Writing and Kids: Not so mutually exclusive

Just the other day I was passing along tips to some writing class students who have school-age children and were explaining (that is, complaining) how little time this leaves them to write. Then today I came across this tough-love guest post, by Louise DeSalvo, over on my friend Christina Baker Kline’s excellent writing-advice blog. If you write and have kids, please go read DeSalvo’s post. To her advice, I’ll just add a few of my own tips; some are different, and some amplify what she advises:

NO (more) volunteering for school activities that take more than an hour or two a month. Or how about just: NO.

Accept that you will have a dirtier (or at least a messier) house than you probably would like – OR hire someone to clean it.

Write anywhere. A lot of my stuff has been rough-drafted on the bleachers at baseball games, in the car waiting for kids to finish up at an activity, on the patio while the kids (when little) were playing nearby, even in the ladies room at insufferably long school and family functions!

Decide what you can slice out of your mom life in order to get a writing life. Five years ago, when my youngest was in first grade, I decided I could do without the daily chats with other moms while waiting for our kids at pick-up time after school. I still had to arrive 15 minutes before the bell rang to get a parking space, but I decided to sit in my car and write – bingo, an extra hour or so a week.

As DeSalvo says, ALWAYS call it "work." I realized this important distinction when asking a non-writing relative to watch the kids; and get the kids used to that terminology too. Mom’s working. Period.

Break free of the idea that you always have to write...at the keyboard, in your office, seated in that great armchair, with your favorite pen.

Get a writing accountability buddy – another parent writer who will exchange daily emails consisting of just one line about how many words or pages you each wrote that day; no venting allowed.

Now - what are you still doing here?

Friday Fridge Clean-Out: No, it's not late. No, it's not. It's not.

In 30-plus years of writing, I have never missed a deadline, not a real deadline anyway, not one set by an editor, a contract, a publisher. But the thing is, Friday Fridge Clean-Out does not actually have a deadline, not really. So if I feel like it's still (or finally) Friday, when in fact it's already Saturday, well that's okay because you know what, in this case I'm the publisher. (Gee I've always wanted to say that.)

Please enjoy these links for your weekend reading.

►Oh, so that’s how you write a huge novel. Literally, how novelists write, that is, physically.

►Library Journal, would you please stop with the excellent lists of memoirs to be published soon? Don’t you know I already have an overflowing shelf of to-be-reads?

►You can read this in case you were wondering what effect the recession is having on the literary culture of New York City (in case you've run out of other things to wonder about).

►Mira's List is a terrific resource for grants, residencies, fellowships and similar opportunities. The list's keeper is also interviewed here.

►And finally, this one is strictly for fun, for those among us who can laugh at our own bad writing, or for those of us who never write anything bad. I mean write badly. I mean….

Have a great weekend.

Mimi Schwartz to read locally on Monday

Mimi Schwartz, of Princeton, will be reading from and talking about her memoir, Good Neighbors, Bad Times--Echoes of My Father's German Village, in Short Hills on Monday, November 9.

The focus will be on her "quest for small stories of decency often lost in the larger narratives of history, and how I found them in one tiny Black Forest village before, during and after Nazi times."

Her book won both a 2008 ForeWord Book of the Year Award in memoir and the NHLW Outstanding Nonfiction Award and will be out in paperback this December. Mimi is also the author of the memoir Thoughts from a Queen-Sized Bed, and Writing True: The Art and Craft of Creative Nonfiction.

Location for the talk is Temple B'nai Jeshurum, 1025 South Orange Ave, Short Hills, at 7:00 p.m., free.

Author Interview: Leslea Newman

One particular group of writers has always especially interested me: Those with full time careers revolving around a constantly changing combination of writing, teaching, and editing projects. In other words, those who make a living with words, but are not on staff full time at a university or media enterprise. The ultimate freelancer, if you will. It is the writers who write and publish, teach and give seminars, edit and consult with other writers, whose careers I study and try to learn from.

An excellent example is Leslea Newman, who has published nearly 60 books -- children's books, poetry, personal essay, short stories, novels, young adult fiction, middle grade novels, and books on writing craft. During my MFA program, I was fortunate enough to participate in a writing workshop under Leslea's direction, and to attend many of her presentations on writing craft and publishing. I'm so pleased that she agreed to a rather lengthy question-and-answer interview.

Lisa Romeo: When you wrote Heather Has Two Mommies in 1988, you co-published it with a friend who owned a small desktop publishing business. Now here you are on the eve of the 20th anniversary edition. Can you talk about your original decision and the journey you've been on with that book ever since?

Leslea Newman: Heather Has Two Mommies started as a grass roots project. I was asked by a woman to write a children’s book that showed a family like hers (two moms and their daughter). No established publisher would touch the book, so a friend of mine, Tzivia Gover, who at the time was a lesbian mom with a small desktop publishing business, and I decided to publish the book together. We raised $4,000 in $10 donations, found an illustrator, and printed the book. Six months later, Alyson Books took over. And the rest is history! I’m very proud of the fact that the book is still in print 20 years later (and the new edition has wonderful illustrations in full color). It’s been challenged many times, but the message of the book remains the same: the most important thing about a family is that all the people in it love each other.

LR: You work in many genres and forms. How do your varied endeavors nurture one another?

LN: Each genre informs the others. For example, I believe that being a poet has made my fiction more lyrical; being a fiction writer has helped me write narrative poems. I always encourage writers to think of themselves expansively—there’s no limit to one’s imagination!

LR: How do you approach your work time and make decisions about what to work on next? Do you make long-range plans, or do you tend to respond more or less organically to the material which is calling out to you most strongly?

LN: I try to write every morning, though sometimes that is not possible because of travel plans, deadlines, and other responsibilities. I never plan ahead; when I sit down to write, I stare at a blank page and pray some words will come along to fill it. If I see a trend develop, for example, if I seem to be working on poems over a period of time, I’ll consciously say, “Oh, I’m working on a new poetry collection.” But the work is the boss; it tells me what to do, not the other way around.

LR: What about saleability and concerns of the literary marketplace?

LN: I never write to sell. Well, I take that back. Once I wrote a romance novel with the intent of selling it and perhaps making some money. It is the only book I have never been able to sell (though it did come close at several presses). Oh well. You can’t blame a girl for trying.

LR: I know you are a big believer in writing every day. Can you explain why you feel that way, how it fits in to your own writing regimen, and make suggestions for others who may be finding it challenging to find either the time or the mental commitment to write every single day?

LN: I do think one gets better the more one writes. It’s like anything else, playing an instrument, playing a sport. And you never know what you’re going to write on any given day. The only thing that’s a guarantee is that if you don’t pick up your pen (or turn on your computer) nothing will happen on the page that day. Often—more often than I’d care to admit—I scribble and scribble and nothing interesting happens on the page. This can go on for days, sometimes weeks. Then one day something interesting will emerge. If that happens on day #42, I know the 41 days that preceded that writing were absolutely necessary. It’s all part of the process.

LR: You are one of the most hard-working writers I've ever met, and yet I don't think I'd call you a workaholic; it's more that I get the feeling you both treat writing as a job, and yet also retain all the joy and love of writing that occasionally gets lost over a long writing career. What do you think helps you achieve this kind of love/work relationship with your writing career?

LN: All I know is that I’m happier writing than not writing (even when the work isn’t going well). I think the reason I still love writing and being a writer is that I’m really in love with language. Nothing pleases me more than coming up with a phrase or image that moves me in some way, whether it makes me laugh, cry, or just impresses me with its rhyme, meter, or originality. This is what I live for, the joy of discovery, or what a writer friend of mine calls the daily miracle.

LR: In one memorable seminar, you brought in a stack of manila envelopes which contained the 17 drafts of Jailbait, the young adult novel you published in 2005. You went on to trace the changes, share your reactions to the editorial suggestions of your agent and publishing house editor, and emphasize the importance of being willing to try new things on the page. You even agreed to refocus the original novel manuscript into a young adult novel – a huge shift. I was so impressed with your professionalism (and willingness to let others inside the process). What do you want not-yet-published writers to take from your experience?

LN: It’s important to realize that more often than not you are not the best judge of your own work. You have a whole head full of other information about your book—information about the characters, the setting, the plot—that is not on the page. Your reader does not have that. Your reader only has the words that appear on the page. That’s important to remember. Also, you have to realize that you and your editor want the same thing: to make your book the best it can be, both for artistic merit and for success in the marketplace. Editors edit—that’s their job. Your relationship with your editor is like any other relationship; it demands mutual respect, an open mind, the ability to listen, and the willingness to compromise. When an editor makes a suggestion, I’m always willing to try it. I may not always do what my editor says, but I am always willing to consider her or his suggestions and see what happens.

LR: When writing across genres, writers often wonder how and when to best showcase the material. Do you ever rewrite a published poem as a piece of nonfiction or use it as a basis for a short story or novel – or vice versa? For example, the poem, “When My Father Stopped Tucking Me” In, from your latest poetry book, Nobody's Mother, has all the markings of morphing into a compelling personal essay or short memoir piece. (And there are so many other examples.) How do you know if that is do-able? Is it a matter of forging ahead and seeing what eventually works out? Or do you try to always begin fresh with each new project?

LN: It is sometimes said that writers really only have two or three stories to tell. I’m not sure if that’s true, but there are definitely themes that come up in my work over and over again. For example, I’ve written so much about mothers and daughters, and do so again in a forthcoming children’s book called Just Like Mama (Abrams, spring 2010), in many poems in both Signs of Love and Nobody's Mother, and in my latest novel, The Reluctant Daughter. When I had various friends dying of AIDS, I wrote the poetry book, Still Live with Buddy, the children’s book, Too Far Away to Touch, and the short story, “What Ever Happened to Baby Fane?” (in Girls Will be Girls) etc. I write whatever compels me, whatever I care passionately about, in whatever form it takes.

LR: Your middle grade novel, Hachiko Waits, based on the legendary dog who waited 10 years for the return of his deceased Japanese owner – will likely get new attention once the Richard Gere film of the story is released. Are you doing anything to prepare for that?

LN: You bet! I have been contacted by several bookstores and organizations, including the Animal Cancer Foundation to do booksignings once the movie is released. I’m very eager to see this new reinterpretation of Hachiko’s story. The new movie is based on the Japanese film which was made in the 1980’s and was very beautiful.

LR: As a writing teacher, what big mistakes do you see not-yet-published writers making, not in terms of technical writing issues, but in terms of the trajectory of their writing careers and development?

LN: Many beginning writers don’t understand that writing is a business, as well as an art, and one has to treat it like any other business. One has to be professional. One has to network. One has to be willing to take risks. One has to give one’s all, 100% of the time. One has to accept failure as well as success. One has to be in it for the long haul. One must be humble. And of course, one has to do one’s best writing. One has to, as Jerry Garcia famously said, “Accept every assignment. Build your fan base one person at a time.” At least that is my philosophy.

I find, much to my surprise, that many writers who have yet to publish have an attitude of arrogance, and only want to be published in the most prestigious publications around. For example, I know a poet who will not send his work anywhere except The New Yorker. And he has yet to be published. I have made a career of publishing with small presses, many of whom published my work when they were just starting out. And it has not hurt me. I still publish with small, as well as large presses. A friend of mine who is a folk singer has a motto: Go where you’re wanted. I think that’s solid advice.

LR: I've used your craft book, Write From the Heart, when teaching, especially the writing exercises. Are there other books on writing craft do you recommend?

LN: To tell you the truth, I find reading beautifully written books of fiction and poetry a lot more useful than reading books on writing. One learns about craft by reading well-crafted books and absorbing technique on a cellular level. However there is one book I absolutely love: The Art of Writing by Lu Chi, translated by Sam Hamill. It was written in the third century, and it is still relevant today. I also like If You Want to Write by Barbara Ueland. And On Writer's Block by Victoria Nelson.

LR: Tell us a little about your newest novel, The Reluctant Daughter.

LN: The Reluctant Daughter is a novel about a woman who can’t decide whether or not she wants to be a mother until she decides whether or not she wants to be a daughter. Lydia Pinkowitz seemingly has it all: a successful career as a Professor of Women’s Studies, a loving spouse named Ali, and many friends. What she doesn’t have is a close relationship with her mother, which is what she yearns for. Lydia and her mother are at constant odds with one another; after a particularly painful encounter, Lydia decides to cut off communication with her family of origin. Then she gets a call from her father: her mother is in intensive care. Will Lydia fly 3,000 miles cross country to try and make peace with her mother, or simply let the woman go? I’ve gotten many letters from women who say the book has moved them enormously and that has been very gratifying. I haven’t met a woman yet who doesn’t have a complicated relationship with her mother!

LR: What's on tap for you next?

LN: I am very excited to have four children’s books coming out in the next two years. Just Like Mama is a sweet book about the special relationship between a mother daughter, which is being released for Mother’s Day 2010. Miss Tutu's Star is a book about a clumsy little girl who wants to be a ballerina, and will be published in fall 2010.

I will be the keynote speaker at the Write Angles Conference in Amherst, Massachusetts on November 21st, and teaching at The Frost Place in June 2010. I’m also participating in the 30 poems in 30 days project that I initiated as poet laureate in Northampton, Mass., to raise money for the Family Literacy Project of the Center for New Americans. And I continue to work as a mentor with private students in all genres -- fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and children’s books.

Friday Fridge Clean-Out: Writing Links for Weekend Reading

►In an interview, writer and northern New Jersey neighbor Alice Elliot Dark talks about the writing process for her essay, The Quiet, which appears in the new collection, Heavy Rotation: Twenty Writers on the Albums that Changed Their Lives. Her essay is about George Harrison and Meet the Beatles!

►The Fall issue of Mississippi Review Online is all nonfiction.

►Copy editors, fact checkers, and proofreaders save writers more often than they torture us. I loved this behind-the-scenes interview with Mary Norris about copy editing at the New Yorker.

►Printers Row is the Chicago Tribune's blog about "readers, writers and books," and also lists Chicagoland literary events.

►Wonder what a conversation might be like between editors of a literary journal who passed on, but really liked, a particular piece of work, and the writer who submitted it? I give you the Potomac Review's blog experiment, The Maybe Dialogue. Reading the four-part series is a combination of eavesdropping on an excellent workshop exchange and an intimate writer-editor conversation. In order, you can find parts one, two, three and four.

►A generous-minded writer shares royalty statements from his traditional print publisher and Kindle, and how they translate into actual profits. In a side-by-side comparison, the results are eye-opening.

►If you've ever had a writing teacher make a huge impression on you and, in turn, a big impact on your work (and I sincerely hope you have had this wonderful, and often upsetting, experience), then like me, you may also love Alexander Chee's piece about studying with Annie Dillard.

► I heard Jack Wiler read a few times and always found his work interesting, unusual, and a more than a little in-your-face. The New Jersey poet died last week.

►If you are a mother and teach in higher education (and, for that matter even if you’re not), check out the Mama PhD blog over at the Chronicle of Higher Education.

►Beauty salons and books. Hey, the Pulpwood Queen may be on to something. Whatever keeps America reading.

►For your weekly dose of writer envy -- publishing deals scored by recent Iowa Writers Workshop grads.

Have a great weekend.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 13. Nothing unlucky here.

In this series, I'm passing on good writing advice which I recorded in notebooks while I was an MFA student.

From a nonfiction workshop:

Narrative is a compendium of modules, not necessarily just a beginning, middle, and end. It's an assembly of parts – scenes, reflection, expository, dialogue; not a chronology. You assemble them as building blocks. When considering your next revision, look for what's not on the page, where are the holes for missing blocks? And figure out, what is my comfortable length for a block – how many words or pages?

- Baron Wormser, former poet laureate of Maine, author of seven books of poetry, a memoir, and a short story collection. Baron also noted that his memoir, The Road Washes Out in Spring, was an assemblage of some 80-plus such parts.

Writing Time-Out: Movies, Milk-Duds, and MJ

"I don't care what they say. Ain't nobody's business..."

In some shots it's a body double. The production company is milking a dead man's profit-generating popularity. Parts of some songs are dubbed with old tracks. Too much movie-making craft obscuring the real story. It's all a hoax, he's living in an Eastern European castle, pulling everyone's strings. All hype, no history.

Say what you like (and the Internet is saying everything possible), I'm still going to see This it It, the Michael Jackson documentary film made from concert rehearsal footage. I'm fascinated by creativity, by the energy and process behind a multi-talented artist, by what occurs behind the scenes of any major event, and by film-making in general.

I don't think, as the conspiracy-theorists do, that it's a convenient coincidence there was so much high-quality rehearsal footage available, for the same reason I'm no longer shocked to discover that an author's 350-page award-winning novel has a backstory involving an unused 100,000 words, 4,000 pages, and 18 drafts.

To my mind, it's not so much about the "real story" of the run-up to Jackson's cancelled London concerts, but an opportunity to glimpse how the work of so many artists -- including musicians, choreographers, lighting technicians, dancers, etc. -- comes together to transform the original creative impulses of the singer/songwriter into a carefully intended experience for a particular audience.

Because isn't that what writers try to do every day (okay, maybe without pyrotechnics) -- to leave an audience (of readers) feeling differently than before?

Writers Block. Writing Building Blocks.

During the period of time before a new class begins – like now, while prepping for my creative writing boot camp next week -- I notice that prospective students often ask if we are going to address "writers block".

Ahem.

This, I say, is what every writer addresses each time a keyboard is opened, a pen is uncapped. I don't mean to be flippant and say there is no such thing as writers block (though at times I do believe that), and I also don't mean to suggest that every writer feels this way about the writing process (thought many days, I do).

What I want to get across is that frustration, not knowing precisely what one wants to write, wrestling with first (or 31st) drafts, feeling lost in the text, unsure of an entry point, struggling to choose a meaningful topic, and facing down the this-needs-to-be-completely-rewritten-and-I-don't-feel-like-it monster, are all normal and probably in some way, necessary components to writing.

On the other hand, sometimes a writer who feels blocked needs to channel the not-writing-but-I-should-be-writing energy, and sometimes, simply moving the pen or cursor helps. Many writers have discovered that writing around their topic and/or writing something that doesn't necessarily feel or look like WRITING, also helps.

Here's what I mean. Instead of forcing oneself to write that essay, story, poem, article, chapter, memoir piece, or other prose entity that's giving you trouble, try writing in and around your topic, via some other form of communication, either about a character or narrator, or that is in some other way connected to the story, such as a:

• letter
• memo
• shopping list
• recipe
• report card
• email
• news account
• song lyrics
• margin notes to as-yet-unwritten text
• footnotes
• angry / appreciative response to the "finished" piece from a reader
• review
• application
• repair-person's recommendation
• police report
• resume
• evaluation
• cease & desist order
• list of complaints
• list of compliments

One could also, I suppose, write out all the reasons why one is not writing. If the pen is moving, or the fingers are dancing across the keys, at least part of the process is thus unblocked. And who knows, from this not-writing kind of writing, could emerge perfectly usable writing building blocks.

Department of Shameless Self Promotion: One savvy author, one of my essays. It's a win-win..

A short, nontraditional piece I wrote is one of five winners in the 31 Hours Contest, featuring essays about parental intuition. The pieces are featured on the website of author Masha Hamilton, who ran the contest in connection with her new novel, 31 Hours, which traces a mother's deep intuition about her son through a compelling story of compassion and complications. You can read the contest winners, including my piece, 43 Lies About My Child, here.

My name is Lisa and I am a magazine junkie.

Confession: I’ve been a magazine junkie since my mother subscribed to five different movie star fan magazines in the 1960s (anyone remember Photoplay?). My tastes have changed, but I still feel the same about magazines in general: I want to read them all, or at least look at them all. Leave me alone at an airport magazine newsstand and I may miss my flight. I earn some freelance income by researching the magazine industry for a media newsletter/database. I get paid to write for magazines, and to help others learn to write for them. So I have personal and professional interests in seeing the print media industry survive. I hate that the industry is so challenged lately that many magazines are currently offering subscriptions for $5 a year.


And yet, I’m also a consumer with kids and a house and tuition bills, and after all, who can afford to subscribe to all the magazines, newspapers, and journals one wants? But no writer can go cold turkey either. As for mainstream media, I subscribe to the New Yorker (at a discounted rate), to the Sunday New York Times (where they’ve never heard of a discount for loyal 20-plus year subscribers), to More and O-The Oprah Magazine (discount again, and because of the good quality of nonfiction, memoir/essay pieces each month). For the sports fanatic son, I keep Sports Illustrated on automatic renewal, as well as Wired, for the tech-loving son. My mother renews Consumer Reports for us every December.

Then, each year for the last ten, I’ve used up a few hundred of the thousands of accumulated miles on an airline I will never fly again, to order one-year subs, alternating between The Atlantic Monthly, Smithsonian, Gourmet (alas, I was as sad as every other foodie magazine lover when it died a few weeks ago), Newsweek or Time, Discover, Self, Redbook, Real Simple, New York, New Jersey Monthly, ESPN The Magazine, occasionally People, and anything else which looks good to me at the moment. When I pay my dues, I get The AWP Writer’s Chronicle, and I subscribe to Poets & Writers.


When it comes to literary journals, I alternate subscribing to one or two of the major nonfiction-only titles – Creative Nonfiction, Fourth Genre, or River Teeth. If I enter a writing contest sponsored by a quality journal, I’m always glad when the entry fee entitles me to an annual subscription, or even a single issue. As for all the other fine literary journals I’ve love to see in my living room: If I can do so through the journal’s website, I buy a single copy when a piece by a writing friend appears in its pages (sometimes I’m a bit late, like this morning, when I ordered the Summer 2008 issue of Alimentum because my friend Penelope Schwartz Robinson’s essay there was just included as a notable essay in 2008 Best American Essays). And I take a one-year subscription to any journal which publishes my work (okay, a decidedly small sample, but there you go). It’s not a scientific method, but I like to think that in this way, I’m doing my part to support literary journals.

When I’m finished with a big pile of magazines, I tote some down to the free bin at my local library. I pass some on to relatives, and the writing-related ones along to students. My approach may take my budget into account, but still outstrips my ability to actually read everything that arrives; and so, my house ends up looking the overflow room of a magazine printing factory. This was helpful when my kids were younger and needed to cut pictures out of magazines for school projects, but not so much anymore. No matter how many clever ways I find to stash, store, or stack them, they keep eating up space. I’m thinking of finding a way to artfully pile them up in front of the drafty windows everywhere in my old house and cut our heating bills.

I’m curious what others do about magazines and journals. Are they accumulating in every room of your house too? How do you budget for magazines and journals? As for books, don't get me started.

Writers know that criticism hurts. Except when it helps.

Therese Walsh's debut novel, the Last Will of Moira Leahy, is generating a lot of buzz. The Women on Writing blog has an interesting interview with her, in which I found the following gem about receiving criticism. To understand her advice in context, know that when Walsh submitted her first complete novel manuscript seven years ago, an agent she trusted advised her to do a complete rewrite, in a new genre. Walsh took the advice.

"WOW: Any advice for writers about how to decide what is helpful criticism and what is just the whim of some agent or editor?

Therese: I think it’s important to be wide open to criticism. That can be hard, because as writers who hone in on emotional truths, we can be thin-skinned
peeps. Criticism can hurt. But it’s what we need, in part, to become better writers. You have to put yourself in a Zen place to accept critique—assume that others have your story’s best interests at heart when you hear what they have to say, then think deeply about what they’ve offered you. If you’ve successfully set aside your pride, your gut will tell you if that person is right or wrong.If you’re still in doubt, bounce professional advice around with your critique group. What do they think? Pay attention if you’re hearing the same criticism from more than one source."

You can read the entire interview, and see a list of other blogs at which Walsh will be talking about her book over the next month, here. And if you're quick -- meaning if you do it today -- you can leave a comment at the WOW blog where they are giving away a copy of the book.
Walsh is also the founder of the Writer Unboxed group blog, an excellent resource on genre fiction.

Friday Fridge Clean-Out: Linkety-Link for Writers

►Go to grad school, get stuck on bed rest, wind up on a bad weather vacation with people you don't like, or get a job as a book reviewer, and you too will learn to read a book a day, maybe even for a week straight. But a book a day for a year? That's what this blogger is doing, and she's nearing the end.

►Poets & Writers now has an MFA database, with a list of all U.S. program, as well as the top 50 (traditional) programs, and other MFA-related resources.

►Noah Lukeman, literary agent and author of The First Five Pages, has an interesting take on whether it makes sense to accept an offer from a small press to publish one's first book (via Backspace).

►Per writing nonfiction in which loved ones appear, I was glad to be reminded recently of this insight from Scott Rosenberg's book Say Everything: "Writers who tell stories about themselves, their families, and friends always walk a tightrope: you fall off one side if you stop telling the truth; you fall off the other if you hurt people you care about, or use them as fodder for your career. Dishonesty to the left, selfishness to the right." (via The Daily Rumpus)

►No, I won't be writing a novel, but I've signed on again for November's National Novel Writing Month. Last year, my goal was to write an average of 1800 new words each day, and by the end of the month, I did have 53,000 words of new memoir material. This year I have a slightly different project in mind, but the idea is the same – accountability and a shove. If you are having trouble sticking to a writing routine, need an outside deadline/accountability partner (or, say 15,000 of them – that's how many completed the program last year), or if you simply want to boost productivity, it may be worth considering.

►We writers are such strange creatures, no? For example, yesterday my day was made (really, I was dancing in my office) when I received what is probably the best personalized REJECTION email of my career, from an editor I admire, at a publication I love, for a column I'm dying to crack, only the day after I sent in an essay submission. Like I said, strange.

►How do you define a prose poem -- and know when it is a prose poem you are writing and not an essay? Know any good resources on the topic of prose poetry? Weigh in on this and other genre-splitting questions (and read the excellent comments/advice) over the Practicing Writing blog.

►Beginning poets might want to consider signing up for Sage Cohen's free monthly e-newsletter.

►The work of two of my writing buddies is featured over at the More magazine website –Dionne Ford's piece is about swimming with her Grandmother, in A Five Generation Vacation, and Sari Botton's essay covers Finding Forgiveness on Facebook.

►Blog reminder – tomorrow (Sat., 10/17) is the last day to leave a comment and become eligible to win a one-year (four-issue) subscription to Prairie Schooner, a wonderful literary journal.

►This terrific New Yorker piece, a parody/rant about the way publishers now expect their authors to do practically all of their own book promotion, would be truly hilarious if it were true. Oh, wait, what's that you say?

►From the Department of Shameless Self-Promotion: This blog was listed among the Top 100 Writing Blogs by the Daily Reviewer; the list is worth a look for the many other great blogs included.

And, finally, if you're not already reading literary agent Nathan Bransford's blog (and in that case, we really must talk), or The Rejectionist, then you missed this great post about the publishing industry. Whoa.

Have a great weekend.

Self Promotion Dept: Back in the Saddle Again

The first piece of my writing ever published (beyond the Neighborhood News which I wrote and sold for a nickel when I was 10, and which lasted exactly two issues, until my parents found out I was hawking it to the neighbors), was a short humor essay for the magazine Horse, Of Course (thankfully now out of print), when I was 12 years old.

For a few years after college, while competing on the horse show circuit, I supported myself (no, not the horses, that was Dad’s wallet) by covering horse sports and top equestrian athletes for dozens of equestrian publications. Next, I spent a few years doing public relations for horse-related businesses.

Many years, and an awful lot of NON-horse related work have intervened, but lately, on occasion, I’m once again writing about horses. One of my essays will be included in the forthcoming collection, Why We Ride: Women Writers on the Horses in Their Lives, to be published next spring by Seal Press. It’s edited by Verna Dreisbach, with a foreword by Jane Smiley. Here’s a glimpse of the wonderful cover.

Update: I just found out the book is now available for pre-order through Amazon.

Today I'm thinking about why I write. Father did know best.

My father was a major reason I fell in love with words. Each night, he read two newspapers. From the time I was first able to read, he pointed out interesting articles. He wrote short stories, allegorical fables, and letters to the editor which he never mailed. He kept them all in a drawer. He wrote some really terrible poetry, and some pretty darn good poems, and sent them to everyone he loved. He loved books, and he knew the difference between writers and authors. He was philosophical and corny, naturally intelligent but formally uneducated. And, he innately knew, when it came to a piece of writing, that shorter was better than long.


He died three years ago today.

My father detested cold weather and moved to Las Vegas as soon as I graduated from college. But four years or so before that, he accompanied me on a tour of Syracuse University, on a winter day when the temperature barely reached 15 degrees. When we exited the journalism school complex, a blast of frigid wind slammed into us, and he handed me $20 for cab fare and went back to the hotel (where I'm sure he read all the local newspapers.) A few months later, he wrote the first of many tuition checks.

Three years ago tonight, on an airplane heading west through darkness to a too-bright Las Vegas morning, I wrote a eulogy. It took me two hours. It was too long. And, it's never finished.

Of marinades, mind dumps, and other ways to say: I'm getting to it!

Last week a writer in a nonfiction class asked a really good question about how to move the writing from her head onto the page. In the course of that discussion, I asked others if they noticed themselves "pre-writing" -- did ideas, personal essay themes, or memoir passages tend to bounce around in their brains for a while, percolating, marinating?

As for me, the more I write, the more I discover that the amount of time a piece of writing spends "marinating" – which I define as hanging out in my head before a word goes on the page – is almost totally out of my control. The rough material seems to have a mind of its own and will migrate to the page when ready. I'm talking here about substantial long essays or memoir pieces, or even book reviews and shorter pieces with some depth to them.

I've learned to trust my gut more when it comes to this stage. Certainly that doesn't mean I don't get frustrated, though lately I also notice that when I move too quickly from idea to first draft, I get just as frustrated, but for different reasons. And yet I'm not the type of writer who believes I must know precisely what I plan to write or where I stand on every facet before writing; very often I've discovered interesting nuances in my own thinking as I write.

I don't always have the luxury to let an idea marinate till the desired state of doneness, nor can I always trust that my thinking/composing/pre-writing process is working in my best interest. Whenever a deadline is involved, or when I think that the marinating process is morphing into procrastination, or when one of my *accountability* writing friends reminds me that it's been a bit too long since I've made any tangible progress on an idea, then I sit my big butt down and get words on the page.

I may not necessarily write the first draft, but I'll make notes, write bits of dialogue, record key phrases, images or details, make lists of important things to include, and even, very occasionally, make a rough outline (shh – I wouldn't want that last bit to get around). Or I'll do what I call a "mind dump" (or the pre-first-draft) – randomly pouring out everything I think I may ever want to say on the issue, but without any regard to how it reads (an activity more like typing or transcribing than writing).

Lately I kind of like the phase when a piece is bouncing around my head but not yet on the page. Used to be, it drove me a little bit insane, because it was usually accompanied by a finger-waving Greek chorus chanting: You're so lazy!...or…It's not going to write itself!...and my personal favorite line of self-recrimination: Anyone can write in their head!

These days, however, I holler back to that chorus: Shut up already!* And, by the way: A. Lazy people don't think about what they are going to write; they sit around thinking they could write. B. Actually yes, if I do think about it carefully and for just the right amount of time, the first draft will more or less write itself. and C. No, in reality everyone CAN'T write in their heads.

Now, the right length of time to marinate? Oh what say you, gods of prose?

*(And, yes, that just about uses up my quota of exclamation marks for the balance of 2009.)