Adjustment Bureau

I last posted about being in the flow for Novel #3. I stand by that, but with a major adjustment.  I'd been talking about the state of publishing with writer and blog maven, Heather Kelly. She helped me see that print and e-books can be complimentary. Yes, I hope for traditional print publication of ROMEO, ROMEO. And yes, once the book is in the stores, Amazon etc, we can simultaneously offer shorter e-books about secondary characters from the novel. Two tracks.

Here's the adjustment... I'm focusing on e-books for five secondary characters. ROMEO, ROMEO itself is done, its arch finished, I'm not touching it. But it's so much fun to be hanging out with those characters again.

How do you guys deal with adjustments?

Got It

Finally got it – YA novel #3. (Novel 0, forever in a box, doesn't count.) The characters, plot & the premise have finally come together. 

Bobsledding is off-season, but this is how I feel, that the key elements have aligned, that the team for novel #3 is ready. Kinda a long time in coming. #3 is based on a screenplay from forever ago that I never produced. But it's narrated by a new guy, a character in LUCKY, novel #2.

And the premise is different. Mostly, it's fun. Which in the past I might have thought was superficial... but... Sometimes a good ride is just what we want. So #3 is out of the gate, a chapter a week. 

How about you guys, how's your novel-writing team?

(photo from winterolympics)

Squawker

So many voices. Those who believe in us, those who want us to write only what they want to read, those who encourage, those who squawk.

When I was a kid, seagulls meant beach vacations. How cool that I now live by the ocean and for the first waking minutes of most days I think I'm on vacation. Usually. Sometimes the squawking is ugly.

I'm wondering if that might be similar to the voices around our writing. How cool that people care enough to voice opinions about our work? How cool that we're not in this alone? So what if not everyone uses the words we'd like. Our job is to hear what they're trying to say and not how they're saying it. And to those other squawkers in our lives... the people who are difficult for whatever reasons? They're just a small part of the flock.

Thank you to all the voices. May we hear them as if we're beginning a beach vacation, open and full of possibility.

How to you deal with squawkers?

(photo from Royalty Free Stock photos)

The Best in Others

My intent was not to post again until September. But an unsolicited email arrived that blew me away...

...reading your writing lights a fire in me that few other writers have been able to kindle. I fear that I will lose a catalyst in my own life if you do not push yourself to get your novel and subsequent work out there.

And another...

I'm here for you to lean on about anything, and I'm fine if you don't lean on me.

No guilt, no judgment, just support. :)

What a gift to have friends like these.

I've been out of touch because of summer busy-ness, but want to say THANK YOU for over-the-top encouragement and unconditional support. 

We don't do this writing work alone. Thank you, for helping light the journey.

(photo from Aleksandar Maćašev's photo gallery)

Kindness

The original post title was Kindness of Strangers, but this kindness was from a friend, not a stranger, and there was no Blanche DuBois tragedy. The kindness is this... how cool to have friends who just let you be... who let you write on their terrace.

Thank you, Peggie. And here's to learning how cool it is to live an hour from Vancouver.

Here's to friendly friends. May we all have the support to do what we're meant to do. The next few weeks will be summer busy-ness, so I won't post until September. Happy writing!

The Other World

Writing helps me feel connected to the world. Grounds me. Helps me feel that I'm doing a good job living this life.

If there's a season for everything, then it's been a season of more endings than I'm used to. Some expected. One very much not. 

To Peter, Dodie, Shera who was supposed to visit next week, my sister's friend Freya... and, yes, our dog Magic, I offer Walt Whitman...  Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes. 

I offer that to the rest of us, too. Let us be good stewards of our universes, including the ones we create in our writing.

...I'm picturing Peter on a porch with a cigar, Dodie curled up with a book of Emerson, Freya is away checking her kids... and Shera reads on the dock with Magic at her side... 

Homeward Unbound

If I were in junior high I'd have an answer to What I Did Over Summer Vacation - found home. The last month has been the East Coast from Massachusetts, New York City, Philadelphia, D.C., the Gulf Coast of Florida, then back to Washington State. Where's home? Massachusetts where I've lived most of my life? This new pacific place? Neither. For me, home travels. Like a good book.

Huh?

A good book takes us on a journey, but the core of the novel keeps us grounded. We might not know where the novel is taking us, but, with good writing and a strong core we know we'll arrive where and how we need to be.

For me, that's home, something inside that keeps me going forward and knowing that, to borrow from John Kabat-Zinn, wherever I go, there I am. And if there's a cafe, a view of the ocean and some family, even better.

Writing-wise, much has happened the last month, starting with two hours of writing most vacation mornings. And how cool that Elana Johnson has taken us on her journey of POSSESSION publication.

It's great to be back. What's your home?