Gail Gauthier's Blog: Gail Gauthier Reads, page 10
July 11, 2015
How Do We Feel About Another Author's Photo Showing Up On Our Work?
An Author Photo Mix-up
Several years ago (just a little over four, to be exact), I read Why Is Someone Else In My Book's Author Photo? by Caroline Leavitt at Salon. In it, Leavitt writes about finding out that the Chinese edition of her book, Girls in Trouble, carried another author's photograph. She found it "discomfiting" and said of herself, "I mourn."
Now, I have learned only a handful of things in my lifetime, but one of them is that I just can't predict how I will respond to any experience. Would I feel that "an author’s photo is the reader-writer connection...It’s a public acknowledgment that a real person — me! — spent four years agonizing and obsessing over the story"? Would I mourn?
My Own Author Photo Issue
Rosemary and Olive Oil, my short story that was published at Alimentum, does, indeed, include someone else's photograph with the author info. Oddly enough, she looks a little bit like Caroline Leavitt.
How upset am I about this? I probably noticed it three or four months or so ago. I just got around last week to writing an e-mail to the Alimentum editor to see if the picture can be replaced with one of mine. I'm not going to send it for a few days so my readers can enjoy checking out the story and the mystery photo. So, no, it doesn't seem to be bothering me that much, and I'm happy to get a blog post out of the situation.
Why Am I Not In Despair Over This Misplaced Author Photo?
Rosemary and Olive Oil was my first published short story for adults, so it was a very big deal for me. To date, it is still my only published short story for adults, so it is still a very big deal for me. I had to rework it a number of times. I've submitted many short stories over and over again, but Rosemary and Olive Oil went to the third publication I submitted it to. I put this down not to the splendor of the story but to having stumbled upon the perfect place for it. Alimentum is a journal of the literature of food, and Rosemary and Olive Oil is, indeed, a short story about food. Finding the perfect home for a piece of writing is difficult and, sometimes, as in this case, kind of magical.
I think this is running off my back for two reasons:
1. It didn't happen at the time of publication. My recollection is that Alimentum had just shifted from a print to on-line format when Rosemary and Olive was published. I don't believe it was using author photos with the bios at that point. I most certainly would have felt differently if this had happened with my shiny new story.
2. I'm a bit of an in-this-moment kind of writer. I tend to be involved with what I'm working on now and not that intent on what I did in the past. When speaking with reporters while promoting new books, I can recall them asking if I was excited about the publication we were discussing. I'd have to say, "Ah, I've pretty much moved on to the next book." Rosemary and Olive Oil was published more than two years ago. Yeah, this author photo thing is interesting and I'm going to address it, but I'm far more concerned with the nine chapters I'm revising of my work-in-progress so I can go on to Chapter Ten and, some day, an ending.
I'll be sending that e-mail to Alimentum's editor in a few days, and I'll let you know what happens. If I think of it. If I'm not tied up with something else.
Several years ago (just a little over four, to be exact), I read Why Is Someone Else In My Book's Author Photo? by Caroline Leavitt at Salon. In it, Leavitt writes about finding out that the Chinese edition of her book, Girls in Trouble, carried another author's photograph. She found it "discomfiting" and said of herself, "I mourn."
Now, I have learned only a handful of things in my lifetime, but one of them is that I just can't predict how I will respond to any experience. Would I feel that "an author’s photo is the reader-writer connection...It’s a public acknowledgment that a real person — me! — spent four years agonizing and obsessing over the story"? Would I mourn?
My Own Author Photo Issue
Rosemary and Olive Oil, my short story that was published at Alimentum, does, indeed, include someone else's photograph with the author info. Oddly enough, she looks a little bit like Caroline Leavitt.
How upset am I about this? I probably noticed it three or four months or so ago. I just got around last week to writing an e-mail to the Alimentum editor to see if the picture can be replaced with one of mine. I'm not going to send it for a few days so my readers can enjoy checking out the story and the mystery photo. So, no, it doesn't seem to be bothering me that much, and I'm happy to get a blog post out of the situation.
Why Am I Not In Despair Over This Misplaced Author Photo?
Rosemary and Olive Oil was my first published short story for adults, so it was a very big deal for me. To date, it is still my only published short story for adults, so it is still a very big deal for me. I had to rework it a number of times. I've submitted many short stories over and over again, but Rosemary and Olive Oil went to the third publication I submitted it to. I put this down not to the splendor of the story but to having stumbled upon the perfect place for it. Alimentum is a journal of the literature of food, and Rosemary and Olive Oil is, indeed, a short story about food. Finding the perfect home for a piece of writing is difficult and, sometimes, as in this case, kind of magical.
I think this is running off my back for two reasons:
1. It didn't happen at the time of publication. My recollection is that Alimentum had just shifted from a print to on-line format when Rosemary and Olive was published. I don't believe it was using author photos with the bios at that point. I most certainly would have felt differently if this had happened with my shiny new story.
2. I'm a bit of an in-this-moment kind of writer. I tend to be involved with what I'm working on now and not that intent on what I did in the past. When speaking with reporters while promoting new books, I can recall them asking if I was excited about the publication we were discussing. I'd have to say, "Ah, I've pretty much moved on to the next book." Rosemary and Olive Oil was published more than two years ago. Yeah, this author photo thing is interesting and I'm going to address it, but I'm far more concerned with the nine chapters I'm revising of my work-in-progress so I can go on to Chapter Ten and, some day, an ending.
I'll be sending that e-mail to Alimentum's editor in a few days, and I'll let you know what happens. If I think of it. If I'm not tied up with something else.
June 21, 2015
The Vermont Faction*
A few weeks ago, I attended the New England Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators' program Designing and Booking School Visits.
I arrived late and was seated at the back of the room. During a break or lunch (I don't remember which. Perhaps I was overexcited.), I overheard some people at the table in front of me talking about where they were from. One of them said she was from the town next to the town where I spent most of my childhood. So I shoved my way onto their table, interrupted their conversation, and said, "I grew up in Sudbury!"
Well, it turns out that Marilyn Taylor McDowell has only lived at her present Vermont location for three years. This is important, because I was afraid she was someone I'd gone to high school with and had forgotten. In fact, at one point Marilyn lived in southern Connecticut, she knows Connecticut writers, and she is a former Tassy Walden winner.
Additionally, she is the author of Carolina Harmony.
So we talked about changes in the town she now lives in, where I went to high school and worked at the Five and Ten. (You used to see books about girls working in Five and Ten cent stores. Not so much anymore, primarily since there aren't any.)
I left those poor people alone and went back to my seat. What happens next? The woman sitting next to me says, "I'm from Milton." That's Milton, Vermont, where I did a school appearance maybe six to eight years ago. This was Jean Taft, whose first book, Worm Weather, will be published in October. She also doesn't live in Vermont anymore, which is why I'm telling you where she used to live, whereas I didn't tell you where Marilyn does live. Because I'm making an effort to be discreet.
Anyway, Jean has French Canadian family. I have French Canadian family. Jean went to UVM. I went to UVM. Jean lived in the Living/Learning Center. I lived in the Living/Learning Center. Jean noticed that large numbers of out-of-state students skied. I noticed that large numbers of out-of-state students skied. Jean's book is being published by a division of Penguin Random House. My books were published by a division of Penguin PreRandom House.
Jean and I got along like a house on fire.
For maybe ten or fifteen minutes out of the whole day, I was part of my own little faction in the back of the room. Except that we didn't have a dissenting political agenda or anything. You could say we were unified by a shared knowledge of place(s).
*The "Allen faction" is the term used by Michael A. Bellesiles in Revolutionary Outlaws: Ethan Allen and the Struggle for Independence on the Early American Frontier to describe "Ethan Allen and his adherents" in pre-Vermont New Hampshire Grants.
I arrived late and was seated at the back of the room. During a break or lunch (I don't remember which. Perhaps I was overexcited.), I overheard some people at the table in front of me talking about where they were from. One of them said she was from the town next to the town where I spent most of my childhood. So I shoved my way onto their table, interrupted their conversation, and said, "I grew up in Sudbury!"
Well, it turns out that Marilyn Taylor McDowell has only lived at her present Vermont location for three years. This is important, because I was afraid she was someone I'd gone to high school with and had forgotten. In fact, at one point Marilyn lived in southern Connecticut, she knows Connecticut writers, and she is a former Tassy Walden winner.
Additionally, she is the author of Carolina Harmony.
So we talked about changes in the town she now lives in, where I went to high school and worked at the Five and Ten. (You used to see books about girls working in Five and Ten cent stores. Not so much anymore, primarily since there aren't any.)
I left those poor people alone and went back to my seat. What happens next? The woman sitting next to me says, "I'm from Milton." That's Milton, Vermont, where I did a school appearance maybe six to eight years ago. This was Jean Taft, whose first book, Worm Weather, will be published in October. She also doesn't live in Vermont anymore, which is why I'm telling you where she used to live, whereas I didn't tell you where Marilyn does live. Because I'm making an effort to be discreet.
Anyway, Jean has French Canadian family. I have French Canadian family. Jean went to UVM. I went to UVM. Jean lived in the Living/Learning Center. I lived in the Living/Learning Center. Jean noticed that large numbers of out-of-state students skied. I noticed that large numbers of out-of-state students skied. Jean's book is being published by a division of Penguin Random House. My books were published by a division of Penguin PreRandom House.
Jean and I got along like a house on fire.
For maybe ten or fifteen minutes out of the whole day, I was part of my own little faction in the back of the room. Except that we didn't have a dissenting political agenda or anything. You could say we were unified by a shared knowledge of place(s).
*The "Allen faction" is the term used by Michael A. Bellesiles in Revolutionary Outlaws: Ethan Allen and the Struggle for Independence on the Early American Frontier to describe "Ethan Allen and his adherents" in pre-Vermont New Hampshire Grants.
June 7, 2015
Is Environmental Fiction All About Place/Setting?
"Not Your Grandfather's Nature Writing: The New "Nature" Journals" by Andrea J. Nolan at "Fiction Writers Review" deals with contemporary nature writing in general. Something jumped out at me relating to environmental fiction.
"But then how do you define environmental, or place-based, fiction?" First, defining environmental fiction has been an issue at the Environmental Book Club feature of my blog, "Original Content." But the answer to Nolan's particular version of the question appears to be there in the question. It's place-based fiction. It's fiction that's strong fictional element (character, plot, voice, setting, point of view) is setting.
This makes sense to me, especially when you consider that setting includes time as well as, well, place. Futuristic post-environmental disaster worlds like you see in "The Uglies" series are about setting. A big part of the reason Carl Hiaason's books are considered environmental is the strong sense of place that is created with his Florida settings. What kept "The Carbon Diaries 2015" from being just another whiney teenage story was the...wait for it...setting.
Nolan suggests that "we should use John Gardner’s definition of great fiction as our benchmark. He said that the hallmark of successful writing is the creation of “a vivid, continuous dream.”" That dream could be the experience I look for in an environmental book. Setting is a a big part of that continuous "dream" experience.
A slightly different version of this post appeared at Original Content.
"But then how do you define environmental, or place-based, fiction?" First, defining environmental fiction has been an issue at the Environmental Book Club feature of my blog, "Original Content." But the answer to Nolan's particular version of the question appears to be there in the question. It's place-based fiction. It's fiction that's strong fictional element (character, plot, voice, setting, point of view) is setting.
This makes sense to me, especially when you consider that setting includes time as well as, well, place. Futuristic post-environmental disaster worlds like you see in "The Uglies" series are about setting. A big part of the reason Carl Hiaason's books are considered environmental is the strong sense of place that is created with his Florida settings. What kept "The Carbon Diaries 2015" from being just another whiney teenage story was the...wait for it...setting.
Nolan suggests that "we should use John Gardner’s definition of great fiction as our benchmark. He said that the hallmark of successful writing is the creation of “a vivid, continuous dream.”" That dream could be the experience I look for in an environmental book. Setting is a a big part of that continuous "dream" experience.
A slightly different version of this post appeared at Original Content.
May 31, 2015
A Writers' Dojang
Recently I wrote at Original Content about this year's Tassy Walden Award (Connecticut) winners. What I didn't mention is that three of this year's honorees, Nancy Tandon, Holly Howley, and Heather Sherlock DiLorenzo, come from the same writers' group. These three writers made up thirteen percent of the Tassy winners over all. However, some of those winners were illustrators. These three women made up twenty percent of the winning writers.
In past years, the group had three other members who placed well. And I believe there are two members who were Tassy winners prior to joining the group. One of them went on to be successfully published. Oh, and another member competed against published writers for a spot with The Great CT Caper and won one.
I've written about writers' groups for The Weekend Writer Project before. As I said then, "there are writers' groups, and there are writers' groups." How to explain so much achievement from this one group? Well, I happened to join it last October and have a little knowledge of what goes down there. You know how I love martial arts analogies? Yeah. I feel one coming on.
Training
These people train. They attend NESCBWI workshops and retreats. They read in their genre. They keep up on what is being published in their field. Referring back to Marlo Garnsworthy's recent blog post, they don't assume that they should "automatically know how to write a publishable story."
Maintaining the Mind of a Beginner
In a martial arts training hall, people of all ranks train together. If the instructor is introducing a yellow belt-level skill, the black belts in the room work on it, too, because there's always the possibility that they missed something when they learned it, there's always the possibility they can improve that skill. They cannot allow themselves to be blinded by the belief that they already know this stuff. They have to maintain the mind of a beginner. (Humility is also a good thing on a very practical level.)
That's how the people in this writing group conduct themselves, also. If they attend a program, they consider how the content can improve their work. If they get feedback on a submission, they don't walk away believing the agent/editor just doesn't get it. Within workshop meetings, they try not to respond to critiques from other members. The point is to listen to what others have to say and assess it.
Collaboration
In the taekwondo school I attended, people of equal rank usually trained together, trying to share knowledge, the idea being that what one student missed last week, another will have picked up on. They are trying to learn from one another. Even in the tai chi school I attend now, where there is no belt system, students who are just learning a form are positioned within the group of more experienced students during practice, so the newbies can model their movements on the people who already know the form.
The people in this writing group doing something similar. "How about this for the first chapter title?" "You might be able to eliminate that first page." One writer might be able to pick up on something another writer has missed.
Getting Up Off the Mat
Getting knocked down isn't that big an issue in martial arts training. Getting up again is.
The people in this workshop submit their work. If the work comes back, they train some more and submit again. You cannot stay down and move forward, too.
Don't Care For Martial Arts Metaphors?
In the event that you don't love martial arts metaphors the way I do, you can phrase the reasons for this writers' group's success another way: These people study. They keep an open mind about their work. They work together. They persevere.
If you're at the point of looking for a writers' group, this is the kind of group you hope to find.
This post originally appeared at Original Content
In past years, the group had three other members who placed well. And I believe there are two members who were Tassy winners prior to joining the group. One of them went on to be successfully published. Oh, and another member competed against published writers for a spot with The Great CT Caper and won one.
I've written about writers' groups for The Weekend Writer Project before. As I said then, "there are writers' groups, and there are writers' groups." How to explain so much achievement from this one group? Well, I happened to join it last October and have a little knowledge of what goes down there. You know how I love martial arts analogies? Yeah. I feel one coming on.
Training
These people train. They attend NESCBWI workshops and retreats. They read in their genre. They keep up on what is being published in their field. Referring back to Marlo Garnsworthy's recent blog post, they don't assume that they should "automatically know how to write a publishable story."
Maintaining the Mind of a Beginner
In a martial arts training hall, people of all ranks train together. If the instructor is introducing a yellow belt-level skill, the black belts in the room work on it, too, because there's always the possibility that they missed something when they learned it, there's always the possibility they can improve that skill. They cannot allow themselves to be blinded by the belief that they already know this stuff. They have to maintain the mind of a beginner. (Humility is also a good thing on a very practical level.)
That's how the people in this writing group conduct themselves, also. If they attend a program, they consider how the content can improve their work. If they get feedback on a submission, they don't walk away believing the agent/editor just doesn't get it. Within workshop meetings, they try not to respond to critiques from other members. The point is to listen to what others have to say and assess it.
Collaboration
In the taekwondo school I attended, people of equal rank usually trained together, trying to share knowledge, the idea being that what one student missed last week, another will have picked up on. They are trying to learn from one another. Even in the tai chi school I attend now, where there is no belt system, students who are just learning a form are positioned within the group of more experienced students during practice, so the newbies can model their movements on the people who already know the form.
The people in this writing group doing something similar. "How about this for the first chapter title?" "You might be able to eliminate that first page." One writer might be able to pick up on something another writer has missed.
Getting Up Off the Mat
Getting knocked down isn't that big an issue in martial arts training. Getting up again is.
The people in this workshop submit their work. If the work comes back, they train some more and submit again. You cannot stay down and move forward, too.
Don't Care For Martial Arts Metaphors?
In the event that you don't love martial arts metaphors the way I do, you can phrase the reasons for this writers' group's success another way: These people study. They keep an open mind about their work. They work together. They persevere.
If you're at the point of looking for a writers' group, this is the kind of group you hope to find.
This post originally appeared at Original Content
May 20, 2015
New Writers, Please Look Before You Publish
I began a Weekend Writer project at my blog a little over two years ago, because I was upset when a friend from high school was being pressured by a salesperson from some kind of pay-to-publish company. Last month in my local newspaper, I read about someone who had just published her first book. She had considered self-publishing, she said, but thought it was too expensive. Then she found a traditional publisher interested in her subject.
I had never heard of this publisher, but I'm not queen of the publishing world. I haven't heard of everybody. So I googled the name. Guess what? It was a pay-to-publish company. There's nothing wrong with that. Some self-published writers do use them. The issue here is that according to the interview this woman gave to the paper, she didn't know. She thought this company was a traditional publisher. A librarian friend who had seen the article said, "Isn't she going to get a bill at some point?"
What makes this story more disturbing is that when I googled the company name, the fourth site that came up was one at which writers who had paid the company to publish for them were reporting problems they'd had. We're talking a pay-to publish company with unhappy customers.
Don't Rush To Publish
You hear the expression "rush to publish" now in relation to self-publishing authors who want to get their book out right away. Speaking from experience, I can say that preparing a manuscript for publication can be nearly as much work as creating it in the first place. Writers need to learn nearly as much about publishing these days as they need to learn about writing. The difference between traditional vs. self-publishing seems as if it should be the very minimum writers should know. However, I've heard of other authors being asked questions by self-publishing authors that indicated that those particular self-publishers didn't have even a basic understanding of what traditional publishers do.
But Let's Add To The Confusion
The line between traditional and self-publishing has become wobbly because some major traditional publishers have added self-publishing services, and many of them are all using the same company to provide those services. Check out Author Solutions and Friends: The Inside Story by David Gaughran at Let's Get Digital.
The bottom line here, folks, is that writers who plan/hope to publish need to educate themselves about publishing.
A slightly different version of this post appeared at Original Content
I had never heard of this publisher, but I'm not queen of the publishing world. I haven't heard of everybody. So I googled the name. Guess what? It was a pay-to-publish company. There's nothing wrong with that. Some self-published writers do use them. The issue here is that according to the interview this woman gave to the paper, she didn't know. She thought this company was a traditional publisher. A librarian friend who had seen the article said, "Isn't she going to get a bill at some point?"
What makes this story more disturbing is that when I googled the company name, the fourth site that came up was one at which writers who had paid the company to publish for them were reporting problems they'd had. We're talking a pay-to publish company with unhappy customers.
Don't Rush To Publish
You hear the expression "rush to publish" now in relation to self-publishing authors who want to get their book out right away. Speaking from experience, I can say that preparing a manuscript for publication can be nearly as much work as creating it in the first place. Writers need to learn nearly as much about publishing these days as they need to learn about writing. The difference between traditional vs. self-publishing seems as if it should be the very minimum writers should know. However, I've heard of other authors being asked questions by self-publishing authors that indicated that those particular self-publishers didn't have even a basic understanding of what traditional publishers do.
But Let's Add To The Confusion
The line between traditional and self-publishing has become wobbly because some major traditional publishers have added self-publishing services, and many of them are all using the same company to provide those services. Check out Author Solutions and Friends: The Inside Story by David Gaughran at Let's Get Digital.
The bottom line here, folks, is that writers who plan/hope to publish need to educate themselves about publishing.
A slightly different version of this post appeared at Original Content
May 12, 2015
Conference Day with the NESCBWI
I spent a Saturday in late April at the New England Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators spring conference. A very good day for me. In the past when I've attended professional events, I've reported on the people I knew who I ran into. Well, I seem to know quite a few people now. Reading a list of them wouldn't be that fascinating. So I will go on to other things.
Workshops Attended
Crafting Short Stories with Trisha Leaver. I may spend a month later this year revising a number of my short stories because of this program.
Show Me the Money with Chris Eboch. This workshop dealt with what I've heard called "income streams" for writers. There are a number of options, but they require so much work! I came up with some pitches for someone else I know while I was in the class. And this workshop was a good lead-in to the afternoon workshop I attended, which was on school visits. School visits, you see, are an income stream for writers.
Bringing Books Alive During School and Library Visits with Marcia Wells and Kwame Alexander. Interesting story here. When I signed up for this workshop, I'd never heard of either of these people. And then Kwame Alexander won the Newbery Medal! Marcia and I have already become Twittermates. I'll be doing a separate post early next month on school visit workshops.
Lunch!
The New England SCBWI regional conference is huge in terms of attendance. Computer Guy went with me a few years ago when we were preparing to republish Saving the Planet & Stuff so he could take a workshop on making e-books from scratch. He was stunned by the crowd then and amazed by a lunchtime picture I took this year.
That is why it was terrific that Jill Daily, a member of my writers' group, somehow snagged a table for the nine of us. It was great not to have to negotiate a ballroom full of people on my own. I am afraid I was not a great lunch companion, however, because I was seated in such a way that I had to turn my back to everyone to see the lunch speakers. And I also was busy taking notes and pictures.
During lunch Deborah Freedman received the Crystal Kite Award for the New England region. This was for her book, The Story of Fish and Snail.
Kwayme Alexander spoke during lunch, too. Extremely charming and charismatic. I actually read a book of poetry this year, and I think I'm going to ask for one of Kwayme's (I went to his workshop, so I can call him Kwayme, right?) adult books for my birthday.
The lunch panel discussion was a surprise for me. I wasn't looking forward to it, because it was on nontraditional publishing. I've spent a lot of time on my own nontraditional publishing effort, and this past month I've been promoting the living daylights out of it. I wasn't wildly enthusiastic about hearing more on this subject right now.
But I was totally taken with this discussion. I think what made it good was the variety of viewpoints of the panelists. There was a self-published writer who is very encouraging on the process, someone who runs an editing company that also helps authors self-publish who recognized that some people are going to need help, someone who had been involved in some kind of self-publishing company that wasn't successful, and a traditionally published author new to self-publishing. I appreciated that they didn't all speak with one voice.
The panelists: Chris Cheng, Laura Pauling, Erica Orloff, and Steve Mooser. J. L. Bell, from the NESCBWI was the moderator. There is a reason for that. He's very good at it.
Another version of this post appeared at Original Content
Workshops Attended
Crafting Short Stories with Trisha Leaver. I may spend a month later this year revising a number of my short stories because of this program.
Show Me the Money with Chris Eboch. This workshop dealt with what I've heard called "income streams" for writers. There are a number of options, but they require so much work! I came up with some pitches for someone else I know while I was in the class. And this workshop was a good lead-in to the afternoon workshop I attended, which was on school visits. School visits, you see, are an income stream for writers.
Bringing Books Alive During School and Library Visits with Marcia Wells and Kwame Alexander. Interesting story here. When I signed up for this workshop, I'd never heard of either of these people. And then Kwame Alexander won the Newbery Medal! Marcia and I have already become Twittermates. I'll be doing a separate post early next month on school visit workshops.
Lunch!
The New England SCBWI regional conference is huge in terms of attendance. Computer Guy went with me a few years ago when we were preparing to republish Saving the Planet & Stuff so he could take a workshop on making e-books from scratch. He was stunned by the crowd then and amazed by a lunchtime picture I took this year.
That is why it was terrific that Jill Daily, a member of my writers' group, somehow snagged a table for the nine of us. It was great not to have to negotiate a ballroom full of people on my own. I am afraid I was not a great lunch companion, however, because I was seated in such a way that I had to turn my back to everyone to see the lunch speakers. And I also was busy taking notes and pictures.
During lunch Deborah Freedman received the Crystal Kite Award for the New England region. This was for her book, The Story of Fish and Snail.
Kwayme Alexander spoke during lunch, too. Extremely charming and charismatic. I actually read a book of poetry this year, and I think I'm going to ask for one of Kwayme's (I went to his workshop, so I can call him Kwayme, right?) adult books for my birthday.
The lunch panel discussion was a surprise for me. I wasn't looking forward to it, because it was on nontraditional publishing. I've spent a lot of time on my own nontraditional publishing effort, and this past month I've been promoting the living daylights out of it. I wasn't wildly enthusiastic about hearing more on this subject right now.
But I was totally taken with this discussion. I think what made it good was the variety of viewpoints of the panelists. There was a self-published writer who is very encouraging on the process, someone who runs an editing company that also helps authors self-publish who recognized that some people are going to need help, someone who had been involved in some kind of self-publishing company that wasn't successful, and a traditionally published author new to self-publishing. I appreciated that they didn't all speak with one voice.
The panelists: Chris Cheng, Laura Pauling, Erica Orloff, and Steve Mooser. J. L. Bell, from the NESCBWI was the moderator. There is a reason for that. He's very good at it.
Another version of this post appeared at Original Content
May 5, 2015
Do Environmentalists Play Well With Others
Every Day Is Earth Day
Environmentalists have specific interests. They are interests that not everyone will appreciate. I am not a particularly serious environmentalist, yet I had a bit of a rep with my older son's first grade teacher because I wouldn't send disposable items into school. Little Will volunteered to bring in spoons for Ice Cream Sundae Day in the spring. "But your mother will want to send real spoons instead of plastic," Mrs. F. objected. "I'll fix it," Little Will promised. And he did, because I felt guilty about making problems for my child. Then I felt guilty because, sure, I could have made my kid hand out stainless steel spoons, pick them up after they were used, and bring them home dirty in one of the grocery bags I save to reuse. I wouldn't have made him wash them. I would have done that. Instead, I bought plastic spoons and sent them directly into the transfer station with just a brief stop in a first-grade classroom.
It's hard to have fun, even with your family, when you believe everything you do matters so very, very much. That's a point made in the following excerpt from Saving the Planet & Stuff.
"Aren't golf courses already environmentally friendly?" he asked. "You know, green grass and no buildings. And I bet those little golf carts get terrific gas mileage."
Nora rolled her eyes. "Golf courses are ecological disasters—all those chemicals to kill weeds. Plus, they're a terrible drain on the water table. But one of my daughters-in-law plays golf with her parents, and I have a grandson who is on his high school golf team. I could play with them, if I knew how. Golfing is just awful, of course, but my kids and grandchildren don't want to go on wildlife tours with us or visit native craftspeople or travel to the desert to view lunar eclipses. We have nothing to do together. And it's amazing how quickly you run out of small talk about drilling for oil in national parks." She sighed. "We need to do a multigenerational eco-recreation article for The Wife. Other people must be having these problems."
No one I know, Michael thought.
"There isn't anyone in your family who wants to take the alternative-energy tour with you? Your kids don't want to visit strange worlds?" he asked. "Because a windfarm has got to be a really strange place."
"Their idea of visiting strange worlds is walking through those foreign pavilions in Epcot at Disney World," Nora said sadly.
"Oh, those are good."
A guilty look flashed across Nora's face. "I went golfing while we were on this last vacation. Just once. My son and daughter-in-law took me along when they went to play with her parents. Now, of course, I didn't really know what I was doing because I'd never done it before, but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. It was like going for a walk with friends on a nice day, but at the same time playing a game."
"Yeah, I think that's what golf is supposed to be."
"Then we went out to lunch. I wish I could find a golf course with a vegetarian restaurant. At least if there were a restaurant at a golf course that wasn't involved with destroying other life-forms … well, maybe that would help to make being there seem less wrong."
Michael stared at her. "Being at a golf course is lame and uncool, but it isn't wrong. Wait. What am I thinking? Of course being lame and uncool is wrong."
Nora gave him a patient smile. "If we want to see changes made in our world, we can't support and use the very things we want to change. What reason would there be to change them?"
Michael shrugged. "Microsoft changes Windows every couple of years even though tens of thousands of people use it just the way it is. And I bet Bill Gates doesn't refuse to use Windows while his employees are working on it."
"I suppose change can come from the inside," Nora said thoughtfully.
"Or not at all, because golf is just a game."
Nora laughed. "Nothing is just a game," she said as they got up and started to clear the table together.
Environmental Theme
I've said here before that I'm not sure what an environmental theme is. "Climate change" isn't a theme, to me. It's a topic. The same with "the environment" or "the rain forest." In my humble opinion, theme needs a verb.
Saving the Planet & Stuff has more than one theme. But its environmental theme is that environmentalism is hard. Environmentalism is a lifestyle that requires thought and choices every single day. Michael doesn't become a big-time environmentalist as a result of his experience with Walt and Nora. But he comes to understand what their lives have been about.
Environmentalists have specific interests. They are interests that not everyone will appreciate. I am not a particularly serious environmentalist, yet I had a bit of a rep with my older son's first grade teacher because I wouldn't send disposable items into school. Little Will volunteered to bring in spoons for Ice Cream Sundae Day in the spring. "But your mother will want to send real spoons instead of plastic," Mrs. F. objected. "I'll fix it," Little Will promised. And he did, because I felt guilty about making problems for my child. Then I felt guilty because, sure, I could have made my kid hand out stainless steel spoons, pick them up after they were used, and bring them home dirty in one of the grocery bags I save to reuse. I wouldn't have made him wash them. I would have done that. Instead, I bought plastic spoons and sent them directly into the transfer station with just a brief stop in a first-grade classroom.
It's hard to have fun, even with your family, when you believe everything you do matters so very, very much. That's a point made in the following excerpt from Saving the Planet & Stuff.
"Aren't golf courses already environmentally friendly?" he asked. "You know, green grass and no buildings. And I bet those little golf carts get terrific gas mileage."
Nora rolled her eyes. "Golf courses are ecological disasters—all those chemicals to kill weeds. Plus, they're a terrible drain on the water table. But one of my daughters-in-law plays golf with her parents, and I have a grandson who is on his high school golf team. I could play with them, if I knew how. Golfing is just awful, of course, but my kids and grandchildren don't want to go on wildlife tours with us or visit native craftspeople or travel to the desert to view lunar eclipses. We have nothing to do together. And it's amazing how quickly you run out of small talk about drilling for oil in national parks." She sighed. "We need to do a multigenerational eco-recreation article for The Wife. Other people must be having these problems."
No one I know, Michael thought.
"There isn't anyone in your family who wants to take the alternative-energy tour with you? Your kids don't want to visit strange worlds?" he asked. "Because a windfarm has got to be a really strange place."
"Their idea of visiting strange worlds is walking through those foreign pavilions in Epcot at Disney World," Nora said sadly.
"Oh, those are good."
A guilty look flashed across Nora's face. "I went golfing while we were on this last vacation. Just once. My son and daughter-in-law took me along when they went to play with her parents. Now, of course, I didn't really know what I was doing because I'd never done it before, but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. It was like going for a walk with friends on a nice day, but at the same time playing a game."
"Yeah, I think that's what golf is supposed to be."
"Then we went out to lunch. I wish I could find a golf course with a vegetarian restaurant. At least if there were a restaurant at a golf course that wasn't involved with destroying other life-forms … well, maybe that would help to make being there seem less wrong."
Michael stared at her. "Being at a golf course is lame and uncool, but it isn't wrong. Wait. What am I thinking? Of course being lame and uncool is wrong."
Nora gave him a patient smile. "If we want to see changes made in our world, we can't support and use the very things we want to change. What reason would there be to change them?"
Michael shrugged. "Microsoft changes Windows every couple of years even though tens of thousands of people use it just the way it is. And I bet Bill Gates doesn't refuse to use Windows while his employees are working on it."
"I suppose change can come from the inside," Nora said thoughtfully.
"Or not at all, because golf is just a game."
Nora laughed. "Nothing is just a game," she said as they got up and started to clear the table together.
Environmental Theme
I've said here before that I'm not sure what an environmental theme is. "Climate change" isn't a theme, to me. It's a topic. The same with "the environment" or "the rain forest." In my humble opinion, theme needs a verb.
Saving the Planet & Stuff has more than one theme. But its environmental theme is that environmentalism is hard. Environmentalism is a lifestyle that requires thought and choices every single day. Michael doesn't become a big-time environmentalist as a result of his experience with Walt and Nora. But he comes to understand what their lives have been about.
May 1, 2015
What Does An Environmentalist Do For Vacation?
It's hard to take time off from environmentalism. Is it okay to forget about your carbon footprint for a couple of weeks each year? Souvenirs are just pre-trash, aren't they? How many motel towels would you have to hang up and reuse to offset all the energy those places use?
Early on in Saving the Planet & Stuff, Michael and Nora describe their different takes on getting away from it all.
"I've been to some terrific malls when we've been on vacation. Huge ones."
Walt dropped the newspaper onto his lap, took his glasses off, and looked across the room at Michael. "You go to malls while you're on vacation?"
The indignation in Walt's voice brought a grin to Michael's face. "Sure. Doesn't everybody?"
"You shop while you're on vacation?" Walt asked, sounding horrified.
Mostly they just walked around in malls in the evenings or on rainy days, but Walt's reaction was more than Michael could resist. Air conditioners, sixty-five-mile-an hour speed limits, malls … was there anything that didn't tick this guy off?
"Well, sure," he told Walt. "What if Abercrombie & Fitch runs a sale and you're out of town? That's the beauty of malls. They have the same stores all over the country. You never miss a thing."
Walt laughed, shook his head, and appeared ready to go back to reading his paper. Michael, however, didn't give up easily.
"So, what do you guys do while you're on vacation?" he asked just to try to keep the conversation going.
"Now our vacations are usually planned around visiting our grandchildren," Nora explained for Walt. "But when our sons were living with us, we used to do things like stay on a farm for a couple of weeks and work with the farmer and her family. Once we stayed on an island that could only be reached by boat. That was a great vacation. Let's see. What other things did we do? Well, one summer we went out west and volunteered at a school on a Native American reservation. Then there was the year we did a tour of the birthplaces of our favorite authors—Henry David Thoreau … Rachel Carson … Wendell Berry—have you read any of their work, Michael?"
Since Michael never remembered authors' names, he could truthfully say, "I don't know. Maybe …"
"They're nature writers," Walt said, his voice indicating he wasn't taken in by Michael's evasiveness. "I'm sure we've got some copies of their books around here somewhere. If you read a few chapters, maybe it would refresh your memory."
"We took turns reading them out loud in the car that year," Nora recalled, smiling. "That was another great trip."
Michael tried to picture the scene: Younger versions of Walt and Nora would be sitting in the front of a car, probably the same car they still drove, with a couple of kids comatose from boredom in the backseat while Nora read from a very thick book.
"The buttercups in the meadow were my only neighbors. And fine neighbors they were! Sometimes, while visiting with an acquaintance in the polluted, nasty town, I have thought of my old friends the buttercups and longed to be with them. They never have a harsh word to say of another, be he buttercup or man, nor do they take from another, living totally on what they get from the sky—sun and rain. And perhaps some nutrients from the earth. Oh, but if only we could be as simple as the buttercups."
I'm definitely going to start treating my parents better, Michael promised himself. They're nowhere near as bad as they could be.
The older Nora looks forward to a few months off so she can travel to Iceland. Why?
"In Iceland they're working on converting their transportation system to hydrogen power," she explained eagerly. "They'll have filling stations where you can buy hydrogen gas to run electric motors in cars. It will be clean. It will be quiet. It will be made from their own natural resources—hydrogen extracted from the steam in their geysers and the water all around them. Imagine that, Michael. An entire country doing something no one else is doing. It will be like stepping into a movie or a book, and in our lifetimes we can do it."
"I usually don't want to do something no one else is doing, but maybe going to Iceland would be like going into an alternative universe," Michael said. "Which could be really neat. Especially since you could leave whenever you wanted to—or when your vacation was over, whichever came first."
Remember, this book was originally published in 2003. I couldn't predict that Iceland would become one of the coolest places to visit this year. It probably isn't because of the hydrogen fuel, though. My sister-in-law said she went because of cheap air fare.
This post originally appeared at Original Content
Early on in Saving the Planet & Stuff, Michael and Nora describe their different takes on getting away from it all.
"I've been to some terrific malls when we've been on vacation. Huge ones."
Walt dropped the newspaper onto his lap, took his glasses off, and looked across the room at Michael. "You go to malls while you're on vacation?"
The indignation in Walt's voice brought a grin to Michael's face. "Sure. Doesn't everybody?"
"You shop while you're on vacation?" Walt asked, sounding horrified.
Mostly they just walked around in malls in the evenings or on rainy days, but Walt's reaction was more than Michael could resist. Air conditioners, sixty-five-mile-an hour speed limits, malls … was there anything that didn't tick this guy off?
"Well, sure," he told Walt. "What if Abercrombie & Fitch runs a sale and you're out of town? That's the beauty of malls. They have the same stores all over the country. You never miss a thing."
Walt laughed, shook his head, and appeared ready to go back to reading his paper. Michael, however, didn't give up easily.
"So, what do you guys do while you're on vacation?" he asked just to try to keep the conversation going.
"Now our vacations are usually planned around visiting our grandchildren," Nora explained for Walt. "But when our sons were living with us, we used to do things like stay on a farm for a couple of weeks and work with the farmer and her family. Once we stayed on an island that could only be reached by boat. That was a great vacation. Let's see. What other things did we do? Well, one summer we went out west and volunteered at a school on a Native American reservation. Then there was the year we did a tour of the birthplaces of our favorite authors—Henry David Thoreau … Rachel Carson … Wendell Berry—have you read any of their work, Michael?"
Since Michael never remembered authors' names, he could truthfully say, "I don't know. Maybe …"
"They're nature writers," Walt said, his voice indicating he wasn't taken in by Michael's evasiveness. "I'm sure we've got some copies of their books around here somewhere. If you read a few chapters, maybe it would refresh your memory."
"We took turns reading them out loud in the car that year," Nora recalled, smiling. "That was another great trip."
Michael tried to picture the scene: Younger versions of Walt and Nora would be sitting in the front of a car, probably the same car they still drove, with a couple of kids comatose from boredom in the backseat while Nora read from a very thick book.
"The buttercups in the meadow were my only neighbors. And fine neighbors they were! Sometimes, while visiting with an acquaintance in the polluted, nasty town, I have thought of my old friends the buttercups and longed to be with them. They never have a harsh word to say of another, be he buttercup or man, nor do they take from another, living totally on what they get from the sky—sun and rain. And perhaps some nutrients from the earth. Oh, but if only we could be as simple as the buttercups."
I'm definitely going to start treating my parents better, Michael promised himself. They're nowhere near as bad as they could be.
The older Nora looks forward to a few months off so she can travel to Iceland. Why?
"In Iceland they're working on converting their transportation system to hydrogen power," she explained eagerly. "They'll have filling stations where you can buy hydrogen gas to run electric motors in cars. It will be clean. It will be quiet. It will be made from their own natural resources—hydrogen extracted from the steam in their geysers and the water all around them. Imagine that, Michael. An entire country doing something no one else is doing. It will be like stepping into a movie or a book, and in our lifetimes we can do it."
"I usually don't want to do something no one else is doing, but maybe going to Iceland would be like going into an alternative universe," Michael said. "Which could be really neat. Especially since you could leave whenever you wanted to—or when your vacation was over, whichever came first."
Remember, this book was originally published in 2003. I couldn't predict that Iceland would become one of the coolest places to visit this year. It probably isn't because of the hydrogen fuel, though. My sister-in-law said she went because of cheap air fare.
This post originally appeared at Original Content
April 22, 2015
What Was I Dreaming?
Last week I dreamed that I wrote an essay comparing...something, I don't know what, though I think it was related to writing...to the I Ching. I didn't know what the I Ching was in the dream, which makes sense, because I don't know what it is when I'm awake. In the dream, I just read a few screens worth of information about it, maybe the equivalent of a Slate article with a short film. Really short. Then I wrote the essay. I didn't get to the point in the dream where I was submitting the completed piece of writing. That's too bad, because I'd really like to know if there's a publication that would even consider such a thing.
Well, it appears that only in a dream would you find a short piece on the I Ching that would make it possible for you to write anything intelligent about it. (Though I'm trying right now.) Even the I Ching Wikipedia entry made my eyes glaze over two-thirds of the way through the second sentence.
The best I can work out, the I Ching, known as The Book of Changes in English, is an ancient Chinese text used to tell the future. This makes it different from the zenny stuff I'm usually interested in reading, which deals with staying in the moment so you are not anxious about the future or regretful about the past.
As a general rule, you don't have to have completed psych 1 to analyze my dreams. But I'm at a loss as to where this I Ching business came from. Yes, I attend a tai chi/kung fu school, and those are both Chinese martial arts. And, yes, next Saturday is World Tai Chi Day, and I'm not taking part with my school because I'm going to a conference. And I did get a couple of e-mails about it.
But nobody mentioned the I Ching.
So, the next day I thought about this and wondered what I could have written that essay on, even though, of course, I didn't really write an essay, I only dreamed I did. In dream world it happened. Here is what I came up with: If the I Ching is about telling the future, maybe I connected it to plotting a piece of fiction. Maybe I came up with a way to use it to work out the future, the plot, of a story.
How easy my life would be if I could find an ancient Chinese text that would do that.
A slightly different version of this post appeared at Original Content
Well, it appears that only in a dream would you find a short piece on the I Ching that would make it possible for you to write anything intelligent about it. (Though I'm trying right now.) Even the I Ching Wikipedia entry made my eyes glaze over two-thirds of the way through the second sentence.
The best I can work out, the I Ching, known as The Book of Changes in English, is an ancient Chinese text used to tell the future. This makes it different from the zenny stuff I'm usually interested in reading, which deals with staying in the moment so you are not anxious about the future or regretful about the past.
As a general rule, you don't have to have completed psych 1 to analyze my dreams. But I'm at a loss as to where this I Ching business came from. Yes, I attend a tai chi/kung fu school, and those are both Chinese martial arts. And, yes, next Saturday is World Tai Chi Day, and I'm not taking part with my school because I'm going to a conference. And I did get a couple of e-mails about it.
But nobody mentioned the I Ching.
So, the next day I thought about this and wondered what I could have written that essay on, even though, of course, I didn't really write an essay, I only dreamed I did. In dream world it happened. Here is what I came up with: If the I Ching is about telling the future, maybe I connected it to plotting a piece of fiction. Maybe I came up with a way to use it to work out the future, the plot, of a story.
How easy my life would be if I could find an ancient Chinese text that would do that.
A slightly different version of this post appeared at Original Content
April 16, 2015
Now You, Too, Can Give A Reading-Themed Birthday Luncheon For Adults
I gave a birthday luncheon last weekend. Not a party. I don't do parties. This was a luncheon for thirteen women.
You know how last week your Facebook page was covered with your friends' pictures of their siblings for something called...ah...Sibling Day? Seriously. Where did that come from? Has anyone heard of it? All of a sudden it's here and people were carrying on as if it's Christmas. Well, my sibling didn't get her picture as a little nipper put up on Facebook. She got a birthday luncheon.
My sister has been a member of a book group for around fifteen years. (I think that's about when my own book group fell apart.) I learned today that she's the one who prepares questions for every single meeting. She's also very taken with her Kindle Paperwhite. Thus, while planning this luncheon I used a reading theme.
A luncheon without a theme is like a book without a theme. What is it really about?
I began, of course, with an invitation. No, actually, I began with finding a place to hold this thing. Then I went on to the invitation. Mine looked like the first page of the first chapter of a book. I used the first sentence of Pride and Prejudice as my inspiration.
IT is a truth universally acknowledged, that a woman in possession of intellect, humour, and sense must be in want of a surprise birthday luncheon. However little known the feelings or views of such a woman may be on the subject, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of her friends, that the mere knowledge of her approaching birthdate is invitation enough to gather.
Of course, others may take their inspiration elsewhere. You just have to remember to work in the details about where this function will be and when.
Ordinarily, I wouldn't give a rat's patootie about table decorations, but my sister gave me a birthday luncheon a while back and she had table decorations, so what are you going to do? What I did was collect a quotation from authors who had birthdays in April. Because this is April, get it? My sister's birthday is in April? One for each day of the month. I used authors and quotes from Library Booklists. I used the same font I used for the "An Invitation" invitation title. I cut the quotations and author names and birth dates out and glued them to some colored index cards that I found in the office, to be honest. Then I spread them around the table at the restaurant. (Actually, I got someone else to do it.)
I thought the quote decoration wasn't going to go over all that well. It was the kind of thing I could easily have forgotten to put out, remembering the cards half way through the meal. Or they could have dropped like a brick, even though there were members of my sister's book group there. However, my sister liked the idea, made sure everyone had a card, and had them take turns reading them aloud. (She does do parties.) So this went well.
Then for favors for the guests I had reading journals and Pentel pens. Let me tell you, people loooove Pentel pens. I got 18 of them for $4 on sale at Staples. I mention that because I'm one of those people who has to tell everyone when she gets a deal. Notice that the labels for the journals match the invitations, match the font on the author quotes. Yes, Computer Guy did some of that.
I realized the day before the luncheon that I should have tried to get the bakery to make a cake in the shape of an open book. Or I could have tried to do it myself. But that would have been kind of gilding the lily, don't you think?
Now maybe a reading theme won't go over as well for a kid gathering because, you know, no wine. But this worked for my adult group today.
A slightly different version of this post (with pictures) appeared at Original Content.
You know how last week your Facebook page was covered with your friends' pictures of their siblings for something called...ah...Sibling Day? Seriously. Where did that come from? Has anyone heard of it? All of a sudden it's here and people were carrying on as if it's Christmas. Well, my sibling didn't get her picture as a little nipper put up on Facebook. She got a birthday luncheon.
My sister has been a member of a book group for around fifteen years. (I think that's about when my own book group fell apart.) I learned today that she's the one who prepares questions for every single meeting. She's also very taken with her Kindle Paperwhite. Thus, while planning this luncheon I used a reading theme.
A luncheon without a theme is like a book without a theme. What is it really about?
I began, of course, with an invitation. No, actually, I began with finding a place to hold this thing. Then I went on to the invitation. Mine looked like the first page of the first chapter of a book. I used the first sentence of Pride and Prejudice as my inspiration.
IT is a truth universally acknowledged, that a woman in possession of intellect, humour, and sense must be in want of a surprise birthday luncheon. However little known the feelings or views of such a woman may be on the subject, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of her friends, that the mere knowledge of her approaching birthdate is invitation enough to gather.
Of course, others may take their inspiration elsewhere. You just have to remember to work in the details about where this function will be and when.
Ordinarily, I wouldn't give a rat's patootie about table decorations, but my sister gave me a birthday luncheon a while back and she had table decorations, so what are you going to do? What I did was collect a quotation from authors who had birthdays in April. Because this is April, get it? My sister's birthday is in April? One for each day of the month. I used authors and quotes from Library Booklists. I used the same font I used for the "An Invitation" invitation title. I cut the quotations and author names and birth dates out and glued them to some colored index cards that I found in the office, to be honest. Then I spread them around the table at the restaurant. (Actually, I got someone else to do it.)
I thought the quote decoration wasn't going to go over all that well. It was the kind of thing I could easily have forgotten to put out, remembering the cards half way through the meal. Or they could have dropped like a brick, even though there were members of my sister's book group there. However, my sister liked the idea, made sure everyone had a card, and had them take turns reading them aloud. (She does do parties.) So this went well.
Then for favors for the guests I had reading journals and Pentel pens. Let me tell you, people loooove Pentel pens. I got 18 of them for $4 on sale at Staples. I mention that because I'm one of those people who has to tell everyone when she gets a deal. Notice that the labels for the journals match the invitations, match the font on the author quotes. Yes, Computer Guy did some of that.
I realized the day before the luncheon that I should have tried to get the bakery to make a cake in the shape of an open book. Or I could have tried to do it myself. But that would have been kind of gilding the lily, don't you think?
Now maybe a reading theme won't go over as well for a kid gathering because, you know, no wine. But this worked for my adult group today.
A slightly different version of this post (with pictures) appeared at Original Content.
Gail Gauthier Reads
I have been maintaining the blog Original Content for twenty years. That one is about any number of things related to writing. I think here I will just post about new publications from me and reading.
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