Fighting For Your Dreams

 Yesterday my very practical sister asked me, “How could you give up your dream?”  While her query had nothing to do with writing, it made me start thinking about my work and my publishing goals and whether I was forgetting them or letting them get away from me. 

 Since I was fresh from a writing retreat, had recently attended another small conference and on the way to yet a third, her words struck a chord.  My immediate response was, “I haven’t let them get away. The dream is still there.”  And they are.  Then she added, “Dreams don’t come true if you don’t take steps to make them happen.” 

 And she was right. Writing dreams will not come true without taking action to turn them into reality.  I began to think about what I needed to do to get back on track and to stay there.  Ever the list maker, I began thinking of simple ways to get myself going and to keep on.  Here are a few thoughts:

 1.  Plan: Make a writing plan and stick to it.  At one of the recent conferences I attended, I asked a multi-published author where she got her ideas.  Her response surprised me.

“It’s not finding ideas that slows me down. It’s finding the time to write.”  She followed up with the advice to make time to write everyday, no matter how busy things get.  Another multi-published author said she gave up television for two years and forced herself to write a few words every day.  My goal is to make writing a daily habit.

 2.  Plot: Know where you want to go in your career, and plot a course in that direction.  Decide what you want to write, and then research publishers and agents.  It makes no sense to waste time submitting to houses that don’t handle your brand of writing.  Getting a response takes long enough as it is.  Not long ago I heard several agents say they look for writers who aren’t experimenting with different genres.  They want to build a writer’s career, and they want to work with a writer who has already figured out her/his strong points.  

 3.  Promote: Don’t be afraid to promote yourself and your work.  Writing is a lonely endeavor, and most writers are notoriously bad at promoting themselves.  But how else will you get your name out there to fans, to booksellers, to editors and agents?  Find groups or people with similar interests that you can talk to.  For years I coached young writers and taught on a one-to-one basis.  Now I find that there are insights I have that I can use to teach to others, and I have begun teaching classes to groups.  

 4.  Pitch:  Don’t underestimate the power of a good pitch.  Be ready to query and submit.  I’ve known writers, who have finished several works, and they are good writers, but they are afraid to put their book out in front of everyone.  At the same time, I met a young woman recently who had finished one book, and she was ready to tell the world about it.  Something tells me she will probably be more successful than the writer who keeps her work hidden away.

 5.  Persevere.  Hang in there and don’t give up.  This last point really hits home for me.  Yes, I have been writing for 20+ years.  I’ve told this story over and over, but the one thing that always gets me is that 20 years ago I gave up.  I stopped trying to get published and went in a different direction.  I never stopped writing, though, and I always kept that little dream in the back of my head. 

 Well now, I’m not going to let go again.  Seven years ago I made myself a new promise that I was going to get published, and it has happened for me, even though it’s happened in a small way.  Now I intend to keep going.

 As long as I have that dream, and my practical tips, well, the sky’s the limit… 

Going Beyond the Writer’s Eye

At the beginning of the year, as I was making up my list of writing resolutions for the upcoming year, I ran across email from writer who suggested using "the writer's eye" to view the world as one way to improve writing skills.

The suggestion got me to thinking and the more I thought about it, the more I realized it wasn't enough to simply use your eyes as a writer.  A better way to phrase that idea would be to view the world through all of a writer's senses.

As a journalist, I always stood back and viewed a situation as simply facts, figures and how an event might impact people.  As a fiction writer, I have to step into that world and see things from a much more meaningful angle.  And yet, my training as a journalist has made the writer in me much stronger because it has honed my ability to absorb and dissect what I’m seeing, hearing and sensing.
 

I look at the journalist’s role in me as being that of a tape recorder--taking things in and recording them as they occur. Then later, the writer plays them back, but in a much more rich and embellished way.

That means looking at everything around me, feeling the energy of the moment almost every day and taking in as much as possible, recording it as a journalist, but then playing it back as a writer at my own leisure.  As such, I am making time to pause for a few minutes at various moments during normal days to reflect on the world around me.

I find myself watching the distinctive gray of a winter day, but I don't simply see the murky gray dawn, I make myself feel it—record it through my senses for use later in a book or short story—the chilliness nips at the nose as I step outside on a frosty morning, the hint of rose tinged clouds on the eastern horizon.   I let myself absorb the cold, feel it in my fingertips, let the wind bite my cheeks. It might be just an ordinary day, but if I can take the time, just a few minutes to record everything about that moment in time, I can use it later from memory, just when I need it.

I find myself doing the same thing in a busy coffee shop—mentally recording everything around me using as many of my senses as possible to be used later: the hum of conversation, the scent of coffee and cinnamon; the strong taste of the coffee, the cold blast of winter every time the outer door opens, the sting on my hand when I spill my hot coffee.  I watch the people around me in case I need to describe a gesture later or think about how to put life into an otherwise dull scene by describing the antics of a two year old rushing from one end of the coffee shop to another, making a number of people nearly spill their lattes before her mother grasps her hand and locks her into a stroller. There’s the student in the corner in a knit hat and bulky sweater, tapping frantically at a keyboard, while taking sips from their tall cup of coffee. I catch snatches of the conversation of a business man on his cell phone, setting up his day with someone already at work.

At a meeting that is growing boring, I don’t simply tune out and think about what I should be doing. Instead, I begin thinking about how I would characterize the carefully dressed woman with the out-of-date hairdo in the third row, or looking out through the windows and thinking about how to visually express the scene outside. I even think about how to correctly describe the droning tone of the speaker.

These are small examples of a normal day, but that’s part of the point.  If you can apply your senses to wherever you are, even for a few moments, and if you either write up the scene later or recall as much as you can as an exercise, it’s going to sharpen your skills as a writer.

Absorbing the world around you on a regular basis can enliven your writing.  I like to think of it as soaking up the ambience of wherever I am, and I’ve always made a practice of doing that any time I visit a new place or find myself in an unusual location or situation. But now I am working on doing it as part of my daily routine. 

If you’ve worked at sharpening your senses on a regular basis, then when you visit that mansion you want to use in your historical, or when  you are personally caught in the middle of a scene you want to use later in book, you’re senses will be sharp and ready to react and you’ll be ready later when you put it all down on paper.

Dealing with the Rejection Demons

We all get them – rejections. I’ve heard Stephen King received hundreds of them.  Recently I received a whole fistful. Sometimes I feel like they’re little demons, giggling in my ear. When I receive four or five in a day, they become monsters, growling over my head.

I don’t know about you, but I keep all my rejections in several folders. (yes they are almost all full).  Every so often I go back and re-read some of them.  Why didn’t that editor love that story?  What does she mean there’s no sexual chemistry?  Need to pick up the pace?  Too much set up?   AAHH.  It goes on and on.

But wait.  When I go back through and read that manuscript, maybe the editor was right.  Maybe I did spend a page describing the setting instead of moving the story along.  Okay, so I’m forcing the chemistry between the two, but I was in a rush to edit this and get it out the door.  And this is a romantic suspense.  The pace should be quick.  Oh, all, right, the editors made some valid points in those rejections.

Okay, what is my point?  Maybe this is a good time to go back through those rejection letters you’ve received. Look for the value in them. That sounds like a hard lesson, but I find every time I re-read an old rejection (except for the form letters) I learn something.

Let me tell you about one thing that really woke me up.  Twenty years ago (yes, it was that long ago) I decided I wanted to be a romance writer.  I joined RWA, which was just in its beginnings; I even attended some of the first conferences.  And I sent in my submissions on my brand new Selectric typewriter—my first big writing expense.

And I got rejected then, too.  And discouraged.  After about five of those, I gave up.

I stopped sending in my queries. Stopped going to conferences, dropped my membership in RWA.  No more rejections came in the mail.

But a funny thing happened.  My writing never stopped.  I continued that.  Years went by and I was writing and enjoying it, but there was something lacking. So what if there were typos, or if the story went nowhere. I kept writing. But I still wanted more.

One day, while cleaning out my old file cabinet for one of my many moves, I ran across those old rejection letters.  What was this?  Buried below the paragraph rejecting my full manuscript was the sentence This doesn’t work for us, but please feel free to send future projects.   I don’t remember reading that back then, only seeing the rejection.  Another letter asked for a revision of my work—which I never sent. Yet another letter said Your story has merit. We’d be interested in seeing more.  What was I expecting, to sell on just that proposal?  Why didn’t I ever finish that and send it?  It was that first rejection—too painful to get over that quickly. Maybe I feared another rejection with the new manuscript.

It took years to get over that, but finally I realized I still wanted my work published. It wasn’t doing anyone any  good piling up in folders on my shelves or on computer disks. I began studying the markets again—and discovered things had changed a lot in the twenty years I was away.  I felt like I was starting all over, but I took a deep breath and began sending out my query letters and proposals.

Now the rejections have started to arrive again.  But this time I’m not giving up. I’m using my rejections, looking for nuggets that can help me improve my writing. I’m taking the editors’ advice--picking up that pacing. Moving that story along. Working on improving that sexual chemistry.

One more thing. All those file folder of  rejections? They’re proof that I refuse to give up.  

And that’s what I tell those demons when they’re giggling in my ear or growling at me.

“Hey, Let’s Hang Out”

Or Getting to Know your Characters Better

          This may sound like a nutty thing to do, but I’ve never been conventional—in fact I pride myself on that.  I’ve not only been inventing my own worlds in my books; I’ve been hanging out in my spare time with my characters. 

I’ll admit off the top that it’s difficult for me to write a romantic hero without absolutely falling in love with him on some scale.  He might make me furious, he might make me nuts, he always appeals to me physically, and he always leaves me for that other woman—the heroine—but I can’t help it.  He only becomes real in my mind when I find myself falling in love with the guy.

            How do I manage this? Well, there are a number of ways, but mainly I like to hang out with the guy.  Some times I go out with him and he becomes real to me as I’m sitting across the table from him, sipping champagne or a big frosty mug of beer. Or maybe he’s the type who prefers coffee or even herbal tea. At some point I have to imagine what it would be like to share a meal, an evening, a fun outing, a weekend or a vacation with the man who is larger than life in my work. Sometimes I go to work with him and we’re partners or I’m competing with him. No matter what, I need to know what goes on in that sexy skull before I can get him to commit to share the pages of my books.

           So what am I trying to say?  It takes a lot to get to know your characters, and in order to get that man—or woman—across to your readers you need to know him or her. What I’m talking about here doesn’t necessarily have to go onto the pages of your book. You simply need to spend that time with your character to get to know what makes them tick, in order to make them more human and to get your readers to feel as strongly about them as you do.

            While I might be falling in love with that man, I like to consider my heroines as my best friend, my sister, my mother or daughter.  In the same sense, they might make me want to strangle them one minute or lecture the next, but I want to feel that when they need me, I will be there for them.

How do I get to that point with my characters?  Like I said, I hang out with them.  I go for a gossipy lunch with my heroine and I always let her choose the spot.  Does she want a rundown hamburger spot? Are we dining in some posh location with the beach beyond the wide expanse of windows?  Or are we in her favorite ethnic spot on a crowded boulevard after a morning of eclectic shopping?

            I’ve heard it said that dining scenes have no place in an active novel, but that doesn’t mean I can’t hang out long enough to get to know who these people are.  Sometimes I spend a weekend with them.  I go for white water rafting trips and ask if my hero is just along for the ride or if he is leading the expedition. Wow, I can see him in his tight fitting spandex already.

            Maybe my heroine is leading the mountain biking expedition and she’s the one who knows how to start the campfires and set up the tent.  I’m not a camping fan, but I go along anyway and marvel at all she knows and how easily she does everything.

 Going back to that hero--there’s nothing like looking across that table from him and imagining what she sees when she looks into his eyes, lit by the candle light. I might banter with him as she would or try to get him to talk if he is the strong silent type.  I can look at how he dresses or I might even play buddy and take him on a shopping expedition.  Is he being dragged into the top men’s shops, or does he know the sales clerks by name and know all he needs to do is call and they will know what he wants.  Or maybe he’s content to visit the bargain racks at the local discount store.  I can tell from my date with him what he might be like.  And since I know my sister like my friend, I know what she’ll like about him and what will set her on edge.

            Sometimes I question him – not like an interview necessarily—but by hanging out with him, I know what he likes what he doesn’t like and what his buttons are. That way I can tell my friend, my sister, my heroine and she can push them all she wants.

 As for my heroine buddy, I do the same with her. I like to see where she shops, whether she likes to cook.  Do I have to pick up after her, or is she on top of everything.  Once I know all these things about her and after I go out on my dates with my hero, I’m ready to start putting them down on paper.

Coffee Shop Addict

It occurred to me yesterday when I saw my sister getting out of her car in the restaurant parking lot at the same time I did, that I have a problem.  I resented that she was on time.

I figured I had maybe ten minutes to sit alone at a table inside with my tattered orange notebook that has become my best friend for the past eight months.

I don’t know when it first started, this urge to write in restaurants and coffee shops, all in long hand, but it did.  I guess it was a morning I was sitting outside Starbucks last fall and an idea came to me about my current manuscript.  At the time I only had with me a small notebook.  It had been in my purse for months, useful only for writing lists and phone numbers, but  I pulled it out and scribbled frantically the scene that was playing in my head.  Before long I had lost sight of the cars racing down the nearby street.  I was in a bedroom with a ghost making harsh demands in my heroine’s dreams.  I’d needed a beginning for that book and it wouldn’t come while sitting at my computer.  That morning it arrived full force at that coffee shop.  I came out of my stupor about the same time she emerged from her ghostly dream and the scene was written.  It was all in long hand, but there it was. Once I was back at my computer and had transcribed those pages, the next scene flowed right along.

The next time I was stuck for an idea on a scene and my computer keyboard kept staring back at me with nothing happening, I took my notebook and found another Starbucks.  This time it was tougher to get down what I wanted, but I didn’t force myself, and I made another discovery.  The coffee shop didn’t work for simply composing scenes, I was able to use it to sharpen my writing skills as well.  I thought about writing exercises, the kind you read about in books, but don’t do at the time.  How about trying something descriptive?  I found myself writing down what I observed in the coffee shop, the people, their mannerisms, their clothes, the interior.  And then I jazzed it up with what their reactions might be if an armed gunman came into the place.  (Okay, I got carried away)  Or if my heroine was in the coffee shop and realized someone across the shop, trying to look inconspicuous, had also been standing outside her apartment when she got home the previous evening.  Or what if she thought she was being followed, but she didn’t know which one of those patrons might be after her?  You get the message.  After writing all that down I went home and wrote a scene with my heroine on the run and the fear even a simple stop for a latte could bring her.

After that I was hooked and with a couple more coffee shop visits, my little notebook was filled up.  I had to trade it in for a fatter notebook, big enough to be useful, but small enough so that it was always there, inside my purse.  And I branched out from coffee shops, realizing a solitary breakfast or lunch could be useful as creative tools as well.  I had lunch with my heroine asking her all those questions that need to be answered in order to get to know her.  What would she order, what would she wear, where would she want to eat?  What would she talk about?  And what would she think if our hero walked in and sat down at the booth behind us?  How would he look?  I wrote it all down, and even if I didn’t use the words verbatim, I felt like I was getting to know her.  It all translated to the keyboard later.

I had another revelation later.  I’d read an article on listening to speech and sitting at a coffee shop, I found myself listening to all the conversations around me, instead of tuning everything out.  Before you think I’m a nutty eavesdropper, waiting to overhear good gossip, I want to say it wasn’t what the people around me were saying as much as how they were saying it.  Quick sentences.  Questions at the end of sentences.  Rushed comments, halting answers.  Dialogue.  The way people speak.  It was all a revelation that I was able to put into practice.  Before long, I was writing down the dialogue I wanted for my characters.

This week someone on one of my many loops said she was having trouble with her motivation.  I knew how she felt.  Sometimes when I’m faced with deadlines and  having to go back to re-edit or re-write something I’d put away months ago, I don’t feel like writing either.  Now when that happens I grab my purse and head for a coffee shop or go out to lunch by myself.  I know that trusty notebook will be with me, though I’m ready to move on to a newer model now.  It may not be the answer for everyone, but it certainly works well for me.  Go ahead, get a little notebook and visit a coffee shop.  You might become an addict too.