Talespinning

To the moon but still on Earth

2012-01-24T07:06:00.000-08:00

No, I haven't gone to the moon, but it feels like a million miles from life's troubles, at least for a little while.

I'm on vacation in San Clemente where wondrous things pop out of the ocean when the tide is low, like rocks covered in patterns and tiny creatures.

Is there a face in this hunk of stone?

Definitely, a face on this one.

This isn't a tall cliff. Just a small rock shot from low vantage point.

I love the way my mind sees miniature worlds within the rocks of this tide pool area.

Tons of sea life spend most of the time submerged where we don't see them. But when the tide pulls out, they are exposed. What are their lives like?

old man egret waits,

shoulders hunched, watching for his

sunset dinner

A couple finds a rocky perch as the tide begins to flow back in and the sun sinks into the sea.

I found wonder and peace roaming the beach. I also have read through more than half of my 80,000-word manuscript as I start editing and finding the right ending for the fairy tale I've been working on more than a year.

As you know, I've been sidetracked by some serious life issues, but this small vacation is lifting my spirits and hope to high levels. This is a working vacation of the best kind.

I'll still be absent a lot from the blog world. My best to all. (Sorry for the weird spacing. Blogger wonkiness)

Finding solace & haiku

2012-01-19T07:36:00.000-08:00

Oh, the aloe is on fire! Isn't this one a show-stopper? Just around the corner from our house in Venice is a gorgeous, Craftsman-style house, surrounded by aloes. The home belonged to the late Jerry Leiber, who wrote the lyrics for classic hits like "Hound Dog," Jailhouse Rock," "Kansas City," "Smokey Joe's Cafe" and tons more.

When he was still living, I was delighted to see him at the grand piano when I strolled past one day.

Walking, photographing and musing are some of my favorite things to do as you no doubt have noticed on this blog.

You've probably also noticed how often I post beach photos. I can't help myself. Walking along shorelines is one of the places I find solace. I love the murmur of small tides, the rush of booming high surf, watching kids race in or surfers tear up a wave.

And then there are the things I find. This time it's just the way the late afternoon light was shining through a piece of kelp.

sliver of stained glass

caught by the descending sun--

window to the sea

Finally, I may be absent a lot in coming weeks. My mother broke her hip and isn't responding quickly to rehab. I not only need to keep an eye on her, but I may need to find long-term care, which is daunting. Meanwhile, I have a week vacation coming, luckily near where she is, so I will be trying to work on my manuscript, as well.

As soon as things settle down, I'll post less sporadically and come visiting you, as well. In the meantime, I wish you all well in writing, publishing or wherever you are at the moment. Peace.

Watch where you step

2012-01-13T07:37:00.000-08:00

I'm much better this week and attended one of my critique groups yesterday. A discussion arose that I'd like to continue here.

My illustration is a stingray I found on the beach. Even out of the water, these poisonous creatures blend in to the background. Stingrays don't go out of their way to strike people with those venomous glands on their barbed tails. But if you step on one, you'll likely get stung.

This discussion has nothing to do with sea creatures. It's about stepping into trouble as a writer, especially if we write for middle grade through YA. We need to be alert, as we wade into our stories, about a lot more than plot, character development, pacing and grammar.

Because behind every story is a message, even if it's as basic as find-your-inner-strength-and- survive. The thing is, when you write for kids, any message may have a huge impact, even more than it does on an adult reader.

I want to be clear that I'm not saying we should be turning novels into platforms for a message, but there is no way to write an engaging story, with any depth, that doesn't have life experiences that lead to character growth, and, therefore, to a message of sorts.

This discussion is about abuse--whether it's parental alcoholism or drug use, a pedophile or a date-rapist--and how a writer deals with it in story. I'm not opposed to these topics. In fact, I was livid when there was a move to ban Laurie Halse Anderson's SPEAK, which is a tastefully written, harrowing tale about the fallout to a teen-age girl who is raped.

Kids need these kind of stories available to them, especially if it helps them deal with a situation already happening, let's them know they are not alone and that they aren't a bad person because something bad has happened to them.

They know a whole lot more about bad stuff than parents realize. What they need is guidance in processing that information. This can come through parents who have good communication with their children, through other trusted adults, or through books that don't hide the bad but show how to survive it.

That leads to the next part of the discussion. Dealing with it doesn't mean the author has to kill off the bad guys. We all know that lots of times in real life they get away and justice is not achieved. This is particularly true in historical fiction where the judicial system may have been weighted against the victim.

So what to do? I believe the answer lies in the personal growth of the protagonist, that somehow even if justice is thwarted, the protagonist learns an important thing and is now stronger and more able to avoid or survive bad things when they come.

Without that the story is too bleak, hopeless, and no kid needs that. In fact, I think the reason YA and middle grade stories have become so popular with adult readers is that there is usually that sense of hope.

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This was a bit of a ramble. I'd like to know if you've given this topic consideration and what you think. Any books you think work particularly well?

P.S. I'm afraid my desire for discussion is on hold. My mother had to go in the hospital and I'm on the way there. Not sure how long I'll be gone. I'd still appreciate comments, but I may not respond right away. Thank you for reading, anyway.

Time out

2012-01-06T09:46:00.000-08:00

This is what I'm going to do--watch my Buffy DVDs for hours on end. You see, I've been sick and I want to be somewhere I love.

I've been lucky to rarely get colds or flu, but I've caught some bug that has laid me up. I've already watched some Supernatural, Doctor Who and Cowboys and Aliens. All fine, but now I want Sunnydale's demons and angels and witty, kick-butt heroines.

Forgive, please, my lack of presence on blogs and Twitter for a bit. See you soon.

(P.S. I had to come back an edit out a typo. In original post I wrote Sunnyvale. Sigh. My brain's been scrambled, but it's coming slowly back--hence the noticing of the mistake...)

Frankie's No-Kiss fest

2012-01-02T10:07:00.000-08:00

I just entered the No-Kiss Blogfest hosted by Frankie Diane Mallis. I thought I'd pass this year, but it's too fun! From its title, you probably get the idea--some sizzling moment that doesn't result in a kiss.

Since I decided to enter moments ago, this is super-fast. I lifted a short scene from a high fantasy novel that is shelved. (painting by Renoir) Hope it tantalizes:

The two men carried Samuel, who was limp as dough, out of the room. Fiona stared at the fire awhile, then stood, stretched, and wandered around out of curiosity. A tapestry covered one wall. It was faded and thread worn, but she admired the skill of the artist who created a lush forest. In its background were snow-peaked mountains, above which circled large birds.

On a side table was a small box with exquisite enameled roses on its lid. Fiona opened it and smiled when it began to play tinkling music. She started to dance by herself, to spin in exuberance, and immediately collided into Brendan, who had returned so quietly she had not heard him come up behind her. She reached out to shut the box, mortified.

“No, leave it open. This music is made for dancing.” He bowed slightly from the waist and held a hand out to her. She was astonished but took it, like any well-bred woman.

He pulled her close, closer than she had ever danced with a man. She could feel the warmth of his body and his breath against her unbound hair. Her heart fluttered. Her cheeks flushed. In fact, heat seemed to spread throughout her.

“You smell like lavender. My favorite,” he said softly. Did his lips brush her ear? He drew her so near she thought a feather would scarce fit between them.

They glided across the gleaming oak floor, again and again. He finally whirled her to a stop next to the music box and shut its lid.

*

That's all, folks. Hope you're stepping lively in 2012!

Stepping through the portal

2011-12-31T05:46:00.000-08:00

I’m talking to you, 2012! I've got a little wish list.

It’s not that I'm asking to be like a giant, regal swan in a lake teaming with common coots and ducks and cormorants. (Um, yes, I was walking with a friend when the swan appeared, and I couldn't resist this stretch. After all, swans symbolize intuition, creativity and light,) And, not to disparage swan behavior, I wouldn’t fling lesser beings aside on the way to the feeding trough. (Ack. Yes, they do that.)

But, sigh. I wouldn’t mind a little adoration and crumb tossing. Just a tad. You know, an agent loves my story. An editor loves my story. The marketing department loves my story. The public loves my story. Hollywood loves my story.

Is that too much to ask?

I suppose it is since I’ve yet to finish said story.

So, 2012 Goal, The First:

Finish writing and editing my darkly funny fairy tale! I mean, really, enough already. I need to send it toddling out into the world and see if anyone wants to fuss over it, put a pretty cover on it and shout out its wonders.
To reach goal No.1, I am going to go away for a week in January with nothing but my manuscript to do some serious final revisions.

As part of my 2012 writing plan, I've downloaded the coolest 365-day, one-page, free calendar called Don't Break the Chain. Inspired by Jerry Seinfeld, it is a simple way to nudge yourself to write (or anything else) every day, so you can "X" out each box. Mission accomplished day-by-day and writing moving steadily forward. Here's a link through The Writers Store.

All other goals can line up in the queue. Here's a good one--the banishment of overused, misused words, such as compiled by the “amazing” Lake Superior State University.

I wish you all a sparkling New Year, filled with adventure and goals well-met. Let’s expect the unexpected, roll with the sucker-punches, be flexible and adaptable. Who knows, some of the surprises may carry wonders.

Doesn't it feel like we step through a portal when one year rolls into the next? So much possibility. (But no ancient Mayan doomsday, thank you very much.)

One last thought, part of a quote from Neil Gaiman: "and I hope somewhere in the next year you surprise yourself."

A mind-bending read

2011-12-27T18:09:00.000-08:00

I've been wearing an orange wrist band I love for the last month. I won it in a contest on Susan Kaye Quinn's blog. The band reads: openBOOKS openMINDS TheLiteracySite.com. The organization raises funds to give books to children, some of whom have never owned a book of their own, and I love that Susan chose to include that during her book launch.

OPEN MINDS also happens to be the title of Susan's YA novel, which should be added to your TBR pile if you haven't sat up reading it late into the night already. Really, this is a great read for young teens to adults, both male and female.

This fast-paced thriller is set in a world where mind-reading is the norm, and Kira, the teen-age protagonist is a freak--a zero, who hasn't developed the ability to communicate by thought. But what really sets her apart and catapults her into danger is her newly-discovered ability to jack into other people's minds and control them.

When she realizes there is a subculture of jackers, who range from benign undercover citizens to vicious criminals and ruthless military agents, she faces choices she could never have imagined. If you can control other people's minds how far would you go and can you ever justify what you're doing?

Susan deftly developed a captivating concept with solid world-building, comprehensible futuristic slang, and characters who matter. There are two love interests for Kira. Raf is a loyal friend and all-around good guy, who the reader can't help but love, but bad-boy Simon turns out to be a heart-breaker, too. They're all caught up in a complex society they barely understand.

This is Book One of the Mindjack Trilogy, and I'm eager for more.

An interesting note about Susan, she's not only a talented writer, she's a rocket scientist. If you poke around her blog--for instance, check out the For Writers page--you'll find links to fascinating, informative and fun past posts on everything from developing characters to analyzing the publishing possibilities open to writers these days.

And there's a sample available you can read of OPEN MINDS on her site, too. Have a peek, but beware. You might get jacked!

A very merry monster to you!

2011-12-24T08:31:00.000-08:00

Merry

Monster

Christmas!

I had to post this. *grins like a monster*

My daughter and I took a walk through the canals in Venice (California, that is), which are gorgeous with strings of light. This bridge may have menorah candles depicted, but the way the photo came out is Monster Mouth! Is it not?

I hope your holidays, however you celebrate, are full of surprises, laughter, joy and zombie-free (at least for the moment).

Hey there Solstice, you sure look good to me

2011-12-22T08:16:00.000-08:00

Winter solstice,

a sunrise walk,

such symmetry,

balance in

time

and space

an offer of

hope

above

beneath

soaring

My wish is joy to you,

peace to all,

beauty wherever

we may walk

Happy holidays however you celebrate, wherever you are!

Book love

2011-12-16T07:59:00.000-08:00

If you're still shopping for gifts or receive a gift certificate or just plain want a good book, well, have I got suggestions for you! I picked a few of my favorite reads this year, which I reviewed on Goodreads or, perhaps, even here before. But these deserve a second shout-out.
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I've rarely been drop-to-my knees floored by a debut author, but I am this time. Tahereh Mafi not only weaves a riveting tale in SHATTER ME, she creates a character who grips my gut, tears at my heart. But the thing that made me almost gasp time and again was the stunning way she describes Juliette's emotional reactions.
When we meet Juliette she is a shell of a teen girl kept alive and half-sane by some inner strength. No one can touch her because of a strange affliction that will cause them pain or death if they do. She is kept locked alone in a cell.

The world-building in this dystopian future is not all that unusual but Juliette is.
Here are a few samples of sometimes stream-of-consciousness style, in which punctuation and numbers don't go by the book. The first comes after she's been alone for a much of a year and is inexplicably given a cellmate. When she offers him a blanket, he does the unexpected:
He takes it only to wrap it more tightly around my body and something is suddenly constricting in my chest. My lungs are skewered and strung together and I've just decided not to move for an eternity when he speaks.
When she is too slow to follow a soldier's orders and is beaten:
The walls are beginning to bleed into the ceiling. I wonder how long I can hold my breath. I can't distinguish words I can't understand the sounds I'm hearing the blood is rushing through my head and my lips are 2 blocks of concrete I can't crack open...
And when she collapses:
I'm in the air. I'm a bag of feathers in his arms and he's breaking through soldiers crowding around for a glimpse of the commotion and for a moment I don't want to care that I shouldn't want this so much.
Mafi's character development and beautiful style are unforgettable.
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WITH A NAME LIKE LOVE is what might be known as a quiet book--a middle grade, historical fiction about a girl whose father is a traveling preacher. I usually read YA or adult fantasy/dystopian but, I was drawn in completely to Ollie's world and her huge heart and courage. And even though Tess Hilmo's writing is rich in detail and atmosphere, a sense of urgency and danger begins early and stays through the story.
I like that this book is never preachy, despite being about a family who travel from town to town to spread the gospel. Perhaps because Ollie's father is named Everlasting Love he is infused with compassion and a good-hearted nature that extends to all the family. That is not to say Hilmo's characters don't have faults and family squabbles--they do, and the dynamic feels authentic.
But when the family pulls their travel trailer into the small town of Binder, they find more than expected after Ollie befriends a boy whose mother is in jail for killing his father. Soon Ollie and her family are on the nasty side of intimidation from townsfolk who want them to leave.
My heart was captivated by their strength in standing up for what they believe is right.
Here are some samples of style:
Binder was a pitiful place, worn thin from years of want. It was exactly like all the other towns her daddy dragged them through. It was exactly the kind of nothing Ollie had come to expect.

Except, maybe, for that boy.

And about her daddy:
Reverend Love's voice was rich as molasses and deep as the Grand Canyon. It had power about it that made people reach into their pockets even when they didn't come with the intention of donating to the cause. He called it his trademark. Ollie's mama called it their only salvation.
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Maggie Stiefvater made me cry. When I came to the ending of THE SCORPIO RACES I had a lump in my throat big as an island of chalk cliffs against black water, painful as the loss of a beloved. And it was the satisfying ache of a story well told, of characters one cares about after the book is closed.
I had thoroughly enjoyed her five earlier books (the Lament fairy stories and the Shiver werewolf tales), but THE SCORPIO RACES is her masterpiece, carved out of myth and painted with blood.
She has written on her blog what it took for her to write this story after many years of trying and not finding it. I think you’re best served to read her words on that.
Her book proves that this time she was as ready to take on this tale as her protagonist Kate “Puck” Connolly and her mare Dove are to face the savage, killer water horses in the deadliest race ever devised. Puck must win to save her home, but she is the first female to attempt the race and many don't want her there.
I kept thinking as I read this how fleshed out and achingly real her characters are, how grounded the sense of place, how authentic and thrilling the equine detail. And how seductive and terrifying are the water horses.
When my heart wasn’t in my throat it was lost to this wild place.
The story is told first person from Puck’s POV and from that of Sean Kendrick, a young man who loves horses but most of all his water horse, Corr, and what that love costs him.
Here are some writing samples to give you a feel for the atmosphere and thrill of this book:
The wind is sucking the sound away from me, so as I approach the scene, it seems as if the men are voiceless. The struggle is almost artful, until you get up to it. It’s four men, and they’ve snagged a gray water horse around its neck and by the pastern on one of its hind legs, right above the hoof. They tug and they jump back as the horse lunges and retreats, but they are in a bad place and they know it.
And this:
The water shifts, black then gray-blue then black again, the froth of a white ruffled collar, and then, out of the froth, we all see it. A dark horse’s head surges above the water, jaw wide open. And then, before the sea swallows the first, we see a chestnut mare break the surface, along with a brief glimpse of a brown spine curving in the water alongside it. Then they’re all gone beneath the water and I have goose bumps creeping up my arms.
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I’d read Laini Taylor’s Lips Touch and Dreamdark books and been enchanted by the freshness of her storytelling and her delicious way with words. But now they feel like an overture for the magnificent symphony that is DAUGHTER OF SMOKE & BONE. Ms. Taylor has brought it all to this work—unforgettable characters, gripping storytelling with surprising twists, real depth of meaning and gorgeous style.
I don’t even know where to begin, because I remain stunned by so many things in this story. The quirky main character, Karou, has a mysterious past, and her strange family deals in secrets she can only guess at. Taylor’s storytelling is like a trail of bread crumbs that lead us slowly, skillfully to the astonishing answers.
In a way, this is Romeo and Juliet among angels and demons, but it’s so much more than that. Taylor pits bigotry, hatred and war against hope, tolerance and love. And she does it all within richly-detailed human and fantastical worlds. I was both grounded and enchanted by her descriptions of places from the souks of Marrakesh and streets of Prague to the land of the chimaera.
My heart was ripped out at the end, but I don’t want to give much away, because I really hope you’ll all read this one.
Here’s a taste of the writing style:
A thrill along every nerve ending. Her body, alert and alive. She was hunted, she was prey, and she didn’t even have her knife tucked in her boot, little thinking she’d need it on a visit to the graverobber.
And this:
He stood revealed. The blade of his long sword gleamed white from the incandescence of his wings—vast shimmering wings, their reach so great they swept the walls on either side of the alley, each feather like the wind-tugged lick of a candle flame.

Ch-ch-ch-changes

2011-12-13T08:00:00.000-08:00

What does a sea turtle or polar bear have to do with a book tour? In the case of one author buying her book will benefit endangered animals. I love seeing the innovative ways that writers are finding to reach audiences in this new era of publishing. Whether published by a big house, a small press or by yourself through resources like Smashwords and CreateSpace, authors have to be more involved in selling their work than ever before.
More about the wildlife at the end of this (short) post. But first, I want to point to a post by Jane Dystel, president of DGLM, about moving forward positively within the changing publishing landscape, particularly the future of digital publishing. No doom and gloom from her perspective, just excitement about the possibilities.
This year, many writers I know in person or online have chosen alternative avenues to get their books in the hands of readers. Some were traditionally published in the past, like Gayle Brandeis. Sometimes, small publishers snapped up their books, as happened for Karen Amanda Hooper. Others tackled the multi-tasking job of publishing themselves as did Shelli Johannes and Susan Kaye Quinn. Talli Roland went small press and self-pubbed, and she came up with creative online release parties that rocketed her sales.
Heather McCorkle chose an independent press and currently has an unusual blog tour for the release of a special edition of her previously released THE SECRET OF SPRUCE KNOLL.

From Dec. 12 until Dec. 17 she is donating a percentage of proceeds from book sales to a charity for endangered species.

If you win a contest she has running with this, she will donate $50 for the "adoption" of an endangered animal of your choice. And you'll get a stuffed animal, too.

Pretty cool, I think.

Where I've been, where I'll go

2011-12-09T07:35:00.000-08:00

What if you found a ladder into the sea?

And discovered you were standing on the spine of a sea monster?

I love where my imagination takes me. Now, if I would just let it help me finish the final lap of my fairy tale! Nearing 80K...

I sidetracked to join Twitter. Finally. Too much fun. Too many interesting people! Too many days gone by. Find me @triciajobrien

But here I am, posting about my wanderings on land and interwebz.

And! I went to the first meeting of a new crit group. We seem to be a pretty solid group of writers, so I'm encouraged. I still love my old group and will travel a gazillion miles to meet with them. Thrice this month, in fact.

Where have you been wandering?

Good book, good wish, good deed

2011-12-03T10:31:00.000-08:00

What if buying a book for yourself would help put a book in the hands of a child in a refugee camp? Purchasing WHAT YOU WISH FOR, an anthology of short stories about wishes by some big-name kidlit authors, raises funds to do this.

About 250,000 people who fled genocide in Darfur are in camps in eastern Chad where even gathering firewood can be put girls in peril of rape from marauders. Libraries and education are far-off dreams for the children in these camps, whose culture has been stolen from them along with their homes. One boy said he would gladly walk to the farthest mountain every day if there were a school he could attend.
Enter The Book Wish Foundation, which is donating all proceeds from sales of WHAT YOU WISH FOR to build libraries in the camps through the United Nations refugee agency. The stories in the book were written by super authors: R.L. Stine, Meg Cabot, Cornelia Funke, Jane Yolen, Joyce Carol Oates, John Green, Jeanne DuPrau, Gary Soto, Karen Hesse, Ann M. Martin, Alexander McCall Smith, Nikki Giovanni, Naomi Shihab Nye, Nate Powell, Sophia Quintero, Cynthia Voight, Marilyn Nelson, Francisco X. Stork. The forward is by actress and activist Mia Farrow.
For writers, another incentive to purchase the book has been added. A 500-word essay contest about how wishes in the stories connect to the refugees offers one-page critiques of 50-pages of manuscript from some of the authors or their literary agents. For more information go to the Book Wish Foundation’s essay contest page.
You can purchase the book at Penguin, Amazon, B&N.

Gnomes and shapeshifters, oh my

2011-11-28T06:47:00.000-08:00

Looked down in my garden and what should appear?

You tell me. Is is gnome, fairy of maybe the little hairy man from Neil Gaiman's STARDUST who serves Tristran a sumptuous plate of fried field-mushrumps?

But this is the mushrump itself!
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Peering in tiny faces in the fauna opened my eyes to all kinds of magical happenings.

baby footprints

disappear in the sand,

gulls tracks appear,

and are gone

shapeshifters?

changling?

fairy transport?

what goes here?

What story comes to mind when you see faces where they shouldn't be and footsteps fading into what--thin air?

Hope your long weekend was wonderful.

It was quite glorious--and as you can see, magical--here. At least inside my head. *meanders off in search of wonders*

Secondly!!!! S. R. Johannes, who many of you will know from her blog Market My Words, is holding a book launch tomorrow, Tuesday, with a ton of fabulous prizes. Fill out the entry form and check in her blog or Twitter for all kinds of fun surrounding UNTRACEABLE, which earned a smashing review from Kirkus.

(sorry if the spacing is weird --I edited after pub and Blogger went wonky)

Call the sirens!

2011-11-25T00:07:00.000-08:00

Today is Black Friday, but forget the mall--there’s an underwater war going on!

As part of Karen Amanda Hooper’s release of TANGLED TIDES, she’s hosting a blogsplash fit for mermaids. But first you must pick a side. What floats your boat? Mermaids, sirens, selkies or gorgons?

I choose sirens—sun-loving, seductive singers who can control weather and are rebels. Oh, yeah. I can picture myself lounging in the sunshine, filling the air with beautiful music, painting the sky however I want it.
Of course, there’s the dicey part about stealing other people’s memories, but, hey, what a useful tool for a writer, right?

Here’s the link to Karen's blog where the fun is happening, including a book giveaway via Twitter contest.

And here’s the blurb for Karen’s debut novel, published by Rhemalda:

Yara Jones doesn’t believe in sea monsters—until she becomes one.

When a hurricane hits her island home and she wakes up with fins, Yara finds herself tangled up in an underwater world of mysterious merfolk and secretive selkies. Both sides believe Yara can save them by fulfilling a broken promise and opening the sealed gateway to their realm, but they are battling over how it should be done. The selkies want to take her life. The merfolk want something far more precious.

Treygan, the stormy-eyed merman who turned Yara mer, will stop at nothing and sacrifice everything to protect his people—until he falls for Yara. The tides turn as Yara fights to save herself, hundreds of sea creatures, and the merman who has her heart. She could lose her soul in the process—or she might open the gateway to a love that’s deeper than the oceans.

TANGLED TIDES on Amazon, Rhemalda Bookstore, B&N, Goodreads.

Congratulations, Karen!

Kissed by honu

2011-11-21T06:52:00.000-08:00

When I learned that Karen Amanda Hooper was kissed by a sea turtle in Hawaii, I thought, "Well, of course. That is the natural order of things."

(picture source)

Karen's blog is one of my favorites--personable, fun, heartfelt. Lately, it's filled with all things mermaid with the upcoming release of her debut, TANGLED TIDES.

On Black Friday, she's doing a blogsplash, which I will participate in, but this is a pre-interview that I hope you'll enjoy. And be sure to come back Friday to join the fun.

Q: This being National Novel Writing Month, I believe you started a mermaid novel during that event a couple of years ago. Did that grow into Tangled Tides? Can you briefly describe how the story evolved?

Karen: I actually started writing my mermaid story in September, but yes, I wrote a good portion of it during NaNo a couple years ago. I think I finished in early January and then edited and revised for a couple months before querying agents. When it received no offers of representation I shelved it for a year. This past summer Michelle Davidson Argyle suggested I send it to Rhemalda, and POOF! A few months later we're celebrating its release. Crazy but true.

Q: If magic happened and you turned into a mermaid, what would be the best thing about being a mermaid? The worst?

Karen: Well, my merfolk can control water, so I would have a lot of fun experimenting with that ability. However, my merfolk can't tell a lie. That doesn't sound too bad at first, but imagine not even being able to tell tell those healthy white lies. Like when a friend asks if you can tell that she gained twenty pounds and asks if she looks bad. Silence is your only kind option, and silence speaks volumes.

Q: How did you do research for the mythological creatures? Did you invent your own mythology, as well?

Karen: I've had a weird love for Medusa ever since I was a little kid and watched the original Clash of the Titans upmteen times. I already knew her story, but I played off of it and gave it my own twist. All the other mythology in my story revolved around how I imagined things could have been if Medusa and Poseidon were in love and ruling their own world.

Q: Are you a water pixie or land lover in real life? Did you make any excursions into the watery depths?

Karen: I'm a mix of sea, land and air. I love everything from snorkeling to hiking to jumping out of airplanes. My favorite watery depths story is when I was in Hawaii and had the incredible experience of swimming with dolphins and huge sea turtles--in the wild. Not in an aquarium, or touristy encounter where you pay to swim in a pool or something. I was swimming off the Kona coast one morning and spinner dolphins came out of nowhere and decided to jump and play all around us. Then, later, we came across about ten honu (Hawaiian sea turles) and one actually glided up the front of me and his nose touched my chin. I call it the day I was kissed by a honu.

Q: How does it feel having your creation come to life on the pages of a book? To reach that goal?

Karen: It's very surreal. Exciting, but surreal. This time last year I was brokenhearted about having to shelve Tangled Tides, and now it's out in the world as a real book! Heck, six months ago I had nothing but tons of agent rejection letters. Just goes to show that anything can happen in this business. Never give up on a project you love!

Signs of winter, sort of

2011-11-14T07:50:00.000-08:00

When the earthmovers arrive by the Venice Beach pier and start building mountains of sand, winter is coming.

Every year, they do this to protect the low-lying residential and business properties from flooding when tides get high and waves get massive.

And every year, kids bring snow saucers or any flat object and slide downhill.

There's been a lot of pounding going on, as well, as they put sand fences up along the bike path to keep the whipping winter wind from acting like sandpaper to any creature passing by.

*

I found this darkly humorous--a tsunami warning sign perched atop a new mountain of sand.

This little wall of sand wouldn't do much good and it's a long way to higher ground on this stretch of coast. It's really rather sobering in light of the horrifying disaster in Japan. Mostly, I try not to think about that, but these signs are hard to ignore.

*

On a lighter note, a little haiku on a blustery day.

*

emerald-green wave,

white-ruffed, trailing a veil of

mist on its shoulder

*

Gayle Brandeis on expecting brilliance, NaNoWriMo, ebooks and more

2011-11-10T06:25:00.000-08:00

My friend Gayle Brandeis began her novel-writing career with fireworks—she won Barbara Kingsolver’s Bellwether Prize in 2002 for THE BOOK OF DEAD BIRDS. Three more of her novels were traditionally published after that. Now Gayle is stepping into the self-published, ebook arena like many other authors.
I interview her here on why and how she chose that route for the sequel to Dead Birds, THE BOOK OF LIVE WIRES.
Before we start the Q&A, I want to share a sample of Gayle’s poetic, riveting style. Here’s the Live Wires opening:
It was the way she moved her arms. It was the way the four year old
moved her arms as he lifted his own arm to swing his axe. It was like they were dancing together, his arm, her arms, as he sliced through her mother’s stomach, her father’s chest. It was the way she moved her arms that convinced him to spare her.
They rose up from her shoulders like tendrils of smoke, like steam from a fresh wound. The tendons were so beautiful, streams running down her triceps, he almost cried. Her wrists turned as if oiled. Her fingers waved like wild grasses. He held his axe over his head and watched this girl’s blood-spattered arms undulate as she tossed her head back and screamed and screamed. He had never seen anything so lovely in his life. He lowered his axe, let it drop to the floor. He held out his hand.

You can currently order the ebook for $2.99 from Amazon or Smashwords. Here’s my interview with Gayle, in which she is simply awesome.

Me: When you wrote The Book of Dead Birds were you already imagining a sequel? How did The Book of Live Wires evolve? Is there a theme connecting the two?

Gayle: I definitely wasn’t envisioning a sequel as I wrote The Book of Dead Birds. The sequel came about through National Novel Writing Month in 2002. The Book of Dead Birds had won the Bellwether Prize earlier that year, judged by Barbara Kingsolver, Toni Morrison, and Maxine Hong Kingston, the three writers I most admire in the world, and while this was so deeply thrilling and affirming, I found I could no longer write. I suddenly felt as if those three amazing women were looking over my shoulder as I wrote, expecting brilliance, and I didn’t feel I could live up to those self-imposed expectations. When I heard about NaNoWriMo, I realized it could help me break through the creative blocks I had set up for myself--writing that quickly, there isn’t time to worry about whether you’re going to please your favorite writers.

I think I wrote a sequel that month because I had been curious about what my characters had been up to since I had finished the first book--I always had the sense that they were off living their lives, but I couldn’t access them until I started to write about them again. Live Wires is narrated by Darryl Sternberg, Ava’s love interest from Dead Birds and now her husband and the father of their baby. A couple of readers had told me that they couldn’t quite get a grasp on Darryl in the first book, that he seemed like too good a guy, and this was my opportunity to get under his skin more deeply. Just as Dead Birds alternates between Ava’s and her mother’s stories, this book alternates between Darryl’s and his grandmother’s stories (he is having her journals translated from Russian, French and Yiddish.) Along with characters in common, I’d say the theme that ties the two books together is the need to heal one’s past in order to move freely into the future.

Me: After four traditionally published novels why did you decide to e-publish The Book of Live Wires? Did other authors influence your decision?

Gayle: Over the years, I’ve mentioned the sequel at various book events, and readers have always been interested in the book, but I never thought I would share it--it was so hastily written, and I felt as if it was something that I had written for myself, not for a wider audience. After more people asked about it recently, though, I decided to revisit it and was surprised to find there was more life inside of it than I had imagined.

I decided to bring it out as an ebook because I want to embrace the shifting sands in the publishing industry rather than run away from them. I thought it would be fun to do an experiment with this book in particular because I have enough detachment from it, having written it so many years ago--it feels like I have nothing to lose.

A couple of writer friends have recently put out ebooks--Rebecca O’Connor’s Rise (a companion to her memoir, Lift) and Tod Goldberg, who released a short collection of stories. I had already thought about doing this experiment when I heard about their own, but watching them forge ahead into this new territory definitely inspired me on my own path.

Me: How do you feel about the rapid changes in publishing? Things that excite you or worry you?

Gayle: Change is both exciting and scary, and it has been a very conscious effort for me to shift my thinking to focus more on the excitement of this time of transition. How lucky we are to be able to watch history unfold, to be part of a changing landscape!

I won’t deny that I do worry about my ability to continue to make a living as a writer, however. My publisher had the right of first refusal on The Book of Live Wires, so my agent had to show it to them before I put it out as an ebook--it was a very funny feeling to be hoping for a rejection so I could move forward with my e-publishing experiment! I never imagined being in that position before. When the rejection did come, it was both better and worse than I could have imagined--the editor said that she loved the book and in a “kinder, gentler time” would have published it, but the larger editorial board wasn’t willing to take a risk on me because my earlier books don’t have the numbers they’re looking for. Of course now I worry that when I want to publish future books--and I do hope to continue to publish traditionally--publishers will turn me away because of my stubbornly midlist status.

It’s good to know that if need be, I can always take publishing into my own hands. I think that in many ways, this is a more empowering time for writers than ever.

Me: What was your experience with Smashwords? Any advice to other writers who are considering e-publishing? How many hats did you have to wear?

Gayle: I published with both Smashwords and Kindle--that seemed to be the way to reach the most varieties of ereaders. I am also working right now to get the book up on Google Books, because a large number of independent bookstores are now offering Google Books to customers through their brick and mortar stores, and I really do want to continue to support indies (that was one of the only things that made me hesitate about this experiment--I don’t want to contribute to the decline of beloved bookstores.)

This process has required the wearing of many hats--I think I have permanent hat hair from the constant shifting between being my own editor, proofreader, art department, typesetter, and tech person (although thankfully I have in house IT and graphic design backup from my husband Michael, and my friend Laraine Herring helped greatly with the editing). Smashwords offers a style guide to help with the formatting, but it can be a bit confusing anyway--I found this little video particularly helpful in clarifying some of the necessary formatting steps: www.norulesjustwrite.com/resources/indy-resources/

One other bit of advice--Flickr is your friend. There are lots of wonderful images that are available under creative commons that you can use for your book cover, and you can often negotiate with the artist to use an image when some rights are reserved (the photographer whose image I used just asked that I pay for a year of his professional flickr account, which was about $25.)

Me: How are you approaching marketing?

Gayle: I hired a professional publicist, just to get some extra muscle behind the book, and am excited by the potential contacts she’s making. I haven’t yet fully launched my own marketing campaign, but plan to use social media (Twitter and Facebook) along with emails to friends and family and colleagues, to get the word out. I’ll probably visit some other blogs, as well, and plan to write some essays connected with the book that will hopefully drum up interest.

I released the book when I did to celebrate National Novel Writing Month, and also the forthcoming 10th anniversary of the Bellwether Prize in January (when my friend Naomi Benaron’s amazing and much buzzed novel, Running the Rift, will be released. I helped her edit the book, and am hoping that our connection and this new ebook will keep my name alive in the Bellwether conversation.)

Me: What's next for you?

Gayle: I am in the throes of National Novel Writing Month right now, focusing on a YA novel that is currently making the rounds of publishers as a proposal (I had only written a couple of sample chapters). I am having so much fun fleshing out this idea that I’ve carried around in me for so long and am excited to try to blast out a draft in a month. I have a couple of other projects in the works--a new novel for adults and a memoir about my mom--but they are on the backburner while I give Seed Bombs my full attention.

*

By the way, Gayle has kindly stopped by in the past to answer questions posed in the comments. So if you want to ask something go ahead and she’ll answer if she can around her crazy-busy schedule.

Fade to black and Open Office

2011-11-05T07:39:00.000-07:00

My last few days have been tangled in a technology web of massive proportion (Hence the photo of a giant spider web in negative format, which I took a long time ago but seems appropriate today).

I'm certainly glad I didn't sign up for NaNo this year. I returned home from a day of family chores, fired up my desktop and found...a black screen.

I got help trying to reboot, save files, etc. The end result is most of my files were saved except for the latest version of my fairy tale novel, which was 70K. I think I may only have lost a few pages of the newest writing. I usually save to thumb drive every day but skipped one or two days, I think. Anyway, that's fixable because of the versions on the thumb drive. But the desktop needed a new hard drive and operating system. It doesn't want to accept my older Word, so I'm going to have to try to reach Microsoft service to see if it can be registered again. Otherwise, it was recommended that I try Open Office. So far, this free, downloadable, word-processor seems to open some of my documents but not all. I'm still experimenting with it.

Does anyone out there use Open Office? What is your experience with it and with sending documents out on submission?

Meanwhile, I have my handy laptop upon which I am typing this post. I have a new version of Word on it and may decide to switch to writing on it. I know, I know, I also need to put a backup on this and not just rely on thumb drives. Me and technology=chaos.

Holy Serendipity

2011-10-29T07:03:00.000-07:00

If there ever is a reason to flaunt the word serendipity this is it. Thursday I went to my critique group and read a scene from my dark fairy tale that takes place within a labyrinth. The maze I described was complex, and my partners asked if I could draw it. “Yikes,” was my first thought.
Friday dawned clear and warm. I headed out for a long beach walk, musing on how I was going to tackle a maze drawing not being a) an artist, b) a puzzle-maker, c) a farmer with a corn field.
As I walked under the pier, I noticed a young woman ahead making a large drawing in the damp sand. Beyond her, a young man was doing the same. There were more than a dozen people busy making circular designs. They were drawing labyrinths!
*
Spooky music? Celestial horns? Drum roll? I mean, this is pretty serendipitous, is it not?

So I approached the girl and asked if they were in a club or something that likes to draw mazes. I mean, there are clubs for everything, right?

But, no, they’re students in an architecture class being taught by Ben Nicholson of the Art Institute of Chicago.

And Mr. Nicholson is so nice he invited me to hang around with them. We even all held hands in a big circle—but I’m getting ahead of myself.

First thing I learned was to begin a labyrinth with a cross. (see illustration)

Then you put L-shapes and dots in each quadrant. After that it gets tricky. Lines are drawn from an end of the cross or L or dot to a point in another quadrant, thus creating the pathways. I practiced a lot. Sand is forgiving, but I won’t be earning a degree in labyrinth making any time soon.

*
Mr. Nicholson talked about the perfection of a beach as a drawing surface, how the horizon is wide and can be used to set horizontal lines, how a penny can be dropped in the sand as a radius to the center of the earth. “On the beach you have, natively, the axis to the world,” he said. And, it suddenly felt very momentous standing there in one of my favorite places.
And then he did one of my favorite things, he told an ancient Greek story about shipwrecked sailors who swim to shore and see geometric drawings and conclude that means they’ve found civilization.

Oh, and then there was the hand-holding. We stood in a large circle, arms stretched wide so our hands strained against one another and walked around and around and around, always keeping eye contact with the person directly across the circle. This led to giggles since there was a dizzying strenuousness to it. After our tramping feet had made the widest circle our group could make in the sand, we squished forward into a tight knot and gave it a bulls-eye. “Any group can make the largest circle and the smallest. Where’s the sun’s axis?” Using his own shadow he drew it in.
One of the things I liked most about stumbling into this class were Mr. Nicholson’s prompts for observation. He may be teaching students about architecture but anyone can benefit from being aware of surroundings. Notice how the sun changes its place in the sky by hour and by season, how its light falls differently on familiar objects, how you can ascertain direction if you know where it will be on the horizon.
Not only did I learn useful real world stuff, I got a few ideas for my characters and story from this encounter. Serendipity is a wondrous thing.
Now back to practicing maze-drawing… I've a long way to go.

Patterns

2011-10-26T21:56:00.000-07:00

Weather changed from living inside a gray cloud to nothing but blue skies today. So fine. Walked twice and became transfixed by patterns in the sand. Low, low tide. Watermarked shore.

A Lilliputian

estuary--languid tide

trickling back to sea

I see giant squid. Or some sea monster imprinted in the sand. Temporary fossils.

Tomorrow I travel many miles to spend an afternoon with some fabulous critique partners. I've got my pages and can't wait to hear theirs. Finding crit partners who both encourage you and push you to climb a little higher, stretch a bit more is one of the best things a writer can do.

I've written more than 68k on the fairy tale I've been working on all year. Closing in on the end and still in love with this story.

I hope you're all finding wonders outside your doors and inside your heads like me. *silly grin*

I've been stolen by water horses

2011-10-23T16:42:00.000-07:00

Maggie Stiefvater made me cry. When I came to the ending of THE SCORPIO RACES I had a lump in my throat big as an island of chalk cliffs against black water, painful as the loss of a beloved. And it was the satisfying ache of a story well told, of characters one cares about after the book is closed.
I had thoroughly enjoyed her five earlier books (the Lament fairy stories and the Shiver werewolf tales), but THE SCORPIO RACES is her masterpiece, carved out of myth and painted with blood.
She has explained what it took for her to write this story after many years of trying and not finding it. I think you’re best served to read her words on that. And if you haven’t seen her trailer for which she did both animation and music, do yourself a favor and track it down. Actually, here's a link to both.
Her book proves that she was as ready now to take on this tale as her protagonist Kate “Puck” Connolly and her mare Dove are to face the savage, killer water horses in the deadliest race ever devised.
I kept thinking as I read this how fleshed out and achingly real her characters are, how grounded and alluring the sense of place, how authentic and thrilling the equine detail. And how seductive and terrifying are the water horses.
When my heart wasn’t in my throat it was lost to this wild place.
The story is told first person from Puck’s POV and from that of Sean Kendrick, a young man who loves horses but most of all his water horse, Corr, and what that love costs him.
Here are some writing samples to give you a feel for the atmosphere and thrill of this book:
The wind is sucking the sound away from me, so as I approach the scene, it seems as if the men are voiceless. The struggle is almost artful, until you get up to it. It’s four men, and they’ve snagged a gray water horse around its neck and by the pastern on one of its hind legs, right above the hoof. They tug and they jump back as the horse lunges and retreats, but they are in a bad place and they know it.
And this:
The water shifts, black then gray-blue then black again, the froth of a white ruffled collar, and then, out of the froth, we all see it. A dark horse’s head surges above the water, jaw wide open. And then, before the sea swallows the first, we see a chestnut mare break the surface, along with a brief glimpse of a brown spine curving in the water alongside it. Then they’re all gone beneath the water and I have goose bumps creeping up my arms.

Haiku by the sea

2011-10-18T07:30:00.000-07:00

I'm in musing mode. So here are a few haiku that washed up in the shore of my mind or whatever.

next to me a clunk

along the deserted strand,

airborne gull dropped a clam

tiny periscopes,

those black cormorants fishing

in the tidal wash

so fast the sand crab

scuttles into the jetty,

was he there at all?

sanderlings skitter

like a flock of wind-up toys

from the rushing wave

Food, what is it good for?

2011-10-16T10:14:00.000-07:00

Are we at war with our food or what? Listeria in cantaloupes and cheese. E-coli in lettuce and beef. Salmonella in eggs and chicken.

The world has come a long way in fighting disease and pests, but we’ve also created new problems. Our reliance on mega-agriculture where crops on grown on a huge scale with mechanized production and long haul transportation increases time from farm to table and may allow some bacteria to multiply and spread.

Pesticides and herbicides have led to resistant weeds and insects that then lead to a new spiral of poisons. Are you really at ease eating animals treated with growth hormones and antibiotics? It’s a common practice.
*

Since this year’s Blog Action Day is all about food, I thought I’d post some things ordinary people might do to make the world a better place.

I prefer not to politicize this blog or make choices for readers who have differing views on social action. For some people it will make sense to protest the corporate nature of today’s farming. For others, a donation to an international aid organization fighting famine will be right.

But what I’m going to suggest are things everyone can do without regard to political or social views:
If you have a garden or even a planter box grow some of your own food.
Frequent your local farmer’s market, thus supporting small-scale farmers.
Buy organically-grown if you can afford to.
Check your supermarket for locally-grown produce, which has been increasing in several stores I shop at. Ask you supermarket to start the practice if they haven’t. What this does is support smaller farms, cut down time to table and decrease use of fossil fuel to transport.
The cost of naturally-grown meat or hormone-free milk can be high, but I’ve found I can buy it often by keeping an eye out for sales. They are pretty frequent.
*

This may sound simplistic, but if a lot of people take small steps, they add up to leaps forward.
End of soap box probably until Earth Day when I’m compelled to remind everyone to keep our home planet clean and safe.

A sky of stars for Daughter of Smoke & Bone and Like Mandarin

2011-10-11T07:05:00.000-07:00

I recently gave five stars on Goodreads to two very different books, DAUGHTER OF SMOKE & BONE and LIKE MANDARIN. Both are gorgeously written and have characters and stories that have substance and linger in my memory so that I want to talk about them here, too.

I’d read Laini Taylor’s Lips Touch (a National Book Award finalist) and Dreamdark books and been enchanted. But now they feel like an overture for the magnificent symphony that is DAUGHTER OF SMOKE & BONE. Ms. Taylor has brought it all to this work—unforgettable characters, gripping storytelling with surprising twists, depth of meaning and lyric, yet biting, style. (Example: His memories were knives, and he was not pleased to have them turned against him.)
I don’t even know where to begin, because I remain stunned by so many things in this story. The quirky main character, Karou, has a mysterious past, and her strange family deals in secrets she can only guess at. Taylor’s storytelling is like a trail of bread crumbs that lead us slowly, skillfully to the astonishing answers.
In a way, this is Romeo and Juliet among angels and demons, but it’s so much more than that. Taylor pits bigotry, hatred and war against hope, tolerance and love. And she does it all within richly-detailed human and fantastical worlds. I was both grounded and enchanted by her descriptions of places from the souks of Marrakesh and streets of Prague to the land of the chimaera.
My heart was ripped out at the end, but I don’t want to give much away, because I really hope you’ll all read this one. I can’t wait for its sequel.
Here’s a taste of the writing style:
A thrill along every nerve ending. Her body, alert and alive. She was hunted, she was prey, and she didn’t even have her knife tucked in her boot, little thinking she’d need it on a visit to the graverobber.
And this:
He stood revealed. The blade of his long sword gleamed white from the incandescence of his wings—vast shimmering wings, their reach so great they swept the walls on either side of the alley, each feather like the wind-tugged lick of a candle flame.

*

LIKE MANDARIN is a contemporary YA debut by Kirsten Hubbard that I wish I’d read even sooner. It was released in March.
The Wyoming badlands are as much a character in this story as Grace or Mandarin--two teenagers who seem as opposite as day and night. This rocky, windswept landscape interrupted by barbed wire fences and small towns is a place with wide vistas but narrow viewpoints, where people like what's known and distrust what's new. I really like that Ms. Hubbard brings such authenticity to this contemporary YA story. These characters make bad choices and big mistakes but they help each other find what they're really looking for and, hopefully, change the course of their lives. This is a story that sticks to you for all the right reasons. Some beautiful writing, too.
Here's a sample of a badlands moment:
I'd wandered through the Washokey Badlands Basin so many times I'd memorized the feeling. The forlorn boom of wind. A sky big enough to scare an atheist into prayer. No wonder cowboys sang about being lonesome.

Have you read them? Did they touch you, too?

Soft and sweet

2011-10-06T16:57:00.000-07:00

steady showers--just

me and falling pink lanterns

from golden rain trees

Been gone a few days. Had a lovely, rain walk.

The sky was showing

2011-10-01T06:59:00.000-07:00

What a showy, showy night! A bit of thunder to startle the senses. Stark white and soot black clouds blowing through in late afternoon, leaving behind the kind of sky and air that makes you crackle with anticipation and wonder.

The sky was showing it's glory and using its voice to get everyone's attention.

I believe these folks were celebrating Rosh Hashanah, tossing bread into the sea and drawing some enthusiastic sea gulls.

I'm not Jewish but my understanding is this New Year ritual is a spiritual wake-up call, a time to cast-off the bad and savor the sweet. The evening before I heard a sonorous note being blown and saw a man with a long, curved ram's horn raised to the sky. He was surrounded by at least a hundred people who had probably made the trek to the shore from a temple.
*

Earlier on my walk I came upon these silver strands of sea water, slowing ebbing and flowing.

When the tide is this low, it almost feels you can walk upon the water, venturing to places normally submerged, secret and silent to us.

Like these starfish I found on a bared jetty.

A photographer is the last to fold up his tripod and call it a day as the sun's rosy glow faded to gray, leaving us all with a sense of wonder and renewal.

*Do you ever feel renewed, cleansed by passing storms--be they external or internal? Life can be so hard, but those chances to start afresh come around again and again.

P.S. This being Banned Books Week, I just read one of the best anecdotes on the value of all books on Jemi Fraser's blog. Check it out!

Voices present and past

2011-09-28T08:04:00.000-07:00

Who lives in your neighborhood? There are signposts in at least two languages in California. And you can find many more.

I remember being fascinated when I learned that Mexico had communities founded by German immigrants in the 1800s, and that San Francisco has a Russian cemetery dating from the same period. People have been leaving bits and pieces of themselves and their cultures all over the world for a very long time.

Every once in awhile a nudge like this sign will remind me that as a writer I need to remember the richness of culture that surrounds us. Sometimes you have to dig a little for it as in the article I linked below. It's so good.

Author Susan Straight and photographer/author Doug McCulloh (Disclaimer: They are friends of mine) are doing a series of essays with images on KCET's SoCalFocus blog. This one about a cemetery, dusty and half-forgotten in the midst of industrial buildings, is a keeper. While Susan digs into the Native American and European roots of this place known as Agua Mansa, Doug captures just the right light to portray the fading, bittersweet past.

Thanks to them, I want to reach out and place a hand on the headstones and say, "You're not forgotten. We'll remember the roots, the bones, that are all our ancestors."

Check it out:

http://www.kcet.org/updaily/socal_focus/commentary/notes-of-a-native-daughter/agua-mansa---gentle-waters-californio-roots.html

Adoration of The Fox Inheritance

2011-09-24T20:18:00.000-07:00

I’ve read fiction with pretty decent mysteries, characters and adventures that somehow left me feeling like I ate ice cream for dinner and hadn’t satisfied my hunger. I think what’s missing is substance, something thought-provoking enough to stick long after the book is closed on its final page. But substance is what I get in addition to a great page-turning read from Mary E. Pearson’s THE FOX INHERITANCE, the thrilling and fulfilling sequel to THE ADORATION OF JENNA FOX.
These two books raise questions about the ethics of keeping humans alive with non-human parts. How much “human” is needed to be human? Is just a mind and its memory enough? How far is it ethical to go in saving someone?
In the first book, Jenna is brought back from the brink of death but at the cost of great confusion for her. Something is being kept from her, and as she slowly unravels the mystery, her horror grows. The second book jumps ahead 260 years to a future where, Locke, the protagonist, is constantly faced with uncertainty about what he is and why his old friend, Jenna, abandoned him.
Both characters face a crisis of identity, a questioning of values and an awakening.
I hate spoilers so I don’t want to give away much about these two storylines if you haven’t read the books. Please read them if you like fantasy/sci-fi/dystopian or even if you just like stories with emotional payoff. There’s a lot of that here.
In past interviews, Pearson has said Jenna’s story grew from thoughts that raced through her mind as she faced one of her daughter’s cancer treatment. She began to wonder about what medical advances would come in the future and how far a parent would go to save their child.
In the first book, Pearson shows us that superglue between parent to child that can make some people step over ethical lines into unknown territory. In the second book, she shows how greed can turn those breached boundaries into something really ugly.
I was fascinated by the world-building, the ethical conundrum and the powerful emotional growth of the characters. Five stars from me.
*
And don't forget that it's Banned Book Week and time to support authors who come under attack for tackling controversial topics.

Castles of the mind

2011-09-17T07:08:00.000-07:00

Walking along the beach, as I do, I came across this man and his mighty-fine sandcastle. He didn't mind me taking pictures.

I asked, "How long have you been building this?"

"Since noon," he replied.

It was about 6 p.m. by that time.

I considered those four hours and the more he would put in before the sun swallowed up the daylight and sent him home.

"Don't you mind that it will be gone by morning?" I asked.

"By midnight," he said, laughing and without ceasing the sculpting.

"Do you take pictures?" I asked, still curious. "Enter sandcastle contests?"

He shook his head. He did this for fun, for challenge, for joy. Nothing more.

That got me thinking. Perhaps the most pure creations are not to please audiences or achieve prizes but are simple outpourings of joy and wonder. It's a free-ing notion, don't you think?

And one more thing: I love those upsweeping castle walls he made. I'm going to draw the castle in my fairy tale, bring it to life on a sketchbook page. What fun I shall have!

The places I would go

2011-09-14T09:33:00.000-07:00

In celebration of Talli Roland's newest book launch, WATCHING WILLOW WATTS, she's asked bloggers 'If I could be anyone, I'd be...'. A number of people chose J.K. Rowling for good reason, but I'm going venture a bit back in time and say Diana Wynne Jones for her extraordinary children's books. The list of her titles is longer than a snuggly house scarf and every bit as yummy as a chocolate frog.

I'd love to have lived inside her expansive imagination, to have her wit and skills at laying out compelling stories with twists and depth of content. And, oh, her sense of humor, how much fun that would be. But silly and wacky as her stories can be, they're dead-on serious, as well.

Her tales are never preachy but there's no doubt that even in her magical worlds there are consequences for bullying, intolerance, bigotry or other nasty behavior. Her characters are ordinary kids shoved into extraordinary circumstances, which they figure out how to handle. Sometimes even small acts of bravery are heroic and important is a message that comes through.

When she died of cancer in March at age 76, The Guardian wrote: "Her intelligent and beautifully written fantasies are of seminal importance for their bridging of the gap between "traditional" children's fantasy, as written by CS Lewis or E Nesbit, and the more politically and socially aware children's literature of the modern period, where authors such as Jacqueline Wilson or Melvyn Burgess explicitly confront problems of divorce, drugs and delinquency. "

She started writing as a child, and as a college student at St. Anne's at Oxford, she soaked up lectures from J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S . Lewis. How I'd love to time travel and drop in on one of those sessions.

If you haven't read her, treat yourself. Here's a partial list of her more than 40 titles: HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE, DARK LORD OF DERKHOLM, YEAR OF THE GRIFFIN, FIRE AND HEMLOCK, THE HOMEWARD BOUNDERS, HEXWOOD, POWER OF THREE, THE CHRONICLES OF CHRESTOMANCI, THE DALEMARK QUARTET, ARCHER'S GOON.
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Um, I have to add that if I were to pick a fictional character I'd like to be it would be Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Just sayin'.

The magic touch

2011-09-08T16:09:00.000-07:00

Magic. What is it anyway? Is it a miracle, a wonder, to be had with the snap of fingers, the flick of a wand? Is it alchemy, a transforming power, or an elemental or mathematical equation we’ve yet to discover? Could it be metaphysical, mythological?
Sometimes I read books with magical happenings that leave me dissatisfied with the world-building and explanation of how the magic works. Other times, I romp with the author through a made-up land that feels real and plausible.
This notion of suspending disbelief is said to originate with Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1817 with the publication of biographical sketches of his literary life. He wrote, rather wordily,: “In this idea originated the plan of the ‘Lyrical Ballads’; in which it was agreed, that my endeavours should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic, yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith.”
In other words, get real.
How to do that? The characters must be as real as your annoying little sister or last boyfriend. Lovable but flawed, and that doesn’t mean they bite their fingernails or trip over their feet all the time. It’s the deeper psychological and emotional stuff that makes the reader say, ‘I know that. I’ve seen it. I can relate.’ Then if the characters sprout wings, the reader already has them grounded in reality.
My reason for musing on this is Lev Grossman’s THE MAGICIANS and THE MAGICIAN KING. These books are brilliant if you like smart-ass humor mixed with tragedy, which clearly I do. They pay homage to great fantasy stories of the past but with something of an attitude--a lot of wit and smarts. The characters are pretty much genius-level teens, who grow into young adulthood in the books.
Quentin is a math whiz and nerd who is fixated on a childhood fantasy series set in a land called Fillory, but once Quentin jumps down the rabbit hole he finds monsters come along with magic.
I don’t like to give spoilers, so I’m only going to say that Quentin’s character arc from the start of Book One to the end of Book Two is stunning. He isn’t just an angst-ridden teen who magically becomes a superhero. Rather, he remains annoyingly self-absorbed and flawed but increasingly stronger as though he’s been tempered by fire. Like a true hero, he makes huge sacrifices, but he’s no angel, just a human with a healthy conscience that he has to learn to use.
Quentin’s teen-age crush, Julia--whose only interest in him in book one seems to be to find out how she can get into the school of magic he attends but which rejected her—becomes equally weighted storywise in book two, which alternates between their POVs.
Julia, who already suffers emotional disorders, becomes obsessed with learning how to do magic. She discovers an underground of self-taught magicians where she rises to the top but not without paying terrible dues. As Grossman writes: Her magic had sharp, jagged edges on it that had never been filed down.
When Quentin and Julia intersect in book two worlds hang in the balance. Magic has brought them giddy pleasures and unfathomable loss and pain, but magic itself may go out of the world because of things they’ve done.
I like to give snippets to show writing style and since I love the attitude and voice I’ll give these.
If you’ve ever tried to listen to someone else’s description of their dream, here’s something from Julia’s POV: They pushed on into astrology and ocean magic and even oneiromancy—dream magic. Turns out you can cast some truly amazing shit in your dreams. But after you wake up it all seems kind of pointless, and nobody really wants to hear about it.
Here’s a great scene description from Quentin’s POV: The tide was out, and the sea was not so much calm as limp. Every few minutes it worked up enough energy for a wave that rose up half a foot and then flopped onto the strand with a startling smack, as if to remind everyone that it was still there.
Again, Quentin: He could have used someone stable to hang on to right now, but as it happened, through no particular fault of her own, Julia was not a person one could hang on to. She needed one of those warning decals that they put on airplane parts: NO STEP.
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Sharpen your tools (or claws)

2011-08-31T09:28:00.000-07:00

I heard good buzz about Blake Snyder’s SAVE THE CAT! The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need. I write novels, but a lot can be learned about compelling storytelling from movies. So I ordered Snyder’s book from my county library share system and found I’d ordered the follow-up book by accident.
SAVE THE CAT! Goes to the Movies is packed with insights useful to any writer. Snyder identifies story types and gives examples of movies that fit these structures: Monster in the House, Golden Fleece, Out of the Bottle, Dude with a Problem, Rites of Passage, Buddy Love, Whydunit, Fool Triumphant, Institutionalized and Superhero.
Some of the films he gives as examples will make you nod your head and murmur, “Of course.” Others may surprise you.
I think the message here is not so much there are only a certain number of plotlines that exist in the world, but that a story needs a rock-solid structure first and then can vary the rest of the details. Otherwise, writers run the risk of being wishy-washy, not able to pinpoint in their pitch and, later, to readers what their story really is about.

If you have trouble identifying into which of the categories your story fits, Snyder lists elements that should be there. For instance, under Rites of Passage, it is the hero who must change, not the world around him.

Under Monster in the House, there must be a “sin,” some transgression that let the monster in. Buddy Love requires an incomplete hero who needs another to be whole.
There are lots of valuable tips. But I think I’ll leave you with a game. See if you can figure out what common links there are in the example movies that Snyder gives for each story type. (You can find the answers by reading the book. I’m so mean. Although if some of you try to guess in the comment section, I’ll tell you if you solved it, because I’m not all that mean.)

Monster in the House: Alien; Fatal Attraction; Scream; The Ring; Saw.

Golden Fleece: The Bad News Bears; Planes, Trains and Automobiles; Saving Private Ryan; Ocean’s Eleven; Maria Full of Grace.

Out of the Bottle: Freaky Friday; Cocoon; The Nutty Professor; What Women Want; Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Dude With a Problem: Three Days of the Condor; Die Hard; Sleeping With the Enemy; Deep Impact; Open Water.

Rites of Passage: 10; Kramer vs. Kramer; Ordinary People; 28 Days; Napoleon Dynamite.

Buddy Love: The Black Stallion; Lethal Weapon; When Harry Met Sally; Titanic; Brokeback Mountain.

Whydunit: All the President’s Men; Blade Runner; Fargo; Mystic River; Brick.

Fool Triumphant: Being There, Tootsie; Forrest Gump; Legally Blond; The 40-Year-Old Virgin.

Institutionalized: M*A*S*H; Do the Right Thing; Office Space: Training Day; Crash.

Superhero: Raging Bull; The Lion King; The Matrix; Gladiator; Spider-Man 2.

Nature's helping hand

2011-08-22T08:01:00.000-07:00

the ocean turns from

snow ice to vanilla cream

with the rising sun

My heart melted a little when I forced myself out for this early morning walk and saw the colors of sun on water and dolphins leaping in the surf.

Someone really screwed me and my daughter over yesterday. It is something that damages us financially and emotionally, since it was a betrayal. Usually, I don't post about such things, but I do if I can find a way to work with them on a creative level.

This is one thing that nature, photography, haiku and other forms of writing do for me. They help me balance the anger and grief over something like this. Do you have ways of dealing with setbacks, particularly those you have no control over?

Reflections

2011-08-19T07:03:00.000-07:00

I'm reflecting on three incredible days I spent at WriteOnCon without leaving my home office. I can't say enough about the people who organize this free online conference or about the scores of editors, agents and authors who volunteer to share their tips, encouragement and critiques.

The photo of reflection I took this week while walking along a flat and freshly wet section of beach. The sand looked like it was enamel and it reflected the sky. Otherworldly.

Here are some random tidbits I was wowed with at WriteOnCon.

Are you having trouble coming up with a title? Editor Martha Mihalick says she looks for ideas in Shakespeare, the Bible and poetry. How cool is that tip? *runs to bookshelf*

Author Lisa Schroeder says you need to have a good reason for whatever beginning you chose for your novel. It should be a moment of significance, and you need to ask yourself why you chose that particular moment.

Agent Joanna Volpe really put the heart into what makes middle grade novels special.

Brilliant is a word that often seems to attach itself to author Sarah Rees Brennan. And it's easy to see why if you follow her livejournal blog or read her books. Her hilarious personality comes through in a chat that also delivers plenty of tips. I will never forget the mind puppets.

Picture book authors Tiffany Strelitz Haber and Corey Rosen Schwartz went many extra miles to give personalized rewrites of stanzas to the people who left examples on their post. It was amazing to see what they can do with rhyme, meter and content

I was pretty much wowed by all the panel chats and agent critiques. You can go through the August archives to find everything, but the easiest way for you to cherrypick what to read is to go to the Full Schedule and link from there. The calls for questions or submissions for critiques are obviously closed now that the event is over, but the posts and transcripts of live events can be accessed any time. Do yourself a favor, for both pleasure and personal growth, read. That's another beauty about this conference--it's there whenever you can spare a moment.

A Pharaoh in the Sand and other tales

2011-08-16T22:06:00.000-07:00

I saw this Pharaoh in the sand and thought what a great story title that would be. I've got storytelling on my mind after spending dawn to dark at WriteOnCon today (except for that walk along on the beach, I was crazy-glued to my computer screen).

If you're not at WriteOnCon, you're missing out on this free, online conference. The good news is you can read all the chat transcripts, watch the videos and read posts any time. But it's fun to attend the live events.

Here are some highlights (stuff I loved) from the first day. These are just paraphrased tidbits. You'll get much more out of reading the related posts or transcripts:

A chat with agent Suzie Townsend. She receives about 350 queries every week, so you can imagine how important it is to make yours stand out. Don't tell her, she says, that you heard she likes strong female characters, show her that character in the way you write the query. If she's not engaged by the character, she'll stop reading. She's very open in this chat about how she works with clients--the relationship, the revisions.

A chat with agent Sara Megibow, which covered in depth how she thinks writers should develop platforms.

The best description of magical realism ever by author Nova Ren Suma.

A video of author Sara Zarr discussing pacing. This was so packed with useful tidbits, I took notes. Here's one: By page 30, all the story seeds should be planted--the central conflict and important characters introduced.

Picture book query critiques from author Emma Walton Hamilton. She read and commented on about 50 query letters!

Q&A with agent Jessica Sinsheimer who went many extra miles in answering tons of questions, including mine, which made me all kinds of smiley.

This barely begins to describe what these people, and many other authors, agents and editors are offering. Truly an amazing event, which continues Wednesday and Thursday. Go taste of its goodness. You know you want to.

Prompting Fate (a contest)

2011-08-11T09:54:00.000-07:00

Contest time at The Merry Sisters of Fate. Randomly-chosen winners are trying for a signed advance reader’s copy of THE SCORPIO RACES by Maggie Stiefvater, a signed advance reader’s copy of THE SPACE BETWEEN by Brenna Yovanoff or a signed hardback of BLOOD MAGIC by Tessa Gratton. The authors are the sisters of fate, if you didn’t know.
The picture prompt for this contest is “The Turret Stairs” by Frederic Burton, and here’s my entry, a flash fiction:

He has no choice. Those are his words, not mine. I feel them like a shard of glass, a needle of ice through my heart.

This is the last time—I have no doubt of this—he will press his body to mine, the final touch of soft lips, hot breath upon my neck.

I cannot look at him.

“I am the kingdom,” he says, as though I need convincing. “What I desire, what I prefer, must always be for the good of all.”

Am I not part of all? But I do not speak those words or any other.

My hand rests on stone, cold as a tomb, centuries of terror held captive in these walls. I must climb into the darkness alone while he will step into the light of ten thousand candles and as many dawns.

“It was your hair, they say, that made them so sure.” He loops the end of my braid around his finger—a red-copper ring. A moan escapes him. He pulls his dagger free and cuts the lock, holding it first to his nose and then tucking it within his shirt. “I will mourn you always.”

I face him finally. “You will mourn, and you will suffer every moment of my eternal imprisonment. I would rather they’d sewn a hundred river stones in my hem or made me run in iron boots fresh from the fire than the end you chose. For you did have a choice, you see.”

“I could not sentence you to such a death!”

“But you have, my love, you have.”

misty thoughts

2011-08-07T07:03:00.000-07:00

flannel sky, pewter

sea, soft and silent as stilt

walkers and our ghosts

flapping red flags

break up the gray stillness

scatter my thoughts

a little contemplation, no more

2011-07-29T19:27:00.000-07:00

wind rivers flow,

ripples in shifting sand--

no other trace

day melts to evening,

the ocean leaves behind some

roots upon the shore

Moving images

2011-07-18T06:42:00.000-07:00

I haven't sorted out Blogger's strange reaction to my move yet, but if I can post some pictures this morning, hey, I'm gonna.

My new office window with the only piece of stained glass I ever made. Took a class, cut my fingers, decided this would be it for me and stained glass. But I like it. And it's the first thing I put in my new living space.

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The view, looking down, from my second-story office (and connected room). This white picket fence and garden have been almost a landmark on the urban beach street where my late in-laws lived for decades.

Venice Beach has these wonderful small-town streets in a residential area a block from the ocean, where houses face pedestrian walks. Cars travel and park in the alleys behind the houses.

This is the state of the walls of my room when they had to be scraped of old, peeling paint (probably lead-based, eew) before we could paint them with new, zero-VOC paint. I love that my room doesn't smell of paint fumes and that I know I'm not breathing toxins.

My room, painted, and before I moved in a ton o' stuff.

From a beach walk. Yay.

I'm still hoping that my blog won't vanish as I complete the email transactions. But, for the moment, here I am. I miss y'all.

well, um, not so much

2011-07-13T18:50:00.000-07:00

I'd hoped to have this blog all set by now. But, no. For some unfathomable reason Blogger makes changing the primary email on a blog a nightmare. I thought I'd figured it out, read the Help forum posts, set up my secondary blog authors for backup, etc. Then my daughter, who's pretty computer savvy, and I tackled the project.
Since we read that you will lose all your photos from Picasa if you transfer the blog administrator email, we set up a Gmail account and transferred all the photos first. Then we meticulously followed the many steps indicated, using different computers and browsers as instructed.
In the end, I have this blog, which confusedly has two contributors--me here and me on the old version. This new one didn't bring my profile or reader list of 317 blogs I follow, but it's on the old one. I had to write a new profile for this one.
I have no idea what's going on and am frustrated beyond anything I can really explain. I don't think I've ever run across anything this convoluted in my life.
Anyway, just trying to change an email because I moved has ended up costing days of my time, and I still don't know if this blog will go poof when I turn my back.
As I promised before I will find you all if I have to start over. Right now, I think I'll go watch a movie and chill.

Hello, out there

2011-07-11T07:52:00.000-07:00

I have finally finished the physical move but am still buried in boxes and other time sucks, so this is mostly filler (Buffy fans know what I'm talking about). Today I will change the email connected to this blog, carefully following Blogger's instructions and hoping I don't find my blog missing afterward. I've seen scary comments in Help forum about this process. If I disappear, my dear friends, I will find you again!
If all goes well, I should be back to posting regularly within a week. I hope, hope, hope.

Sherman Alexie is my hero

2011-06-10T10:12:00.000-07:00

This man is one of my heroes. I became of aware of Sherman Alexie many years ago when, as a reporter, I covered an event where he spoke to students of a BIA school. He was so authentic, and his words carried weight even when delivered in humor (which he excels at, by the way).

When some people put "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" on banned lists, I was shocked. The book is so compelling, so witty, so important that I couldn't understand any prejudice blinding someone to its value. But then I am often shocked by what people wish to ban.

This semi-autobiographical YA novel never shirks from the horrors of living in poverty and abuse but tells the story with the resilient spirit and humor that Alexie brings to his work. For many hurt kids, on and off reservations, the book is a life raft, a beacon of hope showing a path to a better future.

A friend sent me a link to an article Alexie wrote for The Wall Street Journal that is a must-read for anybody, especially writers. Alexie says books were the most loving and trustworthy things in his life as a child. He read everything from classics to horror and found out that reading about monstrous things could teach him how to battle real monsters in his life.

This quote stuns me: "I write in blood because I remember what it feels like to bleed."

Please, please, read the whole article. You owe it to yourself and your readers.

P.S. I continue to post sporadically whilst in process of moving and turning my entire life upside down. *grins and groans*

I never want to live without stories

2011-05-28T05:40:00.000-07:00

Despite the difficulties in my life right now, I keep on reading and want to share a few good books with you. I've put these reviews on Goodreads where I go by Patricia J. O'Brien.

And I've added a great quote about reading and writing at the bottom of this post. Makes me want to shout, YES!

I'd never want to live without stories and storytellers. I can't imagine a life without imagination and wonder and contemplation and adventure and knowledge and the deliciousness of what if.
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BLOOD RED ROAD by Moira Young

Oh. My. I started reading this advance copy weeks ago and put it aside because I had trouble adjusting to the narrative style. I'm so glad I picked it up again and soon found myself completely at ease with the language. I wouldn't want this marvelous story written any other way. I haven't seen a female protagonist this flawed and tough and compelling since Katniss.
It's dystopian in a Mad Max kind of world, and the narrator, Saba, doesn't read or write. Words come out as they sound, and there aren't quotation marks. Still, it's not hard once you get into the cadence. Here's a sample:
Yer young, she says, an strong. A natural-born fighter from the look of it. I knew it right off. You'll be perfect.
Perfect fer what? I says.
She straightens up. Looks at me with her small dark eyes, cold as stones.
Perfect, she says, fer cage fightin.
The little hairs on my arms stand on end. I shiver.
That's right girlie, she says. You better be afeared. Cage fightin's mean. Nasty. An it's big business in Hopetown. You'll do well fer us.
I ain't doing nuthin fer you, I says.
You ain't gotta choice, she says.
You cain't make me do nuthin, I says.
Oh you'll do ezzackly what I tell you, she says

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THE LIAR SOCIETY by Lisa & Laura Roecker

Sassy, fun and mysterious. For anyone who's read Lisa and Laura Roecker's blog you know they can be hilarious. Their debut YA has a taste of Veronica Mars to it with a smart, gutsy protagonist, Kate, who won't let herself be intimidated in her quest to find out why her best friend died in a suspicious fire. A list of suspects grows as she discovers that many students and faculty of her private school hide secrets.
Kate is urged on by emails from her dead friend, which make the reader wonder if the story is paranormal or if Kate is being led on by someone. I hate spoilers so I'm not going to sketch out the plot, but I liked the way Laura and Lisa kept adding new suspects and clues. Kate's sidekicks--a nerdy neighbor with a crush on her and a hot bad boy, who may or may not be a suspect--are nicely drawn and, eventually, endearing.

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THE MAGICIANS by Lev Grossman

I've heard some people call The Magicians a Harry Potter for adults, but that doesn't begin to describe this coming-of-age tale, written in a great voice of a nineteen-year-old guy who finds out he's got a talent for magic. Lev Grossman spins a fine fantasy but does it with literary style and a complex company of characters who are smart, sly and flawed. Quentin and his friends at a secret school of magic have extraordinary power, but they're teenagers, complete with insecurities, hormones, jealousy and rash decisions. When they step in it, some really bad things happen. My heart broke near the end of the book, but the actual end returns to a satisfying bit of hope and humor and a measured appreciation of the world and its mysteries.
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I stumbled across this great quote by Michelle Obama when she talked to some school girls in England. Full article.
"So I would encourage you all to read, read, read. Just keep reading. And writing is another skill. It's practice. It's practice. The more you write, the better you get. Drafts--our kids are learning the first draft means nothing. You're going to do seven, 10 drafts. That's writing, it's not failure, it's not the teacher not liking you because it's all marked up in red. When you get to be a good writer, you mark your own stuff in red, and you rewrite, and you rewrite, and you rewrite. That's what writing is."

I've got my red pen (actually purple) and I'm going to revise two chapters of my dark fairy tale today. How about you?

Voices lifted to the night sky

2011-05-24T06:52:00.000-07:00

By the waters

the waters of Babylon

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We lay down and wept

and wept for thee Zion

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We remember thee remember

thee remember thee Zion

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Two family friends, sisters Montserrat and Maximilian, led a small group in singing "Babylon" at sunset. We were a dozen or so family/friends remaining at my father-in-law's house in Venice Beach and we'd walked out to do one of his favorite things--watch the sunset. (It was a gray sunset, not this one that I'd shot another day. I wasn't taking pictures during the wake.)

We learned the three verses and sang in rounds. I couldn't have asked for a more perfect way to end an incredible day. My heart swelled and soared. I think from the expressions around me that the singing did the same for everyone else. Thank you so much, ladies, for pulling us into that circle.

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The lyrics are based on a Psalm. Besides use by Jewish and Christian religious groups, many composers and poets have borrowed from or referenced these powerful words. Among them, Giuseppe Verdi, Stephen Schwartz, Don McLean, T.S. Eliot, Stephen Vincent Benet, Paulo Coelho.

That long link to culture would have pleased Ken. He and his wife, Fern, surrounded themselves with friends who were writers, artists and musicians.

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In the house, we put dozens of his photographic prints around and a slide show of his pictures. At least fifty people came, bearing love.
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I'm still in an emotional--highly-charged but also very drained--state. I'm going to be making a move back to Venice and trying not to lose the momentum on my dark fairy tale, which is two-thirds complete. So my blogging may be sporadic during the next couple of months. I will visit you all when I can. As always, I thank you so much for visiting me. Peace.

Farewell to a man who changed my life

2011-05-05T06:05:00.000-07:00

Walking on Venice beach, I saw lots of snowy egrets in the last few days. I'm used to seeing them along lakes and wetlands but not so much where waves meet sand. This shot reflects they way I feel right now--deeply reflective.

My father-in-law died Saturday. Ken was a quiet man, a private man, quite the opposite personality of my mother-in-law, Fern. But between them they exposed me to a world of wonder. They changed my life, showing me the richness of experiences available if we open ourselves up, reach out.

They always traveled, often spending months abroad, staying with people they'd met or with friends of friends all around the globe.

Life was meant to be explored, to be tasted and contemplated and shared. She did it through words. He did it through pictures, capturing extraordinary moments in his portraits and landscapes. When people visited, they begged for him to do a slide show of his images, many of which made it into galleries and on Corbis. I think this link to Ocean View, an exhibit at the UCR/California Museum of Photography is still viable.

(The link takes you to the main page. You must click on artists and Ken O'Brien to see his work, I discovered when checking the link.)

Ken gave me my first SLR camera and taught me how to compose photos and how to develop them in his darkroom. He showed me by example that capturing good images means getting out and about, being on the lookout and then being patient, waiting for the right light, finding the best composition.

In no way am I offering these shots on this post as examples. They are just what I found while walking and contemplating his long, well-lived life. And I shot them on the fly with a phone camera--something that would have shocked his meticulous nature.

He was a man who'd always kept himself trim and active, but his health declined and turned him into a shell of who he was. His passing was expected. His friends and family knew it was time for him to bid adieu to this world with all its wonder and pain.

The Easter egg party I wrote about recently was an incredible send-off. So many people were there who had known him for years and spent happy days at his home. Normally, he napped a lot in his final days but he sat in his wheelchair for the whole party. I like to think he absorbed all the love that filled that house.

Anyway, that's why I've been absent from the blog world and will be sporadic in the days ahead as I have many family issues to deal with. I will visit you all when I can. Thank you to the new followers and all who comment. It always means a lot to me.

Sweet mystery

2011-04-26T08:44:00.000-07:00

What is more mysterious than life, than the intricacies of nature? This fern captivated me from the moment I noticed it in the garden of my late mother-in-law. Her name, too, was Fern.

The writer in me sees: A fairy's chariot. A creature from a distant planet. A deep sea being, like an octopus, curling into itself when flung upon land. A mystery waiting to unfold.

I love that my eyes, my mind, take these leaps. And I know that helps my writing.

I'm currently two-thirds done with my fairy tale WIP and ready to take the giant leap into the climax and resolution, where all the complex, mysterious threads come together. I've been hearing the characters' dialogue for weeks. I haven't written down these confrontations, because I see them, I know them. They are developing, waiting to unfold and will be there when I need them.

Here is another view of a fern frond unfolding. This one looks like an upside down seahorse, doesn't it?

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Fern loved the sea, lived by it most of her life. She also loved literature but rarely let anyone see her writings, her words scribbled on backs of envelopes, scraps of lined paper or sometimes typed.

After she died, my daughter found a folder of her writings with a note (on an envelope) to me. It read, "Did I ever show you, I think not, these poor, few travesties of lyric songs. You may see them, dear."

A moment, please. My eyes tear, my heart aches. I do miss her.

Since April is National Poetry month, I'll share one of Fern's poems, hoping that I found the most finished draft she wrote.

She called it No Myth.

Forewarned, Psyche dared not find

the face of Love in light,

nor flare of discontent which might

unseat that lord; no sight

reveal if he be radiant or foul.

And yet he knows her contour,

slant and color of the eye,

her soul, computerized,

conditioned, tidied, tamed,

claimed, tuned to die,

he shoots the shaft, reversed, towards home.

Did she risk an open query,

haggle over price to pay,

trade, while tugging at Love's sleeve,

deceit for immortality?

Or make that godly, girlish move

aware, sure, pure in sin,

knowing lone Beauty, Love

needs not consort with Truth to win.

Thank you, Fern, for opening my eyes to so much, to the magic and the truth all around us.

(once again, I cross my fingers that Blogger won't make too much mess of the paragraph spacing)

Earth Day: This, Not That

2011-04-22T00:01:00.000-07:00

THIS.

For a better Earth.

NOT THAT.

THIS.

NOT THAT.

April 22, Earth Day, 2011. We can all do something. Clean up a park or beach. Plant a tree. Join an ecological organization.

Natural Resources Defense Council.

2011-04-18T05:54:00.000-07:00

There's a lot to be said for tradition, as I was reminded at an annual gathering to make Ukrainian Easter eggs or pysanky.

About fifty people, who are so ingrained in the fabric of my life that they are all family, came to my father-in-law's home in Venice for a day of egg dying, feasting and beach time.

None of us is Ukrainian, as far as I know. We started doing this years ago when my mother-in-law, who loved art, literature and all things cultural, decided to take a class in the craft, bought the necessary tools and set her vast numbers of friends and family on this annual journey.

She's been gone awhile now, but she would have loved seeing her house filled to the brim with loved ones, having a fantastic time--children skittering around, eyes sparkling, laughing and then settling down to try their small hands at the task.

Some make the intricate, traditional designs that incorporate geometric patterns and symbolic figures. The symbolism dates from pagan fertility celebrations and later Christian beliefs.

Many of our group do free-hand design of anything from abstract to pop. One year, Max, who is an artist, made an egg that looked like ancient Greek pottery.

There's something meditative about the process, which is much more complex than ordinary egg dying. For one thing, the eggs are raw! Yes, that means sometimes there is breakage and tears.

* The dying is batik-method, using non-edible dyes. With a stylus, the person scoops up a tiny bit of beeswax, melts it over an alcohol lamp and draws thin lines of wax to hold color. So if the design calls for white, the first lines are done before any dying. Then the eggs are dipped in each dye (from light to dark colors) for each part of the design to be waxed in that color.

The person in this photo is locking in yellow with the wax.

* When the egg is done, it is soaked in solvent to remove the wax. Dona, the Wonder Woman, who has brought all the equipment for the party for decades, takes home the finished eggs, blows the insides out and varnishes them to bring back the next year. She does this for students in classes at her pottery studio, as well.

* If that's not enough, Dona also makes enchiladas for the annual event. John makes chili. I make deviled eggs (for 50 people that's a lot of peeling!). Other people brought pulled pork, salads, tamales, dips, cakes. We ate well. We created well. We loved each other anew.

Fern, we did you proud.

I read somewhere that pysanky derives from a word meaning to write. So you write on the eggs. I think a bit of the person's spirit, what makes them unique, extends to their eggs.

* I had a contemplative, sensory-filled, fun and satisfying weekend. Hope you did, too.

(PS. Still have trouble with Blogger's paragraph spacing, as I know others are, too. So if this is wonky, that's why)

Pitch Perfect

2011-04-13T16:37:00.000-07:00

Writing a killer pitch is one of the most important things a writer can do besides writing the best book possible. Those few lines may be with your book for its entire life, luring an agent to represent you, snagging a publisher to print your book and enticing readers to choose it.

Today I sat in on a sort of pitch session with an agent. I didn't have to leave my home office to do it.
WriteOnCon, the fabulous free online summer conference, offers chats and events with agents and editors all year. This time Natalie Fischer read through a ton of queries that had been sent in previously.

Her instant reactions are priceless as far as I'm concerned. Any writer, even an agented and published one, can learn by watching an agent tear through submissions. This is reality. There's not a lot of time, there are tons of people jostling to sell a book, and the agent has pretty much seen it all and has personal preferences.

I applaud writers for putting their queries up for scrutiny in public. I did it last summer during the conference and learned quite a bit from the process. Many queries are quite good, and the stories sound interesting, but they get shot down because they sound too much like all the other books. This is something we all need to consider in a very competitive market. What makes your story truly unusual?

If you missed today's live event, you can read the transcript. The any-time availability is one of the things I love about WriteOnCon. So what are you waiting for? Go read what Natalie had to say, and, while you're over there, check out this chat with Michael Bourret and Jim McCarthy. It rocked.

Walking on the sky

2011-04-09T06:31:00.001-07:00

I went for a walk in a cloudburst of hail and rain and found--a portal.
*
What land is this where the sky is torn and lies beneath my feet?
*
I have walked this path a hundred times and never seen this place.
*
Between dimensions.
*
A pause.

No smack talking in La-La Land

2011-04-04T20:12:00.000-07:00

I heart you, Oxford English Dictionary,
my new BFF,
for keeping up-to-date
on pap and Wags and TMI

OMG, I can’t believe you
validated our texting world
of abbreviated speak.
No smack talk. No.
I raise a glass of flat white to you
and munch a doughnut hole.

And I won’t show off my muffin top, LOL
*
*
The Oxford English Dictionary announced its newest words selected for publication (some used above in my silly poem) and a bunch were text-talk.

FYI, the dictionary carries the modest subtitle: The definitive record of the English language. It dates back 150 years and includes the history and meaning of 600,000 words. The photo is early editor James Murray in the Scriptorium.

It’s published by Oxford University, which dates from the 11th century and is the oldest university in the English-speaking world. Among a long list of writers associated with Oxford: Lewis Carroll, Oscar Wilde, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Graham Greene, William Golding, V.S. Naipaul, Phillip Pullman, John Donne, T.S. Elliot.

*
*
Don’t you feel erudite, now? Here are a few of my favorites from the new list: couch surfer
fabless
dot-bomb
rotoscoped
tinfoil hat
ick factor
*
* la-la-la-la-la. I'm singing like the la-la land girl I am. *grins*
*
PS: I'm having a world of trouble with keeping paragraph spaces in my Blogger posts. This is about the sixth try. So please forgive any weirdness.

Why I Love Diana Wynne Jones

2011-04-01T06:54:00.000-07:00

I remember the first time I read HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE. I was looking for something fresh. The book's protagonist, Sophie, immediately became one of my all-time favorite heroines. Based on the wit, imagination and sheer fun of that book, I purchased many more books by Diana Wynne Jones and filled a bookshelf with them.

You've probably heard that this talented, prolific children's author died last week. Beautiful homage was paid her by Neil Gaiman and Maggie Stiefvater.

I want to talk about the joy she brought me through her books. The dedication for HOWL'S is revealing in itself: "The idea for this book was suggested by a boy in a school I was visiting, who asked me to write a book called The Moving Castle. I wrote down his name, and put it in such a safe place that I have been unable to find it ever since. I would like to thank him very much."

Since I love good opening lines, here is this one:

In the land of Ingary, where such things as seven-league boots and cloaks of invisibility really exist, it is quite a misfortune to be born the eldest of three. Everyone knows you are the one who will fail first, and worst, if the three of you set out to seek your fortunes.

So poor Sophie is pretty much cursed since birth. She's so lonely she talks to the hats she makes for the family business. She's dutiful and resigned to her fate until a witch turns her into something unthinkable--an elderly woman. What Sophie does from then on and her interactions with the vain Wizard Howl are hilarious. Both characters develop in fabulous ways.

Here's a sample, just a little treat, of when Sophie accepts she's now an old woman instead of a girl and sets out to find a new life. But first, she badly needs a walking stick:

Evidently her eyes were not as good as they had been. She thought she saw a stick, a mile or so on, but when she hauled on it, it proved to be the bottom end of an old scarecrow someone had thrown into the hedge. Sophie heaved the thing upright. It had a withered turnip for a face. Sophie found she had some fellow feeling for it. Instead of pulling it to pieces and taking the stick, she stuck it between two branches of the hedge, so that it stood looming rakishly above the may, with the tattered sleeves on its stick arms fluttering over the hedge.

"There," she said, and her cracked old voice surprised her into giving a cracked old cackle of laughter. "Neither of us are up to much, are we, my friend? Maybe you'll get back to your field if I leave you where people can see you." She set off up the land again, but a thought struck her and she turned back. "Now if I wasn't doomed to failure because of my position in my family," she told the scarecrow, "you could come to life and offer me help in making my fortune. But I wish you luck anyway."

She cackled again and walked on. Perhaps she was a little mad, but then old women often were.

If you've seen Hayao Miyazaki's anime version but not read the book, do yourself a favor and read it. The two are not remotely similar.

Diana Wynne Jones surprised me again and again with many other stories, such as the Chrestomanci, Derkholm and Dalemark books. Her stories are creative and courageous with undertones of deeper meaning. For example, Witch Week shows kids overcoming prejudice, but the story is told with Jones's wit and satire.

In 1999, she won a Mythopoeic Award for DARK LORD OF DERKHOLM, an amazing story that shows the devastating effect of exploitation. The magical creatures and folks of this realm are forced each year to put on a war of good versus evil for tourists who come from another world, presumably like ours. The wizard chosen to portray the Dark Lord in this story is injured and his children--both griffins and humans--must find a way to organize the tour and try to stay alive.

In accepting the award, Wynne Jones said she believed children's books should be first about enjoyment and then should encourage children to think for themselves.

And because she was known to poke fun at her own genre, and because it's the first of April, after all, I'll leave you with the first and last A to Z entries in her tongue-in-cheek THE TOUGH GUIDE TO FANTASYLAND, which Terry Pratchett called "an indispensable guide for anyone stuck in the realms of fantasy without a magic sword to call their own."

ADEPT. One who has taken what amounts to the Post-graduate Course in Magic. If a Magic User is given this title, you can be sure she/he is fairly hot stuff. However, the title is neutral and does not imply that the Adept is either Good or Evil. Examine carefully each Adept you encounter and be cautious, even if she/he seems friendly.

ZOMBIES. These are just the Undead, except nastier, more pitiable, and generally easier to kill. When you slash your Sword across their stomachs--which you will inevitably do--they watch their impossibly decayed intestines pour out in a glob, and then look at you with an expression of ultimate pathos before crumbling at the knees. Naturally they Smell quite strongly.

Thanks for all the delicious realms of fantasy you created, Diana Wynne Jones.

Been soaring

2011-03-26T20:07:00.000-07:00

In my next life I may need to be a pelican. I've always loved to watch them dive like arrows into the sea or skim the edge of waves as if their wingtips could brush the surface without consequence.

On my vacation this week I discovered the Dana Point Headlands, which brought the pelicans up very close and personal.

The headlands is an enormous coastal cliff that towers above Dana Point Harbor to the south and Strand Beach to the north. I've often walked at its foot and have posted pictures of the rocky beach, but I never knew there was a trail on top.

From the top, which is an ecological preserve bursting with native plants, you can see 180 degrees of blue-slate ocean and horizon. It is one of few places where you see the slight curvature of the earth due to the unbroken expanse and the height of the promontory.

This time of year, gray whales are migrating back north after spending the winter in their nursery in Mexico.

I saw a mother and baby! Mostly, I saw a bit of their backs as they surfaced. In the three visits I made to the headlands, I saw whales each time, including a nice tail flip.

Whale watching boats linger below the cliff (you can see one in this picture) and then travel up the coast from the harbor. One of the boats was surrounded by dozens of porpoises, popping out of the water like flying fish.

This year, I remembered to bring my binoculars, which are necessary if you want to see much.

* *

The pelicans kept astounding me, too, appearing silently from below the cliff.

Not at all silent was a mockingbird who sang every song known to bird--chit-chit-chit, neider-neider, tweet, chirrup, chirrup, chip, twee-twee, wrrrrrr, cherree, pip, pip, pip. Or some such language. I was there for hours, and he rarely stopped.

The bush sunflowers were all in bloom, and the air was filled with the sharp tangy scent coming from a bluish bush and the sweet butterscotch aroma given off by California everlasting.

Between the fresh sea breeze and the heady aroma from the plants, I couldn't get enough deep breaths. It was intoxicating.

There was the continuous rush and rumble of waves against cliffs, a far-off fog horn and the querulous bark of sea lions who sunned on a buoy. I felt transported to a simpler time and place.

Later, I was back in San Clemente for sunset.

The wind was cold and howling across the sea, causing a string of little girls holding hands to skitter down the wood-plank pier shrieking.

I walked to the end where the water spreads out for unfathomable distance, and all the world is reduced to sea and sky. (And, of course, other people taking pictures who I included, because everyone knows that shots are better with people in them.)

I leave you with an ocean enameled by sunset and a few hardy surfers waiting to catch the last wave of the day.

I did work some on my fairy tale, mostly brainstorming ideas and came up with some I'm excited about. Two crit groups this week. Can't wait.

Anatomy of a good read

2011-03-19T13:54:00.000-07:00

MR. MURDER took me where I thought I’d never go.

Dean Koontz’s novel pits a mystery writer with a successful career and happy family life against a professional assassin who is also a madman.

After I finished this book recently, I posted on Goodreads: “Wow. I had to make myself read this after a friend suggested I might find it interesting to study the way Dean Koontz alternated POVs, including the antagonist's viewpoint. Usually, I don't read psychological thrillers, because I'm a wimp and get too scared. This book captivated me with riveting story, clean prose and wonderful characterizations. It also surprised me a number of times. Excellent storytelling, and I'm so glad I got over my scaredy-catness and read it. And I have to agree that he handled POV switches masterfully and to great effect.”

I’m writing in alternating POVs in my WIP, a fractured fairy tale, switching at times to the antagonist. My villain is twisted and unpredictable, and I’m having a great time creating her, adding as much depth to her as to my protagonist.

Reading MR. MURDER now (published 18 years ago) is perfect timing for me. His antagonist is so twisted and frightening, but I grew to understand what made him tick through Koontz’s carefully-built character arc. This was the best part of reading this book for me as I study how Koontz made the story more chilling by letting us walk in the killer’s shoes and see through his eyes.

We learn just enough in the first scenes to be scared of this man who carries fake identification, a pistol with a silencer and admits to having holes in his memory. He dispassionately sizes up women he might have sex with and then kill, as long as he draws no attention to himself or messes up his scheduled assassinations. Everything he does is planned, calculated, and apparently orchestrated by some handler he can’t remember. He doesn’t know his real name or family.

He feels empty, as Koontz writes, “He feels as if he is a hollow man, made of the thinnest glass, fragile, only slightly more substantial than a ghost.”

All this before the reader is 30 pages in. Then the killer goes renegade, pulled by some destiny to find a life. “I need to be someone,” he says.

Because I don’t like to give spoilers, that’s all I’m going to say about a story that gallops headlong into terrifying territory. I strongly suggest reading the book if you haven’t and are interested in writing a great antagonist.

As for overall viewpoint, I’m one of those readers who must have clean POV changes or I’m booted out of story. I like the viewpoint switches to occur by chapter or by scenes separated by breaks and with action anchoring the reader in the new character’s perspective. There are very few authors skillful enough to do it within scenes, Neil Gaiman being one of them.

Koontz used multiple POVs in MR. MURDER. He did it with scene breaks, and the opening lines of each scene made it clear which person was thinking. I never questioned where I was or why I was there. That’s another key issue—the reason to switch heads is to convey information or perspective that can’t be gotten another way and is important to the story arc. It should add depth, not just words.

Dissecting Koontz’s viewpoint changes, the opening lines if each break include the following (this is not verbatim, just partial lines)
1(protagonist)—Martin Stillwater suddenly realized he was repeating the same two words in a dreamy whisper. . . “I need. . . I need. . .I need. . .”
2(antagonist)—The killer’s flight from Boston arrives on time. . .At the rental agency counter he discovers that his reservation has not been misplaced or misrecorded, as often happens. . .Everything seems to be going his way.
3(protagonist’s child)—Daddy wasn’t Daddy.
4(antagonist)—Like a shark cruising cold currents in a night sea, the killer drives. This is his first time in Kansas City, but he knows the streets.
5(protagonist)—While the girls were upstairs, brushing their teeth and preparing for bed, Marty methodically went from room to room on the first floor, making sure all the doors and windows were locked.

This book is too wickedly good to give away the plot, so I don’t want to go into who the killer really is or what happens to the family. But here is a snippet I loved as a writer:

He said, “You and I were passing the time with novels, so were some other people, not just to escape but because. . .because, at its best, fiction is medicine.”
“Medicine?”
“Life is so damned disorderly, things just happen, and there doesn’t seem any point to so much of what we go through. Sometimes it seems the world’s a madhouse. Storytelling condenses life, gives it order. Stories have beginnings, middles, ends. And when a story is over, it meant something, by God, maybe not something complex, maybe what it had to say was simple, even naïve, but there is meaning. And that gives us hope, it’s a medicine.”

I hope this is useful to other writers, or readers. I was fascinated.

I may or may not have Internet access this coming week, so if I don't respond to comments, that's why. Have a great week, everyone.

Taking a moment to celebrate

2011-03-17T12:35:00.000-07:00

Happy St. Patrick's Day--before a chance to post my wishes for a safe and fun day slides away. I've been busy!
*
I baked brown soda bread yesterday for family in Venice. Today, I baked another loaf to take to a friend's house for corned-beef dinner. Add a Guinness, and, well, yum sums it up.
*
The best soda bread in my opinion is made with whole grains, oats, buttermilk, a dash of brown sugar and, of course, baking soda. There's no need to add anything (except a slab of butter) to this flavorful bread.
*
My daughter is studying to become a Pilates instructor, so yesterday I also took a lesson with her that was truly amazing. She's going to be a great teacher, and I'm fast becoming a convert to this exercise program.
*
Plus, I've written another chapter of my fairy tale, so I'm feeling energized and productive, even while my heart still grieves for the losses in my personal life and in the world right now.

The tide was super high in Venice today. I remember reading something about the full moon this weekend being closer than it's been in 18 years and, so, may affect the tides.

I took this photo on another day when the tide was low, and with a touch of pink to the clouds, instead of the lid of gray there was this morning.

Here are some off-the-top-of-my-head haiku that floated from the sea breeze into my muddled brains.

tide reaches so high,

water laps the lifeguard

tower called Driftwood.

sandpipers huddle

in the weak dawn; a fishing trawler

sways on choppy seas.

two monster-bright eyes

emerge from swirling mist; clawed

tractor sweeping sand.

Cheers! Slainte!

Each voice, each life

2011-03-12T05:39:00.000-08:00

Author Jo Knowles wrote an excellent post titled Write like there's no one in the room.

There's something that frees us to take risks, explore our boundaries, let our spirit rise when we are not concerned about eyes watching or critics judging. And each of us has something to say, in a way no one else will say it.

Each voice. Each person. Each life. That's what's on my mind. The images coming from Japan bring me to my knees, cause such anguish and heartbreak.

I grieve for the country. I cry for each person whose voice is gone.

None of us know if we will live a century or be handed an abbreviated life as I wrote about in my last post.

We have no control over some things, but we can control how we spend our time, how we treat other people and what kind of legacy we leave. I am guilty of many mistakes in life and can only hope that each time I pick myself up and go on that I will do better.

Recent events hammer home to me how much each second matters, how my petty worries are insignificant within the bigger scope of life, how I have a responsibility to myself and others to let my light--whatever it is--shine and not shroud it in fear and self-doubt.

We live on a volatile planet in a volatile universe. I have loved this Earth, this tiny planet in the vastness of space, with the fierceness of a mother. I have feared her, too.

This Earth, in all its beauty and danger, is what we have. What we do is up to us.

Photo of a supernova remnant, courtesy of NASA.

(Important update: For those of you who know blogger Claire Dawn in Iwate, she has posted that she is safe. I am filled with such relief.)

The Day After

2011-03-07T08:55:00.000-08:00

Irene. Krista. Judy. Kevin. Joanne. These are people I loved who died of cancer.

They had so much still to live, to give. And they died with too much pain.

The reason I'm writing about this today is this weekend I attended a memorial for Jo--a funny, vibrant, compassionate woman who loved her family and her animals fiercely. She did not want to give in to cancer. She fought hard.

One of her sons swallowed his grief to talk about her loving heart. Another son made a touching slide show of her life. As we watched, we saw the joy and love that had filled so many years. We laughed at the German Shepherd trying to curl into her lap. We cried at her last visits to the stables.

As painful as memorial services are they give us the chance to reflect on the lives of those we love, to remember how they touched us or made us better. That is an honor, not a burden.

*

When my friend Kevin was struggling to stay alive, I was shocked to be diagnosed with the same cancer he had. Normally, I wouldn't share much about this on a blog about writers and stories, but what is dying but the final bookend of life and what is writing except about life?

I still remember his reaction when I told him I had been struck with the same cancer. He let loose an expletive of the strongest kind, and I actually liked that a friend would loudly voice that anger and not give me pity or platitudes. I am one of the lucky ones, having survived several surgeries and treatment. I'm still here after a dozen years. *knocks on wood*

Kevin was an artist, curator, writer, musician--a true creative soul. But he told me he had come to accept that his life might end long before he'd anticipated. I wrote this simple poem as I struggled in the early days of my own diagnosis. It's just a reminder to me to live each day as if it were the last, to be clear in my goals, compassionate in my interactions to the best of my ability.

"I’ve accepted an
abbreviated version
of my life,"
he said.

An elegant,
gritty turn of phrase.
Wish I’d imagined it,
not inherited it.

But it’s time
to edit,
condense,
clarify the essence.

And be prepared
for an abbreviated
version
of my life

*

This morning I wandered the sea shore, thinking of Jo and her family. Some words came to me in haiku form, so I'll share them.

*
sluggish clouds lift from

the green back of coastal hills.

sun melts the tightness

*
swarm of pelicans,

trailed by two stragglers, skims the

ruffled edge of waves.

*

wailing, scolding gulls

circle, land; unquestioning

their role or place

*

a surfer glistens

ocean-wet, grinning, teeth white

as the crashing waves.

*

clear, salt breeze fills my

lungs, makes me part of the sea

and completely me

*

Godspeed, Jo. And love always Irene, Krista, Kevin, Judy. And, belatedly, I add my dear Aunt Doris, who I just found out died of cancer, as well.

Take a look at a book

2011-03-02T08:30:00.000-08:00

I was so lucky last night to have a young reader at my crit group and thrilled to see her happy faces drawn on my YA manuscript. If you write kidlit of any sort, you know that's an extra-special connection. So, thank you, Lucy.

And that brings me to another reading moment of joy. Read Across America is celebrating today with a slew of Dr. Seuss activities in schools, libraries, homes. Is there anyone who hasn't experienced the joy of Seuss rhymes and satisfaction of his stories?

Dr. Seuss, aka Theodor Geisel, wrote the iconic The Cat in the Hat, following a 1954 report that suggested children were having trouble reading because books were boring. He incorporated words his publisher thought would be important for children to learn. He made it fun. He made it meaningful. He left a legacy of 44 books. Soooo. . .

Read to the kids

Read to yourself

Take a book right

Off of the shelf!

Where my feet take me

2011-02-27T07:53:00.000-08:00

Between rain and a threat of snow in low-lying Southern California, I walked up the little mountain in town to an old stone tower. It makes me feel I'm in another land, one I visit for escape, even the dark kind.

Lots on my mind--death of loved ones, uncertain future, fear that I will never get where I'd hoped to go. I spent considerable time on this walk intrigued with stone. Watching newly-released, underground springs glisten over granite boulders, finding soil and rock slides that will continue as long as the ground is saturated, marveling at the varied moods even stone can trigger.

Is it inanimate? I think not.

As I stood under a stone bridge, I noticed the picture-perfect scene of freshness it framed--lively, scudding clouds, tender new grass (this is February in SoCal, remember) and, again, the punctuation of jutting, sprawling rock.

I once heard piles of weathered boulders described as woolsack, presumably for a resemblance to sacks of wool. I'm not a geologist, but they sometimes do look like a jumble of sacks.

Stone gives the world texture, substance, history--forged in the beginnings of earth time, breaking down to allow new life.

There is so much going on when you look closely.

Late in the day, I saw this

but took no photo:

white ghosts of mountains

flicker in and out of the

drifting cloud bank

and this:

bare branches, storm-stripped.

through the lattice of their limbs,

piles of dusty-pink clouds
*
And, as it always does, Nature pulled me to my feet, gave me a staff and said get on with it.

Big names, big hearts

2011-02-25T07:02:00.000-08:00

This week has been painful. I lost a dear family friend, Joanne, to cancer Wednesday. I will hold her always in my heart as the funny, bright, energetic woman she was. The same day, author L.K. Madigan died of that damned disease. May you both be at peace after the long suffering. May we find a cure someday.

No photos really work for this, so I chose a moment of peace in nature, which always calms my soul.

The loss of my friend followed on the heels of the horrendous earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand that has taken more than a 100 lives, with more than 200 people missing and possibly buried in the rubble of what was once a beautiful, thriving city.

How can we help, especially if we live half-way around the world? Let Neil Gaiman show us one way. Yes, that's a teaser. The answer lies ahead.

While the search for the missing continues in the NZ's Canterbury region, people who survived are dealing with injuries, homelessness, loss of all they owned. The Red Cross is already stepping in to help the survivors, and two New Zealand speculative fiction writers have come up with an amazing way to assist that.

J.C. Hart and Anna Caro are compiling an anthology of short stories with themes of survival and hope. The funds are to be donated to the Red Cross Earthquake Appeal and other charities. They contacted numerous authors and have received promises of stories for the book from many established writers.

Among them, *drum roll* NEIL freakin' GAIMAN!

Mr. Gaiman, not only writes surprising, marvelous stories, he's proven time and again that he is a generous man, fully involved with life.

I'll be buying this anthology, for sure, when it's published. You can keep up on the progress at Tales for Canterbury.

Thank you in advance for lending support to this fantastic project.

Those in need

2011-02-22T07:03:00.000-08:00

I've been gone for days and was going to post some pretty beach pictures and haiku or musings, but I've chosen just one sunset. I hope the defused, bronzed light and enameled surface of the sand will soothe me. And you, if you please.

My thoughts are with the people of Christchurch, New Zealand, who've suffered another massive earthquake, but this time with numerous casualties.

For those who know my blogging/writing buddy, Wen Baragrey, she and her family survived but not without terrifying moments. Recently, she had a give-away contest to celebrate the homecoming of her grandson, Jayden, who has spent most of the first few months of life in hospital. He was there again when the quake struck and the hospital was evacuated. You can read Wen's post here and the NZHerald here. Please send her and all the people of New Zealand your prayers or healing thoughts. Thank you.

P.S. One more link. Walk Through Sorrow is so heartbreakingly eloquent.

A quieter place

2011-02-16T16:29:00.000-08:00

Historical fiction is usually a quieter read than paranormal, dsytopian or fantasy. But that doesn't mean it can't transport you to another land and leave you breathless.

I just finished Jennifer Donnelly's A NORTHERN LIGHT, a Printz Honor book, and a while back I read Kirby Larson's HATTIE BIG SKY, a Newbury Honor book.

They are lovely, nuanced stories that are not without traumas. One of the things that intrigued me was that the authors had been drawn to write these novels by real-life events. Kirby Larson's tale grew from a family story about a great-grandmother who homesteaded by herself. Jennifer Donnelly, too, had family stories handed down from relatives who lived in the Adirondacks--the site of a murder that made sensational news in 1906.

Both authors also researched historic documents so the books are filled with authentic detail and a sense of having walked in the shoes of those who came before us. My editions include bibliographies of works the authors read to better know the time and place of their stories.

I'm going to give you teasers. A bit of blurb and sample to perhaps lure you into these fine books.

For most of her life, sixteen-year-old Hattie Brooks has been shuttled from one distant relative to another. Tired of being Hattie Here-and-There, she summons the courage to leave Iowa and move all by herself to Vida, Montana, to prove up her late uncle's homestead claim. (from back cover)

Snippet:

One minuscule step at a time, I battled toward the barn, praying for help: "Lord, I can't do this alone." But no help came. It was up to me. I drew in an icy, ragged breath. I couldn't fail. Couldn't lose my way. Or lose my cow. That thought propelled me forward the last few steps. Finally, finally, I reached the barn, gasping and sobbing for air. My face was raw. I tasted the salt of blood trickling down my cheeks.

A NORTHERN LIGHT is set in 1906 against the backdrop of the murder that inspired Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy. Donnelly's novel puts a teenager trying to escape a hardscrabble life in the middle of the mystery surrounding another girl's death.

Snippet:

It was dry and remarkably warm for the start of April, and I was tired and dirty and dripping with sweat. The muscles in my arms ached and my hands were raw from guiding the plow and I was just as mad as a hornet. Pa had kept me home from school again. . .

Can't resist another sample:

I sat slumped on my milking stool, knowing that the last chance I had to go to Barnard was on its way into the till of some bartender. Knowing that my uncle was off on a three-day spree. Or four. Or five. Or however many days it took to spend a hundred dollars. It was a hard and hopeless thing.

So, yeah. We learn a lot about our present by delving into our past. Hope you pick these books up if you haven't read them yet.

For the sake of love

2011-02-14T07:15:00.000-08:00

I'm celebrating Valentine's Day as concept--a day to appreciate love. I don't have a valentine at this time in my life, but I know too well the spark, slow burn and glow. I'm forever grateful to have lived and loved.

I took this photo a few years ago of friends of mine. I'm not sure I've even shown it to them. I saw them wander off from a huge family/best friends sort of party for a quiet moment together, and I loved the love I saw.

Last night, I re-watched The Last of the Mohicans. You know the one, where Daniel Day Lewis runs magnificently through forests and up mountains to save his love. There's the heart-stopping scene where he must leave her to be captured so that he can live to save her. His final words, "I will find you. I will find you," before he jumps into a waterfall and is carried away. Le sigh.

I'm going to post poetry snippets from some great writers (please search them out for the entire poems and where to purchase their collections) and a couple of badges I received from Rebecca/WordsCrafter. If any of my readers (whom I love) wish to pass along the badges, please bag 'em and share 'em. It's all about the love today. Bloggers=Love was made by Jules at Trying to Get Over the Rainbow for everyone.

she

stolen from my bone

is it any wonder

i hunger to tunnel back

inside desperate

to reconnect the rib and clay

and to be whole again--(a portion of adam thinking, which appeared in the collection, quilting, by Lucille Clifton. Ms. Clifton died last year. Her voice will be missed but can be savored again through her books.)
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I want you to know

one thing.

You know how this is:

if I look

at the crystal moon, at the red branch

of the slow autumn at my window,

if I touch

near the fire

the impalpable ash

or the wrinkled body of the log,

everything carries me to you,

as if everything that exists,

aromas, light, metals,

were little boats that sail

toward those isles of yours that wait for me.

--(a portion of If You Forget Me by the great Chilean poet Pablo Neruda)

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This morning as I walked along the lakeshore,

I fell in love with a wren

and later in the day with a mouse

the cat had dropped under the dining room table.

In the shadows of an autumn evening,

I fell for a seamstress

still at her machine in the tailor's window,

and later for a bowl of broth,

steam rising like smoke from a naval battle.

This is the best kind of love, I thought,

without recompense, without gifts,

or unkind words, without suspicion,

or silence on the telephone.

--(a portion of Aimless Love by Billy Collins or his site. This poem is so incredible. Read it all in his Nine Horses collection.)

This post is not complete without haiku from a couple of the old masters.

By flowering pear

and by the lamp of the moon

she reads her letter

--Buson (1715-1783)

Slung over a screen,

a dress of silk and gauze.

The autumn wind.
--Buson

I wish she were here

to listen to my bitching

and enjoy this moon.

--Issa (1762-1826)

Love to all the storytellers in whatever form they write!

Let's hear it for the guys

2011-02-10T07:54:00.000-08:00

I recently got around to reading John Green’s PAPER TOWNS and Scott Westerfeld’s UGLIES. Why did I wait so long? Two very different YA novels--one dystopian, the other contemporary. In surprising ways, both explore personal image and misconstrued perceptions.
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PAPER TOWNS—part mystery, part coming of age, part crazy road trip--is meant to be explored, layers peeling back as you go. It’s smart, witty and unnerving.

Green dragged me unwillingly through the first part of the book. Not because it wasn’t well-written but because the character Margo made me anxious. I worried about what she was going to get Quentin, the first-person narrator, into. And that’s the point. She’s not easy, but she sure is fascinating.

Margo is bigger than life, walking the edge, and perceived by her classmates as magnificently fearless and cool. Some significant revelations and changes take place in both characters during the story, but I won’t give spoilers.

A nerdfighter stuck a post-it inside the PAPER TOWNS I purchased in a bookstore. I’d heard that some of Green’s followers were doing this, but I looked when I bought it and didn’t find a note. Then when I was half-way through reading, I untucked a page stuck in the jacket flap and there it was! The discovered note added to the experience of reading a mysterious, thought-provoking story.

One thing I love about Green’s writing (also evident in LOOKING FOR ALASKA) is that his young adult characters have substance. They read, they contemplate, they have conversations and still care about important teen stuff like the opposite sex.

In PAPER TOWNS, Quentin believes Margo left him a clue within the lines of Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself.” He studies it over and over, looking for a breadcrumb trail to where she’s gone. And the novel’s title, too, is worth pondering. It refers to developments that never get built, to towns that exist only on paper.

Here’s a sample, which I hope whets your appetite:
And so we sat there, she with her nail polish balanced on the dash, and me with a shaky finger on the pulse of myself. It was a good color of nail polish, and Margo had nice fingers, thinner and bonier than the rest of her, which was all curves and soft edges. She had the kind of fingers you want to interlace with your own. I remembered them against my hip bone in Wal-Mart, which felt like days ago. My heartbeat slowed. And I tried to tell myself, Margo’s right. There’s nothing out here to be afraid of, not in this little city on this quiet night.
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Westerfeld tackles body image and plastic surgery in a bold way in UGLIES. In this future world, everybody gets an extreme transformation from ugly (as in all of us) to picture-perfect pretty when they turn sixteen. Tally can’t wait, especially since her best friend’s birthday came before hers and he’s already gone to live in New Pretty Town.

Once again, I don’t want to give spoilers, but one of the things I appreciate as a writer and reader is the clear structure of this novel. It’s divided in parts like a play in three acts. Each part has a title and an accompanying quote that is spot on. So I’m going to share that much.

Part I
Turning Pretty
“Is it not good to make society full of beautiful people?”—Yang Yuan, quoted in The New York Times

Part II
The Smoke
“There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.”—Francis Bacon, Essays, Civil and Moral, “Of Beauty”

Part III
Into the Fire
“Beauty is that Medusa’s head
Which men go armed to seek and sever.
It is most deadly when most dead,
And dead will stare and sting forever.”—Archibald MacLeish, “Beauty”

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Yeah. These are great reads. Let’s hear it for the guys.
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Addendum: There's a contest going on at Wen's On Words and Upwards that you don't want to miss. Signed copies of Helen Lowe's books, and--horse lover alert--a gorgeous drawing of a horse by Wen, who is an artist as well as a writer. Gallop on over!

Seeing things

2011-02-07T07:42:00.000-08:00

Masks intrigue me. They can be beautiful, terrifying, mysterious and powerful.

I found this nature-made little mask on the rocky shores of Dana Point. Does it not look like a predatory bird?

I know it's a little airy-fairy of me to believe in signs and portents, but when I discover something unusual like this I imagine the hand of Fate, the presence of guardians or, at the very least, good luck in the finding.

People, of course, have long made masks of animals and birds into which are woven stories of creation and moral beliefs. The creatures are given qualities that have become symbols, so that even in our own writing, we may use an owl to signify wisdom, intuition, mystery or protection. A hawk is sometimes seen as a messenger, a bringer of visions and of intense energy.

Any time I hear the raspy scream of a hawk overhead, I look up, feeling a surge of energy. I've watched them swirl and glide and swoop but also seen single hawks hang without moving, as if suspended in space. Watching, I experience.

This is another view of the sea-borne mask.

Perhaps, it would fit a leprechaun or a tallish fairy. Perhaps. I'll wear it in my dreams and soar high and far.

On a boulder, I saw a fading pink rose held down by a small rock. There's a story behind that; we are free to make up our own.

A snowy egret fished the dark tide pools.

I let my tennies get wet to get this shot. I wanted to be part of the surging sea as the sun disappeared. To take a bit of magic home with me.

Again and again with pleasure

2011-02-02T09:17:00.000-08:00

The prompt today on YA Highway is what books you'd pick to read over and over for the rest of your life.

As I thought about it, I decided to list books I already devoured more than once--time tested to make me hungry for their landscapes, their tales. One thing they all share is a magical sense of other worldliness. It's escape that may, at times, be terrifying but is always fascinating.

HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE by Diana Wynne Jones

I don't know how one author can be so prolific, imaginative and funny as Diana Wynne Jones. I adore Sophie, a young girl who gets turned into an old woman by a witch in Howl's Moving Castle.

Some people love the movie, but for me the spunk, humor and fantasy are best in the book. This is where Sophie shines.

Here she is soon after her transformation, aching, cold and feisty as she discovers the castle bumping along on the moor:

She raised her stick and waved it imperiously at the castle.

"Stop!" she shrieked.

The castle obediently came to a rumbling, grinding halt. . . "

A WIZARD OF EARTHSEA by Ursula K. LeGuin

I don't know if I will ever love a wizard more than the conflicted Ged/Sparrowhawk of LeGuin's masterpiece.

I've often quoted her opening verse, "The Creation of Ea," because it is the essence of great fantasy and of real life.

Only in silence the word,

only in dark the light,

only in dying life:

bright the hawk's flight

on the empty sky.

THE HUNGER GAMES by Suzanne Collins

Katniss. 'Nuff said.

STARDUST by Neil Gaiman

I have listened to this on audiobook numerous times. For one thing, I love the way Neil Gaiman reads his stories, and I've disappeared with him into the worlds of NEVERWHERE, THE GRAVEYARD BOOK, CORALINE, FRAGILE THINGS and the wonderful THE WOLVES IN THE WALLS.

STARDUST feels like an old-time fairy tale with the nuance of an omniscient storyteller taking you to a faraway land that somehow has roots in ours. Every character has multiple layers, intriguing inconsistencies.

THE CHANGELING SEA by Patricia A. McKillip

McKillip has her own shelf in one of my bookcases. She is amazing at weaving fantasy in all sorts of different tales.

What enchants me about this little book is the sea as an extension of the characters' lives.

The tide was low that afternoon as Peri walked home, so low that even the great jagged spires stood naked in the glistening sand, and all the starfish and anemones and urchins that clung to their battered flanks were exposed.

Have you books you read again and again?

A soft day

2011-01-30T18:40:00.000-08:00

In Ireland, a soft day brings a muted mistiness to the landscape, a pattering but not buckets of rain pelting down, mind you.

It's a time to go out, walk the hills, climb the cliffs. I happen to be in Southern California, but today was a soft day, and I took to my favorite little mountain.

At first, I needed only my hat, then my hoodie and finally my umbrella. The drops sounded like small pebbles falling, gently. Later, it would turn splattering and splashing, but not then.

Here you see my favorite boulder and my favorite umbrella bought in Toronto during a rainy trip. It makes me smile, no matter what the weather.

Filmmaker Alan Parker ("Evita," "Angela's Ashes") said, "Rain is very difficult in film, particularly in Ireland, because it's quite fine, so fine that the Irish don't even acknowledge that it exists."

In my new mode of trying to observe something new in my environment every day, I was delighted to find raindrops clinging to this chain railing.

And how about this tiny hobbit hole in the cliff? Two plants no bigger than peas have taken up residence on the doorstep.

One of Alice Hoffman's characters, Elinor in The Probable Future, has a name for all variations of rain. Fish rain. Rose rain. Daffodil rain. Swamp rain. And the fearsome stone rain.

A haiku I wrote some time ago fits this day.

a gust of wind,

the rain-beaded branch

bare again

The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda (1904-1973) said, "I grew up in this town, my poetry was born between the hill and the river, it took voice from the rain, and like the timber, it steeped in the forests."

I'll leave you with this rock moss that looks like a strange hand and a couple of witty songwriter/singer quotes.

"Some people walk in the rain, others just get wet."--Roger Miller (1936-1992)

"Don't threaten me with love, baby. Let's just go walking in the rain."--Billie Holiday (1915-1959)

Mad with joy

2011-01-27T08:31:00.000-08:00

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"People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us." --Iris Murdoch, author (1919-1999)

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I often wonder how people can do this. . .

. . .to this planet of wonder and beauty. We live on a miracle in the universe. If I imagine a world without flowers, I feel empty. It amazes me that something whose purpose is to propagate and, in doing so feed other lifeforms, can also be so dazzling. How did we get so lucky?

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Here. I'll spread a little mad joy and wonder. Just because.

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I've got an idea. *light bulbs bursting*

I think I'll start a small journal that's just for noticing a wonder in my personal universe. It could be as simple as observing the veins in a leaf or watching the moon rise.

It's not that I don't see these things regularly. That's why I write haiku. Still, I'd like to make a point of seeking out what makes this a world worth praise and passion.

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I hope this doesn't sound googly-eyed or preachy. I simply believe we can make
our world better by seeing it for what it already is and glorying in that.

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That brings me to the lovely Julie Dao who bestowed upon me the Happy Blogger Award. This award is about blogs that make you feel good when you visit. I feel that way about Julie's site, which is filled with fantasy and gorgeous music. I always want to pull up a chair and stay awhile. I also second the other bloggers she named, many of whom are my favorite hangouts.

Since I should add more (and this is impossible always), here are few bloggers who make me smile on a regular basis.

Stephanie Thornton

VR Barkowski

Karen Amanda Hooper

Carolina Valdez Miller

Sarah Wylie

Tracy/Phoenix

Just chillin' and a great panel discussion Monday

2011-01-23T17:41:00.001-08:00

In the grab bag of life, I got some wonder and some pretty awful the last few days. Someone did a hit-and-run on my parked car doing $1,000 in damage.

But I got a rental and spent one afternoon at the gorgeous cliffs of Dana Point. More photos below.

And I went to a fabulous party last night hosted by my crit partner, Rilla and her husband Satish. Besides great food and conversation, they had everyone bring a photo and story of travel adventure. It's amazing how wildly different the stories turned out to be--a fictional dig to China, a proposal in Paris, a gasping crawl up Mt. Kilimanjaro.

As for me, I flubbed the telling of finding a stone circle on a foggy moor in Devon. I've told it lots of times, but I think I babbled incoherently this time. Ah well, I'll blame my distraction on my poor injured Miata.

Anyway, the evening itself was picture perfect.

The sky tonight is pink-and-blue stripes. I think Dr. Seuss dreamed it up. I feel like I should hold someone's hand and skip.

WriteOnCon alert!
Tomorrow, Monday, Jan. 24 at 5 p.m. Eastern there will be a live panel discussion with Pippin Properties, Inc. agents. Holly McGhee, was formerly an executive editor at HarperCollins and Joan Slattery was an editor at Alfred A. Knopf.

If you've never been to a WriteOnCon chat, it's easy-peasy. Just sign in and type a question. The moderators pass on the questions.

I, sadly, will miss this one, because Monday afternoon I'm at my very own live critique group, which is actually cause for happiness. We rock, just sayin.'

The good news is anyone can visit the WriteOnCon site later and read the transcript. I know I will.

More Dana Point, because it's awesome. The trail around the tide pool hugs this cliff, but it's been mangled by flooding and landslides since heavy rain in December.

Those massive boulders tumbled down from above. And, there are houses hanging on the edge of those cliffs!

The trek over all the rocky shore is actually invigorating. There's always some wobble and give when you step and the crunching of stone on stone.

The tide pools were really fun to explore this time. And I saw dolphins enjoying the waves with two surfers. Everybody was chill.

A nice fan of mussels.

And stunning anemones, sea grass, hermit crabs and more.

Eye-opening moments, heroes and vanquishing fear

2011-01-20T07:13:00.000-08:00

How can I portray a dream?

I've kept dream journals, awakening in dead of night to jot down words that can hardly contain the images. I've tried painting them. But the essence usually slips back to that other world.

This photo is nothing like a recent dream I had, but it does convey the surreal-ness and ethereal-ness of it. I tried to put it into haiku. It didn't fit, but here's the attempt.

peering from cavern--

sky-blue sea hits white granite,

dashing all darkness

I'm not going to bore you with the dream details, but I will say what was most wonderful was the sense of leaving behind darkness, fear, despair, in order to brave a new world, full of possibility. That's how it felt when I woke up and what picturing the expanse of blue water and snowy-white cliffs still conveys.

I hit a snag--not a wall, just a bump--in the fairy tale I'm currently writing. I knew where the next chapter was going but felt like it needed something. In other words, I wasn't enthused, and figured it lacked tension.

I just didn't know what to do.

So I picked up Donald Maass' Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook, which I'd left languishing on a bookshelf. Maybe I'd find a way over the snag. Well, you know what? This workbook really works.

The first exercise asked me to name personal heroes. Abraham Lincoln popped to mind first. I've always admired him. I also thought of Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, Jr.

But what did these bigger-than-life public figures have to do with my teen protagonist in a fairy tale? As I continued the exercise, I wrote down what qualities made them heroes: courage, fortitude, conviction, compassion, eloquence.

And I knew that's exactly what I want my heroine to embody as she grows into her place in the world.

But it was another exercise that freshened my journey into the chapter that had stalled me.

The prompt was to write something your MC would never say, never do.

I don't want to reveal my plot, but I struggled with this until I realized that I already had the perfect answer. All I had to do was go back and expand an issue with another character that was in the story. Once I did that, I'd added new tension, new obstacles for my protagonist.

I'm not only writing up a storm, I'm thrilled with the layer this has added to the entire story. Thank you, Mr. Maass!

Gotta do a huge shout out.

Beth Revis' ACROSS THE UNIVERSE has hit the NY Times bestseller list at #7! Yay, Beth!

A day in the life

2011-01-17T07:50:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I climbed the little mountain in my town, as I do, and found rejuvenation waiting--the sky scrubbed by wild winds the day before, the earth sprouting where last month's deluge had soaked in, unseen birds singing. So words popped in my head to form haiku.

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a sudden trilling,

wild burst of exuberance

on a still morning

ancient granite

yields a foothold to fragile

wild grasses

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Today, I have a crit group meeting all afternoon. Our stories will take me to Wales and India and the rural South. I will climb mountains with them and find hope along the journey, because that's what writing and writers bring to my life--a sense of new beginnings and wonder, words developed and shaped to form worlds where we make sense of ours.

And, today, I remember a man of tremendous courage and foresight, who brought hope and rejuvenation to the world. May we all learn not to judge by the color of skin or country of origin or religious belief or physical impairment or anything except the content of character, the goodness of spirit. And may we all, someday, be free at last.

In memory of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Google-fu with Beth Revis on release of Across the Universe

2011-01-13T16:25:00.000-08:00

I asked Beth Revis just three questions for the following Q&A. This week is the release of her debut YA novel, ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, and I knew she'd be crazy busy. Yay, Beth!

Beth is one of the first bloggers I met online when I started blogging less than two years ago. She is funny, smart, interesting, caring and honest, which has made me love her blog and now her book.

If you don't know her publishing story it's an incredible one. In the time I've known her she's gone from aspiring to agented to major book deal to published with starred reviews. She tells this journey best in her own words, which she does on her blog, including a five-part series of posts in June 2010.

My three questions for Beth:

Q: You wrote a wonderful post once about how you realized a writer doesn't need to be a scientist to write good sci-fi/dystopian stories. Please tell us what allowed you to strap on your personal jetpack and step into far reaches of space.

A: Honestly, I think it was just doing it. It's like the old writer's mantra: butt in chair. When I started thinking about my story, I realized I needed a sci fi setting--so I started writing a sci fi setting. When I came to something that I didn't know or understand, I'd trot off to the internet. A little Google-fu, a little emailing to people who really WERE scientists, and I'd get enough info keep writing.

If I had thought about it, I would have talked myself out of writing sci fi. I'm so unqualified. But I didn't think about it, I thought about the story, and that led to the words, and that led to a novel, and the rest is history.
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Q: What was the first idea for Across the Universe? How did that concept take off for you?

A: Oh, I can't be too specific here! The first idea was the end. I thought of a neat twist, and I built the story around it.

(Drat! *pouts* Guess we have to wait for books two and three to find out.)

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Q: If you have one piece of advice for other writers from what you learned this year, what would it be?

A: Write the next book. I had so many trunk novels, so many rejections. But I kept writing. And you know what? I always thought the book I was working on would be "the one." I'd write my heart out, then edit, and rewrite, and revise, and submit....and nothing. But doing that for all those failed novels helped me to write one that didn't fail--and kept me writing, which was the most important thing.
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Thanks, Beth. As always, I appreciate your words.

So Beth has this Launch Contest, which nudged me take this photo of me with the reverse side of the book jacket for ACROSS THE UNIVERSE.

Other people are going to be a lot more clever, I think, but I did hang up my swirly cosmos scarf-like cape thingie.

And that's the super-cool diagram of the spaceship, Godspeed.

Everybody's got until Jan. 25 to buy the book, take a photo with it and try to win some fabulous prizes.

In case you've missed the blurb on ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, here 'tis:

A love out of time. A spaceship built of secrets and murder.

Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awake on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into a brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.

Amy quickly realizes that her awakening was no mere computer malfunction. Someone—one of the few thousand inhabitants of the spaceship—tried to kill her. And if Amy doesn’t do something soon, her parents will be next.

Now, Amy must race to unlock Godspeed’s hidden secrets. But out of her list of murder suspects, there’s only one who matters: Elder, the future leader of the ship and the love she could never have seen coming.

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Wishing you a long, star-filled journey, Beth!

Mushing with author Terry Lynn Johnson

2011-01-09T06:21:00.000-08:00

Um, what's a snow hook? I know nada about mushing, but have just learned that a snow hook is like a parking brake. And in dangerous moments a dogsled racer might toss the metal clawed hook into the snow to quickly stop a team.

I found out about snow hooks and other fascinating things in the debut novel by Terry Lynn Johnson, DOGSLED DREAMS. The book will hopefully soon find its way into the hands of middle grade readers and onto shelves of school libraries. Terry also has a terrific teacher's guide with educational and fun activities available on her website.
You want a thrilling taste of this story? Read the first chapter.
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Anyone who loves dogs will be drawn to this tale of a twelve-year-old girl's yearning to race sled dogs. She has to overcome her own self-doubt as well as blizzards and wild animals. The story is packed with realistic details, which is not surprising when you find out that the author raced her own team of eighteen Alaskan Huskies. Besides dogsledding, Terry steps out in snowshoes, paddles kayaks and canoes and sails. She lives on the edge of wilderness in Whitefish Falls, Ontario, Canada.
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I asked Terry, who writes for outdoor magazines, a few questions about how DOGSLED DREAMS came to be.

Q: When did you decide you wanted to write a book for kids and why?
A: I took a correspondence writing course three years ago with a mind that I wanted to write my memoirs. My writing tutor suggested I try writing fiction for kids after she read some of my magazine articles. I'm so glad, because I don't know if I would have tried it.
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Q: Why do you believe sled dogs will interest kids who may live where it never snows or where neighborhood dogs may be viewed as threats, not friends? What do you hope kids may learn about a relationship with a sled team?
A: I believe kids are interested in learning new ways of seeing things. That's the best part of writing for kids. And if you put them in the scene so they can hear the dogs, smell the dogs, feel the dogs, then hopefully they will care about the dogs. Dogsledding is about more than going fast down a trail. I hope readers learn that the trust mushers and their dogs must have in each other is a magical thing - that's what makes this sport so special. The book is full of technical information too, including a diagram at the back with dog positions, parts of the sled, etc along with a list of resources.
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Q: How would you sum up the changes the dogs bring to your main character?
A:Perhaps that Rebecca is more confident in her own abilities, that she is a good musher who cares for her dogs. And maybe she's learning to live more in the moment like the dogs do.
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Q: If there was one thing you'd like people to take away from reading your book, what would that be?
A: That most mushers love their dogs beyond words or explanation. Also, if you work hard, you can achieve your own dreams.
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Q: What are your dreams for this book? Where do you hope it will go and into whose hands?
A: I'm currently gearing up for a junior musher video contest on my site, so I'm dreaming that there will be lots of cool entries to watch of great kids with their dogs! I am also hoping that it is read by all those that approached me when I raced my own team and asked about the lifestyle.
*
Q: Any booksignings or events coming up?
A: My local bookstore Chapters in Sudbury will be hosting an event next month. As well, I'll be in Cannington Feb.26 at the dogsled races there signing books and doing a reading at the library. I'll post more specifics and other dates on my website.

Random haiku

2011-01-06T05:34:00.000-08:00

silent pair of crows--

scraps of black velvet soaring

on an updraft.

That's it. A random haiku written in my head while walking. Now back into the land of my fairytale to see where the updrafts take me.

Turning mountains into a mission statement of sorts

2011-01-04T07:02:00.000-08:00

Two of my favorite walking trails were closed after the week of non-stop rain in California before Christmas. The lake route reopened as soon as flood waters ran downstream, but the small mountain trail is still barricaded.

Um. Yeah. So I went around the caution tape like some other intrepid hikers and found out why.

Most of the trail is clear. But there are areas where erosion underneath the path may cause collapse and then there is this. Whew, that's a big boulder.

No wonder it's still closed.

But I'm glad I ventured up, and you know I'll go again. . .

Because . . .

This is what I get for a treat when I do. . .

Climbing mountains rewards me with gorgeous vistas, a sense of accomplishment, a stronger body and a mind that becomes free of trivia.

I've done a lot of writing in my head while walking. But I haven't thought of it as a mission. Until now.

I'm not a Mission Statement kind of person. Too many years of corporate-speak, I guess. But when Susan Kaye Quinn posted her Mission Statement as a writer recently she got my attention. It makes sense to develop self-awareness, to know what we want from all this effort we expend writing. What purpose does it serve in our lives?

Susan is an engineer, and I always struggled with higher math, physics, that sort of thing. My talents, I think, are more in the art realm. So instead of calling what I've written a Mission Statement, I'll refer to it as my life-goal as a writer. Here's what works for me, but, please, also read Susan's, which was my model.

To use my life experiences and background in creative non-fiction, poetry and fiction to write stories that reach beyond the day-to-day into the land of possibilities. To interact with other writers and editors to constantly improve my craft. To be supportive and helpful to others. To reach as many readers and impact as many lives as possible without allowing numbers of any kind to define me or my work. To always leave my readers with hope.

Yay, it's time for No Kiss Blogfest

2011-01-02T00:18:00.000-08:00

No Kiss Blogfest today! That means dozens of writers are putting up scenes where lips come close but are denied connection. Mean writers.

The fest is hosted by Frankie Diane Mallis, and the scenes are bound to range from sizzlin' to hilarious.

The art I chose for my fractured fairytale with modern sensibilities is John Waterhouse's La Belle Dame Sans Merci.

The scene I'm sharing takes place after a princess is forced to leave her father's castle to go on a quest. She is supposed to fulfill her destiny alone and has already had to fight an ogre. This scene occurs when she searches for someone who's following her.

Sword in hand, Princess Charming stepped soundlessly to an opening in the brush. A person, wrapped in a cloak, slept beside a dead fire. A horse dozed nearby.

She crept forward until she could put the tip of her sword against the person’s neck. The cloak covered most of his face, but he was surely male. “Who are you, and why do you follow me?” she demanded, her voice quavering only on the last word.

The man jerked and gasped. Charming stumbled back, tripping on a root. For a moment, she felt suspended in air and then she landed with a thud on her rump, but she managed to keep the sword pointed in the man’s direction.

She scrambled to her feet, feeling an unwanted blush flare on her cheeks, and stared wide-eyed at the young man peering out of the cloak. “Conner? What are you doing here?”

“Gah. You scared me, sneaking up like that, Charms. Although your pratfall took the edge off.” He smiled and sat up, rubbing his eyes and then running fingers through his tangled, blond hair.

“I scared you. Haven’t you been following me--like a sneak thief?” She wanted to erase the fact she’d fallen. But she needed to brush off the dirt, so she ran her free hand across her backside as stealthily as she could.

“A sneak thief! I’m trying to protect you.” Conner flung aside the cloak and stood, towering a foot taller than she.

They glared at one another for an instant until both became aware that Conner was in his long, wool underwear. “Drat. Beg your pardon,” he murmured.

Charming averted her eyes, staring at the dark loam and fallen leaves around her feet. She could hear Conner struggling into his leather breeches and doublet. But even when he was dressed, with boots on and hair tied back, she was too embarrassed to hold his gaze.

She attempted bravado. “You know you must go home, Conner, but you may as well come to our camp for breakfast first.” She kicked at the cold branches in his campfire to scatter them.

“Our camp?” Conner put a finger beneath her chin and tilted her head so she had to look at him. “I thought you were alone.”

“It’s complicated.”

“It’s always complicated where you’re concerned.” Conner dropped his hand from her chin.

“Who’s with you? I requested to be first choice. I thought no one was allowed to accompany you.”

“So did I, but this woman showed up in the middle of the night.”

“A woman?”

“She’s not exactly ordinary.” Charming was unsure what she was allowed to say about Selena.

“She says she can teach me things that will help me on the quest.”

Conner frowned. “I want to meet her, question her.”

“I said you could come for breakfast, but don’t try to be Princess Defender or whatever role you think you must fill.”

“I can’t help being your defender, don’t you know that?” Conner’s voice sounded softer, deeper. He brushed a stray lock of hair off her forehead and let his fingers linger on her cheek.
Her skin tingled where he touched her. His eyes were the same color as pine trees. Why had she never noticed how rich and mysterious the color was before? And his lashes were long enough to cast shadows.

His hand cupped her chin while his thumb grazed her lower lip, feather-soft. “Charms, we never get to be alone. I’ve wanted to do this for so long.” His face dipped toward hers.

Time seemed to stop. She’d never been alone like this with any boy. As she looked into Conner’s familiar face, she was fascinated by how changed he looked--the way his eyelids were heavy, his lips slightly parted.

It seemed that the world held its breath, and there was no one but the two of them in all time and space. But there was so little space between them now. She lifted her chin, offering her mouth to be kissed, longing to know what his lips would feel like on hers.

A tiny gust of wind came out of nowhere, whipping a strand of her hair loose. It danced across her nose and then Conner’s. When they both reached to rub their noses, their hands collided.

Charming giggled. She felt as she was breaking a spell as she took a step back, out of his reach. “Conner, I must return to camp.”

“Just one kiss, Charms. Who knows when we’ll have another chance.” He moved forward, closing the space again. “Just one can’t hurt anything.”

As soon as he said those words, she knew, without a doubt, that within the world of magic, a kiss might change everything. She could not. “We should have breakfast and then you must go home before they come after you.”

She turned her face away from the hurt in his eyes. She ached for that one kiss, too.

Goodbye 2010, Hello Bright, Shiny New Year & Fests

2010-12-31T18:23:00.000-08:00

Lifting, rising above gravity, reveling in each sunrise, every sunset. Allowing myself to breathe, to relax, to be. That's my goal.

I hope that by not making word count goals or resolutions to finish work by certain dates, that I will achieve these things through the exuberance of being alive, doing what I love. I want joy to shoulder out anxiety and doubt. So, I'm going to grab a broom and sweep 2010 out the door and welcome in a new year filled with effervescent hope and possibility.

Of course, Storyqueen says we need to be careful what we wish for, so if you see me floating off like some untethered helium balloon. . .

Since I had so much fun in my last post writing a scene-in-verse for a blogfest, I'm going to jump on in to another fest. Actually, I joined this one last year, and it rocked. Sunday (Jan. 2) is Frankie Diane Mallis' No Kiss Blogfest, and, yeah, you post a scene where a kiss comes tantalizingly close, but no lips touch. Be brave, put up a scene, or at least come read all the juicy entries.

And one more fest! I just saw Vicki Rocho's Eye Candy Blogfest, which is easy-peasy. Just put up a picture that makes you smile. Here is a wooden plate painted by artist Katrin Wiese. I can't help but grin every time, looking at all the magical passengers on that little boat.

Neil Gaiman has the best wishes for the new year, including "I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself." That's something I aspire to. I love surprises. Thanks, Neil.

1/1/11, you got to believe in magic sometimes.

Happy New Year! *scuttles off to indulge in brie and bubbly stuff*

A novel approach, in verse

2010-12-29T05:21:00.001-08:00

I

I stumble through woods
where trees keep souls--
dead and gone,
newly-born,
I do not know.

I hear them breathe,
a different sound
than the thrum of sap,
the chitter of bare branches
one on another.

I do not feel my toes
anymore. They are stone,
but I feel the trees,
dug in deep,
weighted with snow.

Caleb? Is he wandering
through these woods,
alone and cold? So cold.
Can he hear the trees,
feel his toes?

I saw the woods
close around him.
I followed his footprints
until they faded under
falling snow.

He left me.
For dead?
I think he did not know
I was in the rubble,
digging my way out.

But did he look for me
as I search for him? I burn
somewhere deep—almost buried—
at the thought of lips
brushing mine.

That was a lifetime
ago. Before
my toes turned to stone
and the flame inside
fluttered like an injured bird.

The trees rattle
and clack in a knife-sharp wind.
They are restless, famished.
I must keep moving,
looking for him.

II

It’s colder now. I think
my bones are made of ice,
brittle, unforgiving,
but the woods stretch before me.
There is no stopping.

The snow has taken
all sound but the groan of limbs.
It’s smothered color.
Even the sky is fog-white,
no tattered scrap of blue.

Mile after mile of thickets
and endless snow. Something red
on a branch. An apple? A red bandana!
Caleb wore one pulled low
above his eyes.

It flutters. A blood-red rag in this
colorless world. He would not
leave it without purpose, a signal. A
sign that he lost his way.
Please, not that he lost heart.

This is my first attempt at writing novel scenes in verse format and is my little entry in Valerie Geary's fresh Scene-in-Verse Blogfest. Thanks, Valerie, for inspiring me to try something new. It was great fun.

I hope everyone is having a fantastic week and looking forward to 2011.

Peace after the flood

2010-12-24T09:31:00.000-08:00

On this Christmas Eve, I'm so grateful for the good in the world. My heart goes out to those who lost their homes or loved ones in the recent deluge of storms in California and other states. And my gratitude to those who worked in the driving rain to save homes and lives.

I was fortunate to only spring a leak in my home office, which I hope will soon be repaired without further damage. For me, this has been mostly inconvenient, but for others the clean-up will go on through the holidays.

It's hard to be happy in the midst of devastation, whether it's your own or someone else's, but all any of us can do is go forward and work for a brighter tomorrow.

On several walks after the rain stopped, I found a wondrous world where waterfalls and ponds appeared and disappeared, where snowy egrets by the dozens came to perch in trees above newly-flooded ground and a banquet of fish.

For many of us abundance is all around. I am humbled again by what the world offers us.

Whatever your beliefs or customs, my wish for you all is joy, friendship, comfort and, above all, peace.

Happy holidays.

Double-dare you!

2010-12-20T17:31:00.000-08:00

Come on in.

The water's fine.

I have a writing challenge for you, but first a gush of gratitude for two of my critique partners.

Some of you will recall I started a YA novel last year with a mermaid theme and then found out from an agent that another book was coming out with some similar elements. I brainstormed ways to eliminate any similarities and started a rewrite. Then I saw more mermaid books and felt uneasy, so I shelved the work for now. I need a new surge of hope, and these gifts are nudging me back to the sea.

Are they not the coolest? Julie made the bluesy ornament, and Rilla found the notebook in Spain. I love the edginess in these images. And I'm feeling the deep calling.

Meanwhile, I'm playing around with writing a novel (or at least a scene) in verse! This is thanks to Valerie Geary and her Scene-in-Verse Blogfest, which I now double-dare you to sign up for.

This is turning out to be so much fun. I'm not overthinking this, just trying out the verse format with a vague idea stemming from a photo of a woods in winter. For now, it's an exercise, and I can feel the writing muscles stretching and getting stronger.

If you're not sure what a novel in verse is check out the excellent books by Lisa Schroeder. We're not talking rhyme or even set meter, it's more a rhythm of words in the storytelling. Here's an example from Lisa's I HEART YOU, YOU HAUNT ME:

Sleep doesn't come.

Night after night

I thrash around

like a fish

caught in a net

trying to escape.

And I cry

for what I've done

and who I've lost.

Please, click the link in this post or the fest button on the upper right of this blog to check out what Valerie is hosting. I've picked a photo of my own that I'm using as a springboard, but you can use any of the ones she posted for inspiration. The scenes will be posted Dec. 29.

Come on and play!

Finally, Shelley said I should post a picture of my decorated tree--the one I squeezed into the front seat of my Miata. So here's a circus acrobat wishing you high-flying joy.

The almost finished tree, and the old wax angel my mother-in-law gave me long ago. It's my favorite. Peace and best wishes for a happy holiday.

A day of small victories and huge news

2010-12-16T18:33:00.000-08:00

Every year I wonder how I'll cram a live, aromatic, non-Charlie Brown Christmas tree in the front seat of my little red Miata.

And every year, the wonderful elves at the tree lot help me find one, truss it up and wiggle it in.

The journey home is snug, especially with a stick shift, but the scent of freshly-cut pine is intoxicating, and, for me, is essential to holiday happiness.

I've gotten good at carrying the tree in and setting it straight and firm in the stand, too.

See? It's so worth the effort to bring a bit of forest home.

Now for the pleasure of unpacking ornaments I've collected from around the world.

In other news, and this is HUGE, fellow writers. According to this article in the magazine of the American Library Association, there is an historic report in the Library and Book Trade Almanac, which for the first time counts the number of published YA titles separately from other kidlit titles.

The numbers left my jaw hanging. It's no wonder it's tough to sell books once they're published when you consider the amount of competition.

Preliminary numbers for kidlit titles in 2009 is--gasp--21,878. YA is 4,644. And I was proud of myself for reading 60 books this year.

I mean, I'm ecstatic that the market is exploding but wonder about long-term implications.

What say you?

Author adoration, adulation

2010-12-13T00:03:00.000-08:00

I keep a little notebook to jot down book titles as I read them and was surprised to see I’ve devoured about sixty books since January.

A phenomenon, which I’m sure everyone’s observed, is how wildly diverse review comments can be. One person gives five stars and another says it’s the worse book ever. The point being that we’re each formed by genetics, environment and experience to have strong biases and desires that may differ radically from someone else’s. And, hey, maybe one day we're receptive and another we're cranky.

So my method of picking some YA books to showcase was seeing which ones stuck to me for one reason or another--it might be visceral impact or a fresh style. I dislike spoilers, so I will mainly mention why the craft of these books appealed to me. I’ve included snippets to give a sense of writing style.

THE MARBURY LENS by Andrew Smith
This is a book I normally would run away from, but it may be the most absorbing, riveting and deeply affecting book I read all year. I’m not a person who loves horror, and this one is horrifying. I almost couldn’t keep reading when I encountered an early scene that hit all my revulsion buttons.
I wouldn’t recommend this to a young or sensitive teen, but for the mature reader, this is an extraordinary tale that leaves you wondering if you’re reading a psychological thriller or a gritty urban fantasy or a mash-up. Smith is so skillful that I don’t care how it’s categorized. The characters and worlds he built have wormed into my consciousness. For better or worse, I doubt they’ll ever leave. How’s that for powerful storytelling?
Snippet: I guess in the old days, in other places, boys like me usually ended up twisting and kicking in the empty air beneath gallows.
Upper YA/Adult crossover for brutal, disturbing situations and language.

LIAR by Justine Larbalestier.
I knew two things before I opened this book. One: there had been controversy over the first cover, which featured a white model, even though the protagonist is black. The publisher created a more representative cover after the uproar. Two: the protagonist is a liar.
I was prepared for an unreliable narrator but not for how ensnared I became in the story, which is suspenseful and surprising. The reader is made a participant, because Micah says on the first page that she’s telling “you” her story and promises not to lie. “This time I truly mean it,” she says. From there on, the reader knows Micah can’t be trusted, no matter what she says, and this makes for a dynamic reading experience in which the reader questions and sorts information.
I’m impressed with the writing craft--how pieces of the story are presented or withheld or turned upside down. Micah is a fascinating character, but you never know if you’ve really figured her out.
Snippet: I tell her I don’t have a broken heart. It’s still beating, the blood still moves around my body; it only aches when I remember to breathe.
Upper YA/Adult crossover for language and situations.

REVOLUTION by Jennifer Donnelly.
I bought this because I like the look of the cover and the author’s style. I was beyond pleased with the surprise inside the covers—a contemporary tale of a troubled teenager with a kind of ghostly time travel via an old diary that renders parts of the novel historical fiction set in the French Revolution. I love the way the protagonist’s passion for music and the guitar help her stagger through overwhelming grief, and how her discovery of another girl’s life and unfinished mission gives her own life new purpose. This story is smart and layered.
Snippet: I eat my dinner alone tonight, like I do every night. In our big, empty dining room. It’s not so bad. I can study my music and no one asks me about the calculus test I failed; or reminds me of my curfew; or demands to know the name, address, and intentions of the delinquent du jour crashed out in my bed.
Mature YA/crossover for language and situations.

SHIP BREAKER by Paolo Bacigalupi
This book started in a claustrophobic, scary way and escalated. Set in a believable dystopian future, the haves and have-nots both struggle to survive. I liked the way the author organically wove in the effects of environmental disaster by simply showing how people found ways to exist in a world made smaller and more dangerous than ever. Nailer, the protagonist, is tough, vulnerable, hopeful and noble, despite his deplorable start in life.
Snippet: A few men were lounging in the shade, tats and piercings showing unknown affiliations. They watched as the three interlopers moved through their turf. Nailer’s neck prickled. He palmed his knife, wondering if there would be bloodshed.
YA with some brutal scenes.

PARANORMALCY by Kiersten White.
This is a romp--a fresh slant on paranormal stories. The teenage protagonist bags paranormals of all stripes for an international containment agency. What she doesn’t know is much about herself and why she is skilled this way.
Snippet: Just as he reached for my neck, I tased him. I was there to bag and tag, not to kill. Besides, if I had to carry separate weapons for every paranormal I took out, I’d be dragging around a full luggage set. Tasers are a one-size-fits-all paranormal butt-kicking option. Mine’s pink with rhinestones.
YA. Suitable for the younger end of the spectrum, too, the protagonist actually says “bleep” when upset.

THE SKY IS EVERYWHERE by Jandy Nelson
The author is so good at finding fresh, spot-on ways of describing things that I think the book should be read for that alone, but the story is meaningful, as well. For instance, when Lennie, the teen protagonist, describes the way she and her Gram and uncle stare at nothing, following the death of her sister, Nelson writes that “it’s as if someone vacuumed up the horizon while we were looking the other way.” Lennie can only let out her grief in written words that she scatters, everywhere. Then a sexual awakening tied to her loss really upends her.
Snippet: Gram raises her hands to her face in distress, and I go back to scribbling a poem in the margin of Wuthering Heights. I’m huddled into a corner of the couch. I’ve no use for talking, would just as soon store paper clips in my mouth.
Mature YA for language and situations.

BEFORE I FALL by Lauren Oliver

I might not have picked up this book about a clique of popular mean girls, but I’m glad I did. Oliver impressed me with the way she peeled character revelations away layer by layer. Early on, the protagonist dies in a car accident but wakes up again and again the morning of the day it happens. With each new-but-same day, she changes her actions, altering events--at first, hoping to survive and later with more awareness of herself, her family, her friends and their victims. I don’t want to give away what happens but it’s a story that resonates long after the last line.
Snippet: It’s a good feeling knowing you can basically do whatever you want and there won’t be any consequences.
Mature YA for language and situations.

Oh that swag

2010-12-09T20:31:00.000-08:00

Ring those holiday bells! Contest alert! Beth Revis has a sack full of goodies to give to 100, yes, that's one hundred winners. That's a lot of envelope stuffing and stamps, people.

There's still a month until the release of her debut YA dystopian, ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, which has one of the most riveting opening chapters ever. I don't want to give it away if you didn't sneak a peak of it online, but one of the dual protagonists gets put in a position that would scare the bejeebers out of anybody. Made my heart race, for sure.

I was one of the lucky people who won an early ARC. All I'll say (so as not to give spoilers) is Beth continues to weave suspense and intrigue throughout the story in which generations of people aboard a spaceship develop an insular culture and a distorted history of the past. It's both fascinating and chilling as the two protagonists, Amy and Elder, begin to unravel the dangerous secrets of the ship.

Kirkus gave a starred review, and high praises came from YA authors Carrie Ryan, Melissa Marr and Kiersten White. To read the reviews or the first chapter go here.

And now we're all invited to enter to win bookmarks, bookplates, buttons, signed ARCs and, for the grand prize winner, a signed hardback with the amazing reversible cover. That's the reverse cover with the blueprint of the spaceship, Godspeed.

So, what are you waiting for? Speed through cyberspace and enter.

Here, I'll nudge you with a couple of teaser lines from the book:

Sometimes it feels like a thousand years have passed; sometimes it feels as if I've only been sleeping a few moments. I feel most like I'm in that weird state of half-asleep, half-awake I get when I've tried to sleep past noon, when I know I should get up, but my mind starts wandering and I'm sure I can never get back to sleep. Even if I do slip back into a dream for a few moments, I'm mostly just awake with my eyes shut.

Yeah. Cryo sleep is like that.

Another suggestion: preorder a copy to gift someone. They'll be over the moon.

Jellies in the sky and frenzies of a personal sort

2010-12-06T10:01:00.000-08:00

Clean.

Scrubbed.

Renewed.

That's how fall/winter skies often are in California. Following winds and rain, the yucky smog and dust vanish. Pure blues, whites, golds splatter like paint on canvas.

I was captivated by the cloud patterns the other day and stopped on my walk to crane my neck and gaze for long minutes. Sometimes I wish I could be sucked into the sky to drift.

sky-jellyfish drift

on tropospheric winds

I can not feel.

*

The need to scrub my abode struck next. I have been on a frenzy for the whole weekend! Even scrubbing floors and vacuuming books!!!

Do you know Hyperbole and a Half? I can't clean now without conjuring the image of Allie's hilarious This is Why I'll Never Be An Adult/clean-all-the-things post here.

She's so creative and funny that she has more than 39,000 followers and gets beaucoup write-ups online. There's even a store on her site to buy her illustrations on shirts, aprons, mugs. And, no, I don't know her or have any connection to her sale stuff. I just think it's awesome.

So as I was struck with the cleaning frenzy, I realized a few things about writing. My writing to be precise. I have been stuck, in the dumps, churning my wheels uselessly in deep mud. I've felt covered with a layer of dust--very unshiny lately.

When I sorted through the whys, I came up with a new one. I'm driven, pressured by notions that I'm too late. There's at least one solid reason for that--a few months ago I learned that a story similar to mine was already being published. That took the wind from my WIP sails and put the driven-demon on my shoulder trying to keep the boat afloat. You must find another angle. You must get it out there fast before its time is past. But that's a problem in itself, I now realize. Being driven by any fear is not a healthy way to write.

If I want readers to feel joy and wonder, I have to feel it myself. I don't have any solutions to my situation that I know are fool-proof (oh, I'm capable of being the fool) but I have some ideas. I think I need to put aside the novel in question and work on other things. Like cleaning all the things that surround me and dusting off other stories I've let languish.

I'm hopeful at the moment that I'll sort this out, and hope is all anyone needs, really.

Secret doors to other worlds

2010-12-02T00:01:00.000-08:00

I discovered this secret door shrouded behind a curtain of vines. It calls to me. What lies beyond?

Faerie? Or maybe. . .

Wizard Howl’s castle trundling along the moors.

The Queen of Hearts' lawn croquet game in full swing.

The tombs of Atuan.

Ethan Rayne’s Halloween costume shop in Sunnydale.

Ray Bradbury’s Veldt.

The Cat in the Hat, a Yottle in a bottle, a Yep on a step and Yooks and Zooks everywhere.

A wardrobe crammed with 1930’s coats.

The golden woods of Lothlorien.

The cantina on Mos Eisley.

Shotgun seat in a black 1967 Chevy Impala. Please don’t let the next stop be The Crossroad.

The Hunger Games Arena.

Ollivander’s Wand Shop in Diagon Alley. I’d like yew with dragonheart string ASAP.

What do you think is behind the door? Come on, what other world would you love or hate to find?