Susan Breen's Blog
May 20, 2016
Coming events
June 13: Community Bookstop http://communitybookstop.blogspot.com/
June 14: T’s Stuff http://teresanoel.blogspot.com/
June 14: Cozy Up with Kathy https://cozyupwithkathy.blogspot.com/
June 15: StoreyBook Reviews http://storeybookreviews.com
June 16: Books Direct https://booksdirectonline.blogspot.co...
June 17: Jersey Girl Book Reviews http://jerseygirlbookreviews.blogspot...
June 18: Melina’s Book Blog http://www.melinathereader.com/
June 18: LibriAmoriMiei http://libriamicimiei.blogspot.com/
June 19: Queen of All She Reads http://queenofallshereads.blogspot.com/
June 19: Island Confidential https://frankiebow.com/
June 20: Back Porchervations http://backporchervations.blogspot.com/
June 20: Brooke Blogs http://www.brookeblogs.com/
June 21: The Girl with Book Lungs https://girlwithbooklungs.com/
June 22: 3 Partners in Shopping, Nana, Mommy, & Sissy, Too http://3partnersinshopping.blogspot.com/
June 23: A Blue Million Books http://abluemillionbooks.blogspot.com/
June 24: I Read What You Write https://ireadwhatyouwrite.wordpress.com/
I also have a lot of in-person events coming up, and I’ll post those soon!
Thanks for stopping by.
March 30, 2016
Agatha Christie
So I've been reading through her quotes, and doing so reminds me of how much I love her, and how wise she was.
Here are some of my favorites:
“One doesn't recognize the really important moments in one's life until it's too late.”
― Agatha Christie
“Good advice is always certain to be ignored, but that's no reason not to give it.”
― Agatha Christie
“To every problem, there is a most simple solution.”
― Agatha Christie, The Clocks
January 28, 2016
A new book
Thanks!
July 5, 2012
about endings
When I was young, my poor mother arranged to send me to creative writing camp. I was not a grateful camper. I didn’t want to go. I didn’t want to be classified. To make matters worse, I was thrown out of camp because I failed the class on endings. We were given subjects and told to come up with one happy and one sad ending ; I simply could not come up with a happy one. To this day, I can picture the counselor, a tall Norwegian woman with bulging eyes, saying, “Susan, can’t you think of one?” (I suspect it’s an especially bad sign when a Norwegian tells you you’re depressed.)
The next summer, my mother might have chosen to send me to therapy camp, but chose instead to send me into the Canadian woods as part of a canoeing camp. (The odd thing is, we had absolutely no money, so I don’t know why she was sending me to camp at all, though now that I think about it, she probably needed relief from me.) In this canoeing camp, I thrived. In fact, the summer was so transformative that at the end of camp I was awarded a paddle, signed by all the campers, and proclaimed “Best Trailblazer.” I still have it, in my office. I consider it one of the proudest moments of my life.
Now that’s a happy ending, I think. Unless you consider what happened the following summer.
Even as I write this, I see that a new issue of Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms is coming out, with all 40 or so endings. I can’t wait to read it. Have you ever had trouble with an ending?
April 13, 2012
about story starters
I’m not generally in the habit of rummaging through my neighbors’ trash, although there have been temptations. Lawn chairs. Desks. TVs that look like they work. However, this morning I passed a great temptation: a thing, covered in a floral sheet, with a sign pinned to it that read, “Please Do Not Take.”
Why not? I immediately asked myself. I don’t know what’s under the sheet, though I thought I glimpsed a bit of wood. I’d like to say I snuck a peak, but I didn’t. I’m a coward and something about the sign made me think its writer had anger management issues. Also, it’s just way more fun to think about.
What could possibly make you want to put up a sign like that? What could it be? A broken piece of furniture and you’re afraid someone will sue you about it. But there must be a legal assumption that trash is broken. Perhaps you have a phobia about other people using your things. Perhaps you think the item is possessed, but then why let the garbage people pick it up. Perhaps you are a nut. Perhaps you loved that item so much that you can’t bear to think of anyone else using it. Perhaps a broken mirror. Perhaps a computer with nuclear launch codes.
Whatever it is, I feel confident there’s a story behind it. And isn’t this how stories begin, so often—with something that’s just not quite right. Have you ever started a story that way?
March 6, 2012
about leaving the comfort zone
For a period of time, my oldest son raced dirt bikes. As a result I spent a lot of time at race tracks an hour north of Manhattan, which isn't upstate, but is so different it might as well be. At that time I was working on a novel, COURTING DISASTER, which didn't sell, but from which I took the character, Chuck Jones, who went into THE FICTION CLASS. I felt Chuck would have an evangelical background and so while my son and his friends lumbered about with chains and tires and so forth, I sat in a chair and read Billy Graham's autobiography, which was very long, but interesting. I can safely say I was the only person at the track reading, (except for a man who was always reading books on conspiracy theories), but people were friendly and, to a person, when they came up to me, seeing the length of the book, they would say, WAR AND PEACE? That always struck me funny. As though there was only one long book in this world.
A lot of Will's racing took place right after 9/11. You could watch soldiers parachuting off into the fields while the dirt bike races were going on. This was Republican country. The boys who raced, and they were all boys, were the sorts of kids who would join the army. Many of them did. They all loved guns and hunting, but although my liberal sensibilities were ruffled, I always felt in good hands when I was with them. I suspected they would do a better job of defending the country than I would. They were so physically strong it astounded me. (My son used to take great pleasure in handing me the dirt bike and then walking away, laughing uproariously as I struggled to keep it upright.) These guys were also idealistic and poetic. The track smelled strongly of motor oil and one of the guys looked at me once and said, "It smells better than candy." When they said the Pledge of Allegiance before the races began, you felt every single word.
I was thinking what a blessing it was to be forced out of my comfort zone. My natural habitat consists of libraries, book stores, Starbucks, Central Park, the Metropolitan Museum. I love those places. But for a period of time, it was a race track, and I think I'm a better writer for it. How about you? Have you ever wound up anywhere unexpected?
January 21, 2012
about remembering
Someone asked me the other day if I'd be interested in writing a memoir and I said, "No. Because I can't remember a thing."
Minutes later I received an e-mail from an editor, giving me information about an article of mine his magazine is publishing. He said the word count was good, but they had to add a word to one of the sentences because they have a "strict anti-widow policy." Oh dear, I thought, and then remembered that a widow refers to a stray word at the bottom of a column. Old newspaper lingo.
Which reminded me of when I started out as a reporter for FORTUNE Magazine. My first job was to work on the FORTUNE 500. This was in the early 1980s, before the internet was used, so the job involved reading through tons of annual reports, looking for those companies that had the largest revenues. The twist was that more than fifty per cent of the revenues had to be from manufacturing. So if you were General Motors, that wasn't a problem. But some companies teetered, if, for example, they did a lot of financial services. One year you might be on the FORTUNE 500, the next year off. You can only imagine the glee a young reporter would feel at telling an older gentleman (because they were all older gentlemen in those days) that his company had been booted off the list. By me.
That in turn made me think of the first time I had a martini, which was at a party in Memphis at which I met Glenn Campbell and Danny Thomas, who were famous at that time. On that occasion, I was reporting an article. They were serving martinis on trays. I have a very hard time not taking something off a tray if someone holds it up to me, and it was not my most professional moment. Thirty years later I had a martini with my husband (who proposed to me after the Memphis trip) and I passed out yet again. Not a drink I should have more than twice a century.
All of which made me think how much memory is inside me, and all of us, just waiting for someone to prod us and make it come out. Unfortunately, and this is embarrassing, I can't remember who asked me about writing the memoir in the first place. But it will come, if I think about it. How about you? Memories inspire any stories?
December 12, 2011
about story starters
Sometimes it's fun to think about the beginnings of stories, without figuring out where they'll end. Of course, if I can figure out where it will end and who the characters will be, that's all the better. But a lot of times I just have a start, and I chew over that for a while, and then it disappears. So I'm passing along this start to you and maybe you can make something better of it than I can.
I was on the train. It was late and I purposely chose a seat behind a man who looked quiet. He wore a shabby suit, he was hunched over, he looked like he was going home after a long day's work. Just as the door began to close, two very loud drunk people burst into the train and sat right next to my quiet guy. One was a very, very tall man and the other a very tall woman. They asked the quiet guy what stop he was getting off, and lo and behold, we were getting off at the same place. I figured he would do what I would do, which was close my eyes and hope they went away. But the quiet guy began talking to them. They were all involved in divorce and custody battles, they loved their children, they were frustrated by various things. I was touched as I listened at what a surprising turn the whole thing had taken. These were three people who never in the world would have connected, and here they were.
A week later, I'm sitting on the train and three big bruiser types get on, or, as Woody Allen would put it "hairy knuckle types." They were talking about some guy who was getting out from jail and I wasn't sure if they were felons or police officers. All of a sudden a voice pipes up, from deep within the 5-seater and I'm darned if it isn't my quiet man. He begins talking to them about Mike Tyson and various other boxers. They start to talk.
There's a John Cheever story about a woman who keeps showing up to visit people who are dying, and I began to get a spooky feeling about this man. What if he was a figment of my imagination? What if he was a killer looking for drunk people? What if he was just a really lonely guy who could only connect with people on a train? (What if I should just read a book and stop listening to other people?)
What do you think?
December 5, 2011
about holiday etiquette for writers
We writers are a twitchy lot, and this is the time of year when we're forced away from our computers and into the society of people who are bemused, intrigued and largely ignorant about we do. I've spent many a holiday party grabbing onto the nearest drink, dog, or baby–trying to still my nerves. So in the interest of holiday harmony, I'd offer up some suggestions of statements to avoid when speaking to a writer.
1. What are you working on?
I don't want to talk about it. I think my new manuscript is good, but I'm not sure and it might be bad, and if I gather up my courage to give you a brief summary, you're likely to say what you said last year: "That's interesting. " I then spent the month of January wondering why you said "interesting" instead of "great." Should I scrap it? Should I start over?
2. When is your book coming out?
I don't know. If I knew, I'd say so. Right up front. I'd walk right into this party and hand you bookmarks and buttons and talk all about it. I wouldn't be trying to keep it a secret. So if I don't say anything, it means there's nothing to say.
3. I was just reading this really bad book and thought of you. You don't write any worse than she does. Why don't you have a series?
Just no.
4. Would you read my manuscript?
Aside from the fact that that would take me about ten hours, which I don't have, if I read your manuscript I would feel like I should come up with constructive advice, in order to be helpful. But every time I give someone constructive advice, they wind up getting insulted and never talk to me again. This doesn't happen in the classes I teach, so all I can figure is that people who expect you to do something for free have different expectations than people who are serious about studying the craft of writing.
5. Have you considered self-publishing?
Everyone considers self-publishing because the ads are all over the place. People who self-publish pay a large chunk of money in order to produce a book that very few people will read. I would rather be paid for that honor.
So what should you say to a writer at a holiday party? I would stick with the tried and true: politics and religion.
Happy season, Bloomer friends. Anyone have any statements they would rather not hear?
November 14, 2011
about epigraphs
Recently I've become convinced that a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt would be perfect as an epigraph for my new novel (an epigraph being a little quote on the opening page right before a novel starts). With the right epigraph I'd immediately establish a warm, sympathetic, intelligent tone. I hope. Unfortunately, although I know what I want Eleanor Roosevelt to have said, and although I think she probably did say it, I can't find the exact right words. I've been reading her letters, confident that somewhere, tucked away, I'll find my epigraph. But meanwhile, I've been accumulating epigraphs perfect for books I'm not writing. So I'll pass them along and feel free to take them.
Eleanor Roosevelt: "Perhaps we have to learn that life was not meant to be lived in security but with adventurous courage."
Eleanor Roosevelt: "It is often said that friendship and loyalty are the petty illusions and dreams of youth and that as one grows older, one gives them up and forgets them, but this seems wrong, for the greatest men and women are those who have been loyal and honest and have believed in friendship to the end."
Bernard Selling: "Sometimes the only real truth is each person's perception of it."
Peter Ackroyd: "If there is one aspect of a writer's life that cannot be concealed, it is childhood."
Antigone: "The mighty words of the proud are paid in full with might blows of fate, and at long last these blows will teach us wisdom."
Oedipus: "The pains we inflict upon ourselves hurt most of all."
Margaret Robison: "The soul has to have a place to come home to."
Bill Roorbach: "If memory is what people are made of, then people are made of loss."
Lucille Clifton: "I write the way I write because I am the kind of person I am."
Katherine Russell Rich: "There are three things you can't hide—happiness, a cough and love."
Anyone have an epigraph they like?
