Crossposted to the Deadline Dames

A friend of mine is considering moving. “I just want to live on my own,” she said to me this afternoon, while the wind made my chimes ring like rattlesnakes. “I want to be able to sit in my underwear with pizza and a beer and a book. I just need it, you know.”

“Oh, honey,” I said, squinting in the sunlight, “I know.”

Virginia Woolf said that money and a room of one’s own is a prerequisite for woman writers. I tend to agree. Certainly getting one’s career to a place where one can comfortably support oneself, or not having to worry overmuch about food and rent, is a marvelous thing.

But I didn’t start out with it.

I have learned to write in any situation imaginable. I started in school writing furiously at every moment I could steal from classes. One of my teachers let me keep a box of spiral notebooks in her classroom over the summer, since I didn’t have hiding places at home. I exercised my youthful ingenuity to hide my diaries and stories at home when I lost that opportunity, used friends’ houses and employee lockers to keep my words safe from prying and punishment. When I left, I hid my notebooks in closets and other places, just to be safe.

I stole moments to write plot outlines on notepads at several jobs. I spent my lunch hours and breaks writing furiously in spiral notebooks between bites of whatever I could afford–or just writing because I couldn’t afford a snack. I learned to write with toddlers around, one half of my brain scanning constantly to anticipate their needs or any danger to them. I learned to write in a house full of shrieking “LOOK AT ME! I DON’T EXIST UNLESS YOU LOOK AT ME! LOOKLOOKLOOK!” (Note: only two of the people screeching that were under 10. The rest…well. Whole ‘nother blog post there.)

I’ve written on trains and planes, I’ve written on buses and in parks, I’ve written in libraries, I’ve written in casino bars, other bars, in bathrooms late at night while the people I’m staying with are asleep. I’ve written in classrooms, coffee shops, head shops, cafes, community centres, all-night restaurants, even in the closed-down delis of major supermarket chains. Finding a space to sit down and whip out my notebook–or lug my laptop to–has become somewhat of an art form.

Do it where you gotta has been by mantra for a long time. Now that I have a house and a chair and a lapdesk, where I can sit cross-legged and pound out text while the whole place is silent because the kids are at school…

…well, it’s been a shock. I’m used to concentrating fiercely in the face of distraction. The silence of the house is a type of distraction I’m not insulated against. I used to keep music on to provide a thread under the other sounds I could jack into and ride while I typed. Now I play it because sometimes the empty house makes me start up in almost-terror sometimes, thinking the kids are Altogether Too Quiet and Up To Mischief.

My productive hours are in somewhat of a flux now. I used to be a champion insomniac, first because I’m built to be a night owl and second because the wee hours were the only damn time nobody needed anything from me. Now I’m finding different chunks of my “day” to be productive, because I finally have space and solitude.

Which brings me to something I consider a Rule. All applicable disclaimers, etc., etc., but here it is:

If you WANT to write, you will more than likely FIND TIME to write.

Yes, I know. “I’m too poor/busy/tired/something! I don’t have time! I can’t find a space!”

Often I hear this from people who are overscheduled or who don’t set boundaries instead of truly being unable. I am willing to concede that whoever, whatever their situation, may be too tired/busy/whatever to write. Billions of people don’t write, and they get along just fine.

I am not one of those people who gets along fine without writing.

I wrote while effectively homeless. I wrote while being a single mother working full-time and going to school. I wrote while raising two small children and cleaning up after a Very Large Child. I think one of the main reasons I’ve achieved a sort of quiet success is because writing has always been a priority to me. I felt I would go mad if I didn’t write. I put writing in with my basic needs of food and shelter, and that is a component of the psychotic persistence several writers (don’t really) joke about being necessary to get published.

It was necessary for me to continue writing. Being paid for it is where I’ve ended up, and that’s just fine by me. I like it that way. I would still be doing this if I didn’t have a room of my own and a lock on my door. In fact, for the rest of my life, putting words together is something I’m going to be doing. I can’t help it.

I say this so you will understand the advice I am about to give. This advice is free, so take it or leave it.

Finding time in a day to sneak writing in, learning to pick up a story and dive in when you only have five or fifteen minutes, getting your wordcount out rather than watching the telly or playing that video game, is essentially saying “This is important to me.” I don’t promise that you will get published if you train yourself to make writing a priority and set boundaries around your writing time. I can promise that your chances of getting good enough to have a reasonable shot at being published will go up with every minute you spend making writing your priority.

If that’s where you’re aiming, okay. Do it where you gotta. Write down the activities you participate in on a daily basis and figure out which ones are essential (like paying rent or eating), which are very desirable (like maintaining your relationship with your real friends, or what-have-you), and which are just desirable (playing a video game, watching television. Note these are just MY examples, yours will be different.). Move writing from the “just desirable” category into the “essential” category, the things you make time for because you’ve just plain got to–or even into the “very desirable” category. Find the time by cutting it elsewhere, if you’re serious. If you’re not serious, it’s OK. There are plenty of other things to do in this wide varied world of ours. Go do them and be merry.

This is why I say I “tend” to agree with Virginia. Of course, I have the benefit of being in a culture and of a socioeconomic section where I have certain advantages, and I realize that. However, I was not always in this socioeconomic or cultural slice, and many other successful writers I know weren’t (or aren’t) either. The room of your own is nice, and the money is damn nice.

But it is the will to find a way that is essential. Without it, the room is just a room.

It’s up to you to fill it.

Over and out.

Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.

Oh, you book, you. You feisty little book. This is twice you’ve juked me out, three times if you count that outline I bowed to pressure and did. The one you’ve made me alter and throw out TWICE now.

Oh you little rascal. You just do not know who you are f!cking with.

I’m getting ready for the last big tango of this part of our relationship. It’ll be a great dance full of gunfire and merriment. I’ll get the characters through the crisis while you yawn and grin at me. I can feel the last big push of creative effort sneaking up on me. It’s a constant tickle under the surface of my skin. I can’t finish another task, I walk away from things I’m doing to sit down and eke out a few more words. I sink so deep into the story any interruption makes me blink resentfully while I return to this world of bills and responsibilities.

So just keep smiling, you book, you. I’m not so kind a lover when you tease. I’m listening to the White Stripes and getting ready to drag you out on the dance floor. No more deleting chunks of text. No more feeling around the corners. Oh no.

We’re going to do this, you and I. I’ve got you around the waist and we’re on the parquet. We’re going pedal to the metal, aiming for the horizon, and devil take the hindmost.

I might not be the best date this story’s ever have, but goddammit, I’m going to be the date this story never forgets.

Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.

Yes, I’ve broken 50K on the latest Dru novel. I am still terrified, I still think it’s awful, I am still tearing my hair out and screaming “everyone is going to hate it AND HATE ME! I’LL NEVER GET FINISHED WAAAH!” But that’s so much a part and parcel of the doldrums of a novel’s creation that I’m actually riding the feelings with a modicum of calm. Yeah, it might suck, but at least it won’t be a pile of unfinished suckage. The rest is for an editor to help me with.

You’d think that after how many books I would figure out that this feeling of it absolutely being the worst book in the universe is just a product of the creative process (or emotional exhaustion) and it would fade. The bad news is that it hasn’t by now, it’s not likely to, and the best I can do is ameliorate it by remaining conscious that this exhaustion and the attendant fear are just reactions. I can watch them go by on my mental screen and breathe through them.

50K is usually the turning point, where I start an increasingly-fast race downhill to the end of the book, tying in all the threads I spun out earlier and tipping over the first domino so the whole thing goes the way I want it to. I often refer to this as the Flat Diet part of the book–where you can just slide the pizza under the door and I’ll see you when I’ve typed finis, kthxbai.

Of course, there’s proofs and a clean pass of another book to look at, and the short story due on April 1…so, along with the pizza can you slide some tandoori mixed grill and some naan through? Just leave the wine outside, I’m sure I’ll remember to get to it in a couple hours…

Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.

Crossposted to the Deadline Dames!

This Friday’s writing post is a bit late because, well, life happens. As it is, I was taking a cake to a sixth-grade classroom this morning (long story, don’t ask) and I ended up giving an impromptu Q&A about the life of a working writer for about an hour and a half.

Oh, my God, you guys. Sixth-graders are brutal. I think the second question was, “What do you make a year?” The kid asking it was genuinely curious. The teacher looked horrified, someone else said, “You don’t ask that!” and I grinned and took it as an opportunity to explain just how much of the cover price an author actually gets from each book, how an advance works, and how many books have to sell before a profit is made.

The kids were fascinated. Their faces squinched up as they did the math, and I could see comprehension spreading through them. They were overjoyed to have a Real Live Writer in front of them, and asked about everything

I got a lot of questions about writers I knew–”Do you know X? What about Y?” And there was one young man who bonded with me over The Breakfast Club, of all things.

I love talking to kids, especially about writing and the writing life. They have great questions, they’re not afraid to ask a single one, they’re smart, and once they relax they’re hilarious. I loved watching them put the math together about how many books would have to sell to earn out a $60K advance. Oh, and we talked about genre, what it is and what it isn’t. I was able to tell about the bad and the good parts of being a writer. And no, I didn’t cuss once.

I also got to tell them why it was OK to not finish every story, and why I never have a problem finding stories. That the world was full of stories, and that a book I write about werewolves is not going to be the book they write about werewolves, because we’re different people. That people are unique, and the odds of us all being alive together in the same room are so astronomical that everyone in there has to have a story. To never doubt that they have a story to tell, something unique and marvelous inside them that deserves to be told. That telling a story is an act of faith, a line thrown into darkness–and reading a story is catching that line, from inside your own dark hole.

It was a great morning.

Then there was a trip to Ikea to get bedroom furniture for a certain Princess. Afterward, at lunch with the Selkie, there was sharing of plot points and much trash-talking and nuts-and-bolts talk.

It’s absurdly awesome to spend almost the whole day talking and thinking about writing. The sixth-graders were so awesome, and there’s nothing quite like getting a platter of Indian food and hashing over plot, continuity, human foibles, grist for the story mill, and war stories with your writing partner. I haven’t spent a more enjoyable day in a long while.

Writing is a very solitary, self-driven art. At a certain point, there’s just you and the words. You can’t get away from long hours spent with just the words and the people in your head to keep you company. The social part of a writing career–not making a fool of yourself with editors, agents, marketing people, and just generally acting professionally at conventions and otherwise–takes up a lot of time too, and sometimes it’s work instead of pleasantry.

And then a day like today comes along, where I get the chance to talk about something I love, something I am so passionate about. That class full of kids, so full of wonder and courage, reminded me of the other part of why I do this job. And trash-talking with my writing partner is another way for me to talk about the down and dirty of something I love with someone who understands, someone who gets it and speaks my language.

Now I’ve got some wordcount to get in. I get to go back to the solitary part of my job renewed and energized. And feeling pretty damn good about this whole gig. It’s great to share my passion–and it’s also great to be able to go home and find that passion still waiting for me. A most enchanting lover built of words and scenes and raw beautiful emotion, always here and always just a few moments of concentration and effort away.

Come in, the stories say. Come in and settle down.

We’ve been waiting for you.

It’s nice to feel wanted.

Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.

When you get up at 6AM with a whole week’s worth of to-do collapsed into a single day…everything turns into a blur. Especially when you’ve been awake half the night stressed out about All The Things You’ve Decided To Do Today. I was up pretty early this morning, and I got everything accomplished. My list, which looked like a mad scientist’s scratchpad, has EVERYTHING crossed off. If I wasn’t so damn tired I’d go get myself a glass of wine to celebrate. Unfortunately the wine would put me straight into a coma.

So I’m just checking in with a couple of quick things.

* To Reader Shelly H.: your letter made me cry. It’s those types of letters that get me through and remind me why I’m doing this on days when I’m deluged by bad reviews or deadline panic, revision hell or Muse bonbon shortage. Thank you for taking the time to write. You really made my day. Hell, my month. Keep swinging, kid. I’m right there with you.

I do read every piece of fanmail you guys send. I can’t respond much (if at all) because of Deadline and Life Pressure. I know you guys understand because you tell me you do, often in the the first paragraph. I do read and treasure–and in some cases, reread–your letters. Thank you so much for writing to me. You’re all awesome.

* I’ve signed myself and the kids up for a rock-climbing basics class in April. (The Krav Maga place was always closed when I went by to check it out. Oh well!) It’ll teach belaying for me, and other stuff for the small ones. They’re absolutely thrilled. I hadn’t realized we had TWO community centres with indoor rock walls in Vancouver. (The mind boggles.) Plus there are other ones in Portland.

However, I know next to naught about climbing. I’ll be climbing indoors for the foreseeable future. Reader TJ Tradekraft (hi TJ!) has already given me some great advice, and if anyone else around here is a climber, feel free to advise me in comments or drop me an email. Yes, I am actually asking for advice. Don’t look surprised, I do this all the time.
I’m looking for stuff like:

what to look for in a good climbing wall
what to look for in a good instructor
general safety tips
general comfort tips (like TJ says, “tape your fingers!”)
general advice

That about covers it. I’ve got dinner cooking and some wordcount to get in so today is a total win instead of a qualified win. I suspect I’ll feel better with more food in me; lunch was good but it was hours ago.

Whew. Off I go…

Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.

Crossposted to Deadline Dames. So you want to know how the Dames got started? Stay tuned…

Someone once said, “You don’t know how to write novels. You only know how to write the novel you’re writing NOW.”

Wise words.

Writers fall on a continuum. You have your pantsers, who tend to store things in their head and blithely run through a novel; then you have your plotters, who have a variety of strategies for deciding on what happens in a novel before they write it. (Strategies like outlining, 3X5 cards, mapping a novel on butcher or kraft paper, Post-Its, you name it.) Anywhere you land in that process is fine as long as you come up with a workable product at the end.

I’ve been an inveterate pantser for most of my writing life. I generally work hot and fast after a protracted period of getting the book clear inside my skull, led on from point to point by the Muse, halting only for those places where I have to feel out what happens next like a woman with a plug in one hand searching for a socket in a dark room. (While artillery goes off all around and rats are trying to eat me…) Sometimes (as we discussed last night on Twitter) I stick inessential or don’t-have-it parts in [square brackets] and flail onward while the momentum is hot. Things like [big fight goes here, yadda yadda, get gun kicked away in struggle and wound to hip]. You get the idea.

Then there comes a book to change all that.

I’ve actually outlined the rest of the book I’m working on, in square bracket chunks.

This upsets me a little. I tend not to “plot” so much because the few times I’ve tried it, I’ve ended up feeling confined by the strictures and throwing them out anyway. It’s like someone peering over my shoulder as I write, which is the kiss of death for any kind of peace of mind for me.

Part of having a sustainable writing career is learning to take these sorts of changes with a minimum of flailing. Or, at least, scheduling in the flailing so you can meet your deadline.

So now I’m forced to take a deep breath and repeat to myself, Be mellow. It’s another way of doing the book. As long as the book gets done, we’re OK with however we get there. Just do what the novel needs now, and don’t worry so much about it. You’ve done this thirty-odd times, and each time it’s been different. You finished the other books, you can do this one, outline or not.

So my message for this Friday? Relax. Each book, short story, poem, what-have-you, is unique. Some won’t get finished. Others need different preparations along the plotter-pantser continuum to come to fruition. If this was easy, or if one size fit every novel, well, this would be a lot easier.

But it isn’t. Just ride the pony you’ve got for now.

Now, when I start losing my mind in another twenty thousand words, can someone point me back at this and thwap me on the head until I chill out?

Thanks.

Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.

The Muse, again. Taking the story through a bootlegger’s turn, and now she’s sitting on her red velvet fainting-couch, selecting bonbons from a beribboned cardboard box, and thinking through how she’s going to tell me to fix this thing. I can’t go any further until I figure out how Character A has received the information he’s going to impart to Girl Friday. I know there’s a solution, it’s on the tip of my brain. The goddamn Muse is sitting on it.

Some days she’s like that.

I am just going to keep throwing bonbons at her until she takes pity on me or until the solution wriggles out from under her and into my head. In the meantime, I’ll be working on another project to make this one jealous. Making books jealous of each other is a good way to jolt them free. If I’m not working on one thing I’m working on another, and that’s what’s saving my sanity.

Such as it is.

So. I’ll be shoveling bonbons and working on the homicidal-fae book today if anyone needs me. If you see the Muse, throw some choco at her or kick her pretty little derriere, willya?

Thanks. You’re a pal. I couldn’t do this without you.

*exits stage right, hands fisted in hair, muttering*

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The engine of synchronicity runs under the surface of my days. In order to feel the engine and see the connections, I have to be in a certain frame of mind. I can generally tell how OK I am by how well I can sense the engine running. Whether it only runs when I’m happy or I just don’t see it when I’m in the undertow is largely academic as far as I’m concerned.

So. I am reading Murakami. There’s a passage in Dance Dance Dance–Chapter 17, to be precise–where he talks about the phone, about connections, about the imperfection of communication. It resonated so strongly I set the book aside and sat thinking for a while, feeling the engine thrum under the surface of daily life.

I started reading Murakami because of a tragedy, and the first novel I picked–The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles–still resonates. I was climbing out of a well of my own when I read it; the tragedy was in a well of its own. For various reasons, it was gruesomely ironic that I started reading him at about that time. I can’t blame the author, but I think that has something to do with my liking the books.

The tragedy wasn’t mine, but it tore at me. My links under the surface of the world mean very little to anyone but me, but seeing them, the wheels and cogs sliding gently into place, meshing with the terrible convenience of coincidence–well, it’s important. Maybe I only see it when I’m happy because otherwise I couldn’t bear the tangled knots weaving everything and everyone I know together. I couldn’t bear to see the machinery going along with its own chaotic, fractal regularity and logic.

In any case, the world is sparkling with golden dust and thrumming with the knots and threads all bound together and pulling in their different directions. It’s marvelous to think that everyone I see is a node with their own net of knots and threads that sometimes touch mine briefly. Each touch is a fresh knot. If it’s a net, it’s one that keeps us from falling too far.

It’s good not to feel alone. The magic has come back. The tightrope act goes on.

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Just a flyby post, since the last few days have been crazy. Next week will be better.

Tonight at 6:30PM (Pacific) I’ll be doing #askawriter on Twitter or about 20 minutes/half an hour. Come by and ask questions about writing/publishing. I will NOT answer questions such as “will you read my manuscript?” or “can you help me with my homework?” Other than that, fair game.

It’s a beautiful blue-sky day and I’ve some zombies to kill. Catch you later.

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Spin me right round, baby right round…

I’ve gone from being barely able to run for two whole minutes without gasping and feeling like I was being tortured…to running for almost an hour at double the pace relatively easily. I’m glad I’ve looked back at the original contract I made with myself to exercise, because it reminds me of how far I’ve come in baby steps. Breaking up a goal into bite-size chunks and methodically working through those chunks isn’t glamorous, but you do eventually get to a place where you look around ad realize, holy crap I’m doing X when before I could barely do Y! It’s a great feeling.

I won’t be signing up for any marathons soon. For right now it’s enough that I know I can do these things, and feel the effects in my much-smaller-now body.

Anyway, today is President’s Day and the kids are home from school. We’re heading out to OMSI with our friend H. and her son. Another great thing about fighting my way back from the abyss–I have energy to do cool things now! I am fun again! *rolls eyes at self* But really, that’s how I feel. Like I’ve plugged back into the socket that is my awesomeness.

Tomorrow night, my awesome fellow Razorbill author Suzanne Young is signing out at Cedar Hills Crossing. The Princess loved her book, The Naughty List, and Suzanne is a ton of fun. If you can, go out and show some love! I don’t know if I’ll get out there, but I’ll be there in spirit cheering her on.

Oh, and my Valentine’s Day date-with-myself has been moved to Tuesday. It just worked out better that way. I’m going to go see The Wolfman. Yeah, it might suck. My expectations are pretty low, I’m just going for the escape, the costumes, and Benecio Del Toro’s lips. (The man pouts like Mae West and I LOVE IT.) Plus I’m going to buy myself popcorn, because I am a Good Date.

I can also say that I’ve finished the latest round of revisions on Heaven’s Spite and am flipping back to Dru 4 and a short story. No rest for the wicked, and I’m getting to like it that way. So I must bid you a civil adieu. Regular blogging will resume tomorrow.

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