Elizabeth Sumner Wafler's Blog, page 2
September 10, 2019
Differentiating Characters:
[image error]Keswick Vineyards, Keswick, Virginia
Near my home, a world-class vineyard and winery nestles into
a pastoral valley limned by blue mountains. “Yes, Virginia,” more than fifty
award-winning vineyards make the central part of our state a destination for
oenophiles. At Keswick Vineyards, there’s a popular annual competition in which
wine club members are invited into the cellars. There, oenophile aka “nose”
teams compete to create a blend labeled as Consensus.
The
Right Blend
Different varieties of grapes make wines more complex and
maximize the expression of a bottle, as do the right blend of characters in our
stories. As a little Merlot can help soften Cabernet’s tannins or a touch of
Syrah can give some oomph to watery inexpensive Pinot, giving characters
distinguishing traits make scenes interesting and robust, worth savoring, and with
just the right finish.
In his (completely brilliant) craft book WRITING THE
BREAKOUT NOVEL, agent Donald Maas says, “Character differentiation is the
technique of making the characters in your cast different and distinct from one
another . . . contrast is the key.”
Aim for contrast by focusing on personality, voice and worldview:
Personality
Like sweetness and acidity in wine, characters need each
other for balance.
The good-guys need foils–black-hearted scoundrels–to
highlight the good-guys’ white-knight personas. (While an antagonist acts in
opposition to the MC, a foil simply provides a contrast.) Consider Cal and Aron
in John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, a novel modeled after the Bible story of Adam
and Eve and their sons Cain and Abel. Aron is pale and delicate, the beloved
son, while the murderous Cain is dark and secretive. Not only do the boys’
personalities provide contrast and complexity to the story, they affect the
choices they make throughout the novel.
Voice
A great wine speaks. Characters resonate with readers
when they’re given accents, nicknames and quirk. A memorable scene in Susan Isaac’s
novel RED, WHITE AND BLUE features a jumble of soldiers sharing a WWII foxhole.
Issacs gives each man a different regional accent making the scene interesting,
compelling, and yes, hilarious. (Though I grew up in Chattanooga, I still giggled
at the guffawing bumpkin from Tennessee.)
In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s THE GREAT GATSBY, Jay Gatsby nicknames
Nick Carraway Old Sport, which
implies that Nick desires an old-money lifestyle; he wants to play rich men’s
games at the mansion estates of East Egg, Long Island. Old Sport. How catchy is
that?
STAR WARS Yoda, the ancient Jedi Master, says his wise words using an object-subject-verb pattern. (Maybe that’s what everyone did 900 years ago.) Old style and direct it is. Quirky and exotic it is. And love the wrinkly little green badass we do.
Worldview
Oenophiles use the term “earthy” to describe
wines delivering a sense of place and origin, from where the grapes were grown,
even to the type of soil.
Great characters have complex root systems. We empathize
with them–even the rascals–because we know where they came from and how their
experiences have shaped their worldviews for better or worse. Even if opposing
characters have similar desires or goals, it’s the origin of what drives them that matters.
Contrasting worldviews make characters believable and
relatable. Sharpen your shovel, and dig deep. Give your characters deeply
buried secrets and internal struggles that will trigger the decisions that
drive your plot.
Just as Keswick Vineyard’s Consensus competition affords
noses an inside view of what makes great wines work, allowing readers to see what
makes our characters tick as individuals, makes for richer, fuller, and more satisfying
reading experiences.
Cheers!
March 28, 2019
The Inevitable Question
When someone asks me what I do, the conversation typically goes something like this.
“I’m a writer.”
*Smiles/lifts brows* “Ahh, what do you write?”
“Women’s fiction.”
*Brow furrows slightly* And wait for it . . . “What exactly is that?”
So, I thought it might be fun to create a little presentation that helps define the genre. Click on the PowerPoint below and let me know what surprised you.
womens-fiction-pptDownload
March 16, 2019
Keeping It Real
Relatable: (adj.) that someone can understand or feel
sympathy for.
I’m one of the three or four women in America who has never watched an episode of TV’s “The Bachelor.” But the other night, while randomly thumbing the remote, I landed on the show’s season finale.
SPOILER AHEAD.
With time to spare at the end of the show, the host proposed (pun intended) that the woman chosen as next season’s bachelorette offer a red rose to one of five new bachelors. An “I like you the best at first blush” gesture. By the audience’s gasps and giggles, I guessed it was an unprecedented, slightly scandalous move.
One at a time, the bachelors approached the gorgeous bachelorette, Hannah, and gave her their personal “pitches.”
Then Hannah made her selection: the guy, who in only thirty seconds had captured her eye, sent her heart a-flutter, and piqued her interest, the dapper Cam.
Cam was polished. He had done his homework, personalized his pitch. He’d performed a ten-second rap he’d written for Hannah, tacking a reference to her Alabama alma mater onto the end: “Roll Tide!”
The guy risked making a fool of himself on national TV.
And it worked.
Hannah understood; Hannah sympathized. “How you pumped up your jams,” breathed the giddy bachelorette, “that was awesome.” Cam gave her a glimpse of who he is and left her wanting to know more. He stood out from the pack, and Hannah tucked a rose into his lapel.
Do your homework. Personalize your pitch for each agent you send it to. Make your characters relatable, even if they are post-apocalypse zombie tax accountants. Don’t give away too much plot too soon. Make the agent want to know more.
You just might receive a rose.
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February 26, 2019
How I Landed My Literary Agent
In 2015 and on the heels of a twenty-year teaching career, I
began writing my first book. I had no experience with creative writing, simply a
passion for evocative women’s fiction. Nine months later, the manuscript was
complete. I emailed query letters and sample chapters to literary agents. While
I received several requests for additional chapters, the manuscript was
ultimately rejected by more agents than I have teeth. I decide to self-publish.
Six months later, the big brown truck unloaded two-hundred books on my front
porch. I threw myself a fancy book launch party and expected to become the next
Anne Rivers Siddons.
I had a lot to learn.
For the next year, I spoke to book clubs, made eight Barnes and
Noble appearances in eight cities and vended the book at countless Saturday
farmers markets. Despite my efforts, IN ROBIN’S NEST never took wing. Too late,
I learned that self-published (vs. traditionally published) authors need
publicists. After paying the publisher, my writing budget was nonexistent. And
publicists cost more than foot surgery.
But I had another story to tell. In 2017, I began writing GEORGIE
GIRL and studying the craft of writing. I hired a young freelance editor, who
affirmed my talent, while teaching me more about the craft than I believe any
MFA program could. A year later, the manuscript was complete. Believing it was “the”
book, I again queried agents. Unfortunately, this was the boom period for
thrillers such as GONE GIRL. A coming-of-age story set in the seventies wasn’t
making agent pulses race. Though I did receive encouragement, another barrage
of rejections (which aren’t personal, but leave you feeling as gutted as
fresh-caught trout) hit my inbox.
I moved on. I read everything I could get my hands on about
the craft and joined the Women’s Fiction Writers Association. Writing can be an
isolating endeavor. Every writer needs a tribe of supporters. Through WFWA I
met my Nashville-based critique partner with whom I’ll be friends to the grave.
I helped others celebrate landing agents, while thinking it would never happen for
me. But I wasn’t giving up.
In March of 2018, I began writing my third novel A CLEFT IN
THE WORLD, the story of an agoraphobic French professor whose raison d’etre is
a women’s college on the skids. Midstream chapter six, my wonder girl editor
took a health-related leave of absence. Scrambling, I was fortunate enough to
find a powerhouse book coach through Author Accelerator and finished the manuscript
in September 2018. Again, I faced the dreaded querying process. With heart in
mouth, I emailed queries. A few rejections hit my inbox. But one month later, I
had received full-manuscript requests from two agents.
The day before Thanksgiving, I received an email from Pamela
Harty of the Knight Agency. She had just finished my book, loved it and wanted
to “chat.” I screamed and prayed and prepared. That afternoon, I had a
delightful conversation with Pamela, and she offered me a contract. Me! I hung up, screamed some more and
cried. I celebrated Thanksgiving with special gratitude. And then dove into the
revisions she suggested.
This week my agent began submitting A CLEFT IN THE WORLD to
publishers. A manuscript can sell in a week. Or a year. Meanwhile, I’m
outlining a new book and deciding what I might do with GEORGIE GIRL.
In today’s market, it can take two or three or ten books to
garner the attention of an agent. If you are pursuing a career in traditional
publishing, learn from rejection. Do your research. Interact with other writers.
Most important, don’t give up! Keep writing and honing your skills.
*Today I serve as Director of Craft/Education Programs for
the association.
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October 27, 2018
In honor of National Black Cat Day . . .
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This is my daughter’s cat Voltaire. He’s a prince, and the inspiration for Georgie’s cat in A CLEFT IN THE WORLD.
October 6, 2018
“I love her because she is the one friend who remembers...
“I love her because she is the one friend who remembers when we were twelve and figured out that Nancy Drew didn’t have time for a boyfriend because she had business to attend to.” from A CLEFT IN THE WORLD
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“I love her because she is the one friend who remember...
“I love her because she is the one friend who remembers when we were twelve and figured out that Nancy Drew didn’t have time for boys because she had business to attend to.” from A CLEFT IN THE WORLD
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October 2, 2018
A Passage from A CLEFT IN THE WORLD
I step from the building that had seemed chilled by Eleanor’s presence and back into the late April afternoon. Students cross the quad in waves, at once buoying my spirits. They eddy around the benches and tables, their courses sure. Smiling, I shake my head. How do they not run into lampposts always peering down at their phones? I drift toward an empty bench in the shade of a river birch, wondering how long it will be until Truman appears, or if I should head back to my office and await his call. I wave to a couple of sophomores, then pull out my phone and check my email. The receipt from the visit with Dr. Chu has made its way into my inbox. I let out a huff at the hit my credit card has taken and am grateful for good insurance. Without my job, I’d have no health care benefits, no medicine. I jerk my mind abruptly away from that thought before the jaws of my anxiety can latch onto it.
The slanting sun sifts through the leaves of the birch, dappling my lap and knees. I lay my head back on the back of the bench, imagining the new medication skirling through my veins, balancing the chemicals, quieting my worries. My stomach grumbles. I look up at the administration building where Truman meets with his mother and assume our dinner date is off. Eleanor Parker at Willa Cather.
[image error]When I was fourteen, I thought she looked like Kim Novak, the beautiful and mysterious Madeleine in the movie Vertigo, I’d seen on TV. She and Mr. Parker had come from Atlanta to attend the underclassmen awards day at Browning. Truman was awarded the freshman English award, and was stunned when English teacher, Miss Foxie Frame—our neighbor and friend—had called him to the stage a second time to present him a prize for poetry. At the reception afterwards, I longed to run to Truman, to give him a hug. But the sight of Mrs. Parker in a severely tailored suit at his side, stilled my feet. With her carefully sculptured hair and tasteful gold jewelry, the woman looked as though she’d been dipped in shellack. Truman had proudly introduced me to his parents as Georgie Bricker, my girl.
Mr. Parker’s eyes were amused as he took my hand. “How do you do, Miss ahh Bricker, is it?” The handsome planes of Truman’s young face, his blue eyes, the shape of his mouth and nose were mere counterfeits of Conrad Parker’s splendid features. He looked like a cross between Paul Newman and the prince in Cinderella. I’m sure I gawked at him.
But my enchantment with Eleanor Parker had fizzled like a dud firecracker when her moonstone eyes moved from Truman’s face to mine, skimmed me in the Easter dress my mother had made for me, the white sandals my father had polished for me that mornin[image error]g. Beneath the weight of her gaze, I’d felt like Ellie May Clampett in The Beverly Hillbillies; the sash of navy ribbon at the waist of my dress a length of frayed rope. “Well. I’m happy to meet Truman’s . . . little friend.”
I had put out my hand as I’d been taught, hoping the little pearl ring Truman had given me for Christmas would glow. “I’m pleased to meet you, Mrs. Parker.”
She’d raised her painted on eyebrows and taken my fingers as though they might be creeping with lice. Just then, my parents had strolled over to congratulate Truman. I’d watched Mrs. Parker survey my mother—her three-year-old spring dress, her plain gold wedding band, her softly waving dark hair, her slender ankles in the special shoes she wore because one leg was shorter than the other. I’d watched Mrs. Parker look back at Truman’s happy face. She’d placed a manicured hand on his arm, the diamond in her wedding set the size of a fordhook butter bean. “Will you bring me a cup of punch, please?”
The laughter of young women returns me to the present. I still have a hard time imagining a young and happy Eleanor strolling here in this place that’s mine. The sun sinks toward the chapel and for a moment seems to impale itself on the steeple. A little shiver runs through me.
September 24, 2018
One of my favorite scenes from A CLEFT IN THE WORLD
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Did you have one of these?
Three days before the rally.
I awake from a disorienting dream in which Lacey and I were thirteen and messing around with a Magic Eight Ball she’d received for her birthday. I rub my eyes, practically poached from the crying I did in the privacy of the shower last night—so as not to alarm Laurel—before going to bed. The dream Lacey—in cut off blue jean shorts and a tank top—held the ball between her palms and said, “Now remember to ask it only yes or no questions.”
I grinned, and asked in the floaty voice of a medium, “Magic Eight Ball, how did I do on the math test? Wait that’s not a yes or no question!” I try again. “Did I do well on the math test?” Lacey nods and turns the ball slowly over in her hands, her short nails bubblegum pink. The triangle containing the message rises into view. Outlook good. “Yay!” I say, making a mock swipe of relief across my brow.
“My turn,” Lacey says, handing me the ball. “Magic Eight Ball, does Truman Parker like Georgie Bricker?”
I purse my lips over a grin, my eyes wide. I rotate the ball and hold my breath as the answer surfaces. You may rely on it. I collapse in rapture on the carpet between Lacey and Karen’s twin beds, planting smooches all over the clunky black ball.
“You know good and well he likes you, G.,” Lacey retorts, “He’s held your hand twice.” She wrestles the ball from me. Her face ages before my eyes, like one of those age progression videos. “Magic Eight Ball” she says, in her clipped adult New York voice, “Will Georgie rescue Willa Cather College?”
The Eight Ball turns in her manicured hands. Cannot predict.
August 9, 2018
Teasers from A Cleft in the World
The half-mark of the rally. Raphael Saadiq’s “Keep Marchin’”pumps from the speakers. Just gotta keep, keep marchin’. Keep marchin’ on. The girls dance down from the library porch with the signs they made and hand them out to participants who didn’t make or bring their own. Many of the placards read, Where There’s a Willa, There’s a Way, like our T-shirts, but other clever ones catch my eye: I am girl-cotting This Closing, What Would Willa Do?, and my favorite, We Don’t Wear Pink Hats, Willa Cather Women Wear All the Hats.
I wait for the speeches to begin—bouncing on my toes to the music, my heart racing with hope—next to Truman and my friends, while monitoring the buzz at the donation tables. Someone from on the ground behind the platform calls, “Dudes, bring out that last cooler of water bottles,” and from there, in a tarp shadow so deep my eyes almost skim over them, stand Laurel and Trask locked in an embrace so intense that I touch my breastbone and gulp. Trask seems to speak into Laurel’s ear. Last minute words of inspiration, love? God bless these terrific kids.
My fingers come away damp from where I’ve touched my T-shirt. Am I sweating that badly? Rubbing them together, I look down. Merde, it’s mustard! A long swath of it paints a yellow exclamation point after the word Willa. I wipe my fingers on the dark denim of my skirt. I have to face Truman’s mother like this? My chagrin makes giddiness bubble up inside me: Pardon me, would you have any Grey Poupon?
To our right, Elizabeth Pattison parts the sea of people like the prow of a ship, Isabelle striding in her mother’s wake in cork-soled platform heels. I tear myself away from the mustard stain to look at Laurel and make sure she catches sight of them. She does and turns from Trask to join them at the steps.
Keep on, keep on, keep marchin’. . .
Forgetting my appearance, I take a deep breath for both of us.
From Chapter Two:
Stepping forward, the board chairman Beau Duffy pulls a slight smile, accepts the clip-on mic from Susan and attaches it to his navy and red striped tie. He clears his throat.
Lina pokes my thigh.
A local pediatrician, nearing retirement and the kind of guy who would come over and roust a mouse from your house, Beau surveys us a moment. He peers at his notes. The room has the preternatural hush of a moon. My own deodorant is breaking down, my armpits growing slick.
“I’m not going to dance around this,” the chairman begins, the microphone fuzzing his words for a moment. “In the last two years, Willa Cather’s endowment—that which keeps us in the black—has dropped sixteen million dollars.” Alarm pricks at my skin like an incipient rash.
The chairman motions to the CFO, Sawyer Hays—who resembles a formal Pierce Brosnan—holding a stack of papers to his chest. Agendas? Sawyer’s face and hands are deeply tanned, as though he’s spent a month on his cruising sailboat, The Willa. Considering the state of our endowment he hasn’t been commanding our helm.
The chairman speaks again. “Coming to you are the exact figures.” All heads turn to follow the passing of the stack. The only sounds are the rustle of paper, the creak of metal chair. “As most of our endowment is restricted—it must be used to fund scholarships or faculty salaries and the like—we have been forced to draw from the unrestricted portion for operating expenses.”
I look at Lina as she passes the stack to me, her hand the chill of granite. She murmurs her Italian version of what the hell, “Che cavalo?”
Beau’s ruddy complexion deepens. “Ladies and gentlemen, we are twelve million dollars in debt.” Fear nibbles at my core.
The math instructor fumbles the stack. Pages drift and slide on the marble floor. No one moves to help. A voice rises from near the front, and then a surf of questions break.
“Why are we just hearing about this?”
“Two years?”
“What does this mean for salaries?”
Beau raises his hands like a bank teller in a hold up. “Please. Let me finish.”
A gust of wind carrying breath mints and alarm brushes the back of my hair, as people behind us bend and shuffle to grab up the scattered pages.
“The board has voted to create a new position—a one-year interim position—of vice president of finance and administration. Truman, will you stand?” Truman. That’s a name I haven’t heard in a while. The man stands and turns to face the faculty. My chest tightens the way it did when I once narrowly missed getting t-boned on Fourth Street. “Truman Parker comes to us from Emory University and Columbia Business School. He . . .” The chairman’s voice echoes in the suddenly airless, book-lined room, and bounces off the ceiling.
“The Ivy League to the rescue?” I think I hear Lina whisper over the blood pounding in my ears.
Truman Parker smiles and buttons his navy suit coat, his blue eyes giving off sparks in the dim, old room. Something breaks loose near my heart. The rest of the board chair’s introduction is lost on me. I don’t remember losing my first tooth, the Christmas I first understood that Santa wasn’t real, or what I wore for a Halloween costume in fifth grade. But I’ll never forget the first time I saw the fourteen-year-old strawberry blond, the first boy to capture my heart.
