Tag Archives: writing

It Will Happen When It’s Supposed To

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Last Saturday I attended the SCBWI Midsouth conference for the third time. For the uninitiated, SCBWI is for writers, illustrators, and enthusiasts of children’s literature (which includes young adult). I always walk away from this conference feeling really encouraged, inspired, and ready to improve my craft. I always meet wonderful people who feel like my people. I could go on about what I learned, but there’s something else in regards to this conference that has got me to thinking: How did I get here?

I believe whole-hardheartedly that things work out the way they do for a reason. I also believe that God is the one who orchestrates all these events in my life and weaves them together just so. But regardless of your beliefs, you have to admit how things come together can be pretty awesome.

I often tout that I had a worthless major in college. And I stand by that. But two things happened in the course of this “worthless major” that I believe led me to SCWBI conferences:

  1. I took a fiction writing class my last semester, because I needed another elective.
  2. I couldn’t get hired straight out of school, so eventually I ended up in a string of temp positions.

The fiction writing class is what got me back into writing. I clung to writing during that time of unemployment when I felt so useless. As for the temp position, that is where I met the woman who first told me about SCBWI.

At my first SCBWI conference, I really had no idea what to expect. I went in there thinking I knew one person, but reconnected with another girl who lived in my town that I had known from church. We ended up in the same critique group at the end of the day, and we kept in touch. That day I also met another girl who lived in our town. We stayed somewhat connected, though we did not hear as much from her as she became a new mom. Then several months ago, she reached out to me and the first girl, and we have been meeting and critiquing each other pretty consistently ever since. It was so great to sit with both of them at the conference this year.

I also learned about publishing from my first SCBWI conference. I was mostly blind to the whole process, but I learned about agents and queries and editors and the whole nine yards.

Before my fiction writing class, I had also been very afraid of sharing my fiction writing. That class was an epiphany – exactly what I needed – the kick in the butt to share. So I was able to share myself, my writing, at these conferences, with these girls I have come to know (and some others as well).

Before the conference this year, I paid for a fifty-page critique of my novel, and it was not an easy thing to do, but it was the right decision. A decision I would have never made, a place I never would have been ready for, had it not been for SCBWI. I got some much-needed constructive criticism. After that critique I improved the first few pages of my story to bring to the conference, and got even more feedback. So I’ll be revising again, on those first few pages and on the rest of the manuscript.

My goal is to have another full revision by the end of this year, ready for some beta readers. This is with the goal of being ready to query sometime early next year. I have made goals like this before that I have not met, but I KNOW I really am much closer this time. Between the paid critique service and my critique partners and what I hear in these conference sessions I know I am headed in the right direction. I am completely convinced I can make my dream to become a published author come true.

And I wonder if I would even be here right now had it not been for that “worthless major.”

So no, I did not get published at 25, I probably won’t have a physical book of mine out by 30 (but hopefully, maybe, I will have a book sold by then?!), but that is OK. I believe publication will come at the right time.

Right now, my own story is being written.

The Confirmation I Needed: TN Writer’s Workshop

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I attended an event a couple of weekends ago that was a writer’s workshop, taught by Chuck Sambuchino. He shared a lot of great information that I know is going to help me when I get ready to query, and I am very glad I went and heard what he had to say.

But there was one part of the workshop that did not focus on advice that made the whole thing really worth it for me.

After lunch, they had four literary agents sitting at a table in the front of the room. Chuck would read the first page of our manuscript that we brought with us. As he read it out loud, the four agents had their own copies and they were reading it to themselves. When the agent reached the point they would stop reading if this came across their queries, they would raise their hand. When two of them had their hands raised, or once the page was completely read and no one or only one of them had raised their hand, the reading stopped, and they discussed what did and did not work for them. It was selected randomly and there wasn’t time for all of them, so you sat there feeling queasy and wondering if your page was going to get picked and what they would say about if it did. If you think it sounds like torture, you’re pretty correct.

I decided to go ahead and turn in a page. For the past two years I have attended an SCBWI conference, and they do something a little similar, except it’s one agent up there and they go ahead and read the whole page and then say what they think. My first year, the guy was pretty 50/50 about what he liked and didn’t like. I had turned in a page for a different story that year and he didn’t really love mine. The next year I did not turn in a page and THANK GOODNESS because that particular agent did not like ANYTHING, and I am not exaggerating. It seemed she wanted something very literary, but this was a bunch of YA submissions and most YA is just not literary. But I had hoped that this time, with four agents, I could get some constructive criticism if my page was chosen.

What I got was better than that.

In case your imagination is as vivid as mine, I’ll go ahead and explain that I did not get one of them to ask me to submit to them (that did happen with one story and one agent though, and when that happened I thought, dangit, that was what I was hoping would happen to me!).

But let me set the scene: I had a crappy lunch out due to traffic and other stupid stuff, and I had just scarfed down an awesome warm chocolate chip cookie I bought at the hotel to make myself feel better, and I was sitting there nervous and just praying to God that someone liked my page. Several pages had been read, and there were mixed responses (though none of them had been real mean), and most of the complaints I was hearing, I felt, did not apply to my page. I don’t feel connected with the character, too much description up front, etc. So I was feeling pretty decent about my page… unless they decided the dialogue was crappy or something. But I have revised this beginning a lot thanks to the people I met at the last conference I went to.

Chuck starts a new page: “Genre: young adult.” I took a deep breath, because that meant it could be mine. He started reading. It was mine! I was watching the four agents carefully, and I literally felt my heart thumping in my chest, racking against my ribs. I waited, watching for hands, but none were going up. Halfway through, almost to the end, then it was finished… no hands! Victory! Then the comments. They were all pretty positive! One had a minor issue that one of the others disagreed with, so that hardly counted in my mind. Overall, they said they loved the voice of the character. And then later, someone else’s page even got compared against mine, one of the agents saying that mine had provided the sci-fi element of the story much more organically. I just kept thinking, Holy crap, four literary agents just read my page and they liked it. 

I can actually do this. 

Because I have wondered if I could. There are so many published authors my age or YOUNGER, and even though I know that there is no age limit to writing I still wonder if I could still make it, if I haven’t missed out, or if I’m just plain not good enough. There are thousands of queries being sent to agents every day and will mine really stand out?

Not everyone in that room had their entire page read without a hand going up. That was an accomplishment. And to have virtually no complaints about it just added to it.

But that was only one page, probably the page that has had the most work done to it. So I need to keep cracking at the rest of the story until it is all just as strong as that page. And then write a query that can capture someone’s attention, which, thanks to this workshop, the convention I attended last year, and Susan Dennard’s “how to write a query” PDF that I got a few months ago, I feel like I can do that.

But even if I get an agent, that doesn’t even recommend we can get the book sold.

But this is a step in the right direction. I can do this. It might take 6 months or 6 years but I can do it. That little bit of confirmation meant the world to me, and I will hang on to it.

So here’s to moving forward, as Chuck said a writer should always do.

When was a time you were encourage to continue a pursuit that was important to you?

My Writing Strengths & Weaknesses

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As I am attempting to revise my novel Earthbound, I have been discussing it with and sending some chapters to my writing buddy Cassie. I’ve got to say, you can’t really write alone. Unless perhaps you’re just an amazing prodigy, in which case I just hate you. But having someone who can point out what you need to work on is just crazy instrumental for the process. I grew up writing but never sharing it, and I have to say that I started to grow leaps and bounds as a writer when I started sharing my work in college for a fiction writing class. We workshopped each other’s short stories, and it was amazing how much my eyes were opened to my natural strengths and weaknesses while writing, and these things have been reiterated to me as I have critiqued with others at writers’ conferences and in my comments from Cassie.

Characters

It makes me really happy to say that my characters always get love when people read my stories. To me, my characters are people I care about and I’m glad that other people care about them too! I also love character-driven stories, so I guess it’s not too surprising that when I write, I can create likable characters.

earthbound-charactersDialogue

Once upon a time before anyone had read any of my writing, I thought I was awesome at dialogue. Why? Because it flowed out of me so easily! I could just write down a conversation between characters that took place in some void because I had no idea where the heck the characters were, much less how to describe it to a reader. But man did I know what they were saying. But I’ve been told more than once that sometimes my dialogue can sound a little wooden, or be too on-the-nose, etc. It’s not that what the characters are saying is bad, it’s just how they’re saying it sounds unnatural. So this is an area I’ve had to work on, and it’s one that I have to remember to work on because I forget that I’m not super awesome at it.

Description

Remember what I said before about writing a conversation that takes place in a void? I’m totally not kidding. I struggle – a ton – with getting myself to describe settings, characters, etc. on a page. HOWEVER, when I make the effort of actually doing it, I get praised for it and told that I’m really good at it! It astounds me because I am so not wordy or purple-prosey when it comes to my fiction writing, but if I push myself at description apparently it works. Maybe it’s because when I actually try, I describe concisely but completely, not taking too much space talking about the setting but not leaving people wanting to know more about it. This was something I really could not do at all before my fiction writing class in college, and that’s when I really trained myself to work on description.

space-station-corridorPlot 

By the time anyone reads my writing I feel good about the plot, so I don’t feel like this has been discussed with me much in terms of my writing, but I struggle a ton with actually planning a plot out before I get the words out. That’s why I have like 100 story ideas but only 4 completed ones (of novel-ish length). Time is a factor too, but mostly it’s just the struggle and commitment to figure out what happens between the beginning and the end and writing it out in a coherent fashion. I’m not like those writers who have no problem doing terrible things to their characters to up the stakes, I want to protect them! But alas, I have to find a way to raise the stakes, otherwise, what’s the point behind it all?

Revising

As I revise, it’s easy for me to be overwhelmed. I’m more of a big picture person, so sometimes it’s hard for me to get into nitty-gritty details, but that’s what the revision process is all about. My characters are good, but they could still use some more work, especially the secondary characters. How can I flesh them out, make them feel more real? How can I describe a setting in a scene better? Does this dialogue sound natural? Does the plot flow? Is it too predictable? What can be tightened? There’s so much to look at.

Recently I was thinking about this and suddenly I remembered where I have read other writers talk about writing in layers. So I’ve decided that now that I have gotten the story written out, I need to focus on the details: the characters, their settings, etc.

For example, Earthbound is set in the future with a vague time frame, but despite the fact that there are families living on a space station, it doesn’t feel very futuristic. I feel I need to focus on adding some details concerning technology that we don’t have today, without bogging down the story. I think Lauren Miller did a good job of that in Free to Fall.

Also, my characters are suffering from grief and some are struggling with depression, OCD, etc., but I’m not sure if it feels like a real struggle I want to make sure they feel realistic, and that you can see them growing and healing.

beach-coupleIf you’re a writer, what do you find are your natural strengths and weaknesses in your writing? Do you have any tips on tackling everything that needs to be taken care of in revisions?

Photos taken from my NaNoWriMo Story Inspiration Pinterest board, which you can check out here. 

The 777 Challenge

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Annie did this challenge on her blog, and I was curious to see how it might look for me.

How it works: 7th page of current WIP, 7 lines down, 7 lines.

This didn’t work out in as neat of a spot as I hoped, so I bent the rules a little, but it’s close enough.

Also, I’m terrified of doing this.

There is nothing profound in these 7 lines. No extraordinary writing. And despite this, I also have the fear of someone stealing the words anyway.

But my first draft didn’t even contain all these lines. Some of this was written recently as I’m going trough revisions for my NaNoWriMo story Earthbound from last year. At least I’m not revealing a section of my story that I feel is super special. Yet at the same time, these lines do say something that moves the story froward.

I want to become more serious about putting myself out there as an aspiring author, which is why I decided to do this. So without further ado and without context of the story (I’ll tell you one thing: Noa is a girl), here’s my 777:

Dad sighs, and I turn around so I don’t have to see the disappointment on his face. “Noa,” he says steadily before I can walk away, and I look back to him and realize he doesn’t actually look disappointed, just sad.

“I’m sorry. Your mother is right. We never intended to stay up here so long without a visit to Earth. But ultimately, the decision is yours. OK?”

I nod before I turn back and head for my room to wait for Dr. Avett’s arrival and my final sentence.

About a Writing Conference and Some Soul Searching

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First off, when I see the word “soul searching” from someone, I immediately expect to hear that they had some dramatic revelation that will result in a big change. This isn’t to that extreme. In fact, the soul searching hasn’t ended, of course I doubt it ever really will, and this post is mostly for me to process some of my thoughts.

I went to a writing conference this weekend, SCBWI Midsouth to be exact, the SCBWI standing for the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Children’s is defined as everything from picture books to YA and as I believe most of you know, I want to write YA. (OK, so I DO write YA. Just because I’m not published (yet), it doesn’t change this fact.) This was my second time at the conference and it was good to return. Last year I felt extremely green (not to just the conference, but even to the process of publishing) and this year I felt I knew a little more, plus knew a few people, and felt more comfortable with getting to know new people, people who are writers.

In some ways, part of what I heard/experienced at the conference could be seen as depressing. One agent (Rosemary Stimola) shared that her agency gets 50,000 unsolicited queries a day. What the what?! I didn’t even know there were that many people trying that hard to get a book published. And that’s ONE agent. (Though she’s a pretty big deal since she’s Suzanne Collins’ agent!)

But I had two sessions at this conference about how to write a query letter, and you know what, now I feel 100% more comfortable and confident about querying (when the time is right, not before) than I did before the conference. I participated in a critique group where I shared five pages of my writing with four other aspiring authors and received both encouraging comments and constructive feedback. And it came at a good time.

Because lately I’ve wondered if I want this badly enough. Maybe I’ll just hire an editor and self-publish my stuff. It won’t get a ton of exposure but my story will have been written and be out there without going through the turmoil of the publishing process. These are the sort of thoughts I’ve had lately. (Note: there are many reasons to self-publish, and I haven’t even decided to not ever self-publish, but this is just not really the healthiest reason to not at least try to get traditionally published.)

And my priorities have shifted in a way I have not pleased with. In the early days of this blog, I would have said that my priorities as a blogger, a reader, and a writer were pretty balanced and even. But over time, the priorities shifted to blogger first, reader second, and writer third. I wasn’t too happy with that. I switched it around last November when for one month I became a writer first, blogger second, and neglected reading just for NaNoWriMo. And then lately I’ve noticed I’ve become a reader first, a blogger second, and a writer third. I’ve actually been excited to see my love for reading grow and I think it’s great that I care about it more than blogging. But writing still playing third fiddle to those two is not good.

So I asked myself: what increased my love for reading?

I think it was the fact that I was reading more, and mostly picking better books.

And I can’t help but think, if I spent the same amount of time on my writing as I do my reading, my love for it might increase and come back to me. I just have to sit down and do it and get over my hang-ups.

It’s a lot of work. YA author Ruta Sepetys was at the conference and one of the things she said during the Q&A panel she was on is that she does research for TWO YEARS for ONE novel. Of course, she writes historical fiction, but just the same, that is a lot of time and devotion to one book. And to think, I tell myself it will take too much time to research something in-depth and/or to plot out a half-baked idea, and I just want words to come out of me. Like anyone can just do that.

Middle grade author Gennifer Choldenko was the keynote speaker and she said something in her presentation about how she believes that any block that she gets when she’s trying to write is a result of not enough knowledge coming in. That was a light switch moment for me. The reason why I struggle and feel a lack of inspiration so many times is because I don’t have the knowledge I need to move forward. Well, that and fear, but that’s another post for another time. Any book of any genre is going to take some sort of research, and I try to do the minimal amount and get lazy with it.

That’s the other thing I have to realize, every time I sit down as a “writer,” I may not always get to write fresh, new, exciting words. I might be researching (real researching, not scouring “inspiration pictures” on Pinterest). I might be editing and revising. Those are worthwhile ways to spend my time because they are necessary.

I need to find focus. 

That was my other concern before this conference. Was my NaNo project actually worth pursuing? Or did I need to try something else out? Reading those first five pages of Earthbound to those four other girls was so helpful. They were enthusiastic about what would happen next and they loved my main character! It was awesome that they were already hooked. They told me ways I could improve things, like cutting out my first line, changing some dialogue, etc. It made me see potential in my story again, because they, with their fresh eyes, saw it.

It also reaffirmed things that I was told in my fiction writing class in college that I still have a hard time accepting… I write good characters. I am actually good at description (which is crazy because it is not natural for me; I have to fight myself to put it in even). I need to work at dialogue (even though I think I am awesome at it because it jumps into my mind more easily than anything else).

And while I’ve been worrying about what I can and can’t write in terms of genre, maybe I should just write a good character-driven story and then work out the other details as the needs for those arise. Whether it’s fantasy or sci-fi or contemporary or historical I can work on those things, again, by gaining knowledge.

All this to say, I’m ready to make writing a bigger priority again. I want it to be writer and reader first (I have finally become a believer that reading is extremely vital to a writer and worth doing a lot of; I was wrong all those years when I thought I could write and not read) and a blogger second.

I would not trade this blogging experience for anything. And I’m not giving this up. So no, I’m not going anywhere, but I might be a little more quiet. I know I said months ago that I didn’t want to have to apologize or explain if I posted less than normal and that I wouldn’t feel pressured to churn out a certain quantity but it’s still hard for me to do. Blogging is fast-paced and I am afraid of missing one day of the action.

So if I’m more silent, know that I’m not leaving you. Not by a long shot. I’m just writing. That’s what I need to be doing, because I believe it’s what I’m supposed to do.

And it’s going to take me time to write. I have met people who have worked on a story for years and still aren’t ready to send queries. Does that mean their writing stinks and their stories aren’t worthwhile? No. I don’t believe that at all. Different stories by different people take different amounts of time. I can’t compare myself to a 23 year old who has an entire trilogy out because that’s not me. AND THAT’S OK.  I already posted about that though. Maybe one day it will stick in my brain.

I haven’t figured out how I am going to schedule my writing time yet, but I know that it’s important and I need to do it. I’m very grateful that I got to spend a day with writers to remind me just how important this is to me.

If you’ve read this far, thanks. If you read this blog at all, thanks. You guys are so encouraging and I truly appreciate it.

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