writerjenn

Guilt and social media

Sat, 18 May 2013 00:35:29 GMT

In response to my last post about phases of being quieter online, two people (one on Blogger, one on LiveJournal) commented about feeling guilty when they withdraw from social media. The second time someone mentioned guilt, I decided I want to say more on this subject.

Why should anyone feel guilty for stepping back? I wondered. After all, blogs and Twitter feeds and Facebook pages are all optional; most of us are not paid to do them and make no promises about when we'll post. Nobody's going to die over whether we post or not. (OK, if you see a tornado coming and tweet about it, you might save someone's life. But that's an exception!)

But entering the online world is entering a community. Most of us interact with a core group regularly, as well as with whomever else clicks on by. We have a horror of being thought of as the writer who became "too good" for her old blog buddies once she signed a book contract. We hate the idea of losing touch with friends once we tie the knot or have a baby. We don't want to disappear when we change jobs.

We like our friends and don't want to lose touch with them.

There's also the fact that sometimes when people disappear, it's because they've had a crisis, and we know people may worry. I can think of one writer I used to see on LiveJournal. Our relationship was at the "acquaintance" level, and many people migrated from LJ to other platforms, so it wasn't until I heard of her untimely death (from another social-media site) that I remembered her and realized I hadn't heard anything about her in a long while. It made me wonder about all the other people I used to see online but don't anymore. I assumed most of them just got tired of blogging or moved over to Facebook, and I know some of them went back to school or got new jobs or simply got so swamped by book promotion that they stepped back from the blogosphere--but now I wonder. Are they okay? I may never know.

So in one sense, I understand the desire to explain our absences from social media. And I think it's a nice idea to say, "I'm going offline for a while" if that's what we're doing. But I don't think we owe anyone an explanation. I don't think we have to justify our absences. Although I've been disappointed when my favorite bloggers stopped posting, I don't believe they owed me anything. They put up a bunch of free content that I enjoyed; we had some fun interactions; how can I complain about that?

Most of all, I don't think social media should have to be a chore. I do think it's important for writers to have at least one place online where readers can find them if they want, one place that provides a bio and author photo and a list of their books. But that can be a single page and doesn't have to be updated too often. Beyond that, it's all icing on the cake. It's about having fun and connecting with people, and if we're not getting that fun and connection here, or if we simply need to focus attention elsewhere, it's natural to step away. The Social Media Police will not come after us. :-)

Quieter times

Thu, 16 May 2013 01:07:18 GMT

There are times when I'm engaging more with the people around me, active on social media, speaking more, writing short pieces. I think of those times as more outward-directed.

And then there are times when I'm reading more, and listening more, and spending more time writing long fiction. Or even just planning, outlining, drafting. In these times, the pull is inward.

I'm in the latter type of phase right now. I've been reading a lot. I've been writing a lot of stuff that is not yet fit for other people's eyes. (Or even decipherable by them, probably.)

It's all good. But I feel as if I've been relatively quiet lately. So this is me just poking a hand above the surface to wave hello.

A first draft is like ...

Tue, 14 May 2013 01:19:28 GMT

A first draft is like jigsaw puzzle pieces spilled onto the ground. There's a lot of material there, but it's hard to believe it will ever fit together, that it will ever make sense.

I think we can conclude that writing isn't easy

Sun, 12 May 2013 01:01:20 GMT

"... I'm always complaining about how hard it is to write or how much I suffer when I'm writing--that almost every song I've ever written has been absolute torture. .... I always think there's nothing there ... this is garbage ... and even if it does come out, I think, 'What the hell is it anyway?'"

Reading these words from an interview of John Lennon (as reported in Jonathan Cott's Days That I'll Remember: Spending Time with John Lennon and Yoko Ono), I had to laugh. Lennon had one of the most successful songwriting careers of all time. It's somehow comforting to know that it didn't come any more easily to him than writing comes to the rest of us. That even with legions of adoring fans screaming when he sang and longing to tear the very clothes from his back--he still struggled with self-doubt, still wrestled with the muse.

Avoiding info dumps

Fri, 10 May 2013 00:35:31 GMT

One thing writers often struggle with is how to convey information without big blocks of exposition (more bluntly known as an info dump). "But how will people know what I'm talking about if I don't explain?" the writer asks. "Readers have to understand the rules of this fantasy world." Or, "I need to explain this character's history."

A good example is how Neal Shusterman introduces the concept of "clappers" in his book Unwind. (Interestingly, Unwind begins with an expository document called "The Bill of Life," but this is barely more than 100 words. And it's clear from how Shusterman handles other details of this future/alternate world that "The Bill of Life" was a deliberate choice--not something he used because he didn't know any other methods for introducing backstory.)

I use the "clappers" example because of its subtlety. Shusterman never gives us an info dump on this topic. "Clappers" is just one of those terms that we figure out from the context. It first appears in this exchange between one of the main characters and his father:

"His father sits in a chair, watching the news as Connor enters.
'Hi, Dad.'
His father points at some random carnage on the news. 'Clappers again.'
'What did they hit this time?'
'They blew up an Old Navy in the North Akron mall.'"

We get a hint of violence, but we still don't really know who clappers are or why they are called "clappers." It's easy to overlook this bit of dialogue anyway because of what else is going on in this scene; Connor has recently learned that his father is sending him away to a grim future (as one does with rebellious teens in this dystopia). The next time we hear of clappers is about 80 pages later:

"The last time there were policemen in the school, someone called in a clapper threat. The school was evacuated ..."

Again, there's no explicit explanation. We're getting that clappers are dangerous because we hear all about the response to them, but we still don't know who they are, or how they operate, or why. We finally learn more not because Shusterman tells us, but because of what he shows us--first in chapter 17, and then later on in the book.

For an even more extreme example of introducing information through context rather than info dumps, check out Anthony Burgess's A Clockwork Orange. The very slang that the narrator uses is invented (though based partly on Russian, so readers familiar with that language do have an edge). Here is a sample from the first page:

"Well, what they sold there was milk plus something else. They had no licence for selling liquor, but there was no law yet against prodding some of the new veshches which they used to put into the old moloko, so you could peet it with vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom or one or two other veshches which would give you a nice quiet horrorshow fifteen minutes admiring Bog and All His Holy Angels and Saints in your left shoe ..."

Because Burgess uses "milk" first, we know "moloko" is milk, and it's easy to figure out that vellocet and synthemesc and drencrom are all drugs put into the milk because they can't legally buy alcohol. We figure out the drug part because it's clear that this is a substitute for liquor, and because it induces visions of angels and saints in your footwear. (And also because "synthemesc" in particular sounds like the names we still give drugs now.) At first, it's slow going, but it's amazing how possible it is to figure everything out from context, and not with a lot of conscious parsing either. I always find myself drawn so naturally into Burgess's world that when I think back on this book, I remember the story clearly but often forget about the language.

It works this way in real life, too. People around us don't stop to explain every little thing, every piece of their history, every allusion they make. We are used to gathering information and piecing it together ourselves. My suggestion to writers would be to skip the exposition and write a draft assuming that readers will pick up the important points and bits of backstory. Then use critiquers to find the places where exposition is absolutely necessary, and insert hints and bits of explanation only to the extent necessary for the reader to figure things out. Readers don't have to know everything about the book's world, just enough to follow the story.

Goofing off

Wed, 08 May 2013 03:37:13 GMT

So, ordinarily today I would've put up a blog post to which I had given a lot of thought, and I would've crossed several things off my to-do list. I always have a to-do list. I have writing goals. I come home from my day job, have some dinner, and start on the list. That is how I get things done.

But tonight I wasn't feeling it. I got caught up in reading something interesting, and just for a change, I let myself do that instead of tackling my chores. Heaven knows the chores will still be there tomorrow.

I goofed off for an evening. And I'm blogging about it not by way of apology or excuse. Rather, I'm hoping to set an example.

Goofing off: because sometimes you just need to.

Facing fear: Storms

Sun, 05 May 2013 23:43:45 GMT

My blog series about fear continues with this post by Nancy Viau:

I’ve never been frightened by the usual suspects: spiders, ghosts, strange places, large crowds, or even public speaking. But give me a booming, crackling, spine-tingling thunderstorm and you’ll see anxiety written on face as if in permanent marker. (As you can imagine, I am not the parent who calls her kids to the window to gaze at the wonder of a storm.)

My fear dates back to my camping days where only a tent protected me from electric bolts streaming from the sky. My dad shuffled the entire family into the station wagon on these nights. The message was clear: Storms. Are. Dangerous! A later run-in with lightning convinced me. It happened when I was a lifeguard. Seconds after I got the swimmers out of the water, a bright bolt hit the high dive and landed within several feet of me. And if that wasn’t enough, when living in Florida, I met a man who was actually struck by lightning, twice! (Are you kidding me? Yikes!)

During a particularly scary storm in 2009, I remembered how I handled this fear as a child. As soon as I saw lightning, I counted the seconds until the thunder. And so on that evening I counted, but I did something else, as well. I listened—really listened—to the storm. It was intense and oh, so loud, but it also had an unmistakable rhythm. And in that rhythm, my story was born.

Thunder claps outside the door.
Boom. Boom. Bang!
Rumble, rap, roar!

To make STORM SONG appealing to children, I focused on the comfort found inside a home. When the electricity goes out, the children play games, eat snacks, and pass the time cuddling with Mom and the family pet. If my book puts children in a happier place when threatening weather moves in, I will have made something good come out of my fear. And the best part? A storm, like all songs, eventually comes to an end. (Thank goodness!)

Storm soon roams across the hill.
Hum…Hum…Um…
Sprinkle, splash…
Still.

Nancy Viau is the author of three nature-inspired books: Look What I Can Do! (about sweet animals from the forest who are not at all scary), Samantha Hansen Has Rocks in her Head (about an out-spoken, rock-loving scientist), and Storm Song (which Nancy will read to herself at the first flicker of the lightning).

Project: Boy Next Door

Fri, 03 May 2013 14:23:55 GMT

L.K. Madigan won the William C. Morris award for her debut YA novel, Flash Burnout. She followed that up with The Mermaid's Mirror. Coached by an imaginary version of Tim Gunn, she continued to write, but cancer cut short her life in 2011. She had a way of mixing humor with darker, heavier material that was wonderful to read.

Her voice lives on in many ways, and it's an honor to give you a sneak peek at her YA novel, Project: Boy Next Door, which will be released next week:

Being the son of a mega-famous mogul isn't all it's cracked up to be, which is why super-smart but socially awkward teen Melvin Pepper wants to try something new: anonymity. To attend a regular high school, get a normal job, meet real people. A break from the pressure and facade that come with crazy wealth and a world-renowned last name.

But Mel quickly realizes that being Mike, his alter ego, isn't as easy as he'd assumed. He gradually makes friends at work and school and becomes involved in the radio club, plus navigates the rocky waters of first crushes and first kisses. However, he discovers someone out there is on to his secret and is threatening to expose it.

And that's not all. One of Mel's new work friends is hiding a dark secret of her own, and Mel feels helpless to make things better for her. He struggles with juggling two very different identities, balancing jealous old friends and nosy new ones. Yup, Mel's in way over his head...and the only chance he has to make everything right is to be true to himself.

The book is currently on Goodreads, and the sales links should be available next week.

Wordless Wednesday

Wed, 01 May 2013 23:40:55 GMT

At the writing desk

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 00:43:08 GMT

In 1957-1958, newly married to the writer Ted Hughes and newly graduated from Cambridge University, Sylvia Plath took a teaching job at Smith College. Hughes taught at another school. Plath's diary from that year is full of despair and frustration that teaching sapped her of time and energy; it's full of her yearning to be a full-time writer. If only she could just focus on her writing! She itched to get back to it. As Plath counted down to the end of the school year, she and Hughes planned to devote the following year to their writing. They had great plans for how productive they were going to be.

School ended in May, but Plath struggled at her writing desk that summer. On July 12, 1958, she recorded this in her journal: "... my life stood weighed & found wanting because it had no ready-made novel plot, because I couldn't simply sit down at the typewriter & by sheer genius & will power begin a novel dense & fascinating today & finish next month. Where, how, with what & for what to begin? No incident in my life seemed ready to stand up for even a 20 page story. I sat paralyzed ... I couldn't happily be anything but a writer & I couldn't be a writer: I couldn't even set down one sentence: I was paralyzed with fear, with deadly hysteria."

Plath roused herself by going into the next room to have a talk with her writer husband, who, one suspects, may have known whereof she spoke. She concluded the day by acknowledging how unrealistically high her expectations of herself were. She vowed to keep going, plugging away regularly, and to stop expecting she could write an instant novel.

What struck me about this entry is how familiar it all is. It's clear that Plath felt horribly alone at that moment. But not only do I recognize the thoughts and feelings she's describing, but thanks to the writer blogs of today, as well as the works of May Sarton and Anne Lamott and countless others, I realize how veeerrry common they are. Strangely normal. It's sort of comforting to see that the writers who came before us struggled in the same ways we do. It's always been hard work; writers have always doubted themselves.

And at that point in her life, even though Plath felt rather blocked, and washed up, and distant from her earlier publishing successes ... her best work was still ahead of her.

On another topic: Before signing off today, I want to encourage people to contribute however they can to this amazing book fair. Even if it's just one book. This school library has a book-to-student ratio of 5:1, well below the ALA recommendation of 11:1, and well below the ratio I have in my own house. I've contributed to this book fair every year, because I can't stand the thought of kids who want to read not having enough books. I hope you will be inspired to do the same. It does take a few minutes to click through the book list and fill out the ordering info, but it's so much fun to shop for book lovers!

(Plath quotes in this entry from The Journals of Sylvia Plath, 1950-1962, ed. by Karen V. Kukil)

Committing to a dream

Sun, 28 Apr 2013 20:59:28 GMT

The theme at YA Outside the Lines this month was change, growth, and turning points. My post is about committing to a dream, putting it first, turning "maybe someday" into "now." A sample: "Becoming a novelist was a step that I wanted to take, but in many ways was scared to take. I kept putting other things on the front burner: Education for my day job. Volunteer work. Travel. Romance and marriage. But in 2003, I looked at my life and decided it was time to give writing a turn on the front burner...."

Spring and building memories

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 22:55:44 GMT

First I offer you a quote that perfectly captures the experience of spring around here now:
"... first tulip cracked its green bud sheath & opened red silk and purple-black stamens to sun--"
(from The Journals of Sylvia Plath, 1950-1962, ed. by Karen V. Kukil)

And now I encourage you to check out Laurel Garver guest posting at The Alliterative Allomorph about ways to mark and remember the events of your life, a sort of memoir-as-you-go. As Laurel says, "Our life experiences provide some of the most potent material—material that will fade like smoke from a snuffed candle if you wait too long to write it."

In between

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 01:40:27 GMT

Sometimes writing is about producing drafts and semi-drafts and revising and abandoning and starting over and producing more. To an outward observer, the lack of finished work may suggest a lull, or even an abandonment of writing. But inside a smooth-walled hive, bees are swarming and storing up honey.

Facing fear: Inside a Nicaraguan bullring

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 01:07:36 GMT

My latest guest in my blog series on the topic of fear has provided a fear-themed excerpt from his newest book, a travel memoir. In this scene, he enters a bullring in Nicaragua. As one does. (And by "one," I mean, "apparently my guest author, but definitely not me.")

Bullfighting in Nicaragua, from One Year Lived
by Adam Shepherd

“Screw it,” I said. “Give me the sombra.”

I reached for the red cloth—nay snatched for the red cloth. I wanted in. These brave guys, juvenile to grizzly, bolting into the ring, teasing and taunting this wild bull, a balancing act between valor and a gutted belly. I had scouted enough. I snatched my improvised red sombra. I peered up into the crowd of spectators: a gang of teenagers, some whipping their shirts in circles above their heads, a family—mom, dad, daughter—a group of ladies dressed in pink and yellow sundresses, another gang of teenagers. Seven hundred people, at least—eight hundred, more likely. I lowered myself from the support of the bleachers. I sucked in a deep breath. I strode out into the sphere of fervor. And I stood, legs braced and every muscle ready for action. Six feet away, this great hulking beast stood in a similar stance, head low, horns tilted toward my chest. He scraped the earth with one hoof, hugging and snorting like something out of a nightmare.

I can’t properly explain the feeling. I was a trembling wreck. This was scary. To say that I’ve never been struck with so much fear in my life grossly understates the terror of the moment. A thousand things could go wrong, and in that first moment, as I stood six feet from the fuming nostrils of that bull, I was convinced that each one of them would. “Another story to tell,” I reasoned, as if “Yeah, y’know, I can’t process solid foods anymore because I was gutted by a bull in Nicaragua” is a story worth its price. I imagined myself as the next casualty tossed under the bleachers. My heart raced, blood pumped furiously through each vein and vessel in my body. My breathing came ragged and short, but I was somehow able to steady my feet and hands.

A man in a white tank top in the first row to the right shot both of his arms in the air in violent thrusts, screaming.

And then my mind cleared; I focused. I was in the ring with the bull. And that’s all that mattered. Laser focus.

My nerves still tense, muscles coiling painfully in my calves and thighs, readying me for what lay ahead. I steadied myself.

“Closer!” Jhonas yelled, and the gallery standing around him echoed his advice. “Más cerca! Más cerca!”

Closer? I thought. Closer? You sure? Really? Hm. Closer.

But they were right; and I edged closer. The bull’s rolling black eyes met mine, and he let out a deep guttural snort. I thought my heart might shatter my sternum. At last, he charged. His powerful hindquarters propelled him toward me—fifteen hundred pounds of deadly muscle. Every nerve in my body thrummed, quivered.

Silly bull, I thought. Bring it on, compadre. You don’t want none of this.

But he did.

Adam Shepard's newest book, One Year Lived, recounts the year he spent out in the world: seventeen countries, four continents, and one haunting encounter with a savage bull. More information (and a picture of the mullet that Adam grew on the trip) are available at www.OneYearLived.com.

Moments from the writing life

Fri, 19 Apr 2013 00:30:02 GMT

"Let me keep my eye off publication & simply write stories that have to be written."--The Journals of Sylvia Plath, 1950-1962, ed. by Karen V. Kukil

"So when I started planning my own book launch, I knew cheese would be a part of it. ...'People are coming to see you,' said my friend Mary. 'No one will care if you run out of cheese.' But ... I was afraid people would care so I bought a lot of cheese. Too much cheese. ..."--Madelyn Rosenberg
Read the whole entry, including what happened to the cheese, here. A delightful mix of the launch-party anxiety we writers know so well, and a beautiful moment. With cheese.

Guest post: Laurel Garver on writing through fear

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 00:44:41 GMT

Every year, I select a topic for a regular series of guest posts. This year's topic is fear, and Laurel Garver is my latest guest writer to tackle the topic. Her post reminds me that art is one way we often find power in situations that might otherwise overwhelm us.

Writing through Fear
by Laurel Garver

Conventional wisdom says fear is something we must combat as writers. It steals our joy, robs us of creativity, yada, yada, yada. Don’t get me wrong, I’m as neurotic as the next person banging away at a keyboard, with hefty baggage aplenty that Dr. Freud would love to unpack.

However, I happen to think that combating fear is counterproductive.

Why? Fear is one of the deepest, most primal urges we have as humans. It is a core motivator, the inverse of most desires, and therefore, key for understanding and creating the stakes of any story.

Fear is something we shouldn’t try to send packing, but rather stalk, study, and seek to deeply understand. If you spend your days chasing it away, you might find yourself at a loss for anything important to say.

Instead, consider the things you fear as grist for the mill, fodder for your hungry imagination. Ask yourself, why does this scare me? what history does it return me to? what possible futures do I believe it will lead to? The best antagonists you will write are born the moment you look under your bed and stare your own personal boogeyman right in the face.

Fear is also a potent source of material for poems. Poetry seeks to distill experience into brief, intense verbal happenings, and nothing is more immediately intense than fear. My strongest work has captured moments when fear is first glimpsed, recognized, understood, or courageously faced, be the feared thing vindictive chickens, air travel, a parent’s mental illness, powerlessness over cycles of poverty, or my own frailties.

Know your fears. Write them. You will always have a story to tell.

Laurel Garver (@LaurelGarver on Twitter) is the author of the novel NEVER GONE, and MUDDY-FINGERED MIDNIGHTS, a new poetry collection about creative life, our capacity to wound and heal, and the unlikely places we find love, beauty, and grace. Learn more about her books at http://laurelgarver.blogspot.com/2012/06/publications.html.

Refuge

Tue, 16 Apr 2013 00:27:43 GMT

This National Library Week, Jo Knowles waxed eloquent about the places that have always been my refuge:

"... Libraries aren't just about book lending. They are the heart of most communities. They are the one place in any community that you can go all year, rain or shine, rich or penniless. ..."

and Guys Lit Wire is asking for help in building up one library.

We can't always do everything, but often we can do one thing.

Without romance

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 18:03:33 GMT

We've all seen books and movies where a romance seemed thin or stale. Where romance seemed to be grafted onto a story or jammed in where it didn't belong. You can almost picture the planners sitting around a table, writing out a formula. "We need a Love Interest to plug in here." *Shudder.*

I love romantic story lines, but not every single time. The end of the TV series 30 Rock (and its ongoing life in syndication) reminded me how much I appreciate this aspect of the show: the male and female leads had no romance. They had a long and intense relationship, full of conflict and mutual support, but they had no sexual chemistry and never forced that. In fact, some of my favorite moments were when the characters joked about their lack of that very heat.

Because Jack and Liz were not (usually) opponents but allies in their working world, the show also could not rely on a typical nemesis relationship to create tension. Usually, the characters dealt with separate problems, but their problems impinged on one another. They gave each other bad advice, good advice, "tough" friendship. They interfered too much with each other; they stepped back; they interfered again.

It's a good example of how male and female characters can have a non-familial, non-romantic bond.

The cycle of (book) life

Thu, 11 Apr 2013 23:57:50 GMT

This edition of my first book won't be available much longer:

I remember the first time I saw the cover design. I clicked on the file to open it, and then covered my eyes and peeked through my fingers while the image slowly appeared on my screen. I was so scared that I would hate it! Instead, I sat there gazing at it, enraptured. Before I saw it, I had no preconceived notions of what the cover should look like, but designer Sam Kim picked the perfect way to represent this story of secrecy, loss, and obsession.

In this marketplace, however, books tend not to last forever, especially hardcovers. Very soon, this one will vanish. (I suppose I can then call it a collector's item?) It's had a nice three-year life on the shelves, and it will live on in paperback and e-book form, so I can't complain. I just thought I'd let people know that if you've ever had a fancy for this edition, it's now or never.

Such is the cycle of (book) life that as one hardcover passes out of print, another is getting ready to make its appearance. This one won't be out until fall, so I'm not talking much about it yet, but here's a sneak peek:

Coming September 2013.

Nourishment

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 01:05:11 GMT

Two nourishing places that I've been online recently:

To celebrate National Poetry Month, Susan Taylor Brown has been posting "poems modeled on other poems. This is a great exercise in the classroom, especially for students (or adults) who are intimidated by the idea of writing poetry. What you do is pick a model, or mentor poem, and then write your own version of the poem." I love the directions she has taken with this. For example, if you remember the William Carlos Williams poem about the plums in the icebox, try Susan's take, which manages to suggest a novel's worth of story in just 28 words.

And this post by Jim Hines on "Living the Dream" reminds me that I, too, am living my dream, and I have much to be thankful for. Yes, I could wish for more. I could wish that I were a household-name writer like JK Rowling. But honestly? There's a line in my first book where one character says, "If you're lucky, you should know you're lucky." Writing books is a strange roller-coaster of an avocation. It's not for the squeamish or the impatient. But it's still pretty awesome, and I know I'm lucky. As Jim Hines says, that doesn't mean that it isn't work. Writing success doesn't fall from the sky into one's upturned palm. It's work, but (often) happy work.

Some things get better with age

Sat, 06 Apr 2013 18:37:15 GMT

Last night I attended the 50th anniversary party for my alma mater’s literary magazine. I edited the magazine for two of those fifty years, and I was thrilled to see that the magazine has not only survived, but thrived, in the years since my graduation.

It certainly was a shoestring operation back in the day. I inherited my position from the graduating editor, who passed the materials along to me in the hopes that the magazine just wouldn’t die. We were a college full of science majors, so creative writing wasn’t a priority, and we had no spiffy desktop publishing or digital layouts to help us. The magazine’s faculty advisor had gone on sabbatical and then retired; my first task was to find a new advisor. (I discovered last night that he kept that role long afterward, guiding many more issues to life in the following years.) The size of the magazine was based on how many pages I could afford, given the budget that student government allotted me. I laid out the pages by hand against blue-lined backgrounds, and a printer who was most likely using lead type produced the magazine. The artwork was all hand-drawn, in black and white.

My second year in the editor’s chair, I had an actual staff to help, and I trained two people to succeed me as co-editors. Today, when I look at the issues we produced, I can say: Not bad for the time. (Also, the influence of Pink Floyd’s The Wall on my generation is obvious.) (And of my own writing, all I want to say is: I’m a much better writer now.) But those issues pale in comparison to the thick, professional, color-illustrated, golden-anniversary issue I was handed last night. The current faculty advisor has obviously done a lot to nurture the magazine and the creative-writing program in general. (There is now a creative writing minor at my school! How I wish I’d had that opportunity.) The staff includes an art editor, a fiction editor, a poetry editor, a nonfiction editor, and so on. (My first year on the job, our staff consisted of ... me.) The poems the students read aloud were much better than anything I was writing myself at that age.

I loved talking with the students about what has changed at the school (the campus has grown significantly, and everything is somewhere else now: the gym, the dining hall, the English department; most of the fraternities that were a big part of campus life then have folded or changed). But most of all, I was glad that they’ve been able to build the magazine into something so beautiful. That my directive to “just keep it alive” has grown into something more ambitious. That my science-oriented school is embracing, more than ever, the need for creative arts.

Words waiting in the wings

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 00:29:09 GMT

Sometimes the words aren't ready to come out yet. They're up there in my brain: baking, or fermenting, or whatever they have to do to get themselves ready for their first public appearance.

I don't blame them for taking their time. Because when they do come out, they're going to be rearranged, modified, and maybe even deleted.

Minor breakthroughs and temporary elations

Wed, 03 Apr 2013 00:05:45 GMT

"... there are minor breakthroughs and temporary elations in the studio to offset the doubts and incipient despair. I do feel as if I were hovering around something that is about to reveal itself."
--May Sarton, quoting her friend Bill, in The House by the Sea

American Graffiti through a YA lens

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 00:24:10 GMT

I recently watched the movie American Graffiti again. What struck me this time was how much this 1973 film really is a YA story, even though it's more commonly considered a nostalgia piece about 1962 (the year of its setting). It's true that the music and the cars are an integral part of the film, and that some details of the story could not easily be transported to any other time. (What current generations, raised by helicopter parents, will notice especially is how all the teens in the film are free to drive around until sunrise, with no hint of curfew or parental involvement.)

But, boiled down, it's a coming-of-age story. The bare bones of the plot could be told in many settings, with many different characters. Two boys are supposed to leave in the morning, for college on the other side of the country. The one who's been eager to leave is suddenly unsure; the one who would just as soon stay has already committed to going, breaking home ties to the point of lending out his beloved car and suggesting to his steady girlfriend that they be free to see other people. In the morning, one boy leaves and the other stays, both of their decisions affected by the events of the night, and both of their decisions setting the course for their separate futures. At the same time, their nerdy younger friend tries his hand at impressing a girl he's just met; this character, who seems at first like just a lovable goofball, has a grim future at war. The fourth main character, whose life has revolved around cars, is beginning to realize that what makes you a king in your late teens won't necessarily set you up for life. On the night in question, he is still popular, still the best racer, still the envy of his peers, but he can see the cliff's edge looming.

I suspect that what made this movie such a success was not just fond recollections of drive-ins, drag races, Wolfman Jack, and sock hops. There's a larger appeal in a story about such nights: The last night your friends were all together. The moment when you realized high school was really over. The day you decided whether to stay or go.

Facing fear: Finding the Sweet Spot, or, Writing Without Fear

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 23:52:20 GMT

Today's guest post by Eve Marie Mont continues our "facing fear" series:

For most fiction writers, creating stories is a passion, something they would do whether or not they had any hope of being published. In fact, when I reflect on my writing life so far, it’s those years before I was published—when I was daydreaming about characters, building story arcs, experimenting with language—that were the most rewarding for me. I think it’s because that time truly belonged to me. It was my choice whether to spend an hour of the day writing or seven. My choice to try my hand at contemporary or magical realism, women’s fiction or young adult. I felt like I was in a giant sandbox of imagination playing with dozens of toys. And best of all, no one was watching.

Now that I’m published and contracted for a sequel, those toys have become tools, and that sandbox has become a workshop, one with glass windows through which any number of people can peer in and pass judgment. And my time no longer belongs to me. Now I’m in the business of creating a product, and people are waiting on the sidelines to judge what I’ve created. Somewhere along the line, I stopped playing because of those eyes on me, because of the voices seeping through the windows telling me that what I was making looked wonky and strange, that it was neither functional nor beautiful.

And then those voices became so loud that I stopped listening to the most important voice of all—my own—the one that was trying to tell its next story.

So how do I find my voice again when all those other voices are shouting at me? How do I find the joy in writing when it feels like a job? How do I get myself back into the sandbox?

A writer friend of mine recently told me that when she's playing tennis, occasionally the ball hits her racket so soundly she can feel the impact of it in her bones. The satisfying feeling travels all through her body, telling her she's made perfect contact, that she's hit the “sweet spot.”

When I told her how I'd been feeling lately, she reminded me that when you’re writing freely and tapping into that reservoir of imagination and possibility, you can find that “sweet spot” in writing too, that place where you know instinctively that you've hit on a truth, made a connection, done something well. If you can somehow immerse yourself in the game and play like no one's watching, the words will come pouring forth and it will feel like magic.

So for anyone out there struggling like me to rediscover the joy of writing, try to find that childlike place where fear and judgment don't exist. Play in the sand for a while, and look for your story there. And once you find it, write like no one's watching. If the words come from that "sweet spot," they're bound to connect with someone.

Eve Marie Mont writes books for young adults and teaches high school English and creative writing in the Philadelphia suburbs. In her newest book, A Touch of Scarlet, the heroine of A Breath of Eyre returns to find truth and fiction merging through the pages of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic, The Scarlet Letter.