Writers Write.

Writers write. I know this is a revolutionary concept, so let me run it by you again. Writers... write.

I often get asked, "But how do you have the time?" Usually this question is asked by someone who has always wanted to write a book, but who has never figured out how to sit down and make it happen. Also not uncommon is for this sort of person to say that they've wanted to write a book for years. Years. Not months or weeks, but years. "Sure, I'm a writer," these people say. "I just haven't finished my book yet. I don't have the time." "How much of it do you have done?" I might ask. "Oh, you know... bits and pieces..." Quick change of subject.

If you do not actually write, you are not a writer. I'm not trying to be a condescending jerk; I'm trying to motivate you. There are a number of things that keep wannabe writers from becoming actual writers, and some of these things are legitimate reasons. I don't want to discount anybody's personal experience or struggles, but if what's holding you back is just a general lack of time, then I'm here to tell you that you will never have the time to write a book. You must make the time. Do you really want another five or ten years to pass without your dream of becoming a novelist becoming a reality? If so, read no further. Go back to Facebook and Pinterest and Instagram. Social media is calling. But if there is a story burning inside of you longing to get out, then today is your day. Not tomorrow - today.

J. R. R. Tolkien wrote that the act of writing stories takes, "Labor, discipline, and special skill." Many people have the special skill part down, but lack in the labor and discipline. If you are lacking in any of those three areas, you will never be successful as a writer. How did I write eight novels while teaching full-time and giving birth to (and raising) four little boys? I have always made time to sit down and write. Not every day, but when it really matters, I do. So the question really becomes: How badly do you want it?

In honor of this subject and November being National Novel Writing Month, I thought I'd post a link to a fantastic article I found on this subject from NY Times bestselling author Hugh Howey. If you want a serious kick in the pants, this is where you can find it. Then go forth and write!

What's in a Book Festival?

Book festivals are exhausting. So much to pack up - and I have a Prius, so packing that little sucker is like playing a high-stakes game of Tetris - so much to not forget, so many details to iron out, so few opportunities to eat or use the bathroom (who needs to use the bathroom, anyhow?), so much talking and smiling and talking and smiling and talking and smiling..., so much worry over selling enough books to make the venture profitable, so much hoping the person you're assuring will like your book will actually like your book, so much work. But I never question if going to book festivals is worth it, because my readership is what makes my writing possible.

Authors are a rather anchoritic bunch by nature. That is to say, we like to be alone, and we can tend to treat our art as a sort of religious practice. It's spiritually fulfilling, in a way, to close oneself off from the real world and sub-create a new world in the form of a story. I think most of us would prefer to write our stories in seclusion, submit them for editing and publishing, and then set them loose (for sale) in the magical world of the internet and let the readers come to us. No direct selling, please. No self-promotion, thank you very much. The Art should speak for itself.

The problem with this is, even in a perfect world, I don't believe this is ever the way it should be. Art always has a personal source. We, the authors, are part of our written works, and our readers deserve a chance to get to know us, and us them. To set a story loose on the world is to enter into a relationship with the people consuming the story. Hopefully that relationship will be a good one, but as with most relationships, it will not thrive without communication and effort on both parts.

One way devoted readers who have entered into a relationship with authors through their books can help that relationship thrive is by writing reviews on places such as Amazon and Goodreads, telling their friends about the author's books, and generally spreading the word! But how can the author foster a good relationship with his or her readers?

I think one way (besides the obvious way of continuing to write books) is to remain engaged and active in book festivals, and that is why I attend as many as I am able to attend. I can blog, I can Facebook and Tweet every day, I can post to Pinterest, but it's not the same as getting on the ground in the real world and meeting new (and old) readers. Meeting people in person - shaking hands and signing books, and placing my stories directly into their possession - is something that will never go out of style. It keeps me grounded and puts names and faces to my readers. It encourages me, too. I hope that, no matter where my books take me in the future, I will always have opportunities to attend book festivals and greet my readers in person. The moment you lose that personal connection to your readers is the moment you fail in your half of the author/reader relationship.

My next book festival, if you live anywhere in the vicinity and would care to join me, is the Southern Festival of Books in Nashville, TN on Oct. 9-11. Come, grab a couple copies of The Gateway Chronicles or BREEDER, and build a relationship with me!

Questions From a New Reader

Every now and then I hear from a new reader so enthusiastic with either The Gateway Chronicles or BREEDER (or both!) that they come to me with a plethora of questions, and sometimes those questions are blog-worthy because I feel there might be more people out there interested in the same information. This is one of those situations! The following questions came in last month from a new reader of The Gateway Chronicles... 

1) Okay, I can't stand it anymore. I must know. What addictive substance did you hide between the lines of your books?? 

Fairy dust. That addictive substance is fairy dust. 

:)

Actually, in all seriousness, I've worked quite hard over the years to make sure my books follow established literary patterns without being cliched. I believe the human brain looks for patterns subconsciously,  and because of this, there are certain storytelling techniques that will always feel more fulfilling in the end than others (or than a story written with no plan at all). This is one reason why I also beat on the "plan ahead!" drum when I give seminars on creative writing.

2) Ever since my first read-through, I've been trying to figure out how much of yourself you put into a character, if not more than 1. So, obviously Darcy is from your town and went to your camp. I tend to think you put some other parts of you in her, too. When at camp, did you have those magical feelings about the camp? Did you feel that perhaps you were meant for a different world, not fitting in? Or have you so aptly captured those aspects from other things you've read and from hearing it from others? Or are you more like Lewis, always carrying around a backpack full of journals? Did you have a friend - or were you the friend - like Sam, who was always by your side, never giving up on you even when you were mean-ish to her? 

Darcy is definitely the character into which I poured the most of myself. I did use my hometown (from my teen years) as Darcy's hometown, and the camp they attend in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan is the real camp I attended every summer of my life from birth until college (with the names changed). There was absolutely something magical and different about that camp, and not in a mystical, creepy, I-can't-seperate-fantasy-from-reality, delusional sort of way, but in a total separation from the rest of the world, from the rest of civilization, sort of way. The real camp, which I'll just call Cedar, was a constant for me in an otherwise changing world. Every summer when we went there, it was virtually unchanged. Obviously the flowers and trees and sun and water and rocks and sky didn't change, nor did the smells or sounds or sensations of being there, but even the camp itself went through very little change. For 18 years, I don't even remember the quilts on the camp beds being replaced with new ones, or the carpet being torn up and replaced. The furniture and artwork was always the same. There were small changes made here and there, but nothing big was done until I was an adult. I know the forest trails out there like the back of my hand, and it's so achingly remote and beautiful. When the sun comes through the trees, or glimmers in off the water, at just the right times of the day, it really is a magical place. It was an escape from reality, and it did make me feel like I was meant for another world. I really didn't fit in well in my "real world" life, at least I didn't feel like I did much of the time, so going to Cedar was like an escape into a fantasy world for me. It revived my spirit. In writing The Gateway Chronicles, then, I wanted to cause the reader to have this same sort of revived sensation by "visiting" the camp - and Alitheia - through the pages of my books.

I was (still am) a bit like Lewis, too. I don't carry a backpack around full of journals, but I'm rarely without one! I keep a small journal in my purse, and I probably have ten to twelves scattered around my house that are full of story ideas, notes, sketches, names, sample chapters... you name it! I put that aspect of my personality into Lewis's character. 

I definitely was not the loyal Sam-friend, although I wish I could have been! I've always been a bit too self-centered to be a Sam. But I had a Sam-friend, who is still one of my closest friends today. Even when I grew exasperated with her and did mean-ish things to her so I could go off and have "me time," she never gave up on me. And she always saw (sees) the good in everyone. That combination of loyalty, optimism, and overall goodness is so rare. I knew I had to write in a character like Sam who had those same traits. A Darcy needs a Sam. (And the parallel in names to Sam in The Lord of the Rings is not entirely unintentional! :) ).


3) Did you make up narks, or are those an across-the-board fantasy creature? 

I made up narks! They are entirely unique, although I tied them loosely to Tolkiensian elves to give people a frame of reference (I believe I say in the first book that they are in the elf family, or something like that). Every successful fantasy series, in my opinion, has to have a unique fantasy creature that has been created just for that particular universe. Lewis has his marshwiggles and dufflepuds, Tolkien his hobbits, and Rowling her house elves. I went with narks, which was a word I pulled from a form letter at Cedar (apparently a "night nark" is actually just a counselor who enforces night curfew). I came up with the concept of having night narks and day narks sharing one body, and the physical and social characteristics fell into place from there. I was super nervous about it before the publication of the first book, though, because I felt that of all the things in the story, the narks were what could flop the worst. Either people would love them, or people would think they were terribly cheesy and hate them. Thankfully, some of the first feedback I got on The Six was that people loved the narks - specifically Yahto Veli. I was relieved!

4) You mentioned teenagers as your target audience. Do you hear from male teenagers about the books? Are they drawn to the battles and strategy?

Yes! Surprisingly, I hear from lots of male teenagers - actually, I hear from lots of males, period! I wasn't sure how The Gateway Chronicles would be received by boys since it's written around a primary female protagonist, but the boys who have read it have responded overwhelmingly positively. Some of my biggest fans are boys, especially boys between the ages of 11 and 14. After the publication of book 4 (I think), I had 8th-grade boys (who were my students at the time), coming up to me the next day, bleary-eyed and sleep-deprived and red-nosed, saying things like, "Thanks a lot, Mrs. B. You made me cry!" or "This is your fault, you know. Your fault!" It was great. I've also recently had a lot of grown men reading them and giving me positive feedback. That's blown me away. I think part of it is that they like the battles and strategy, but I really think that's only a small part of it at the end of the day. Some themes are just universal. If you write a story that speaks to the human condition, you're going to have a crossover story on your hands. 

5) Any tips on where I can look up the names/places?

Baby name books or generators online, lol. But it's the truth! I have a big book of baby names that includes names from all around the world with country of origin, meaning, variations, etc., and I've relied heavily on that for choosing names with specific meanings I wanted for The Gateway Chronicles (and all my writing). A Greek translator online would help with many of the Alitheian names, too, but not all of them! Some of the nark names incorporate Finnish and Hebrew and Native American languages. If you ever really are desperate to know what a particular name means, though, and can't find it online, just shoot me an e-mail at kbhoyle.author@gmail.com and ask me, and I'll spill the beans. :) 

6) Is it tough to switch gears to your teacher-hat?

Yes and no. At this stage in my career, it's really more about the time crunch. My writing and teaching career have coincided for about eight years now, so I know more or less how to balance things. There are times of the year when, as a teacher, I just have to focus on getting teacher stuff done, but then there are other times where I have more energy and it's easier to come home and write for a couple of hours at night. But because I teach history at a classical school, which means I'm not bound by a textbook or a curriculum some government suit put together, I basically get to stand in front of my students and tell stories - true stories, but stories - all day long. I get to dramatize historical stories for a bunch of teenagers every day. And I get to read to them from primary source material that is hundreds of years old, and I get to talk it out with them, and gnaw through the tough bits, and study them and their reactions to things... It's kind of fantastic! As an author of Young Adult material, it feels like the other side of the writing coin, if that makes sense. I do wish, however, that I just had more time. But I think we all wish for that! And as Gandalf says, "All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us."

You Might Not Like My Books...

There, I said it. The one admission most authors are loathe to make. My books are not going to be for everyone, and really, that's okay.

I've been reading through a lot of feedback this week on my first book, The Six - old and new Amazon reviews and Facebook feedback, mainly, and there's a trend I've noticed among it all, both the good and the bad: commentary on how unlikable my main character, Darcy, is. This isn't anything new, but it seems to have come up a lot lately, and it's gotten me to thinking about American consumerism and what we expect out of our entertainment these days.

So if you haven't read The Six, or if you've read it and were turned off by Darcy's attitude in book one, here's what I have to say to you: If you want your heroes to arrive ready-made, spunky, capable, and flawless, then my books are probably not for you. Sorry. I know we live in a culture that demands instant gratification, but I often find instant gratification disingenuous, unrealistic, and false. I believe in developing a character - especially a heroic character - from the ground up, and that means you're going to have to slog through the bad stuff to make the good stuff (when you get there) that much more rewarding.

There are many reasons why I wrote Darcy to be so insufferable in The Six. Here are a few of the main ones:

1) It's realistic. She's 13 in book 1, and while there are some truly delightful 13-year-olds out there (my character Sam is one of them), the greater preponderance of them lean toward selfishness, whininess, and moodiness. And the thing is, they don't even realize it! 13 is a difficult age, an age at which you believe the world revolves around you, and an age during which your emotions border on out-of-control on a daily basis. This is how I was at 13, and I wanted to bring it to life in Darcy.

2) It gives her room to grow - a lot of it! A main character should be dynamic, and the change that takes place should be for the better. I could have started Darcy off as a more likable character and still given her some ups and downs, sure, but I thought a full transformation from self-centered to selfless would pack a greater punch. She has to start off pretty awful for there to be any real change over the course of her story arc. I also didn't want her to hit her heroic high point in book 1 (or 2, or 3...). This is what I felt happened in The Hunger Games. Katniss is as good as she's going to get in the opening chapters of the first book, and it kind of feels all downhill from there. (Just my opinion, of course, feel free to disagree!)

3) The Gateway Chronicles is a six-book series. That's a lot of story to get through, and again, I wanted Darcy to grow at a realistic pace side-by-side with her natural maturing, and to allow the events of the adventures and trials she goes through to shape her into a better person. She definitely has highs and lows as the books progress, but overall, she should be the worst she's ever going to be in book 1, and the best she's ever going to be in book 6. That's been my goal from the beginning. Most people don't change over night, and if I'd had Darcy improve too much by the end of book 1, there wouldn't have been enough transformation left for five more books.

4) The Six is a Nigredo-stage book. This gets a little technical, but if you've read any of the other blog posts I've written about literary alchemy, that's what it's all about. There are three stages of alchemy Darcy has to progress through, and it all begins with the Nigredo, or black, stage of dissolution. This is a burning-away-the-dross stage, a stage during which the character is often beset with both internal and external problems that challenge the character's preconceptions about his/herself. It is the first step in a spiritual journey during which the character has to come to realize that he/she maybe isn't as great as he/she always thought. It is a peeling away of what is bad so purification can take place. This is where Darcy is at in The Six and The Oracle. Because I have six books, there are two books per stage. Darcy begins the Nigredo in The Six and progresses through it in The Oracle, which ends with a sort of crucible that challenges Darcy's notions of what love actually is and launches her into the next stage. By the time The White Thread opens, Darcy is ready to step into the Albedo, or white, stage of purification, and it's at this point that she starts to really learn selflessness.

To wrap up, it really is okay if Darcy turned you off SO much that you just couldn't get into my books. I still appreciate you giving them a chance, and I acknowledge that my books are not going to be enjoyable for everyone. But if you read all this and get what I'm trying to do with her in the stories, maybe you'll want to give them an extra chance. I promise you, she does get better - much, much better - as the story progresses, but you have to be willing to take the journey alongside her. She stumbles a lot along the way, but that's because she's human. And I believe a human character is more relatable in the long run. And if you're one of my industrious fans who have always understood that this is what I'm doing with Darcy from the very beginning, bravo to you! I commend you for giving her a chance, and I hope I don't let you down with how I conclude her story in book 6!

***As a very nerdy aside, I couldn't help thinking about the Marvel superheroes as I wrote this post. I'm a huge Marvel fan (geek), and I have strong and real opinions on all the Avengers. I love them all for various reasons, and while Captain America is probably my favorite Avenger at the end of the day, the two with the best origins stories, hands down, have always been Thor and Iron Man. Seriously, does anybody like Tony Stark before he's kidnapped? Or Thor before his dad banishes him to earth? They are both monumental jerks, and they're supposed to be, but that's what makes their transformations into heroes so satisfying in the end.

Blog Hop: My Writing Process

Hello! This week I was kindly invited by fellow TWCS author Rene Gilley to participate in a blog hop, and as I've been woefully remiss with my blog this year, I thought it would be a great opportunity for me to connect with some new readers. So, if you're new to my blog, welcome! You can also learn about me by visiting my website. If you're an old friend, welcome back, and I hope you take a moment to check out Rene's blog hop post here and encourage her as her debut YA novel, Just Sing, is set to release in one month.

1. What am I working on?

I am working on several books at the moment. First up is the final release of my 6-book YA fantasy series, The Gateway Chronicles. Book 6, The Bone Whistle, will be out this fall (no release date yet, sorry!), and is in the final stages of the editing process. In the early stages of edits is the first book of my NA dystopian trilogy, Breeder, which should be released around Christmas of this year. While those edits are in process, I'm also working on the two sequels to Breeder, Criminal and Clone, and I'm hoping to have those manuscripts wrapped before The Bone Whistle comes out in the fall. So, I have a lot on my plate right now!

2. How does my work differ from others in its genre?

My fantasy work really hearkens back to an older tradition of storytelling, I think. I'm not saying it's old fashioned, but it will appeal to the adult who loved The Chronicles of Narnia as a child, and to the teenager who's looking for something on their level that is also deep, soulful, and meaningful. I read a lot of YA literature - almost exclusively so, actually, and almost all of it in the speculative genres - and I have not come across anything modern that feels or reads quite like my Gateway Chronicles. Modern YA lit tends to be all about self-actualization. In contrast, my Gateway Chronicles challenges the natural selfish tendencies of teenagers and taps their full potential to be giving, constructive, talented, and selfless members of society - granted, I do this over the backdrop of a fantasy realm with all sorts of adventures, romance, mysteries, and action thrown in for good measure. But I really do think this sets my fantasy books apart from most of the other YA equivalents out there.

As to my dystopian writing, well . . . let's just say, I guess I'm an old soul at heart, because it follows this same trend. Breeder reads more like The Giver than Divergent or The Hunger Games. I say this with some trepidation, because it's not necessarily a good thing to say your book is NOT like the most popular books current in the genre, but I really do think people are constantly looking for new spins on old ideas, and Breeder will deliver just that. As a New Adult novel, it's geared for a little older audience than my YA fantasy material, and this is because the story is really intense, and it deals with mature themes and a truly horrific futuristic world. Thematically, it has the gravitas of the older, classic dystopians, mashed together with the intensity of a good science fiction novel, and the romantic tension of a modern dystopian like The Hunger Games. It follows one girl's journey as she slowly uncovers the layers of reality and illusion in her world, and like a good mystery novel, it should cause the reader to second-guess what she's uncovering at all stages. In the very end of the last book, when all is revealed, I want the reader to sit back and go, "What? What? I can't believe that's what's been going on this whole time!" and then pick up book one and start all over just to see how all the pieces fall together once the truth is revealed. This is a tall order to accomplish as a writer, but it's already tested well with my beta readers, and I'm feeling pretty confident that it will set Breeder apart as unique in its genre once it is published.

3. Why do I write what I do?

There is one primary reason why I do what I do: I want to convey truth to a world that largely doesn't believe in objectivity. There are, of course, subjective things in this world, but I've always strongly believed in the objective nature of right and wrong. I won't go into my personal beliefs or more of my philosophy here, because I'd rather you (readers) read my books and try to figure it out for yourselves, but I will say that you will always find my books peppered with pointers to objective reality. I just realized that sounds kind of boring, so let me add that I also believe the primary function of fiction to be entertainment, and as such, it's a great venue for transmitting ideas in non-offensive ways. I must first write a good story, one that entertains and edifies, otherwise anything I want to say in my books will be lost.

4. How does my writing process work?

My writing process can be broken down into pretty distinct stages.

-Epiphany

This is the point at which the idea strikes me. I usually know when an idea is worth pursuing as a novel project. If it sticks with me and builds on itself, like a snowball rolling down a snowy slope, then I know it's a good idea, and I'll move into the next stage with it. And the epiphany can come from anything and strike at any time. For Breeder, it happened when reading an article in a magazine. For my next series after Breeder, it came from looking up at my favorite constellation one night.

-Dreaming and Brainstorming

This stage can go on for any length of time, and now that I'm an actual published author, the length of this stage is usually determined by publishing demands or what I think will sell. For example, I had my "epiphany" for Breeder only about two years ago, and I've had several ideas on the back burner for a lot longer than that, but I know that dystopian is hot right now, and I want to get on that train. So, I quickly moved Breeder into the organizing notes stage and on into planning and writing. But I have many more ideas that are still in the dreaming and brainstorming stage, and it's just a matter of when I will decide to publish those stories that determines moving on to the next stage with them. But this stage is fun - it's comprised of lots of randomness and lots of jotting down things in journals and drawing sketches and stuff like that. I usually come up with names and character and plot details during this stage, but it's very disorganized, and I have to be careful to write things down so I don't lose them. Much of what I work on during this stage doesn't actually make it into the final project, but that's okay, because it's all about dreaming of what could be. I'm in this stage right now with the series I will write after the Breeder Cycle. The next series is a science fantasy (yes, that's a thing) for a middle grade readership, and I've been dreaming and brainstorming this story for about two years, as well.

-Organizing notes

I only move into this stage once I've determined it's time to start actually working on a book (ie. when a publication date or goal is established). I take all the random notes from the dreaming and brainstorming stage (usually handwritten and in no particular order) and plug them in to a typed fact sheet. This is not an official outline, just a way for me to sift through what I've come up with so far and see where I have character, setting, and plot holes. This stage goes pretty quickly, and I will usually add the planning portion to this same document so I don't have to flip between my notes and my outline when I'm outlining and then writing. I will also usually write preliminary summaries of my story/stories at this stage.

-Planning

Anybody who's ever spent any time on my blog, website, or Facebook page knows by now that I'm a huge believer in planning a novel before writing it. This can be difficult, as I'm not a natural planner and usually I'm very disorganized, but I've found that I can't discipline my mind to finish a novel if I don't have the details spelled out ahead of time as a way to both keep me from following rabbit trails, and a way to keep the story coherent straight to the end. For this stage, I plug my organized notes into a sort of outline. I have utilized traditional outlines in the past, but I usually now use a ring composition chart outline that gives me not only the order of events, but the themes and points of importance that go along with each chapter, as well as the corresponding places to mirror and/or reverse echo those things from one half of the novel to the next. This method keeps my novels from becoming train-of-thought ramblings and ensures that every event is important to the story and moves the plot forward. I should point out, however, that my outlines are not exhaustive. I typically leave blanks and gaps where I don't exactly know what is going to happen, but the beauty of having an outline is that these gaps don't cause me to grind to a halt when I'm writing (the dreaded - and illusory - "writer's block"). Instead it's kind of like going on a journey. I know my destination (you must know the end of your story before you start writing it!), and several stops along the way, so gaps are often just rivers I need to bridge, or forests I need to traverse, and it's just a matter of figuring out how to get to the other side. That might sound cheesy, but it works!

-Writing

My writing stage goes pretty quickly, all things considered. If I've planned well, then there's no reason to get truly stuck, as I mentioned above. Having my notes organized into a reference sheet, and the linear progress of the story mapped out on a chart and/or outline of some sort, allows me the freedom to just write. My novels tend to be between 100,000-160,000 words each, and I usually knock that out in 6-12 weeks of straight writing. I don't like to be distracted when I'm writing, and I love to engage in what I call "marathon" writing sessions - where I write 5,000-15,000 words in one sitting. I get the least amount of sleep when I'm in this stage, and I'm totally focused on forward progress. I only re-read what I wrote the previous day when I sit down at my computer, and I resist going back for any deep revisions. If something strikes me as needing to change earlier on in the story, I'll make a note to go back and change it later, but I don't let it derail me from moving forward. My writing pace picks up the closer I get to the end of the novel, too, so it usually takes me half or a quarter of the time to write the last half of the novel as it took me to write the first half.

-Revising

Once the first draft is complete, I try to let it rest for a day or two or three before I start revisions. Sometimes, because of deadlines, I don't have the time for the resting period, but it really is very important whenever I can squeeze it in. I do one complete and thorough read-through revision before I submit the draft to my editors. This is where I go back and make any changes I noted in my writing period, check for story continuity, fix general typos and errors, and get a feel for it. I should love my story at the end of the revision/read-through, and if I don't, then I have a problem, because I probably haven't written a very good story. I will also revise my outline, if necessary, and my notes and preliminary summaries at this time to match the actual draft (because often things change a little as you write.) Once I'm happy with the draft and have it all polished up, I submit it to my editing team (and beta readers, too).

-Panicking, take 1

I spend the few weeks it takes my editing team to read and evaluate the manuscript panicking over whether or not they'll like it. I usually don't start off panicking, because finishing a manuscript and submitting it for publication is a pretty euphoric feeling, but once that euphoria fades, I panic. The anxiety can be so severe that I usually don't read my manuscript evaluations until a few days after my team sends them back, because I need to mentally prepare myself. (My lead editor teases me for this, as they've never actually given me a poor review... knock on wood.)

-Editing

This stage takes several months and is comprised of three main parts: substantive, copy, and reader edits. My editors do most of the work, and when they send their portions back to me, I basically just have to go through and approve the changes and corrections they've made. I usually don't end up with major rewrites - not anything I would consider major rewrites, at least. And I'm a pretty good sport about the whole process. When you're an author, you have to remember that your editors are trying to make your books better, not worse, so giving them the benefit of the doubt to do their job well is very important. I don't fight anything unless it's changing my voice too much, or unless they're trying to cut something that's crucial to the story, which doesn't happen very often. I have a very good relationship with my editors, and I intend to keep it that way.

-Panicking, take 2

Once the editing is complete, the manuscript is off to formatting, and at some point close to publication date, I receive a final document I have to sign off on. This always makes me panic at least a little because what if there's some major error none of us caught?! But . . . at some point, you have to declare the book done. So I sign off on it, and then spend the next few weeks until publication panicking over whether my readership will like it - which is really what it's all about in the end. It's so much blood, sweat, and tears to write, prepare, and publish a novel, and if nobody likes it after you've published it, I imagine it would feel like a wasted effort - and I know I would feel like I have let my entire team down. Thankfully, that's never happened to me (yet . . .), so I don't have any legitimate reason to panic, but it's hard to shake that anxiety. But, to end on a positive note, maybe I should add one more stage . . .

-Relief and Rejoicing!

Publishing a novel and having your readers respond in positive ways is one of the best feelings on the planet. My panic is replaced with relief, and I have a blast rejoicing with my readers over story details and anticipated conclusions. And then I rejoice a little personally at their agony over having to wait a whole 'nother year for my next book to come out. I'm not going to lie, it's great. :)


Okay, so that's my very thorough breakdown of my writing process. If you made it all the way to the end, huzzah for you! *Long-distance high five*

I hope you tune back in to the blog hop next week to learn all about my friend and fellow author Fran Amerson and her writing process. She writes memoirs about her struggles with infertility and journey to adoption, and she's releasing a new book on Mother's Day! You can find her blog here.

ALSO, I've roped a former student into participating, because she's writing her first novel (that she intends for publication, at least), and is a young and fresh mind, and I'm sure she'll have some excellent insight into the starting-out stage of the journey. Her name is Maggie Rapier, and as she's just now setting up her writing blog, I'll post the link as soon as I have it.

Thanks again, everyone! I hope you've enjoyed the post.

Idiotic Adults, and Other Problems with YA Literature

I love Young Adult literature as much as the next person, probably more than most, given my position, but because I spend so much time reading YA, I've come to identify some recurring and troubling problems. The following are, of course, generalities, and the presence of any of these elements in a book doesn't mean that I won't/don't like the story, but they do tend to grate on me. These are also things I've tried to avoid in my own writing, so if you think I am myself an offender, definitely call me out!

1) Idiotic Adults. This one can be found all over. It's present in almost every YA book I read, and it never ceases to bother me. YA books these days tend to have a cast of teenage characters who are inexplicably wiser than any of the adults in the stories. Adults in YA literature are idiots, worthless, and/or wicked. They never have the answers, and they tend to contribute to the problems. Now, I understand that YA authors are trying to reach out to their primary fan base - teenagers - by giving them wish-fulfillment stories in which the teenagers save the day, and I don't have a problem with teenagers saving the day. But I do have a problem with the consistent lack of adult leadership. It sends a message to young people that they don't need adults in their lives, that when they enter adulthood themselves, they'll be relegated to the ranks of stupid and senile, and that wisdom is attained by the age of 17. Not only are all of these things false, but they are potentially damaging to a teenager's psyche and to the families of which they are a part. A wise mentor - at least one - was a staple of older literature for good reason, and I'd like to see it return to modern YA lit. Let's send a message to young people that, yes, they do have great potential, and yes, they can do great things, but they should also follow in the footsteps of wiser adults who have gone before them.

As a side note on this issue, I find it difficult to suspend disbelief when the teenagers save the world/have all the answers sans the expertise of any adults.

2) Age-inappropriate romance. Oh, the throes of teenage romance! Is there anything more dramatic or angst inducing in a young person's life? I fully understand the depth of feeling and emotion that comes with teenage romances, and I do believe that teenagers can fall legitimately in love, but it's rare for a teenage romance to be fully mature - especially after only a few days, which we're constantly asked to accept in YA lit. Teenagers do behave differently in relationships than adults do, and there are some things that come only with age and maturity, but I think many YA authors forget this when writing their romantic pairings. I recently finished a book in which the two main characters are only 15 years old, yet the way the author describes their thought processes toward each other (including sexuality) is more akin to how two 30-year-olds would think about each other. The mental processes of the characters did not match their ages, and that leads me to the next issue...

3) Age-inappropriate characterization. Kids should act and think primarily like kids. And like it or not, teenagers are still kids! When I read a book where the characters are 13, I want them to think and act like 13-year-olds. And this should be different from how 15-year-olds think and act, which should be different from how 17-year-olds act, etc... In fact, each year of a teenager's life bring great changes - intellectually, physically, spiritually, and in maturity - and to not differentiate between the ages is sloppy writing and disingenuous to teenagers themselves. I think a reader ought to be able to accurately guess the ages of the characters without them actually being stated, yet I'm constantly surprised when reading YA. "Wait... this character is only 14? I thought she was 18!" I think sometimes authors just want to publish a YA book, but they don't really want to put the time and effort in to figuring out how teenagers act, think, and speak. So what I find over and over again are stories that contain adults parading around as teenagers.

4) The most specialist girls in the world! I don't have a problem, per se, with the trend toward spunky female protagonists in YA lit, and I can't be too critical of it, as I also have female protagonists, but it is getting a little... overdone. Female YA protagonists are beginning to look like cookie cutters of each other, and it's almost without fail that the stories hinge on these girls being the most specialist girls in the world. But how long will readers buy into this repeating storyline? Spunky teenage girl discovers she's the key to solving all of society's ills while teaming up with tragic, brooding, attractive male counterpart. I tried to avoid this cliche by making Darcy reliant on a cast of characters (and wise, adult mentors!), rather than finding all the answers within herself.

All right, these are just a few of mine, but this blog post is getting long, so I'll leave it at that. Agree with me? Disagree? What are some trends of YA lit that bother you?

"The End is Where We Begin"

You know, I don't often comment about books I don't like on here. I usually only comment on books that I LOVE and want to make sure y'all know influenced me, but I was reading through reviews for the third in a YA trilogy I was mildly interested in finishing - not madly in love with as many other people are - but interested in finishing . . . until the preponderance of the reviews came back negative. I won't name the book because I'm not interested in damaging the career of any fellow author, no matter how misguided she may have been with this book, but I mention this here because a) I think it's important for authors to pay attention to both good and bad reviews because we have a responsibility to our readers, and b) There was a comment made in one of the reviews that made me go, "uh huh! That's why." One reviewer said that this author has been quoted in interviews saying that she had "no idea" where the story was going when she first started writing the series. My creative writing students will chuckle at this, but if I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times - you DO NOT START WRITING A BOOK BEFORE YOU KNOW THE ENDING. This holds *especially* true for writing a series! If you are scrambling to make sense of everything you've already written at the end of the series, your readership can tell. At least, with this particular series, I could already tell from the beginning that she didn't have a plan, which is part of why I didn't get too emotionally invested in it in the first place.

So, here's what I promise you.

I have a plan. I have always had a plan. I planned out the basic premises of all six books before I started writing book 1, and I've known how the whole series will end before I started writing book 1. Have there been some changes to my plan along the way? Sure! Have I come up with new and different ideas as I go? Of course! Has the story evolved somewhat organically once the ball got rolling? You bet! But I have striven very hard to keep everything pointing toward the ending I planned out six years ago, and that has helped me to write a story that is coherent, logical, and enjoyable. You, the reader, can trust me. I take your feelings into consideration, and as long as I CAN work something in that I know you want, I WILL. Everything that you think "means something" probably in fact does, and there really is a "puzzle" for you to figure out. AND I have beta readers already lined up to read book 6 when I finish who will let me know if my plan has been executed to satisfaction and whether or not you, the reader, will feel fulfilled by it. I don't want to let you down, and I think any author who puts edginess or shock value above the needs of the readers has lost his/her way. I promise to give you an ending that has a eucatastrophe, an ending that makes sense, and an ending that has, really, existed all along.

One of my favorite bands has a recently-released album entitled, "The End is Where We Begin." Good advice for any author, especially an author with thousands of people riding on his/her books. At the end of the day, I don't want my readers to close book 6 and say, "What was the point?" And that is clearly what has happened to this author.

Make Time to Read!

I thought of this post as a piggyback off the post I did a little while back called, "Make Time to Write!" I can't claim full credit for the idea, as a fellow author had recently posted in a discussion thread what is perhaps a little-known fact: that once we - authors - really get enmeshed in the business of being an author, we find it very difficult to actually read what our fellow authors are writing anymore! I read her comment and sat back and chuckled, because it is a very true statement. I know I'm speaking for many an author out there, but I think it's fair to say that authors love to read. Of course we do! Why else would we be writing stories of our own? But the tasks that surround first taking a story idea from conception to completion, then revising and producing it, followed by selling and promoting it, make for very little time to do other than those things. As I touched on in my previous post, it can be difficult enough to find the time to do that very quintessential thing which is writing. Sitting down to engross ourselves in any sort of leisure reading, therefor, tends to go out the window in a pinch.

But this is something that must not happen. If you consider yourself a writer of any sort, you must always make time to read!

Reading is one of the most important ways we hone our craft. As a teacher, I can always pick out my readers in my classes as the readers will almost inevitably be better writers. I have found over the years that people who don't read don't know how to craft engaging sentences, they don't know how to bend words to their needs, they don't understand, and therefore cannot utilize, the intricate subtleties of language. Writing is in large part imitative, and as writers, we first seek to emulate other writers we admire. And there is nothing wrong with that, in fact, it ought to be encouraged! I have never ascribed to the theory that everything we need to create a masterful work already exists within us. Rather, I believe writers are all born with an innate talent and predisposition for writing, but that writers must look outside themselves to learn the craft and hone it. Much like in physical disciplines such as martial arts, writers must also learn from a master, and it will only be after a great deal of "wax on, wax off" that a unique, creative voice will emerge. Once you know the craft, then you can really have fun with it! My creative writing students often don't like to hear this, but with the exception of a few creative geniuses, it will always hold true that most of your early writing will be little more than practice and imitation.

This is why writers must always read. Not only is it enjoyable and relaxing, but it helps with the ongoing task of learning how, and how not, to write. And if your time for leisure reading, like mine, is short, just be exceedingly choosy about your choice of reading. I've said it before, but I mainly only read books in the same genre in which I write - to see what's out there in the market, to see what "the kids" are reading, and to see what I find to be effective and ineffective writing (and storytelling, but that is often a different thing entirely!). So remember, "wax on, wax off!" Make time to read.

Make Time to Write!

Being a full-time author this year is full of new and exciting challenges, but probably the greatest challenge of them all is also the most ironic of them all - it's really, really hard to find time to actually sit down and write! I don't know how it is for other writers, but I'm kind of a get-in-the-groove-and-don't-stop sort of girl. Once inspiration strikes, I can write for hours on end, and even when inspiration is fleeting and illusive, I can still keep writing as long as I have the time because I am such a meticulous planner (ie. my stories are planned out well enough so that I usually know where I'm going, even if I'm not "feeling it"). But if I'm interrupted for days on end with countless other tasks, or if I have said other tasks hanging over my head, I find it very difficult to write.

Now, I actually have much more time on my hands this year than in previous years. I'm no longer teaching full-time, which frees up an enormous amount of time, energy, and brain capacity (really), but when I was teaching full-time, prioritizing writing to the top of the to-do stack was actually easier. Think about it this way - with writing deadlines hanging over my head, I really had no choice but to use my limited free time to write. Neglecting the extra stuff was a necessity. What I'm finding now, about one month in to being a full-time author, is that it's much more difficult to prioritize that writing time. My tasks this week have included: filling out a marketing form (still not done with this - they are a beast to complete!), signing and organizing and mailing book orders, working on my website (still in construction), blogging (ha), corresponding with a variety of different people about a variety of different necessary things, and cleaning and organizing our home office into a usable space. Finally, three days ago, I threw up my hands and said, "That's it! I have to write!" Having my surgery a month ago, followed by a family-wide stomach bug (which I got twice - yay), followed by traveling to the Decatur festival last week and all the work that came with that, really meant that I hadn't truly written in over a month, so getting back on the proverbial horse was a challenge. But the moment I made myself sit down and DO IT, the juices started to flow once again. The next day I wrote 4,000 words, which is a really good day for any writer. Long story short (pun intended), I have learned a very important first lesson about making this full-time author career work. To be an author, you have to write books. Yes, all the other marketing and corresponding stuff is also important, but writing absolutely has to be my priority. Every day, without excuse, I must make time to write!

And now I'm off to take my own advice...

"There and Back Again"...

...The Beauty of Ring Composition in Life and Literature.

As you know if you read my previous blog post, when I was in Sydney, Australia a couple weeks ago for the Sydney Writer's Festival, I had the opportunity to speak with a 9th-grade literature class regarding my books and how I write them. I ended up speaking primarily about literary alchemy, but I started the discussion with ring composition. Ring composition, otherwise known as chiasmic/chiastic structure, is an ancient literary device named for the Greek letter Chi: X in which a poem, passage, or entire text builds up to a central point (what I usually call the axis when I am teaching it to students) and then builds down to the conclusion, stressing the same points in the reverse order. So, for example, the text could look like this:

A (beginning)
          B
                    C
                              D(middle/central point of the story)
                              D
                    C
          B
A (conclusion)

Or:
                              A (middle/central point of story)
                    D                 D
          C                                     C
                    B                 B
         (beginning) AA (conclusion)

And there are other variations. In my books, I tend to follow the second example I gave, but the basic principle is the same - the second half of the story mirrors the first half of the story either by comparison or contrast (ie. D2 could either mirror D1 or be a reverse echo of D1).

Okay, this is all getting a bit technical, so let me get down to the why of the matter. Why bother doing this at all? This is what one of the students in the class asked me, and it is more than a valid question, in fact it is at the heart of it all. Doesn't this make for a lot of work? Isn't writing just about self expression? Isn't it more important that I just get words on the page? Stop! You're stifling me with your compositional restrictions! The answer to these questions, in order, is: Yes. No. Kind of. Let me explain...

I don't think any serious writers want their works to be irrelevant, and in order to prevent irrelevancy, one must take steps to write works that subconsciously lodge themselves in the reader's brain. Ring composition is one way to do that, and it is tried and true. It is subconscious for the reader because, unless they are purposefully studying the text to look for it, they won't see it, but they will feel it. The human brain responds to patterns, and especially to repetition and mirroring, so if you use a chiasmus in your writing, it lodges your story more firmly in the long-term memory of the brain, and if you've written a good story, it should end up being something that readers relate more easily to and want to go back to for more. But yes, it makes for a lot of work! In fact, it's down right hard to do. Many a sleepless night have I spent pacing my living room, trying to puzzle through how to make this structure work with my stories, but in the end, it is always worth it (and it's gotten me out of more than a few writer's-block binds!). Besides, anything worth doing ought to be difficult in some degree. Who ever said rewarding work should be easy? And no, writing is not just about self expression, and if you use a structure like ring composition, you can ensure that your work goes beyond you and hopefully becomes something that is relevant not just for you and your time, but for others and times to come. How do I know this? Let me name a few of the texts that have utilized ring composition throughout the ages and let the examples speak for themselves: The Histories, Beowulf, the works of Aristotle, the Bible, Dante's Inferno, all the works of Shakespeare, Aquinas's Summa Theologica, The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, The Chronicles of Narnia, Alice in Wonderland, Harry Potter, and many more. And yes, while it is important for a writer to "just get words on the page," it is also important for a writer to think about the order in which those words will be presented. All literature is instructive; all authors have some point to make. Ring composition can help you make that point subconsciously without wasting your words.

There are other benefits to using ring composition beyond what I have already mentioned. It lends a sense of purpose, permanence, and completion to a text or story. Have you ever read a book that, if it were a building, it would look like a Jenga tower with odds and ends sticking out here and there, dangerously close to falling over? I have, and usually these sorts of stories feel unfinished or unsatisfying when I get to the end, and I'm left with dangling story elements that were never resolved. I usually chalk this up to poor, or no, planning on the part of the author, and I rarely return to these stories for a second read. If you successfully use ring composition, this should never happen in your own work. Your story will not only make a point, it will lodge in the readers' brains, and when it's finished, it will feel finished. Lastly, ring composition imitates real life and the journeys that all of us take. I thought about this as I was winging my way over the Pacific Ocean coming back from Australia. The same journey, in reverse order, that I took only a week before. When I got back to the Dallas airport and waited for my connection to Birmingham, I even saw some of the same security personnel I had encountered on my way out. This may seem trite to you, but it put a contemplative smile on my face as I pondered its relevance to my writing, and to the greater story of life (ashes to ashes, dust to dust, naked from my mother's womb and naked I return, etc...). There is something beautiful to me about the chiastic structure in life and literature, and it will always be a structure I come back to in my writing. After all, who isn't moved by the deeper implications behind Tolkien's simple words? "There and Back Again." 

Why Traditional Themes Work

There's a lot to be said for tradition. If something is a tradition, it means it has been around for a long time, and if it has been around for a long time, there is probably a good reason. In literature, the Great Books are (simply put) books that deal with Great Themes - themes such as good vs. evil, power, sacrifice, redemption, life and death, love, and many others. Themes such as these speak to the human condition, and authors ought to seek to imitate the Great Books if they want their work to speak across the ages. I frown on authors who tailor their books to the ever-changing tide of cultural opinion. You might find success for a moment, but when that tide changes, your books will be washed away with it, as irrelevant in the next moment as they were relevant in the moment before. If you write to please pop culture, or with only your immediate generation in mind, you will never find lasting success. And I'm not talking about Kleos, that greatest of ancient Greek virtues that makes the hero (or the writer, in this case) "immortal." I'm not talking about your reputation at all, I'm talking about themes and messages that transcend you, as the author, and speak directly to the heart of mankind. Ask yourself this - if someone were to pick up my books in 100 years, would they read something that still speaks to them? If the answer is no, then you have not written something worth reading.

But let's face it, books have to sell, right? Publishing is a business, and you must write books that appeal to your generation. Absolutely! Of course you do! But that is what is on the surface. It's the candy-coating, if you will. But what should be at the heart of your books, beneath the surface, are stories filled with traditional themes that grab the hearts of the readers and make them come back over and over again. In this scenario, you cannot lose.

Avoid, avoid, avoid the pop culture trap. Avoid promoting the current fad, the current political agenda, the current soapbox topic... anything that will be here today and gone tomorrow. Avoid it! There are Greater things to be said. If I am granted the ability to look back on my body of work at the end of my life to evaluate what I am leaving behind me, I want to see that I have written stories that are true, that are beautiful, that are good - stories that are lasting.

And NOW for a little teaser! Speaking of authors who have written lasting works, if you're familiar with my books, you know that I pair each one with a C. S. Lewis quotation, and that quotation so far has always been about Darcy. In book 5, The Scroll, I've chosen one that speaks to Darcy, but is about another character, and I bet my biggest fans will be able to guess who! Here it is:

"What can you ever really know of other people's souls—of their temptations, their opportunities, their struggles? One soul in the whole creation you do know: and it is the only one whose fate is placed in your hands." C. S. Lewis

A Very Valentine's Day Post

In honor of Valentine's Day, I thought it would be a good idea to post my thoughts on romance and how to write it effectively into a novel. Now, I don't write in the romance genre, but I will always have an element of romance in my books. Why? First of all, I enjoy it! When I'm reading a novel, I always think that some sort of romantic story arc edifies the overall story. Romance can be done really well, or really poorly in a story, and as a writer, I've tried to imitate what I think is the best of what I've seen, and avoid the worst. Here are some of the common pitfalls I've tried to avoid in writing romance into my books...

1) Romance that moves too fast.
Romance in a story ought to be a slow burn. It is so much more satisfying to watch two characters slowly grow together over the course of a novel, or a series of novels, than to watch them meet and fall head over heels in love in the first fifty pages of the novel. The progress of romance from hints to resolution is meant to leave the reader with a sense of satisfaction, and if you reach that resolution too soon, the reader can lose interest in the rest of the progress of the character development. It's not as though every romantic story arc in a story has to be long and drawn out, but the ones that are the most important often ought to be. The tension leading up to the declaration of love is more interesting for a reader than much of what happens after. Along these lines too, this is especially true if the author has two characters almost immediately jump into bed with each other. Where do you go from there? If you're going to write a speedy romance into your story, you'd better have a darn good reason for doing so!

2) Why do they love each other?
As often happens with romances that move too fast, this one is tied in with the first pitfall, but I thought it was big enough to be worthy of its own point. Sometimes characters fall so instantly in love that I, as the reader, simply don't buy that they could possibly BE in love yet. This doesn't always happen with the romance moving too fast, either. Sometimes the characters who are supposed to be falling in love are so wrong for each other, I simply can't see them together. Authors sometimes get married to an idea in their heads (such as two disparate oddballs falling for each other) and they hang on to the idea like bulldogs even when they may have written another character into the story that the reader can clearly see would be a better choice for one of the characters who is supposed to be falling in love with someone else (boy, does that sentence make sense?). This often happens when authors try to write clever love triangles. Either way, that loss of secondary belief is the kiss of death to a novel, for me at least.

3) Sappiness.
If it's too sappy and sentimental, it makes my gorge rise. If I can't picture myself or someone else saying or doing what's being described in real life, I'll never buy it in a novel. Romance doesn't have to be overly gooey. Enough said.

4) Age-inappropriate expressing of feelings.
This happens all the time in young adult novels! The two characters falling in love, who are supposed to be maybe sixteen or seventeen, talk and behave like full-grown adults in the expression of their deep love for each other. Now, it's NOT that I don't believe teenagers can fall in legitimate love, because I do. But teenagers have a certain vernacular about them that is different from how adults think, speak, and behave when they are in love. I try very hard to keep my teenage characters acting like teenagers, even when they are in love. The expression of love matures as people mature, and sometimes YA authors lose sight of that and write their teenagers as if they are adults.

5) Surprise! They're not actually getting together!
Authors can get really high and mighty about their art sometimes, and can take it to the point of refusing to bow to crass commercial expectations (nose tilt, superior expression). This sometimes takes the form, in a novel, of an author hinting all along that two characters are going to end up together, and then never bringing those hints to successful resolution. This drives me, as a reader, CRAZY! If you're going to lead the reader into thinking that something is going to happen, then for the love of Pete make it happen. To do anything else is just mean.

These are just a few that came to me off the top of my head, and you may not agree with me on all of them, but that's okay. :) I've so enjoyed getting to the romantic parts of my bigger story (the story arc that covers all six books), and because I knew the end when I started writing the beginning, putting in those little tidbits here and there that would lead to the coming together of two characters was so much fun. If you've read all the way through book 4, hopefully you'll appreciate going back and seeing how Darcy and Tellius interacted in book one when they were really just children. And there's a new romance blooming in book 5... but I can't say much about that yet. Those of you who know my style best will have seen it coming from a mile away.
Happy Valentine's Day, everyone.

Reverse Engineering

When I first conceived of writing six books in this series, I really had no idea what I was getting myself into. The story seemed so blissfully simple when I outlined the overall series. I knew, of course, that there would be unexpected twists and turns along the way, but knowing that and navigating my way through it now that I am there are two entirely different things. As I buckle down this week to begin serious work on book 5, I'm faced with the task of making sure that all the subplots I introduced along the way begin to work toward their expected - and unexpected - conclusions. I am once again thankful that I plan before I write, because at least I do know how the story is going to end, and there wasn't a single subplot introduced without that in mind. The difficulty really becomes simply making sure that I don't forget anything as I draw the story to a close. Two books might seem like a lot of space in which to do this, but when you're writing a novel, it always ends up being far less space than you think it's going to be. All along I've put off plot points that I couldn't get to in one novel to the next novel, but now I can't do that any more. I also need to be careful not to introduce too many brand new plot points in book 5. If the story arc is a hill, I crested it in book 4 and it's time for me to start working my way down the other side. After thinking about how I'm going to do this for several weeks, I've come to the conclusion that the wisest thing for me to do first is to reverse engineer the story. I'm not going to write it backwards from the end of book 6, that would be insane, but I am going to make a detailed plan of the climax of the whole series (a plan, keep in mind, of an ending I figured out long ago), then I'm going to lay out all of the prophecies and oracles side by side with this plan and make sure that the dots connect. That way I'll have all the BIG stuff accounted for. Then I'm going to take each of the main characters' story arcs and make sure that they connect properly with the plan in the end. If I get all this straight, the rest of the subplots should fall nicely into place... if I've been as careful about what I've introduced along the way as I think I've been. This should dovetail nicely into the document I wrote up last year detailing all the subplots and their necessary conclusions, so it's not as though I'm starting from scratch on this. (I'm a woman with a plan!) Truthfully, though, even with all my careful planning, I am a little daunted. I feel like a juggler with about fifty balls up in the air, and each one needs to be caught and carefully lowered to the ground. If I let any of them fall, I will feel like a failure. So now I need to go and collect about five writing journals, consolidate and analyze about 100 pages of typed notes, and stack the first four books beside me (gotta fact check!) to begin this task of reverse engineering the last two books. In writing, when you know where you're going, you can more easily figure out how to get there.

Letting it Go: Thoughts on Editing

Okay, first off, I realize that I am so far overdue for a blog post it isn't even funny! Perhaps I can be forgiven, however, after some insight into the past six-eight weeks. In this span of time, I have wrapped up my blog tour for The Six, edited The Oracle, edited The White Thread, and finished writing the rough draft of book 4, The Enchanted - which I started in January. I have also prepared for and given birth to my third son (three boys, oh my!), and now I have a two-week-old at home along with my three-year-old and my five-year-old. As a teacher, I had to prepare for my maternity leave that would overlap final exam time for my 10th graders and finish teaching as much material as I could get through before the arrival of baby #3.

Can you forgive me for neglecting my blog? (Cue mini violin)

Moving beyond the hectic craziness that was the last 8 weeks, I'm now looking forward to a summer spent editing The Enchanted, working with my publicists to organize interviews and appearances, and writing book 5, as well as kicking off another blog tour for The Oracle and, later in the summer, a third blog tour for The White Thread. All things considered, however, it's actually less work than I've been engaged in this spring, so I think the future is bright!

Out of all this mess of stuff, the most difficult part has been the editing process, and I just wanted to share a few thoughts. Allowing a team of people to come in and rework your manuscript is a difficult thing, and I've actually called it humbling several times over this past spring. I knew that it would be hard to release my books into the hands of others, but I don't think I anticipated just how difficult it would be at times. Working with editors takes trust - a lot of it. I decided from the beginning that I would trust my editing team to make my books better, even if I didn't agree with changes they made and even if I didn't understand all the changes they made, and I'm glad I made this promise to myself. The fact of the matter is, they want me to succeed; they are not out to make my books worse, and I sometimes need to remind myself of that. The most difficult changes to swallow are the stylistic ones. For example, they do not want me to use hardly any creative dialogue tags or ly-adverbs, but I love using them! And when I read my favorite books, I see the pages full of them, as well (probably why I enjoy using them, as writing is an imitative art). However, if I can hold my books in an open palm and allow my editors to use their expertise to fashion my stories into more professional-sounding prose, then I think I've taken an important step. And quite frankly, nine times out of ten, when I go back and read a section they have helped me rework, it really is better. I find that I'm actually looking forward to editing book 4. As it is the first manuscript that was not previously self-published, I think I'll be able to approach it with more of an open mind. Although maybe I've just learned a little more trust and humility, which are things that we all need in life.

Reflections on Writing The Six, Part 2

This is my 100th blog post! And there was much rejoicing! Yaaayyy...

Okay, on to what this post is really about.

I promised to finish the story of how The Six came to be, so here goes... I already mentioned how the idea for the series was inspired by my actual camp experiences growing up and by my actual camp friends. But, as I also mentioned, I didn't have a clear concept in college of what the story would be about, although I had the setting and feel laid out. My notes for "Nine Fast Friends" stayed shelved for several years. I finished the other fantasy manuscript I was working on, tried and tried to get a publishing house and/or an agent, failed and failed at that, and graduated college with a healthy cynicism of the publishing industry. Self-publishing was very expensive and not very widespread at this time (2005), and most of the people with whom I discussed the self-publshing option laughed at the idea of it. (I'm not here going to go into the entire self-publishing to traditional publishing road, as that will be the subject matter of a later blog post.) My husband and I moved to Denver to pursue masters degrees, and in Denver I became a part of a writer's guild. I also discovered, after just one month in Denver, that I was expecting our first child. Suddenly the prospect of a master's degree didn't seem so attainable anymore... neither did staying in Denver where we had no friends or family, and very high expenses. My husband and I decided to relocate to Birmingham, Alabama and the move took place just three weeks before our son was born. This is worth mention in the evolution of The Six because when I left Denver, I took with me the friendship of a fellow writer from the writers guild named Ross. Ross and I exchanged manuscripts for several months (this was still my first fantasy manuscript), and he was the first one to tell me that my style is to write for teenagers. I had always said that I just wanted to write for "everyone!" and he pointed out that not only was this impractical, but it wasn't my style. He also told me in all honesty that my manuscript wasn't ready for publication; and he was right!

I really took his comments to heart and spent several months considering what I wanted to do. I didn't have the passion for that first manuscript that I needed to have for it, and after 20-odd rejections and finally the suggestion from Ross that it needed to be reworked entirely, I decided that it would simply be better to start over with something else - something I could work on from scratch and that could be written with teenagers in mind. I was coming up on the summer of 2008 and just finishing up my first year teaching. I knew that the only time I would have to write a book from beginning to end would be the summer time, as teaching is so time consuming, so I began to plan in earnest in the spring. Looking at all my various story notes, I settled on writing a science fiction/fantasy series called Que (pronounced "Cue"). This was probably my most well-fleshed-out idea, and as soon as school was out, I began to write my outline for the story. I was also at this time, however, re-reading one of my favorite books, Pride and Prejudice, and for some reason the name Darcy caught with me so strongly that I couldn't get it out of my head. I don't know where Pennington came from, but it also arrived that night, and I remember it was as though my brain suddenly caught fire. I probably spent 3 hours pacing my bathroom that night talking to myself and formulating the story idea. I knew as soon as the name Darcy Pennington came to me that she belonged in my camp story and that I would not be writing Que after all. In those three hours of pacing and hours lying awake in bed after that, I decided on six characters instead of nine (nine main characters is, after all, far too many to keep adaquate track of), settled on all their names, and conceptualized the story. The notes I took that night became the basis for The Six, but I also knew that it was going to be a series, and I couldn't start writing the series until I knew the end of the story. There were so many other things I wanted to be a part of the story, too - from literary alchemy to color symbolism to number symbolism to name symbolism to homages to my favorite authors and stories - and I figured out the basic structure of it all in about a week. It's really, obviously, too much to go into here, nor do I want to give away all my secrets - or even half of them (what good author does that?) - but it was a whirlwind of activity for me. Once I had the series synopsis set, I wrote my outline for book 1, set a daily writing schedule for myself, and got down to the work of writing, without ever having any real idea of whether or not I could produce a coherent novel in the two months I had left before school started again.

I finished the 384-page manuscript, somehow, before school began, and that's where I'll let off on the story of how it came to "be." As I said above, the publishing journey is a whole other story. I will say that I tested my manuscript on my students. I kept a binder in my classroom, and my 8th graders, in particular, took to it with a frenzy. I remember many a day where I had to break up arguments over who got to read it, and some students even took to snatching the binder when they walked in the room and stashing it in their desk so as to be able to have "dibs" on it should we end up with any free time in class. This sort of reaction told me that not only had I successfully written a novel, but I had apparently written something that teenagers wanted to read.

I've been careful throughout the writing of the story to preserve the identity of the real camp, although many of the location names and some story aspects are takes on actual places and events. For example, there really is a large boulder at this camp that is covered in gnomes painted on little rocks and stuck in the crevices. The recreation hall at the real camp is named after a college student who passed away - although not at the camp. And there is a story that a student in another week once tried to burn the rec hall down. The very best qualities of my camp friends have found their way into the characters, and I would, of course, never disparage any of them or use any of their real names. The stories have been, in one sense, a set of thank you notes to them and their influences on me.

And now I'm really waxing sentimental. Perhaps some of you wish that I would have given more detail in this account, perhaps some of you far less. Each story in the series has its own history and "fun facts" associated with it, but, again, if I told you all of that, what secrets would I have left?