Morning-After Reading Regrets

A while back we had a fabulous guest author here, crime fiction writer Hallie Ephron. Like we NovelMatters ladies, she blogs with some fellow authors at their site, Jungle Red Writers. 

Recently they asked their readers which movies they had watched that they wished they hadn’t. Their readers were enthusiastic in their stories about everything from being ambushed by gross-out films, to those which were an unremarkable waste of time except for one image or one line that lingered as persistently as garlic on a stranger’s breath in the morning.

Books are that way, too. Sometimes we stop reading something—or keep reading something and are filled with regret later. (I was such an ignorant prude that I threw away my copy of The Good Earth when I was 13 years old because it actually suggested that Chinese people had sex with one another. Never did finish that one. But I do remember something about them eating mud during a famine.)

So – X-rated books aside, which books are so remarkable in your memory that you wish you’d never read them? Do tell. Give titles. Describe details—unless they involve sex and mud and anything else that might gross me out. 

The Details of How We Live And Die

“A writer’s obituary should read: He wrote books then he died.” ~William Faulkner

Gosh, really? I’d hoped mine would say a bit more, something perhaps about sucking the marrow from the bones of life (that’s Thoreau). Or perhaps simply that I loved my family and friends even more than my books.

The day I first read this, I looked Faulkner up on Wikipedia, to see if he’d gotten much done besides writing, and the answer was yes, he had. He’d won two National Book Awards, two Pulitzers, and The Nobel Prize in Literature. Of course, you could argue that his awards only meant that he had written very good books, so his record was safe from clutter. Earlier in life, he’d joined first the Canadian and then the British Royal Air Force (too short for the US military), but had not seen any action. Ah, but then, once he’d won his awards, he’d gone and donated part of the prize money to establish scholarships for African-American education majors as well as the Pen/Faulkner Award for Fiction. A writer who wants his obituary to span no more than six words should be more careful. After all, if you run a print preview of his entry on Wikipedia, you get nine pages of material.

Ernest Hemingway would have pointed out that the military experience - paltry though it was, compared with his own - would come in handy for a writer penning war novels. He himself had won the Silver Medal of Honor during WWI, the Bronze Star during WWII, and two medals for bull-fighting! Oh, and he’d won an Award of Merit from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Pulitzer and The Nobel Prize in Literature as well.

Know how many pages you could print out about him on Wikipedia? Nineteen, more than double that of the modest Faulkner.

He had his own take on the life and death question:

“Every man's life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another.” ~Ernest Hemingway

For myself, I think I could gladly leave off the bull fights from my life story. And I’m sure I’d make a terrible soldier. In fact, if I had to live Hemingway’s life to be an author, I might be tempted to give up writing and take up cross-stitch.

Perhaps the author who best exemplifies Faulkner’s ideal would be Emily Dickenson. She spent most of her adult life voluntarily confined to her home, caring for her parents while they lived, writing poems she never meant to publish, lowering gingerbread to children on the street by means of a rope and a basket. She wrote poems - that were later put into books - and she died.

No Nobel Prizes. No Pulitzers. But in the hundred and some years since her death, people have described this poet with her basketful of cookies as “daring,” “sophisticated,” “pre-modernist.” William Dean Howells once wrote that "If nothing else had come out of our life but this strange poetry, we should feel that in the work of Emily Dickinson, America, or New England rather, had made a distinctive addition to the literature of the world, and could not be left out of any record of it."

Sixteen pages on Wikipedia. This woman who asked that her poems be burned when she died. What was her answer to Faulkner and Hemingway?

“Find ecstasy in life; the mere sense of living is joy enough.” ~Emily Dickenson

What’s your answer? How ought a writer live her life?

We’d love to read your thoughts.

Carpe Annum Tribute

 

An important component of Carpe Annum – claiming the year – is claiming the past. Taking stock and acknowledging how we got to this point in our lives as writers.  Identifying the layers of the bedrock we’ve built upon, including great books, great writers, mentors and encouragers great and small, who steered and cheered us on.  This segues naturally into a Mother’s Day appreciation since next Sunday is THE day.  (Get those cards in the mail today, if you haven’t already.)

My sweet mother just turned ’91 or 90, whichever.’  I chuckled to myself when she said this. It was so similar to the opening of Water For Elephants.  What’s a year when you’re approaching a century?  I credit her for introducing me to a lifetime of reading.  

I remember the excitement when a package came in the mail for me at the age of five or six containing three books by a new children’s author named Dr. Seuss.  I assume The Cat in the Hat arrived first, or whatever, as mom says. Every few months another package arrived with more books until we had a small collection.  I think I had first seen them in the dentist’s office.  I had soft teeth, and having bitten my old dentist (not soft enough, apparently), he had referred me to a new-fangled pediatric dentist who very wisely prescribed a pre-appointment sedative and filled his waiting room with children’s books.  Later, reading them to my own children, I realized my mother must have gone nuts repeating those nonsensical rhymes over and over, but she never quit, even after I could recite them by heart.  My particular favorites were Put Me in the Zoo, Go Dog Go, and One Fish Two Fish.  Interestingly, Dr. Seuss credits his own mother with inspiring him to write books.  You can read about his journey (27 rejections for the Cat in the Hat) at http://www.catinthehat.org/history.htm.

When I was older, mom took me to the library and signed for me to get my own library card.  It was the first official card in my plastic wallet.  The children’s books were located in a snuggly, low-ceilinged basement that muffled all sounds of outside civilization.  I could have brought my sleeping bag and settled in. I overheard mom telling the librarian that my teacher said I was ahead of my grade in reading, and the librarian showed me the stacks for more advanced reading.  It was something mom never would have told me, not wanting my head to ‘get big.’ Parents had to keep their kids' feet on the ground in the 1960s.

Later, mom and I read Victoria Holt’s books until we could predict the endings, and moved on to Agatha Christie and L.M. Montgomery.  The day came in my adolescence when I picked up a paperback novelization of one of my favorite shows, The Avengers.  Not the Marvel Comics superheroes – I’m talking John Steed and Emma Peel, the British agents.  I argued hotly for it and she clucked her tongue and shook her head before allowing me to buy it with the caveat that if there was inappropriate material, I would stop reading. Now we were swimming out past the buoy into unknown literary waters.  She trusted me and I felt mature enough to handle whatever it contained. I had no intention of getting rid of it.  I read the book in my room, anxious that ‘the passage’ might appear.  And, of course, it did – not even a scene, but an offhand comment that shocked me. By today’s standards, it was mild, but I felt chagrined and tossed the paperback with my favorite actors on the cover in a place where she would never find it.  To her credit, she never asked about it until a year or so later.  I simply acknowledged that she was right and she never said another word.  Good form, mom.

Then, in high school English class, we read West Side Story.  I was a bit shocked and disturbed by one scene in the book which I felt was inappropriate for high school, and I skipped over it.  Mom, of course, managed to pick up the book and flip to THAT scene, which triggered a tirade and a threat to call the principal’s office. I talked her down from the edge, assuring her that it was the only book that had anything offensive in it that we had read and she cooled off. I mean, if you overlooked Catcher in the Rye and A Separate Peace, which she didn’t need to know about.  

Mom and I continued to swap book titles until our tastes parted ways.  She even read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. But she loved a good mystery best of all.  She read so many from her local library that she had to make a small mark inside the cover when she was done so she wouldn’t check it out again.  I was shocked that she would be so bold as to mark in a library book.  Well, maybe not.

I think the thing I appreciate the most is that she didn’t discourage me when I said I wanted to write.  Mom was never overly demonstrative – so not her generation.  But she proudly took my first book into the library where the librarian added it to a display case for local authors.  I dedicated that book to her and my family, but the dedication page was inadvertently omitted (stuff happens) and the page made it into the next book.

Whose shoulders do you stand on in your writing journey?  Who has helped you build a foundation to Carpe Annum?  We’d love to hear!

Writer's Fear

Where does all the fear come from?

The results are in: Writers are one freaked out group of people. 

What are we afraid of? According to the comments on Wednesday’s post the answer is: plenty.

We’re scared of the foundational questions that form the bedrock of our decisions to even pursue writing in the first place. Let’s start on that shaky ground.

Should I Art? Writers (all artists, really) are faced with the unspoken—and sometimes voiced—questions posed by our culture the moment we choose a life of art: Are you sure? Don’t you want a paycheque? (That’s paycheck to you Americans.) Don’t you know art is just a hobby?

Margaret Atwood created this handy reference chart of writer’s fears about what people think about our books and us as people.

What people say	What Writers Hear
1. I always wait for your books to come in at the library.	I wouldn’t pay money for that trash.
2. I had to take you in school.	Against my will. Or: And I certainly haven’t read any of it since! Or: So why aren’t you dead?
3. You don’t look at all like your picture.	a. Much worse.
4. You’re so prolific!	You write too much, and are repetitive and sloppy.
5. I’m going to write a book too, when I can find the time.	What you do is trivial, and can be done by an idiot.
6. I only read the classics	And you aren’t one of them.
7. Why don’t you write about _______?	Unlike the boring stuff you do write about.
8. That book by _______ (add name of other writer) is selling like hotcakes!	Unlike yours.
9. So, do you teach?	Because writing isn’t real work, and you can’t possibly be supporting yourself at it.
10 That story of MY LIFE - now THAT would make a good novel.	Unlike yours.

If we manage to push our way through the maddening din of the cultural pressure to abandon writing and put on a suit and tie, we immediately slam into the next major fear: Who am I that I should I art? 

Ah, yes. Self-doubt. Isn’t it true that I do not possess the skill/talent/education/cunning good looks of a true artist? Alas, I lack.

Well of course you lack. That’s why you art. Art isn’t about getting your poop in a group first and then approaching the craft from a God’s eye view of having accomplished something. Art is the journey. 

So we slog through and manage to create art. And guess what happens? Rejection. And not even real rejection. Rejection we conjure in our imaginations and somehow convince ourselves will absolutely happen if ever the art we’ve created is shared with the world/agent/publisher/editor/next door neighbour/Mom. 

Should we manage to leap over the fear of rejection fence (which we got over simply as a matter of repetition. We were rejected and rejected and found ourselves still living), we meet up with Fear Of Success, Otherwise known as Second Book Syndrome. 

Everyone gushes after a new author. Hopes are high! Then the book releases, your third cousin emails you that it wasn’t half bad, and Wow! You’ve got a contract for a second book. But what if your third cousin doesn’t like your second book as much as your first? No time to think about it now! You have a lifetime to write your first novel, and six months to write your second.

Now we’re really afraid. Writer’s block is our new best friend. We squeeze the words out as if from an empty toothpaste tube. We’re so close to the story that every word we write looks wrong. We stare at a word and it just looks weirder and weirder the longer we stare. We being to doubt that English is our Mother Tongue. Half way through the second novel we realize we don’t actually know how to write a book. 

We switch into auto-type, madly plastering the page with words, as many as we can think of as quickly as possible (and update our facebook page with our process: 25,000 words today and I blew out my keyboard!) even if the words come out in no particular order because 

We

Have

A

Deadline  

Sure, having a deadline makes you look like a superstar on social media—Oh me, oh my! My fab editor is waiting on my manuscript. Tee hee—but the reality of deadlines is they suck the fun out of the creative process for many writers.

The only thing worse than a deadline is a lack of a deadline. This usually means we’re still steeped in the first couple of fears listed above. 

Here are some cures for your writer’s fear:

Realize that writing is work. Do the work. Don’t complain. I'm lucky enough to know Joy Jordan-Lake and call her friend. In a recent email discussion (we were talking about our fears as writers) she observed: “Writing is like home renovation alternating between sledgehammer and tweezers”

That's the secret. Do the work. 

Self confidence isn’t necessary, but gumption is. If your knees are shaking and you feel like you’re going to throw up, you’re probably doing the right thing.

Show up for work. Do what scares you. Face the fear. Then, do it some more. In time, you’ll find you’ve acquired the knowledge, skill, expertise, and mastery you feared you did not possess.

Goodbye, Fear

I loved Patti's post on Monday, saying goodbye to poor Fred, who wanted to sabotage her novel. A wolf in sheep's clothing was Fred. Today, I'm saying goodbye to fear, and I have Henrietta Frankensee to thank for it. Henrietta is a regular commentor on our blog, and I always appreciate what she has to say. Her comment on our latest Roundtable discussion inspired this post.

She said, "... one day I'll have the courage to join a writers group ... to find a writers group." And that got me thinking about my own fears, and the effect they've had on me over the years. I think I've shared this story before, but when I was a sophomore in high school -- the year from hell for me -- I attended three different high schools (I attended five high schools altogether). In my history class at the third school of my sophomore year we were to write a short term paper, then give an oral report on the paper. I did my term paper, then came the day I was to give the report. Shortly after class started, I asked my teacher (a male, thankfully, because they never ask questions) if I could use the restroom. He gave me a hall pass, I took my purse, left my books on my desk ... and walked home. And I never did give the report.

So believe me, I could relate to Henrietta's fear of joining -- or even exploring the idea of joining -- a writers group, which I did in the mid-eighties, only because I was invited, then compelled to join the group that a friend of mine attended. I was so nervous about going. All the women were experienced writers -- a couple of them had been published multiple times -- and the group had been together for a number of years. I was the youngest person there, and the newest writer. I was petrified whenever it came my turn to read my writing to them.

I was shy by nature, which I think I demonstrated above, and had never been a self-promoter. So getting past that hurdle of fear was huge for me. Well, I'm happy to say, the benefits were well worth the effort. I learned so much about writing and about the submission process from that group. The lessons were invaluable. Recently, I returned to the group to share my latest novel with them, and my Amazon-publishing experience. Only two were original members, and I recognized myself in the quivering voices of novice writers as they read their work to us, and who looked at me the way I used to look at others -- as if I had all the experience and all the answers.

I'm so glad I pressed beyond my fears all those years ago, and am grateful for the direction and encouragement I received from the Write Bunch. But I'm still plagued with fears. I'm in the process of looking for an agent. Last week I queried a handful of agents I thought might be a fit for my writing style and goals. And with each query, before I even sent it off, I found myself battling fear. I had butterflies in my stomach and a deep reticense to hit the Send key

Why? What was I afraid of? A lot, actually. I was afraid my query wasn't written correctly, afraid it wouldn't generate interest, afraid of rejection. When I stopped to analyze it, I asked myself, What's the worst that could happen? Well, I said, they could turn me down. Really? That's it? While I don't relish the thought, I've been through far worse. Far. Worse. So I put things in perspective and sent my queries. And as I faced down my fear I did it with Henrietta in mind, and anyone else who dreads taking that next big step.

And all those years ago, when I was so afraid of reading my work out loud to my writing peers, what was it that I feared? That they'd laugh me out of town? That they'd point out my flaws? That they'd tell me to retire my pencil for good? Well, they didn't laugh at me, they didn't tell me to hang it up; but they did point out my flaws and gave me sound advice for improvement. Invaluable advice. Invaluable encouragement.

I emailed Henrietta a few days after her comment on the blog, asking her if I could quote her for this post, which she obviously agreed to. Then she said she had contacted a critique group and was meeting with one of the writers with the expectation of joining. Yay, Henrietta! Carpe Annum!

Fear can paralyze us or it can motivate us. As a writer, what are you most afraid of, and how can you turn that fear into a motivation?

Deleted Scenes: Goodbye, Fred!

In a recent post--Does This Novel Seem Crowded to You?--I talked about how to prevent overpopulation in your story. Every character has their job to do. If not, well, goodbye!

When first writing Goodness and Mercy, I created a character to act as antagonist to my protagonist and to give a secondary character a chance at redemption. That character, Fred, is charming with a hint of menace, as you will soon see.

Once I got deeper into the story, I saw that Fred was a complication that muddied the premise. In fact, his presence made the story something very different from my original idea --yes, I was working from an outline--and I didn't want to go there.

No room for sentimentality--goodbye, Fred! Lucy doesn't need a Fake-Ally Opponent. So there!

While some may consider writing the following scene a waste, the process clarified my vision of my story by showing me what I didn't want it to be. And that's a very valuable discovery.

Here's the deleted scene, starring Lucy and Fred.

A flirtatious breeze released a shower of golden cottonwood leaves and played at lifting my skirt. It was all I could do to hold a stack of library books and keep my skirt in place. A truck skidded to a stop on the gravel.

Fred Greaves leaned out the driver's window and smiled his billboard smile. “Did you leave any books at the library?” He shouldered his door open. “Let me help you with those.”

He reached for the books. I stepped back. “I’m fine. It’s not that far, and as long as I’m walking, I’m not reading Nathaniel Hawthorne.”

He looked pained and clenched at his shirt over his heart. “Has Lotti soured you on me already?”

“Ada,” I said and shifted the books.

He laughed. “I thought me and Ada had an understanding.” He mimicked her voice perfectly, “Nothing good comes of idleness, Mr. Greaves.”

I bit my cheeks not to laugh.

He put up his hand. “You’re right not say a word against her.” He gestured at the orchard behind me. “She has spies everywhere. How else can she know everything, unless…do you think she’s a witch?”

Although I ached to agree with him, I didn't dare agree with him. “She’s a good Christian woman.” After all, she attended church regularly and delivered potato casseroles to funerals.

Mr. Greaves motioned and I followed him to the passenger side of the truck. “Come on. Jump in. I don’t bite nearly as hard as those women would suppose. Besides, you’re about to drop your books. The good people of Palisade do not abide the abuse of their library books.”

I climbed into his truck for two reasons. First, two blisters the size of quarters made each step pure misery. This from the new shoes Ada had chosen for me, the kind meant for lumberjacks. Second, Mrs. Greaves said things about Ada I wished I could say straight to her face. Oh, and one more thing. Accepting a ride from Mr. Greaves would put a knot in Ada’s girdle.

“Thank you,” I said as he slammed the door shut and walked back around to the driver's side. I figured Fred to be younger than my father but certainly not a boy and much younger than most of the men I saw around town. The boys hurried off to the war the moment they became eligible. And he sure didn’t look like any of the farmers I’d ever known, not in Wisconsin or Colorado. He still owned all of his fingertips and his fingernails looked nicer than mine. When he smiled, his eyes nearly squinted shut, and I liked that.

Fred caught me watching him and gave me a sideways smile. “Do you want to learn how to drive? I could teach you. Got nothing better to do.”

“I already know how to drive.” I wanted to tell him I’d driven eighty-five miles before the tin lizzy dropped her transmission on the road, but I wasn’t telling anyone that story. Mr. Greaves wouldn't turn a girl in for kidnapping her own brother and sister, but in a town as small as Palisade, one word to the wrong person and everyone would know.

“I’m not surprised,” he said. “You’re an amazing girl. Fact is, you’re more of a woman than a girl, aren't you? I bet there’s a lot of boys giving you a second look over there at the high school. Isn’t that true?”

If I hadn't been loaded down with books, I would have squirmed at his question. Instead, I kept my answer short. “I never noticed," I said, but I had noticed.

“How old are you, Lucy?”

“Sixteen. I’ll be seventeen next February.”

“Now, see, I thought you were older. You carry yourself well.” And he winked.

We sped by our mailbox. “Stop!” I yelled.

The truck fishtailed to a stop and the pile of books slid from my lap. Fred leaned down to gather the books. He smelled of fresh tobacco and aftershave, much nicer than I'd expected of a man who treasured his rubbish pile.

He said, “I was enjoying our conversation so much, I nearly drove right by your house. You’re a very pleasant young lady.” He held my math book to his chest. “You sit right there. Don't move. You’re a lady.” He opened his door and looked back at me over his shoulder. “That’s how you’re to be treated. Stay right there.”

I sat as still as stone until Mr. Greaves opened my door and extended his hand. I'd only seen men do such a thing in movies. I took his hand as I stepped out of the truck. It was strong but soft. My heart fluttered. What was that all about?

He relinquished my math book. “Its the lucky boy who catches your eye, Lucy. Be choosy. You deserve the best. If you ever need anything, I'm usually around. You're always welcome. I keep colas in the icebox.”

This could not be the man Ada had been talking about. “Thanks for the ride, Mr. Greaves.”

“We’re friends now, Lucy. Call me Fred.”

[Author's note: After reading this scene, I wanted to shout, "Lucy! You stupid, stupid girl. Get out of the truck; do not pass go; and never, ever, ever seek Fred out, colas or no." The scene begs for Lucy to do just that and for a totally different story than the story I wrote to be written. You can see why Fred had to go, at least for now.]

Do you save deleted scenes? Have you ever used a deleted scene in another part of the same story or used it in part or as a whole in a new story? I have! Are there other ways to use deleted scenes? Name an author whose deleted scenes you would love to read.

The Mary Kay Syndrome

Now, let me begin by saying that I love Mary Kay cosmetics. In fact, people often comment on how few wrinkles I have, and I attribute that to beginning to use the skin care products in my early twenties. And it was a Mary Kay lady who kindly whispered to me that I had stray makeup brush hairs on my face before I spoke publicly at a book signing last week.

And yet when I think of Mary Kay, it is with mixed feelings. First of all, the last group “facial” I attended where the products were demonstrated, one of the hostess’s chairs broke beneath me. (It’s pretty hard to keep applying cream with your ring finger and saying, “lightly, lightly,” when you have just demolished an antique.)

But even more memorable was the time that I was traveling cross-country for a speaking engagement, a trip that required several plane changes. On the last flight was a group of well-dressed and pleasantly boisterous women. Upon deplaning, I went into the airport’s ladies’ room to try to comb my hair and make myself presentable – since I’d left home at 3:30 a.m., I wanted to freshen up a bit before seeing the conference organizer who was meeting me at the gate. 

As I leaned and peered into the mirror and put some mascara on my bleary eyes, the group of women came into the bathroom. I didn’t pay them too much attention until one, a delegate I guess, came up beside me.

“I’m a Mary Kay representative, and I have products that can help you with that,” she said, handing me a business card. Then she and all the other ladies flounced (yes, they really did) out of the bathroom, leaving the other women in the bathroom looking at me –who felt about as attractive as an airsick bag.

So why am I telling these stories? Perhaps as a morality tale. What stung so much, what made me walk out of that bathroom feeling drab and inadequate, was the public way in which the spokeswoman, a stranger to me, showed me my faults. I can just imagine her giving a knowing wink to her compatriots, and them congratulating each other on a great sales opportunity captured and another ignorant person now fully informed.

The morality tale is that the Internet is also a public place. It’s true that readers and writers often see the flaws of writers, and are often anxious to point them out.

Let’s leave the snipping and criticizing to people who don’t even pretend to be Christians. The Bible way to show someone his or her fault is privately—and with humility.

Lest you fall, and break more than a chair yourself.

PS and by the way: This post wasn't provoked by anyone saying anything cruel to me about my writing (at least, not lately.) I've just observed that writers and readers sometimes are not constructive in their comments, especially on Facebook. Have you noticed that, too?