Nadine Feldman, Author

celebrating strong female characters and whatever else strikes my fancy

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nadine galinsky

Printers, Photographers, and Photoshop Gurus

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Some time ago I pondered when and how to let go of a task and allow someone else to do it. I think I’m getting the hang of it! And it only took 50 years! Part of the problem is that I love to learn, and thus sometimes get into the weeds of projects that take me away from my primary purpose.

This time around, I caught myself after viewing a photograph, before and after it had been worked on by a Photoshop guru. Given that Patchwork and Ornament is full of color photographs (images of artwork, travel, and family), this particular photo caught my attention. It was a picture of a little boy next to someone dressed in a bunny suit. In the after photo, some of bunny’s ears were cut off…and the photo looked great. I never would have crossed such a line. This is when I knew I was out of my league.

My husband, Henry, sensing my panic, swooped in and found a guru on Craigslist who, for a reasonable fee, could remove shadows, lighten dark areas, and brighten colors. All the things I don’t know how to do and don’t have any business learning in this lifetime. We met with her, and I felt instant confidence in her abilities. Moreover, she cares about the project, which is important to me.

Henry also re-shot photographs that I had taken. His equipment and skill level are both well beyond mine.

In less than three weeks, I will send all of this to the printer. I’m confident with my layout–I think I’m doing a darn good job. But it feels good to let work go that someone else knows how to do. My job, I remind myself, is to write, edit, and publish. I’ll have to remind myself again and again, I’m sure, but for today I get it.

Excerpt from Patchwork and Ornament: A Woman’s Journey of Life, Love, and Art

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by Jeanette Feldman

Dear friend, I have your recent letter in hand and have read it several times.

You ask how is it that I can write a vivid, positive, hopeful poem like Hans Hoffman’s House and yet write intensely, bitterly, negatively about my career failure as a painter, work so painful that I cannot read it or show it to anyone, not even my family. I find that this question has provoked some thought, a question that I can answer only with visual images.

Picture a ballroom in an old and seedy hotel in a small eastern city. It is a high school reunion. The people at the reunion are near the age of fifty. Their high school prom was held in this ballroom. It is bittersweet for them to listen to the musicians play Glenn Miller and to understand that the men and women they are now were boys and girls of years ago. They dance stiffly and formally on the wooden floor.

Above their heads, a great ball of small glass squares revolves. The great ball turns slowly, catching light from little spotlights trained on it. The couples dance, the ball revolves, and the images reflected on the ball are never the same, as both ball and people are always in motion. Their reflections move across the mirrored squares from dark to light, above and below, and back into dark nothingness.

I see myself as one of the people dancing my dance of life under the slowly revolving ball, sometimes in the dark, sometimes in the light, my reflection shattered in many pieces but never the same, never in the same place, many parts of one being never the same twice but always in flux, always in change. I too dance at times in the dark, an then there are times I dance in the light.

A Dose of Indignation

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“Is that all you’re doing?” asked a former co-worker when I explained that I was writing full-time. My French teacher, when teaching the term femme au foyer (housewife), pointed me out as one of the femmes au foyer in the room. “I start writing at 8:00 a.m. and work all day,” I complained. “Well, you’re not making any money, so you still fit in the housewife category,” she suggested. I don’t believe her. I love her dearly, don’t get me wrong, but her attorney husband also writes poetry, so she sees writing as a bit of an indulgence.

Now, I have nothing against housewives, and a creative homemaker deserves a great deal of credit and honor that she often does not get. But that’s not what I do. Right now I am producing one book, getting another ready for reprints, and writing a third. In addition to the writing, I am starting to gear up the marketing machine while I coordinate with cover designers, photo editors, and printers. I am waiting to get my novel back from my editor in preparation to do substantial rewrites.  My days are busy and full, and often I work on weekends to keep up.

Yet somehow in my home, no one else is capable of filling the water jug in the refrigerator or restocking the soda. Toilet paper rolls remain empty until I fill them. When it’s time to do dishes after I have cooked a meal, people scatter. I could go on and on. In short, I seem to have become the family servant.

So, like a good femme au foyer who believes that her dreams are also important, I went “en grieve.” Like the French, my strike lasted a specific amount of time (one evening). I refused to cook. Instead, I sat on the sofa and played computer card games with my feet up. My husband decided that the recipe I had chosen for the evening was something he could handle. As dinner wound down, I made my grievances understood. My writing, my work, takes time and effort. I root for everyone else to make their dreams come true, and I want support with mine as well.

We writers sometimes have to get tough with those around us to protect and value the time we need to do our work. It’s all too easy to give away our valuable energy to others, leaving ourselves depleted and unable to create. When that happens, we need to get a healthy dose of indignation. We may need to go en grieve. Our work matters. Our dreams matter. Our creativity brings joy, entertainment, and maybe even hope to others, and we need to see it that way–and make sure we communicate that to others.

To Vacation or Not…

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This weekend, with trembling hands, I sent off the signed quote to the company that will be printing Patchwork and Ornament. They wanted to know when I expected to send in my files. I have set a September 14 date, so I have exactly four weeks to get everything done. I should be do-able. I glanced quickly at the latest layout, which I finished last night, and I’m quite pleased. Knowing me, I’ll be revising until the last second, but I am getting close.

So I faxed the quote on Saturday, and on Sunday my husband says to me, “I know you have a lot going on, but would you want to go out of town for Labor Day?” Ah, he always knows what to say to me! Dangle a travel opportunity in front of me, and I’m off and running.

Technology is amazing. Within the hour, we had decided where to go (Estes Park, CO), booked flights, found a condo to rent, and ordered books about hiking in the Rocky Mountain National Park. After an hour and a half, I was asking myself, “What have I done?”

Play vs. work is my dilemma. Play stokes my creative juices, especially when I’m out in nature and breathing fresh air. However, there is work to be done. Hence, my working on a Sunday night when I normally take weekends off. This morning I had two computers going, one for scanning photos that may go into Patchwork and Ornament (I’ve decided it needs more images), and one for Exodus. At one point I was scanning, printing out Patchwork and Ornament, and studying French, all at the same time.

I guess sometimes a pending vacation gets me in gear, maybe even more than committing a deadline to a printer!

The Novel Approach

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A year ago, I pulled a novel draft out of a drawer and began retooling it. Blood and Loam, as I call it, tells the story of a confused, dysfunctional young woman who must find her inner strength to save a small farming community from a villainous “land vampire.” The idea has haunted me for years, and I am pleased to have finally found the path of the story.

Writing this novel has been a real education on what not to do, and even after a year of dedicated, hard work, the story still has problems. Part of me has wanted to put the story back in the drawer and write it off as my “practice novel.” It may still end up that way, but I’ve had enough good feedback on the story to not give up just yet.

Earlier in the year I submitted the first few chapters for critique in a novel writing class. I also submitted the first ten pages to a contest. In both cases, I received helpful feedback. Problem is, the story careens off track later on, in places no one has yet seen. I have bumped up against my limitations as a fiction writer, and I realize that I need help to take it to its next level…help that will allow me not only to improve my skills with this story, but also to make writing the next novels (I have three more ideas so far) easier, faster, and better.

This week I took the brave step of hiring a freelancer to provide a manuscript evaluation. I went through Elance, and I was impressed to find several bidders with impressive qualifications, including published and well-reviewed books of their own. It was tough to make the final choice. The woman who won the bid not only is a published author, but also has a mental health background, which I thought would be a great bonus for the psychological elements in the story. In about two weeks, I hopefully will have some guidance on what to do with my story.

I had mixed feelings about taking this approach, but seeing the quality of some of the bidders has changed my mind. I’ll pass along the results of this venture once I get them, and we’ll see if it was worthwhile, but in the meantime, I feel like I have taken a positive step with my writing. Stay tuned!

The Right Tools for the Job

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As a writer, I know the tools for my job:  my computer, notebooks, red pens, writing reference books, informational podcasts, etc.  I carry these tools in my writer’s tool belt, and I look for new and better tools so that I gain skill in my craft. I’ve learned that I don’t necessarily need the Snap On tools, but a nice Craftsman makes my life easier. In other words, I may choose to read a book rather than pay for a workshop, or vice versa, depending on the situation. I’m looking for the best value, but I will not sacrifice quality to save a few dollars.

Now I’m  learning how to apply this philosophy to book production.

I’ve been getting bids from printers for Patchwork and Ornament. P&O is a different animal from my first book, one with a color interior (we are adding 30-35 color images to go with the text).

Unexpectedly, paper selection has become a Big Deal. We need something more opaque than what comes with a black-and-white book. I must decide between a matte and gloss finish. And, curiously, the paper used most often for color is thinner, so I need paper that will give me enough spine width so that people won’t think the book is absurdly overpriced.

I went back to the printer I wanted to use and asked for a different paper, one with the qualities I wanted but a lower page per inch.  They balked.  Turns out they don’t stock a lot of different papers, so if I work with them, I am stuck with a paper I don’t want. My rep and I found ourselves at an impasse, and her response to my concerns was to keep steering me toward that which I have rejected.

Tools…paper is an important tool to the job of book production. And, while I am at times accused of being a bit of a control freak, I know what I want, and since I am investing thousands of dollars of family funds to do the job, I feel like I need the tools that will work for me.

In the meantime, I contacted another printer that I found in various resources for small publishers. I saw a book that they had printed, one filled with vivid, clear color images and cool paper. I looked at their website and found a massive paper selection, including the number of pages per inch. This got my attention.

When the rep called me, I felt like I was working with a  real guide. We explored a number of options. She offered to send a paper sample book. She made suggestions. She is providing me with a number of different quotes with a variety of scenarios so I can decide what I want to do.

I haven’t seen the quotes yet, but I will tell you this: this company is simply better equipped to do what I need done. Many companies advertise that they do color printing, but this experience feels like I’ve moved from a plumber’s apprentice to a master plumber. The other company has a great reputation, and I hope to use them on some black and white projects that I’m working on for the future…but for Patchwork and Ornament, it was a matter of finding the right tools for the job.