Nadine Feldman, Author

celebrating strong female characters and whatever else strikes my fancy

books

If It Walks Like a Duck…

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As I continue with laying out Patchwork and Ornament (my late mother-in-law’s memoirs that I compiled and edited), it occurred to me to print out a copy, put it into a binder, and start showing people what I’ve been working on. Show and Tell has generated a lot of response, all positive. Granted, these are my friends and family, but even so…instead of thumbing through it quickly and saying something like “that’s nice,” they want to read further. A woman in my dentist’s office read 35 pages while I was getting a tooth filled!

Even more interesting, as they read Jenny’s stories, they start telling me their own, and boy, am I hearing some great stuff. I’m thinking that, as part of my approach to get the word out about this book, I could put together a workshop to help people get started with creating their own family legacies, even if they just keep them in the family. I feel like I’m on to something special each time I share P&O with others.

Each piece of writing seems to send me on a new and unique journey, and the one I’m embarking on with this book seems particularly sweet and rewarding. Yet the manuscript alone doesn’t have the same effect…laying it out, and having it walk like a duck, I mean, look like a book, makes a big difference. I think that even if we just set up some margins in our word processing programs to make our manuscripts more book-like (except, of course, when submitting to publishers!), we may get more non-writers to take a look at what we’re doing. It changes their perceptions. It may even change our own.

The Write–Er, Right Time

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Every summer in Houston, as the heat rolls in and blankets us with its heaviness, my routine goes through a change. My daily walks shift from early afternoon to mid-morning, to early morning, then disappear altogether. I shut myself in, hiding out from the heat.

Last year, when I reported this to my friend Isabel, she just laughed at me. “Oh, for God’s sakes, get out there!” she said. “It’s not that bad.” Suitably shamed, I resumed my daily treks and discovered that she was right.

This year, I seemed to have made the discovery on my own. Yesterday I said, “Okay, I’m walking. I don’t care how hot it is. I need to move.” I went into the Rice Village, which is a 30-minute walk from my home, had some wine and cheese, and walked home. And I was reminded that “it wasn’t that bad.”

Walks bring me sanity and calm, even more than my regular yoga practice. Walks invite ideas and solutions to problems. I often walk between tasks so I can bring a new perspective to the next item on my to-do list. Yes, the exercise is nice, but that’s not why I walk. I walk because I write, and walking makes me a better writer. I slow down. I look at the trees and the squirrels. I listen to the sounds of the day and smell the newly mowed grass. I reconnect to a more primal rhythm. I return refreshed and invigorated.

As I walked, I also reminded myself that there is never a “right” time to do anything. I walked in the worst heat of the day, my arms and legs fluid, my breath shifting and deepening. I walked because I needed to. I feel the same way about my writing. Sometimes a bright, shiny object pulls my attention away, always something seemingly more important to do, so I step away from time to time–only to return because I need to. Walking, breathing, writing–life.

Oh, Those Baby Steps

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Almost exactly twelve years ago, I discovered The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. It would take too long in this blog to say how my life has changed in those years, but B.C. (before Cameron) I was a writer who didn’t write, which is one of the saddest things on the planet. I had no idea how to begin; yet three weeks after beginning the exercises in her book, I was writing short stories. I was pregnant at the time, and a few months later, when my daughter was stillborn, I used the tools to write my way through grief. That’s how When a Grandchild Dies: What to Do, What to Say, How to Cope, was born.

She didn’t just get me writing. She helped me find my curiosity. I went back to school and got a degree, I learned how to quilt, I bought a camera, I began to travel…the list is endless.

There are two main lessons that I learned from her book–though I highly recommend it for any artist who feels stuck, and I often revisit it when I block. First, she reminded me that rough drafts are just that, rough, and that we need to be willing to do things badly in order to learn. Second, she taught me how to write in little snippets of time, which was what I had for years.

I was thinking of her this morning. This week I have dusted off the draft to Exodus: the Freedom Meditations, which is a small book of musings based on how Exodus applies to our modern lives and quest for inner freedom. I’ve been busy doing book layouts, but I needed to feel like I was writing, so I have started working on it again. I don’t spend a lot of time on it each day, but I do enough to feel the satisfaction of creating new work. I have been pretty bloody with the red pen this time around, but I still really, really like the work. Despite what sounds like heavy subject matter, it’s more playful than what I usually produce. I get to feel like a little kid at play again. What a gift–the gift of baby steps.

Finding Printers

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The layout to Patchwork and Ornament is coming along really well. I’m about to add the various color images, photographs of Jenny Feldman’s art. I have enough done to know how many pages the final product will be — 168 including front and back matter — so I’m in the process of getting quotes. While I’m at it, I’m also getting quotes to reprint my first book, because I’m almost out of stock and need to figure out what to do with it.

The world has changed in the past ten years since I self-published my first book. We can get quotes online instantly from all over the world. I’ve been told that color books such as P&O are best printed in China, so I’m looking into it, but we’ll see. Apparently Canada and Italy fit somewhere in the middle of the pricing spectrum.With digital printing options, I can get small print runs (1,000 or less) done fairly quickly and easily in the good ol’ USA–but the prices may be a lot higher.

When pricing a book, one has to take into consideration the discounts to wholesalers and distributors. Amazon, for example, gets a 55% discount. If you’re going to use a distributor and/or fulfillment center (both good ideas), deduct even more. When I published my first book, I priced it too low, making my book an unintended non-profit project. If my print costs are too high, then I could conceivably price my book out of the market. It’s a tricky business.

I’ll pass along the price comparisons once I have them. In these tough economic times, I’d love to support American business.

Doing and Not Doing

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The past month has been crazy as I prepared for the Agents’ and Editors’ conference, but I came back fired up from all that time with fellow writers.  I plowed into my current projects: revising, laying out, and organizing. I set up my calender for the next several months.

I love when I get that much energy and fire to do my work. However, I also know that to be most effective, I need to take a certain amount of time off. Otherwise, I get burned out, cranky, and obnoxious (well, more than usual).

A few days ago we hopped a plane and are visiting family in Illinois. We are away from the searing Texas heat, and the pace of our visit allows us a lot of downtime.

Somewhere deep in the recesses of my brain, neurons are firing, solving problems with manuscripts, thinking about changes to the layout, and dreaming of new writing. I know that when I get home, rested and refreshed, I will have new and better ideas for my work. It never fails.

For me personally, part of being a writer has been to give up my Puritanical work ethic and to focus more on flowing with the writing. I value my ability to be consistent and organized–these qualities keep me on track. But cultivating the qualities of pacing, rest, and gentleness will make the writing I do better and more pleasurable.

A Bad Day Writing is Better Than a Good Day Doing Anything Else

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Today I printed a draft layout of Patchwork and Ornament. Taken from the journals and writings of my late mother-in-law, Jenny Feldman, P&O details her life from growing up in the South Bronx during the Depression, to her life as an artist and world traveler.

While I have a ways to go before it’s ready to go to print, I get goosebumps looking at the work. I am totally in love with it, not just because I love the author but because I think it’s really good.

Last year I left my corporate job with the intention of taking a year off to write. At the end of that year, my husband and I decided to extend my hiatus indefinitely, and each day I head to my writing area by about 8:00 a.m. and go to work. As with any job, some days I don’t want to do it. Some days the writing doesn’t go well, or I wonder if I will ever learn to write at all.

But today, when I look at the draft and see how far it’s come in a short time, I am filled with a satisfaction and joy that I find nowhere else. In these moments, just as after childbirth, I forget the pain and gaze with wonder at this new creation.

Writing can be isolating, lonely, and discouraging at times. We work hard, sometimes for years, and the work doesn’t always see the printed light of day. Even if it does, it may not sell. Still, I accept this life because of these magical moments, when everything comes together, and I feel like I know who I am.