Chicken by Chicken -- The Next Big Thing

Hi folks, My friend Vijaya Bodach tagged me with "The Next Big Thing." I'm going to use this as a springboard for some insider stuff from the world of working writer. I hope that my personal journey will give you some needed encouragement for the days ahead.  My title "Chicken by Chicken" is a play on Anne Lamott's book title, BIRD BY BIRD, a helpful writing book. Chicken by chicken is how I roll as a writer. 

So here is my current project, it's sucking up a huge portion of the hard drive of my brain. Normal stuff for me when I'm polishing a book: family members talk to me and I don't answer until they physically shake me, I see people at the grocery store and don't remember to say hello until five minutes later after they are gone, and I forget to eat until I have a pounding headache.

"The Next Big Thing." 

What is your working title of your book? PROFIT

Where did the idea come from for the book? Off the top of my head, from a blue marble with a story to tell, an eight-year-old boy cursing in the middle of a street, a vision of a ghost trapped in a well, and a deep desire to make some sense out the travesty of war -- the idea for PROFIT sprang out of some weird and wonderful places.

What genre does your book fall under? Space Opera with a dash of cyberpunk thrown in, YA

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?  Ah, nothing like casting your own book. Right now, I'd like to see Chloe Moretz as Sarai. I'd like to see Jaden Smith as Terb. For Zilard, maybe Keegan Allen. Cody Simpson might work for Krish. Magine? Clarice Pempengco. My movie will require some voiceover actors too.  Mosi the Rat, I think Jonah Hill.  Risat the Oracle, I think Carrie Fisher. Yes, something like this cast would work.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?  In the far-flung future on the lush world of Poeia, fifteen-year-old Sarai Corren cares for shopping and snagging a hot guy; she never thought she'd have to go to the ends of the Milky Way and pay a terrible price to get what she wants.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? My hope is it will be published traditionally.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?  About a year, but spread that over four years.

May we see an intro? Here is my first line: "You’re the goddess of avoiding bots." Krish's lips touched Sarai's ear. His raven hair brushed her cheek. "How did you know it was coming?"

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?  I think some comparisons could be made to these books: THE STARS ARE OURS by Andre Norton, Orson Scott Card's ENDER'S GAME, William Gibson's NEUROMANCER with a slice of Douglas Adams' HITCHHIKERS GUIDE TO THE GALAXY.

Who or what inspired you to write this book? I was inspired by (of all things) the story of David, the books of Mark Twain, Robert Heinlein and Madeleine L'Engle, and the sacrifices made by peacemakers.

What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?  I'm asking big questions about war, literacy and technology. I say: rattle the cages!  I'm letting the idea of identity roar within my pages. You might be challenged and comforted  at the same time by my vision of our galaxy.

This is an informative exercise. You might try it even if you don't want to publish it on a blog. Oh, yes, one of the rules is to tag some authors and ask them to tag five more authors(only if you have time and inclination, of course): Candilynn Fite, Andy Sherrod, Ellen McGinty, Kathleen Ruth, Katherine Bond. Thanks for dropping by and letting me spend some time chatting about my current project. Come back next week

Here is my doodle:  I call it: "Chick out of Control."

Here is the quote for the week:

I don't know which is more discouraging, literature or chickens.  E. B. White

Reflection: Stasia Kehoe Ward

Hi, folks, like I mentioned last week. This week's reflection comes from Stasia Ward Kehoe. Her new book AUDITION comes out from Viking later on this year. Her two blogs: Writer on the Side and A Year of Auditions are well worth your time.

In Stasia's Words: Many of us who write also express our creativity in other ways. We are painters, potters, singers, dancers, graphic designers, actors, clowns... So the question is: Do we compartmentalize these artistic outlets? Paint OR clown? Dance OR write?

At first, it seems obviously and easy to say that we set aside different times and places for different artistic forms. But perhaps this is a limiting conclusion. I believe you can sing a landscape or choreograph a phrase. You can understand the world through your own unique artistic lens. For example, when I develop story characters, I need to feel a visceral, physical sense of them--how their feet touch the floor when they walk, what makes their skin crawl, whether their spine is straight or slouched. When I am doing what I feel is my best writing--and whether the character I'm creating is a showgirl or a professor--I bring to each page a descriptive sensibility that comes from my dancer self. Similarly, if you are a visual artist, your connection to color, light, and line should not be ignored just because you are sitting at a computer keyboard.

Perhaps you've written a manuscript that is technically strong, seems like it should be great, yet some ineffable thing is missing. Or you've got a character you love but with whom you sometimes feel a vague disconnect. Try unlocking your novelist brain to let those other creative parts of yourself get in on the story. It may take a bit of fidgeting with the key. You may have to sing through your opening pages or close your eyes try to picture the absolute, exact colors that make up your main character's eyes. You may think this whole idea is crazy (and sorry about that). But, for me, this is the way to take my writing to its own special place. Lots of novelists discuss the elusive notion of "finding your voice." Writing with my whole creative self turns out to be what this phrase means to me. ___

Oh this is so true. I hope you take these thoughts to heart and let them really boost your work. See you next week for more reflections.

I'm always doodling to keep the creative spirit hopping. Here is this week's doodle: "Ballerina."



A quote to tuck in your pocket.

Mystery is at the heart of creativity. That, and surprise. Julia Cameron

Day 29: The Golden Coffee Cup -- Janet Lee Carey

Click here to learn more about the Golden Coffee Cup.

Today’s joyous high five comes from Janet Lee Carey author of many wonderful books and recent wonderful fantasies: STEALING DEATH and DRAGONS OF NOOR!



I love Janet's work; she brings such a sense of the interconnectedness of everything. She pours out the java for us today:

Fiction is a faith walk. The kind of faith required only grows as a writer pays close attention and sets the words down upon the page. Even if you’ve successfully written one or more novels you can’t expect to reproduce that success. We all have to start with a tabula rasa and begin at the beginning each time. Over the years while working on my novels, I’ve used a journal to play with plot ideas, create characters, and stay open to story. My journal keeps me fresh. It also keeps me honest when I let it. My inner storyteller knows what I need to hear and lately my journal has been telling me to slow down.

Dueling deadlines has had me on a fast writing track in the past few years. I’ve had to write a lot each day to make my deadlines, but page count and word count are all about quantity, not quality. As I slow down and seek my own rhythm, the story unfolds at its own pace, my breathing pace, my heart rate, and I begin to hear my storytelling voice more clearly. If you’re like me and you’ve been writing in a rush maybe you’d to try slowing down a little, and finding your own natural rhythm. Fiction is a faith walk. If you walk at your own pace where might it take you?

Oh, what hot java for the penultimate day of the Golden Coffee Cup! Snap! Snap! Snap! See you back tomorrow. Post your goal stories, and I'll announce the winners on Dec. 1st.

You are all SO awesome.

Faith is to believe what we do not see; and the reward of this faith is to see what we believe. St. Augustine

Day 26: The Golden Coffee Cup -- NOT SAVING ANYTHING

Click here to learn more about the Golden Coffee Cup.

Welcome! I hope you go for a walk today, then I hope you get to work. We've only got a few days left. Snap! Snap! Snap!

Stasia Kehoe is one of the most human, humble, fun folks I know. Here’s a link to her blog. If you don’t know about Writer on the Side, yes, you will thank me later. Her upcoming book AUDITION (Viking, Fall 2011) is going to flip your world. Her words reveal reality -- no easy feat. Here her secretary offers a furry high five!



Stasia brings today's hot java:

I am so happy to be sharing a few thoughts about writing during Molly's Golden Coffee Cup Challenge. I've been writing for many years (okay, decades) but just got an agent and book deal about six months age. It's been a process of great joy and discovery and, honestly, I wouldn't trade all those child-rearing, writing-on-the-side years for anything.

Along the way, an important discovery I made is that writing is about getting close to the bone: Connecting personally to the characters you write--telling their truths. And, most importantly, NOT SAVING ANYTHING.

What do I mean? If you find yourself thinking, "Oh, readers are going to be shocked when they discover what I'm going to write three chapters from now" or "I love this turn-of-phrase but I'd like to keep it in another manuscript I've got in the drawer--not use it for this one," then you are SAVING. Holding back. Staying a bit too far away from the raw edges, the breathless moments.

To use a sports metaphor, you've got to leave it all on the field--to run every race so that you're so tired you feel like you'll never run another. Sure, it can be scary to have something major happen to a character early in the novel, or to use up every great metaphor you've ever constructed in just one manuscript (trust me, you'll think of more).

To be clear, I'm not saying that pacing isn't important and that plot secrets can't be kept but there's also a way in which you've got to feel like you're giving everything over to your story in each moment.

For me, I have to let the story own me--to feel like I'm standing, blinking under a magnifying glass, a blinding light--and to allow myself to react without hesitation and worry about the consequences later.

So, seize every moment as you write, put your passion on the page, and don't save anything. Happy Writing!

Come back for more hot stuff tomorrow!

Today's quote: Only with absolute fearlessness can we slay the dragons of mediocrity that invade our gardens. George Lois

Life Inspiring Fiction -- Janet Lee Carey, author of THE DRAGONS OF NOOR

Please check out my upcoming Golden Coffee Cup and the following Opportunity, but to create meaningful work, we have to get the fire within burning. The answers to our writing journey are threaded through our life journey. On this journey, we find the themes that we circle around and explore in our stories. Most of us find that we spend our entire career revealing these heart-felt themes.

Talented fantasy author Janet Lee Carey is here today to share some of her insight into how we move the inspiration of our life into the fiction that we write. Janet is the author of many books including STEALING DEATH, THE BEAST OF NOOR and its sequel THE DRAGONS OF NOOR. Today we’ll be taking a close look at how Janet’s real life passions and interests connected with and inform her newest fantasy novel THE DRAGONS OF NOOR. This blog is in celebration of her newest book.



The natural world is a huge force in your work, please suggest some practical ways that you draw strength to create from the natural world.

I’m lucky enough to live by a lake where I can watch the morning mist rising over the water. The lake changes moment by moment. I look down to read a paragraph and when I look up again the light has gone from gray to rose, new birds have flown in. I’m constantly thrilled and challenged by the fierce beauty of the natural world, so it’s not surprising that it’s central to all of my fiction. When writing new scenes I try to let the setting speak. For this to happen I have to get out of the way and let the natural surroundings say what needs saying in the story at that particular moment. Everything the story needs is right there in the scene.

Describe the how and why of the moment the kernel of an idea was formed for THE DRAGONS OF NOOR.

There were two parts to the original vision. One came from a daydream I had years ago where I saw children stolen by a wild wind.
Children fly when worlds are shaken,
Now the children are Wind-taken.
Seek them there, seek them here, before the children disappear.
The first few lines of the poem above came early in the writing process. Sometimes poems arrive like signposts. It’s my job to follow the signposts into the story to see where they take me.

The second kernel had to do with an image of the ancient forest toppling down through some mysterious blight. Funnily enough the question, “Who will speak for the trees?” raised by Dr. Seuss’s book THE LORAX, accompanied the vision.
These two images collided in my mind. I knew the loss of the ancient trees and the wind-stolen children were connected somehow, but I didn’t discover the internal story map right away. I had to write the first draft to understand the connection.

Caution: allowing the imagination elbow room and writing discovery drafts leads to a lot of cutting and revision down the pike. Still I wouldn’t write any other way.

Trees, it’s all about the trees. In THE DRAGONS OF NOOR, the azure trees are dying, connections between worlds are severed, heroes must rise up and save these connections, could you share some stories of how trees have inspired you and how they made your way into your story?

I grew up under the towering California redwoods, and I mean under them. The ancient trees dwarfed us. I think this gave me a unique perspective growing up. I felt there were older living beings around me -- that I was a small person in their world. Because of this I see all the manmade structures, our houses, buildings, bridges, as necessary to our survival, but I also feel we are building on ancient terrain.

The forest was a presence. I felt the trees surrounding me walking to and from school. I also read fantasy books up in the boughs. In ON STORIES C.S. Lewis says “[the reader] does not despise the real woods because he has read of enchanted woods: the reading makes all the real woods a little enchanted.” This was certainly my experience. The books I read made me see the redwood forest with a deeper appreciation.

Some seedling thoughts I discovered writing THE DRAGONS OF NOOR.

Trees play an essential role in the human psyche. Our bodies, hearts, and brains need their silent majesty, green boughs, and shade.

Trees are rooted in humankind’s childhood. When we cut them down we sever ourselves from our wild past and chop down our most ancient playground.

The tree deya, Evver, says to Hanna as they part ways:
~Feel the ground beneath your feet as you walk. Heart to root; remember the ones who hold you up.~


You’re sending donations to PLANT A BILLION TREES as part of the celebration of the release of THE DRAGONS OF NOOR, could you explain why you’ve chosen to support this organization and what it means to you?
Of course! I knew when the book came out I’d be looking for just the right outreach to celebrate. The Nature Conservancy’s Plant a Billion Trees is the perfect fit.

Plant a Billion Trees goal is to restore one billion native trees to Brazil's highly endangered Atlantic Forest over the next 7 years.

Nature Conservancy says, “Tropical forests are the lungs of the earth, filtering out ten million tons of car-bon dioxide from the atmosphere every year. Every day these valuable trees help reduce global warming.”

Readers who want to help restore the forest can check out the “Giving Back” page on my website, or go straight to Plant a Billion Trees campaign page.

More Celebrations:
Local Seattle area readers are welcome to join THE DRAGONS OF NOOR Book Launch Party at Parkplace Books in Kirkland, Oct 23rd 7-9 pm.

Thanks for the great questions, Molly. It was a pleasure to visit Seize the day today.

In lieu of this week's doodle, here are some lovely trees to inspire you on your journey.


credit Tom Carey


QUOTE:
Sometimes I go about pitying myself
And all the while I am being carried across the sky
By beautiful clouds
Ojibway saying

Day 3 of the Golden Coffee Cup: Sydney Salter

Howdy, Golden Coffee Cuppers. No clue what a Golden Coffee Cup is? Click here. We are on day three. Are you feeling the groove? Let me know how it goes and I will do some holy snapping in the comments!



Today we have a happy high five from the talented Sydney Salter. Time to SHOUT OUT! Sydney is the author of several books. I've read the the first one. Funny stuff, folks. Here's the current list: MY BIG NOSE AND OTHER NATURAL DISASTERS, Harcourt/Graphia, JUNGLE CROSSING, Harcourt, SWOON AT YOUR OWN RISK, Harcourt/Graphia, 2010. Please consider giving Sydney's blog a look: http://www.mybignose.blogspot.com/

Sydney's Novel Fairy Tale

Once upon a time....

NaNoWriMo taught me how to break free of my writing limitations--I CAN write when I don't have time, when my kids are fighting, when I have to make Thanksgiving pies... I'm a three time NaNoWriMo winner and both of my YA novels were written during that wonderful flurry of words. Best of luck, everyone! --Sydney Salter

...and she lived happily ever after.

I hope today's shot of java has helped you press past the the problems of today and think about the big picture. Yes, visualize that book in your hands and then under the covers at night with a kid and their flashlight.

And last of all, a quote to ponder.

The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value. I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress and grow. Thomas Paine