Method to my Madness Monday: My Writing Season

Stephen King said that you should write a novel in a season.

Yeah, I get that.

You need to stay in that flow.

Up until now, I’ve written every novel in a period of about three months. The first two – Saved By the Music and The Girl Next Door ­– I wrote together in three months. (Not recommended – but good for a jolt to your writing process – akin to jumping into the ocean during winter.)

The thing is: when you’re feeling it, you’re feeling it. You have to go with it. The more you stop, the more time you have to waste getting started again. Warming up...and even remembering what the heck you were getting at when you walked away.

A sampling of my latest notes. (Scrivener doesn't work for me.)
Can you imagine trying to figure this out months or even years later?

If you stay away from your WIP for awhile, you have to figure out what points you already made, what you still have to work in...and you have to get to the heart of your purpose all over again.

This current novel is in its fifth year – but not really. I wrote what I thought was the novel five years ago – but it turned out to be the bones of the novel. It was the true grit of it – the deep emotion. But I had the structure all wrong – and I had to find a cohesive path for the character to feel all those emotions.


I  had to put some flesh on those bones - and pack some fat in between, too.

It took me the interim years to work up the nerve to do this. Piecing those bones together had been so painful!

As I’ve said before, this is my most ambitious endeavor timeline-wise. My other novels take place in a period of months. This novel has a forty year span. It’s almost as hard figuring out what to leave out as it is to write it.

So I took out the draft and I went over it and I rearranged and cut and added – and now I’m in the home stretch.

Finally, this draft, I’m writing my novel within a season.

 

Feels good!

And who am to contradict a master?

Read this book if you haven't.
You really can learn from a master - and his story of writing CARRIE is awesome!
Quite an inspiration!

Method to my Madness Monday: Hocus, Pocus, Where's Your Focus?

            What do I want to say about writing today?

            I think it’s the message I received in my Matchbox miracle: Focus.

            There’s so much going on in my life right now. As there is in yours. But we can’t wait for that “optimum” moment to write. It will never come!

            The best thing to do is to allow yourself five solid minutes. You’d be surprised what you can get done. Especially if you need to revise something. Carry a page of your manuscript in your pocket.

         If you’re standing on a line, if you’re waiting in a doctor’s office, if you’re sitting on a toilet...

pull out that paper and revise! Not only will you get something done – you’ll be proud & pumped up! And what does that lead to? More writing!!!

            I’ve done some powerful revisions waiting to order coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts.

 (I actually wrote much of my first two novels in Dunkin’ Donuts.)

            There are many opportunities to get some writing in during the day – if you allow for them. The thing you must do is focus on finding them. It’s like ideas. They’re everywhere. You just have to see them.

            Even if you have nothing to revise, just jot things down. A random sentence might lead to something. And if not – at least your brain is churning.

            You must keep those gears in motion, or they’ll get rusty.

            It’s not about the final product – it’s about state of mind, which ultimately leads to final product.

            And you’ll be in a good mood.

            That counts for a lot.

Method to my Madness Monday: Build Your Story/Build Your Barge

Building your story is like building a floating concert hall: neither one comes finished.

This is kind of what Aunt Olga's barge looked like when she bought it.

                This is the beginning of Saved by the Music, chapter two – when Willow (aka me) sees the interior of the barge her aunt wants to convert into a concert hall:

 

                Maybe the inside looked better.

                Aunt Agatha yanked open the thick metal door of the cabin.

                Any hopes I had were swept away in an explosion of dirt and dust. Particles went up my nose and down my throat, sending me into a coughing and sneezing fit.  “Sorry, Love. I’ll have to remember to clean up around this door,” Aunt Agatha said.

                Once the cloud and I cleared, I saw a cavern, big and dark and spooky. That’s all it was — one huge, bleak steel room, about the size of my school gym, with a regular sized door at either end, and gigantic sliding doors on each side. The walls, floor and ceiling were covered with grime. Piles of wood cluttered the room, plus other construction-type junk.

                “What do you think?” Aunt Agatha chirped, propping the door open with a crowbar. “Isn’t she a beaut?”

                I cleared my throat. “It’s not what I pictured.”

                She laughed. “What is?” She tweaked my nose. “You didn’t think the place came all finished, did you?”

            Your story doesn’t come all finished, either.

            Just as my aunt saw the potential in the dreary cavern, so must the writer see his completed work through the jumbled mess in his mind.

            Aunt Olga enjoyed restoring each piece of wood for the walls and the floor. She reveled in painting the roof. The whole project was a labor of love. And she was no spring chicken.

            So here’s a clue: If you don’t love the writing process – maybe you’re not a writer.

            Sure, there’s frustrating moments. Many.

            Soooooo many.

            “Oh my god,” you may scream, “I have to revise that #?!@!?# scene again?”

            But once you sit down and work on it, you’re happy. This is what you were meant to do! The fun is in the revision. In finding “le mot juste,” as Flaubert called it: The perfect word.

            If you don’t enjoy going over the same sentence seventeen times (bare minimum) to make sure it sings, you might want to reconsider your path.

            Go find something else that makes you heart sing – life is too short.

            But if you identify with these words, then go forth and write! Build your scenes, bird by bird (once again, I urge you to read Anne Lamott’s beautiful book.)

             You are the pig who built his house out of bricks, not straw or sticks.

You are taking the time to build the strongest story ever!!!

           

             Remember my aunt and her dark cavern.

            She believed she could build it into a concert hall.

             See the metaphor?

“Whether you think you can or whether you think you can’t, you’re right.”

-Henry Ford

If you'd like to read my novel Saved by the Music, here's the link for Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Saved-Music-Selene-Castrovilla/dp/1934813141/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322498010&sr=1-2

There's a lot going on in this cover, if you look closely. See the face, the music strings, the skyline, the water...and the barge?

Surrender: Step One in the Revision Process

            How do you write a story?

            Scene by scene.

            It’s kind of like laying bricks,

 until you have a sturdy house no wolf can blow down.

            I know this – I preach this.

            If you examine my novels, you will see I practice this.

            Why, then, have I had such a hard time doing this in my latest novel?

            I think it’s the time frame.

            My preceding novels take place over a short span of time. Months.

            My latest novel covers forty years.

            How can I write forty years scene by scene? What kind of epic will this be?

These are the questions which have immobilized me.

            Even now, when I’ve painstakingly created scenes for most of the first 100 pages (taking it bird by bird, as Anne Lamott advises) I somehow felt obliged to make a blanket statement of thought to introduce main character.

Read this book, if you haven't.

If you have, read it again.

            On Friday, I presented my opening to a panel of three agents at a literary conference at The New School. I really thought they’d like it.

            Here’s the very beginning:

            She loved them all, Luna realized.

            And why not?

            There lay in every man something to love – no matter how cold, brutal, unforgiving he could be. There was always a fragment. A trace. perhaps left from his youth, before the ice settled. Luna had honed in on the positive at once. Every time.

            Agent #1: “There’s no sense of place.” (Agents 2 & 3 nod.)

            Me, in my head: “You ninny! I’m introducing the character.”

            Me, out loud: “She’s in bed with a guy. I bring that in shortly.”

            Agent #1: “You need to bring in now. I want to see that man in her bed.” (Agents 2 & 3 nod.)

            Me, in my head: “Can’t you see that this writing is compelling? What reader wouldn’t want to read more? I’ve poured out my soul here! You can’t wait a page to see the guy laying there? Talk about needing instant gratification!”

            Me, out loud: “So you want me to set the scene first, then delve into the main character?”

            Agent #1: “Yes.” (Agents 2 & 3 nod.)

            I smiled and thanked them, but inside I was seething. Still, I wrote notes about what they’d said.

            And then, as I was going over my words for the umpteenth time, something strange happened.

            I decided to try in their way.

            It was this calming feeling.

            It was surrender.

            Not to the agents – but to the process.

            To the basic tenet of writing that requires scene by scene writing.

            I knew that, dang it all!

            And just like that, the idea came to me: What if Luna is talking to the guy while he’s sleeping?

            And I got excited.

            And I knew I had something.

            Here’s my new opening:

            Kneeling beside her bed, Luna gazed at M’s wrinkly eyelids. They looked like elephant skin, except they weren’t gray. “I love you,” she said.

            “Zzznmpfff...,” M snored.

            It was more of a response than he’d offered last night, when she told him the first time. He’d said nothing then – not even, “Thank you.”

            Wow! What a difference!

             I’m conveying the same information, but in a fun way readers can participate in.

            What was that thing they teach us in writing class?

            Oh yeah.

            Show, don’t tell.

            I knew that, too!

            There’s nothing like learning your lessons over and over. As you live, so shall you write.

            My fellow scribes, I urge you to surrender to revision.

            The sooner you do, the sooner you’ll find your peace with your story.