Write Early, Write Often…Write Something!

Teresa Fannin, reader, writer, gardener, chocolate fan & tea drinker

Author: teresafannin (Page 12 of 56)

Distracted

09/13/2017 /

There is much out there to be concerned about. The recent track of Irma as the hurricane invaded Turks and Caicos, Puerto Rico, glanced past Cuba and made for the Florida Keys. At one point in time the trajectory was right up the middle of Florida with it’s sphere of rain, wind and havoc projected to cover the entire peninsula. Wow! We had all just witnessed Harvey who blew into Houston and decided to stay a while and dump on a low land that just happens to be important to our energy industry. Sigh!  And you have to say to yourself, wait! What? no one is talking about Jose who is sitting out there in the Atlantic. What about Jose?

Weather! No, it’s not the weather. I grew up in California. You knew you were in an earthquake when it hit. Up in Boston you knew you were in a major ice storm or blizzard–again–when it hit. Now you get 24/7 on the news channels. [Whose idea was it to give weather it’s own channel? So that we can constantly be alerted to all the natural disasters Mother Nature can dish out? Seriously?]  Like we can do anything about it. Well, yes, I concede. We can do something, we can be prepared. There would have been tremendous loss of life in Florida if there were no warnings and people just stayed.

I recently read Jacqueline Kelly’s The Curious World of Calpurnia Tate. Yes, the voice was extraordinary, the story a powerful one of accepting society as it is and yet being brave enough to know that there are changes needed. Calpurnia stays focused on the fact that she has a brain and wants to use it. And as her grandfather accepts her into his study, she finds support for her goals. Nicely Done.

Interestingly, the story also talks obliquely about the Galveston Flood of 1900. A cousin comes to stay because her Galveston house is destroyed. A veterinarian comes to town with a story of surviving the flood. And through it all you realize that all their information is weeks if not months old. And while people are shocked and horrified at what occurred, that buffer of time also lessens the personal anxiety and fears.

No buffer today. Journalists and reporters are out there, battered by the winds, lol, warning others to be careful. The weather is right in our homes, it’s on our social media as people check-in to say they are safe. It is fascinating and horrifying at the same time. And also, in retrospect, amusing, the loss of power does not seem to impact the WiFi and the posting continues.

It’s like there is this invisible tether attaching you to the TV. It is a massive distraction. It is mesmerizing. It is addicting. How can you not watch? And yet, there are still very importing things going on in your own life. But still. The anxiety of the reporting~’it’s coming this way, no, it’s going here, landfall will be at…the winds are…’.  You feel almost trapped by the ongoing coverage and what, dear god, if you miss something?

You feel like you’ve run a marathon when it is over. Time to regroup. Time to settle your mind. Get back to the tasks that are important. Time to focus.

Thank goodness I have a massive rewrite to concern me. After my critique sessions at the recent SCBWI Carolinas conference I was adrift, not really wanting to spend time. Upset at breaking my own rules about critiques, questioning now when I should have questioned then.

But life is a series of ‘do-overs’. So here I am. Getting my anxiety out and on ‘paper’. Moving on.

Write On!

 

Butt in Chair

09/05/2017 /

BIC. Butt in Chair. Time to return to writing. This year with a shortened conference timeline~posting registration in May and selling out in July~ It seemed like I lost a couple of months of thinking, mulling, musing and writing time. I did. Back now!

I don’t get to many of the sessions at the conference, not because I can’t, but because I want to make sure that I focus on the conference and all that it entails. Sigh. I value multitasking, but that was in business where the thought was not deep, the stakes were not as high and the opportunity to use subordinates existed 🙂

I make up by reading the books recommended by the speakers [I use NC Digital Library when I can] and I stack them up against my own story-not the writing- but the story. What is the voice?  What about the pacing of this novel. Can I chart the synopsis, the major crisis, show where the denouement comes in? I look at presenters website and follow their process. It is a personal journey that I recognize for some is shorter than for others. Who is their editor? Who is their agent? What are my possibilities?

So I am always attuned to how writers write.  The Techniques of a Bestselling Writer, Five-Second Rule to Transform Your Life, The Writer’s Journey. Oh, there are many! They are great reads. Thank you. But no.

I remember at a NESCBWI conference in the last century Barbara Seuling said she never delivered a book to her editor where the editor kept the first two chapters, they were always cut! This gives me hope, but not. It is a different time since Barbara first penned her first manuscript and submitted.  Today we talk about The Most Valuable Real Estate in Your Novel~The First Page & THE HOOK!  Admittedly, our conference first pages session shows that editors and agents, tho they are not on the panel, also look for that indescribable ‘I’ll know it when I see it’ line or paragraph. How many of those books they accept? Who knows? But yikes, no pressure!

Anyone who knows me, like my own critique group, knows I start a book with the end scene. I know where I want the character to end up~ solving a mystery, finding family, accepting but still unhappy with the solution they themselves wrought, successful, improved, better than they were at the beginning.  In that moment I know the character at that place in time. What they want, why, and how. I’m not always sure how to describe it [and mayhaps I have blown many a query in not being able to articulate it.]  Then my only problem is to go back to the beginning and start the story.

And there you have it. START THE STORY. Full confession: while I did learn to diagram sentences [actually loved that] the outlining of an essay, chapter, story has never been in my skill set. I sort of consider it the same as not being able to get out of San Francisco heading south~ needing to go north to Marin county, turn around, head across the Golden Gate and then get on the right highway. Maybe now with GPS it would be different, but…. Sigh. It is just the way it is, I have accepted this. But always felt a bit backward and incomplete.

I also belong to Sisters in Crime. the quarterly InSinC magazine appeared in my mailbox on Saturday and as I leafed through I came across an article by Jill Kelly, author of six novels and a member. Defending the Rights of Pantsers. I laughed at the title. Truly! Yes.

Like most of us, being a pantser was not her choice. But she wrote. Every day. At least 300 words. [do emails count?  Probably not.] After writing four novels she happened on a book Story Engineering by Larry Brooks.  Yes, I may buy it, but not really sure why. As Jill says in the article about the main character in House of Cards: ”he is the god of his little world….he is the CEO and everyone does his bidding. I think this is how story engineers do it.”

And then she says, “my relationship with my characters is very different. We’re friends, collaborators…sharing a mutual experience, they are writing this book with me.”  She names pantsing a ‘call and response tradition’ like jazz musicians improvising off one another. I so get that. I get emotional over my character’s problems and solutions. I feel, deeply, the points in the story where she is faced with choice. I worry with her over how this will end. While I cheer for her success, I can see how she could fail! I cry. I get angry. I am amazed when a character shows up to help or hinder. Where were they before? Should I know that? Why do I see them so clearly today but not even know they existed yesterday?

Ms. Kelly’s tips include: Write everyday. Write the first thing in the morning. Gather possibilities. Draft fast, rewrite slow. Be proud of how you work. Nice!

Maybe because of the thirty years spent in corporate America, being paid on the basis of goals met, her tips feel like a set of performance appraisal goals that are attainable, worthwhile and straightforward. There are four months left in the year! These are not strident, difficult or unmanageable goals.

So. Butt in Chair.  Yes, Pantser! Officially, proudly,  joining the club!

 

One Week Later

09/03/2017 /

At this time last week I was looking at the conference schedule and anticipating the heartfelt and honest keynote of Lisa Williams Kline, the final presentation of the 25th anniversary. It is always both a joy and a sadness to come to the end. We start the weekend on Thursday with pick ups of the intensive faculty, dinner and the short sweet time to savor all the work that has gone into making this weekend happen. Not forgotten, but put aside, are the mistakes in scheduling, the long hours, the continual communication, the problems with registration…the meal is cooked, it is time to sit and eat.

With a sold out crowd and many on the wait list, there is a certain amount of satisfaction in opening the conference officially Saturday morning and this year, with the extraordinary voice of Gary Schmidt leading the charge for us to remember always the children, to cherish, to tell the truth, that there is not one truth but many because there is not one child in one situation but many children in different situations and we as writers and illustrators are there to serve their stories.

When we ask our presenters, especially the editors, agents, art directors, we ask for a craft presentation. How do you describe voice? What is pacing and how does it add suspense? What is the structure of a story? Our PAL authors have proposed and based on what we have in space, and track we choose. It is difficult and yet not.

I get that we disappoint some. There’s not enough for illustrators. There should be more on chapter books. Why do you do mainly categories and not genres? Like anyone else developing and delivering a conference for individuals in the children’s lit field, we are limited by what is presented to us and what time we have to schedule. Sometimes I think, if we could eliminate first pages and first impressions, then….but I think there would be a boycott of the conference.

It is definitely not~bye, farewell, all done! Now it is one week later. The conference paraphernalia is accounted for and put on the shelves. The finances are tallied and the long report required by the main office is almost complete. An event report is required on the regional team list and that is done. Certificates of those who won contests, but did not attend, have been mailed out, as well as checks for contracts met.  A email blast on the conference wrap up has been completed and sent and, yes, there are still questions and emails have, too, been answered. My house is cleaned after being neglected for some days and the laundry is done!  Still to come is the tallying of the evaluations and sending to the faculty.

While a part in the back of my brain rails against the time spent in followup, I do remind myself that this is a time to reflect on what we can do better. To look at all the successes that have come from these conferences this team has delivered for this region- nine now for me.

This was the 25th conference for SCBWI Carolinas, the first conference in 1972 run by Fran Davis and we value the traditions set by Fran and Earl when he joined her in jointly running SCBWI Carolinas.  And, we are not done. We have three webinars upcoming and 2018 to initiate.

Not a bad 25th celebratory year!

The Fourth

07/04/2017 /

Today we celebrate our independence. Our country’s birthday. But it wasn’t. The declaration wasn’t even signed this day, I believe the truth is, it was read this day. It’s not like there was this nine month growing from seed to country and then Happy Birthday, you are a country.

This was a process, long, contentious, war-wearying, irrational while yet being the most brilliant, most rational, most elegant solution to government that anyone had ever seen and will likely see again. There is no country on this planet that has been granted the freedoms and the opportunities that are available here. A wonder of wonders for two hundred forty one years.

Today we are divided not just politically but culturally and emotionally because of that WeThe People document and the constitution which did not come into existence until later. My American history is a bit rusty. Not my favorite historical period, truth be told, I have always found it burdened with too many overtones of emotional response, this is my country. It is hard to separate my pride and glee that I was lucky enough to be born here, grow up here, work here, live here.  And, whenever I travel, now or in the past, I am always stuck by the fact that this is where I want to be. Living abroad was an interesting idea, but not one I would take seriously. That is just me.

In the seventies, during the Vietnam war, it was ‘love it or leave it,’ an extreme sentiment to be sure, and not one I agreed with. Because of, maybe in spite of this sentiment, it feels like we have spent the past forty years trying to be more like everyone else, Europe, especially. In my research in the colonial period of Africa, I find that Eurocentrism so strange. It is a view that Europeans are right, they are perfect and the rest of us, from the Americas to the East and the Mideast  to the Africans, are all just slightly less; undereducated, under civilized, and undergoverned. The change in political parties running the US government can be seen as a repudiation;  that many are not willing to abdicate their inalienable rights to a political elite in Washington. That we want to be less governed. We are not undereducated, but perhaps not well taught. Not undercivilized, but civilized differently.

I find it to be unconscionable that some may want to deny what are my inalienable rights for a supposed, in their discretion, a greater good. My rights are not subject to anyone else’s suppositions!  I am not a revolutionary, never could be. Well, that is wrong, I could be persuaded, not sure what I could do at this point, but….

Today, in honor  of all those who fought with word and deed, and those who fought  with gun and sword, who believed all those long years ago, that humans were and are able to think for themselves and to govern themselves with enlightenment, facility and courage, we owe ourselves and our children better than what we  have now.

This is about me, and you, my family, and yours. This is about a country that was founded on the basic truth of acceptance. Acceptance that this is a just and viable form for govenering a free people.

More than happy birthday, thank you.

Magic

06/30/2017 /

I’ve been to the Magic Castle. Nope, have no clue how they do it. I don’t watch ‘behind the scenes’ shows. I don’t want to read blogs on the main characters. Or how the actors live. I grew up in Los Angeles. Went to school with children and grandchildren of ‘those Hollywood’ folk. There was no paparazzi. There was no stalking. They were just ordinary people with a job in the movies.

Hmmm…do I believe in Magic? Sort of. Yes, that wand would be cool. Yes, that spell book would come in handy. Who wouldn’t want all of that? Just a wave here, a snap of a fingers, a few words there and, bob’s your uncle, BAM! Done.

Some say magic is to some, what science is to others. Would I use magic? Probably no. It feels like it we don’t have it because it is too easy. But I do know magic.  I’ve been a reader since forever. I’ve been to places that no plane, train or ship could go. I’ve seen worlds that are too horrible to contemplate, or are too much fun to miss, or are just downright lovely to spend time in. Reading is magic! That is what I am looking to create.

I think of those ‘behind the scenes’ shows and wonder if anyone would be as excited to see a writer shaping a story? Creating a world?  You create a character. You give him/her life, foibles, obstacles. You provide family, homes, towns. You record their thoughts, ambitions, musings. So, yes, I do believe in magic, but not the kind with a wand or a spell book.

Because writing is hard. In nonfiction it is research, read, write, revise. Research, read, write, revise. Sigh.

I’m at that middle of a narrative nonfiction that is a slough. The writing is hard because the subject is hard. While it has been discussed in very academic circles, in MG/YA, not so much. I’ve got to get in some information. Yes, it’s important. Can it be boring? Can it difficult to translate for high school kid? Yes.

I’m sort of at that place where I know what comes after, I know how the narrative continues, but this one place! THIS. ONE. PLACE. Sigh!

Yes, it would be a miracle. And I’m letting it block me. And so, I think I will put in my draft ‘something happens here’ and move on.

Is that a good choice? I have no idea. My goal is to finish this narrative by the end of summer. So I have a couple of months. But time does fly. As if by Magic!

 

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