Averil Dean's Blog, page 15

Yarn and Popsicle Sticks

The dishes are done. I know as much about this book as it’s possible to know without getting in there and starting to write. I’ve planned it, mapped out the arc, amassed a series of (to me) interesting complications, and done some rudimentary research. This book is going to take a good bit more of that than anything I’ve written before, but it can wait. The story comes first, verisimilitude later.

I’m stalling about sending it to my agent. It always feels like offering the breathless expositio...

Gray Area

Truly, Madly

If you want to write, if you want to create, you must be the most sublime fool that God ever turned out and sent rambling. You must write every single day of your life. You must read dreadful dumb books and glorious books, and let them wrestle in beautiful fights inside your head, vulgar one moment, brilliant the next. You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy heads.

I wish you a wrestling match with your...

Disgrace

Some books must be read twice in order to feel as if you’ve read them once. This is one of those.

Which books are like that for you?

Twenty Questions

What’s the first article of clothing you remember owning?
What time do you naturally wake in the morning?
Last sandwich you ate.
Do you sing in the car?
Tattoo inventory.
Broken bone inventory.
On a scale of 1-10, the heat number on your Thai noodle order?
Have you ever held a snake? (That’s only a euphemism if you want it to be.)
Weird lessons your parents made you take.
What’s your sign?
Where are your glasses?
What would you name a little boy?
What would you rename your home town?
Can you tie a cherry...

Arc

Today I’m getting started on the new proposal. I’m not entirely clear on how this works once you’ve got a couple of books under your belt and are angling for a new contract, but I’m pretty sure there’s a proposal involved. It’s just a detailed synopsis, really, a new book’s play-by-play, and maybe a couple of sample chapters if someone asks for them. This is one of the perks of having written a couple of books; people know you’re good for the work and will do what you say you’ll do, and they’...

Clean-Up Crew

This is one of those Mondays where I have so much to say that I can’t settle down and put the words together. My life is so quiet generally speaking that when anything at all happens I get an experiential rush and have to start writing in bullet points because it’s all been too much for me. Or, failing that, I just strip it down to the bare facts: we took two day trips this weekend. One to Ballard (shopping), the other to Mount Rainier (nature ogling). More about those later.

The other thing I...

Casting

What do you think about this idea? How many players in your company?

Talisman

If there’s a book you really want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.

~Toni Morrison

Ain’t that the truth. I spent hours at Barnes & Noble last weekend and came away with nothing. Nothing! And not because there weren’t dozens of books calling my name, but because I had a particular craving and could not find a way to slake it. For every book I write there is a single book already written that evokes the mood I’m hoping to capture, something to return to when I need...

Virtuoso

Hot damn, people. I had no idea you were so tech savvy. What else are you holding back? Do you play the oud, sew your own clothes, have a minor in dolphin psychology? Can you climb a tree, do a back flip off a swing at its apex? Somersault across the living room without ending up in traction? Do you make chocolate-chip constellations in your five-year-old’s pancakes? Can you operate a lathe? A dowsing rod? A pasta machine? Can you locate true north by laying your palm on the ground, or sniffi...