Lacey Louwagie's Blog, page 11

NaNoWriMo Week 1: How to Find the Time

Well, I am up to my eyeballs in NaNoWriMo and it’s only day 3. After a productive write-in on Saturday, a somewhat grueling coffee-shop stint on Sunday, and an early morning of writing the bare minimum today, I gave my “So, You Want to Write a Novel (in a month)?” presentation for the second time tonight. A couple weeks ago I shared some tips for how to prepare for NaNo. Now that we’re starting out, I’m going to make some suggestions for what you might cut out of your life to make time for noveling this month.

Mindless Web Browsing – I think we’re all guilty of clicking “just one more link” before we move onto more productive pursuits. Don’t let mindless web browsing (including clicking all over the NaNo website!) steal your writing time this month! Set clear goals for your online time, such as: “I’m going to check my email and then log off,” or “I’m going to be online for 15 minutes, tops,” and then stick to them . If you’re especially prone to internet distraction, you might want to consider disconnecting completely when you should be writing. I just do this manually, but you can also use Freedom software.
TV – TV is the clickbait of the past. IT NEVER STOPS. If you’ve got it on to watch one show, another show will follow it — one that is designed to keep you watching. If you have certain shows that you can’t bear to miss, consider recording them and setting aside time to watch them later. Then you won’t get sucked into whatever happens to be on next.
Housework – So, I prefer to work in a clean environment, but I let the dishes pile up in November. I have a threshold of about three weeks when it comes to a messy house — meaning I can put up with it for that long before it’s so distracting that I can’t do anything else. That three-week threshold will get me almost through the entire month! Seriously, is it really THAT important that your floors be shiny in November?
Lunch breaks – If you work a traditional job that allows a 1-hour lunch break, consider staying “on-site” and bringing a bagged lunch from home. Eating it will only take you about half an hour, which gives you another half hour to write. Every word helps!
Your paying job – Okay, I actually DON’T advocate giving up your paying job for NaNoWriMo. But consider taking advantage of benefits you might have. I have a friend who used a vacation day each Wednesday during November to stay home and write. I once took a vacation day on November 30 so I could stay home and finish my novel.
Waiting for inspiration – You do NOT have time to wait for inspiration during NaNoWriMo. (With that said, if it happens your way, grab that sucker and don’t let go!) You have to schedule time to write, whether you feel like it or not. And here’s a secret: when you go back to revise what you’ve written, you can’t tell the difference between what you wrote when you were “inspired” and what you wrote when you were slogging through. It FEELS better to write while inspired, but it doesn’t necessarily produce better writing.

Enjoy that “beginner’s energy,” and good luck!

My Visit to the Emily Dickinson House, and a Review

Over a year ago, reading Lives Like Loaded Guns planted the idea in my head that I would like to visit Emily Dickinson’s home in Amherst. A week and a half ago, I made that idea a reality.

The Homestead

It is a rare experience when one can read a book, and then visit the place where that book occurred and find it just as you imagined. But such is possible when the book you read is a biography, and people are dedicated to preserving the legacy of its subject.

Both the homestead and the Evergreens were just as I imagined them. The Evergreens was an especially interesting experience because it has not been “restored” as the homestead has, and is instead left much in its original state. Time has taken its toll with fraying wallpaper and dull paintings, making the experience of walking through it somewhat eerie, but also more authentic.

The Evergreens

The staff is knowledgeable, friendly, and enthusiastic. I was especially impressed that they opened the doors at 10:50 am, even though the official opening time was 11.

I’m horrible at journaling my vacations, and when I did write, rather than record what I was seeing and doing, I spent a lot of time reflecting on the pull that Emily Dickinson has on me. Poetry is not my preferred genre to write or read in, and while some of Emily’s poetry resonates down to my soul, some of it does very little for me. Yet I’ve been fascinated by her since high school; for a long time, I thought it was just because the idea of becoming “reclusive” has always held a certain allure to my introverted self. Yet, as I learn more about her, I think there is something deeper to my admiration. I like that she was not famous in her lifetime, and that she wrote poems about religion but stayed home while her family went to church, and that she claimed she “could not pray,” and that she was not necessarily the shirking violet you might associate with the word “recluse.” Although a lot about her remains a mystery, I think what she has passed down to us is an example of a life lived authentically — out of the spotlight, but totally connected to the soul. And I think a quest for authenticity is one of the driving forces in my life and in my writing. I see in Emily Dickinson an example of a writer who has achieved what so many of us yearn for.

Below is my review of my reading material for the trip.

 

I Told My Soul to Sing: Finding God with Emily Dickinson by Kristin LeMay


My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I read this book over the course of my East Coast vacation a couple weeks ago because visiting the Emily Dickinson museum midway through the trip was to be the pinnacle of the journey, and the reason I decided on the East Coast as our vacation destination this year.

This was a good book to read in conjunction with the visit, as it kept me immersed in Emily Dickinson’s world. It’s part biography, part academic examination of Emily’s poetry, and part spiritual memoir. I liked the study of Emily Dickinson’s complicated and evolving spirituality — most of which, it must be said, was conjecture based on Kristin LeMay’s own reading of Emily’s poetry and letters. Still, she makes a compelling case for Emily’s faith life, and one to which I can relate. One thing that I think is clear, amidst the disagreement, is that Emily was not one who believed immediately, easily, or without doubt, and somehow, that makes me trust her as a spiritual guide.

The author mainly lays out her own journey of trusting Emily Dickinson as a spiritual guide, finding kinship with her in areas as diverse as mortality and doubt and the transcendence of beauty. I would have liked this book to be more deeply spiritual memoir; I wanted to know even more about the author’s own faith journey. Where the book fell most flat for me was in the academic examination of specific poems, the picking apart of various lines and words to make her case, etc. Although central to uncovering how the author got to her ideas about Emily Dickinson’s spiritual life, it just didn’t engage me as much as the personal stories about either woman’s lives did. Still, it definitely gave me a better understanding of some of the poems in this collection — most of which are fairly obscure — than I would have come to on my own.

While this was a good choice for the trip in terms of subject-matter, I could see early on that it may not have been good “travel reading” in general. Although accessible, the subjects dealt with are weighty, and it’s not the type of book in which someone can just be “swept away.” I think it might be better suited to reading slowly before bed over a month than on airplanes and train stations in a week.





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Doing NaNoWriMo? How to Get Started NOW

NaNoWriMo begins in a week and a half, which means your time for any pre-NaNo prepping is drawing short. Although NaNo rules require that you not write a single word of your novel before November 1 (and I’m no cheater!) there are several things you can do right now to help you hit the ground running.

Track how you’re spending your time - The biggest challenge to writers everywhere, and NaNo-ers in particular, is finding the TIME to write. It seems our lives always feel too full or too busy to add one more thing to our plates. Try tracking how you spend your time for a week to discover where you are losing “time pockets” — 15 minutes surfing the net, half an hour of unplanned TV watching, etc. Then, take a good long look at where your time is going, and decide what you’re going to cut during November. (It’s tempting to cut sleep and exercise, but I don’t recommend it — the thoughts of well-rested writers flow more freely, and exercise gives you good “novel-processing” time.)
Make an outline or jot ideas – The way you implement this will depend on whether you are a “planner” or a “pantser.” Planners like to have detailed outlines before they dive into writing. Pantsers like to “fly by the seat of their pants.” If you are a planner, now is the time to work on your outline. If you are a “pantser,” writing an outline might actually impeded your success doing NaNoWriMo — many pantsers (also called “discovery writers” because they make it up as they go along) find knowing too much about how their story is going to turn out crushes their enthusiasm for writing it. If you’re a pantser, jot down a few ideas — images, tone, characters, etc., or make a list of questions you want to answer in your novel. Not sure which category you fall into? Think about what makes you get “stuck.” Planners often feel stuck when they’re not sure what is going to happen next; Pantsers get stuck when they know too much about what’s coming in their story.
Research – Research is a rabbit hole that can suck hours away from enthusiastic writers. Although research is important, you will NOT have time to do it AND write your novel in November. If you know you will need to research a time, place, or profession for your novel, do that research now. Don’t worry if you don’t finish it. Use your “best guess” when you write in November, and finish researching when your novel is done, correcting any errors.
Get into a writing habit – Although there are some “binge writers” out there who write feverishly for short periods of time after months of writing abstinence, for most people, your writing brain is like a muscle that becomes more limber and responsive with regular use. Get yourself in the habit of writing now by setting aside some time for journaling, writing letters, or blogging. This will make your “writing brain” more readily accessible in November — and you will want fast access to that baby, believe me.

If you have other tips about things you can do to prepare for NaNoWriMo before November hits, leave me a comment!

A Writer’s Pilgrimage

Tonight, I sleep in Amherst. Tomorrow, I tour Emily Dickinson’s home. This is the reason I came to the eastern edge of the United States when it was “my turn” to choose a vacation destination. I can’t wait to get a glimpse into Emily’s world.

NaNoWriMo — I’m doing it.

So, I told myself I would do NaNoWriMo if I finished my Rapunzel novel by November 1st.

That’s not going to happen. (I don’t think).

I’m still going to do NaNoWriMo.

I got off track on Rapunzel because of unforeseen work disruptions which led to me ending work with a long-standing freelance client so I could keep up with the increased workload from another. And as I’ve written about often, I suck at writing during times of personal transition.

I will be able to bring my novel up to part three so I leave it at a good stopping point, which I think will mean it will not be too hard to get back into at the end of November. And that month might be a good opportunity for me to let everything “gel” before I make a decision about how I want to end it.

I do feel nervous about taking on NaNoWriMo when I’m in the thick of another novel AND will probably have some more unpredictability at work. I need to pick up some extra freelance work because I’ve bitten off a little more than I can chew financially right now, due to some expected expenses like an upcoming vacation and some home improvements, as well as some unexpected ones, like medical bills for both me and my pets.

But I remind myself that I’ve tackled NaNo during the years when I was doing my 9-5 and had less flexibility in my schedule. I tackled it during my first year as a full-time freelancer, when I was regularly putting in 10-hour days to make ends meet. I tackled it the year I was getting married, even though I didn’t think I could add one more thing to my to-do list during that time.

And the world won’t end if I don’t reach 50,000 words, right?

Ha, that’s what I always say. And I always become a slave to the word count gods anyway.

But I find myself yearning for it. I yearn for those long dark days and the hot tea for early mornings and late nights writing; I yearn for that feeling that comes from the total immersion of NaNoWriMo that I never get during the rest of my writing life; I yearn to become part of the local NaNoWriMo community here and to make more connections with other writers. I yearn for the practice of bringing my writing with me everywhere, of never letting myself “off the hook.” And having another completed novel won’t hurt, either.

I’m going to be writing the sequel to Rumpled, this one told from Emily’s perspective (the miller’s daughter). I’m missing a major plot point that I hope will arrive sometime next month.

I’m giving a presentation on completing NaNo at my library tomorrow, with tips on how to get it done (if you’re in it to win it). And preparing for the talk without plunging in alongside everyone else just doesn’t feel right.

I’ll post some of my tips here in the weeks leading up to November, and I’m making no promises about what will happen with my public writing after that.

An Artist Date? I Took My Artist on a Romantic Getaway!

Ever since I finished my A Year in the Life project, I’ve been working through the writing exercises in Julia Cameron’s The Right to Write. Last week, the chapter “The Well” prescribed taking yourself on an “artist date” — but NOT writing about it afterwards. According to Julia, the idea was to “fill the well,” not “draw from it.”

Julia Cameron prescribes three regular activities to sustain a life of creativity. These activities are:

Morning pages – 3 pages of journaling every morning (I cheat and don’t do these every day – just Mon – Thurs.)
Artist Dates – a once-a-week outing to someplace that stimulates your senses, undertaken alone.
Regular walks to allow thoughts to synthesize (this one is also easy for me, since I have a dog and walk or “bike” him almost every day.)

Of the three activities, the Artist Dates are the hardest to commit to for me. As an introvert, I just don’t like going out all that much. And I worry about what these outings might cost, and fear I am not creative enough to devise weekly excursions that DON’T cost money.

Still, I was in luck last weekend, because “The Well” chapter corresponded with South Dakota’s annual Festival of Books. My husband had a prior commitment, which meant I attended the two-day festival alone. It was an Artist’s Date Deluxe!

One might think that attending lectures by various authors would do more to stimulate the mind than the senses, and indeed I found my writer’s mind opening and expanding with excitement and inspiration as I attended sessions by Kate DiCamillo, Kathleen Norris, Joseph Bruchac, Sonia Manzano (Maria from Sesame Street!), and Karin Slaughter.

But to my pleasant surprise, the lineup provided more than just intellectual fodder. Following Kate DiCamillo’s keynote speech on Friday night, Native American storyteller and dancer Kevin Locke ran historical images of American Indians on a projector while he played a traditional flute, then performed a “circle dance” during which, at one point, he had 28 hoops adorning his body at once. The next day, Joseph Bruchac raised goosebumps on my skin with his chilling oral rendition of “Skeleton Man,” a traditional Mowhawk folktale. And my eyes filled with tears when Sonia Manzano played a three-minute clip of Maria’s “highlights” from Sesame Street, bringing me back to my childhood in an instant, and the way I insisted my mom wake me up early on the day that the episode of Maria’s wedding played — I just had to catch the 7 am showing rather than the 10 am one (although I watched it again at 10 and on video many times after.)

When I saw the clip again for the first time in almost thirty years, I saw it with the eyes of someone who has completed that rite of passage myself, and I felt touched by how nuanced and authentic Manzano’s portrayal of bridal nerves were even for such a young audience. It affirms to me that even as children we can intuit what touches the truly Real in the entertainment that comes into our lives.

So, my inner artist was good and pampered after last weekend — not to mention my inner child. I can’t wait to see where she takes me next.

Pets and Contraception at the YAC blog!

My post is up at Young Adult Catholics today about how an interview with a reporter about the Catholic church and contraception led to another re-examination of what makes someone Catholic.

And I forgot to link to my previous post, which is all about the pope’s disparaging of pets.

Retelling Book Review: The Real Boy by Anne Ursu

The Real Boy by Anne Ursu


My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I liked this book even better than Ursu’s critically acclaimed Breadcrumbs, which was a pleasant surprise, especially since the source material (Pinnochio) is less appealing than The Snow Queen was.

Although I shelved this book with “retellings,” it’s really more of an “inspired by” book. There are definitely allusions to Pinnochio, including the title and subtle imagery throughout the book, but it also stands completely on its own as a fantasy novel. The worldbuilding is just complex enough without bogging the story down too much, each detail there to say something about the power of magic, fear, and regret. The language is beautiful, and characters are well-rounded and often morally ambiguous, especially the magician Caleb. I loved Oscar, the main character, and the way he embodied the awkwardness of not fitting in. I think he was written as a character with Asperger’s, although this was never made explicit even in an allegorical way. I think it’s especially valuable when genre books feature characters with mental differences without the book being totally about that, and this book pulls it off beautifully. Oscar has his own story — he just happens to navigate his world in a way that we might expect someone with Asperger’s might.

In Breadcrumbs, I felt where the story really shone was in its fantastical elements. Perhaps that’s why I liked this one even more, because the whole story takes place in such a setting. I loved just totally sinking into this world. I refrained from giving the book five stars because it seems to get a little jumbled at the end, and the ultimate solution is somewhat morally ambiguous if you stop to think about it — but is supposed to be interpreted ineffably as the “right thing to do,” I think. Still, I will not be passing this book on via Paperbackswap, which is one of the highest honors a book can earn in my book-crowded house!





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Cheryl Klein Plot Master Workshop – Go If You Can

I’m not real big into writing conferences. I tend to skip over pages about conferences in writing magazines, and my mind sort of

If you can’t take the workshop, there’s always the book!

shuts off when I read advice about how to pitch at conferences, or how they are a good way to “get your foot in the door.” I think, but can’t my writing speak for itself? And, I can’t afford the travel + the time off work, and the only way to get better at writing is to write anyway, right?

But when the SCBWI brought Cheryl Klein, executive editor at Arthur A. Levine Books, to the city I now live in, and on a weekend, nixing the cost of travel and of taking off work, I figured I would have been crazy not to go. And I was right.

It was an intense weekend, so much so that I’m still a little tired and going back to work feels almost like a “break.” An intense week of “story mapping” led up to the workshop, and I used my middle-grade novel Ever This Day as my project. I spent about a year and a half sending the story out to agents and gathered a folder full of rejections, then put it aside to work on publishing and promoting Rumpled. I looked forward to the chance to see it with “fresh eyes” when I did the story map, but when I was working alone it was still pretty easy for me to fool myself that I could leave things the way they were.

Ms. Klein’s workshop shook that assumption up, and it’s a good thing.

I felt as if I had hit a wall with that particular piece; I know I care about it perhaps more deeply than anything else I’ve ever written — it’s the novel closest to my own experiences — but I had gotten to the point where I couldn’t really “see” it anymore. I still believed in it, but I had received so many rejections that I was starting to feel it behooved me to take another close look. Cheryl’s workshop finally opened my eyes to some of the things that are left to work on, and I’m excited to return to the novel and bring it into closer alignment with what I dream it can be.

Cheryl will accept one manuscript for review from each person who takes one of her courses, and that alone is worth its weight in goal, and certainly the cost of admission. So, this is what my writing schedule looks like for the next few months:

Finish the second draft of my Rapunzel retelling
Pound out another NaNoWriMo novel and then
Return to Ever This Day for another round of intensive revisions

Although Cheryl is an editor for children’s books, her workshop will benefit anyone who writes fiction. Definitely go if you get the chance — if you read YA and Middle-grade books, you get the added benefit of being starstruck to hear how some of your favorite books have come to be. And you’ll feel inspired to see that editors, if Cheryl is any representation, at the “big 5″ publishing houses are still just as passionate about books as you are.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Which I Make a Story Map

This weekend, I am taking a YA and middle-grade novel class with Cheryl Klein, and I’m going to be cramming my “homework” all week. I’m about 1/3 of the way through “story mapping” my middle-grade novel, Ever This Day. Below are the instructions for the exercise:

For each scene, note:

The scene number

Starting manuscript page number

What is the action of this scene (paragraph version)? Write a paragraph describing the action of this scene. Note any significant information introduced, interesting lines relating to the themes or character growth, or any recurring images.

What is the action of this scene (one sentence version)? Summarize the scene in one sentence.

What is the change that takes place in this scene?

The “change” question is definitely the most challenging one, especially in flashback scenes. Are we talking about the change that happened in the flashback, or some present change that is somehow tied to the flashback? I’m sort of wobbling around using whichever one seems most relevant.

At the end, you’re supposed to line up all your answers to #4, and they make your “story map.”

I’ve read lots of suggestions of doing this sort of thing, and some agents and editors ask for one while they’re deciding whether to take on a manuscript. But even my desire to get published never motivated me to make one. Why? I think, as self-motivated as I think I am, I am truly discovering the power of a looming deadline.

And I was never one to blow off homework.