…wherein I ponder the correlation between my writer friends who seem so discouraged this week, and the wild rumpus in Louisiana over the miracle that is the Saints headed to the Super Bowl.

Please notice that I put “Who Dat?” in quotes because I would not want some large sports entity to claim that I am claiming I invented that phrase. I didn’t–and I’ll just let the Louisiana governor, attorney general and other elected officials make a legal fricasse out of whoever tries to wrestle it out of the cold, dead mouths of Saints fans.

Anyway.

I have noticed a disturbing theme the past couple of weeks in emails and writer blogs that I regularly read. People are feeling low. Discouraged. Not sure where their plot is going. Not sure there is a plot to go anywhere. Sick of their heroines, tired of their heros. Sick and tired of this whole novel writing thing.

Since my sister has been sending me daily updates of the various parades, parties and fais-do-does from la Louisiane, it struck me that a little writerly pep rally might be in order.

Writing is like being a Saints fan. (Work with me here, s’il vous plait.) I can’t claim to be much of a football fan, or one of the johnette-come-latelies jumping on the winning bandwagon. But I did grow up in Louisiana, and I did graduate from LSU, so I hold those up as my qualifications to make this analogy.

Way back in 1967, the Saints started out in a blaze of glory. On the very first play of the very first game, a Saints player ran back the kickoff 94-yards for a touchdown. Yay!  After that shining unforgettable moment, however, it was years–no, decades–of losses. Losing season after losing season. Nicknamed the “Aints.”  Fans wore paper bags over their heads to show their disgust. The team’s record was so dismal at one point, a local sportcaster swore he’d walk down Bourbon Street in a dress if the Saints ever made it to the Super Bowl.

How is this like writing? How often do you start a new writing project, and it seems like it’s going to be a snap! The voice is right, the set-up is great, the first scene flows from your fingers like rum from Captain Jack Sparrow’s bottle. But then the momentum ends,  or the adrenaline rush is over, and you’re slogging through the great wasteland of Act II. Or, worse, you’re not even slogging so much as writing about how hard it is to write. And the next thing you know, you feel like a Saints player, like this book is never going to come together, you’re never going to get it finished, you’re never going to go on to the next project. The payoff for your hard work seems impossible–and it’s just not fun anymore.

This is what I kept hearing all last week. Why, I don’t know. Winter? The start of tax season? Post-holiday blues? I don’t know, and it doesn’t really matter. What matters is to get the momentum going, the adrenaline pumping, the (choose football metaphor of your choice and insert here, because I’ve run out) and get back to work on writing.

For practical advice, here are a few ideas that work for me. I would love to hear what works for others.

– Change location: If you write at home, go out to a coffee shop, the library, your dining room table. Someplace where the scenery is new. Or someplace where there is no scenery, if that’s a distraction, and no Internet.

-Exercise: A walk, an exercise DVD, a couple dozen jumping jacks or sit-ups will get some endorphins going. I heart endorphins.

– Hands-on help: Try some (or all) of the techiniques in many, many how-to books on writing. A few I’ve found helpful are Writing and Selling Your Mystery Novel by Hallie Ephron; Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook by Donald Maass; Don’t Murder Your Mystery by Chris Roerden; Book in a Month by Victoria Schmidt. A background exercise might help you discover something new and interesting–and inspiring–about a character.

-Attend a literary function–a reading, signing, workshop. Be around like-minded people. Picture your book on the shelf. Picture yourself in the signing chair.

-Whine to friends and eat a lot of chocolate. If you do this one, you might need to follow up with suggestion #2.

-Go to a parade. I hear that, on Tuesday, a bunch of men in dresses will be marching down Bourbon Street.

The point is, not to give up. Not to stop writing. Because, really, in your heart of hearts, that’s not what you want. Right?

Anyone else have tips for the discouraged among us?

Bon chance.

Ramona

PS – Since I didn’t include any visuals above, let me include one here, the flag of Acadiana. See the pretty fleur de lis’ on it?

...wherein I manhandle a character, and then question myself as an author and my choices in abusing people, even fictional ones.

My WIP’s main character, “M,” had a moment this week. A bad moment.

M went to see this guy she should not have gone to see, as amateur sleuths are wont to do. M has lost people she loves in what everyone, especially her know-it-all brother the sheriff, insists were simple accidents. She’s convinced of the opposite, but no one believes her. And it doesn’t help that some people say that she’s cursed. No. Not helpful at all, that one.

So, she goes to see This Guy, the husband of a friend and someone she should avoid for about a thousand good reasons. But she’s sure he knows things about the accidents, so she questions him. And things get a little hot. So hot that she very nearly slaps him. By very nearly, I mean she raises her hand to the proper pre-slap position, but stops herself. Hitting This Guy will bring her down to his level, and she may be cursed, but she’s not a lowlife. So, she lowers her hand and walks away.

I was proud of her. So proud, in fact, that it took me a moment to see that keeping her on the high ground completely flat-lined the action of the story.

You know that dramatic arc illustrated in workshops, where the line climbs higher as story tension mounts? My arc was shooting upwards and then it plummeted, because M is too damn nice for her own good, and for the good of the book.

I had to reverse the plummet, had to get M off her high horse and back into the fray, to do… what?

She couldn’t hit him. That was already decided. But, what if I made him hit her?  That would fit his character. And it would reverse the plummet.

So, I tried it. She stopped herself from slapping him, but instead of letting her walk away, he hit her.

No, wait. Not hit her, as in punch her. He wouldn’t go that far. He grabbed her arm. Hard. She pulled away. No, wait. She tried to pull away, so he gripped harder. He yanked her closer. Then he told her off. No. No, he did more than that. He threatened her. Her and her loved ones. Then she pulled out of his grasp. Or…instead, she tried to pull away, but he dug his nails into her arm, so she had to twist out of his grasp, and his fingernails scraped her arm. Better yet, his nails gouged in her arm, leaving a trail of bloody marks.

Whoa. Now we’re cooking. This lights a bunch of new fires. This Guy seems capable of violence, which is news to all. The grab will leave a mark. If her brother the sheriff sees this, he’ll go ballistic.

But, do I want him to see it? Or do I want M to hide it, because she was not supposed to see This Guy in the first place? And then there is This Guy’s family. There are children in the house. If she gets This Guy in trouble, will he take it out on someone even more innocent? And what about her friend? Has This Guy ever manhandled her?

Yeah, baby! Danger. Violence. Threats. Hard choices. All good stuff, and all I had to do to accomplish that was knock M around a little.

Pause.

This is not the first time I have abused a character. I’ve written a guy getting pistol-whipped. I’ve written a girl who runs off with a couple of guys who make her “do things.” I’ve written a young boy who can’t swim thrown into the Gulf of Mexico by a drunken shrimp boat captain. I’ve written a man repeatedly bitten by a snake. I’ve written a boy forced to fight his two adult uncles. I’ve written an unstable person who inadvertently hurts an animal. I’ve written a woman psychologically abused during an affair. I’ve written a young man who survives a shooting that kills his father. I used one bullet there—through the boy and into the father—to make his survivor guilt a heavier burden.

In all of these, the point of the story had been the abuse. Never, until the moment with M, did I write an abusive moment because I needed an exciting plot point. But after my initial relief of fixing the scene died down, I wondered if I’d just written myself into a moral dilemma. Was this unbearably callous? Abuse a character to advance a plot? Where had that come from?

But here’s the odd thing. In the story, it had happened. It was unexpected, a surprise to everyone, but he’d done it.  He grabbed her arm. That genie was not going back into the bottle. It was written and there was no going back. Why? Because it felt right to the story. Because, in real life, things like this happen.

When I work with new writers, one of my standard suggestions is to remind them about missed opportunities. Sometimes action offers an opportunity to make a story richer and deeper. Sometimes it offers an opportunity to talk about what not everyone feels comfortable talking about.

There are writers, and readers, who refused to write or read women in jeopardy, or kids in jeopardy, or animal abuse stories. I get that.  If there’s torture or graphic violence in a story, I’m gone. While I doubt anyone would consider my arm-grabbing scene as graphic violence, there are those who might give me grief for going there.

But I did. And now I have an opportunity to elevate the story by asking some questions that  a woman in real life, in this situation, would ask.

Starting with, what does she do now?

If This Guy had punched her, the answer would be simple. She’d go to her brother. But This Guy grabbed her arm in a heated argument. A grab is different from a punch. Or is it? Does it mean he lost his temper, or that he’s a woman beater? If she doesn’t tell anyone, and he hurts her friend, is that her fault? Or would that make things worse? Now that she knows he’s got a scary temper, what is her responsibility? But wait, she’s a victim. Why am I assigning responsibility for something that is not her fault?

I am still pondering the answers to those questions, but not to what happened. Violence happens, and we as authors should not be afraid to write about it. With one simple change in a scene, questions opened up, difficult questions that real women in real life face every day. Those questions can’t be asked, or answered, if a character always takes the high road and walks away.

What do you think?

Ramona

….wherein I use the catch phrase from a spoof of Star Trek to discuss studying the craft of writing.

There’s a great moment in the movie Galaxy Quest* between Dr. Lazarus (played by classically trained actor Alan Rickman, playing classically trained actor Sir Alexander Dane) and the ship’s… I mean…show’s captain (named Jason, played by Tim Allen, star of Home Improvement). For the unfortunate few who have yet to see this film, run out and do so at once, because you are missing out.

This particular great moment is when Jason (who has removed his shirt) is fighting off a ginormous rock monster and the rest of the crew…I mean…cast is watching helplessly. Dr. Lazarus offers some wise advice:

Dr. Lazarus: “You’re just going to have to figure out what it wants. What is its motivation?”

Jason: “It’s a rock monster! It doesn’t have motivation!”

Dr. Lazarus: “See, there’s your problem, Jason. You were never serious about the craft.”

I work with a lot of new writers, and experienced ones, too, and being serious about the craft is advice I would steal from Dr. Lazarus. You may not be fighting rock monsters, technically, but figuring out motivation, how to seal up plot holes, use secondary storylines, and engage a reader from word one can feel like a battle if you don’t have an arsenal of knowledge at your disposal. Writers learn by writing, but we also learn by continuously studying and applying knowledge.

So, while everyone is announcing their resolutions and personal goals for the new decade, I’d like to throw one into the ring: Pick an area of weakness in your writing. Set yourself a course of study to address and conquer that weakness. Do it for 2010. In 2011, you can choose a new area of weakness. And so on.

In 2009, I studied short stories. I’d received a grant from the Delaware Division of the Arts based on a short story project, so it was only right and fitting to use the grant funds for that purpose. I attended the Rosemont College Writers Retreat and spent a week honing my short story skills.

But not everyone can afford or spend a week in a college dorm and focus on one area of writing (although I highly recommend you give it a try.) So here’s a more do-it-yourself version, and my own plan for craft study in 2010.

I have a weakness in scene writing–specifically, knowing where to break off a scene and end a chapter. Because, I suspect, I’ve written so many short stories, I have a tendency to wrap things up very tidily. In a short story, this is a good thing, even if the ending is open-ended and left for the reader to interpret. In a short story, a reader wants some sense of resolution, some answer to “Why did I just read all of that?”

However, in the middle of a novel, a big dose of resolution is the antithesis of a good thing. If the reader feels a sense of closure, what will she do? Shut the book. Go to sleep.

Choosing where to end a scene is tricky. You don’t want your scenes to end at a place where you reader feels that she can stop now, snuggle under the covers and go night-night. You want your reader to reach the end of the chapter and say, “Darn! How can I sleep now? Captain Jason’s in the middle of fighting a rock monster!”

This is not my first round with studying scenes. A couple of years ago, two writer friends and I began a do-it-yourself study course. We met every month at historic Greenbank Mill and called our course Let’s Make A Scene! We traded copies of novel openings and dissected them, studied various books on scene writing, and basically talked about what constitutes a scene. I’d started work on a mystery novel, so it was good for me to discuss and then apply the knowledge.

But like many good intentions, thanks to time and summer and life, our study group dropped off before we got to the part about studying scene endings! Aargh!

Now, as I edit my mystery, I see that I need to do more work. This fall, I attended the Seascape Writers Retreat and learned that I’m a dribbler. I reach a point of high action or a confrontation at the end of the scene, but instead of ending there (and driving the reader to turn the page), I add a few more lines. It’s a habit, because I did it over and over. I’m sure it’s from short story training. In a novel, that kills the dramatic tension of the moment.

So now I have to retrain myself. I’m thinking of calling the study group and begging for a refresher course.  If not, I’ll do it solo, and if anyone reading has advice, I’ll gladly take it. This year, I conquer my personal rock monster.

Happy 2010. I hope you all continue to study our craft.

By Grapthar’s hammer, let’s make Dr. Lazarus proud!

Ramona

*Thanks to DreamWorks for the photos. In case anyone is on Team Jason, he gets revenge against Dr. Lazarus, and calls him a “scene-stealing hack.” Heh.

Upon discovering that the primary character in my novel is actually a fictionalized version of…me.

So I’ve been writing this mystery. I set it in Louisiana (my homeland), with a French-Catholic sleuth (my upbringing), who is of Acadian descent (my cultural heritage), in a fictional town called St. Lucy (my middle name), living on a sugar cane farm (my house), with a raging addiction to coffee (a la me), two bickering brother-types (lucky me!), and masses of crazy relatives (mine again) who like to drop in uninvited, but always bring a coffee cake. (That part I made up. Usually, my cousins show up expecting coffee cake, not carrying one.)

Oddly enough, I still claim this novel is fiction.

I wrote an entire first draft before I discovered that the sleuth is really me. And by “discovered” I mean that a writer friend read it and said, “Wow, your sleuth is really you.”

And get this—up hearing that, I had the nerve to be surprised. Oh, sure, I recognized  the similarities noted above, but I was going for that write what you know thing. And since I have a good first (second, third, nineteenth) draft completed, I’m not going to ditch it  just because I failed to recognize that I was writing about an Other Me the whole time.

I’m not alone in this. Lots of writers live vicariously through their characters. You’ve heard it before:

“I hate my boss, so I got revenge by killing him in a story.”

“My nosy sister in law? Wait till you read what I did to her in chapter seven!”

“My lying, cheating ex and his wing wang finally got what they deserve on page 8.”

“I put a little family joke in there. Did you catch it?”

The comeuppance led me to do some major thinking about Other Me and her back story and likes and peculiarities, and that is a good thing. Best of all, once I got past that moment of chagrin, I decided to embrace the Other Me and make her a better, more interesting me.

So this is what I did. I gave her a few quirks that I definitely don’t possess. She’s a wild driver with an interest in fancy cars. (The real me has never gotten speeding ticket and my interest in cars never goes past if it runs well.) She wears sexy lingerie, even though she sleeps alone. (So far. For her, I mean. The real me…you don’t need to know this, do you?)  She has more advanced degrees, a better wardrobe, a nicer singing voice and an interest in voodoo. (Okay, that one we share, and that’s all I’m saying about it.)

She also has a lot of dead people in her life. That part, I’m happy to say, is totally fiction.

But now I realize something else. Other Me has two brothers, who will certainly recognize themselves, since I virtually quoted some of their idiotic fights from our childhood.

In real life, I have a sister. Other Me does not.

Help. I might be in trouble now.

Ramona