The Perspective of a Dandelion

It's spring. Which means T and I will engage in dandelion warfare for approximately 93 days.

I don't mean that we'll join forces and seek to cleanse our yard of them, I mean we will argue about them. We'll argue about whether or not they're a weed, whether or not they're pretty, and whether or not they deserve to exist. For 93 days.

It goes something like this....

Me: UGH. Look at that field of dandelions.
T: Pretty!
Me: No. They're not.
T: Look at that yellow! They're like sunlight!
Me: They're not sunlight, they're weeds.
T: GRASS IS A WEED, TOO.
Me: But it's a useful one.
T: Being pretty is useful. Just ask Keanu Reeves. How do you think he ever got cast in anything.

I see the point. If I step far enough back from my adult experience of dandelions, I can remember the joy child-Natalie would have felt at the sight of a field of fluff balls. I can divorce my thoughts from how widely those seeds will disperse, how like a virus they'll encroach on my yard, how like a Kraken they'll attach to my soil with a death-firm grip and instead see their oppressive beauty...

Sometimes, I'm more successful than others.

But as I was prying those little beasts from my lawn one evening, I had some time to consider how radically our perspective changes our reality. If, like T, I was content to find the beauty in a lawn full of dandelions, I'd save myself an awful lot of sweat and toil. I might be content to let them rule my yard in yellow fury. But without that perspective, I rooted around in the dirt for hours like a madwoman. I changed the landscape of my lawn little by little until only a few bits of yellow remained.

I didn't eradicate them completely because when there were only a few left, they were suddenly refreshing and beautiful against dark green grass - a metaphor for survival rather than oppression.

Having just come through a rather involved edit and a test-run of my Critique Crash Course, the timing seemed appropriate.

(Obviously, I was going to relate this to writing, right?)

In my last round of edits I was charged with tightening my novel. In the course of doing so, I grappled with finding a balance between pretty and over-written. I asked my author friends, "What does it mean to over-write? How do I know if I'm doing it? Where I'm doing it? How do I fix it?"

As you can imagine, I got a variety of really good answers. They ranged from "avoid too much repetition" to "don't flood a scene with gorgeous prose because you can" to "be efficient."

At first, this was really hard. All of my words appeared firmly rooted in place. There was no disturbing them. They belonged because I'd been over the manuscript enough to KNOW they belonged.

Hadn't I?

It was hard to tell, so I gave it to a friend and asked her to demonstrate which words were weedy and which were holding down the soil of the story. What she returned to me were pages so devastated I almost didn't recognize them. My knee jerked. I didn't want to believe there was THIS much to shed. What was left? How could the leftover words possibly carry the weight of the story.

But once I'd recovered from the shock, I started to see what she'd done - how she was teasing the story to the front by tamping down the fluff. I was able to analyze my prose simply by virtue of having someone come in and point out the weeds I mistook for flowers.

This was a new sort of revision for me. Not something I was prepared to do on my own, but a good reminder of why I need people to look at the same thing I'm looking at and tell me what they see. Sometimes the way to achieve a new perspective is by climbing onto the shoulders of someone else.


So here's what dandelions taught me about writing: pretty can be a virus. Too much of it and a manuscript can drown in the relentless monotony of it. There's a trick in shifting your perspective from flower to weed, and for me it was as exciting as a free cappuccino.

In the end, I culled the manuscript by 7k. I changed the landscape of the novel so that the language wasn't so cluttered, so that the story got more sun, so that the important bits didn't have to compete for water.

But I left the dandelions that became flowers in the process.

Let's Talk Critique Pt 2

Welcome to part two of Let’s Talk Critique. This is where we’ll talk about “how” good crit partners do what they do. If you missed the “what,” check it out here.

There’s a lot of common wisdom out there about how a crit partner (cp) can go about critiquing without being a giant douchecanoe. This is good because there’s no certification process for learning how to crit. I'm certain my critique style is heavily influenced by having done an undergraduate degree in English Lit in which I was frequently asked to analyze capital-‘L’-Literature from a variety of perspectives (oh, Po-Mo, how I heart you). But I don't consider that adequate preparation for the work of thinking critically about something that's still in progress. It was just a starting point.

Most of the posts I’ve seen on the subject of crit revolve around the behavior of a good/bad cp, which easily accounts for half of what it takes to be a good cp. That’s the “partner” part of “critique partner,” and since that ground has been well and truly covered elsewhere, I’m going to continue the conversation by focusing on the “critique” part of “critique partner.”

As I work with my super stellar cps primarily via email, I'm focusing on crit-in-letter form. I can't really speak to the in-person dynamic of crit, but I imagine these still apply.

So! Here are Natalie's top 4 truths of making really good crit with action items and more Firefly gifs:

1. Be the best bad guy you can be.
We all know the sandwich method of critique: this is the good-crit-good school of critique. I think it bears repeating because pointing out the good can be challenging when you’re reading with a critical eye. But it IS important. Not because you need to make the author feel good (though, that’s part of it), but because this is frequently the hard part of a good critique.

It’s easy to look at a piece and find ways in which it could be better; it’s not always so easy to find its strengths especially in drafting stages. But finding the love is where you lay the groundwork of a good critique. If I’m going to tell you that your main character’s emotional arc is missing key beats and is therefore unrealized in the end, then I’d better also be able to tell you that the arc you’re striving for is visible precisely because you’ve established the starting point so well. It's easy to be a bad guy. It's tough to be a good bad guy.

Action item: Make your compliments/encouragements as insightful as your critiques.

2. Navigate the ‘I’.
This is a tough one because most of us come to writing as readers, and as readers we're encouraged to identify with characters - or, at least, that's what we learn in school. But! In the case of crit, you're not a reader, you're a critiquer, and what you would do is therefor irrelevant. 

Okay. Maybe not totally irrelevant, but it should probably take a backseat to your analysis of the work. If your gut reaction to something in the text is to argue that it's not believable because you wouldn't behave as the main character did, there's probably a reason, but it doesn't have anything to do with you.

For example. Let's say you were critiquing for me and I gave you a piece about a vampire slaying space cowboy with the ability to download personalities like software and maintain quippy dialogue throughout. And let's say there was a scene in which said vampire slaying space cowboy hides under her bed to escape an invasion of zombies.

Instead of saying, "if I were a vampire slaying space cowboy with the ability to download whatever personality I wanted, I wouldn't hide beneath my bed from something as mundane as zombies," you might practice removing yourself from the equation and consider why that's your reaction. In this case, it might be because I hadn't properly illuminated the fact that this vampire slaying space cowboy had a horrific experience with zombies in her childhood and lacks the confidence needed to meet them face on.

Action item: Read your crit letter for 'I' statements and consider how to restate them in a way that removes you from the picture. Be creative!

3. Aim before you fire. 
Once the critical glasses are on, it can be difficult to moderate them. But! Too much of a good thing is like the 4th Indiana Jones movie - people only really remember the first three with fondness.

It's easy to get swept up in the excitement of a good crit. You can see all the things! You can be useful! And brilliant! And point out the universe of problems!

Well. Don't.

This is where it's helpful to know your terrain and pick your battles wisely. This is also a part of critique that is hugely flexible and will shift depending on your relationship with the writer. 

Speaking in general terms, a well-aimed crit is worth more than an exhaustive one. If you see a wealth of trouble in a manuscript, it may be best to address only the most salient issues - for example, you might prioritize the character arc over addressing voice, or major plot issues over problems with smaller scenes. In these cases, the bone saw is more useful than the scalpel. Remember: the elements of storytelling are connected and addressing one is, in some ways, addressing all.

Action item: Practice condensing critique notes or demonstrating relationships between them.

4. Be clear. Be concise. Be nice.
Revise your crit letters. Especially in the early stages of working with a new partner, precision is kindness. Take the time to organize your thoughts and make them incisive without abandoning niceties - it's possible to say hard things without being mean, but it definitely takes practice.

Similarly, crit letters aren't soapboxes; there's no need to write a treatise on the inherent fault of zombie/vampire/werewolf mythologies (see aforementioned comment about behaving like a douchecanoe). I promise you this is a surefire way to lose the goodwill of your critique-ee.

Trust that the author knows that zombies/vampires/werewolves can't exist (well....except for zombies), and focus instead on why in the context of their manuscript, the mythology is weak. Which is to say, anyone can tell me my zombies are improbable, but a good cp will tell me why my zombies are unbelievable. A great cp will do that with a single statement and a smile.

Action item: Revise, revise, revise your crit letters just as you did the manuscript. 

The thing these all have in common is creativity. We don't usually think about crit as being creative. Critique is the necessarily academic component of writing a novel. It's strict, the disciplinarian of daydreams. It reigns us in and cools us down and counters impossible yes's with irritatingly realistic no's. But. (You knew there was a but.) BUT. (But did you know there were two?) A really good critique does all of that in a way that leaves you burning to try again - to be better than you were last time. A really good critique isn't a monster waiting to swallow your bones, it's the whetting stone there to sharpen your sword.

So, there you have it. How Natalie approaches crit. Again, this has little to do with behaving like a good cp. Behavior is another boat. Or another post if you're interested.

Let's Talk Critique Pt 1

In the past 6 months, I've had the opportunity to critique manuscripts for three people I've never worked with before. I always warn people that my critiques can be rough if you're not very familiar with critique, and these were no exception. To illustrate, each of these crit letters was 2k and over.

The interesting thing about these, and the reason I'm posting about it, is that they were for writers at very different stages of the process. One was just starting out, one a seasoned writer making strides toward publication, and one a debut author. In each of these cases, comments were made about my critique style and how I learned it. Which got me thinking that this might be a topic more people are interested in.

Fast forward to this week, when Maggie Stiefvater posted her CP Love Connection and it seems perfectly timely. As an aside, I highly recommend you start there if you're looking for a creative hook up. And remember to check the postings on her mirrored blogs.

So, let's talk about critique and what it means to be a partner. This will be a post in two parts. Part one (that's this part) on the "what" of crit; part two on the "how." (Part three if I think of something else). 

I know that there are people who have elaborate hierarchies of the various sets and subsets of critique partners. People talk about Alpha readers and Beta readers and for all I know they have Gamma, Delta, Epsilon, and Zeta readers, too. But I'm going to break things down into the three levels reflected most precisely in the publishing process: Editor, Line Editor, Copy Editor. They will all serve you well, but in very different ways. And please know that though I'm speaking in very general terms, I'm talking about my own experience in the wild and sundry world of critique.

What does an editor do?
I'm feeling bullet-y today. Let's use those.

• Read for over-arching consistency and integrity in the story. This is the big picture, so big, you're in space looking down at the earth, discovering how the continent you want to build will fit in the vast scheme of things. In other words, plot and character arcs - do they work? Are they realized?
• Give attention to the movements within a story and transitions between them. This is probably the medium-sized picture, from the earth's atmosphere on a clear day where you can see the topography of this new continent. In other words, subplots, setting, and tone - are they adding to the story?
• Be aware of the momentum of the story. This is the most focused view; you're on the ground navigating the path you charted from atmo. In other words, pacing, pacing, pacing - which scenes drag at the story? What quiet moments are missing?

Editing comes first. An Editor reads for each of these levels of storytelling and can communicate with you about them. An editor is the person who gets what you're trying to do and is invested in helping you achieve that goal as precisely as possible. This is where critique partners are most helpful because they act as your editor before you have an editor.  

What does a line editor do?

• Voice and point of view. Are they consistent throughout?
• Word choice and sentence structure. Do the word choices and sentences relate to specific character arcs? Is pacing consistent with sentence structure?
• Pacing and rhythm within the text. Should you consider condensing a paragraph into one or two lines? Do you over-use pronouns or specific sentence type?

To be clear, of course CPs can do this for you. I've done it, but this very different work from actual critique. Line editing will to very little to help a writer address overarching problems in the narrative, so doing too much of this before a critique can be a waste of your time. 

What does a copy editor do?

• Read for consistency in descriptions. Do your characters have the same hair color throughout? Did you spell the name of the town consistently? Did your protagonists mother drive a Prius at the beginning and an SUV at the end?
• Find problems with internal logic. Can your character actually cross a certain distance in the time they say they can?
• Words, words, words. Grammar and style (both the author's and the publisher's). Do you love the Oxford comma? Always spell gray with an 'e'? 

A copy editor focuses on grammar and sense. This is the nitty gritty. Their job is to make sure each sentence functions as intended and makes sense unto itself, and to make sure the reality in your head isn't wildly off base. This is the very final stage of the editing process and has very, very little to do with critique. 

To be clear, I think a CP can do all of these levels of editing, but it's the first level that is the most crucial. You wrote a book, which makes you brilliant, but a CP who can point to the major plot hole in your work is just as brilliant. A CP who can point to the plot hole and also how the fix for that hole already established in the manuscript well, they're the best in the 'verse. If your CP only gives you line notes and copy edits, you don't actually have a CP. 

So now that I know what I'm looking for, how do I find a good critique partner?

Finding a good CP can be tough. Having swapped manuscripts with dozens of people, I know that being in the trenches can be so frustrating you begin to question the worth of the quest. But don't give up! There's no training for this job. As with writing, many of us learn by doing, and that means that every time you swap a manuscript, you are both learning and teaching someone how to give critique. 

My best advice is to keep swapping - establishing rules such as those in Maggie's post before you trade - with an eye for those who can critique on the editor level. 

There are several resources online that will help you connect with similarly situated writers. I'll list more below, but if you know of others, please drop them in the comments. You can also reach out to local chapters of SCBWI or your library to see what crit groups are active in your area, but I've had the best success online. 

Resources
In addition to Maggie's connection, the following are great places to cruise for creatives:

• VerlaKay BlueBoards (primarily aimed at children's book writers)
• CP Seek (which I have no personal experience with, but hear good things about)
• Ladies Who Critique
• Write On Con's Critique Match Up

Stay tuned for Part 2! HOW to give good crit. 

Hello! My Name is Natalie.

It's been so long, I'm afraid you've forgotten my face. Allow me to re-introduce myself. My name is Natalie and we've met, but it was last year and my hair was probably a different color....

I haven't been posting. There are reasons - 2012 went out with an apocalyptic bang and 2013 entered similarly - but I've not forgotten my dear blog. Consider this my reentry to the blogosphere.

Here's is the quick update of what I've been up to:

1. I've teamed up with a diverse group of debuting YA authors and we've just launched our blog. We are The Fourteenery - 14 YA Authors Debuting in 2014. (Obligatory prize post here). This is a group of women I've been working with for several months and I'm excited and delighted to be engaged in this collaborative venture.
2. Tumblr! I love it. And I'm Obviously Parker (obviously).
3. The Official 2014 Debut Young Adult and Middle Grade author group has launched! If you'd like the bird's eye view of what's coming down those roads, check out the OneFour KidLit blog and/or Twitter feed.
4. Texas! For the first time in my life, I visited the great state of Texas for a writing retreat. 21 writers, 5 days, 2 houses, 1 river. As you can imagine, it was as exhausting as it was recharging.

In lieu of anything more, I'll leave you with this picture of the world's largest pecan. Which I found in Texas. And touched.
More soon. Ciao for now.

On Attacking Baristas and Xylophones

I'm very protective of the music I use for writing. I search long and hard for the perfect collection of songs that can suffuse my brain with the tone I want to create in my novels. Every revision requires at least one new song to represent the shift, the new sense of climate I'm aiming to add to the story.

There's a small handful of people I'm willing to share my songs with. I can count them on one hand. It's not that I don't want to share my music, but I'm sort of afraid that if I give my story songs away, I'll dilute the power they hold over my subconscious. Somehow, I'm convinced that giving away the musical kernel of the novel is to give away the kernel of the story itself.

Irrational. I know. But it means that when I'm sitting in my coffeeshop, sipping my cappuccino on a Tuesday morning, and one of my hard-discovered songs comes over the speakers, I immediately leap to my feet and attack the mild-mannered, music-literate, cappuccino-making genius behind the counter with what I'm sure is a terrifying "WHY MY MUSIC, YOU THIEF????"

Don't fret. The encounter ended with mutual respect, one more cappuccino, and an exchange of music recommendations.

The point is, I'm as emotionally invested in my music as I am in my own novels. There's something really amazing about finding a song that perfectly captures a piece of my own imagination - the spark of a character, the first image of the story, the core of its emotion. It reminds me that I'm participating in a much larger tapestry of creative thought, adding to a conversation that's been going for hundreds of years in every medium storytellers can get their fingers on.

Which is my long-winded way of saying music is important to me, yo. (And I'm a little crazy about it).

As a way to further establish how crazy I am (and entertain you with my follies), I'll offer this final example.

About a week ago, M (one of the four people I share music with), sent me a song with the explanation, "you should listen to this because it's weird."

And it was. Weird. But oddly appealing. I filed the recommendation away for further thought and countered with a piece that was equally as odd, but far less appealing with attack xylophones. The point is we had a decent exchange about this piece of music.

Fast forward a week to two days ago when I encounter a song I think M will like. I send it and the following happens:

Me: Have you heard of this band? I like them so I think you will, too.
M: .....I have. Didn't I send you one of their weird songs last week?
Me: Um. You did? Did I like it?
M: You did. There's a problem with your brain.
Me: DON'T YOU THINK I KNOW?!

I'm on the prowl again. Searching for the music that will pattern my brain for the foreseeable future. Send your recs if you've got 'em!

When the UPS Man Brought Me a Date (or Two)

I received a package on Tuesday. It's an exciting package because it means I'm about to get really serious with BEWARE THE WILD again. It was a package of notes and treats from Editor π and Co.

Would you like to see? (click for close-up)

It's almost too much excitement for one photo to contain.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a date with a few thousand words, a few awkward metaphors, a few new scenes... YES, I'm going to be busy for a while.

Ciao, y'all.

The Question of the Political Author

There’s been a fair amount of discussion lately about whether or not authors should be political. In May, Agent Jenn Laughran made this incredibly thoughtful post in response to outrage about Orson Scott Card, Reading with the Enemy. I’m sure she wasn’t the only one to post on this topic, but hers is the one that stands out in my mind. More recently, there was this post from Em’s Reading Room, which used a survey approach and broke it down by reader/blogger/author opinion.  Which then lead to this post by Maggie Stiefvater, which is a general reminder to be civil.

The topic of artists being political is an interesting one, but it’s not a new one. I promise you, there’s not a single author, musician, or actor who hasn’t spent many hours pondering the question of how much to say in the public eye, especially in the age of Twitter and Facebook, when your words are very quickly and efficiently dispersed. This is a new topic for the YA community however and so it’s worth paying attention to how it’s being discussed.

I think it’s particularly interesting that this question surfaced in the weeks following an example of OSC’s vicious homophobia and also in the weeks after Jackson Pearce’s vlog criticizing Chick-fil-a President Dan Cathy for his opinions of gay marriage.

This is incredibly troubling to me, because it looks an awful lot like the question isn’t whether or not authors should be political outside of their books, but whether or not YA authors should be political about Certain Things.

There are many topics about which authors get their politics on without this question rearing its ugly head: the whitewashing of covers, the presence of LGBT characters, the insidious nature of the “pink cover” on novels written by women…. There are tons of examples. The most recent that comes to mind is Cassie Clare’s discussion of the response to the casting of Magnus, a topic that (disturbingly) echoed earlier discussion of Rue and the Hunger Games.

YA authors are frequently political, some even about gay marriage, but I can’t think of  other examples as pointed and as widely-viewed as OSC’s opinions or Pearce’s vlog. I think the fact that the question of whether or not authors should be political has surfaced around each of these occurrences is significant.

I don’t think this is a coincidence and I’m uncomfortable that this is starting to look like a pattern.

I’m uncomfortable with the fact that this puts authors in the difficult position of having to weigh their beliefs against their pocketbooks.

I’m extremely uncomfortable with the fact that this points to a very specific idea of censorship.

There is always something to be said for engaging in civil dialogue. I am completely in favor of passionate, difficult conversations that move hearts and minds. I think it’s important to ask these questions about art and the artist and politics and I think it’s extremely important to watch how they’re being asked.

An excessively thoughtful post on how to write

I've seen a lot of blogs about writing, recently. Maybe more than a lot. I've probably seen scores. You can't turn a virtual corner in the blogosphere without coming face-to-blog with some list of writing do's and don't's.

Don't's.

That can't be right.

Don'ts.

That's better. Except for making me crave donuts.

/tangent

Back to the subject at hand, I thought I'd take some time to write a super thoughtful post about writing to share with all of you because I like to weigh in on things and pretend my opinion matters, and because I always find myself arguing with these lists.

I know. It's a bad habit, arguing with lists. They just get to me. Maybe it's because they look so authoritative and tall. Or because they try to make something organic fit inside this neat structure and I get all "OH NO YOU DON'T. I DEFY YOU, LIST. I'M A SPIRAL." Because, really? Listing out do's and don'ts of writing is a little like teaching a snowflake how to be a snowflake.

STEP ONE: Be unique.
STEP TWO: ...No, that was basically it.

So I had a latte and a good think while staring into the Kansas sky. I even put on my glasses to write this post because it makes my thoughts poignant - such is the universal rule of wearing glasses while thoughtful.

THEN I turned on some Mozart because Mozart makes your words sophisticated and all treatise-like. I titled the post, "Writing: An Overture to Timelessness" because it sounded important.

AND THEN I started writing. And do you want to know what I realized? I really only have TWO things to say about writing or learning how to write or honing your craft in general. Ready?

DO: Write.
DON'T: Wait.

Ta da! Since it turns out my advice could fit inside a fortune cookie, I changed the title.

(As a side note, ((or a parenthetical, even)) I am joking.)

(Sort of.)

I don't do memes...except this one

Not long ago, I was tagged by Ruth Lauren Steven (who, by the way, is running a very, very interesting contest on her blog for writers - one that involves agents and queries and pages - go here for all the details) in the Lucky 7 meme. But I was busy and didn't post, and a short time later, was tagged again by Myra McEntire. I'm not usually one for memes. In fact, I never post them because they invariably take me back to grade school and the excruciating pain of hand-written chain letters. However, I've enjoyed seeing this one on the blogs of friends and fellow writers, so I'm dipping into the meme world for just a second to play along.

If you’re tagged, you have to do the following:

1. Go to page 7 or 77 in your current manuscript 
2. Go to line 7 
3. Copy down the next seven lines/sentences as they are – no cheating 
4. Tag 7 other authors (I've reserved the right to edit. If you want to post, consider yourselves tagged by virtue of stopping by to read my blog.) 

I have two works in progress at the moment, so I asked Twitter to help me decide between options 1 (click) and 2 (click) and they picked the first. The following drafty excerpt is from page 7 of the wip I'm calling WATER for now:

Half a mile below, miles of dusty karst-invested hills swept past. Perfect territory for finding hidden pockets of water in one of the many cave systems, but every last one I passed was as dry as the sky above. I didn’t need the constant reporting of the ship’s radars to know it. The only water I sensed was pumping through the veins of the ship. With the sun already past its zenith, I was looking at yet another night in some cracking valley with who knows what for dinner and a dwindling ration of water. 


I’d already been away from camp for five days. I carried enough drinking water for ten, twelve if I pushed it and was careful. 

/end Lucky 7 meme

Thank you for reading. To show my appreciation, I'm going to save your life. BOOM. You're welcome

What happens at retreat...

...ends up in one of Jackson's videos. This is something of a cautionary tale.



As you may have deduced, this was the retreat at which I learned I love to chop firewood, some houses really are like little countries, and nothing delights like Carrie Ryan story time.

So, I'm Revising

There's nothing quite like revision to make me wish the world and all of my daily responsibilities would quiet down for a while. It's not possible and perhaps it's not ideal (I've always responded well to a fair bit of pressure), but it means I become rather limited as human beings go. My answer to everything is, "I need to be writing," because every time I disentangle my mind, even a little bit, from the twisted vines of my manuscript, I have to fight to find my place again.

This means I've started doing things that are entirely unlike me. I've dropped bowls of dog food all over the floor. I've stopped organizing my bills. I've privileged getting home faster over stopping for essentials like milk, eggs, or vegetables.

I've stopped painting my nails.

This is serious stuff. Anything that doesn't appear immediately useful to my revision process gets tossed if possible. But there are some things that do help my revision process and yesterday contained so many that I'm taking this moment to share them with you.

First! The Shearwater album, Animal Joy was released, which meant it was on my iPod nearly as soon as I woke up because someone who loves me very much preordered it for me. I've only recently discovered this band via NPR, but oh, how I love them. The album was on repeat nearly all of yesterday. Here are two tracks for you to sample:

ANIMAL LIFE  

BREAKING THE YEARLING  

Very soon after receiving this musical delight, I visited my local coffee haunt and was treated to this peach of a latte (a-ha ha ha) by our regular barista. He says he didn't do it on purpose, but I prefer to think he's just this talented.

And finally, a little bit later in the day I got something I've been anticipating for weeks and weeks, which will make my hours of staring at the screen much more comfortable...

 And with that, away I go, back to work so I can get back to work.

Rules are over-rated (mostly)

Anytime you try a new recipe or pattern or piece of music, the rule is the same: stick to the words on the page. The general wisdom is that you may want to change things the next time through, but on your maiden voyage, you DO NOT DEVIATE unless you want DISASTEROUS THINGS TO HAPPEN.

I’m really bad with rules.

Not the big ones. I’m good with stoplights and airport security. But when it comes to creative endeavors, I always, always deviate from the plan. I have an inability to trust that the person who put the pattern or recipe together, or who made interpretive changes to the sheet of music I’m about to try knew what they were doing. Or, maybe they knew what they were doing, but they didn’t know me. So, instead of following these things to a T, I look them over a few times, hold the idea of the thing in my head, and trundle forth into some state of semi-disaster or moderate success.

I make changes to and substitutions in recipes. I only refer to a pattern if I can no longer see through my tears. And I don’t have time to worry about crescendos and perfect trills in music.

Of course, it’s never perfect the first time through, because that’s when I’m learning. Perfection only gets in the way.

Turns out, I write the same way I do all of these other things. The difference in writing is that I have to make up the pattern I intend to deviate from. You might think that this means I’m more likely to stick to it, but that’s just not true. Apparently, I don’t trust myself to know the ins and outs of a story any more than I trust the folks at Vogue to know what I need in a jacket pattern (my shoulders are not Vogue shoulders).

At one point, I was afraid that writing multiple drafts of the same story meant I was doing it wrong. Friends shudder every time I tell them I’ve started over or that I’ve tossed another 20k into the “bits and bobs” file. But I think I’m going to start using different words for this process. I think it might be better to say that I’ve started again and that drafts are rehearsals for the real thing.

It’s good to have a plan or a guide or an outline. I like having the shape of the thing in mind before I begin, but I also like taking off into the unknown. It’s in the telling of it that the story is born. At least, that’s true for me.

So! It’s the New Year and that sounds like a fine time to pick up a new project. I’ve got two vying for dominance, both with very loud voices. I don’t know which to dive into first. So, if I were to tell you that one of these ideas looked like this….



And that the other looked like this...



Which would you vote for? Tryptic 1 or 2?

***
All photos found via Flickr Creative Commons.

Two Plunges: Tumblr & Guest Posts

I've resisted Tumblr for a long while. The same way I resisted Twitter until everyone in the known universe had an account except for me (there may be exceptions to this; please, allow me my hyperbole). But the time has come. A name too perfect to pass up arose from an exchange between Tessa and myself and therefore, my Tumblr was born. Once something has a name, it exists, you know.

If you're curious to see what I'll Tumble (and believe me, I am), you can find me here: Obviously Parker.

The other new experience was a guest post that went up about a week ago over at the Adventures in YA & Children's Publishing blog.  This is a fantastic blog, run by people engaged with the publishing work at every level. It is full of excellent resources and advice for writers. In addition every month, they run a workshop on the 1st 5 pages of works in progress. This is one of the best (not to mention generous!) ongoing workshop offers I've seen. Find more details by clicking here.

My guest post is here: The Anatomy of a Good Hook. In which, I use fishing hooks to talk about writing.

Hope you're all off to a grand start this 2012!

Queries and Cappuccinos

There's something about winter that makes a cappuccino at any hour of the day sound like a good idea. (Okay, in all honesty, there's also something about any month ending in y that makes cappuccinos sound good, but that's beside the point. Winter is the point.) I find winter drinks irresistibly cozy. Triple-y so if I'm traveling. Which means that I've spent most of December Highly Caffeinated. Also, at zero risk for developing a calcium deficiency anytime soon. This is a good thing as I've also spent a good portion of December doing revisions and critiquing three full manuscripts.

(As an aside, I found the most amazing cappuccino I've ever tasted/seen while in Merida, Mexico. DO YOU SEE THE FOAM? HAVE YOU EVER SEEN ANYTHING SO DIVINE? There was no other way to drink this than to sacrifice all dignity and give yourself over to a cinnamon face-plant. I, for one, didn't hesitate to toss my dignity out the front door.)

I'm approximately seven cappuccinos away from finishing this round of revision. It's timely, I think, to be wrapping up at the new year. I've seen a number of people in the writing community doing similar things like brushing up queries and pitches and since I probably didn't get you anything for the holidays, I'm going to give away a few query crits. This isn't totally selfless. I'll treat myself to one cappuccino per query I crit, so really, I'm enabling myself to stay caffeinated.

Okay! So! Have a query? Want my eyes? Here are the rules:

1.  Your query should look like a cappuccino! By which I mean, in the subject line of your email to nataliecparker AT gmail DOT com, please include: CAPPUCCINO QUERY!  
2. Your query should taste like a cappuccino! By which I mean, it should include the component pieces of any query: the intro, the pitch, the closing remarks. It should be polished and pretty!
3. Your query should smell like a cappuccino! ... /metaphor Please copy and paste your query into the body of your email. No attachements. 

That's it. First five emails to hit my inbox get my eyes. 

Happy winter, everyone. I hope you'll treat yourself to a cappuccino (or bubble tea.....I don't really know what tea drinkers do for a treat) and feel a little extra cozy.    

UPDATE - I've got my 5 queries, so this offer is closed. Give me another few months, though, and there'll be another.

November round-up

November certainly has a way of skating out from under me. Everything happens at this time of year. Elections, pumpkin pies, 65% of the people in my life were born in November (including myself), and 82% of the people I know give themselves over to novel-writing fury! It's a wonderfully creative month and I can't love it enough. And then it's gone. *dramatic sigh*

I spent my November tagging along with the NaNo folks, finishing a re-draft of a novel I already loved and needed to love more. Now that it's in the hands of my terribly clever crit partner, I'm reading for several other people and letting myself enjoy the energy of a new idea.

For anyone wondering how my month of no sugar went, I am happy to report it was a complete success. No particulars here, but I am extremely pleased with the experiment. Not only do I feel better now than I did at the beginning (both physically and emotionally), but I came away from it with a much better understanding of how sneaky sugars can be. Seriously, refined and cane sugars are pervasive. It's disturbing, but not insurmountable. To anyone struggling with feeling happy in their bodies, I cannot recommend this experiment enough. More details are in the post I linked to above.

Next week, I'll be off on another day-job adventure. This time we're heading south to the Yucatan Peninsula for 10 days where we'll explore ancient Mayan ruins and tromp through mangrove forests. I'll report as I go, but I've been told that the mangrove forests are the one place on earth anyone recommends wearing 100% DEET.

O_O

Also, I need scuba booties.

I say again, O_O.

Even so, I'm excited. These trips have a way of being utterly amazing (see tag: I love my job for more trips!). These trips also have a way of making me thankful when we return with the same number of people we departed with...

And in other completely unrelated news, I'm still struggling with the idea of mirroring my blog on another platform given LJ's consistent hankiness. I've worked with Blogger before, but didn't fall in love. So, I'm considering WordPress. Anyone have any thoughts about this? Strong opinions welcome.

I am not Harry Potter. (And neither are you.)

This post is about critique and even though I’m going to talk about writing, I don’t think it applies exclusively to writing/writers. Crit is something we all do every single day whether we’re deciding what to wear or deciding where to go for lunch, what to watch on TV, which book to read, what brand of toilet paper to buy. It all comes back to having a critical sense about such things. But I’m going to frame this all around writing because that’s what I’m embroiled in. I’m also going to use Harry Potter, because he's adorable.

I’ve given out a metric ton of crit recently and I’ve received a fair bit as well, so it’s been on my mind. I like to think that I’ve gotten pretty good at delivering critical thoughts in a way that won’t leave someone gnashing their teeth and wailing to the sky, so I’m going to share one key element that I think comes pretty close to being a good and general rule (much as I hate to use the r-word) of critique. Ready for it? Here goes:

It has nothing to do with you.

No, really. The story you’re getting ready to critique? It has nothing to do with you. Absolutely, one hundred and ten percent of nothing to do with you or your life.

It’s easy to forget this. As a reader, we try to connect with characters and situations. We imagine what it would be like to be relegated to life in the cupboard under the stairs as a child, or receiving a prestigious and mysterious invitation to a new school. At the very least, we try to understand how these things could be possible and marvel at the world being built before our eyes. And if we disagree with Harry, we try to understand his motivations. We try to understand why a boy would stay in a home where he was stashed away like a dirty mop.

As a critiquer (critter? critiquest?), our strategy changes. We’re looking at a story with an eye to helping the author shape and polish it until it’s as refined as the Hope Diamond! And this is where the potential for less than stellar crit comes in because this is where the tendency to react like a reader who identifies with a character gets in the way.

So here’s the thing, good critique has nothing to do with how much you do or don’t identify with the character on the page. Good critique has everything to do with how believable you find the character on the page.

Shall I illustrate?

Back to Harry tucked away in the cupboard under the stairs. You didn’t ask, but I’m going to tell you, I would NEVER let ANYone stuff me in a small room with spiders and water heaters and a creepy, creaky ceiling. I don’t care if they are related to me, if that had ever happened to me, you bet your sweet tush I’d have blown out the pilot light on that heater, hidden five cans of open tuna beneath the sofa, and hightailed it to anywhere but there. I would have made such a ruckus with the neighbors that the Dursley’s would have been shamed into giving me a proper room and I would have found some friends with moms willing to give me a hot meal once or twice a week. In short, you would never find me in such dire straights as Harry Potter was in at the start of book one.

…

Do you care?

(Pssst – the answer is no.)

Right, you don’t care because what I would or wouldn’t do doesn’t have the first thing to do with what Harry would or wouldn’t do. Much as it may surprise you, I am not Harry Potter.

Neither are you.

I know, I know, it sucks. Get over it.

You’re not Harry Potter. You’re not Bella Swan. You’re not Katniss Everdeen. But you believe these characters on the page. So the question is why?

I’ve seen more than a little crit based solely around the “I” of the reader. And I think the reaction of the reader can absolutely have bearing on the believability of the character, but critique isn’t a matter of pointing to something and saying “I don’t believe this because I would never do that.” Critique, actual critique, is following that impulse through to the "why."

What does that mean? It means we're going back to Harry under the stairs. If JK were to ask me for crit on the very beginning of the first book (this isn’t a call I expect, by the way), I wouldn’t do it by putting myself in Harry’s shoes. If I want to be worth my salt in crit, I would think super, super hard about why I reacted the way I did to that scene. I might instead tell her that reading that passage left me wondering about the resources available to Harry outside of the home (of course, I might also concede that my heart was bleeding for Harry so this is really a small issue). I might point to something about the Dursleys that made them appear too sympathetic. Or I might simply say that the tone was too dry, too precious, or too fill-in-the-blank.

There is a place for the “I” in critique. It’s all one person’s opinion, afterall. But it doesn’t belong in the story.

So that story you’re getting ready to crit? Remember this: You are not Harry Potter.

How Writing a Good Hook is like Running a Good Con

Recently, I've been watching the show Leverage, and because I have also recently read the first 5 thousand words of 59 separate novels, I've been thinking about what makes a good hook. There were a few that had me by the first line, others that had me by the end of the first paragraph, and still others that didn't really have me until the end of the first chapter.

Was one more "right" than the other? I don't think so. They all accomplished the same thing, which was to keep my attention well enough that the urge to continue reading was irresistible. So, what is the secret to writing the perfect hook?

The short answer is easy: there is none.

There is no single thing that ensures your hook will be a good one. There are no hard and fast rules to depend on because it's the execution of the thing that gives it an edge. A good hook is good because it does something (maybe a lot of somethings) really well and defies the reader to look away.

The longer answer isn't so easy, which is why I'm leaning on Leverage (oh, how soon the bad jokes begin...) to help me out.

For the purposes of this metaphor, the writer is the con-artist and the novel is the con and the reader is, you guessed it, about to get conned.

As anyone who watches Leverage knows, a good con begins before any interaction between the con-artist and the con-ee, which is to say, the con begins before the reader ever sees the first line of the novel. This is the exciting time when the reader is looking forward to something sweet or exciting or intense. They want to get something out of the time they're about to commit to reading, in essence, this makes them an Easy Mark. The con begins when the reader decides to do what they love - read.

Enter the Grifter aka The Oh-so-important First Line
The Grifter comes in with a smile and lovely perfume and says, "I want to show you something... it's a secret. But I can tell by that stack of books behind you that you're the kind of person I can trust. Won't you take a peek?"

Like the Grifter, the first line makes a promise to the reader about what's to come. This is the time for you to bait the hook, to whet the appetite of the reader, and to show them that there is something here worth sticking around for. It's an offering, a hint, and a tease all at once. A delicate balance of information and mystery! And they are worth working hard on because they are what will get your reader to invest - time, effort, energy and imagination - into your story.

And this is where things start to get real.

Enter the Hacker aka Building Your World
You never see the Hacker. He's behind the scenes, pulling strings and staying two steps ahead. He's the guy opening doors and building bridges from disbelief to belief. He's the guy who says, "I'm gonna rock your world and you'll never even know my name."

Yeah. He's cocky like that.

These are the lines that immediately follow the first. This is the time to follow the promise and the tease of that first line with something more concrete. The set is built around the reader and it's the Hacker's job to make them think it's as real the world they live in. Be convincing because this is the backbone of the trap. If they can see where the Hacker has fallen down on the job (leaving gaps in your world-building), they're less likely to trust the story before them. So, ground the reader completely because it's time to steal their hearts.

Enter the Thief aka the Prancing Princess of Plot
Using groundwork laid by the Hacker, the Thief makes the promise of the first line come to life before your eyes. She really works in concert with the Hacker, but she gets her own section because I'm forcing an inorganic metaphor onto an organic process. In reality, this is all extremely messy and entangled, but I like the illusion of order.

So! The Thief weaves a trap as the reader moves deeper into the story, she moves quickly and quietly so that even if they catch a glimpse of her, they didn't realize what she was up to. She does the impossible and says, "It really wasn't impossible. See?" She defies expectation! She balances upside down, on one hand, while breaking into a vault! She leaves little pieces of plot around and thanks to the work of the Hacker, they tantalize and excite because they are not what we expected to find. Exciting!

But what now? Why should the reader care?

Enter the Hitter aka The Stakes
The Hitter doesn't smile. He doesn't apologize for who he is and he doesn't wear pink. In fact, the Hitter doesn't even speak. Frankly, he'd rather punch you in the gut.

This is the guy that convinces the reader that the con isn't fooling around. This is a story that means business and it's not the sort you wanna look away from. This is the time to show the reader what it is about this story that matters. They've already got the set-up, now it's time to introduce the stakes. The Hitter doesn't back down, he bumps everything up a notch until we have urgency! Tension! A reader who is eager and (if the Hitter has his way) even a little terrified.

And so...

Enter the Mastermind aka The Final Note
With all the work that's come before, there seems little left for the Mastermind to do. But his is the crucial moment. The very end of that first chapter, the fulfillment of the promise dropped by the Grifter, the realization of the work done by the Hacker, the Thief, and the Hitter. The Mastermind tracks all of these things and delivers the final note. He sweeps in at the end with a devilish and satisfied grin and says, "Right this way." Because if he and his team have done their work well, then the reader will be helpless. They will thank the Mastermind and move right along to chapter two as if it was their intention all along.

So there you have it. My round about way of saying that all writers are con artists.

(And also that I love Leverage.)

The Leaning Tower of Critique-a

Remember the time I gave a very public demonstration of my tendency to leap before looking? That would be this post in which I made an open offer of crit to the world at large. Very soon after I put that post up, five g-chat windows opened looking a little like this:

Window 1: ARE YOU CRAZY?

Window 2: YOU ARE CRAZY.

Window 3: Put a cap on it or TAKE IT DOWN!

Window 4: omgomgomgomgomgomgOOOOOOMG

Window 5: O_O

To which I responded, "Oh, pshhhh, you're over-reacting. It will be fine." Because I didn't really think I could possibly get more than 20 or 30. . .  I wasn't just wrong, I was VERY wrong. And I soon decided the best course of action (for my sanity) was not to think about it all in terms of numbers, but to simply move through them as systematically as possible.

It took me a little longer than I thought, but my reading time was punctuated by having previously agreed to 3 full manuscript crits, one busy trip to New Orleans for ALA, and one trip to Minneapolis where I joined Tessa, Maggie, and her husband for a short leg of their tour during which I was made to sleep below the water line in an old tug boat where alligators scratched at the hull by my ear all night long. What? You think there are no alligators in Minneapolis? I think you're wrong! 

But that's neither here nor there, I want to talk about numbers. The stone cold stats of my recent insanity.

Ready? Go!

Total number of 5k submissions received: 59 (which I think should be spelled fifty-FREAKING-nine)

The fruit breakdown: 

Coconuts: 39 (SO MANY COCONUTS!)
Applenuts: 3 (yes, 3 separate people created a new category to break my brain)
Apples: 12
Peaches: 5

Number of characters named Lily: 13 

First crit sent out on 6/14
Last crits sent out on 7/30

Words read: 295,000
Total word count on 59 crit letters: 62,208 <- I feel like I should point out, that is a NOVEL. O_O

Now that I'm done, they're sort of gratifying to see. I don't really want to jump in and repeat the activity anytime soon, but I did learn a lot by doing this and perhaps more importantly, I got to meet a lot of talented writers I might not have otherwise. So, a big thank you to everyone who was brave enough to send me their work! Thinking through your stories has been both immensely enjoyable and immensely helpful and I'm grateful to every one of you!  

And now, I will buckle down and do nothing but write my fingers silly for the next several months.  

This is the post...

. . .wherein I get to use phrases like "represented by" and "my agent." Were technology a little further along, this would also be the post from which I could shower you with confetti.

I am pleased as pudding, pie and posies to announce that I am now represented by Sarah Davies at The Greenhouse Literary Agency.

(!!!!!!!!!!!!! <-my excitement defies words) On the evening of May 15, 2011, I sent out the first queries I've sent since my senior year of high school. It was exciting and terrifying and I soon had a happy handful of requests for my manuscript. My manuscript! Things happened much faster than I ever could have hoped for and I won't go into all the details here. Instead I will skip to the part where I sign my agency agreement with an impish grin and thematic nail polish. --->

So! I am celebrating this moment. Would you like to know how? Yes, I think you would. I'm celebrating by making a potentially reckless offer that is open to anyone.

*ahem*

In celebration of being able to say the words "my agent is" I am giving away critique like it's the end of the world! This is not a contest, this is a public demonstration of my tendency to leap first and learn how to fly on the way down. Call me Icarus, with superglue.

Here's how it works.

• You send me the first 5k of your wip (I don't care if it is a complete draft or not) in an email to nataliecparker AT gmail DOT com (attached as a word doc) with the subject line: CALL ME ICARUS: title of your wip here.
• In the body of that email, please give me the following information: your name, your genre and your sensitivity level based on my newly crafted scale of fruits! See below:

I AM A PEACH - I am delicate. Look at me sideways and I'll bruise. Please be gentle and kind.
I AM AN APPLE - I've been around the block. It takes a little effort to hurt me, but it can be done. Pull your strongest punches, please.
I AM A COCONUT - I am a fortress. Bring it on.

• Cut off date is Friday, June 17th at midnight.

I will read and crit in the order in which these arrive and work as quickly as possible. That's it! Anyone and everyone is welcome because I am crazy excited!

And since it bears repeating - My agent is Sarah Davies!

For the love of Gothic!

(Quick note - several of you are waiting for an announcement. This is not that post. This is a cryptic and teaser-riddled note to indicate that there is announcement to come, but I am not ready for the reveal. This is a note to remind you that I am 32 - 77% evil on any given day.)

In the past week, I have gone to see the recent Jane Eyre movie twice. I don't remember the last movie I saw twice in the theatre. It really is that good and if you haven't already gone, I recommend you find it and drive great distances to see it.

Jane Eyre is one of the few gothic novels I haven't actually read. This is a rather blatant and embarrassing hole in my gothic education, but I've always avoided it because one of the previous film adaptations made me shudder in the bad way. This is a Very Bad Reason to avoid a book, I know, but for some reason, it left me with a sense of over-whelming helplessness and women submitting to bad men because they had no other choices.

I'm going to back track to remind you that I *love* (love, love, love) gothic novels. I found them during my undergraduate years, when I was living in England and discovering that the North is just as dreary and weather-worn as Washington state, but in a more quiet way. I started (as so many of us gothic lovers do) with Horace Walppole's The Castle of Otranto and moved quickly onto the work of Anne Radcliffe, Matthew Lewis, Mary Shelley, John Poliodori. By the time I was through, Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey had me laughing out loud.

This addiction carried through to my graduate years. I wrote my MA thesis on the use of gothic conventions in contemporary women's fiction and gave myself an excuse to read a lot of fiction in the course of getting a degree.

But there was no Jane Eyre. There will be now, because if this movie is any indication, I have short-changed myself and this book because ho-leeeeee cowbells. How many things are there to love about this movie? Too many. But I'm going to give you my top three.

1 - It's all so clear! It's in the atmosphere!
Moors! Distant horizons! Castles! Storms! Darkness and light! Fire and night! Secret rooms! Every scene is framed to communicate something about Jane's interior process. If she feels lost and small and hurt and alone, the landscape is unending and wild and ignorant of her presence. If she feels hopeful or happy, the scenes are closer, warmer, intimate.

2 - Not just natural, but SUPERnatural.
This was subtle, but pervasive. A constant undercurrent through Jane's life. Spirits! Ghosts! Connections that cross the moors! I loved this. It's not always so subtle in gothic novels (helloooooo, Castle of Otranto!), but this was just this quiet piece of tension tucked into the darkest corners of Jane's life.

3 - O.M.G. Rochester. O.M.G.
Let's just all agree that Michael Fassbender is beyond brilliant and leave it at that. My point about Mr. Rochester isn't really about Michael, but about how the film showed us how gothic HIS existence is, how entrapped HE is, how he finds his only option is to try and live two separate lives, how one of those lives is being buried alive by circumstances beyond his control. Oh! But this is so beautifully done. It might actually be my favorite thing about this film.

So, now that I've made myself all swoony again, I'm just going to leave it at this - SEE THIS FILM. Now, excuse me, while I go read this book.