Writerly Pearls of Wisdom: Part 2--and Adieu!

Here it is, the culmination of three years of amazing insight, dedication, and utmost humility. (This last attribute is probably the most important for a writer because, if you choose this wonderful writer's life, you are going to have to withstand the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.)

As I did yesterday, I leave you with the words of some of my dearest writer pals. And remember, the readiness is all. (Feeling so Hamlety today.)

From Jennifer Rumberger, one of my Marvelous Middle Grade Monday mates:

Never give up. No matter how hard the writing life gets, just keep at it! Also surround yourself with writing friends. Their support is invaluable.

Jennifer recommends: A book everyone should read in 2013 is Destiny, Rewritten by Kathryn Fitzmaurice. Her best book yet!

And, from another excellent middle grade writer and blogger, Barbara Watson: 

A quote that is probably well known in the writer's world but I just read on a blog last week. I didn't cross-reference the source to make sure it's worded properly and are, in fact, his exact words, but it's been helping me each time I place fingertips to keyboard since I read it: You can take for granted that people know more or less what a street, a shop, a beach, a sky, an oak tree looks like. Tell them what makes this one different. ~Neil Gaiman 

R.L. Saunders is an pal represented by Linda Epstein at The Jennifer De Chiara Literary Agency (same agency as me). Read her blog. She's funny as all get-out: Writers figure out what works for them: writing schedules, lighting, inspiring coffee creamer flavors, outlining, 67 crit partners, not outlining, magic query templates, lucky sweatpants--that sort of thing. Then they get really excited about figuring out what works and they write blog posts about it because it feels SO RIGHT. And it is right. For them. Your job is to work hard at figuring out what works for you. There are lots of rules and tips for writers at every stage of the process. Take them with a grain of salt (like the rule about avoiding idioms) because they're really only suggestions you might try on. Just remember that what looks hot on Michael G-G might make your ass look big.

But seriously, avoid idioms. And never, ever wear sweatpants that are fewer than seven years old while you write or you'll never be published.

One of our new Project Mayhem team, Dianne Salerni is the author of We Hear The Dead and The Caged Graves (Clarion 2013): "Success in writing requires patience and persistence. You have to accept that it will take longer than you want. Your books might not get published in the order you wrote them, and some might not get published at all. Without the patience to wait for the right opportunity or the persistence to keep writing book after book, you might lose out on what you seek most -- just before it arrives."

I have long sung Beth Kephart's praises. To my mind, she is one of the most lyrical writers around. (Go here to see my review of her masterful novels, You Are My Only and Small Damages): 

"Every now and then remember the fat black sleepy cats and worn rugs and handwritten signs of the nearest used book store.  Remember, in other words, the books that aren’t on today’s lists, in today’s blogs, in today’s fever.  Much of what is good and golden and teach-worthy and inspired was written years ago and should not be shunned for its age or yellow paper.  Paper, yes paper.  Visit a used bookstore.  Take something classic home.  Let the spine crack and the glue shimmer.  Let words be ageless for you."

Laura Stanfill is the genius behind Brave on the Page, Oregon Writers on Craft and the Creative Life. Meeting Laura and being part of her project was one of the great gifts of last year:

 "It's great fun to learn about how different writers approach the page, but there's no one right way. Do what works for you. Do it well. Do it consistently. Show up and work as often as you can. And don't worry if someone else swears that your method is wrong. If it works for you, then keep doing it. In putting together Brave on the Page, a collection of essays and interviews about the writer's life, I had forty-two people--including Michael--address different aspects of the craft from their own perspectives. Everyone had something different--and equally wonderful--to share about how they approach their work. We must remember to use others' journeys as inspiration, not as a way to find fault with ourselves. I learned this lesson, finally, when I became a mom. There are so many parenting books out there, and I spent the first few years worrying that I was doing something--or lots of things--wrong based on how self-assured many of those authors were with their one-size-fits-all advice. So focus on the page, on your own work, and question your methods in order to nurture your own growth as a writer--not because someone else tells you to." 

April Henry has been a mentor of mine ever since our children attended the same elementary school. She is the New York Times best-selling author of over a dozen novels. Her latest is The Night She Disappeared. April was on deadline when I contacted her, but her blog has a ton of good advice. The one thing she stressed was: Tenacity is as important as talent. I heartily agree!

C.Alexander London is the author of the An Accidental Adventure Series. He is the sort of wildly funny middle grade writer I aspire to be. Here's what he had to say: The worst writing you ever do is better than the best writing you never do. 

The author of May B., and a Project Mayhem stalwart, Caroline Starr Rose, always has wise words to share: 

"The piece of writerly advice I've clung to the last few years is this: Learn to write this book. It's attributed to Elizabeth Bear but came to me via J. Anderson Coats. It has been hugely freeing for me to discover that while systems and goals and blah blah blah sometimes work, sometimes they don't. Each book is its own animal. You really do start over every time. And it's OKAY."

I've known Rosanne Parry, the author of Heart of a Shepherd and Second Fiddle,  for many years, and she is a dear friend, mentor and supporter. We share the same critique group as well as the same agent, Stephen Fraser. "Our agent is my preferred vendor of literary pearls. Here are a few favorites. "You're making art, it's supposed to take time." and "I find the authors who enjoy longevity are the ones who do not stop writing." (Rosanne's new novel, Written in Stone, will be published in June 2013.)

Another critique group member and friend is Barbara Liles. Barbara was the recipient of the 2011 Oregon Literary Fellowship, has written a great novel about the Norse in Greenland which any editor worth their salt should publish, and was recently a contestant on a Norwegian reality TV show. Her pearl is the one on which I choose to end because, really, where has the time gone?: "Do not be surprised, that time, for a writer, is a strange and flexible dimension."

Thank you all for being my companions on this wonderful writer's journey. I hope you will continue to visit me at Middle Grade Mafioso and Project Mayhem. Till then, may your writing be dangerous and your spirits stalwart. Adieu.

YA For A Day: The Brilliance of Beth Kephart

(I have been extremely scarce from the blogging world lately, and if you want to know the reason why you can read about it over on Middle Grade Mafioso.)

Back? Okay, let's move on to my review of a couple of novels by a writer whom I whole-heartedly admire. I have written before about Beth Kephart, and about how her memoir about her son's early years, A Slant of Sun, touched me so deeply when I read it. I was thrilled to learn that Beth is now writing YA fiction and in the last few months I have been reveling in her beautiful stories.

Brief descriptions of Beth's two most recent novels could be: "Sophie, a teen stolen in infancy, comes to learn the truth about the woman whom she thinks is her mother" (YOU ARE MY ONLY); and "Kenzie, a pregnant teen who is sent to Spain by her controlling mother, learns lessons about love and the meaning of home." (SMALL DAMAGES) But both descriptions sound so reductive. Each of these novels creates a unique world of its own, and they do so through a singular and powerful use of language and description.

The best analogy I can come up with about Beth's writing is that it is like swirling dreamily in a pool of the most beautiful music. Her sentences, especially her verbs, give me little heart-tugs when I read them. Here's the beginning of SMALL DAMAGES:

"The streets of Seville are the size of sidewalks, and there are alleys leaking off from the streets. In the back of the cab, where I sit by myself, I watch the past rushing by. I roll the smeary window down, stick out my arm. I run one finger against the crumble-down of walls. Touch them for you: Hello, Seville."

"Leaking off" is such a perfect description. Later, the narrator talks of a nun "blackbirding by." There are fantastic sentences throughout the book; turning to a page at random I find "mountains in the distance seem hacked off by sun," while on another page "the bed aches up beneath her."

But it is not all gorgeous language. Kephart's stories are full of secrets and hurts, of small and sometimes painful declarations of love, and of what it means to expose one's heart to the joys and sorrows of the world.

They also feel like delicately constructed symphonies. In YOU ARE MY ONLY, there is the insistent refrain  of blue: the song the mother sings before her daughter is kidnapped is "True, true, the sky is blue," and the novel opens with Sophie telling us it's "a blue-sky sun day." Later, we find the kidnapper's journal, in which the kidnapper writes a couple of times that "the sky was blue, and it was easy," a line which has particular resonance when at a climactic scene (no spoilers here!), Sophie tells us that "the sky is not blue; it is not easy." That tremendous blue chord lingers long after the book is over.

I am in awe of Beth Kephart's mastery of the musicality of language, and haunted (in the best possible way!) by the beauty of these stories. As such, I will drop everything and read whatever story she sees fit to serve us next--and I highly recommend you do too.

This will be my last blog post of 2012. I wish you all a peaceful holiday season, and best wishes for 2013. I will be back in the saddle come January. Au revoir, auf wiedersehen, and For Auld Lang Syne.

Rediscovering A Great Writer: Beth Kephart

My oldest son was born in 1996 at 24 weeks' gestation, weighing only 1 pound and six ounces. (He is truly a miracle, which I have to remind myself whenever I'm yelling at him to clean his room.) My wife and I wrote a book about his birth and his first couple of years, a book which is still on our computer drive. I remember going to a writing conference and being told by an editor that books about kids/babies having a hard time or with "problems" just didn't sell. (Which, of course, is rubbish--but I wasn't as confident of my opinions in those days.)

As a result, I set out to find non-fiction books about non-typical children, and one of the books I found and loved was called A Slant of Sun by a writer named Beth Kephart. Here's what it says on Amazon about this book:

Named a Best Book of the Year by Salon magazine and The Philadelphia Inquirer, A Slant of Sun was praised for its incandescent prose about the experience of loving a child who brings tremendous frustration and incalculable rewards and for its extraordinary resonance. Like Operating Instructions and The Liars' Club, A Slant of Sun is a contemporary classic.

Nearly one in five children grow up facing a developmental or behavioral challenge, and like them, Beth Kephart's son, Jeremy, showed early signs of being different: language eluded him, he preferred playing alone to an afternoon on the jungle gym. Doctors diagnosed Jeremy with a mild form of autism called Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified. A Slant of Sun is a passionate memoir about how Kephart, guided by the twin tools of intuition and imagination, helped lead her son toward wholeness. Pulsing with the questions, "Is normal possible? Definable?" A Slant of Sun speaks to everyone not just parents of the redemptive power of love.

"Incandescent prose." When I read this book, I remember knowing I was in the hands of a great writer.

But time intervened, and I lost track of Beth Kephart. Recently, however, I was doing something on this great internet of ours when her name popped up. Was this the same writer? What had she been up to the past 12 years?

It turns out that Beth Kephart has written several YA novels, including one called You Are My Only.

She has a blog where her rich writing and photography shine. It's on my sidebar now, and I urge you to check her out. I promise you will not be disappointed.