A Little Birdie Told Me...

I like to think, alot.  

As a writer, it has always served me well for developing my characters, but I have to be careful that my pension for thinking doesn't spill over into my character's head.

The error is easy to spot when monologues abound, but solving them has been a difficult challenge. My inner wordsmith and I go head to head, fighting over the necessity of such thoughts and their oh-so-many words. To combat this writing hiccup of mine, I now have a yellow sticky note that sits on the top of my computer. It reads...

IF IT'S WORTH SAVING, IT'S WORTH SAYING.

Consider it a new writing checkpoint that allows me to scrutinize my sentences and the direction they (and my novel)are going to take. The discovery is two fold.

1) IF IT'S WORTH SAVING... allows me to assess need. Does the reader need to know a set of details - a recollection, a memory, a thought, an impression - in the context of the story NOW? If the answer is YES, it stays. If NO, then the section gets cut and pasted to a TAKEOUT FILE for safekeeping. (Not having to hit the delete button makes my inner writer happy.)

2) IT'S WORTH SAYING...allows me to keep the focus on dialogue. I may hold character thoughts dear but the danger in a conversation of one is the halt in storyline; the action quickly runs flat or worse, off track. To remedy this, I go back to my question of need but with a twist. If the need is there for the reader, then I ask, "who needs to say these words?" I then do a bit of improv, letting different characters try the words on for size. Hearing them said in different voices and viewpoints helps me to see their worth - can they stand as dialogue and who, in the end, can serve them best? The beauty of this process is that paragraphs of thought quickly get trimmed down to a few key sentences. When the right mix of character and words are found, the transformation is immediately felt on the page. 

There will still be some words that do not bend to dialogue or other characters, that fight to remain a character's thoughts alone. That is okay because thoughts are more than just words -that is their worth. Challenge yourself to work with these inner voices and I am sure you will find a way to make them sing.

Do your characters like to get lost in their own heads?  How do you  keep the action still moving on the page?

What Muses Never Tell...

Much can be said about the suffering artist, but what about his muse?

Lady With Seven Stars, By Michelle Wiebe

MUSE RUSE

My muse, Penelope is a fickle sort,
she runs hot and cold when it comes to words.
When I sit down to write, Penelope knows how to disappear.
Writing is difficult this way. The room is too still,
the space small, the air dry, nothing breathes.
"Come outside," she whispers.
"It's raining."
"Yes, lucky you."

Penelope loves the rain. There is something about it
that makes her positively giddy. I go out with low expectations,
but once again, she surprises me.
As the rush of rain hits, it devours me
and leaves me speechless.
Penelope is pleased, she stretches her arms out to the sky and sings.
"Why are you so happy?" I ask.
But Penelope doesn't answer, she just shakes her head.
Sometimes, I wonder what Penelope was
before she met me. In a former life, I imagine her
as a blithe fish, or a pink swan, maybe even a mermaid
or a nightingale, but I never go there with her,
it is just another thing Penelope would never say.

One night I dreamed that Penelope revealed her truth to me.
She held my hand and pointed up to the night sky.
"There, you can always find me there."
I look up at a storm that rages overhead,
it is vicious as it is wide, but at it's core where Penelope points,
hovers a quiet space, it rests among the rapture like a tiny oasis.
It is one part ardent, two parts beautiful.

"Where are you now?"
Penelope feigns a smile. "I'm here, though somedays,
the feeling of a storm is just as real."
I look at Penelope but she doesn't look back.
"Am I the storm, Penelope?"
"No, it's just words," she says, "all these precious words."
When Penelope looks my way, her eyes are wet and sad.
She tries to smile, to laugh it off saying, "Wouldn't it be better to just hide away
amid the tiny, white spaces in between?"
Before I can answer, Penelope is swept away, gone.
I look up only to see the storm's eye glow back at me.

The next morning, the dream sits on the tip of my tongue.
I try to remember it, to write it down but my words feel inadequate.
No matter how much I write, I can't seem to describe the memory of
Penelope or the feeling she left behind.
It isn't until I am ready to give up, that a shifts occurs and I come to understand it,
the moment and all that Penelope never could say.
Sometimes, there just aren't any words left to give.

By Nancy Sima

Do you believe in muses? What do you think your muse would never admit to or say?

An Offer Of A Thousand Pardons and Tea



Photo Credit: Free Tea Party

You may wonder why it has been so long since I have last written.   

I can easily blame the holiday break. All it takes is one day off, or in my case, the whole month of December for my writing time to fall away. In the interval, I have indulged my fascination of all things English - books, film and yes, tea. It has idled away many hours and done nothing more to my writing than to affect the tone of this post...a thousand pardons.

The choice was entirely mine although now, I recognize how foolish I was to think I could escape my necessity for words. Writing may at times be difficult, but NOT WRITING so easily morphs into something much worse. A reminder that teeters about, always on the brink of one's attention. Such cruelty I know you alone would understand. We have commiserated well enough on the topic before so as not to feel lost in our thoughts and to rally one another foward. While I have always delighted in your company in this regard, I ask that we share no such words today.  

Talk breeds trouble for writers such as ourselves. When writers get to be talkers, our words fall into a hollow, doing little more than bounce about as echoes, speaking to no one.

"Writers must write what they wish to say, not speak" as our dear friend, Mr. Ernest Hemingway once said and so I write to you now to acknowledge our time apart these last few weeks and to bid my idle hours adieu. I return to writing where I am certain you will agree, my thoughts and words will find better uses there. 

Till then, I remain sincerely yours,

Calendar Gal

From My Desk To Yours...

I'm A Lucky Gal...

For Your Words of Encouragement and Writerly Advice

- THANKS -

You've All Been Swell!!

Stuck In Time

I've been feeling stuck lately. Writer's block? That would be the easy, go to answer if not for some compelling thoughts I've read by Martha Alderson aka The Plot Whisperer on the subject.

"If you find yourself plagued with writer's block, chances are you suffer a deeper malady - procrastination. If you find yourself putting off even starting to write, chances are your malady runs deeper still - perfectionism."

Her words linger as I continue to chart the structure of my novel. The process has brought up a lot of questions, for my characters, as well as for me. In taking time to answer them, I've been thinking about time, namely, how much time I spend writing?

I've never been one to sit and write for hours on end. A euphoric session that lasts a few hours will inevitably be lambasted by sessions of nothingness to boot. But in between these two extremes, I've found a comfort zone of about 1 1/2 hours. It's something to work with but to date, I have not produced a readable manuscript, something that I am willing to hand over and so I ask myself why?

My writing time has been a comfortable space, but has it been too comfortable that I haven't asked anything more from it?  Looking back over the years, I've accrued plenty of words but words alone are not enough to render a story complete. What is the difference that some writers can churn out a tale in one, two or three years time while another writer requires ten?

The bones of my story are currently posted on my wall. I imagine the work that follows to be an easy game of connect the dots until I spy something more glaring looking back at me. For all my hours of writing, my story still stands incomplete. In some cases, I have not written my story as much as I have written around the details of it. I can follow the lines till suddenly, the energy falters. Something stops me and I find myself willing to only circle the outer edges of some chapters. Is there such a thing as procrastination-in-motion, the equivalent to spinning one's wheels?

As I said, writer's block would bave been the easy, go to answer if not for the obvious tracks I leave behind. I know some circles aren't worth repeating but now, it seems even time begs for something more. 

Laurence Durrell said, "It takes a lot of energy and a lot of neurosis to write a novel. If you were really sensible,you'd do something else." Are you feeling sensible today?

Sing Me A Song David Gray

Some of my favorite storytellers are singer-songwriters though from a writer standpoint, I find theirs to be a more envious talent. They weave miniature tales, beautifully sparse and exact in feeling to the point that the work appears effortless. That they can sing as well, is really just another hit to the ribs.   

Still, there's something about a song that keeps me coming back. It always gives me more than a tune in my ears. It travels onward, reaching a place deep inside of me. Who can understand or explain it? Surely they must have felt the same thing in writing it, no? Then the shock of words when they admit another familiar tune. "I struggled to write this one...it didn't come together for a long time."  

Maybe we're not so different after all?

Are you inspired by music? Tell me, what song/artist/group unwinds something in you to write?

Hello, My Name Is...

Writers are an interesting bunch. Some of us will never admit to the title of "writer". Perhaps the fear that one day someone will call us out on it feels too great? Still others adopt a host of other tags to define themselves and all that they do on the page.  You know what I'm talking about.

Plotter, panster, left brainer, right brainer, tell me, what does your badge say? To be fair, my blogger occupation is currently listed as wordsmith.

We all hold up signs looking to connect with other like minds. There's a comfort in meeting people who think as we do, but wouldn't we do better to step outside of our boxes?

One can always make the argument that you learn as you go, but at some point you have to concede that your way is not always the best way. That was my thinking recently when I hit yet another snag with my revisions.

For all my pride of being a pantser, a right brain extraordinaire, I had to admit that I was feeling lost, disconnected from my protagonist. I was feeling the need for some structure that only thinking like a plotter could bring. It's not that I was incapable of such mapping detail, just that such a process was never mine or ever needed for me to write...until now.

Putting aside my manuscript, I started delving into some plot and structure books. Reading was my new comfort zone. Thankfully, it didn't take long before I hit gold with Martha Alderson's, "The Plot Whisperer" - a big thank you to Debbie for sharing Martha's You Tube Series! 

Martha knows writers. She speaks the lingo and knows all the excuses, hangups and reasons for which side of the brain fence we roam. She recognizes the divide but also takes some time to explain what we stand to lose when we write with only half a brain. Martha encourages writers to explore both sides of their mind, the analytical, detail oriented, language driven left as well as the intuitive, big picture, character and emotion driven right. It might not be easy for all but she makes a compelling argument that "balance serves a story well".

So now I am working on this dual system of writing and plotting my story. I've surrounded myself with plot planners, bubble diagrams and scene trackers. I've asked questions about dramatic action and considered my character's emotional development. All in all, I am moving forward once again and it feels good. The best part, my mind is full of ideas.

Plotter or Pantser? Yes and yes, but WRITER suits me best.


Have you bridged the gap between plotter and panster? What's the biggest writing challenge you've had to face?

Comic Relief for Writers

This MUTTS comic strip sits at the bottom of my computer. When the outside world feels heavy and gray it serves as a reminder for me to just keep writing.

What do you surround yourself with to stay inspired through the daily grind?

TED - A Name So Nice You Have To Say It Twice - TED!!

I heart TED, do you?

TED is the world stage for Ideas Worth Spreading, a conference that features some of the greatest minds in Technology, Entertainment and Design today. I LOVE their events, especially when authors take to the mic.

Here's a starred talk by "Eat, Pray, Love" author, Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity. She makes a thoughtful and entertaining argument for the use and misuse of genius. ENJOY!!

To learn more about TED, go to their website HERE

Is creativity the work of "a genius" or are you the genius of your own work?



In Between The Lines

Bryan Berg - House of Cards

These days the word "revisions" feels like a misnomer to me. That or maybe I am just doing it all wrong.

Yes, I am revising and shaping up my chapters but I am also adding to them, writing more and more in between the lines. (And I thought I was done with all the heavy writing in my first draft.)

The margins are all to blame. They stand there innocently enough, wanting to help. I cross out a few words here, a sentence there and rewrite in the wide open spaces. The trouble starts when I notice how a change of a few words can invoke a different tone for my character. Another side of them is revealed and it makes me want to go exploring. Streams of words follow, dialogues, new scenes, even whole chapters emerge. In the moment, it's all wonderful until I look back and realize that I am now somewhere else in my novel, in uncharted territory. Wonderful then turns into disconcerting.

These new words impact not only the current scene they enter but all the choices my main character makes from beginning to end. They challenge everything that stands in the first draft and take me to task for a better house of words. "Revision" is too simple a word for all the elaborate play they make inside my head. Truthfully I can't ignore it. I know it's what's needed but dang, if you could only see the view from where I stand.

Where have your revisions taken you? Did you find your way back to your story or did you find something else, for better or for worse, in between the lines?

Where You Begin...

Another thought on beginnings through the lens of photography.
Thanks to my friend Sara for sharing these lovely words of wisdom.

 "Regarding beginnings, I can only share with you my experiences as a photographer... sometimes it feels like you are always in the dark. I go out and shoot returning with nothing but a light tight film canister  (I know I'm dating myself in this digital age), head off to the darkroom and process the film, adding chemistry and time, again in the dark about what is actually captured on the film. It is not until I open the canister with trepidation always, because there are so many variables, did I get the right exposures, did I choose the right chemistry to bring out the best, did I agitate enough or not enough (which can destroy the film with uneven streaks). Once the development tank is open, you can only take a quick glance, as dust and finger prints are equally destructive. After the film is dry, you can begin to reverse the view from negative to positive. In the darkroom you can play with size and contrast too but it isn't until the very end of the process that the creative beginning actually occurs, because it is only when you put the image up on a wall that you can really step back and look. It is always a moment of surprise and often disappointment. But if there is the one image (in hundreds of attempts) that resonates, then the process begins and gives me something to build on."

Question: What do you find more challenging - writing a good beginning or a good ending? Could they be two sides of the same coin?