Beth Kephart's Blog, page 190

Just walk and breathe in some salt air

"Don't force it," my friend Kelly said.  "Just walk and breathe in some salt air."



So I did.  And woke at four and rewrote three chapters.  Because sometimes going forward with a book means stepping back.  Again.



I'll take a little break now. Look for birds.

Beach Haven, just after dawn

[image error]

See Buzz Bissinger Talk about Fatherhood and the Art of the Rave, and support the Spells Writing Lab in the process

Readers of this blog know just how much I adored Buzz Bissinger's forthcoming memoir Father's Day.  I wrote about it here not once, but twice.  I read passages out loud to my students.  I told a seatmate on a train.  I just kinda—well, did my thing.



There goes Miss Crazy Effusive again.



Philadelphia-area readers and thinkers and hearts (that's all of us, right?) now have a chance not just to meet Buzz and hear him talk about the making of the memoir, the glories and heartbreak of fatherhood, and the art of the rave (don't you want to hear Buzz talk about the art of the rave?), but to support a really important cause—the Spells Writing Lab, a literacy-focused organization that offers after-school tutoring, weekend writing workshops, in-school assistance with student publications, and professional development opportunities for teachers.  If that's not enough to persuade you, consider the composition of its advisory board, which is rocked by Stephen Fried, Elizabeth Gilbert, Carol Saline, Lisa Scottoline, Lori Tharps, and Caroline Tiger, among others.



The event is taking place at the Loews Hotel on 1200 Market Street, Philadelphia, on May 10, 2012. It begins at 6:15, and Anyone Who is Anyone will be there.  (I hope to make it, too.)  More information can be found right here.[image error]

At 96 years old, Herman Wouk sells a new novel, in a project spearheaded by my agent

Obviously my agent, Amy Rennert, cannot tell me a lot about what she is doing—not when she's in the run-up to a big sale, at least, or in the heat of auctions.  But today while Amy and I were talking about another confidential project (which is A okay, because it happens to be mine), she forwarded a link to something she called special.



I waited.  My email pinged.  I opened the link.  Whaaaatttt? I said.



Because, as it turns out, ninety-six-year-old Herman Wouk, who won the Pulitzer Prize for The Caine Mutiny, has a new novel due out from Jonathan Karp at Simon & Schuster, a novel with Moses at its heart.  Mr. Karp and Mr. Wouk are, says Amy, no accidental pairing; in fact, Mr. Karp wrote his master's thesis on Wouk when in graduate school at New York University.



But neither are Amy and Mr. Wouk an accidental pairing.  I asked Amy for some behind-the-scenes insights.  This is what she said:

The new novel is outstanding. HW has long wanted to write a novel about Moses and in The Lawgiver he approaches the subject with great warmth, wisdom and imagination. It's a tour de force. Some of his earlier novels have long been favorites of mine—including City Boy, The Caine Mutiny (my father introduced me to it and I still have his original hardcover copy from 1951, the year it was published!) and Marjorie Morningstar—and getting to know Herman Wouk and work with him closely has been a great privilege and pleasure.    

Impressed?  I am. 
[image error]

FLOW, my river book, earns its keep

It's always a little bit of a thrill when one of your
books earns out its advance.  Today I received a royalty check for FLOW,
my Schuylkill River book. It isn't huge (see?). But it does remind me
of the power inherent in fighting for a book in which you absolutely
believe.  Thank you, Micah Kleit, Gary Kramer, and Temple University
Press for taking a risk with a book that remains very close to my heart.

Bach and Berlin, a sliver from a work in progress

I hurry us deep into the belly of
the church, away from the wind that tumbles in behind, toward Herr Palinski,
who is still playing Bach like a four-armed man, like Berlin—both sides—is
listening.  Slowly Meryem eases in, lets me sit with her in a lonesome pew.  She tilts her head and looks up, as if
the music is coming from high in the church's hollows, or from the tenacious stain of windows.  Her
ducky yellow boots flop sideways. 
Her back scoops my ribs.  

— from the Berlin novel, for Tamra Tuller/Philomel [image error]

May the sun rise on your day.

I love knowing famous people (and the power of young adult fiction)

Okay, so.  Yes.  I'm behind.  I'm behind on everything.  I'm behind on the dusting, the laundry, the reading, the friendships, the blogging, the book writing, (not the taxes, though), (not the Easter presents), (not the clients), and so and therefore and thus, I didn't see this New York Times conversation on the power of young adult fiction until today.  Even though it was posted March 28th. 



That's how behind I am.


It doesn't matter.  I can still sing and shout a little here.  Because check out the teen blogger who has entered the conversation.  Her name is Emma Allison.  She's from Canada.  Her blog is called Booking Through 365.  And just days ago, she reviewed Dangerous Neighbors.


I love knowing famous people.[image error]

On page 200 of the Berlin novel, I stop

and allow myself to ponder how all of this (specifically) ends.  I am, perhaps, 5,000 words away from a first full draft.  In terms of plot and character, especially in terms of research, this is by far the most complex book I've ever attempted.  Every single word feels like a victory.  Every image is extracted from a graffiti-colored tangle.  I will work with and for clients on Monday, teach at Penn on Tuesday, then disappear for five days—the first time (these fifteen years into the writing of books, these sixteen books (not to mention an uncounted, embarrassing number of failures) in) I have ever gone away to be with a story, to be an author.  This book is that hard.  This book needs that much silence, and so do I. 



In the meantime, my boy is home for a day and a half.  The air is the right temperature for spring.

Ikebana Workshop

Ikebana Workshop







For this she has clipped the wings

Of Jane's tree and bucketed monks head

And stolen rose hips from a mass of vines

On a roadside stretch while her husband

Perpetuated the crime. 
Beauty being in




The bend of things and in the wide

Omnivorous eye

Of a bloom. 




We are to watch for thorns,




She says, and for architecture.

We are to turn the subject back

On itself and lift the object's chin

And make room for spaces in

Between, and nothing is lovelier




Than the odd one thing, and turgor

Is a word she'd buy, a word she gives away

For free.  Her
best friend died this summer,

And in the earthen room

In which we work, there are




Her best friend's things: 

Pods and kenzans and ceramic half moons and the name

Helen, which she
joins with honor

And stem. 




We are women working in shadow

And with inversions and toward the faith

She teaches us to have

In the line between the lines

Of stolen hips and wings.  




— Beth Kephart, posted as part of the Savvy Verse and Wit National Poetry Month Blog Tour.