May 21, 2013 at 10:51 am (fiction, gay, gay fiction, Observations)
Tags: career, critique, Daily Rituals: How Artists Work, Editing, fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken, LGBT, LGBT Fiction, Mason Currey, writer, writing
BHE (for new readers BHE stands for “Best Husband Ever”) recent gave me a great book called “Daily Rituals: How Artists Work” by Mason Currey. It is a novel that tells you about process famous artists had when creating their art. Reading about the process of others, made me think about my own.
When I was writing “The Role” my process followed this structure:
7:00-7:30 a.m. Wake up
7:30 – 9:00 a.m. Free time
9:00-10:00 a.m. Read a piece of fiction in the POV and tense of my novel. (1st person, present tense)
10:00 a.m. – ???? Write a minimum of 1,500 words.
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Take a walk (or do Pilates if it is raining)
3:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. If I hadn’t finished my work count I would write to that. If I had met it and was mentally exhausted I would consider this free time.
Understanding and accepting my process is still something I am doing, but there is one aspect of my process I wanted to highlight today.
Reading.
Reading others really helped me in structure, plotting, and just generally making my story feel like a novel. You can learn a lot from excellent authors by engaging with their stories in a critical way. While I usually just enjoy novels that take me on a journey, examining how their writing swept me away was one of the best lessons I ever learned.
So if you are struggling in your writing I suggest you read an old favorite and examine why it is an a favorite of yours. Try and inject some of that magic into your manuscript.
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May 20, 2013 at 12:49 pm (gay fiction, Observations)
Tags: failure, power, strength, Struggle, writing
So it has been a long time since I blogged about anything, and the main reason is I’ve been incredibly busy. I could dwell on the events of the past few weeks, but I think a few bullet points will get everyone up to speed to today’s topic:
- I am now represented by Eric Ruben of the Ruben Literary Agency. To read about that story click here.
- I have been working a lot. In one two week period I was able to bill almost 40 hours of overtime. That means that in the course of 2 weeks I almost worked the equivalent of three.
- BHE and I are in the process of getting a house. We’ve already had our bid accepted, we just have to get the loan and inspection stuff done.
That’s not everything, but it’s enough. Anyway, so today I was thinking about what I wanted to blog about. I came up with the power of defeat. If you had found me on January 1, 2013 and told me that by Mid-May I would be so busy I’d have to bullet points major milestones in my life, I’d have said you were crazy. I was so down on myself. I had a lot of aspirations for 2013 but I was guarded with my hope. I knew what a longshot many of them were. I’m happy to report the important ones have seemed to have been accomplished. Part of that is the confidence that comes with being employed. I feel useful, and even when my job has been difficult, I’ve always felt thankful to have it.
I don’t think anyone has ever enjoyed failing, but, for me, a lot of good has come from my failures. There is generally a moment where my brain just clicks and everything that I saw as an obstacle becomes a stepping stone. Many of us wish to teleport from our current location to the goal, but the journey is necessary most of the time. It’s not always going to be fun, but it will make sure that once you’ve crossed over the finish line you are ready for what awaits on the other side.
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March 7, 2013 at 8:33 am (fiction, gay, gay fiction, Review)
Tags: Alva, fiction, LGBT, LGBT Fiction, LGBT Fiction Review, Sara Alva, Social Skills, Social Skills Review
I’ve been trying to read more of my genre lately, so I downloaded a lot of sample chapters on my Kindle. One of them was for the novel “Social Skills” by Sara Alva. I was intrigued that so many reviewers on Amazon and GoodReads kept saying that this was basically a really good version of a “Nerd\Jock Romance.” That so many reviewers harped on this made me believe I wasn’t going to get past the first few pages. Predominately because I wasn’t interested in reading another one of those books. Fortunately, while I would say the main lovers in Social Skills are informed by those stereotypes, neither totally adhere to them.
Connor has nerd qualities, in that he is smart and socially awkward, but his social anxiety isn’t simply a result of being a nerd. It stems from a lot of things. He is also a college freshman, who is short (and insecure about it), closeted, and living in non-freshman dorm. Even the best of us would be/were awkward at that age given that set of circumstances. As for Jared, he is barely a jock. He’s just a conventionally attractive guy who plays sports. Sure he’s on the football team, but he’s not scoring winning touchdowns, he’s warming the bench.
What Sara Alva has managed to do beautifully is write characters who feel much more real than the stereotypes mentioned in the reviews. Perhaps this is why the book is lauded as being a really excellent version of a Nerd/Jock Romance. I would say it is a romance that takes place in college. Sara Alva’s ability to write about college was actually the reason I bought the book. Unlike so many novels, which pretend college is just a harder version of high school, I felt like Sara really represented the college experience in a realistic way. I adored that the students complained about the distance and time it took to see one another, because I had the same complaints when I was in college. My college friends and I laugh that we ever thought a 15 minute walk across campus was a burden, now that we travel several hours and hundreds of miles to see one another.
There is a lot more about college she gets right, but I won’t bore you with further examples. The novel is a short and enjoyable read. I encourage you to pick it up, and see for yourself. I think Sara Alva is definitely an author to watch for in the future.
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February 18, 2013 at 9:06 pm (fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken, Observations, writing)
Tags: 2013, doubt, Editing, fiction, future self, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken, LGBT, LGBT Fiction, past self, revising, writer, writing, YA, YA LGBT
So the cool thing is…I’m working on something new. With a few fulls hanging out with agents, I decided to stop tinkering with my old novel, and work on other things in my life. One of those is a new novel. I’m once again not really working with an outline, which doesn’t seem to be a problem yet. My first chapter is definitely faster paced than my old one. Of course the new project is YA, so that might be why.
Anyway, my issue so far is this. When I wrote my first novel, I basically wrote to put down the bones of a story. The goal was to just see if I could write a full-length novel, that had a beginning, middle and end. Once I was about 1\3rd through the novel, my ability to write improved a lot. Partially because I wrote everyday, and therefore was in better “writing” shape (my waistline however…well let’s not talk about that!) the other thing that was different was that I knew the characters and the world I was writing in much better. So it was easier to write chapters that felt more fleshed out. I was so so ecstatic when I wrote my ending, and I thought I’d be able to do a quick revision and send it out to agents.
BOY WAS I WRONG!
My first draft was a story with a beginning, middle and end. It had great characters, wonderful moments, and a killer ending. The problem was….the beginning was a wreck. It was crude and poorly written. I despaired, wondering if the entire novel was actually like this. I flipped 100 pages into the novel, and soon saw that it was well crafted and much better than what I had started with. So I went to work heavily revising my first 100 pages. It wasn’t easy. I was angry with my past self for leaving my current self to deal with this mess. I swore never to do this again.
Funny thing? After writing only 2,000 words I can see I’m doing it again. Now it is better written than the first novel, but it is still crude. The character’s are definitely interesting, but I’ve not spent enough time with them to really get a feel for exactly how they feel and sound. It’s almost feels like they are in an opera where they play an exaggerated version of themselves. I am sure that, much like the last time, I will be able to better wield my keystrokes to turn these operatic icons into characters you can connect to on a true and personal level.
So to my future self I must say this: I know the beginning is rough, but you know these people so much better than me. So don’t be mad at me for not doing them justice. Just remember, without me, you’d never know them at all. Together, you and our even further future self will hopefully be able to bring our new found friends and enemies into the hearts of our readers.
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December 15, 2012 at 9:14 pm (Observations)
Tags: 2012, 2013, resolution, wish
This post is kind of self-help in language, so if you don’t like reading about people announcing to the universe their desire to change themselves for the better, I’d skip this. I usually hate reading it too, but this blog is meant to be a collection of my thoughts, and this is something I wanted to have on the record.
It occurred to me that as 2012 comes to a close, I have a lot of things I want to do. Life goals/aspirations, that I’d felt too guilty or unable to pursue, because my fruitless job search had bogged me down into a deep depression. In 2012 my goal was was simple to say, I wanted my novel to be read by people. Now, when I announced this aspiration, I meant the public at large. However I have had about 15 people read it, and it was nice to have that. I usually make some sort of resolution each year, but it rarely sticks (though I did lose 75 pounds the one year I ever kept my resolution!) So instead of “resolving” to do some new things in 2013. I created a list of things I just want to do. Things I usually think of as “Wouldn’t it be nice if I did that!” A good example is that my husband and I always say we should create a “poker night” for our male friends (many of whom have girlfriends\wives who do a book club). This year, I’m going to stop saying we should do it, and just do it again.
When I lived in AR, I was kind of a social event planner. Now granted, the events usually were the same each week (Friday night watch movie, Saturday night have wine and song at a piano bar, midnight meal at diner, Sunday brunch, repeat) I was good at getting people to do things. However, doing that takes a lot of planning and effort. And the older I’ve become the more expectations I feel are foisted upon events that I plan. Whenever we throw a party, whereas once I might have simply bought a few bottles of wine and laid out some cocktail books with the extensive liquor cabinet I had (though I rarely drank hard liquor back then.) Now, I spend a good 3 hours the night before chopping fruit for enough Sangria to probably fill more than a Magnum bottle. [in fact I often have to buy special containers for it!] and I also cook food for about 3 – 6 hours the day of. Now do I HAVE to do this? No. I enjoy it. I like throwing parties, and have learned how to accurately set expectations of how involved the party planning will be. So what’s my point? Basically I’ve lost sight of a the mid-point. I am either completely lazy or super involved (some would say overly involved). The beauty of my AR event planning was that it was more middle of the road. I think I was just tired of being the only one who did it! So when I didn’t have to (my husband explained that my friends would figure out what to do with themselves if I stopped planning everything) I never wanted to be thrust back into a situation where I felt the need to do be the “go to” person for a lot of things. Instead I took a lot of “assistant” roles.
So I think I’m ready to get back to being more active. I think my body will be happy to return to the gym/yoga/pilates (of course it’ll take 2 weeks for it to really be happy about this decision!). I think my brain will be happy to once again return to using some portions that have been neglected. And perhaps most importantly, I think my soul will be happy to once again have me singing everyday (even if it is only in my home office!).
So I’m not “resolved” to changing myself for the better in 2013. I’m excited about it! Because I don’t HAVE to. I WANT to!
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November 6, 2012 at 1:06 pm (Parties and Social events)
Tags: Bitter, Campari, Cocktail, Election, Election 2012, Election Cocktail, Loser, Obama, Romney
So I’m pretty sure I won’t be disappointed by the election, but my husband asked me to think about what we should drink in case we were. We decided Champagne was what we’d open if (when) Obama is re-elected, so I suggested Whiskey if he isn’t. My husband figured we might drink that anyway, and so I thought about it. Finally an idea hit me, a cocktail that basically screams disappointment. I’m calling this the “Bitter Loser” Here is the recipe:
Ingredients:
1. 2 shots Campari
2. 3 Sparkling Ice Cubes (Sparkling wine that is frozen into ice cubes)
3. Lemon
To prepare:
Place ice cubes in tumbler and pour Campari over. Squeeze Lemon juice over, and garnish with lemon rind.
Since Campari is a bitter liqour I figured it would be fitting for it to slowly eat away at the champagne as the ice melts. This will make drinking it easier, but it will take time. So it’s a pretty good drink both taste wise and symbolically.
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October 23, 2012 at 9:45 pm (fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken, Introductions)
Tags: 2012, career, critique, Editing, feedback, fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken, LGBT, LGBT Fiction, query, revising, rewriting, Sutton Foster, The Role, waiting, workshop, writer, writing
So it has been a long time since I blogged. Part of the reason is dealing with my job (I had a lot of great paid work come in, which is now sadly going away) I also have been at a standstill with my novel. All of the agents I queried rejected me. I’m not shocked by this, I expected it to happen. It is easy to expect the worst, that way you won’t be disappointed. But there was a silver lining. Due to the great reaction of my friends, family, and fans I was able to get some critical feedback from the agent Linda Epstein.
Linda is the kind of agent I want, because she is interested in representing the type of material I write. It is very rare to find someone to represent such a niche market, so I was hoping she was going to read my first five pages and ask me for more. Sadly, she did not. She pretty much hated my first five pages. I was wounded very deeply by this, but she made something clear to me.
I needed to step away, and come back much later. I felt that there was something wrong with my opening, but I had no idea what it was. I revised and revised and revised, but nothing seemed to work. When I opened up Linda’s comments a month later, I saw the answer clearly. I couldn’t fix what was there, because it wasn’t workable. The opening didn’t really have the same tone as my piece. It was trying very hard, and instead of coming off as sophisticated it came across as clunky and desperate. So I decided not to remodel, but tear down and start basically from scratch. The only thing I kept was the basic plot point (Main characters is reunited with a friend who offers to change his life for good)
I’m happy to report it worked. The new opening does everything I wished the old one did. It introduces one of the major characters up front, instead of waiting several chapters. It also moves at the pace of the rest of the novel, which is nice.
Now I’m at the stage of “Okay, I like this new open. If I want to keep it, I need to do something similar to the next few chapters.” So of course now I wonder whether I want to do that.
Click here to read the new opening!
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August 3, 2012 at 10:17 am (Review)
Tags: Amy Adams, Central Park, Donna Murphy, Gideon Glick, Into the Woods, Last Midnight, Public Theatre, Sarah Stiles, Shakespeare in the Park, Sondheim in the Park
Last night I felt transformed after attending The Public Theatre’s current production of Into the Woods. While I initially thought waiting 7 hours in line for the free ticket was a lot, I can tell you I’d wait a full 24 hours in the baking sun to see it again for the first time.
So I am pretty sure I know what most people want to know about. Amy Adams. Let’s get this out of the way right now. Ms. Adams is very good in the production. Her voice is strong, she is expressive, and although her portrayal is different from Joanna Gleason’s Tony Award winning performance of the same role, Ms. Adam’s is certainly able to hold her own with the cavalcade of talent that is on that stage. This is no small accomplishment, and there are other actors in the show who do not fare quite as well as Ms. Adams so I commend her on her performance. I was skeptical when I entered, but left impressed.
As an actor who has rehearsed and performed in the show, I felt certain I would, at best, be treated to a highly competent production of it, and never felt anything could come close to the video recording made many years ago. Yet, I could not have been more wrong.
The directors Timothy Sheader and Liam Steel were clearly aware that Into the Woods is a modern masterpiece, and therefore understood that to mount a successful production extreme care must be taken. You must keep in mind that fans of the show, are going to want to see what made them fall in love with it in the first place. At the same time, fans are not interested in watching a production which attempts to copy the source material. Even the great Donna Murphy would look bad if she attempted to portray the witch the way Bernadette Peters had so many years ago. Therefore the directors needed to reimagine the show in a way that allowed them, and the actors, to breathe new life into the show, without changing the show to the point that it lost the intrinsic magic that captured the hearts of everyone so many years ago.
I am happy to report that have done so, and done it with such elegance and brilliance, that I was reduced to tears (and in some cases sobs) multiple times throughout the evening. Most of my tears were out of sheer wonder, as the production is at times so beautiful that one cannot be blamed for weeping. Other times, it was a single actor who unlocked a certain truth in a phrase I’d heard hundreds of times, or possibly even sang dozens of times.
I will say that three actors deserve extra special mention. Gideon Glick’s showed such commitment in his portrayal of Jack that I heard “Giant’s in the Sky” with new ears. Just thinking of those few moments on stage still get me choked up. On the other end of that spectrum is Sarah Stiles, who somehow found a way to add even more humor to the already hilarious role of Little Red Riding Hood. Yet she still somehow managed to make “I know Things Now” and “No One Is Alone” emotionally resonant.
Finally there is Donna Murphy who had the seemingly impossible task of reinventing the part of the Witch. Thanks to the clever reimagined staging, Donna Murphy was able to shine new light on the role instead of being swallowed up by the shadow of Bernadette Peters. Murphy’s version of the witch is not without humor, but she seemed more interested in engaging the audience with the harsh realities of life than getting laughs. That said, she is still very funny, but when it comes to “The Last Midnight” the groundwork she laid from her first entrance paid off in an eleven o’clock number that somehow managed to be chilling thrilling, probing, and entertaining all at once. I knew that song was fun and fantastic, but until last night I never knew it had such power. Mrs. Murphy is glorious in the role, to say anything more would be a waste of time.
For those who are going to see this production, and honestly I believe that this is worth flying to New York City to see, this is all I want to write to you. To say anything else would truly ruin the many splendors of the production, and I would be truly evil to ruin the incredible magic that is involved in this production. I will post a more spoilery review later though because honestly, I feel the need to gush.
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July 23, 2012 at 4:35 pm (fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken)
Tags: 2012, career, critique, Editing, feedback, fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken, Jo, LGBT, LGBT Fiction, Little Women, Little Women Musical, query, query letter, revising, Sutton Foster, The Role, waiting, workshop, writer, writing
So I have officially submitted my first few query letters. The feeling is that of exhaustive anticipation. Especially since some of the query letters were sent to agents who are known for quick and speedy replies (most of them rejections). Still, if I’m going to get rejected, I’d rather have it done quickly.
The thing I mainly wanted to discuss was why I wanted to query. As I said in the last post, I could not go on tinkering with my manuscript. It is a strong one, but I understand that with an editor it could be stronger. The issue is, I need an editor. I need someone who will read some variation on a phrase and tell me “yes, this minor tweak makes this section stronger.” etc. I feel like that is the signal that it is time to start querying. I can’t really look at my novel for very long, as I am sick of tinkering with it. Now, if some agent and editor want me, I’ll be tinker all they want! But, I need to get that agent/editor first.
Thankfully, I have been blessed by an abundance of extra contract work this week. In addition, I interviewed for a temp agency who is hoping to place people with title examination experience. So there are things out on the horizon that I am hopeful about.
While I like my query letter, I really do feel I am better at pitching my novel in person. I wish I could do what the character Jo does in “Little Women.” I enjoy the musical version of that portion the best. Click here to hear it!
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July 19, 2012 at 9:41 am (fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken)
Tags: 2012, beta reader, career, critique, Editing, feedback, fiction, gay, gay fiction, Hoboken, LGBT, LGBT Fiction, printing, query, query letter, revising, The Role, waiting, workshop, writer, writing
So a good friend of mine recently read my heavily revised first chapter and the cover letter I hope to send out. She seemed genuinely pleased by my writing, and made some excellent notes on the manuscript pages. However, before we could talk about the chapter, she first wanted to talk about the cover letter. At the bottom of her marked up copy she wrote:
“This is too formal, too resume-y. Be Richard in it! He [meaning the agent] can’t hear you in this.”
I knew what she meant, but I explained there was a lot of pressure for me on the cover letters. Since my book features LGBT characters, and is not YA, a lot of the decent book agents out there have no interest in it. It’s a great story, but most agents want to be in love with the book. I understand this, it makes it easy for them to sell it, so my friend wanted me to explain who would love me book. Fortunately, she didn’t just ask this question. Rather, while sitting in an abandoned bar near the train station she pulled out a survey she had prepared, and interviewed me about my book.
The questions were pretty vague, but I liked the exercise of being interviewed about my book. I treated it like she was a potential agent, and so I pitched her my book. What is clear to me is that I am better at pitching in person. It’s probably because I’m an actor, so it is super easy for me to show someone how excited I am about my book.
I’ve taken several days to really think about it, and I think she is very right. My cover letter is accurate, but not thrilling. So now I am going to revise it, so that any agent will hear me in it.
In addition, I’ve decided that after I tinker a bit more with the first chapter, it is time for me to just start querying. When it has gotten to the point that I can’t tell whether my original or new material is better, I think it means I am finally ready to submit. I’d need to work with an editor to take it to the next level. If no agent wants me, I can hire one, and then self-publish. Hopefully, someone will want it though!
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