Back to the Past

The book I'm working on now is set in WWII-era Iowa City. Yep, Iowa.

I have a good grasp of 20th C. history, but I nearly googled myself to death trying to get the setting right. There's not a lot out there, but, I thought, what I found was enough. Through the University of Iowa photo archives I saw where my character might live, where she'd do her grocery shopping, and where she'd stop for a cup of tea or a beer, depending on her preference. Their collection is wonderful.

Still, I had to make some assumptions based on more general historical facts. For example, small-town USO functions were typically held in YMCAs or YWCAs, so when my gal went to roll bandages for the guys overseas, she skipped on down to the Y.

Those assumptions started to bother me. What if I was wrong? You might think, who the heck is going to know the difference? Well, I would. Someone who was around back then might.

So I called the Johnson County Historical Society. The woman who picked up, Sue Foster, patiently listened to my questions. "You need to talk to Bob Hibbs," she said when I finished. "He's our local historian and he knows everything. Let me see if I can find his number..."

She did find it, and next thing I knew I was asking Mr. Bob Hibbs where I might go if I attended a USO function in 1943 if I lived in Iowa City.

"All the USO activities were held in the American Legion Building," he said without even pausing to think. "The old YMCA building burned down."

Okay, then. I would have been wrong.

This might not seem like a big deal to you. But the more I learn about the brave, industrious souls who inhabited Iowa during the war, the more I want to do right by them. It seems an insult to assume now. I want to know.

The closest you can get to that knowledge is through real, live human beings. Thanks, Sue. Thanks, Bob. My book is better thanks to both of you.

Thoughts on Twitter from the Hippie Emily Post

Twitter is hard on writers. Especially those of the unpublished variety (Does anyone use the term "pre-published" anymore or has it been banished after general agreement that it's freaking obnoxious?). This is me : @LorettaNyhan. Make a pie chart of who I follow and you'll get a big old wedge of other writers, followed by a diverse group of publishing professionals: editors, publishing companies, agents, etc. A tiny sliver would represent people outside of publishing.

So most of my communication takes place between me and people in the book business.

Until recently, this was often problematic.

I'd assumed Twitter operated like a quiet pub on a Sunday afternoon. Three or four people sitting at the bar sipping their drinks, the conversation both leisurely and democratic.

Um...no.

For an unpubbed writer, Twitter is like being in a crowded classroom full of attention starved Type A students with a constant rotation of substitute teachers. Some subs care passionately about teaching and their students, others could give a crap about the students but love their subject. Some are just passing time until something better comes along. Some have borderline personality disorders.

The students desire to be heard, to stand out from the pack, to earn recognition for their "specialness." Not going to happen. Not often, anyway.

My Twitter philosophy has been this: if I find a tweet interesting, I should feel free to respond, no matter who the person is. I mean, the tweeter put it out there, right? Is this the way you guys feel?

This is fine if you understand three things: 1. No one is obligated to respond to you. 2. You might learn things about people you admire that you'd rather not know. 3. If you are responding to someone you hope to one day work with professionally, then conduct yourself in a professional manner.

Now, I like to think I haven't embarrassed myself on Twitter (yet), but it makes me cringe to think how easy it is to do so. I see unpubbed writers replying to big-name authors, editors, agents, etc., acting like they are not only sitting at a bar, but about to fall off the barstool. As in any industry, there is a hierarchy in publishing. The very idea of this may clash with your rebellious writerly spirit, but you need to respect it if you're going to get anywhere.

This is not to say the big-wigs won't respond. Some might engage. Others might not. Authors tend to have thickly drawn lines when it comes to tweeting. One famous author simply doesn't reply to anyone. Some only reply to other "names." One New York Times bestseller responds to everyone. I've seen her avatar so many times I think I know her face better than my own. And, though I risk sounding like Stuart Smalley, all of these choices are okay, and have nothing to do with you.

For an unpubbed writer, things get a bit trickier when responding to editors. These are people who might find my work in their inboxes someday. My rules for these tweets: 1. Proofread. 2. Don't fawn. 3. Avoid saying anything remotely stalker-like. You would think these rules are easy to follow. You would be wrong. I'm probably overthinking @ replies now, but I'd rather err on the side of caution. In this market there are so many reasons for an editor or agent to reject. Setting off the "Twitter Psycho!" alarm shouldn't be one of them.

Writing is a lonely endeavor, so it's not a surprise we all jumped into the Twitter pool feet first. Let's not forget that though social networking may jumble the private and public, it's not an excuse for us to do the same.

This is the end...well, sort of

I just finished a (mostly) fantastic YA mystery. The story was compelling, the voice incredible, the plot kept me on my toes. I kept thinking, I am LOVING this! Yay!

Until I got to the end. If one can even call it that. When I was almost done, I could feel the scant pages left and I wondered how in the world the author was going to tie everything up.

I shouldn't have given it a thought, because--I kid you not--the last page read to be continued.

Loose ends were not tied, the threads were simply cut. If I want an explanation, I need to buy the next book. Which, let's face it, I probably will. So, from a marketing perspective, the technique worked.

As a reader, I'm not sure how I feel about this. On one hand, I'm pretty angry. I feel manipulated. On the other hand, I'm intrigued, and still thinking about the book overall.

So what do you guys think? Does the writer have an obligation to the reader to complete the story? Should books in a series stand alone?

A Little Bit of Structure

School starts tomorrow. (Let me take a second to luxuriate in that last statement.)

Ahhhh. OK.

Summer has its merits but it sucks for writing schedules. I don't work well without some structure to my process, and summer, if you're doing it right, is one meandering, destinationless float down a lazy river. I need a designated writing time every day in order to get anything done. One of my heroes, William Goldman, rented an office in Manhattan and furnished it with a desk, a typewriter and a coffee machine. He showed up five days a week and wrote from 8:30 to 5. I wear more hats than he did--mother, wife, teacher, chef, chauffeur, etc., but I LOVE that idea. Writing is your job, so treat it as such.

I'm fortunate enough to have my days pretty much free when the kids are in school. I write in the mornings after dropping them off, sometimes until lunch, sometimes even after. Yes, I've been known to stare at the monitor for three hours, or wander over to Twitter to torture myself with other writers' word count updates (2000 words today! I'll hit 80K tomorrow!), but the whole butt in seat concept actually works. Some words usually come, and yeah, they might get deleted the next day, but they are there, you know?

So how do you guys get the words out? Are you a morning person like me or do you work best late at night? Do you need to write every day? Are you a word count freak? I'm curious!

Sex, Drugs, and Goodreads

I've noticed a disturbing trend in Goodreads reviews: people are giving one or two stars to YA books because they include instances of teen sex (and sometimes drinking and/or drug use). Reviewers often complain that a book provides poor role models, is immoral and offensive, or simply is not reflective of modern teen life.

When I read these reviews I want to type in the comment box, do you actually know any teens? According to the National Survey of Family Growth (sponsored in part by the CDC), 42% of teen girls and 43% of teen boys are sexually active. Contrary to the myth that teens are having a lot less sex, these numbers have remained steady for the past ten years.

The adults posting these reviews know this. Maybe their teen isn't having sex, which is well and good, and let's face it, preferable. But there are millions of other teens who have decided to do the deed, often quite responsibly--is it so hard to admit a novel may be reflective of that reality? And, that it may have value as a work of art because it does?

Now, I should cut the teens writing these reviews some slack. And I will. Because the more I read them the more I lose faith in our school systems, not our young people.

Increasingly, these reviews contain no mention of character, plot, or even a gut-reaction like or dislike. The sole reason for giving a book a low rating is the inclusion of sex. Judging a novel on that basis illustrates a definite lack of critical thinking skills. Expecting novels to only reflect your system of values is expecting them to cease to be art.

Good art has always challenged, provoked, reinforced, reflected. Good art investigates what it means to be human. This is something one used to learn in high school. But (sweeping generalization alert) it seems we're focused on training kids to only search out what art means to them personally. There is a place for that response, but there is also a price for using it as the only evaluative tool. We're not teaching our kids to look for a book's impact on society or to appreciate an author's skill. We're not showing them that though a book may infuriate, it may also instruct. We ask, how do you feel about this? and leave it at that.

This is a type of close-mindedness. It creates narrow thinking, a terrible trait to develop as our kids face the challenges ahead.

Online KidLit Conference? I'm In!

Some of the biggest names in the YA Lit world--writers, editors, agents, bloggers--are conducting an online writer's conference on August 10-12. It's FREE. Yep, free. And you don't have to find a babysitter or money for a flight or the will to change out of your pajamas because it's all ONLINE. Registration starts July 1. Click here for more info!

Method Writing

Supposedly Daniel Day Lewis is a total method actor, immersing himself so fully in his roles he'll only answer to his character name, even if it's his wife calling. (Wonder how much fun she had when he was working on Gangs of New York.) Method acting always seemed a bit extreme to me, until now. Because I'm experiencing method writing. Uh-huh.

Right now I'm going through my second novel trying to make sure my current MC (Roisin)sounds nothing like the MC from my first novel (Trudie). I had a hard time shaking Trudie--she's funny and sarcastic and full of sass. I was a lot more fun to be around when writing about her world. Roisin is introverted and contemplative--and about halfway through writing this second novel all I wanted to do was hole up in my bedroom and ignore the world. I can see the point where Roisin seeped in; at around Chapter 15 she lost any trace of Trudie-ness.

Does this happen to you guys? Do you adopt the traits of the characters you've grown so close to? Or am I creeping you out?

Soon I'll leave Roisin and head into my new novel, told from four perspectives--2 male, 2 female. And it's about sex. So for four to six months will I be schizo? And a perv? Hmmm...

The Nuns Were Wrong

I went to a Catholic all-girls high school. Um...yeah.

So I heard a lot about God smiting me if I so much as let a boy's hand travel up my back while dancing. I heard about girls getting pregnant from toilet seats. I heard about the shame which would fall upon my family if I rolled my skirt at the waist so my knees would show.

At first, this constant barrage of nunsense meant sex and guilt seemed a natural combination. It didn't take long, though, for me to realize having sex did not necessarily have to result in a scenario worthy of a hand-wringing after school special. (Actually all it took was one really hot boy.) I was around seventeen when I figured this out. And I think kids today, if they even have the heaviness of this particular guilt stuck to their shoulders, figure it out much, much earlier.

So why do so many books directed at this age group still equate sex with punishment? Believe me, I'm not saying sex isn't a big deal--at any age--but I think contemporary teen fiction should reflect the realities of teen life. Cory Doctorow has a great, common sense take on this topic. Check it out here.

And, now, back to the WIP...

The Falcon and the Snowed

I couldn't look at my news page without seeing Falcon, the six year old boy we thought might have flown away in a homemade hot air balloon, and his father, the one who thought exploiting his children in the name of a reality show was a good idea.

It got me thinking about reality, and our collective definition of the word. We've come to accept reality as being subject to editing, and, though that's super attractive to my writerly soul, it lessens our appreciation of basic human experience. Love, friendship, family, career, food--all of the elements of our day-to-day existence are now subject to documentation and manipulation. This destructive media influence goes beyond peppering fashion mags with models so severely photoshopped their heads are wider than their hips, it confuses the lines of what is natural and contrived until we just can't tell anymore.

Contemporary, realistic YA fiction offers one antidote to this. Stephanie Kuehnert, author of The Ballads of Suburbia, discusses this in a recent blog post. As she says, the characters depicted in these novels may undergo completely different experiences from those of the teens who pick them up at the bookstore, but the dialogue that follows validates the realities of the readers' individual experiences. Yes, we're talking fiction, but teens are classic "reader response" critics--their understanding of literature relies heavily on what they know of the world, and what they're curious about. They make it all about them, and in this case, I think that's a good thing.

I wonder, for these teens, how growing up in the age of created realities will affect how they view themselves and the world, as adults. What do you think?

Your #1 Fan

Ran over to the public library to pick up some of your awesome book suggestions only to find it's closed until October 12! I felt like Clark Griswald pulling up to the gates of Wally World. Wha??? Closed?? So I hopped on my bike and pedaled to the next suburb over where the library is perfectly decent, but significantly smaller. They didn't have anything I was looking for, and I was in a hurry, so I picked up something just because the author is from Chicago (feeling a little Chi-town sentimental after the Olympics debacle). The title? The Amateurs by a guy called Marcus Sakey. Crime thriller, not my usual genre, but oh, man, I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN. Kept my eyes pried open until the wee hours just to get to the finish line. So exhilarating, no?

After finishing a good book, I usually bask in its glow for a while, thinking about the characters and the story and the art of putting it all together. Then, until this week, I'd return the book to the library or slide it back on my bookshelf, talk to a few friends about it, and that would be that.

But this time, armed with the @ sign and a Twitter account, I contacted Mr. Sakey just to let him know how un-put-downable his book was. I wrote a charming message in under 140 characters, hit enter and...felt like Annie Freaking Wilkes. I wrote a fan letter. I am truly a dork.

Or am I? Do people often do this? Do you? Social sites have definitely made our world smaller, ushering in an era of overfamiliarity. I felt well within my rights to contact Mr. Sakey directly, a far cry, I thought, from sending a letter to Ralph Macchio in care of Teen Beat magazine, complete with rainbow stickers on the envelope and purple ink. But, really, are they not essentially the same thing?

Then again, Ralph never wrote me back. I got a message from @MarcusSakey in less than 24 hours...hmmm...

The World According to John

(I'm back online!!! I'm back online!!! With a super-long post because, let's face it, getting back online is like shaking up the bottle before you pop the cork...can't...stop...typing!)

OK, here goes...


I tried to be a serious writer after college. Really I did. I churned out self-conscious short stories and derivative screenplays, and even made a stab at a novel or two. I had a good imagination, and (pre-marriage/pre-babies) all the time in the world, but I just wasn't ready. Was I lacking in life experience? Maybe. Did I like the idea of being a writer more than the actual grunt work writing for a living entails? Possibly. I don't really know. I do know that I liked to sit in NYC bars like Kettle of Fish, drink cocktail after cocktail and bore pretentious tourists with my really great ideas. Ideas that did indeed sound pretty awesome after a steady stream of vodka and cranberries, but somehow never made it to the page.

When, in my early thirties, I decided to commit myself to writing--again--I pursued it with a vigor I simply didn't have in my twenties. This didn't make sense to me. I was a mommy twice over; I taught night school; I was exhausted. I should not have had time for writing, but somehow I made the time. I took help where I could get it--babysitting, beta-reading, backrubs from the hub. Though I didn't have the time or money to take creative writing classes, I did the next best thing to secure an education--I went to the library.

It was there I found On Writing by Stephen King and Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott, two books worth their authors' weight in gold as far as technique. I also found a great book about writing YA by K.L. Going, and a cheap copy of The Elements of Style, that old classic by Strunk and White, at the library book sale. All of these books taught me invaluable lessons about writing, and reinforced what I instinctively knew. Just thinking about these books can fill me with confidence, because the subtext of each is, you can do this!

But...sometimes...after staring at a blank page for an hour, writerly neurosis throws quick drying cement down the neural pathway devoted to creativity. Happened to me last week. I just...stopped. So, what did I do? I scrolled through my mental bookshelf, skipped over the books on writing and went to an old favorite about writers: The World According to Garp. Luckily I'm scary-obsessed with John Irving, so I found a copy on my actual bookshelf, and got to reading.

The World According to Garp is about many, many things, but what stood out to me on this read was the amount of time Irving spends showing us how a writer's imagination is formed and used in the process of becoming a writer. Real life will filter in, but, as Garp learns, it doesn't substitute for how the imaginary makes a story infinitely better. Irving explores this through Garp's short writerly life and the parallels to my own writing (and yours, I'd bet) are fascinating. I finished the book renewed and excited about my WIP again.

Incidentally, John Irving's new novel, Last Night in Twisted River, comes out in October. You can bet I'll buy it in hardcover!

Calling Mr. Givenchy...

Right now I'm busy with final edits on my novel before it goes on sub to publishers (!!!!). In order to give myself a break every so often (translation: to keep myself from freaking way out) I peruse catalogs, browse online, comb through magazines in search of--Ta-Da!--the perfect fall ensemble.

Summer clothes don't do it for me. And Chicago weather makes spring a wet, muddy disaster. Forget winter as well--we hearty folk cover ourselves in down and wool. But, fall, or rather, autumn, is absolute glory. The clothes attached to this season are perfect as well. Knee-high coffee color leather boots. Herringbone tights. Corduroy jackets with leather patches at the elbows. Cashmere everything--scarves, sweaters, even socks! Ooh, la-la!

There's one problem, however, with my fantasy of waltzing into Prada or Burberry, or even the much-more-likely Target, and choosing my fall outfit: My husband and I are saving to remodel our kitchen, so my clothing budget doesn't really exist.

It's a good thing, then, that my look hasn't really changed all that much over the years. I don't rock a mullet or wear acid-wash, but my style is definitely that of a woman whose girlhood was spent watching way too many old-style Hollywood movies. One example: I wear ballet flats, all the time, and have for years. In fact, years ago, before ballet flats came back big-time, I'd buy real Capezio ballet shoes and have them soled at the shoe repair dude. That's my homage to Audrey Hepburn. My other purchases over the years have been reflective of my obsessions with Diane Keaton in Annie Hall, Ali McGraw in Love Story, Katherine Ross in The Graduate, and Katherine Hepburn in just about anything. Oh, and Cher during her gypsy phase. More recently, the feast for the eyes known as Mad Men has made me want to scour every vintage store in Chi-town for tight cashmere sweaters and pencil skirts.

When borrowing heavily from the past, though, it is important to find balance in your presentation. I've made mistakes with this. Like Paris Hilton, ridiculous in head to toe Juicy Couture, I've gone all-vintage and ended up looking like a museum exhibit. A few key modern pieces must be added to the mix. It's kind of like creating a character based on someone you know in real life (You knew I'd bring this back to writing somehow, didn't you?). If it's a mere recreation on paper, then it's kind of a cheap copy, no? You have to add a little creativity to it, a little bit of you. Then the character really jumps off the page, right?

Good Old-Fashioned Grit

Some writerly friends of mine recently finished a challenging revision on a manuscript. They stuck to it, day after day, setting goals and reaching them, reviewing and editing, over and over, and now this new version of their book really rocks the house. They're proud of it, and rightfully so. But they should also take pride not just in the end result but of their mastery of the revision process.

Ho-hum, you say? Don't all writers work like this? The answer is a resounding, no way.

I've known a lot of writers in my time. I've worked on magazines, newspapers, and currently freelance for a company where the MFAs far outnumber the MBAs. I've spent time as a grad student in the English department of a university well-known for its creative writing program. I was friendly with some of the MFA students, but the line between them and us teacher-track nobodies was drawn pretty thick.

I was jealous of the creative writer folk. They were brave, glamorous, eccentric--and loved for it. I wanted to be in their crowd, but the fear of sharing my work with any of them was so acute, I never signed up for a single workshop. I went to their WIP readings, watched them in our shared offices, rowdy as if they were in a bar at 2am, but I never joined in.

Being an observer (ok, maybe a loser) does have its benefits, though. After a while I noticed how much these people talked about writing. And how much they drank. And flirted. And postured. What I didn't have any idea of, however, was how much they wrote. Or rewrote. After spending two years learning, partying, existing in tandem, I had a pretty good idea: not nearly enough.

I saw this when I was in the working world as well. Talented people. Very, very talented people of all ages and walks of life, with half completed novels and notebooks full of ideas, but somehow the work never got done. Life got in the way, at times, but more often than not it was the lack of something else, something defined quite well in a recent Businessweek article about the power of stick-to-itivness. Intelligence and creativity will open many doors, and keep them open, but a better predictor of success, according to a recent University of Pennsylvania study, is good old-fashioned conscientiousness and perseverance. In other words, grit.

And I was recently given a real-life lesson in this, from my writerly friends. We roll our eyes when starlets tell People magazine, "It's all about the work." But you know? They're exactly right. It's a lesson I've learned the hard way, but it's one I don't think I'll soon forget.