Helene Dunbar's Blog, page 6

Remembering…

This is not a post about writing, but about living and remembering. I don’t know if this blog is an appropriate place for this piece, but I don’t know that it isn’t either. I just know that it happened. And that I wrote as a way of coping. And I know that, hard as it sometimes is, we should always remember.

*****



Thursday, September 13th, 2001

By the time the rubble has cleared there will be more words written then there are pieces of white soot floating around lower Manhattan. “Ground Zero”…the World Trade Center has a new name that won’t appear on any map or any subway sign but it’s one that will forever be marked in our memories.

I wasn’t in the area.  I was late to work.  I stopped to get coffee and, in retrospect, remember a few people looking up and talking in a more agitated way than you usually hear on a Tuesday morning…but it’s New York and you learn not to pay too much attention here to people talking loudly. About 2 miles away from the WTC I answered my office phone to hear my dad telling me, from Michigan, that a plane had hit one of the World Trade Center towers.  He was watching The Today Show as he does every morning and I could hear it in the background.  I chided him because I was to fly the next morning on a small prop plane to a military base for an engineering conference (I’m a marketing writer for an engineering/architecture firm) and I was nervous. We chatted about my fairly new fear of flying and then I heard Katie Couric in the background and my dad saying, “Oh wait…there’s been a second one.”

In a blink, this terrible accident was no longer a mishap. President Bush said yesterday that we can’t call this a “terrible accident” that this was a deliberate act specifically planned to incite terror. I don’t often agree with him but this time I see his point.

I work on the 6th floor of a building at Union Square. I saw people rushing to the windows and I soon followed, telling my father I’d call him back, not knowing that I wouldn’t be able to get a line out of my office phone for another few weeks.

My boss pointed out that you could see the hole the plane had left in the second tower.  My coworkers looked on in amazement.  I tried to hold back the tears.  I returned to my desk and turned on the radio – a taboo behavior in my department.  This time, no one said anything.  Somewhere on the floor I heard the words “mushroom cloud” and so I rushed to the window again to see the black cloud billowing from the gaping hole, followed by the sight of this beautiful landmark sinking into the ground, taking untold numbers with it.

Faced with the utter enormity of what I’d seen, all I could think about was watching the Irish band Lunasa play the final show of the “Tuesday Night Celtic Concert” series at the World Trade Center two weeks before. The band had stayed at the Millenium across the street, one of them bragging about how they’d gotten such a great deal on Priceline for the hotel.  That had been a beautiful night marred only by a smattering of rain.  But the sunset reflecting off the towers was a sight I wouldn’t forget.  I regretted not having a camera that night.  I regret it more now.

The rest of the day was one of almost unbearable pain.  In the next 72 hours everyone I knew who had cause to be at the site that day was accounted for and was all right.  But the City was in pain.  The country.  The world.

All I could think about was going home. It became my mission although I didn’t know what I was going to do when I got there. I made it to the George Washington Bridge to find that they were no longer allowing foot-traffic on the bridge.  Shuttle buses had been organized but the line was hours long.  Volunteers had already mobilized, handing out water to people wait to cross. In desperation I followed the example of others and hitchhiked about the bridge back to New Jersey although once I got there, all I could do was stare at the news in disbelief.

Saturday, September 15th, 2001

What you notice most in NYC right now is the silence. New York is never silent. People look you in the eyes.  That doesn’t normally happen.  I’ve spent a lot of time in Union Square. On Thursday someone had provided pieces of brown craft paper and magic markers so that people could write their thoughts.  I stared and read.  Their eloquence amazed me even in the ones where most words were misspelled.  I was struck dumb.  A writer, I couldn’t write.  I was too worried about writing the correct thing.  Finally I forced myself to take up a marker. I quoted U2, “We’re one but we’re not the same – we’ve got to carry each other” and Science Fiction writer Joe Strazynski, “Faith Manages.”  I wrote a lot in between that I remember vaguely was about love and peace and neighbors and tolerance but I don’t know what. Just that once I started I couldn’t stop.

On Friday, under gray, rainy skies that echoed the tears in most of our hearts, the craft paper in Union Square had been replaced by candles and flowers. One family sidled up next to me and bent down to place a bouquet on the ground next to the others. It had a note to someone – a daughter, a sister, a wife who had yet to be found. At Washington Square Park notes are threaded through the chain–link fence; one asked information about a missing photographer. A woman next to me with a large camera saw it and dissolved. In the square to document this sacred time, she discovered that someone she knows is missing.  Multiple people rushed to her aid.  And this in a city where no one usually looks at each other.

We have been changed.  Our lives have been changed. Friendships have been made, rekindled and have perished under tons of rubble.

Sunday, September 26th, 2001

The images that strike me the most are those from other countries.  Moments of silence, American flags where there usually are none.  Outpourings of grief and love from those with no obligation to give either. In England, the Queen sings the American National Anthem. Children in Russia light candles.

My phone does not stop ringing for days. My emails flow in a constant stream. I hear from almost every boy I’ve dated more than once.  Emilie, one of my best friends, tells me that her father called her in Massachusetts from Spain to see how I’m doing. Another says that we are all learning who our true friends are and she is right.

I hear from my father a lot, other friends and I connect habitually through email. My roommate at “K”, now in Japan, writes me at odd hours; an American Expat, she is emotionally stranded there away from her home when it needs her the most and when she needs us. A Japanese newspaper contacts her for her “American” reaction.  She talks about me.

I finally touch base with a friend I’ve been playing phone–tag with for months. It is our way to do this, leaving messages for each other, never quite connecting. This time I reach him and we talk for 3 hours.  Two days later he calls me and we do it again. Two more days pass and it’s four hours. His heart is in New York and his Milwaukee friends just don’t quite understand.

I find that at times like this, old friends mean more than any. No pretense, no gloss. All of the hurt that is in my heart is worn on my sleeve and I don’t care.

In the midst of this I’m moving INTO the city. Though the logistics of this move from NJ had me stressed two weeks ago, I’m now calm. I have perspective. I pray as I haven’t in years for those who have lost loved ones and those who will in what will surely be a coming war. My friend in Milwaukee is an actor; he likes to think of himself of a hippie although a highly domesticated, artistic one. I am a pacifist who was terrified when Bush was elected. I’ve never supported a U.S. military action. Yet we both support, however fearfully, the coming darkness. Our participation in this war is not over oil or land or warped views of religion. It is necessary. We have been attacked. Our spirit has been attacked. The enemy cannot win.

I choke up now when I see signs reading “Sorry, no American flags left” in store windows. I ride the subway from my new apartment in Queens with a battalion of firefighters. They look tired but fairly jovial. They smell like smoke in the crowded car. I squeeze in against the door and one of them wonders if I have enough room. I want to say “I would get out and walk if I needed to, to make room for you” but I don’t. I just nod and smile.



Tuesday, September 18th, 2001

A week has passed. Planes are being deployed to the Gulf. There have been no survivors found in 7 days.  Union Square, which has helped me through so many days, has become a type of morose street fair.  Dealers sell T-shirts with images of the towers and “I survived” on it.

I am depressed. I should divert myself. Nothing seems to make sense though, besides the news and conversations with various friends. I spend my time unpacking, exploring my new neighborhood and enjoying the breezes that float over my neighbor’s garden and into my window. I’ve just begun to be able to listen to music but only a few specific CDs.

In this vein I head to an Irish pub where musician friends play. The pint glass on the bar, usually filled with matches, sports American flags on toothpicks. A few drinks into the evening, I have a startling memory – one night about 6 weeks ago, I sat, reading at the bar, in a terrible mood. A firefighter from the company around the corner tried to talk to me.  I ignored him. Now I wonder if he is alive or dead. I feel guilty.

I manage to get lost in the music and the company and the night runs into the morning. I’m hours late for work, which is fine because I can’t work these days anyhow.  But I know that I must – as so many are losing their jobs. When I stop into the synagogue I used to work for to finish some freelance work, I spot a flyer. The American Jewish Congress has asked the shul to provide volunteers on the 25th to serve food to the rescue workers. I sign up even though the flyer warns of the psychologically difficult venue, just off ground zero.

A few days later I go out again. Although the music is amazingly good, I can’t get my mind off of everything. Fiddle legend Eileen Ivers, originally of Riverdance, comes in and we talk. She and her husband are with another couple – the man worked in the World Trade Center. He snuck off to the gym that day, figuring he would just be late to work.  Many of his coworkers were killed. There is no escape from the subject.

I have more periods now of being able to do others things and even enjoy them. This is supposed to be healthy progress. But I feel as though I’m betraying those who are still mourning. I am fortunate that I have so much unpacking to do. It is easy to see the progress but doesn’t take all that much thought and is fairly tiring.

Tuesday, September 25th, 2001

I have just spent 14 hours at ground zero on 6 hours of sleep spread over 3 days. I carry the stench of burning metal and who knows what else with me. I am tired and disoriented and have images imprinted on my brain that are so unreal I’m not sure if the right words have been invented to describe them. I have been fortunate enough to have the opportunity to volunteer through Congregation B’nai Jeshurun, a synagogue I used to work for and whose publications I still edit as a freelancer.  They were asked by the American Jewish Congress, who in-turn, had been contacted by the Seaman’s Church Institute to supply a team of workers.

I am assigned to work in and near St. Paul’s Chapel. This is the church where George Washington prayed and the pew he used is roped off. It sustained no damage although if you walk around the perimeter of its 300-year–old cemetery you can pick up pieces of papers that were blown out of the offices in the towers.  The church has become not only the depository for many of the donations that have come in but also the one peaceful place that the rescue workers can go. Candles are lit and flowers line every available space.  Cots are set up along one wall.  Many of the workers simply sleep in the pews. This is the place where people let their guard down. It is where you see the policemen and firefighters cry and pray. It is the most solemn place I’ve ever been in and is strangely peaceful.

It is amazing that right outside the door are scenes of mass destruction. Yet at the same time, there are moments of incredible beauty. One rescue worker brings me a drawing, done by children from a parish somewhere, of the tent I am working in that supplies all necessary things to the workers (It’s rather like running the only store in a small town). This is the scene down there – for 14 hours we search for sweatshirts, chocolate, coffee, hand cream to supply to these people who are doing the hard work.  Sometimes we find these things and sometimes we don’t. We are held hostage to the donations that come in. But it doesn’t matter.  If we are out of sweatshirts, they layer on what we have; they make due with lukewarm coffee and the wrong size shoes.  But always they thank us.  THEY thank US.  I try to explain to them that we are doing so little in comparison as to be almost unnoticeable but, amazingly, these people who have toiled 17–hour days for almost two weeks now don’t see it that way.  I am thanked for being “a life saver”, a police officer with more brass than I can translate into a title, tells me that we, those who are volunteering to keep them supplied, are the “unsung heroes” of the operation. Ultimately, this is one of the two things that brings me to tears; this outpouring of gratitude and beauty from people who are obliged to show neither. Given what they’ve been through we are expecting to make allowances but none are needed. Awe is generated instead. And this scene has played out daily for two weeks.

The night I volunteer is the first cold night of the fall. We get in a load of new, donated sweatshirts at 2am but distribute them within a half-hour.  The police are frustrated because anything they wear has to be blue. Another group can only wear green.  It’s funny how we fall back on rules and regulations to make us feel secure. I have an extra-large pink sweatshirt in the box.  These burly men eye it covetously but refuse to take it.  For hours, I try to give it away to shivering rescuers but always hear the same story – they don’t want to be made the butt of their coworker’s jokes. Finally, a fireman takes it. “I’m broad–shouldered” he tells me. “Just let them take their chances making fun of me!” Outside the church, people are jovial. We spend a surprising amount of time laughing but there is always a voice behind it that says, “laugh with me so that we don’t fall apart.”

At one point, another volunteer appears with a small amount of goods that people have donated for the canine patrols. I go with her into the site to see if we can find out where they’re working. My post at the Tent is set up alongside the Millennium Hotel. All night I see the remains of the building that contained Borders bookstore which now equals approximately 6 floors of charred metal. I’ve walked over that far but have not proceeded yet through the additional set of barricades into the rest of the site. Now, on a mission, my coworker and I are lead by a young soldier in fatigues from one commander to another, looking for the workers with dogs. By the time our search ends, we have walked this entire side of the site, ending up in a burned out Burger King. Spray–painted on the staircase is “Evidence” with a green arrow pointed up towards the second floor. The FBI and police are using the site as a holding area for pieces of planes and anything else that might be used to build a case. We don’t find dogs but leave the parcel among the small selection of goods that have been set up on the main floor. On our walk back to the Tent, I finally take a good look around.

“Indescribable” is a word you hear often. I will probably never use it again after this since never again will it be so appropriate. The best I come up with, on the spot, knowing that I’ll be expected to describe this scene later is: it’s as if a great artist has been asked to render their worst nightmare.  It looks like hell.  It looks too bad to be real, like some horrific movie set.

It looks like the buildings are melting. Charred and black, this site, so much larger than the three leveled buildings, looks like a giant torch was taken to it. Huge pieces of steel hang off the buildings the way wax does when it drips off the side of a candle. Windows are blown out; facades are ripped off, the air is beige with soot. The buildings still smoke. Apparently, the machinery, brought in to remove the debris, is allowing oxygen into pockets of smoldering material. As I’m on the night shift, this is all lit by huge floodlights adding to the feeling of being someone’s fictional version of Armageddon. At ground level, it’s all stacked rubble. You only try not to think about the 6,000 lives that ended somewhere in there.

What first breaks through the overwhelming sense of incomprehension that settles over me are the looks on the faces of the workers as they try to go about the task that they’ve been assigned to. Some are angry and frustrated to be standing around guarding the street now that more machinery has been brought in and human labor isn’t so much in need.  Others, the younger ones typically, just look straight ahead, barely blinking. The other thing that strikes me is the sudden realization of where I am. This is the same space that held the Lunasa concert just a few weeks ago when the Irish band performed the closing show of the “Celtic Tuesdays” series. The largest pile of rubble is in between the two buildings, just about where the stage was.

My shift ends late because we’re waiting for backup and because I can’t seem to leave although St. Paul’s priest, a warm man with soft blue eyes tells me that I must go home and sleep. I turn in my access badge and head around the corner where a friend and business associate has his printing company.  Miraculously, no one there was hurt and the business is open. We talk for a while, he comments on the smell that hangs on me. Eventually, he too tells me to go home and rest. From the looks in the subway, I realize that my friend is not to only one to notice that I am carrying the stench of the place with me. I only hope that I carry the beauty of it alongside as well.

In the end, I know that at the very least, I carry the images and the voices and the hearts that I’ve encountered today. And what runs through my head are not so much the memories of watching these two great towers crumble into dust or the grieving faces of those who have lost loved ones, but a song.  The previous night I was fortunate enough to hear “An American Tune” by Paul Simon, an American songwriter, filtered through Dervish, a band from Sligo, Ireland performed just 8 blocks from the site.

“…And I don’t know a soul who’s not been battered I don’t have a friend who feels at ease.

I don’t know a dream that’s not been shattered or driven to its knees.

But it’s all right, it’s all right, for we’ve lived so well so long.

Still, when I think of the road we’re traveling on,

I wonder what went wrong, I can’t help but wonder what went wrong.

And I dreamed I was dying.

I dreamed that my soul rose unexpectedly and looking back down at me smiled reassuringly,

and I dreamed I was flying.

And high above my eyes could clearly see the Statue of Liberty sailing away to sea,

and I dreamed I was flying.

And we come on the ship they call the Mayflower, we come on the ship that sailed the moon.

We come in the age’s most uncertain hour and sing an American tune

oh, but it’s all right, it’s all right, you can’t be forever blessed.

Still, tomorrow’s going to be another working day and I’m trying to get some rest,

that’s all I’m trying is to get some rest.”

Tuesday, October 9th, 2001

We all try to get back to normal. We try not to talk about it so much. But it’s there. Every time the wind changes directions and the smell hits or every time you talk to someone you haven’t talked to in a while.

On Friday I call a co–worker from Pennsylvania. He tells me about the work my company is doing on the White House – a job begun months before this incident – and about how our employees are given bio–warfare suits “just in case.” He wonders out loud if his family will be taken care of should anything happen to him. He talks. His words come in a flood.  He was in Montreal when it happened.  He and the other Americans in the meeting were shuttled quickly out of the conference room. They took vans back across the border.

Today, three weeks since all of this began, I am simultaneously working on a compilation piece for the synagogue of volunteer’s stories and a piece for Irish Music Magazine on Dervish’s show 8 blocks from the site and the other effects on the NYC music scene. In an effort to “escape” for just a few minutes, I walk outside my apartment. Bells are tolling. Passing the Roman Catholic Church, I saw police in dress blue with a bagpipe group standing by. It was a memorial service. I can’t imagine that the rest of the country is bombarded with these reminders so constantly.

Tuesday, October 16th, 2001

It has been over a month and I know that I need to somehow resolve this essay and my feelings.  But it is hard to wrap it up while we’re at war. I write my friend in Japan who says that she doesn’t see the point in bombing the mud–huts that pass for training facilities in Afghanistan. I tell her that I understand but I am still moved to read that the missiles being dropped had been marked “For NYPD and NYFD”. I wonder if I can no longer call myself a pacifist or if the sheer act of having your homeland attacked, of seeing planes of travelers turned into bombs, of having conversations with friends and coworkers about biological weapons, is justification for supporting war just this once.

I am, right now, I suppose, a patriot. I am proud of my country and proud of my city. Lest anyone be confused, I’m also proud of my Egyptian coworkers who deal with undeserved suspicion every day now.  But as I prepare to take another “K” friend down to the site, to remind him and myself that this act cannot be forgotten and about the perspective we’ve gained here  – that life is fragile and short and that safety is merely a chimera – I find myself gripping the flag that I’ve pinned to my bag and hoping that, when this is over, there will still be something to fly the stars and stripes over. And that, perhaps, we might even remember what we’ve learned about heroism and solidarity and how fragile these ideas are that we’ve taken for granted.

The Next Big Thing Blog Tour

As part of the Next Big Thing Tour, Colette Ballard, author of the upcoming RUNNING ON EMPTY tagged me. The tour is a way for readers to discover authors they might not yet know about.

So on to the questions!

1. What is the working title of your next book?

The working title was In Case of Emergency, but I’m grateful to have an editor who is better with titles than I am. The official title is These Gentle Wounds.

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?

Over the years, I worked on a number of freelance articles on the Susan Smith murder trial among other similar case. When a similar event happened in New York State in 2010, it made me wonder what sort of the life the surviving child might have.

I do want to say that this story does not mirror either of those cases and it isn’t a Law & Order type story. More, it’s about resilience and trusting yourself and those who love you.

3. What is the genre of your book?

Young Adult Contemporary.

4. What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in the movie rendition?

This is seriously the most difficult question I’ve been asked about this book. In everything else I’ve written, there is at least one character that has a “dream” actor for the role. But….I’ve always heard Gordie’s voice so clearly I’m not sure I can think of anyone who perfectly fits.

I can say that from Bates Motel wouldn’t be miscast at Kevin. And for Sarah…maybe who is currently on The Fosters.

5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

Just like the title, I’m sure that my publisher is going to come up with something FAR better than this. But here is what we used for the sale announcement:

THESE GENTLE WOUNDS is about a boy with PTSD and survivor’s guilt who must call upon strength he didn’t know he had in order to save himself and those he loves when his abusive father reenters his life.

 

6. Who is publishing your book?

Flux (Llywellyn Worldwide)

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

Well….I don’t really draft. I also don’t write in order. And I tend to obsessively revise as I go along. I’d say that the entire book took 2 years, but even that’s a guess as I was working on other manuscripts at the same time.

8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

Heidi Ayarbe’s Compulsion is the first thing that comes to mind. Also, some of the work of Susan Vaught.

9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?

See above. It was really a “what if?” type of situation that I wanted to answer for myself. I never really expected anyone else to read it. But Gordie really struck a chord with many of my early readers and I was thrilled to find the other people cared about him as much as I did.

10. What else about the book might pique the reader’s interest?

It has an AWESOME playlist filled with bands you probably haven’t heard of unless you know a lot of the bands coming out of Oxford (UK) and there is molecular gastronomy in it. One fun recipe in particular that I’ll link to on my blog at some point.

Now, I’m fortunate enough to be able to tag two other authors that you’re going to want to check out.

Emily Lloyd-Jones‘ ILLUSIVE will be debuting with Little Brown in 2014.

Kathryn Jones‘ CAMELOT BURNING will release from Flux also in 2014.

 

The Most Brilliant Post on Publishing and Writing…and well, LIFE, that I’ve ever read.

I had my semi-annual marathon phone call with one of my best friends yesterday. We don’t intend to only speak twice a year, it just happens that way. But she’s one of those friends that I know is THERE. It doesn’t matter how often we speak or don’t, I can feel her out in the world and that makes the world better.

Anyhow, this was the first time I spoke to her since my book sold and she asked me if it was still exciting. I explained to her that it is all still so new and there are still so many things I haven’t gotten to do yet like go through copy edits and hold an ARC (advance reader copy) in my hands and hold my BOOK in my hands. And know that people are reading it.

Yes, I’m sweating about book #2 in my deal which was written before TGW and I’d like that not to be so apparent. Yes, I’m sweating about my-very-favoritist-book that is out with two sets of new eyes and yes, I’m REALLY sweating about my new thing which I just haven’t had time to focus on.

But I’m excited in that way that only new things can make you. When I was in college and I was lucky enough to see Best Friend every day, I had a quote on my door from Dave Sim’s Cereabus graphic novel series: “Everything done for the first time unleashes a demon.”

That isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Anyhow, coincidentally, (as most things seem to happen with Best Friend, she has a strange relationship with the universe that way) as soon as I got off the phone, someone tweeted a link to this amazing Chuck Wendig blog,  titled, So You Just Had Your Book Published.

Seriously, if you write, or create music, or art, or do ANYTHING that matters to you, but that must really on a process and audience, READ THAT POST. Because yes, the mechanism for creating anything might be painful, but deep down that isn’t why most of us create.

Remember that.

 

Words and Images

I have a cover! Huzzah! And I’m dying to show it to you!

But no, you can’t see it.

Sigh, I know. What’s up with that, right? See…here’s the thing. I “could” show you my cover. I’m “allowed” to show you my cover, but…you only get one shot to make a big splash (or even a little splash) with these things. So as soon as I get some more stuff from my publisher, I’m hoping to have a website with more than five readers (Hi Dad!) who follow it, do my big cover reveal.

Until then can you just assume that it’s awesome? Because it is. Seriously. It’s worth the wait.

Anyhow, what I will share now is this. I LOVE Wordle. As someone with absolutely no ability to create anything visual, I love that I can take words (words!), plug them into this site, and get something visual back.

So here is the Wordle for THESE GENTLE WOUNDS. Pretty ain’t it???

 

Shout

I’m going to be away for the next week doing MAJOR non-writing related life things. But I saw my preliminary book cover today and I’m completely in love. I just couldn’t let the day go by without saying that.

Because that doesn’t always happen. Ply ten authors with alcohol and five will start to talk about how much they hate their covers (or new titles). I get it – I’m in marketing and I understand why it happens, so I was doubly- terrified.

But the folks at Flux are generous at taking author opinion into account and my editor is a visionary and totally nailed this cover. I mean, when he sent me two original images and told me to send him covers from other books I liked, I was stumped. I honestly told him that what he’d sent me was better than anything I could come up with. Then I cried. Because I’m like that.

Anyhow, so when this phase of MAJOR LIFE THING is through, I will, at some point, at some destination on the internet-o-sphere, have a cover reveal. In the meantime, I thought I’d post one of the songs from the THESE GENTLE WOUNDS playlist.

First, I’m an 80′s music freak having been music manager for both my high school and college radio stations (cool schools, huh!?!). And Tears for Fears’ debut album blew me away and still blows me away. But I also worship the genius that is Duncan Sheik and his slowed-down, angsty version of Shout just captures the sound of someone who has been beaten down but not out, someone who will get it right as soon as they muster their strength and believe in themselves. Enjoy!

(And as always, if you like this track, please purchase it and keep supporting artists so that they can keep doing what they do!)

Finding Your Way

Like it or not, writing is a process. Letters become words become sentences. If you’re lucky those sentences become paragraphs that don’t suck too much. And so on and so on.

Since I’m currently in the process of doing various bit of work on four different manuscripts at the same time (!) I’ve been trying to think of a way to streamline and/or clarify my writing process. To that end, I’ve talked to a lot of writers about HOW they go about putting those words down on paper, hoping that I can gain some wisdom from those who are more organized.

But you know what? It doesn’t work like that.

Look, I read writing blogs all the time. And when I was starting out, this is the advice that most of them gave me:

Outline.
Interview your characters to get to know them.
Fit the shape of your manuscript into the structure of a screenplay.
Write an entire draft before you revise anything or you’re in danger of never finishing a manuscript.

I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with any of that advice. What I will say is that those three bullets kept me from writing fiction FOR YEARS. It wasn’t until I allowed myself to rewrite that advice as a list that reflects the way my brain works, that I was able to move past it. And my list looks something like:

It’s okay to write chapters and scenes completely out of order and sew them together like Frankenstein’s monster at a later time.
It’s okay to start with a premise instead of a plot.
It’s okay to spend days revising the 2nd, 12th, and 20th chapters just because you want to. Even if you haven’t written the chapters that come between. And even if you know that you’re going to have to revise all of them based on a character who surprises you by stepping off the plane in chapter 10.
It’s okay to allow your characters to talk and figure out who they are by listening in.
It’s okay to find your own way.

One of my amazing critique partners, Beth Hull, is my absolute opposite in terms of process. She often writes in long-hand (I wouldn’t be able to read mine even if I could do it fast enough to keep up with my thoughts), She outlines, and beat sheets, and interviews, and her writing is beautiful. But that is her process and I wouldn’t be able to write a paragraph if I had to do it that way. (Trust me, I’ve tried.)

Am I occasionally jealous of writers who have impeccable outlines to work from? Sure. But I’ve also learned the hard way that knowing what was going to happen in my story can keep me from writing it, because I am no longer curious. I love revising and finessing in an organized way. But when I’m writing, I have to be as curious as I am as a reader. And just as surprised by the way the characters unfold.

I don’t know if anyone reading this is a writer, but if you are, I hope you take one thing away from this: Your process is YOURS. If it works for you, it isn’t wrong. It doesn’t matter if your friend, or your writing group, or you very-favorite-author-in-the-world uses a different method to craft their story. Find Your Own Way.

 

 

Where Do Ideas Come From?

I don’t know any writer who hasn’t been asked “Where do your ideas come from?” I’m also not sure I know any writers who don’t cringe (at least a little) when they hear that question.

I’ve been thinking about where ideas come from and how they grow into a book. So far, here’s where the ideas for my manuscripts have come from:

A friend saying, “you should write a book about…”
A dream
Trying to answer the question “What if” while out with my husband walking the dog
A tragic news story that has haunted me, in various forms, for years
Needing to get the tragic story above out of my head and turning it upside down to write a funny sarcastic character who deals with a whole different set of tragic circumstances
Another dream although the entire story changed in the process
An era in history that has always fascinated me
A story on Mysteries at the Museum.

Five of those are complete (you can define “complete” in whichever way you choose. I’m not sure I have a blanket description, myself). Two of them have sold, one will never see the light of day, and one might be saved from the circular file through a collaboration with one of my amazing crit partners if we can ever find the time to do it. The other is probably my favorite and I have notes to use in revising as soon as I come up for air.

Another is 90% completed, but something has been stopping me from writing the ending and until I figure out my own hesitation, I’m going to let it percolate. Finishing things isn’t something I have problems with, so I’m assuming there might be a reason for this.

The historical, which should be the easiest because it is about a time I’ve been studying for years and a character who is probably the most like me out of any I’ve written, is vexing me. “Write what you know” might be great advise, but I sometimes think that if you know too much, it’s hard to write the story.

The final one is wavering between genres, so I have to see where it leads me. But I’m kind of in love with it at the moment.

I’m sure, in some later post, I’ll try to describe my totally unorthodox writing process and how I got to the point of giving myself permission to OWN that process.

But for now, I’m kind of fascinated by looking at my own list and knowing that it’s possible for two words like “what if” to turn into an entire book.

What’s in a Name?

Names are meaningful things and I say that as someone who has a name that that-coffee-place-that-starts-with-S can’t ever get right. (Seriously I’ve thought of taking pictures of all of the crazy permutations they’ve come up with and that’s WITH me spelling it out loud).

Yet names are something I have problems with. I was never great at writing headlines and although I think I’ve finally sorted out how to knock out a good query letter, titles are NOT my thing.

My debut book, due out in Spring/Summer 2014 from FLUX was called ICE for the longest time. ICE is the nickname given to my main character by the most important person in his life, his older brother Kevin. My MC, Gordie, is a hockey player, so there’s that. But I also like the fact that Ice, as a substance, is strong and yet can melt and crack.

Organically, the title evolved to IN CASE OF EMERGENCY because sometimes you need to learn where your safety net is. In Gordie’s case he needed to accept that he even had one.

So that’s what my cover page said. But I always referred to it as ICE because I’m lazy and typing out the long title was just a pain. I was SO lazy that my agent was surprised (and I think dismayed) to find that the book had a longer title. Which was just because I’d probably never typed the whole think out for her before.

And now….my book has a new name. It’s REAL name. A name that I think might raise questions from readers, but a name that reflects both the book’s content in a deep and meaningful way as well as Gordie’s nature. Because like ICE, he’s strong, yet fragile and prone to cracking. He’s wounded, but gentle and trying to wrestle with things that others can’t see.

I give great thanks to my editor, Brian Farrey-Latz, for seeing through the layers to target right to the heart of this book, which is now and forever known as THESE GENTLE WOUNDS.

Wings

I started writing fiction on a whim and to lose a bet.

But like a pretty weed that blows into a yard without invitation, the fiction writing bug took.

My first novel, my trunk novel, the one that will never see the light of day and that I’m terrified to go back and read, was about fairies, and music, and love, and the salvation of love, and the power of love to heal and restore faith just when you thought you had none left. (Drop the fairy bit and this description could be loosely applied to a lot of my writing. There are worse things.)

That novel didn’t totally suck. But it convinced me never again to try to write high fantasy even though that wasn’t what I was aiming for to begin with, anyhow.

I finished the draft. Revised it. Found crit partners. Revised more. I pushed the ideas for a sequel and a third book to the back of my head and moved onto something new.

But the accomplishment didn’t escape me. I’d completed a (rather long actually) manuscript. And while I was never going to query it, the experience convinced me to start a second WIP and a third (which got the attention of my agent and which is due out in 2015) and a fourth (which got the attention of an editor and is due out in 2014), and so on.

I knew that I’d done something BIG even if no one outside my small circle would ever read it. And I needed to celebrate that.

So I found myself doing something else I never thought I’d do. I got a tattoo. It was designed for me, based on an idea (wings — fairy not butterfly –, stained glass, spot color, inner wrist).  And it’s stunning.  Every time I look at it, I fall in love all over again. It was meant to be small. It isn’t.

I’ve joked with my husband that I should get a tattoo for every manuscript I finish, but I have no need to do that. Other manuscripts have gotten me agents and editors, other manuscripts will turn into books and fly away on their own wings into the land of readers.

But that first book, will always be the first, will always be the one that convinced me to keep going, will always be the one that gave me wings.

What’s Your Book About?

As I’ve been humbly telling people about my book deal (aka gushing hysterically), inevitably someone has asked the question “what is your book about?”

I LOVE that they’re asking this question because I love talking about my writing.

I HATE that they’re asking this question because I’m genetically unable to sum anything up. Ever.

Two years ago, I went to my first SCBWI conference. And I pitched an agent who was on my “dream agent” list and who only considers writers from conferences.

Honestly, writing that book was easier than writing my pitch. I spent the entire conference trying to streamline that one paragraph. After all, I only had 15 precious minutes with the agent. And a pitch is meant to be just a sentence or two.

And it doesn’t matter that I’m in marketing professionally, marketing myself is something I find difficult.

So, yeah. I was a wreck.

I managed to spew out the words that I’d so carefully written and rewritten about my book. I’m sure I sounded like a bad actor regurgitating a horrible script. The agent stared at me. Then she asked some brilliant question totally unrelated to my over-crafted paragraph. And we started talking. And it was great. And she requested my manuscript and she said she loved it, but it was too close to the type of thing another of her clients wrote (which was exactly why I’d hoped she take me on, but yeah, I get it).

Anyhow, that book is coming out in 2015, so I have some time to sort out how to tell people about it because I still haven’t figured that out.

But now I have THIS book, the one coming out NEXT SUMMER and people are asking WHAT’S IT ABOUT????

My easy answer is that it is about a boy with PTSD. And that’s true.

But it’s also a book about brotherhood, and believing in yourself, and finding strength you didn’t know you had. And it’s about hope, and possibilities, and the difference you can make in other people’s lives even if you think that your own life is a total mess. Even if you think that YOU are a total mess.

And it’s been known to make people cry. And I’m okay with that.

I think, when people ask me next, I’m going to say all of that and see how they react.