Not Normal

So I tried something new this week. Water Pong Wednesday. And it flopped. Granted, I think I chose too hard of a challenge. As much as I love palindromes, it is hard to come up with them off the top of your head! I would like to try another Water Pong Wednesday next month, because I do think it could be fun, but I’ll just have to choose a better challenge. Thanks salsanpeeps (otherwise known as Husband) for thinking of the palindromes. You win! And Mary, the Keep Calm and Paddle On (answer: KAYAK) magnet is yours if you’d like it.

If you’re curious, here are the five-, six-, and seven-letter palindromes (if not, scroll down for the Friday post on discovering new characters):

Five-

civic

kayak

level

madam

radar (this one actually has an interesting history, starting as an acronym, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar

refer

rotor

sagas

sexes

shahs

solos

tenet

Six-

pull-up

redder

Seven-

deified

repaper

reviver

rotator

Now on to the response to Monday’s post.

My characters introduce themselves to me. Sound nuts? It probably is. And I love it. Here’s how it works:

Usually while my hands or my brain is busy with something else, I’ll hear an unmistakable voice from somewhere inside my own head. I rush to grab something to write on and with and write furiously. I try not to think or move, except for my hand on the page. I’m not even sure I breathe until the character is “finished.”

My first character, Mabel, introduced herself in a college course. I wrote this in the margins of my class notes:

Sometimes there are rules.  They aren’t written down or hung on the wall, but you still have to follow them.  One is not using your school scissors to cut someone’s hair.  Also, girls like pink and dolls.  I don’t follow that rule.  I don’t follow most rules actually.  I’ll tell you more about that later.

I am a tomboy, and you can spot a tomboy from a mile away.  I’m always the one in what some moms would call play clothes: comfortable pants with room to move around; layered shirts for hot and cold control; tennis shoes ready for a race at a moment’s notice; and never, ever any tights.  The tomboy uniform helps me do things like move with lightning fast speed, hit a home run, or climb a tree.

I held on to this introduction for three years before trying to write the story. So even after the character is introduced, the hard work isn’t done. In fact, I’m still revising this story.

After I wrote Mabel’s book, I was afraid that her voice might be the only one I’d ever hear. Then Biz came along. Here is her introduction: 

My name is Elizabeth, but as long as I can remember, everyone has called me Biz. Not Liz or Izzy or Beth. Just Biz. My mom says it fits because I’ve always been busy and Biz sounds like busy. I try to tell her that doesn’t work because busy is B-U-S-Y and Biz is B-I-Z. She tells me I’ll understand what she means someday. I don’t know when someday is but I’m already tired of waiting. Someday my slightly used little sister will be old enough to do more than drool in my books. Someday I’ll be able to ride the bus to school like a normal kid and I won’t have to vacuum the ants off my sister Marcy’s front seat before I get in. Someday, if I’m lucky, I might get to use my brain to do something more than just ace history tests. But it isn’t someday. It’s just Tuesday and I’m just Biz.

I think Biz is becoming the main character of a mystery I’ve been taking notes on and finally just started (I’m 139 words in! Only tens of thousands more to go!)

And just last week, another character introduced herself. As I told my husband, she is a tough one (I deleted her profanity for the sake of the blog):

It is bad enough that I’m a teenager with a baby sister. It’s worse that she was born nine months from my birthday. Exactly. Like I can’t count. I can just picture my parents being all like “aww remember when she was conceived and now she’s a young lady.” Puke. What’s even worse is that my mom thought the occasion would be a good time to have “the talk.” Yeah. That talk. About eight years too late, I think. And she kept using words like “beautiful” and “holy”. She wouldn’t last ten minutes in the back of the bus.

This was the first character whose introduction came more in the form of question and answer. I still have a lot of questions to “ask” her and I have no idea what her story is, but I think she’s got a lot of potential.

It amazes me that all three of these voices, and all three of these characters, came from me. And, at least in the case of Mabel so far, that I can keep “hearing” the unique voice for the duration of an entire manuscript. Maybe I’m not normal. Then again, maybe I am.

F. Scott Fitzgerald once said: “Writers aren’t exactly people … they’re a whole lot of people trying to become one person.”

And E.L. Doctorow said: “Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.”

Well, at least if I’m not normal, then I’m in good company.

Related Links:

An interesting pondering about writing and voices from Vivienne Courtoise: http://viviennecourtoise.blogspot.com/2011/10/i-hear-voices.html

A guest post from Susan Bearman on the Write it Sideways blog on harnessing the voices: http://writeitsideways.com/hearing-voices-maybe-youre-a-writer/

 

 

 

Another Voice

“I got another voice,” I tell Husband while plugging my laptop back in on the desk.

“What?” he asks.

“I got another voice,” I repeat. “Another character introduced herself to me. And she’s a tough one.”

“Oh, so you don’t mean a physical voice?” he asks, sounding relieved.

“No…but sort of,” I reply. I’m sure that didn’t help. He must think I’m nuts.

So far all of my characters for my longer stories have introduced themselves to me (I’ll share more about how this happens on Friday). I feel very lucky to discover characters this way, but I also want to know if anyone else is a little nuts like me. So, the prompt for this week is:

How do you get an idea for a new character? What do you do after you get the idea?

 

Step Outside

Being in my comfort zone means surrounding myself with things that represent me or make me feel good. Here are some examples:

I like antiques like this, especially when they have interesting details or a story behind them.

 

 

 

 

I like intricate patterns like this, even before it became a fad.

 

 

 

I like architectural tops like this from Cable and Gauge and sold at Macy’s, mostly with jeans and flats.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I like a little bit of juxtaposition like that I drive a masculine car despite being a female and a mom.

 

 

 

 

A summary I guess could be that I like things that make me look at things in a new way.

Kelly answered my questions “What item do you own that it very ‘you’? What about your writing is uniquely ‘you’?”:

Item: An orange Dakota watch that clips/hangs on my belt loop. It needs a battery. That is also very me. That you’ve never seen it gives an indication of how long it has needed a battery.

My writing: Almost everything I’ve written so far is concept-oriented. I’m always sneaking in things for kids to learn … I can’t seem to help it.

Kelly is one of my critique partners, so I know her pretty well. And she’s right about her writing. But, as I said in reply to her comment on the last post, what she doesn’t say is that she manages to fit content into even her fiction without it feeling heavy. Kelly’s skill of sneaking in content is amazing, but it isn’t very me. And that’s good. That’s her thing.

My writing trademarks are more “me.” My picture books usually have:

first person point of view (I as opposed to he or she)

a twisted or ironic ending

spare text reliant on illustrations

an irreverent topic or attitude

 

My longer stuff usually has:

lots of humor

a well-developed main character

a lot of dialogue

body language description as part of characterization

made-up words (see the post Etymology)

irony

That is my writing comfort zone.

Sometimes my comfort zone isn’t as comfortable. Right now I’m revising two books in my chapter book (that may become middle grade) series. And it is HARD. Despite feeling stretched, which is a good thing, I feel like I need a break to let the dust settle before pushing on. But since I’m just getting in the groove with a new writing schedule (more on that next week), I don’t want to take time off. So what do I do?

I think this is a good time to step outside my writing comfort zone. To a new subgenre even. I’m thinking of writing a children’s mystery.

I’m excited. And terrified. I’ve never written a mystery before.

But I guess the best thing about my comfort zone is that I define it. That means I can expand it at any time. If I start to write a mystery and decide to stick with it, mysteries become part of my comfort zone, just like writing picture books or humorous chapter books once did. And if not, that’s okay too. At least I stepped outside. A little fresh air is good for me.

More on Comfort Zone:

7 ways to start writing outside your comfort zone: http://www.writersrelief.com/blog/2011/06/step-out-of-your-comfort-zone-and-become-a-better-writer/

Kenneth Mark Hoover, a SF and dark fantasy author’s, blog about trying something outside his comfort zone: http://kennethmarkhoover.me/2011/11/08/the-challenge-of-writing-outside-your-comfort-zone/

A post about writing outside of your comfort zone: http://writinginshadows.com/2012/10/27/writing-outside-of-your-comfort-zone/

 

 

Comfortable

“Do you want to wear this shirt?” I ask Mister, holding up his dinosaur shirt. “Aunt Katie got you this shirt.”

“No. I don’t like it,” he says.

“How about this one?” I show him one with blue and gray stripes.

“No. I don’t want that shirt,” he whines.

“This one, then?” It has a robot with googly eyes.

“No.” He’s flopping on the floor now.

“Then what do you want to wear?”

He stops his flopping and peeks in the drawer.

“This one.” He pulls out his Elmo shirt that is washed out, has paint on the front, and is too small. You know, the kind of shirt that makes my kid look like nobody loves him. But with terrible twos going on, I’m choosing my battles. Plus, we aren’t planning to leave the house today. Conceding, I help him pull it on.

I hope Mister won’t always be most comfortable in the thing I least want him to wear.

Sorry for the delayed new post. With Susanna Leonard Hill’s In Just Spring story contest going on, I wanted to leave that post up for as long as I could. I did not, by the way, get chosen as a finalist in the contest. It’s okay. The story wasn’t very good anyway, but I’m proud that I managed to make at least some of the story representative of me.

Like the story about Mister’s favorite shirt above, some things are just more comfortable than others. I’m more comfortable writing picture books that have spare text, no character’s (or characters’) names, and a touch of irony. It was lacking in a lot of other areas, but I think my spring story had all three of those things.

So the questions for this week deal with what makes you comfortable. I look forward to reading your answer in the comments!

What item do you own that is very “you?” What is very “you” about your writing?