Light and shadow

My friend and I abandoned an awesome art show for a few hours on Sunday to go play at Edwards Gardens.  It's not exactly Central Park but it is an oasis in the city.  We were a tad disappointed that so many other people felt the same way.  We had a creepy photo shoot in mind.  Not exactly something you can do without an explanation - or a plethora of horrified looks.

Exhibit A

There's a nice little gazebo. Dark and spider filled, it suited our needs nicely. We took a couple shots but the headless one is my favourite.  I think it was helped by the bulky white sweater I was wearing. It tricked the camera's aperature. Yay!

Exhibit B

I love shadows and all the wonderful things you can do with them. I particularly enjoyed the irony of using lush green grass as our back drop.  I call it Norman Bates meets Whistler's Mother.  The purse over my shoulder changed my shape so that I looked considerably older and wider than normal.  Still, I like it.

Exhibit C

Hmmm, I don't seem to have any photos of the tree that fascinated me with the way the leaves and light played together.  I do have one dark photo of me watching it all.I'm in shadow and holding my hair out of my eyes so I can see better.  Check out the creepy shadow on my arm. The tree is eating me!

In the end I decided against the committment it would require to lie at the bottom of the broken stairs beneath the police tape.  Besides, I prefer to throw the bodies down there, not be one myself.

Autumn

I had a good conversation on Twitter about writer's inspiration.  I realized that I'm drawn towards horror stories in the Autumn. The obvious correlation to Halloween isn't the only reason. Most of it comes from the scent of decay in the air.  Leaves turn to mould, apples rot on the ground, the by-product of wine grapes presses down on the air with its sour notes.  Mildew permeates everything.

It's also the time of Fall fairs with their carnivals and clowns.  "By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes."  I always associated that quote with Road Dahl and Ray Bradbury because they had such wicked observations of the nature of man.  I missed out on MacBeth by moving to another province midway through high school.

Yet, Autumn is my favourite season. The smell of wood smoke riding the cool breeze reminds me of Hansel and Gretel. Cotton candy and taffy apples or even apple cider to fill the blood with the sugar rush that makes me feel invincible, daring, confident I'll return unscathed from the dark basement.

It's the time of year when rats scurry from lodging to lodging for the perfect damp place to hide out the winter months.  Squirrels throw the empty walnut shells from the tree.  My yard is littered with the remnants of their gorging feasts. Claw marks decorate the outer blocks of our foundation.

Yet, I love it all. I love the smells, the colours of leaves as they age then float to the ground. I love the myriad textures of the ground as it cools and retains moisture.  Holes appear where before there was solid ground.  The rat-a-tat pop of shells hitting the deck and the angry chatter of squirrels squabbling over the late harvest.  So many flavours dance upon my tongue; pumpkin, peach, wine, fresh corn, squash, rich dark concord grapes.  Autumn is a feast for the senses.

Fear underscores it all. Fear that there won't be enough food. That we're aging faster than we like. That the ground will flood. That the crops won't return next spring.  That there are things waiting in the dark more terrifying than we can imagine.

We like the fear because it shows we care.  We are attached to the return of all we need.  And we believe it all will.  It always has.

There's no reason to think it won't again.

But we enjoy the thrill of fear, regardless.

Safety platform

Last week, I went back to the literal train bridge.  I took a break from writing, work, and other commitments. It was hard not to think of my last post.  I educated my friend about those safety platforms and we decided they would be very useful to have in all aspects of our life.

I don't like to quit. Diets are the only thing I truly abandon and even those get revisited on occasion. I do often switch up one activity for another when I'm frustrated over the lack of progress.  More often than not the progress is held up by my preconceived notions.

I'm about to start a fourth book in the previously mis-named trilogy.  My heroine has amazing conflict and arc. The hero is pretty cool but his conflict and arc are so minor in comparison. I'm trying to decide if that can be twisted to maximum advantage (how can he possibly understand her if he can't relate?) or if I should gut him somehow.

I have retreated to the safety platform, in this case creating a wedding gift, while I ponder which train to follow.  Outrunning them seems unnecessary when I can take my time and see where they're headed instead.

Which train would you follow?

PS - I feel a bit like Sheldon Cooper and his obsession with trains

Train bridge aka Not my best title

Some friends were just talking about household repairs and the lengths some vendors will go to in order to move equipment.  It made me think about all the times that we're so focused on one route that we cannot see the others.  So I wrote "Sometimes it's better to get off the tracks rather than try to out-run the train".

That made me think about my writing. Over the years I've become more flexible about changing genders or characters to better suit the story. I've re-written plots because characters solved the entire issue on page three (sometimes they are much smarter than I am).  I've changed titles repeatedly to get the exact sense in three words or less.  As a writer I am considerably more flexible than I am as a person. Mind you, that took a lot of time. My critique partners will tell you I clung to my ideas even when the entire group thought I'd gone off in the wrong direction.  My paths are rarely direct.  In writing or life.

As a business person, I know nothing. My instinct tells me one thing but my experience is the opposite.  I have enlisted the advice and guidance of business people from other fields. My former accountant thought writing was an absolute waste of my time from a financial point of view. That opinion has been repeated by everyone I've consulted. None of their opinion has anything to do with my writing quality but everything to do with the competition and business model for publishing.  Indie or self-publishing has made the above both better and worse. There are a lot more options for the writer to take control of their career.  No one I've talked to who is doing it is able to support themselves financially from writing alone.

I have a good job doing something I love. I also love writing. I jumped off the tracks for two years and didn't write much. I definitely didn't pursue it as a career.  But the manuscripts have stacked up.  Their stories want to be heard.  So I'm running down the track again.  The train behind me is gaining speed.  Fortunately, there is a bump out alongside the track, a safe place to stand when the train barrels past.

I'm going to stand there and read up on more options. I'm sure another train will  be along any minute if I want to run in front of it. Or I could wait until the track is quiet and sprint down the bridge then.

If you're not sure where I mean, look straight above the left swan's head and you'll see the little cut-out on the top of the train bridge.

When is a kiss sexual assault?

I primarily write romance. It may have some paranormal elements to it but at the end of the day it is a romance that ends on a happy note.

When my characters meet they are invariably strangers.  Their first kiss is monumental. It is part of both character and plot.  It rarely follows the "Can I kiss you?" scenario.  They read each other's signals.

Then I read this article about a reporter who was kissed on-air by a strange man.  Full disclosure, the author of the article, Michael Hollett, is my cousin, not that our relationship has any bearing on the discussion.  I am aware of the backlash he encountered because he posted about it on Facebook. Michael has always stood behind his beliefs, solidly and without wavering. I know that because we're family and it's been a part of his personality from before I was born.

All the family stuff aside, the article, and Michael's stance, made me think about how easy it is to justify assault through non-verbal cues.  I read far more romance than I write. I interact with human beings every day at work and at home. I've been witness to, and experienced, sexual assault. In most of the cases I can personally attest to, both literary and actual, the aggressor "mis-read" the victim's body language. In a lot of cases, they didn't care.

Is the skin flushed from fear or arousal? Are the eyes dilated from apprehension or pleasure? Is the breathing ragged from panic or anticipation?  Those are the cues we use to determine whether our physical attention is wanted.  It is so easy to read those signals based on our own desires and expectations.

Honestly, I've never considered the first kiss scene where the hero, or heroine, suddenly presses their lips against the heroine's, or hero's, lips to be sexual assault. You know going into the story that these people are going to meet, fall in love, triumph over conflict and live happily ever after. In real life, that is most definitely not the case.

Are romance novels at fault for that mis-communication? Not any more than video games are responsible for the increase in gun crimes at movie theatres.  There are correlations but most of us know the difference between reality and fiction.

Still, I've given the kiss as sexual assault a lot of thought.  A lot of thought. Just because we never viewed something a specific way before doesn't mean we shouldn't start.

Random thoughts because it's a Wednesday

I have a notebook full of story ideas and half scenes.  Anything on television from news to game shows is fodder for story.  I had a brilliant idea the other day based on a science show my nephew and I were watching. We discussed it briefly but I failed to write it down.  I asked him about it yesterday.  His response, "You said what if something like that was really true and the thing did another thing and that happened." Really?  "Yes. It was a good idea." Except neither one of us remembers anything specific.

Notebooks. They can save you from hours of speculation that never leads anywhere.

Or maybe it was just the idea that people thought their house was haunted because things went missing or reappeared in the wrong places.  Turns out it's just a cat. No real twist to anyone who has ever shared space with a cat. They're brutal for stealing items and hiding them. I lived with a crow who was tidier than a cat. Crows store all their treasure in their nest, not beneath the fridge or inside your shoe. And why on earth do they think a shoe is excellent cache for a mouse.  We use those shoes every day.

My mind makes weird connections. I might just write a story that puts several of them together. But first the pseudonym.  And remembering the idea where the news was true and the thing did another thing and that happened. Then the parrot laughed. Because he knows how foolish human brains can be.

Names

Greetings, my friends.  The trilogy has a name - The Tiger's Eye series. Yes, series. Because while brainstorming the three books I kept coming back to one character from the third in the trilogy that was never planned. The first was a standalone.  Then a character caught my attention. Then another one. And now a fourth. She got short-thrift in the third book and the goddess noticed. So she issued a challenge that the shy character is going to have to steel her spine in order to meet.

I have to finish two origin stories first. One for a secret project (who knew I could keep a secret?) and one for the horror story. It's the epilogue that shows how the painting became so disturbing.  Because the final scene was so horrific, I have to make the creation scene compelling but also equally intense.  The research has been too much for me to stomach so my nephew approached a neighbour who is also a hunter.  It's always good to have help.

I need a pseudonym for the horror story.  It's not like anything else I write.  I don't want to confuse readers who are used to the voice you read over here.  DNe suggested I look at contemporaries of Edgar Allen Poe and see what tweaks my creative radar.  Of course, I immediately thought of Raven. It's a good name. It's not creepy though the poem is suspenseful.

What really holds me back though is an excellent short story writer I follow on Twitter - Jesse Raven  His writing style is so tight and suspenseful.  I look forward to his upcoming compilation.  Go check out his website. You'll see why I need a different name. Ravens may flock together but one usually stands out and Jesse is it.

So the search for pseudonym continues.  I could possibly keep one half of Keziah Fenton. I'm not sure which half.  It's a quest. I love those.

What says horror name to you?  Remember, Stephen King is already taken.

Trilogy title

Woohoo! I just finished the revisions on the NC paranormal romance, Putting Down Roots. It now joins Heaven Coming Down and Hell to Pay in the complete trilogy. 

It's exciting to finally be down a project that's taken ten years from the original sentence in the first book to the final sentence in the third. I had no idea I was starting a trilogy when the idea came to me.  And all because a cocky man I knew at the time said that he could solve all of the world's problems if he had the same time and resources as God.  

I need a name for the trilogy. The first is a quest to save the world, features gods and demons. The second is a challenge to save one man’s soul from the demon’s daughter and the third is about nymphs and humans curing cancer while falling in love. The central theme in all three books is man's interference with nature. All the characters from the first two appear in the final showdown with the evil nymph at the end of the third book. 

Do you have any ideas on what I can call the trilogy?

PS - I am doubly proud of myself for finishing it while still suffering from vertigo.  If something means enough to you, you will find a way

Still spinning

Being dizzy 75% of the day makes one cranky. That's my experience, at least.  I miss reading and writing.  I've jotted things in my notebook when the world isn't going by quite so quickly but the days of spending hours at my desk seem but a distant memory.  Steps are being taken to resolve this.

In the meantime, I've learned the following:

Sitting on the ground is a good position for not only weeding but throwing a ball. Be sure to sit on the grass so that when you fall over, it's a cushy landing.

The reason the wild petunia isn't doing so well is the neighbour's volunteer black walnut. If you lie on your back and stare up between the leaves, the sky looks like it's been serrated.  Also, that tree grew very tall very fast.

Mulberries hold fast to the tree branches during a wind storm but leap from their stems if you're trying to pick them. Also, a robin can ride out the wind if the berries are plentiful.

Cats like to sleep in the window.  They also like to chirp at the foraging squirrel.  A closed window is best at these times.

Every manner of vegetation will grow in the cracks of the sidewalk.

If you lie on the floor, the birds will fly from their cage to walk all over you.  The cat stands back as beaks are sharp.  Also, freckles look a lot like seeds. Beaks are very sharp when the freckle holds fast to the skin.  Beak wounds heal quickly with the aid of coconut oil.

Closing your eyes to slow the spinning of the earth occasionally results in naps.

Reading a printed page is much easier on the senses than a screen.  No new book scent on the screen.

All of the above can be used as research in one capacity or another. It's all fodder. Fodder!

Stay balanced, my friends

It's always something

Vertigo, my friends. It's my second go-around in as many months. I'm am tired of the world spinning past me.  I've been moving my body to minimize the speed at which things fly past my fast when I am no longer in motion.

That is not conducive to writing. Or reading, for that matter. Hence, the complete and total lack of creativity. That made the writing retreat an odd experience. Fortunately, I am blessed and was able to have many conversations and brainstorming sessions.  I have notes made in the moments when the spinning was less severe.

Do you suppose the fact that the new project is about spinning wool had any bearing on my inability to stand still? Spinning, spun, fell.  At least, I have some great ideas. And sheep photos. We were staying in a town whose university mascot is a ram. Lots and lots of ram paraphanalia. So my mind was definitely on the new project.

What do you do when you are unable to work on a project?

May updates

Rootless Trees is done its first draft!! I've been sitting on it waiting for feedback from my critique partner. I really struggled with the last two scenes.  There were a lot of loose ends to tidy.  Even in sewing or knitting, I hate doing the loose ends.  You have to take time to ensure they are woven in well enough that they don't unravel, nor are seen by the eye (untrained or expert).

I'm very pleased with the horror story. It needed about five sentences for revisions. Unfortunately, that leaves it at novella length. My plan for that manuscript needed another 20,000 words. That would destroy the rhythm of the story. More pondering.

So on to the Icelandic sweater story.  I need a reason the two friends will fall out. It needs to be big enough and real enough to cause a rift that can only be mended by some serious growth on the part of the two heroines.  No one dies. No one gets divorced. Those are my two rules.  These women have been friends for over twenty years. They can say anything to each other.  But one of them has to cross a line, no matter how unreasonable it is, for the other to fall out with her. I'm just not sure which line or which one crosses it.  Other than that, I have an outline and am pleased.

At this point, I can write the opening as well as get to know the characters. I'm sure the break will reveal itself. In the meantime, the feedback for Rootless Trees was good so I can take it from there.

In other news, my beautiful mulberry tree has been cut back drastically. Two gutters and a house corner were pummeled by the two main branches that curved over the porch. I don't have pictures of the handsome man on my roof taking care to damage the tree as little as possible. He managed to save three main branches, enough for a couple of jars of mulberry jam.   I'll spare you the photos.  It hurts my heart to stand at my desk and look out the window.  One thin branch continues to reach up towards my office and occasionally wave.

Letting go

Just two scenes left to write. Two scenes.  I know exactly what's going to happen. So why is it taking so long to actually write all the words that are needed?

One theory is that I don't want the book to end. It's the third in a trilogy and I really like these characters. They've all been with me in one form or another for seventeen years.  The original idea came out of a conversation with a male friend who thought he knew everything.  Once the characters showed themselves they became as real to me as any imaginary friends. They're independent of my will. I know that sounds a little bit nuts but other writers feel the same way about their characters.

Another theory as to my delay in finishing these two scenes is the need to send them off in a really big way.  I keep trying to improve on the grandiosity of the final scene. That's in conflict with the tone of the story. Yes, there's magic. Yes, they're changing the world and curing cancer. But their personalities would dwell on the moment rather than the larger picture. They are intimate scenes about two characters and how their interaction affects each other.  Saving the world is the by-product.

Do you ever hold off finishing a story (reading or writing) because you're not quite ready to let the characters go off into the world without you?

Musical inspiration

The current manuscript is tentatively Season of Renewal which doesn't have earth in it either. I originally called it Rootless Trees.  I like that title as they both are floundering without connections other than the ones they make together in this new land.  That is a very angry song by Damien Rice.   It's come in handy a few times as I worked on various scenes.

There are multiple versions of this song. The most haunting is the one with Damien Rice and Lisa Hannigan.  I won't post a link as I cannot find the official version that used to be on Damien's website.  The angry version is much faster and full of power.  Google them on youtube.

What I like most about this song is the varied nuances in each and every rendition.  And I use them all in the story.  Because sometimes being a rootless tree can free you up to find your heart's true home.

Titles - not as easy as one would suppose.

Titles

I'm wrapping up the third book in a trilogy.  The first was titled Heaven Coming Down, followed by Hell to Pay.  The last one should have Earth in the title. It was called Rootless Trees because both hero and heroine are transplanted but the truth is the book is about regrowth after the forest fire sweeps through and razes everything to the ground.  I like Earth's Renewal but it doesn't have the same rhythm of the other two titles.

I've spent a ridiculous amount of time looking at quotes and sayings about trees.  This is one of my favourites -

What did the tree learn from the earth
to be able to talk with the sky? 
- Pablo Neruda

It won't work for my title so I need your help.  Do you have any suggestions?

Welcome, Spring

Yikes, over a month since my last post. Things have been busy.

My nieces took part in a Bear Bear photo shoot. We had so much fun it was ridiculous. Then it was decided that Bear Bear had to be returned to the Lost and Found and could not be played with by us. His brief taste of fame was over. I am still compiling the stories. I'm looking into a way to illustrate them.

After five months of living beside each other, Amadala moved into Yoda's cage yesterday. I had nothing to do with it. They decided on their own that they were ready for cohabitation. It is a nice big dwelling and the cage door is open most of the time. Neither bird is afraid to peck the cat. He has the wounds to prove it. Regardless, they are not left unsupervised.

My plan to finish Bracken's story by the end of March was knocked off course by external forces. Now that I have a handle on those, back to writing. I'm pleased with how it's coming along.

One last thing - the end of winter does not mean it's short weather. Not yet. Soon.

Writing and knitting and bears, oh my

I've been busy with Bear Bear and nieces and editing and finishing projects. I should have photos and stories to share shortly.  The only thing I've actually completed is the sweater I started knitting during the Winter Olympics a year ago. I had to stop because of the elbow injury.  Now that's as good as it's going to get(considerably better than it was) I'm incorporating more of my activities back into my life.

I've also done a fair amount of shoveling. Not Boston marathons of shoveling but enough every day that my upper body is starting to look good. Mother Nature is a very effective trainer, and less expensive than a gym membership.  I am one of the happy minority enjoying this winter.

What's new in your neck of the woods? (and why do we call it that?)

#How librarians spend their breaks

This is the short story I wrote when we found a little bear in the lost and found at work.  It is the first in a series of adventure for the lost bear my coworker named.

We're promoting it every where in the hope that his family sees his photo and claims him.  

Bear Bear was scared. His family was lost. This place was nice. Bright. Smelled like books.

He liked books. But his family wasn't here. The lady behind the counter picked him up from the couch and put him on the cabinet. He could see everyone who came into this sunny place. The lady talked to him. She was nice. She petted him and told him she would help him find his family.

But first he needed a bath.

Not a bath! A bath would ruin his stuffing. He didn't have much stuffing left. His family had loved it right out of him.

The nice lady said bears had to be clean to stay at the library.

He was at the library! His family loved the library. There were stories and games and movies and lots of fun things to do while he waited for them to come back.

Bear Bear decided a bath would be okay. He would have a bath and sit on the cabinet and wait. His family would come back and see him up there.

The library was a safe place to wait. Maybe he could read a good book while he waited.

Switching things up

They say if you're stuck writing one thing you should dive into something completely out of your comfort zone.  I didn't write for almost two years. I futzed at stuff but nothing that moved stories forward.  It was a bleak time.

Then I wrote a horror story and words flowed. The images that flickered behind my eyes were so powerful I had to record them.  It was cathartic in a lot of ways.  I'd been processing so much grief and rage that it was easy to understand not only the motivation but emotions of those characters.

When I was done that story I felt better about myself as both a writer and a human being.  It's a good piece. It needs some tweaking and I'll get to that sooner rather than later.

The horror story made it possible for me to go back to writing romance. I not only believed in the power of love again,but that I had something interesting to say about it.  The demons that had held me back from writing had been exorcised as part of writing the horror story.

Last week, someone left their little stuffed bear at work.  So far I've written three stories about that little bear. More importantly, I've finished the rough draft of the novel-in-progress and am on track to finish the Hit by a Truck edits by the end of the month.  I've been writing so much I've neglected the blog. Most of what I'm doing is the old pen and paper edits.  I even took them to the doctor's office yesterday and worked away on the exam table.  Why do they make you change into a thin cotton gown then wait 20 minutes for the doctor to appear?  No problem, that was 20 minutes I put to good use.

What's the most interesting way you've heard of people switching gears for a project?

Synchronicity

Hozier. Great music and wonderfully inspirational.  I am on the penultimate scene of the first draft.  I warm up with a bit of singing along, then dance around till the ideas starting flowing and away I go.

I've been reading a lot the last couple of weeks. We always gift each other with books for the holidays. For some reason this year mine were science based.  Then yesterday we went to see Imitation Game about Alan Turing. It was heart-breaking, brilliant and incredible to realize how much the world has changed, how much it has not and how fortunate we are to recognize both facts.

My friends and I went out afterwards to discuss the movie and life.  Again, a bit of science discussion that helped me realize that despite it being a subject in which I did not do well at school, my brain absorbs so much more than for which it's given credit.  While describing something completely unrelated to the movie or my story, it hit me.  The end of my book was right there in front of my face all this time.

I went to sleep with the ending in mind. I work up with it still there. When I came home from work today, Hozier and I made beautiful music together and I wrote.

Sometimes you need something unrelated to show you what you already know.

I hope this year is full of wonderful surprises, scientific or otherwise, for all of us.

Music!

This past year I discovered several new-to-me artists.  I also used my standing desk more often than not.You put the two elements together and voila - happy writer. Or productive writer.But if one of those elements is missing, I struggle to put words on the page.

I let a lot of stuff get in my own way.  My responsibilities and obligations are more than some people's and less than others. It was more a matter of putting it all first. Now my stuff is a priority as well.  (You'll get the hang of it, Susan, I slowly am)

Music is a distraction for some but it motivates me.  Right now, I'm listening to Hozier while typing at my standing desk. I'm further into the current scene than I have been in weeks.  Partly because I remembered to just let the story out instead of worrying about how it all fits together. But also because I can lose myself in the music.  It keeps one part of my brain busy while another part creates.
May you find the things in life that bring you pleasure.  There's always something that will block that if you allow it but it's okay to put yourself and your needs first once in a while. Crank up the music and dance or turn it on low and let it mellow you out. Whatever suits your current mood and need.

Happy New Year, Friends!