a different problem: it doesn’t fit in with the rest of my writing garden. I have made halfhearted attempts to find an agent for it, but truth is, I don’t want to be known for this work. It’s too disturbing, too violent, too much at odds with what I want to contribute to the world. It is a pesky invader, a plant I can’t remove. I haven’t given up on this one, though, either. Once I finish a draft of the new novel, I’m going to dig up B&L by the roots and replant it. I think I know a different way of telling the story, one that retains the drama without requiring that I compromise who I am in order to sell a few books.

One never knows what the garden will actually do. All we can do is plant, feed, water, and observe. Listen in the stillness to what the plants need to thrive. Keep the weeds pulled. Invite the butterflies, the hummingbirds, bats, and bees, but let them come in their own time, when the milkweed expands and blooms. Know that sometimes, the plants will die, while other times, they will awe us with their capacity to survive. And the fruits? Those are the extras, a byproduct of the act of sowing.

Sharing Our Stories: An Approach to Patchwork & Ornament

January 4, 2010 by admin

Although Patchwork & Ornament will be released officially at the beginning of March, I’ve shared some advance copies with people. Almost everyone who touches it expresses similar sentiments: “Here was a woman with plenty of struggles, who had the right to be bitter, but yet found her passion and created beauty anyway.”

This is the story of Patchwork & Ornament. Here was an ordinary woman, someone who achieved a certain level of recognition in her field, though not at the level she wanted, working through the challenges of her life through art and, as we discovered after her death, a substantial amount of writing. As people read her story, they often find within Jenny Feldman’s words their own stories, their own struggles, their own triumphs. I am so pleased to see this happening over and over. One of the reasons I chose to share Jenny’s work publicly was to get people thinking about their own stories, and maybe even to write them down.

As we enter 2010, I hope that some of you writers out there get busy telling your stories. The time for shyness and timidity is past. We need to know, in both fact and fiction, what you have to say, how you feel about life, what matters to you. I agree to do the same. I’m going to share Patchwork with as many people as possible; work on finding an agent/publisher for Blood and Loam; finish and load Exodus to offer free online; and start a new novel, as yet untitled. I’m learning, more and more, to value what I have to say…and to value what you have to say as well. I’m looking forward in 2010 to learn more about the work of others who, like me, travel an independent writing path.

How to Write a Novel in 20 Years or More

December 19, 2009 by admin

Blood and Loam is on its last draft. Well, at least until (hopefully) some agent picks it up and demands some rewrites. For the first time since I started to toy with the idea more than 20 years ago, I am proud to say that I am close to finishing. I could call this post “How Not to Write a Novel,” but I believe, looking back on the process, that a unique perfection exists with every book. Some take a few months to write–I wrote When a Grandchild Dies in a few months, then spent another year or so revising. Patchwork & Ornament, which I edited, went from idea to printed book in about nine months.

Then there’s Blood and Loam, the book that wouldn’t leave, that wouldn’t end, that I have thrown in the trash more often than I care to think about. Here’s the story:

Somewhere in the late 1980s, I began a story about a confused, traumatized young woman who takes a profound inner journey in order to defeat a force of evil that threatens the survival of her Midwestern small town. I didn’t know anything about writing a novel, but I started anyway. Since my villain has supernatural powers, I researched dark arts, squirming all the while. When I had about 75 pages done, I signed up for a creative writing class to get some help and feedback. Sounds good, right? Well, not so much.

Mistake #1 – Showing a draft too soon, or to people you don’t yet know you can trust. We were assigned to share the first 25 pages for critique. Most of the feedback was helpful and positive, but apparently my manuscript hit some nerves with the teacher. She went into a long lecture about my protagonist’s lack of believability, and my protagonist was the one character somewhat based on me. Oops. I translated that into I am not believable. I came home and threw everything away.

Mistake #2 – Further with that, basing a character or story on oneself. Beginning novelists often do this. When, several years later, the idea for the novel kept buzzing around my head like a fly, I made sure my protagonist had her own appearance and totally different backstory. The Stella of my novel is her own person now.

Mistake #3 – Fighting the Genre. Blood and Loam is a dark, violent, creepy novel. I wanted to write a nicer book, and there is nothing nice about Blood and Loam. For many years, I worried about whether this novel would contribute to or detract from a society that already has so much violence in it. Over time, I’ve learned through personal experience that sometimes our greatest growth occurs in traumatic situations, and that sometimes life is messy, dark, and even violent as we forge our way through them. Stella is on a classic Hero’s Journey, and she has some big obstacles to overcome–the fact that she does helps me justify, in my mind at least, that B&L ultimately contributes something positive. (You might notice that I’m still touchy about this!) I believe we should write our ideas, no matter how much they bother us. Otherwise we do not honor the spirit of creativity that lies within us.

Mistake #4 – Not writing regularly. Any novelist will tell you that the best thing to do is to put the story on paper as quickly as possible. Stops and starts are painful. ‘Nuff said.

Mistake #5 – See Mistake #1. Yep, I did it again. I rewrote, took a novel writing class, and got scared yet again. I didn’t have a bad critique, but I wasn’t as far along as some of the other students, and I felt intimidated by their skills.

Mistake #6 – Not getting work critiqued when it’s ready. Conversely, there comes a point when we’re drafting when we might start to chase our tails. In my case, I found myself tweaking single words while ignoring some major plot problems. Given my history with critiquing, that’s understandable, but there came a point when I knew I needed outside feedback. I found it through a Gotham Writers Workshop class, and then by hiring a published author to provide a manuscript critique.

Mistake #7 – Not knowing how to let go. These characters have been with me for a long time now, and they feel a bit like one big, happy, dysfunctional family. We hang out together, and while terrible things happen when we do, we keep coming back. I’ve always related to Stella, even though she is not me. Stella represents some of the mistakes of my younger years about which I have continued to feel shame and guilt. Yet I have grown more into the character of Hannah, who, in the Hero’s Journey, represents the Mentor. I’m not nearly as calm and peaceful as Hannah, but I have come to know a thing or two over the years.

So here I am, letting go of Stella as part of my identity. Letting go, finally, of the person I once was, and haven’t been for many years. Embracing the inner wise woman, the Hannah who came out of nowhere, who is totally made up. Perhaps I gave myself the gift of Hannah as a character because I needed her; now I am her.

I’ve been reading a biography of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and I learned that it took him more than 20 years to write 100 Years of Solitude. He says, quite simply, that he wasn’t ready for the book when he was younger. It was too big for him at the time. This statement, from a great master, reminds me that books come in their own time. We as authors sometimes have to have our own journeys in order to understand how to complete them. B&L has, for me, been a journey that is long, powerful, and deep. Which leads me to:

Mistake #8 – Forgetting why we write. I had forgotten that, for me, inner growth is the goal. In finishing, in letting go of these characters, I am opening myself up to new stories, new possibilities, new adventures, new challenges to ponder and work through. As 2009 comes to a close, so too do my adventures in a fictional small town in Iowa that I have grown to love. I shed this skin and emerge anew.