On Patience and the Bottle in my Fridge
Many moons ago, someone gave me a bottle of decent champagne. I think it might have been leftover from a holiday party. I didn’t have an occasion to open it at the time, and I’m not generally fabulous enough to pop a bottle of bubbly for no reason. It was around the time I first went on submission for the first time ever, so I thought, “I’ll save this for the day I accept an offer for my book.” (Which I realize now is a slightly obnoxious but not uncommon thought pattern for newbies on sub.)
The champagne sat in the way-back of my fridge. And it sat. It sat for so long that I started Googling things like, “Does champagne go bad?”
Oh, there were times when it looked like I’d be opening it. I’d open the fridge door to get some carrots and smile at the bottle. Soon, soon. Maybe I’d pull the champagne flutes out of storage and rinse off the dust, you know, just in case.
HUBRIS ALERT. The occasion to take out the bottle never materialized, despite coming painfully close to fruition.
On some days, that green bottle mocked me from its perch on the shelf. I stuck the Brita pitcher in front of it to hide it. My husband found it one day. “Did you know that there is a bottle of champagne in the fridge? What’s that doing there?”
“Nothing.” Saving that champagne was a stupid idea, I thought. The bottle is going to sit in there forever. I’ll be packing it up for every move. Each December, I’ll debate yanking it out for New Year’s just to get rid of it. If I ever have children and then someday they have to move me into a nursing home, they’ll find it and ask, “Mom, why is there a bottle of champagne from 20– in here?” But I kept it in there anyway. Because part of me always believed that I would, in fact, have the occasion to open it someday.
That bottle became a random symbol of determination, of the hope and optimism a writer needs when working on another round of revision or a fresh first draft. Maybe someday people will read these words I’m writing. If I really REALLY work hard, if I’m patient, and if I’m just a little bit lucky. When that happens, I will celebrate. I will pop that champagne, finally.
You probably know where I’m going with this. That heavy, green, EMPTY champagne bottle went out with last week’s recyclables. The cork is sitting on my desk. Dreams do come true, hard work is rewarded. Patience pays off, and so does optimism. And this is why it’s good to never give up.
One-Word Wednesday
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| “Gratitude and Rust” by Shannon Kringen (CC) |
Thanks for all of the kind words yesterday! I’m overwhelmed in the best possible way with the support and enthusiasm of the writing community. 🙂
(Borrowing this meme today from Katy Upperman)
Some Good News
From Publisher’s Marketplace today:
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| Click to read, or see below: |
Rebecca Behrens’s debut WHEN AUDREY MET ALICE, featuring the thirteen-year-old First Daughter who finds Alice Roosevelt’s secret diary hidden beneath the floorboards of the White House and is inspired to “eat up the world” though one wrong step could mean tabloid scandal, to Aubrey Poole at Sourcebooks, by Suzie Townsend at New Leaf Literary & Media (World English).
Dude! My book is being published! It’s definitely surreal to write this post announcing my good news. The closest approximation to how I feel right now is this. I’m thrilled that When Audrey Meets Alice will be in print! I’m so excited to be working with Aubrey Poole and the rest of the Sourcebooks team. And I’m incredibly thankful to the amazing Suzie Townsend for being such a great advocate for my writing and finding a home for my book.
I’ll leave you with a slightly dorky picture of me at Alice Roosevelt’s childhood home, Sagamore Hill. I already had a visit planned for the weekend after I found out this great news, which was serendipitous and awesome. Happiest day trip ever! I don’t think I’ve stopped smiling since I got the call. 🙂
The Next Big Thing
Thanks to Katy Upperman for tagging me. I loved reading about her fabulous WIP, Cross My Heart. Here are some answers about my upper-MG WIP:
What is the working title of your book?
When Audrey Met Alice
Where did the idea come from?
It’s kind of a long story. I knew a little about Alice Roosevelt from my dad, who has always been a huge Teddy Roosevelt fan. I have always been fascinated by the lives of first daughters, and I suppose that interest was re-sparked when the Obamas moved into the White House.
But the specific idea for a book about a first daughter who “meets” Alice Roosevelt came to me while I was walking home from work one day. That’s not very special, but I later found out that I was walking past a home where Alice once lived, as a young person, right at the time that this concept popped into my head. Which is a little spooky.
What genre does your book fall under?
A blend of contemporary and historical fiction
Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
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| Alice Lee Roosevelt (from Wikipedia.org) |
I am a huge Mad Men fan, and one of my favorite characters is Sally Draper. I would love to see the very talented Kiernan Shipka as Audrey. As for Alice, I’m not sure. Any suggestions?
What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
Lonely first daughter finds Alice Roosevelt’s long-lost diary, and shenanigans ensue.
Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
I am so fortunate to be represented by the amazing Suzie Townsend at New Leaf Literary.
How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
Hmm, I got the idea in summer 2010, and I had a finished first draft by the end of that year. I wasn’t working on it continuously, though: there were some distracting life events (e.g., a move) and some revisions on a previous manuscript that pulled me away at times. So I’d say about five months. But that was a first draft of two completely separate narratives, which I had to try to weave together.
I’ll give you the first line:
It is ridiculously difficult to
get a pizza delivered to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
What other books would you compare this story to?
In some ways, the structure is similar to Revolution, which I read long after the first draft. But my manuscript is upper middle grade, so the subject matter is a little lighter. Promise the Night, an MG about famous female aviator Beryl Markham, is also kind of similar. I like to think that both Audrey and Alice have strong voices, and there is a lot of humor in the stories they tell. So I might compare it to some of my favorite voice-driven books.
Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Alice Roosevelt, of course. She was a scandalous White House wild child at a time when girls had a lot of social constraints. Also, there was a photograph of Sasha Obama on a beach that I found really poignant–she’s in her swimsuit, playing in the sand. But you can see behind her a horde of people gawking at her and taking pictures. First kids are afforded some incredible opportunities and experiences, but I imagine they also lose a lot of privacy, freedom, and normalcy. I wanted to explore that situation.
What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
There is a very cute boy. And lots of descriptions of food.
Have you shared about your WIP? If you’d like to, consider yourself tagged for the Next Big Thing!
Scents and Writeability
We talk a lot about how some senses contribute to the writing process. The music playlists we listen to as we power through revisions, the pinboards we gaze at to visually inspire our WIPs, the chocolate we savor to help us deal with bad news, even the way our fingers feel tapping the keys (and the way our backs feel after slouching in a desk chair for hours while drafting). But there’s one sense that I feel like gets neglected in discussions of the writing process, and that’s smell.
Smell can be an important and influential part of the writing process. I’ve started incorporating scents into mine, and I swear it’s not related to neglecting laundry so I have more time to write. (I’m a freak who likes doing laundry, actually.) When I sit down to work on the first draft of my WIP, I use the smells of specific candles to get me into the atmosphere of the story. My current favorite? A cedarwood and rosewood blend that I think smells like a barrier island in summer, hot pine needles and driftwood and the Atlantic. Whether the candle objectively does or not smell like that is besides the point; when I burn it while I write, it connects me emotionally to the place I’m traveling on the page.
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| My current favorite candle. |
Not every story is told in a place that smells like flowers, though. I’m not suggesting you make your desk area smell like sulfur if you’re writing about hell. But I do suggest CB I Hate Perfume, which has some fantastically unique scents, like In the Library, a “warm blend of English novel, Russian & Moroccan leather bindings, worn cloth, and a hint of wood polish,” or Walking in Air, which was inspired by Balanchine’s The Nutcracker. (Uh, I think I need At the Beach 1966. I love the smell of Coppertone. Happiness in a bottle.)
Bath and Body Works also has a line of candles out now that includes French baguette and macaron blends, to which I say: I WANT. It’s enough to make me think that the next project I work on needs to involve French bakers, so I can make my writing space smell like bread and cookies all the time.
And then there’s good old Demeter Fragrance Library, which has the normal (almond; mulled cider), the cool (paperback; New Zealand), and the just plain weird (earthworm; dregs, as in the bottom of a wine barrel; and turpentine).
Obviously, you don’t need a delightful or weird potpourri to write. But sometimes a little ritual, like lighting a candle or spritzing a room spray, can help you get into the mood of your story. Or it can help you unwind and let the words flow.
So, have I convinced you to get into aromatherapy for writers?
July in Pictures
How I spent last month: living out of a suitcase.* I made it through 9 flights and 26 hours in the air! I currently have no idea what time zone my body thinks I’m in, but I can assure you that it’s not EST.
All that travel was so worth it:
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| I made friends with sea turtles. |
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| And relaxed poolside. |
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| Saw waterfalls. |
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| Ate coconut everything. |
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| Went to lots of beaches. |
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| Saw lots of sunsets. |
But most importantly:
It was my best month, well, ever.
I’ll be back to semi-regular Internetting next week (thanks to all those flights, I have plenty of books to talk about).
What have you been up to? What awesomeness have I missed in the blogosphere?
*Actually three suitcases, and by the second half of the trip it had evolved to those three plus one hefty tote bag masquerading as personal item. I do not pack light.
Requiem for a Dumbphone
BEA: Middle Grade Panel
Thursday was my lucky day, and I got to pop by BEA to spend a couple hours on the floor. I timed it so I could check out a panel: “Writing Strong Female Characters In Middle Grade Books” with Lauren Oliver, Sharon Creech(!),* Judith Viorst, and Shannon Messenger.
Here are some highlights from the panel.**
Which comes first, the world or the character? How does a voice develop?
For Lauren Oliver, character and world develop simultaneously. Specific lines come to her first, which bring the character and worlds together; then she starts exploring it. “The character’s journey is yours, too, as a writer.”
Sharon Creech also finds that world and character develop simultaneously. She strives to stay true to what the character thinks, feels, and speaks. That helps define the world (and voice).
For Judith Viorst, voices lurk “in the location of her belly button.” Writing her Lulu books was the first time that she went from telling a story to her grandkids to turning it into a book.
Shannon Messenger trusts the story: “It tells me where to go.” Her character Sophie came to her before the world of the story did (Keeper of the Lost Cities).
Thoughts on writing middle grade (as opposed to other categories):
All of the authors spoke to the satisfaction of knowing that they are converting/creating readers with their MG books.
LO: Writing middle grade “is like slipping into a blanket.” [I love that sentiment! I think for a lot of lifelong voracious readers, reading/writing middle grade feels like going home.]
SC: Middle grade is the age at which kids fall in love with, or into, books. It’s also an age at which kids are becoming very mature and thoughtful. For a writer–it’s fun to explore those contradictions.
When do you include older characters in a middle-grade story?
SC: She always feels compelled to have older characters and to incorporate what they are thinking.
LO: Sometimes she includes older characters; sometimes she simply has a “mechanism of older wisdom;” it depends on the book.
JV: Likes to include a lot of sibling rivalry.
SM: Is partial to the “cliche of the orphan,” but her characters still have parental figures.
On unlikable characters:
JV: Loves the “hard likes”–characters the reader will eventually come to like, but it’s not easy.
LO: Never felt nor internalized the pressure to be a good girl, so she likes complexity in her characters.
SC: Unlikable, or bad, characters are much more fun to write.
SM: Her “bad boy” character was the most fun to write. She notes that you have to push the reader to see why they should like those characters.
On their writing processes:
LO: The mystery is: what’s this book about. She outlines to some extent, often after she writes 10K so the book starts living.
SC: Has a fluid process. She doesn’t trust an outline [for first drafts] and has to go organically or it is too school-like. After the first draft, she sort-of outlines to look for holes.
JV: The discipline is getting in the chair. She makes herself sit down every day, idea or not.
SM: She makes word count goals, which are sometimes unrealistic. Prefers the “Connect the Dots” method of neither outlining nor pantsing.
*A favorite author from my own middle-grade years, so I was thrilled to see her. I heard Sharon Creech speak about Walk Two Moons and Absolutely Normal Chaos as a tween, and the writing advice she gave in that lecture continues to inspire me!
**Please do not treat as direct quotations as my note-taking was fast and furious.
TAC 2012 Recap in Pictures
I can sum up Teen Author Carnival 2012 in one word: fantastic.
So fantastic, in fact, that while I was enjoying listening to all the wonderful authors speak, I neglected to take notes about the panels. Doh.
I did take some pictures, though:
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| The Keeping it Realistic panel |
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| Authors Lauren E. Morrill and Siobhan Vivian |
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| The Where Have You Been All My Life? panel |
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| Such a gorgeous library |
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| More gorgeous library (through a door, hence the crappy photo) |
I also got to meet up in person
with some super-cool writer peeps, like Ghenet, Gina, and Elodie! And
learned an important lesson about why it is finally time for me to get a
smartphone (I still use a slide-out qwerty phone without internet):
because I missed out on meeting quite a few other writer friends because
I had no access to Twitter until I got home. Sad face. It’s time, so
I’ll head to the Apple store this weekend, and into the 21st century!
Have you been to any BEA week events this week?
YA Research: Interview with an Urban, Public-School Teacher
Back in the day, I went to a large public high school in a small city. I’ve realized that most of the YA and MG books I (personally) read are set in suburbs or small towns. It made me wonder: what’s it like to be a teen in a larger city these days? I turned to my sister, who is a super-awesome, National Board-certified teacher and basically my hero. She agreed to answer some questions about the school she teaches at and her students. It’s a cool perspective on life at a large, diverse urban public school.
Tell us a little about the high school you teach at.
My school is a large, urban (some would say inner city) high schools with 3600+ students. Our school is diverse, like our city, with its majority of students Latino but also with many African-American, Chinese-American, Polish-American, Pakistani-American and Palestinian-American students.
What are your students’ biggest school-related concerns?
My students are stressed! They often feel like jugglers–they are learning to balance seven classes, which in junior and senior year are all college level, with other extracurricular clubs and sports and their service learning obligations. Most of my students have at least five hours of homework nightly, but many do not get home until 6 or 7 p.m. because they stay after school for activities like Physics study groups, History essay writing workshops, soccer practice, lifeguarding training, stained glass art club, or school musical rehearsal. Plus my students are under a lot of pressure from our school to improve their ACT scores!
What are some outside-of-school problems, issues, or concerns your students face?
My students live with a range of issues outside of school. Since our school is located six miles southwest of downtown Chicago, the surrounding neighborhoods have many socioeconomic issues common to inner cities. If you walk around our school’s neighborhood you see some boarded up buildings, both homes and businesses. You see tagging. You do not see many public parks, and our local library cut its hours recently. My students live among the problems of their environment: family money problems, parents working two jobs, high rates of unemployment and homelessness, gang violence and related drug and alcohol abuse. Yet my students balance living with these problems as well. They help their parents when take their little sisters and brothers to school, pick them up afterward and help them complete their homework. They walk around in small groups to stay safe, and scorn drug and alcohol usage. They even volunteer with our school’s urban ecology club to pick up trash in the neighborhood, and have been writing letters to local government officials to try to get more resources for our school’s neighborhood like green space, lengthened library hours and a community health clinic.
Is bullying a problem at your school?
I think that our school is somewhat of an urban oasis from bullying due to its large size. We are large enough that there is no one popular group– instead, there are the basketball players and cheer squad, the soccer team, the musical theater group, the dancers (we have a classical ballet program), the goths, the emo kids, the Key Club, the manga lovers, GLBT Pride and numerous study groups. Among freshmen, there is a tendency to verbally bully left over from elementary school, but teachers do NOT allow this behavior to continue. A big part of our Social Studies curriculum is to deter bullying by teaching social understanding and civic competence. This helps greatly– students learn that there is tremendous diversity among our school population in terms of ethnicity, religion and sexuality. Furthermore, they learn that discriminating against each other due to differences is NOT acceptable.
What do your students get excited about, in terms of academic subjects/topics, the news, music, pop culture, etc.?
My students pay some attention to the news and pop culture via the internet, but their passions really come alive for music. Some of them participate in after school dance programs where they learn traditional ethnic dances of Mexico, West Africa and Poland. Others just dance to their iPods at home:) In terms of academic subjects, in History class students really connect to learning about the Age of Exploration, the Age of Imperialism and the Holocaust. I think that a universal part of being in high school across cultures is that kids are defining themselves, and asking questions related to “who I am going to be?” History class lets them time travel and ask related questions about their values and identities: “If I were alive in 1519 when Cortes arrived in Mexico would I resist or collaborate with his conquistadors? In 1933 Germany, would I support Hitler or join youth movements against him?”
What things aren’t your students interested in?
Their homework?!? Seriously though, one misconception about urban students is that they are disengaged from their schoolwork as well as from communities. Based on my experiences, that is NOT true. My 60 graduating seniors last year earned $640,000 in college scholarships. If I asked them this question, they would respond: “drugs? reality television? doing chores at home?”
What is prom like at your high school?
Since our school is in a large city, every year our senior student committee chooses a downtown ballroom for prom. Students tend to choose a different venue each year, to personalize their graduating class’s experience. They choose a theme, like “Red Carpet Nights,” that ties together with the decorations, catering and favors at the hosting hotel. Prom begins with a formal dinner for all to enjoy, followed by dancing with a live DJ until midnight. Professional photographers take formal and informal pictures of students throughout the night. As for attending students, some come as couples but many others come as groups of friends. Their fashion sense is the best part of prom night– many fashion forward girls design their own dresses and have them custom made by local seamstresses. Some make their dates get custom tailored vests and ties for their suits to match their dresses! We even have a prom fashion show to fundraise for the main event to see their gowns early. Also at prom, it is common for our goth and emo kids to show up wearing Chuck Taylor All-Stars along with vintage dresses. Prom is awesome!
Do your students have time to read for fun? If so, what do they enjoy reading?
My students LOVE reading. They are especially captivated by manga, as well as fantasy and science fiction novels for young adult readers… especially the Hunger Games trilogy this year. They recently competed in a school wide trivia contest about Hunger Games, complete with parachutes. Since then the Katniss braid has definitely increased in popularity.
What makes you most proud of your students? What surprises you most about teens today?
My answers to these last two questions are interconnected. My students’ strength, resilience and ability to be down-to-earth both surprise me and make me very proud. My students are often stereotyped differently, but in reality they are devoted to their families, friends and educations. They are facing numerous problems, both in their neighborhoods and the larger society, but are striving to overcome them. They continue to impress me daily with their diligence, perseverance and optimism about being able to make their lives and our world better.
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